Month: January 2018

Overwatch‘s Mercy has been the subject of many changes over the past few months, and now developer Blizzard is changing her yet again. In the latest Public Test Realm update, the company has tweaked her Ultimate, Valkyrie, so it no longer makes her Resurrect ability instant, and it no longer gives a bonus Resurrect charge. In addition, Valkyrie’s duration has been reduced from 20 seconds to 15 seconds, and the speed boost that the Ult grants to Guardian Angel has been cut in half.

Mercy has been subject to a number of changes recently, but Blizzard thought the hero’s Valkyrie and Resurrect combination was still too strong. “Mercy’s recent Resurrect changes have helped in allowing enemies to have more counter-play in dealing with her, but she was able to use Resurrect through Valkyrie enough to largely mitigate the impact of the previous changes,” the company said in a forum post. “Additionally, we’re toning back the amount of mobility Valkyrie provides through Guardian Angel and reducing its duration to overall reduce the power of this ability.” The developer concluded by saying it will “likely be iterating on these changes in the coming weeks.”

Elsewhere in the new update, Junkrat’s Concussion Mine will now deal less damage to enemies far away from the explosion’s center. Blizzard argues it had become “a bit too easy to throw out huge bursts damage in a large area,” and that this tweak will still allow players to use his mines effectively, but also force them to be more accurate.

These changes are live now on the PTR, which you can check out if you own Overwatch on PC. However, be aware that these latest changes have not yet come to the live game (and may never arrive there), as Blizzard wants to continue experimenting before implementing anything.

Outside of the PTR, Overwatch has a new map and event coming “very soon,” while a new hero is already in testing. The game’s esports event also starts next week, and you can read more about that in our primer for everything you need to know about the Overwatch League.

 

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With the success of Fox’s X-Men movie franchise, it was only a matter of time before the Marvel mutants moved to the small screen. 2017 saw the premiere of two acclaimed shows, Legion and The Gifted. It has now been announced at the Television Press Association winter press tour that the latter will return for a second season.

The show’s first season has enjoyed solid viewing figures, with an average of 8.3 million viewers across all platforms. However, Disney’s recent $52 billion deal to acquire Fox’s entertainment assets had cast some doubt over the future of Marvel-related shows such as The Gifted, as Fox’s Marvel movie properties like X-Men and The Fantastic Four are expected to be integrated into Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe. In addition, Disney plans to launch its own streaming service in 2019 and it is likely that its Marvel properties will have a heavy presence there.

Despite this, The Gifted is remaining on Fox’s broadcast network for at least one more season. It is also worth noting that unlike the X-Men movies, Marvel was involved with development of the TV show, as it retains some of the TV rights to the characters.

The Gifted stars Stephen Moyer, Amy Acker, Natalie Alyn Lind and Percy Hynes White, and focuses on a suburban couple who are forced to go on the run from government agents when they discover that their children are mutants. The showrunner is Matt Nix, who previously produced Burn Notice.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly in September, Nix spoke about juggling the different creative forces involved with the show. “It’s weirdly much better than you think and much worse than you think,” he said. “My feeling truly about everyone involved in the process is that they all really care about this, and nobody’s stupid. They have all been down this road and know how to deal with it. The thing for me is that everybody gives really smart input, so it’s my job to square, like, four different kinds of notes.

“Fox, for example, is very respectful of the source material. It’s incredibly important to them, and they are conscious of wanting to make a show for everybody. You don’t want to just service one fandom. At the same time, Marvel very rightly is protecting their property, so they’re saying, ‘This is the way this works, this is how these powers work, this is who this character is historically in the comic books.'”

God of War may only just be heading into the territory of Norse mythology, but it might not stick around there.

Speaking to Game Informer, director Cory Barlog explained: “The Greek games were the Greek era of God of War. Moving on, the next mythological belief system he interacts with became the Norse era of God of War. But we may end up going on to the Egyptian era and the Mayan era and so on and so forth.”

Of course, God of War’s Greek era was eight years and six games long, so this may not be a plan for the immediate future. Then again, much of the appeal of the upcoming PS4 God of War is in its change of setting and the personality of its lead character, Kratos, so Sony Santa Monica may be keen to reinvent the series more often.

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‘Burnout Paradise HD Remaster’ (a tentative title) will seemingly be released for PS4 in Japan on March 16 – which hopefully means we’ll be getting it worldwide too.

On Twitter, Renka_schedule (a game scheduling Wiki) revealed a Japanese format and release date for the classic open world racer/smasher.

As Gematsu points out, listings for PS4 and Xbox One versions dated for March were spotted in December. It’s looking more and more likely that we’ll be taken back to Paradise City this year.

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There’s a changing of the guard happening at Warner Bros. and DC Films. It was revealed in December that Jon Berg and Geoff Johns were being replaced as the heads of the DC Entertainment films division, and now the new head has been announced.

Producer Walter Hamada, whose credits include It, The Conjuring, and Annabelle, is stepping in to guide the future of DC properties on the big screen. The move, which was first reported by Variety, comes after Justice League failed to meet its critical or box office hype in late 2017, leaving many wondering what the future of the DC movie universe would look like.

With so many films announced, Warner Bros. is counting on Hamada and Johns, who will remain the DC Entertainment president, to right the ship. “I’m confident Walter and Geoff, working with our filmmaking partners, will deliver films that will resonate with both broad global audiences as well as DC fanboys and fangirls,” Warner Bros. President and Chief Content Officer Toby Emmerich says in a statement.

Given that production on DC’s next movie, Aquaman, has already wrapped up due to its December 2018 release, it’s possible any major tonal shifts that come as part of the leadership change won’t be noticeable until Shazam hits theaters in 2019. However, Hamada has experience working with directors James Wan (Aquaman) and David F. Sandberg (Shazam), serving as an executive producer on their previous work in the horror genre.

In addition to those two films, DC has Wonder Woman 2, Cyborg, and Green Lantern Corps as part of its upcoming slate. There are also a number of unconfirmed projects that have been talked about, including several Harley Quinn and Joker-centric stories.

Meeseeks, KIng jelly bean and Evil Parent clones. The Smiths had a rough time in this episode. Buddy Hutton breakdown everything he found and tries to charge you schmeckles.