Monthly Archives: August 2021
What People Are Saying About the First Footage Of Tom Holland’s Uncharted Movie
The first footage of Sony's forthcoming Uncharted film starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg is here... sort of.
Initial clips of the Uncharted movie appeared as part of a sizzle reel intended to promote Sony's upcoming movie lineup. As reported by Screenrant and io9, they included scenes that should appeal to fans of Naughty Dog's popular series of games.
According to those who viewed the sizzle reel, the Uncharted scenes began with Sully [Mark Wahlberg] asking Nathan Drake [Tom Holland] if he wants to go on the kind of adventure he has "only read about in books." This fits with earlier reports that the Uncharted film will be an origin story of sorts that focuses on the early part of Drake's career.
It's followed by additional scenes, including a shot of Drake near a pirate ship reminiscent of Uncharted 4. The money shot is reportedly Drake falling out of a plane resembling a similar sequence in Uncharted 3.
The scenes were well-received by the outlets that saw it, particularly given that they seem to feature plenty of nods to the games. Still, it was barely more than a teaser buried in the midst of a longer sizzle reel.
An Uncharted movie has been planned in one way or another for many years now, losing multiple directors along the way. Tom Holland was cast in the role of Uncharted's treasure hunter in 2017.
Sony has so far kept Uncharted heavily under wraps, with just a couple images revealed so far. Expect it to get a much heavier push as Uncharted nears its February 18 release date.
Kat Bailey is a Senior News Editor at IGN.
Destiny 2 Brings Back the Gjallarhorn as Part of Bungie’s 30th Anniversary
Destiny 2 is finally bringing back the fan-favorite rocket launcher Gjallarhorn as part of a special 30th Anniversary Pack releasing this December.
Bungie is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year and will host a massive in-game celebration to commemorate the milestone. There will be loads of free events and items players in Destiny 2 can experience, including a new 6-player match-made activity celebrating Bungie's history.
There will also be a special 30th Anniversary Pack available for purchase. This pack includes a new three-player dungeon, exotic weapon, four emotes, exotic ship and sparrow, two universal ornament sets, and a unique helmet ornament.
Hidden in this dungeon is a weapon that players have been begging for to return: Gjallarhorn.
Gjallarhorn has been updated for the Destiny 2 sandbox, so expect it to function up to the specs of Destiny 2 and not the previous game.
Bungie is bringing this fan-favorite weapon to life as well. In a partnership with Nerf a dart-firing version of Gjallarhorn is also coming down the pipeline, though sadly it wasn't shown during the Showcase.
Destiny 2's big showcase finally revealed the new trailer and release date for its upcoming expansion, The Witch Queen. While details leaked ahead of the show, they were all accurate including its February 22, 2022 release date, new Glaive weapon type, weapon crafting, and more.
Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.
Magic: The Gathering Netflix Show Stars Brandon Routh, and Is Coming the Second Half of 2022
Netflix's Magic: The Gathering series will star Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) as lead character Gideon, and will be coming in the second half of 2022.
Revealed during Magic Showcase 2021, Routh appeared to introduce the character, and we got a first look at sketches and 3D models, shown in the tweet below.
Magic: The Gathering is coming to Netflix in the latter half of 2022! This animated series is a completely new story that features beloved characters like our friend Gideon here. Keep an eye out for the prequel novel, arriving alongside the first Netflix season. pic.twitter.com/zCQ8ZwI0wq
— Magic: The Gathering (@wizards_magic) August 24, 2021
The show is now fully written, with the entire voice cast in place, and all voice recordings completed. It's been described as "character-first entertainment," focused on the familiar faces from the Magic multiverse, and their relationships. There's still a lot to do however, and the show won't arrive until the second half of 2022
The show will arrive alongside a prequel novel, which will tell the story of Gideon and Jace, how they met, see them head on a "roadtrip through the Multiverse" and, eventually, explore where their relationship went sour – presumably leading us directly into the events of the show.
The Russo Brothers exited the show, with Transformers: Prime co-creator Jeff Kline joining the project as executive producer.
Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.
Magic: The Gathering: 2022 Sets Include Cyberpunk, Gangster and 30th Anniversary Settings
Magic: The Gathering is going to some very unexpected places next year, with the card game's premier sets returning to the original Dominaria setting for the game's 30th anniversary, as well as adding a new Gangster-inspired plane, and a neon cyberpunk utopia.
Announced during Magic Showcase 2021, four sets were announced for 2022, taking players to some very disparate planes:
Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty - Q1 2022
Acting as something of a sequel to the Sengoku era Japan-inspired Kamigawa sets, Neon Dynasty is set 2,000 years after the original 2004-2005 block. Neon Dynasty depicts the future of Kamigawa as a utopia, filled with "neon, ninjas, and cyberpunk samurai."
The set has been created in conjunction with external cultural developers, aiming to balance fans' love of the original Kamigawa sets with a respectful look at a futuristic Japanese culture.
Streets of New Capenna - Q2 2022
A completely fresh setting for Magic, New Capenna is based on old-school gangster movies, but with an expectedly fantastical twist. The city was built by angels but is now ruled by demonic crime families (each of which aligns with three colours of Magic). While it's a totally new setting, Wizards of the Coast promises that the set will include connections to existing characters in Magic lore.
Dominaria United - Q3 2022
To celebrate Magic: The Gathering's 30th anniversary, 2022's third set will take players back to the first ever Magic setting, Dominaria. Classic locations including Shiv, Tolaria and Urborg will appear, and Wizards promises that the high fantasy setting will feel totally familiar to longtime fans – and act as an introduction to the classic form of Magic for new players.
The Brothers War - Q4 2022
Also set in Dominaria, the Brothers War returns to one of Magic's most important storylines – the conflict of Urza and Mishra and its effects on the Magic Multiverse. The set will see the story told "through a new lens", including new perspectives and voices outside of the titular brothers – but deliver on the artifact-heavy set that longtime fans will expect.
Magic's been adding a lot of unexpected sets recently, from a full Dungeons & Dragons crossover, to a digital-only set with card effects that couldn't exist in the physical game. There's also an animated Netflix series on the way, but the Russo brothers will no longer be involved.
Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.
Magic: The Gathering Shows Off Lord of the Rings, Street Fighter, Fortnite, Warhammer 40K Crossovers
Magic: The Gathering will add cards and sets based on Lord of the Rings, Street Fighter, Fortnite, and Warhammer 40,000.
Shown off during Magic Showcase 2021, all of the new cards will be branded under the Universes Beyond label that covers the tabletop game's crossovers with other franchises.
The most substantial of the crossovers is a full Lord of the Rings set, Tales of Middle-earth, coming in 2023 and released in both boosters and 4 Commander decks, as well as Secret Lair drops. It will be released in physical and digital forms, and will be available in both Magic: The Gathering Online and Magic: The Gathering Arena. And yes, there'll be Gandalf, Gollum, Frodo, and Aragorn cards.
We also got a closer look at the previously-announced Warhammer 40,000 crossover, which will be released in the form of Commander decks with new cards, new art and reprints. They'll be legal in the modern format of the game, and will arrive "later in 2022."
More surprisingly, we also learned that Fortnite and Street Fighter will be transformed into drops for Magic: The Gathering's Secret Lair program. Fortnite cards will be rebranded reprints spread over two Secret Lair Drops. Street Fighter drops will take the form of "mechanically unique cards", and wil lalso be included in future releases. We got a look at Chun-Li's card art and learned that, yes, she's been given the Multikicker keyword ability).
Alongside the crossovers, we also learned about all of 2022's main Magic sets, which include Cyberpunk, Gangster, and 30th Anniversary settings.
Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.
Destiny 2 The Witch Queen Will be Released in February 2022
Update: Bungie confirmed that Destiny 2's next major installment, possibly the biggest yet, will be released on February 22, 2022.
The release date was confirmed during the Destiny 2 Showcase which officially revealed The Witch Queen expansion. IGN will have a rundown of the biggest Witch Queen reveals so check back.
Original Story: Destiny 2's next large-scale expansion, The Witch Queen, is seemingly set to launch in February 2022, according to the latest supposed leak surrounding the game.
The expansion is set to be formally revealed by Bungie in a live stream later today (August 24) at 9am Pacific / 12pm Eastern / 5pm UK (that's 2am AEST on August 25). However, as spotted by True Trophies, an alleged leak from the PlayStation Australia store listing for the title has let slip a few of the details surrounding the upcoming content. Fans hoping to wait until Bungie's official reveal to read details about the upcoming Destiny 2 expansion will want to look away now.
The Australian store leak suggests that the upcoming Destiny 2 expansion will release on February 22, 2022 and that players will gain access to an all-new weapon type during their playthrough. Known as the "Glaive", the leak suggests that the new weapon type will allow players to "unleash powerful melee combos, projectile attacks, and a deployable energy shield," when battling against enemies.
In addition to the Glaive, the store page also seemingly sheds further light on a new destination for the game. In what is being described as a "definitive Destiny campaign", players will embark on a new adventure to uncover the Witch Queen Savathun's Throne World and "the mystery of how she and her Lucent Hive stole the Light".
Bungie teased the Witch Queen's reveal in a short clip on Twitter recently where the Destiny 2 account went on to say, "We have limited details on this embodiment of the Witch Queen Savathûn, but her stature suggests a height of 21 feet."
For more official details surrounding what lies ahead for Destiny 2, make sure to check out Bungie's showcase event. Alternatively, for the latest from the game, you can check out our Destiny 2 dedicated page which is full of trailers, news, and clips from Bungie's online first-person shooter.
Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.
Dying Light 2 and Guardians of the Galaxy Getting Nvidia RTX Support at Release – Gamescom 2021
As part of its Gamescom 2021 announcements, Nvidia announced today that the PC versions of Dying Light 2 and Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy will support the GPU giant's RTX gaming technologies DLSS and ray tracing, providing better frame rates as well as lifelike lighting, reflections, and shadows.
As noted in the press release, Dying Light 2 will use Nvidia's RTX tech to create "an immersive, visceral experience" for players. Nvidia's DLSS will provide a frame rate boost to the game without compromising the image quality. At the same time, the game's day-night cycle will benefit from ray-tracing in a few ways, such as using ray-traced global illumination to provide bounced lighting to the entire in-game world.
Though the blog post does not go into much detail about how Guardians of the Galaxy will benefit from the RTX tech, Nvidia did confirm that those that do not own an RTX-powered PC or laptop will have the option to play the RTX-enhanced version of the game via GeForce Now, Nvidia's cloud gaming service, allowing you to stream the game on a lower-end device.
DLSS has become one of Nvidia's notable features in its RTX line of graphics cards. Standing for deep learning super sampling, DLSS upscales lower resolution images and uses artificial intelligence to make the image appear in a higher resolution without sacrificing power from your hardware to achieve that quality. Games such as Battlefield 2042, Doom Eternal, and Red Dead Redemption 2, have the tech available already, or will support it at launch.
In June, EA and Nvidia announced a partnership that would bring DLSS and Reflex into Battlefield 2042. The latter is a toolkit to measure system latency that is used in many popular competitive games such as Fortnite and does not require an RTX GPU.
Taylor is the Associate Tech Editor at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.
No More Heroes 3: IGN Japan to Host Launch Livestream With Suda51
IGN Japan will host a special livestream to celebrate the launch of No More Heroes 3, attended by series creator Goichi Suda, known to fans as Suda51.
Titled ‘Garden of Madness! No More Heroes 3 launch livestream with SUDA51’, the event will be streamed live on IGN Japan’s YouTube channel on Sunday August 29 at 6pm Pacific / 9pm Eastern (that's August 30 at 2am UK / 11am AEST), and will be viewable entirely in English. The livestream page can be found on YouTube here.
During the 90-minute stream, Suda51 will add his commentary to about 40 minutes of live No More Heroes 3 gameplay, along with an interview section and a Q&A with viewers via the chat.
No More Heroes 3 will be released on Nintendo Switch on August 27, published by Suda’s studio, Grasshopper Manufacture. It follows the 2019 game Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes, and is the first new numbered title in the series since No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle was released for Wii in 2010. It follows the colorfully violent adventures of pop-culture nerd turned hitman Travis Touchdown, as he defends Santa Destroy from an alien invasion and fights to the top of the Galactic Superhero Rankings. Also you can suplex alligators.
For more details on ‘Garden of Madness! No More Heroes 3 launch livestream with SUDA51’, visit IGN Japan.
Daniel Robson is Chief Editor at IGN Japan. No prizes for guessing which game series his Twitter handle @NoMoreDaniels is a reference to.
Devil May Cry’s Classic Combat Was Inspired By a Bug in Onimusha
Devil May Cry's classic combat system, which allows players to launch enemies into the air before executing a flurry of blows in their direction, was originally inspired by a bug in Onimusha.
As translated by Siliconera, series creator Hideki Kamiya recently tweeted about a number of development details surrounding the game in commemoration of the series' twentieth anniversary.
In the thread, the creator revealed that another department within Capcom was working on Onimusha during the same time as Devil May Cry was in production. Kamiya explains that it was a bug in Onimusha which was partly responsible for Devil May Cry's famous air-based combat. The bug itself resulted in Onimusha's enemies flying up into the air and it was this that gave Kamiya inspiration for his own title.
Upon seeing the bug for himself, Kamiya told programmer Kazunori Inoue, "I want to hit enemies and see them fly into the air!" This happy mistake, paired with Devil May Cry's gun-based targeting system, laid down the framework for Devil May Cry's combat for years to come.
In the thread, Kamiya also spoke further about details surrounding Devil May Cry's initial inception as a prototype for Resident Evil 4. Kamiya reportedly said that it was Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami, who encouraged him to turn the prototype into an entirely new game.
In other Capcom news, the company recently announced record quarterly sales and profits thanks to the release of Resident Evil Village and Monster hunter Rise. The company confirmed that Resident Evil Village, which was released in May, has sold over 4.5 million units worldwide. IGN reviewed Resident Evil Village upon release and gave it an 8/10 for its "genuinely engrossing and increasingly combat-heavy continuation of the Ethan Winters story."
Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.
Spider-Man Fans Are Arguing About a Villain Hidden in the No Way Home Trailer
Following a leak, the official teaser trailer for Spider-Man: No Way Home is here and the internet has gone into overdrive. Fans across social media have been eagerly breaking down the trailer ever since it arrived, and this has led to some members of the community debating the appearance of one particular moment, and which classic Spidey villain might be making an appearance.
This is your friendly neighborhood spoiler warning. If you want to know nothing about Spider-Man: No Way Home, turn back now.
The first look at Spider-Man: No Way Home teases multiple bad guys across its relatively short duration. MCU fans were quick to acknowledge confirmation of Alfred Molina's Doctor Octopus in the film and also point out homages to Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin and Jamie Foxx’s Electro. But one smaller moment has fans arguing about whether we could be seeing The Lizard or, more unexpectedly, Venom making an appearance.
A blink-and-you'll-miss-it section of the trailer sparked the debate. At around the 2:27 mark, the trailer shows a short shot of a still-to-be-revealed villain seemingly crashing into a Doctor Strange-conjured shield behind Peter Parker. Many immediately took the shadowy, hulking figure to signal the return of The Lizard from 2012's The Amazing Spider-Man.
This shot was really dark but is this Lizard? #SpiderManNoWayHome pic.twitter.com/rDgUaqR23E
— Nicholas Whitcomb (@Whos_Nick) August 24, 2021
The inclusion of The Lizard would make sense based upon what we know about the film's villains so far. A number of short sections of the trailer suggest that a lineup of villains including Doctor Octopus, Green Goblin, Electro, and the Sandman could be returning from across Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield's Spider-Man movies. With Curt Connor's Lizard featuring in 2012's The Amazing Spider-Man, and the creature in the trailer letting out a low, rumbling roar, this would make for a sensible cameo in the trailer.
As with anything on the internet though, some people disagree, pointing out that the dark figure could instead be Spider-Man's symbiote nemesis, Venom. Eddie Brock was previously a part of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3 back in 2007. The Marvel villain has since seen his own entirely separate franchise of films which star Tom Hardy as Brock, but have never crossed over with Tom Holland's take on Spider-Man.
Sony has previously indicated that there is "actually a plan" to connect Sony's Spider-Man Universe to the MCU, a statement that will only fuel the rumors that the dark figure could instead be Venom. A number of fans across social media believe that the character is Venom, with many pointing to what looks like a frame that could show Venom's eye markings.
I'm 55% sure this is Venom... pic.twitter.com/m2eKMuzHzV
— ArticLovesFilms (@AW_Official_) August 24, 2021
Venom director Ruben Fleischer has said that Sony is "building towards" a confrontation between Tom Hardy's Venom and Tom Holland's Spider-Man, so it's not out of the question that this could be a cameo leading to something bigger. It would certainly add an extra level of trepidation if Hardy's Venom entered the mix in No Way Home. There's always the chance we'll know more after Venom: Let There Be Carnage arrives on October 15.
However, fans likely won't find out whether the cameo in the trailer is Venom or Lizard until closer to the film's release in December this year. For more on the Spider-Man: No Way Home, why not check out this article where we break down the film's trailer further.
Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN currently watching the Spider-Man No Way Home trailer on repeat. You can follow him on Twitter.