Looking to wrap up the Switch’s first 12-months on a high note, Nintendo will release Bayonetta and Bayonetta 2 on its hybrid console on February 16, 2018. GameSpot recently got an early hands-on look at the second game and it’s been confirmed that it will perform at a locked frame rate of 60 frames per second. You can see for yourself at the video above.
Developed by Platinum Games, both Bayonetta releases have been recognized as two of the best hack-and-slash games in the last decade. Due to its mix of stylish melee combat and over-the-top gunplay, the series is considered an unofficial successor to Devil May Cry, especially since the first games in both series were directed by Hideki Kamiya.
Both Bayonetta 1 and 2 will bolster an already strong and diverse Switch games library. These two are expected to join the likes of Skyrim, Stardew Valley, and Rocket League–critically acclaimed games that are seeing new life and continued success on the Switch. Both games reviewed well on GameSpot, the sequel earning the rare 10 out of 10 rating; check those verdicts out in the links below.
Bayonetta 1 and 2 arrive ahead of the newest installment in the series, Bayonetta 3, which will be exclusive to Switch. Nintendo hasn’t announced release date for Bayonetta 3 yet, but the company did share a brief teaser trailer for the game, which you can watch here. You can also catch up on all our other Bayonetta Switch news below.
Be the first one to play UFC 3, which will be released on 2nd February, 2018. You will get a special preorder bonus of 500 UFC Points to build your Ultimate Team, 5 Premium Packs in UFC 3 and you will be able to chose one Loan Champion Edition Fighter and Move for five fights in UFC 3. Want to learn more about t he game? Read our review here.
WASHINGTON — The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee made “material changes” to a secret memo he shared with lawmakers before sending it to the president to approve for final release, the top Democrat on the committee said Wednesday night.
Adam Schiff (Calif.), the committee’s ranking Democrat, called on Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) to withdraw the version of the classified memo he sent to the White House on Monday, arguing that a prior vote in favor or releasing the memo was invalidated by Nunes’ changes.
The memo, drafted by Nunes’ staff, reportedly accuses the Justice Department and the FBI of abusing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the fall of 2016 to spy on Carter Page, a Trump campaign adviser.
Earlier this month, members of the House Intelligence Committee voted along party lines to allow all members of the House to read the memo. Several Republicans hyped the document as evidence of a cabal of law enforcement officials determined to block President Donald Trump from entering office and to undermine his presidency. Democrats dismissed the memo as an inaccurate and misleading attempt to impugn law enforcement officials and undermine special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Schiff, one of two members of the committee who has seen the underlying intelligence on which the memo is based, accused Nunes and Republicans who backed the memo of politicizing intelligence to protect Trump.
On Monday, committee members voted again along party lines to send Nunes’ memo to Trump, giving him five days to decide whether to block it from being released publicly. During the same meeting, Republicans on the committee prevented Democrats from simultaneously releasing their own memo, drafted as a rebuttal to the Nunes document. Republicans also voted down a motion to delay the release of either memo until they had been reviewed by the Justice Department and FBI.
In an unusual public statement, the FBI warned Wednesday that it has “grave concerns” about the accuracy of the Republicans’ memo. Nunes, who recently voted to reauthorize and expand the part of FISA that allows intelligence agencies to collect information on U.S. citizens, accused the FBI of issuing “spurious objections to allowing the American people to see information related to surveillance abuses.”
By Wednesday, the release of the Republicans’ memo seemed imminent. Trump, who has attacked the credibility of the law enforcement agencies tasked with investigating him, assured a lawmaker on Monday evening that he “100%” plans to release the memo.
But on Wednesday night, Schiff announced a discovery he hopes will block, or at least delay, its release. The memo Nunes sent to the White House was a different version of the memo that was shared with lawmakers, Schiff wrote in a letter to Nunes on Wednesday.
“While the Majority’s changes do not correct the profound distortions and inaccuracies in your document, they are nonetheless substantive,” Schiff wrote in the letter.
The changes “try to water down” some of the Republicans’ assertions, a Democratic committee source, who requested anonymity to frankly discuss internal committee processes, told HuffPost. The changes were made ahead of the Monday vote but without the knowledge of all committee members, the source said.
When the committee voted on Monday to send the memo to Trump to approve for release, Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) specifically asked Nunes if the memo shared with members of the House would “word for word” be made public, according to a transcript of the meeting.
“Well, as the gentleman knows, we will send the content over to the White House, and the President has five days to either agree with us that it should be made public, or the President could say that he does not want it made public,” Nunes responded on Monday.
That response “was deliberately misleading,” Schiff wrote in his letter to Nunes. Because Nunes changed the document before sending it to the White House, without notifying other members of the committee, its Monday vote is irrelevant, Schiff argued. He called on Nunes to withdraw the version sent to the White House and hold a new committee vote on releasing the document.
A spokesman for Nunes indicated that the chairman has no plans to withdraw his memo. “In its increasingly strange attempt to thwart publication of the memo, the Committee Minority is now complaining about minor edits to the memo, including grammatical fixes and two edits requested by the FBI and by the Minority themselves,” Jack Langer, wrote in an email. “The vote to release the memo was absolutely procedurally sound, and in accordance with House and Committee rules. To suggest otherwise is a bizarre distraction from the abuses detailed in the memo, which the public will hopefully soon be able to read for themselves.”
The Democratic committee source disputed Langer’s description of the changes. “While the Minority has continually pointed out flaws in the Majority document, we have not requested any changes because we feel the whole document is fundamentally flawed,” the source wrote in an email. “It is clear that the Majority is no longer fully comfortable with what it has represented to House members. The Majority has no choice but to restart the process in a transparent manner.”
Regardless of the nature of the edits to the Nunes memo, Schiff’s effort to delay the Republicans’ memo could be a strategically sound move. If he succeeds, he might be able to push his own rebuttal memo through the committee voting process in time so that it can be released alongside Nunes’ memo.
During the committee meeting on Monday, Schiff accused Nunes of purposely orchestrating the timing of the release of each memo to control the narrative around the appropriateness of the Justice Department and FBI’s use of surveillance to monitor the Trump campaign staffer.
“I understand the political stratagem. You want your memo to be out there for a week and the public to have only one version for a week so you can set the narrative,” Schiff told Nunes on Monday. “That makes this political exercise all the more transparent.”
Nunes, a former member of Trump’s transition team and a close ally of the president, has used his secret memo as part of an effort to undermine Mueller’s Trump-Russia probe. The memo reportedly accuses Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein of approving an application to extend surveillance of Page. Because Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation, Rosenstein is the only official who can fire Mueller. Rosenstein has repeatedly said has has seen no reason to get rid of the special counsel. If Trump were to fire Rosenstein — let’s say for inappropriately approving the extension of a FISA warrant — he could then appoint a friendly replacement to fire Mueller.
The top Democrat on the US House Intelligence Committee has accused Republicans of tampering with a memo about FBI spying at the 2016 election.
Adam Schiff said Republicans had changed the text after it was voted on.
The secret document was passed by the Republican-dominated committee but needs approval from President Donald Trump to be made public.
It is believed to accuse the FBI of abusing its surveillance powers to target the Trump campaign.
Concerns about its contents were raised by the FBI itself which complained of “material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy”.
Democrats fear the document may be an attempt to discredit the inquiry into Trump campaign links to Russia, which is being led by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
If Mr Trump gives his approval, the memo may be released later on Thursday.
What do we know about the memo’s contents?
The four-page document was compiled by staffers for House Intelligence Committee head Devin Nunes, a member of Mr Trump’s Republican party.
It apparently accuses the Department of Justice (DoJ) and the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) of abusing a programme known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (Fisa) during the presidential election campaign.
The allegation is that the FBI spied on a member of Mr Trump’s campaign on the basis of unproven accusations against Mr Trump known as the “Russian dossier”.
That dossier was compiled by former UK intelligence agent Christopher Steele with money financed in part from Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Following his State of the Union speech on Tuesday night, Mr Trump was heard telling a Republican lawmaker he was “100%” for releasing the document.
BREAKING: Discovered late tonight that Chairman Nunes made material changes to the memo he sent to White House – changes not approved by the Committee. White House therefore reviewing a document the Committee has not approved for release. pic.twitter.com/llhQK9L7l6
Mr Nunes sent a version of the memo that was “materially altered”, the Democrat said. He gave no details.
Quoted by Reuters news agency, a spokesman for Mr Nunes described the changes to the memo as minor, including two edits requested by the FBI and Democrats themselves.
Mr Schiff’s allegation was, the spokesman added, an “increasingly strange attempt to thwart publication”.
“We are committed to working with the appropriate oversight entities to ensure the continuing integrity of the Fisa process,” it added.
The DoJ has said it would be “extraordinarily reckless” to release the memo.
How are relations between Mr Trump and the FBI?
Trump officials say the memo proves his allegation that he has been treated unfairly by the FBI.
Devin Nunes, who served on the Trump team during his White House transition, said it was “no surprise” the FBI had objected to the memo’s release.
“It’s no surprise to see the FBI and DoJ issue spurious objections to allowing the American people to see information related to surveillance abuses at these agencies,” he said.
After firing FBI director James Comey last year, Mr Trump reportedly asked his temporary replacement, Andrew McCabe, how he had voted in the 2016 presidential election.
Mr Schiff suggested the White House would use the memo, if released, to fire Mr Mueller or Mr Rosenstein.
Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat on the Senate Intelligence committee, said the Republicans were clearly trying to “undermine the special counsel’s investigation”.
Poland’s Senate has approved a controversial bill that makes it illegal to accuse Poles of complicity in the Nazi Holocaust.
The bill also prohibits describing Nazi death camps in Poland as Polish. It sets fines or a maximum three-year jail term as punishment.
The bill has outraged Israeli MPs who are now seeking to strengthen their own Holocaust denial laws.
The bill must be signed off by the president before entering into law.
It passed in the upper house of the Polish parliament with 57 votes to 23, with two abstaining.
The Polish President Andrzej Duda says his country has the right “to defend historical truth”.
What has been the Israeli reaction?
The Israelis are furious about the bill, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has described as an attempt to rewrite history and deny the Holocaust.
Deputies from across Israel’s often fractious political spectrum have united to denounce it.
Opposition MP Tzipi Livni of the Zionist Union party – normally a staunch critic of Mr Netanyahu – said: “They have spat in Israel’s face twice, firstly as the state of the Jewish people that is trying to prevent a second Holocaust, and secondly in the face of an Israeli prime minister who had reached an agreement with his Polish counterpart, and had it ignored.”
Centrist MP Yair Lapin was also defiant tweeting that the law could not change history.
Now, Israeli MPs are backing a bill that would expand Israel’s existing Holocaust denial laws to include a five-year jail sentence for anyone denying or minimising the role of Nazi collaborators, including Poles, in crimes committed in the Holocaust.
The amended law would also give legal aid to any Holocaust survivor telling their story who is prosecuted in a foreign country.
The US state department has also asked the Polish government to rethink the bill, saying the US was concerned the legislation could undermine free speech in the country and cause further diplomatic division.
What about in Poland?
Polish politicians have expressed bafflement at the Israeli response.
“We are very sad and surprised our fight for the truth, for the dignity of Poles, is perceived and interpreted in this way,” said Senate speaker Stanislaw Karczweski.
Deputy Justice Minister Marcin Warchol said it was wrong to suggest the bill would stop people researching Polish history.
“Poland is a democratic state of law which respects the freedom of public debate, scientific research, and the right to criticism,” he said.
Poland is governed by a nationalist party, Law and Justice (PiS), which is keen to show the world how Poland was ruthlessly victimised by its German and Soviet neighbours in the war.
Media reaction to the law has been much more ambivalent. “Instead of settling the crisis, we have made it even worse,” said a columnist in the conservative daily Rzeczpospolita.
Meanwhile about 100 Polish artists, politicians and journalists have signed an open letter calling for the repeal of the bill, saying it goes too far in trying to make Poland “the only blameless nation in Europe”.
What happened in World War Two?
Poland was attacked and occupied by Nazi Germany. Millions of its citizens were killed, including three million Polish Jews in the Holocaust.
Six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust overall.
The country has long objected to the use of phrases like “Polish death camps”, which suggest the Polish state in some way shared responsibility for camps such as Auschwitz.
The camps were built and operated by the Nazis after they invaded the country in 1939.
Indeed, more Poles have been honoured by Israel for saving the lives of Jews during the war than any other nation.
However, historians say others were complicit by acts such as informing on Jews in hiding, for rewards, and participating in Nazi-instigated massacres including in Jedwabne where hundreds of Jews were murdered by their neighbours.
Moving to Xbox 360, the Disney-published high-octane racing game Split/Second is free through February 15. It is playable on Xbox One through backwards compatibility, so you can pick it up and play even if you don’t have an Xbox 360.
Then on February 16, a new set of freebies will be available. On Xbox One, the side-scrolling Assassin’s Creed spinoff, Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: India, will be free, while the wacky driving game Crazy Taxi will drop to the low, low price of $0.00 on Xbox 360.
You can see February 2018’s full Games With Gold lineup below.
February 2018 Games With Gold
Xbox One
Shadow Warrior (February 1-28)
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: India (February 16-March 15)
