Cherrim Should Now Be Easier To Catch In Pokemon Legends: Arceus

The first post-launch patch for Pokemon Legends: Arceus has arrived, bringing with it fixes for a number of glitches that have made life difficult for Arceus players. Chief among these: an issue where Cherrim would become uncatchable if it changed forms during a battle has now been fixed.

Prior to the 1.0.2 patch, the cute little cherry Pokemon was proving almost impossible to catch, with players on Reddit saying they spent multiple hours on the attempt, with Cherrim breaking out of Ultra Balls even on 1HP. The game’s Japanese support page acknowledged the bug prior to the new patch, saying that Cherrim couldn’t be caught if it transformed even once during a battle.

Other updates include a fix for an issue where, during offline play, the screen would freeze if players tried to pick up a lost satchel after throwing a ball containing a Pokemon. Another fix stops players from obtaining duplicates of a Pokemon that was only intended to appear once.

Unfortunately, the update seems to have caused another bug with the potential to prevent players from ultimately catching Arceus. As mentioned by players on Reddit and now acknowledged on the Japanese support page, patch 1.0.2 has created an issue where players won’t be able to complete the “The Plate of Moonview Arena” mission if they catch Cresselia without talking to Melli first. As this mission is part of eventually unlocking the game’s ultimate Arceus encounter, it’s a frustrating bug for players to come up against.

The support page has said that this bug will be fixed in the next update, but hasn’t specified when that will be. For now, players are encouraged to make sure they talk to Melli before proceeding to try and catch Cresselia.

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Live A Live Remake Announced For Switch, Coming July 22

1994’s Live a Live is getting a remake, revealed during the February 2022 Nintendo Direct. The RPG is scheduled to launch on July 22, featuring an updated HD-2D art style that resembles Octopath Traveler or Triangle Strategy–the latter of which now has a free demo.

Live a Live follows seven different characters in distinct, seemingly unrelated stories that take place across a variety of different locations and points in time. As you continue playing, you’ll discover how all seven stories ultimately intertwine in one cohesive narrative.

As seen in the trailer, the Live a Live remake seems to follow the original game’s narrative pretty closely without changing anything, featuring the same seven time periods–Prehistory, The Wild West, Imperial China, Twilight of Edo Japan, Present Day, The Near Future, and The Distant Future. You can tackle these different stories in whichever order you prefer or bounce between them, much like 2019’s 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim.

This remake represents the first time that Live a Live has been released outside of Japan. Live a Live will launch on Switch.

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EarthBound And EarthBound Beginnings Are Coming To Nintendo Switch Today

EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings–first released as Mother in Japan–are coming to Nintendo Switch. Revealed during today’s Nintendo Direct, both games appear to be faithful ports of the critically-acclaimed titles, and will be available for for Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscribers later today.

#SuperNES and #NES RPGs EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings will be available to #NintendoSwitchOnline members…shortly after today’s presentation! pic.twitter.com/Cpgt149C6Y

— Nintendo UK (@NintendoUK) February 9, 2022

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MLB The Show 22’s First Gameplay Footage Has Arrived, And It Looks Great

The first gameplay footage for MLB The Show 22 has been released, showing what this year’s professional baseball game looks like in action–and it looks pretty great. Captured on “next gen” hardware, the video shows off a number of different ballparks and players, including cover star Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Angels, as well as sluggers Aaron Judge and Raphael Devers.

Be sure to watch through until the end, as the gameplay video finishes up with a shot of retired ace Randy Johnson, who was known to have one of the strongest, most bird-unfriendly arms in baseball history. Presumably, Johnson will come to MLB The Show 22 as one of the game’s “legends,” similar to how Cy Young and Jackie Robinson were featured in previous editions of MLB The Show.

The trailer doesn’t actually get into any of the specifics around what is new in MLB The Show 22, but it’s a good primer at least to show off how the game looks this year. More details about the gameplay updates will be shared over the coming weeks.

MLB The Show 22 launches on April 5, just in time for the start of the new MLB season. Like last year, Sony San Diego developed the game and it will be released on multiple platforms, including Xbox, and, for the first time, Nintendo Switch. Xbox fans can play the game on Game Pass as part of their subscription.

As for cover star Ohtani, he was an obvious choice. In 2021, he hit 46 home runs and collected 100 RBI. He also put up very impressive numbers as a pitcher, going 9-2 with a 3.18 ERA and 156 strikeouts.

“After having one of the greatest seasons in the history of Major League Baseball, Shohei Ohtani was really the only obvious choice to grace the cover of MLB The Show 22,” Ramone Russell of developer Sony San Diego Studio said in a post for Xbox.

MLB is currently in the midst of a labor lockout, but whether or not that would have any impact on MLB The Show 22 remains to be seen.

MLB The Show has multiple editions to choose from, so it might be helpful to consult GameSpot’s MLB The Show 22 preorder guide to find out more.

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The Story Behind BioShock Infinite’s Dancing Bread Boy

BioShock Infinite now has one less mystery within its floating walls thanks to the excitement of SkateBird developer Megan Fox, as she tweeted her love for the game’s environmental storytelling. That, in turn, led to some explanation of the infamous dancing bread boy from the first-person shooter.

Following Fox’s tweet, it didn’t take long for Gwen Frey to show up and spill the flour that everyone wanted to hear. Frey founded Chump Squad, an indie studio with one of the best names ever, but she previously worked on BioShock Infinite and its subsequent DLC, Burial at Sea. One of Frey’s jobs during development included placing “all the background characters,” which also included giving life to the dancing bread boy. Frey revealed the whole process in a series of tweets, which are delicious, even if they are a little heavy in carbs.

Frey believed the Paris scenes were “too static and needed more motion.”

“I was populating the Paris scene with ‘chumps’ (skeletal meshes of humans with no AI). I’d play a looping animation on a person, script some head-tracking or whatever, & request VO lines from the writers to flesh them out.”

Frey continued, saying that chumps were the only real option as the team couldn’t add anything additional with “proper AI pathfinding.”

She also had to “[reuse] animations from the base game,” due to a lack of resources for new background character animations for Burial at Sea. Any animations she wanted to use had to be pulled from things already made for Infinite’s main game.

Luckily, Elizabeth’s dance by the beach provided Frey with a very busy animation, which would break up the Paris scene quite nicely.

random sensory flashback to the Bioshock Infinite DLC where they wanted to communicate to the player “you are in Paris, France” so they put a little kid in the game dancing around in the street while holding a baguette over his head pic.twitter.com/E77jzW0Air

— Pocklecool (@instant_grat) February 4, 2022

She was forced to abandon the idea of two dancing children after encountering another technical hurdle. The bread boy’s dance around a cylinder-shaped object was necessary to prevent collision issues with the player. The giant baguette above the boy’s head came next.

Frey tried to use child hands and feet on bread boy, but the animations didn’t line up with the scene. The boy was clipping through the environment since the proportions were different from the adults. She added adult hands and feet to correct this issue but then had to compensate for the boy’s hands being so far above his head. A giant baguette was added, which somehow just made it all work. (It’s probably the yeast.)

Frey ended her story with what she planned to say if anyone started asking questions about bread boy before BioShock Infinite was shipped, saying,”I figured if anyone asked I’d just say ‘bread is great right?!'”

Compromises forged from a lack of resources and/or time are common in game design. We see it all the time but don’t always know it because of creative people like Gwen Frey.

If you’re not familiar with my new favorite video game character, bear witness to him and his full carb-fueled glory. Cliff Bleszinski and I both think the story of Bread Boy is legendary. I do, however, wish it didn’t mean learning about the existence of BioShock’s man-baby-man, which you now have to live with too.

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Rocket League Gridiron Challenges: How To Earn Rare NFL Wheels

Rocket League Gridiron mode is back for another Super Bowl week, and if you strap on a helmet and take to the field, you can earn a pair of limited-time NFL-themed cosmetics, including rare NFL wheels for your Battle-Car. Here’s all you need to know about the Gridiron challenges available now during the Rocket League Super Bowl 56 event.

Rocket League Gridiron rules

Gridiron mode is developer Psyonix’s way of incorporating American football into the array of game modes in Rocket League, joining Hoops (basketball) and the game’s traditional “Soccar” mode that quickly lifted it into the upper echelon of esports games back in 2015. In Gridiron, games are played in 4v4 and the standard Rocket League ball has been replaced with an American football–and all of its unpredictable bounce patterns.

Touching the ball attaches it to the roof of your car, giving you possession, and you can pass the ball or hand it off to teammates by performing a dodge. If a goal is scored while the ball is attached to a player’s roof, it counts as a touchdown (and extra point) for seven points. If a loose ball is scored, it counts as a field goal for three points. There’s also a sideline boundary that players can’t cross, unlike other Rocket League modes which exist in a bubble within out-of-bounds markers.

Pictured: some of the NFL’s most storied franchises, and also the Rams.

Rocket League Gridiron challenges

There are three Gridiron challenges available in-game from now until 6 PM PT / 9 PM ET on Tuesday, February 15. One of them is repeatable as many times as you wish until the end of the event, while the others are finite and will give you exclusive Super Bowl cosmetics. This year’s rewards include a new player title as well as some cool wheels.

Score a touchdown or field goal in five matches – Field General player titleScore a touchdown or field goal and demo (blow up) a player in the same match – NFL wheelsWin 10 online matches (repeatable during event) – 20,000 XP

Remember that these items won’t be available after February 15, so act fast if they’re important to you. Meanwhile, they’d go well with the abundant items from the NFL Fan Pass, which debuted in September of last year and has been receiving updates all season no matter when players bought into the pass.

As of today, the pass features helmet toppers, flags, and decals for all 32 NFL teams–though the Washington Commanders set will need a refresh, as it still says Football Team. The decals can be applied to both Octane and Dominus and follow a similar animated style no matter which team you select. The NFL Pass is sold for 1,000 Credits, equivalent to $10, and adds only cosmetics. You need not buy it to complete the Gridiron challenges.

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Shadow Warrior 3 Release Date Announced In Silly Fourth Wall-Breaking Trailer

Shadow Warrior 3 will be released on March 1, publisher Devolver Digital has announced, with a release date trailer breaking the fourth wall and generally poking fun at marketing materials.

Shadow Warrior 3 is described as a “fast-paced first-person love song dedicated to action.” You play as Lo Wang, a former Yakuza mercenary who is trying to save the world from a disaster that he might have had a hand in kicking off in the first place.

“By nearly plunging the world into a full-blown apocalypse, Lo Wang accidentally opens a multi-dimensional prison cell holding a humongous world-eating dragon. Now, finding himself in something of a prophetic predicament, and–more importantly–with his mojo lost, Lo Wang is forced to team up with his own nemesis, the ex-billionaire Orochi Zilla, and his newly enlisted ally Motoko, to set things right,” reads a line from the game’s description. “However, the road to redemption is spiked not only with ultra-malevolent Yokai demons but also with equally damning distrust between Lo Wang and his team of discount heroes.”

Shadow Warrior 3 is developed by Flying Wild Hog, the Polish developer behind the previous two Shadow Warrior games, as well as the Hard Reset series. The studio was acquired by THQ Nordic parent company Embracer in 2020. Shadow Warrior 3 is releasing on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.

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Sifu: Secret True Ending Guide and How to Spare Bosses

After you’ve defeated Yang, the final boss of Sifu, there’s still unfinished business left to attend to. That’s because revenge is not the way of kung-fu, and defeating all of the game’s bosses does not give you the true secret ending. Instead, you must spare all of the people who killed your family, but the game doesn’t explicitly tell you how to do that. Here’s how to earn Sifu’s true ending and how to spare all bosses.

How to get the secret ending in Sifu

After you finish the game, you’ll be able to replay each stage and fight the bosses all over again. What you need to do is spare each boss instead of killing them. Sparing a boss will not only get you one step closer to the true ending, but each one rewards you with a special talisman. Below are the bosses and each corresponding talisman:

Fajar – Wood TalismanSean – Fire TalismanKuroki – Water TalismanJinfeng – Metal TalismanYang – Earth Talisman

You can spare them in any order, so pick whichever boss you’re most comfortable with so you can practice. But how do you spare bosses?

How to spare bosses in Sifu

Deplete a boss’ white health bar to spare them.

Up to this point, you’ve defeated bosses by breaking their structure and using a finisher to take them down for good. If you notice, each boss has a separate, white “health” bar beneath the structure meter. You need to deplete this white health bar to spare them, which is easier said than done.

To do so, play each fight like you would normally. Break their structure, use a finisher, and begin the second phase of a battle. At this point, do your best to actually damage the opponent instead of simply raising their Structure meter. The best strategy is to parry, which allows you to follow up with an attack, depleting the white health bar.

Eventually, you’ll get to the point where the boss’ Structure will break, but don’t finish them off. Instead, back away and wait for their Structure to reset so you can repeat the process once again. You’ll have to break their Structure a couple of times before getting the prompt to spare.

Once again, the finisher prompt will appear, but so will a new option to “Spare” the opponent, which is done by pressing left on the D-pad. Spare them, and a new cutscene will play, indicating that you have let them live. Repeat this process for the rest of the bosses in the game.

The Yang fight plays out a little differently, but the strategy is mostly the same as before. Reach the second phase of the fight, skip finishing him off a couple of times, and then press left on the D-pad when the spare option appears.

At this point, you’ll have one last phase to get through with Yang, and this time, you won’t have the ability to come back to life. This section requires you to break Yang’s Structure, and he can do the same to you. Your health bar disappears, and the ability to age and retry is not available.

For this part, just block, avoid, and parry him as you’ve done in the past to break his Structure one last time. And this time, you do want to use your finisher on him. Doing so will unlock a secret cutscene and the true ending of the game.

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Horizon Forbidden West Gets First, Short PS4 Gameplay Trailer

Just shy of a week before launch, Sony has released a sliver of new gameplay for Horizon Forbidden West running a base PlayStation 4.

The footage, which is just over 20 seconds long, is quite visually striking. That’s especially true when you consider it’s a 2022 game running on hardware that’s nearly a decade old at this point, showing off just how well Guerrilla Games’ sequel has improved over the first entry. There’s definitely some visible fuzziness thanks to the reduced resolution, but overall the game still manages to look rather beautiful.

Of course, this is far from an exhaustive look at how the game will run on the lowest spec hardware its launching on, especially given that there’s no combat or erratic camera movements in the gameplay. But after the showing of Horizon Forbidden West on PS4 Pro recently, you can probably rest assured that if you haven’t had a chance to upgrade to a PS5 yet, you’ll be well-served still. It’s a welcome showcase too, given how releases from other publishers on older hardware has, in some cases, remained hidden until release (Cyberpunk 2077 was notorious for this).

Horizon Forbidden West continues the story of Aloy, as she travels to the west coast of the post-apocalyptic ruins of the United States. It features some improvements to overall traversal, melee combat, and more, all of which you can catch-up on in our guide to everything we know about Horizon Forbidden West. It launches on PS5 and PS4 on February 18, with several editions and collector’s items that you can still preorder.

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PUBG Developer Krafton Is Making Its Own Metaverse And Creating NFT Projects

PUBG developer Krafton has become the latest gaming company to make moves into the NFT space. The company said in a news release that it has invested more than $6.5 million into multiple companies to advance its efforts in this space, while it also plans to make its own NFT-related projects.

Krafton is investing $2.5 million into Seoul Auction Blue and $4.1 million into XBYBLUE, while it has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to make its own NFT projects.

Seoul Auction Blue runs the art purchasing platform SOTWO. XBYBLUE, meanwhile, runs a service called XXBLUE that acquires and curates digital content IP that can then be sold to consumers.

Krafton’s game studio, Bluehole, will lead the charge in working with these new companies to use Krafton’s technology to make and sell NFT avatars for use in the metaverse “in the future.”

Krafton CEO CH Kim said the company is confident it can come up with NFT solutions are that are “fun and engaging.” Kim teased that this is “just the beginning” of what Krafton has planned in this space. Partnerships with other companies around the world will be announced later.

As for the NFT projects, Krafton said in a second release that it’s working with NAVER Z to make new Web 3.0 and NFT projects to create an “NFT metaverse platform.” NAVER Z runs the ZEPETO metaverse platform, which boasts 290 million users globally.

Krafton said it is leveraging its experience in making a big online game, PUBG, to help fuel its efforts in the metaverse space. It will also create a user-generated content tool and make a “high quality virtual world” using Epic’s Unreal Engine to make its metaverse.

The announcement of Krafton’s NFT/metaverse plans comes just days after Elden Ring company Bandai Namco announced it would spend $130 million to create its own IP metaverse, according to VGC.

NFTs, in particular, have been one of the most-discussed elements of games and the wider technology space for the past year or so. Recently, the indie games platform Itch.io slammed NFTs and the companies that support them. Check out GameSpot’s roundup to find out more on where video game companies like Ubisoft, EA, Nintendo, EA, and Xbox stand on them.

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