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We here in the IGN UK office really like Rezzed. The indie-focused show is: a) Packed to the airy rafters with new, exciting, and deeply strange games, b) Within walking distance of our office, and c) Has a pub on-site.

It’s the best, basically, which makes it very sad that the show has been postponed to this summer. Thankfully, its online equivalent, Rezzed Digital is running in its stead, and its organisers gave us a healthy bunch of the games that should have been on show this weekend to try out from the comfort of our quarantine zones. Here are some of our favourites, which we highly recommend you look up, wishlist and mentally bookmark for future reference.

The Falconeer

Imagine if in Waterworld – yes, the infamously bad post-apocalypse movie featuring Kevin Costner – everyone flew around on the giant eagles that saved Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings. Now imagine those eagles also have canisters strapped to their back that collect lightning from storm clouds, which can then be fired at other eagles. You’re now part of the way to understanding The Falconeer, a gorgeous eagle dogfighting game. Or, should I say eaglefighting?

The Falconeer shares a surprising amount with Failbetter’s Sunless games, in that it takes place in a vast, dismal open world dotted with safe harbours where you can dock (or, in this case, perch) to take on mercenary work. That work is often challenging; all the missions I undertook in the demo resulted in the quest giver being rather angry with my performance. Part of it is down to the combat, which – as aerial fights often are – is a little tricky to get the hang of, but also because the instructions aren’t all that clear to begin with. But while there’s a room for extra clarity, The Falconeer has already nailed its beautiful aesthetic and haunting atmosphere; that it manages to be so somber despite its daft bird combat premise is fantastic. – MP

Steam Page, Website

Shadows of Doubt

Shadows of Doubt looks like one of those Minecraft maps surgically enhanced by lighting mods, shaders and heavy-duty hardware. But it plays like- er, well I’m not sure what else plays like this, because it’s a simulated open world detective-stealth game. Haven’t come across too many of those. Made by one-man developer Cole Jefferies, it’s a game about the bits of detective work usually deemed unsexy by games – i.e. the actual detective work. Every one of the hundreds of persistent citizens in your procedurally generated dystopian noir city have names, jobs, and houses. You can explore every single apartment, and every room in those apartments. Some of those apartments have TVs playing the sound of real-life detective dramas on them, which isn’t important, but I love anyway.

You piece together cases by visiting crime scenes, interviewing suspects and, quite often, circumventing the law to find the evidence you need. My favourite touch? Your internal notes and objectives are controlled by your own internal red-string corkboard, where you can pick up and rearrange every clue you deem important. Even in its very early stages, I’m overwhelmed by the possibilities in here, and excited by how deep this little thing could get. – JS

Steam Page, Website

Liberated

Remember how the Max Payne games told the story via graphic novel segments before each mission? That’s also how noire thriller Liberated reveals its narrative, but it goes one step further: you play the game within those panels, too. As the pages of the dystopian story turn, the key panel of the issue becomes the frame for a black-and-white side-scroller that combines the atmospheric puzzler approach of Limbo and Inside with snappy stealth and gunplay.

When fights break out fantastic ‘BANG’, ‘POW’, ‘UUGH’, and ‘HEAD SHOT’ onomatopoeia words erupt from your weapon and enemies. Scraps are over quickly thanks to low health pools, and so it’s encouraged to sneak and blend in with the shadows to keep yourself alive.

There’s multiple perspectives, too, which provide different gameplay opportunities. As freedom fighter Barry, a member of ‘The Liberated’ who are rebelling against an autocratic state, you’re reliant on little more than your pistol and a phone to hack into computers. But when perspective switches to one of the city’s cops, you’re able to use automatics weaponry and even pilot a bomb-setting drone in one scene, setting up a bloodbath for members of The Liberated. It’s all a bit grim, but nonetheless stylish fun. – MP

Steam page, Website

Scourgebringer

It might be structured like Dead Cells, and look like Katana Zero, but this absurdly stylish 2D action roguelite actually reminds me most of Doom (and not just because of the Mick Gordon-esque metal that kicks in during every fight). At first glance, it looks like other combat platformers of its kind, but its combat is faster, meaner and, in my limited experience, cooler. A mixture of light and heavy slashes, dashes – that do not make you invulnerable, crucially – and an ammo-limited gun make up the building blocks, but the cement holding them altogether is how they chain together.

Any time you connect with a hit, your double-jump recharges, meaning you can more or less stay airborne for entire fights. It’s not only thrilling, it’s important, as things begin to tend toward the direction of ‘bullet hell’ before long, forcing you not only to fight well, but move well to make it through its twisting, generative single-screen maps. I want to do much more fighting. I need to do much more moving. – JS

Steam Page, Website

Eldest Souls

The name may sound like a cynical SEO trap, but Fallen Flag Studio’s project provides a novel new perspective on edge-of-your-seat boss rush games. Eldest Souls’ combat is built around a charge attack; build up a meter until completely full and your protagonist will dash at the enemy for a strike, but also momentarily gain the Bloodthirst buff. This allows for a powerful overhead sword-swing that not only badly stings a boss, but also restores a chunk of health. Already you can likely see how a battle plays out.

While each boss is distinctly in the mold of Dark Souls (the first two in the demo are a werewolf with a giant bone shield and a colossal knight with a towering halberd), it’s Eldest Souls’ nuances that make it stand out. You’re not limited by stamina for attacks, but you can only dash three times in succession before a cool-down kicks in. It means you can go hog wild on damage, but approaches and escapes demand finesse. Victories also unlock further abilities, such as a dash that deals a flurry of blows as it finishes, which encourages some fun, sometimes risky playstyles. – MP

Steam Page, Website

The Almost Gone

How can something that looks this pretty be this dark? The Almost Gone is less of a point-and-click adventure than a point-and-click drama, pitched dreamily between the micro-detail of the Room series and a European art film. The story is, I think, about a child planted in the middle of a divorce, but it’s told through the medium of picking through remains of a literally cracking family home and its surroundings. Its best idea is also its biggest problem right now – every area you visit is atomised into tiny slices of room that can be rotated and prodded at to find clues and unlock new areas.

They’re gorgeous, pastel-shaded bits of architecture and clutter but, once you’re navigating between half a dozen at once, it can begin to feel more of a chore to navigate than it should. It’s a minor gripe, however (and could be easily fixed with a mini-map) and, once you get your head around each location, puzzles unfold naturally and satisfyingly across multiple rooms. Just be prepared to feel quite sad as you complete them. – JS

Steam Page, Website

Trials of Fire

The surging popularity of card-based battlers has led to plenty of innovation, and Trials of Fire has several neat mechanics in its deck. Core of these is recycling; each card costs Willpower to play, but you begin each turn with none of the resource. Instead, you must scrap cards in your hand in exchange for Willpower. It’s a system that demands plenty of forward thinking, but is helped out by the fact that each of your three warriors has their own hand of cards. If one character doesn’t need to attack this turn, you can sacrifice their cards to provide Willpower for another character.

Trials of Fire features attack and spells cards with similar traits to games like Slay the Spire, but battles are played on on a hex-based grid, allowing for characters to move across the board each turn. This further complicates battles and allows for tactics such as flanking enemies with multiple fighters, and casting spells with areas of effects.

The battles are framed by a pen-and-paper style RPG adventure told through the turning pages of a dusty old book, but those elements feel merely narrative dressing for the elegantly designed battles, the arenas for which rise out of the tome’s pages. – MP

Steam Page, Website

A Monster’s Expedition

What drew me into A Monster’s Expedition was its self-billed genre – an open-world puzzle game. I kind of got it, but didn’t really have a sense of how it’d work in practice. What I quickly realised was that this wasn’t an open world in the sense of a city to explore or side-quests, but choices. At its heart, this is a sprawling, picturesque puzzler about rolling logs into place to get from miniature island to miniature island (it’s not far in approach from Stephen’s Sausage Roll). It also has a wonderful generated soundtrack to go with your moves, and some very endearing writing.

But its brilliance is that, pretty early on, you begin to see multiple routes appear, then fast-travel, and then you realise you can try things out in different order, and scratch an exploration itch. The only obstacle is your brain getting to grips with the puzzles and their growing set of internal rules (logs pushed on the side roll until they’re stopped, logs pushed from the end move square-by-square, etc.). From what I can tell right now, it’s something like a Metroidvania, except the gear-gating is based on your own neurons connecting and getting smart enough to work things out. I’m in. – JS

Steam Page, Website

Lord Winklebottom Investigates

Endearingly low budget, Lord Winklebottom Investigates is a Sherlock Holmes point-and-click adventure, but Sherlock is a giraffe called Winklebottom and Watson is a hippo by the name of Dr Frumple. They’re just the first of a cast of beautifully drawn animal characters, all of whom are animated in a bizzare, stretchy way that makes the entire thing look like a hybrid between Terry Gilliam’s Monty Python skits and an Aardman show, with the static framing of a Wes Anderson movie.

It’s as gently strange and amusing as that sounds, too. It seems like half the cast is voiced by a single actor, and while it’s not clear if the game is in on that joke, it works in its favour. Each animal you meet natters away with one of several British dialects which only strengthens its appeal. Oh, and the very first puzzle involves making a cup of tea, which cements it as probably the most English game ever made. – MP

Steam Page, Website

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Though it may be (mostly) common knowledge that Chris Farley was originally cast as the voice of Shrek, Tommy Boy director Peter Segal recently spoke to Uproxx about how the DreamWorks Animation blockbuster, which spawned three hit sequels, was explicitly based on Farley’s chemistry with best friend and Tommy Boy co-star David Spade.

“After Tommy Boy, we got a lot of offers to do things together,” Segal said, “and I of course was dying to find another project for us. Because, again, I took the leap of faith with him after working on two different television projects with him before Tommy Boy. And then, I did offer him a couple of things. He, by the way, almost did Shrek.”

Farley actually recorded some dialogue for Shrek prior to his death in 1997. He was, of course, replaced by fellow SNL alum Mike Myers, and the rest is Scottish-accented history.

Segal added “Terry Rossio and Ted Elliot, who wrote Shrek, I met with them years after Shrek came out and they said, ‘You know who we patterned the donkey and the ogre off of? As far as their relationship? That was Spade and Farley in Tommy Boy. That’s why we wanted Farley.”

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Given that Shrek was such a massive money-maker, and that Myers and Eddie Murphy’s voices are etched in history as Shrek and Donkey, it’s hard to imagine a Farley-style Shrek with a Spade-type Donkey. But it works if you consider the two of them swapping the role of “hyperactive character who annoys the glum character.”

In other movie news, check out all the best comedies on Netflix right now, the news about Ryan Reynolds being in talks to star a Dragon’s Lair movie, and a helpful PSA from the stars of Steven Soderbergh’s Contagion.

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Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association. Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at Facebook.com/MattBFowler.

Given that the sports world is currently on hiatus, along with the world of entertainment, ESPN is going to air famous Disney sports movies on Friday nights for families looking for programming they can watch together.

ESPN’s own press page announced that, starting March 27 with The Rookie (timed to MLB’s planned Opening Week), the network will continue to broadcast sports films over the next few Fridays. The lineup includes:

• The Rookie (2002), starring Dennis Quaid
• Glory Road (2006), starring Josh Lucas and Derek Luke –  timed to the traditional NCAA Final Four weekend
• Miracle (2004), starring Kurt Russell
• Invincible (2006), starring Mark Wahlberg
• Secretariat (2010), starring Diane Lane and John Malkovich
• The Greatest Game Ever Played (2005), starring Shia LaBeouf

Glory Road is set to air Friday, April 3, at 8:30 p.m. ET. Additional air dates will be announced.

These films are also available to stream on Disney+. In fact, take a look at the best movies from Disney’s streaming site right here…

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For those of you looking for oddball gems or quirky cult favorites, Disney+ has some wickedly weird offerings as well…

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For those looking for more at-home entertainment, here’s a list of movies that are hitting VOD early.

IGN spoke with a number of medical experts to learn how movie delays may help stop the spread of COVID-19.

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Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association. Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at Facebook.com/MattBFowler.

There’s never been a better time to be an X-Men fan. Marvel relaunched the entire franchise in 2019 under the direction of writer Jonathan Hickman, anchored by a brand new mutant status quo wherein a united Professor Xavier and Magneto have created a home for their people on the island nation of Krakoa. Under the “Dawn of X” banner, Marvel has launched a number of new monthly X-Men comics that expand on this brave new world.

Now that we’re roughly half a year into the relaunch and the first wave of Dawn of X books are beginning to be collected in trade paperback form, we figured now is the time to look at the entire X-Men line and see which books have most lived up to their potential. Read on for a breakdown of all six books, as we rate each in terms of overall quality and in how much they add to the larger X-Men status quo.

A quick note before we start – we’re sticking to just the original six Dawn of X books that launched in October and November 2019. Marvel has since expanded the franchise even further with newer additions like X-Men/Fantastic Four and Wolverine, but we’d prefer to give those newer books more time to grow before passing judgment. And if you enjoy this new approach to comic reviews, why not check out IGN’s recent breakdown of Marvel’s The End one-shots?

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X-Men

Written by Jonathan Hickman | Art by Leinil Yu, RB Silva & Mahmud Asrar

As its straightforward name suggests, X-Men is the flagship book in the current line. Writer Jonathan Hickman picks up where he left off in House of X and Powers of X, introducing new threats to Krakoa and laying the groundwork for bigger conflicts to come. While the series features an ensemble cast of A-List X-Men, it tends to revolve mostly around Cyclops and the rest of the extended Summers family.

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Is X-Men Good?

X-Men is an enjoyable read, if not quite as satisfying as Hickman’s previous work on House of X and Powers of X. The series requires a slight adjustment. Where each new chapter of those two miniseries added bold new details to the new status quo, X-Men is comparatively slower and more laconic. The emphasis on standalone, done-in-one tales also limits the scope of the series. Still, the series succeeds in recapturing the exciting, sci-fi-oriented flavor of Grant Morrison’s New X-Men, and the emphasis on Cyclops and his family helps the book maintain focus.

Read IGN’s review of X-Men #1

How Does X-Men Fit Into Dawn of X?

Unsurprisingly, with Hickman at the helm, X-Men is among the more important Dawn of X titles. The series has focused on introducing several ongoing threats to the nation of Krakoa and how that nation is finding its place on the global stage. It’s also revealed a number of other fascinating details about life in the mutant nation, including the implication that Cyclops, Jean Grey and Wolverine are involved in a three-way relationship.

That said, X-Men isn’t always the book leading the charge in Dawn of X. Arguably the biggest plot development of the last six months, the assassination of a key X-Men character, happens in another book and is only casually referenced in the pages of this series. Hickman seems to be working under the assumption readers are following along with the entire X-Men line, and that’s not necessarily a good thing.

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Marauders

Written by Gerry Duggan | Art by Matteo Lolli, Michele Bandini & Lucas Werneck

While the team featured in this series shares a name with Mister Sinister’s gang of mutant killers, they’re hardly villains. Marauders features Kitty Pryde leading a pirate-themed X-Men squad tasked with smuggling mutants out of authoritarian countries and delivering them to Krakoa. The series also deals heavily with the newly formed Hellfire Trading Company and the power struggle between Emma Frost and Sebastian Shaw as they work to control the flow of Krakoan wonder drugs to the outside world.

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Is Marauders Good?

Marauders is easily the best of the first wave of new X-Men comics. Hickman himself named it as a favorite back at Comic-Con 2019, telling reporters writer Gerry Duggan was among the first to become involved with the Dawn of X relaunch and brought many fresh ideas to the table. That’s readily apparent in this book, which both takes full advantage of the new status quo and does the best job of exploring the deep bonds between longtime X-Men characters. Above all, the series is a worthy showcase for Kitty, pushing her in a new direction without feeling like a step back from her days as headmistress of the Xavier Institute.

Read IGN’s review of Marauders #1

How Does Marauders Fit Into Dawn of X?

Marauders may not have dramatically altered the course of the franchise so far, but it is heavily steeped in the new status quo created in House of X and Powers of X. Along with X-Force, Marauders does the most to show the far-reaching ramifications of Krakoa’s existence on the world stage. But ultimately, Marauders is more a character-driven series than a plot-driven one, so it’s best to head into the book with that in mind.

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Excalibur

Written by Tini Howard | Art by Marcus To & Wilton Santos

The latest incarnation of Excalibur deals with the intersection of magic and science in the new mutant world order, as Apocalypse (now a member of the X-Men nation) and the new Captain Britain (a mantle now carried by Betsy Braddock) lead a team against Morgan le Fay and her army of witches.

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Is Excalibur Good?

Excalibur is generally a series that sounds great on paper but comes up a bit lacking in execution. One of the bigger problems with this book is that, aside from Apocalypse and Captain Britain, most of the main characters feel superfluous and randomly chosen. The scripts also tend to be over-packed with information, which makes it difficult for the series to find its voice. The book does provide an interesting look at Betsy’s struggle to move forward after having spent years inside another woman’s body, and it’s been among the more visually consistent Dawn of X books so far.

Read IGN’s Excalibur #1 review

How Does Excalibur Fit Into Dawn of X?

Excalibur definitely finds its niche in the larger Dawn of X tapestry, exploring how science and magic are really two sides of the same coin when it comes to creation and evolution. But so far, the series mostly operates in its own corner of the franchise, without much tangible impact on the rest of the line. This series is more for fans of the Braddock family or the classic Excalibur comics than it is a crucial part of Dawn of X.

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X-Force

Written by Benjamin Percy | Art by Joshua Cassara, Stephen Segovia & Oscar Bazaldua

X-Force has always been the darker antithesis to the X-Men, dealing with major threats to mutantkind with extreme prejudice. But in the era of Krakoa, X-Force has now become an officially sanctioned team supervised by Professor X and Beast. They’re basically Krakoa’s version of the CIA, the only mutants with the authorization to kill.

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Is X-Force Good?

Despite some early growing pains, X-Force is easily one of the best books to come out of the Dawn of X relaunch. Writer Benjamin Percy (who previously wrote Marvel’s Wolverine: The Long Road Home podcast) is adept at both channeling the tone of this new era of X-Men established by Hickman while bringing his own flavor to the book. X-Force is also one of the more visually distinctive X-books, especially thanks to Dean White’s haunting colors. X-Force succeeds in presenting a grim but necessary counterpoint to the rest of the line, showing the moral compromises that have to be made in the interest of safeguarding a new nation.

Read IGN’s X-Force #1 review

How Does X-Force Fit Into Dawn of X?

X-Force has actually been the single most important book in the new X-Men line. Issue #1’s cliffhanger really sets the tone for the series going forward and illustrates just how easily the new mutant nation can crumble if the X-Men don’t stay vigilant and proactive. Like many recent incarnations of the series, this X-Force delves deeply into the personal struggles these characters face in being part of a mutant wetworks squad. Can they kill in the name of Krakoa and still be worthy of Krakoa? Can the nation survive if they don’t?

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New Mutants

Written by Ed Brisson & Jonathan Hickman | Art by Rod Reis, Flaviano Armentaro & Marco Failla

No matter how many times the X-Men franchise evolves, there’s almost always a book devoted to a younger generation of up-and-coming mutant heroes. That’s where New Mutants comes in, as it shines a spotlight on members of the classic new Mutants roster along with other fan-favorite teams like Generation X and the cast of Wolverine and the X-Men. On top of that, the series also dabbles in the cosmic side of the X-Men franchise, with the Starjammers and the Shi’ar Empire playing a key role in the first arc.

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Is New Mutants Good?

New Mutants is easily the most inconsistent of the various Dawn of X books, as it basically alternates between two distinct, parallel storylines – one focused on Sunspot leading a team into Shi’ar territory and the other set back on Earth. The former story is by far the stronger of the two, thanks both to Rod Reis’ lush art and an enjoyably goofy, self-aware tone. The latter is very different in terms of tone and visual style, and we wish the series were a little more cohesive. The good news, at least, is that the collected editions reprint the series out of order so that each arc is grouped together. We’d definitely recommend reading New Mutants that way.

Read IGN’s New Mutants #1 review

How Does New Mutants Fit Into Dawn of X?

With Hickman co-writing the Shi’ar arc alongside regular writer Ed Brisson, it’s no surprise New Mutants carries some pretty significant ties to the core X-Men series. That story establishes sweeping changes to the Shi’ar hierarchy that will no doubt impact a great many Marvel books (especially with the Empyre crossover fast approaching) and also lays the groundwork for a major Brood storyline that’s picked up in the pages of X-Men. Coupled with a focus on Doug Ramsey and the growing hints of something big brewing on the Cypher/Warlock front, New Mutants will likely continue to be a big trendsetter for the franchise.

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Fallen Angels

Written by Brian Edward Hill | Art by Szymon Kudranski

Fallen Angels occupies the darkest corner of the Dawn of X status quo. This is a series that spotlights the social outcasts of the X-Men family, including Kwannon (now back in control of her own body), X-23 and the newly de-aged Cable. Working alongside Mister Sinister (a dubious ally on the best of days), Kwannon and her team fight to stop a digital virus that robs children of their free will.

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Is Fallen Angels Good?

For better or for worse, Fallen Angels shares a lot in common with Excalibur. Here, too, it’s mostly Kwannon’s struggle to reclaim her life and sense of identity that gives the book its dramatic weight. And like Excalibur, most of the remaining ensemble cast seem superfluous and randomly chosen like darts thrown at a board. It certainly doesn’t help that Fallen Angels has become the first casualty of the new X-Men line, ending on a less than satisfactory note after just six issues.

Read IGN’s Fallen Angels #1 review

How Does Fallen Angels Fit Into Dawn of X?

Despite the presence of Sinister, Fallen Angels doesn’t really add anything meaningful to the bigger X-Men picture. The book is mostly isolated from the rest of the line, as well as extremely visually and tonally divergent. Unless you’re invested in Kwannon as a character, you can safely skip Fallen Angels and wait for these characters to spin out into other titles like Cable’s solo series or the recently launched Hellions.

What’s your favorite Dawn of X comic so far? Let us know in the comments below.

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Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.

VR headsets aren’t all created equally. We at GameSpot have tested out the newly released Half-Life: Alyx on the four biggest VR headsets: Valve Index, HTC Vive Pro, Oculus Rift, and Oculus Quest.

From a top view, it’s no surprise that the Index is the ideal platform to play Alyx on, considering they’re both made by Valve. But it’s also the most expensive and currently in short supply. The Vive is the next best opinion; it’s designed for steam VR, which makes setup with Alyx easy, and you can swap out the subpar Vive controllers with the Index’s to take advantage of the finger tracking.

While you may lose some of the more advanced features playing on an Oculus, you’re still going to have a good time with Alyx. The only headset we have trouble fully recommending is the Oculus Quest, as the Oculus Link software is still in beta and can have connection issues. But if you already own a Quest and are willing to put up its shortcomings, it’s still completely possible to play Alyx on it.

Continue Reading at GameSpot

Animal Crossing is an unconventional kind of game that is loved by many, but did you know that its origins lie in a failed piece of Nintendo hardware.

Nintendo’s charmingly offbeat life-sim series Animal Crossing made its long-awaited debut on Switch this month with the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons. The game arrives nearly 20 years after the franchise first premiered on the world stage, and in that time it has grown into one of Nintendo’s marquee properties, appearing on almost all of the company’s modern consoles and shifting millions of copies worldwide. But while Western fans were introduced to the series with 2002’s eponymous Animal Crossing for GameCube, the franchise actually originated on Nintendo’s previous home system, the Nintendo 64, and it was initially born out of one of the company’s biggest commercial failures.

The very first Animal Crossing game, known in Japan as Dobutsu no Mori (or Animal Forest), was the brainchild of two Nintendo designers: Katsuya Eguchi and Hisashi Nogami. While neither may have the name recognition of Shigeru Miyamoto or Eiji Aonuma, each has had a hand in creating some of Nintendo’s most beloved titles. Early in his tenure at the company, Eguchi designed levels for Super Mario Bros. 3 and would later direct Star Fox and Wave Race 64. Nogami, meanwhile, worked as a character designer on Yoshi’s Island and Mario Kart 64 (and would eventually go on to produce another breakout Nintendo franchise, Splatoon).

According to Eguchi, Animal Forest was originally envisioned for the 64DD, the ill-fated disk drive peripheral for the Nintendo 64. “It began life as an N64DD project. Then we came up with the concept of ‘a game where you hang out and do stuff with a bunch of people in a single field.’ Then one by one, we started coming up with more ideas, and [Animal Forest] is really just the collection of all those different strands,” Eguchi said in a 2003 interview. “In short–we just wanted to make something for the 64DD,” Nogami summed up.

Continue Reading at GameSpot