Month: April 2020

The Parks and Recreation cast are no strangers to reunions. Following the airing of its last episode in 2015, we’ve seen Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman team up for a game show and the ladies of Pawnee have been known to get together for Galentine’s Day. Fans patiently awaiting the next reunion will have their patience rewarded tonight, as the cast of Parks and Rec reunite for a special 30-minute scripted episode. In the name of charity and keeping in touch with friends during a very isolating time, the one-time episode follows Leslie Knope as she tries to “stay connected to her friends in a time of social distancing”.

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Money raised during the reunion special will go to the charity Feeding America, a hunger-relief organization working to bring food and other basic needs to Americans who need it. The Parks and Recreation producers and cast along with State Farm, Subaru of America, and NBC will match all the money donated during the airing of the episode, so if you love Parks and Rec and raising money for a good cause, you won’t want to miss it.

Here’s how to watch the Parks and Recreation Reunion special, as well as which cast members you can expect to see and how you can donate.

Where Can I Watch the Parks and Recreation Reunion Special?

The Parks and Recreation reunion episode will air live on NBC on April 30 at 8:30pm ET/ 5:30pm PT. If you don’t have live TV, you can tune in via a few different streaming services such as Hulu with Live TV, YouTube TV, fuboTV, and AT&T TV Now, which all offer a free one week trial if you don’t already have a subscription. If you do miss the live broadcast, you can stream the special the following day on the NBC website, Hulu, and Peacock TV.

Which Cast Members Are Returning For the Parks and Recreation Reunion 2020?

The following cast members have been confirmed for the Parks and Recreation reunion:

• Amy Poehler as Leslie Knope
• Rashida Jones as Ann Perkins
• Aziz Ansari as Tom Haverford
• Nick Offerman as Ron Swanson
• Aubrey Plaza as April Ludgate
• Chris Pratt as Andry Dwyer
• Adam Scott as Ben Wyatt
• Rob Lowe as Chris Traeger
• Jim O’Heir as Jerry Gergich
• Retta as Donna Meagle

How Can I Donate During the Parks and Recreation Reunion?

You can donate on the Feeding America website at FeedingAmerica.org/ParksandRec via credit card or Paypal. Remember to make your donations during the live episode so the amount gets matched and more money gets raised!

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Felicia Miranda is SEO Editor at IGN and you can find her on Twitter at @FeliciaVagabond.

Disney is hoping Hercules will go from zero to hero again, this time in live-action. The studio has reportedly tapped Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame filmmakers Joe and Anthony Russo to produce, but not direct, a live-action remake of their 1997 animated film.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Hercules will be scripted by Dave Callaham (Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Doom, The Expendables).  The Russos will produce via their AGBO production company.

The project is in very early development and there’s no director attached yet.

The film is also not at the casting stage yet. 1997’s Hercules voice cast included Tate Donovan, Danny DeVito, James Woods, and Susan Egan.

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THR claims it’s not known whether the live-action Hercules will be a musical as the original animated film was, but it should be expected to have action in it given Callaham’s writing credits.

Ever since the massive success of 2017’s Beauty and the Beast, Disney has leaned into live-action remakes of and sequels to their animated classics (although in the case of The Lion King, “live-action” really means photorealism).

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The Russo brothers’ next directorial effort is the drama Cherry, starring Tom Holland. They also produced Netflix’s Extraction, starring Chris Hemsworth and directed by Sam Hargrave.

All four talents will join IGN today, at 5pm PT, for a Watch From Home Theater breaking down the action-thriller.

This past generation was treated to a great Hitman reboot, and if you haven’t had the chance to play it for yourself, then now’s your chance. Developer IO Interactive announced on Twitter that Hitman is available to play for free on PS4 until May 3. Hitman has plenty of content to keep you busy all weekend, and if you like what you played, you can snag select Hitman titles at a discount of up to 85% off. Hitman: Game of the Year Edition is $9, down from $60, and comes with all of its content. You can even pick up Hitman 2 for $18, which also has a regular price of $60.

The latest Hitman games are both excellent. GameSpot’s Hitman review scored it an 8/10, while our Hitman 2 review also came with an 8/10, both praising its massively complex levels and seemingly endless possibilities. Each game was also celebrated in GameSpot’s respective Game of the Year awards–Hitman was in our top 25 games of 2016, while Hitman 2 was chosen as one of 2018’s best games.

In related news, PlayStation Plus’s free games for April 2020 are going away early next week. PS Plus users have until May 4 to claim Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End and Dirt Rally 2 before they go away forever. After that, the free PlayStation Plus games for May 2020 will become available. Next month’s offerings include the city-building simulator, Cities: Skylines, as well as Farming Simulator 19.

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With the announcement that Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is taking us to the Viking Age, let’s take a look back at how the gameplay of Ubisoft’s flagship franchise has evolved over time.

Apex Legends is getting a new mode, Quests, when Season 5: Fortune’s Favor starts in May and adds Loba as a playable character. Respawn hasn’t provided many details about Quests, but it sounds like it could be a single-player or multiplayer PvE game mode.

“When Apex Legends Season 5: Fortune’s Favor arrives on May 12, players will find a new game mode, Quests, that will have players hunting for treasure and answers each season,” Respawn writes in a press release. “Those who complete the journey will be richly rewarded.”

Though Respawn hasn’t confirmed it, Quests could be the “pleasant surprise” for Titanfall fans that the developer teased would be coming to Apex Legends in Season 5. A recent tweet, embedded below, that hinted at upcoming content for Apex Legends included images of what looks like a BRD-01 Automated Infantry Spectre, a robotic enemy found in the campaigns and multiplayer modes for Titanfall and Titanfall 2. If Quests does happen to be a PvPvE or PvE mode, then Spectres could be one of the enemy types.

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We’re all in a bizarre situation currently, with the COVID-19 pandemic forcing us to stay at home, and have extremely limited contact with the outside world. So, from time to time, we need to introduce a little bit of fun and excitement into our lives at home. And what better way to do so than shooting your roommate with Nerf blasters?

We’re all getting a little bit of cabin fever at this point, and we all have a bit of pent-up energy. There is no better way to get rid of that energy than having a Nerf blaster war. And if you need to take a break from playing Fortnite, you can bring the video game into your home with a new line of Rippley-themed Nerf blasters.

The line of three blasters is coming exclusively to Best Buy in May, and a couple of them are repaints of Fortnite Nerf blasters from last year. But what’s really important is that these upcoming blasters are a lot of fun and a great way to assault your roommate when they eat all the ice cream, which you went to the store and bought for yourself.

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The Game Developers Conference is shifting plans once again in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Though it had been postponed to the summer, organizers now say it will shift to an all-digital event in order to keep participants safe and best serve the community.

“As so many game developers embrace remote working arrangements and online collaboration, we’re inspired to adapt and deliver GDC in a digital format that will be available to everyone with an internet connection, and will work hard to deliver the high-quality content and networking opportunities GDC attendees have come to expect,” organizers said in a statement on the official site.

GDC usually takes place in San Francisco in March. As the global health situation became more pressing, organizers at first announced it would move ahead with extra precautions to stem the spread of the virus. Shortly after, it postponed to an indefinite time in the summer, and then in March it announced new dates: August 4-6. This new announcement references the event still taking place in August.

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Directors and former stuntmen Chad Stahelski and David Leitch announced today that they’re returning to The Matrix series to help coordinate the upcoming fourth instalment’s action scenes. In an interview with Collider, the pair discussed coming aboard not to assume full responsibility for guiding all of the movie’s action, but to assist director Lana Wachowski by lending a hand with “the creative concept” and “the choreography and some of the physical training for the guys.”

“I’m helping out a little bit for a sequence, I think Dave [Leitch is] helping out for a sequence,” Stahelski told Collider. “Lana’s come back with a lot of love to have a pseudo-family reunion, so that’s been a lot of fun. It’s been good to see a lot of the crew members again.”

As for what he thinks of the movie so far, Stahelski praises Wachowski for “directing her own action” and said “I think if you’re a fan of the original [Matrix] trilogy you’re gonna love this.” He adds that “from what I know of it, it’s incredibly fun” and that the series is “coming back with a vengeance.”

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IGN Prime has partnered with TOGE Productions to bring you Steam keys for MagiCat, a side-scrolling platformer inspired by retro games from the 16-bit era.

MagiCat takes players on a quest to retrieve a stolen artifact and explore the astounding magical worlds of the MagiCat universe. Using the powers of dashing, high jump, and fireball, along with items that can be unlocked as the story progresses, players must help MagiCat regain the world’s lost relic. Players will indulge in a memorable adventure packed with excitement and addictive gameplay and game features.

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Click here to get your free key to MagiCat on PC. Keys are available on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Every month, the IGN Prime team provides members an opportunity to grab great games and goodies picked by the Prime team.

It’s already a few years old but developer Playtonic Games has unveiled a new mode for Yooka-Laylee on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. You can now play the bubbly platformer in super-nostalgic 64-bit graphics for free.

Accessing the free update is easy: Talk to Vendi, the creepy-looking anthropomorphic vending machine, and she will give you the 64-bit tonic. Drink that up and get ready to take a trip back to the ’90s with blocky graphics reminiscent of Banjo-Kazooie, Conker’s Bad Fur Day, Donkey Kong 64, Super Mario 64, and the like.

In addition to this new character model for the bat-chameleon duo Yooka and Laylee, Playtonic also added in the Yooka 64 model from the 2D side-scrolling spin-off Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair.

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