TheOregon Trail, which is probably one of the most recognizable computer games for people who grew up in the 80s and 90s, is set to become a movie. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Apple is developing a live-action film adaption for the game, with Will Speck and Josh Gordon attached to the project as directors and producers. Seeing as the collaborators are known for films like Blades of Glory,The Oregon Trail movie will likely be a comedy rather than a depressing drama about a 19th-century pioneer family dying off one by one due to dysentery and starvation.
The Hollywood Reporter's sources also said that the movie will feature a couple of musical numbers "in the vein of Barbie." Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, known for La La Land and Dear Evan Hansen and who were recently nominated for an Emmy for a number Steve Martin performed in the past season of Only Murders in the Building, will reportedly produce original music for the film. Kenneth and Keith Lucas (Judas and the Black Messiah), along with Max Reisman, are writing the screenplay. It's still very early days for the production, though: There are no actors attached to the project yet, and Apple hasn't even formally announced it.
Originally created by Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann and Paul Dillenberger, the original Oregon Trail game was first released in 1971. In the game, you're supposed to buy supplies, hunt for food and travel west at a reasonable pace while trying to keep your caravan your caravan alive.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/apple-is-reportedly-developing-a-comedy-film-based-on-the-oregon-trail-110022317.html?src=rss
TheOregon Trail, which is probably one of the most recognizable computer games for people who grew up in the 80s and 90s, is set to become a movie. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Apple is developing a live-action film adaption for the game, with Will Speck and Josh Gordon attached to the project as directors and producers. Seeing as the collaborators are known for films like Blades of Glory,The Oregon Trail movie will likely be a comedy rather than a depressing drama about a 19th-century pioneer family dying off one by one due to dysentery and starvation.
The Hollywood Reporter's sources also said that the movie will feature a couple of musical numbers "in the vein of Barbie." Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, known for La La Land and Dear Evan Hansen and who were recently nominated for an Emmy for a number Steve Martin performed in the past season of Only Murders in the Building, will reportedly produce original music for the film. Kenneth and Keith Lucas (Judas and the Black Messiah), along with Max Reisman, are writing the screenplay. It's still very early days for the production, though: There are no actors attached to the project yet, and Apple hasn't even formally announced it.
Originally created by Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann and Paul Dillenberger, the original Oregon Trail game was first released in 1971. In the game, you're supposed to buy supplies, hunt for food and travel west at a reasonable pace while trying to keep your caravan your caravan alive.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/apple-is-reportedly-developing-a-comedy-film-based-on-the-oregon-trail-110022317.html?src=rss
Netflix is rolling out a new feature called Moments that lets you save, share and easily rewatch certain scenes from shows and movies. So if there's a killer bit in a comedy special that you want a friend to see, or a shocking twist in Squid Gamethat you can't get enough of, this might be useful.
The feature will be mobile-only for the time being. Moments is debuting worldwide on Netflix's iOS app today. It'll be available on Android in the coming weeks.
When you see a scene you want to save or share, you just need to tap the Moments button at the top of the screen. It'll be saved to the My Netflix tab. You'll be able to jump back to Moments on your phone whenever you like. Netflix says that episodes and films will start playing from bookmarked scenes when you rewatch them. There's also the option to share a moment on social media platforms or in messages as you create a moment. You can share scenes with friends from the My Netflix tab as well.
Netflix has long had social sharing options for episodes and films, but adding an easy way to help users revisit favorite scenes and share them with friends is a smart idea. It looks like the company's take on the clips feature that Twitch and YouTube have offered for several years. There may be more to come from Netflix on this front though, as the company wrote in a blog post that "Moments will hopefully expand in the future, offering even more ways for members to use and enjoy the feature."
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/netflixs-latest-feature-lets-you-easily-share-and-rewatch-your-favorite-scenes-151053954.html?src=rss
Netflix is rolling out a new feature called Moments that lets you save, share and easily rewatch certain scenes from shows and movies. So if there's a killer bit in a comedy special that you want a friend to see, or a shocking twist in Squid Gamethat you can't get enough of, this might be useful.
The feature will be mobile-only for the time being. Moments is debuting worldwide on Netflix's iOS app today. It'll be available on Android in the coming weeks.
When you see a scene you want to save or share, you just need to tap the Moments button at the top of the screen. It'll be saved to the My Netflix tab. You'll be able to jump back to Moments on your phone whenever you like. Netflix says that episodes and films will start playing from bookmarked scenes when you rewatch them. There's also the option to share a moment on social media platforms or in messages as you create a moment. You can share scenes with friends from the My Netflix tab as well.
Netflix has long had social sharing options for episodes and films, but adding an easy way to help users revisit favorite scenes and share them with friends is a smart idea. It looks like the company's take on the clips feature that Twitch and YouTube have offered for several years. There may be more to come from Netflix on this front though, as the company wrote in a blog post that "Moments will hopefully expand in the future, offering even more ways for members to use and enjoy the feature."
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/netflixs-latest-feature-lets-you-easily-share-and-rewatch-your-favorite-scenes-151053954.html?src=rss
In an AMA this weekend, Instagram head Adam Mosseri shared some insight into why some videos on the platform appear reduced in quality well after they’re posted, and it all boils down to performance. Responding to a question about old stories looking “blurry” in highlights, Mosseri said, “In general, we want to show the highest-quality video we can. But if something isn’t watched for a long time — because the vast majority of views are in the beginning — we will move to a lower quality video.” If the video later spikes in popularity again, “then we will re-render the higher quality video,” he said in the response, which was reposted by a Threads user (spotted by The Verge).
Further elaborating in a follow-up reply, though, Mosseri added, “We bias to higher quality (more CPU intensive encoding and more expensive storage for bigger files) for creators who drive more views.” The comment has sparked concern from small creators in the replies who say it puts them at a disadvantage competing with others who have larger platforms. Meta has previously said it uses “different encoding configurations to process videos based on their popularity” as part of how it manages its computing resources.
The performance system “works at an aggregate level,” Mosseri said, “not an individual viewer level… It’s not a binary theshhold [sic], but rather a sliding scale.” In response to one user who questioned its fairness for smaller creators, Mosseri said the quality shift “doesn’t seem to matter much” in practice as it “isn’t huge” and viewers appear to care more about video content over quality. “Quality seems to be much more important to the original creator, who is more likely to delete the video if it looks poor, than to their viewers,” he said. Understandably, not everyone seems convinced.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/mosseri-confirms-instagram-reduces-video-quality-for-posts-that-arent-raking-in-views-233033536.html?src=rss
In an AMA this weekend, Instagram head Adam Mosseri shared some insight into why some videos on the platform appear reduced in quality well after they’re posted, and it all boils down to performance. Responding to a question about old stories looking “blurry” in highlights, Mosseri said, “In general, we want to show the highest-quality video we can. But if something isn’t watched for a long time — because the vast majority of views are in the beginning — we will move to a lower quality video.” If the video later spikes in popularity again, “then we will re-render the higher quality video,” he said in the response, which was reposted by a Threads user (spotted by The Verge).
Further elaborating in a follow-up reply, though, Mosseri added, “We bias to higher quality (more CPU intensive encoding and more expensive storage for bigger files) for creators who drive more views.” The comment has sparked concern from small creators in the replies who say it puts them at a disadvantage competing with others who have larger platforms. Meta has previously said it uses “different encoding configurations to process videos based on their popularity” as part of how it manages its computing resources.
The performance system “works at an aggregate level,” Mosseri said, “not an individual viewer level… It’s not a binary theshhold [sic], but rather a sliding scale.” In response to one user who questioned its fairness for smaller creators, Mosseri said the quality shift “doesn’t seem to matter much” in practice as it “isn’t huge” and viewers appear to care more about video content over quality. “Quality seems to be much more important to the original creator, who is more likely to delete the video if it looks poor, than to their viewers,” he said. Understandably, not everyone seems convinced.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/mosseri-confirms-instagram-reduces-video-quality-for-posts-that-arent-raking-in-views-233033536.html?src=rss
Blumhouse wasn’t going to publish a game in 2024. The studio, one of the leading names in horror films, announced in February 2023 that it was launching a video game publishing business and executives were scouting projects from independent teams with budgets under $10 million. The goal of Blumhouse Games was to support a few rad horror titles per year, with a tentative plan to start publishing them in 2025.
But then, in September 2023, the Blumhouse folks stumbled across Fear the Spotlight. It was a moody, voxelized horror game about two friends sneaking around their haunted high school and communing with the ghosts of students that died in a fire in the ’90s. Spooky shenanigans and mysterious puzzles ensued, all presented in third-person and with a gritty PS One aesthetic. Fear the Spotlight was a PC game made by Crista Castro and Bryan Singh of Cozy Game Pals, a husband-and-wife team with impressive professional credentials: Castro was an art director at Nickelodeon and the art lead on the Animaniacs reboot, and Singh was a programmer who worked on The Last of Us and Uncharted series and Journey. They left their corporate jobs and founded Cozy Game Pals during the pandemic, and Fear the Spotlight was their first major project together.
Cozy Game Pals
Fear the Spotlight didn’t have a particularly buzzy debut, but a few weeks after it hit Steam, Blumhouse Games president Zach Wood and creative lead Louise Blain happened to spot it on Twitter. Castro told Engadget how it went down:
“Zach found it, and he and Louise Blain sat down and played it together and were like, oh my gosh, this is exactly the kind of game that we want to be publishing, this is really great. Let's reach out to them and see, do they need any help? Is there something here that we can work together on?”
“Meanwhile, yes, we did need help,” Singh added, laughing. “We had released it, but we had no idea how to get people to know about it. The people that were finding it were saying very positive things, and we're like, OK, that's great, but now what do we do? We know how to make things, but we don't know anything else about marketing.”
Blumhouse signed Cozy Game Pals and asked how they could help improve Fear the Spotlight. At first, Castro and Singh suggested porting it to consoles and adding additional languages, basic things to get the existing game in front of more players.
“They were excited about the idea, but then they also offered more time,” Singh said. “They asked, what would you do if you had an extra year to work on it?”
The opportunity to expand Fear the Spotlight caught Castro and Singh by surprise. It also scared them, at first.
Cozy Game Pals
“We had never really considered a significant addition to the game before that,” Singh said. “And we also had what we thought was a finished game that we were really proud of. So it was really, really difficult to figure out how to add to a thing that we felt was finished; we didn't want to ruin it. Part of it is our taste and our work, but also part of it feels like black magic. Like, if we mess with it, is it going to come out in a way that we're proud of?”
Castro and Singh took the chance. On October 26, 2023, about one month after Fear the Spotlight’s debut, they removed it from Steam with the promise that they’d add new gameplay, console versions and localization features. They didn’t mention Blumhouse at the time. Behind the scenes, Blumhouse Games gave Cozy Game Pals one year to create the definitive version of Fear the Spotlight, with no creative restrictions.
The revamped version of Fear the Spotlight came out on Steam, PS4, PS5, Switch and Xbox Series X/S on October 22, 2024, developed by Cozy Game Pals and published by Blumhouse Games. It’s the first game in Blumhouse’s publishing roster, which includes future titles from EYES OUT, Half Mermaid, Perfect Garbage, Playmestudio and Vermila Studios.
Cozy Game Pals used the year of extra development time well. Rather than messing with the black magic of the original, Castro and Singh added an entirely new segment, doubling the game’s run time and expanding on their initial ideas in sophisticated, extra-horrific ways. Fear the Spotlight, by the way, is an excellent horror experience. It has low-poly environments, low-res textures and grainy CRT effects, but its animations are smooth and the camera uses friendly third-person controls, nailing the nostalgia without compromising modern conveniences. The story revolves around two teenage friends, Vivian and Amy, and takes them on individual but connected journeys through twisted, spirit-infested versions of reality. Their dialogue and personalities feel authentic, and their emotions are incredibly relatable, whether in the face of unspeakable horrors or just when talking to a crush. It has a few good jump scares, too.
Cozy Game Pals
The first half of Fear the Spotlight is packed with satisfying puzzles, spooky phantoms and tense hide-and-seek mechanics. The second half, created after Blumhouse’s intervention, adds layers of emotional depth and introduces a truly terrifying foe. Vivian is the main playable character in the original version and Amy's story takes center stage in the expanded content.
“The first Vivian story was really us figuring out how to make this game,” Castro said. “But then by the time we were making Amy's, we had so many lessons learned. I feel like the monster is better, the puzzles are better, the storytelling is more streamlined. The second half wraps it up really nicely.”
On top of handling the art, Castro was the main writer on Fear the Spotlight, while Singh handled programming. Castro was the diehard horror fan in the relationship — he was a Resident Evil boy, she was a Silent Hill girl (read to the theme of Avril Lavigne’s Sk8er Boi) — and together, they wanted to capture the fun of being scared in video game form. Fear the Spotlight draws from their personal lives and memories of high school, when every emotion felt new, extreme and sometimes silly. From this lens, Fear the Spotlight also deftly handles serious topics like loss, death, prejudice and love.
“It's just such an impactful time in our, in most people's lives,” Castro said. “I grew up playing these games in the ’90s or in the early 2000s, like Silent Hill one and two and three. So thinking back to high school and how I felt, writing the story was just like, I can only write from my own personal experience. Having a crush and feeling awkward, and when you actually bond with someone, how special that is.”
Singh continued the thread, saying, “I think the home-life stuff — we bond over a lot of our shared experience, which is also represented in the game. Families are complicated, family structures. Having a father that's not present in your life, or the loss of a very close family member, it just changes you and affects you. Those are just pulled from our lives.”
Castro and Singh lovingly described Blumhouse Games as a scrappy team of horror fans, with fewer than 10 people supporting a handful of projects at once, and doing so while trying to prove themselves in a new market. On top of handling trailers and press for Fear the Spotlight’s re-release, the Blumhouse crew helped Cozy Game Pals find a contractor to do a logo and key art, a porting company to help get the game on consoles, and a localization team. More than any of that, though, Castro and Singh said the people at Blumhouse Games seem to truly enjoy the projects they’ve signed.
“They've just been the ideal partner, incredibly supportive,” Castro said. “They really let us decide everything for our game, the game is completely our vision. We would show them prototypes and level designs and of course, they had feedback and thoughts, but yeah — ”
“They know our game really well,” Singh said. “They're genuine fans of the original release. They know our game intimately and can talk to us about our ideas from a very informed perspective.”
Castro concluded, “They come from it from a support perspective. Like, how can we help you guys create your vision that you care about, that you're happy with. It's been amazing.”
Fear the Spotlight is available now for $20 on Steam, PS4, PS5, Switch and Xbox Series X/S.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/how-fear-the-spotlight-became-blumhouses-first-video-game-140044877.html?src=rss
There’s time for one more Armageddon for Amazon’s Good Omens but not much. Amazon Prime Video announced that Good Omens would return for one final season last year, but TVLine reports it’s only going to have one 90-minute episode that will begin filming in Scotland soon.
Amazon originally confirmed that author Neil Gaiman, who co-wrote the book upon which Good Omens is based with Discworldcreator Terry Pratchett, will continue through the final season as the show’s executive producer, writer and showrunner. TVLine says Gaiman “contributed to the episode’s writing,” but “he will not work on the production.”
Gaiman has stepped out of the spotlight and away from several projects based on his works since his sexual assault allegations surfaced in July. The Tortoise Media podcast Master: The Allegations Against Neil Gaiman outlined the author’s alleged behavior with accounts from four women, one of whom signed a non-disclosure agreement. A fifth woman later stepped forward with similar accusations on the podcast. Gaiman denied the allegations and said he was “disturbed” by them, according to Rolling Stone.
The allegations paused pre-production for Good Omens’ third season. Gaiman also offered to step away from the show in September, according to Deadline.
Good Omens stars Michael Sheen as the angelic, fussy angel Aziraphale and David Tennant as the free-wheeling demon Crowley who formed an unlikely alliance to prevent the coming of the Antichrist and the fall of humankind. The dramatic comedy started as a limited series on Amazon’s streaming network in 2019 but the show’s popularity prompted a second season in 2020 with an expanded cast including Jon Hamm as the archangel Gabriel.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/good-omens-final-season-will-have-only-one-episode-212956591.html?src=rss
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Warcraft gaming universe but there’s not going to be a BlizzCon gathering to celebrate it. So Blizzard is doing the next-best thing by holding a live streaming event.
Blizzard announced that its special Warcraft 30th Anniversary Direct stream will start at 1PM ET on Wednesday, November 13. The broadcast will run on Blizzard’s official streaming channels for Twitch, YouTube and TikTok.
There aren’t many details available about what Warcraft fans can expect to see during the livestream except for a special concert celebrating World of Warcraft’s 20th anniversary. Following the stream, Blizzard will broadcast a live concert called World of Warcraft: 20 Years of Music from Switzerland. The 21st Century Orchestra and the choirs Tales of Fantasy, Ardito and the Madrijazz Gospel will perform selected songs from the MMORPG’s iconic soundtrack.
Activision Blizzard announced back in April that it wouldn’t be holding a BlizzCon gathering this year despite WoW’s momentous milestone. Maybe that’s because things have been a little rocky for the game company in the past few years. Microsoft included Activision Blizzard in its round of 1,900 layoffs alongside ZeniMax at the beginning of the year, and in the months after the studio formed the largest wall-to-wall union in the industry.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/blizzard-announces-warcraft-30th-anniversary-stream-next-month-210021972.html?src=rss
After a lengthy break due in part to last year's Hollywood strikes, the hit Apple TV+ sci-fi/thriller series Severance is returning for its second season on January 17. The streaming service has released a teaser trailer that doesn't give much away, but has just enough in the way of intrigue and confusion to keep fans on their toes.
(Light spoilers for season one are ahead.)
Severance, you may recall, focuses on a group of people who undertook a brain procedure to entirely separate their work and non-work memories. Four workers at Lumon Industries (with their office selves known as "innies") eventually carry out an escape plan of sorts. They find a way to blur the lines between the two sets of memories, with three of them learning some world-shattering revelations about their "outie" lives in the first season finale.
Apple says that, in the second season, "Mark and his friends learn the dire consequences of trifling with the severance barrier, leading them further down a path of woe." The teaser shows a panicked Mark S. (Adam Scott) back at Lumon Industries, running through the building's oppressive corridors. In similar fashion to the previous teaser, sound bites from the first season are included alongside some eyebrow-raising visuals, including a troubling watermelon version of Irving's (John Turturro) head.
Mark halts in his tracks when he reaches an office area and encounters three new co-workers instead of his regular cohorts. A moment later, supervisor Milchick (Tramell Tillman) arrives to welcome the formerly displaced worker back while carrying a bunch of balloons with Mark’s face on them. You might think of it as the planet's most terrifying return-to-work policy being enacted.
The teaser works well as a first proper look at the new season. While the first season’s excellent finale gave the innies and the audience some much-needed and truly shocking answers, the clip raises some major new questions. It’s likely that we’ll need to endure plenty of tension in the 10-episode second season before getting more clarity as to what’s going on at this bizarro workplace.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/severance-season-two-teaser-trailer-shows-the-worlds-worst-return-to-office-policy-in-action-142930296.html?src=rss