Monthly Archives: September 2019
The Best Apple iPhone 11, 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max Deals to Preorder Right Now
iPhone 11 preorders are now live, with the phone due to be released on September 20. The device features a brand new camera, increased battery capacity, and a new range of colourful designs. If you are interested in the new handset, there are plenty of preorder deals now available to purchase in anticipation of release day.
For example, all iPhone 11, 11 Pro, and 11 Pro Max pay monthly purchases from Carphone Warehouse will come with a £50 eGift card. There's also a £10 voucher available for anyone preordering the iPhone 11 SIM-free.
Spider-Man MCU Split Is a ‘Tragic Mistake’ Says Joe Russo
Avengers: Endgame and Infinity War co-director Joe Russo has said that he believes Sony is making a “tragic mistake” by ending its collaboration with Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios.
Talking to the Toronto Sun as part of a larger conversation about their upcoming new film Mosul, directors Anthony and Joe Russo answered questions regarding their work at Marvel. Joe Russo pointed out that Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige has been important to bringing Spider-Man’s new incarnation to the big screen, and that Sony is making a mistake ceasing its contract.
Classic Dragon Quest Games Are Coming to Nintendo Switch
Square Enix has announced that it will be bringing Dragon Quest, Dragon Quest II: Luminaries of the Legendary Line, and Dragon Quest III: The Seeds of Salvation to the Nintendo eShop on the Nintendo Switch on September 27, 2019.
Fans will be able to experience the entire Erdrick trilogy on the same day as Dragon Quest XI S: Echoes of an Elusive Age - Definitive Edition on Nintendo Switch, allowing them to see both the beginning and current state of this beloved series that began in 1986 on the Famicom/NES.
The original Dragon Quest sees players assuming the role of the "Hero", a descendant of the valiant hero Erdrick who is on "an epic journey through the historic realm of Alefgard."
Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games Adds New ‘Dream Events’
While most of the mini-games you’ll find in Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, coming this November, are (relatively) grounded in reality, three new “Dream Events” are being added to the rotation.
The new Dream Events include “Dream Shooting,” “Dream Karate,” and “Dream Racing.”
In Dream Shooting, you’ll run around a Japanese manor shooting targets and giant flying kites to score points. In Dream Racing, you’ll grab a hoverboard (much like Sonic Riders) and hurtle your way downhill while doing aerial tricks, grinding rails, and collecting Mario Kart-style powerups. In Dream Karate, you’ll try to take down opponents on a large platform that lights up in individual sections. Whenever an enemy falls by your hand, that section of the platform will light up with your team’s color, and whoever dominates the most space on the platform wins.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake Will Feature ‘Classic’ Battle Mode
Final Fantasy VII Remake features a ‘Classic’ mode that more closely replicates the 1997 original game’s turn-based battles.
Announced at Tokyo Game Show and summarised on Twitter, Square Enix explained that classic mode handles the action side of Final Fantasy VII Remake’s combat automatically, requiring the player to only use the command menu to issue attacks. While this isn’t identical to the original game’s combat - in which characters remain stationary between actions - it does replicate the menu style of player input.
See 15 minutes of FF7 Remake gameplay with IGN commentary below.
How to Set Up Your New Gaming Monitor
So, you’ve bought a new gaming monitor. It’s plugged in, powered up, and you’re ready to start headshotting enemies, right? Not so fast! There’s more to blasting off with a new display than simply plugging it in. If you want to get the most from your new monitor, you’ll need to configure the display itself and change some settings in Windows to get the most out of it. If that sounds intimidating, fear not, because I’ve got your back.
In this guide, I’ll be walking through the most common questions and settings to get you into the game fast and squeezing every ounce of performance we can from your new gaming monitor. Let’s get into it.
Borderlands 3: PC Players Report Losing Their Save Data
Some Borderlands 3 players are reporting losing all their progress on PC as a result of corrupt save files.
Many users seem to believe the issue lies in the cloud. Multiple players on Twitter have reported problems after activating cloud saves that then either wiped progress completely or reset to an earlier save point.
One fan tweeted Gearbox and Epic Games asking, "I just lost 7 hours of work from Borderlands 3 because something went wrong with the cloud save that Epic has is
there a way to revert it back so i don't lose all that time and all the gear i got?"
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Greedfall Review
There's religious fanaticism, and then there's Inquisitor Aloysius from Greedfall, a man so excessively villainous his whole schtick borders on farcical. A member of Thélème, one of the game's six factions, he appears when you first step into the town square of the city San-Matheus. What draws your eye is the sight of a hulking woodland beast howling in pain while tied to a stake in an enormous burning pyre, as a captured native islander looks on helplessly. When asked why the creature and his people are subjected to such cruelty, the Inquisitor bellows an odious response about cleansing the corrupt souls of his tribe. Then in one swift movement, he yanks the islander's head, stabs the poor soul with a knife, and yells obscenities about heresies into the sky.
That uncomfortable scene is emblematic of the plot in Greedfall; its tales of colonialism and political subterfuge are tackled with such little nuance that it verges on parody. The islanders wear face paint, have heavy accents, and venerate the woodland beasts as deities, while the cardinals, bishops, and alchemists refer to them as savages that need enlightenment or salvation. Greedfall relies heavily on these kinds of blunt narrative tropes for its setting, much in the same way it does on a very familiar open-world RPG structure. And while it's very easy to lose yourself in its competent, if comfortable, formula, it means that Greedfall ultimately feels unremarkable at best.
You play as the charming diplomat De Sardet from the Congregation of Merchants, who's in charge of brokering peace between two warring factions: the Thélème, a theocratic nation that preach their gospel heavily and want to convert as many natives as possible, even if it's by force, and the Bridge Alliance, home to a nation of alchemists who wield their vast and incomparable knowledge of science for political ends.
Both factions want to colonize a mystical island called Teer Fradee, which is brimming with fantastical flora and fauna. They, as well as the clans of indigenous people who are resisting their incursions, seek your help for their own ends. But that's not all; you also have something you want from the island: the cure for the Malicor, a mysterious plague devastating your home. In short, everyone wants a piece of this enchanted isle, and your task is to navigate through this political minefield for the best outcome--whatever you think that is.
Greedfall attempts to tweak certain aspects of its otherwise conventional colonialist plot (the islanders aren't depicted as crazed natives or hungry cannibals, and the factions are somewhat multicultural), but beyond a vague sense of awareness about its oppressive legacy, Greedfall's heavy-handed themes never make way for anything more nuanced or interesting. Sure, it highlights the exploitative behaviors of the Thélème and Bridge Alliance factions, but their actions are so moustache-twirling malicious that they become mere caricatures of evildoers.
Even your companions and other characters are cookie-cutter emblems of their group: Siora is the native princess who wishes to seek peace for her clan; Petrus is the religious Thélème advisor with tons of political savvy; and Kurt is the loyal, headstrong mercenary whose stoic demeanour can barely disguise his world-weariness. Most damning of all is your character, De Sardet, who, as the big hero, embodies the "white man's burden" allegory that also plagues other colonial-themed narratives; it's all on you to liberate the natives or unite the factions against them.
Greedfall's saving grace is that its role-playing systems are adequate, and the game's greatest strength is how well it sticks to what is tried-and-tested. It features mechanical design that's common in the genre--exploring, looting, questing, etc--but it's also savvy enough to incorporate the best versions of these elements--most notably it feels like it draws inspiration from CD Projekt Red's The Witcher 3, a title I couldn't stop making mental comparisons to.
At the beginning, you're given the choice of playing as one of three character archetypes: the melee-focused warrior, the stealthy gunslinger, or the spell-wielding tactician. But you're also given the flexibility to break out of these standard classes through an array of skill trees. As you progress through the game, you can freely invest hard-earned points, which opens up a variety of methods you can approach combat with and even how you resolve quests--be it bludgeoning your way through conflict with a two-handed axe or wearing a horde of rampaging beasts down with poison traps.
And, as has become common in open-world RPGs, Greedfall also comes with a crafting system. Materials are in abundance--enemies, from human foes to wild animals, drop them frequently, while crates and jugs across most cities are bursting with goodies you can loot. One constraint, however, is that you can only craft upgrades to armor and weapons you own, rather than cobble brand-new equipment altogether. This streamlines crafting, and it also encourages you to still seek out better equipment. Meanwhile, combat is more than just a frenzied blur of swords and gunplay too; you can make tactical pauses to examine your enemies closely, change your target, consider your combat options, or silently contemplate how stunning your swashbuckling buccaneer looks in the heat of action.
Greedfall suffers from some bugs, primitive systems, and even glaring spelling errors, however. Some dialogue is clearly skewed towards a male De Sardet; in my playthrough as a female De Sardet, several characters still referred to me as "he." The stealth mechanism is also unintentionally hilarious. When on a stealth mission, enemies tend to treat companions as invisible; they will not notice two big, oafish men blundering about in front of them, but will jump out of their skins when they notice De Sardet peeking out from behind a nearby crate. Romancing your companions is also another thing you can do in the game, but the moves you need to make to get into their hearts (and under the sheets) are so perfunctory, it’s almost unmemorable. You engage in a three-part companion quest with the lover of your choice, where you'll find conversations that give you the chance to maximize your romance meter. But the game makes it obvious when you've said something wrong (characters will retort back unhappily, accompanied by a numerical drop in your reputation), so it's an easy process to save scum, and the ultimate reward is a not-very-saucy bedroom cutscene.
In spite of the game's blundering narrative issues, it's still easy to get hooked into the rhythm of exploring, crafting, brawling, investigating, and interacting with the host of characters and beasts, while getting lost among the beautiful lush greenery of Teer Fradee. Running into more challenging enemies or engaging in boss fights are a particular treat, since it's an opportunity to pit your hard-earned combat abilities against formidable foes. And tucked within the story, as hackneyed as it is, are occasional glimpses of genuine humanity, such as De Sardet's close relationship with their cousin Constantin, who's also the new governor of Teer Fradee.
But ultimately, because Greedfall is so cavalier about its colonialist themes, and because it plays it safe by sticking so closely to the template of open-world RPGs, it doesn't really feel revelatory in any way. Instead, it's content to be just another digital playground--just another world filled with magic, riches, secrets, and monsters for players to shoot and loot at will. I did have fun when I got lost in its familiar RPG loop, but its lack of nuance or innovation prevents it from being truly remarkable.
WWE Clash of Champions: Did Charlotte Become a 10-Time Women’s Champion?
As the weather starts to (hopefully) cool, the scent of pumpkin spice fills the air, and Halloween decorations flood grocery store shelves, it's time for champions to clash!
Lock it in here all evening - and follow me over at @TheMattFowler for some live-tweeting - for fast and fun results from WWE's Clash of Champions PPV. Becky Lynch will defend her RAW Women's Championship against Sasha Banks, Bayley will try to save her SmackDown Women's Championship from being nabbed by Charlotte Flair, and Kofi Kingston puts his WWE Championship up against Randy Orton.
Seth Rollins and Braun Strowman will both have two matches tonight, the first being the defense of their RAW tag team titles against Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode. After that, Seth will actually face Braun, with his Universal Championship on the line.