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Headlines In Horror: Batman 2 Villains! Doom 4 Rocks! Saw & Pac-Man Collide! Resident Evil 6 At E3?
This has been a heavy week for horror fanatics with several amazing and even startling new headlines regarding some of our favorite franchises popping up every week. Of course, for those of you who bought Alan Wake, you probably haven’t noticed any of these headlines, so I’m here to give your mind an intellectual massage. What does that mean? I’m not entirely sure, but it sounds sort of gross. But you know what? I like gross, so let me get my fingers in there so I can better soothe your horror-living self.
The best thing about the last handful of weeks is the news has been varied; we’ve had some big headlines come out of the Resident Evil camp, but if you’re not into that than maybe you’ll enjoy the Dead Space 2 news? Or perhaps some Doom 4, Left 4 Dead 2, Silent Hill 6 (not real title), F.3.A.R., or Arkham Asylum 2 news will satiate your appetite? Read on to get caught up.
So Dead Space 2 was unveiled fairly recently, gifting us with an ink-blotty new trailer for the game that, while not necessarily as unsettling as the teaser for the original, can give us some details on the game before they’re unveiled officially.
One of the things you’ll notice are the Necromorphs that show their ugly faces in the trailer, and two of them might be new additions to the franchise. The first is probably the Puker Necromorph that was unveiled a few months ago, but the second is anyone’s guess. All I know is that the thing is BUTT ugly. But hey, beauty’s in the eye of the beholder, right? Don’t take my word for it, check the duo out below.
In other Dead Space 2 news, it looks like we won’t be seeing the game anytime soon, or at least not until next year. According to an EA release schedule the game is planned for a Q4 fiscal 2011 release, which means we won’t be playing the game until sometime between January-March 2011. Also, this time around Dead Space 2 will arrive on the PC and possibly handheld devices as well, so that’s exciting.
It’s entirely possible. We’ve already been told we will have to wait many years until the next installment in Capcom’s big franchise, but they recently said they’ll be revealing a sequel to one of their established franchises, and this time development of the title will be handled by a Western developer. The two contenders for this sequel bomb? Resident Evil 6 and Devil May Cry 5. There’s a very good chance it could end up being the latter, since it’s already been rumored that the game is being developed by Ninja Theory (a Western developer), and enough time has passed to warrant the announcement of a sequel to the series.
Honestly, though I love the idea of hearing something about RE6 I’m hoping it’s Devil May Cry because the thought of Resident Evil becoming even more action packed really upsets the stomach. What about you? Is your money on Resident Evil? Or Devil May Cry?
While on the subject of id’s upcoming titles at a recent Bethesda event, id Software’s Creative Director Tim Willits said “It’s gonna be cool. It’s gonna be awesome.” So there you go. Doom 4 will be awesome. If you had any worries regarding the quality of the title, let that small confirmation soothe your worries away.
Since there’s a chance his opinion might be a little bias, worry not, as we’ll have a better idea of just how awesome the game is when it’s unveiled at QuakeCon this August. But until then we’ll just have to take Tom’s word for it.
According to comments and tweets from two of the game’s voice actors’ a couple of the villains in the next Batman title have been unveiled, including the frosty Mister Freeze and Talia al Ghul. I’m familiar with the former, and from the name of the latter I’m guessing she’s the daughter of Ra al Ghul.
It’s hard to get excited about a villain I’ve never heard of (Talia) so I think I’ll get mildly enthusiastic about the announcement of Mister Freeze so I can save the majority of my energy that will need to be released once they confirm the Scarecrow’s reappearance. That guy rocked my socks. Can any Batman aficionados out there give me a reason to get excited about Talia?
Remember that abandoned pool hall in The Passing? Well, if you look close enough there’s some interesting writing scribbled on the wall by Frank West, Dead Rising’s hero.
But that’s not all, oh no sir, as it seems the shopkeeper in Popcap’s rather excellent tower defense game Plants vs. Zombies also made his mark while strolling through the chapter.
See what I did there? Foggy? We know the next chapter Konami’s survival horror series is in the possibly capable hands of the Czech studio Vatra Games, but the big new headline is a little more unsettling, and not in that good survival horror way. It looks as if the next Silent Hill will be a first person shooter. Now, I’m not saying FPS games can’t be scary, Condemned has brought me close to peeing myself on more than one occasion, but I’m having trouble picturing a scary Silent Hill shooter.
Giving players more combat abilities in Homecoming kept the game from ever being scary or even a little challenging, and that’s bad news for a franchise that has prided itself for its chilling atmosphere and excessive toughness. Hopefully, Vatra will prove me wrong and give us the Silent Hill experience we’ve all been aching for since the third game, but I’ll admit I’m more than a little worried.
In under a week Alan Wake’s first downloadable episode (free for those who purchased the game new, just use your download token that came with the game) entitled ‘The Signal’ will become available on July 28th. Not only will it give you a reason to return to the game (assuming you’re mighty quick gamer and have already beaten it), it will also answer some of the questions left at the end of “season one”.
The second downloadable episode is called ‘The Writer’, and will have our protagonist fighting through some post-traumatic stress issues after having survived all the events in the game. This episode doesn’t yet have a release date, other than the mysterious “coming soon.”
Two things I never could’ve predicted coming together was the retro Pac-Man series and the torture-porn Saw franchise. Does it work? Well, actually, it does.
Sam Neill, the New Zealand actor best known for his role in 1993’s Jurassic Park, has passed away this week at 78 years old. In a statement shared on Neill’s Instagram page this morning, the actor’s family said that his passing was “sudden and unexpected.”
Neill had been diagnosed with a rare blood cancer in 2022, but stated the following year that he was in remission. The family notes that he “remained cancer free” at the time of his passing.
The family statement reads, “It is with immense sadness that the whānau of Sam Neill share the news of his passing on Monday 13th July, in Sydney Australia. Sam was surrounded by family and passed with the dignity that has characterised his whole life. The loss was sudden and unexpected but blessed by the fact that Sam remained cancer free.
“They would like to express their deepest gratitude to the staff at St Vincent’s Private Hospital for their incredible care. More details will be shared later, but for now, on behalf of the family, we ask that you respect their privacy as they navigate this immeasurable loss.”
In addition to his iconic role as Dr. Alan Grant in the original Jurassic Park and the sequels Jurassic Park III and Jurassic World: Dominion, Sam Neill left an indelible mark on the horror genre with memorable roles in Andrzej Żuławski’s Possession, The Omen: The Final Conflict, John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness, and sci-fi horror favorite Event Horizon.
Sam Neill’s vast resume in film and television began in the early 1970s and also includes the films Sleeping Dogs, Enigma, The Good Wife, A Cry in the Dark, Dead Calm, The Hunt for Red October, Memoirs of an Invisible Man, Hostage, The Jungle Book, Snow White: A Tale of Terror, The Horse Whisperer, Bicentennial Man, Daybreakers, Escape Plan, and Thor: Ragnarok.
Sam Neill is survived by his four children and eight grandchildren.
Steven Spielberg said in a statement to Variety, “I owe a debt of gratitude to Roger Donaldson, Gilliam Armstrong, Graham Baker and Phillip Noyce for casting Sam Neill in the roles in which he was so brilliant that brought him to my attention and led to his playing Dr. Alan Grant in Jurassic Park. Sam was exceptionally collaborative. It was a stretch for him to play a character who acted as though children were messy and smelly because this was the opposite of the loving father he was to his children. I adored making all the Jurassic movies with him.”
Spielberg adds, “Along with Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, we will always have our Jurassic family and Sam will never be forgotten by us or his many millions of fans around the world.”
Sam Neill in ‘Event Horizon’
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