Movie releases and casual mobile games seem to go hand in hand these days, so it’s no surprise the new Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle film has a companion mobile game. In my experience, the majority of movie-themed mobile games turn out to be uninspired money grabs, so I went into Jumanji with some tacit eye-rolling. However, after spending a little time with the game, I was happy to discover it isn’t half bad. In fact, once I got a handle on the rules, it became downright fun..

The best way I can describe Jumanji: The Mobile Game is a mashup of Monopoly and Hearthstone, but simpler. While the combination may sound terrible, it actually comes off quite well in Jumanji. The game board consists of 12 spaces. 10 of them are like Monopoly properties you can purchase and then set up camp. Each time you pass START, you’ll earn income off these properties, so acquiring as many as you can becomes a central goal. The other two spaces are special features, similar to the corners in Monopoly. These change as the game progresses. Sometimes they are punitive and landing on them will cause you to be imprisoned and miss a turn. Others can give you boosts like gold coins or the ability to move to any spot you choose on the board.

Like Monopoly, the object of the game is to monopolize the board, forcing your opponent into bankruptcy. What makes Jumanji ingenious, however, is that it solves a major Monopoly gameplay problem that puts many people off. When you first start playing Monopoly, it can be fun, but once a player has gained control of the board, the outcome is unavoidable and inevitable. If you are the loser, you’ll be subjected to hours of tedious torture as your opponent slowly bleeds you dry of your resources.

Jumanji solves this problem by offering more options for what can happen when you land on an opponent’s property. Players have the option to pay a toll or attack the other player. If they choose to attack (which everyone pretty much does), then players move to an RPG-style dice battle. If your attack is higher than your opponent’s defense score, you win the fight and with it, not only steal that player’s property, but also some of his or her gold.

But the battle isn’t solely dependant on the toss of a dice. In fact, attacks are where the Hearthstone -like CCG elements come into play. Going into a game, each player takes with them a deck of six cards. These cards make up your team and each have varying amounts of attack and defense points, as well as special skills. When you purchase a property, its base defense level is the same as your team’s combined defense points. In the same way, when you make an attack, your base attack is equal to the combined attack points of your team. When an attack occurs, your base points are added to your dice roll and whichever player’s total is higher wins the match. When a game ends, whichever player wins will be awarded a backpack full of resources, including new cards you can unlock or duplicates used for upgrading cards.

In the first stage of Jumanji, this is as complex as the rules get, but Stage 2 introduces to skills, which add a greater element of strategy to the game. Each card in your deck comes with a particular skill that is either passive or active. Passive skills go into action under certain conditions (ex: increase defense by 1 during the day), while active skills can only be used once during a game. These include everything from destroying an opponent’s base to stealing coins and more. Some of these skills prove quite useful and become a key factor in putting together your team. You also get to choose one of four heroes for your game, each with a starting perk like additional coins or heightened attack scores.

Since Jumanji is meant to be played in five to 15 minutes, the developers have added two additional ways of winning the game if you can’t manage to bankrupt your opponent. 1) Gain control of all properties in a set, creating a monopoly or 2) have the most money at the end of 12 rounds.

My biggest complaint with Jumanji is the opening tutorial lacked information about how to play and the strategy behind the game, which could be off-putting to new players. If you stick in there though, you’ll soon discover that Jumanji is a satisfying online multiplayer game. If you enjoy casual games that combine both luck and strategy this one is worth checking out. You can download Jumanji now for free on either the Apple App or Google Play store.

New Jumanji Mobile Board Game Is Actually Pretty Fun

Every conversation, every scene in The Gifted has a larger meaning. It’s what makes the X-Men series feel so big, despite being filled with lesser known characters. The fall finale was no different. The Stepford Cuckoos make their debut, telepathically forcing more than a dozen Sentinel Services agents to open fire on one another. This happens only hours after Agent Turner’s lengthy, and somewhat enlightening, conversation with the Strucker parents that culminated in an agreement to transport the captured Mutant Underground’s allies away from Trask Industries where Dreamer was murdered.

“It was very important the conversation included the wives,” series star Emma Dumont told Player.One. “We’ve seen conversation between Jace and Reed. It’s bigger than just these men and their egos, there are bigger risks. And it foreshadows that the X-Men say a war is coming — this scene specifically shows it may not just be a war between two parties. What does that mean for the mutant underground and the Struckers, and what does it mean for Lorna? There are so many factors that we get into in the last three episodes.”

At this point in the series, we don’t know much about the deadly “7/15” event that is tied to the disappearance of the X-Men and the Brotherhood, but the nature of the Stepford Cuckoos’ introduction was so ruthless, so dark, there’s no doubt Agent Turner is done hearing out the Mutant Underground.

“We can talk about 7/15 all day long and obviously understand what it’s a reference to, but until we actually see a mutant commit a horrible crime like this, we aren’t gonna understand why Jace is the hero of his own story,” she said. “The fact that this sweet little blonde girl could make armed, trained men do these things — it’s terrifying. But not only can she can do it, she will do it. We could kill each other every day of our lives, but we don’t, because we have empathy. That’s what makes us different than other animals. But to see someone who really doesn’t have that… The audience needed to see it.”

Dumont explains the scene highlights The Gifted’ s ongoing exploration of prejudice. You cannot blame an entire group, especially an entire minority group, for the terrible actions of one person. But for Polaris, the incident was particularly jarring because the Stepford Cuckoos actions are sort of an irrational version of her own Magento-esque mutant code. It’s a kill-or-be-killed world, but there are rules.

“If you are using your mutant ability, using mayhem and violence and chaos, and you are not saving someone… Lorna thinks it’s fine, kill Hitler, it’s totally fine, but if you are doing things that don’t benefit other people, that is disgraceful. Reed, in her mind, isn’t helping anyone. Putting those mutants away, ripping up families, those are bad things and they are not redeemable,” Dumont said. “However, if someone like Magneto were to kill one bad human and save hundreds of innocent mutant lives, that is okay with her, she sees the good in that. It’s a very sketchy fine line, but to her it’s very clear thinking. Lorna thinks it makes total sense.”

Eclipse doesn’t see it that way, and his relationship with Polaris illustrates the dynamic between Professor X and Magneto (and their real life counterparts) from the comics and cinematic universe.

“It’s an exact parallel to Professor X and Magento. Marcos wants peace. He will sit by and have change happen slowly. He thinks any change is good change, and Lorna won’t have it. She definitely believes if we all started acting a lot more, using our powers and taking a stand. If that means violence than so be it. But if things continue the way Marcos wants them to continue, then things will never change,” Dumont continued.

“The difference between slavery and current-day hate crime, it’s a difference but we are still living in a world where horrible things happening to minority groups — innocent people being hurt and killed — and it’s not okay. And Marcos sees those two time periods and says, ‘Oh, but look how different it is now? Now, people don’t own mutants, they just abuse them and hurt them.’ But to Lorna that’s an awful way of thinking. She thinks if you stand for nothing, you’ll fall for anything. She has a very Magento way of thinking politically. In the eyes of justice, that’s the right thing to do.”

Like Magento, Polaris isn’t even sure there is a place for people like Strucker — who have only recently displayed a willingness to understand the mutant cause — to be part of the way society moves forward to create equality.

“Someone that’s been raised up in bigotry, who now works for the government, not only do they do that because they are passionate about ‘protecting the general public,’ they are paid to do this. They get paid to hurt people. So, of course, the end goal we all say is to make this a peaceful environment for mutants and humans to live in together. But Lorna doesn’t know if that is possible. She’s almost to the point where she thinks these people need to be taken away,” she said.

The X-Men universe is defined by what exists between love and hate. Mutant discrimination never stops, political initiatives are never enough to incite real social change, the scientific experiments only get more invasive — and The Gifted will be no different.

“There will never be a happy ending, especially in the X-Men universe,” said Dumont. “The fall finale was heartbreaking in every way imaginable. On an individual level, people start to get what they want, but then in the overall goal of making peace between mutants and humans, it sort of falls apart.”

Dumont teases big things for the last few episodes, including an internal struggle about her character’s place in surviving such an oppressive world — a story arc Dumont isn’t shy to compare to that of Magneto. With a child on the way, Polaris will finally come to terms with what she believes needs to be done.

“She has this reputation, but finally now she’s at a place where she doesn’t care. She doesn’t care if you don’t like things about her because she is right. And she hates that she’s right — we will see this in the last few episodes — she hates that Magneto was right. She wishes it wasn’t this way, but it is, and she has to do what she has to do.”

The Gifted returns Jan. 1.

The Gifted’s Emma Dumont Thinks There’s No Happy Ending

The Marvel’s Wanted pilot starring Lance Hunter and Mockingbird didn’t pan out, yet thankfully, Agents of SHIELD has found a way to bring a beloved team member we haven’t seen since Season 3 back to the series. Nick Blood will return as Hunter in episode 5, “Rewind.”

The new promo reveals Hunter’s return, and that Fitz has been held in captivity for six months. We don’t know who these people are (they look like military), but they have forced Fitz to help them find the missing SHIELD agents. Fitz has yet to come up with any plausible theories — the only thing he can come up with is that they’ve been abducted by aliens.

“You want to find them to bring them to justice, I want to find them so I know they are okay.”

Bring who to justice? It seems like a lifetime ago, but if you remember back to the Season 4 finale and the whole AIDA framework ordeal… there’s no question government officials need answers about what happened. Before the team was abducted, Fitz even offered to take the blame for messing with the Darkhold. But before he and Coulson can finish their discussion, the bald guy appears and next thing you know, everyone except Ftiz is in space. Even though AIDA and the Framework is Fitz’ fault, SHIELD is still on the hook and it appears the government officials are convinced they are on the run. And when Fitz said he thinks SHIELD was abducted by aliens, the woman tells him to enjoy spending his life in a cell.

Thankfully, Lance Hunter comes to the rescue. According to Blood, Lance and Fitz are integral to helping the team return from space.

“Oh yeah, I don’t think Fitz could have managed it without him — or at least that’s what I think Hunter tells himself ,” Blood told TV Line. “Fitz is very grateful to see him, despite the fact that some of his ideas don’t go quite according to plan.”

Unfortunately, it’s unlikely we’ll see Mockingbird join the fight. Adrianne Palicki is busy in The Orville, but who knows, maybe ABC is saving her return as a surprise. Blood did reveal his characters is at least still in touch with Bobbi.

“Well, he’s been up his usual tricks, doing some mercenary work and bickering with Bobbi… He doesn’t necessarily have access to all the bells-and-whistles and gadgetry that S.H.I.E.L.D. did, so he has to use his charm and his wit to break down doors, and call in a few favors from his dodgy friends — who at times are quite unreliable!”

The next episode of Agents of SHIELD airs at 9 p.m. on Friday. Are you excited for Lance’s return? Let us know in the comments.

Watch Agents Of SHIELD Season 5 Episode 5 To See Lance Hunter Return

Minecraft Marketplace Holiday Update Coming Thursday, Says Mojang

Minecraft has updated across the Xbox One family of consoles with a variety of changes and new content.

In addition to the new Norse Mythology Mashup Pack, the update also adds a Festive Tumble Arena where gamers can celebrate the holiday season. This update also changes some mechanics involving cauldrons, potions, water, and world generation that should please many Minecraft fans. Here’s the official release notes for this update.

• Added Norse Mythology Mashup Pack.
• Added Festive Tumble Arena.
• Added New Horse Model.
• Added Dyeable Leather Horse Armour.

Cauldron changes

• Cauldrons can be filled with potions.
• Tipped Arrows can be created using an Arrow with Cauldrons filled with potions.
• Water can be dyed.
• Armour can be dyed in a Cauldron filled with dyed water.

Baby Zombie jockeys can now ride any mobs.

World generation changes

• Added Fallen Trees & Dying Trees.
• Village Changes.
• Tables have brown carpet instead of a pressure plate.
• Added Ice Plains & Cold Taiga Villages.
• Added Chests to Ice Plains and Cold Taiga Villages.
• Ice Plains & Cold Taiga Villages won’t generate crops.
• Paths around village wells now made up of grass path (sandstone in desert).
• Dispenser changes.
• Fireworks will fire in the direction the dispenser is facing.
• Mob heads will drop to ground unless they are being placed on a block that would cause a Wither or Snow Golem to spawn.

Updated Wither Boss behavior

• Explodes and spawns Wither Skeletons on half health.
• Change to dash attack.
• Remove health regeneration.
• New birth and death animations.
• Armor Stands now have arms and multiple poses.

Do you play Minecraft on an Xbox One? Let us know if you like the console experience in the comments below.

Minecraft video game gets big content update in time for the holidays

• Three US college-age hackers pleaded guilty to creating the Mirai botnet, which took out critical parts of the internet in 2016 through distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
• The attacks affected Spotify, Twitter, Reddit, and well-known security journalist Brian Krebs.
• The three men created the malicious software to profit from the popular game Minecraft, according to Wired.
• They hoped the DDoS attacks would take out rival Minecraft servers, and boost their own DDoS mitigation business.

Three US hackers have pleaded guilty to creating the Mirai botnet, which took out some of the internet’s biggest sites last year including Reddit, Spotify, and Twitter through distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

According to a Wired investigation, the college-age Paras Jha, Josiah White, and Dalton Norman originally created the botnet to gain an advantage on Minecraft. But once they realised the botnet’s power, they went bigger.

“Mirai was originally developed to help them corner the Minecraft market, but then they realized what a powerful tool they built,” one FBI investigator told the publication. “Then it just became a challenge for them to make it as large as possible.”

Hosting and protecting Minecraft servers is competitive and big money

While Mirai eventually took down critical parts of the internet, alarming engineers tasked with keeping the infrastructure running smoothly, it had humbler beginnings.

The game Minecraft is massively popular, with 55 million players a month. Users construct blocky 3D worlds by “mining” blocks. The entire effect is cartoonish, and the game is popular with kids.

Those who want to play multiplayer must sign up to a Minecraft server, which can often have tens of thousands of users who pay money to rent “space” or buy tools. According to Wired, the FBI investigators found that people were making big money by hosting Minecraft servers. “These people at the peak of summer were making $100,000 a month,” one investigator said.

Microsoft

That, in turn, has resulted in rival Minecraft server hosts trying to one-up each other with DDoS attacks. Indeed, the arms race in DDoS attacks is directly linked to Minecraft, an agent said. The goal of DDoS in Minecraft is to try and frustrate users on a rival server with slow service — so that they end up switching to yours.

Mirai’s creators wanted both to knock out rival servers, but also potentially make money by offering protection against DDoS attacks. The trio had set up their own DDoS mitigation company and used Mirai to take out a competitor, French web hosting firm OVH. OVH offers Minecraft DDoS mitigation services and, in September 2016, it suffered a crushing DDoS attack unlike anything it had seen before.

“This was a calculated business decision to shut down a competitor,” one of the investigators said.

Eventually, Mirai’s creators decided to publish its source code online, to try and throw any investigators off the trail. That opened up the tool for wider use, and variants of Mirai — apparently not created by the three original hackers — took out performance management company Dyn. That meant outages for Dyn customers including Reddit, Github, and Twitter, and gave Mirai greater attention. According to Wired, an FBI investigation into Dyn is still ongoing.

The three left enough fingerprints for both the FBI and security journalist Brian Krebs, victim of a Mirai attack, to track them down.

3 US hackers took out key parts of the internet in 2016 because they wanted to make money on Minecraft

“These kids are super smart, but they didn’t do anything high level—they just had a good idea. It’s the most successful IoT botnet we’ve ever seen—and a sign that computer crime isn’t just about desktops anymore.”

– FBI supervisory special agent Bill Walton on the creators of the Mirai botnet.

Wired recently published a piece interviewing several people who were involved in analyzing and investigating the biggest cyber security breach of 2016, caused by three college-aged individuals who were looking to gain an advantage in Minecraft by creating the Mirai botnet malware.

FBI supervisory special agent Bill Walton describes how the trio didn’t intend to create this sort of chaos. “Mirai was originally developed to help them corner the Minecraft market, but then they realized what a powerful tool they built,” he explains. “Then it just became a challenge for them to make it as large as possible.”

The creators of Mirai targeted French Internet provider OVH because it offered Minecraft DDoS mitigation tools and certain servers. “Why are these Minecraft servers getting hit so often?” FBI special agent Elliott Peterson remembers asking.

Minecraft was the reason the Mirai botnet was created

How a Dorm Room Minecraft Scam Brought Down the Internet

We often fawn over the intricate design elements of Funko’s vinyl figurines and really can’t fathom the journey one of these collectibles takes from initial drawing to their final home on our shelves. Yet, every so often we’re floored by how awesome some of the simpler designs end up looking. Case in point, these Minecraft Pops!Funko’s done low-res figures before but there’s something about these Minecraft characters that works so perfectly. Their blocky design transfers perfectly into the tangible third dimension that it’s like they jumped right out of the screen.As with most Funko lines, they’ve planned a bit of an “exclusive” hunt in order to get your hands on all these beauties. Once they hit stores in February of 2018, a glow version of Creeper can be found at FYE, a Charged Creeper at Gamestop, Walmart will have Steve in Gold Armor and Alex in Enchanted Armor, and you’ll have to head to Target to find the Skeleton with Fire.A real-life quest for these to adorn our shelves seems perfect for any Minecraft fan and is substantially easier than some of the accomplishments in the game. When players are so dedicated to a game they can create functional clocks, calculators, and accurate recreations of Westerosi locations from Game of Thrones—headed to a few different stores seems like a breeze.

What do you think of these new Pop! figures? Which Minecraft elements would you like to see them produce in the future? Let’s discuss in the comments below!

These MINECRAFT Low-Res Pixelated Funko POP!s Are Amazing

Ender Dragon is Minecraft’s final boss, a serpentine collection of dark blocks that launches fireballs at the player. Minecraft speedrunners have long struggled with it, but this week speedrunners finally discovered how to bypass the Dragon altogether. It’s already led to a world record.

Part of what makes the fight against the Ender Dragon time consuming is a series of End Crystals that sit atop pillars and heal the Dragon when it flies near. However, players can also craft their own End Crystals and bring them into the final level to wreak havoc. Originally players were trying to place extra End Crystals in specific places to influence the Dragon’s path during the fight and also deal some extra damage (they can be exploded like land mines).

Recently, experimenting with this strategy yielded an even better discovery. Placing an End Crystal as soon as the player enters the Dragon’s level causes it to glitch and never spawn while still yielding the portal to the end credits that marks the completion of a run.

Placing Crystals after the Dragon has already been defeated summons a new Dragon. If this happens, the game checks to see if the end portal that spawns after the battle is already there, in which case it doesn’t create one. However, timing things right can confuse the game. By placing the crystal before the battle starts, the player is able to trick the game into skipping the fight entirely. “Because we place the crystal before the Dragon fight is fully loaded, it fails to find evidence of another portal, and so it creates one,” explained the MineCraft glitch hunter Matthew Bolan.

A player by the name of Geosquare discovered the glitch by accident while researching a tool-assisted speedrun for the fight. His findings in turn helped one of the game’s most prolific speedrunners, Illumina, to break the world record of 4:07:400, held by Joshgaming4 and which had previously stood for over two years, with a 3:20.9 run.

“It was from mid 2015,” Illumina said in an email. “It was a very daunting time to beat and that’s why it stood for so long.” Illumina thinks the run still has room for improvement.

There’s a lot of randomness in a Minecraft speedrun, and speedrunners try to find the ideal parameters for spawning a new world. In Minecraft these parameters are known as seeds. Players select a seed at the beginning of a run, and they determine what flavor of map will be generated by the game. In Illumina’s case, using the new Ender Dragon glitch meant finding a seed that would give him a world conducive to crafting the necessary End Crystal. In addition to discovering the glitch, Geosquare also helped find the best seed for executing it.

“The seed was found by Geosquare by writing a program using variables that would make the seed optimal,” Illumina said. “He ran the program for about 5 minutes and they spent a couple hours looking through the seeds that came up. There is probably a better seed than the current one as it only took a couple hours to find, but when there are 2^64 seeds, it is not easy to go through all of them.”

Illumina’s world record was specifically in Minecraft’s “seeded” category. There are other categories that prohibit both glitches and seed optimization, but Illumina thinks that misses half the fun. “A benefit from [seeds] is that it keeps the category more interesting as you never know when a new seed would be found,” he said. “Some runners said that we should just stick to one seed to make one route consistent but I disagree in doing that.”

“Every category of this game is too RNG and takes a lot of grinding to get a great run,” said Illumina who’s been running the game since 2011. “But it’s always fun to see if you will get lucky in a run, kind of like gambling. It’s definitely much different of a game to run from any other I’ve seen. Things like the Dragon skip and seed optimization programs help marry the chaos of the game to the practiced skill expert players want to bring to it.”

After Two Years Minecraft Finally Gets A New World Record

The Xbox One X has been on shelves for just under a week (well, shelves that aren’t here), and it’s a little difficult to gauge its success without hard sales figures. Microsoft haven’t come out of the gates with glorious tales of how their new console has been selling like hotcakes, and some data in from the UK might make you curious as to why. Because the Xbox One X is selling pretty damn well there. Better than Sony’s PS4 Pro did during its own launch window.

According to GamesIndustry.biz, the Xbox One X has seen over 80,000 sales (adjusted by 20% from raw data) in the United Kingdom alone, which is a pretty significant figure for the singular region. The sales figures eclipse that of the PS4 Pro, which only hit 50,000 in the same time and took a full month to reach 80,000 in total. The lack of exclusives at the launch seem to have been a moot point too, with third-party titles such as Call of Duty: WWII and Assassin’s Creed Origins proving to be solid sales companions with the Xbox One X during the last week.

This bodes well for Microsoft, who have been facing an uphill battle ever since this generation started. Out of the gates the Xbox One was the weaker of the two core consoles, and over the years that battle has changed the rules of combat. Sony and its extensive exclusives library now outweighs many arguments over the Xbox One X’s superior power, but it seems evident that in the UK that’s still a large factor in purchasing decisions.

It’s still early says for the console though, and Microsoft’s toughest days are still ahead. As Sony continues peppering their future with great looking exclusives, Microsoft is hunting for new developers to bring under their wing. A process that might only see fruit in many years to come.

Last Updated: November 13, 2017

Xbox One X gets off to a strong sales start in the UK

Marvel Heroes and its Omega upgrade, were a grand effort. When developer Gazillion Entertainment first launched it as a PC-exclusive several years ago, it was a diamond in the rough. It wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but it still had a solid foundation that could be used for further enhancements.

Said enhancements were slotted in aplenty, with Marvel Heroes growing with new gameplay additions on a monthly basis at one point. Free to play, offering a taste of everything that it had before it asked for some cash in return, Marvel Heroes was a great game to spend a few idle hours on. Marvel Heroes omega was meant to be the start of a new chapter for the game, one that brought its action to consoles with some handy dandy control schemes that simplified the action.

Instead, it was a swansong as Disney pulled the plug on Gazillion Entertainment and their access to the pantheon of heroes and villains. Originally scheduled for demolition at the end of December, giving players time to say goodbye and experience the game without the need to purchase anything else, Gazillion has instead closed up shop sooner than expected.

All of the staff has been dismissed, and the servers have been switched off, as Gazillion made the closure official:

A damn shame, that’s what it is. The fact that this was done to the staff before they could celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday properly is bad enough, but when you factor in that the crew got zero severance payments as well? If there’s any anger to be directed at Marvel Heroes Omega, it needs to be channelled at the people in charge who were responsible for mismanaging the title and letting their crew of hard-working developers take the brunt of this monumental stuff-up.

Last Updated: November 28, 2017

Marvel Heroes Omega is officially dead

Gambit, arguably one of the most popular X-Men characters, is one who has still not appeared in an X-Men movie to date. We are of course completely erasing that X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie from our minds. It didn’t happen, I tell you.

So, I guess it’s surprising that it has taken this long for 20^th Century Fox to finally start moving forward on the troubled production of this iconic hero’s solo movie, but with Channing Tatum firmly set for the lead role and Gore Verbinski on board to direct the film, it is finally scheduled to get made. It even has a release date for Valentine’s Day, 2019, which will serve as a personal love letter for all of those fans desperate to finally see Gambit come to life.

Such is the despair and frustration around the stop-start nature of the troubled production though that some fans don’t want to get their hopes too high until they actually see pictures of the film actually getting started before they will believe that it will actually get made. And while I do not have such evidence to bring you today, a new report from Omega Underground reveals that casting work on a film titled ‘Forevermore’ is due to start soon for a film to be shot in New Orleans.

Now ‘Forevermore’ might not sound like much, but the article goes on to reveal that it is the new working title for the Gambit film, which was formerly called ‘Chess’ by the studio in previous plans. Those unfamiliar with working titles, it’s usually named that studios use in development to try and keep actual details of films secret – though as you can see, it doesn’t help with today’s modern world where the slightest of changes can be easily picked up by fans and journalists anyway.

Along with the title change, there are also reports of a role being cast for a character called Mariya, which they believe refers to Bella Donna and another casting for a role titled Lewis which is believed to be for the film’s villain. If these rumours are true, we should be hearing some new casting announcements for the film soon.

We still don’t know much about the Gambit film, but at least it looks like production should start soon. With next year bringing a total of three big X-Men movies with New Mutants, Deadpool 2 and X-Men: Dark Phoenix, Gambit will also hopefully bring something different with it to set it itself apart from those films and potentially usher yet another exciting character in the otherwise mostly disappointing X-Men film franchise.

Last Updated: November 21, 2017

Gambit movie gets a new working title; could be starting production soon

WAR! GOOD GOD Y’ALL! What is it good for? Father and son bonding apparently, as Kratos’ war against the pantheons that ruled mankind ended with plenty of deicide and a quest to find peace. What does a former god of war do in his off-time then? Apparently sire a child, as Kratos is coming back not only with a vengeance but with his son Atreus as well.

In a new chapter for the series that looks far more emotional and narrative-driven than ever before, Kratos has to juggle severed heads and parenthood in a world where mythology is both brutal and fierce. A world where plenty of old gods and beasts still have a bone to pick with the legendary warrior, who now no longer wields the chains of Olympus but rather simpler and more visceral death-dealing tools.

Which you can see Kratos put to good use in this latest trailer for God of War.

Dammit, still no release date.

Last Updated: October 30, 2017

It’s time for some father and son bonding in a new God of War trailer

When the story first broke a few weeks back that Disney was potentially looking at acquiring a huge chunk of Fox’s film and TV properties, for many fans – who realized this meant that the X-Men and Fantastic Four franchises could now be brought into the Marvel fold – it seemed like a dream. Now that dream seems to be becoming reality. A very, very expensive reality.

Following on from reports that Disney was back at the negotiating table with Fox and had gone radio silent – usually meaning that things were getting serious and they didn’t want details leaking out – it now looks as if the two studios could come to an agreement as early as 15 December. That’s next week. As previously reported, Fox would look to hold onto their lucrative news, sports and broadcast network divisions, while Disney snaps up their film and TV properties which will undoubtedly be used to heavily bolster their own digital streaming platform which is set to launch in 2019.

Along with those film and TV properties, Disney would also acquire Fox’s stake in Hulu (to supplement the portion they already own alongside Comcast), Nat Geo and Sky, the distribution rights still owned by Fox for some of the early Star Wars films, and partial ownership of comic publisher Boom! Studios. Current Fox shareholders would retain a stake in the newly trimmed down studio while acquiring shares in Disney in a fixed exchange ratio.

And according to CNBC – the ones who actually broke this rumour initially – all of this could come at an eye-watering price tag upwards of $60 billion. That’s an incredible amount of money, but consider Disney’s most recent history of massive purchases. They bought Lucasfilm for $4 billion in 2012 and have already made $3 billion of that back off just two Star Wars movies in two years. Similarly, they also acquired Marvel in 2009 for $4 billion, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe alone – ignoring the actual comics publishing side of things or any merchandising – has already earned over $5 billion for them. Forgetting the comic book movie franchises and other properties they would acquire, Fox’s gigantic slate of TV dramas alone would probably help Disney to make a sizeable dent on that $60 billion investment, so this is definitely not bad business.

This is not a done deal though. CNBC reports that its own parent company, Comcast, is also in negotiations with Fox as a potential buyer along with Sony and Verizon Communications. However, it appears that the talks with Disney have moved along the furthest and are the closest to being finalized. This would without a doubt be a massive game-changer in the entertainment business, and some would even say that Disney could be flirting with anti-trust laws with this proposed monopoly. Not that it would dissuade them. Disney has been known to make legislators in Washington look the other way in the past, and with it being rumoured that current Disney CEO Bob Iger is looking to make a run for US President in the near future, it looks like only a matter of time before the House of Mouse actually does rule the world.

Last Updated: December 6, 2017

Disney could close $60 billion deal to buy Fox by next week

Way back in February 2015, Marvel and Sony blew fans’ minds when they revealed that they had struck a surprising co-production deal that would allow Spider-Man (whose film rights were owned by Sony) to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After the failed reboot of Amazing Spider-Man, fans were overjoyed at the prospect of Spider-Man finally getting done right on the big screen. As amazing as that sounded though, there was a problem: These same fans were all Peter Parkered out. After an original trilogy starring Tobey Maguire then another two film reboot with Andrew Garfield, many were calling for a different Spider-Man to be given his cinematic due. An Ultimate Spider-Man, to be exact.

In the Marvel Comics universe, their Ultimate imprint was an alternate universe that featured younger, more contemporary versions of their classic characters. It also had its own young Peter Parker… “HAD”, as the young hero would eventually die at the hands of his archnemesis Green Goblin, unmasked and in full view of the public. His death though would inspire Miles Morales, a young boy who also had spider-like abilities thanks to the very same experiment that gave Peter his. Donning his own costume, Miles would become the new Spider-Man to fill the gap left behind by Peter Parker.

Created by writer Brian Michael Bendis as a character his mixed-race daughter could identify with, the half black/half Hispanic Miles Morales would become a beacon of representation in the Marvel universe… and also just one really amazing Spider-Man. His popularity would lead to him being one of the few heroes brought into the mainstream Marvel universe when the Ultimate Universe was destroyed in the Secret Wars event, and he’s even landed his very own cartoon TV series on Disney XD. But still, no movie talk as Tom Holland was cast to play Peter Parker again in Captain America: Civil War and Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Luckily though, Marvel had a plan. Coming off mega-successes like The Lego Movie and 21 Jump Street, filmmaking duo Phil Lord and Chris Miller were tapped to write/produce a new feature-length animated film focusing on Miles Morales. Well, him and a whole lot of other Spider-Men as Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was revealed to follow Miles Morales as he somehow discovered of the existence of the many alternate universes in the Marvel universe and all their respective webheads. And thanks to the first trailer for the film dropping at Brazil’s Comic Con Experience (CCXP) over the weekend, we now know that it looks spectacular!

The film features some jaw-dropping visuals and I absolutely love the little touches of the classic comic frames jammed into the action. For now, this film is a completely standalone entity. However, we don’t know which Peter Parker it is that shows up at the end of the trailer, and with the whole multiverse angle I wouldn’t be surprised if Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse teased some connection to Tom Holland’s live-action MCU version at some point. Can you imagine how fans would lose their minds if this movie proves popular enough to have Miles make the transition from animated to live-action to show up next Holland’s webslinger and the rest of the Avengers somewhere down the line? We have been told that after the still-untitled Avengers 4 that the MCU was getting shook up in a big way, and the existence of alternate universes would definitely do that.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse will be directed by Bob Perschietti (Puss in Boots, The Little Prince) and stars the voice talents of  Shameik Moore, Liev Schreiber, Mahershala Ali and Brian Tyree Henry. It is scheduled for release on 14 December 2018.

Watch the spectacular first trailer for Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s animated Spider-Man movie!

I’m starting to think that the Game Awards might rival the Critical Hits awards, what with the show having access to an amazing online infrastructure, oodles of cash and developers who don’t leave flaming bags of dog crap on their front porch whenever we ask for interview opportunities. Maybe, but not really. Nice try Geoff Keighly, but you have a long way to go before you’re taken as seriously as we are over here in the Critical Hit awards show kitchen where we hand out dodgy Chinese chocolates to the biggest winners of the year.

That being said, this year’s Game Awards was a great show. Plenty of announcements, plenty of trailers and at least one instance of a game developer telling the Oscars to go f*** themselves. Our kind of show! In case you missed the show, worry not. Here’s a list of trailers from the various announcements, in case you weren’t ready to wake up at 3 in the AM to stream the event:

World War Z

Vacation Simulator

Accounting +

From Software’s Shadows Die Twice

In The Valley Of The Gods

The Legend of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild – The Champion’s Ballad

SoulCaliber VI

Fortnite Battle Royale 50 v 50 team mode

Bayonetta 1 and 2 for Nintendo Switch

Bayonetta 3

Death Stranding

Witchfire

Sea of Thieves release date trailer

Dreams

GTFO

Metro: Exodus

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds

So…2018 looks fun, right?

Last Updated: December 8, 2017

All the announcements and trailers from the Game Awards 2017

If there’s one game that I’m looking forward to in 2018, it’s a title which doesn’t revel in blood, guts and gore. Rather, it’s a game of creation, fuzzy logic and fleeting glimpses of imagination. Media Molecule’s Dreams is that game, a project whose hefty ambitions have resulted in it spending plenty of time in development.

I’m not exactly surprised. Little Big Planet from Media Molecules was an absolute behemoth when it came to giving fans options to create their own content within the confines of that game, and that was years ago. Time has passed, technology has improved and the software injected into these machines is more malleable than ever.

Dreams is all about creation. It’s about shaping your dreamscape, of using the power of the mind to create new worlds to explore. At the 2017 Game Awards, Media Molecule had a new look at Dreams debut. Check it out below:

That’s a lot more surreal than I was expecting, even more so than the original E3 2016 reveal of Dreams. It looks like Media Molecules is aiming to create a game for everyone, by giving players the tools to create interactive experiences within Dreams that range from Galaxian simulators to good ol’ PLEASE HUG ME DAMMIT games for its main character who craves a decent night’s escape from reality.

I kinda dig that. A PlayStation 4 exclusive, Dreams can be played with a regular controller or the PS Move controllers.

Last Updated: December 8, 2017

Media Molecule’s Dreams had plenty to show at the Game Awards

Guys! GUYS! GUUUUUUUUUUUUUYS! A new Devil May Cry is coming! Glorious day! Fantabulous! Splendifferictacular! I can’t wait to play a new Devil May Cry…

…HD Collection.

DAMMIT I GOT ALL HYPED UP FOR NOTHING. Apologies to all three of my nipples, we’ll have to save the excitement-rubbing for later. Back to the meat of the story then: Devil May Cry, a franchise that redefined action on various consoles, is coming back with a vengeance. Next year March 13 according to VG247, the original trilogy of Demons with tear ducts will hit PC, PS4 and Xbox One.

That means that players will get to play 2001’s Devil May Cry originale and it’s superb super-awesome 2006 demon-slaying sequel Devil May Cry 3, which introduced Dante’s blood brother Vergil and the meme that launched a thousand ships. That also means that players will have a chance to play Devil May Cry 2, a game which usually elicits howls of anguish from fans.

I’ve personally never played the middle game in the first trilogy, although most fans regard it as a middling bastard child that almost killed one of Capcom’s best franchises thanks to its sheer awfulness. Hold my root beer while I get my gimp suit, because I need to experience this pain for myself so that I can understand what y’all have gone through.

It’s not the first time that Devil May Cry popped it original trilogy onto a newer console, as the first HD Collection hit PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 way back in the dark ages of 2012. A more innocent time, before loot boxes and one wherein the only true problem in in the industry was EA’s propensity to make online portions of its game locked to a console thanks to a special code that came with each new purchase of a hot game.

Ah, the good ol’ days. Anyway, March 13 then for anyone who has an interest in achieving S-rank scores in bludgeoning demonic beasties. That’ll set you back an RRP of $29.99. I’ll update with local pricing as soon as I get it.

Last Updated: December 8, 2017

A new Devil May Cry HD Collection is on its way to PC and console

Minecraft, the cleverly named blocky game that’s about both mining and crafting is still unfathomably popular. Millions of people play the game regularly, including my own children who’ve made it so that I’ve bought the game half a dozen times on a number of platforms.

That was meant to become moot with the new Minecraft Bedrock Edition, which was supposed to unify the games across platforms. Ditching the series convoluted naming scheme, and known plainly and simply as Minecraft, the new version was supposed to make everything better, allowing people from different platforms to play together. It’s done that, but it’s also split the community on Xbox One.

On that platform, the game is available in two flavours: The original now deprecated Minecraft: Xbox One Edition, and the newer Minecraft based on the Bedrock Edition. Only it seems that people vastly prefer the older version. One of the biggest problems for most is that the new Bedrock version appears to be a straight port of the Windows 10 version of the game, without the console-specific control tweaks that made the game manageable on the Xbox One.

A look at the reviews of the new version of the game on the Xbox One shows that people are very, very unhappy with Minecraft. (via USgamer)

Says one unhappy player:

“The UI is atrocious. Commands have been added, but are limited. Some items aren’t in the creative inventory. The big servers are laggy. You get no starting coins for microtransactions. Sprint flying is much slower. I lost all my skins, textures, and mash-up packs. EXTREMELY buggy. All wooden tools and crafting tables require oak wood. IT’S JUST PE MINECRAFT ON XBOX!!!! IT IS SUPER BUGGY!!! I CAN’T CONNECT WITH FRIENDS!!! Over all, it feels like an unfinished game. Mojang should have just updated the first Xbone edition to have new textures, servers, realms, infinite world size, and microtransactions with earnable or starting coins. Big downgrade in many areas.”

And another:

“I played this version in beta and it was NOT ready for a public release. There are numerous problems that went unaddressed or were flat out ignored. To list a few: -Frame rate is extremely unstable and drops considerably -This version is not optimized for redstone and more complicated devices produce massive amounts of lag. I also want to point out that redstone in general received a HUGE downgrade in this version compared to the previoua console version with the engine seemingly unable to handle lots of redstone activating at once, odd timing bugs, and various other removed features. -The new crafting interface is unoptimized for a controller and cumbersome to move through because you have to go through each square individually. -Movement and block placement are somewhat laggy and nowhere near the standard that the original console version set. Overall, this version is a rushed and massive downgrade from the previous console.”

And another:

“i had a survival world that ive spent atleast 400 hours in, and the transfer changed the terrain and the whole entire world itself and i lost all progress and it wont let me change it back…… and because i transfered it to this new version, i dont have that save anymore and im literaly thinking of just uninstalling this outrages game…..

the game itself is glitchy and has so many bugs that i cant even play the game…… it laggs and has at times delayed my screen….. unlike the xbox one edition that is smooth and not glitchy or laggy”

Reddit is equally awash with threads calling the game as it stands a mess.  4J Studios was responsible for the older versions of games, taking platform strengths and weaknesses into account when tailoring the game to each platform. It appears they are no longer involved in the process, and the Minecraft team is attempting to a one-size-fits-all approach.

At least Xbox players are able to play the older version of the game. The Nintendo Switch version is set to transition to the Bedrock version next year, allowing Switch, Xbox One and PC players to play together – but if it’s in the state it’s currently in, players may not want that update.

Xbox One Minecraft players are not happy with the “Better Together” version