“Why are you helping me?” IFC Films has debuted the trailer for the indie drama The Free World, which premiered at Sundance this year, about a man fresh out of prison for crimes he didn’t commit. He meets a woman with an abusive husband, and decides to risk his own life to be with her. Starring Elisabeth Moss as Doris, and Boyd Holbrook as Mo Lundy. The cast includes Octavia Spencer, Sung Kang, Sue-Lynn Ansari and Waleed Zuaiter. It seems like a solid drama, but I don’t remember hearing much buzz about it during Sundance. As always, Moss looks to be giving a great performance and it might be worth it for her. ›››
“He wants us to help his family escape… We have to help him.” Survival Pictures has unveiled a trailer for an indie drama called The Promise, set during the last days of the Ottoman Empire. The film follows a love triangle between Michael, a brilliant medical student, the beautiful and sophisticated Ana, and Chris – a renowned American journalist based in Paris. Starring Oscar Isaac as Michael, with Christian Bale as Chris, and Charlotte Le Bon as Ana. Also featuring Angela Sarafyan, Shohreh Aghdashloo, James Cromwell, Jean Reno, Rade Serbedzija & Michael Stahl-David. This seems like a big, bold attempt to tell the story of the Armenian genocide featuring with an impressive cast, which actually makes this worth watching. This also doesn’t look so much like an indie, rather a very large production. I’m curious to see it. ›››
Suspect her. Believe her. See the other side. Netflix has released a trailer for their upcoming documentary titled Amanda Knox, telling the full and uncensored story of Amanda Knox, the woman who was accused of killing her roommate in Italy in 2007. The documentary focuses on Amanda Knox specifically, featuring extensive interviews with her as well as her former co-defendant and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, Italian prosecutor Giuliano Mignini and Daily Mail reporter Nick Pisa. Which side of the story do you believe? See both sides below. I think I’m most impressed that Netflix is releasing this so soon after it premieres at the Toronto Film Festival, which is great because as soon as people start seeing this and we start hearing more about it, it’ll be available for anyone to watch. These two new trailers are also very compelling side-by-side. ›››
“Creativity has no place in this school.” CBS Films has debuted a second full-length trailer for the film Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life, an adaptation of the bestselling book series of the same name. Young actor Griffin Gluck stars as Rafe Katchadorian, a boy with a “wild imagination” bored of middle school who decides to break every rule and see what happens, bringing his friends with him. The full cast includes Lauren Graham, Rob Riggle, Thomas Barbusca, Andy Daly, Adam Pally, and Efren Ramirez. This actually looks really fun, especially disregarding the rules and messing with expectations. I’m sure if I were younger I’d enjoy it even more, but still, it looks pretty good. “Rules aren’t for everyone!”›››
Streaming giant Hulu has order a full series of a new video game comedy show from Superbad and Sausage Party writer’s Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg.
The program, which was first discussed in February this year, will star Hunger Games lead Josh Hutcherson. The show’s key are has also been released, showing Hutcherson’s futuristic role.
There will be 13 30-minute episodes for Future Man, which will debut in 2017 (via The Hollywood Reporter).
Hutcherson plays a “socially inept” gamer named Josh Futterman, who is a “janitor by day, world-ranked gamer by night.” He must stop the extinction of humankind “after mysterious visitors from the future declare him to be the key to defeating the imminent super-race invasion.”
The show is written by Sausage Party and The Night Before‘s Ariel Shaffier and Kyle Hunter. It’s the first half-hour TV comedy from Rogen and Goldberg. They directed the pilot of Future Man.
I can’t believe @hulu is letting us make this show @Sethrogen@evandgoldberg! Seems like a bad idea! Ha. Seriously can’t wait!
Each week we search and gather up the coolest comic book art you won’t see in actual comics. The reason you won’t is because professional artists often draw sketches for fun or commissions and post them on their websites, blogs, and Tumblrs. Some artists even arrange commissions through their sites so be sure to check them out. This is a way to see the artists working on one book draw characters from other comics or publishers.
Chrissie Zullo posted some new art on her Facebook page including some Stranger Things and more Overwatch art.
Franco also posted a sketch of Eleven plus some other art on his Instagram.
Yildiray Cinar posted new sketches on his Instagram.
Andrew Robinson posted some commissions from Fan Expo Canada on his Instagram.
2K revealed the PC system requirements for BioShock: The Collection on Steam today–you can see them in full at the bottom of the article. Additionally, the publisher detailed upgrade instructions for players who bought the Games for Windows Live versions of the first two games.
If you own BioShock and/or BioShock 2 on Steam, then you’ll receive the remastered versions upon their release. However, things get a little more complicated for those with Games for Windows Live copies. For the original BioShock, you’ll need to submit a ticket to 2K Support with a scan of the original receipt, a confirmation email, or some other way to prove your purchase.
Getting the remastered version of BioShock 2, on the other hand, is much simpler: just enter your Games for Windows Live key into Steam, and the game will be added to your library.
If you want to play the original version of either game, then there’s good news. Both the remastered and original will be in your library; the single Steam listing for each game also includes both versions. BioShock Infinite is not included in the remasters on PC “because it already meets current-gen console standards and runs smoothly on high visual settings.”
BioShock: The Collection releases for PS4 and Xbox One on September 13, while the Steam versions will go live on September 15 at 3 PM PT.
Persona 5 may be months away from launch in the West, but it’s just days away in Japan. As such, Japanese PlayStation Store listings are now live for the PS4 and PS3 versions with screenshots of each, giving us a good look at how the two compare.
Until now, we’d only seen the PS4 version; game companies typically show off the best-looking versions of their games until late in the pre-release cycle. That can result in disappointment for those playing on older hardware, but it may not be the case here.
At least based on the three screenshots from each version we have, Persona 5 looks good even on the 10-year-old PS3. Take a look at the comparison shots above and below to see the differences; the PS4 version is on the left in each. You can see the PlayStation Store listings (via DualShockers) for PS4 and PS3 here and here.
Video and hands-on impressions of the PS3 version may reveal the gap is larger than the screenshots suggest–the frame rate and load times could be worse, visual effects may be reduced, or–gasp—those beautiful menus might not be quite so slick. But based on what we can see here, playing the PS3 version of Persona 5 may not be as unfortunate as some perhaps expected.
Persona 5 launches in Japan on September 15. It’s due out in North America and Europe on February 14.
Among the new features in Destiny‘s upcoming Rise of Iron expansion is an item-customization option called Ornaments. Despite sounding like something that hangs off of your weapon or armor, Ornaments are essentially new skins for items, and now Bungie is showing off what they look like on a selection of weapons.
The company began sharing images on Instagram today of the different looks that Ornaments make possible for some of Destiny’s new and existing Exotic weapons. Those posted so far include Telesto, Monte Carlo, Trespasser, Invective, and Khvostov, which is the starter weapon from the very beginning of Destiny that’s been turned into an Exotic for Rise of Iron.
We’ll continue to update this post as more images are shared. It sounds as if we’ll only be seeing Ornaments applied to weapons today, based on a tweet from the official Destiny account.
Some significant changes are coming to Hearthstone‘s Arena mode, beginning with the removal of several dozen cards.
In a blog post that deems Arena “a fun environment that could use some overall balance tuning,” game designer Dean Ayala explained what Blizzard sees as its problems and how it intends to begin resolving them.
“One goal we have for Arena is that we want it to feel meaningfully different from any other way you might play Hearthstone,” he said. “I think we’re hitting that goal now, but it’s important for us to keep that in mind when thinking about future changes. Variety among all game modes is important to us, but an equally important goal is to have a wide range of experiences within each game mode. This is an area where we feel Arena has some room for improvement.”
When starting out an Arena run, Blizzard doesn’t want you to pick your class based on what’s considered to be the most powerful one. Ayala admits Mage and Rogue have been among the most powerful, followed by Paladin, and then everything else in some order.
“So what are some ways we can address Arena balance?” Ayala continued. “Tools that we have available immediately involve removing cards from Arena completely–C’Thun-synergy cards and Purify are examples of this. We’d like to avoid removing strong spells and weapons from the Arena, because they add to a lot of the unpredictability and excitement surrounding the possibilities outside the current board state.
“We’d also like to avoid removing iconic cards, since they are generally versatile and familiar tools to veteran and new Arena players alike. Additionally, we can remove lower-performing cards in order to make room for a class’s more commonly utilized cards to show up more often in your Arena draft.”
This is the thought process Blizzard is bringing to the game with an upcoming patch, which will remove cards belonging to eight of the game’s nine classes (Paladin being the exception). You can find those at the bottom of this post; they include Priest’s Mind Blast, Hunter’s Starving Buzzard, and Mage’s Forgotten Torch.
Blizzard has further plans to continue improving Arena, but it doesn’t sound like those are coming just yet.
“We’re looking to develop additional solutions to balance Arena as well, such as the ability to adjust the rate that individual cards show up in your draft depending on a designer input value,” Ayala said. “If we pursue that route, there is still the matter of deciding on the best way to go about using that tool to achieve balance for each of the nine classes and still have Arena feel fun and different each run.
“Drafting by card rarity is another discussion that we’ve been hearing a lot. If it’s a matter of balance, we’re fairly confident the ability to adjust the ‘weights’ of cards available can solve that.”
Ayala said Blizzard will keep an eye on the changes it’s making in this update and wants fans to share their feedback with the company.
