Julius

Thanks for the heads-up! Spotted it the other day when trying to figure out if I'd applied for everything (I had, but the email confirmation for the lottery for some took a while to come through), got to imagine that's the lottery panel with best odds to get into because I think its addition will have flown under the radar for some. I'm surprised it wasn't put down as a lottery panel originally, to be honest, so I'm glad it has been – I'm kind of shocked Andor hasn't got the same treatment too, to be honest. Out of the lottery panels I think Kenobi is slap bang in the middle for me in terms of priority (behind Lucasfilm and Ashoka, ahead of Bad Batch and Sequel Villains), so I'm curious to see how it all plays out! Now just nervously waiting for the passes to arrive (any day now hopefully, I've seen others start to get theirs over the last week!), starting to plan what I need to take, and waiting for the Store/Funko Pop reservations drop and hopefully getting some luck with those (I'm not a Funko guy but my sister's boyfriend is, so hopefully I can nab him one of the exclusives?). Going to be a manic couple of weeks – excited but very nervous!

I think it must've been Bloodlines rather than the Aftermath Trilogy then, but the galactic capital actually rotates between member worlds (we don't know exactly how long for, but I feel like it's fair to assume that there have been a few rotations by the time TFA comes around). At this point I think Chandrila is the galactic capital (which I'm sure we'll see at some point?), but I feel Coruscant still holds a lot of weight just in terms of the number of politicians who would surely still there, things like the Tribunal, the number of Imperials and facilities located there, etc. But I do totally agree, and I'm sure we'll get more on Hosnian Prime at some point...I'm just not sure when that will be. Maybe when we start to hit post-sequels stuff we could see flashbacks/prologues taking place on Hosnian Prime? The whole Disarmament Act probably didn't help them in the slightest. Silly politicians But yeah, agree, though I think what the shows have more space to do than the films ever will is just show the grey areas, and that no one side is ever going to be right or perfect. Better than the Nazi-like Empire? Yeah, probably. But there are monsters and malicious motives on every side of a conflict, and it's always nice to see that explored more! The only reason I hesitate to think that it's Thrawn is that I feel they might have hinted a bit more definitively that it was him through the use of Defenders over Interceptors, so I'd probably lean towards it being another part of the Imperial Remnant...for now. Also just because Thrawn doesn't really have a reason to go after Bo in such a personal manner as destroying her home (also would seem a bit out of character for him), whereas I feel the Remnant kind of owe her some payback after everything that happened with Gideon. Do find it funny that it took them this long considering Mando found her so easily, so she's probably somewhere in the Galactic Pages Would love to be wrong and have it be Thrawn though, and even if this wasn't him, I wouldn't be surprised if we see him by the end of the season. More than any other show in recent memory Mando reeeeeeeeally stresses a plot point and then gets right to it within the space of an episode or two, leaving us twiddling our thumbs over what the rest of the season might be about, so I don't think it's a crazy idea to have things escalate to the point of his return by the end of this season at all! And also yeah the dogfight was spectacular, feel like they've kind of been killing is this season with the amount and quality of them we're getting. Keep it coming! Oh yeah, exactly. It's a trade-off that they think is worth it, and I think at least one of the shows has to carry the mantle as spearheading the tech, and I do think it has to be Mando, because they continue to want to push the tech into the mainstream. For me I think it's a trade-off that's fine because it keeps the shows coming at a steady clip, and I'll take that over perfection. Similar to what I'd like to see with Rogue One and Tarkin, though, I do kind of wish they'd be open to cleaning things up after the fact – I only learned recently that it's something that happens with some major anime Blu-ray releases where they clearly had to rush to meet a deadline, but it just helps the content hold up that much better. Especially seeing as Disney seem to have given up on physical releases for TV shows for some dastardly reason (still no complete box set for Rebels, really?) I'd love if they would just continue to brush things up. Talking about The Volume, what I do find a bit funny is that The Batman probably has the best use of the tech because I had absolutely no idea it was used until well after seeing that film! And yeah, I also think Mando uses it really well, a lot of the time by having smaller spaces but then just filling them to the brim with things to look around at that makes it feel like less of a set. Kenobi I think felt so empty by contrast because, well, the environments in The Volume often were so empty – be it a cave, a small forested area, or an Imperial office or ISD bridge. It made sense that these places were empty, but it also just allows your eye to drift too much from details to the vague edges of the screen because there's not all that much going on.

@Ronnie regarding that planet... Agree with a lot of what you say though – not a flawless episode in that it's a little clunky at times and the CGI isn't always there. Unfortunately I think that's just down to the tight schedules they work to these days normally meaning these projects have less time in post-, something I was starting to make peace with...until Andor showed that some projects do get the time and budget to go above and beyond the bar that Mando has set in that regard. A bit ironic I think that driving The Volume forwards has almost, at times, felt a bit limiting in achieving their creative vision.

Kirby's Dream Land 2 and Burger time Deluxe have been added to the Game Boy catalogue:

Side Pocket and Devious have been added to the Super SNES and NES catalogues, respectively!

Earlier this evening I watched Mando S3 E3... Fantastic episode, again. Really made the decision to premiere with only one episode a little confounding with how much stronger I feel the second and third episodes have been. And so the wait begins for next week's episode!

I'm 100% with @Josh64 on this one, I also find the box office fascinating and I think it's a huge shame that something similar isn't reported in large part for games (even Nintendo "only" provide units sold), as it completely skews the perspective of what's considered a success and what isn't for a game by the audience, which is naturally going to be different for each and every game. I mean, increased revenue streams don't necessarily mean more profit if the costs involved in producing (and these days also maintaining) the game have also increased alongside that. I'm sure many developers would just as well argue the opposite (that MTXs and DLC are a necessity in making their game a success), especially considering that a good chunk of the successful F2P games that live and die on the MTX hill are coming from huge publishers to begin with, and who have shareholders to report to. Right, but we've also seen many, many more games flop with a F2P model than we've seen succeed, and of the minority of F2P games that have seen success, there are very few that I would say are doing so without some sort of pre-existing built-in install base (most successful F2P games I feel have thrived off the back of the name of the AAA developer or franchise it is spun off from). Heck, even Fortnite needed a favour from PUBG in that it was paid-for early access when it launched with Save the World and, because of the type of game it was initially set up to be and because of who it was developed by, transitioned stupidly fast after seeing the success of PUBG into also having a Battle Royale mode which went F2P and came with a slew of MTXs. As for the topic at hand, yeah I think it's just Nintendo potentially getting ready to diversify their prices ahead of the launch of the Switch's successor. Now whether or not this means we see games come in at the other end, like shorter titles selling for $30, remains to be seen, but I think Tears of the Kingdom is the obvious game to start to set the bar with when it comes to a price hike up to $70, because I think that's unlikely to dissuade too many from picking it up based on the commercial and critical success of Breath of the Wild. Won't be shocked at all if Prime 4 ends up in a similar situation, or the next Mario, but I don't expect it to be the norm... ...yet.

Just finished Andor, and yep, it just got better and better. Also, I'm sure it's totally a coincidence - there are only so many musical notes and so many ways to rearrange and resolve them - but I knew the main melody of the Andor theme sounded familiar (to the point that I hummed along and knew where it was going after hearing it the first time): it's a dead ringer for the Final Fantasy IV Main Theme! (maybe not the best example, there's a moment on Aldhani with a tracking shot of a speeder bike where it sounds much closer but I haven't been able to pinpoint it in the OST just yet) Anyways, yeah, in case it wasn't obvious enough after salvaging what he could of Rogue One, Tony Gilroy and their team are absolutely the real deal when it comes to Star Wars. Damn near perfect first season of Andor as far as I'm concerned. Second season will have a lot to live up to, and I hope doesn't thread the needle through to the story of Rogue One too closely (to avoid the potential of cameos and Easter eggs galore). Right, what to watch next in preparation for Celebration...probably Visions and Tales of the Jedi?

Just finished Episode 6 of Andor, so here are some scattered thoughts from the first half of S1: Look, I love a lot of what we've got with Mando, but if Andor continues on this trajectory, it's hard to imagine it not being my favourite live-action Star Wars show to date. I have no idea where it's going to go, but I just binged five episodes back-to-back, which I sometimes struggle to do even with shows I love (perhaps especially so). It feels like it's deep diving in on certain aspects of Star Wars we simply haven't seen enough of so far, and pulling it off with aplomb. Can't wait to see how it all plays out!

I rewatched it last summer and flew through it in a week and a half – safe to say it's just as good the fourth time around as it is the first! One of only five complete shows (so not individual parts/seasons) I've scored a 10 according to my MAL account (for anyone curious, the other four are Steins;Gate, Hunter x Hunter, Cowboy Bebop and Monster), and yeah, even amongst those it stands out. It's one hell of a ride, enjoy it drah– Oh haha, yep you might be in trouble

Slew of updates for EZA's Patreon: Am I the only one who gets nervous every time we get an update from them these days?

Amiibo also available at GAME for £14.99, looks like it's out of stock elsewhere:

Friendly reminder that the Direct and final trailer are going live tonight: You know, in case you understandably completely forgot about it happening in the two weeks since it was initially announced

@Ronnie regarding your questions, based on my own knowledge and a bit of digging around... But yeah, those are my 2 AM ramblings, we'll see if they still make sense when I wake up and read it all back in the morning, but hopefully some of my points have come across and I've maybe taken a very roundabout way of trying to answer those questions

A friendly reminder that Fusion lands on the service today! Urgh, I really want to get back to a Metroid adventure, it's been a minute since I played and loved Zero Mission...

Just finished E2 S3 of Mando... Great episode (again), maybe a bit stronger than last week's for me just considering how much I feel the story progressed this week compared to last. Roll on next Wednesday I guess!

Yeah, late on a Sunday evening, perfect to doze off to kind of surprised they gave Bethesda a 10 minute spotlight for the trailer/delay/Direct announcement, but hey, fair enough! Probably the smart move Always been the case for me that Xbox just needs to work on their curation, let alone their actual output (which has been...sparse, to put it kindly). It's all well and good buying up every other studio going, but if you don't space out their releases and end up with first-party droughts, and don't fill those droughts with must-play third-party AAA titles (with exclusivity, if you can get it)? I just can't personally find the desire to pick up a machine mainly for a legacy catalogue and indies, regardless of their quality, I need to be confident about what's coming. Right now I do still think Xbox are looked at, perhaps a bit unfairly, as still just being Halo/Forza/Gears (I'd argue +indies now too?) by the industry at large. Maybe Starfield is the start of that narrative changing, but at the same time, Bethesda have had some misses over the last few years and so the pressure is on, because you know that game is going to be coming in hot and a potential mess in need of fixing. Comparison is the thief of joy, as always, but I look at PlayStation and know that on the first-party front I can at least expect Spider-Man 2 by the end of this year, and I get Final Fantasy XVI in the next few months and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth within the next 12? And then I look at Nintendo. Does my Switch gather more dust than I ever thought it would? Honestly, yeah. But will I be buying whatever the Switch successor is on Day 1, knowing full well that Nintendo is going to crank out some must-play titles for it? Hell yes I will. I feel like Xbox promised a lot back in 2020 leading up to the launch of the Series X|S, and some 2½ years removed from it's launch, I think it's fair to say that they've struggled to live up to their promises.

See, I agree, in that I like the anticipation and build-up to getting more films...yet at the same time, I know there'll be plenty of reasons for delays/cancellations, but it definitely makes Lucasfilm look somewhat incompetent that so many films and creative partnerships have been announced and then shelves. To be clear, I don't think it's anything to worry about (especially in an age when Star Wars is somewhat thriving on a streaming platform, and even more so when there's so much else vying for our attention!), but if you told me 10 (and a bit) years when Disney picked up Lucasfilm that they'd only release 5 films in an annual flurry before going cold again, 13 year me would've laughed at the irony of Star Wars films coming back and then going quietly back into the night so soon even more so when only one of those five projects had a smooth production to boot! Would've made a great set of Making Of books (and maybe a 'How Not To Make' for the cancelled projects), but yeah, Disney chose to save face instead and not deliver the goods on that front Knew you'd be gutted about Jenkins' film, to be honest that being the only one we really knew anything solid about makes it hurt a fair bit, and like you said, it's been slim pickings on the starfighter dogfight front for a while now. Here's hoping someone else picks it up down the line in some form or another! They added a few panels after the initial tweet (the ROTJ one and the Andor ones weren't up initially), so here's hoping! And yeah same for me for the Lucasfilm ones! Yeah, spent this morning realising it's about four weeks away and so I've outlined my plans for what I'm watching and listening to over the course of the next month, which will be interesting! And I'll try my best, but if it's anything like my Bloodborne updates... ehhhhhhhh, could take a minute I'll need to get my friend who's tagging along to bring any of his spare phones too by the sound of things! And yeah, will definitely need to keep my eyes peeled for tickets to anything I don't manage to get into. Trying to keep my expectations in check, so worse comes to worse it's just a weekend surrounded by Star Wars fans, which will be fun because I've not been in a huge crowd consistently since COVID kicked off a few years ago, much less a Star Wars one! (closest I've got to that is probably one of the midnight releases, but everyone tended to keep to themselves then) Honestly, a bit surprised Domhnall Gleeson isn't attending. I can get it in Adam Driver's case - he just seems to hate attention, and I'd be the same away too - but Gleeson has attended a fair bit before in press junkets and the like before, and in terms of time on-screen, he's probably what, the antagonist with the second most minutes drummed up in the sequels behind Kylo? Could just be busy ofc, but very curious love that Andy Serkis will finally get to see some love though! Yeah, Kristin was excellent last year I thought! But like you say, the chemistry Andi and Carboni have built up over the years, honestly it's just unmatched

Amiibo is available from ShopTo and TheGameCollection for £10 less than it is on Amazon at the moment – I'd guess that the Amazon price is set to be updated, but might be worth putting your name down elsewhere in the meantime to save a bit! Nintendo UK have also announced their pre-order bonuses, as well as additional items to bundle with the game:

Think this is our first Not-E3 show to get a date? The Starfield Direct will be taking place Sunday 11th June following the game's delay to September:

Delayed to September 6th 2023, with a Starfield Direct on June 11th 2023 for Xbox's and Bethesda's Not-E3: This thing has been delayed a couple of times and it's still probably going to come in hot. Let's just hope it's more a case of this: Than this:

Babe wake up, the new PS5 system software update just dropped

Hoo boy, looks like Kevin Feige's and Patty Jenkins' films have been shelved: Earliest we have a Star Wars film slot scheduled in for right now is 2025, and unless that's Taika's film, I have my doubts we'll actually get it. That would be nearly six years without a new Star Wars film releasing after The Rise of Skywalker, which...yikes. Shame because the pieces of the puzzle seem to have been finally slotting into place the last few years for shows on Disney+, but hey, we also don't know too much about most of these projects (well, apart from Jenkins', and I'm sure that one will sting for a while), so it's not hard to let go. At this rate, I'm starting to think it's more likely we get a feature-length "episode" to cap off the storylines of Mando et al (akin to Siege of Mandalore, even if that got cut up into pieces) before we get to the next Star Wars film. If it's anything like previous years, I think these will be the major ones organised by LFL, but I'm sure the schedule will fill up nicely in the next few weeks – this should just be the first batch, because like you say, it's definitely light on the ground in spots. A gaming panel would be neat, especially with E3 quickly going the way of the dodo and this being the last year of EA's exclusivity deal. Given that Survivor got delayed from mid-March to the end of April, I can't help but wonder if they might stick some kiosks up for people to demo the game? As for music, I'm really crossing my fingers hard for a David W. Collins panel unwrapping a bit of one of the OSTs – maybe going back to finish Rogue One, which he never got to do as Oxygen stopped before they could round it off? Or heck, would love to hear his thoughts on TLJ's or TROS's OSTs, even if I don't think he's the biggest fan of the direction they took, there's a *lot* to unwrap in those soundtracks. Despite it being finished for years, Star Wars Oxygen is by far and away my favourite Star Wars podcast that I've listened to, so yeah, here's hoping! Yeah, put me down for a bit of everything too Obviously want to get into the main day opening events: the Studio Showcase (really hope that if we can't they show everything there to the people outside the main stage!), Ahsoka, and The Bad Batch. Then there's just the short matter of the Clone Wars and ROTJ anniversary panels, Making of Andor (started Ep 1 the other day and loved it!), Concept Artists of ILM, Creature Cantina, Villains of the Sequels (a shame Adam Driver will probably never turn up to one of these again ), VFX of Andor, and a Look Back at Obi-Wan (yeah I wasn't the biggest fan of the show and even less so it's soundtrack, but given that I couldn't justify the kind of absurd prices to get a photo op with Ewan and Hayden, I'd want to attend just to see them in-person ). So, uh, yeah, just like 80% of what they've announced, please and thank you Ah, that's good to know! Keep the tips coming and I'm kind of glad I didn't throw away my old phone now, guess that'll be in the rotation to try to book some spots! EDIT: find it really funny that Witwer isn't attending the animation game night, because he wipes the floor when it comes to Star Wars trivia and just realised in the list of presenters for the Live Stage – no Andi Gutierrez?! Gutting, Andi was always great with Anthony (and yes I miss the Star Wars Show)

Schedule for Celebration is coming through... Hopefully got news on the lottery in the next week or two? Also, I think there was a rumour a few weeks back now about how nothing would be streamed from Celebration this year. While it would suck if that were the case, honestly, considering how it was handled *at the event itself* for some major panels... I don't even know what to hope for at this point just hope that, whatever they decide to do, they communicate it much more clearly this time around. Last year was a mess!

With one episode left, the show has continued to be great...but, Episode 3 aside, I think almost everything else was handled just as well - if not better - in the original game. Still killing it in terms of viewership, unsurprisingly: the show's audience has grown 74% from Episode 1's premiere to the premiere of the most recent episode, Episode 8. I'm sure I'll talk about it more once the show is over, but there's just been weird moments and choices for me in the show throughout which means it doesn't quite hit the heights of the game for me, despite still, by far and away, being the best adaptation of a video game to date. Just weird moments of dialogue shuffled around from one place to another, staying shot-to-shot and line-to-line faithful in some scenes but then making new and original content for others (which has strangely trailed off? Think there were some great uses of this for flashbacks/Day Zero stuff), and some weird musical choices too (we got the credits music for Part I playing at the end of Episode 5 or 6, can't remember which? And a certain climactic moment in the last episode didn't have music which served as a great callback and arc closer in the game). There have also just been moments where they spell things out for you in a way that they don't in the games, and my eyes roll into the back of my skull – are writers really that nervous about subtext in their scenes these days? The biggest kicker for me - and the most puzzling - is just how little we've seen of the Infected throughout the show; it's felt less survival horror and more, well, survivor with zombies occasionally thrown in. Super weird choice, because we've only had one or two moments of true tension related to the Infected as a result (the rest has kind of been them going full Hollywood, to an almost distracting degree at times), so yeah, there's that. Can't help but wonder if their budget was capped for some silly reason, because even though I loved Episode 3 and think it was much better than the content we got in the game for that part of the story, it being so different to the game seems to be a result of needing to cut corners and run away from using the Infected. It's really bizarre. They've straight up cut two of the most memorable encounters with the Infected in the entire game! On the flip side, there's been some great acting in this, I think Bella Ramsey has been great as Ellie, occasionally there'll be a line stolen from the game verbatim and I'll just be like "well, Ashley Johnson definitely did that better", but it's only been distracting once or twice (and I think that just comes about as a result of this Ellie feeling weirdly younger at times than she was in the game). It's also just nice that this is already brilliant story continues to show that with time, patience, and the right people spearheading a project, video game stories can be told well in other formats. Oh, and I nearly forgot: I wish people would just give up on shaky cam, I think it was Episode 7 where I suddenly got nauseous and needed to check the bitrate of my stream because the camera was jittering about all over the shop. There's a time and a place for it, and that's not a shot with two people stationary either side of a table just talking to each other I don't personally think I can consider this more than a 9/10 adaptation of a 10/10 game and story, despite one episode still being left, but if nothing else, it was worth it for Episode 3 and to see how it was handled. I can't help but wonder if them adapting Part II could help fix my main issues with it (pacing and structure), whereas their adaptation of Part I has made an already lean and mean story into an even leaner story, and I do think that's come at a cost to the quality of the adaptation.