Alien: Romulus marks a return to the roots of the legendary sci-fi horror franchise, drawing from the chilling atmosphere and intense suspense that made the original films iconic. Directed by Fede Álvarez (Evil Dead, Don't Breathe), this ninth installment in the Alien series sets out to offer something fresh to longtime fans and newcomers alike. (Even fans of the video games will enjoy a nod, too.) The movie hits theaters on August 16, and so far, critical responses are mixed.

Set between the events of Ridley Scott's Alien (1979) and James Cameron's Aliens (1986), the story unfolds as a group of young space colonizers stumbles upon a derelict space station, only to encounter the terrifying xenomorph--which still endures as one of the most fearsome creatures in cinematic history.

The film features an ensemble cast including Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu. With Álvarez at the helm and Scott returning as producer, Alien: Romulus is crafted to blend the original's claustrophobic horror with a fresh perspective. The screenplay, co-written by Álvarez and his frequent collaborator Rodo Sayagues, aims to explore new depths within the Alien universe while staying true to the franchise's eerie and suspenseful legacy.

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World of Warcraft: The War Within will see hero Alleria Windrunner stepping into the spotlight once more as one of the expansion's main characters, and a new animated short from Blizzard highlights just how long she's been a pivotal character in Warcraft lore.

Titled Alleria: Light and Shadow, the short film is the first fully 2D-animated work created by Blizzard and follows all the major decision points in Alleria's life over the course of the franchise's history. It begins with her decision to leave her homeland and family to fight the Horde alongside the Alliance in Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness, depicts her choice to take the fight to enemy as part of the Alliance's expedition into Outland, and ends with her embrace of the Void as a means to defeat Azeroth's enemies--even at the cost of her relationship with her romantic partner, Turalyon.

"Alleria: Light and Shadow is a groundbreaking addition to World of Warcraft's lore, bringing a new level of storytelling to the game's universe," Blizzard says. "Whether you're a long-time fan or new to the lore, this short film offers a captivating glimpse into the character that will play a pivotal role in the upcoming expansion, The War Within."

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Bethesda Game Studios has announced the official release date for The Elder Scrolls: Castles. The latest installment in the Elder Scrolls series will launch globally on September 10 on mobile devices.

Bethesda Game Studios shared a post on its official X/Twitter account announcing the release date alongside a video of the director of mobile games, Craig Lafferty, and production director Veronique Bruneau explaining the game. Lafferty describes The Elder Scrolls: Castles as the "spiritual successor to Fallout Shelter." Castles has the same premise as Shelter in the sense that players create their castle, ensuring it runs smoothly and assigning the proper people to the right jobs.

We're thrilled to announce that @TESCastles, our newest mobile game from the team behind Fallout Shelter, will be launching globally on Sept. 10th!
We hope you all enjoy this game as much as we've enjoyed working on it. Hear from Production Director Veronique Bruneau and… pic.twitter.com/OayYeiMC1f

— Bethesda Game Studios (@BethesdaStudios) August 15, 2024

One notable thing about The Elder Scrolls: Castles is that a single day in the real world is counted as one year in-game. As time passes, players will see their castle evolve alongside their ruler. How they customize their castle will directly affect how successful they are. Castles will also feature a roguelite mode where players will send their subjects to fight off endless waves of enemies in exchange for rewards. Players can equip enchantments that'll give their people buffs in hopes of them surviving longer.

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Randy Orton has been with the WWE for over 20 years now and is a celebrated performer within the company. He's captured every major championship and headlined his share of marquee matches throughout his career and recently re-signed with WWE for another five years. He's sprinkled in a few movies in his career, as wrestlers tend to do, and even auditioned for Deadpool 2.

During his time talking with current WWE Champion Cody Rhodes on the recent episode of What Do You Want To Talk About?, Orton surprised Rhodes with a few facts about his career, but also how he wanted to lean more into Hollywood acting like John Cena and land auditions. One of the auditions Orton took was for the role of Cable in the Deadpool sequel.

"So I do auditions here and there, and I remember I got an audition early on when I finally got some representation in that industry," Orton explained. "I think Deadpool 2--"

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Amazon has notable discounts on Nintendo Switch Joy-Con controllers right now. You can get a pair of Pastel Pink and Yellow controllers or Pastel Purple and Green controllers for $65 (was $80). Both deals are shipped and sold directly by Amazon. Walmart also has deals on first-party Nintendo Switch controllers. Most notably, you can snag a Nintendo Switch Pro Controller for $58 (was $70). This offer and other Nintendo controller deals from Walmart are shipped directly from the retailer, but the deals are sold by third-party sellers.

Get Purple/Green Joy-Con Deal Get Pink/Yellow Joy-Con Deal

With the Amazon deals, Prime members are eligible for same-day shipping in select locations. These are your standard Nintendo Switch Joy-Con, offering HD rumble, two black wrist straps, and support for both the original Switch and OLED model. You can use them in tabletop mode on Switch Lite consoles, like the Walmart-exclusive Animal Crossing bundle.

Nintendo Switch Lite: Timmy & Tommy Aloha Edition

$159 (was $200)

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Beyond Amazon's deals, several third-party sellers are discounting Joy-Con at Walmart. Keep in mind that these are offered by companies other than Walmart, but the retail giant will be the one fulfilling the order. They do, however, come with free 30-day returns, so if you run into any issues, you can return your order to your local retailer or send it back.

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The inventory of Destiny 2's weirdest shopkeep, the squid-faced weekend vendor Xur, is about to change once again. Starting with an August 20 update, Xur's Exotics-focused inventory will also include the new Exotic class item available in The Final Shape expansion, which means it'll now be a little easier to get new rolls of the piece of gear to fill out your loadouts.

The first time Xur shows up after the update, on August 26, he's guaranteed to stock the Exotic class item, Bungie said.

Bungie announced the change in its latest This Week in Destiny blog post, which provides some more details. You'll be able to purchase an Exotic class item from Xur for 41 Strange Coins, which is a fairly significant haul of the currency, and it'll feature a random combination of perks. However, Xur isn't guaranteed to carry the class item each week; his inventory is randomized, so you'll have to pop in each weekend to see what he's carrying (or, of course, you can read our weekly Xur guide).

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Sherlock: The Complete Series (Blu-ray)

$29 (was $100)

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There's been no shortage of Sherlock Holmes movies and TV shows released over the years, but none of the modern interpretations of the franchise have received as much praise as BBC's Sherlock. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock and Martin Freeman as Watson, it gives viewers a modern take on the iconic characters from Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novels. Now is a great time to finally check out the gritty detective series, as Amazon is slashing the price of Sherlock: The Complete Series to just $29 (was $100). That's the lowest-ever price for the Blu-ray collection. With all the money you save, consider pairing it with the upcoming Sherlock Holmes 383-piece building set, which releases August 27 for $20 and lets you snap together an adorable version of Holmes and Watson.

Sherlock: The Complete Series (Blu-ray) $29 (was $100)

This Blu-ray collection gets you all four seasons of Sherlock plus The Abominable Bride movie--which sends Sherlock and Watson back to the 1890s in a unique spin-off. The rest of the series takes place in modern London and was nominated for a variety of awards. It would even go on to win the 2011 BAFTA for Best Drama Series. As with some other BBC series, Sherlock has feature-length episodes of roughly 90 minutes but is limited in overall number of episodes. Seasons 1-4 contain 12 episodes total. When you include The Abominable Bride spin-off movie, the complete set runs just over 19 hours.

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Amazon is running this price cut as a limited-time deal, so there's likely not much time left before it reverts to full price. Check it out soon if you want to add the beloved series to your home theater for cheap.

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Maple Syrup is a foraged item in Stardew Valley that has a few different uses. It's needed to craft a few items, including one that's the only consistent way to get honey. In order to collect maple syrup, you will need a special tool as well.

How to get Maple SyrupFrom left to right, Pine, Oak, and Maple.

Maple Syrup can be collected from maple trees by using a tapper. You can craft tappers at foraging level 4 using 40 wood and 2 copper bars. To collect maple syrup, you need to place the tapper on a maple tree and wait nine days for it to produce maple syrup. If you get a heavy tapper, a late-game, upgraded tapper, it takes half the time to produce. Maple trees have a tan tree color and large green trees. Maple trees look similar to oak trees, but maple trees have larger leaves with more space between them. You can reference the above image to see the difference.

More Stardew Valley guides:

• How To Make Wine In Stardew Valley

• How To Get Oak Resin In Stardew Valley

• Every Barn Upgrade In Stardew Valley

• Stardew Valley: How To Upgrade Your Tools

What to do with Maple Syrup

Maple Syrup has two primary uses outside of selling it. The first is that it appears in two different bundles. It is one of the options in the Exotic Foraging Bundle and is a required item in the Chef's Bundle. The other use is in crafting bee houses, which are unlocked at farming level 3. You can craft them using 40 wood, 8 coal, 1 iron bar, and 1 maple syrup. Bee houses produce honey every couple of days.

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There will be more than dancing in September and the start of fall in the northern hemisphere. Next month is also looking like a delightful time to check out a group of pleasant new games, like The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom on Switch and Astro Bot on PS5. Both seem like potentially great experiences to open your windows, relax on the couch, and let your worries drift away.

Nintendo already revealed that Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom will feature familiar locations to put you in your happy place when it launches September 26. Even better, the princess can travel to these areas by riding a cute horse, too. Meanwhile, the Astro's Playroom sequel for PS5 brings back the adorable protagonist in what looks like another charming platforming game on September 6. Astro Bot is so lovable that even a limited-edition DualSense controller for the character sold out quickly.

It's not just the big companies dropping cute games in September, either. The Plucky Squire, from publisher Devolver Digital, just got a release date for September 17 earlier this week. The adventure title stars Jot and his storybook character friends. Shortly before that, Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines comes out on September 12. It's a sequel to Grapple Dog but appears to feature a lot more run-and-gun shooting action.

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The long-in-development Masters of the Universe live-action reboot movie has taken another step forward. Camila Mendes has been cast as Teela, the daughter of the Sorceress and the lead heroine in the Masters of the Universe franchise. Teela is also the Captain of Eternia's Royal Guard, and the love interest of Prince Adam/He-Man, who will be played by Nicholas Galitzine.

Mendes' casting was first reported by The Hollywood Reporter. The actress is best-known for playing Veronica Lodge for seven seasons on The CW's Riverdale; which was based on the Archie Comics characters. Prime Video has previously cast Mendes in the lead of two romantic comedies, Upgraded and Música. Her other credits include Do Revenge on Netflix and Palm Springs on Hulu.

Masters of the Universe is based on the toyline that Mattel launched in 1982, and it has spawned multiple animated series. In 1987, a live-action Masters of the Universe film was released with Dolph Lundgren as He-Man, Chelsea Field as Teela, and Frank Langella as their nemesis, Skeletor. The current film has previously been in development at Sony and Netflix before it was picked by Amazon MGM Studios for a theatrical release.

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Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 arrives on October 25, but you can get hands-on with the game's beta as early as August 30. Activision has revealed the preload information ahead of the early-access period, and here is everything you need to know to make sure you have the beta installed for day one.

Black Ops 6's beta preload begins on August 28. Activision says the fastest way to jump into the beta immediately is to download the Season 5 Reloaded update for Modern Warfare 3 and Warzone that arrives on August 21. You'll want to make sure this update is complete before August 30, as Activision says players with this update installed will automatically receive the beta files as an update to their existing game.

Alternatively, new or returning players without Call of Duty installed can participate in the Black Ops 6 beta by downloading it from their platform's storefront.

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The next Transformers movie is almost a month away from premiering and will be the first animated Transformers movie to hit theaters since the 1986 feature. Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, Keegan-Michael Key, Scarlett Johansson, and more voice the iconic characters with Hemsworth and Henry taking on Orion Pax and D-16 before they were Optimus Prime and Megatron, respectively.

Paramount released a quick featurette with the interviews with the cast about their roles and the characters' major differences from what we've seen.

"What intrigued me was the origin story," Hemsworth says. "And to be voicing Optimus Prime is another level. He begins as Orion Pax, he's a worker in the mines, this is his journey to become the all-powerful, all-knowing Optimus Prime. This film has an incredible cast...and it was a lot of fun." Both Hemsworth and Henry acknowledge the story revolves around the budding relationship and inevitable fallout between their characters.

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Blaze Entertainment has announced that the Legacy of Kain Collection will be released for the retro-inspired Evercade family of systems in September.

The collection, which costs $25, includes both Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain and Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, and preorders will be available on August 30. It's the second Giga Cart for Evercade, is a game console family avaialble in both TV and handheld versions that focuses on retro games with ROM cartridges. Also on August 30, the Evercade EXP-R handheld and VS-R home console will be available for $100.

This announcement came as a surprise, as rumors of a Legacy of Kain Soul Reaver I & II Remastered surfaced last month due to a statue spotted at Comic-Con. The series is also getting a prequel graphic novel.

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Hunt: Showdown just received its massive 1896 re-launch--one that overhauls Crytek's supernatural extraction shooter and updates it for current-gen consoles--and it's doing the numbers on Steam to prove it.

Crytek's shooter has always had a consistent player count of around 20,000-30,000 people on Steam over the last few years, slowly but surely cementing its place as one of the best extraction shooters available. The Hunt: Showdown 1896 launch has pushed the game's concurrent Steam players to new heights, reaching over 55,000 players and counting at time of writing, according to SteamDB.

It's a big moment for Hunt: Showdown. The 1896 update overhauls the 2018 shooter's visuals, with an upgrade to the latest version of the CryEngine and all the improved lighting and audio updates that come with it. The changes are so dramatic that Crytek is ending support of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game. Owners of the last-gen console versions, however, will be upgraded for free to the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S versions. It also adds the game's first new map in years (set in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, which is the first map set outside the swamps of Louisiana), and introduces new enemies, weapons, weapon variants, and cosmetics.

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Review bombing has become a way of life, as shows like Star Wars: The Acolyte have been inundated with fake reviews bashing the series. Now, the Federal Trade Commission is taking action against fake reviews and A.I.-generated reviews. But this doesn't mean that the federal government is going to show up at your door if you leave a negative review.

As laid out on the FTC's official site, the new rule isn't targeting individuals who write bad reviews out of spite. Instead, it's going after reviews--either written by people or artificial intelligence--that accept compensation in return for favorable coverage and false testimonials. These practices artificially suppress real reviews, and often misrepresent their products.

"Fake reviews not only waste people’s time and money, but also pollute the marketplace and divert business away from honest competitors," said FTC Chair Lina Khan in a statement. "By strengthening the FTC's toolkit to fight deceptive advertising, the final rule will protect Americans from getting cheated, put businesses that unlawfully game the system on notice, and promote markets that are fair, honest, and competitive."

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Call of Duty is known for having massive file sizes that can eat up a ton of storage, especially on older consoles like PlayStation 4, but Activision is changing this before the launch of Black Ops 6. Players will also have a better control over what Call of Duty content they download.

A large update is arriving alongside the launch of Modern Warfare 3 and Warzone's Season 5 Reloaded on August 21. In addition to the new seasonal content, the update includes a few extra changes meant to shrink the file size, including reorganizing the game files, separating Warzone from the default download for annual titles, and implementing new texture streaming tech.

With this new update in effect, players will only be downloading the annual Call of Duty titles they purchase, and Warzone will be a separate download that they can choose to "opt-in" and download at that time. Alternatively, they can separately download it at any time.

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Call of Duty's current user-interface isn't very user-friendly, with lots of scrolling needed for blocky menus that are often compared to the Hulu streaming app, but Activision is changing this before the launch of Black Ops 6.

The publisher announced that a new interface is on the way, and the Call of Duty app will receive updates to the UI that will make navigation easier. This UI overhaul arrives sometime in mid-October, but a specific date was not given for the big change.

The new UI will introduce a Call of Duty landing zone where top content will be visible on one clean page without needing to scroll. This page is set to feature Call of Duty's most-recent annual feature as well as Warzone, with past titles still being accessible through the player's game library.

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Preorder Dragon Age: The Veilguard - Standard Edition

$70

$10 gift card bonus at Best Buy Preorder at Amazon (PS5) Preorder at Amazon (Xbox)

Preorder Dragon Age: The Veilguard - Deluxe Edition

$90

$10 gift card bonus at Best Buy Preorder at Amazon (PS5) Preorder at Amazon (Xbox)

Dragon Age: The Veilguard releases on October 31, and it's shaping up to be another epic installment in BioWare's beloved franchise. Preorders are now available ahead of its launch, and you'll find three editions up for grabs. Alongside the $70 standard edition, there's a $90 deluxe edition loaded with exclusive DLC, and a premium collector's edition called The Rook's Coffer that comes with heaps of physical collectibles. Best Buy is giving away free $10 gift cards with preorders, though only the standard and deluxe editions are available to order from the retailer at this time.

Preorder Dragon Age: The Veilguard at Amazon

• PlayStation 5
• Xbox Series X
• PlayStation 5 (Deluxe)
• Xbox Series X (Deluxe)

Quick look: Dragon Age Collector's Edition Preorders

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Legendary's cinematic Monsterverse is set to enter the realm of video games in a big way later this year following the success of Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire at the box office, with three Monsterverse games set to release in the back half of 2024.

One of those upcoming titles is the newly announced Kong: Survivor Instinct, described as a 2.5D action-adventure game set during and after the events of 2021's Godzilla vs. Kong. The game will see players take on the role of a father searching for his lost daughter through the wreckage left in the wake of Kong and Godzilla's battle. Of the three upcoming games, Kong: Survivor Instinct will be the only one released as a standalone product on PC and current-gen consoles.

In a press release, 7Levels co-founder Paweł Biela said working with the Monsterverse IP has been a "formative experience" for the developer, and that the game will allow the team to "show some of the fan-favorite Titans from a unique perspective."

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Fanatical has dropped a fresh bundle of PC games on its storefront, and if you're looking for a varied selection of titles to choose from, you can score a pretty good deal here. Like previous promotions, the Build Your Own Trinity Bundle will let you select games from a curated list. You can get three games for $5, five games for $8, and seven games for $10. If you want even more, that works out to $1.43 per game.

See on Fanatical

The bundle offers several gems, and many of the games are Steam Deck-compatible. The biggest of these is easily Garfield Lasagna Party, a collection of mini-games starring the Monday-hating cat and friends. There's a healthy selection of activities to engage in like snowball fights, obstacle courses, and a pizza-slicing minigame. Is it a crime that Garfield Lasagna Party was buried in favor of Elden Ring, God of War Ragnarok, and Tunic when it was released in 2022? Absolutely, and now you can right this injustice by giving the orange tabby the love he deserves.

For mystery fans, you can experience a tale of obsession and manipulation, inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece Vertigo. This is a faithful narrative thriller that pays tribute to the legendary filmmaker, and it has a fascinating story that'll keep you on your toes. Other highlights of this bundle include the intense baseball-meets-fighting-game action of Lethal League Blaze, the vivid and elegant puzzle game Behind the Frame, and the adorable adventure Garden Story. Check out the list below for all the games you can add to your Build Your Own Trinity Bundle.

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