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The creative director of E3 2020 has decided to step down from being involved in this year’s show.

Merchandise and event production company Iam8bit has resigned from its position as creative director “with mixed emotions” as revealed in a tweet, but the reason why hasn’t been given.

It’s with mixed emotions that @iam8bit has decided to resign as Creative Directors of what was to be an evolutionary #E32020 floor experience. We’ve produced hundreds of gaming + community events and it was a dream to be involved with E3. We wish the organizers the best of luck.

— iam8bit (@iam8bit) March 5, 2020

 

Iam8bit was originally brought on to “reinvigorate the show and, frankly, to shake things up,” as it said in the announcement earlier this year.

The idea at this year’s E3 was to create a showfloor that “celebrates gaming culture in exciting new ways.” This would be shared with the world through new streaming and digital programming.

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While Iam8bit isn’t giving any explanation of why it has resigned from its position, the organiser of E3, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), has given a statement to GI.biz.

“We can confirm that Iam8bit is no longer part of the inter-agency group working on E3 2020. We greatly value their passion for the video game industry and the contributions they brought toward our vision for this year’s show,” the ESA said to GI.biz.

“We have an innovative and experienced team in place including Endeavor’s creative agency 160over90, event innovators Mat+Lo and longtime E3 partners, GES, Dolaher Events and Double Forte — all collaborating to bring to life an exciting and authentic experience for fans, the media and the industry.”

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The ESA has confirmed that it still plans to go ahead with E3 2020 despite the city of Los Angeles declaring a state of emergency due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Many of the game events meant to be happening in the first half of this year have already been cancelled due to concerns surrounding the spread of the virus.

The ESA released a list of companies that still plan on attending E3 2020, but one of the big companies that has dropped out is Sony. E3 Coliseum host Geoff Keighley also said he won’t be attending this year.

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Chris Priestman is a freelancer who writes news for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.

Today, Frictional Games announced their next horror project and it’s a return to the series that made them famous. Amnesia: Rebirth will be released on PC and PS4 later this year, 10 years after the release of Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

Amnesia: Rebirth follows a new character Tasi Trianon as they try to survive a deadly creature stalking her in the Algerian desert. This creature apparently feeds of Trianon’s terror, and players must be careful not to breathe lest they alert the hunter. You can watch the full announcement trailer below.

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The trailer is light on details but it’s immediately clear that Trianon finds herself in hostile territory. There are what appears to be caverns outfitted with traps, and you can briefly see the silhouette of a creature in a sandstorm.

Amnesia: The Dark Descent was released in 2010 where it became a viral hit online. The no-combat horror game was a popular mainstay for YouTubers and streamers to show how brave (or not) they could be while playing the game. Frictional would publish a sequel called Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs that was developed by The Chinese Room.

Frictional would develop their own follow-up in 2015 called Soma, which isn’t set in the Amnesia universe but features many of Frictional’s hallmarks such as having an unreliable protagonist and ambiguous memory.

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Prior to today’s announcement, Frictional began drip-feeding several mysterious videos hidden online that led up to today’s reveal. Some of the past videos included references to Algeria, and hinted at the desert location.

Amnesia: Rebirth will be released in autumn 2020 for PC and PlayStation 4. It is already available to wishlist on Steam. For more, check out IGN’s review of the first Amnesia here.

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Matt Kim is a reporter for IGN. You can reach him on Twitter.

James Gunn has confirmed that he once had an idea for a Guardians of the Galaxy spin-off movie focused on Drax and Mantis, which was “never ruled out.”

Taking to Twitter on Thursday, the filmmaker verified a recent report, exposing his idea of a Drax and Mantis team-up movie, while suggesting that it “could be amazing” if the project was ever actually greenlit.

True. But this was never ruled out. I still think it could be amazing. @DaveBautista @PomKlementieff https://t.co/MpA2iDGLHg

— James Gunn (@JamesGunn) March 5, 2020

This comes shortly after Dave Bautista, who plays lovable lug Drax in the Guardians movies, expressed his interest in Gunn’s potential spin-off movie while simultaneously turning down the possibility of his character appearing in a Disney+ series.

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“I wouldn’t do a series because Drax as a series would be really rough with the make-up and everything, it would just be too tough. What I would like to do is, honestly, and this is not my idea, I’m stealing this idea, James Gunn had the idea to do a Drax/Mantis movie, and that’s what I’d be up for because there’s just too much fun there,” Bautista said in a recent interview with Collider, even though the movie didn’t end up making it into Marvel’s schedule.

This isn’t the first time that the idea of a Guardians spin-off movie has been bandied around; a Groot/Rocket buddy movie was once deemed a “highly possible” release to follow Avengers: Infinity War. Gunn also suggested that he would like the Ravagers to star in a standalone movie as an expansion of Vol. 2’s post-credit scenes.

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Before any of that, however, Gunn is expected to move onto Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, though it could be a long way off, as Gunn previously apologised for Guardians 3’s absence from Phase 4 of the MCU. However, it sounds like it could be worth the wait, as Karen Gillan, who plays Nebula in the MCU, claimed the script for Volume 3 is the best of the trilogy.

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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

On Twitter, Craig Mazin, the writer and producer of the just announced The Last Of Us HBO show has confirmed that he will not be changing Ellie’s sexuality, much to the relief of fans.

Ellie’s sexuality has been a divisive issue among fans ever since it became apparent that Ellie was gay in the first DLC, Left Behind. Ellie’s sexuality has been further confirmed by the marketing for The Last of Us Part II, with an early trailer showing her kissing another woman. Ellie is a rare example of a gay protagonist in a major AAA game, and Mazin clearly recognizes the importance of representing this in the series.

The feeling of being included in media is a big deal to those who have been marginalized in the past, ignoring that part of Ellie’s character would be a shame.

Continue Reading at GameSpot

The Wonderful 101: Remastered has surpassed $2 million in funding on Kickstarter, unlocking a new mission and extra stretch goals.

Unlocked by reaching this new funding goal is Luka’s Second Mission, of which we only have a vague description to guess at what it might be: “Our young hero is back and ready for more adventure.”

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Some idea might be gleaned by looking at Luka’s First Mission, which was unlocked when Kickstarter funding reached $1.5 million, and is said to be a “brand new 2D side scrolling adventure starring a young hero.”

Luka appears in the original game as a young, aspiring boy who encounters the Wonderful Ones several times throughout the story. He is eventually inducted into the team under the alias Wonder Googles on account of his goggles that fire laser beams.

Developer PlatinumGames has now revealed two more stretch goals as the Kickstarter enters its final hours. The first, unlocked at $2.25 million, is orchestral recordings for the songs “The Won-Stoppable Wonderful 101” and “Tables Turn.”

The second new goal, unlocked at $2.5 million, is new languages added to the game. No specific languages are mentioned by Platinum asks for fans to let the studio know which languages they most want the game to support if this stretch goal is reached.

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The Wonderful 101: Remastered was the first of four big announcements that Bayonetta and Nier: Automata developer PlatinumGames has for 2020. The second was a self-published game currently known as Project G.G.. The third announcement was the opening of PlatinumGames Tokyo which will be developing live-service games.

The Wonderful 101: Remastered already has a release date. It will be released for Nintendo Switch, PS4 and Steam on May 19 in North America and May 22 in Europe.

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Chris Priestman is a freelancer who writes news for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.

Mark Wahlberg goes home to the streets of Boston in Spenser Confidential, a Netflix Original Movie inspired by the late Robert B. Parker’s literary private eye and the 1980s TV series Spenser: For Hire. It’s a competently made vehicle for Wahlberg to once again play a Boston tough guy but the movie itself isn’t thrilling or compelling enough to fully click as a murder-mystery, working marginally better as a buddy flick thanks to Wahlberg’s banter with co-star Winston Duke, who plays his newfound ally, Hawk.

Loosely inspired by Ace Atkins’ Spenser novel Wonderland, Spenser Confidential really doesn’t require any previous knowledge of either the books or the TV show to understand it. Even if you do have such knowledge the film makes so many changes to fit Spenser to Wahlberg’s screen persona that it could just as easily not be a Spenser story at all. This film — which reunites Wahlberg with director Peter Berg for the fifth time — follows ex-cop Spenser as he readjusts to life after a few years in prison for assaulting his former commanding officer. No sooner has he returned to South Boston than Spenser learns that very same cop has been executed. Spenser has an alibi but when another cop shows up dead the conspiracy widens. Driven by both his innate curiosity and strong moral code, Spenser quickly gets on the bad side of dirty cops, street gangs, and the city’s power brokers in his pursuit to bring justice.

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The whole mystery that the movie hinges on has all the stakes of standard ‘80s/‘90s crime thrillers or countless TV procedurals. You can identify exactly whodunit and why from the get-go so you spend the next 100 minutes going through the motions to get to a conclusion that was obvious from Act One. The action scenes are fine if uninspired; the best parts being seeing Wahlberg’s Spenser getting his ass handed to him by various groups of toughs or, in one of the more amusing sequences, a guard dog. Even though it’s firmly established that Spenser is a trained boxer, the use of Wahlberg as a punching bag is a fun recurring gag throughout the film.

While the mechanics of the murder mystery element of Spenser Confidential are formulaic, at least the personalities of the cast help elevate the other aspects of the movie into something a bit more engaging. As Hawk, Winston Duke forgoes the stone-cold delivery made famous by Avery Brooks on Spenser: For Hire in favor of playing him as a giant who eats greens and drinks oat milk, hipster habits totally foreign to Spenser. Duke’s Hawk may be kinder and gentler than his TV predecessor but he also makes the character far more real and accessible than Brooks’ more cartoonish but way cooler incarnation.

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(It should also be noted that the original Spenser was a thoughtful soul who loves poetry and quotes famous authors; the closest Wahlberg’s Spenser gets to that is being called “bookworm” in the prison library for reading up on tractor-trailer trucks. Also, Spenser wasn’t a Boston native like Wahlberg’s version.)

Other supporting players include Alan Arkin doing his best Alan Arkin impression as Spenser and Hawk’s curmudgeonly benefactor Henry, while comedian Iliza Shlesinger proves an underutilized scene-stealer as Spenser’s brash ex-flame, Cissy. Cissy may be a cliche Tough Boston Girl but at least she generates some laughs at the tough guys’ expense. Wahlberg, Duke, Arkin, and Shlesinger all have a fun chemistry together that a stronger and more engaging story would have helped showcase all the more.

Warning: this review contains full spoilers for Star Wars: The Clone Wars – Season 7, Episode 3. If you need a refresher on where we left off, here’s our review for Season 7, Episode 2.

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The Clone Wars is certainly living up to its name in Season 7. This first story arc is very heavy on both clones and wars. But as is too often the case with arcs that stretch out into four full episodes, the formula is starting to wear thin as we get closer to the end. Even as it finds new ways to spice up Captain Rex and Bad Batch’s mission, “On the Wings of Keeradaks” misses some key storytelling opportunities.

The good news is that this episode doesn’t fall into the same patterns as the previous two chapters when it comes to the action scenes. Rather than showing scene after scene of Rex’s team shooting down ineffectual droid enemies in narrow corridors, Episode 3 focuses on both opening up the scale of the action and mixing up the scenarios facing our heroes. Where Episode 2 sometimes struggled to create a legitimate sense of danger (particularly with a Jedi as powerful as Anakin backing up the team), this followup is much better about creating a sense of a small team facing overwhelming odds.

That’s especially true in the climax of the episode, where our heroes join forces with the Poletecans to face the full might of the Techno Union. That battle scene is pure Star Wars, with heroes triumphing against a vastly larger force and causing plenty of destruction along the way. This sequence, as much as any other, really showcases the improved animation style in Season 7. Especially comparing the series as it is now to the original Clone Wars movie or Season 1 episodes, it’s amazing to see how far the technology powering the series has come.

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That same sense of danger and overwhelming odds is also apparent in the opening sequence, as the clones stall for time while Rex and Tech liberate Echo and Wat Tambor’s minion’s cut their way through. The opening is vaguely reminiscent of the cellblock shootout from A New Hope in that regard. Wrecker is even teed up to make a heroic sacrifice here. While that death doesn’t come to pass, the possibility is upsetting enough. This Bad Batch storyline has done a very efficient job of introducing these new characters and making us care about them in a short span of time. What are the odds all four of them make it out alive next week?

Unfortunately, this episode’s relentless focus on action and lopsided battles prevents it from accomplishing the one thing that’s most important right now. “On the Wings of Keeradaks” does surprisingly little to actually take advantage of Echo’s return. Echo himself seems to shrug off his long captivity with ease, reverting almost immediately to his old dynamics with Rex and Anakin. We don’t get a clear sense of the psychological toll of his captivity or what Rex is feeling now that his hopes have been realized. As long as this story arc is, you’d think there’d be more time to slow down and deliver those little character moments that made the first two episodes so enjoyable. Hopefully Episode 4 can make up for lost time on that front.

It’s also disappointing how this episode deals with the notion of the Poletecans being caught in the crossfire. There’s something tragic about the way the way they’ve been unwillingly dragged into the Clone Wars despite their best efforts to remain safe and isolated. But rather than treat them as unfortunate collateral damage in Rex’s selfish rescue mission, this episode depicts the Poletecans as reluctant soldiers who just need a good pep talk. It feels like there should be a little more nuance to this conflict – a greater emphasis on how the heroes of the Republic can bring devastation despite their best intentions. But that’s always been a flaw with The Clone Wars. For all its efforts to make good on the idea of there being “heroes on both sides,” too often it reverts to a “Republic good, Separatists bad” mentality.

Given my penchant for shooters as opposed to melee-focused action games, I’m a bit surprised by how much I enjoyed playing Bleeding Edge. At a press preview event, I played Ninja Theory’s hero-focused multiplayer game for the first time (I missed chances at E3 and the open beta weekends) and Bleeding Edge impressed me with its satisfying combat and a surprising attention to sound design.

After spending 90 minutes with the game, it’s so immediately apparent that Bleeding Edge started out as a multiplayer online battle arena game. Success is almost totally dependent on teammates communicating with each other and fulfilling the established roles of a balanced unit.

Might Be Too Role-Focused For Its Own Good

Every character in Bleeding Edge fits into one of three classes: damage, support, or tank. Bleeding Edge seems entirely dependent on a team fulfilling an exact quota: one damage, one tank, one support, and a fourth player who changes their role to fulfill the needs of the team. Bleeding Edge’s meta allows for experimentation (in that you can pair different damage, support, and tank characters with one another), but it’s a rigid level of choice–going without any one class will screw over your team.

Continue Reading at GameSpot