News
5 CommentsKiller Instinct Season 3 video confirms new single-player mode is coming
Killer Instinct Season 3's launch trailer recaps all the stuff coming to the game today, but it also offers news for what's coming later. That is Shadow Lords, a single-player mode.
Shadow Lords, according to its official announcement, is a kind of campaign mode in which the player picks a main fighter and then recruits a team of combatants to stop bad guy Gargos. Crafting, of all things, is mentioned, which sounds like a variant on what should be a lot of unlockables. Characters added to the game after Shadow Lords' launch, which isn't specified other than "later this season," will be included in the mode as well.
Other news in the trailer includes a reminder that four more fighters are coming out every month between now and July, beginning with Mira in April and Gargos in May. Also,...
News
330 CommentsBlizzard is removing a sexualized pose from Overwatch, citing player feedback (update)
The creators of Overwatch are facing a new controversy, this time over a butt.
Blizzard said today it will remove a victory pose from its upcoming shooter Overwatch after receiving feedback from a player who criticized the pose as overly sexualized and unbefitting the character's personality. Overwatch game director Jeff Kaplan confirmed the removal on the game's forums, saying the developer will "continue to try to do better."
The removal of the pose in question, which applies to the character Tracer, the closest thing Overwatch has had to a mascot, stemmed from a post on the game's beta feedback forums. A poster by the name of "Fipps" posted a lengthy critique of Tracer's pose, commending Blizzard for creating a "diverse, interesting, and compelling" cast of female heroes, but...
Cover Story
Issue
16
March 9, 2016
The making of PlayStation VR
Go behind the scenes with some of the key people behind Sony’s upcoming headset.
Read moreNews
27 CommentsStreet Fighter 5's March update includes some amazing, wild and terrible new costumes
Capcom's latest update for Street Fighter 5, which paves the way for Alex's arrival and adds some promised game features, includes a batch of new costumes for the fighting game's roster. And players have already mined the March update to reveal a batch of weird, wild and questionable alternate costumes for the Street Fighter 5 cast.
Fans of professional wrestling will be well-served by the new round of DLC costumes; R. Mika, Zangief and newcomer Alex all have new gear that seems fitting for the squared circle. You can check out those new selections, including Ken's not-so-great short-haired alt look in the gallery below.
It's not clear when players will get access to the new costumes, but Street Fighter 5's in-game store will launch tomorrow, March 30.
The March update for Street...
News
14 CommentsMetal Gear Solid series gets price cuts in major PlayStation Sale
The PlayStation Store is offering discounts on a plethora of Metal Gear Solid games this week. From now until April 4, several titles in Konami's classic stealth franchise are discounted by up to 75 percent.
Nineteen games are accounted for in the PlayStation sale. Visit the store page for the full list of discounted titles or check out our highlights below.
Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (PS4) — $40.19 (33 percent off)
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3) — $9.99 (50 percent off)
Metal Gear Solid: HD Collection (PS3) — $19.99 (50 percent off)
Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes (PS4) — $4.99 (75 percent off)
Metal Gear Solid (PS3/PSP) — $4.99 (50 percent off)
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance — Ultimate Edition (PS3) — $7.49 (75 percent off)
Movies
6 CommentsWatch Daisy Ridley's audition for Star Wars: The Force Awakens
In a new clip from the Star Wars: The Force Awakens documentary, fans will be able to see part of the audition tape that led to Daisy Ridley securing the role of Rey.
The torturous scene, which seems to be similar to the moment Kylo Ren attempts to break into Rey's mind while on board Starkiller Base, was used to see how vulnerable Ridley could get, according to director J.J. Abrams. In the clip, Ridley has tears streaming down her face and was instructed to do the scene over and over again so Abrams could gauge the actress' abilities.
Posted by Star Wars on Tuesday, March 29, 2016
The clip mentions that because they needed a fresh face to restart the Star Wars franchise, finding an actress who could pull off vulnerability in one scene and and transform completely...
TV
19 CommentsHow did Supergirl get along with the Flash?
So this week the Flash crossed over from his version of Earth to Supergirl's version of Earth, and spent a lot of his time cracking wise and dispensing dating advice to Kara Danvers, which was nice of him.
Crossovers are, in essence, commercials
Supergirl and The Flash did team up to defeat what may be the worst super-villain duo I've ever seen. Silver Banshee shouts loudly and Livewire is made of electricity, which sounds cool, but is sorta undone by regrettable sartorial decision-making. Banshee's "make-over," from malicious Siobhan to frightful villain looks like something out of a lazy tween's Halloween bash.
They were eventually defeated by earplugs and a water-hose. This was not evil's finest moment.
There was also a cringey ending in which the citizens of National City came...
News
5 CommentsOrcs Must Die! Unchained is hitting all the right notes, open beta begins today
I'm standing at a hightop table in a hotel room in San Francisco. Next to me is Ian Fischer, design director on Orcs Must Die: Unchained, the latest title in the hit action tower defence franchise from Robot Entertainment. He's instructing me on the finer points of smacking a bugbear in the head with a shovel.
When I've saved up enough energy, he tells me to hit the V key to go "Unchained," a powerful turbo mode that only comes around a few times every session. Before long I've reduced a whole pack of bugbears to a steaming pile of chunks. They roll around on the floor like cartoonish cuts of bloodless meat. It's what I've come to expect of the brand of humor unique to this franchise.
But I'm not alone this time. My little dwarf miner, a crazed prospector named Dobbin, is cackling...
Latest Reviews
News
19 CommentsHow did this game about watching paint dry end up on — and get removed from — Steam?
Thanks to an exploit, a programmer quietly uploaded a prank project to Steam over the weekend — one which Valve has since delisted. According to its description, Watch Paint Dry, launching April 1, was "a sports-puzzle game that evolves around one mysterious cutscene." But that cutscene wasn't so mysterious after all, based on its screenshots and name.
Watch Paint Dry was a game explicitly about watching paint dry and, its "developer" said in a post-mortem of the quirky project, it wasn't much of a game at all.
"[Watch Paint Dry] is no more than a prank and was merely to test something I've been trying to report to Valve for the past few months — the ability to get any game you want on Steam, without Valve ever even having a look at it," the creator, Ruby, wrote in a post on...
Movies
21 CommentsAnime hit Fullmetal Alchemist is getting the live-action treatment
Fullmetal Alchemist's next film adaptation will be live-action, according to Crunchyroll. Filming is slated to begin this June in Italy, with a 2017 release currently planned for Japan.
Based on the popular manga-turned-anime, which has aired in the U.S. on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim block several times over the years, the movie will use a combination of real actors and CGI to depict the story of Edward and Alphonse Elric. The brothers are distinguished by their partially metallic bodies, which resulted from a transmutation experiment gone wrong.
Both the manga and its pair of anime adaptations have finished. Two animated films were produced as sequels to the series. The latest, The Sacred Star of Milos, saw release in 2011.
Viz Media publishes the manga in the U.S. The company r...
News
10 CommentsLeft 4 Dead 2 joins Xbox One backward compatibility list
Another Xbox 360 game is now backward compatible with Xbox One. Today, Microsoft updated the ever-growing list to include Left 4 Dead 2.
Valve's survival horror shooter marks the fourth addition to Xbox One's backward compatible titles this week. Microsoft kicked things off yesterday by making Xbox 360 games Halo Wars, The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match and Soul Calibur 2 HD playable on the newer platform.
Left 4 Dead 2, which hit Xbox 360 in 2009, makes it onto Xbox One before its predecessor. The first Left 4 Dead game came out on Xbox 360 just a year earlier.
News
23 CommentsDark Souls' director 'doesn't believe' player who beat the game without taking a hit
Last month, a player on Twitch streamed his no-hit run of the first Dark Souls game — but series director Hidetaka Miyazaki is chalking that playthrough up to an "elaborate rumor."
"I don't believe the player who says he completed the original Dark Souls without taking a hit," Miyazaki told Wired UK in an interview. While he conceded that it would be an "amazing" feat, he has trouble seeing its plausibility.
Whether or not that particular run is real — an archive of the lengthy livestream is still available, for other doubters — Miyazaki said he appreciates Dark Souls fans' creativity. Other players have used unconventional control methods to complete the Dark Souls games, often uploading videos of their accomplishments. These include beating them with Guitar Hero or Rock Band...
Movies
4 CommentsDeadpool lands new record at international box office
Deadpool may only be the third highest-grossing R-rated movie in the domestic market, but the film has shattered international box office records.
This past weekend marked Deadpool officially making more than $745 million worldwide, making it the biggest R-rated movie since The Matrix Reloaded, which made $742 million at the international box office. Domestically, however, Deadpool is still only the third-highest grossing R-rated film, sitting behind Clint Eastwood's American Sniper and Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ.
When Tim Miller's Merc with a Mouth film was released in February, it also debuted to record-breaking numbers. When it first opened, Deadpool made $132.4 million, breaking box office records for an R-rated movie's opening weekend. It has since continued to dominate...
News
7 CommentsCourt rules Valve broke Australian consumer law
Eighteen months of legal wrangling with Australia's consumer protection authorities have ended with Valve being found in violation of the law there for not having a refund policy.
The lawsuit was brought in 2014 by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, before Valve established the refund policy now in place. An Australian federal court ruled that Valve made misleading statements to consumers in its terms and conditions, all of which pertained to the right Australian citizens have to demand a refund if they are sold a faulty or defective product.
Valve had disputed that it was officially doing business in Australia or that whatever was being sold through Steam could be considered "goods" under Australian law. A judge ruled that Valve was in fact doing business in...
Active Discussions
Polygon Daily: March 30, 2016
in Off-topic by James Elliott
Polygon Daily: March 29, 2016
in Off-topic by James Elliott
Zombies! Vikings! Dynamite! Oh My! Plight Vol. 4 No. 4 Is Outta Sight!
in Off-topic by spooky
The Division Weekly: March 28: Intelligence is a Rounding Error
in Tom Clancy's The Division by Sabre IS Sabre
What are your greatest video game achievements?
in Polynauts by James Elliott