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Java is a great coding language for beginners and experts alike. It's a lightweight language that is one of the most popular for developing front-end web programs and apps. If you're interested in learning Java, you can get Learn Java Programming Bundle from Simpliv for only $40 (reg. $359). This bundle provides eight courses and 94 hours of content on how to create professional-level Java apps from scratch. Even if you're a complete beginner, they have tutorials on all the basics of coding with Java. From the Java Development Kit to Java Virtual Machine, Simpliv will take you through the ins and outs of one of the most used programming languages today. They even provide you with lessons on interviewing for jobs in the industry. Best of all, you'll have lifetime access to e-learning lessons that you can watch at any time, on your schedule. With this limited-time discount, you're only spending $5 per course. Price subject to change This content is from our partner StackCommerce. GameSpot may get a share of the revenue if you buy anything featured on our site. View the full article

A beta test for Battlefield 2042 is expected to begin in October, and ahead of that, some people who preordered the game have reported receiving codes already. In a post on Reddit, multiple people say they received a beta code after preordering on Amazon. Stories about beta codes from Amazon were also shared on Twitter, among other places (via GamesRadar). Some are speculating that the codes were dispatched early, due to the fact that EA delayed the Battlefield 2042 beta in correspondence with the game's overall delay to November 19. The official word from EA is that the beta dates for Battlefield 2042 will be announced in September, and with the month wrapping up soon, it shouldn't be much longer until we learn more. Codes that have been sent out already do not work. According to insider Tom Henderson, the Battlefield 2042 beta will begin on October 6 for people who preorder before opening to everyone else on October 8. It's been a long road to release for Battlefield 2042 already, as DICE took an extra year to develop the game to help give developers more time to make the most out of the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. The game supports 128 players on those platforms, compared to 64 on PS4 and Xbox One. Explaining the delay from October to November, DICE called out the "unforeseen challenges" related to developing a big, ambitious game during a global pandemic. The studio had expected its developers to be able to return to the office by now, but this was not possible. Plenty of games planned for 2021 have shifted to 2022, due to the impact of the pandemic and other factors. For more, check out GameSpot's roundup of all the games delayed so far. View the full article

A game as prolific and eventful as Fortnite is sure to have a lot of debate surrounding the topic of what may be its best guns. In Fortnite, the best guns will change from season to season, as each new season brings with it new toys to try out and new themes that open up new creative avenues for Epic. After much deliberation, here are our picks for the best guns in Fortnite so far. The Best Guns In Fortnite The best guns in Fortnite will vary from season to season.Burst Assault Rifle (Epic Or Legendary) Arguably the most versatile and reliable gun in the game, a purple or orange "Bursty" is must-have loot whenever it drops from chests or into eliminated players' loot piles. The Burst AR is extremely accurate and fires off three rounds with every trigger-pull, allowing you to recenter the gun on your likely moving target with very limited recoil. In seasons where the Burst Assault Rifle is vaulted, its absence is sorely missed. Compact Submachine Gun If you play like me, you always want to have a close-range weapon in your inventory. While many prefer shotguns for such encounters, I've found the Compact SMG gives me a better chance of winning gun battles. Shotguns are brutal but slow, whereas the Compact SMG gives you a big magazine and almost unrivaled firing rate, meaning anyone who strays too close can be eliminated swiftly with plenty of the clip left over for their teammates. Kymera Ray Gun We may have seen the last of the Kymera Ray Gun, but I sure hope not. This alien tech weapon acted as an alternative to the SMG class and provided a continuous stream of death ray energy the likes of which Fortnite has never seen before or since. While it's weak on builds, it's devastating on players and vehicles. If it meant having the island invaded again so I could play with the Kymera Ray Gun once more, I might take the deal. Pump Shotgun (Epic Or Legendary) Whenever the "pumpy" is unvaulted, you'll see Fortnite fans do one of two things online: rejoice or panic. Sometimes even the same people will do a bit of both. The Pump Shotgun has long been considered overpowered, but Epic has hardly dialed it back, seeming to like it that way. It's slightly slower reload time means hitting your first shot or two is critical, but if you do, that'll be all you need. Automatic Sniper Rifle Season 8 saw the return of the Automatic Sniper Rifle after a long absence, and it quickly changed the battlefield that is the island. With a longer scope than the Scoped AR, the ASR gives you the best of both worlds: rapid-fire shooting and deadly-accurate damage, creating one of the best DPS guns in the entire game. If I could make one gun permanent--never to be vaulted again--I'd choose this one. The Kymera Ray Gun may never come back to Fortnite since it's so attached to the defeated aliens.Gallery Shadow Tracker My favorite Mythic gun is the Shadow Tracker, and that's for two reasons. For one, this list probably reveals I love a highly accurate weapon, and virtually none are more accurate than this silenced pistol. But its special ability of pinging targets on your map for allies to see really lifts the Shadow Tracker from a great gun worth its price in gold bars to a pivotal late-game tool in the right hands. The Shadow Tracker has won me countless matches. Midas' Drum Gun When Midas was waiting at the center of the map in Season 2 of Chapter 2, his haven was the hottest spot of the season. That was owed all to his beloved Thompson, known in-game as Midas' Drum Gun. This Exotic weapon combined the accuracy of the Compact SMG with the improved range of an AR, giving players the most-wanted gun in a season that was already obsessed with overpowered guns. With so many Mythics on the map and so many bosses to take down if you wanted one, most people flocked to take on Midas for his Tommy Gun each match. Dragon's Breath Sniper Rifle This pyromaniacal sniper was already a fan-favorite gun, but it rose to new heights after Epic permanently buffed fire propagation in Chapter 2 Season 6. With each shot from the Dragon's Breath, the immediate area is engulfed in flames, and now that fire spreads farther and faster, tearing down builds and burning through enemies with a fierceness that is as panic-inducing as it is properly deadly. Whenever this Mythic is available, it's money well spent. Mechanical Shockwave Bow When the "Primal" Season 6 arrived in Chapter 2, snipers weren't found anywhere, but in their place was a series of bows and arrows. Of those, the Mechanical Shockwave Bow was the most fun. Hitting enemies with this bow would do the initial damage from the piercing bow, but then shoot them toward the sky (or back into the storm) thanks to the attached shockwave grenade with every hit. With practice, you could even shock wave yourself over and over to traverse vast distances quickly. While this is probably the weakest gun on this list, it's also one of the most creative when used in the right hands. Sideways Minigun The newest gun on this list, the Sideways Minigun is an otherworldly chain gun with accuracy that is probably too reliable for its damage. Perhaps that means a nerf is coming, but for now, we rank the Sideways Minigun as the best gun in Chapter 2 Season 8. Like other Sideways guns, the minigun is most effective when nearly overheated, so it's designed to bring a downpour of bullets early and often onto your enemies, shredding through builds, vehicles, or anything else in its way. View the full article

Most superhero games give you all the power--you are, of course, the hero of the story. With Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, developer Eidos Montreal is taking a different approach, putting you into a superhero team with the focus on making you feel like part of the group. You can't deal with every problem on your own, but it's remarkable how, through the teamwork mechanics within the game, you quickly start to feel like you can work together with the other Guardians to handle any obstacle. We recently got to spend about two hours playing a chapter of Guardians of the Galaxy, which gave a sense of both how the choice-based story will unfold and how you'll handle controlling the entire team of Guardians in battle. In both cases, your choices as the de facto leader of the Guardians is important, but yours isn't the only voice that matters. Through its mechanics and its character development, Guardians of the Galaxy puts its focus on being a single-player game that's all about teamwork. The portion we played takes place on a Nova Corps station called The Rock, where the Guardians head to pay a fine in order to get the interstellar fuzz off their backs. It starts in typical Guardians fashion--the team doesn't agree on the best course of action, and as Peter Quill, aka Star-Lord, you have to deal with their different personalities and bickering. Gamora thinks it's a good idea to settle up on the fine, even though it's costly, so the Guardians won't have to keep looking over their shoulders. Rocket, on the other hand, wants to just make a run for it and keep the cash. Quill agrees with Gamora and so the team is off to pay the fine, but even before you depart, you have a chance to spend time with each member of the team, learn more about them, and develop a relationship with them. That includes a heart-to-heart moment in which you make it clear to Rocket that his opinion is valued, even when you don't agree with him. It also includes a moment where you catch Gamora surfing the interstellar internet to feed her secret hobby of collecting extremely cute dolls. Soon after landing at The Rock, the Guardians start to suspect that something is wrong. None of the space bureaucrats are at their posts, and the station appears to be empty, so there's no one to pay the fine to. The group decides to head further into the station, but to do that, you need Rocket to use his engineering skills to open some doors. That highlights the Guardian Request system: When you need someone else on the team to do something, you can ask them for help, but they might not always just follow orders. Later, when you hit another locked door that requires Rocket's expertise, he straight-up refuses to open it, which demonstrates why Eidos is calling it the Guardian Request System. Rocket is tired of wandering around the station looking for people, and unless Quill agrees that he's not going to lead them through the entire station, Rocket won't be opening any more doors for the group. Decision-making is important to the story, but so is the interplay between the characters, and the Request system highlights how your interactions affect both plot and the puzzles you'll need to solve. Rocket eventually agrees to open the door, but only after Quill agrees to end the search after just one more room. That one room is the turning point of the level, though, when you find a Nova Corps helmet and are able to listen into local communications. Here, you start to get a sense of what's going on when you hear some weird religious chatter between Nova troopers--and apparently, they're searching for someone. This also presents one of the major choice moments in the level, where you can decide to either speak up and ask the Nova Corps folks what's going on, or remain silent. On our first playthrough in the chapter, we stayed silent, and past the next door we found an elevator with a glass wall. Through it, the Guardians watched as some Nova Corps soldiers, with weird purple halos of energy around their heads, executed some of their comrades. Seems like some kind of cultish mind control situation is happening, but since we didn't make our presence known on the radio, the Guardians were able to sneak into the room and take the cultists by surprise. That kicked off combat for the first time, where we got even more of a sense of how teamwork permeates all levels of the game. Quill on his own isn't a particularly strong fighter. He carries a couple of guns and sports his signature jet boots, allowing you to run or fly around the battlefield to hit different targets or drop into cover. But while Quill's guns do some damage and he can also fight hand to hand, neither is always super effective against all enemies. In an interview with GameSpot, senior creative director J.F. Dugas said Eidos Montreal had tried different versions of the game where Quill, and the player, were more powerful, but a more traditional superhero-like take on Guardians of the Galaxy didn't quite work. "It's building an ecosystem between the player and the characters around [Quill]," Dugas explained. "And when you think about that, Peter is not the superhero, actually. He doesn't have superpowers, he doesn't have any of those things. So it was all a question of, how do you balance it to make it feel rewarding to play Peter, but also feeling that you need your Guardians and vice versa? Because if you, as the player, you're super powerful, then the Guardians or your companions are dead weight. And the opposite--if they're too strong, they steal your fire." Quill's role, which Dugas and senior gameplay director Patrick Fortier described as being the team's quarterback, includes ways he can support the rest of the Guardians, though. His guns have elemental add-ons that give you different benefits. In the demo, we had access to an Ice element that allowed Quill to freeze enemies, which made them easy targets for the other Guardians. In combat, the rest of your team will take on enemies on their own, with each fighting in their own way--Rocket sports an arsenal of heavy weapons, Groot ties enemies up with his roots, and Drax and Gamora close the distance to fight with melee weapons or hand-to-hand. But you can still use the Guardian Request System here, where you can call on each member of the team to use specific abilities on individual targets. So freezing a tough enemy with Quill's guns allows you to then call on Drax to hit that enemy with a big attack, doing massive damage. Gamora's assassin abilities are great for taking out distant snipers, while Groot can tie up multiple enemies with his vines and briefly take them out of the battle. Rocket has a powerful grenade that's great for damaging several enemies at once. Alone, none of the Guardians are suited to every situation, but together, they're extremely formidable. As Quill, it's up to you to give orders in the fight, paying attention to what threats are the priority and knowing which Guardian can best deal with them. The demo quickly started mixing tougher enemies with the grunts as we fought our way through them, including a big guy who sported an energy shield that made him tough to shoot. Using Groot or Drax as a distraction was key, allowing Quill to flank him to avoid the shield. Blasts from the freeze gun left the enemy vulnerable so Gamora could get in and do some big damage, and if you attacked from the back, you could destroy the shield generator, taking away its defensive advantage. Eventually, you can initiate a momentary boost called the Huddle, which also charges on a timer. The Huddle pauses the action and brings the Guardians to Quill for a quick pep talk, but you have to make sure you're paying attention to your squad in order to effectively pump them up. The different members of your team will talk about how the fight is going, using keywords that hang on your screen. You then have two options for your response, and you need to pick the pep talk response that's right for the situation. If the Guardians are demoralized, you can reiterate that the group is capable of taking on anything when they work together. If they're fighting over who's kicking more ass, you can implore them not to get cocky and to support each other so everyone can kick even more ass. The Huddle is a great emergency measure, because it automatically revives anyone on the team who was downed, even if you pick the wrong answer. But if you pick the right one, the Guardians are energized by Quill's coaching, and everyone gets a momentary damage boost when they get back into the fight. It's another way the game emphasizes the team over the individual, and reiterates that you're a key part of the group. Playing through the demo a second time also showed how choices can impact combat encounters. If you choose to talk to the Nova Corps through the helmet, a group of cultists will come looking for you, and you lose the element of surprise when they show up, forcing you into a fight. In the next scene when you're in the elevator, the cultist enemies know you're coming and open fire on the glass window. So instead of getting the drop on the enemies, Drax literally leaps out of the elevator and starts wailing on people. Quill's jet boots allow him to follow, but the rest of the team can't jump down three stories. So the first part of the fight is just Quill and Drax while you wait for the other Guardians to catch up, and in order to make it through, you really have to step up your game as the leader. A few moments later, the rest of the team joins the battle, and their banter reflects how you did. You might hear Rocket remark that the team owes Drax a beer for ripping through the enemy Nova Corps if you do well in the fight. So ultimately, your choices might lead you to the same places, it seems, but not necessarily in the same way. While your decisions with the Guardians and how you treat them might influence how the story unfolds and their relationships with you, Fortier said they won't affect combat. Rocket might complain about opening a door because you haven't been listening to him throughout a mission, but that doesn't mean he's going to refuse orders while you're in combat. "We wanted to find the balance between having those moments to keep players engaged and to tailor the experience to how you played it, that you have a story to tell at the end of your adventure that is different than mine," he said. "We went from point A to point B, we got to the same destination, but you had these things happen to you and you interacted with these characters and you had these different moments and I had something else. But we didn't want to go overboard with that. So we tried some combat where suddenly Rocket doesn't work anymore or things like that, and then it became a little too micro, because then you don't remember what it is you did exactly, and you start fearing how you're going to respond. So we wanted to keep it lighter in that way." Working together well as a team builds a sort of combo meter that measures your effectiveness, which earns you experience points you can spend on any of the Guardians to unlock new abilities. You can add to Quill's arsenal of moves, like adding the ability to hover above the battlefield to get better sightlines on enemies, or throw more options to the rest of the Guardians for when you use the Request system in a fight. Each of the moves has different stats, so you can see how much an attack will damage enemies, how many people it can target, how long it will make your cooldown timer, and how much it contributes to filling up enemies' Stagger meters, which can stun them and leave them open to more attacks. Knowing what abilities are good in which situations is essential to winning fights, and the better job you do synergizing each team member's moves, the more experience you earn to buy new abilities. There are also ways to make yourself a little more effective. Collecting supplies off the ground as you work through a level gives you materials you can later use at workbenches, giving you a chance to upgrade Quill's loadout. That lets you add to your capabilities, powering up your guns or equipping a better version of your scanner that lets you gather information about your enemies--which feeds back into your ability to make good decisions for the team, while making yourself a better fighter too. The demo ended soon after a few more big fights with various enemies, requiring changes in tactics in order to deal with each. The team finally made their way back to the ship, with the Guardians constantly bantering and joking the whole way through. Through combat, character moments between fights, and the decision points throughout the demo, it was remarkable how much Guardians of the Galaxy captures the feeling of being a member of a team--even if the rest of the team is controlled by AI. It all suggests that Guardians of the Galaxy is a superhero game that's not going to feel like other superhero games--but it does a great job of capturing the humor, dysfunction, and camaraderie that makes the Guardians of the Galaxy such a great group of characters. Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy is slated to release on October 26 for Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PC. A cloud version is also coming to Nintendo Switch. View the full article

FIFA 22 doesn't officially release until October 1, but you can actually start playing it today. The game's EA Play trial is launching today, September 22, for subscribers. This is the full game, but it's only playable for a period of 10 hours. As such, you should try to remember to completely close the game when you're not playing to preserve the most play time. All progress and achievements carry forward should you decide to buy the game outright. The FIFA 22 EA Play trial will be available anywhere you can subscribe to EA Play--and this includes Xbox, PlayStation, and PC. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members can play, too, since their membership comes with EA Play bundled in. In other news, EA Sports has announced the player ratings for the top 1,000 players in the game. You can see them all in this gigantic database on EA's website--Lionel Messi is once again the highest-rated player overall. We also recently learned that FIFA 22 will bring back preview packs, which allow Ultimate Team players to see inside a card pack before spending money on it. One of the biggest gameplay innovations in FIFA 22 is the HyperMotion technology, which uses machine learning and AI to make the game's animations look more fluid and realistic. Check out the video above to learn more about how this works. FIFA's competitor, the PES series, is now known as eFootball. The franchise made a huge change for this year's game, not only in the name but the business model, which is free-to-play featuring a heavy live service element. View the full article

Microsoft will show off what's included in the next Halo Infinite multiplayer beta test as part of a livestream event today, September 22, the company has announced. The broadcast begins at 2 PM PT / 5 PM ET, and you can watch it on Twitch and YouTube. According to the announcement, the broadcast will include a "first look" at what to expect in the beta. As announced previously, the first of two September multiplayer betas runs this weekend, beginning September 23, letting players try out 4v4 Arena Slayer. Another beta takes place the following weekend, with that one focusing on Big Team Battle, which ups the player count to 12v12. Everyone who signed up for the free Halo Insider program by September 13 should have received an invitation to participate in the first beta, while all members should be eligible for the BTB test. If you haven't already, be sure to check your Halo Waypoint inbox and your email for an invite. In other news, the September installment of the Inside Infinite series was published this week, and it contained stacks of new insight into the game and its multiplayer mode. Check out the stories below to learn more. Halo Infinite Big Team Battle Mode Detailed Ahead Of Multiplayer Beta Test Halo Infinite Multiplayer Microtransaction System Is Coming Into Focus Halo Infinite Multiplayer Progression Explained As 343 Responds To Criticisms Halo Infinite's Training Mode Sounds Great After a big delay, Halo Infinite's free multiplayer and campaign are set to be released on December 8. View the full article

September 22 is a very special day in Middle-earth history. It is the shared birthday of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, and the day is celebrated on the internet as Hobbit Day. Peter Jackson's The Fellowship of the Ring begins with Bilbo's 111th birthday party, which proves to be a jubilant and critical point in his journey. It is the day that Bilbo gives up the One Ring and leaves the Shire for good. Frodo takes ownership of the One Ring, and, well, plenty of drama ensues. People are celebrating the occasion by dressing up as Hobbits, re-watching The Lord of the Rings, turning the pages of Tolkien's iconic fantasy work, and eating donuts. Deviant Donuts in Mystic, Connecticut created some incredible-looking Lord of the Rings-themed donuts to celebrate Hobbit Day. You can get a closer look at the scrumptious and decadent-looking creations below. The Twitter account for New Zealand, regarded by many to be Middle-earth on Earth, is posting a series of images and details for famous Lord of the Rings filming locations. You can see more in the thread below, which is being updated throughout the day with additional stops. Unfortunately for New Zealand, Amazon decided to move production on Season 2 of its Lord of the Rings show to the UK. Given that it's Hobbit Day, it would seem to be a fitting time for Amazon to reveal new details on its TV show, though whether or not that happens remains a mystery. It was recently reported that Oscar-winning composer Howard Shore will return to compose the music for Amazon's show. Outside of that, a strategy game called The Lord of the Rings: Rise to War releases on September 23, so fans of Middle-earth games will have something new to play very soon. Looking further out, Warner Bros. is releasing an epic 31-disc The Lord of the Rings/Hobbit box 4K/Blu-ray box set in October that comes with a series of extras. View the full article

Marcus Lehto, the co-creator of the Halo universe and the original designer of Master Chief, has teased a major career update. Lehto said on Twitter that he is in the process of making some "pretty big decisions" about his career--and not everyone will support what he's doing. "Some of you will support it, some will not. I just ask that you all join me on this next leg of [the] journey," Lehto wrote. "It's going to be big!" We might not find out what Lehto is teasing in the immediate future, as the developer said more information will come "in a few months." Lehto worked at Bungie from the beginning where he co-created the Halo universe before becoming the art director at the studio on other Halo titles. He was creative director on Bungie's last Halo game, Halo: Reach, before he shifted to the Destiny series. Lehto left Bungie in 2012 and started his own company, V1 Interactive. The studio released its first game, Disintegration, in 2020. It was unable to find an audience and the game's servers shut down before the studio overall closed. It'll be interesting to see where Lehto lands next, and we'll report back with more information as it becomes available. View the full article

Have you ever looked at a Call of Duty map and wondered what it might look like constructed entirely out of Lego? Neither have I, but it turns out the answer is that it looks pretty cool. The folks at Diamond Lobby have designed eight epic Lego builds based on some of the most iconic Call of Duty maps, and we only wish they existed in real life. While theoretically these Lego maps are possible to build, these ones have been constructed using the Bricklink Studio 2.0 software, with the help of designer Evghenii Loctev. In case you did want to try building one yourself, each map also includes what it would cost if you bought all the bricks in the build--though Diamond Lobby warns that some bricks used are rare and therefore pretty expensive. The images include eight iconic maps: Crash, Castle, Terminal, Firing Range, Rust, Nuketown, Slums, and Raid. Of all the maps that have been recreated, Crash would be the cheapest to actually build at $1340 for the 2167 bricks required. The most expensive is Terminal, with the giant plane requiring 18,043 bricks at a cost of $4,726. Terminal is made up of 18,043 bricks and costs $4,726 to build. Image: Diamond LobbySlums is made up of 3,456 bricks and costs $1,591 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyRust is made up of 1,811 bricks and costs $1,810 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyRaid is made up of 14,152 bricks and costs $2,474 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyNuketown is made up of 5,953 bricks and costs $3,033 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyFiring Range is made up of 5,133 bricks and costs $1,988 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyCrash is made up of 2,167 bricks and costs $1,340 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyCastle is made up of 12,873 bricks and costs $2,508 to build. Image: Diamond LobbyWhile these images make us dream of an official Call of Duty Lego set, the franchise seems to be licensed to Lego competitor Mega Bloks--though the rival toy company has produced a nice-looking Nuketown set. View the full article

If you've got some extra Capitale saved up, this week is the time to spend some on a run for the Ember of the East. If you don't, the good news is Rockstar will also be rewarding bonus Capitale to players through a number of different means. Here are all the bonuses you can redeem in Red Dead Online this week. The main event in Red Dead Online this week is the Ember of the East opportunity, part of the recent Blood Money expansion. If players have the Capitale required to start the mission--and if they can pull it off successfully--they'll be able to redeem twice the RDO$ and XP rewarded for a successful heist. Players will be gifted extra Capitale at the end of the week based on their level--10 for players under rank 5, 15 for players between rank 6 and 50, and 20 Capitale for anyone over rank 51. If you need the extra Capitale before September 27, you can get bonus Capitale from Clearing House Crimes all week, while additional Capitale will be available to loot from chests and fallen enemies in any Contract played this week. Two Contracts will also be rewarding extra cash and XP for the week--The Bluewater Contract and the Cornwall Contract--while completing any contract during the week will award a free Vest voucher and 2000 character XP. Players will continue to get free fast travel for the week, as well as a posse XP bonus for any activities completed as a posse. This week's discounts include 40% off Off-Hand Holsters, and 30% off Coats, Revolvers, and some Skill Pamphlets. View the full article