The past few months for the Sonic the Hedgehog movie have been a trying one for everyone involved in the film. Now, Jim Carrey--who plays antagonist Dr. Ivo Robotnik in the upcoming 2020 film--has given his take on all of this.During the Television Critics Association presentation for Carrey's Showtime series Kidding, the actor opened up for the first time about the controversy.He discussed fans loving these characters since they were children and claiming ownership of them. "I don't know quite how I feel about the audience being in on the creation of it. We'll see what that entails because sometimes you find that the collective consciousness decides it wants something and then when it gets it, 'I just wanted it, I didn't care about it. I just jumped on the bandwagon,'" Carrey explained. "Ownership of anything is going out the window for all of us."The first trailer was released in May, and after fan backlash about the titular character's look, director Jeff Fowler announced the character would be getting redesigned, which ended up pushing back the movie to a 2020 release. This has been the first time that a major studio has given in to fan backlash after the release of a trailer.Sonic the Hedgehog is voiced by Ben Schwartz (Parks and Recreation) and features Carrey as Dr. Robotnik. James Marsden (Westworld) plays a state trooper who catches onto Sonic's super speed. Obviously, both Marsden's character and Sonic are trying to stop the evil Robotnik. Sonic's new release date is February 14, 2020.Info from Gamespot.com

Ever wondered how something as elaborate as anime gets made? Streaming giant Netflix seeks to answers questions like that and more with a new documentary titled Enter the Anime.Enter the Anime goes behind-the-scenes of some of the streaming platform's popular and newly-released anime. This includes shows like Baki, Castlevania, Kengan Ashura, and Ultraman. The documentary also talks to the musical talent behind anime like Aggretsuko, Knights of the Zodiac: Saint Seiya, Neon Genesis Evangelion, and more. Enter the Anime is set to stream on Monday, August 5.Enter the Anime isn't the only new addition to Netflix in August. A handful of the Sylvester Stallone-led Rocky films will be available for streaming, as well as Gangs of New York, Groundhog Day, The Punisher, and more. Of course, a new month means things are leaving the streaming platform, including The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Scarface, The Emoji Movie, and more. Check out the full list of what's coming and going below.Coming to Netflix in AugustAugust 1Are We Done Yet?Boyka: UndisputedFour Weddings and a FuneralGroundhog DayHornsJackie BrownJupiter AscendingNow and ThenPanic RoomRockyRocky IIRocky IIIRocky IVRocky VSex and the City: The MovieSomething's Gotta GiveThe Bank JobThe House BunnyThe Sinner: JulianTo Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie NewmarWhy Do Fools Fall in LoveAugust 2Ask the StoryBots: Season 3 -- NETFLIX FAMILYBasketball or Nothing -- NETFLIX ORIGINALDear White People: Volume 3 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALDerry Girls: Season 2 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALOtherhood -- NETFLIX FILMShe-Ra and the Princesses of Power: Season 3 -- NETFLIX FAMILYAugust 4Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj: Volume 4 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 5Enter the Anime -- NETFLIX ORIGINALNo Good Nick: Part 2 -- NETFLIX FAMILYAugust 6ScrewballSebastian Maniscalco: Why Would You Do ThatAugust 8Dollar -- NETFLIX ORIGINALJane The Virgin: Season 5Judy Moody and the Not Bummer SummerThe Naked Director -- NETFLIX ORIGINALWu Assassins -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 9Cable Girls: Season 4 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALThe Family -- NETFLIX ORIGINALGLOW: Season 3 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALThe InBESTigators -- NETFLIX FAMILYiZombie: Season 5Rocko's Modern Life: Static Cling -- NETFLIX FAMILYSintonia -- NETFLIX ORIGINALSpirit Riding Free: Pony Tales -- NETFLIX FAMILYTiny House Nation: Volume 1August 13Knightfall: Season 2Tiffany Haddish Presents: They Ready -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 14The 100: Season 6August 15Cannon Busters -- NETFLIX ANIMEAugust 1645 rpm -- NETFLIX ORIGINALApache: La vida de Carlos Tevez -- NETFLIX ORIGINALBetter Than Us -- NETFLIX ORIGINALDiagnosis -- NETFLIX ORIGINALFrontera verde -- NETFLIX ORIGINALInvader Zim: Enter the Florpus -- NETFLIX FAMILYThe Little Switzerland-- NETFLIX FILMMINDHUNTER: Season 2 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALQB1: Beyond the Lights: Season 3 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALSelflessSextuplets -- NETFLIX FILMSuper Monsters Back to School -- NETFLIX FAMILYVictim Number 8 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 17The Punisher (2004)August 20Gangs of New YorkSimon Amstell: Set Free -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 21American Factory -- NETFLIX ORIGINALHyperdrive -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 22Love Alarm -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 23El Pepe: Una vida suprema -- NETFLIX ORIGINALHERO MASK: Part II -- NETFLIX ANIMERust Valley Restorers -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 27Million Pound Menu: Season 2 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALTrolls: The Beat Goes On!: Season 7 -- NETFLIX FAMILYAugust 29Falling Inn Love -- NETFLIX FILMKardec -- NETFLIX FILMWorkin' Moms: Season 3 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 30The A List -- NETFLIX ORIGINALCAROLE & TUESDAY -- NETFLIX ANIMEThe Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance -- NETFLIX ORIGINALDroppin' Cash: Season 2 -- NETFLIX ORIGINALLa Grande Classe -- NETFLIX FILMLocked Up: Season 3Mighty Little Bheem: Season 2 -- NETFLIX FAMILYStyling Hollywood -- NETFLIX ORIGINALTrue and the Rainbow Kingdom: Wild Wild Yetis -- NETFLIX FAMILYUn bandido honrado -- NETFLIX ORIGINALAugust 31Luo Bao Bei: Season 1Leaving Netflix in AugustAugust 1A Cinderella StoryA Cinderella Story: Once Upon a SongAnother Cinderella StoryAustin Powers in GoldmemberBeverly Hills ChihuahuaChuggington: Season 1-5Death in Paradise: Season 1-7Fear and Loathing in Las VegasFinal DestinationFinal Destination 2Final Destination 3Good Will HuntingGosford ParkHairspray (1988)Hairspray (2007)Hot FuzzJust FriendsLegionPoltergeistScarfaceSecretariatThe Butterfly EffectThe Butterfly Effect 2The Da Vinci CodeThe Fifth ElementThe Final DestinationThe Hurt LockerThe MasterThe VillageW.World War II in ColourWorld War Two: 1941 and the Man of Steel: S1ZombielandAugust 2The FounderAugust 5Mothers and DaughtersSlow TV: CollectionAugust 6Love, RosieZodiacAugust 8The Emoji MovieAugust 11No Country for Old MenAugust 14The Royals: Season 1August 15World War Two: 1942 and Hitler's Soft Underbelly: Season 1August 16The 40-Year-Old VirginAugust 20The Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyAugust 21Beautiful CreaturesAugust 28Wind RiverAugust 30BurntAugust 31Straw DogsInfo from Gamespot.com

Bandai Namco has released the first trailer for Digimon ReArise and also announced the game will launch outside Japan. Pre-registration is already open if you want to sign up and be one of the first Digidestined to play.In story mode, Digimon ReArise has a Pusurimon spawn inside your smartphone. After conversing with the digital monster, the two of you become friends. Your peaceful days are interrupted though when the monstrous Spirals attack. Pusurimon comes to your aid, emerging from your phone and digivolving into Herissmon. Herissmon becomes your Digimon partner, and the two of you go on a journey together to stop the threat posed by the Spirals.On your quest, you meet and befriend tamer Michi Shinjo and her partner Salamon, tamer Keito Tamada and his partner Elecmon, tamer Mayu Kohinata and her partner Kudamon, and tamer Takumi Hiiragi and his partner Dorumon. You also run into an Agumon, whose tamer's identity is a mystery (we're guessing it's Taichi/Tai given the focus on the character for Digimon Adventure's 20th anniversary).Digimon ReArise has other things to do outside of the story though. You're able to connect with other players for tamer-versus-tamer battles that support up to five-on-five fights. Battles occur in real time, forcing you to balance your cooldown timers--much like the upcoming Pokemon Masters. Outside of battle, you can raise different Digimon and send them to DigiTown, an enclosed space you can decorate as you see fit and where your digital companions can befriend each other, be fed, and have fun. They can also be sent to a gym to train and become more powerful. Once one of your Digimon's stats are high enough and their bond with you strong enough, they'll be able to digivolve and pull off more powerful attacks.Digimon ReArise is scheduled to officially release for iOS and Android mobile devices in 2019. You're given prizes for pre-registering, including a digiegg that hatches into Pumpkinmon--one of the Digimon in the game that's been given a brand-new mega evolution.Info from Gamespot.com

Indie studio Starsoft has revealed its first game, Savior, a platformer with very impressive, fluid-looking anmiation.Savior is described as a 2D, action-adventure platformer where you will "dramatically change a vast open world [and] engage [with] a variety of opponents [using] strategic, precision melee combat." The game has you controlling Sam, an adventurer caught in the middle of a cold war between The Chosen and The Fallen. It looks similar in style to classic '80s and '90s cinematic platformers like Another World and Prince of Persia, with elements of modern pixel-art platformers like Chasm and The Messenger thrown in for good measure. "While you'll need to gain wealth, power and allies; the central task of Savior is to rebuild the societies and world around you," Starsoft wrote in a press release. "We're building in sweeping, persistent visual changes to reinforce the idea that the player can, and does, change the world with their actions."Though no release date or platforms have been announced yet, Savior is available to wishlist on Steam, signalling it will arrive on PC at the very least.Info from Gamespot.com

When it comes to adapting a video game into a live-action adventure, it's a tricky proposition. After all, you have to create something a mainstream audience can invest in while making sure fans of the source material are satisfied. Bargain bins are filled with examples of movies that missed the mark, but Showtime is betting it can right the wrongs of previous adaptations with its upcoming Halo TV show.Speaking to press at the TCA press tour, Showtime Networks co-president Gary Levine revealed casting announcements for the character of Cortana, among others, and detailed how the show plans to appeal to fans of the Halo games. "The good news is we've been working very closely with 343 [Studios] through the entire development process," he explained. "And they are there both as a resource to tell us stuff we don't know and also to make sure we're not violating anything big in the canon. So we're doing this with total confidence that the fans are going to embrace what we're doing."He also noted that while the graphic content of the show will be along the lines of what's seen in other Showtime series--"PG-13," as he put it--"violence is going to have consequence." When it comes to a war between the USNC and the Covenant, that's reassuring to hear.The big question remains whether we'll see Master Chief's face on the new show, though. When GameSpot asked Levine about it a year ago, he teased Chief's potential unmasking as "a key question and an important part of our series."While Levine still won't reveal whether viewers will see the character's face, American Gods alum Pablo Schreiber has been cast in the role. What that in mind, we asked what made the actor such a good fit for a potentially faceless part. "What I love about Pablo is he has the physicality to be a Spartan, to be Master Chief," Levine explained. "But he is A: a great dramatic actor and B: he's got such a twinkle in his eyes. [He's] so good with wit and comedy. And we want the Master Chief to have that range. And Pablo brings the range."It's still too early to tell, given that Halo doesn't begin production until the fall. Our money's on Chief taking off his mask to show viewers that "twinkle in his eyes," though.Halo is scheduled to debut on Showtime in 2021.Disclosure: Showtime is owned by CBS, the parent company of GameSpot.Info from Gamespot.com

Fire Emblem: Three Houses asks a lot of you. Every piece, from battle to friendships to training your units, must be managed both individually and as part of a whole. It can be intimidating, but when it all clicks together, it really clicks. Mastering the art of thoughtful lesson planning as a professor improves your performance on the battlefield, where success relies on calculated teamwork and deft execution. Cultivating relationships during battle in turn draws you closer to each of the characters, who you then want to invest even more time into in the classroom. Every piece feeds into the next in a rewarding, engrossing loop where you get lost in the whole experience, not just in the minutiae.Three Houses casts you as a mercenary who, while out on a mission with their father, runs into a group of teens under attack. After a brief introduction and battle tutorial--which you shouldn't need, since you're apparently already an established mercenary, but we'll go with it--you learn that they are students at Garreg Mach monastery. Each of them leads one of the school's three houses: Black Eagles, Blue Lions, or Golden Deer. At the behest of the church's archbishop, who definitely gives off nefarious vibes but is also a gentle mom figure, you end up becoming a professor and must choose which of the houses to lead. There is a lot of mystery to the setup, with consistent hints that something is not quite right, and it's easy to get absorbed in trying to figure out what the archbishop and various other shady figures are up to.Your main role as professor is to instruct your students in matters of combat and prepare them for story battles at the end of each month. Battles in Three Houses feature the same turn-based, tactical combat at the heart of the series, albeit with some changes. The classic weapon triangle is downplayed quite a bit in favor of Combat Arts, which have been altered somewhat from their introduction in Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia. Combat Arts are attacks tied to a weapon type and can boost a unit's attack power at the expense of weapon durability; some are effective against specific enemy types, like armored units. You can also unlock skills outside of Combat Arts that grant you better stats with certain weapons, like a heftier boost for using an axe against a lance user, similar to the old weapon triangle. It's the same complexity the series is known for but less abstracted, making it a bit easier to strategize without sacrificing depth.One of the big combat additions is battalions, mini armies you can equip that provide various benefits to a unit during battle. They also give you a new type of attack called a Gambit, which varies based on the type of battalion--magic-focused, brute force, and so on--and stuns the enemies it hits. Gambits are limited-use and can be incredibly powerful against the right enemies. You can increase a Gambit's effectiveness even further if one or more of your other units are within attack range of the target, a tried-and-true Fire Emblem concept that applies to all kinds of attacks. There's also an anime-style splash screen as you attack that shows each character involved in the Gambit looking fierce, which adds a nice bit of drama.How much you use Combat Arts and Gambits depends on what difficulty you're on. On Normal difficulty, well-trained units will likely be able to dispatch most enemies in one or two hits without the help of Combat Arts or Gambits. On Hard, however, enemies hit harder and withstand your attacks better. You have to think much more carefully about unit placement, the best time to use a Gambit and take advantage of its stun effect, and how many Combat Arts you can fire off before your weapon breaks. This is where things get exciting; after a few turns of cautious setup, you (hopefully) get to knock out tons of enemies as your plans fall into place.Some of the early-game and optional battle maps are open spaces that don't require you to think too hard, especially on Normal. But the story battles throughout feature a variety of map layouts--from pirate ships to what appears to be a lava-filled cavern--that challenge you to consider where your units need to be, both in the next turn and several turns down the line. Many of them have different routes, enemies coming at you from multiple angles, optional treasure to chase, and other quirks that require you to split your party up or change their equipped classes to suit the situation. Thieves, for instance, can open chests and doors without a key, while flying units don't take damage from ground that's on fire.The depth of strategy in these elements really shines on Hard difficulty, but especially so when coupled with Divine Pulse, another limited-use ability. Divine Pulse allows you to rewind time in order to redo all or part of the battle, usually if one of your units dies. Rewinding with Divine Pulse shows just how important unit placement and attack choice can be, as even a slight change can make or break the encounter. It's also just a nice quality-of-life feature if you play on Classic mode, in which units who die in battle are lost forever and can't fight or train anymore. You might still soft reset from time to time, but it's great to be able to rectify a mistake right away and get a shot of instant gratification for a job well re-done.Battling, of course, is only one part of life at the monastery. The backbone of Three Houses is the monthly school calendar, and if you like organizing things, planning ahead, or school in general, this can be the most engrossing part. On Sundays, you have free time you can spend in one of four ways: exploring the monastery, participating in side battles, holding a seminar to improve your students' skills, or simply taking the day off. Mondays are for instruction, which consists of selecting students from a list and choosing a few of their skills to boost. The rest of the week goes by automatically, with a sprite of the professor running along the calendar and stopping occasionally for random events or story cutscenes. It sounds a bit hands-off, but there's a lot to think about as it is, and the week-by-week rather than day-by-day structure keeps things moving and ensures you never have to wait too long to progress in any area.The predictable structure of each month--and the fact that you can see the full month's schedule with events listed ahead of time--gives you the foundation to make effective plans. All that time management can definitely be overwhelming, at least at first. You have to keep tabs on your students' skills and study goals, your own skills, everyone's inventory, and various other meters and menus while planning for the lessons and battles to come. But you're treated to a near-constant stream of positive reinforcement as those meters fill up week by week and your students improve their skills. You're always moving toward the next thing: the next level up, the next skill you need to develop, the next month and what may unfold.To complement this, your activities when exploring the monastery (as well as how many battles you can participate in, if you choose to battle on your day off) are limited by activity points. You get more as your "professor level" increases, which means you have to balance activities that boost your professor level with ones that help your students grow. Activity points also ensure that the month continues at a healthy pace, preventing you from lingering on any one Sunday for too long. Seminars and rest days just eat up the whole day without consideration for activity points, which can break up the more involved weeks and provide their own benefits.How you choose to spend your time also comes down to how motivated your students are to learn. Each of your students has a motivation gauge that's drained when you instruct them, and they can't be instructed again until you interact with them and get their motivation back up. You can do this most effectively when exploring the monastery--where you get to talk to different characters, give them gifts, and share bonding time with them--whereas battle only rarely increases motivation levels. While you can skip a lot of the school life bits and even automate instruction, you won't get the best results. You're directly at a disadvantage in combat if you don't make time for your students, which is by design.Like all recent Fire Emblem games, keeping you invested in your units and their relationships is the glue that binds the whole experience together. It's incredibly effective in Three Houses, where your direct involvement in nearly all aspects of a unit's growth trajectory gives you a special stake in their success. After spending time and effort to help a character achieve their full potential, you're not just satisfied when they win a fight--you're proud. And the more you invest in someone--both emotionally and through months of lesson plans and instruction--the more cautious you'll be about putting them in harm's way, and the more you'll work to come up with a solid battle strategy.Considering you're a teacher, it's good rather than disappointing that there's almost no romance to speak of. Some students are flirty, but mainly, you're fostering camaraderie rather than playing matchmaker or romancing them yourself. As you unlock new support levels with different characters--both by interacting with them at the monastery and by using teamwork in battles--you get cutscenes that flesh them out more. Some are charming, lighthearted conversations between two friends, while many of them give you insight into more serious matters--a father forcing his daughter into marriage, discrimination within the monastery, the dark reason behind someone's lofty ambitions. For the most part, each support conversation is just a piece of who a character is, and as you slowly build support levels over time, you begin to uncover the full picture of each person. As a result, learning more about each of the characters and their place in the monastery is as much a reward for progress as the level bars that tick forever upward as you go.Every NPC is fully voiced in both English and Japanese, which brings a lot of life to the brief support conversations. Disappointingly, though, the professor is silent. They do have a voice--they'll occasionally say a line when leveling up or improving a skill--but in cutscenes and when talking to students and faculty, they just nod or shake their head flatly. There are brief dialogue options during conversations, but where they could give way to a full, subtitled sentence or two from the professor, you're just left with the other character's reaction. Characters do, however, refer to the professor's personality and how they come across throughout the game, which is odd considering they mostly nod at things. This puts distance between you and the characters you're bonding with, and it's a missed opportunity in a game where the protagonist has an otherwise set look, personality, and backstory.It's not hard to like a lot of the characters, though. They draw you in with anime archetypes--the ladies' man, the bratty prince, the clumsy but well-meaning girl--and surprise you with much more nuance under the surface. Some of the funniest scenes early on involve Bernadetta, a shut-in with extreme reactions to normal social situations, but her inner life is a lot darker and more complicated than those early conversations let on. You might discover a character you thought was a jerk is actually one of your favorites or slowly stop using a less-than-favorite character in battle. You also have the option of having tea with someone, during which you have to choose conversation topics according to what you know about them, dating sim-style. Knowing what topics they'll like is actually a lot harder than it sounds, and successfully talking to a favorite character--even if the tea setup can be a little awkward in practice--is a small victory.Each house's campaign feels distinct but not so different that one seems way better than the other. Every house has a mix of personalities and skills, and they all have their own advantages and disadvantages. Students from different houses can form friendships with each other, too, and you can eventually recruit students from other houses to join yours. Rather than being repetitive, on a second playthrough, recruiting gives you access to different relationship combinations; you can see a different side to a character through a different set of support conversations. And while the overall setup of the game is largely the same across the three houses, each has its own web of B plots, and the second half of the game will look very different depending on who you're with and the choices you've made.The first half concerns the church, its secrets, and the fact that the professor knows very little about their own identity. As the basic loop of each month pulls you forward, so too does the promise of learning the truth about something, whether it's why the archbishop wanted you to be a teacher in the first place or who a suspicious masked individual is. These threads remain pretty open, though, at least after one and a quarter playthroughs. You get different details in each route, and so far it's been a long process to piece everything together.Learning more about each of the characters and their place in the monastery is as much a reward for progress as the level bars that tick forever upward as you go.After a five-year time skip, you enter the "war phase" of the game. While the structure of the game is the same--you even instruct your units, since you still need to train for battle--the focus shifts to the house-specific stories. They involve a lot of hard decisions, with old friends becoming enemies, people you wish you didn't have to kill, and students who've changed either in spite or because of your guidance. Late-game battles are especially challenging, with higher stakes and multi-lane layouts that require a lot of forethought. Success in these battles is incredibly rewarding, as you're seeing dozens of hours of investment in your students reach a crescendo, but they're bittersweet in context.When all was said and done, all I could think about was starting another playthrough. I was curious about the mysteries left unsolved, of course, but I also hoped to undo my mistakes. There were characters I didn't talk to enough, students I didn't recruit, and far more effective ways to train my units. A second playthrough treads familiar ground in the beginning, but after learning and growing so much in the first, it feels fresh, too. That speaks to Three Houses' mechanical complexity and depth as well as the connections it fosters with its characters--and whether you're managing inventories or battlefields, it's the kind of game that's hard to put down, even when it's over.Info from Gamespot.com

Pokemon Go's August Community Day takes place this weekend, but that isn't the only event beginning in the game soon. Niantic has announced a new gift-themed event, which is set to kick off on Monday, August 5, and it'll introduce yet another new Shiny Pokemon to the game.From August 5-19, the number of gifts you can carry in your inventory will be increased to 20. Additionally, Niantic will be upping the number of gifts you can open each day to 30. Any Eggs you receive from these gifts will also only require 2 km to hatch, but the Pokemon that can appear from them are those that can normally be found in 7 km Eggs.One such Pokemon is Bonsly, the baby form of Sudowoodo. Not only will you be able to hatch it from 2 km Eggs, you'll also have a chance of hatching a Shiny Bonsly for the first time. You can't tell what Pokemon will hatch from an Egg before you begin incubating it, so you'll need to exchange a lot of gifts and hatch as many Eggs as you can if you're hoping to add a Shiny Bonsly to your collection.Pokemon Go Rayquaza Guide: Shiny Rayquaza, Counters, And How To CatchPokemon Go: How To Catch And Purify Team Rocket's Shadow PokemonIn the meantime, August's Community Day takes place this Saturday, August 3. The featured Pokemon this time will be Ralts. Throughout the event, Ralts will spawn in the wild much more often than it normally does, and you'll have a chance of encountering a Shiny Ralts for the first time. If you can evolve it into one of its final forms, Gardevoir or Gallade, up to an hour after the Community Day ends, the Pokemon will learn the event-exclusive move Synchronoise.That's not all that's happening in Pokemon Go right now. Team Rocket recently invaded the game, and now they have even more kinds of Shadow Pokemon in tow. The Legendary Rayquaza also recently returned to Raid Battles. The Pokemon will be available again until September 2, and this time, you'll have a chance to capture a Shiny Rayquaza.Info from Gamespot.com

With the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Scarlett systems expected to ship later next year, publisher Electronic Arts admits to being "very excited" about the next generation of hardware. During the company's earnings call on Tuesday, July 30, EA says it's been "working on [next-gen games] for some time," Video Games Chronicle reports.EA says it "will be ready" when the next generation hits. While the PS5 has no confirmed release window, we do know Scarlett will launch Holiday 2020. CFO Blake Jorgensen said EA has been "working hard on building games for next year on Gen 5." Jorgensen mentioned Madden, saying, "As has happened in the past, not all games will come out on Gen 5 immediately. Obviously, games like Madden, you probably bring the Gen 5 game out when the Gen 5 console ships, not when Madden itself ships."While EA is looking forward to the next generation of hardware, Platinum Games CEO Atsushi Inaba said "it's more of the same." Inaba seems unimpressed with Microsoft and Sony's upcoming consoles, saying, "It's nothing that's disruptive or super innovative."GameStop, on the other hand, is looking forward to the forthcoming systems. Particularly, GameStop is excited about them still having disc drives, with chief customer officer Frank Hamlin saying, "We're very much a believer in helping our customers sell them a physical game when they want it."Info from Gamespot.com

Unlike other major stores, Best Buy didn't try too hard to compete during Amazon Prime Day in July, but the retailer has followed up with a major sale of its own this weekend with some deals that are comparable to what we saw during Prime Day. As usual with Best Buy sales, the event focuses largely on general tech deals on things like TVs, computers, smart home devices, and more, but there are some solid game and console deals to be had this weekend as well.The sale includes some first-party Switch games for $45-$50, which is pretty much the cheapest they get, so it's a good time to pick up Mario Kart 8 Deluxe or Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu if you're interested in any of those games. Acclaimed PS4 exclusives like Marvel's Spider-Man and God of War are also down to $20. There are a ton of gaming accessories on sale, with Xbox One wireless controllers for $20 off, refurbished Switch Joy-Cons for only $54, and a 64GB Switch memory card for $25.Quick look: Best Buy's best game dealsBlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle -- $30Devil May Cry 5 -- $40The Division 2 -- $30God of War -- $20Judgment -- $40Mario Kart 8 Deluxe -- $50Marvel's Spider-Man -- $20Metro Exodus -- $30Nier: Automata - Game of the Yorha Edition -- $25Octopath Traveler -- $45Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu -- $45Samurai Shodown -- $50Super Mario Odyssey -- $50We've rounded up some of the best gaming deals that caught our eye in Best Buy's sale below; plus, check out the best deals on smartwatches, tablets, and more from our friends over at CNET. The sale ends Sunday, so don't wait too long if you see something you like.See all deals at Best Buy Marvel's Spider-Man - PS4$20 ($40)Fight crime and swing through the streets of New York City in this acclaimed PS4 exclusive, which is on sale for only $20.See at Best BuyNintendo Switch Joy-Cons (refurbished)$54 ($80)These Geek Squad-certified refurbished Joy-Cons come at a deep discount compared to their hefty list price of $80. You can get them on sale for just $54.See at Best Buy Mario Kart 8 Deluxe - Switch$50 ($60)The ultimate party game is on Nintendo Switch, including all the characters and tracks from the Wii U version, new vehicles, and more. It's $10 off, selling for $50 at Best Buy right now.See at Best BuySanDisk 64GB MicroSD Memory Card for Nintendo Switch$25 ($50)Running out of memory on your Nintendo Switch? This memory card has double the amount of storage that the console itself comes with, so you'll have room to add plenty more games to your library.See at Best BuyXbox One Wireless Controller (Phantom White)$50 ($70)Add a new wireless controller to your collection for $20 off. The special edition Phantom White controller is on sale for $50 (its list price is $70, but other colors are discounted, too.See at Best BuyWD 1TB My Passport Go Portable SSD + 64TB Flash Drive$130 ($170)This portable SSD is an excellent solution for storing and accessing files on the go, and it's compatible with PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Mac.See at Best BuyNintendo Switch console (refurbished)$275 ($300)If new releases like Fire Emblem: Three Houses and Wolfenstein: Youngblood are making you consider picking up a Switch, you can grab a Geek Squad-certified refurbished console at Best Buy for $25 off.See at Best BuyAcer Nitro 15.6" Gaming Laptop$580 ($800)This budget laptop is even more appealing now that it's on sale for $220 off--you can get it for $580 instead of $800 at Best Buy. With a 1920x1080 resolution, an Intel Core i5 processor, and Nvidia's GeForce GTX 1050 Ti graphics card, this 15.6-inch Acer laptop is a great affordable option for those looking to get into PC gaming.See at Best BuyToshiba TV and Xbox One S console with free copy of Madden NFL 20Save $130Best Buy is currently offering the Toshiba 43-inch 2160p 4K Fire TV in a bundle with the Xbox One S and a free digital copy of Madden NFL 20 (Xbox One), which just released August 2. The TV is $80 off, dropping its price to $250, and the Xbox One S bundles are each $65 off, dropping their price to $235 (you may not see the Xbox One discount until checkout). Just be sure to verify you see Madden 20 added during checkout--some of our editors didn't see the digital code included at checkout, while others did.See at Best BuyInfo from Gamespot.com

When Jurassic World first hit theaters in 2015, reviving the Jurassic Park franchise that had stalled out 14 years earlier, it ushered in a new era of dinosaur adventures. Now, the Jurassic Park ride at Universal Studios Hollywood has gotten the same treatment, and fans of the franchise can cast themselves in the chaos.When Jurassic Park: The Ride first opened at Universal's Southern California theme park in 1996, it became an instant favorite. After all, it's hard not to love a boat ride with a massive drop. As the years went on, though, and Jurassic Park strayed further from popular culture, the attraction's luster faded. Then Jurassic World happened, sparking a total revamp of the ride.But theme park enthusiast can be a fickle bunch, especially when it comes to changing a ride they grew up with. So how do you approach a project like the Jurassic World ride without losing what made the original so special to visitors? "Very carefully," senior director and executive producer at Universal Creative Jon Corfino said.Speaking to GameSpot at the new ride's grand opening, Corfino explained that the key to making sure Jurassic World lived up to its predecessor was a collaboration. "We worked very closely with [Jurassic World director] Colin Trevorrow [and producer] Frank Marshall--really, the guardians of this franchise and brand--because you gotta stay close to the DNA," he said. "And their contributions were essential because they were very focused on sticking with the initial awe and wonder starting point."A lot of that awe and wonder from the original Jurassic Park ride remains intact, with guests coming face-to-face with a variety of peaceful animatronic dinosaurs before things go horribly wrong and the more chaotic of the dinos mess everything up. A lot of these elements, in particular, are pulled right out of the original version of the ride--including numerous dinosaur interactions.However, even with nods to the original ride, Jurassic World stands on its own. For instance, the brand new first scene on the attraction drops gusts into an aquarium where the massive Mosasaurus is seen feeding on a shark. It's a fun moment and one that immediately calls the 2015 movie to mind, given it featured this particular dinosaur. It also happens to be thrilling, thanks to some cleverly-placed water cannons that serve a dual purpose of teasing the danger that's to come and getting riders very wet.Another aspect of the ride helping to distinguish Jurassic World from its predecessor is the inclusion of the movie's stars. In the line queue, as well as on the ride itself, you'll see the characters played by Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, and BD Wong appearing in videos.According to Corfino, including the cast in the new ride was essential to its authenticity. "Whenever you're dealing with a brand like this, you have to stay authentic. And it just wouldn't have been right to not have them," he said. "So we were able to put together an idea, work with them, get them involved, which was absolutely fantastic. They were tremendous partners. Chris and Bryce were such a hoot. Their chemistry together off-screen was fantastic, much less on-screen. B.D. Wong was fantastic. And it sets the whole tone. It just wouldn't be right without them."Jurassic World: The Ride is open now at Universal Studios Hollywood.Info from Gamespot.com

Xur's arrival in Destiny 2 has lost some of its excitement as the game's second year of content draws to a close. Most players who login to Destiny regularly already have most or all the Exotic weapons and armor the weekend vendor carries--which are those from Destiny 2 Year One and the Forsaken expansion. Anything newer isn't available, which means if you've been playing Destiny for a long time, there's usually no reason to bother tracking Xur down.Sometimes, though, Xur's wares are worth checking out. While Exotic weapons in Destiny 2 always have the same perks, Exotic armor gets random perks--which means that Xur's version of an Exotic helmet or pair of boots might be slightly different from the one you already have. This week, Xur showed up in the Tower in Destiny 2 with a great role on an Exotic piece of armor, and if you play Titan, you should pick it up.Head to the Tower's Hangar to find Xur, who is positioned on a catwalk on the north end. You're going to want to pick up the Exotic helmet he's offering called One-Eyed Mask. This Exotic is great for the Crucible: its special perk marks enemies who damage you, and if you track them down and get your revenge, you're granted a damage boost and an overshield. That makes One-Eyed Mask a favorite in Destiny 2's competitive modes by itself, but Xur's version has another great perk: Enhanced Hand Cannon Targeting.Targeting buffs in Destiny 2 make guns more accurate, boosting their Target Acquisition stat--which basically helps you land headshots. The Enhanced version of those perks are pretty rare, so to get one on an Exotic helmet is great. The Hand Cannon version, though, is probably the best for Crucible. Most of the best PvP guns in Destiny 2 are hand cannons, like Not Forgotten and Luna's Howl.This combination of perks makes One-Eyed Mask a pretty phenomenal find, especially if you're preparing to head into the Crucible to grind Destiny 2's current seasonal event, the Solstice of Heroes. The Mask will run you 23 Legendary shards, so hurry over and pick it up--you only have until the weekly reset on Tuesday, August 6, to make your purchase.Info from Gamespot.com

Free game trials are commonplace on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, but much less so on Nintendo consoles. However, if you're a Nintendo Switch Online subscriber, you'll soon have a chance to play one of the system's Mario games at no charge for a limited time.Beginning August 7, Nintendo will hold a free trial period for Mario Tennis Aces. NSO members will be able to play the full game for free until 11:59 PM PT on August 13. The title will also be available for 30% off from the Eshop until August 20, so if you like what you've played, you can pick it up at a discount and carry over any progress you made.For a limited time, #NintendoSwitchOnline members can experience the full #MarioTennis Aces game on #NintendoSwitch for free from 8/7 at 10am PT – 8/13 at 11:59pm PT!https://t.co/Yuxlbxs2rx pic.twitter.com/2nvEXH8mYN — Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) August 1, 2019Mario Tennis Aces launched in June 2018 and has received a steady stream of updates and new content since then. The game's final free DLC character, Dry Bowser, arrived last month, along with alternate costumes for Wario and Waluigi. The game now features 30 playable characters, including a handful who have never appeared in a Mario Tennis title before, such as Boom Boom and Pauline.In GameSpot's Mario Tennis Aces review, critic Justin Clark wrote, "The Tetris Effect is in full swing here; days after the credits rolled, I still crave the satisfying thwack from a Power Shot, mentally replay matches and imagine how I might do things differently given a bit more focus and know-how. Mario Tennis Aces does what this series has done best, and for the most part, improves what it's rarely gotten right prior."NSO subscriptions are available for US $4 / £3.49 / AU $6 for one month, US $8 / £7 / AU $12 for three months, and US $20 / £18 / AU $30 for one year. Nintendo also offers an annual Family Membership that costs US $35 / £31.49 / AU $55 and covers up to eight Nintendo Accounts across multiple systems. Other perks to the service include the ability to play Switch games online, access to a library of NES games, and the ability to back up game saves via the cloud. If you're an Amazon Prime member, you can still grab nine free months of NSO from Twitch.That isn't the only freebie NSO members can take advantage of. Nintendo is also offering a free Spirit Board Challenge Pack for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. The pack is only available for NSO subscribers and includes an assortment of helpful items for the game's Spirit Board mode.Info from Gamespot.com

You have many roles in Fire Emblem: Three Houses--teacher, soldier, confidant. But you also have to babysit the people around you, because they tend to leave their stuff all over the place. Each month, starting with Chapter Three, you can find Lost Items while exploring the monastery. Every item will have a vague description of who it might belong to, which can be very confusing. In this guide, we've outlined every Lost Items we've encountered by chapter and listed who they belong to so you don't have to run around Garreg Mach for ages tracking them down.Like with gifts, Lost Items will increase your support bonds with characters and, if they're in your house, increase their motivation by half. We recommend only returning Lost Items to your students if they're not at max motivation. Also like with gifts, you can only return Lost Items to the house leaders and their bodyguard/retainer figure (Edelgard and Hubert, Dimitri and Dedue, and Claude and Hilda) if you're in their house. We've been able to pick up Hilda's Lost Items while playing as another house, for some reason, but we're unable to give them back to her. Note that this list does not yet include Dimitri and Dedue's Lost Items; we'll continue to update it as we play more.Chapter ThreeHand Drawn Map -- LeonieSketch of a Sigil -- HannemanSchool of Sorcery Book -- AnnetteTattered Overcoat -- CasparWhite Glove -- Edelgard (Black Eagles only)Wooden Flask -- JeraltWooden Button -- RaphaelChapter FourArtificial Flower -- LorenzBadge of Graduation -- CatherineBag of Tea Leaves -- FerdinandConfessional Letter -- MarianneMysterious Notebook -- AloisNoxious Handkerchief -- Hubert (Black Eagles only)Thunderbrand Replica -- CasparUsed Bottle of Perfume -- Hilda (Golden Deer only)Wellness Herbs -- ManuelaChapter FiveArt Book -- IgnatzCurry Comb -- IngridEncyclopedia of Sweets -- LysitheaExotic Feather -- PetraFeather Pillow -- LinhardtNeedle and Thread -- BernadettaPortrait of Rhea -- CyrilSword Belt Fragment -- FelixUnused Lipstick -- SylvainChapter SixAgricultural Survey -- FerdinandAntique Clasp -- FlaynBundle of Herbs -- AsheHammer and Chisel -- HannemanHow to Bake Sweets -- MercedesHow to Be Tidy -- MarianneSilver Brooch -- DorotheaSilver Necklace -- GilbertSpotless Bandage -- Hilda (Golden Deer only)Chapter SevenBlack Iron Spur -- FelixBundle of Dry Hemp -- ShamirBurlap Sack of Rocks -- RaphaelHresvelg Treatise -- Hubert (Black Eagles only)Letter to Rhea -- CatherineJousting Almanac -- IngridSmall Tanned Hide -- PetraTime-Worn Quill Pen -- Edelgard (Black Eagles only)Chapter EightA Treatise on Etiquette -- LorenzClean Dusting Cloth -- ManuelaCrumpled Love Letter -- SylvainCrude Arrowheads -- LeonieForeign Gold Coin -- AloisFruit Preserves -- MercedesMild Stomach Poison -- Claude (Golden Deer only)Old Map of Enbarr -- FlaynStill-Life Picture -- BernadettaSongstress Poster -- DorotheaThe Saints Revealed -- LinhardtUnfinished Fable -- SetethWell-Used Hatchet -- CyrilChapter NineAnimated Bait -- LinhardtBig Spoon -- RaphaelBlue Stone -- IgnatzBook of Ghost Stories -- MercedesCarving Hammer -- GilbertCentipede Picture -- ShamirEvil-Repelling Amulet -- AsheLens Cloth -- HannemanOld Cleaning Cloth -- CyrilOld Fishing Rod -- SetethPrincess Doll -- LysitheaUnfinished Score -- AnnetteChapter TenAnimal Bone Dice -- ShamirBag of Seeds -- MarianneBoard Game Piece -- Claude (Golden Deer only)Dusty Book of Fables -- FlaynFur Scarf -- LeonieHandmade Hair Clip -- Hilda (Golden Deer only)Introduction to Magic -- AloisLetter to the Goddess -- IgnatzLight Purple Veil -- ManuelaLovely Comb -- DorotheaNoseless Puppet -- GilbertPegasus Horseshoes -- IngridSnapped Writing Quill -- SetethToothed Dagger -- FelixWeathered Cloak -- CatherineChapter ElevenStay tuned…For more Fire Emblem: Three Houses tips, check out our best tips for sharing meals, our guide to recruiting students, and our rundown of how gardening works. You can also watch our videos on the things we wished we knew before we started playing and how to make the most of your time in the game. Finally, if you want general info, check out our list of the essential tips for Three Houses.Info from Gamespot.com

With MachineGames at the helm, Wolfenstein has enjoyed a resurgence during the last couple of years. Wolfenstein has managed to captivate with its strong characters and intriguing world-building, giving you a glimpse into an alternate future where the rules are rewritten and whole new terrifying possibilities are waiting to be explored. None of this is present in the series' first venture into VR, however. Wolfenstein: Cyberpilot isn't just lacking the elements that make its universe intriguing, but it's also dated by recent VR standards, with flat, unexciting action and little reason to return after one short playthrough.Set in 1980s, Cyberpilot puts you in the shoes of a pilot working for the French Resistance at the same time as the events in Wolfenstein: Youngblood. Your piloting skills are alluring to two French hackers who have managed to smuggle away a few Nazi war machines, giving you the chance to aim these monstrosities back at their creators. If you've ever cursed at being mauled by a Panzerhund, Cyberpilot initially seems like a great opportunity to flip the script.It doesn't take long for that feeling to fade, though. Three of Cyberpilot's four missions give you control of a new machine to pilot. The Panzerhund lets you dash towards enemies before melting them down with a mouth-mounted flamethrower, a small airborne drone makes sneaking around a Nazi bunker simple, and the more straightforward Zitadelle arms you with a high-powered machine gun and rocket launchers. Despite these varied abilities, Cyberpilot doesn't provide interesting challenges for you to test them against. Each mission is linear and frustratingly one-note. You keep moving forward through cramped and visually bland spaces, mowing down enemies in your way and occasionally taking a breather to heal up before the next encounter. The drone mission at least tries to shake things up by pivoting from all-out action to stealthy engagements, but the unresponsive AI and cramped level design don't allow you the satisfaction of a well-planned stealth kill.Since you're using machines armed with flamethrowers and unlimited rockets, combat should presumably be explosive and adrenaline-pumping. But Cyperpilot gives so little feedback to your actions that it's difficult to feel their impact at all. Enemies, for example, make no sounds when engulfed in flames or blown back by nearby explosions, and they almost always use the same animations when dying before disappearing from sight. The devastating weapons at your disposal offer no satisfying animations and subsequent sound effects that give them a real kick, which makes action feel limp and uninteresting.In between each mission, you can explore a multi-floored resistance bunker, using a lift to transition from a spacious loading bay to a dimly lit reception area adorned in abandoned Nazi regalia. These spaces look great and do a good job of reminding you of the imposing grip your enemies still have on European soil. Although this bleeds into the handful of missions you're sent on, Cyberpilot doesn't offer anything new or interesting to say about this alternative perspective on the resistance. The only other characters are your resistance handlers, who occasionally engage in some quirky banter between each other, but outside of that you're nothing but a tool to them, and you disappointingly get no new insights into Wolfenstein's world as a result.These brief interludes between missions also introduce you to each new pilotable machine in intimate fashion. Before being able to remotely control them, you need to hack your way past their security, which Cyberpilot makes out to be far more complicated than it really is. While you're being fed descriptions of intricate wiring and defensive subroutines, all you are doing is using motion controls to remove a chip from the machine in question, plugging it into a nearby monitor, and then replacing it after a brief pause. Getting to see the details of each chillingly monstrous Nazi machine up close, in VR, without fearing death is surprisingly fascinating, but there's not much else to do during these sequences. That makes each of these forced interludes feel drawn out and unnecessary.Cyberpilot can be played with either the PlayStation Move controllers or a DualShock 4, and neither is great. With a DualShock 4, combat feels more familiar. You use the thumbsticks to freely move around and rotate (either smoothly or in adjustable segments) while using motion control to aim. In this configuration, your two hands move as one, which makes activities outside of combat a chore. The PlayStation camera can only track the front-facing light from the DualShock 4, so reaching for objects on either side of you is borderline impossible in some cases.Using the Move controllers changes that immediately, and also gives you more freedom in combat. Moving your arms independently from one another lets you bash on your special attack button and heal at the same time, which is impossible to do when you're tethered together by a seemingly invisible set of handcuffs. As a tradeoff, movement is trickier using the Move controllers. Rotation is mapped to face buttons while lateral movement is controlled using the big, mushy PlayStation button on the face of the controller. It's far less ideal than the DualShock 4, leaving you with a decision to make between the lesser of two evils.There's no reason to jump into Cyberpilot if you're looking for another avenue to explore more of Wolfenstein's world. You won't have too much time to adjust, either, given that Cyberpilot's four missions can easily be finished in less than 90 minutes. Beyond reaching its flat ending, there's nothing else to do to make what time you do have more engaging. There are no collectibles to find, alternative mission routes to explore, or exciting mission set pieces to replay for the thrill of it. It gives Cyberpilot a distinct tech demo feeling; since VR games have become increasingly more adept at using the hardware in unique ways, Cyberpilot feels outdated by comparison.There's no reason to jump into Cyberpilot if you're looking for another avenue to explore more of Wolfenstein's world. This straightforward shooter lacks the punch to make its action exhilarating and breaks up combat with even more repetitive and slower-paced interludes where you'll do the bare minimum with motion controls to achieve simple and mundane repair tasks. Beyond looking striking for a VR game in some places, there's nothing about Cyberpilot that warrants your time.Info from Gamespot.com

When Infinity Ward developers talk about the multiplayer mode of its upcoming Call of Duty: Modern Warfare reboot, they describe dismantling the franchise's gameplay to evaluate every part of it. Modern Warfare shows the results. In many ways, it's a throwback to an earlier point in the evolution of the franchise. It does away with the more recent turn toward heightened mobility, defined hero characters, and sci-fi technology. In others, it's finding new ways to differentiate itself from a crowded field of shooters. Modern Warfare maintains the DNA of Call of Duty, but it's also a refresher on the shooter genre that's making the old feel new again.Activision gave journalists a chance to play a few hours of Modern Warfare's multiplayer a few days before its official reveal livestream event. At the presentation, Infinity Ward gave a pretty broad sense of everything that players can expect from the game when it launches on October 25. One of the biggest pushes evident during our play session sees Infinity Ward reworking the Call of Duty formula to accommodate more varying playstyles. That's evident in just about everything, from the layouts of its maps, to the game's movement and climbing mechanics that are used to reach new locations, to the Gunsmith menu that lets you heavily customize every gun in the game. A lot of the fun of Modern Warfare's multiplayer--and it was a lot of fun--comes from discovering your favorite, strategically advantageous parts of maps, and loading into a match with a gun customized for your specific needs.Infinity Ward showed off several different modes during the play session. We got in a few sessions of the 2-on-2 Gunfight mode, which takes place on small, symmetrical levels that Infinity Ward refers to as "Flash maps." Slightly larger "Tactical maps" accommodate six-player squads for team deathmatch games, as well as modes like Headquarters, the classic king-of-the-hill game type, and Cyber Attack, in which one team tries to set a bomb on a specific location while the other defends it. A nighttime map shrouded in darkness showed off Modern Warfare's new tech for rendering night-vision goggles, along with the realistic effects that come with them--like the inability to fully aim down sights, since a gun against your face would knock into the goggles parked there.Matches got even bigger and more intense, though: We played some that sported 10-player teams and others with 20-player teams. Art director Joel Emslie told GameSpot that Modern Warfare's multiplayer will support more than 100 players in some matches, and has the maps to match.Redesigning The Playing FieldIt's the maps that make this new approach to Call of Duty work. Infinity Ward said it's moving away from the "three-lane" style of shooter maps--a design that usually includes three main pathways toward the center of the area, driving players to engage with each other but offering little in the way of strategic and tactical options.Instead, Modern Warfare's maps are designed more like real urban areas, with the emphasis placed on free-standing buildings and verticality. There are lots of structures you can enter and ascend to find useful sightlines and elevated positions. Infinity Ward is also putting a big emphasis on traversal and mantling, giving you ways of reaching high ground that aren't immediately obvious.The movement system is perfect for reaching "power positions," where you can use sightlines to take down unsuspecting foes or flank an entrenched enemy who's picking off your teammates from a hard-to-hit spot. Infinity Ward likened the approach to that of arena shooters, which drive players to critical locations (and into firefights) with the placement of power weapons.Studio head Pat Kelly said during the presentation that Infinity Ward wanted to encourage players to explore to create and refine their own strategies based on the maps' designs. The goal was to make sure you could feel clever as you found innovative ways to take the advantage.Infinity Ward said these changes to how it makes maps are meant to accommodate lots of different strategies, even in the middle of fights. Running and gunning with a shotgun can be lethal in some places, just as staking out a tough-to-spot window and camping it can be. Maps are generally built with a lot of flanking opportunities and verticality, requiring you to adapt to many different situations as you play.Another big addition is that of doors, which can change fights significantly. You can use doors in a variety of ways, just by opening and closing them to create or eliminate sightlines. Opening a door while aiming down your gunsights lets you peek through--and maybe toss in a flashbang or grenade. Sprinting or sliding into a door, or using a melee attack, lets you kick it in, potentially disorienting people on the other side, but it's a loud approach that gives away your position.You can also breach doors with any explosive in the game, or use them to hide claymores to take out approaching flankers. Elements such as doors can also give you a ton of information about other players' locations if you listen carefully, thanks to Modern Warfare's sound technology and design. That's extremely handy, since personal radar is only accessible by earning Killstreaks, a change from past games.There Are Many Like It, But This One Is MineModern Warfare's customization options allow for a lot of variety in playstyle as well. The new Gunsmith menu adds a lot of freedom to Call of Duty's usual custom weapon loadouts, allowing you add a mess of attachments to every gun in the game once you've unlocked them. Each weapon can handle up to five attachments, which is a few short of all the available options--and you can unlock anywhere between 30 and 60 attachments for each weapon. You can add sights, targeting lasers, extended magazines, and various barrels, grips, and stocks. All of them have strengths and weaknesses: a scope gives you better range at the cost of handling speed, while a stock that reduces recoil is heavier and thus slows down your movement.Emslie said the size and variety in the maps, the materials used to construct them (some of which you can shoot through, depending on your gun's caliber), and new additions like driveable vehicles (which you can destroy with your weapons, like other Killstreak vehicles such as attack helicopters), make Gunsmith customization a pretty essential part of your strategy."The player counts and the environments are so large that you need your weapons platform to be way more versatile and you can go deep with that stuff," he said. "It was almost a necessity. You can get extended mags and drum mags, and yeah, it goes crazy. You can modify the weapon down into a nine-millimeter magwell, so you can turn an [assault rifle] into a submachine gun. And it's just really fun."Call of Duty's perk system makes a return in mostly the way players expect, as well. You can choose three perks for your character, but individual guns can also each sport a perk slot as one of its five attachments. Those can give you little boosts, like a faster melee attack or better bullet penetration, that can further amplify your particular method of approaching a fight.Support For Support PlayersModern Warfare brings back the franchise's Killstreaks, which give you special weapons or abilities based on how many enemies you take down before dying. The significant change here is the move away from Scorestreaks, which gave you rewards for completing objectives or helping teammates, not just making kills. The Scorestreak system gave players ways to contribute to their team without necessarily being big kill-earners, but Infinity Ward said Scorestreaks made those rewards too unpredictable. Instead, it reworked the old Killstreak system because it added higher stakes to staying alive during a match.That doesn't mean you lose the ability to contribute if your kill-to-death ratio is a bit lacking, though. Your equipment choices can provide you with additional ways to support your team. You can trade a grenade for a Tactical Insertion flare, for instance, which you can drop in a match to choose your next respawn point--perfect for defending a specific location. You can also add one of a new set of Field Upgrade items to your loadout. These equipment pieces all run on cooldown timers and become available periodically as you play. Most offer ways to support your teammates by allowing you to provide extra ammo, destroy enemy explosives, or control a remote recon drone that can mark opponents.Killstreaks have gotten an overhaul as well. There are plenty that let you rain death on enemies with airstrikes or support helicopters, as in past games. But several also let you call in driveable vehicles like tanks, which often have room for more than one player. That means a teammate's killstreak can also benefit you: you can hop into the gunner's seat of the roof-mounted .50-cal of someone else's tank, for a start. All those customizations and options provide lots of different avenues for success for different kinds of players. Developers said they expect the combinations of guns, vehicles, equipment, and map design to lead to ideas and strategies the studio has never considered.A More Unified ExperienceOne element we didn't get much of a look at is the way that Modern Warfare's modes will interact with each other. During the reveal event for the game in June, Kelly mentioned that one big push is to try to make Modern Warfare a more holistic experience. He said the goal was to move away from releasing a game that feels like three separate products in one package: a single-player campaign, which is pretty much separate from multiplayer, and which is pretty much separate from a more cooperative mode like Zombies. (Modern Warfare doesn't have a Zombies mode, but Infinity Ward has mentioned it'll include the cooperative Spec Ops mode, instead.)Emslie said part of the synergy between the game modes will come from shared or adjacent locations that make the campaign feel relevant to multiplayer. You can look off the side of one multiplayer map we played and see a site from the campaign, for instance. "You might see different characters appearing in Spec Ops from the narrative, and stories carry through," he said.The major consistency from one mode to the next is in how Modern Warfare plays, though, Emslie said."What we really worked on was our consistency so that, if you're someone that really likes to play narrative, and you're interested in that, and you're familiar with a weapon, when you go and experience that weapon in another mode [it plays the same]. Let's say you could train in single-player for a gunfight. And you pick [the same gun] up somewhere else--'Oh, I know that gun, I know that kicks like a mule. And I know that configuration and profile.'"Much like the original Modern Warfare, using guns earns you points that allow you to unlock new attachments for those specific weapons. Your earnings also transfer between modes, so you can level up your guns in single-player or Spec Ops and retain all your attachments when you hop into multiplayer.'Grey Area' Versus 'Badass'Though Infinity Ward is trying to make Modern Warfare's modes feel more unified, the effort raises the question of how multiplayer interacts with the single-player campaign. During the first reveal for the game, narrative director Taylor Kurosaki explained that part of the studio's approach to modern Warfare was to tell a more realistic story that delved into the gray areas of morality and right and wrong in war. That approach sounds like it's fundamentally at odds with the multiplayer approach, which Infinity Ward emphasized works to make players feel "badass."Modern Warfare came under fire in the days before the multiplayer reveal when Infinity Ward announced some of its upcoming Killstreaks, one of which is an airstrike of white phosphorus. We encountered the Killstreak during our play session when the opposing team dropped it on us. It functions like a giant deadly gas cloud that turns your vision black-and-white, does a small amount of damage to you, and slows your movement speed. According to the Killstreak description, white phosphorus also can burn players in matches, but we didn't encounter that aspect.In the real world, white phosphorus is a horrific weapon that melts skin--it was used by the US military in Iraq, resulting in thousands of civilian casualties. Using that sort of weapon for fun on other players in multiplayer seems like a big disconnect from a story that's trying to explore a more human side of warfare.Call of Duty has long utilized weapons for multiplayer gameplay that are terrifying in the real world. In fact, you could argue all of its weapons fall into that category. As Emslie pointed out, the multiplayer trailer shown during the event ended with the detonation of another Killstreak from past games: a nuclear bomb."I think that, in the end, the narrative is telling a story, a serious story, and it does things in a way, to make things--it's trying to get a dramatic reaction out of the player, and making you feel things," Emslie said."We want people to be thoughtful about what they're playing," audio director Stephen Miller added."In the narrative experience, you're using this landscape and this universe to make people care about these characters," Emslie continued. "And then when you're in the multiplayer space, you're trying to get them, using the same things in the same universe, to care more about the fun that they're having. It's almost like a mental chess game, where you're solving puzzles with mechanics and doing these things. And the characters that are in there, it's more about representing you in this play-space."...It's almost like having two different actors in the same film," he said. "You might have a really dramatic, deep, disturbed character with a horrible past and all this trauma. And then over here, you've got another character that's devil may care, whatever. But I look at it that way. I almost look at the game as, it's three very different characters and actors in the same film, in the same play."Coordinating CrossplayProbably the biggest news to come out of the Modern Warfare reveal announcement, other than the game itself, was its support for crossplay between PS4, Xbox One, and PC players. That capability was on display during both events, where matches ran across systems with no discernable difference between the experiences.Conventional wisdom holds that crossplay might create some disparities between players, though. It's generally accepted that PC players using a mouse-and-keyboard setup benefit from smoother, more accurate aiming than their console counterparts who use gamepads. In testing the game, though, Emslie and Miller said Infinity Ward hadn't seen many issues in that vein--individual skill is the more important factor."We had some pro-gamers out to the studio when we had crossplay," Emslie said. "And we had console versus PC, and the console guy kicked the PC guy's ass. And I was just totally impressed, but I've seen people on a pad playing with their thumbs and a touch screen going against PC and, you know, I think it just comes down to how good you are with the interface. It's starting to get to that point, I think.""And we had console versus PC, and the console guy kicked the PC guy's ass."Emslie also said Infinity Ward is paying close attention to the balance between platforms and is working on systems to make sure that everyone who fires up a Modern Warfare match is on an even keel. Developers are still refining those systems, but Emslie said ensuring that balance is a major priority for the developer.There's a lot we don't yet know about Modern Warfare, but the time we spent playing it at the multiplayer reveal suggested Infinity Ward's work in breaking down and reevaluating the Call of Duty formula has yielded a lot of exciting, fun results. From gunplay to sound design and map layout, Modern Warfare is a major refresh on the franchise's formula, without straying too far out of the lines of what fans think of when they think "Call of Duty."Kelly said during the multiplayer reveal presentation that the studio wants to make sure to distinguish Modern Warfare in the minds of players: It's not a remake or a remaster, but something new. At least after a few hours of playtime, with its focus on new technology, crossplay, and revisiting and refining old aspects of the franchise while looking for new ones, it seems like Infinity Ward has accomplished that goal--and like Modern Warfare could be a big step forward for Call of Duty.Info from Gamespot.com