Titan Comics is getting ready to launch the new Horizon Zero Dawn: Liberation comic series this month. A new trailer for the first issue was recently released and fans of the series are sure to get excited. The series takes place during the original game and expands on the world. The comic is written by Ben McCaw and Anne Toole with art by Elmer Damaso.
Taking place during the events of the original game, this new arc explores the never-before-told adventures of Aloy and her fan-favourite sidekick Erend as they hunt for a killer with links to his past…
Horizon Zero Dawn: Liberation #1 will be available on July 28 with covers by Peach Momoko, Harvey Tolibao, Ann Maulina, and Adrian Wilkins with a concept art wraparound cover also available. You can pre-order your copy of the comic now from your local comic shop, comiXology (affiliate link), and Forbidden Planet.
Both Ufotable, the studio behind the anime series Demon Slayer, and the company’s founder, representative director, and president Hikaru Kondo have been indicted for tax evasion.
The animation studio acknowledged the indictment made by the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office. It also states that the company has filed an amended tax return and paid the full amount. It also apologizes for any inconvenience it may have caused to any related parties. Ufotable allegedly owed 137 million yen in taxes.
According to the Kyodo news service (via Anime News Network), ufotable owes 109 million yen in corporate tax from 2015 to 2018, and 28 million yen in consumption tax from September 2014 to August 2018. Kondo reportedly hid money earned from ufotable anime-themed restaurants and stored them at home last year.
The ufotable animation studio was founded by Kondo back in 2000. It’s best known for its anime adaptation of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, and its successful first film Demon Slayer The Movie: Mugen Train. It has also produced other anime adaptations including Fate/Zero, The Garden of Sinners, and Katsugeki: Touken Ranbu.
Both the Demon Slayer anime series and film are available to stream on Funimation now in Japanese subbed and English dubbed.
If you just can’t get enough of Tanjiro Kamado and his quest to save his sister, the video game Demon Slayer: The Hinokami Chronicles lets you play through the story so far. The CyberConnect2 developed 3D fighting game will launch on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC on October 13, 2021.
A voting poll, released by The Dallas Morning News and the University of Texas, has found that 39 percent of registered voters in Texas support Abbott, while 38 percent favor McConaughey in a hypothetical election match-up.
SEGA is releasing Sonic Colors: Ultimate this year, and they recently released a new trailer showing off all of the updates that fans can expect to see. The game will feature 60 frames-per-second gameplay, re-vamped lighting, improved graphics with support for up to 4K resolutions, and much more. There’s even a new Rival Rush game mode and ways to customize Sonic. Fans enjoyed Sonic Colors when it launched on the Wii back in 2010, and now, more fans will be able to enjoy the revamped version of the game on September 7 on the Nintendo Switch, PS4, and Xbox One with digital and physical releases or a digital-only release on PC via Epic Games Store. Here’s a quick look at the highlights from the new trailer for Sonic Colors: Ultimate:
HD Updates – New high-definition updates and improvements, including 60 FPS, re-vamped lighting, improved graphics and 4K resolution
New Mode “Rival Rush” – Go head-to-head with Metal Sonic to unlock rewards
Park Tokens & Customization – Head to the store and use park tokens to unlock unique boosts, auras, shoes and gloves for Sonic
Jade Ghost – Transform Sonic, fly around and pass through solid objects to reach hidden areas
Customizable Controls – Customize your controls to find a layout that suits your play style
Tails Save – Find a tails save and be taken back to safety if you need to be rescued
100 Count Ring – Collect a 100 Count Ring to gain temporary invincibility and boost your score after each level
Music – Fully remixed soundtrack to set the pace while you put an end to Dr. Eggman’s evil plan
Now available digitally and on demand, sci-fi thriller Let Us In stars Makenzie Moss, Sadie Stanley, Mackenzie Ziegler Siena Agudong, O’Neill Monahan, and Tobin Bell. The film was directed by Craig Moss, who co-wrote the film alongside Joe Callero.
“A spirited twelve-year-old girl and her best friend start investigating the sudden disappearances of several missing teens in their small town,” says the synopsis. “Realizing there might be something deeper happening, Emily and Christopher might be up against forces they can’t even imagine.”
ComingSoon’s Alyse Wax spoke with Let Us In star Tobin Bell about the film being a gateway into horror, working with young performers, and his belief in urban legends.
Alyse Wax: I liked Let Us In. We’ll keep the very end a secret, but it was fun.
Tobin Bell: I thought it was fun too. I really did. I love that it is sort of a gateway film. A film that is a good film to introduce beyond potential horror fans. It’s not too extreme like Hostel or something like that. It’s more in this tradition of scary films over the years until we reach the 90s or the early 2000s when we made the jump into a whole new approach. This one, I think it’s really cool. I would watch it if I was 13, 15, or 17. It’s got a nice quality to it, but still enough scared, right?
Can you tell us about your character?
Mr. Munch is an interesting guy. The guy that I play, he’s living in this house and doesn’t have what you’d call a particularly welcoming reputation in the neighborhood. But when I saw the scene with the kids when they come to my house, there was something about it that I felt drawn in by him in some way.
Did you enjoy working with the kids?
Oh yeah. Kids are energetic and they’re bright lights. They’re incredibly spontaneous and they were fun. It’s always an unknown. You never know how much training they have. You never know how they’re going to connect with you at all. In this case, they were both so easy to work with. [Director] Craig [Moss] works with kids really well. So, if they were having trouble deciding when do I sit or when do I get up, he would just ease them through that and make it really simple for them and really clear. It was fun to watch that. Craig didn’t say a whole hell of a lot to me because the kids were moving in the scene and sometimes movement can be problematic with kids because sometimes they don’t repeat and you need to repeat because the cameraman thinks they’re going to do one thing and then all of a sudden you do something else and they don’t get the shot. You got to do it again. So that’s part of it, they’re learning, and I was very pleased with their abilities.
There was a point in time toward the end of the scene when Makenzie [Moss] who plays Emily, she had to leave. It was a school [function] or something, so I did the end of the very end of the scene with, I forget who it was, like the first AD or something. They shot her side and then came around and shot mine. So at that point in time, I was maybe talking to a guy with the beard that wasn’t Emily.
But that happens, I’ve had that happen to me. A number of times I was doing Stargate SG-1 up in Vancouver, and I did an entire scene with the assistant director because the actor who was the lead in Stargate got sick, so they shot his side and then he went home. So you’re doing it with somebody who is reading the lines out of a book. Acting is a challenge all the time. You just kind of, you just roll with it and do your best and hope that magic is on your side.
Speaking of magic, do you believe in the urban legend of the black-eyed children?
I don’t know. I had never heard of it before I did this. Before I did this film, I’d never heard of it, but since I’ve been told that it is the legend. A friend in New Jersey told me about how he grew up with [the legend]. I was raised in Massachusetts, so intrusive legends have to do Salem. There’s a few others as well, but I don’t think black-eyed kids was one of them when I was growing up.
Are you prone to believing in urban legends like that?
If it’s dark enough and I’m alone enough, you know what I mean? You hear sounds or something and then the legends take on a new credibility. The imagination is alive and well in that kind of situation. The whole thing about what’s in the closet or what’s down in the basement. Well, you don’t worry about that stuff until a few things add up at the same time. All the lights go, you lose power in the house. Stairs creaked as you go, and then it starts to gang up on you.
Since Saw you’ve mostly done horror films. Is that something that you enjoy or do you just enjoy that you keep working?
I like to work, but I also like the scenes. I like that each scene has its own challenge. I got a phone call last year before this whole pandemic thing. There was a 10-minute scene in the living room with five teenagers. It was such a difficult scene. I thought I could do it and do it well, but I wasn’t sure. I love the challenge. Every different scene has different dialogue. That particular scene, for me, it was all about the physical logic of the scenes. Like where is he standing now? Cause he was moving the entire time. All the kids were sitting in chairs and he was moving away. Who’s he talking to now? And what is he talking to them? So, yeah, when people call you up and ask you to be in their movie if you can say yes, you do if you like the material and you have a time window to be able to do it right.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever star Angela Bassett reveals that the MCU sequel has had several rewrites as cast and crew work hard to honour Chadwick Boseman.
Mario Golf: Super Rush launched on the Nintendo Switch a couple of weeks ago, and fans have been enjoying it. The game sees favorite characters from the world of Super Mario and lets them relax by playing some golf. Nintendo was kind enough to provide me with a copy to review and my thoughts are below.
Let’s talk about the single-player experience first. The first thing that you’ll probably want to do when loading up Mario Golf: Super Rush is start off the Golf Adventure mode. This is a small campaign where your Mii starts out as a Rookie golfer and you’ll play through the various kinds of golf modes available and rise through the ranks. As you level up, you’ll be able to increase stats to fit your play style and improve your drive distance, control, spin, speed for running on the course in certain modes, and more. It’s not super exciting, but it is very helpful and is essentially a more fun tutorial. It works well overall, but don’t look for a fantastic story.
The main draw of Mario Golf: Super Rush though, is playing with friends and family. You can choose to just go and play one of the core game modes. There’s Standard Golf that plays like you would expect. You hit the ball, it flies through the air, lands, and then you’re magically teleported to the ball and keep shooting. You can also play Speed Golf which features a lot of the similar gameplay, but instead of teleporting to your ball, you have to run to your ball. In both of these versions, you gain energy to access your character’s Super Shot like any good Mario sports game. You can also adjust a ball’s curve and spin to give you good control over where the ball lands and how it rolls. There are also obstacles on the course to make things more challenging, although these vary depending on which course you choose to play.
Other things to note that I greatly appreciate are that you can choose to play three, six, nine, or 18 holes and you can change where you start to provide more variety as you play. You can also play with as little as one controller and pass it around or have a controller for each player (up to four). You can even play where everyone takes turns simultaneously, although this limits the number of human players to two.
I personally prefer the Standard Golf mode. Speed Golf often left me frustrated on the later courses. My ball would end up right next to a vertical rise that would be impossible for me to hit up in a hit meaning I had to spend at least one additional stroke just to get up it, and then I had to struggle with getting my character to climb up there after it. Even worse was the Crosscountry (XC) Golf mode in the Mii Adventure section of the game which was like Speed Golf, but you also had to complete the course in a set number of strokes. Yes, there’s more strategy as you have to plan out the order in which you go for the holes (there will be multiple holes for you to complete per round), but it was very frustrating to play.
The final main game mode is Battle Golf. This mode features nine holes that you and up to three others play for at the same time. It doesn’t matter the number of strokes, just who gets their ball in first. You’ll want to strategically aim for holes to get ahead of the competition and use items like Bob-ombs to make your opponents struggle. There can even be special events turned on that trigger every now and then and really cause problems for everyone. I found this mode to be best with all human players personally.
The game can be a lot of fun, but there are some areas that I would adjust. For instance, when playing simultaneously, there were several times where I wouldn’t get to see where my ball went towards the end as it would cut away to another player’s ball and then even after all humans sunk the ball, you would have to wait around and watch the CPUs finish as well. Also, during Battle Golf, after you sink a shot, you’ll do a little dance which is fun, but in that game mode you want to be able to keep going and try to get more holes to score higher. I’m sure this is done on purpose to help other players have a bit of help and help prevent quick snowballing, but it felt more frustrating, especially when you’re not ahead in the game. Other areas that I would like to see improvement include giving Donkey Kong a golf outfit (everyone else has one, why not him?) and I would’ve liked more variety in the Special Shots. Too many feel the same and it’s also annoying how some Super Shots are designed for Speed Golf and simultaneous play while others are a bit more versatile.
As a quick note, I did try the motion controls for the game. It plays a lot like Wii Golf back in the day. If you enjoy that, you’ll enjoy this. It’s not the worst feeling, but it is a lot harder than using the buttons. Plus, I didn’t see any way to access a Super Shot while using motion controls.
Mario Golf: Super Rush overall is a lot of fun, especially as a party sports game; the way that Mario sports games are really meant to be played. Yes, there are areas where the game can be improved, but if you’re just looking for a fun activity to play with friends and family, this game is great. Heck, even my preschool age kid loves playing the game. I’m interested to see what additional content Nintendo has in store. I would especially love to see Samus join the game and shot the ball out of her arm cannon for her Super Shot. Could be a great thing to include when closer to the release of Metroid Dread.
Previously slated for a 2021 release, the upcoming anime series Spriggan is now set for a 2022 release. A teaser trailer and new images have been revealed.
The trailer gives a good look at what to expect from the action-packed anime including a glimpse of Spriggan protagonist Yu Ominae. Several stills, as well as a key visual, have also been revealed, which puts the protagonist front and center. You can check out all the new images in the gallery below.
Not sure what Spriggan is all about? Here is a brief description of what you can expect to see from the upcoming Netflix anime series:
“A great civilization once existed on this Earth. Possessing knowledge and scientific prowess far exceeding that of modern man, the relics of this ancient civilization remain hidden across this world even now. As high-speed communications networks cover the globe and the peering eyes of satellites are able to expose all secrets, the armies of great nations clash as they seek to uncover and research these artifacts, which possess an unfathomable “power.” A member of this ancient civilization carved a message into a plate: “Protect our legacy from evildoers.” Taking this message to heart, one organization aims to seal away this ancient civilization for good. The elite secret agents of this organization are known as… Spriggans.”
Spriggan was originally a manga written by Hiroshi Takashige and illustrated by Ryoji Minagawa. It was published in Weekly Shonen Sunday from 1989 to 1996. The manga series has sold over ten million copies. An anime film based on the manga released back in 1998. The Netflix Original anime will be streaming on the streamer when it inevitably arrives in 2022.
