Helldivers 2's long-awaited Illuminate faction finally shows up on the map before quickly disappearing, or did they?

It’s sounding like more live-action anime projects are likely on the way, as Crunchyroll and Sony are interested in developing some.The superhero well isn’t exactly dry, as there’s a whole ocean of IP to adapt from, but for Marvel, apart from its big success with Deadpool & Wolverine, the MCU has been waning in popularity since the release of Avengers: Endgame. That could be part of a broader superhero fatigue, James Gunn’s new DCU will be the real test of that, but Hollywood quickly moved on to video game adaptations, with movies like the Sonic the Hedgehog pair of films and the Super Mario Bros. Movie all doing very well, and shows like The Last of Us and Fallout proving very popular. But there’s another IP mine that Hollywood is clearly interested in tapping: anime.To see this conte…

A third Dune film is in the works, but if you ask Denis Villeneuve, his take on the sci-fi classic is “not like a trilogy.”At the moment, Dune director Denis Villeneuve is currently in the process of writing a third film, which will be based on the second book in the series Messiah. But despite being a third film, the director isn’t viewing them as a trilogy. Villeneuve recently made an appearance on Vanity Fair’s Little Gold Men podcast, where he spoke about the Dune films, and his plans for the series going forward. “First, it’s important that people understand that for me, it was really a diptych,” Villeneuve said of his two Dune movies.To see this content please enable targeting cookies.Manage cookie settings “It was really a pair of movies that will be the adaptation of the firs…

Matt Reeves felt that The Penguin’s real name, Oswald Cobblepot, was just a bit too silly, so he asked DC if he could change it.The Penguin’s civilian name has been the very extra Oswald Cobblepot for a good number of decades now, but in something as serious as 2022’s The Batman, a name like that might seem a little out of place (though we can of course suspend our sense of disbelief at a man dressed up in bat-themed military gear). So, the character’s name was changed to Oswald Cobb, or Oz Cobb, which definitely doesn’t sound silly at all, and in a recent interview with SFX Magazine (via ComicBookMovie.com), producer Dylan Clark offered a bit of context as to why that decision was made.To see this content please enable targeting cookies.Manage cookie settings “They never got around to cha…

PC gaming appears to continue to be as popular as ever, as Steam just hit a new concurrent user count record.I feel like every time I like away from Steam for five minutes, it’s setting a new record for the amount of players it has online at once. Valve started the year off by breaking its concurrent user count record (more than once) when more than 33 million users were online at once. In March that went up all the way to 36 million, then again to 37 million in August, and now, just under an hour ago at the time of writing, Steam managed to hit a concurrent user count record of 38,367,277, a very strong number for the video game distribution platform (via SteamDB). It should be noted that doesn’t mean over 38 million people were playing games at the same time, it’s just how many people we…

After a fantastic box office run as Marvel Studios’ first-ever R-rated movie, Deadpool & Wolverine isn’t saying “bye bye” just yet. Instead Marvel and Disney aim to position it as a big player in the upcoming awards season.While a bit funny, it doesn’t really come as a surprise, as Disney and Marvel have a tradition of pushing hard to sell their biggest blockbusters as cinematic achievements following Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther having a groundbreaking Oscars presence back in the day. It’s happened before and will happen again.To see this content please enable targeting cookies.Manage cookie settings Via Variety, who had the exclusive, we’ve learned that Shawn Levy’s movie “will be submitted for consideration at the Golden Globes in the comedy categories, with Reynolds’ performa…

The Electric State, the next film from Joe and Anthony Russo about an alternate history where Disneyland animatronics gained sentience and revolted, has received a first look.Here’s a pitch for you: imagine a world where once Disney had made animatronics for Disneyland, they became intelligent robots that rebelled against those that made them, with humans and bots fighting each other leading to the remaining, defeated robots banished to an “exclusion zone” in the southwestern desert. It’s certainly a big idea (based on Simon Stålenhag’s graphic novel of the same name), and one that’s received a first look over at Vanity Fair, where the Russo’s and some of the cast spoke with the outlet about the upcoming Netflix film. First look at The Russo Brothers’ ‘THE ELECTRIC STATE…

Matt Reeves’ Batman universe is far from a silly one, but apparently one source of inspiration for The Penguin’s look is on the sillier side.Colin Farrell, if you didn’t know, doesn’t typically look how he does in The Penguin. No, it’s done by this thing called special effects make-up, as impossible as it might be to believe, obviously transforming the actor in such a way where you probably wouldn’t know it’s him unless you were told. Obviously his design has a bit of a mafia vibe about it, but as it turns out, that wasn’t necessarily the first port of call when it came to hunting for sources of inspiration for his look. In a recent interview with DiscussingFilm, The Penguin make-up designer Michael Marino shared that Bob Hoskins in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, of all things, is where some of …

Things have just gone from bad to worse for Joker: Folie a Deux, as Warner Bros. has apparently already lined up its digital release.When the first Joker came out way back in 2019, it surprised pretty much everyone by making a whole billion dollars and change at the box office. What was not a surprise was Warner Bros. deciding to greenlight a sequel, a sequel, I might add, that had a budget of $200 million to produce and $100 million to market and distribute. And how did it do in its opening weekend? So badly it made even less than Morbius, of all films. To see this content please enable targeting cookies.Manage cookie settings The film just had its second weekend, which saw it take home $7 million domestically, a massive 81% drop from its first weekend, the worst second-weekend decline fo…

VariousThere are so many ways to be a Dungeons & Dragons fan these days. The tabletop RPG mainstay has been synonymous with pen-and-paper adventuring for 50 years now, and 2024 marks a major reworking of its core rulebooks to make the game more approachable. Anyone who’s played even just a couple of sessions knows how easy it can be to covet a friend’s set of custom dice, appreciate the care a Dungeon Master has taken in setting the right ambience for a crafted campaign, or even obsess over their choice of pen and notebook — after all, it’s what you’ll be spending a large chunk of time staring into as you ponder your character’s next heroic action.But what’s amazing is that you can be a huge D&D fan without ever touching a character sheet. D&D and the Forgotten R…

Traveller’s TalesAlice Jovanée (she/her) is a commerce writer, and she has been writing about gaming and tech since 2005. Prior to Polygon, she worked at publications such as The Verge.Regardless of how you feel about the current season of Rings of Power, if you’re looking for another way to satiate your Tolkien love you’ll definitely want to check out the current catalog of free games available to Amazon Prime members. Earlier this month, both Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor GOTY Edition, and Lego The Lord of the Rings were made available to Amazon Prime members for free through Sept. 30. However, you can now also pick up Lego The Hobbit for free through Oct. 23. Just head to the corresponding Prime Gaming page and you’ll be presented with a code that you can redeem on GOG.com fo…