HBO renews ‘The Last of Us’ for a second season

Get ready for more clickers, quips from Ellie and perhaps a trip to a decaying Seattle: HBO has renewed The Last of Us for a second season. That’s not exactly a surprise, as the adaptation of Naughty Dog’s games is already a huge hit for the network. Some 22 million people have now watched the first episode, five times the number of people who tuned in on the premiere night 12 days ago. The show also saw the largest second-week jump in audience figures of any original HBO drama series.

If you haven’t caught The Last of Us yet and are curious what all the hullabaloo is about, there’s some good news. You can now watch the first episode for free on HBO Max.

The streaming service often offers free tasters of certain shows in the hopes of getting viewers hooked and prompting them to subscribe. The first episode of Game of Thrones spin-off House of the Dragon, another major success for the platform, is free to watch on both HBO Max and YouTube.

For the uninitiated, The Last of Us is based on a PlayStation 3 (and PS4 and PS5) game of the same name. It’s often held up as one of the finest examples of storytelling in video games. It tales the tale of a smuggler who reluctantly escorts a teenage girl across the US after the world has been ravaged by a fungus that turns people into terrifying, mutated creatures.

So far, HBO’s terrific adaptation has largely followed the same story with some smart deviations and changes. Critics have hailed the third episode, which airs this Sunday, as the best installment of the season. It focuses on a side story that’s primarily told through a note players find in the game. 

‘Forza Motorsport’ arrives later this year on Xbox Series X/S, PC and Game Pass

Forza Motorsport, the eighth mainline entry in Turn 10 Studios’ long-running simulation racing series, will arrive later this year, the developer announced during Microsoft and Bethesda’s Developer Direct showcase. The release date constitutes something of a delay, as Microsoft announced last June it would release the game in the spring of this year. Moreover, if you were hoping to play the game on an Xbox One console, you’ll need to turn to the company’s Xbox Game Pass service to do so; Microsoft plans to release Forza Motorsport on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox Game Pass and PC via the Microsoft Store and Steam. 

On Wednesday, Turn 10 promised Forza Motorsport would take full advantage of the latest Xbox and PC hardware to deliver the franchise’s most immersive racing experience yet. The game will feature more than 500 cars for players to collect, including 100 vehicles that are new to the series. To make those cars look their best, Turn 10 used a spectrophotometer to scan the paint jobs of the cars featured in the game. “With this new sourcing technique, our paint models have a more realistic light response across colors, metal flake and gloss levels,” the studio said in a blog post published after the showcase. Each car will now also feature context-aware damage and dirt buildup that Turn 10 says is “authentic and unique” to each vehicle.   

During the showcase, the studio showed off Kyalami Grand Prix Circuit in South Africa, one of the five new racing tracks featured in the game. With the help of photogrammetry and laser-scanned images, Team 10 says the environments in Forza Motorsport feature 10 times more realistic detail than past entries in the series. With the addition of dynamic time of day and weather simulation, Turn 10 says fans can expect no two laps around a track to look or play the same.    

Expect Microsoft to share more details about Forza Motorsport later this year.

‘Hi-Fi Rush’ is an action rhythm game you can play today

Here’s a pleasant surprise from Xbox and Bethesda’s Developer Direct showcase: a full game you can download (almost) right away. The Evil Within studio Tango Gameworks has unveiledHi-Fi Rush, a combo-driven brawler with rhythm game elements. You play Chai, a would-be rockstar who fights a robotics company with the help of the beat. Think Devil May Cry or Bayonetta crossed with a music game, or a very pretty spiritual sequel to Crypt of the NecroDancer. You aren’t forced to play to the beat, but you’re rewarded for staying in sync with high-powered combo moves and finishers.

Not surprisingly, style plays an important role. The game revolves around its anime-inspired cel-shaded look, its non-stop humor and a mix of both licensed and original music. Streamers don’t have to panic about copyright violations — there’s an “alternate audio mode” to keep the soundtrack legal during broadcasts.

The title will be available later today for Xbox Series X/S and Windows PCs (through the Epic Games Store, Microsoft Store and Steam). It’s also available through Game Pass on these platforms. This is a distinct change of pace for Tango, which is better known for dark, moody titles like Ghostwire: Tokyo. You might not mind, though, particularly if you’re looking for something more upbeat.

‘Minecraft Legends’ delivers blocky base-building action on April 18th

Minecraft Legends, the unique action-strategy spin on Microsoft’s block-building franchise, will hit the Xbox, PlayStation 5, Windows and Nintendo Switch on April 18th. Announced last June, the game resembles a modern spin on classic Warcraft strategy: Your goal is to protect your base and destroy your enemy’s. It’ll feature online campaign co-op and competitive multiplayer, as you’d expect. And judging from the most recent trailer, it looks compelling enough to tempt over gamers who could never figure out what to do in the original Minecraft.

‘Poker Face’ is the millennial ‘Columbo’ riff I’ve been waiting for

Poker Face isn’t the sort of show that can be spoiled, but have a warning anyway.I always think there’s been a gulf between production-line TV and its prestige brethren, but that the internet helped demarcate its edges. NCIS was the most-watched drama …

GTA Online PC players hit with game-breaking exploit

A new exploit in the PC version of Grand Theft Auto Online is causing players to lose game progress and in-game currency, with some accounts becoming corrupted or banned. The exploit, a “remote code execution,” was distributed through the developer of the North Online GTA cheat mod.

The exploit can reportedly impact anyone, not just players in the same multiplayer lobby as the attacker, according toBleepingComputer. That means anyone currently online and playing the game on PC is at least theoretically vulnerable to attack. (Console players are unaffected.) Engadget reached out to Rockstar for comment, and we will update this article if we hear back.

The company tweeted this acknowledgment of the fiasco on Monday.

North’s developer removed the abusive elements on January 21st and apologized (their changelog read “bad judgement on my part for adding this public.”) Although GTA Online doesn’t block harmless community-created mods, those distributing cheats or other hacks tilting the game’s competitive balance may face real-world consequences. Rockstar and parent company Take-Two Interactive have previously taken legal action against cheat makers, including the creator of an infinite-money hack who was ordered to pay $150,000 plus attorney fees in 2019.

A workaround for corrupted accounts, which some players have claimed works, is to delete the “Rockstar Games” folder from the Windows Documents folder before reloading the game. However, we recommend avoiding the PC version until Rockstar cleans things up.

‘Tron 3’ may finally be happening with Jared Leto

It’s been over 12 years since Tron: Legacy debuted and those who’ve been longing for a third entry in the classic sci-fi series may have wished for it on a monkey’s paw. Tron: Ares, as the film may be called, could start filming this August with Jared Leto, ol’ Morbius himself, reportedly set to star. Joachim Rønning (Maleficent: Mistress of Evil and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales) is in talks to direct, according to Deadline.

As Variety notes, Leto first signed on back in 2017, but Disney has had a third movie on the backburner since long before then. Tron: Legacy director Joseph Kosinski (who went on to make Top Gun: Maverick) said in an interview that he wrote and storyboarded a sequel “that takes place on the internet with Yahoo and Google and all those sites.” Kosinski said he was close to moving forward with it in 2015 but suggested Disney “pulled the plug” as it had Marvel and Star Wars to focus on.

This time around, Tron: Ares could finally be happening. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that Daft Punk will return to deliver another banger of a score. The iconic duo split up in 2021.

‘Endless Dungeon’ will hit PC, Xbox and PlayStation on May 18th

Sega has at last revealed when folks will be able to snap up Endless Dungeon. The action-packed game is coming to Steam, Epic Games Store, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 on May 18th. A Nintendo Switch version will be available later.

Endless Dungeon, from developer Amplitude Studios, was previously slated for a 2022 debut. It’s a squad-based blend of a tower defense game and a twin-stick shooter. Players are tasked with both protecting a so-called crystal bot and progressing further into a dungeon.

You can team up with three friends or go it alone and control three characters by yourself (you’ll have direct control over one and bark orders at the other two). Endless Dungeon is a roguelite, so you’ll gradually unlock persistent upgrades, weapons and characters.

Alongside the release date announcement, Sega opened up pre-orders for most platforms. You’ll get early access two days before the official launch, as well as some extra goodies, by pre-ordering the “Last Wish” digital edition. A physical Day One edition with a card game and art book is available too. Sega also released a new trailer which shows some more chaotic gameplay:

RED’s V-Raptor cameras can now upload 8K RAW footage directly to Adobe’s Frame.io

Adobe’s Camera to Cloud system, which can upload footage from cameras to the cloud (shockingly enough), is now available without the need for additional hardware. In what the company is calling an industry first, the tech is integrated into RED’s V-Raptor and V-Raptor XL cinema camera systems, which can directly upload 8K RAW footage to Frame.io. The only other thing you’ll really need is a high-bandwidth internet connection.

Swift cloud uploads should let post-production teams start work on the footage quickly, wherever they may be located. Adobe suggests this can save production companies time and money. It previewed the RED Camera to Cloud integration at Adobe Max in October, noting at the time that Fujifilm’s X-H2S mirrorless camera would also be able to upload RAW photos to Frame.io directly.

Adobe says more than 6,000 productions are already using Camera to Cloud, which until the RED integration required another piece of gear. Now, anyone who happens to have a V-Raptor camera can try it out. Direct Camera to Cloud uploads will likely remain the domain of professionals for now (the V-Raptor starts at $24,500), but here’s hoping Adobe brings the integration to other cameras soon.

In addition, Adobe announced at the Sundance Film Festival that a beta version of an AI-powered video editing tool is opening up to more users, but not everyone just yet. The web-based Project Blink pinpoints people, objects, dialogue, actions and sounds in video and makes them all searchable. When the AI finds the relevant section, it creates a new clip. You can copy and paste text and the tool will slot in that part of the video.

Among the new features and upgrades include more audio tags (which flag elements like applause and laughter) and the option for users to upload as many files as they wish thanks to infinite scrolling in the library. Project Blink isn’t the only text-based video editing tool around, however. Other companies, such as Descript and Runway, have developed their own versions.