Batman and Fortnite are teaming up again, but they’re moving out of the video game and onto the pages of DC Comics. On April 20, the first issue of the six-part miniseries Batman/Fortnite: Zeropoint arrives from the comic book publisher.
Fortnite players will have a big reason to pick up this comic: in-game bonuses, starting with the Rebirth Harley Quinn Outfit–which you can see below. If you buy all six issues of the comic and input the codes, you’ll unlock the Armored Batman Zero Outfit for your Fortnite character.
Images from DC Comics
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DC Universe Infinite subscribers will receive all the issues for the mini-series for free–and that also includes the Fortnite codes. Each issue of the comic will sell for $5, with a card stock variant going for $6.
The upcoming tale finds Batman being sucked through a rift in Gotham City, which lands him in the world of Fortnite. Fighting in an endless loop and trying to recall his past, the Dark Knight will see some familiar faces: Renegade Raider, Fishstick, Bandolier, and more. Batman will uncover truths about the island within the new limited series.
Zero Point will be written by Christos Gage with Epic CCO Donald Mustard working alongside him as story and concept consultant. Reilly Brown, Christian Duce, Nelson DeCastro, and John Kalisz will provide the art on the series.
“When DC first approached me about doing a Batman/Fortnite series, I thought it would be a lot of fun,” said Gage. “After speaking with Donald [Mustard] and discovering just how deeply we’d be diving into the secrets behind the world of Fortnite, I was amazed! This series will reveal things about Fortnite that have never been seen or heard before yet are very much part of the canon of the game.”
Thus far, it’s hard to view Google Stadia as a success. The streaming service has failed to attract a large audience, and Google recently stopped first-party game development a little over a year after the service officially launched, leaving multiplatform games to fill out its library and putting its lifespan in question. This is despite spending a substantial amount of cash out of the gate to scoop up big-name games.
According to a new report from Bloomberg, Stadia boss Phil Harrison–who previously held executive positions at both Sony and Microsoft–wanted to make a big splash by paying “tens of millions of dollars” for games such as Red Dead Redemption 2 on the platform. It was a very bullish decision that, paired with exclusive games from its internal studios, would have given Google a path toward success with Stadia.
Harrison was part of the PlayStation at Xbox teams at arguably their lowest moments. While working as an executive for SCE Worldwide Studios, the PS3 launched and struggled with a high price point and lackluster exclusives early on. As Corporate VP at Microsoft, he was a leader for the Xbox brand in Europe when the Xbox One launched with a similar thud.
Wired was also told that Harrison wasn’t being transparent with the developers at Stadia Games and Entertainment. Just days before announcing the division was shuttering, Harrison had praised the developers for the work they had been doing.
Stadia’s business model is also different from some of its competitors, including Microsoft’s xCloud, which may affect its ability to attract those already familiar with consoles. With an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, you can play many games on a console via download or on the go via streaming. Those interested in the former already have access to the latter, meaning they don’t have to be pitched on the viability or even the performance of the latter. It also gives users access to all new first-party Xbox games without needing to purchase them, and that’s something Stadia can’t match without its own development teams.
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Rumors were swirling that The Pokemon Company would unveil remakes of Pokemon Diamond and Pearl as part of its Pokemon 25th anniversary celebration–and sure enough, we got our first look at Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl during the February 2021 Pokemon Presents stream. That the remakes are indeed coming is not in itself surprising; The Pokemon Company has been steadily remaking older entries in the series, and Diamond and Pearl were the next in line to be modernized. What was surprising, however, is the approach being taken with the Diamond and Pearl remakes.
The Pokemon Company stressed that Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are “faithful” remakes, and they certainly look as much. The games deliberately invoke the aesthetic of the original DS titles. Not only do they retain the classic top-down perspective, but characters and other overworld elements also have the same squat proportions as they do in the originals, which makes Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl look more like touched-up versions of the DS games rather than full-fledged updates.
This is in stark contrast to the approach Pokemon developer Game Freak has taken to previous remakes. Each time the studio has remade an older pair of Pokemon games, it has updated them to modern standards. Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen modernized the original Gen 1 games in the style of Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire; HeartGold and SoulSilver updated the Gen 2 games in the vein of Diamond and Pearl; and Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire made over the Gen 3 games to match Pokemon X and Y.
Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl buck this trend. Rather than reimagining the games in the style of Sword and Shield, as many fans undoubtedly expected, developer Ilca (with longtime Pokemon director Junichi Masuda) is leaning in on nostalgia and sticking closely to the look and feel of the original Diamond and Pearl. While this is new for the Pokemon series, it’s reminiscent of the approach Nintendo and Grezzo took with Switch’s Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening remake. That game was likewise a faithful recreation of the original Game Boy title. The visuals and controls were updated, but the feel and aesthetic were retained, resulting in a modernized take on the classic.
Interestingly, this wasn’t the only clear Zelda parallel on display. Pokemon Legends: Arceus, the other new project announced during the February Pokemon Presents broadcast, evokes another Zelda game, Breath of the Wild, with its sweeping shots of sprawling, wide-open environments. The link–to continue the Zelda metaphor–that ties the new Pokemon games together is the Sinnoh region, which serves as the setting in both Legends and Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl. Juxtaposed, they present an interesting set of companion games–one lovingly revisiting the past, the other charting an entirely new path for the series.
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl launch for Switch in late 2021, while Pokemon Legends: Arceus is slated to release in early 2022. You can read more about the titles in our roundup of all the biggest news from the Pokemon Presents stream.
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Nintendo announced remakes of Pokemon Diamond and Pearl in its 25th-anniversary stream today: Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will release later this year on Nintendo Switch. The Gen 4 remake games have been on many Pokemon fans’ wishlists for years, offering a chance to go back to the Sinnoh region and start a new adventure with Turtwig, Chimchar, or Piplup. Though an exact release date hasn’t been announced, Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are already up for preorder at Best Buy, and other listings will likely appear soon.
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl preorder bonuses
No preorder bonuses have been announced for Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl yet. We’ll include that information here when available.
As of right now, preorders for Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are only available through Best Buy, which isn’t showing the covers on the listing yet.
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are not being developed by Game Freak but rather Ilca, which also worked on Pokemon Home. However, Game Freak’s Junichi Masuda, who directed the original games, is returning as director on the remakes alongside Ilca’s Yuichi Ueda.
The Gen 4 remakes have an adorable chibi art style with squat characters, though in battle, the Pokemon trainers will appear in a more realistically proportioned form. According to Nintendo, these are “faithful remakes” of the 2007 games, and “the sense of scale of the original games’ towns and routes has been carefully preserved.”
In addition to the reveal of Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, Nintendo announced Pokemon Legends Arceus, an open-world adventure also set in the Sinnoh region. Though it releases in early 2022, that game is also available to preorder now.
AMC Networks chief operating officer Ed Carroll announced on an earnings call that the sixth and final season of the Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul is “likely” to return in 2022. According to The Hollywood Reporter, this information was mentioned in passing while discussing other network business–though it is no small bit of intel.
Season 5 of Better Call Saul aired its finale in April 2020, which at a glance even folks who aren’t fans can deduce meant the series was heading immediately into delays due to COVID-19. In a Deadline virtual event taking place in August of that year, series co-creator Peter Gould shared, “We were hoping to go into production by the end of the year. It doesn’t seem likely that it’s going to happen with the situation that we are in.”
Even if the coronavirus pandemic hadn’t broken out, it was entirely possible for Better Call Saul would have followed its predecessor Breaking Bad’s trajectory in tackling its final season. Season 5 of Breaking Bad was split into two parts, each consisting of eight episodes–the first eight premiered in July 2012, and the second premiered in August 2013. As Gould and his co-creator partner Vince Gilligan have remarked many times on both series’ companion podcasts, the most important resource on their shows isn’t money, it’s time. But ultimately, delays hopefully mean a better product in the end.
Better Call Saul star Bob Odenkirk, meanwhile, has an upcoming action movie, Nobody. As with Better Call Saul, this film has endured many delays. Nobody’s current, fourth, and recently announced release date is March 26.
A brand-new spin on the Pokemon franchise is coming to Nintendo Switch in early 2022. Announced during the latest Pokemon Presents presentation, Pokemon Legends Arceus is an open-world RPG set in the Sinnoh region. While we don’t know much about the game just yet, diehard Pokemon fans can already preorder Pokemon Legends Arceus.
Pokemon Legends Arceus is available to preorder at Best Buy for $60. No preorder bonuses have been revealed, but retailers tend to offer unique bonuses for Nintendo Switch exclusives.
Pokemon Legends Arceus is set in a much earlier time period than the mainline entries. You play as a Pokemon trainer who is compiling Sinnoh’s first Pokedex. Sinnoh’s Pokemon Professor has brought three Pokemon to Sinnoh–Rowlet, Cyndaquil, and Oshawott–and you get to choose one of them as your partner Pokemon. From there, you head off on an adventure to survey and catch Pokemon. The legendary Pokemon at the center of the story is, of course, Arceus, who is described as an “Alpha Pokemon.”
Pokemon can be caught in one of two ways in Pokemon Legends Arceus. You can track them and lob a Poke Ball, or you can engage in traditional turn-based combat by sending your Pokemon into battle. It’s unclear at this time if you’ll face off against other trainers, but Sinnoh looks a lot more calm than normal, so it could be somewhat of a leisurely adventure. The visuals look like Pokemon Sword and Shield, while the world has a Breath of the Wild vibe.
The first teaser trailer for Netflix’s Shadow and Bone has arrived, and IGN gave fans an exclusive inside look at the epic new fantasy series as part of IGN Fan Fest. Shadow and Bone is based on author Leigh Bardugo’s bestselling series of “Grishaverse” novels, which have sold more than 2.5 million copies worldwide to date.
IGN exclusively revealed the first teaser trailer from the series as part of an in-depth panel and Q&A with Bardugo, showrunner Eric Heisserer, and cast members Jessie Mei Li, Ben Barnes, Archie Renaux, Freddy Carter, Amita Suman, and Kit Young, uniting the cast and producers for their first public interview about the show.
Watch the cast and creators react to the Shadow and Bone teaser trailer and break down the biggest moments in the video below:
Here’s how Netflix describes the ambitious new series: “Shadow and Bone finds us in a war-torn world where lowly soldier and orphan Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li) has just unleashed an extraordinary power that could be the key to setting her country free. With the monstrous threat of the Shadow Fold looming, Alina is torn from everything she knows to train as part of an elite army of magical soldiers known as Grisha. But as she struggles to hone her power, she finds that allies and enemies can be one and the same and that nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. There are dangerous forces at play, including a crew of charismatic criminals, and it will take more than magic to survive.”
Warning: This article contains spoilers for WandaVision Episode 8!
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The conclusion of WandaVision is fast approaching, and Episode 8 just gave us a taste of the epic battle to come. “Previously On” ends with a mid-credits sequence featuring SWORD Director Hayward activating a copy of Vision, one who looks just like our favorite Synthezoid but for one key difference – he’s all white.
If you were reading Marvel’s Avengers comics in the ’80s or have ever played a round of Captain America and the Avengers in the arcade, you probably recognize this unusual look for Vision. But if you’re not familiar with the difference between White Vision and the usual green, yellow and orange version, here’s a quick breakdown of how the series is drawing on the source material.
Vision’s white costume dates back to a 1989 storyline called Avengers West Coast: Vision Quest. There, Vision’s body is completely dismantled, forcing Hank Pym to attempt to put him back together. While Pym is able to physically reassemble the Synthezoid (minus his damaged skin), restoring his artificial mind proves to be an impossible task. There’s no way of recovering Vision’s memories. Worse, Vision was originally reprogrammed by the Avengers using the brain patterns of Wonder Man. Wonder Man refuses to allow his mind to be copied a second time.
The result is that Vision is reborn with none of the memories or latent humanity that made him who he was. He’s a cold, unfeeling android – a literal blank slate. His new white costume reflects that transformation, retaining the basic shapes and designs of the original but eliminating all traces of color. That new look was immortalized on the cover of The West Coast Avengers #45, a tribute to Vision’s first appearance in 1968’s The Avengers #57.
The West Coast Avengers #45 cover by John Byrne. (Image Credit: Marvel)
White Vision in the MCU
Obviously, there are a lot of differences between the comic book and MCU incarnations of Vision. For one thing, the MCU version has no connection to Wonder Man (a character who has yet to make a true appearance in this universe). The MCU Vision is instead built on a foundation of Tony Stark’s old AI unit JARVIS and given life via the Mind Stone.
Still, we can assume this new, white version of Vision is heavily inspired by the one introduced in Vision Quest. As we’ve learned over the course of the series, Hayward and his SWORD agents have been busy trying to rebuild and weaponize Vision, likely out of the same paranoia that once motivated Tony to “build a suit of armor around the world.” But Episode 8 makes it clear the original Vision is well and truly dead. Even the one who’s been appearing in the series up till now seems to be nothing more than an echo built on Wanda’s memories. It makes sense that, without a functioning Mind Stone or access to Tony’s old files, whatever climbs off that laboratory table is going to be a pale imitation of the real thing. This is a crude facsimile of Vision, one who possesses all of his powers but none of his warmth and humanity.
This being an MCU project, we’re almost surely going to see the two Visions battle it out in the series finale. The question is which of them will emerge in the end, assuming they aren’t both destroyed in the ensuing chaos. The series has hinted the regular Vision physically can’t exist outside the boundaries of Westview (which makes more sense in light of these new revelations). There may be no escaping this surreal prison Wanda has constructed. Even if Vision 2.0 is treated as an antagonist in the series finale, he may go on to have a longer arc in Phase 4 and beyond. Just as the comic book version of Vision fought a long, uphill battle to rebuild his mind and push past his white costume phase, this Vision copy may struggle to become more than just an unfeeling weapon of SWORD. And who knows, maybe we’ll finally meet the MCU’s Wonder Man along the way.
Director Neill Blomkamp has announced on Twitter that a District 10 screenplay is being co-written by himself, Sharlto Copley, and Terri Tatchell. The trio have previously collaborated on 2015’s Chappie and this upcoming film’s predecessor, 2009’s District 9.
Beyond this terse, although incredibly exciting and highly anticipated bit of information, literally nothing else is yet known about the film–which makes sense, since it obviously hasn’t been written yet. District 9, which was an adaptation from Blomkamp’s 2006 short film Alive in Joburg, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and was widely praised by fans and critics alike for its nuanced exploration of humanity, xenophobia, and social segregation. In 2009, District 9took in roughly $210.8 million at the box office.
For those who might have missed it at the time, District 9’s official synopsis is as follows: “Violence ensues after an extraterrestrial race forced to live in slum-like conditions on Earth finds a kindred spirit in a government agent exposed to their biotechnology.” In 2021, the notion of a foreign contaminant causing a national health crisis takes on a greater significance for audiences and creators alike, so in a way it makes sense this news is coming out after the coronavirus has had such an impact.
Demonic, an upcoming supernatural horror film written and directed by Blomkamp, will be the director’s next released project. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Demonic will have its virtual premiere at the 71st Berlin International Film Festival in March.
