Month: September 2019

In 2008’s Iron Man, Marvel Studios dropped in a brief post-credits scene featuring Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, who teased the existence of something called “the Avenger initiative.” The rest, as they say, is history, and cinema was forever changed. However, it turns out that a different draft of Fury’s monologue teased the existence of X-Men and Spider-Man, almost a decade before Disney would acquire Marvel and subsequently acquire the film rights to the X-Men franchise, as well as share film rights with Sony.

At this year’s Saturn Awards, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige introduced a previously never-before-seen deleted scene from 2008’s Iron Man. The clip will be included on a box set that contains the entire Infinity Saga, coming later this year. In the clip, Jackson’s Fury can be seen tacking on a little bit of additional info to his now-familiar spiel.

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With Tokyo Game Show 2019 happening, plenty of news has come out of upcoming Japanese games, including Final Fantasy VII Remake. While we got a fresh look at the new combat system, along with seeing Tifa and Aerith in action (and the summoning of Ifrit), we also got details on Classic mode. And series producer Yoshinori Kitase took the stage to show off the game and walk through how Classic mode works.

In case you’re out of the loop, the standard combat system for FF7 Remake has you attacking in real-time to fill up the ATB gauge, which then allows you to pause the action to execute special attacks, cast spells, and use items. Thus, it plays like an action RPG. However, in Classic mode, standard attacks are automated and the ATB gauge fills up on its own. You won’t have to worry about the real-time action aspect, and you would only need to take care of executing commands as if it was a traditional turn-based RPG.

The official Final Fantasy VII Remake Twitter account briefly outlined the system in a series of tweets:

Classic mode is a separate gameplay option that’s intended to make the combat feel closer to how it worked in the original game’s turn-based system. Official footage from the stage show has not been released yet, so if you were not able to catch the segment during the stream, you’ll have to wait to see it in action. For more on Final Fantasy 7 Remake, be sure to check out the hot TGS trailer that shows off Shinra’s villainous goons known as The Turks or the latest FF7 Remake gameplay. You can also see how the squatting minigame has been recreated or watch our early hands-on impressions of the game from PAX West 2019.

During its Tokyo Game Show 2019 stream, Square Enix showed off more gameplay from the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. While the majority of the demo was the same as what was shown during E3 2019, the company did surprise viewers by providing a showcase of Aerith, Tifa, and Cloud battling a boss enemy.

The gameplay was narrated by Yoshinori Kitase, who served as the director of the PlayStation original and is producer on the remake. Although the explanation was entirely in Japanese, the gameplay allowed fans to glean some new details. The boss in question is Aps, who is encountered in the Midgar Sewers.

Aerith, who traditionally occupies the magic-user/healer role in Final Fantasy VII’s parties, is shown bolstering the magical abilities of her teammates. In the gameplay, she puts down a magical field which Tifa enters. Once inside the field, Tifa is shown executing a series of Thunder strikes consecutively.

Tifa, meanwhile, is still the bruiser, throwing herself at the enemy and delivering brutal rushes of punches and kicks. She still packs a punch and during the gameplay executes some really flashy special combos. At one point a Limit Break move was used and she executed an impressive somersault kick.

Perhaps the most exciting reveal was Ifrit, who was summoned into battle through a Materia slotted into Cloud’s Buster Sword. Ifrit operate independently, while the player continues to control the three party members. However, the summoned monster seemed to follow Cloud’s lead, attacking by launching himself into the enemy and breathing fire on it when Cloud was on the offense, but backing away when his summoner did. Ifrit could also be commanded to use special abilities such as Flare Burst, which summoned hellfire to damage Aps.

Before leaving the battlefield, Ifrit summons a swirling cyclone of flames that wrapped up the enemy and, ultimately, dealt the killing blow. It was a flashy, cinematic move that looked very cool.

During the presentation Kitase also showed off the new squatting mini-game, which has been fleshed out quite significantly. While the classic Final Fantasy VII version was a fairly simply experience, the remade version has a rhythm game element to it where buttons are pressed in specific timing to ensure the character maintains balance.

The PlayStation TGS stream is ongoing and, at the time of writing, the footage hasn’t been released online through official channels. However, you can watch fan captures like the one above.

£320 off Sony Bravia 55″ LED 4K TV, £40 off Ultimate Ears Wonderboom Bluetooth waterproof speaker, £45 off Microsoft Gears 5 and Xbox wireless controller bundle.

Watch Tifa, Cloud, and Aerith take on the Aps boss in the Midgar Sewers, and summon Ifrit to deal some big damage.

Hideo Kojima shows off customization options, weapons, and what players will be able to do in their safe house as part of the second Death Stranding TGS demo.