Would You Pay $500 for Marvel’s Civil War Box Set?
Marvel Comics is preparing a box set of the Civil War comic book event that will set you back a pretty penny.
Fansided reports that the box set, coming just in time for the Captain America: Civil War movie, will retail for $500. That money will get you a total of 11 hardcover volumes, spanning 100 issues of comics in which superheroes punch each other.
Man in the High Castle: Imagining a Nazi-Led America
At the TCA (Television Critics Association) press tour this week, the cast and producers of The Man in the High Castle spoke about the new Amazon series. Based on the novel by Philip K. Dick (whose stories inspired Blade Runner, Total Recall and Minority Report), the story imagines an alternate history where the Nazis and their allies won World War II, picking up in the former United States in 1962 (the year the book was released).
The Man in the High Castle Pilot Review
Executive Producer/showrunner Frank Spotnitz (The X-Files) spoke about how much discussion they had about how society would have developed differently if we’d lost World War II, saying, “Obviously, we started with an alternative history that is in the novel. And, then, honestly, the biggest challenge was finding the visual alternative history, and that was something the pilot director, David Semel, confronted, because we knew from the pilot on we were establishing the rules of this world and we needed to honor them however many years this show went forward. So that does come down to hairstyles, wardrobe, types of vehicles. You know, there's a very big shot of Time Square very early in the pilot episode. Well, what would Time Square look like if we didn't live in a corporate capitalist society? What would it look like if the Nazis had proceeded for another 17 years ruling the world? What would their values be? What would their commercial values be? Would there be cars with fins? Would you have a kind of space age optimism in the design of home appliances? So there's literally thousands of props and set design and costume and hair design issues that David Semel and, then, our series director, Dan Percival, have been on the front lines of deciding.”
Usain Bolt Gets New Look in Temple Run 2
To celebrate his sixth appearance at the IAAF World Championships in Beijing, China, the playable Olympian Usain Bolt will be updated in Temple Run 2 to better reflect his current appearance.
Bolt's current jersey featuring the colors of Jamaica with black tiger stripes laid over yellow and green will be free to download for players who have purchased the limited edition Usain Bolt character.
Temple Run 2 is an endless runner and the sequel to the original Temple Run. It is available on iOS, Google Play, Amazon, and Windows Phone 8.
This isn't the first time professional athletes have been featured in Imangi Studios' mobile hit, as several professional football players have been playable characters in the past.
Hobbit Extended Trilogy Coming to Theaters
The extended versions of all three films in The Hobbit trilogy will be released in theaters this October.
Presented by Warner Bros. and Fathom Events over three nights, An Unexpected Journey, The Desolation of Smaug, and The Battle of the Five Armies will be available to view in select theaters.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey will be the first of these extended screenings and will debut on October 5 at 7:30pm local. An exclusive introduction by director Peter Jackson will also be shown.
Ron Perlman on Why He Chose Hand of God After SOA
In Amazon's new series Hand of God - first season available September 4th in the U.S., UK, Austria, and Germany on Amazon Prime - Sons of Anarchy's Ron Perlman plays a morally corrupt judge who suffers a breakdown and believes that God is speaking directly to him, compelling him onto a path of vigilante justice.
Perlman, along with the show's cast and creators, answered questions from TV critics during the recent TCA Press Tour, touching on the arc of Season 1 and whether or not Perlman's character, Judge Pernell Harris, is insane or actually obeying commands from the Almighty.
"The answer could be multiple things," creator/executive producer Ben Watkins said. "I wanted to give fodder for both sides of it. And that puts the audience in the position where they have to draw the conclusions. And I'm really interested to see how that happens because then the answer is different for everyone, and it's really based on their beliefs, how they were brought up, and their agendas."
New Black Ops 3 Screens Showcase Campaign, Multiplayer
Gamescom kicks off this week, and to celebrate Call of Duty: Black Ops III's appearance at the convention, Activision has released a new batch of screenshots for Treyarch's upcoming shooter.
The images provide a fresh look at both the game's campaign and competitive multiplayer.
Give them a look in our gallery below.
Call of Duty: Black Ops III is set for release on November 6, 2015. Before then, Activision is running a public beta, which kicks off first for PS4 owners on August 19. The following week, on August 26, the beta will go live for those on PC and Xbox One.
StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void Confirmed for 2015 Release
The final StarCraft II expansion, StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void, will officially be coming out this year.
Rumors of Legacy of the Void's release date first popped up back in January, and during its quarterly call to investors, Activision Blizzard officially announced that the game will be launching later this year. However, no specific date was mentioned during the call.
Gamers who preorder Legacy of the Void get Whispers of the Oblivion for free. The prologue features the first Zeratul missions since Wings of Liberty and is available right now.
World of Warcraft Subscriptions Down to 5.6 Million
World of Warcraft has dropped another 1.5 million subscribers, Activision confirmed today.
The company stated during its quarterly earnings call that the long-running MMO is sitting at 5.6 million subscribers. This is down 1.5 million from 7.1 million in March 2015, a number which itself was down from 10 million. The nearly 3 million WoW subscriber loss was considered the biggest quarterly drop in the game's history.
Activision did note that a large non-expansion update called Fury of the Hellfire released near the end of the quarter, and helped to stabilize the subscriber numbers. It also said Blizzard revenues are up thanks to strong performance across its products, and that overall online players are up 50% year-over-year for Blizzard.
Gamers Have Played 2 Billion Hours of Destiny
Destiny players have played the game for over two billion hours total since launch.
Activision shared the news today during its quarterly investor call. Diving the time over Destiny's 20 million players, that averages out to about 100 hours of gameplay from each person.
Bungie is soon making a few major changes to the game. Destiny's leveling system will no longer use the light system, plus, all of Ghost's lines, performed by Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage, will be removed and replaced with lines from Nolan North.
Activision Blizzard Reports $1 Billion in Q2 Revenue
During a call with investors today, Activision Blizzard reported better-than-expected earnings for the second quarter of its fiscal year. It's GAAP revenues for Q2 came in at $1.04 billion USD.
Digital revenue for the company came in at a Q2-record 55% of total revenue, with $569 million coming in digitally. When the numbers are presented on a Non-GAAP basis, growth in digital sales year-over-year was 27%.
Still absent from the Activision Blizzard report were hard numbers on Destiny sales. The company mentioned the high attach rate for the House of Wolves expansion, and said the 20 million registered Destiny players have averaged 100 hours of gameplay each, but provided no other sales figures for the game.