Microsoft has tailor-made the entirety of its new 4K ready Project Scorpio console, from its highly customized hardware components like the Scorpio Engine silicon, to the software pipeline and toolsets that enable efficient game performance scaling--everything has been custom-fit in the best way possible. All the resources are synergized, and nothing is wasted--not even power. Now the company reveals how its achieved this efficiency, and it all stems from the foundation of all systems: the motherboard.

Project Scorpio's tight power efficiency is achieved thanks to the Hovis Method, a digital power delivery system infused onto the console's motherboard that fine-tunes each console's voltage. Every single chip is a little bit different, and Microsoft knows that no two Project Scorpio SoCs will be exactly the same; different chips and mass-produced parts can result in different power draws across the board, which can disrupt the system's delicate balance. The Hovis Method was employed to custom-tune each system's power settings so that there's no power wasted, and no extra heat (this gives us a very big clue that Project Scorpio will indeed be quite small).

"To maximize performance and minimize power consumption, Project Scorpio uses the Hovis Method, a cutting edge digital power delivery system that custom tunes each console's voltage," Microsoft says.

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HTC unveiled their latest smartphones earlier this year, the U Play and U Ultra, but they are yet to unveil a worthy successor to the HTC 10. Although it has been rumored that the device will be named the HTC 11, trustworthy leaker Evan Blass confirmed that HTC chose a rather simple name for their upcoming device - HTC U.

The famous leaker unveiled the specs of the device last month, and now, he has posted the first image of the upcoming flagship.

The image reveals what looks to be glass on both front and the back of the phone. It is also apparent that the phone will have significant bezels, unlike LG's and Samsung's recently unveiled flagships. The fingerprint sensor will remain on the front of the phone, and in case there were some doubts - there is no dual camera.

I've just read the technical deep dive article that the amazing writers at Eurogamer tackled on Project Scorpio, and noticed some very interesting news: AMD's next-gen Vega GPU architecture is making an appearance in Project Scorpio.

Project Scorpio rocks a mostly Polaris-based GPU, with technical features from the Polaris GPU architecture making up most of the soul of the new Xbox, but there are features like delta color compression that boosts bandwidth for 4K rendering and 4K textures. Microsoft took some of the improvements that AMD made in the Polaris architecture in Project Scorpio.

According to Andrew Goossen, Technical Fellow, Graphics told Eurogamer that performance optimizations from the next-gen Vega GPU architecture made it into the Scorpio Engine's design.

AMD is launching their Radeon RX 580 graphics card soon, alongside the RX 570/560/550, with the entire RX 500 series being a rebranded and tweaked RX 400 series. The flagship Radeon RX 580 has already been overclocked, hitting 1.5GHz on the GPU under water.

The overclocked RX 580 in question is from XFX, with it rocking a single 8-pin PCIe connector and stock GPU clocks of 1360MHz. This means the results from this card should line up with the RX 480 clocked at the same GPU speeds, but the thing that concerns me the most is that the XFX Radeon RX 580 needed to be cooled with water cooling to hit 1.5GHz?

I can tell you that I'm hitting that on stock cooling without much tweaking. My results will be arriving very soon! :)

'Star Wars' fans looking to get their next fix following the reveal of 'The Last Jedi' teaser trailer can look no further than the newly released trailer for the fourth season of the animated hit 'Rebels', which Director Dave Filoni has revealed will be the show's last.

Over the last three seasons, the show has gone to critical and fan acclaim, bringing back beloved heroes and villains such as Darth Vader, Grand Admiral Thrawn, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Maul, and has ascended it's animated origins and taken on some dark themes. The final season is promising to end the series with a bang, and hints at some wider ramifications for the film series. During a panel at 'Star Wars' Celebration, Filoni says that "Star Wars Rebels will be the complete journey that it was meant to be from the very beginning. We all felt that the time was right and that the characters were at a point where their story, and their destinies, should finally be revealed. We deeply appreciate all our fans who have journeyed with the Ghost crew, and I promise season four will be like no other."

'Star Wars: Rebels' returns to screens in September.

I fully expect EA to offer early access trials for all of its big-name games, and Battlefront 2 is the latest: EA and Origin Access subscribers will get to try DICE's new Battlefront shooter eight days before its release.

Battlefront 2 is scheduled to launch November 17, 2017 on all platforms, but EA Access subscribers on Xbox One and Origin Access members on PC actually get to try it as early as November 8, 2017. Naturally PS4 owners are locked out of the deal since Sony has barred EA Access from its console. EA hasn't confirmed how beefy the First Access Trial will be, but we expect it to be similar to Mass Effect: Andromeda's by offering a set amount of playtime. No info on a public or closed beta test has been revealed, but expect that info at EA Play in June.

"Try Star Wars Battlefront II starting November 9 when you join EA Access on Xbox One or Origin Access on PC. Your progress carries over to the full game if you decide to buy," EA confirmed. So we should have to download the full game for the trial just like with Mass Effect: Andromeda to ensure our data carries over. We don't know how big Battlefront 2 is just yet, but the PSN listing says "minimum 50GB of save data," so that could be the base install size.

EA today announced Battlefront 2, revealing tons of details including an "emotionally gripping" campaign that connects the original trilogy to the expanded universe, full-on galactic space combat, and tons of new heroes and maps across all three of the franchise's eras.

We've collected an array of new Battlefront 2 screenshots from across the net, and can confirm that Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones' Kamino planet will be one of the in-game maps, and Jango Fett should be one of the un-announced new heroes.

Here's what we know about Battlefront 2 so far:

EA's new Battlefront 2 sequel will retain the original game's 20 vs 20 multiplayer mode, this time with galactic in-space dogfighting.

While DICE and EA have yet to reveal specific details about Battlefront 2's 40-player mode, including which maps and vehicles will be featured, we should see the mode transcend across all three Star Wars eras--prequel Clone Wars timeline, original trilogy, and the expanded universe--with battles from each specific era.

"Join up to 40 players in massive multiplayer fights in authentic locations across all eras. Revel in deep class-based online gameplay, pilot a wide variety of land and air vehicles, and control iconic characters with distinct abilities that can turn the tide of battle."

UPDATE: The official Microsoft Store listing for Battlefront 2 says the game has "in-app purchases," strongly hinting the game will have microtransactions as I predicted.

DICE today confirmed that Battlefront 2 won't have a season pass, and EA has "something different in mind" to keep gamers playing longer without fragmenting the community. Does that mean microtransactions are coming?

Publishers like EA and Ubisoft have very typical business models when it comes to online-based multiplayer games: strategic releases of paid DLC content to engage the community, and microtransactions to ensure recurrent player spending keeps things profitable. If a game doesn't go with paid DLC or season passes, it usually goes with microtransactions instead. EA has no stranger to "MTX" (microtransactions), and makes a huge portion of its money through in-game purchases in games like FIFA and Madden.