Category: Gamespot

Fortnite dances have become a mainstay of sporting events since the title exploded in popularity, so it’s only fitting to see a real-world sport invade the battle royale game. Developer Epic Games has announced it is partnering with the NFL to offer a new set of football skins in Fortnite based on real-world jerseys, and they’re set to arrive later this week, following the new update.

Starting Friday, November 9, NFL outfits will be available for purchase from Fortnite’s in-game store. Epic hasn’t announced pricing details for the new skins, but you’ll be able to choose between uniforms of all 32 teams in the NFL. Epic says you’ll also be able to customize your jersey with any number from 0-99. The skins will be available in the store beginning at 4 PM PT / 7 PM ET.

The NFL outfits aren’t the only new items on the way to the game this week. Fortnite’s in-game News feed is teasing that a new weapon–the Heavy Assault Rifle–is “coming soon” to the title. Epic hasn’t announced when the new gun will be added, but it will presumably arrive as part of this week’s Fortnite patch.

A lot of other things have been transpiring in Fortnite recently, most notably the major world-changing one-time event that took place in the game on November 4. At the end of the Halloween-themed Fortnitemares event, the mysterious purple cube that has been a fixture of the game since it first appeared toward the end of Season 5 exploded, sending players to a strange realm of light.

Once players were transported back to the island, they noticed that the vortex that was in the middle of Loot Lake has now been replaced by a strange Stonehenge-like monument. Epic has also rolled out a set of Li’l Kev challenges–named after the community’s nickname for the purple cube–that will give you the chance to unlock the new Li’l Kev back bling.

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Pokemon Go developer Niantic has just launched its newest mobile game, Ingress Prime, on iOS and Android. To celebrate its release, the studio is holding a special event in Pokemon Go, giving players their first opportunity to catch two new Shiny Pokemon.

For a limited time, two Gen 1 monsters–Cubone and Ponyta–will appear much more frequently in the wild than they normally do. Not only that, but if you’re lucky, you’ll also have a chance to come across Shiny variants of each as you’re playing. Shiny Cubone has a greener complexion than standard Cubone, while Shiny Ponyta has a blue fiery mane rather than a red one.

In addition to the new Shiny Pokemon, Niantic is also offering players a couple of free customization items for their trainers to commemorate the launch of Ingress Prime. Right now, you can get an Ingress Prime shirt for your avatar, as well as tops featuring the logos of The Enlightened and The Resistance–the two teams vying for supremacy in Niantic’s new game.

In other Pokemon Go news, Niantic has revealed the special move players will be able to learn during this month’s Community Day, which takes place this Saturday, November 10. During the event, the Gen 2 starter Pokemon Cyndaquil will appear much more frequently in the wild, and if you manage to evolve it into its final form, Typhlosion, up to an hour after the Community Day ends, it’ll learn the powerful attack Blast Burn.

Niantic also recently rolled out a new update for Pokemon Go, which introduced the recently announced Adventure Sync. With this new feature, the game will keep track of the distance you’ve walked, even when it’s idle, making it much easier to hatch Pokemon Eggs and discover Candy with your Buddy Pokemon.

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Blizzard has announced that Warcraft III: Reforged is being made with real-time strategy game newcomers in mind. Revealed at BlizzCon 2018, Reforged is an upcoming remaster of the original 2002 Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and its 2003 expansion The Frozen Throne.

“Yeah, Warcraft III did not have the easy mode,” Blizzard lead artist Brian Sousa said during an interview with GameSpot. “It was either hard or really hard, and so now, even me, I remember playing missions over, and over, and over. This is a really hard game, so getting in there and making it a little bit more accessible for today’s players, at least, to get into the RTS genre. This RTS has been around for 15 years. It’s still around, people are still playing it, so we’re not too worried about redefining the RTS because this already has a huge community, right, and we’re not looking to change how Warcraft plays. We just want it to be a little bit more accessible and look better for today’s players.”

In the same interview, senior producer Pete Stilwell also revealed that Blizzard currently has no plans of developing Warcraft IV. However, a sequel is not impossible. “I mean, I wouldn’t rule anything out, but we don’t have any plans around [Warcraft IV] at this point. Getting [Warcraft III: Reforged] right, I think, is our priority first and foremost,” Stilwell said. This matches with what Starcraft II: Legacy of the Void producer Tim Morten said about Warcraft’s future.

Reforged will feature remastered maps and campaigns, as well as remodeled animations and characters. The game will launch with 4K support, and an upgraded UI and world editor in comparison to the original game. A special edition, called Spoils of War, unlocks in-game content for Diablo III, Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, Heroes of the Storm, and World of Warcraft.

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At BlizzCon this past weekend, Blizzard announced a brand-new Diablo game–but it wasn’t exactly what fans were expecting or hoping for.

Diablo Immortal is a new Diablo game for mobile devices that Blizzard is developing alongside partner NetEase. Even though Blizzard told fans weeks ahead of BlizzCon that they shouldn’t expect an announcement of the next mainline Diablo game at the show, a reveal of a new mobile game wasn’t the kind of surprise some were hoping for. The next big Diablo game–potentially Diablo 4–is likely in the works, but Blizzard said nothing about it at BlizzCon.

We caught up with Blizzard’s Wyatt Cheng (principal game designer) and Joe Hsu (senior game producer) at BlizzCon to talk about the announcement of Diablo Immortal, the reaction to it, and more.

Cheng started off by explaining that Diablo Immortal is coming to mobile because the franchise is already well represented on console and PC; the next area of expansion is the growing mobile market, he said.

“At the end of the day, at Blizzard, we’re gamers,” Cheng said. “And we play a ton of games on all platforms, console, PC. We play board games. We play card games. We just play games, and a lot of us play mobile games. And I think when we look at an opportunity to make an awesome mobile game, we want to take it.”

Blizzard has been working with NetEase for nearly a decade on bringing popular franchises like World of Warcraft, Heroes of the Storm, Overwatch, and another mobile title, Hearthstone, to the Chinese gaming market. Partnering with NetEase again for Diablo Immortal just made sense, Cheng said.

Another reason Blizzard is bringing Diablo to mobile is because there are more stories in the universe to tell. “We were looking at this 20 year period in between Diablo II, Lord of Destruction, and Diablo III, and we said, ‘All these events happened, so we should take a look at creating a game that explores that space in time,’” Cheng explained.

He added that Diablo Immortal is sort of like the movie Star Wars: Rogue One, which exists in the wider Star Wars universe but can still be watched and enjoyed on its own.

As for Hsu, he said bringing Diablo to mobile is representative of Blizzard’s efforts to “try new things” and bring Diablo to more people.

“We love to bring new things to our players,” Hsu said. “For me personally, I still play Diablo III. I play the Seasons, and that is awesome experience, but I would love to try new things, and we would love to share that with everyone. And it’s such a rich IP where we can do that, so it was a good choice. I feel like it was a very good choice.”

Some amount of the conversation around Diablo Immortal has been negative. As mentioned, a portion of the fanbase was hoping to see the next big Diablo title instead of a mobile game. Hsu said he hopes people give Diablo Immortal a shot first before judging it.

“We really believe playing is believing, and we would love it if everyone everywhere gets to try it out and give their honest opinions,” he said. “That would be amazing.”

Being skeptical is perfectly fair and reasonable, Cheng said, but he still hopes people stay open-minded about Diablo Immortal.

“I think that’s reasonable in today’s world, our modern world, to be a little skeptical,” he said. “But then for the people who play it, if they can go out and say, ‘No, no, no, seriously, guys. I was at BlizzCon. I played the demo. It was awesome.’ Hopefully that word of mouth spreads.”

Blizzard co-founder Allen Adham told Kotaku that the company expected fans to get upset about Diablo Immortal, but not on the level that eventually came to bear. There was also backlash when Blizzard announced Diablo for consoles and fans also got upset about Hearthstone in general being a free-to-play mobile game, Adham said, so pushback is nothing new for the company. All of that said, Adham added that he understands Diablo fans want more.

“We knew our audience here desperately wants to see and hear about one thing in particular,” Adham said, presumably in reference to the next big Diablo game.

You can expect Blizzard to spend a lot of time and attention on Diablo Immortal. Cheng said Diablo for mobile will be the next big core pillar for the Diablo franchise going forward.

“Yeah, I do. I do for sure,” he said. “If we fast forward in 10, 20 years and look back, we’re going to be developing up the lore. And when people paint out the storyline, we have new stories to tell. We have new gameplay. There’s going to be brand new experiences for players in Diablo world.”

Blizzard has yet to disclose the business model for Diablo Immortal, so as of yet it’s unknown if it will be free or paid. Blizzard’s previous mobile game, Hearthstone, is free. It is supported by microtransactions. We asked if Diablo Immortal would have microtransactions, but both Cheng and Hsu said Blizzard is focused more on getting the game right before talking about business specifics.

No doubt another one of the reasons Blizzard is bringing Diablo Immortal to market is because of the business opportunity. Smartphones are ubiquitous, and the microtransaction model–especially in China–is common and generally accepted. Parent company Activision Blizzard made $4 billion from microtransactions last year, and stakeholders are surely eager to see this figure grow higher still.

One other matter surrounding Diablo Immortal is the accusations that it is a re-skin of the game Crusaders of Light, which is another title from NetEase. Asked directly to respond to the re-skinning claims, Cheng told IGN: “We have artists on our side, they have artists on their side, and we work together as a team, as a partnership to create everything about Diablo: Immortal. The environments, the characters, the skills, the story.”

GameSpot spent some hands-on time with Diablo Immortal at BlizzCon, so keep checking back soon for more.

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Real life MLB action just ended, with the Red Sox defeating the Dodgers to win the World Series. The season starts back up again in late March, and now Sony has announced some of the first details on the next entry in the MLB The Show franchise.

MLB The Show 19 will launch on March 26, 2019 for PS4, and young slugger superstar Bryce Harper will be on the cover. While Harper has been announced as the cover star, the final box art isn’t ready yet because Harper hasn’t confirmed where he’s going to play next.

Harper has spent his entire professional career as the right fielder for the Washington Nationals. He’s now a free agent, however, and is expected to sign a lucrative contract with a new team in the weeks or months to come. Once that deal is done, you can expect Sony to update the cover art for MLB The Show 19 with Harper’s decision.

For now, we’ve got Harper in a hoodie.

MLB The Show 19 will be available in a Standard Edition ($60 USD) and a Gone Yard Edition ($100) that is exclusive to GameStop and EB Games. It comes with a New Era baseball snap back cap, a copy of the game, in-game extras, and more. A $100 Digital Deluxe edition will also be available; some of its extras include an allotment of Stubs, custom avatars, and more. An MVP Edition ($70), meanwhile, includes a series of digital extras and a steelbook case if you’re picking up the physical edition. Everyone who pre-orders any edition of MLB The Show 19 gets extra in-game digital content.

No gameplay footage or images from MLB The Show 19 have been released yet, but keep checking back with GameSpot for more between now and launch.

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Square Enix has released a new trailer for Kingdom Hearts III, offering us another look at the Kingdom of Corona, a world based on Disney’s Tangled. In the video, which you can watch above, Sora, Donald, and Goofy stumble upon the tower where Rapunzel is being held and help set her free. But before long the newly liberated princess finds herself face to face with a monster.

Flynn Rider is also there, but quickly opts to take a backseat in battles, saying that he can get Rapunzel back to the kingdom but will need Sora and his companions to handle combat, which they have quite a bit of experience with at this point. The quick gameplay showcase also provides another look the traversal ability Rapunzel has, which involves swinging using her hair.

Much of the celebrity voice talent that was attached to the Disney universes featured in Kingdom Hearts III are reprising their roles, as are key performers from previous Kingdom Hearts titles. Haley Joel Osment returns to voice Sora, while Zachary Levi will return as Flynn Rider and Donna Murphy will once again be Mother Gothel. For Frozen, Idina Menzel is voicing Elsa, Kristen Bell is Anna, Josh Gad is Olaf, and Jonathan Groff is Kristoff.

John Ratzenberger and Wallace Shawn will feature as Hamm and Rex from Toy Story, while Tate Donovan is back as Hercules from Hercules, and Kevin R. McNally as Gibbs from The Pirates of the Caribbean. Tony Anselmo and Bill Farmer, who have served as the official voices of Donald Duck and Goofy for over than 30 years each, will also reprise their roles.

Utada Hikaru, who has provided the vocal theme for previous mainline Kingdom Hearts titles, will once again lend her voice for the third game. This time, however, the soundtrack will also feature a collaborative track made with Skrillex. Kingdom Hearts 3 is set to release on January 29, 2019 on Xbox One and PS4.

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Ghost Pokemon have been a common sight in Pokemon Go this past week thanks to the recent Halloween 2018 festivities, and soon one will be the star of its very own special event. Niantic has announced it is hosting a Gengar Day on Saturday, November 3, bringing the Shadow Pokemon to Raid Battles for a limited time. [Update: Gengar Day has arrived; be sure to check out the schedule below to see when the event is underway in your region.]

Like Pokemon Go’s monthly Community Days, Gengar Day will be a brief event, only running for three hours. During that window of time, the Shadow Pokemon will appear as a Raid Battle at Gyms. These require a Raid Pass to join, but you’ll be able to get five of them for free from a nearby Gym to help you participate.

Not only will Gengar spawn frequently at Gyms during the event, you’ll also have a chance of coming across a Shiny one. You may not initially be able to tell it’s a Shiny at first glance, however; unlike most other Pokemon, Gengar’s Shiny variant is only subtly different from its standard form. It’s still worth getting one, though, particularly if you plan on picking up Let’s Go Pikachu or Let’s Go Eevee for Nintendo Switch when they launch next month.

Shiny Mega Gengar artwork for Pokemon X/Y

Any Gen 1 Pokemon you catch in Pokemon Go can be transferred to the Switch titles, where you’ll then be able to recapture them at a new facility called the Go Park. If you do manage to find and get a Shiny Gengar during the upcoming Gengar Day event, you’ll want to bring it over to Let’s Go; Gengar is one of the few Pokemon capable of Mega Evolving, and Shiny Mega Gengar (pictured above) is one of the coolest-looking Pokemon in the games. You can find the hours for each region’s Gengar Day event below.

Pokemon Go’s Halloween event is scheduled to end on November 1. It introduced a handful of new Ghost and Dark Pokemon to the game, along with the Gen 4 Legendary Pokemon Giratina, which will appear in Raid Battles until November 20. You’ll also be able to encounter another Gen 4 Ghost Pokemon, Spiritomb, by completing a new Special Research questline.

Meanwhile, Pokemon: Let’s Go Pikachu and Eevee launch for Nintendo Switch on November 16. As previously mentioned, players can transfer monster from Go to Let’s Go, and doing so is the key to getting the new Mythical Pokemon Meltan, which we recently learned is able to evolve into a Pokemon called Melmetal. You can read more about the games in our hands-on impressions of Let’s Go Pikachu and Eevee.

Pokemon Go Gengar Day Hours

Americas, Greenland

• Pacific Time: 11 AM – 2 PM
• Eastern Time: 2 PM – 5 PM

Asia-Pacific

• 12 PM – 3 PM JST

Europe, Middle East, Africa

• 9 AM – 12 PM UTC

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The latest Super Smash Bros. Ultimate presentation was chock full of new announcements, including word of a special dedicated service coming next year. Dubbed “Smash World,” the free service will let you post and watch videos of your glory moments.

Game director Masahiro Sakurai teased that the service will boast other unnamed features as well, and that it will be given regular updates throughout its lifespan. The brief glimpse at the UI shown during the presentation had a large array of video captures appearing on a mobile device.

Smash World isn’t the only extra coming to Smash Bros. in 2019. The presentation also revealed plans for DLC characters, stages, and music to come throughout the year. There will be five packs in all–each of which grants one character, one stage, and some music tracks–for $6 apiece. Nintendo is also offering a Fighter Pass for $25. In addition to those five characters, Piranha Plant is being added as a playable character, and he’ll(?) be free for anyone who registers their copy of the game by January 31, 2019.

As for launch day content, the presentation revealed a few more goodies in store on that front as well. Two more fighters joined the roster–Ken and Incineroar–and we finally got a closer look at both the Adventure Mode and the new Spirits Mode, along with how online matchmaking works.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate launches December 7. Check out our pre-order guide for more details.

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