Alpha – Skip Ahead Registrations Now Closed

Thanks to all the Xbox Insiders who answered the call to join Alpha – Skip Ahead! We’ve now reached our capacity for Alpha – Skip Ahead and will be preventing additional Xbox Insiders from joining until further notice.

For those enrolled in Alpha – Skip Ahead, the first RS5 build will become available within the coming week. Please keep an eye on the Xbox Insider Blog for further details.

Our most sincere thanks to all the Xbox Insiders helping us build the future of Xbox together! Whether you’re currently flighting an RS4 build or gearing up to flight an RS5 build, we value your feedback.

Random: Fortnite Burger Sign Disappears From Map, Winds Up In Real-Life Desert

Ever since the almighty rocket launch event that took place in Fortnite a week ago, strange cracks and rifts have been appearing all over the map, seemingly changing and evolving with each day. This has evolved into specific locations being sucked out of the game through what appears to be some kind time vortex – and things are getting really weird.

One such location is the Durrr Burger mascot which can usually be found on top of a restaurant in Greasy Grove. As you can see in the clip below, the giant sign simply disappeared a couple of days ago, and no one knew exactly why or where it went.

As it turns out, the Durrr Burger seems to have wound up in a real-life desert. Yes, in our real-life world. Twitter user @selashiloni was “scouting shoot locations for an upcoming photoshoot” when he stumbled across a giant burger sitting in the middle of nowhere. Signs are scattered around the site mentioning an “anomaly”, and there’s even what appears to be a Fortnite police car.

So how did it get there? Well, it could be an enormous stunt pulled by some very dedicated fans, or it could be – and we hope this is the case – a next-level bit of marketing from Epic Games. Other locations such as the Tomato Man head at Tomato Town, the motel sign, and the Lonely Lodge sign have also been destroyed by the strange swirling vortex – perhaps we’ll see these pop up in real-life places soon, too?

Do you think this is a genius marketing ploy? Or do you think fans have taken it upon themselves to add a humorous twist to the Season 5 tale? Let us know with a comment below.

Steam Intergalactic Summer Sale Day 13

The Castles of Burgundy is coming to digital in 2019

A digital edition of the excellent The Castles of Burgundy is currently in development and will be out next year. Digidiced, the studio behind mobile board game conversions of such gems as Le Havre: The Inland Port and Agricola, have announced that Castles of Burgundy is one of their next projects.

Berlin-based Digidiced is among the recipients of a new round of Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg funding, and they’ll be getting €70,000 to support the computerized version of Castles of Burgundy, per Gamesmarket. That’s great news for fans of Stefan Feld’s modern strategy classic, as Digidiced has a stellar record when it comes to producing digital versions of eurogames.

While Digidiced hasn’t formally announced which platforms they’re supporting with The Castles of Burgundy, the studio’s games have generally been available on both iOS and Android devices, as well as through the Windows store.

Look for the digital version of The Castles of Burgundy in 2019.

Image credit: Board Game Geek

Arc System Works' Kill La Kill Game: Story, Gameplay Details Revealed

At Anime Expo 2018, Arc System Works and Studio Trigger have revealed more details about the Kill la Kill fighting game. Called Kill la Kill The Game: IF, it's a 3D fighter filled with the acclaimed anime series' trademark flashiness and over-the-top action. The team also debuted a new trailer, which shows off main characters Ryuko Matoi and Satsuki Kiryuin in detail. You can watch the trailer above.

During the panel, representatives from publisher Arc System Works, developer APLUS, and Kill la Kill anime studio Trigger all discussed what the game will be like. While the trailer shows Ryuko and Satsuki fighting one-on-one, the team hinted that the game might not adhere to that format entirely, because some of the characters fight hordes of enemies at once in the anime. They did not, however, confirm which other characters from the show will appear in the game.

Writer Kazuki Nakashima, who worked on Kill la Kill among other acclaimed anime series, is returning to create an entirely new story for the game. While the anime stars Ryuko with Satsuki as the antagonist, the game tells an alternate story from Satsuki's perspective--the kanji for the "IF" portion of the game's name means "alternate thread" or "cloth," a pun on the show's thread and clothing motifs. Studio Trigger considers the game's story canon to the Kill la Kill universe, like "another episode" of the show.

Kill la Kill first aired in 2013 and consists of 24 episodes. It's known for its absurd yet gripping story, visual comedy, and extreme but lighthearted fanservice. While it's not clear if you'll need to have watched the anime to enjoy the game, you should probably watch it anyway.

Kill la Kill The Game: IF is coming to PS4 and PC in 2019. Its developer, APLUS, previously worked on Little Witch Academia: Chamber of Time, another game based on a Trigger anime. Studio Trigger is closely involved in development, including character design. While not directly responsible for development, publisher Arc System Works (BlazBlue, Guilty Gear) also seems to be working closely with A+ on the game.

My Hero Academia: Two Heroes Movie Will Debut In Theaters This Fall

Funimation confirmed at Anime Expo 2018 that My Hero Academia: Two Heroes debuts in public U.S. and Canadian theaters this fall. Funimation also tweeted out the film's teaser trailer dubbed in English, with both Justin Briner and Christopher Sabat returning to voice Izuku "Deku" Midoriya and Toshinori "All Might" Yagi respectfully. The film had a private debut at Anime Expo and has been getting a positive reception.

For those who haven't been keeping up with My Hero Academia, the popular shonen manga/anime follows the story of Izuku Midoriya, a young boy who's born "Quirkless" in a world where 80% of the human population has a superpowered Quirk. Midoriya idolizes heroes, individuals who've been given special licenses to legally use their superpowers to save others and battle evil, but is repeatedly told his dream of becoming one is impossible without a Quirk.

In a chance encounter, Midoriya meets the world's greatest hero, All Might, and Midoriya's earnest desire to help others inspires All Might to pass his Quirk, One For All, to the young boy. One For All gifts its wielder with enhanced levels of strength and stamina and becomes more powerful with each person it's passed on to. Midoriya uses One For All to enroll in U.A. High School, a place where Japan's greatest heroes are trained, and slowly learns to master One For All under the instruction of All Might and other famous superheroes, while a growing League of Villains begins to put plans into motion.

You won't have to be completely caught up on the My Hero Academia anime to enjoy the upcoming film. Two Heroes occurs in the brief period of time between Seasons 2 and 3, right after Midoriya and his classmates finish their final exams. According to Funimation, the story of Two Heroes follows Midoriya and All Might after the two "receive an invitation from a certain person to go overseas to a giant artificial moving city called I-Island." This island is a gathering place for Quirk research, and while there Midoriya meets Melissa Shield, a girl born Quirkless like he was. When villains attack the island, the heroes will have to work together to ensure the peace.

My Hero Academia was the most awarded anime of 2017 (even earning our number one spot for the year), and Episode 11 of the show's third season has been lauded as one of the best battles in a shonen anime. No specific dates have been chosen for Two Heroes' theatrical release yet, but if previous anime films are any indication, the movie will have screenings in both Japanese and English.

Two Heroes isn't the only My Hero Academia goodness we're getting this year. A new video game, My Hero One's Justice, is scheduled to release for Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox One, and PC on October 26. The arena brawler lets you duke it out with your favorite heroes and villains from the manga/anime.

Marvel's Ant-Man And The Wasp: After-Credits Scenes Explained

Ant-Man and The Wasp is now in theaters, if you're wondering if it has any post-credits scenes to stick around for you, you're in luck. As is the Marvel way, it does indeed, with a total of two after-credits scenes to check out after the movie "ends" (I guess we should lean into calling them stingers this time around, right?). The real question on everybody's mind has been whether the after-credits scenes connect Ant-Man and the Wasp with Avengers: Infinity War or 2019's Avengers 4. The answer? Unfortunately, yes. Warning: Spoilers ahead.

In the first scene we get a look at what Scott, Hope, Hank, and Jan have been up to in the time immediately after Jan's return. They've taken their lab-sized bridge to the Quantum Realm and either totally rebuilt it or just conveniently shrunk it down with Pym Particles to fit in the back of a van, and now, Scott's about to make the jump. This time, he's not on a rescue mission, but after more "quantum particles," which he alludes to being part of Ghost's "cure" (the solution to her problem of phasing in and out of different quantum states uncontrollably).

It's worth noting that with this new, smaller bridge, Scott isn't using the submarine like vehicle that Hank used when he went to pull Jan out. He's just going in with the Ant-Man suit and a plucky attitude. That matters because just seconds after Scott successfully makes the jump, he suddenly finds himself out of communication with the team back in the normal sized universe operating the device's control panel. Unsurprisingly, we learn that all three of them were dissolved into dust care of Thanos's Infinity War finger snap, right at the most inopportune time, leaving Scott presumably stranded in the Quantum Realm with no way to get out, no way to communicate with the outside world, and no one alive with the knowledge that he's even there at all.

It's a pretty bleak fate, given how obscure the Quantum Realm is to begin with, and with Hank, Jan, and Hope gone, the list of people smart enough to engineer a way to reach him--or even aware that the Quantum Realm exists--shrinks pretty dramatically.

The second post-credits scene takes place immediately after the first. We're taken to the Lang house--eerily deserted, with the TV cut to an emergency broadcasting channel. Upstairs, the giant ant "stand in" Hope programmed to mimic Scott's routine keeps on keeping on, oblivious to the apocalypse, playing Scott's drum set.

There's basically an endless list of possibilities revolving around the Quantum Realm. Obviously, part of Avengers 4 is going to have to deal with Scott either getting out of or going further into the Quantum Realm. We learned in this movie that quantum particles can literally affect the nature of reality and can cause (or, significantly, reverse) the phasing of matter between parallel universes. We also learned that spending enough time in the Quantum Realm alters one physiology and can imbue a person with the ability to control--or at least manipulate--quantum particles in people's bodies.

Granted, it's pretty unlikely that Scott is going to stay trapped in the Quantum Realm for as long as Jan was, but we shouldn't rule out the possibility that he's going to come out the other side displaying similar energy manipulation abilities, at least temporarily.

With abilities like that, or with the quantum particles he harvested (and, maybe, can continue to harvest), there's a whole new list of potential failsafes against the Infinity Stones. It's probable--maybe even likely--that when the Stones destroy matter, they're not actually vaporizing it, but instead forcing it to phase out of our reality into another--maybe even into a place that is touching or related to the Quantum Realm. Failing that, it's certainly more than possible that the quantum particles are a way in which the Stones can be reliably counteracted; even if people were literally reduced to dust, if quantum particles can alter the fabric of reality, what's to say they couldn't reach into an alternate universe and pull a new version of a vaporized person back into our dimension?

It's also worth considering that the Quantum Realm may have literally been out of reach of Thanos's snap all together, and thus, in one way or another, immune to the Infinity Stones' powers. Of course, there's the chance that Scott just got lucky enough to not be one of the people randomly chosen, but he's atypical for the surviving group in that he wasn't one of the original Avengers, which is one of the major commonalities between nearly all of the remaining heroes post-Infinity War. If the Quantum Realm is somehow safe from the Stones abilities, it may come into play in a totally different way come Avengers 4 next year.

Looking for more on Avengers 4 and Ant-Man and the Wasp? Read our full Ant-Man and the Wasp review, learn why it was released after Infinity War but set before it, discover the comics history of Ant-Man, and check out everything we know about Avengers 4 so far.

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Now Available on Steam – Crash Bandicoot™ N. Sane Trilogy

Online FPS Warface is Coming Soon to Xbox One

Dear friends! We’re thrilled to announce that the critically-acclaimed online free-to-play FPS Warface is well on its way to Xbox! Welcome to a massive community with millions of fans all over the world and get ready for a fight!

How did we earn this recognition? There’s no universal answer, as each individual player finds their share of fun in this dynamic and action-packed shooter. For example, a large share of our community is inseparable from PVE content: you can always embark on a short co-op mission or launch a full-scale raid against the devouring hordes controlled by a cunning AI. Tread carefully and dare not underestimate these enemies: a single AI marksman or heavy infantry unit can wipe out your entire squad in the blink of an eye. At higher difficulties the armored personnel carriers and turrets won’t go down to your regular small arms fire, and will require the coordination and teamwork only a tight-knit unit can provide!

Accuracy and individual skill are undeniable advantages, though nothing beats a reliable ally that you can always trust to watch your six. We’ve been cultivating the teamplay mechanics for years in Warface: if you’re going up against a tall obstacle, you need to do a co-op climb. Took a heavy hit to an armor plate? Holler at your nearby Engineer to replace it. Need to get patched up? We’re all getting that mental image and a voice in our heads shouting “Medic!” — all the aforementioned is hardwired into the game, or otherwise encouraged by the existing gameplay features and mechanics. Team up on your way to victory!

Looking for engaging PVP action? Dive right in! Choose any of the game modes and be deployed to one of the multitude of maps, each with a unique feel supplemented by weather conditions, climate or time of the day. Our competitive community is always looking for another soldier to join the fight — whether it’s personal and individual challenges, or competitive 5-on-5 gameplay. Make your way up the Ranked ladder, fight for the right to be in the First League and claim the ultimate prize: unique stripes to be featured on your profile, setting your achievement in stone for everyone to see in every match you play!

By the way, unique marks, badges and stripes are just a small part of the whole customization system at your disposal. You can modify the look of your character, your weapon and even its parts right as you duck for cover amid a gunfight! Character appearance is first-based on your class and can be further enhanced by body skins– a true collector’s heaven!

These are but some reasons to grab a gun and give it a shot. We’re looking forward to the day you enlist in the elite Warface squad and answer the call to arms against the equally enigmatic and ambitious corporation: Blackwood. Better start packing, first squads are getting deployed in September 2018! See you on board, soldiers!