PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is now available on Google's Stadia streaming platform, and is free for Stadia Pro members.

Today Google confirmed it's not playing around with Stadia. The service is getting some of the biggest games on the market today, and Google secured billion-dollar titans like EA's FIFA, Madden, and Star Wars, along with the massive battle royale sensation PUBG.

Right now PUBG is available for free as a bundle for all Stadia Pro members, which is good news if you haven't signed up. Google is offering a free two-month Stadia Pro trial for all new members, but you have to use a credit card to sign up. If you forget to cancel, Google will charge you $10 a month.

Microsoft has announced that it has issued a patch for a severe flaw in Microsoft Teams that could have allowed a user's account to be taken over simply by viewing a GIF. The security issue stemmed from the way that Teams handles images and could allow data theft and account hijacking. The security flaw was discovered by a security firm called CyberArk over a month ago.

CyberArk worked with Microsoft Security Research Center using the Coordinated Vulnerability Disclosure to fix the flaw. Repairing such a sensitive flaw was a priority with the massively increased number of users who are utilizing Teams for education, work, and healthcare during the coronavirus pandemic. CyberArk was able to show Microsoft how it was possible to use a compromise subdomain to host images and steal security tokens by merely getting the user to view an image.

One of the most serious aspects of this particular attack was that it was invisible to the user. CyberArk said that it found that two Microsoft subdomains were vulnerable to takeover, including aadsync-test.teams.microsoft.com and data-dev.teams.microsoft.com.

Battlefront is being retired into maintenance mode and won't receive any new updates after Scarif, DICE today confirmed.

DICE is about to sunset two of its live games: First Battlefield V retires this summer, and then Battlefront II will be retired starting tomorrow.

"This means that we're moving away from delivering regular content updates. As the game lives on with the players and our community, we're looking forward to hearing your stories for years to come," DICE said in a blog post. The studio plans to go full steam ahead on Battlefield 6 for next-gen consoles.

Google isn't messing around with Stadia. Google just secured some of the industry's biggest billion-dollar earners for its fledgling game-streaming service.

Stadia might blow up big time, and in the best way possible. Today Google announced a huge partnership with EA to bring some of the industry's most popular and lucrative games like FIFA, Madden, and Star Wars over to Stadia. This move has tremendous implications for Stadia's long-term earnings and adoption.

EA plans to release five games across its titanic franchises to Stadia. The singleplayer-only Jedi: Fallen Order will arrive in 2020, and both FIFA and Madden will arrive by winter 2020. Whether or not the newer FIFA 21 and Madden 21 will release on Stadia wasn't confirmed. More games will launch in 2021, EA says.

A lot of people out there looking forward to the launch of a new streaming service from HBO called HBO Max. New details on the service and a deal that WarnerMedia has going with Apple have surfaced that some subscribers to HBO Now will appreciate. WarnerMedia has announced that it's teaming up with Apple to launch the HBO Max service and to specifically ensure a seamless experience for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple TV users.

HBO Max will be available through the Apple TV app at launch on May 27. The best part is that customers who are currently paying for HBO Now through the Apple App Store or Apple TV Channels will be upgraded to HBO Max at no additional charge. Those needing to sign-up will pay $14.99 per month for HBO Max via Apple platforms or other services.

The announcement also confirms that customers who own a second or third-generation Apple TV will be able to stream HBO Max content from their iPhone or iPad directly to their TV via AirPlay. The fourth-generation Apple TV and iPhone and iPad devices will also get an HBO Max application. The older Apple TV devices will need to stream using AirPlay.

How many chapters will gamers need to buy until they own the full Final Fantasy 7 Remake? Square Enix doesn't know just yet.

April's launch of Final Fantasy 7 Remake wasn't the full package, but only the first chapter in a multi-volume roadmap of games. Square Enix plans to release multiple full-sized volumes that are sold as standalone, full-priced games. We originally assumed the series would be a trilogy with 90 hours of content--one full game release for each of FF7's original 3 discs--but now Square Enix says the game could have more than three parts.

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LG has confirmed the specifications for its new flagship smartphone call the LG Velvet. The device set to launch next week, and now fans know what to expect. The smartphone has a 6.8-inch 20.5:9 aspect ratio OLED display and both the screen and the back cover will have curved sides.

Velvet will be 74.1 mm wide with LG promising the width makes the device easy for consumers to handle. Stereo speakers will balance sound with artificial intelligence software designed to control the volume and optimize sound. On its back, Velvet will have a 48-megapixel main primary lens along with an eight-megapixel ultra-wide lens, and a five-megapixel depth sensor.

The front selfie camera will be a 16-megapixel unit. LG says that the cameras will support ASMR recording to improve sound quality on recorded videos. Under the hood will be a Qualcomm Snapdragon 765 5G SoC. Power will come from a 4300 mAh internal battery. The smartphone will have a headphone jack, which is something that many people appreciate.

WhatsApp has announced a new update for its service meant to cater to people trying to work from home and keep in touch with friends and family during the coronavirus pandemic. WhatsApp says that since the pandemic started to hit the world, it has seen people globally turn to voice and video calling on WhatsApp more than ever before. The service says that group calling has been particularly useful, and users have asked to connect with more people at once.

WhatsApp says that starting today, it is doubling the number of participants that a user can have a WhatsApp video or voice call with from four people to eight people at a time. While talking about doubling the number of people who can participate in a voice or video call, WhatsApp also says that over the last month, people have, on average, spend more than 15 billion minutes talking each day on WhatsApp calls. The company says that number of minutes is "well above a typical day before the pandemic."

WhatsApp points out that just like its written messages, all voice and video calls are protected with end-to-end encryption. The new group calling feature is also built in a way to make it available to as many users as possible, including people using lower-end devices and hose on slow networks. WhatsApp says that it's also available on Portal, and users have said that is a great way to share the living room family during the quarantine.

A new rumor making the rounds that suggests the next-generation Samsung Galaxy Note smartphone, thought to be called the Galaxy Note 20, will receive an updated chipset. The new chipset would be a change from the Exynos 990 chipset that Samsung is using right now. Some Samsung devices use the Exynos 990 chipset, but the Snapdragon 865 is used in the Galaxy S20 series of smartphones in South Korea.

According to the rumor, the chipset used in the Galaxy Note 20 will be the Exynos 992. That chip is expected to bring improved performance and improved power efficiency compared to the current generation Exynos 990. This change would also reportedly see Samsung switch back to Exynos processors in South Korea.

Samsung's new chipset is expected to be based on the Samsung 6nm fabrication process. Chips using that fabrication process are scheduled to go into mass production in the second half of 2020. The current-generation Exynos 990 processor uses the Samsung 7nm EUV process that has been widely criticized for being unable to compare in performance to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865.

Like virtually all retail locations around the United States, Apple's retail stores have been closed down due to the coronavirus pandemic for over a month. Apple's retail chief recently told employees in a video briefing that Apple expects that the company will reopen many retail locations in May. Apple's retail stores have been closed outside of China since March.

Word of the store openings in May came from Deirdre O'Brien, vice president of retail and people for Apple. Word of her comments surfaced from unnamed retail employees who viewed the video. According to the employees, in the video, she said that "we are continuing to analyze his health situation in every location, and I do expect we will reopen up many stores in May." She failed to announce any specific stores or regions that would be reopening in May.

O'Brien had previously told Apple employees that some locations in the United States would resume operations in early May. Many states around the country are getting back to work as stay-at-home orders are being lifted around the nation. In some states, such as Georgia, some businesses have already reopened.