The first wave of Pokemon Go‘s Ultra Bonuses has arrived. This batch of rewards will be available until September 9, and it includes the return of three fan-favorite Legendary Pokemon, as well as the debut of a couple of new Shiny variants.
First, the three Legendary dogs from Pokemon Gold and Silver–Entei, Raikou, and Suicune–are appearing again in Raid Battles, as are a few other monsters originally from the Johto region such as Tyranitar, Ursaring, and Skarmory. On top of that, you’ll have a chance of encountering the Shiny forms of Sentret and Gligar in the wild, and Unown U, L, T, R, and A may hatch from 10 km eggs.
Two more waves of Ultra Bonuses will follow later this month. From September 9-16, players will be able to hatch region-exclusive Pokemon such as Farfetch’d, Kangaskhan, and Taurus from 7 km eggs, and all four forms of the Mythical Pokemon Deoxys will appear in Raid Battles. The following week, from September 16-23, will see the first Gen 5 Pokemon make their debut in Go. You can see the full list of Ultra Bonuses and when they’ll be available below.
Pokemon Go Ultra Bonuses
September 2-9
Entei, Raikou, Suicune, and other Johto Pokemon will appear in Raid Battles
Unown U, L, T, R, and A may hatch from 10 km Pokemon eggs
Shiny Sentret and Shiny Gligar will appear in the wild
September 9-16
Farfetch’d, Kangaskhan, Mr. Mime, and Tauros may hatch from 7 km eggs. You may also hatch their Shiny forms
All four forms of Deoxys will appear in five-star Raid Battles
Pokemon effective against Deoxys will appear in other tier Raids
September 16-23
Klink and Shiny Klink will appear in Raid Battles
Shiny Patrat and Shiny Lillipup will appear in the wild
Mewtwo that know Psystrike will appear in five-star Raids, as will Shiny Mewtwo
In addition to those bonuses, Niantic has also kicked off a new Special Research questline called A Thousand-Year Slumber, which leads to an encounter with the Mythical Pokemon Jirachi. You can see the full list of those quests in our Thousand-Year Slumber Special Research guide.
That isn’t all that’s happening right now in Pokemon Go. Niantic has also rolled out a new batch of Field Research tasks in the game. If you complete enough of them to achieve a Research Breakthrough, your reward will be an encounter with a flower-crowned Eevee, which first appeared in the game last year to celebrate the launch of Let’s Go, Pikachu and Eevee on Switch. Meanwhile, Pokemon Go’s next Community Day takes place on September 15 and features the Gen 4 starter Turtwig.
After the Labor Day weekend, it’s a pretty slow week for streaming services. Netflix doesn’t have too much coming out, and the same can be said for Amazon, Hulu, and Shudder. However, just because there isn’t a ton of content coming out, that doesn’t mean there aren’t a few things you need to watch this week.
On Tuesday, Hulu has a couple releases you’ll want to see. First, you can watch all of Season 1 of USA’s series The Purge, based on the film series of the same name. The second season arrives this fall, so binge-watch Season 1 to catch up.
Additionally coming that day is the dramatized version of the story of Wu-Tang Clan with Wu-Tang: An American Saga. The first season of the story of the hip hop group will air weekly on Hulu.
Arriving Wednesday on Shudder is the original film The Wrath. Taking place in 14th century Korea, a curse is killing a high-ranking family, one by one, in this supernatural haunt. This film is a remake of the legendary 1986 movie Woman’s Wail, and the trailer is pretty intense.
Below, you’ll find everything coming to Amazon, Hulu, and Shudder this week.
Monday, September 3
Amazon Prime Video
Victoria: Season 3
Hulu
Bolden (2019)
We Die Young (2019)
Tuesday, September 4
Hulu
The Purge: Complete Season 1 (USA)
Wu-Tang: An American Saga: Series Premiere (Hulu Original)
Kicking and Screaming (1995)
Wednesday, September 5
Shudder
The Wrath (Shudder Original)
Thursday, September 6
Amazon Prime Video
Late Night – Amazon Original movie
Niko and the Sword of Light – Amazon Original series
Hulu
Into The Dark: Pure: Episode 12 Season Finale (Hulu Original)
Watchmen is one of the fall’s most anticipated shows. The HBO series is based on Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ classic graphic novel, which was published by DC in 1986, and the showrunner is Lost co-creator Damon Lindleof. The show’s premiere date has now been announced.
HBO has confirmed that Episode 1 of Watchmen will screen on Sunday, October 20. The news was revealed in a tweet that uses the comic’s distinctive Doomsday Clock, which shows how far the world is from destruction, and the words “everything begins.” Check it out below:
Watchmen stars Regina King, Jeremy Irons, Don Johnson, Tim Blake Nelson, Louis Gossett Jr., and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II. While many of the roles are currently under-wraps, but we do know that King will play the show’s lead, a superhero character called Angela Abar, while Irons will play the villainous Adrian Veidt (aka Ozymandias). Check out the Watchmen trailer here.
Lindelof is best known for co-creating Lost with J.J. Abrams, as well as showrunning the acclaimed The Leftovers and writing the scripts for movies such as Star Trek Into Darkness and Prometheus. In 2017, he explained that Watchmen is not an adaptation of the comic book, but a continuation of its story and themes.
“Those issues are sacred ground and will not be retread nor recreated nor reproduced nor rebooted,” Lindelof said. “They will however be remixed. We are not making a ‘sequel’ either. This story will be set in the world its creators painstakingly built… but in the tradition of the work that inspired it, this new story must be original.”
The industry is bracing itself for another seismic shift. This time the threat is twofold: both the massive, disruptive change possible with new cloud-based technologies, and a new entrant into the market as Google prepares to launch its Stadia platform. Microsoft has its own plans to offer streaming through a cloud service, xCloud, as a complement to its usual console services. But how much will cloud gaming shake up the industry, and how quickly?
Currently, cloud gaming has three major hurdles to overcome: availability of high-speed internet, bandwidth data caps, and the public perception of digital ownership. To glean insights on the technical obstacles facing cloud gaming, GameSpot spoke with David Linthicum, a cloud computing expert and Chief Cloud Strategy Officer at Deloitte Consulting.
High-Speed Availability
One of the foremost threats to cloud gaming dominance is the simple limitations of the market. A recent NPD report found that roughly 31% of households in the United States lack any kind of broadband access. Though the report was bullish on the coming advent of 5G to bring broadband to rural markets, any new product is at a disadvantage if almost one third of the population can’t use it from the outset.
“The so-called digital divide, between those that can or cannot make the best use of the internet, can be clearly felt in rural markets where the lack of broadband impacts everything from entertainment to the educational system,” NPD connected intelligence president Eddie Hold said. “And even the state level data masks the underlying reality that in the most rural markets in America, less than 20 percent of households have a broadband connection.”
Any other concerns regarding broadband penetration would appear to be a matter of timing. Google may not reach high market penetration immediately, but if the company is patient, the first-mover advantage could pay off.
“Going forward, I think if we get in a time machine and go forward five years, I think [game platforms are] all going to be in the cloud, just because of ease-of-use,” Linthicum said. “For now, we’re going to see hitches with pricing, impact on gamers who actually run software and them being able to monetize. I think the big thing’s gonna be latency. I was an early Netflix adopter and that thing would have all types of issues even in high-bandwidth environments, but eventually they fixed it. I think people are pretty forgiving around new technology and they always understand that things are going to be continuously improving.”
Data Caps
Even for power users with a high-speed connection, though, cloud gaming service introduces a secondary risk: data caps. If users are slapped with high overage rates simply for playing games, it could kill Google Stadia and similar services in the crib before the technology rises to meet the demand. Google VP Phil Harrison addressed the question of data caps in an interview with GameSpot, suggesting that ISPs would respond to consumer needs.
“Historically, ISPs have demonstrated that they are very responsive to [consumers’ needs],” Harrison said. “When music streaming became popular, they lifted the bandwidth limit. When music streaming migrated to YouTube and Netflix streaming, once again the limits went up, and we expect that the limits will continue to rise over time. Partly driven by consumer demand, but also frankly, ISPs are in competition. There is a market dynamic, you know, that we believe will help continue to deliver a great service for gamers.”
That answer didn’t satisfy some awaiting Stadia, especially upon word that the company had revised its estimates upward–from 30Mbps for 4K to 35Mbps. Some watchers multiplied that figure into an hour of play, coming up with 15 GB per hour. That roughly squares with Linthicum’s prediction that a server-based gaming platform would demand roughly twice the bandwidth of a 4K movie, which Netflix estimates at 7 GB per hour.
“We haven’t put a meter on Stadia,” Linthicum said. “But I suspect that for home-based networking systems everybody is going to be well below it. It looks like they’re going to, in essence, put metering embedded with the Stadia-based system so people can see how much data they’re using.
“I think people are always a little misinformed about how much information actually comes down via the systems like Netflix or another streaming service,” he continued. “It uses less data than people typically think it uses and I suspect that may be the same here. With that being said, we’re dealing with people who have all sorts of bandwidth restrictions and capping and some people are still using hotspots and things like that. Obviously you have to keep an eye on how much data you are using to make sure you don’t go over.”
Linthicum said that the additional data is due to the need to be more aware of latency to maintain the gaming experience, but stressed that this is an educated guess without having metered the service.
Source: Xfinity Data Usage FAQ
Assuming that roughly 15 GB per hour of play is accurate, though, it adds up fast. An avid gamer who is the most likely early adopter for Stadia might play 10 hours or more per week. That’s 600 GB of data per month, just spent on video games, and not counting any other activities that might impact your bandwidth usage like movie streaming. By comparison, Internet Service Provider Comcast recently reported that median customer data usage had reached 200 GB per month.
It’s easy to see how gamers could blow past the bandwidth limitations quickly and get hit with overage charges. But like Harrison, Linthicum says he expects that ISPs will work to capitalize on the opportunity with consumer-friendly packages, rather than simply punish them with extra fees.
“I suspect [ISPs] want to know what’s coming down in terms of the bandwidth requirements and the behavior of Stadia and other gaming servers, cloud-based gaming services that are going to be coming out and making sure they are able to adjust expectations accordingly. Because they obviously make money from this if people increase bandwidth or increase speed. That costs additional dough and so they want to make sure they’re marketing correctly but also make sure they’re accommodating the needs of the users. I think we’re going to see some bundling of systems and some marketing campaigns show up around this.”
Digital Ownership
The biggest obstacle to cloud game streaming may not be technical, but perceptual. The community may not be ready to accept a streaming future in which they don’t own their digital purchases. Though most digital goods are merely licensed by consumers, the public often thinks of content stored on a local device differently than streaming. Consider the difference in mindset during the era of vast MP3 collections versus widespread adoption of services like Spotify. While customers largely never actually owned their iTunes MP3 collections, they had an inherent sense of ownership, whereas Spotify subscribers largely understand themselves as paying for access to an ongoing service.
Game prices on Google Stadia will match those of new physical copies, which may exacerbate the perceived differences between physical goods and digital streaming. Similar to Spotify, Netflix segued a successful DVD rental service into one of the largest video streaming services around, but that was at a single low, all-you-can-eat price point.
Google is very explicitly not doing that, and it has stated that its subscription service with the Stadia Pro will only include one new game per month. A more comparable model to Netflix’s approach might be Microsoft’s popular Game Pass service, if wedded to streaming as the delivery mechanism. But Microsoft has not given any indication as to whether or when that might happen, and Xbox boss Phil Spencer told GameSpot that he believes dedicated cloud gaming is “years away from being a mainstream way people play.”
However, where it may sacrifice in appeal to the core gaming audience, it could make up by broadening the appeal of video games. The average PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or power-PC owner may not see a reason to purchase a streaming game for $60, but that audience already owns the hardware to play it natively. The in-roads awaiting the game streaming future could come from consumers who have enjoyed games in the past or occasionally, but haven’t been able to justify the cost of dropping hundreds of dollars on hardware every few years.
“We’re going to get gamers that weren’t traditional gamers, even guys like myself that do it every once in a while, but don’t really habitually game on a daily basis,” Linthicum said. “But if it’s easy for me to just go ahead and take a few minutes and click on something within YouTube and have something pop up, that’s a very rich experience. The net new users, I think, is probably going to be their biggest market growth: traditional non-gamers that are going to find Stadia just compelling, because of ease-of-use.”
Microsoft seems suited to compete in this market as well. It has accented that it wants to use its xCloud platform to bring game streaming to a wide array of devices, and Google will begin introducing Stadia streaming to more Android phones sometime in 2020 after its initial premium launch. Once both services are up and running, we may have a better idea of whether the democratization of video games to anyone with a screen is enough to overcome the pitfalls.
Anime Souls-like Code Vein is slated to launch on consoles and PC later this month, and fans eagerly awaiting to wander the vampiric open-world will get the chance with a free demo that’s available now on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
The free Code Vein demo lets you create a Revenant and dive into the game’s beginning area. If you’re looking for a challenge, the Code Vein demo also grants you access to a dungeon called The Depths. Bandai Namco shared an announcement video showcasing a variety of dark, gothic landscapes available to explore in the free demo. The video, below, also gives a look at some characters you can create and enemies you can face before Code Vein’s launch.
A network test for Code Vein went live back in May. The test provided access to the game’s opening chapter and multiplayer. In an intriguing change for Souls-like multiplayer experiences, Code Vein features entirely supportive cooperative play. We chatted with producer Keita Iizuka at a preview event about the other changes Code Vein makes to the Souls-like formula, including respec-ing your character with ease, grouping up with other players, and more.
Code Vein is publisher Bandai Namco’s take on From Software’s iconic Dark Souls formula with a very distinct anime twist. As a Revenant–a chosen undead–you’ll battle against enemies called the Lost–husk-like remnants of Revenants–in a post-apocalyptic dystopia overrun with the scent of blood and the sight of death. The open-world action-RPG will land on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on September 27.
While Netflix still holds the crown of the “King of Streaming”–a totally meaningless title I just made up–not every week is going to be jam-packed with tons of new content. Take this week, for example. Only Tuesday and Thursday have releases this week, but there are a couple original series you should keep your eye on.
Coming on Thursday, Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat, Bruno) stars in the new Netflix original limited series The Spy. Based on a true story, Cohen plays Eli Cohen, an Israeli spy who spent time working undercover in Syria who brought information to the government was crucial to winning the Six Day War. Although Cohen is primarily known for his comedic work, he can pull of stunning dramatic roles, which you can see in the first trailer for The Spy.
The other big release this week is Season 3 of Jack Whitehall: Travels with My Father, also arriving Thursday. In this comedic docuseries, comedian Jack Whitehall travels around the world with his dad. For the third season, the Whitehalls head to the United States of America where the duo visit bingo halls, go to a Wild West town, and Jack learns how to be a professional wrestler, all of which are detailed in the trailer.
Below, you’ll find everything coming to Netflix this week, and if you want to look ahead, make sure to check out what’s coming out on Netflix for all of September.
New to Netflix this week
Tuesday, September 4
The World We Make
Thursday, September 6
Archibald’s Next Big Thing — NETFLIX FAMILY
Article 15
Elite: Season 2 — NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Hip-Hop Evolution: Season 3 — NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Jack Whitehall: Travels with My Father: Season 3 — NETFLIX ORIGINAL
However, there is reason for some optimism even in these numbers. The same report found that 43% of rural households own a streaming media player–nearly the same percentage as households nationwide–even without broadband access.