Category: Games

Gearbox Software, the studio behind the upcoming Borderlands 3, appears to be softening its position in an ongoing legal battle with a former employee. The company had previously threatened to file an official grievance against Wade Callender, its former general counsel, but has since dropped that threat and filed a new petition that removes some of its original claims.

Polygon reports that in its most recent court filing, Gearbox dropped a section that accused Callender of breaching his fiduciary duty by revealing confidential information. That claim was in relation to disclosures made in Callender’s own suit against Gearbox.

Gearbox has also reportedly not filed a grievance with the State Bar of Texas, as it threatened when the legal matter came to light. Callender himself confirmed that the grievance has not yet been filed, saying he contacted the state bar directly to inquire about his record.

The ongoing legal dispute has been a volley of suits and counter-suits. Gearbox first filed suit against Callender, claiming he had failed to repay a loan and had improperly used company credit cards. A month later, Callender filed suit against Gearbox, alleging that CEO Randy Pitchford had taken $12 million from the company coffers, and more luridly, that he had left a USB drive with pornography and trade secrets at an event. Gearbox then updated its original petition with an amendment accusing Callender’s suit of breaching his fiduciary duty–that claim has now been dropped.

Pitchford has been a focal point of other controversies as well. Another former employee, David Eddings, recently explained why he won’t be resuming his role as Claptrap for Borderlands 3. That led to a testy exchange with Pitchford until Eddings ultimately alleged that Pitchford had physically assaulted him at GDC 2017, and subsequently stalked him on social media.

Pokemon Go‘s ongoing Extraordinary Raid Week event is set to wrap up on May 28, giving players a chance to battle new Raid bosses and earn extra bonuses until then. If that isn’t enough to scratch your Raid itch, however, Niantic has announced it is bringing three Legendary Pokemon back to Gyms very soon–and this time, you’ll have a chance to encounter their Shiny forms.

Cresselia, Kyogre, and Groudon are all set to reappear as five-star Raids over the next few weeks. The Lunar Pokemon will be the first to return, appearing in Raids from May 27 to June 18. The Sea Basin Pokemon Kyogre will follow from June 18 to June 27, while Groundon is scheduled to appear from June 27 to July 10.

It’s rare to see the aforementioned three Legendaries in Pokemon Go, so if you missed previous chances to catch them, this is a good opportunity to add them to your collection. Each one also only has a single type, which should make it easier to prepare a team to counter them. The Psychic-type Cresselia is weak to Bug, Dark, and Ghost Pokemon; the Water-type Kyogre is vulnerable to Grass and Electric Pokemon; and the Ground-type Groudon has a disadvantage against Grass, Water, and Ice Pokemon.

In the meantime, you still have a chance to catch Azelf, Mesprit, and Uxie. The Legendary lake trio will appear in Raids until May 27. Even after that date, however, it will still be possible to come across the Pokemon in the wild, although the chance of encountering them is exceptionally rare. Each Legendary is also currently exclusive to a specific region, so there’s no word if or when they’ll rotate to other parts of the world.

Niantic has also announced the date of Pokemon Go’s next Community Day. June’s event is scheduled to take place on Saturday, June 8, and the featured Pokemon this time will be Slakoth, the adorable sloth originally from Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire. On top of increased Slakoth spawns, Pokemon Eggs will hatch at a quarter of the distance they normally require during the event.

It’s been two years since our last adventure in the Nazi-killing, bombastic world of Wolfenstein, but the wait is almost over as Wolfenstein: Youngblood is fast approaching. Bethesda are returning to E3 2019 with its very own press conference once again, and Wolfenstein fans have their fingers crossed for a new gameplay demonstration of Youngblood ahead of its June 26 release date.

What We Know So Far

Wolfenstein: Youngblood was first announced at E3 last year. The game is being developed by MachineGames, who has created all of the most recent Wolfenstein games, though this time it is in collaboration with Dishonored developer Arkane Studios. Youngblood leaves B.J. Blazkowicz behind and shifts focus to his two daughters, Jessica and Sophia. Set 19 years in the future during the 1980s, the twin sisters are in Paris trying to locate B.J., and lending a Nazi-killing hand where need be.

For the first time in the rebooted series, you’ll be able to play cooperatively. If you don’t have a buddy on hand, you sister will be AI-controlled. Unfortunately, there is no split-screen capability planned for Youngblood. The game is adding new RPG elements, updated weaponry, new abilities and gadgets. Youngblood executive producer Jerk Gustafsson told Official PlayStation Magazine that the level design will resemble that of Dishonored. MachineGames also confirmed that the gameplay structure will be more open-ended and branching, with plenty of side missions to get stuck into. Missions can also be taken on in any order. As this is not a full priced game, we’re expecting a condensed version of the Wolfenstein formula.

The game is set to cost $29.99 for the standard edition and if you splash out on the $39.99 Deluxe Edition you will also get access to a Buddy Pass where you can invite a friend who doesn’t have the game to play with you for free. The game will have cosmetic only microtransactions and will arrive on Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Nintendo Switch on June 26.

What’s Confirmed For E3?

So far, Bethesda have confirmed very little for its 2019 press conference. While there’s sure to be a variety of titles showcased, only Doom Eternal has a confirmed appearance at this stage. Bethesda’s Todd Howard has also ruled out the possibility of Starfield or Elder Scrolls VI making an appearance, but there’s no official word on whether we’ll see more Wolfenstein: Youngblood.

What We Hope To See At E3

Given Wolfenstein: Youngblood releases mere weeks after Bethesda’s E3 conference, we’re hoping to see an extended look at how co-op gameplay will work. So far, it seems clear that high-octane action is making a significant return but we’ve yet to check it out in all its uncut glory, so that’s what we’ll be hoping for come E3. Excellent co-operative campaigns aren’t always easy to come by, so we’re keen to see how the multiplayer elements are integrated with the story and combat mechanics.

Additionally, we’d love to get a closer look at the new weapons, gadgets, and abilities that have been teased for Youngblood. It would also be great to learn whether each twin will have a unique approach to combat. The fast approaching release date makes us pretty confident that at least seem of these questions will be answered come E3.

Dead Island 2 was announced all the way back in 2014, and its development has been anything but smooth. The game was originally announced with Spec Ops: The Line studio Yager announced as the developer.

But in 2015, publisher Deep Silver announced that it was parting ways with Yager, and it was later confirmed that Sumo Digital would be taking over as the lead developer.

Deep Silver was later acquired by THQ Nordic, which is now the publisher of Dead Island 2. This week, THQ Nordic announced earnings, and it included an image of Dead Island 2’s logo. This suggested that the game is still in the works, and THQ Nordic CEO Lars Wingefors confirmed it.

“Dead Island 2 [is] still being worked on. Stay tuned,” he said (via IGN).

That’s all Wingefors had to say on the subject of Dead Island 2. There is no word as of yet as to when Dead Island 2 may resurface or what changes might be

Also during the call, Wingefors talked about THQ Nordic’s massive development pipeline. He said the company has 80 projects in the works, including 32 titles that have been announced and 48 that are unannounced. The unannounced titles include new games from Kingdom Come studio Warhorse, Saints Row developer Volition, and Metro dev 4A Games.

Years ago, it was said that Dead Island 2 would feature a heavy emphasis on melee combat and role-playing game elements. According to Deep Silver, it will also have “never-before-seen” handcrafted weapons. The game is powered by Unreal Engine 4, and will take players to places like the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and Venice Beach. Another previously touted feature is “seamless” multiplayer for up to eight players that can “cooperate, compete, or simply coexist.” The publisher has described this as a “new-gen multiplayer experience.”

However, it remains to see what might have changed throughout the game’s tumultuous development. E3 2019 is coming up next month, but nothing so far has suggested that Dead Island 2 will resurface at the gaming show.

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey, the new title from Assassin’s Creed creator Patrice Desilets, now has a release date. The title will launch on PC on August 27, with a release on console for PS4 and Xbox One coming in December. The PC version is exclusive to the Epic Games Store for its first year.

Ancestors is the first title from Desilets’ new studio, Panache Digital Games. The studio was founded in 2014, so it’s been a while to see the first title from the independent team.

“Our goal for Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey is to provide an experience no player has ever lived before,” Desilets said in a statement. “Our small team is creating an ambitious and immersive game with a unique setting that will captivate gamers of all types, and we look forward to players exploring our world later this year.”

Ancestors is published by Private Division, which is the independent games label run by Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead parent publisher Take-Two Interactive.

A single-player, third-person exploration survival game, your journey in Ancestors begins as a hominid in Neogene Africa some 10 million years ago. Over time, you grow and literally evolve to the Australopithecus popularly known as Lucy. On your way to becoming Lucy, you’ll learn new skills and abilities as you take the form of the next subspecies of hominid that would eventually become the human form of today. It is quite an ambitious concept to say the least.

You can check out the latest trailer for Ancestors in the embed above.

Read next: Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey Is An Uncompromising, Relentless Survival Experience

Funny or Die’s absolutely absurd, low-budget fake interview show featuring Zach Galifianakis as its host, Between Two Ferns, is being made into a movie for Netflix. The film will be released on September 20 this year, so thankfully fans don’t have very long to wait.

It’s being written by Galifianakis and Scott Aukerman, who wrote the original web show, with Aukerman directing. Caitlin Daley and Mike Farah of Funny or Die are producing alongside Aukerman and Galifianakis.

Here is the silly synopsis:

“Zach Galifianakis dreamed of becoming a star. But when Will Ferrell discovered his public access TV show “Between Two Ferns” and uploaded it to Funny or Die, Zach became a viral laughing stock.

“Zach and his crew are taking a road trip to complete a series of high-profile celebrity interviews and restore his reputation. Directed by Scott Aukerman, Between Two Ferns: The Movie is a laugh-out-loud comedy that gives new insight into the curmudgeonly, beloved outsider Zach Galifianakis has created over the years.”

Between Two Ferns has welcome some huge names in the past, including Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama, Justin Bieber, Bradley Cooper, Bruce Willis, Ben Stiller, Jerry Seinfeld, Steve Carell, and many others.

The interviews are cringe-worthy and very awkward, and they usually end in calamity or worse. They proved to be immensely popular on YouTube, so it is no surprise that a new version of the show is now being made.

Lucasfilm might be developing a movie based on the 2003 BioWare RPG Knights of the Old Republic. According to BuzzFeed, Lucasfilm has hired Altered Carbon creator, Laeta Kalogridis–who also wrote the scripts for Shutter Island and Alita: Battle Angle–to pen the script. Kalogridis also produced the box office juggernaut Avatar, which is the highest-grossing movie in history.

Knights of the Old Republic takes place 4,000 years before the events of the first Star Wars movie, A New Hope.

News that Lucasfilm is developing a Knights of the Old Republic movie is not a surprise. At Star Wars Celebration in April, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy confirmed that the studio talks about making a Knights of the Old Republic movie “all the time.” Kennedy straight-up confirmed at the time that a Knights of the Old Republic film would be made or at least considered. “Yes, we are developing something to look at,” she told MTV News at the time.

According to BuzzFeed, Kalogridis is “close” to finishing the initial draft of her script for Knights of the Old Republic, which could be a trilogy. Three anonymous sources told this to BuzzFeed.

Kalogridis would become the first woman to script a Star Wars movie since 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back, which was co-written by Leigh Brackett.

If the Knights of the Old Republic movie is indeed real, it is not coming anytime soon. The next Star Wars movie is 2022’s film from Game of Thrones creators D.B. Weiss and David Benioff. BuzzFeed’s report notes that Kalogridis has not yet submitted the Knights of the Old Republic movie script’s first draft, so it could be a very long time before the movie gets made (if it ever does). There is no word as of yet regarding who will direct or star in the film, or when it may be released.

Whatever the case, Knights of the Old Republic is a fan-favorite Star Wars game rich with storytelling opportunities, so it’s exciting to think about what could happen.

The next Star Wars film is this December’s The Rise of Skywalker, which concludes the new trilogy that began with 2015’s The Force Awakens. It also wraps up the entire Skywalker Saga that started back in 1977, so it is truly the end of an era. The first images from the film recently emerged, and they showcase some brand-new characters.

After releasing the first details of his plan to go after loot boxes and pay-to-win mechanics in video games, Republican US Senator Josh Hawley today officially released the full text of his bill. Not only that, but Hawley revealed two co-sponsors, and they are both of the rival Democratic party.

“It’s pretty simple. Video game companies shouldn’t put casinos targeted at kids in their games. Proud of this bipartisan effort,” Hawley said on Twitter.

The two co-sponsors of the bill, which is called Protecting Children from Abusive Games Act, are Democratic Senators Richard Blumenthal (Connecticut) and Ed Markey (Massachusetts).

The bill asks Congress to regulate some pay-to-win microtransactions in video games, while it also seeks a ban on loot boxes for games that are designed to appeal to people under the age of 18. Specifically, the full wording of the bill states that it would become illegal for a publisher to release a “minor-oriented” game that features pay-to-win microtransactions or loot boxes, while it also seeks to previously released games from receiving updates that add such mechanics.

Key to this bill is how pay-to-win and loot boxes are defined. The bill states that a pay-to-win mechanic is one that “eases a user’s progression through content otherwise available within the game without the purchase of such transaction,” as well as one that “assists a user in accomplishing an achievement within the game that can otherwise be accomplished without the purchase of such transaction.

It is also defined as something that “assists a user in receiving an award associated with the game that is otherwise available in association with the game without the purchase of such transaction.” And finally, the bill states that pay-to-win also means a purchase that “permits a user to continue to access content of the game that had previously been accessible to the user but has been made inaccessible after the expiration of a timer or a number of gameplay attempts.”

Exclusions include difficulty modes, cosmetic items that do not affect gameplay, and add-on content like DLC packs and expansions.

As for loot boxes, the bill defines a loot box as a “randomized or partly randomized” item that unlocks a feature of the product or adds to or enhances the entertainment value of the product without disclosing what the actual content is until after the purchase of the loot box.

The bill defines a “minor-oriented” game as one that is targeted at people under the age of 18 as judged by the subject matter, the visual content, and the music or audio content, among other things. No examples of what a “minor-oriented” game are were provided. The bill’s language also does not say if Hawley will work with the United States’ ratings organization the ESRB on this bill. That group is owned and operated by the Entertainment Software Association, which opposes this bill, so that could be one reason why.

Hawley’s bill says he’s able to ask for this ban under the Federal Trade Commission’s Unfair or Deceptive Acts or Practices act.

In addition to the ban on some loot boxes and pay-to-win mechanics, the bill is asking for a study to be conducted on the effect of pay-to-win and loot boxes that would be commissioned not later than two years after the act is enacted.

Hawley and his co-sponsors are asking for the study to analyze the psychological effects of pay-to-win microtransactions and loot boxes on users and also to study game development practices related to pay-to-win microtransactions and loot boxes, among other things. It’s not clear why Hawley is asking for these studies to be held after his bill is theoretically enacted and not before it.

The Protecting Children from Abusive Games Act’s co-sponsors released statements in support of the bill to The Verge. Markey said, “Inherently manipulative game features that take advantage of kids and turn play time into pay time should be out of bounds.” Blumenthal commented, “Congress must send a clear warning to app developers and tech companies: Children are not cash cows to exploit for profit.”

For its part, the ESA has said it opposes Hawley’s bill. The trade group, which represents the video game industry’s interests in Washington D.C. and also runs E3 every year, is in business to protect and support its members. A lawmaker from Hawaii who also targeted loot boxes told GameSpot that the ESA sent lobbyists to Hawaii to try to kill his bill. In response to Hawley’s bill, the ESA said in a statement to PC Gamer that countries like Ireland, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom have also determined that “loot boxes do not constitute gambling.”

“We look forward to sharing with the senator the tools and information the industry already provides that keeps the control of in-game spending in parents’ hands. Parents already have the ability to limit or prohibit in-game purchases with easy to use parental controls,” the ESA said.

An Uphill Battle

Research firm Cowen & Company released a note to investors about Hawley’s proposal. The overwhelming majority of bills that are proposed never pass in US Congress, and Cowen & Company said Hawley’s bill is no exception in that it faces an uphill battle.

Analyst Doug Creutz says Hawley’s bill represents a “far more serious, existential-level threat” to gaming, and specifically mobile gaming, because it also focuses on pay-to-win mechanics in addition to loot boxes.

As for why Hawley’s bill might run into trouble, Cowen & Company acknowledged that Hawley is an outlier among Republicans in that most Republicans are pro-business and regularly oppose regulation on technology companies. Not only that, but Congress is “barely functioning” in 2019, with lawmakers focusing more on “must-pass legislation” that keeps the government open.

“Loot boxes have very little mind share in Congress,” Cowen & Company said.

The firm also said Hawley’s bill might face a roadblock because the Supreme Court already decided in 2011 that video games are protected as free speech under the First Amendment. As such, some lawmakers might not want to be involved in a committee about loot boxes and microtransactions, Cowen & Company said. One of the new bill’s co-sponsors, Richard Blumenthal, supported the bill that sought to ban the sale of violent video games to minors which was eventually struck down.

The next step for Hawley’s bill would be to head to a Congressional hearing. No hearing is currently scheduled, which may not bode well for the bill. However, Cowen & Company noted that Markey and Blumenthal coming on as co-sponsors gives the bill more chances at getting a hearing. Hawley, a freshman Senator and the youngest US Senator at age 39, sits on the Judiciary Committee and he might ask chairman Lindsey Graham for a hearing, Cowen & Company said.

Another issue at play is that the FTC already announced it is holding a hearing on August 7 to dig into loot boxes. Democratic lawmaker Maggie Hassan (New Hampshire) requested this hearing, though despite that, she did not become a co-sponsor of Hawley’s bill.

Overall, Cowen & Company says the video game industry should take Hawley’s bill seriously, even though it also believes the legislation is not a near-term concern. You can read the full text of the Protecting Children From Abusive Games Act here.

Read next: Nintendo Is Removing Animal Crossing, Fire Emblem Mobile Games In Belgium Amid Loot Box Concerns