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If we get to the end of 2024 with a better news story than Willy’s Chocolate Experience in Glasgow, I will be absolutely staggered.It’s the perfect story. You’ve got high expectations versus miserable reality. You’ve got an organiser who – if his reams and reams of apparently AI-generated self-published books are any indication – has a samurai-level expertise when it comes to parting people from their money. You’ve got the fact that he runs a company called House of Illuminati. You’ve got police involvement. You’ve got…

After more than two weeks of hammered servers and lengthy queues, Helldivers 2 players and developer Arrowhead have a reason to collectively sigh in relief. Helldivers 2 server issues seem to have finally let up during the weekend, and now the studio is ready to go back to the “original plan” and prep new content. That’s not to say that the weekend was quiet, oh no. Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt predicted on X (Twitter) that divers would reach the 800,000 player cap over the weekend. It may have accomplished just…

Following the box office bomb of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi left Square, as did a few folks who worked with him. In an interview on Episode 60 of My Perfect Console, host Simon Parkin asked Final Fantasy VII Rebirth producer Yoshinori Kitase if he ever considered leaving with his mentor and friend Sakaguchi-san, as well as what convinced him to stay."So I think there were two main reasons for me in deciding to stay at the time," Kitase-san replied via a…

The co-creator of Foundation, one of the best Apple TV Plus shows, is stepping back from his show duties amidst budget cuts drama.According to The Hollywood Reporter, the change comes after sources claimed: “Goyer and executives at the show’s production company, Skydance, clashed over the budget for the upcoming season.”Foundation’s third season has been on a hiatus since March last year when the Hollywood strikes led to the halting of filming. Earlier this month, cast and crew were sent home from Poland, where filming…

Artificial intelligence-generated propaganda is almost as effective and persuasive as real propaganda, a team of researchers have found after a study involving more than 8,000 US adults. They also warned that propagandists could use artificial intelligence (AI) to expose citizens to many articles, thereby increasing the volume of propaganda and making them harder to detect. For the study, researchers at the Stanford University and the Georgetown University in the US identified six English language articles, which,…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeThe songwriter Diane Warren has spent more than four decades conjuring overwrought bangers by the bucketful – power ballads that plead and mourn and crescendo, the kind irresistible to office parties and chintzy karaoke machines. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen Celine Dion’s “Because You Loved Me” drunkenly warbled by the most overconfident person you know from HR. A handful of…

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac: Apple says the iPhone 15 lineup can retain 80% of its original battery capacity after 1,000 charge cycles, up from its original estimate of 500 charge cycles — In addition to changes to the Battery Health settings in iOS 17.4, Apple has more iPhone battery news to share today. Chance Miller / 9to5Mac: Apple says the iPhone 15 lineup can retain 80% of its original battery capacity after 1,000 charge cycles, up from its original estimate of 500 charge cycles …

Behaviour Interactive revealed today the newest chapter for Dead by Daylight titled All Things Wicked. The new chapter will release on March 12, 2024 and feature an all-new original Killer, Survivor, and Map. A quaint small town, Greenville, has undergone a string of recent disappearances while local legend speaks of a sinister and deadly history that may be the culprit. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZY0sg28rXc New Killer – The Unknown Based on the trailer and information from the now-available public test build,…

A few months ago, Gearbox Publishing turned the servers back on for classic MOBA Hero Shooter Gigantic, which had been turned off for over five years. They were only live for a couple of days, but it was enough to get people talking on the Gigantic Subreddit. What was the point of this two-day event? Is Gigantic coming back in some way? Well, the answer is yes, and it’s looking to come back in a big way with Gigantic: Rampage Edition on April 9, 2024. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9J98V8B63U Gigantic: Rampage…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeWhen Harry Met Sally director Rob Reiner had originally written his timeless rom-com to end on a more somber note.The acclaimed filmmaker and actor, 76, was speaking on a recent episode of CNN’s Who’s Talking with Chris Wallace podcast when he revealed the initial ending he had planned for his 1989 classic. “The original ending of the film that we had was that Harry (Billy Crystal) and…