Wolfenstein: Youngblood’s Levels Have “A Lot Of Similarities” To Dishonored

Wolfenstein: Youngblood continues the rebooted Wolfenstein story, but transitions the narrative away from series’ stalwart BJ Blazkowicz in favor of his twin daughters, Jessica and Sophia. A different set of protagonists isn’t the only change being implemented in Youngblood though. The game is also leaving behind the fairly straightforward structure of previous Wolfenstein games for a more open-ended Dishonored approach.

“I think players will see a lot of similarities to level design in the Dishonored games, so in that sense it can be a little bit different as an experience but it can be for the benefit of the game, especially when it comes to finding different ways of approaching a combat scenario or a mission in general,” Youngblood executive producer Jerk Gustafsson told Official PlayStation Magazine.

“Regarding game length, it’s hard to say,” MachineGames senior producer John Jennings wrote in a Reddit AMA. “We’re doing a much more open-ended/branching gameplay structure on this one so, while there’s a golden path to finish the main story, if you want to play all of the side missions you’re easily looking at a length more similar to [Wolfenstein: The New Order or Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus] than [Wolfenstein: The Old Blood].”

In that same AMA, Jennings also spoke about how it was to work with Arkane Studios, the developer behind Dishonored, Dishonored 2, and Dishonored: Death of the Outsider. “It was great working with [Arkane]; they’re a really awesome team,” Jennings wrote. “We certainly learned some things from them and I’d like to think they learned some things from us too. It’s really nice being part of the Zenimax/Bethesda family; there are so many studios you can talk to and share experiences with. Our past collaborations have been mostly with [id Software] in the past though, so it’s been great to work with Arkane directly for the first time.”

During the AMA, Jennings also spoke about game development crunch culture, and how MachineGames is trying to eliminate it. Wolfenstein: Youngblood is expected to launch this July for Xbox One, PS4, Switch, and PC. Pre-ordering the Youngblood Deluxe Edition nets you a pretty nice bonus, allowing you to more easily play through the campaign’s optional co-op mode with a friend without needing to buy two copies of the game.

Game Of Thrones Episode 5: Everyone Missed This Massive Hint At How Dany Might Die

With Daenerys Targaryen gone full Mad Queen in Game of Thrones Season 8, Episode 5, “The Bells,” the question on everybody’s mind is simple: Who can possibly stop the Dragon Queen in the show’s final episode ever?

Will Arya kill Dany, fulfilling the final part of Melisandre’s “brown eyes, green eyes, blue eyes” prediction? (Dany should have purple eyes, based on the books, but actress Emilia Clarke’s eyes are, indeed, green.) Will Jon kill Dany for her crimes during the Fall of King’s Landing, and assume his rightful role as king? Or will something more surprising happen–a twist, involving Varys and his little birds, that seems extremely likely in light of some quiet scenes early on in Episode 5?

Here’s what everybody missed as we became absorbed in Varys’s execution, Dany’s massacre of the smallfolk, and Cleganebowl (the hype was real): Varys and his young spy, Martha, were actively trying to poison Dany before she cut his scheming short.

In the episode’s opening scene, Varys was very clearly writing letters explaining Jon Snow’s true identity, presumably to send to everyone with a pair of eyeballs in Westeros in order to justify Jon seizing the throne. Although he’s still doing this later in the episode when Grey Worm comes for him, it’s unclear whether he actually sent any ravens–if he did, it happened offscreen. My money’s on yes, but that’s beside the point, for now.

When one of Varys’s “little birds,” Martha, enters the room, they have a brief exchange in which Martha tells Varys that “she won’t eat” (“she” presumably being Dany), and Varys replies that they’ll “try again at supper.” Martha believes Dany’s soldiers are watching her, and Varys attempts to reassure the little girl by reminding her that big risks garner big rewards. At the end of the scene, Varys sends Martha back to the kitchen, where she apparently works.

“The greater the risk, the greater the reward.” What’s a bigger risk than attempting to poison the Targaryen queen?

It’s a very Varys-like move; the Master of Whispers is always plotting, and frankly, his arc this season has felt uncharacteristically dumb. His plan was to approach Jon and Tyrion directly, and if they didn’t go for it, he’d just die? That’s not the Spider we used to know. But openly defying the queen–a classic, if risky, misdirect–while he secretly plots to poison her from the shadows? Now that’s more fitting.

That isn’t all, though–there’s one other scene that hints at the poison plot, and might even give us a clue to how Dany will go down in the finale.

No Caption Provided

When Varys hears Grey Worm and the Unsullied marching down the hall toward his room, he burns the letter he was writing–and removes his rings. The camera lingers in an extreme close-up as he twists one briefly, pulls it off, and drops it into an empty chalice on his desk. The rest soon follow.

This could be nothing, or it could be everything: When Olenna Tyrell poisoned Joffrey at his wedding, she plucked the poison–appropriately dubbed “the strangler”–from Sansa’s necklace, which had been given to her by the fool Dontos at Littlefinger’s behest, and dropped the false crystal into Joffrey’s cup, where it presumably dissolved and became undetectable.

No Caption Provided

Zooming in on Varys’s rings and brightening up the image doesn’t reveal any conspicuous blue crystals. In fact, the ring we get the best look at seems to have represented Varys’s loyalty to the Targaryen queen–it appears to be this ring from jewelry retailer Mey’s official partnership with the show. The retailer calls it an “allegiance ring,” and their site claims that Varys, Tyrion, Jorah, and Grey Worm have all worn one since Season 7. It was designed to look like a dragon spine. In taking it off, Varys is symbolically shedding the symbol of his loyalty to Daenerys.

But Varys is still loyal to Jon, who he now knows is also a Targaryen. Even though we didn’t see the obvious blue poison crystal as Varys removed all his rings, the show seemed to focus on their removal just long enough that it might be important in the finale. That scullery maid, Martha, may still be skulking around, after all, and her master’s death at Dany’s hands could inspire her to continue attempting to carry out his final wish: To see the Dragon Queen dead, no matter the method.

Just in case, I’ll be watching out for any sign of Martha in Game of ThronesSeason 8 finale.

Photo: HBO/Helen Sloan

Game Of Thrones Episode 5, Season 8: 15 Easter Eggs And References You Might Have Missed

Monster Hunter World Helped Dauntless Grow

Dauntless, an action-RPG of the cooperative monster-slaying genre, has been in the works since before we even knew Monster Hunter World existed. Developer Phoenix Labs was hoping to inhabit a space that the core Monster Hunter series had previously never been: the PC.

So when Capcom revealed that Monster Hunter World would be coming to PC after all, you might assume that the king of the genre would end up cannibalizing some of Dauntless’s players, and maybe curb interest in the lesser known competitor entirely. It turns out that World’s massive success has actually had the opposite effect.

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Pokémon Detective Pikachu Director on How Mewtwo Connects to Kanto

While on the surface Pokémon Detective Pikachu appears to take place in its own corner of the Pokémon universe, one key line opens up a whole world of connections.

Warning: full SPOILERS for Pokémon Detective Pikachu ahead!

Detective Pikachu may take place mostly in Leaventown and Ryme City, but the movie also includes a line of dialogue that confirms it exists in the same world as Kanto. While talking about Mewtwo, Dr. Laurent says they caught the most powerful Pokémon of all which had escaped from Kanto 20 years ago. Kanto is the region where the first generation of Pokémon games (Red, Blue and Yellow) take place, as well as where Ash Ketchum starts his journey to become a Pokémon master with his trusty Pikachu.

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Dauntless PS4, Xbox One Release Date Announced

Dauntless is being released on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC through the Epic Games store on May 21. Originally, Dauntless was set to launch on consoles in April, but was pushed back to Summer. The free-to-play action-RPG is set to release on Nintendo Switch and mobile later this year.

Though Dauntless has received major updates in preparation for the console release, the brand new character customization system launching on May 21 is especially noteworthy. It’s a lot more involved than the ancestry system currently in place. This new customization menu can be accessed at any time, too, giving existing players a chance to change up their look. Check out the video of the new character creator below we captured during our hands-on demo with the new Dauntless build on the Xbox One X.

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10 Minutes Of Dauntless Crossplay Boss Fights

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Saga Of Tanya The Evil – The Movie Review: The True End To Season 1

Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie is a bit of an outlier when it comes to anime films, as most that are based off of an existing series either exist within an unimportant narrative vacuum, or are condensed recaps of plots that already played out on the small screen. This is not the case for Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie, as it is a direct continuation to the anime’s first season. This works in the movie’s favor, as the assumption that viewers know what’s going on allows the film to focus on telling a brand-new story. And though the movie feels a bit bloated with secondary characters, the main cast deliver a satisfying follow-up to Saga of Tanya the Evil Season 1.

In Saga of Tanya the Evil, after being killed, a random salaryman encounters a mysterious voice that demands the man refer to it as God. The man refuses to put his faith into someone he’s never met and decides to call the voice Being X instead. Believing the man would turn to God if he were to lead a life filled with suffering first, Being X reincarnates the salary worker as a girl named Tanya Degurechaff in a world that closely resembles Earth in the early 1900s. Born in the world’s version of Germany, and noticing world events are closely following the history of Earth, Tanya joins the military when she turns nine years old and sets her sights on ending the conflicts that are beginning to pop up before they escalate into what she knows will be World War I. Being X warns Tanya that the only way she’ll be spared eternity in hell is if she dies by natural causes or accepts Being X as God.

Following a rather cryptic opening–that the film could have really done without, as it adds nothing to the overall plot–Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie picks up seconds after the anime series’ rather abrupt cliffhanger ending. The movie feels like the missing piece to Season 1, as it neatly wraps up the final plot point of the season before hinting at the next big arc. The film delivers the showdown between Tanya and Mary Sue–the daughter of a man who Tanya killed–that Season 1 heavily implied was imminent, and also sees Tanya’s goals change as a result. Realizing her home country’s government is flawed and that World War I is inevitable, she begins influencing her country’s leaders in hopes of preventing anything like what transpired in Earth’s Germany during the 1900s. It’s a satisfying conclusion to the first decade of Tanya’s life in this fantasy world she finds herself trapped in, while also setting the scene for her new role in the military.

Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie contains no recap, so newcomers might be lost–especially since there is no explanation as to who Being X is. That doesn’t matter too much, though. Chances are, if you’re watching this movie, you’ve seen the original series. And the movie uses that fact to its advantage, playing off those expectations that something terrible will befall Tanya at any moment. Tanya’s greatest ambition is to free herself from Being X, so it’s unnerving to not feel its god-like presence in the first half of the film. There’s a palpable tension in that first half, as things are going almost too well for Tanya.

But that all changes with the introduction of Mary Sue, and her and Tanya’s new rivalry becomes the focus of the movie’s second half. Tanya meets her match in her newfound adversary, especially after Mary’s love of God and desire to always see justice fulfilled is twisted into vengeful hatred upon realizing Tanya is the one who killed her father. Mary’s descent into animalistic fury is the first time Saga of Tanya the Evil has introduced a character who’s more monstrous than Tanya, and Mary wields Being X’s power against the nine-year-old with violent force. Tanya gets to witness, for the first time, how her own influence can bring out the deranged madness of those around her.

Being X may have given Mary the power to take her revenge, but he hasn’t affected her mind like those who’ve stood against Tanya before. Mary is an enemy that Tanya created through her actions alone, and she realizes–in one of the few moments of humility for the character–that she must grow as a person if she hopes to avoid her own destruction and spare being sent to hell by Being X. The country she protects will have to change too. It’s a startling moment of maturity for her character, and it influences her actions in the movie’s final moments–setting up what could be an intriguing next arc.

Admittedly, it isn’t much growth, and that’s thanks in large part to the movie’s insistence on devoting screentime to the minor characters that make up Tanya’s battalion, Mary’s squad, the headquarters of their respective armies, and one-and-done villains. There are way too many secondary characters, and the movie spends too much of its time justifying the inclusion of each one, referring back during important narrative moments to names and faces that have seconds of screen time and little introduction.

When the movie stops worrying about the side characters and focuses on Tanya or Mary instead, the best parts of the story come through. The two characters act as foils for each other, and watching their conflicting ideologies and personalities escalate their initially modest back-and-forths into a magic-fueled aerial dogfight is one of the best parts of the movie.

But even before the two come to blows, both women sell the movie with smaller, quiet moments. Tanya’s predicament–being an arrogant and cruel adult trapped in a little girl’s body–leads to several humorous moments. She’ll mock her subordinates in one scene and ask them for a step stool so she can see the battle plans on a table in the next. Mary has some pretty good moments too, especially the ones where hints of the growing darkness inside her leak out, breaking the facade that she’s the perfect girl everyone believes her to be.

The movie has plenty of action scenes. Tanya’s story is clearly more of the focus, but several battles play out across the film’s hour and a half runtime. Most aren’t great, with static figures shooting at the enemy while goofing off and talking to their teammates. Tanya and Mary’s final fight, however, is the best Saga of Tanya the Evil has ever looked. Both women are carefully animated to showcase the speed of their aerial ballet, and their faces twist in both fury and exhaustion as they each become more frantic in their desire to kill each other. And as gruesome as it is, the movie does a good job of showing the violent details that comes with a rifle splintering a rib or breaking an arm. There’s so much movement to their duel, conveying how both women are on a completely different level of skill in comparison to those around them.

Ultimately, Saga of Tanya the Evil – The Movie is a good time. Provided you’ve watched Season 1 of the anime, the movie is a satisfying continuation to one person’s desperate struggle to one-up a god by ending a worldwide war, only for her to learn the price for her hubris. It introduces far too many characters to keep track of, though, opens on a scene that definitely didn’t need to be included, and squanders most of its battles with incessant chit-chat from all those involved. But watching Tanya outsmart her opponents with sadistic glee is enjoyable fun, and her final fight with Mary is the best the anime has ever looked.

Get a Switch Pro Controller for the Lowest Price Ever

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Deals on Nintendo Switch don’t come around very often. That’s probably because the hybrid console is flying off the shelves at every retailer that stocks it. However, if you’ve been waiting for a deal to buy a Switch, you can find two options at Walmart right now. As a bonus, many of the best Switch games happen to be on sale now as well. Basically, it’s a good time to buy a Nintendo Switch.

Save 18% on a Switch Pro Controller

The Best Cheap Gaming Monitors

Be sure to visit IGN Tech for all the latest comprehensive hands-on reviews and best-of roundups. Note that if you click on one of these links to buy the product, IGN may get a share of the sale. For more, read our Terms of Use.

The right gaming monitor can elevate your PC gaming experience, and you don’t need to spend a ton of money to do it. Whether you’re looking to compliment your shiny new gaming PC rig or just looking for an inexpensive update to an existing system, this guide will help you navigate the dizzying array of choices.

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