‘Chaos Walking’ actress Daisy Ridley has become a household name after her appearances in the Disney LucasFilm Star Wars sequel trilogy. Since then, she has appeared in several films, television, but has also done voice acting for a variety of video games including the upcoming independent game ’12 Minutes’ from Annapurna Interactive. She voices the wife of the main character, being joined by ‘X-Men: First Class’ actor James McAvoy as the main character with ‘Spider-Man’ actor Willem Dafoe as the main villain.
’12 Minutes’ developer Luis Antonio described the game as being similar to the film ‘Groundhog Day,’ where you play a husband who is caught in a loop trying to save his wife from an intruder. Every time you die, you can use the knowledge from the previous round to find new ways to stop the stranger from harming the protagonists.
In an interview with SyFy Wire, Antonio discussed the game as well as what it was like working with British actors Ridley and McAvoy, whom he forced to don American accents.
“Sometimes we’re doing scenes and they would question the motivations because I thought more about the gameplay elements,” Antonio admits. “But James would be like, ‘Why would I be doing this? It’s true for me to be doing this because I want the player to know this, but the character doesn’t think this way.’ So, we would deconstruct, realize the motivations and then bring them back in and it would naturally enrich the character. They would become more realistic and you’d care more about them.”
He goes on to explain that this was the first time that Ridley used an American accent, but that she grew, along with McAvoy, to get emotionally engaged with the characters they were voicing.
“Like if James’ character is stressed out, it has to come through in the shaking of his voice,” he explained. “Or if the wife is smiling, there’s no facial expression, so you have to feel the smile through the way she opens her mouth. There was workshopping to figure out how to really convey this, and then we wrote extensively the story of all the characters for when we were in the recording sessions.”
Antonio added that he hopes that ’12 Minutes’ will attract new gamers or people who have never gamed before, as it provided around five to six hours of gameplay.
Here is a sneak peak for ’12 Minutes:’
Game Dev Opens Up About Working On ’12 Minutes’ With Daisy Ridley and James McAvoy
Zombies Ate My Neighbors and Ghoul Patrol Coming To Nintendo Switch!
Friday night. Blockbuster. ‘Zombies At My Neighbors’ and a giant box of Whoppers. That is a childhood memory of mine. My buddy Eric and I would always rent that LucasArts game. It was 1993, and we both finally got Super Nintendo systems after years of begging our parents.
We spent hours playing and failing at the game. There was also a lot of shouting because one of us would go off in the wrong direction. This would lead to a lot of frustration and thrown Whoppers.
Now ‘ZAMN’ and its sequel ‘Ghoul Patrol’ are on their way to Nintendo’s Switch! What a time to be alive!
These games are being released under the ‘Lucasfilm Classic Games’ banner. Odd that they’re not using the classic LucasArts logo instead. Could this mean we’ll be seeing more LucasArts console games coming to the Switch?
‘ZAMN’ was a run-n-gun game focusing on horror and sci-fi movies of the past 50 years. You could choose between Zeke and Julie in either single or two-player modes. The object was to run around the maze-like map and rescue your neighbors before they were devoured or killed by aliens, zombies, werewolves, mummies, etc. It was fun, challenging, and had some great art as far as the character designs went.
‘Ghoul Patrol’ was a sequel, kinda. It did have the same main characters, but the game didn’t start out being related to ‘ZAMN’ at all. It shows if you’ve ever played the game. It’s still fun, but ‘Ghoul Patrol’ just can’t match the original.
Nintendo Everything covered the story and posted the trailer.
The cult classic Zombies Ate My Neighbors and its sequel make their long awaited return in Lucasfilm Classic Games: Zombies Ate My Neighbors and Ghoul Patrol! Play these classics from the golden age of 16-bit gaming with new enhancements and never before seen museum features.
Zombies Ate My Neighbors
Hey, where’s that scary music coming from? Yikes! It’s Zombies Ate My Neighbors, where you appear in every demented horror flick ever to make you hurl ju-jubes.
What are Zeke and Julie, our two wholesome teenage stars doing in a 16-bit game like this?! Trying to save the nice neighbors, cheerleaders and babies from a fate worse than polyester!
Who could put this SLICE of suburbia in such a goose-pimply hysteria? Zombies, relentless Chainsaw Maniacs, Mummies, Evil Dolls that just won’t die, Lizard Men, Blobs, Vampires, Giant Ants, Martians and more.
Will these crazy kids survive the night? Find your way through 55 horror-filled levels like a grocery store gone bad, a shopping mall awry, a mysterious island and your own back yard. Don’t miss “Weird Kids on the Block”, “Mars Needs Cheerleaders” and “Dances With Werewolves”.
You can fend off the freaks with a virtual candy counter of weapons like uzi squirt guns, exploding soda pop, bazookas, weed wackers and ancient artifacts. Also grab power ups-o-rama like secret potions and bobo clown decoys. Does this game ever end?!
Ghoul Patrol
Zeke and Julie, our intrepid teenagers, visit the Ghosts and Ghouls exhibit at the city library, where they find an old treasure chest containing an ancient spirit book. Naturally, they cannot resist reading it. Suddenly, a horrific snaggle-toothed spirit emerges.
Now, this snarling phantom and his dastardly minions are infesting Metropolis and slithering their way into the history books, where they plan to rewrite history with their spooky ways. Only you have the power to go back in time to de-spook and encyclopedia and zombified historic dudes.
Terminate, with prejudice, using crossbows, ping-pong ball machine guns, Martian “Heatseeker” guns, and more.
Vaporize garbage can ghosts and ninja spirits, rescue bug-eyed librarians and wigged-out pirates, dodge flying books and adolescent-eating plants!
Only our two heroes have the power to get the mighty beastly spirit back into his book and stop the madness. Ghoul Patrol to the rescue!
Key Features
- – Save Feature: Quickly save your progress in either game and continue your adventure wherever and whenever you want
– Museum Features: Watch a video interview with one of the original Zombies’ developers or explore numerous galleries containing game art, previously unreleased concept images and marketing assets
– Soundtrack: Listen to the entire soundtrack for both games in the included music players
– 2 Player Mode: Play the game with two player local co-op
– Achievements: Track your game progress with a set of achievements covering both games
Sadly there’s no online two-player co-op. This would have probably taken more work than it was worth, though. There is a quicksave feature but no rewind. That feature would be quite useful in ZAMN. Sometimes it’s easy to get turned around in the mazes, and one of your neighbors meets an untimely death.
Oh, well. At least it’s an official release and comes with extras like the soundtrack and an interview with game designer Mike Ebert.
What are your memories of playing either of these two games? Let us know in the comments.
Alan Moore Announces Fantasy Novel Series
‘Batman: The Killing Joke’ author Alan Moore announced that he is writing a five-volume fantasy epic series ‘Long London’ along with ‘Illuminations,’ a collection of short stories.
The UK publishing house Bloomsbury, responsible for the ‘Harry Potter’ series, has signed a six-figure deal with the ‘V For Vendetta’ writer for his “groundbreaking” series and “momentous” collection.
“I’m bursting with fiction, bursting with prose,” Moore told the Guardian. “I couldn’t be happier with the new home that I’ve found at Bloomsbury: a near-legendary independent publisher with a spectacular list and a fierce commitment to expanding the empire of the word.”
He added, “I have a feeling this will be a very productive partnership.”
Bloomsbury editor-in-chief Paul Baggaley expressed his enthusiasm for working with the ‘Swamp Thing’ writer.
“Alan Moore is simply a legend and it has been such a pleasure to listen to him talk about his ambitious Long London series as well as discovering the range of his shorter fiction,” he said. “These projects have set Bloomsbury alight.”
Moore retired from comic books recently after working on such projects as ‘From Hell,’ ‘Watchmen,’ and ‘The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.’
According to its synopsis, “Long London is a series about “a sometimes-accessible shadow city that is beyond time.” This is a hugely inventive, atmospheric, mythical world of murder, magic and madness. It is a quintet of novels that sweeps across the 20th century, starting in the shell-shocked and unravelled London of 1949, and following the populations of writers, criminals, artists, and magicians through that familiar city and a version of London just beyond our knowledge.”
Likewise, ‘Illuminations’ is “an astonishing, rich and broad collection of short stories, each featuring some kind of illumination or realization. From ghosts and otherworldly creatures to the four horsemen of the apocalypse to the Boltzmann brains fashioning the universe at the big bang, Alan Moore’s Illuminations is a series of beguiling and elegantly crafted tales that reveal the full power of imagination and magic.”
Build-A-Bear Makes Confusing New Outfit Announcement For Animal Crossing Plush Releasing on May 11th
Build-A- Bear has announced that they will be releasing new outfits for their Animal Crossing Tom Nook and Isabelle plush. The new outfits will launch on May 11th at 10AM CST/ or 11 AM EST.
However, they way it reads, implies you only can get the new outfits (and winter sounds) if you buy the plush again.
I’m hoping that you can buy the outfits separately or buy the new versions if you would prefer.
Apparently, I’m not the only one confused here.
Wait, so in order to get the new outfits, you have to buy the bears AGAIN!!!
That can’t be right???#AnimalCrossing @buildabear pic.twitter.com/fgdyCdZvsM— NickNacks (@VixNickNacks)
Why aren’t they selling the outfits separate?
— Heather Bechtoldt (@Hbdach) May 10, 2021
Wait, so in order to get the new outfits, you have to buy the bears AGAIN!!!
That can’t be right???#AnimalCrossing @buildabear pic.twitter.com/fgdyCdZvsM— NickNacks (@VixNickNacks) May 10, 2021
Apparently a preview was posted by someone a couple of days ago:
Animal Crossing Build a Bear Tom Nook and Isabelle coming with winter outfits!
Source: https://t.co/FIff7L5cys pic.twitter.com/vZ7DmXdXCQ— Em/Moss(saurus)★🐬🦕 (@bi_stegosaurus) May 8, 2021
Fans were already upset that the two “big reveal” plush were just Tom Nook and Isabelle, and if you have to buy them again to get their outfits, they are not going to be too happy again.
Looking in the fine print it seems to say that one can only purchase in bundles.
“While supplies last. Bundle styles limited to 1 per Guest. The Animal Crossing™: New Horizons collection can only be purchased as bundles. Items cannot be purchased unstuffed, cannot be modified and cannot be combined with any other promotional offers or discounts. Due to extremely high demand and limited quantities, you may be put in our virtual waiting room to purchase the Animal Crossing™: New Horizons collection. Please allow 7 business days for order processing. Available online only at buildabear.com. Prices are in US dollars unless otherwise noted.”
I’m not buying the plush again just to get the new outfits. It the outfits aren’t made available separately Build-A-Bear is going to have another PR fiasco on their hands.
What do you think? Comment and let us know!
Venom 2 Trailer Gives Us a Good Look at Carnage!
The first teaser trailer for Venom: Let There Be Carnage has dropped, and it gives us a good look at the live-action iteration of Spider-Man baddie Carnage (aka Cletus Kasady, played by Woody Harrelson.)
Carnage looks fantastic! Almost like he’s… made of meat?!
Venom: Let There Be Carnage releases on September 24, 2021, pushed back from October 2020 due to the pandemic.
Directed by Andy Serkis, Venom: Let There Be Carnage stars Tom Hardy, Woody Harrelson, Michelle Williams, Naomie Harris, Reid Scott, Stephen Graham, Sean Delaney and Larry Olubamiwo. The film also features a number of newcomers, including Naomie Harris, Stephen Graham, Sean Delaney and Larry Olubamiwo.
[Hat Tip: CBR]Dave McKean Talks His New Comic Book ‘Raptor’
Dark Horse Entertainment has picked up comic book writer and illustrator Dave McKean’s new ‘Raptor: A Sokol Graphic Novel.’ It follows several fan-favorites including DC Comics ‘Black Orchid,’ as well as covers for ‘Hellraiser’ and ‘The Sandman,’ but also illustrating the Batman story ‘ Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth,’ who he worked with writer Grant Morrison.
According to the official synopsis, “Raptor flickers between two worlds and two conflicted souls: Sokol wanders a feudal fantastical landscape hunting monsters for those that can pay, and Arthur, a writer of supernatural tales in 19th Century Wales, mourning the passing of his young wife and dabbling in the supernatural in the vain hope of seeing her again. They both exist in the twilight between truth and lies, life and death, reality and the imagination.”
Dave McKean recently sat down with Comics Beat to discuss ‘Raptor,’ and his process in writing it.
“It had a circuitous beginning,” he said describing coming up with the concept. “I was asked to do a short story for an established character, I thought immediately of a longer story, but though it was suitable, actually it was too personal an idea to hand over to someone else’s world, so I spent a frantic week reworking it, developing my own lead character, and placing it in a world that I felt much more at home with.”
McKean continued, “I wanted to do something that was inspired by the contemporary nature and travel literature I’ve been reading, something that would express my love of the natural world, and something that would live in this realm between reality and the imagination. My character is trapped between those two worlds, the state of human and bird, or reality and fantasy, of civilised life and raw animal instinct. I have several other GN projects in pieces in my notebooks, whichever one crystalizes into a solid story and script first ends up being the next one on my drawing board.”
The ‘Black Dog’ illustrator discussed why it follows two different narratives.
“I like this conversation across the line of creator and creation, artwork and audience,” McKean explained. “I think it’s a world and character with which I could explore many ideas. I wanted to plant a few seeds of who he is, what he is, where he’s come from and where he’s going, but leave a lot unsaid so I can maybe fill in pieces of the puzzle in future stories.”
Raptor: A Sokol Graphic Novel will be in comic shops on July 7, 2021 and in bookstores on July 20, 2021.
DAVE MCKEAN’S ‘RAPTOR’ TO BE PUBLISHED AT @DarkHorseComics! #comics https://t.co/Jjbj09vbKC pic.twitter.com/yKC2fVnC3p
— Comic Crusaders™️ (@ComicCrusaders) November 20, 2020
Elijah Wood’s Ted Bundy Thriller Picked Up By RLJE Films
Elijah Wood is starring and producing a new thriller featuring the serial killer Ted Bundy titled ‘No Man of God,’ which has recently been picked up by RLJE Films. Wood will play FBI agent Bill Hagmaier, who frequently interviewed Bundy, played by Luke Kirby, ahead of the serial killer’s execution.
Deadline reports that AMC Networks’ RLJE Films has received the North American rights to the movie which will base its story on the real transcripts and conversations between serial killer Bundy and Agent Hagmaier. It will premier at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere in June and will be released in theaters this August.
The thriller will be directed by Amber Sealey, as her fourth film following ‘A Plus D,’ ‘How to Cheat,’ and ‘No Light and No Land Anywhere.’
“The film is really comprised of a series of conversations and those conversations are lifted in part from real conversations and then recollections from Bill of these conversations,” Wood told EW in April. “As it pertains to things that we do with our company, I’m never reading material thinking of myself as an actor.”
He added, “I’m only ever thinking as a producer. It was a significant way through the process that I was like, I actually do want to do this. I love Bill and I love his journey in this relationship.”
“Bill Hagmaier is the man who’s credited with getting Ted Bundy to come clean about his crimes right before his execution,” Sealey added. “Even though Bill himself is a very religious, very good, very honorable person, he had to forge a friendship with Bundy, in a way, in order to get close enough to him in order for Bundy to feel safe enough to come clean. And he did.”
According to the official synopsis, “Set largely in a single interrogation room, the film is based on real life transcripts culled from conversations between FBI analyst Bill Hagmaier and serial killer Bundy that took place between 1984 and 1989. The film details the complicated relationship that formed between the two men during Bundy’s final years on death row.”
‘Resident Evil: Village’ Toned Down For Gamers?
We’ve been playing ‘Resident Evil: Village’ all weekend, and we’re just about at the end. It’s a challenging game, to be sure, but there are some major differences between this game and the one that preceded it.
Ethan Winters is still getting messed up to no end, but this time around, it feels like he has more breathing room between the beatings. This time around, there aren’t endless mold creatures. The hellish family isn’t always at your heels. This was a purposeful choice for a specific reason.
Axios interviewed the producer of ‘Resident Evil: Village,’ Tsuyoshi Kanda, and he detailed why the sequel isn’t nonstop scares. Kanda does acknowledge that the ceaseless tension of ‘Resident Evil: Bioharzard’ made it great. “That’s exactly what we were striving for, so it’s a huge compliment for us,” he said.
This unending fright fest was a problem for some players. Kanada went on to explain that some found ‘Biohazard’ “too scary.” So, to make the game a bit more accessible, changes had to be made to the 8th game. The producer expanded on the approach taken in ‘Village’, “… at the same time, it’s always our goal to create something that anybody can feel comfortable jumping in and playing, so we eased up on the tension curve relative to ‘Resident Evil 7: Biohazard,’ so that players aren’t in constant fear.”
Some of the feedback we received regarding [RE7] that it was too scary to play. In one regard, that’s exactly what we were striving for, so it’s a huge compliment for us. But at the same time, it’s always our goal to create something that anybody can feel comfortable jumping in and playing, so we eased up on the tension curve [in RE Village] relative to ‘Resident Evil 7: Biohazard,’ so that players aren’t in constant fear.
Check out the first 50 minutes of gameplay from our Twitch stream.
‘Resident Evil: Village’ is now available on XBOX, PS5, and PC.
What are your thoughts on ‘Bioharzard’? Too scary for some gamers? Was the neverending tension too much? Did you find ‘Village’ too tame? Let us know in the comments.
[Source:Axios]
David Tennant Joins The Cast Of ‘The Amazing Maurice’ Animated Film
‘Ducktales’ reboot and ‘Dr. Who’ alumni David Tennant is joining the growing cast of ‘The Amazing Maurice,’ an animated adaption of the late British novelist Terry Pratchett’s ‘The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents.’
Cinema Express reports that this will be the second adaption of a Terry Pratcher work that Tennant has appeared, the first being ‘The Good Omens,’ from Amazon Prime.
Sky Cinema is producing ‘The Amazing Maurice’ along with Ulysses Filmproduktion, Cantilever Media, Studio Rakete, Red Star Animation and Narrativia. It will make its way onto the NOW streaming service in 2022.
The plot follows “Maurice, a streetwise ginger cat who has the perfect money-making scam. He finds a kid who plays a pipe, and he also befriends his very own horde of strangely educated, talking rats – so Maurice can no longer think of them as ‘lunch’. When Maurice and the rodents reach the stricken town of Bad Blintz, they meet a bookworm, Malicia. Their little con soon goes down the drain as something very bad is waiting for them in the cellars.”
The movie will be directed by Toby Genkel and Florian Westermann with Emilia Clarke (‘Terminator: Genesys’), David Thewlis (‘Wonder Woman’), Himesh Patel (‘Yesterday’) as Keith, Gemma Arterton (‘The King’s Man’), Hugh Bonneville (‘Downton Abbey’), and Hugh Laurie (‘The Personal History of David Copperfield’) as the protagonist Maurice.
Hugh Laurie will lead the voice cast in The Amazing Maurice, a new animated film based on Sir Terry Pratchett's Discworld story about a streetwise ginger cat: https://t.co/wScuOt4nXW pic.twitter.com/IenqVci13Q
— British Comedy Guide (@BritishComedy) November 5, 2020
Director of Sky Cinema Sarah Wright said in a press release, “’The Amazing Maurice’ is a fantastic story from a legendary author, and I couldn’t think of a better tale to bring to life as an animated film for all the family. I’m excited to work with Ulysses Filmproduktion and Cantilever Media to bring this exclusive new movie to Sky Cinema audiences in 2022.”
‘The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents’ is a children’s fantasy novel written by Pratchett in 2001 by Doubleday as part as his popular ‘Discworld’ book series.
Power Con Exclusives: Castle Grayskull’s Robot and Pit Creatures!
Power Con is happening for real this year, ya’ll. Real-life, in person, at a hotel. Classic convention stuff! What a relief after a year of virtual cons, thanks to COVID.
It’s just not the same unless your scouring aisles and aisles of merchandise IRL. Conventions are meant to be seen, heard, and smelled. Yes, the lovely smells.
2021’s Power Con is making sure you attend by offering up come awesome ‘Masters of the Universe: Origins’ exclusives. True, most of the figures are tough to find at stores as-is, but some of these figures may never see life on a shelf.
Superhero Hype drew our attention to the list of exclusives. They’re a mixture of retro classics and some long-awaited accessories.
First let’s look at the $60 Faker double pack. This one contains the evil Fake and Dupli-Cat. Faker looks to be the traditional re-paint of He-Man, but with a unique paint job on the eyes and a Havok Staff. Dupli-Cat is Battle Cat but with two new robotic front paws.
The dungeon creature had been planned for release with the ‘Classics’ release of Castle Grayskull but was cost-prohibitive. Now we finally get it! Rather than relying on the old floor sticker, you can slot this new prop onto the playset!
The spirit of Grayskull isn’t the same character that we saw in the 200X series. This, according to SHH, is based on a panel of the mini-comics that used to come packaged with the original line of toys. I don’t recall this, but it’s welcome nonetheless.
[Source: Superhero Hype]
