In its final order, the court goes over the numerous arguments from the case, at one point addressing the fact that Apple takes a 30% cut of all purchases occurring in apps published on its store. Though the 30% rate has been common in the game and app industries for years, in recent times platforms such as Steam, Microsoft, and Epic itself have opted to take less, while Apple has dug in its heels.
This was brought as evidence against Apple, with Epic suggesting that its hold on the market and insistence on 30% ultimately drove prices up for consumers. Apple argued that not only was 30% was an industry standard, but that developers get a commensurate value from the App Store to make up for the cut.
But the judge disagreed, calling the take “unjustified.”
“One…developers could decide to stay on the App Store to benefit from the services that Apple provides,” the ruling reads. “Absent competition, however, it is impossible to say that Apple’s 30% commission reflects the fair market value of its services. Indeed, at least a few developers testified that they considered Apple’s rate to be too high for the services provided. Two, Apple has provided no evidence that the rate it charges bears any quantifiable relation to the services provided. To the contrary, Apple started with a proposition, that proposition revealed itself to be incredibly profitable and there appears to be no market forces to test the proposition or motivate a change.”
Basically, the judge is saying that the 30% rate Apple takes is impossible to determine the value of, because there isn’t enough competition to suggest otherwise. Furthermore, it doesn’t seem like anything Apple does for developers has any relation to the money they take from in-app purchases.
The court went further, pointing out that the justification for a 30% rate could be determined if a third-party store put pressure on the company to innovate and provide features to developers it had previously neglected. But with competition currently held back, there’s just no way to tell.
But, again, the ruling doesn’t call Apple a monopoly — just “anticompetitive.” It has a share of the mobile gaming market between 52% and 57% that it battles with Google for, making for a “mostly duopolistic” ecosystem that Apple has “considerable market power” within.
And that, the court concludes, may soon turn into a monopoly if its market share keeps going up, competition doesn’t step up its game, or Epic or someone else brings a better antitrust case to court next time.
“The evidence does suggest that Apple is near the precipice of substantial market power, or monopoly power, with its considerable market share. Apple is only saved by the fact that its share is not higher, that competitors from related submarkets are making inroads into the mobile gaming submarket [Nintendo Switch], and, perhaps, because plaintiff did not focus on this topic.”
Overall, most of the ruling was in favor of Apple, though Epic won a specific battle with an injunction forcing Apple to allow developers to link to outside payment options within their apps (though this still doesn’t let them add direct payment that bypasses the App Store’s systems). Tim Sweeney has said that as a result of this, he will not be bringing Fortnite back to to the App Store until direct payment is permitted.
Mad Max Furiosa will be delayed by a year–arriving in theaters in 2024 instead of 2023, according to Deadline. No reason was cited for the shift in dates, but a production delay is not unexpected since the world is still in the throes of a pandemic.
Mad Max Furiosa is a prequel to Mad Max Fury Road and will explore the backstory of Furiosa, a fearsome character who betrays Immortan Joe in order to free his five wives. Anya Taylor-Joy–known for her role as Beth Harmon in the surprise Netflix Original hit Queen’s Gambit–will still star as the younger Furiosa.
Click To Unmute
Size:
Want us to remember this setting for all your devices?
Chris Hemsworth and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II are also part of the cast lineup. Charlize Theron, who played Furiosa in Fury Road, will not make an appearance in the standalone prequel.
Director George Miller teased previously that Furiosa will take place over a much longer time span as compared to the relatively contained Fury Road. “This is a saga; it happens over many years, so there’s a lot of different elements to it. But that’s all I should say,” he commented.
Miller also revealed the casting process behind appointing Taylor-Joy as the main lead. He saw her act for the first time in the upcoming movie Last Night in Soho and thought her performance was interesting. During her audition, he asked Taylor-Joy to perform the “mad as hell” speech from 1976’s Network and was impressed by her ability to incorporate his simple notes and produce a better subsequent performance.
In other Fury Road news, if you’re looking for a sweet new ride, Fury Road Mad Max cars are up for auction. The vehicles have a starting bid of $1, but no doubt the price will reach astronomical heights once the auction starts. Bidding begins on September 26 and will be livestreamed.
PlayStation Network games come in all shapes and sizes. From the meditative exploration of Gone Home and What Remains of Edith Finch to the frantic multiplayer fun of Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout and Rocket League, downloadable games can basically be anything. Though you won’t find any big AAA open-world or live service games on this list, the breadth of experiences offered on the PlayStation Store has never been wider. There’s something for everyone, and our list of the best PlayStation Network games takes all ages and skill levels into account.
The list below includes shooters, roguelikes, platformers, puzzle games, adventure games, sports games, RPGs, and more. But if you don’t see what you’re looking for here, be sure to check out our lists of the best PS5 games, the best split-screen PS4 games, and the best PS4 games.
Celeste is an interesting lesson in how difficult games can provide the best of both worlds. On the one hand, it’s a tough-as-nails platformer, a la Super Meat Boy, where your death count may well climb to skyscraping heights. On the other hand, developer Extremely OK Games is deeply committed to accessibility, allowing players to tweak the difficulty of their game experience as much or as little as they want, with the option to turn on invincibility, give yourself unlimited jumps, and more. This approach feels fitting for a game, like Celeste, that provides a sustained look at mental health and what failure and success mean for different people. Additionally, Celeste also feels great to play, with some of the best platforming you’ll find in a game not developed by Nintendo, and creative levels that take full advantage of protagonist Madeline’s jump and dash. The mood in each of those levels is set masterfully by Lena Raine, whose soundtrack contains some of the best retro-inspired music you’re likely to hear.
This adorable Zelda-like adventure game swaps out the sword and bow for a puzzle-solving paintbrush. Chicory is set in a world called Picnic where artists called Wielders alter the aesthetic of the world with a magic paintbrush. At the beginning of the game, the latest Wielder has abandoned their calling and you take up the mantle and the magic brush. Brush in hand, you’ll accomplish tasks for the denizens of Picnic, leaving a trail of paint behind you (which conveniently lets you know which areas you’ve already visited). It’s a stellar game, with brain-tingling puzzles and a story that will tug at your heartstrings.
With striking hand-drawn art inspired by the rubber hose animation of Max Fleischer and early Disney cartoons, Cuphead is as inviting as it is deceptively deadly. You will die many, many, many times before you reach the conclusion of this 2017 run-and-gun platformer. The name of the game here is pattern recognition as you, by yourself or with a friend, guide Cuphead and his pal, Mugman, through a series of punishing (but lavishly animated) boss encounters and occasional platforming shooter levels that take cues from Contra. Though anyone can admire the art, Cuphead is, decidedly, not for the faint of heart.
A punishing roguelike with a striking look and distinct side-on perspective, Darkest Dungeon is, as the title implies, a brutish and dark game with tons of depth to keep players invested for a long time. Released in 2016, this strategic RPG boasts an art style inspired by medieval woodcuts and a risk-reward approach to dungeon-delving, where team composition and team lineup (literally, your characters are presented in a right-to-left line on screen) require deep and consistent thought. Characters are plentiful and each has different strengths and weaknesses to consider as you compose a party. In fact, planning a run is just as important as executing it, though no amount of planning can prepare you for everything that you’ll encounter in Red Hook Studios’ procedurally generated dungeons. But anticipating every eventuality, and knowing when to retreat if you failed to do so, is part of the fun in this tense and surprising role-playing game.
A standalone multiplayer expansion to Klei Entertainment’s mega-popular survival game, Don’t Starve Together expands the player count and ups the ante. The objective is simple: don’t starve, but you can accomplish that goal in a variety of ways. Establish farms to grow food, mine resources, fend off wild animals, and take on seasonal bosses. Klei’s hand-drawn art style looks great here, and Don’t Starve Together’s procedurally generated world is endlessly explorable.
A surprisingly massive hit for developer Mediatonic when it launched in 2020, Fall Guys takes a bunch of obstacle courses and minigames that wouldn’t feel out of place in Mario Party, then adds a bunch of bean-looking bipeds, and makes them compete for a crown in Battle Royale fashion. One of a few multiplayer games–like Phasmophobia and Among Us–to get a big pandemic boost from bored quarantined players, Fall Guys is simple, but fun, with wins coming on the back of skill and ample amounts of luck. The physics are wild, too–don’t be surprised if you lose a round when your bean repeatedly gets yeeted off the map. Mediatonic is still updating the game a year later, which means plenty of new obstacles for new and returning players to contend with.
This walking simulator created by former BioShock 2 developers kicked off years of debate about what makes a game a game. “Is Gone Home even a game?” players asked. Yes, and a really good one, at that. Developer Fullbright took the principles that guided the environmental design of immersive sims like Deus Ex and Thief: The Dark Project, stripped out the combat and stealth, and moved the action to the fairly mundane setting of an empty family home in the Pacific Northwest. You are Katie, a college kid visiting her family for the first time since they moved into a new house, and suspiciously, none of them are around. Gone Home communicates the powerful story that follows almost entirely through snooping and voyeurism. You will get to know these characters, not through cut scenes or dialogue, but through the crumpled up notes and personal effects they left behind.
A roguelike for people who don’t like roguelikes, Hades places greater emphasis on characters, story, and general forward momentum than basically any title in the genre that came before. Exiting Early Access in 2020, indie developer Supergiant’s fourth game cast players as Zagreus, the discontented son of Hades, who has decided to escape from the underworld or die (over and over and over again) trying. With rock solid isometric action combat, flashy abilities, a brilliantly told story, and hooky RPG progression, Hades proves that the roguelike has massive crossover appeal, provided the procedural elements are balanced by an author’s expert hand. The team at Supergiant has never worked in the same genre twice-Hades is the studio’s first roguelike and its first Early Access game– but the studio delivered a game so confident, beautiful, and fun to play that you would think they had been making games like this for decades.
A story-driven about the romance and intimacy between two lovers who crash land on an alien planet called Source, Haven is a unique and strongly written indie RPG. Yu and Kay, the story’s central lovers, must work together to survive, frequently venturing out from their spaceship, Nest, in order to find supplies, clean up rust and heal hostile creatures by defeating them in combat.
This cooperative sci-fi shooter, heavily inspired by Starship Troopers, has now brought bug-squishing action to three generations of PlayStation owners. The four-player twin stick shooting gameplay is delightfully (and sometimes panic-inducingly) hectic as you attempt, usually unsuccessfully, to avoid shooting and/or crushing your teammates due to the game’s friendly fire. That’s not the only difficulty, though, as much of your time will be spent managing your meager ammo and slot-based Stratagems.
Drawing heavy inspiration from the Dark Souls series, Hollow Knight is a 2D Metroidvania that, through its punishing mechanics and dark art style, builds a strong sense of setting. This is a world that is worth exploring, with secrets to uncover, hidden connections to make, and abilities to unlock. Combat is tense and platforming is precise. Creative bosses and tough platforming gauntlets await in the hand drawn depths, and a full sequel called Hollow Knight: Silksong will probably even still come out at some point.
An intense top-down shooter that demands tactical thinking and quick reflexes, Hotline Miami is a smart and brutal piece of work. With a striking aesthetic, challenging gameplay, and memorable soundtrack, Hotline Miami is the ultraviolent pixel-art shooter to beat, even nine years later.
The less we tell you about Inside, the better. Playdead’s 2016 follow-up to Limbo is as darkly atmospheric as fans of the Copenhagen-based studio had come to expect, casting you as a nameless child running through a terrifying and violent world where men with guns attempt to shoot you, pigs possessed by strange, controlling leeches charge at you, and vicious dogs try to rip you to bloody shreds. Set in dark woods, a dystopian city, a flooded cavern, and a sterile laboratory, Inside is mysterious and cinematic, evoking a world that you might–against your better judgment–like to visit, but where you certainly wouldn’t want to live. Stellar platforming controls and wonderful level design ensure that, while the world may be foreboding, it’s always a joy to explore. This dark odyssey all builds to a climactic conclusion so gruesome, pointed, and unsettling that we haven’t forgotten it five years out from release and doubt that we ever will.
That Game Company’s masterpiece of asynchronous multiplayer design is a study in loneliness and cooperation. Exploring this desert world of sand and rock is emotionally impactful, no matter how many times you experience the sensation of gracefully gliding through its distinct landscapes.
The game that put Bloober Team (Observer, The Medium, Blair Witch) on the map, Layers of Fear is a first-person horror game where you can trust no one, not even the world around you. Set in a well-realized abandoned Victorian mansion setting, Layers of Fear casts you as a painter, and its world is, fittingly, one of ever-changing shapes and shades. Like all of Bloober Team’s games, Layers of Fear is divisive. But, for the players it works for, it really, really works.
With the option to play in and out of VR, Rez Infinite is the definitive version of the classic rhythm shooter. Designed by Tetsuya Mizuguchi, who would go on to lead development on Tetris Effect, Rez Infinite is, like its block-arranging descendant, an immersive, all-encompassing experience. Though the gameplay isn’t too complicated–it’s a rail shooter at its core–Rez Infinite proves that there’s more to the whole than the sum of the parts.
An important inclusion on this list as Rocket League was catapulted to success by its inclusion as a free PlayStation Plus game. That isn’t to say it wouldn’t have found success otherwise, though; who can resist the appeal of a game where you play soccer as a speedy car? Easy to pick up and play but endlessly deep, Psyonix’ multiplayer sports game manages to capture the feeling and physics of soccer in a way few games have before or since. Six years later, the game is still receiving regular support and attention as a successful eSport (and, after Epic Games’ acquisition of Psyonix, completely free-to-play).
Shovel Knight is the retro 8-bit platformer as you remember it. This is a game that could not have existed on the NES, or even the SNES, but that nonetheless captures the feeling of jamming the DuckTales or Super Castlevania IV cartridge into your console and watching as the afternoon flies by. Shovel Knight has a whopping four campaigns, all of which are included in the Treasure Trove package.
How do you make a sequel to the “perfect game?” Mossmouth answered that question by making a game that was pretty similar to the original Spelunky, the action-platformer roguelike that gave rise to a million other action-platformer roguelikes, but with enough new additions to keep returning fans interested. New, creative biomes, tameable mounts, and turkeys that can be killed and eaten for bonus HP are just a few of the new twists Derek Yu and team put on the old Spelunky formula for this 2020 sequel.
The Harvest Moon series has gone through creative droughts and weirdness around the licensing–the original developer, Marvelous, is now making the Story of Seasons games, while publisher Natsume toils on soulless Harvest Moon games in their absence–but Stardew Valley is Stardew Valley. This 2016 farming RPG takes everything Harvest Moon did well and repackages it from a fan’s perspective without the baggage. Developer Eric Barone, smartly, gives players an overarching goal–restoring the derelict community center–then populates the world with so many fun things to do (farming, fishing, arcade games, romance, dungeon-crawling, and more), that you always have big and small goals to accomplish.
“Time only moves when you move.” It’s a terrific conceit, and Superhot Team has now built three games around it: Superhot, Superhot VR, and Superhot: Mind Control Delete. The first of those, the developer’s 2016 debut, took the control scheme of the first-person shooter and applied it cleverly to a puzzle game framework. Superhot is much less about fast reflexes and twitchy aim-down-sights ability, and much more about learning how to strategize your way through a fight where the odds are stacked against you. The only advantage you have on your opponents is that you can move in bullet time, like Neo in The Matrix, which is a pretty cool advantage, to be honest.
It’s easy to pigeonhole Terraria as “2D Minecraft,” but Re-Logic’s side-scrolling action-platformer/sandbox survival game is more than the sum of its recognizable parts. Though… they certainly are recognizable parts. Dropped into a procedurally generated world, you (and a group of friends if you want) explore fully destructible environments which can be broken down into component parts you can use to build a vast array of items, weapons, buildings (which, together, can form helpful villages) and more. As in Minecraft, the world is mostly safe by day, and populated by dangerous creatures at night. With imposing enemies to vanquish (the eyeball monsters are especially freaky), massive underground cavern networks to explore, and an impressive suite of creative tools, Terraria invites players to dig deep (metaphorically and literally). Don’t be surprised if you have a hard time stopping yourself from investing hundreds of hours into this compulsively playable creative survival game.
Developer Drool dubbed their creation a “rhythm violence” game and who are we to argue? Thumper is a rhythm game for people who want to be stressed out and white-knuckling a controller while throbbing music assaults their eardrums. Controlling a silver-plated beetle, or something, you move along a track as frightening psychedelic visions play out around them. While most rhythm games ask you to pretend to play an instrument or tap buttons in time to the beat, Thumper has you lurching aggressively from side-to-side. Part rollercoaster, part mosh pit, part Lovecraftian fever dream, Drool’s 2016 release remains a brilliantly unique game in the music game space.
A frantic multiplayer game from the people who made Celeste, TowerFall Ascension is as fun and frenzied as it gets. This four-player local multiplayer game pits a quartet of combatants against each other in kill-or-be-killed archery battles. The maps are small and the graphics are old-school, but TowerFall Ascension wrings massive amounts of fun out of its self-imposed limitations. Nothing beats dashing into an opponent’s oncoming arrow to grab it, then taking them down with their own ammunition. It’s thrilling stuff, and match rules can be modified in a variety of ways, so no matter how long you play, the game retains its easy to pick up, hard to master charm.
What Remains of Edith Finch takes the basic premise of Gone Home–a young woman visiting an abandoned family home in the Pacific Northwest–but makes the missing family members present, not through notes and personal effects, but through short, playable vignettes. That might mean playing through a horror story rendered in comic book panels with cel-shaded art. It also might mean witnessing, through a camera lens, a traumatic hunting trip where the plot only advances when you snap a picture. What Remains of Edith Finch is relentlessly inventive on the level of its individual stories, but also manages to build to a powerful conclusion that ties everything together. It can be completed in an afternoon, but you’ll remember it for years after you play it. Oh, and, Lewis’ “cannery sequence” is one of the best levels we’ve ever played in a game and, four years later, there is still absolutely nothing like it.
Just about every week brings something new toDestiny 2, whether it’s story beats, new activities, or interesting new combinations of elements that let players devastate each other in the Crucible. Iron Banter is our weekly look at what’s going on in the world of Destiny and a rundown of what’s drawing our attention across the solar system.
When Destiny 2 finally gained cross-save capabilities back in 2019, I was finally able to stop playing the game on PlayStation 4–where I’d been since the first day of Destiny–and hop over to PC, where my serious Destiny friends resided. That was around the time I also started to take the PvP aspect of Destiny 2 semi-seriously, and while I know that I’ll never be a great Crucible contender (I’m too damn old at this point and completely unwilling to put in practice time to improve), I’ve really enjoyed a stepped-up focus on the competitive aspect of the game.
That’s why the best news this week is Destiny 2’s new take on the Trials of Osiris. Sure, Savathun and Mara Sov said some more really cryptic, downright unsettling stuff about the threats we’re dealing with next year in Destiny 2, but it’s the Trials that are dominating my thoughts as we head into the third weekend of the Season of the Lost.
Trip To The Litehouse
I’ve always liked the concept of the Trials of Osiris, just like all the aspirational and endgame content in Destiny 2. Its requirement that you go “flawless” and win seven tough matches in a row, unlocking some of the game’s best rewards, is the kind of extra-special, cool experience that I associate alone with this game. For the people really invested in Destiny 2, this, like raids, is something that pays off your time in the game and your excitement for it with a one-of-a-kind gaming experience.
But in practice, Trials has always been, at best, a pain in the ass for the vast majority of us Guardians. It’s an event that has traditionally been prohibitive for all but the very best players. Top-tier streamers, pro gamers, and all-around especially good Guardians have dominated the Trials, stomping on us lesser mortals every weekend. And that creates a feedback loop. No matter how sweaty I get, I’m not getting to the Lighthouse; it’s something I had to come to expect. So, for the most part, I quit playing Trials–and other players react like I do. The pool of Trials initiates gets smaller and smaller as it gets more and more frustrating a mode to take on, and that means you’re more and more likely to run into only the people who hang around: the best people. That increases the frustration, driving more players out. And so Trials became a playground for the absolute elite, a section of the game that was a waste of time for the rest of us.
Recent adjustments to Trials, which include dishing out rewards with weekly bounties and at different win tiers, have mitigated the frustration a bit. My team and I can at least reliably make our way to three or five wins before we bottom out, so we get something. But it still always felt like Trials was a mode where the rich get richer and the poor merely present themselves to make a broken, bloody staircase of Guardian corpses for the Flawless players to climb to more fun rewards.
With the new changes to the Trials of Osiris in Season of the Lost, everything is different–at least on paper. As of this writing, I won’t have had time to jump into the new Trials mode and actually try it out. But the list of alterations Bungie has made seem excellent. New matchmaking, new opportunities for solo play, new reward tiers, new Passages that no longer count losses; all of it means that the vast majority of Destiny 2 players have a reason to get into the mode again. The more the player pool expands, the more each of us regular Joe Crucible contenders actually has a shot at the Lighthouse, as we dilute the pool of ludicrously good folks with our mediocrity. That means the mode will be more fun for us to play, and we’ll be facing each other more of the time.
And overall, that’s great. Trials is a cool idea, but not if it drastically locks out most of the player base. And it doesn’t need to sacrifice what makes it special and super-tough–you still have to rack up seven wins with no losses to make it to the Lighthouse–to be something that everyone can enjoy. I’m hoping the changes work as well as it sounds like they should, and I’m hoping that a big influx of more players into the mode will actually mean that, sometimes, a miracle Flawless will happen. But if not, I’m content to at least pick up all the armor and a few nice great guns for my trouble.
Discovering The Darkness Daddy
This week’s story content sent us to the Shattered Realm take on the moon, the excellently named Ruins of Wrath. The radio dialogue between Petra, Mara Sov, and Ikora this week, along with our visit to Savathun, continually pivots around a central idea: Xivu Arath answers to somebody else.
This is something that’s been swirling in the background since, like, Shadowkeep. Every time we’ve talked with the Darkness–be it in the Moon pyramid, on Io during the Season of Arrivals, on Europa as we gathered Stasis powers, and so on–there’s been the implication that there is a real, specific “entity” somewhere in the distance that we haven’t officially met yet. The Black Fleet of pyramid ships is some kind of manifestation of that creature, but pointedly, we discovered during Arrivals and afterward that those ships are empty. There’s no one inside to fight. The Black Fleet isn’t a one-to-one Darkness equivalent to the Traveler, it’s something else, and the Presage mission is all about how Calus was trying to make contact with this entity directly. As Osiris-as-Savathun says during that mission, the Darkness and the entity are separate things. (Meylin Games on YouTube has a good breakdown of the Presage clues.)
We haven’t seen whatever the entity is yet. But it sounds like that’s where we’re imminently headed.
Okay, so what’s interesting about this is what was said about this Darkness entity, which I’ve been calling the Anti-Traveler just to give it a clearer name (Darkness Daddy also works). An ongoing thread this season is the apparent unification of Darkness forces that previously weren’t pals: the Taken and the Hive often work together, but now we’re seeing them also work with the Scorn, which is a new development. The Taken also previously were controlled by Savathun by way of Quria, but we (supposedly) killed Quria in the Season of the Splicer, and it seems the remaining Taken are now working for Xivu Arath. Finally, dialogue this week mentioned that Oryx, the Taken King, did not invent the Taken–he basically borrowed the power to create Taken creatures from the Darkness. Someone else, presumably, is actually in control of the Taken and has been loaning those creatures, and the ability to zap sentient beings into another dimension to turn them into whatever the Taken are, to characters such as Oryx and Quria.
That adds another degree of formidable to the Anti-Traveler and suggests the Taken will be the major antagonist force as we near the end of the saga. It also calls into question how the Hive’s powers work, or will work, especially after Savathun breaks free of her worm. And if you ask me, it provides more evidence for the theory that Savathun gets her Light from the Traveler.
So Bungie is currently teasing a badder antagonist than we’ve seen before, something on the level of the god-like Traveler, and is filling in the details of its abilities. But over and above that, we have what Savathun said last week, about something more than the conflict between the Light and Darkness. The characters and story here are spinning out, seemingly, two things we need to be worried about in the future. First, there’s the Anti-Traveler, the immediate Darkness threat that’s been building since the post-credits scene of Destiny 2. But second, there’s whatever Savathun was referring to–whether that’s the overall concept of Destiny 2 as a game itself, or a level of existence beyond the paracausal entities messing with us right now. But it sounds like more hints at what we could see of Destiny 2 once we’re past the last announced expansion, The Final Shape.
Anyway, the Anti-Traveler is coming. Wonder if it’ll look like those statues we’ve seen around the game so far, and what might be hidden under that black cloth on its head.
Oh, one last thing! Last week in the lore on the new Iron Banner armor, Saladin gives a passing thought to Savathun’s Song, that “viral chant” we’ve heard characters including Shaxx, Crow, Eris, and Lakshmi-2 singing, for a start. Just something that hasn’t come up in a while that seems like it might be super-relevant to the ongoing conversations we’re having with the Hive god of deceit.
Destiny’s Final Shape
After Bungie’s Witch Queen showcase at the start of the Season of the Lost, I got to sit down and have a conversation with Destiny 2’s game director, Joe Blackburn, and its general manager, Justin Truman. We discussed a bunch of things both present and future in Destiny 2, including what they’re drawing on for inspiration with The Witch Queen, what playing against Hive Guardians will feel like, and how the developer is working to make more of Destiny 2 feel like its iconic content, such as raids and dungeons, and less like other first-person shooters.
There’s more from the conversation I’ll be publishing soon, but to start with, Blackburn and Truman’s explanations of what Bungie wants The Witch Queen to be like are compelling. Specifically, Blackburn said the team wants more of Destiny 2 in general to be more like the game’s best parts–missions such as Presage, as well as activities such as the dungeons and raids. The plan with The Witch Queen in particular is to make “the definitive Destiny campaign,” he said, which sounds pretty intriguing.
One thing I didn’t get a chance to talk about with Bungie was the 30th Anniversary celebration event the developer is putting out later this year. It has some specific meme intensity that I can’t ignore–a dungeon based on the Loot Cave from Destiny 1 (an element that is both hilarious and traumatic for me from the early days of covering the game) and the return of Gjallarhorn, Destiny’s most iconic gun. Darryn Bonthuys took a look at what makes the Gjallarhorn so special, which is a good primer for those Destiny fans who missed out on the gun back in the day. You might also want to dig into the lore about Gjallarhorn a bit in places like Ishtar Collective, as it’s one of those items that really feels like essential “Guardian history.”
That’s it for the Destiny stuff that’s buzzing in my brain this week. If there’s anything I missed, feel free to share it in the comments below.
Google Stadia director for games Jack Buser has left the company to work for Google Cloud. Buser will head up Cloud’s gaming arm as the new Director of Global Gaming Solutions, according to a new report from ZDNet.
Buser will begin his tenure at Cloud on September 13, where he’ll report directly to Google Cloud Vice President of Industry Solutions Lori Mitchell-Keller.
“Jack’s hire illustrates Google Cloud’s continued investment into our global, customer-first gaming strategy, and his five years at Google will help open doors for broader strategic partnerships with customers across YouTube, Stadia, and more,” Mitchell-Keller said in a statement to ZDNet. “Jack brings 20 years of experience within the industry as well as a unique blend of business and technical knowledge to further expand our ability to serve gaming customers.”
However, other reports cite additional development details and issues, such as “tens of millions” spent on AAA ports, as major reasons for the closure of Stadia’s internal studios.
A Google spokesperson told IGN in a statement, “Gaming is an incredibly important vertical at Google and we’re seeing huge momentum across all products and services. Jack’s new role will allow us to better bring customers the best of Google across our Cloud services, Stadia, YouTube, and more. Stadia continues to be led by its GM Phil Harrison, and Stadia’s business development and partner management teams will continue to be led by Michael Abbattista, who took over the role in 2020.”
Buser’s departure points further to Stadia’s overall pivot to marketing itself as a platform for third-party companies to use as a cloud gaming platform, rather than an actual house for game development. Buser’s Stadia role was likely more aligned to the Stadia of old — the Stadia interested in developing its own games and becoming a platform not unlike PlayStation, Xbox, and the like — so his departure isn’t all that surprising, as noted by ZDNet.
A Cloud spokesperson told the publication that the company “sees incredible momentum across all industries, and gaming is one of the key verticals we are investing in.” It seems Buser will help lead Cloud’s charge into gaming.
Google says Buser’s hire will help the company develop new relationships with game publishers and developers while also connecting players to Google’s wider suite of services. It also says that Buser’s departure from Stadia will actually help Stadia because it will give Buser the chance to create more partnerships and product opportunities across Stadia and Cloud.
In Chapter 2, Life is Strange: True Colors begins introducing puzzles that Alex will have to navigate to help the residents of Haven. The heavy-hitting ones are mandatory, though there are a few optional ones as well. Below, we go over all the major choices you’ll get to make in True Colors Chapter 2: Lanterns.
Quick note: Chapter 2 is when True Colors really opens up, allowing you to freely explore Haven and pursue tasks in whatever order you want. Alex will usually comment when she hits points of no return–in the case of Chapter 2, first telling Jed she’s done with work and then confronting Mac–so make sure that you’ve done everything you can before those moments.
More Life Is Strange: True Colors Guides
Chapter 2: Lanterns Walkthrough
Did Gabe Make The Call? [Mandatory]
At Gabe’s wake, Ryan will confront Mac, angrily accusing him of ignoring Gabe’s call to halt the scheduled detonation in the mine. To this, Mac will say he got no such call and Gabe must have made a mistake. Ryan will then turn to you for validation, asking you to support his claim since you heard Gabe make the call.
Of course, you didn’t hear the call. All you have is Gabe’s word that he made the call. Telling the truth isn’t the ideal way to go in this scenario, especially if you’re gunning for friendship or romance with Ryan. Side with Ryan and lie: Tell everyone that you heard Gabe make a call, thus accusing Mac of negligence.
Steph’s Grief Puzzle [Mandatory]
Similar to understanding Ethan’s fear, to understand Steph’s sadness, you need to empathize with her. Approach her and tap into her grief–this will highlight certain items around the apartment with a soft blue glow. Finding everything shouldn’t prove too difficult. You’ll know you’ve found everything relevant when Alex says that she has enough to go on to comfort Steph.
When you approach Steph, the subject you want to bring up is playing foosball. Goad her into playing. You’ll likely beat her the first time and then she’ll collect herself and dominate you in the second round, so prepare to battle it out in round three. It doesn’t matter too much whether you win or lose, but if you win, Alex will act like an entitled champ and Steph will be reminded of the fun she’s had with Gabe as a result. So try to win.
Signing The Typhon Agreement [Missable]
Once you’re free to explore Haven for the first time (during Alex’s search for Mac) quite a few optional choices open up to you. One of the most important involves Charlotte. Go to her shop, the marijuana dispensary, to speak with her. She’ll confide in you that she’s struggling with her own grief, helping Ethan, and dealing with Typhon–the mining company responsible for Gabe’s death.
Charlotte will tell you that Typhon has sent her a document for an enormous settlement, provided she agrees to immediately not press charges about Gabe’s death. It’s a super shady deal, but she could also use the money to support Ethan’s future. She’ll ask Alex what to do. Tell her to take the money–it sucks but it also shows that Alex cares about Charlotte and Ethan and wants their future to be secure.
Comforting Ethan [Missable]
If you head to the park, you can find Ethan. Though he isn’t really ready to open up to you, you can read his emotions to understand how he’s feeling and then let him know that you’re there for him. This will improve Alex and Ethan’s relationship. It will also unlock additional dialogue with Charlotte–you can go back to her now and tell her what’s bugging Ethan, improving your standing with her even more.
Boss For The LARP [Missable]
During this exploratory phase, you can also meet up with Steph at the record store. She’ll tell you that she wants to plan a LARP for Ethan and will ask Alex to pick which villain should be the final boss.
Your choice here will determine which of the two bosses that Alex and Ethan will fight during the LARP in Chapter 3. Both seem to be of equal strength so it really just comes down to which boss sounds cooler to fight.
Alex’s Name For The LARP [Missable]
Before leaving the record store, you can fill out Alex’s character sheet for the LARP. Before you do, be sure to read the second issue of Ethan’s comic–it is on the counter right next to the character sheets. Doing so will reveal that the protagonist in Ethan’s comic has a trusted companion by the name of Alwynn.
When filling out the character sheet, you can choose Alwynn, Alto, or Alexandra as Alex’s name for the LARP. Now that you know that the character that Ethan will portray has an in-universe companion named Alwynn, you should go with that. It will further solidify the bond between Alex and Ethan and more seamlessly insert Alex’s character into the LARP.
Eleanor’s Fear Puzzle [Mandatory]
When you search for Ethan at the flower shop, Eleanor will tell you that he left a while ago. Before you can leave, you’ll notice that Eleanor is deeply afraid. You can’t leave the shop without helping her.
Similar to handling Steph’s sadness, approach Eleanor and read her emotions. You’ll then need to find all the relevant objects–they’ll be glowing purple. In the room with Eleanor, there’s the sign on the door, flowers in storage, and the register. In the backroom, you’ll find the phone and a picture of Riley. Interact with all of them to understand why Eleanor is afraid.
You’ll then have to help retrace Eleanor’s steps. To do this, you’ll have to once again interact with the five objects but in the right order. Based on what you’ve gleaned from Alex interacting with each object, you have to try and use common sense to piece together Eleanor’s day up to that point. If you need help, we’ve outlined the steps below.
Interact with the sign on the door.
Interact with the phone in the backroom.
Interact with the picture of Riley.
Interact with the flowers.
Interact with the register.
After all that, you’ll be confronted with a horrifyingly daunting and tragic choice. It will hurt, but we feel that opting to tell Eleanor the truth is the right way to go. Neither choice will impact the ending of the game, however.
Helping Mac [Mandatory]
When you finally confront Mac, he’ll have a panic attack. You can either help him or just walk away and leave him to suffer. Neither choice impacts what ending you get–just decide whether he deserves to suffer through a panic attack alone.
Forgiving Ryan [Mandatory]
When you find Ryan at the end of Chapter 2, his grief will make him angry at himself. You have to talk him down, and ultimately tell him whether Alex forgives him for Gabe’s death, Gabe would forgive him for his own death, or that Ryan ought to forgive himself. These choices don’t seem to influence the overall direction of the story too much, though suggesting that Gabe would forgive Ryan makes the most narrative sense.
After that, Alex and Ryan will continue to talk and eventually you’ll have the choice of shaking Ryan’s hand or hugging him to seal the duo’s partnership. If friendship–and eventually, romance–is your aim, go for the hug. If you want to keep things strictly professional, then a handshake works.
Like previous games in the series, Life is Strange: True Colors will regularly present you with choices that will influence the outcome of the story. Most of these choices are mandatory but a few are optional and easily missable. Below, we go over all the choices that are important to True Colors Chapter 1: Side A. You’ll make additional decisions beyond these ones, but they don’t have as significant an impact.
As an additional note, though we don’t go into detail about all of them here (we’ll cover the major ones), there are certain choices that can influence how Alex perceives herself. Notably, whether she loves music and herself. If you constantly make decisions that have Alex look down upon her incredible musical talent, she won’t as easily regard making music as a career choice. Additionally, folks around Alex–upon learning of her Empathy–will regard her as a superhero, but it’s up to you to decide whether she ultimately views her abilities as a gift or a curse.
More Life Is Strange: True Colors Guides
Chapter 1: Side A Walkthrough
Meeting Gabe [Mandatory]
Right at the start of True Colors, Alex will meet her brother again for the first time in years. You’ll be prompted with the choice of whether to shake Gabe’s hand or give him a hug.
Personally, we advise you to go for a hug. Neither choice has massive ramifications for the story (at least as far as we can tell) but hugging Gabe as opposed to shaking his hand will influence the two siblings’ relationship to start on as positive a note as possible.
Meeting Riley [Mandatory]
When you first meet Riley, you’ll learn that Gabe is helping her with an application essay. Riley thinks it’s smarter to use flowery language to describe her weaknesses, like she “works too hard,” while Gabe thinks it’s better that she just be honest. Riley will then ask you to be the tiebreaker.
If you want to ensure your relationship with Gabe is as close as it can be, side with him. However, it’s better to side with Riley in this debate as doing so will ensure you set the most positive first impression you can with her (similar to hugging Gabe at the start as opposed to shaking his hand). Being Riley’s friend and someone she can trust will be important for later chapters.
Talking To Gabe About Ethan’s Plans [Mandatory]
When you first meet Ethan, he’ll tell you about his plans to sneak into Haven’s old abandoned mine after dark. He’ll ask you to keep his secret–later, his trust in you will be put to the test when you have the option of telling Gabe about Ethan’s plans or keeping quiet.
It may seem like the right and responsible thing to do to tell your brother that his adopted son is planning to go visit a mine after dark. But that’s how cops think, and Alex ain’t no snitch.
And beyond that: Your choice in this instance doesn’t really matter–the overall story won’t change depending on whether you blab or keep your mouth shut. But you do get brownie points with Ethan for keeping his secret and that’s more important.
Rocking Out With Gabe [Mandatory]
When Gabe shows Alex his apartment, he’ll eventually start playing air drums and invite Alex to pick up a broom to rock out with him on “guitar.” You can join him or be a coward and just watch.
Don’t be a coward.
Meeting Charlotte [Mandatory]
When you finally meet Gabe’s girlfriend, Charlotte, she’ll strike up an (awkward) conversation with Alex, in an attempt to get to know you. She’ll take notice of Alex’s star tattoo and eventually ask how Alex feels about Haven so far. You have the choice of being positive, negative, or ambivalent.
In order to set a positive first impression with Charlotte, it’s important to be positive or ambivalent about how Alex feels about Haven.
Alex’s History As A Server [Mandatory]
When Gabe needs to step out for medical attention, Jed will ask if you can step in to be a server for the bar, saying that Gabe told him that you have plenty of experience as a server. This, of course, is a lie. So you have the choice of supporting Gabe’s lie or telling Jed the truth and admitting you have no experience.
In this instance, telling the truth and then impressing Jed with your performance is the best course of action. As a server, you’ll need to clear the backroom, take and remember two orders, and check in with people. The only tricky part of this is remembering Diane and Duckie’s orders. They will tell you what they want and then you need to tell Jed via a multiple-choice test. As soon as you get their order, just go straight to Jed before you forget. You’ll have time to do everything else afterwards.
Duckie’s Missing Whiskey [Missable]
Part of Duckie’s order is his usual: a particular brand of whiskey. He and Gabe had the bottle last, so you’ll need to find it. It’s upstairs in the apartment, squeezed between the couch cushions.
Steph’s Jukebox Game [Missable]
Steph is in the bar during your shift and will ask if you want to play the Jukebox Game with her. You get to ask five yes or no questions in an attempt to figure out one of the songs in the Jukebox.
Frankly, it doesn’t matter whether you win or lose. The important thing is to play so that you start a friendship with Steph and establish a repertoire that can lead to romance down the line, if you so wish.
Talking To Riley About Mac [Mandatory]
When Riley learns about Mac getting beat up, she’ll show up to ask what happened to him. Mac will then lie, telling Riley that Gabe is at fault. You can also lie and cover for Mac (ensuring Gabe takes the blame for the altercation) or tell Riley the truth.
Though you do earn Mac’s trust by covering for him, the dude doesn’t deserve it. And even without his trust, you’ll be able to get the information you need from him later (it will just require a little push on your part). Tell Riley the truth–it will end her relationship with Mac for good, but it will further cement your friendship with her. More importantly, you’ll firmly earn her trust and you will need that for later.
Talking To Gabe About Alex’s Past [Mandatory]
On the rooftop, late into the first episode, when confronted with the choice of talking to Gabe about Alex’s past, you’ll have two options. You can talk to Gabe about Alex’s life in foster care or outright reveal to him that she possesses superhuman Empathy powers.
There is no wrong answer here–either choice will improve the relationship between Alex and Gabe as her opening up to him will prove to him that she trusts him. However, there is a branch in the story here. If you tell Gabe about your powers, he will be the first to know about them. Continuing to hide them means that someone else (one of True Colors’ two romance options–Ryan) will be the first to know, ensuring that their relationship with you will be a lot closer (as they will then become the first and only person to know).
This may make it seem like hiding your powers from Gabe is the way to go, especially if you want to romance Ryan, however, telling Gabe about your powers is extraordinarily helpful in getting Alex onto the track of regarding her abilities as more of a superpower than a curse. You’ll be able to get her on this track regardless of what you decide here, but if you want that process to start sooner rather than later, confide in Gabe.
How Alex Feels About Gabe’s Gift [Mandatory]
When Alex admits that she found Gabe’s gift–a guitar–he’ll ask her what she thinks about it. You can have Alex tell him that she felt rusty or that she loves the guitar. Go with the latter choice, especially if you want Alex to fall in love with making music over the course of the story.
2018’s God of War marked a major departure for the franchise, and not just because Kratos saw himself journeying from Greek to Norse mythology. Santa Monica Studio’s acclaimed adventure fundamentally changed many aspects of the experience of playing God of War, from its cinematic, unbroken camera to Kratos’ Leviathan axe to the ever-present Atreus and so much more.
While God of War Ragnarok certainly looks to be building on what came before, its new director Eric Williams is looking to evolve the fundamentals of that memorable experience, while also providing new variety and intrigue for players.
IGN spoke to Williams and Studio Creative Director (and director of GoW 2018) Cory Barlog after the Ragnarok gameplay reveal as part of the PlayStation showcase, and Williams explained some of his philosophy in approaching directing this sequel.
“God of War 2 and Ghost of Sparta are probably the two favorite games that I worked on,” Williams said. “There was a method to both those games, taking the base and then saying, ‘You know what, let’s go deep on fan service. Let’s go big on variety, but not more just to have more. More that was appropriately structured.
“For me being first time [in the director’s chair], I’m going to take the history lessons of the past, and I’m going to use those to try to do that. So in Ragnarok, what we are trying to do specifically with Kratos, we’re trying to give a lot more expressiveness to the player.”
And, no, by “expressiveness,” Williams doesn’t mean giving Kratos more goofy photo mode faces (though I personally wouldn’t be opposed to them). Instead, he was referring to some of the choices around Kratos’ gear, which players had a much greater control over in the 2018 entry as opposed to previous games. He also teased that Atreus, who often served as an aid in combat who had a limited number of follow-up and combo moves he could pull off while players controlled Kratos. “The way [he and Kratos] link up, he’s grown up a little bit, so he’s got a lot more follow-ups and setups for Kratos,” he continued, though he noted the team is equally making sure the suite of enemies players face can match up to these new moves.
“Creatures then obviously need to have tools to go against that, otherwise you’re going to destroy them. So creatures have new things that you’re going to need to think, ‘Oh, I might need to break them down with Atreus first, or do this with Kratos,” Williams noted.
“There’s going to be a little bit more conversation with the enemies with all the new tools. But because you can have different tools, then you have different conversations, so you can kind of push them one way or that way,” he continued [conversation of course not meaning literal discussions but combat strategies], noting that in the way armor had depth in the first of these Norse-based games, other elements should similarly allow for player variety.
Williams also explained that this thought, of evolving and deepening what players experienced before, is also being applied to Ragnarok’s actual world, which will let players visit all Nine Realms whereas God of War 2018 omitted some. And even though Fimbulwinter has begun, players shouldn’t expect to only encounter snowy realms.
“Going to all the Nine Realms, that was big for me making the old new again. Any realm you’ve been to before, because Fimbulwinter has struck, they’re changed in some way. It doesn’t mean that every realm is effected by snow, by the way. I think that’s a misnomer…Fimbulwinter is an event that changes the realms in different ways. Midgard is the cataclysmic epicenter, so it got permafrost, almost if you will.”
But all of the additions the team is making are very methodically intentioned – while the gameplay teases hint at a greater variety than even 2018’s God of War offered, Williams wants to make sure all of these new additions mean something to the experience, using an example from combat that indicates how these additions have wider effects.
“Variety for variety’s sake is not a thing at all [for us].”
“Variety for variety’s sake is not a thing at all [for us]. It’s there to serve what we’re trying to do,” Williams said. “Kratos grappling up the ledge with a chain and then colliding with the enemy and going off [in the new gameplay footage], you couldn’t do things like that [in 2018]. Most of the gameplay last time took place on a plane. Now there’s some verticality to it, but it wasn’t [a thought like], ‘Oh, let’s have him flinging up walls just because.’ [That’s included] because there’s gameplay oriented around it, almost king of the hill-type encounters. So it changes how a player expresses themselves on the battlefield.
“Enemies also, can take advantage of that. So if you’re not paying attention, they’re going to take advantage as well. So it helps again with that conversation that goes through combat.”
Though the gameplay trailer only gives us a tease of what’s to come, it begins to establish how Santa Monica Studio is building on the new combat of 2018 and deepening it further for players. For now, that gameplay will have to suffice as we wait for God of War Ragnarok’s release on PS4 and PS5 in 2022.
Stay tuned to IGN for more from Williams and Barlog.
Jonathon Dornbush is IGN’s Senior Features Editor, PlayStation Lead, and host of Podcast Beyond! He’s the proud dog father of a BOY named Loki. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush.
When a basketball player gets into “the zone,” people say it can feel like time slows to crawl. They can see things before they happen, every little detail about their opponent stands out, and the rim seems to get bigger and more inviting. NBA 2K22 hasn’t quite managed to get me into the zone during my early time playing it so far, but the improved gameplay and breadth of content of this iteration get it closer than it’s been for the past few years. From important changes to how stamina impacts shooting to a City filled with diverse ways to improve your MyPlayer character, 2K22 feels like a breath of fresh air.
With only a day with the PlayStation 5 version under my belt, both I and the community are still in the early stages of learning this latest iteration of NBA 2K. I haven’t put in the hours to learn all its ins-and-outs yet, making it hard to say how it will hold up over time at the moment. However, certain things already stand out about developer Visual Concepts’ latest installment that are exciting for me as a long-time player.
NBA 2K22 has made some important tweaks to the on-court action that help make it play like a more realistic game, most noticeably how it handles stamina loss while dribbling. In 2K21, it was easy to run at a defender on the perimeter, hit a Curry slide, and drain a three without breaking a sweat. Against the CPU, that tactic was almost undefendable, especially in MyTeam where player cards were quickly made ridiculously overpowered. With 2K22, you can still employ tactics like that, but the stamina loss you suffer from sprinting and doing dribble moves is made much more significant to balance out its effectiveness.
Managing fatigue leads to a playstyle that feels closer to real-life than 2K21 ever did.
As your player gets more tired their shot meter will shrink, making it tougher to hit shots. That leads to a game that initially seems slow compared to 2K21 – but if you play under more control and don’t just hold that sprint button, you’ll actually have an easier time putting the ball into the bucket because of your larger shot meter. It may not seem like an important change at first, but it leads to a playstyle that feels closer to real life than 2K21 ever did.
On top of that, I’ve noticed some of the more problematic legacy issues not popping up as much. Things like bump steals aren’t gone completely, but I certainly haven’t seen them happening as much as last year. That could, of course, all change as players get more familiar with 2K22, but for now, I’m happy to see Visual Concepts taking steps to iron out some of those more annoying tactics. There are still quite a few instances of weird animations that took me out of the experience, but those too are lessened from previous years.
I’m happy to see Visual Concepts taking steps to iron out some of those more annoying tactics.
Improved gameplay doesn’t mean much if you don’t have good places to take advantage of it, but fortunately, so far Visual Concepts seems to have provided plenty of things to do throughout its selection of modes. I’ve spent most of my early time playing in MyTeam and MyCareer, and they’re both full of options like the new multiplayer options in MyTeam and the increased variety of off-the-court activities in MyCareer. MyTeam, in particular, has so many options if you’re looking to grind toward your dream team, be that playing with the world’s best current NBA superstars or legends of the past. Unfortunately, its lackluster multiplayer options don’t follow suit.
Unlimited and Limited modes are back with basically no changes. That means most players will probably never sniff the top tiers of Unlimited rewards and Limited continues to be a luck fest in terms of rewards. Visual Concepts has also changed Triple Threat Online to something it’s calling “The 100.” You start the mode with 100 points, and after each game your opponent’s score will be subtracted from that total as you work your way up the prize board until you hit zero points. That could’ve been a great casual option since you’re guaranteed to at least make it to the second tier on the prize board. But, in practice, it’s unrewarding compared to the single-player modes for casual players and more annoying for dedicated players who will now have to struggle to get to the top tier of the board much more than in previous years.
The new Draft mode looks interesting.
The new Draft mode looks interesting and will hopefully make up for those multiplayer shortcomings, but I haven’t had time to play much of it yet. If you’re looking to get into MyTeam, I would definitely focus on the single-player content during your early days and then go online afterward if you want to.
On the MyPlayer front, Visual Concepts gives players tons of interesting things to do in NBA 2K22. From the jump, you can run around The City, completing quests and meeting NPCs… like Jake from State Farm. It’s a very silly world where your soon-to-be pro baller can just skateboard around to his heart’s content (complete with ludicrous skating physics), go to the gym for some weightlifting mini-games, and then get in a 3-on-3 game against other elite players. The story mode seems a bit scaled back compared to last year so far, but I’m still early and it’s impossible to say how some of the off-the-court action will impact the mode.
After spending a little over a day with it, NBA 2K22 is at least shaping up to be a firm step in the right direction following a disappointing 2K21 release. I am still early in my time playing, so my thoughts could easily change as I learn more about what has or hasn’t changed, but I’m hopeful that the gameplay tweaks I’ve already come to love and all of the different options Visual Concepts has given me to take advantage of them will stand up over time. Check back next week for the full review and score.
Marvel’s live-action New Warriors comedy series featuring Squirrel Girl was cancelled because it was “too gay,” according to the series’ showrunner.
As reported by Gizmodo, former New Warriors showrunner, Kevil Biegel, tweeted out three behind-the-scenes images of Milana Vayntrub’s Doreen Green, aka Squirrel Girl. Naturally, that tweet was quickly deleted, but Gizmodo was able to take a screenshot of the photos before Biegel took them down.
Biegel also tweeted a brief explanation as to why the show was cancelled, citing that it was “too gay.”
“A SINGULAR power that be killed the show,” Biegel reportedly wrote in a now-deleted tweet chain, according to Gizmodo. “Because it was too gay. A rich, straight, Brentwood turd. He got fired for being vile at his company. We, on the other hand, live.”
Other tweets made by Biegel, which also have been deleted, allege that New Warriors was cancelled by a homophobic executive that took aim at the show for being “very, very proudly gay.” Biegel did not reveal who that executive was, but the former showrunner did clarify that it was not Jeph Loeb, who left Marvel when the studio closed its Marvel Television arm.
The three photos posted by Biegel overnight show Vayntrub (who you might recognize from those AT&T commercials) standing in what appears to be a studio space wearing a Doreen Green outfit with a large squirrel tail prosthetic attached to her backside. Another photo shows Vayntrub with a puppet of Tippy-Toe, who is Squirrel Girls’ real-life squirrel sidekick, on her shoulder.
The third photo was artwork from the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl comic run helmed by Erica Henderson, Rico Renzi, and Ryan North, according to Gizmodo.
