The way traditional Lego games have seemingly vanished has come as a surprise to me. We recently saw the launch of Lego Fortnite from Epic, and Lego Horizon Adventures is on the way this fall from Guerrilla, but Traveler's Tales made more than 30 Lego games between 2005 and 2022. However, it's been more than two years since the studio released a Lego game, and with no announcement of what's next, there's no guarantee it'll be another Lego project. This follows reports that making the most recent game in the franchise, Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, demanded "extensive crunch."

That's troubling for the studio's staff, but it also means there's a void to fill for families and players who enjoy the way Lego games routinely reimagine pop culture through a kid-friendly lens. Funko Fusion could comfortably fill that role when it arrives later this year.

I recently played several hours of Funko Fusion, spanning levels that re-imagined Jurassic World and Hot Fuzz, which do a great job expressing how varied the IP involved in this game will be. Even if you aren't a fan of the recent movies, Jurassic World is massive, which makes the addition of Hot Fuzz cool and unexpected. It's a cult classic, not a blockbuster, which means that in this way, Funko Fusion fulfills a role the Lego games never could, as they were always focused exclusively on top-tier franchises.

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Andor Season 2 will forever change how Star Wars fans feel about the movie Rogue One, according to Andor lead Diego Luna. He said in a new interview that people will experience Rogue One in a new light after Andor Season 2 because they'll finally see and understand what the characters did and went through leading them to the events of Rogue One.

This includes the droid K-2SO, who is voiced by Alan Tudyk. "I think people watching Rogue One, after watching Season 2, are going to see a different film. Everything will be signified differently knowing what had to happen for K-2 to be there," Luna told Entertainment Weekly. "It's going to make you witness the journey of Rogue One in a different way, I think. And not just with K-2, but with many other characters. I think it'll be really cool," Luna said.

Luna and Tudyk already worked together on Rogue One, and Luna said it was "delicious" to work with Tudyk again on the same set. "You're going to see why K-2 is so important in Rogue One," Luna said. "And how does he get to be such an important character for the Rebellion."

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Monkey business is usually discouraged when it comes to Souls-like games, but Black Myth: Wukong is the rare exception to the rule. One of the big game releases of August, you can score a pretty decent 10% discount on the PC version of the game, over at Fanatical. Normally $60, you can grab the game for just $54 ahead of its August 19 release, or if you feel like unlocking some extra content, the digital deluxe edition will cost you just $63 (normally $70).

Preorder at Fanatical

• Black Myth: Wukong (Standard Edition) -- $54 ($60)
• Black Myth Wukong (Digital Deluxe Edition) -- $63 ($70)

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John Madden, the Super Bowl-winning coach turned turned NFL broadcaster and face of a video game franchise, is getting his own biopic movie. Writer and director David O. Russell has put the project together and cast Nicolas Cage to headline the film, which will be called Madden.

"Nicolas Cage, one of our greatest and most original actors, will portray the best of the American spirit of originality, fun, and determination in which anything is possible as beloved national legend John Madden," said Russell in a statement to Deadline. "Together with the ferocious style, focus, and inspired individualism of Al Davis, owner of the underdog Oakland Raiders, the feature will be about the joy, humanity and genius that was John Madden in a wildly inventive, cool world of the 1970s."

Madden only had a relatively short stint in the NFL as the Raiders' head coach from 1969 to 1978, which included seven division titles and a Super Bowl win. If the Madden movie is confined to the '70s, then it will exclude some of the most interesting times in his life. After retiring from coaching, Madden went on to become the most famous broadcaster in the NFL, as well as a key figure behind the Madden NFL video game franchise, which continues even after his death in 2021.

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Once you've flown a couple of times, airline safety videos are usually boring enough to easily ignore (although you really shouldn't). But a video featuring Pikachu and several other Pokemon teaching you proper airplane safety rules? Now that's an attention-grabber. All Nippon Airways and The Pokemon Company have teamed up to instruct passengers how to stay safe on aircraft, and the result is an adorable collaboration you'll want to watch.

The video above has some pretty great cameos from various Pokemon, like Farfetch'd's tiny leek stick luggage taking up far too much space in the overhead compartment, Pikachu observing the seatbelt rule, and a Jigglypuff looking like it's ready to assault a vaper. This is all the information you'd typically expect from an airline video and staff before taking off, but the blend of live-action actors and Pokemon makes it both cute and educational. The video will be played aboard the special Pokemon Air Adventures aircraft from the ANA fleet, which are two airplanes decorated with Pikachu and Eevee designs.

ANA isn't the only airline to adopt a more-interesting approach to teaching passengers the rules of the air, as Air New Zealand has several cool videos with a Middle-earth influence. Back on solid ground, Pokemon fans can look forward to the release of Pokemon Legends Z-A in 2025. While only a few details on the game have been shared so far, it looks like players will be traveling to Lumiose City in Kalos from Pokemon X and Y when the game is eventually released.

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Prior to Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Terminator Genisys, the franchise's continuity held together pretty well. Judgment Day was originally set to happen on August 29, 1997, until it was pushed back by the events of Terminator 2. Netflix's upcoming anime series, Terminator Zero, is picking up on that thread by showing viewers what was happening in Japan as the countdown to Judgment Day was nearly over. And in a new extended preview clip from the series, the events of 1997 appear to coincide with the birth of a Terminator in the future.

Although the clip features no dialogue, it doesn't have trouble conveying the story through on-screen text. In 1997, scientist Malcolm Lee has a vision of his A.I. creation, Kokoro, which is a rival to Skynet. And in the future, Skynet commissions a single Terminator with one purpose: To travel back in time and murder Malcolm before Kokoro can be activated in Japan.

From the previously released trailers, we know that the human resistance will send a female soldier named Eiko back in time to protect Malcolm from the assassination attempt. But when the Terminator can't reach Malcolm, it will target his young children.

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Prime Video's superhero TV show The Boys crushed it in terms of ratings for the end of its fourth season. Nielsen has released its latest top 10 streaming list for the week of July 15-21--a period that covers when the Season 4 finale arrived on July 18--and The Boys took the stop spot.

During that week, The Boys tallied more than 1.3 billion minutes streamed throughout 32 available episodes. House of the Dragon landed in the No. 2 position with 1.1 billion minutes streamed over 16 available episodes, with Cobra Kai, Love Is Blind, and Bluey rounding out the top five, each with over 1 billion minutes streamed that week.

As reported by TV Line, The Boys has now reached a billion weekly minutes of streaming time for the eighth time since the show debuted; that's the most for any Prime Video release. It's also the 20th time that The Boys has cracked into the Nielsen overall top 10 chart--that's also a record for a Prime TV show.

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Season 2 of HBO's The Last of Us introduces characters from The Last of Us: Part II the game, including Abby. The character generated a lot of heated discussion when the game came out in 2020, and the expectation is that the cycle will repeat itself with Abby on the TV show. Isabela Merced, who plays Dina in Season 2, responded to the backlash against Abby, saying in an interview, "there are so many strange people in this world." She also reminded people that Abby, who is played by Kaitlyn Dever on the show, can't hurt you because she is not real.

"There are people who actually genuinely hate Abby, who is not a real person. Just a reminder. Not a real person," Merced said in an appearance on the Happy Sad Confused podcast.

She went on to say that Abby actress Kaitlyn Dever had to have a larger security detail when it came to filming The Last of Us Season 2. Laura Bailey, who played Abby in the video game, received death threats and other forms of abuse, even threats against her newborn child.

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Activision has shut down a highly anticipated Call of Duty mod, just hours before it was due to release. The mod, H2M, was billed as a remastering of the original Modern Warfare II multiplayer experience, delivering what Activision itself did not. But it's not going to happen. As fans feared, Activision issued a cease and desist order to the developers, just like the company did with the fan-made Call of Duty SM2 mod in 2023.

"We are complying with this order and shutting down all operations immediately and permanently," the developers said. The order to shut it down came on August 15, just a day before the modders were due to release the H2M mod on August 16.

The mod would have required a copy of 2017's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered. In anticipation of the mod's release, sales of Modern Warfare Remastered rose significantly on Steam. After the news about the cease and desist order came out, however, players review-bombed Modern Warfare Remastered, turning its recent reviews rating to "mostly negative."

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The Epic Games Store has entered the mobile space. Starting today, Android and iOS users in Europe can download the Epic Games Store for mobile, through which they can access Fortnite, Rocket League Sideswipe, and the brand-new mobile version of Fall Guys. This includes the first updated version of Fortnite for iOS in four years, just in time for the Marvel-centric Absolute Doom--it's poetic, since the last update for Fortnite iOS occurred just before the start of the previous Marvel season during Chapter 2.

Aside from the free rewards that we'll get to in a moment, the biggest item here is the arrival of the mobile version of Fall Guys--it's the same game, now on your phone. All your cosmetic items carry over, and Fall Guys has full cross-progression and cross-platform play between the mobile and console/PC versions.

Android users will be moving on from the old Epic Games Launcher, which simply allowed you to install and update Fortnite and Rocket League Sideswipe. The Epic Games Store for mobile is intended as an alternative app store, similar to the well-established Amazon Appstore for Android, so the idea is that it will also offer many games from other developers and publishers.

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For nearly three years, gamers have awaited any word about Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas VR. It was originally announced in 2021 as a title for the Meta Quest 2. But as Meta moved on to the Meta Quest 3, further updates about the game were scarce. Now, Meta has said that GTA: San Andreas VR is "indefinitely delayed."

In response to a comment on its official YouTube channel, a Meta Quest VR representative stated that "GTA: San Andreas is on hold indefinitely while we both focus on other projects. We look forward to working with our friends at Rockstar in the future." Meta confirmed the news to IGN shortly thereafter.

There are some questions about how far along the project was, since Meta never shared any screenshots or video of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas VR. Rockstar's original version of the game was ambitious even when it was released in 2004. San Andreas had a much larger open world than either Grand Theft Auto III or Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, as well as an enthralling story.

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Developer All Possible Futures has announced that The Plucky Squire will launch on September 17 for PC, PS5, Switch, and Xbox Series X|S. It'll also be included on PlayStation Plus for Extra and Premium tier subscribers.

The Plucky Squire follows a young boy named Jot who can switch between his 2D storybook world and the outside 3D realm. Jot is kicked out of the storybook by Humgrump, who finds out he's destined to be its villain, in an attempt to rewrite the ending. Now Jot must venture between both planes in order to restore the book's original good ending.

August's PlayStation Plus free games lineup includes Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach, and Ender Lilies: quietus of the Knights. Premium and Extra subscribers also got a hefty August update with games like The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Wild Hearts, Cult of the Lamb, and Watch Dogs 2.

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Between May 2022 and November 2023, WWE wrestler Randy Orton was forced to take a lengthy injury hiatus. And apparently, Orton spent much of that time playing From Software's Elden Ring and exploring the Lands Between. Orton may be back in action now, but he's logged 600 hours in Elden Ring since he first started playing.

Via VGC, Orton revealed his devotion to Elden Ring during Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes' What Do You Wanna Talk About video series. Orton recalled teasing Rhodes for being a gamer, but now he's become even more of a gamer than Rhodes.

"I f***ing love Elden Ring," said Orton. "Let me preface this next statement with saying that I was out with spinal fusion surgery, so I had a lot of time on my hands. I got, like, 600 hours on the game... I love that game. DLC just came out."

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Fortnite servers are down for routine maintenance, but soon, they'll be back up and ready for players to invade the game by the millions in Chapter 5 Season 4.

After a polarizing season of vehicular combat and those awesome Nitro Fists, Fortnite's Wrecked season has come to a close, and the new season, Absolute Doom, is imminent. But, for the moment, we're stuck in limbo with Fortnite offline while Epic Games deploys the season update. This is standard procedure--we get at least a few hours of downtime before each new season. It's just a matter of time now.

Fortnite servers down - When does Chapter 5 Season 4 start?

When Fortnite's servers come back up, it'll usher in a new Marvel season--its first since 2020--complete with a battle pass full of Marvel icons, new map locations based on the comic book titan's decades of lore, and lots of new weapons.

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Against all odds, isometric computer-style RPGs are popular again. While the breakout popularity of Larian Studios' Baldur's Gate 3 is certainly the watershed moment for the modern CRPG resurgence, numerous other companies have also aided in the genre's resurrection over the years. Some of the most notable are Beamdog Studio's enhanced edition re-releases of classics like Planescape: Torment and Neverwinter Nights, and Owlcat's recent Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader--and thanks to a new Humble Bundle deal, you can grab PC versions of some of the best CRPGs from both studios for cheap. This bundle launched alongside Humble's Summer Spectacular Sale, which features hundreds of PC game deals.

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Humble's Beamdog and Owlcat: RPG Masters bundle includes up to seven games and numerous DLC packs from both studios for just $35, though there are also smaller bundle options for even cheaper if you just want to pick up a few titles.

The cheapest option is $4 and gets you Beamdog's Enhanced Edition remasters of Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale. Both games are often cited as two of the best 90s CRPGs--Planescape: Torment features incredible writing, dialog, and a unique dark fantasy setting unlike most other RPGs, while Icewind Dale focuses on combat and dungeon crawling. You also get a Humble Store coupon code for 85% off Mythforce, which is a first-person co-op dungeon crawler inspired by hero shooters and classic 90s fantasy and cartoons. With the coupon, you can pick up Mythforce for just $5.25 (normally $30).

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If Deadpool And Wolverine left you in the mood for more stories featuring the unlikely duo, you're in luck. Marvel is capitalizing on the movie's recent box office success with new comic books featuring the mouthy heroes, including an all-new series that sees the duo waging a two-man world war and reprints of fan-favorite crossovers from throughout the years.

Preorder Deadpool And Wolverine: World War III $14.39 (was $16)

The upcoming Deadpool And Wolverine: World War III collects a recent three-issue mini-series of the same name. Written by Joe Kelly and drawn by Adam Kubert, Deadpool And Wolverine: World War III is the duo's latest crossover, which sees the two caught up in a conspiracy and waging a global war as a two-man army. The trade paperback collection drops on October 1, and you can preorder it now for $14.39 at Amazon (down from $16).

Preorder at Amazon Deadpool vs. Wolverine $25 (was $40)

If you're looking to catch up on the pair's history, then the Deadpool vs. Wolverine collection is the place to start. Released earlier this year, Deadpool vs. Wolverine collects numerous stories from the 80s and 90s featuring the titular character, with adventures ranging from an assault on a Hydra base to showdowns against werewolves and robots. Here's the full list of what's included in the Deadpool vs. Wolverine collection:

• Wolverine (1988) #88
• Wolverine (1988) #154-155
• Deadpool (1997) #27
• Cable and Deadpool #43-44
• Wolverine Origins #21-25
• Wolverine and Deadpool: The Decoy
• Material from Wolverine Annuals '95 and '99

Normally $40, the Deadpool vs. Wolverine collection is currently on sale for just $25 at Amazon.

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If that's still not enough of the Marvel tag team for you, you can check out two new behind-the-scenes photo and art books for the recent Deadpool and Wolverine film. The first, Deadpool & Wolverine: The Art of the Movie, drops October 29 and features tons of concept and production art from the movie, while Deadpool & Wolverine: Exposed launches December 17 and offers a rare look into the movie's creation with 200 pages of photos capturing candid moments of the cast and crew while filming. Both books are available for preorder now.

Deadpool and Wolverine books

• Deadpool Vs. Wolverine -- $25 ($40)
• Deadpool and Wolverine: World War III -- $14.39 ($16) | Preorder, releases October 1
• Deadpool & Wolverine: The Art of the Movie -- $90 ($100) | Preorder, releases October 29
• Deadpool & Wolverine: Exposed -- $54 ($60) | Preorder, releases December 17

If you like action figures, Bandai Spirits is releasing a pair of premium Deadpool & Wolverine collectible figures through its Tamashii Nations line, and multiple budget-friendly figures will be added to the Marvel Legends series this year.

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The Elder Scrolls: Tastes and Tales of Tamriel (Official Cookbook Vol. 2)

$35

Preorder at Amazon Preorder for Kindle The Elder Scrolls: The Official Cookbook Vol. 1

The long wait for The Elder Scrolls 6 will continue until at least 2026, but at least you can prepare for your next adventure by mastering culinary arts with The Elder Scrolls: Tastes and Tales of Tamriel. Now available to preorder for $35 at Amazon ahead of its September 17 release date, this arcane cookbook contains over 60 recipes as well as accompanying details, illustrations, and photographs. It sounds like a lovely book, and if it's as awesome as the first Elder Scrolls cookbook, it could be quite popular. It also includes a travelogue with background details about the origin of each dish, exclusive illustrations, and original photography.

The hardcover book is a sequel to the wildly popular 2019 Elder Scrolls cookbook. Volume I wasn't just "popular for a gaming cookbook" either; it has more customer reviews on Amazon than possibly any other gaming book. It has garnered over 13,000 Amazon reviews with a 4.9/5-star average. Absurd. If you spend some time looking at gaming books on Amazon--art books, encyclopedias, cookbooks, etc.--you will quickly notice that the vast majority of titles come nowhere close to those numbers. Even The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia, which was published in 2013, is still shy of 11,000 reviews (the Zelda Encylopedia is around 9,000). We couldn't find any books centered on video games that generated as much active customer interest as the Elder Scrolls cookbook.

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With the upcoming NBA season slowly approaching, the Orlando Magic decided to have some fun announcing its 2024-2025 schedule. And what's more fun than animating two of the team's star players--Cole Anthony and Jonathan Isaac--to send them through the multiverse of cartoons to reveal where they'll be playing their games?

The video was shared on the official Orlando Magic X account. The video had Anthony and Isaac talking to the likes of both Spider-Men from the Spider-verse films, the Ninja Turtles from Mutant Mayhem, Rick from Rick and Morty, the X-Men from '97, and even attempting to catch Pokémon.

welcome to the magicverse pic.twitter.com/QBTGjlIpAD

— Orlando Magic (@OrlandoMagic) August 15, 2024

If you're curious about the team schedule lineup, below is a list of the teams they'll be playing.

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It's still a Halo-style arena shooter with portals, but what has surprised me most about Splitgate 2 is how much more there is to go with that idea. With its new iteration of the game, developer 1047 Games has dialed in elements that help build out the game's identity, complementing what was already there with some new additions that help Splitgate 2 feel different from most other shooters on the market.

Ahead of its closed alpha, I played Splitgate 2 for about four hours, some of that with other members of the GameSpot crew to field a full squad of four. The preview we played wasn't everything the game will have to offer, but it did provide a solid look at the way new elements are pairing with old ones from the original Splitgate to help give the sequel even more of a specific, unique identity.

As mentioned, the underlying idea is the same: Splitgate is a free-to-play competitive multiplayer first-person shooter where the arena is covered in special walls, and on those walls, you can place portals. Shoot a portal at one wall and another at a second wall and you create a gateway that lets you enter one and exit the other, instantly traveling across the map. You can also shoot through the portals and chase opponents through their portals, which leads to a ton of fun ideas and chaos among people who know how to use the portals effectively as part of their competitive strategy.

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September is traditionally when the box office cools down after the summer blockbusters finish their runs. But if the early word on Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is any indication, then this long-awaited sequel is going to buck the trend with an opening weekend worthy of the summer.

Via The Hollywood Reporter, the sequel to 1988's Beetlejuice is projected to open with $80 million. If the film manages to pull that off, it will have one of the highest September openings of all time. That said, it should be noted that Warner Bros. is offering a more conservative outlook for the film. The studio believes that the total will fall somewhere between $65 million to $75 million, which would still be a big opening.

Regardless of the final total, these projections suggest that now was the right time for director Tim Burton to return after 36 years alongside original cast members Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, and Catherine O'Hara. Burton's Wednesday showrunners, Alfred Gough and Mike Millar, co-wrote the script, with Wednesday's leading lady, Jenna Ortega, starring as Astrid Dietz, the daughter of Ryder's Lydia Dietz.

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