Entertainment

The Audible Story House will only be open during the month of May, featuring story “tiles” that visitors can use to sample audiobooks, along with seven “listening spaces” equipped with Sony headphones and Dolby Atmos surround sound. Here are some renderings of what the pop-up might look like:

As part of a new initiative called The Playerbase, people can apply to have their likeness incorporated into PlayStation titles. Initially, one person will be selected to appear in Gran Turismo 7, but Sony says it looks forward to “expanding The Playerbase as additional PlayStation Studios participate.”

Before Netflix’s live-action One Piece adaptation returns for a third season in 2027, the streamer will also debut a new One Piece Lego animated special this September, which will make a good companion for WIT Studio’s upcoming The One Piece anime remake series.

The billionaire investor is offering to take over the world’s biggest music company (and home to artists like Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamar) through his hedge fund. The deal for UMG is valued at more than $50 billion and would install Hollywood superagent Michael Ovitz as chair.

While Tencent and Jared Kushner’s private equity firm are no longer contributing to Paramount’s $110 billion bid to buy Warner Bros. Discovery, The Wall Street Journal reports that $24 billion of the proposed deal is still being provided by sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi.

If you thought writer Jack Thorne’s Adolescence was a stressful watch, the new trailer for his take on Lord of the Flies might be a bit much to take in before the series hits Netflix on May 4th.

Murphy Campbell’s nightmare isn’t over yet. Distributor Vydia has rescinded its claims to her YouTube videos. But her Facebook and Instagram posts about the incident have been removed for copyright infringement. Neither Meta nor Vydia have responded to a request for comment, but it’s unclear what could possibly have been infringing in this video (reposted by United Musicians & Allied Workers).

Glitchy lo-fi art. Inscrutable plot. Fake backstory about a 35th anniversary release. Kings. Swords in stones. Spaceships. Oh, and an absolutely killer soundtrack. You owe it to yourself to go spend a few minutes exploring the strangely beautiful (in an ugly sort of way) world of Ruin.

The contract still needs to be ratified by union members, but it reportedly includes increases to funding for the WGA’s health plan and pension, as well as increases on residuals for streaming. It also bolsters protections against works being used to train AI.

Luke Dicken posted about the changes on LinkedIn, as reported by Game Developer, saying that the team’s time “has come to an end.” Before becoming Take-Two’s head of AI, he held the role of senior director of applied AI at Zynga, which is owned by Take-Two, for two years.

Xbox’s Undead Labs will be hosting alpha playtests for the zombie apocalypse game starting next month, according to a video. You can sign up for the waitlist now.

It was already exciting enough to know that Ryan Coogler was working on an X-Files revival, but The Wrap reports that he is also set to produce a new Animorphs reboot for Disney Plus.

Via Amazon Luna, that is; EA Sports FC 26 is now be playable for Amazon Prime subscribers at no extra cost on recently-revamped Amazon’s cloud gaming service.

Apple TV’s next big series kicks off at the end of the month, and Widow’s Bay follows a small island town with a, let’s say, checkered past. The show mixes up horror and comedy, and it’s part of a big line-up coming to the streamer this year.

18 more films now support American Sign Language (ASL) and British Sign Language (BSL), including Red One, Heads of State, Road House, The Idea of You, and more. You can view the full library of titles with ASL and BSL on Prime Video.

I can’t wait for CKSS.

Sega launched an entirely real “Sanic Collection” for April Fools’ Day, which consists of three t-shirts that you can buy only on April 1st. The timing is spot-on, too: Sanic just turned 16 on Tuesday.

It’s no secret that musicians are generally not huge fans of AI. So obviously, a magazine for musicians “brought to you by ChatGPT and Suno” wouldn’t go over well. But Bass Magazine wants to assuage any fears, saying:

Though Netflix insisted that it bought Ben Affleck’s AI company InterPositive to help filmmakers, Deadline reports that one of the startups big selling points listed in its 2024 patent application is its ability to bring production costs down by millions of dollars.

You can also pick up finger guns, ride llamas, and ride on the shoulders of your friends. This is a rare April Fools’ Day bit that’s actually good, IMO.

For April Fools’ Day, Capcom posted a video featuring Pragmata protagonist Hugh in an adult-sized Mega Man outfit. It’s goofy, but the game is only a couple weeks away from release — maybe it will actually be unlockable?

Unfair Flips, the coin flipping game that garnered a vibrant speedrunning community, is getting a fun, temporary twist: all flips in the game will now be fair. “For the next 24 hours, YOU can test your TRUE mettle in coin flipping,” developer Heather Flowers says. “No more probability, just pure skill.”

Next week Bethesda’s sci-fi RPG is coming to the PS5 and getting a paid story expansion. But Starfield is also getting a major free update that adds a long list of features, including pets and a much-improved New Game Plus. You can get a rundown in this new trailer.

For April Fools’ Day, The New York Times is sharing a “Micro Crossword,” which has just three boxes to fill in. The NYT is also launching April Fools’ Day-themed versions of other puzzles, too, including a maximalist Connections.

If you’ve visited the official Project Hail Mary website on mobile rather than desktop, you may have missed the free STL file that you can download to replicate this popular prop from the movie. You’ll have to acquire the Xenonite yourself though, obviously.

The musician’s account disappeared after posting pictures from his no-phones-allowed concert to r/PaulMcCartney, spurring media reports that mods had banned him. However, as 404Media points out, the subreddit’s mods say it wasn’t them, and a site admin commented with an attempt at an explanation: