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Shortly after releasing the new Betrayal expansion, Grinding Gear Games outlines the immediate and distant future for action RPG Path of Exile.

Path of Exile is getting four major updates in 2019, all of which will adhere to GGG's familiar content rollouts including challenge leagues, new features, fresh class skills to keep combat nice and momentous, as well as basic fixes and QoL improvements. While no exact details were given on the updates themselves, a timeline was confirmed:

• v3.6.0 - March 2019
• v3.7.0 - June 2019
• v3.8.0 - September 2019
• v3.9.0 - December 2019

The developers also hope to release the next mega-expansion in 2020 with content that rivals major content drops like Betrayal and Fall of Oriath. GGG is careful to say that a release date hasn't been locked into place, though.

Microsoft's new Project xCloud game streaming subscription ambitiously folds neatly into its new Xbox-as-a-service roadmap.

By streaming games remotely from servers to platforms like consoles, PCs, laptops, and mobile phones, Microsoft's Project xCloud service will usher in a new era of convenience and accessibility. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says the company internally refers to the latent service as the "Netflix for games," and is one of the major proponents in cross-platform, uniform and digital-based game streaming. Other competitors like Amazon, Google, and even telecom titan Verizon are also making game streaming services.

But Microsoft has an edge over its competitors: its vast webwork of existing online frameworks and a treasure trove of wholly-owned games and IPs. Thanks to long years of honing its craft, Microsoft has become a master of engagement by synergizing its subscriptions (Xbox LIVE, Xbox Game Pass), services (Mixer) and content (Xbox Store) together in a cohesive digital cycle that spreads cross Xbox consoles and Windows 10 PCs.

"We have a huge back catalog. We have our own games," Nadella said in a recent meeting with journalists. "We have a structural position in that we have both a console business as well as a PC business," he said, "which happens to be bigger than the console business when it comes to gaming."

Blizzard is currently hiring 17 developers to help with new unannounced Diablo projects, of which includes Diablo IV.

We've known that Diablo IV is in development for a long time now. Blizzard recently confirmed that multiple new Diablo games are in development, and the studio has gone on previous hiring sprees to fill out its ranks for these new titles.

Now the studio is currently hiring 17 people across all disciplines to work on a new unannounced Diablo project. It's worth noting this project is separate from the Diablo: Immortal mobile game, and that some of these positions, including Senior Software Engineer Graphics/Gameplay, have been open for a while now.

Publisher Starbreeze's financial woes have seemingly caused The Walking Dead to be delayed a second time on consoles.

Starbreeze is having a hard time right now. Its big new The Walking Dead shooter didn't sell too well on PC, causing a big disruption in the company's quarterly projections (it was banking strongly on TWD's success). This set off a chain of events that ultimately led to Starbreeze filing for insolvency and curtailing all extraneous segments not related to game development. Now Starbreeze is exclusively focusing on games, and according to ex-CEO Bo Andersson, The Walking Dead is just the first of eight big new projects the company plans to make.

Sadly Starbreeze's woes continue on. The publisher was undoubtedly counting on The Walking Dead console port to win back some of those project sales and bolster quarterly earnings, but the PS4 and Xbox One versions have been delayed from their original February 2019 launch to an unknown date. This marks the second console release delay.

"Starbreeze has decided to postpone the release date from its original February 2019 date, further information regarding the future release will be announced at a later date," reads an announcement on Starbreeze's investor relations page.

In a publicity stunt garnering tons of attention--both positive and negative--UFC champ Ronda Rousey is lending her voice to one of Mortal Kombat's most notorious femme fatales.

The rumors were right: renowned MMA knucklebuster Ronda Rousey is coming to Mortal Kombat XI, at least in voice-over capacity. The fighter will lend her voice to MK's original female badass Sonya Blade through cinematic sequences, fatalities, the new crushing blow mechanic, and the overarcing storyline.

"I've been a lifelong Mortal Kombat fan, and Sonya Blade was the first kick-ass, female video game character that I related to. I always admired her and admittedly kind of emulated her in my own way," Ronda Rousey said in a press release. "Now I get to voice her in Mortal Kombat 11. It's a dream come true to be a part of the Mortal Kombat franchise that I grew up playing.

The Lord of the Rings books are some of the most well-known pieces of creative literature, that is mostly due to the universe being so in-depth that you can get lost in all of the little interconnecting stories. This amazing creation came from J.R.R Tolkien and now we are receiving a movie about his life.

The movie is simply titled 'Tolkien' and is basically a biopic of the mans life. Beginning as a young man in the heart of World War I, we will see actor Nicholas Hoult play the part of Tolkien, and how he began to be inspired with the creative thoughts of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings universe while being in the trenches in France.

According to Entertainment Weekly, the movie is also reported to touch on Tolkien's wife Edith Bratt who had significant influence in Tolkien's writings. The love story between Beren and Luthien in the book 'Beren and Luthien' is about a mortal man and immortal elf. This story is direct reference to Tolkien and Bratt, as on their joint gravestone they are referred to as Beren and Luthien. In the 'Tolkien' movie, Bratt will be played by Lily Collins. The director talking the helm will be Dome Karukoski. The Tolkien movie is expected to hit theatres on May 10th, 2019.

We aren't very far out from the release of Anthem and to get the hype ball moving further along, BioWare has released a new gameplay video. This time round we will be looking at Anthem's story, progression and customization options.

BioWare has started a new gameplay series for their coming new release Anthem. In the above video we get an in-depth look at Anthem's story, level progression and customization options. At the beginning of the video we get some details regarding the games story, we learn about the the Anthem of Creation and the dominion, as well as our role as players and what it means to be able to step into a javelin suits.

About halfway through the video we get a more deeper understanding of the customization options and how players will have to change their load out depending on what mission or enemy they are trying to conquer. Each javelin has "2 offensive slots, 1 support slot, 2 weapon slots, 6 component slots and 1 ultimate power." Players will have to find a balance between each of these slots, load outs will change depending on the play style of the player and the mission that is ahead of them. For more Anthem news, check out yesterdays gameplay video release, it showcases 10 more minutes of gameplay, click here.

If you are a PC user and have never heard of VLC Media Player then you must of been hiding under a comfy rock somewhere, this media player is the go-to application for video streaming content in all of the whacky formats you can get.

VLC Media Player recently reached an awesome milestone, the program has been recorded to of been downloaded now over 3 billion times. The above Twitter post from founder of VLC's parent company, VideoLan, Ludovic Fauvet showcases VLC reaching 3 biillion downloads. The President and Lead Developer for VideoLan, Jean-Baptiste Kempf sat down with VentureBeat to discuss the success of VLC and what the developers have in-store for it in the future.

Kempf says that he plans to bring VR support to the application, this will add 3D interactions, stereo sound and add a virtual theatre feature. VLC recently rolled out an update that pushed the version of the program to v3.0.6, included within this update was support for HDR videos in AV1. Kempf says that when update 4.0.0 is ready it will be bringing playback improvements in scaling and video quality of HDR files. Looking towards the future now, Kempf also mentions that he would like to bring the media player to the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4. I don't know how possible this idea would be, but it would be good to see VLC on both of these platforms.

If you are into indie games there is no doubt that you have heard of Motion Twin's Dead Cells. The title released back in 2017 and was a hit success in its genre, a year later it released on the Nintendo Switch and took off sales wise.

Dead Cells came to the Nintendo Switch on August 7th, 2018 and was very well received by the Switch community. So well received that the sales for Dead Cells outsold the PlayStation 4 sales by 4 to 1. Recently the sales numbers have been released by Motion Twin and it reveals that within the first of its release on the Nintendo Switch Dead Cells managed to sell 100,000 copies.

Now this might not sound like a lot of copies when comparing to a AAA title, but for an indie rouge-lite action-platformer this is quite an achievement and Motion Twin should be more than proud of their efforts. To reward all those players that picked up Dead Cells, Motion Twin have said that there will be a free major patch headed fro Dead Cells sometime in the early months of 2019. As more details are released about the content update I will be sure to follow up with another news piece. Want more information on Dead Cells? Check out the official website here.

Nintendo Switch owners are about to be blessed with yet another fantastic game, Titan Forge Games will be debuting SMITE very soon for the handheld console.

Portable gamers will be glad to know that they will be able to go full god mode wherever they in about a week. Hi-Rez Studios and Titan Forge Games will be debuting their title SMITE to the Nintendo Switch on January 24th and to celebrate the launch almost being upon us they have released the above launch trailer.

Nintendo Switch owners can pre-order the 'Founder's Pack' which contains bonus loot for the player, the Foxy Amaterasu skin, 200 gems and much more. I have provided a full dot point list in the entirety of this post. If you are interested in checking out more news to do with SMITE, visit the announcement trailer here. For more information regarding SMITE for the Nintendo Switch, visit the official listing for the title here.