The saga of the release date for the Monster Hunter movie has yet another twist, just days after a controversy emerged over a particular line of dialogue. While the film recently had its release date changed to Christmas Day, you’ll now be able to see it in theaters even earlier.
Sony’s Monster Hunter will hit theaters domestically on December 18, GameSpot has learned. It’s unknown at this time as to why the studio decided on the new release date. That leaves Tom Hanks’ News of the World, Regina King’s One Night In Miami, and the dark comedy Promising Young Woman as the movies premiering on December 25.
This move comes a day after Monster Hunter was pulled from theaters in China after a line of dialogue spoken by Jin Au-Yeung’s character caused an outrage. Also going by the name MC Jin, the actor explained the scene for himself in an Instagram post, which you can see below.
“It’s a pun and the way I portrayed the character and the emotion of it is, this is a moment for him to proudly proclaim that he is a Chinese soldier, not just his knees, but his arms, his head, his heart,” he said in the video. And this has nothing to do with that stupid ‘Chinese, Japanese, dirty knees,’ whatever the heck that is, has nothing to do with it. If anything, why I’m so frustrated and it’s eating at my heart is that I felt this was a scene that was supposed to be a moment for Chinese people to be like, ‘Yes! There’s a Chinese soldier!’ That’s all. So for it to be flipped upside down like this, it really, really, really is eating at me. But I will say, at the same time, for anybody that misunderstood or thought that it was meant to be belittling, I sincerely apologize, I do.”
Monster Hunter follows Captain Artemis (Milla Jovovich) and her team as they are transported to an alien world, which is home to gigantic monsters. Together they will have to survive the experience in order to save their own world. The film hits theaters on December 18 in the United States.
Marvel’s Avengers now has the first of its post-launch characters, Kate Bishop. The sassy archer is another hero in the Marvel universe who uses the Hawkeye codename–Clint Barton, who’s also Hawkeye, is her mentor and will be the second post-launch character for Marvel’s Avengers. Yup, Marvel’s Avengers is getting two playable Hawkeyes back-to-back.
“Yeah I mean, I’ll be honest, from a gameplay standpoint, it would probably have been easier to not have to do two very similar characters,” Marvel’s Avengers lead combat designer Vince Napoli told me. “But, as with everything in the game, I think it’s a decision driven by story and narrative. [The team] sort of fell in love with the idea of telling a story we only could by having Hawkeye as the first character. And then when they were looking at the storyline, they were like, ‘Hey, it’d be awesome to also throw Kate in there.'”
As Napoli tells it, developer Crystal Dynamics wanted to use the two Hawkeyes to tell the next chapter of Marvel’s Avengers story, but the team didn’t want Kate to just be thrown in solely for story purposes. If she mattered to the overall narrative of the game then she deserved to be playable too, not just Clint. “At least it gives us a couple of playable characters right away, one after the other, which is really cool,” Napoli said. “And I know you’re excited to have a quick two-part introduction and kickoff to this whole post-release story stuff. So that’s kind of nice, the fact that there’s a nice, a quick turnaround.”
Same Name But Different Heroes
There are a lot of similarities between Kate and Clint. Both heroes rock purple outfits, wield a bow and arrow as their primary weapon, and–as said before–utilize the same hero codename. However, as comic fans will tell you, the two characters couldn’t be more different in how they fight, and that’s reflected in their gameplay mechanics. You don’t have to worry that Crystal Dynamics is feeding us the same character twice.
From gameplay trailers, we can see that Kate wields trick arrows like her mentor, but she accentuates her combat style with a sword for close-ranged combat and stolen AIM tech that allows her to teleport both herself and teammates throughout the battlefield. I was told that Clint would also be an archer, though he would ultimately play differently.
Both Kate and Clint’s stories take place after the events of Reassemble, the main single-player campaign of Marvel’s Avengers. As of right now, you can jump into Kate’s story, Operation Taking AIM, which sees Kate go on a mission to rescue her mentor, an adventure that ties into Nick Fury’s disappearance following A-Day and time travel. Scheduled to be released in early 2021, Clint’s story continues where Kate’s leaves off, taking place in the far future where Clint meets an old, bearded Hulk.
Despite these missions taking place after Reassemble, you don’t actually have to have completed Marvel’s Avengers’ campaign to access them. “In order to get the full story, it’s always–like I would prefer that you play the campaign to get all of the story, but you don’t have to,” Marvel’s Avengers senior narrative designer Nicole Martinez told me.
All You Need Is Family
Kicking off Season 1 with a two-part story about the Hawkeyes doesn’t mean Marvel’s Avengers is abandoning what folks loved about Reassemble. Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, is still central to the overall story of the game. If anything, Operation Taking AIM showcases how Kate becomes another surrogate family member for Kamala, much like Bruce becomes a second father-like figure for her in the main campaign.
“Kamala’s still definitely the heart of the Avengers, it’s just that as part of moving forward, we always look at the new heroes personality-wise and how they fit into this family in relation to Kamala,” Martinez said. “Basically, like how in Reassemble we focus on Kamala but we also get those small, almost vignettes of how each Avenger comes back into the fold. That’s kind of how I’m viewing all of the Operations for introducing the new heroes because Kamala is still very much a part of it, but this time we’re looking at how Kate comes back and then we’ll look at how Clint comes back. And in that way I think it continues the pattern of the Reassemble campaign.”
Martinez continued: “I mean the writers, we always have a good time working on the banter whenever we add a new hero and looking at how Kamala interacts with each of them since she’s heard of all of them and is a very big fan. And Kate and Kamala kind of develop this sister relationship where Kamala’s like her little sister, and Kate sees a bit of her former self in Kamala–in how she once was working her way up to being an Avenger and trying so hard to prove herself to Hawkeye and the rest of the team. And so I think they get along really well and we think that their relationship is cute.”
There is a secret facility hidden underneath the Fortnite Season 5 map. It’s a big, corporate-looking base with concrete walls and steel doors. No one is quite sure what the facility is for, but it could play a big role this season.
The secret base can be accessed through multiple points in the map, including new locations like Stealthy Stronghold, Colossal Coliseum, and Hunters Haven. The entrance at each location is hidden underneath some sort of breakable cover. They each contain a handful of items and a couple of chests. Most of the walls, support structures, and doors cannot be destroyed with a harvesting tool.
Fortnite’s underground facility.
These mysterious underground rooms could be related to the office that Agent Jonesy has been seen in the previous two live events: the Galactus event and the Device event. It’s possible that the entire facility has always been located underground in the game’s lore or the Zero Point, a singularity at the core of Fortnite’s story, is pushing the two worlds together. It’s not like Fortnite’s lore wasn’t complicated enough already.
The hidden entrances aren’t the only clues that hint at something big hiding under the map. Season 5 also introduced computer-controlled characters called IO Guards that rise up from underground. They’ll attack players on sight after coming out of a steel box that rises like an elevator. They can even be seen in one of the Season 5 trailers, running past Agent Jonesy. Sometimes the boxes rise up from the ground with chests, a golden throne, a dinosaur, or even the bots leftover from previous seasons.
IO Guard box.
The entrances to these hidden facilities are only found at some of the new locations in Season 5, while the IO Guard boxes are all over. Players have said that they can hear sounds when they’re inside them and hope that the facilities play a part in this season’s live event.
Some players have hypothesized that the IO stands for Imagined Order, which is a government-like agency that helps keep order with the loop (the simulation where battle royale matches are played). One of Season 5’s many NPCs, Bunker Jonesy (who is located in Camp Cod and elsewhere), actually talks about the loop and other elements of Fortnite lore. Players have used him to fill in the gaps.
The secret underground facilities and IO Guards are an interesting way to tie Fortnite’s needlessly convoluted story together after many seasons of different characters, themes, and bits and pieces of lore. Epic Games has teased a number of secrets like these facilities, but has rarely followed through in actually using them. Here’s hoping that Season 5 is different.
Geoff Keighley has revealed that Ghost of Tsushima is The Game Awards Player’s Voice Award winner this year after three rounds of voting from fans.
The Game Awards will take place on December 10 and it’s there that awards like Best Narrative, Best Direction, and of course, Game of the Year, will be announced. These awards are voted on by both a curated voting jury and fans, but in those instances, the voting jury accounts for 90% of the vote while the fan vote accounts for the other 10%. That’s not the case in the Player’s Voice Award – which is entirely decided upon by fans, or really anyone who signs in to The Game Awards to vote.
There’s no vote weighing involved with this award so Ghost of Tsushima is the game that got the most total votes out of all the other nominees. It beat out other 2020 releases like The Last of Us Part II, Hades, and Doom Eternal.
This is a bit of a light week for new Netflix releases. A Trash Truck Christmas sort of conveys the gist of what will be newly on offer from the streaming service over the next few days.
Depending on what you’re in the mood for, the docuseries The Surgeon’s Cut looks to be among the most promising this week. The four-part series gets under the skin of four pioneering surgeons, who talk about their lives and professions. In a year where medical professionals have arguably never been more important, it’s an interesting look at how surgeons view their work–as the trailer suggests, there’s plenty of medical jargon, but also lots of interesting philosophical insights into the ways medical practitioners view their work as both art and science.
Also uplifting and insightful is Giving Voice, a documentary co-produced and co-directed by James D. Stern and Fernando Villena about the annual August Wilson monologue competition, in which thousands of high school students compete for the opportunity to perform on Broadway. Earlier this year, Giving Voice won Festival Favorite Award–which is selected by audience votes–at Sundance over 127 other features screened.
Similarly, The Prom is about a group of struggling Broadway stars who “shake up a small Indiana town as they rally behind a teen who just wants to attend prom with her girlfriend.” Starring Nicole Kidman, James Corden, and Meryl Streep, it’s safe to say this is one of the more star-studded offerings out on Netflix this week.
The Pokemon series celebrates its 25th anniversary in February, and Pokemon Go developer Niantic is commemorating the occasion with a special in-game event. On February 20, the studio will host the Kanto Tour, a one-day event featuring exclusive Research tasks and all of the original Pokemon.
As was the case with Pokemon Go Fest this past July, Niantic will sell virtual tickets for the Kanto Tour event. These will cost $12 USD and will give players access to an array of exclusive content, including a Special Research story that will lead to an encounter with a “special Pokemon.” Those who complete the aforementioned Research line will unlock a second event-exclusive Special Research story. This line will be a longer-term commitment that will ultimately culminate in an encounter with Shiny Mew.
On top of that, Pokemon from the Kanto region will appear in the wild, Raids, and as Research rewards more frequently than normal throughout the Kanto Tour event, and ticket holders will have a chance to encounter Shiny versions of all of the original 150 Pokemon.
Version-Exclusive Pokemon
Ticket holders will also be able to choose between a “Red Version” and a “Green Version” of the event, which will influence what kinds of Pokemon appear in the wild. You can see some of the version-exclusive Pokemon below:
Red Version
Attracted to Incense:
Ekans
Oddish
Mankey
Growlithe
Scyther
Electabuzz
Possible Shiny encounters:
Bulbasaur
Charmander
Squirtle
Pidgey
Ekans
Pikachu
Nidoran (F)
Oddish
Diglett
Mankey
Growlithe
Ponyta
Shellder
Drowzee
Krabby
Hitmonlee
Lickitung
Scyther
Electabuzz
Eevee
Kabuto
Dratini
Green Version
Attracted to Incense:
Sandshrew
Vulpix
Meowth
Bellsprout
Magmar
Pinsir
Possible Shiny encounters:
Bulbasaur
Charmander
Squirtle
Pidgey
Pikachu
Sandshrew
Nidoran (M)
Vulpix
Meowth
Psyduck
Bellsprout
Geodude
Exeggcute
Hitmonchan
Koffing
Tangela
Horsea
Magmar
Pinsir
Eevee
Omanyte
Dratini
Early Purchase Bonuses
In addition to exclusive event content, those who purchase a Kanto Tour ticket by a certain date will get a couple of in-game bonuses. If you buy a ticket before the end of January 13, you’ll also receive virtual tickets for January and February’s Community Day Research stories. If you miss that deadline, you can still receive a ticket for February’s Community Day if you purchase a Kanto Tour ticket before the end of February 3.
Non-Ticket Content
Even if you don’t purchase a ticket for the Kanto Tour, you’ll still be able to join in on the festivities. Throughout the event, all players will have a chance to encounter Kanto Pokemon in the wild and in Raids, whether or not you’ve purchased a ticket. You will also be able to complete event-exclusive Timed Research tasks, and the Legendary Pokemon Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres, and Mewtwo will all be available in five-star Raids with exclusive moves.
Event Hours
The Kanto Tour event takes place on Saturday, February 20, and runs for 12 hours, from 9 AM to 9 PM local time.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War received a major update today ahead of its huge Season One content drop – but some Xbox players are suffering from a strange bug that seems to be a holdover from the last game in the sub-series, Black Ops 4. The ‘Blackout Trial’ bug seemingly locks players out from the game, despite them owning the full version.
CharlieIntel points out that, following the update, many players on social media have reported booting the game to find an error screen saying “Blackout Trial has ended”, with the only options being to leave the game or buy the full version. These players own the full version of the new game, and are given no option to bypass the screen, meaning the game is unplayable.
Updated Cold War this morning, now I’m getting this message and can no longer access Multiplayer or Zombies?
Blackout was the battle royale mode included in the last Black Ops game, 2018’s Black Ops 4. While Blackout’s map does seem to be returning to Call of Duty: Warzone in some form, Blackout itself is not currently a part of Black Ops Cold War, making this a strange bug to encounter in the new game.
We’ve contacted publisher Activision for comment on the bug. For now, there’s no official fix, although some players are reporting that heading to Xbox’s “Manage Game and Add-Ons” section for Black Ops Cold War and making sure that all content packs are correctly installed and applied can fix the issue. Others, however, are reporting that the fix isn’t 100% effective.
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].
Cyberpunk 2077 is almost here, and if you pre-purchased the game through CD Projekt Red’s digital storefront GOG, a special Easter egg awaits you. Once Cyberpunk 2077 has been pre-loaded ahead of its December 10 launch, the urge to open the installed game and hope for a glitch that allows you to start playing early might be strong, but doing so will result in Johnny Silverhand appearing to remind you that you’re going to have to be a little bit more patient.
Reddit user Jmendo02 shared a screenshot of what will happen if you’re too eager, as Silverhand will tell you: “Go back to sleep, Samurai. It’s not December 10th yet!”
City-burning to commence on December 10
That’s the inverse of what the character–who is played by Keanu Reeves–said in the Cyberpunk 2077 E3 2019 trailer while using saltier language.
If you have pre-loaded Cyberpunk 2077 through GOG, the Epic Games Store, or Steam, it’s worth checking to see if you have the latest patch installed as that will bring the game’s total install size to over 100GB. Another patch on top of that will arrive on launch day. Cyberpunk 2077 is now also available for pre-load on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, and PlayStation owners can head to this link to see when they’ll be able to install Cyberpunk 2077 on those consoles.
In our Cyberpunk 2077 review, critic Kallie Plagge had plenty of praise for the game’s sidequests and characters but noted that the experience took place in a world that felt superficial, and contained numerous bugs.
“But then it’s hard to get into Cyberpunk 2077’s world in general,” she wrote. “So much of it is superficial set dressing, and there’s so much happening all around you–ads going off at all times, gunfights breaking out in the streets, texts coming in about cars you’ll never buy–that a lot of the game feels superfluous. The side quests and the characters they showcase are the shining beacon through the neon-soaked bleakness of Night City, and they give you room to explore the best the core RPG mechanics have to offer. These are what carried me through an otherwise disappointing experience.”
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This article contains spoilers for Netflix’s Extraction.
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The Russo brothers have revealed that they are working on building out an entire cinematic universe from Netflix’s Extraction.
In conversation with Collider, Joe and Anthony Russo, who produced Extraction, with Joe writing the script, shared an update on the upcoming sequel and discussed the potential development of future projects in the franchise, as they shared their plans to create an entire Extraction cinematic universe, exploring some of the characters’ stories further.
“I will say this: we are working at building out a universe of films that could potentially explore some of the other characters from the first movie and some new characters, and see more historical interaction between the characters,” Joe admitted. “So if you’re interested in David Harbour’s character, you just may get to see him in a future Extraction movie.”
In the first film, Harbour portrayed Gasper, a former squadmate of Chris Hemsworth’s Tyler Rake, but the film ends with both characters supposedly dying. While the audience never actually witnessed Tyler’s last breaths, he did appear to suffer a fatal injury. Russo explained how telling stories at different points in the timeline could potentially allow them to revisit these characters.
“We’re trying to find more interesting ways to tell these stories and cross-pollinate them,” Joe added. “We’re big fans of just forging new paths in narrative. Can we go backwards and forwards at the same time? Can things that happened in the past affect the movies in the present? What are new ways to tell those stories? And can we see different points of view?”
He added: “Every antagonist is the protagonist in their own story, so can we see their point of view? How do they perceive the world? What makes them empathetic? I think what makes that a compelling element to the Extraction universe is it is a global franchise telling global stories, and we’d like to diversify the point of view in those movies.”
Shortly after its release, Extraction was unveiled as one of the most popular Netflix original films of all time, attracting 99 million viewers in its first four weeks on the platform, according to figures released by Bloomberg. Russo previously confirmed that a sequel to the film is in the works, with production now scheduled to start sometime next fall. Check out our review of the first film here.
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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.
World of Warcraft has been around for a long time, but its popularity shows no sign of abating. In fact, according to Activision Blizzard, the game’s latest expansion comes as the game’s number of long-term subscribers is cresting higher than ever before. In a statement, the publisher claimed that Shadowlands is the fastest-selling PC game ever, selling more copies in one day than any other game the company has records for.
According to Activision Blizzard, Diablo 3 was its last PC game to sell more than 3.5 million copies on its day of release, and Shadowlands has surpassed that milestone with 3.7 million sold. The statement also says that players have spent more time in WoW’s fictional world of Azeroth this year than in any others, and that total player time in-game has doubled compared to 2019.
Shadowlands is World of Warcraft’s eighth expansion pack, and it was released back on November 23. WoW recently celebrated its 16th anniversary, which probably makes some of you feel as ancient as an Old God. Activision Blizzard also announced plans to crack down on “multi-boxing,” which is a popular way to grind faster via multiple game clients.
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