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‘Zombi’ is Getting a Retail Release in January
When ZombiU shed its Wii U exclusivity and the awkwardly tacked-on vowel that identified it as such so it could be remastered for PC, PS4 and Xbox One as Zombi, I was like a ghoul at an all-you-can-eat brain buffet. It had been on the short list of Wii U exclusives that I’ve wanted to play for three years — alongside Bayonetta 2 and the still-fresh Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water — so it felt good being able to scratch it off that list.
It didn’t take long for that warm feeling to be replaced by frustration.
Zombi isn’t a remaster, it’s a port. I hoped it would be comparable to what Resident Evil HD was to the Resident Evil GameCube remake, but what we got was more like Resident Evil 4 for Xbox 360 vs. Resident Evil 4 for PC. In other words, it was moderately disappointing.
It’s still a lovely game crammed with smart ideas that go a long way in separating it from the horde of zombie games that continues to grow each month, and despite a disappointing “next-gen” debut, it may still have some life left yet behind those cold, dead eyes.
This modicum of hope comes from the recent announcement that Zombi will be getting a retail release on January 21 in Europe. It doesn’t sound like much, but one could see this as a sign that Ubisoft is testing the game’s sequel potential by watching how it performs as a retail product. And if that doesn’t happen, we may still get something out of it should it perform well enough to warrant retail releases in other territories, such as ‘MERICA.
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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