Microsoft has committed to putting "the right people in the right position" at the helm of Activision Blizzard amid the ongoing serious allegations around the company's toxic workplace culture.

As reported by VGC, Microsoft president Brad Smith told CNBC that his company is looking at the current leadership team at Activision Blizzard, and that there will be "change" to some aspects should the acquisition deal proceed.

He said: "We're looking to the leadership team at Activision Blizzard today to make culture and workplace safety a top priority every single day, until the day when this deal hopefully closes. And then we'll take over and we need to make that same commitment.

"There will be some aspects that will change but it will all be one new team that will work together," he continued. "Most importantly, we want to see the culture evolve, and we'll see how people perform between now and the day this closes, assuming it's approved. And then we'll have the opportunity to make sure that we have the right people in the right position."

Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick has been at the centre of rumoured changes and is currently expected to leave after the Microsoft deal closes. Several shareholders, employees, and members of the Activision Blizzard King (ABK) Workers Alliance have called for Kotick's resignation after a report claimed he knew about alleged sexual assault and harassment allegations within the company.

Activision Blizzard was sued by California over allegations of a "frat boy culture" and sexual harassment, but Blizzard has promised to improve its culture after what it called a "challenging" 2021.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale.

Reid Carolin, who was once set to direct Gambit, has revealed some details about the cancelled movie.

During an interview with Playlist, the film’s former director explained what the cancelled superhero flick would have been about. And it sounds all kinds of awesome

“It was all this kind of low-level mutant fights and disagreements,” he said. “We set it in this world of the Mafia—almost kind of like a mutant Goodfellas in New Orleans.”

Gambit was originally confirmed back in 2014 with Channing Tatum suiting up as the Louisiana mutant and long-time member of the X-Men. And it sounds as though it would have played heavily on his Cajun background.

“We made this world in New Orleans that was a city of mutants that didn’t care about saving the world,” explained Carolin. “They went there so they could use their powers to party and hook up, and their hands could fry the grease at MacDonald’s and whatever else and the hardest thing for them to do was to fall in love because they could read each other’s minds, or when they got into a fight, they could turn a table into a grenade and send their partner to the hospital or whatever.”

Carolin said that he and Tatum produced the film for over five years, actively working on it for two years straight. They wrote “multiple versions of the script and finally found the one that I think that was going to be really awesome.”

But the film’s troubled production kept it in development hell, with Channing Tatum still devastated at its cancellation.

“It is still one of my favorite scripts I’ve ever read,” Carolin explained. “I mean I worked on it, so it’s easy to say that.”

“I think it played really well in the Deadpool universe at Fox,” he added. "Emma Watts had really championed it at Fox. They made Deadpool at Fox and they understood that when you went a little punk rock with these characters you could pop some wheelies and really attract an audience.”

Unfortunately, it looks as though Disney wasn’t so keen on the movie. After Disney acquired Fox back in 2019, the axe finally came down on Gambit. Carolin revealed that the movie was fully cast, a crew was assembled, and they were just months away from filming “when ultimately Disney scrapped it.”

Whether or not the project gets revived remains to be seen. But Carolin and Tatum are certainly keen to get back on board.

“Those guys at Marvel have a really good thing going and I’m sure they have a plan that I don’t know about for the ‘X-Men’ universe,” said Carolin. “I’m not going to tell them how to do their jobs, they’re nailing it. But I hold out hope that maybe someday it’ll come back—Channing is perfect for the role. And as long as they keep making Deadpool a character, he’ll need a world to play in and… if they want some more characters like that, I think [they should] come our way.”

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

LEGO is releasing a new set recreating Jurassic Park's iconic T-Rex paddock breakout scene.

Revealed exclusively by IGN, the 1,212-piece set includes a posable T-Rex, two Ford Explorers (one flipped and crushed, the other intact), and a smashed electric fence. Minifigs include Alan Grant, Ian Malcolm, Tim Murphy, and Lex Murphy, and you also get LEGO-fied night vision goggles, a flare, and even two tiny water cups.

The set is available for pre-order at the LEGO Store and Target, and will arrive on April 17, priced at $99.99 USD. Check out images of the set in the gallery below:

The original Jurassic Park scene remains an all-time classic cinema moment, in which Jurassic Park's electric fence system goes dark, and a T-Rex escapes, only to chase down the island's visitors. From rippling water to a desperate flare escape, it's magnificent stuff.

We broke down the scene a few years ago, explaining why the the T-Rex's paddock attack still works to this day, and how it's had a lasting effect on filmmaking to this day.

Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

Days Gone director Jeff Ross wanted to make an Uncharted prequel.

During an interview with Sacred Symbols (via VGC), Ross explained what his Uncharted prequel would have been all about.

“Victor Sullivan at the age of 25 in a very stylised world where… it would be around 1976, I think is where we figured out his age might be,” he explained.

Sony Bend was at one point reportedly working on a new Uncharted game… and while many thought it was likely an Uncharted sequel, it could be that this was actually Jeff Ross’s young Sully prequel.

And it’s certainly an interesting concept.

“He busted out of the Navy for reasons, and I thought seeing him young and trying to figure out his way in this world going from trying to be a soldier or you know a military man to now I’m just out on the streets and I’m gonna become a hustler,” he added.

After Sony failed to greenlight Days Gone 2, the director wanted to work on something new and began putting together ideas for this unmade Uncharted game.

And given the upcoming Uncharted movie features a far younger Sully than we’ve seen in the games, it would have been a nice touch to see the iconic adventurer get his own globe-trotting game.

The idea, Ross said, was that Sully would evoke a classic James Bond. “A young, sexy Victor Sullivan, to me, would have been like Sean Connery,” he said.

Unfortunately, the concept soon ground to a halt, and it sounds though that’s largely due to problems making it feel like an Uncharted game.

Ross admitted there were far fewer “opportunities for shootouts”. This was a big problem. After all, he didn’t want to make “the first Uncharted game where the player didn’t shoot anybody.”

The upcoming Uncharted movie starring Tom Holland sees Sully played by Mark Wahlberg. Although not exactly a ‘70s era Sean Connery, it’s exactly the kind of youthful take on Sully that could have made a great Uncharted prequel. As it stands, we’ll have to wait for the upcoming movie to next see Sully’s iconic moustache in action.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

343 Industries has finally released an update to help fix Halo Infinite's long-term lag problems, and confirmed it is working on long term solutions too.

For the first time since Halo Infinite released on December 8, 343 Industries has addressed the problems by offering an explanation and partial solution in a blog post on its website.

Since launch, players have encountered various syncing issues in the game such as accurate shots that don't connect, melee attacks going through enemies, and bullets twisting around corners.

Lead Engineer of the Sandbox team, Richard Watson, said in the post: "In Halo, we choose to favour the shooter. Practically, this means that whatever happened on the shooter’s screen the server endeavours to honour. That means whenever a player sees themselves hitting a target, our system does its best to give them the hit on the server."

The studio has outlined a few partial solutions to reduce, but not necessarily eliminate, the issue. Matchmaking will now more consistently connect players living close to each other to improve connections.

The update should also prevent players from manipulating Halo Infinite to connect them to servers near to them, which forces other players to have poorer connections.

Watson added that the update is "already shown promising results and should take further advantage of this morning's changes."

343 Industries plans to add indicators in a later update that show when a player's connection is poor, both their own and another player's in the lobby.

It hopes its latest update, combined with this upcoming feature, will stop the lag issues, but 343 Industries will look into adding a server selection feature if the problems continue.

IGN said Halo Infinite was "amazing", as "after six years, it was fair to wonder: did Halo still belong in the 'Best Shooter' conversation? And would I still care about it? I am both relieved and delighted that Halo Infinite emphatically answers both questions with a resounding yes."

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale.

The Walking Dead star Norman Reedus is creating a new fantasy TV series with the Jim Henson Company.

According to Variety, the live-action fantasy show is in early development, while Norman Reedus teams up with Brian and Wendy Froud to create the show’s creatures.

“Norman Reedus, the Frouds, and the Jim Henson Company coming together to create a show is the mashup of my dreams,” said Halle Stanford, president of TV at The Jim Henson Company.

The show will reportedly feature an entirely new universe of creatures created by the Frouds, who previously worked on The Dark Crystal movie and TV show, as well as Labyrinth.

“Norman is an artist, and when I suggested to him, what if we create a series with the Frouds together that explores his love of magical creatures, he was so excited.”

Expected to be a primetime adventure series, unfortunately, little else is known about the project at this time – including its name. But it feels like one to get excited about.

“They are masters in the fantasy world-building space,” said Reedus, talking about the Frouds. “I mean, a show about goblins, trolls, and otherworldly creatures? There’s nobody in the universe better suited for that than the Henson Company.”

Whether or not the show will feature goblins or trolls remains to be seen. And it’s just as likely that these mythical creatures will provide the basis for entirely new monsters.

Although Netflix cancelled The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance after just one season, it looks as though the Jim Henson Company is still keen to explore that world.

“We are nimble, we are resilient. We are ready to jump,” said Stanford. “The minute anyone would like to jump back into [The Dark Crystal], it is a world that we will continue to build on and think about.”

However, it’s thought that this new project will be something else entirely.

“It is an urban fantasy,” said Stanford. “It will be a magical world. But I feel like Norman is going to help us bring the ‘punk’ back in ‘hope punk.’ I also think that people kind of like that punk in Henson’s legacy. The Muppets were the underdogs, our Goblin King with David Bowie was so cool…”

“When you say ‘Jim Henson,’ it invokes something in people,” she added. “So, I’m hoping those that felt inspired by him, like Norman Reedus, will look to us as a new home to create these types of stories that are transformative and entertaining, and having something to say, but also wanting to kind of push the medium of television.”

Henson’s The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance was even darker than the original movie, and while they originally planned beyond the first season, the show was ultimately cancelled long before it got there.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

MoviePass, the service that would let subscribers watch one movie at a theater a day for a monthly fee, is set to relaunch this summer with a credit system that could potentially award users more credits if they watch ads.

As reported by Variety, MoviePass' credits would roll over month to month and could be traded or shared with other users. MoviePass founder Stacy Spikes also suggested that users could watch an ad to earn more credits and the user's phone camera could track their eyeballs to make sure they are actually paying attention.

While no pricing information was given, it appears this new version of MoviePass will offer different plans for users to choose from. Spikes, who was actually pushed out from MoviePass when it was acquired by Helios and Matheson in 2018, said that he and the team want to reimagine it as a cooperative and "rebuild MoviePass as a company that's built by its fan base."

MoviePass was founded in 2011, but it wasn't until 2017 that the company took the world by storm with its too-good-to-be-true $9.95/month plan that would let subscribers see one movie at a theater a day. That fee turned out to be unsustainable and MoviePass began introducing surge pricing and would even hide popular movies from appearing on the app and change users' passwords to prevent them from using it too much.

The service may have been one of the first to successfully implement this model, but the big chains - AMC, Cinemark, Alamo Drafthouse, and more - all released their own versions of MoviePass at different price points in turn.

In September 2019, MoviePass notified subscribers it would be shutting down and, in January 2020, Helios and Matheson filed for Chapter 7 liquidation.

“A lot of people lost money, a lot of people lost trust,” Spikes said. “There were a lot of people who were hurt and disappointed, and I was one of the people who was hurt and disappointed.”

Spikes hopes MoviePass can make a triumphant return, even despite the challenges the film industry are undergoing thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, as he believes the movie industry is "the greatest thing on Earth."

Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

Yesterday's news that Futurama is being revived (again) on Hulu was met with joy from fans of Matt Groening's animated sci-fi comedy. However, that joy quickly turned to frustration when it became clear that a major cast member hadn't yet signed on: John DiMaggio, the voice of Bender.

Since then, DiMaggio's absence has sparked a major backlash under the hashtag "#bendergate." Fans contend that the series won't be the same without DiMaggio's Bender, who has delivered many of the show's most memorable lines.

DiMaggio himself is leaning into the backlash. The actor has spent much of the day sharing articles about fans threatening a boycott and re-tweeting accusations that Hulu is "lowballing Bender."

Voice actor James Adomian, who has voiced roles in Rugrats and Bob's Burgers, wrote in support of DiMaggio, "Everyone in the industry saw the audition notice go out two weeks ago for Bender, asking for a voice match for John DiMaggio. Seeing it, I said out loud 'Shove it!' in my best Bender voice, which will always just be a fanboy cosplay of John DiMaggio."

Animation director Kelly Turnbull called Futurama's reported attempt to replace DiMaggio an example of a wider issue with the animation industry.

"I feel like the idea of [John DiMaggio] as a replaceable element of Futurama is part of a wider issue of an industry that doesn’t respect voice actors on the same level as live action actors. You'll see voice actors who MADE a character treated like no live action actor would be," Turnbull tweeted.

Asked why DiMaggio had yet to sign on with Futurama, co-star Billy West, who plays Fry, wrote, "I think he's looking for the right pen."

Thanks for the concern and the props, everyone. I really appreciate it. Don’t worry, I’ll keep you posted, but until then… CHEESE IT! #bendergate

— John DiMaggio (@TheJohnDiMaggio) February 10, 2022

One of the best-known voice actors in the industry, DiMaggio has appeared in games, movies, and shows since the mid-90s, with Bender arguably being his most famous role. He's also a major part of Disenchantment, where he plays King Zøg.

Many of the comments point to a pay dispute between DiMaggio and the Futurama showrunners. More than a few noted the irony of Hulu using an image of Bender to promote the show's return. DiMaggio, for his part, thanked fans for their concern. "Thanks for the concern and the props, everyone. I really appreciate it. Don't worry, I'll keep you posted, but until then… CHEESE IT! #bendergate'."

Futurama is currently set to return on Hulu sometime in 2023, and while a return by DiMaggio hasn't been fully ruled out, it's far from certain. But if DiMaggio is unable to reach an agreement with Futurama showrunners, at least some voice actors are urging their compatriots not to take the role.

"Additional VO tip, in light of news today: don't make attempts to slide in on someone else’s spot," voice actor Andrew Kishino tweeted. "That's a wild greasy maneuver. Respect their position, talent & integrity."

Kat Bailey is a Senior News Editor at IGN

Yesterday's news that Futurama is being revived (again) on Hulu was met with joy from fans of Matt Groening's animated sci-fi comedy. However, that joy quickly turned to frustration when it became clear that a major cast member hadn't yet signed on: John DiMaggio, the voice of Bender.

Since then, DiMaggio's absence has sparked a major backlash under the hashtag "#bendergate." Fans contend that the series won't be the same without DiMaggio's Bender, who has delivered many of the show's most memorable lines.

DiMaggio himself is leaning into the backlash. The actor has spent much of the day sharing articles about fans threatening a boycott and re-tweeting accusations that Hulu is "lowballing Bender."

Voice actor James Adomian, who has voiced roles in Rugrats and Bob's Burgers, wrote in support of DiMaggio, "Everyone in the industry saw the audition notice go out two weeks ago for Bender, asking for a voice match for John DiMaggio. Seeing it, I said out loud 'Shove it!' in my best Bender voice, which will always just be a fanboy cosplay of John DiMaggio."

Animation director Kelly Turnbull called Futurama's reported attempt to replace DiMaggio an example of a wider issue with the animation industry.

"I feel like the idea of [John DiMaggio] as a replaceable element of Futurama is part of a wider issue of an industry that doesn’t respect voice actors on the same level as live action actors. You'll see voice actors who MADE a character treated like no live action actor would be," Turnbull tweeted.

Asked why DiMaggio had yet to sign on with Futurama, co-star Billy West, who plays Fry, wrote, "I think he's looking for the right pen."

Thanks for the concern and the props, everyone. I really appreciate it. Don’t worry, I’ll keep you posted, but until then… CHEESE IT! #bendergate

— John DiMaggio (@TheJohnDiMaggio) February 10, 2022

One of the best-known voice actors in the industry, DiMaggio has appeared in games, movies, and shows since the mid-90s, with Bender arguably being his most famous role. He's also a major part of Disenchantment, where he plays King Zøg.

Many of the comments point to a pay dispute between DiMaggio and the Futurama showrunners. More than a few noted the irony of Hulu using an image of Bender to promote the show's return. DiMaggio, for his part, thanked fans for their concern. "Thanks for the concern and the props, everyone. I really appreciate it. Don't worry, I'll keep you posted, but until then… CHEESE IT! #bendergate'."

Futurama is currently set to return on Hulu sometime in 2023, and while a return by DiMaggio hasn't been fully ruled out, it's far from certain. But if DiMaggio is unable to reach an agreement with Futurama showrunners, at least some voice actors are urging their compatriots not to take the role.

"Additional VO tip, in light of news today: don't make attempts to slide in on someone else’s spot," voice actor Andrew Kishino tweeted. "That's a wild greasy maneuver. Respect their position, talent & integrity."

Kat Bailey is a Senior News Editor at IGN

FromSoftware says that it's seeking to balance Elden Ring's difficulty, with one particularly frustrating Network Test among the elements being tuned for the final version. But there will still be some difficult bosses, some of which will reportedly rank among the most difficult the series has ever seen.

Speaking with Gamer Braves, Elden Ring producer Yasuhiro Kitao covered a variety of topics pertaining the final release, which is due later this month. Among them, he discussed the difficult balance, saying that the Network Test's showcase boss, Margit the Fell Omen, was "just too hard."

Nevertheless, Elden Ring will have a myriad of optional bosses to test the skills of top players, some of which will be very difficult.

"In terms of bosses that are unessential and optional and hidden, there are some of these that we have deliberately increased the challenge for those players who want to seek out this kind of experience. Hopefully if you’re that way inclined, you can seek out some really tough challenges hidden away in the world," Kitao said.

FromSoftware's Souls games have a long history of very difficult optional bosses. They include the likes of Bloodborne's Martyr Logarius, who will test your ability to parry attacks while heavily punishing mistakes. The DLC bosses are even nastier, with expansions like The Old Hunters notably featuring some of the toughest bosses in FromSoftware history.

As Elden Ring is open world and FromSoftware's biggest game to date, there may be more of these secret bosses than ever before. Game director Hidetaka Miyazaki recently commented that he expects more players to finish Elden Ring than the studio's previous games, perhaps because its biggest challenges are off the beaten path.

Elsewhere in the interview, Kitao addresses issues like the HUD and other changes from the Network Test. It's worth reading in full if you're a big fan of the series.

In our final preview ahead of the game's release on February 25, IGN said Elden Ring "encourages and rewards exploration — and now has much more room for creativity than simply giving you more than one corridor in a castle to check out."

Ryan Dinsdale is a freelancer contributor at IGN