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Flick

Classic Anime Flick ‘Angel’s Egg’ Hits Theaters in November

by admin August 17, 2025

Before he helmed the first anime film adaptation of Ghost in the Shell, director Mamoru Oshii made his own original works, including Angel’s Egg. The film turns 40 years old later this year, and to celebrate, distributor GKids is bringing it to North American theaters for the first time.

Beginning November 19, theaters across the country will put a 4K restoration of the movie on the big screen. Created by Oshii and character designer Yoshitaka Amano, the post-apocalyptic film stars a young girl safeguarding an egg and a young boy with mysterious dreams about a bird. The movie was notably Oshii’s first original work—and has themes that would stick around in his later works—and has very little spoken dialogue. At the time, audiences didn’t fully connect with it because of its biblical allegories and meaning, but it has grown in estimation over time. This past May, it screened at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival.

After it leaves theaters, Angel’s Egg will land on HBO Max. Earlier this week, GKids announced a deal with the streamer to bring 20 live-action and animated adult movies to the platform, starting with Your Name, Shin Godzilla, and Perfect Blue on September 1. HBO Max already houses Studio Ghibli movies in the U.S., and in a press release, WB Discovery’s Royce Battleman said this new deal “allows us to continue delivering premium films to our subscribers and solidifies HBO Max’s position as a leading destination in the space.”

Later titles hitting HBO Max include Summer Wars, Wolf Children, and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time.

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.

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August 17, 2025 0 comments

Esports

Rematch June 16 update patch notes bring Rainbow Flick buff & fix netcode issues

by admin June 16, 2025

Rematch has officially arrived in early access, and it comes with an update to address some of the issues raised during the beta, including buffing the rainbow flick and fixing some netcode problems.

Whether you’re a fan of football, Rocket League, or both, chances are you’ve had your eye on Rematch, the new competitive 5v5 game from the team behind Sifu. Throughout its multiple betas, it’s received plenty of buzz, including from fans of EA SPORTS FC who are looking for something a little different.

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But while these betas did a great job of getting players on board, they also highlighted some issues with the moment-to-moment gameplay. Now, as it launches in early access, an update has arrived to address some of these problems.

Here are the complete patch notes for the Rematch June 16 update.

Rematch early access patch notes

Sloclap

Check out the full patch notes below, as shared by the devs on the official website:

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Rainbow Flick

In response to the feedback gathered during the second beta, we reverted some modifications we made on the rainbow flick. The first interaction with the ball using the volley variation of the rainbow flick should be as fast and fluid as experienced in the first beta while some balancing changes still apply to chained flicks to avoid keeping the ball out of play for too long.

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Mouse and keyboard tap

We corrected a lot of bugs and improved the overall feeling of the new tap aiming system on mouse and keyboard. Now it should be easier to aim 360 degrees around the character, without the aiming being “sticky” in some directions or going in the opposite direction from where you wanted to aim.

While using the new system, please remember that it requires you to consider the mouse as a joystick, so moving your mouse diagonally and not only horizontally will help you nail every angle. We are still closely monitoring this new system, and already have plans to keep improving it in the next updates.

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Mouse and keyboard remapping

Remapping is now available for mouse and keyboard! You can remap inputs the way you want, and even choose to use or not the “modifier” option which rebinds lobbed actions on 2 inputs (modifier + tap, or pushball) instead of one.

You might encounter some bugs while using the remapping feature, but we’ll try to fix them as quickly as possible.

Controller remapping is also coming later this season, as well as more advanced remapping options.

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Bugfixes

Gameplay

Fixed an issue where players could stay stuck in Defense Mode
Fixed an issue that allowed players to cancel the kickoff animation and control the ball after a goal replay
Fixed an issue where some passes and interceptions were not counted in the scoring system
Fixed an issue that made the player invisible after a goal replay
Fixed an issue where the ball would lose all momentum after two players performed a tackle on it at the same time
Fixed an issue that made volley tap unavailable after the ball was volley shot with extra effort

Netcode and Desync

Fixed multiple issues where ball would pass through the goalkeeper’s dive, despite the catch animation being played
Fixed an issue where the ball’s position would take a long time to be synchronized again for all players
Fixed a ball desync present upon hitting the goalpost bars
Fixed a ball desync present upon performing a volley action after a wall bounce
Fixed an issue where the second shot deflected by a player’s defense mode would create replication and desync issues

Mouse & Keyboard

Fixed an issue where Inputs were not displaying correctly in menus when using mouse and keyboard
Fixed an issue where the magnus resets to 0 when not continuously moving the mouse in the same direction

Tutorials

Fixed an issue where AI does not pass the ball after ball call during movement tutorial

Menus

Fixed multiple bugs that could cause the game to lose focus
Missing functionality for Menu music volume slider
Missing functionality for rematch after finishing a custom match
Fixed an issue with the player’s rank being displayed incorrectly in the profile page and main menu
Fixed an issue with the player’s level being displayed incorrectly at the end of a match
Fixed multiple instances of texts not being correctly localized or translated across all menus and tutorials
Fixed an issue that made the option to report players unavailable
Fixed an issue that made all sound feedback in menus stop working
Fixed inconsistent texts in controller gameplay settings

Crashes

Fixed a crash happening when launching the game without steam
Multiple other crash instances fixed

Visual and cosmetic issues

Fixed issues where some of the heads selectable in customization were corrupted at low or medium graphic settings
Headgear color from the customization isn’t the same one in match

Matchmaking and Online experience

Fixed multiple errors that could interrupt matchmaking
Fixed multiple issues with voice chat on Xbox platform

For more on Rematch, be sure to check out how Ranked mode and its Division work, as well as the best settings to run.

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June 16, 2025 0 comments

Gaming Gear

James Wan’s Ventriloquist Horror Flick Is Ready to Be Rediscovered

by admin June 3, 2025

In 2007, James Wan was a horror up-and-comer who’d scored a huge hit with 2004’s Saw, which had by then already released its first two sequels with a third on the way. But before Insidious and The Conjuring he made a couple of one-offs: the Kevin Bacon vigilante thriller Death Sentence, and the ventriloquist horror tale Dead Silence.

The latter was just added to Shudder, and though it was a bust 18 years ago, it’s now a fun one to revisit—especially taking into account all that Wan and his frequent collaborator Leigh Whannell, who scripted Dead Silence, have accomplished since then. Though they were still just the Saw guys at the time, you can easily pick out certain narrative choices and imagery that would later become touchstones of their work.

Saw‘s game-obsessed Jigsaw puppet was already entered into the record ahead of Dead Silence, and it’s echoed here in Billy, the main ventriloquist dummy in a movie that gives him a lot of evil toy back-ups. The white face, the ghoulishly hinged jaw, and the fondness for bow ties are all shared characteristics, though Billy has luminous blue eyes that peer around in sinister ways the audience notices far before the characters do.

Wan is notably a huge fan of cursed objects; the Conjuring cinematic universe is built around them. It can’t be a coincidence that Annabelle—a doll even more ghastly than Billy—is the most charismatic escapee from Ed and Lorraine Warren’s stash of occult treasures. (Wan’s Instagram handle? “Creepypuppet“.)

Dead Silence also hints at stylistic elements that would enter Wan’s later work, with eerie sound design that plays up silence as much as shrieks, as well as jump scares that predate the furious old-lady entity in Insidious, as well as the Nun’s fondness for dramatically emerging from the shadows… then contorting her face to bring out her demonic side.

You also can’t ignore the fact that Saw mainstay Donnie Wahlberg is also in Dead Silence, playing a familiar sort of scruffy police detective. This version of the character is more skeptical than the corrupt cop in Saw; he’s fond of issuing warnings like “You don’t want to make me chase you!” as he races after the protagonist into an abandoned theater full of haunted dolls. He also has a weird obsession with his battery-operated razor, a tic that leads nowhere despite being foregrounded as a key personality trait.

Dead Silence’s set-up also hints at Wan supernatural stories to come, with a malevolent figure in the past poking its way across generations to make sure a curse never dies. Unfortunately the main character, Jamie—Ryan Kwanten, just prior to True Blood—isn’t as compelling as the central figures in Insidious or The Conjuring. He’s just sort of an unmemorable dude, though he is a determined one. When his wife dies in an absolutely hideous way—the very night a ventriloquist dummy is delivered to their apartment from an unknown sender—he heads straight to his hometown, where his estranged father (Bob Gunton) lives with his suspiciously young and glamorous new wife (Amber Valletta).

Though Dead Silence takes place in 2007, it’s set in a reality seemingly devoid of cell phones and Google searches. There are land lines galore, and historical exposition comes courtesy of a mortician’s extended flashback as well as a literal scrapbook that Jamie happens to come across. There’s also a nursery rhyme that references the town’s boogeyman figure: a theater performer named Mary Shaw so obsessed with the dolls in her act she insisted they be buried with her… each with their own tiny coffin and grave marker.

There’s even more to the backstory that surfaces as Jamie digs deeper—including a decades-old cold case involving a missing child, and an extended bit about tongues being ripped out that seems like it should tie into the “throwing your voice” part of ventriloquism, but the details don’t quite come together there.

Still, “Be careful! If you go looking for answers, you just might find them” is the advice the mortician passes on to Jamie (naturally, he never even considers abiding by that), and Dead Silence agreeably ties up most of its plot threads by the end.

It also has an absolute scream of a twist ending that makes you think perhaps, just maybe, Wan and Whannell had campier ambitions for this story. As it plays out onscreen, Dead Silence skews a little too much toward taking itself too seriously, especially considering the sheer amount of dolls involved. It’s also filmed with a relentlessly dour blue-tinged filter, which is maybe the greatest sin committed here, as well as what marks it so clearly as a mid-2000s relic.

If you don’t mind turning up the brightness to ease that gloom, though, you can have a jolly good time watching this one. Don’t be surprised if you have the urge to watch a few more Wan flicks once you’re done.

Dead Silence is now streaming on Shudder.

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June 3, 2025 0 comments