BattleState Games, the developer behind Escape from Tarkov, didn't expect the backlash of only granting access to its PvE mode for those who purchased the $250 collector's edition. It has since issued an apology and made several changes.

"First of all, I would like to say that I am very sorry that fans and the game community in general are experiencing these feelings, said chief operational officer Nik Buyanov in a Reddit post. "Unfortunately, I somehow did not foresee the fact of such a reaction and now I have drawn conclusions for my future decisions."

BattleState Games will now make the mode free for those who purchased the Edge of Darkness edition, but will do so in waves. That's because there is not enough server capacity to accommodate every single player at the moment. Furthermore, there will be mod support for the PvE mode after the game releases out of early access.

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Decades after making guest appearances on sitcoms and Star Trek, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson evolved from a key figure in the world of wrestling into becoming this generation's big action star and bonafide box-office needle-mover. After failing to helm his own corner at Warner Bros. with Black Adam, things have been rockier than rock-solid and it could be the beginning of a full-on rock slide.

TheWrap is reporting that Johnson's actions on the set of his upcoming Christmas action movie, Red One, have him a nuisance at best and disgusting at worst. The movie, co-starring Chris Evans and J. K. Simmons as Santa, has Johnson as a bounty hunter out to save Santa after he gets kidnapped. Amazon had hopes of branching the movie into a formidable franchise, but in addition to a year-long delay said to be due to 2023's strikes, there may have been other issues with the production.

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Johnson showed up as much as eight hours late to set, causing ballooned costs by at least $50 million, according to three insiders who insisted on anonymity for fear of Johnson's retribution.

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Microsoft has revealed the date for its summer Xbox Games Showcase, and it's on June 9 at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET. Following the showcase, there will be a special deep-dive into the next installment of a series, which is reportedly Call of Duty.

While Xbox didn't reveal which games will be present at the showcase, it's likely that we'll see Avowed, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, as they're all slated to be released this year. The next installment in the Gears of War series might be announced there as well.

Last year, a deep-dive Starfield Direct aired directly after the Xbox Games Showcase, but Microsoft redacted the name of what this year's follow-up direct would be. The Verge reports that the mystery franchise is Call of Duty.

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There have been numerous reboots and reinterpretations of Scooby-Doo since Joe Ruby and Ken Spears created the talking dog and his teenage companions for the first animated series in the franchise in 1969. Now, Scooby-Doo: The Live-Action Series is heading to Netflix with a script-to-series order.

Deadline broke the story, and also revealed that the new series will be produced by Greg Berlanti‘s Berlanti Productions and Warner Bros. Television. Josh Appelbaum and Scott Rosenberg--both of whom executive produced Netflix's live-action Cowboy Bebop series--created the new take on Scooby and his friends, which is described as "an update of the popular cartoon."

The original animated series and most of its follow-up shows have revolved around Scooby, his best friend Shaggy Rogers, and their pals Fred Jones, Daphne Blake, and Velma Dinkley. Together, they travel the country and solve supernatural mysteries that usually turn out to be old men in Halloween costumes. However, a few incarnations of the show have embraced actual supernatural elements in the decades after the first series aired.

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Square Enix has announced that it expects to lose $140,000,000 in "content abandonment losses" for the fiscal year, which ended on March 31, 2024.

According to a new financial report, the Square Enix Board of Directors met at the end of March to discuss how to move forward with game development. Square Enix has reaffirmed its stance on being more selective about which games to develop. Upon close examination of Square Enix's current development pipeline, it seems like there have been several projects canceled and will result in a 22.1 billion yen, or $140,000,000, loss as a result of abandoning them. Square Enix did not name or reveal which ones were canceled.

Square Enix president Takashi Kiryu revealed earlier this year that it would be revising its game development processes to focus on fewer, but higher-quality, titles. Furthermore, he said that Square Enix would be aggressive in applying AI to both game development and publishing pipelines.

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A new extraction shooter has joined the fray, as Gray Zone Warfare launches on Steam Early Access today. Developer Madfinger Games noted that the Escape From Tarkov competitor was at No. 7 on the Steam wishlist before becoming available to purchase.

Gray Zone Warfare is set on the fictional Lamang Island and lets players pick one of three private military companies for their ex-special forces character. From there, the game offers a PvE mode or a PvEvP mode, with Madfinger Games saying the open world can fit 48 people and 1,000 AI units. Additionally, the extraction shooter boasts offering 150 different tasks whether solo or in a four-player squad.

The tactical FPS features "authentic ballistics models," according to Madfinger Games, with weapons being customizable through hundreds of parts. The developer also says the game contains a health system that is supposed to "simulate the human body realistically." That means players have to become well-versed in knowing what injury has taken place and how to address it.

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Developer Team Ninja has landed a hit with Rise of the Ronin, with parent company Koei Tecmo touting that the game's "sales are surpassing the Nioh series." The action-RPG released last month as a PS5 exclusive.

Koei Tecmo added that Rise of the Ronin "raised the level of our development, technology, and management" in a fiscal year 2023 financial report briefing. The company pointed out the game's high metascore as well as strong user feedback as notable highlights.

No specific sales totals were mentioned by Koei Tecmo, other than comparing the strong start for Rise of the Ronin with the Nioh series. Before Nioh 2 launched in 2020, it was announced that Nioh had sold 3 million copies across PS4 and PC. Nioh 2 initially launched on PS4 before eventually arriving on PS5 about a year later in 2021--along with a remastered version of the first game that same year. In October 2022, Team Ninja revealed that the Nioh series had reached 7 million units sold worldwide.

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Amazon Prime Video confirmed Fallout Season 2 just over a week after the premiere of Season 1, which suggests that the original series based on the video game franchise is a massive hit. Now, Amazon has revealed that 65 million viewers have watched the show in the 16-day window since the series debuted on April 10.

Via Variety, Fallout is the second most-watched title on Prime Video since The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 1 in 2022. Variety also notes that 60% of the show's viewers came from outside of the United States, with the United Kingdom, France, and Brazil mentioned as "hubs for the show’s popularity."

However, Amazon has not released its methodology for counting Fallout's viewers. For example, Amazon doesn't mention how many viewers finished watching the show's first season or even a complete episode. Regardless, the popularity of Fallout on Prime Video does appear to be fueling interest in the video games themselves. The aftermarket prices for Fallout 4 on PS4 have risen dramatically on Amazon Prime itself.

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While showcasing its upcoming Contra crossover DLC Operation Guns at the ID@Xbox April Showcase, Vampire Survivors developer Poncle revealed a brand-new surprise update called Laborratory that is be live now on all platforms.

The new update, which Poncle refers to as its "first AAAA upgrade" in a press release, adds such upgrades as fully rendered running animations, realistic train physics, and doors that open when you go through them.

In terms of new content, the Laborratory update brings players to a corrupted science lab, which has been taken over by an evil milk magician and his dark forces. The update also adds some festive seasonal content (despite it being April) with new character Santa Ladonna and festive weapon the Santa Javelin.

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Bethesda's Todd Howard has been very careful talking about the future of the Fallout franchise in the last few weeks, but in a recent interview with Kinda Funny Games, he may have just teased two unannounced projects related to Fallout.

When asked whether Bethesda might look at doing more third-party collaborations like it did with Obsidian and New Vegas back in 2010, Howard said the company looks at what it's doing with the franchise as a whole.

"We look at what we're doing with the franchise and then we say, do we still feel good about--and I can't reveal it now--but here's our runway for the Fallout franchise: season two happening, what are we doing on mobile, what are we doing in 76?" He went on to hint at what may be unannounced Fallout projects, adding: "What are we doing with this thing, what are we doing with this other thing, and when are these landing?"

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With Fallout seeing a new wave of interest thanks to Amazon Prime Video's recent Fallout TV series, Todd Howard has been reflecting on the franchise as a whole. In a recent interview, Howard clarified his thoughts on the Obsidian-developed Fallout: New Vegas, and spoke about how it might be reflected in the next season of the TV show.

Speaking on a livestreamed interview with Kinda Funny Games, Howard clarified that he thinks Obsidian "did an amazing job with New Vegas." Responding to rumors that he hates New Vegas, Obsidian, and wants to retcon the events of the game, Howard said: "We see some of that, and I'll say to everybody, that's a game that we published, right? I will say Fergus, who runs Obsidian, is absolutely one of my favorite people in the video game industry."

When asked whether Obsidian and Bethesda might be likely to collaborate again now both are owned by Microsoft, Howard said: "I can't speak to things that we're doing with the franchise in the future, obviously, but New Vegas is a very very important game to us and our fans, we think they did an incredible job."

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The next set of Magic: The Gathering Secret Lair offerings, the Spring Superdrop 2024, is on its way, and with it comes an unexpected collaboration. Hatsune Miku will become the next video game IP to join the MTG ranks with the Secret Lair x Hatsune Miku: Sakura Superstar drop beginning May 13.

The Sakura Superstar drop will be the first of four Hatsune Miku drops coming to Magic's Secret Lair limited-time shop between now and the end of the year, with each drop focused on a different season. The theme for Sakura Superstar, as the name suggests, is centered around the annual flowering of cherry blossoms--or "sakura"--in Japan.

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This Secret Lair x Hatsune Miku: Sakura Superstar drop will include six cards, all of which are reprints of previously released cards--though three of them are renamed to fit the Hatsune Miku theme. The six cards are as follows:

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Game director and executive producer of Bethesda Game Studios Todd Howard recently said that Larian Studios deserves all the praise and success it's been getting following the launch of Baldur's Gate 3.

In an interview with Kinda Funny Games, Howard spoke highly of the studio by saying, "They've done great work for for a long time," and that Larian deserves all the accolades it's received. Howard continued by saying that there are "some people in the industry who look [at Larian] and say 'Oh look at this overnight success.' Like, have you played their previous games?"

Howard continued to praise Larian by saying:

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Xbox Expansion Cards

WD C50 1TB - $125 (was $150) | Seagate 2TB - $230 (was $270)

Get WD Black C50 Card at Amazon Get Seagate 2TB Card at Amazon

If you're an Xbox Series X|S owner who regularly has to delete games or move data between your SSD and an external hard drive, you'll want to check out Amazon's current batch of deals on the Western Digital Black C50 Expansion Card and Seagate Expansion Card. These are the only two expandable storage devices that work with the proprietary storage slot on the back of your Xbox. Amazon is selling the WD Black C50 for up to $25 off, and the 2TB Xbox Expansion Card by Seagate is up to $40 off.

Xbox Expansion Cards WD C50 1TB - $125 (was $150) | Seagate 2TB - $230 (was $270)

This 1TB WD Black C50 deal matches the all-time lowest price at Amazon. We've only seen the $125 price a handful of times since the card's launch last year. Though it's not as substantial of a discount, Amazon is also has a promotion on the 512GB C50 that drops the price from $80 to $70.

The WD Black C50 is one of two official storage solutions. The only other alternative is Seagate's Expansion Card, which is going for $140 (was $150) for its 1TB model at Amazon. The C50 is clearly the better deal at the moment for a 1TB card, especially since both devices accomplish the same thing.

But if you want to further maximize your storage capacity, Seagate is the only manufacturer with the 2TB Xbox Expansion Card. For a limited time, you can get the 2TB Seagate Expansion Card for a $40 discount, dropping the price from $270 to $230.

Get WD Black C50 Card at Amazon Get Seagate 2TB Card at Amazon

You can run out of space on your Xbox Series X|S surprisingly fast. The Series X has 802GB of usable space, while the base model Series S clocks in at 364GB. Modern AAA games eat up space quickly, and if you subscribe to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, deleting games to make room for new ones can become the norm.

Outside of a few awesome deals at Woot that sold out extremely fast, we haven't seen substantial discounts on Xbox Expansion Cards often.

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Game director and executive producer of Bethesda Game Studios Todd Howard said he doesn't regret having a new Fallout game release alongside the show on Amazon Prime Video. He explained that he feels that Fallout as a franchise is doing well and is still as relevant as ever.

In an interview with Kinda Funny Games, he explained that the studio views Fallout as a "top-down franchise," asking how healthy it is or determining how relevant it is to the world at the moment. "I think we're doing really well there," he said. Howard continued by saying that Bethesda has a dedicated team to Fallout 76, and because of that, there's been a steady stream of Fallout content.

Howard explained as a result of the show's success, more people are willing to try out the new content in Fallout 76:

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FX's The Veil takes the audience into the world of international espionage on a personal and global scale. The series follows CIA agent Imogen Salter (Elisabeth Moss), who is tasked with taking Adilah El Idrissi (Yumna Marwan) on a trip from Istanbul to Paris and London. All the while, however, Salter is attempting to get El Idrissi to reveal a secret that could save thousands of lives. The series also follows the CIA's Max Peterson (Josh Charles) and the French DGSE's Malik Amar (Dali Benssalah), both of whom must put aside their prospective agency's differences in order to help Imogen complete her mission.

Peterson works for the CIA in counter-terrorism and finds himself swept up into this mission. "He's kind of written as a bit of an instigator, as a disrupter. So he's a bit of a s*** stirrer," Charles told GameSpot. "He brings in some darkish humor, and what I think is interesting is that there's a lot of 'loosey goosey' on top, and a lot of language and making fun of the fringe. Underneath all of it, there's a lot of order and a lot of discipline. He's one of these guys that grew up in this world with a military background, and he's been doing this a long time, so it feels like he knows the rules so well that he could just kind of push them all the way to the edge."

The counterpart Peterson is forced to work with is Amar, and the two of them have very different personalities. "[Amar] is strictly professional," Benssalah explained. "His job is his life. He's at the center of a major international investigation, but he's not on the ground. He is stuck in the office. So he feels powerless because [he] can't be out there with Imogen. He knows he and Imogen have a complex, romantic, and professional relationship. When we meet the character, we can see that he is ready to explode. This is a tricky, dangerous mission. And also the fact that he's forced to to work with the CIA, and he doesn't really like their representative, Max Peterson. Nothing goes the way he wanted. He is already nervous."

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May 4, aka Star Wars Day, is this upcoming weekend. In honor of the pop cultural celebration, GameStop is holding a Star Wars Day sale all week, discounting numerous games and collectibles available online and in-store.

See all deals at GameStop Diamond Comics 10-Inch Star Wars Cal Kestis and Darth Revan Figures

Two of the best discounts in GameStop's Star Wars Day sale are for the 10-inch statues from Diamond Comics based on Darth Revan from Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Cal Kestis from Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Jedi: Survivor. Both PVC sculptures are hand-painted and come in windowed display boxes. You can grab them for $64 apiece, which is a nice discount from the standard $80 both figures normally go for.

Diamond Comics 10-inch Darth Nihilus Figure

While those are the main two Diamond Comics figures on sale, GameStop Pro members can grab the 10-inch statue based on the villain from KOTOR II, Darth Nihilus, for $76 (was $80). It's a very small discount compared to the other two figures, but part of GameStop's Star Wars Day sale includes a deal that saves you $25 on orders of $250 or more.

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Todd Howard, game director and executive producer for Bethesda Game Studios, recently explained why Fallout 76 doesn't have cross-play. According to Howard, the studio is looking into it, but "it wasn't designed that way from the beginning."

The news comes from a Kinda Funny Games interview in which Howard explained why Fallout 76 still doesn't have cross-play nearly six years after launch. According to Howard, the team mainly focuses on cross-progression rather than cross-play.

"From us, the more important thing is cross-progression than cross-play and we do separate them. We'd love to have it all, it's something we are looking at but I will say it's quite--you know the way that it was architected from the beginning is quite a technical lift." Howard said. "Not saying we aren't doing anything. We are looking at it and seeing where that's going to impact people."

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The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings first hit theaters in 2001, but it's still as relevant today as it was two decades ago. It's also still fairly expensive to watch the gorgeous trilogy in the best format possible, as the LOTR 4K UHD Extended Collection retails for $90. However, now is a good time to finally add the collection to your home theater, as it's discounted to just $59--one of the best prices we've seen in 2024.

The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy (4K UHD) $59 (was $90)

This collection includes both theatrical and extended cuts of The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King. Best of all, this collection features the reconfigured 4K UHD versions of the films, allowing you to experience the journey through Middle-earth with crisp, vibrant images.

In addition to 4K Blu-ray discs, the box set comes with digital versions of each film.

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If you've only seen the original theatrical releases, the extended cuts alone are worth the price of admission. These versions add around two hours of extra footage across the trilogy, giving you plenty of new scenes to explore.

To complete your Middle-earth collection, consider picking up The Hobbit Trilogy 4K UHD Collection. Like the LOTR collection, this one is usually listed for $90 but is on sale for just $58. It too includes both theatrical and extended cuts of the three films (An Unexpected Journey, The Desolation of Smaug, and The Battle of the Five Armies), making it the ideal way to round out your Middle-earth library.

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Manor Lords is a medieval city-building and management sim, with a bit of strategy and combat mixed in. As a baron surrounded by a handful of villagers, you find yourself at the crossroads of destiny. Will you lead a prosperous town and expand your domain, or will you be lost in the annals of history? We hope it's the former, so here's our Manor Lords guides hub to help you with your goals.

Manor Lords guides hubStarter guides

Game setup and difficulty - Find out which settings are great for those who are just starting out.

Beginner's guide - We've got several tips for the long road ahead.

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