The Fantastic Four are a bit of a hot button issue over in the MCU these days, thanks largely to the mysterious Phase 4 and the recent Disney buyout of 20th Century Fox placing the team’s film rights back in the potential MCU lineup. But the comics are, thankfully, a different story. After their triumphant return from their extended post-Secret Wars absence, the F4 have been holding down their own ongoing series and reestablishing themselves as Marvel’s first family.
And there’s more on the way. Announced earlier today, Marvel will be publishing a brand-new “special series” centered around the Fantastic Four created by Gerry Dugan and Greg Smallwood called Fantastic Four: Yancy Street. Set within the main continuity of the Marvel Universe and following events laid out in their current ongoing book, Yancy Street will be a chance for the team to explore their own history and relationships with one another as they settle back into their old neighborhood.
In the spirit of last year’s Web Of Venom special series, Yancy Street will be a series of quarterly specials that afford the team the time and space to deal with some of their classic villains and settings in the spirit of their originators, Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. The first issue will feature The Thing pitted against vintage villains, The Terrible Trio.
Created back in 1961, the Fantastic Four were Marvel’s first official superhero team, pre-dating both the X-Men and the Avengers. A team of scientists and friends exposed to mysterious extra-dimensional radiation that gave them fantastic (get it?) powers, Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Woman, The Human Torch, and The Thing remain some of Marvel’s most beloved and well-recognized superheroes to this day. Their current ongoing series was launched in 2018.
Fantastic Four: Yancy Street #1 hits shelves on August 21.
While it was controversial with series fans from the moment it was announced, DmC: Devil May Cry was largely well-received by critics. Positive review scores aren’t the only beacon of good fortune for the divisive entry in the hack ‘n’ slash franchise, however, as Hideaki Itsuno, the director of multiple Devil May Cry titles, would love a sequel.
According to a report from USGamer, Itsuno–who’s worked also worked on multiple other Capcom games including Power Stone, Capcom Vs. SNK 2, and Dragon’s Dogma–would have no problem with a DmC 2. But there’s a catch: for Itsuno, British developer Ninja Theory has to be on the project again. Otherwise, as Capcom producer Matt Walker added, “It wouldn’t be DmC without Ninja Theory.”
“On the dev side we certainly wanted to and thought we would work with Ninja Theory again to create a sequel to DmC, but that unfortunately didn’t get off the ground,” said Itsuno, who expressed interest in a sequel.
Walker agreed with the sentiment, saying, “We’d still love to see a sequel, but we think it absolutely has to be made by Ninja Theory–so much of the amazing style and substance in that game was only possible because they have such a knack for what’s cool.”
Apart from DmC, Ninja Theory is most known for developing action games such as Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, Heavenly Sword, and the critically-acclaimed Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice (which recently made the jump to Nintendo Switch). Ninja Theory was acquired by Microsoft and folded into the company’s Xbox Game Studios in 2018, meaning if a DmC sequel were to happen, it’d require Microsoft’s blessing to be multiplatform or end up an Xbox and PC exclusive.
In our DmC: Definitive Edition review, we said that the “numerous tweaks and upgrades of DmC: Devil May Cry Definitive Edition have made a game that isn’t just a better version of DmC, but a bonafide hack ‘n’ slash classic.”
While a DmC 2 may not be in the works any time soon, fans of the action franchise recently got Devil May Cry 5 to tide them over, which we awarded a 9/10.
Ghost Recon Breakpoint is this month’s IGN First, and earlier this week we kicked things off with an in-depth look at its cave hideout that doubles as an online social hub. Today, we’re bringing you a conversation with some of the leading minds behind both Breakpoint and the Ghost Recon franchise for a look back at how Breakpoint has evolved the series.
Watch the video above to hear about how and why Ghost Recon has changed over the years and what Breakpoint is doing differently from Wildlands. Be sure to check out our hands-on preview here and read our exclusive details about its social hub too, and we’ll be back with even more Breakpoint as part of our IGN First next week.
Comedian and Saturday Night Live veteran Chris Rock is set to produce a spin-off of the Saw horror movie series, due for release next year.
The film will be directed by Darren Lynn Bousman, who helmed the second, third, and fourth movies in the original series. Once again, it will be a Lionsgate production.
“When Chris Rock came to us and described in chilling detail his fantastic vision that reimagines and spins-off the world of the notorious Jigsaw Killer, we were all-in,” said Lionsgate’s chairman Joe Drake in a statement
. “Saw is one of the highest grossing horror franchises of all-time and it’s one of Lionsgate’s most successful film series. This upcoming film will still be as mind bending and intense as all the previous Saw films. Chris conceived this idea and it will be completely reverential to the legacy of the material while reinvigorating the brand with his wit, creative vision and passion for this classic horror franchise.”
John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum, the third chapter in the Keanu Reeves saga, hits screens this week. The story, which kicked off with the legendary assassin coming out of retirement to avenge the death of his dog, and then travelling to Rome to take out a target, now finds the character “excommunicado,” with a contract on his head.
So how did John Wick get here? And what is the unique appeal of both the man and the myth? We examine the facts… (Be sure to also read our John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum review when you’re done here!)
Spoilers follow for the first two John Wick movies!
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Let’s just dive right in, shall we? If you want 30 days of free streaming anime, go to Twitch Prime, find the Crunchyroll Premium button and click on it to start your 30-day free trial.
While there’s no direct correlation between gaming and watching anime, the Venn diagram of the two subsets has a pretty significant overlap. The people at Twitch and Crunchyroll realized this, which is why they worked together to offer 30 days of free Crunchyroll Premium.
Dubbed the Epic Mega Sale, the store is offering markdowns up to 75% off on some PC games. In addition, $10 is slashed off the price of any game over $15, including already discounted games and pre-orders, at no cost to the publisher or developer. That encompasses upcoming games like Borderlands 3, one of its biggest exclusives, which you can now pre-order for $50, and the recently announced John Wick game, John Wick Hex, which you can pre-order for $8 instead of $20.
Just purchased something from Epic and wish you’d waited? If you bought a game between May 2 and May 15 in the Epic Store, you’ll be refunded the difference between what you paid and the sale price. And if you’ve pre-ordered a game from the Epic Store that cost more than $15, you’ll receive a $10 refund within the next couple of weeks. The only exceptions to the $10 off deal are DLC, game add-ons, season passes, and in-game purchases, such as V-bucks in Fortnite.
In addition to all the store-wide discounts, Epic announced its free biweekly game deal is expanding during the Mega Sale, which runs now through June 13. In that time period, a free game will be given away every week, starting with today’s offering, genre-bending anthology Stories Untold.
Dates for Steam’s 2019 Summer Sale leaked (once again) yesterday–it’ll start June 25 and last two weeks–so Epic’s Mega Sale seems strategically timed to precede that one. While Steam’s sale will no doubt have the greater volume of games, Epic’s deals (particularly the $10 off one) are nothing to sneeze at, and it’s a good chance to grab cheaper pre-orders on upcoming games and some free PC titles. Either way, June is gearing up to be a great month for PC gamers on a budget.
I spent last Halloween on the set of a horror movie that was filming at a haunted asylum.
The film? This summer’s remake of the 1988 killer doll cult classic Child’s Play. The location? Riverview Hospital outside Vancouver, a mental health facility that local legend insists is haunted. But the vacated hospital wasn’t being used as any sort of creepy setting in the story. Instead, it was doubling as the basement of the apartment building where Aubrey Plaza’s character, single mom Karen Barclay, lives with her adolescent son, Andy (Gabriel Bateman).
Join GameSpot as we celebrate gaming history and give recognition to the most influential games of the 21st century. These aren’t the best games, and they aren’t necessarily games that you need to rush out and play today, but there’s no question that they left an indelible impact on game developers, players, and in some cases, society at large.
In 2000, PC gaming was largely a “serious” scene. Counter-Strike, Diablo II, and Deus Ex all launched that year, Valve’s Half-Life had launched two years prior, and id Software’s Quake still had legs four years after its release. They were joined by one very odd duck: The Sims. It was the evolution of developer Maxis’ previous success in SimCity, but on a more personal scale. It was freeform, goofy, and much more “casual” than its contemporaries, and it was clearly something special.
The Sims blended the best of what simulation games could offer with lessons learned from none other than Quake, which laid the foundation for modern game modding and the communities that surround it. With accessible modding tools and a built-in sharing platform, The Sims brought community-made content to a broader audience. Through this platform, it fostered a space to explore games as a passionate and social experience. That had a greater impact on players than it did the development of other games, but it was an important one all the same. The Sims resonated especially with girls and women–for many of them, it was a gateway into a world that was otherwise incredibly hard to reach.
When The Sims arrived, there wasn’t really anything like it. There were Maxis’ own Sim games, the highlight of which was SimCity, and 3D home-design software was popular. But a virtual dollhouse, one in which you controlled the narrative, the relationships, the look and personality of a person and their home–that was novel. The Sims took simulation and scaled it down, not in complexity, but in scope. Rather than managing an entire city, you managed a life. And, unlike most other games at the time, there was no real way to fail. Whether something was a win or a loss was entirely up to you.
As it turns out, that appealed to a vast audience. The Sims was a near-instant best-seller, and critics adored it, too. Common praise included the game’s infectious personality and charm, its great sound effects, and its hard-to-define “addictive” quality. It was even GameSpot’s Game of the Year in 2000, and what we wrote then captures what made it stand out so much:
“Despite the game’s basic strategic elements, one of the reasons The Sims is such a remarkable game is because its central conflict is essentially life itself. Most any other game gives you a concrete objective: You’re pitted against powerful enemy armies, arch-rivals, deadly aliens, or fantasy creatures. The Sims offers a similar challenge, but in the unlikely form of your having to manage the mundane details of an average suburban life. This witty, ambitious premise actually turned out to be a truly impressive game as well.”
In 2002, the Sims surpassed Myst to become the best-selling PC game of all time. More than half the players were female, which surprised people–including Maxis co-founder and Sims creator Will Wright, who had thought of The Sims as a game with broad appeal rather than a game specifically geared toward women. Even more so than in recent years, this was a time when gaming was very much considered a male hobby. But it was women that treated The Sims more like a hobby, and a popular hypothesis was that they gravitated toward its domesticity, lack of violence, and emphasis on interpersonal relationships. However, while the exact demographics were unexpected, the passion with which these women approached the game was, indeed, by design.
The Sims was built from the ground up to be a community-led experience. Maxis released modding tools months before the game itself came out, and player-made content was brought together by an official website called The Sims Exchange. There, players could upload buildings and Sims they’d created and download others’ creations–and these sharing features were accessible right from the game’s menu. That meant even a casual player would have no trouble finding, participating in, and becoming more and more involved in The Sims and its community.
The entire purpose of The Sims Exchange was to enable creativity and storytelling. Custom content uploaded there wouldn’t fundamentally alter and/or build upon what The Sims was, as was the case with some popular mods for other games around that time (and to this day). Instead, you found carefully handcrafted parks and buildings that you could easily fit into your game as it already was. You followed that kind of customization as far as was possible and used your imagination to fill in the rest, and that, too, tied in with the community; The Sims Exchange was home to vast libraries of annotated screenshots that comprised player-created stories.
Even a casual player would have no trouble finding, participating in, and becoming more and more involved in The Sims and its community.
Even outside the proper channels, it was easy to connect with others through The Sims. Sims did a lot of crazy things, not the least of which was setting themselves on fire while trying to cook, and exchanging those stories was good for a laugh. We also can’t overlook the importance of The Sims as an inclusive experience. It was one of the only games at the time to include homosexual relationships (though that part did and still does get overlooked), and you could, of course, make your Sims look how you wanted. Critically, and likely because of its broad appeal and comparatively normal themes, The Sims didn’t carry as much of the stigma that other games did. For adults and especially for female players, playing and talking about The Sims wasn’t met with the same kind of derision that playing something violent or “nerdier” often incited. If you felt isolated from or unwelcome in gaming before, The Sims was your ticket to freely explore it.
In 2003, one big competitor emerged: Second Life. The MMO-like life simulator allowed you to create and customize an avatar as well as virtual property, and much of the content was user-generated. Because of its online nature, however, Second Life was also at the center of a number of controversies, including gambling and pornography worries. It also suffered from technical problems and security concerns. Compared to the disappointing and short-lived Sims Online–which didn’t have custom content, a key part of The Sims’ popularity–Second Life was a far greater success. But Second Life emphasized role-playing with others over creativity or management aspects, which ultimately made it and The Sims very different games.
For the most part, The Sims cornered the market on itself. Maxis released seven expansion packs between the game’s launch and the end of 2003, keeping interest high. And, of course, the community also gave it legs. The Sims stayed popular and active through the release of The Sims 2 in late 2004. Now, after four main installments, The Sims is one of the most successful video game franchises of all time, ranking among series like Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty.
There are other life-sim games out there, some of which most likely took inspiration from The Sims, but the full extent of The Sims’ influence is seen in its players rather than in other games. The Sims 4 has an incredibly dedicated YouTube community, and custom content is still thriving. The Sims doesn’t have many direct progeny in games, but it’s a household name; it’s still the game that even the gaming-averse can pick up and become absorbed in.
