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At E3, a number of things catch your attention, but a video and a simple banner showing an ancient warrior who looks strikingly like actor Jet Li can draw any casual fighting-game fan over to the Snail Games booth for a look at “Age of Wushu”. And as it turns out, the action-film star/former Wushu (which just means “martial arts” in Chinese) champion does in fact have a little something to do with the game. “There is a character in the game that is Jet Li. He has a character name, then in parenthesis it says Jet Li next to it. I guess they really wanted to drive that point home, in case you did recognize him,” said Chris Toft, a lead QA producer for SnailUSA, the Chinese company’s stateside division. “He is a character in the Twilight Village story. […]

The Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) floor at the Los Angeles Convention Center echoed with cheering, gunshots, tire screeching and music from hundreds of game demos Wednesday as more than 45,000 attendees gathered for the world’s largest annual video game trade show. E3, now in its 18th year, has become a mecca for video game developers, retailers, industry professionals and journalists. The trade show, which runs through Thursday and is not open to the public, often serves as the pulpit for the industry’s biggest announcements. On Wednesday, convention-goers were greeted by an enormous “Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures” display outside the main entrance, complete with painted Mini Coopers. The big three game companies dominated the floor, with Nintendo’s bright white walls and whimsical displays setting it apart from its darker (and considerably more adult) neighbors, Microsoft and Sony. FULL COVERAGE: E3 […]

Conan O’Brien’s familiar pompadour of red hair stood out at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) at the Los Angeles Convention Center as he made a stop at the small SnailUSA booth Wednesday. O’Brien was among fans, retailers, media and industry professionals who took to the aisles to get some up-close time with new offerings, many of which they’ve been hearing about for a few days. Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo all hosted big press events, including the introductions of two new consoles in the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. FULL COVERAGE: E3 2013 When asked why he was visiting the SnailUSA booth, he shrugged. “I was here just to cover E3 and mostly to try to settle the controversy between the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One consoles — the Hatfields vs. McCoys argument of our time,” O’Brien said. “I haven’t […]

If you were one of the unlucky pop culture enthusiasts who was defeated by Comic-Con International‘s EPIC Registration system back in February, don’t give up yet. Though four-day badges are still sold out, several thousand single-day badges are now available for resale via drawing, Comic-Con announced Monday. Passes for the annual entertainment expo sold out minutes after registration opened, but a limited number of tickets (including 3,100 much-coveted Saturday passes) are up for resale because of returned and canceled badges and a reduced allotment of reserved badges for certain Comic-Con departments. The convention — to be held July 18-21 at the San Diego waterfront convention center — is a gathering of some 130,000 professionals and enthusiasts in the realms of sci-fi, fantasy, video games, comics and horror. The expo features panels, film and TV screenings, portfolio reviews, merchant booths and […]

Eastern philosophy is not the first thing one associates with the Disneyland Resort, but the message of the Fantasyland Theatre’s new and quite splendid stage show “Mickey and the Magical Map” is decidedly, and surprisingly, Zen. Or as Zen as a show can be in which young men and women in rustic fantasy-wear sing and dance their way through some of the studio’s greatest hits in front of a gorgeous three-tiered screen awash in animated wonder. Like many characters of his demo, Mickey Mouse is, above all, a seeker of enlightenment. In “Mickey and the Magical Map,” he’s back in Sorcerer’s Apprentice mode, trying to prove himself by filling in the final empty space on his master’s map. The black spot, which does not want to be painted, comes to life and takes Mickey on a magical, musical, multimedia tour. […]

Here’s something that might make you wish you had X-ray vision. A Minnesota man found a rare copy of “Action Comics” No. 1 in the walls of an abandoned home. Turns out, the Superman comic is worth more than $100,000. David Gonzalez, 34, paid $10,100 for the dilapidated house with a torn-up roof in Elbow Lake, Minn., aiming to put his decade of construction and remodeling experience to use. While he was gutting the house for renovation, he found a comic book amid old newspapers that had been used to insulate the walls. The comic was from June 1938, and the cover featured Superman lifting a car over his head. It was “Action Comics” No. 1, which marked Superman’s first comic book appearance 75 years ago. “I knew it was worth money,” the father of four told the Minneapolis Star […]

The White House rejected a petition to build a Death Star, but a different piece of “Star Wars” machinery has been brought to life — with Lego. On Thursday in New York City’s Times Square, Lego unveiled its largest model ever: A life-size X-wing Starfighter, constructed out of Lego bricks — 5,335,200 of them, to be exact. The “Star Wars” X-wing replica, which weighs nearly 46,000 pounds and contains a full-scale R2-D2 in the cockpit, was created to promote “The Yoda Chronicles,” a new Lego Star Wars three-part animated series premiering next week on Cartoon Network. The model will remain in Times Square through Saturday. Afterward it will land at Legoland California Resort, where it will be on display through the remainder of 2013. The X-wing Starfighter is, of course, the ship that Luke Skywalker and other members of the […]

Remember Patton Oswalt’s eight-minute “Parks and Recreation” monologue about his proposed plot for “Star Wars: Episode VII”? It took YouTube only one month to animate the comedian’s suggestions, spider-Wookiee and all. During a guest spot on the NBC comedy last month, Oswalt played a Pawnee citizen aiming to filibuster a City Council vote. He launched into a lengthy, improvised speech about his ideal story line for the upcoming “Star Wars” sequel. The outlandish plot includes a resurrected Boba Fett, Marvel’s villain Thanos (teased at the end of “The Avengers”), Tony Stark, the gods from “Clash of the Titans” and “Wrath of the Titans” and a beheaded and mechanized Chewbacca, among other awesome but unrelated characters from the realm of genre entertainment. The full speech was released on YouTube, drawing more than 2.7 million views and attracting the notice of J.J. […]

For Free Comic Book Day on Saturday, Image Comics is focusing on the past and the present — the publisher will revisit one of its classic titles, “Aphrodite IX,” with an eye toward rebooting its green-haired assassin, and will release a new issue of “The Walking Dead” that contains a new Tyrese-focused short story and reprints short stories featuring Michonne, the Governor and Morgan. Robert Kirkman’s zombie comic book might be top of mind in the pop cultural consciousness thanks to the wild popularity of the AMC television series it spawned, but “Aphrodite IX” might benefit from an additional promotional push. Originally created by David Wohl and David Finch, the title debuted in 1996, but only generated six issues and one trade paperback. Now Matt Hawkins, president of Image’s Top Cow imprint, and artist Stjepan Sejic are teaming to bring […]

WonderCon attendees wielding camera phones flocked around Dawn Bright, a video game concept artist from the Inland Empire area who donned a head-turning Queen Amidala costume of her own creation. Her lavishly embellished gown, black feathered headdress and trademark white-and-red painted face stopped “Star Wars” fans in their tracks as they ambled through the lobby of the Anaheim Convention Center on Friday. “I made the entire dress from scratch,” Bright said, proudly pointing out the spiraled embroidery on her cloak before posing for more photos. “I just finished this costume last night at midnight, and I’ll actually be participating in the masquerade tomorrow.” A few feet away, more WonderCon-goers (some of whom wore costumes of their own) snapped pictures of Bright’s husband, Daniel, and their 3-year-old daughter, Victoria, dressed as the heroes from Disney’s “Wreck-it-Ralph,” with little Victoria’s stroller decked out […]