Yearly Archives: 2018

Fortnite: Season 5 Skins and Items Leaked

Season 5 of Fortnite kicked off this week, bringing vehicles, and a new desert biome with it to the Fortnite map. Update V5.0 rolled out yesterday but has already been datamined, revealing alleged new items, skins, and emotes that will drop during the course of the season. There are 13 skins, nine pickaxes, eight back blings, three contrails, seven gliders, and nine emotes that dataminers have discovered.

Twitter user @SiloxLeaks shared the details of the items, some of which are part of the Battlepass and some of which have yet to be released.

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Destiny 2 Getting a New PvP Mode

Destiny 2 is getting a new competitive PvP mode as part of its upcoming Forsaken DLC.

According to the latest issue of Game Informer, the new mode is named Breakthrough, a Crucible mode challenges players to capture points on the map.

Breakthrough has two different phases. In the first phase, two teams of four race to capture a single point called the Breaker. In the second phase, the team that captured the Breaker will go on the attack to capture the other team's Vault, a new point on the map. Naturally, the team that does not capture the Breaker is tasked with defending their Vault from the attacking team in this second phase.

The mode has multiple rounds, with the team that either successfully captures or successfully defends each round's Vault being awarded a point. It's not clear at this time how many rounds each match will have.

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Darksiders 3 Hands-On: What We Learned After Playing 2 Hours

Seeing little embers drift across the screen, with a slowly building, slightly gothic orchestral track and the bold, angular logo for the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse lingering in the background, is one of the most unexpectedly welcoming things I’ve seen in a while. And just above the words ‘Press Any Key’, right in the front and center of the screen: Darksiders III.

The long-awaited sequel went dark after the reveal trailer was posted in May 2017, but just a couple of weeks ago, I was able to play almost two hours of the latest build at the Gunfire Games studio in Austin, Texas. It has evolved significantly since the first time I played it, but it’s still, at its core, a post-apocalyptic, hack’n’slash, puzzle-filled adventure set in a world full of angels, demons, and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Honestly, I think I’m mostly comforted by the fact that Gunfire – a team comprised largely of the original Vigil Games group that made the first two games – seems to have done a remarkable job of modernising the series without departing from the core pillars of the franchise at all. One of the designers told me, “It’s a video game. I know that sounds odd, but that’s one of my favourite things about it. We went through this process of, what are some of the tropes that you get rid of, what are some of the tropes that you keep? We sanded it down, and here we are.” That completely made sense to me.

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Two Blockbuster Stores to Close, Leaving Only One in Existence

Blockbuster Video, the former Goliath in the home-video rental industry, is officially closing two of its remaining three stores in existence.

As reported by Deadline, the closing stores in question are in Alaska, one in Anchorage and one in Fairbanks, and they will be shutting down their retail business on Monday, July 16. They will then reopen the next day through the end of August solely to sell off their remaining inventory.

This leaves a solitary Blockbuster location in Bend, Oregon to wave that yellow and blue banner for as long as it can.

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Dead Space 4 Would Have Had a Female Protagonist, Open World Design

EA's Dead Space series might be gone, but it's not forgotten - not even the game that didn't make it.

Though the franchise was effectively shuttered after its third installment in 2013, Ben Wanat, creative director of Dead Space, opened up to Eurogamer this week about what a Dead Space 4 would have looked like, and how it would have played. In a wide-ranging interview Wanat discussed changes to zero gravity combat, the linear style of play, and the main character.

"The notion was you were trying to survive day to day against infested ships, searching for a glimmer of life, scavenging supplies to keep your own little ship going, trying to find survivors," Wanat said, before explaining what sounds like open world areas of exploration.

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We Happy Few’s Flawed Characters Are Its Mysterious Heart

Like many, the last time I put my hands on We Happy Few was when it was released in early access all those years ago. Back then I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Its weirdly wonderful retrofuturistic setting and mandatory drug consumption for the citizens therein creates an evocative space to explore, but outside that exploration, what is it?

It was apparent after first showing that many expected a traditional narrative, characters, and story to flesh out the world and tie it all together, so developer Compulsion Games set to make that a reality. And after spending an hour playing through chunks of story ahead of We Happy Few’s August 10 release, that effort is paying off.

As a refresher I replayed the opening of Arthur – the bumbling reluctant hero who works at the Wellington Well’s propaganda ministry – as he decides enough is enough and tosses his required dose of the psychedelic drug Joy. Much of the experience was the same, but what struck me this time was the polish and detail put into this section since the last time I’d seen it. The time spent retooling and refining We Happy Few certainly shows.

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Update: Splatoon 2 Leaderboard Hacker Banned By Nintendo Indefinitely

Update 07/16/2018: PleaseAddAntiCheat, the anonymous player that hacked Splatoon 2's leaderboards to ask for an anti-cheat solution, has seemingly been banned from online play indefinitely.

Posting on Reddit, the user posted the notice from Nintendo regarding their ban, and wrote: "Looks like it took them a while to get to all of my accounts. But can confirm my console is now 2124-4027

."

The initial leaderboard hack has also now been removed. IGN has contacted Nintendo for comment.

For those who don't know Splatoon 2 has a cheating problem, they can currently find out at the top of the leaderboards.

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Thanos Completes Three-Part Infinity Gauntlet San Diego Comic-Con Exclusive

By now the masses are familiar with the story of Thanos assembling the Infinity Gauntlet thanks to Avengers: Infinity War, but the folks at Upper Deck are spotlighting the original tale as found in the Infinity Gauntlet comic with a three-part print set from their UD Gallery line that combine to make one epic image.

The first two images have already been revealed (referred to as Act I and Act II, they make up the left and right segments of the image), and now we are excited to unveil the Act III print by artist Crystal Graziano.

Sized at 18” x 24”, a special version of the print will be on-sale at San Diego Comic-Con for $74.99 and will be limited to 250 copies, all of which are signed, numbered and authenticated. If you purchase the entire 3-part Triptych during Comic-Con, you will receive a discount.

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Ex-NASA Engineer Creates ‘Insane’ PS4, Xbox One Controller Mod

Ex-NASA engineer Jake Middleton has launched a Kickstarter campaign for his “insane, over-the-top” PlayStation 4 and Xbox One controller mod, MEGA-one.

MEGA-one acts as a type of exoskeleton for existing PlayStation 4 and Xbox One controllers. It’s made from “aircraft grade” aluminum, features an “industrial-grade” vibrator, and “mega motor,” culminating in a mod that makes controller vibrations 10 times more powerful, according to a chart on its Kickstarter page.

Should the Kickstarter campaign reach its goal of nearly $7,500 USD, the unique mod is expected to begin shipping in February 2019. MEGA-one will be available on its own for $135 USD or pre-assembled with a controller for $200 USD. Middleton estimates the mod kit will take roughly five minutes to assemble and only seconds to detach from a controller.

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