Update: Planet of the Apes: Last Frontier has now been pulled down from the PlayStation Store, apparently having mistakenly appeared on the shop earlier today.
IGN has reached out for comment about the game’s appearance on the store, as well as when a full release is planned across all platforms.
Original story follows:
Planet of the Apes: Last Frontier has unexpectedly launched today for PlayStation 4.
The standalone cinematic adventure game is now available to purchase for $29.99 via the PSN Store. Last Frontier, which IGN exclusively revealed, was originally slated for Xbox One and PC as well, however as of press time the game is not listed on either of those systems’ stores.
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Production on Sony’s upcoming Venom movie has officially begun.
The start of filming was announced in a post on the movie’s official Twitter account, which simply states “Day 1. #Venom,” alongside the first set photo, which you can check out below:
While Bandai Namco continues to unveil more characters for Dragon Ball FighterZ on a regular basis, we know comparatively little about the game’s story mode. A new interview by Game Informer, however, has revealed a few more details about the mysterious campaign.
In the interview, Dragon Ball FighterZ producer Tomoko Hirok spoke more about the game’s story mode, which Hirok confirmed will feature three different story arcs. As we recently learned, players will be “linked” to different characters during each arc, which is partially a way to explain how you take control of them while playing. “I know it’s meta, but you are playing a fighting game as the characters, and in that sense, that’s portrayed in the story, too,” Hirok said. However, the idea of linking up with characters is more than a plot device; it has some bearing on the gameplay, as you can develop bonds with characters the more you play as them.
“In order to become stronger, you need to speak with Goku inside the mind, and as you defeat more enemies, you grow a bond with Goku that will give you a sense of you actually fighting with and alongside Goku himself,” Hirok explained. “In a sense, you’re getting friendly with Goku, which could lead to having special conversations with him and other characters.” She also mentioned Vegeta as an example. “Vegeta may give you the cold shoulder at first, but as you become more friendly, he may open a side of him you’ve never seen before.”
One of the other major components of the game’s story mode is Android 21, the original character who was designed by Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama for FighterZ. Hirok didn’t reveal many new details about the enigmatic Android, but she did shed a bit more light on the character.
“[Android 21] was a scientist with intelligence on par with Dr. Gero and was involved in various technologies, which brought about what’s happening in the story through her experiments,” Hirok said. However, she wouldn’t specify whether the new Android had some sort of relation to Dr. Gero. “I can say that she has ties with the Red Ribbon Army.”
Hirok also teased some significance to the Android’s gender. “There’s two reasons behind why [Android 21] is a female,” Hirok said. “One is a story-driven reason that I can’t disclose yet, which will only come to light through the story of the game, so I really want our players to enjoy learning more about why she’s a female then. As for the other reason, it was simply because Dragon Ball has a lot of male characters, and we wanted a female character to liven-up the game world.”
In the new video, released by USA Today, Johnson describes the experience of growing up a fan, only to now be creating his own entry into the iconic Star Wars canon. “I flash back to when I was a kid with the action figures,” he says of walking aboard the Millennium Falcon for the first time. “Suddenly I had a big lump in my throat. This is how it gets you.”
The footage gives a candid look at the set of a Star Wars film in a way most don’t see–from Daisy Ridley (Rey) twirling around her lightsabers like a baton to Johnson directing Peter Mayhew to give a Chewbacca howl that’s “sad like a dog whimper.” While the production was no doubt long and exhausting–this is a Star Wars movie, after all–the feeling the video gives is that the experience was filled with positivity and joy.
Based on what the cast has to say, one of the main reasons that came to pass is the director himself. Following Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Ridley says that Johnson decided to shake things up. “Rian is doing many unexpected things and taking the characters in new directions,” she reveals. John Boyega (Finn) adds, “The individual stories of these characters are elevated and made fresh and new.”
That new approach isn’t just refreshing for the cast introduced in The Force Awakens, though. Even Mark Hamill, who has been playing Luke Skywalker for 40 years, is excited about the movie’s trajectory. He explains, “That’s what I love about Rian’s approach to the story. It’s like a real journey of discovery.”
It’s Carrie Fisher (Leia Organa) that has the nicest sentiments for her director, though, in an interview filmed before her 2016 death. The Last Jedi will be the final appearance in the franchise for the late actress, who says of Johnson, “He has flaws in other areas. I just don’t know about them.”
For his part, Johnson admits to USA Today that the scenes featuring Fisher in the movie are among the ones he’s most excited for fans to see. “Having these scenes in the film recontextualize tragically with her not being here anymore, it’s incredibly emotional,” he says. “For the next few months, seeing the fans … process the loss and celebrate her as Leia one last time, it’s going to be intense. I think it’s going to be really sad but really joyful, I hope. She really kicks (butt) as General Leia, and I’m happy for that.”
Star Wars: The Last Jedi is in theaters on December 15.
Google Trends has revealed the most searched costumes this Halloween, and Wonder Woman currently stands as the top trending costume in all the land.
As reported by Fortune, the tool Google Frightgeist provides an up-to-the-minute list of the results for the most-searched costumes, and as of this writing, Wonder Woman leads the bunch. The character has had a great year, as the Gal Godot-led DC film broke box office records, and Diana Prince will be back in Justice League in November.
Wrestling legend Roderick George Toombs, better known as “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, passed away in 2015 quite suddenly, which was a shock to the wrestling fan community. Now, two years later, a documentary about Roddy Piper’s life and work–inside and outside the ring–is available online: Roddy Piper: In His Own Words.
The recently released documentary, which you can watch for $8 on the Ninefilms website, dives into the 40-year career of Piper in both WWE and WCW, and as well as his role in the John Carpenter classic They Live. Ninefilms gave GameSpot an outtake–as seen above–of Piper’s take on Hulk Hogan taking on “Stone Cold” Steve Austin. You can check out the full trailer for the doc below.
In addition to Roddy Piper: In His Own Words, the $8 price of admission also gets you access to the film Nine Legends, which revolves around interviews with Goldberg, Bret Hart, Mike Tyson, Chris Jericho, Dynamite Kid, Amy Dumas (Lita), Rob Van Dam, Ted DiBiase, and Randy Couture.
Roddy Piper was one of the greatest heels–or bad guys–of all time. He was best known for his work in WWE during his segment “Piper’s Pit,” where Roddy interviewed other stars, which usually led to brawls or a coconut being smashed on someone’s head. In 2005, Piper was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame by Ric Flair. During his speech, Piper recounted moments from his career, in a way only he could. He made fun of his stint in rehab, and some of his failures in the ring, with a huge smile on his face while making the crowd laugh.
Xbox Australia has announced a unique promotional campaign for the Xbox One X that involves sleeping in a mini-hotel in Sydney. Microsoft is calling this over-the-top campaign the “Xbox Stay N’ Play” experience, which comes prior to the Xbox One X’s release in November.
You will check in with your Xbox Gamertag, or make one when you get there. From there, you’ll head to your room that has an Xbox One X in it, a 4K TV, and Dolby Atmos headsets. There will also be a “full selection” of games enhanced for Xbox One X, though a list of these was not provided.
You can book a reservation now on a first-come, first-served basis through this Eventbrite page. Check-in is at 8 PM each night and you have to be out by 8 AM the following morning. You don’t have to sleep over, as you can also book a two-hour slot during the day.
If all the reservation slots get booked, you’re not completely out of luck, as the mini-hotel will have a lobby where you can walk in and play games from 8 AM-8 PM each day. The Xbox Stay N’ Play experience is open through November 5, with the Xbox One X officially launching on November 7.
The Xbox One X is the smallest and most powerful console Microsoft has ever made. Recently, the developer of Super Lucky’s Tale said the console is developer-friendly and is “like a high-end PC.” Keep checking back with GameSpot for more on the console in the days ahead leading up to launch.
Persona 5 is undoubtably one of 2017’s stand out games, and now a new Ultimate Edition bundle has been released for both PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3, which includes tons of downloadable content.
For $125 on PS4 or $115 on PS4, you’ll get the base Persona 5 game, the Healing Item Set, the Skill Card Set, an additional difficulty level, and even the original Japanese audio track. There are also tons of DLC costumes and background music, including Persona 5 DLC like the Christmas and swimsuit packs, along with goodies from other Persona and Atlus-developed games, including:
Catherine
Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha
Persona 2
Persona 3
Persona 4
Persona 4 Dancing All Night
Persona 4 Arena Ultimax
Shin Megami Tensei if…
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona
Ultimate Edition players will also get access to more Personas to battle with, including:
Ariadne & Ariadne Picaro
Asterius & Asterius Picaro
Izanagi & Izanagi Picaro
Kaguya & Kaguya Picaro
Magatsu Izanagi & Magatsu Izanagi Picaro
Messiah & Messiah Picaro
Orpheus & Orpheus Picaro
Thanatos & Thanatos Picaro
Tsukiyomi & Tsukiyomi Picaro
The Ultimate Edition is available now for sale on the PlayStation Store. In August, publisher Sega announced that Persona 5 had been a global success for the company, selling 1.8 million copies of the game since its release in Japan last year and globally in April. You can read more about its engaging characters and streamlined gameplay in GameSpot’s full Persona 5 review.
Destiny 2 is a lot more Destiny. The structure is largely the same, as is the mechanically excellent shooting and satisfying loot grind. But there are a variety of changes both under the hood and throughout your activities that make it a significant improvement over the original and a better experience for more than just the most hardcore players.
From the onset, there’s an overwhelming amount of stuff to do. The Red War story funnels you through the four areas you can explore, introducing you to each one as you go. At each destination, there’s a bunch of optional activities to choose from, including story-like Adventure missions, simple loot dungeons called Lost Sectors that lead to hidden areas of the map, and public events and patrols, which return from Destiny 1. Then, as you progress through the story, you’ll unlock the strike playlist and PvP in the Crucible. For a newcomer to Destiny, it can be hard to decide what to do and when.
The Red War story missions are less about plot and more about acclimating you to everything there is to see. You’ll level up at a pretty steady pace, but there are two level-gated missions that essentially force you to complete Adventures and other activities for XP before you can move on. There’s no actual reason for the missions to have level requirements, which can be annoying, but having direction is welcome after Destiny 1’s lack thereof. And aside from netting you XP and loot, the semi-hidden Lost Sectors reward exploration while Adventures are filled with lore and interesting details about the world that fall outside of the scope of the main story. If you’re burnt out on standard PvE, you can switch to PvP to level up, which requires different gear and skills.
The story is enough to serve its main purpose, which is to contextualize the shooting and looting you’re doing through it all. Its villain is a derivative conqueror figure with a hunger for power and destruction, and the save-the-world plot is tired. But you don’t need to know much to get going except that humanity is in danger, and you of all people have the power to help. The story’s strengths lie in atmosphere and side details, like the endearing craziness of the deranged AI Failsafe or the mysteries of the Vex machine race, and that should be fine for the majority of players who see the story as something to rush through in order to reach the high-level “endgame.” The mournful soundtrack in particular is fantastic, and it carried me through the most basic story beats, even on repeat playthroughs.
Like Destiny 1, there’s a lot of grinding to be done between finishing the story and moving onto the high-level endgame activities like the Nightfall strike and the Raid. And again like in Destiny 1, the shoot-and-loot feedback loop feels fantastic. The gunplay is still excellent, and being rewarded for your efforts with an even better gun is something worth celebrating. The biggest change is how much quicker it is to increase your Light level–now called Power–with minimal grinding early on. The combat isn’t any easier because of it, though, so it simply takes away the Destiny 1-era frustration of running the same few strikes a dozen times before you can move on to literally anything else. Plus, knowing you might get a slightly more fashionable pair of gauntlets from a five-minute public event gives you the kind of instant gratification that will sustain you through to the endgame.
There’s a decent variety of weapons and gear to find, mostly in random drops. And once you know what gear is desirable, it becomes a fun metagame to hope you’ll find it. A favorite around the GameSpot office has been the exotic auto rifle Sweet Business, and though no one has been using it, we had a lot of fun embarking on the quest to get Rat King. You might get lucky and get what you want right away, but for most people, finding a combination of great weapons for both PvE and PvP and gear with abilities that complement them takes some time. As far as customization goes, the Eververse and its microtransactions return, though leveling up after the official level cap grants you the new Bright Engrams that can be redeemed for consumable shaders, emotes, and more (for free). The change to shaders wasn’t popular among fans at first, but making them consumable allows for a greater range of customization on different pieces of armor as well as weapons.
Some activities and areas are more cleanly or interestingly designed than others, and after a handful of hours, you’ll start to identify the ones you love to play again and again and the ones you aren’t as fond of. At least two of the Crucible maps are circular in design and essentially funnel you to your death if you aren’t paying attention, which can get pretty boring; some areas require a fair amount of platforming, which can vary from tolerable to tedious depending on your class. But others are laid out in all the right ways to be memorable and fun to replay, like the Arms Dealer strike that keeps you running from room to room and preserving your heavy ammo for a series of tanks.
Though there’s plenty you can do on your own, Destiny 2 is undeniably better as a shared experience. That can come on many different levels; you can work silently with complete strangers to trigger a heroic public event that gets you all better loot, and on the opposite end of the spectrum, you can coordinate with five friends for hours on end to tackle the Raid. You can also join a Clan, which can grant you a number of passive benefits, like legendary gear, as long as someone in your Clan is meeting certain milestones. On top of that, Destiny 2 also introduces Guided Games, where solo players can search for groups who are short one person and willing to help them through difficult endgame activities like the Nightfall or Raid.
Success through strong teamwork is absolutely the best part of Destiny 2.
Success through strong teamwork is absolutely the best part of Destiny, and the top-to-bottom tweaks and additions in Destiny 2 make it more accessible without dampening your sense of accomplishment. Meeting the level requirement for the Nightfall or Raid and actually completing it are two very different things, and getting in sync with your Fireteam and flawlessly executing a strategy takes a lot of work. The first two Nightfall strikes, for example, both introduced a modifier to the original strike that forces you and your team to coordinate loadouts and stay in constant communication about which weapons and subclasses you’re using. You have to figure that out while also shooting waves of enemies and trying not to die. You’ll most likely fail, but each failure helps you perfect your strategy incrementally, and the process of collectively achieving that goal is immensely satisfying.
At the highest level, the vast and visually striking Raid combines the need for top-tier weapons and gear, picking the correct subclass and loadout based on what your team needs, strong combat skills, and problem-solving as a group. Destiny 2’s first Raid, Leviathan, is very, very difficult, and solving its often obscure puzzles can be both rewarding and frustrating. For the most part, each failure teaches you something new, and the GameSpot Raid team actually cheered when we came up with a solid strategy after going in blind. But there was one section in the middle that we struggled to complete even after we figured out what to do conceptually. Of course, this was after about five straight hours of raiding, so fatigue was definitely a factor–but it didn’t blend the puzzle-solving part with actual execution as well as the previous sections of the Raid.
In true Destiny fashion, if you do something once, you’ll probably end up doing it many more times. The difference with Destiny 2 is in the variety and accessibility of what’s available, which cuts down on a lot of the frustration associated with grinding. And even after you’ve leveled up, there’s still more you can do, from keeping up with daily and weekly challenges to just hanging out with friends. It’s a much stronger foundation than the original had and one that’s enough on its own to keep people coming back week after week.
Editor’s note: Now that Destiny 2 is out on PC, we’ve put that version through its paces in both solo missions and competitive multiplayer matches. The PC version comes with the usual suite of graphic and control options, and ran smoothly on our test PC built around a GTX 1070. We’ve since updated the score to reflect our experience across all available platforms.
