Movie Director Says Resident Evil Village Copied His Monster Design

A disgruntled movie director has suggested that Capcom copied his monster design for a boss fight in Resident Evil Village.

The claim has come from Dutch director Richard Raaphorst via LinkedIn, who states that the design of a boss monster from Resident Evil Village is the same as a creature from his 2013 horror movie Frankenstein’s Army. He reads, “In 2013 I directed my film Frankenstein’s Army. It’s a crazy monster movie filled with my own creature designs, one of which has been used – completely without authorization or credit in the newest Resident Evil game.”

Light spoilers for Resident Evil Village follow.

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The monster in question is a boss fight from the Heisenberg’s Factory section of the game, where you fight a monster with a propeller for a head called Sturm. In Frankenstein’s Army, a similar monster appears as an unnamed human creature with a propeller for a head (you can watch a video of the movie scene here). Raaphorst provided images of the two scenes, going as far as telling Eurogamer that Sturm is a “one to one” copy of his design.

In that interview with Eurogamer, Raaphorst points out that even the way the scene and boss fight end is similar, with the monster being forced to burst into flames. “It’s just the same scene as in my movie,” he said, “except that in my movie you have to cut loose the fuel tubes. That’s the only thing that is missing. But the whole thing is getting into flames, and then it explodes, and then the way it rotates through the camera – it’s all the same, really. Even the environments, the whole colour palette. It looks like an animatic for my movie.”

Raaphorst’s comparison images. (Source: LinkedIn)

Raaphort goes on to say that, “It’s so difficult to come up with a great design. It’s really hard to actually think about something that communicates as a cool design. It’s not just that ideas are floating around that you can grab. It’s actually hard labour. Then they just grab it and put it somewhere in the game.”

Twitter user CloneKorp has created a thread claiming that not only Sturm, but a number of monsters from Frankenstein’s Army were repurposed for Resident Evil Village. In a reply, Raaphorst said, “Oh dude, this is worse then I thought. First I felt angry, then proud, but now I see this, I feel sad.”

IGN has contacted Capcom for comment on the similarities, and Raaphorst’s claims.

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In other Capcom news, it was revealed today that the company continues to achieve record breaking profits, with the latest fiscal year being the most profitable in its history thanks to strong sales of its Resident Evil and Monster Hunter franchises. It was also revealed that Capcom used a giant grumpy stand-in for Lady Dimitrescu’s motion capture in Resident Evil Village.

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Liam Wiseman is a Freelance News Writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @liamthewiseman

Sweet Tooth: Netflix Series Will Be Less Dark Than the Original Comic

Sweet Tooth – the upcoming Netflix series based on the DC comic of the same name – will drop some of the darkness of the original graphic novel.

In a new making-of video, which you can watch exclusively on IGN, executive producers Robert Downey Jr. and Susan Downey explain that the series will honour the novel, but will take a slightly different approach.

“The graphic novels were a little darker, a bit more foreboding,” explains Robert Downey Jr. “We felt like we could really hold onto the themes, but make it a more enjoyable place,” adds Susan Downey.”

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While that could be a little concerning to existing Sweet Tooth fans, creator Jeff Lemire also makes clear that co-showrunner Jim Mickle has kept the comic’s style intact: “Jim Mickle, as soon as I heard how in line his vision was with what I had originally created, I felt like it was in really good hands.”

Lemire adds that he thinks some of the best parts of the show are brand new characters created for it. Robert Downey Jr. adds, “This is seamless, like the novel just continued on.”

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Sweet Tooth will premiere on June 4, and its cast includes Christian Convery, Nonso Anozie, Adeel Akhtar, Aliza Vellani, Stefania LaVie Owen, Dania Ramirez, Neil Sandilands, Will Forte, and James Brolin.

The show takes place in a post-pandemic world, where human-animal hybrids have begun to be born. Sweet Tooth himself is half-human, half-deer who goes on an America-spanning adventure – alongside drifter Jepperd – to discover his origins.

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Joe Skrebels is IGN’s Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to [email protected].

The History Of Battlefield’s Destruction

Video Transcript

In a world where first person shooters are a dime a dozen, anyone who has played the original Battlefield games or grew up with later entries such as Battlefield 4 can tell you their favorite moments when interacting with the game’s use of destruction. What’s up all, I’m David, and destruction in Battlefield has to be one of my absolute favorite aspects of the franchise! From its first entry in Battlefield 1943 to the unreleased Battlefield 6, if there is one thing that the franchise will guarantee, it’s environmental destruction over the course of a match. Let’s take a look at how the series uses destruction and “levolution” and just what makes it so special. We’ll also take a quick moment to speculate on the rumors of what destruction in Battlefield 6 could look like. Now if you’re excited for Battlefield 6 make sure to like this video so we’ll know to prioritize coverage of the game. Be sure to hop in the comments too after the video and if you really want to help us out, hit that bell button! Let’s get started.

Before Battlefield went onto the frostbite engine, destruction in the game mainly involved very minor, specific parts of the level. Bridges are a common example, and in games like Battlefield 2, bridges could be destroyed with explosives. This basic form of destruction quickly evolved as Battlefield transitioned to the Frostbite engine which gave the game a lot more firepower (pun intended) in creating a dynamic world that would rock your screen with explosions and shockwaves, adding a level of immersion that went beyond just what you saw on screen, but instead threw you into the middle of what was basically a massive, interactive sandbox.

With Battlefield: Bad Company 2, we also got a more complex system of destruction. Entire objects would no longer disappear at once, instead, buildings, trees, and roadways would crumble over the course of a match. If you nailed one side of a house, it wouldn’t just go full-on kaput but with enough of the walls being blown out, the roof would eventually collapse creating a big pile of rubble that could kill any enemies still inside. Battlefield 3 built on this with the introduction of micro-destruction, so you didn’t need grenade launchers and rockets to break walls, your standard assault rifles would chip away at smaller barricades, walls, and furniture. There was a tradeoff with this however. Sure more things would be visually destroyed but it wasn’t as significant and the scale was much smaller leaving less of the environment to actually be destructible. Battlefield 3 essentially traded away larger destruction for better overall looks. The solution to this in my opinion ended up being the next logical step of destruction: gradual changes to the map that takes effect over the course of an entire match, which is where Battlefield went on to invent the “Levolution”.

So first things first let’s talk about the difference between Destruction and Levolution. Destruction was prevalent in the Battlefield games listed so far and it’s basically part of the game’s identity. But Levolution refers very specifically to large-scale destruction events in Battlefield 4, which to me is honestly the holy grail and perfect balance of destruction. The concept on paper is simple: each multiplayer round in Battlefield 4, has a sort of timeline attached to the map, so by the time you are in the latter half of the round, chances are a major set piece, or sometimes huge portions of the map looks nothing like it did when you first started! And we’re not talking just small roadways or bridges being removed – I mean 60 story skyscrapers that had an objective on the roof spectacularly into a colossal pile of rubble. As these specific areas take damage or have certain parameters met, sometimes dramatic consequences resulted.

Hardline also had some levolution set pieces though not as intense as Battlefield 4. Still, you could knock a giant crane into a building to create a new path between objectives, or even have a bank vault come crashing through the roof during a heist. Hardline did an excellent job of keeping the environment around you versatile, and somewhat unpredictable, at least in the early stages before you really got acclimated with its gameplay.

Unfortunately, Levolution didn’t stick around: instead Battlefield 1 introduced massive Behemoths that would wreak absolute havoc. They were granted to the losing side in matches as a way to even the odds, but were criticised for tipping the balance a little too favorably in either direction. There were technically some map-specific destroyable sections in Battlefield 1 but this was nowhere close to the scale of Levolution. Battlefield V would actually go on to completely ditch both the Behemoths and Levolution in favor of a tool box which kind of reduced the impact of destruction. In Battlefield V, anyone could create cover at fixed locations, and support classes could incorporate extra variety or build routes between areas. This new mechanic was enough to alter the flow of certain maps but again, it just didn’t have the same degree of grandness and spectacle that the iconic Levolutions had and often battles focused on the same pre-set fortification spots over and over again.

This brings us to Battlefield 6! Rumor has it that massive destruction will be making a return which is great for several reasons. We’re in the midst of a new console generation so the brutal framerate dips on my old Xbox during destruction should be a thing of the past. With both the Series X and the PS5 equipped with better specs, those lucky enough to own a next-gen console or a high-end PC are hoping to reap the benefits of greater destruction. Levolution could be a great way to create a climactic moment in any given round – a visual turning point showing that the home stretch is in sight. I’m sure there are those who didn’t care for or felt that Levolution’s in particular could grow stale after a while, but Battlefield 6 could have a solution in taking the dynamism up another notch through a revamped weather system.

The rumor is that the weather system will incorporate natural disasters in the form of massive storms. We’ve gotten slight glimpses of extreme weather in Battlefield 4, with huge rain storms causing choppier surf leading to less accurate naval combat and tougher visibility but Battlefield 6 might even go so far as to include weather ranging from storms, all the way to straight-up tornados. If or when these rumors are confirmed in Battlefield 6’s reveal, we can get a gauge into the scope of how dramatic extreme weather could get. As far as I’m concerned, that sounds hype as all absolute f**k! Just picture you’re with your squad in a vehicle, the map has already been demolished in several areas and all of a sudden a fricken tornado is raising hell, demolishing buildings in its path. It’s certainly a lot to be excited about, and although there’s no official word yet if Battlefield 6 will come out on last-gen consoles, my hope is it stays next-gen exclusive so there’s more effort on pumping out as much destruction as possible.

We’ll have a better idea of what will actually be possible in Battlefield 6 in the coming days and we’ll be sure to share our thoughts and impressions of everything we see. What did you prefer, the organic destruction of Bad Company, levolution from Battlefield 4, or even behemoths. Be sure to sound off into the comments and tell us what kind of destruction you’d like to see in Battlefield 6! Thanks for watching!

Hitman 3 Season Of Pride DLC Launches Today With Patch Notes For 3.30

Hitman 3’s new DLC, Season of Pride, is out now alongside a big new patch. The new DLC is part of the Seven Deadly Sins content, and it adds new content and some spiffy new cosmetics for Agent 47, while the patch overall includes numerous fixes and improvements.

The Nintendo Switch version of the game also gets special attention with a 60fps “performance mode” to help the game look and run better on the hybrid console.

Available from May 10 in Hitman 3 is a new Escalation contract called The Sebastian Principle. It challenges players to hunt down a target living in Dubai who is overly proud of himself and in need of someone to teach him a lesson, I guess.

Then on May 12, a new Elusive Target called The Iconoclast comes to Hitman 3. Your target is also a contract killer who is too proud to share the stage and wanted all the glory.

On May 14, Hitman 3 welcomes a new bonus mission in Sapienza called The Icon. Available until May 23, the mission calls on players to take down a washed up movie director and actor. There are also new community-created contracts in the new season.

You can check out the video above to get a glimpse at the new content coming to Hitman 3 in the Season of Pride.

The first act of the 7 Deadly Sins DLC was focused on Greed. After Pride comes Sloth, Lust, Gluttony, Wrath, and Envy, so Hitman 3 fans have a lot more to look forward to.

The paid content for each season individually costs $5. Otherwise, all of the seasonal content comes as part of the Seven Deadly Sins DLC, which costs $30 total.

In addition to its ongoing development on Hitman 3’s DLC, IO Interactive is making a new James Bond game with an original story. Additionally, it was recently reported that IO is making a fantasy game with dragons as an Xbox exclusive.

Patch Notes And File Size:

As for the new patch, the update brings the game up to version 3.30 on all platforms and is available now. The download is around 3.5 GB on all systems, except Stadia and Switch because those versions are streamed from the cloud.

One of the biggest updates in the patch is a performance mode for the Switch version of Hitman 3. This allows users to play at 720p/60fps, which compares to the standard 1080p/30fps. Additionally, the Switch version gets a Steady Aim feature on the L button, following this feature’s release for the other console versions earlier.

“This allows you to improve your aim and slow time when aiming with a Sniper Rifle with the Marksman perk, especially useful for the Sniper Assassin game mode and certain Mission Stories. The in-game UI and controller maps will display this accurately,” IO Interactive said.

You can see the complete patch notes below, as detailed by IO on the Hitman 3 website.

General Updates

Challenges, Fixed

We’ve resolved issues that would prevent players from unlocking the following challenges: Cleaning Up (Colorado), Electric Boogie (Marrakesh, HBoS), Urine For It (Sapienza, Landslide), Estate Wines (Mendoza) and Got My Boomstick (Carpathian Mountains).

We’ve also fixed an issue that prevented the Bullet Train (Carpathian Mountains) trophy/achievement from unlocking.

Notebook Challenges

We’ve fixed an issue where completed Challenges would still be shown as ‘locked’ when viewed via the in-game notebook. Players would previously need to save/load or restart the mission to see accurate challenges displayed during the mission, even though completion status was correctly being tracked.

Legacy Lighting Pass

We’ve adjusted and tweaked various lighting issues across locations from Hitman 1 and Hitman 2. Only the ICA Facility and New York have not had any changes made related to lighting.

Our focus was to tweak extremely bright reflections or glows, transitioning between dark and bright areas, navigating/seeing textures in dark areas and to ensure that screenspace reflections look as expected with these changes.

Legacy Load Errors

We’ve made changes to resolve an issue that would prevent players from saving/loading when using items from Hitman 1 or Hitman 2 Basically, the one with the “Load Failed” error message that asked you to check that you had access to specific content.

NPCs Ignore Toilets

Toilets are now more appealing to anyone affected by emetic poison. In other words, we’ve resolved an issue where NPCs would prefer to use a rubbish bin / trash can rather than the toilet to throw up. Now, they will use the more logical choice, more often.

Leaderboard Percentiles

We’ve fully implemented a new feature to the Detailed Score Screen to give an at-a-glance look at how your score compares to the selected leaderboard. It’s also possible to see where the majority of players rank for each mission.

MiniMap Overlay

We’ve resolved a minor visual issue where icons near the minimap and prompts could overlap when viewing the inventory.

Sieker 1 Out

We’ve changed the properties of the Sieker 1 Emetic Gun to fix an issue where it could not be selected in Offline Mode.

Taunton Sieker

We’ve resolved an issue that would cause the inventory images of the Sieker 1 and Taunton Dart Gun to be swapped, depending on what was unlocked and in what order.

Identical Explosives

We’ve tweaked the inventory images for the ICA Explosive Images so that they better reflect the in-game versions.

PS5 Game Help

We’ve resolved an issue where placeholder text was showing for some steps of the PS5 Game Help. It had nothing to do with our pet cat.

Caught Bald-Headed

Agent 47’s bald head will no longer poke out the top of the Arkian Tuxedo suit.

Featured Contract Rewards

We’ve tidied up how the Featured Contracts rewards challenges are being tracked to fix a few issues. Some context: Our intention at launch was for players to complete unique Featured Contracts to earn the different milestone rewards (10, 20, 30, 40, etc). However, it was possible to reach these milestones by repeating the same contract. After reverting back to the intended structure, it caused a few irregularities on the challenge progress depending on the extent of players’ progress.

Here’s what will happen with the release of the 3.30 patch:

– Players who have reached the specified milestones when 3.30 is released will earn the related unlocks. (Example: If you currently have 32/30 contracts completed and no way to earn the unlock, 3.30 will grant you that unlock and mark the challenge as completed.)

– All uncompleted Featured Contract Reward challenges will accurately display the number of unique Featured Contracts that have been completed. (Example: If you played the same contract 29/30 times at launch, 3.30 will adjust that challenge progress to 1/30.)

The idea here is that we want to keep the intended structure of these challenges going forward, but without punishing players who played by the ‘rules’ at launch.

Featured Contract Counter

We’ve resolved an issue that could prevent the first completed Featured Contract from being registered on the “Featured Contracts – Track” counters, which could lead to irregularities in the progression.

FC Disconnect

We’ve resolved an issue that could cause players to disconnect when completing a Featured Contract. The contract completion was properly registered in the Featured Contracts Track challenges, but any unlocks that should have been awarded were not granted.

Queued Cues

We’ve made some changes to ensure that the proper audio cues play when unlocking new items through mastery unlocks or when new complications for Escalations are introduced.

Already Registered

We’ve updated the error message players receive when trying to log in to their IOI Account and are told that they are ‘already registered’ but unable to log in. Players are now told that they need to visit the IOI Account website and log in using their preferred platform. (This was mostly occurring for PC players who had previously signed up for an IOI Account but are playing HITMAN 3 on Epic for the first time.)

Xbox One Rendering Quality

We’ve added a ‘Rendering Quality’ toggle to the Options>Graphics menu on Xbox One X and Xbox One S that allows players to choose between High Quality or High Framerate modes.

A Brief Moment

We’ve resolved an issue that could cause in-game dialogue to continue after entering the inventory wheel and then choosing an item to store in a briefcase. It’s intended that the entire game is paused when players are in all inventory menus.

Challenge Filter

We’ve added a new option to the Challenge menus that will make it easier to filter the challenges depending on what you want to see.

Colourblind Guards

We’ve adjusted the guard dialogue lines that trigger when they’re hunting 47 to more accurately describe the suit he was wearing. In some cases, certain suits would trigger placeholder dialogue lines describing 47 in the Requiem suit.

Precision Aim

When playing on a controller, you can now press the L1/LB button to activate the ‘Marksman’ perk, which will improve your aim and slow down time. This has been implemented as part of a important change for Nintendo Switch players but will work for other controllers and platform too. The in-game UI and controller mapping will still show R2/RT as the default option for non-Switch players, but we’ve noted it here seeing as the option will be available.

Typo Thief

We’ve fixed a typo in the description of the Taunton Dart Gun. From Steal to Steel.

Tactical Placeholder

We’ve updated the description of the Tactical Turtleneck suit in the inventory to remove placeholder text.

Poison Pen

We’ve updated the Italian description for the Siringa Emetica a Forma di Penna ICA to better reflect that it is an emetic device, not lethal.

Stability Improvements

We’ve resolved issues that could cause the game to crash or be unstable.

Where It’s Due… 3.30

We’ve updated the credits to reflect work done since the last patch.


Location Changes: Dubai, UAE

7DS: Exiting Dubai

We’ve resolved an issue where the unique ‘exit music’ from The Greed Enumeration would trigger when exiting the Dubai location in content not associated with the DLC.

7DS: Voice of Greed

We’ve made a change so that dialogue from the The Greed Enumeration now stops playing when players skip the end cutscene.

The Sound of Carpet

We’ve resolved an issue that could prevent carpet sound effects from playing in Dubai. There was nothing wrong with the carpet itself, but 47 was not *quite* touching the carpet.


Location Changes: Dartmoor, England

Best Intensions

We’ve fixed a typo in the subtitles near the end of the “Means, Motive and Opportunity” Mission Story. We’re not going to tell you too much about it because spoilers.

Left In Suspense

We’ve resolved an issue where Agent 47 could get stuck when vaulting over walls in Dartmoor, especially near the Trophy Room.

Hang Down

We’ve fixed an issue where the phone in the Lawyer’s Office was always standing up.

My Room

We’ve fixed an issue where 47 can be spotted through a wall in Alexa’s bedroom.


Location Changes: Berlin, Germany

[This month, there are no patch notes specific to Berlin.]


Location Changes: Chongqing, China

A Very Observant Lady

We’ve reinforced some of the walls in the restaurant to prevent NPC’s from seeing 47 through specific walls.

Paper Town

We’ve resolved an issue where some buildings in the background of Chongqing appeared to be made of paper, or not connected to one another.

Wet Suit(s)

We’ve removed a layer of waterproof coating from the Raver Suit, Futo Suit, Freedom Phantom Suit and Lynch Suit so that they look wet when outdoors in the Chongqing rain. Same goes for 47’s head.

Apartment Stalkers

We’ve fixed a few tiny holes in the walls of the apartment staircase that allowed eagle-eyed NPC’s to see 47 performing illegal actions. They could probably see him perform legal actions too, but nobody reported that as a problem.

Inside Rain Out

We’ve tweaked a few things so that players no longer hear the ‘outside sounds’ of rain and traffic from certain places in the facility in Chongqing.


Location Changes: Mendoza, Argentina

Villa? On Top.

We’ve tweaked the drainpipes on the Villa Roof to make sure they’re visible from all angles.

Legal Rifles

Sniper Rifles are now considered to be ‘illegal’ when carried in any outfit in Mendoza, to be consistent with all other locations.

Location Changes: Carpathian Mountains, Romania

Improbable Proloff

We’ve tweaked some of the parameters of the Proloff Parable to allow players to earn the Silent Assassin rating on all three levels.

Sieger 300 Arctic

We’ve tweaked the inventory image of the Sieger 300 Arctic to better reflect the suppressor on the weapon.


Legacy Location Changes: Hitman 1 and Hitman 2

Marrakesh: Zaydan’s Prisoner

We’ve put the bag back on the prisoner’s head.

Sapienza: Solo Personale Autorizzato

We’ve fixed a sign on the door to the cave tunnel that was only visible when the door was open.

Isle of Sgail: Washing Ton

We’ve updated the description for the “Ghost of Janus’ Past” challenge to have the correct spelling of ‘Sophia Washington’.


Virtual Reality (PS VR)

Font Eligibility

We’ve made tweaks to the font colours to make them easier to read, depending on the background colour.

Textures

We’ve fixed several issues that were causing missing textures, visual issues and other environment art issues when playing in PS VR.


Platform-Specific Changes: Switch

Performance Mode

We’ve added a toggle to enable Performance Mode at 720p/60fps over the default option of 1080p/30fps.

Precision Fire

We’ve added the Steady Aim feature to the L button on Nintendo Switch. This allows you to improve your aim and slow time when aiming with a Sniper Rifle with the Marksman perk, especially useful for the Sniper Assassin game mode and certain Mission Stories. The in-game UI and controller maps will display this accurately.

Helpful note: It’s possible to toggle whether you hold or tap ZL in order to aim a weapon. Look for the Toggle Aim option in Options>Gameplay>Weapon Aim. Note that this won’t affect 47’s ‘aiming’ when throwing; this will still require the play to hold the button to move 47’s throwing arc.

Dubai Demo

We’ve added a new 10 minute trial available for all Nintendo Switch players, allowing them to experience the new Performance Mode on the opening level of the game; Dubai.


Platform-Specific Changes: Stadia

Muffled Audio

We’ve resolved an issue that could cause dialogue and gunshots to be heavily muffled when choosing the default starting location on Dubai.

State Share Where

We’ve added the name of the in-game location (Dubai, Dartmoor, etc) to State Share captures.

Saving Consistency

We’ve made a change to be consistent with how the game handles game save files that include items that are unique to each game from the trilogy.

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Carnage Explained: Who Is Venom 2’s Villain?

The first trailer for Venom 2: Let There Be Carnage has arrived, and guess what? It features Carnage! But who exactly is the very red, very scary symbiote bad guy?

It all started with Spider-Man’s black alien costume in the comics, which betrayed him and wound up in the hands of his bitter rival Eddie Brock — who became Venom. But it also spawned an even meaner and deadlier nemesis in the form of Carnage. This bloodthirsty sadist has racked up quite a body count over the years, and even the Avengers have been hard-pressed to bring him to justice.

And now the Woody Harrelson character (also known as Cletus Kasady) is finally arriving on the big screen. With that in mind, here’s everything you need to know about this symbiote psychopath…

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Carnage Explained: The Basics

Carnage is basically the closest thing Spider-Man’s rogues gallery has to a Joker. Most of Spidey’s enemies have some tragic or redeeming qualities. Not Carnage. He’s a force of nature who lives to kill, destroy and sow chaos. And he’s not particular about the order in which he does so.

Carnage-Marvel-Comics-comic-bookCletus Kasady was already an accomplished criminal and sadist even before gaining superhuman powers. But after spending some time as Eddie Brock’s cellmate and gaining a symbiote costume of his own, he’s become one of the most proficient killers in the Marvel Universe. He’s incredibly strong and very difficult to put down once the blood starts flowing. A mutual hatred of Carnage is about the only thing that can make Spider-Man and Venom put aside their differences and work towards a common goal.

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Carnage’s Powers and Abilities

Carnage is basically a meaner, stronger version of Venom. His costume is an offshoot of the Venom symbiote, and like Venom, Carnage has access to amped-up versions of Spider-Man’s powers, such as boosted strength, agility and speed. Like Venom, Carnage can block out Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense, even while he has access to enhanced senses of his own.

However, because Carnage’s symbiote gestated on Earth rather than the planet Klyntar, it’s stronger and more unstable. Carnage is powerful enough to fight both Spider-Man and Venom to a standstill. He can reshape his symbiote tendrils into various deadly weapons and even launch them as projectiles. The symbiote also grants Kasady a Wolverine-like healing factor, allowing him to survive what seemed like certain death on multiple occasions.

6f13b61bf0edf211e3a39fe531761253._SX1280_QL80_TTD_Fortunately, Carnage does have weaknesses. He’s not as susceptible to sonic weapons as Venom, but he is even weaker than Venom is when faced with fire. He’s also extremely vulnerable to the touch of Anti-Venom, a hero whose entire purpose is to hunt down and destroy symbiote. And in Venom 2, director Andy Serkis says Carnage’s powers are somewhat different, including the ability to turn into mist!

Carnage: Origin and Background

Given the breakout popularity of Venom after 1988’s Amazing Spider-Man #300, it was only a matter of time before Marvel further exploited the concept. Carnage was the first (and by far the most popular) of several new symbiote villains introduced in the early ’90s, with Cletus Kasady making his first appearance as Carnage in 1992’s Amazing Spider-Man #360 (created by writer David Michelinie and artists Erik Larsen and Mark Bagley) and quickly became a recurring presence in the franchise.

Venom_Carnage_11993 brought about a massive Spider-Man crossover called “Maximum Carnage,” arguably the biggest Marvel storyline ever to revolve around this character. It even inspired a video game of the same name (more on that later). “Maximum Carnage” forced Spider-Man and Venom to join forces with other Marvel heroes like Captain America, Black Cat, and Cloak and Dagger to battle Carnage’s alliance of evil.

Carnage remained an active player in the Spider-Man comics throughout the ’90s, with several stories featuring the symbiote bonding with characters other than Cletus Kasady. That resulted in some less than beloved hybrid characters like Spider-Carnage and Cosmic Carnage. Eventually, most fans agreed that the villain had become overexposed. Even Marvel seemed to agree, and an early issue of 2004’s New Avengers featured Carnage being ripped in half by the Sentry and left to die in Earth’s orbit.

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But few characters stay dead forever in superhero comics, and Carnage eventually made his comeback in a 2010 miniseries called, appropriately enough, Carnage. That book revealed that both the symbiote and Kasady survived bring torn in half. Carnage and follow-up stories like Carnage USA and Superior Carnage restored the villain to his old status quo and once again made him a force to be reckoned with in the Marvel Universe. Still, that didn’t stop Carnage from briefly turning over a new leaf in 2014’s Avengers & X-Men: AXIS. There, a villain named Red Onslaught (part Red Skull and part Professor X) inverted the minds of many heroes and villains and rendered Carnage temporarily heroic.

carnageCarnage underwent his most significant overhaul in “Go Down Swinging,” the final chapter in writer Dan Slott’s decade-long Amazing Spider-Man run. There, the Carnage symbiote bonded with Norman Osborn to form a new villain called the Red Goblin. Spider-Man managed to defeat this terrible combination of his two deadliest foes, but little does he know that traces of Carnage remain inside Osborn’s grandson, Normie. Do we smell another Carnage comeback in the wind?

Carnage: Beyond the Comics

Carnage has had plenty of room to shine on the small screen. Carnage first appeared in animated form in 1994’s Spider-Man: The Animated Series (voiced by Scott Cleverdon) and served a a major antagonist in several episodes. He also played a big role in the spinoff series Spider-Man Unlimited (voiced this time by Michael Donovan).

Carnage as seen in Ultimate Spider-Man.
Carnage as seen in Ultimate Spider-Man

Carnage missed out on appearing in 2008’s Spectacular Spider-Man, though he was slated to show up if the series had lasted longer than two seasons. He did play a recurring role in Marvel’s next Spider-Man cartoon, Ultimate Spider-Man (voiced by both Dee Bradley Baker and Fred Tatasciore). That series continued the comic-book trend of having the Carnage symbiote bond with other Marvel characters, resulting in mash-ups like Carnage-Ock and Carnage-Hulk.

Carnage has also enjoyed a healthy video game career dating back to the 1992 Game Boy title The Amazing Spider-Man 2. He was a major boss character in 1994’s Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage and its sequel, Spider-Man and Venom: Separation Anxiety, both of which are inspired by the comic book storylines of the same name. Carnage has also appeared in everything from LEGO Marvel Super Heroes to Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions to Marvel Puzzle Quest. The video game adaptation of 2014’s Amazing Spider-Man 2 movie even offered a glimpse of what Carnage might have looked like in Sony’s rebooted Spider-Man universe (of the time).

For years the villain was rumored to be the main antagonist in Sony’s Venom solo movie. At one point that movie was even reportedly titled Venom Carnage. However, Riz Ahmed’s character Carlton Drake wound up being the main baddie — as a different symbiote villain called Riot — in the film. Woody Harrelson had a small role as Cletus Kasady in the movie, setting up his transformation into Carnage for the sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, where he will co-star with Tom Hardy.

May 10, 2021: This story has been updated with the latest information about Venom: Let There Be Carnage.

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Jesse is a mild-mannered writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter, or Kicksplode on MyIGN.

Venom 2 Director Says Cletus Kasady’s New Look Reflects Character’s ‘Darkness’

The first Venom: Let There Be Carnage trailer has arrived, and Woody Harrelson’s Cletus Kasady is looking quite different.

Audiences were first introduced to Woody Harrelson’s Cletus Kasady in the post-credits scene of 2018’s Venom, with the incarcerated villain sporting a killer mop of hair. His curly crimson locks drew some criticism at the time, with a few people poking fun at the actor’s clownish wig, but it appears that the hardened criminal has had his hair hacked to pieces since his last cinematic appearance.

Director Andy Serkis spoke to IGN about the drastic change in Cletus’ hairstyle between movies, explaining how the character’s shorter ‘do reflects the passage of time and the evolution of his mental state. “We wanted to give a sense that he’s been in there for some time and that he’s gone through various changes… so that we could really [see] what’s going on with the darkness of the character.”

Cletus Kasady Carnage Comparison

As the trailer shows, Cletus’ madness is reflected through the strange, intricate drawings lining the walls of his cell. Those drawings may or may not have a special significance to the plot, but they definitely offer insight into the villain’s terrifying mind and his erratic array of emotions, which Serkis says jumps between “his anger and frustration and his sadness and his desperation and his loneliness.”

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Cletus’ alter-ego Carnage was the first (and by far the most popular) of several new symbiote villains introduced in the comics of the early ’90s, with Cletus Kasady making his first appearance as Carnage in 1992’s Amazing Spider-Man #360. As a recurring presence in the franchise, many fans have been reviewing the character’s comic book appearance compared to his live-action look.

In addition to Harrelson, Tom Hardy and Michelle Williams are reprising their respective roles as Eddie Brock and Anne Weying in Venom 2, together with Reid Scott who is returning to portray Dr. Dan Lewis, Weying’s boyfriend. Let There Be Carnage also features several newcomers, including Naomie Harris, Stephen Graham, Sean Delaney, and Larry Olubamiwo.

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After a delay, Venom: Let There Be Carnage will be released in US theaters on September 24 (or September 15 in the UK, and September 16 in Australia).

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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

Gal Gadot Confirms Joss Whedon Threatened Her Career During Justice League Reshoots

Gal Gadot has commented on reports that director Joss Whedon threatened her career during Justice League reshoots in 2017. The Wonder Woman star confirmed the story on the Israel TV show N12 News.

During the interview, N12 News reporter Yuna Leibzon asked Gadot about reports that her attempts to change the way Wonder Woman was portrayed in the film were blocked by Whedon. “He even said you should just be pretty and say your lines. You weren’t going to let him get away with it,” Leibzon said.

Gadot then confirmed that this had happened, and that she dealt with it right away. “What I had with Joss basically is that he kind of threatened my career and said if I did something he would make my career miserable,” she said. “I handled it on the spot.” Check the interview footage below:

Whedon joined Justice League after original director Zack Snyder left the production, and oversaw reshoots and post-production. The reports about his behavior towards Gadot were first revealed in The Hollywood Reporter, which stated the star wanted Wonder Woman’s character to be more consistent across all the DC movies she appeared in. In December, she alluded to Whedon’s threats, telling the LA Times, “I had my own experience with [Whedon], which wasn’t the best one, but I took care of it there and when it happened. I took it to the higher-ups, and they took care of it.”

The accusations against Whedon started last year, when Cyborg actor Ray Fisher accused the director of abuse towards him and other cast and crew members. He also singled out producers Geoff Johns and Jon Berg for enabling it, and more recently has accused executive Walter Hamada of covering up their behavior and interfering with the studio’s subsequent investigation. The accusations against Whedon go beyond Justice League too, with Charisma Carpenter recently speaking out about his behavior during the making of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

PS5 And PS4’s Most-Downloaded Games Of April 2021 Include MLB The Show 21, Returnal, And Outriders

It’s time, once again, to look at which games cracked the top 20 list of most-downloaded titles on PlayStation Network across PS4 and PS5–and for April 2021, an older game does not hold the top spot on either list. The US and Canada PS4 and PS5 charts are both topped by new releases, with MLB The Show 21 grabbing the number one spot.

For the last few months, both PS5 and PS4 charts in the US and Canada have been dominated by GTA V or Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, but that’s changed in April 2021. On the PS5 list, MLB The Show 21 takes the top spot despite it being free with Game Pass on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S; Outriders and the PS5-exclusive Returnal come in at 2 and 3. In Europe, FIFA 21 continues to reign, with Outriders at second and It Takes Two at third.

On PS4, MLB The Show also dethroned GTA V and Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, although those two titles still achieved second and third place, respectively. Nier Replicant snuck in at 15, making it the only other April release to crack the top 20. Other notable titles include Naruto to Boruto: Shinobi Striker at ninth place, PGA Tour 2K21 at 12th place, and Gang Beasts at 20th place.

Not much has changed on the PlayStation VR charts, as Beat Saber and Superhot VR continue to dominate. The Free-to-Play PS4 and PS5 chart is also not particularly surprising, as Call of Duty: Warzone, Fortnite, Rocket League, and Apex Legends top the list.

You can see the top ten most-downloaded PS5 and PS4 games below, while the complete download charts can be seen here on the PlayStation Blog.

Top 10 PS5 Downloads of April 2021

US/Canada Europe
MLB The Show 21 FIFA 21
Outriders Outriders
Returnal It Takes Two
Mortal Kombat 11 Returnal
It Takes Two Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
FIFA 21 Spider-Man: Miles Morales
Spider-Man: Miles Morales Mortal Kombat 11
NBA 2K21 Marvel’s Avengers
Madden NFL 21 Disco Elysium – The Final Cut

Top 10 PS4 Downloads of April 2021

US/Canada Europe
MLB The Show 21 Grand Theft Auto V
Grand Theft Auto V FIFA 21
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War F1 2020
Outriders Minecraft
Mortal Kombat 11 ARK: Survival Evolved
Minecraft The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Game of the Year Edition
NBA 2K21 Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
Ark: Survival Evolved Gran Turismo Sport
Naruto to Boruto: Shinobi Striker eFootball PES 2021 Season Update
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Ghost of Tsushima

Now Playing: Returnal Video Review

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Jason Statham’s Wrath Of Man Leads US Weekend Box Office

With movie theaters slowly open across the United States–and more people are getting vaccinated–Americans are headed to the movies again. Between May 7-9, Guy Ritchie and Jason Statham’s movie Wrath of Man took the number one spot.

Taking in $8.1 million for its opening weekend, Wrath of Man opened in more than 2,800 theaters domestically, according to Box Office Mojo. The film stars Statham as H, a man who works at a cash truck company in Los Angeles that moves millions of dollars around the city. Of course, H is a very mysterious man, one who is seeking revenge for a murder in his past.

Coming in at the second spot is the anime movie Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, which has now been in theaters for three weeks. Over the weekend, the movie made $3 million. In total, Demon Slay has made $21 million domestically, and $432 million worldwide. The film broke records in Japan when it first released in October, making over $21 million–the best weekend opening for a film in the country.

The fourth and fifth spots go to two movies that were both released simultaneously on HBO Max: Mortal Kombat ($2.3 million) and Godzilla vs. Kong ($1.9 million). Considering the circumstances, both moves have had a good run in theaters so far. Mortal Kombat made $37 million while Godzilla vs. Kong is setting pandemic records, making $92 million domestically. Worldwide, Godzilla vs. Kong is at $422 million.

Check out the top 10 from the past weekend in the American box office below.

Weekend US box office for May 7-9

  1. Wrath of Man $8,100,000
  2. Demon Slayer: Mugen Train $3,053,500
  3. Mortal Kombat $2,375,000
  4. Godzilla vs. Kong $1,930,000
  5. Raya and the Last Dragon $1,865,000
  6. Separation $1,075,000
  7. Here Today $900,000
  8. Nobody $760,000
  9. The Unholy $730,000
  10. Tom and Jerry $426,000

And there’s still more to look forward to in the near future, as vaccines roll out and movie theaters reopen across the country. We just saw a new trailer for Venom: Let There Be Carnage, which contains a lot of Eddie Brock arguing with Venom and Carnage creating, well, carnage.

PS Remote Play iOS App Adds DualSense Controller Support, Turning Your Phone Into A Pseudo-PS5

While you can’t fit the actual PlayStation 5 in your pocket–the hefty console barely fits on an entertainment center as it is–the PlayStation Remote Play app on iOS devices has let you play PS5 games on your phone. Sony has released the app’s 4.0.0 update, adding support for the PS5’s DualSense controller. With that now in place, the PS5 will never leave your side again.

The addition comes after the recent iOS 14.5 update added the DualSense to the list of controllers compatible with iOS, meaning the controller will only work with iOS devices that have installed the update. The DualSense joins the DualShock 4 and the app’s built-in touch controls as the only ways to control Remote Play, with third-party controllers still not compatible.

PS Remote Play allows PlayStation 4 and 5 owners to connect to their consoles remotely online, letting them play the consoles and stream games directly to their mobile devices. Unlike Xbox’s Cloud Gaming or Google Stadia, PS Remote Play requires a console in order to function as opposed to the cloud server-based format of its competition.

The Remote Play app debuted on iOS devices in March 2019 after the PlayStation 4 updated to console firmware 6.50, with the 7.0 update adding Android functionality later that year. PS5 compatibility with the app debuted with the console’s launch in November 2020. Sony has not added DualSense compatibility to the Android version of the PS Remote Play app as of this writing.

Now Playing: PS5 DualSense Controller Hands-on