Utopia
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Watch the first trailer for Gillian Flynn's Amazon series 'Utopia'
Amazon has released the first trailer for Utopia and announced that it will debut on Prime Video on September 25th.
Amazon will make Gillian Flynn's 'Utopia' adaptation, not HBO
Thanks to collective feet-dragging and pre-production hell, Amazon has scored a win over HBO. The US adaptation of Utopia will live on under Jeff Bezos' roof, retaining novelist (and former Entertainment Weekly writer) Gillian Flynn as executive producer, creator and showrunner. The nine-episode limited series focuses on a group of youths who met online, found a graphic novel and as a result are being hunted by a "shadowy deep state organization." The graphic novel deals explicitly in conspiracy theories, and it turns out that the stories on its pages could actually be real. Across the pond, the original series ran for two seasons.
Bjork's next album comes with free cryptocurrency
Icelandic music star Bjork is famously experimental with just about everything, so it's no surprise that she's now working on bringing blockchain into the music industry fold. Her people have announced that she's partnering with British startup Blockpool to put the technology at the center of her next album release, not only letting fans buy the record with cryptocurrency, but actually giving them digital cash for doing so.
Recommended Reading: A closer look at the 2015 Oscar nominations
Recommended Reading highlights the best long-form writing on technology and more in print and on the web. Some weeks, you'll also find short reviews of books that we think are worth your time. We hope you enjoy the read. Breaking Down the Oscar Nominations: What the Hell Happened to 'Selma'? by Mark Harris Unless you took a week off from the internet, you're well aware that this year's Oscar nominations were announced a few days ago. While Selma did earn nominations for Best Picture and Best Song, the film that depicts Martin Luther King Jr.'s marches from Selma, Alabama, to Montgomery in 1965 was mentioned only twice. Grantland's Mark Harris takes a closer look at the full list to see what other categories should've included Ava DuVernay's picture.
What's on your HDTV: NFL, 'Drunk History', 'Boardwalk Empire', 'Trailer Park Boys'
It's time. This week NFL football is back (and so are the Engadget HD Podcast fantasy leagues), and the season kicks off Thursday night as the Packers face the defending Super Bowl Champion Seahawks on NBC. Boardwalk Empire on HBO starts its final season Sunday night, and we get our last episode of Drunk History for a while this week too. The League is back on FXX, and a downloadable Dance Central Spotlight game for Xbox One is finally ready to arrive. Fans of Canada's Trailer Park Boys can even look forward to season eight of the show, which will debut on Netflix Friday morning. The weirdest new entry? Fox's reality show, Utopia, which gathers 15 strangers together and will leave them on their own, for an entire year -- in between episodes viewers can tune in and watch 24/7 at UtopiaTV.com, or through an app on mobile devices. Hit the gallery or just look after the break to check out each day's highlights, including trailers and let us know what you think (or what we missed).
Perfect Ten: MMO features that were hyped but never delivered
Developers like to talk a big game. It's expected, it's encouraged by all parties, and it's part of the fun. When a game or big expansion is coming up, the spokespeople for studios like to hop on stage, grab that mic, and start proselytizing for all they're worth. And while some promises come to fruition, others are various shades of white lies, and still others never come to be at all. These are the features that studios would much rather you forget were mentioned in the first place, although this is the internet and the internet never forgets. Well, players who latch on to everything devs say as absolute truth never forget. Sometimes things happen along the way in development. Studios run out of time to get in all of the features and have to prioritize which make the cut and which do not. Features end up not testing as well as hoped and the studio quietly drops them because the PR hit for the features not going in is much less than the disaster that they might cause. And some developers like to flap their gums and spout brainstorm ideas that send the actual programmers and designers back at the company into spasms of agony when they try to figure out how to make them work. Today let's go through 10 features that were talked up but never delivered in MMOs!
The Game Archaeologist looks at Guild Wars Utopia
Aztecs. Chronomancers. Mounts. Halberds. Golems. Dual wielding. These are all but a hint of what a fourth Guild Wars campaign could have been, a campaign that was under development in the mid-2000s but was scrapped by 2007. Replacing it was the expansion Guild Wars Eye of the North and the workings of a super-secret sequel to the game (which you've probably never heard of). It was the forgotten campaign, swept under a rug while it was still under the rug. But what if, in some alternative timeline, ArenaNet had gone ahead with this campaign? What if it became an established part of the Guild Wars legacy, as familiar to us today as Nightfall and Factions? What if Guild Wars Utopia had lived?
A Mild-Mannered Reporter: For the greater good
It didn't take much convincing for people to start assuming that the Praetorians in Going Rogue were fundamentally the bad guys. For all the talk that's been given about how players can choose either path, about how there isn't always good and evil... the players are smarter than that. Being on the side of the jackbooted oppressors is just plain wrong, there are no two ways about it. No matter how heavy-handed the City of Heroes team might be about it, players knew better than to take the bait. The problem with this line of thinking is that it's wrong on one fundamental level. It's not that there's a lack of evil running through Praetoria, it's that people are seeing it on the wrong side. Loyalists aren't the shoo-ins for villains that the community seems to think they are -- they're heroes, making the world a better place. There might be the occasional misstep, but when you get right down to it, no faction on Praetoria is as well-suited to the ethos of heroism than those loyal to Emperor Cole.
Earthrise wallpapers show Eastern Gardens denizens and tamed mutants
Masthead Studios just got in touch with us and sent over two new wallpapers for their upcoming post-apocalyptic game Earthrise. One image shows off a group of kabuki-masked freaks denizens of the Eastern Gardens, one of the more outwardly utopian zones to be found in Earthrise's island setting of Enterra.
Earthrise question of the week is a call to crafters
Earthrise is the post-apocalyptic MMO being developed by Masthead Studios that will have a game setting quite different from the crumbled, burned out world we'd typically associate with global armageddon. Earthrise is set in a utopian future that's quickly turning dystopian, one that's still rather crumbly on the outskirts to keep that aftermath feel to the game. Beyond the guild warfare and sandbox elements of gameplay Massively has looked at in the past, Masthead Studios is putting a great deal of emphasis on the game's crafting system. In fact, this is the focus of the Earthrise Question of the Week on the game's forums, posted by the game's community manager Moll. However, instead of simply doing a brief Q&A as in other weeks, Moll explains the concepts behind the crafting system before eliciting feedback from Earthrise fans.%Gallery-48760%
Latest Earthrise newsletter updates on game's progress
Sofia-based Masthead Studios has released the March `09 newsletter for their upcoming post-apocalyptic MMO Earthrise. As with their previous newsletters, Issue IX points out where Earthrise has been discussed in the gaming press over the past few weeks, and shows off some of the game's concept art. This month, Masthead Studios is showing off concepts for the mutated Nathura zone.In addition, the developers write about what they love about Earthrise and working on the title -- ranging from the game's epic scale to the extensive combat system. Issue IX also expands upon the game's lore, with the struggle between the factions of Noir and Continoma, a clash between utopian idealism and anarchy. Have a look through the latest Earthrise newsletter and see how their vision of a post-apocalyptic future is turning out.
A Warcraft Retrospective from Gametrailers.com
The fine folk over at Gametrailers.com are preparing for Wrath of the Lich King in their own, fun little way. And by little, I mean totally awesome. They've posted the first part of their Warcraft Retrospective, looking back on the history of the Warcraft series of games. This first installment talks a little about Warcraft I, Warcraft II, and the adventure game Warcraft Adventures that ended up getting canned.On top of the nostalgia-riddled look at past incarnations of Warcraft, the retrospective provides insight into the origins of things such as the RTS genre itself and perhaps one of the first map editors that ended up in user hands, setting the stage for just about every RTS to start providing one baseline. Entertaining and educational! Uh, sort of. I really do recommend watching it, though. It's only a click away, so go on! Hit play![ Thanks, Ray, James and Colyn! ]
Earthrise lore features clash between utopian idealism and anarchy
Earthrise is a new title that we haven't seen much of thus far beyond screenshots and concept art. Still, it's one that's holding the interest of a small but growing community, waiting to see if the game will offer an experience that's a far cry from a fantasy MMO. In making the game a departure from the fantasy genre, the Earthrise creators at Masthead Studios have been fleshing out the game's lore and relaying it to potential fans through its own newsletters and some media exclusives, at IGN's RPG Vault in particular. IGN continues its series of Earthrise previews, focusing on the lore of the post-apocalyptic setting. That is to say the old world is dead, wiped out in World War III. Those who weren't part of the Continoma-selected elite are either ash or reduced to slavering mutants prowling Enterra in search of their next meal. The previous piece titled Continoma: The Beginning focused on the corporate entity that rose to power and came to rule what was left of the earth following the near-annihilation of human society. IGN now looks at what happened after the burn in "Continoma: The Rebirth." Check out their piece for the full story on the pioneers of Earthrise who work to rebuild society to utopian standards, and the anarchists who resist the order of this new establishment.
BlackBerry Thunder, touchscreen Motorola on board for Verizon's visual voicemail
Details are still trickling in on this whole visual voicemail sitch on Big Red, but we're starting to wrap our noodle around it. In addition to the four devices we've already mentioned -- the Voyager refresh, Chocolate 3, Blaze, and Utopia -- it turns out that none other than the mighty BlackBerry Thunder will be among the first devices to benefit from sooper dooper 22nd century high-tech voicemail management.We've also learned that it's actually the Vu30 (little close to the LG Vu, eh, guys?) that's being called the Motorola Utopia, while the Blaze will be some heretofore unknown touchscreen device -- pretty uncommon by Moto standards, particularly in the States where we don't get to benefit from the MING series' awesomeness. As always, we'll roll out more info as we get it.
Sci Fi Channel creating hybrid TV series and MMO
The Sci Fi Channel plans to air a TV series that simultaneously plays out as a massively multiplayer online game, the Los Angeles Times reports. This pairing of television writers with game designers will allow fans of the series to influence its story arc through their own actions in the virtual space. David Howe, president of the Sci Fi Channel, said, "This is the Holy Grail for us, without a doubt... this is groundbreaking, and I don't say that lightly."The large and dedicated player communities attached to various titles in the MMO space are appealing to the Sci Fi Channel. "Bundling a World of Warcraft player community with a series and an on-line social community is something the Sci Fi Channel has tried to puzzle out for several years," according to the Los Angeles Times. The Sci Fi Channel's desire to tap into the MMO market led them to work with Trion World Network, a California-based game company with some major investors standing behind it. The hope is that together, they will achieve a first in interactive entertainment: create a hybrid television series and online game, where players affect or even determine the direction of the show. If successful, this will stand as a milestone in the history of both television and games.
Verizon scoops aplenty: Touch, Samsung U940, and more!
Getting amped for that snow white Touch, are we? Well, good news: it'll be here pretty quickly, with Verizon's latest estimate putting it on shelves in the late February / early March time frame. That'll be followed up pretty quickly by the Samsung U940, a lovely high-end QWERTY phone in the vein of the F700; we'd previously heard Q1 for this one, and Verizon's pushing Q1 to the extreme here by tagging it for a March release. The Motorola W755 has been dubbed the "COOL" -- though we're not sure whether that's a go-to-market term or just a codename -- and it'll be here at some point in the spring. Finally, we've caught wind that Big Red's prepping a Moto V750, dubbed "UTOPIA," which we don't know much about but may be a spiritual successor to the V710. Whatever the heck it is, look for it in late spring.[Thanks, anonymous tipster]
Virtually Overlooked Week: Alisha's picks
Virtually Overlooked has taken over Wii Fanboy! All this week, members of the staff will be outlining their personal picks for future Virtual Console releases.My path through gaming history is very haphazard and filled with missed turns. Somehow, I managed to skip several really amazing titles that I probably would have played for hours and hours, until they were imprinted in the deeper layers of my brain. I guess I just got really attached to the games that I played and loved, and as a kid with limited resources, I couldn't or wouldn't go hunting for new games. Even so, looking back at the avalanche of titles that shaped my early gaming "career," I can't help but think -- could anyone have played everything? Who were those people, and why wasn't I borrowing all their games?But I didn't miss everything, and the games I played were games I loved. I swear, after I finally put it aside, I could have probably played the original Legend of Zelda using only my toes and a half-working controller. Well, through the Octoroks and Tektites near the beginning screens, at least. Even now, the sight of those guys makes me smile. And did anyone else have one of those awesome Zelda watches? During school hours, those things were a lifesaver. But we've already got the inaugural Zelda on the VC -- so let's look at a few of my loves that are as-yet unavailable.
