Fallout creator Tim Cain takes us back to the past to discuss the influences that helped shape the first game into one of the most iconic video game franchises of all time.

There's nothing quite like a Fallout game. The retro-futurism style of the atomic age brings a striking visual design that you really don't see very much any more. A good portion of the game was based on satire grounded in reality, really tapping into the nuclear and communist scares that defined the era.

One not-so-surprising influence was the 1988 Apple II classic Wasteland. Cain clarifies that Wasteland wasn't as much of an influence as everyone thinks. "The biggest influence, outside of the post-apocalyptic world and things like Rangers, was the idea that there could be quests that have a moral dilemma in them."

Universal's next big video game adaptation will be based on The Legend of Zelda, sources have told renowned film critic and reporter Jeff Sneider.

Following the billion-dollar success of the Super Mario Bros. Movie, reports indicate that Nintendo is currently working out a mega-deal with Universal on a film adaptation of its popular Zelda franchise series. Illumination, the production studio that animated the Mario film, is likewise expected to bring Link's grand fantasy adventure to the big screen.

"I got this tip last week from a great source. I didn't want to just blurt it out, and I did call yesterday but I never heard back. So we're just going to put it out there. Again, not a big shocker, but from what I'm told it's getting close to official," Sneider said in a recent episode of The Hot Mic video series.

The Samsung Galaxy S23 FE is a phone that we've seen conflicting rumors about over the last few months. Some believe that it's real and on the way, others suggested that there will be no FE, or Fan Edition, version of the latest Galaxy S lineup. Now, a new leak claims to have pictorial proof of the battery that will power the phone when it is eventually made official.

Whether this finally confirms that there is really going to be a Galaxy S23 FE or not remains to be seen, but some people seem pretty convinced that we will finally see this new phone sooner rather than later.

The battery itself was spotted by Galaxy Club in a certification listing from Safety Korea. The battery carries the model number EB-BS711ABY which matches the SM-S711 model number that is thought to be for the Galaxy S23 FE. However, the certification doesn't confirm what capacity the battery has which means that we can't have a guess at how well the Galaxy S23 FE will fare in the battery life stakes.

If you live in Germany and were planning on picking up a new phone, you're going to have one fewer company to look into. That's after Vivo followed the lead of OnePlus and Oppo by pulling out of the country, halting sales of its phones in the process.

The move follows a ruling over a patent battle with Nokia that saw Vivo and the other two companies lose. As a result, Vivo says that it's no longer selling its phones in Germany. However, those who already have a phone will continue to receive customer support when required while future software updates have also been secured, the company says.

Interestingly, WinFuture notes that Vivo could license the WLAN patents required to continue selling its phones in the country but appears to have chosen not to. The retailer does note that Germans who really do want to get their hands-on a Vivo phone can still do so via other European countries, although that is perhaps an extra layer to the purchase process that most people are unlikely to want to go through.

When Apple announced the Vision Pro headset during the WWDC 2023 event on June 5 it confirmed that the external battery pack will offer just two hours of power when the headset isn't connected to a power outlet. But that could change if there's a way to install a larger, more capable battery pack further down the line.

And it turns out that there might actually be a way to do that, although Apple is yet to confirm as much. Instead, it's been left to leaker DuanRui to posit that a hole on the Apple battery pack might allow users to eject the cable, meaning that it can then later be plugged into a different battery if required.

The cable does appear to be in a state that suggests it can be removed, and it's possible that putting something long and thin like a SIM ejector tool into the hole beside it will see the cable easily removed. There are two holes in fact, but one is likely to be an LED indicator that shows when the battery is either being charged or is in use.

Apple announced that its Apple TV devices will soon be able to make and accept FaceTime calls for the first time when tvOS 17 ships later this year, but that's nothing. Now, it appears that Google is already working on allowing devices running its Android TV software to accept actual telephone calls as well.

That's according to a new report based on the Android TV 14 beta that is now available, with leaker Mishaal Rahman taking to Twitter to share the details.

According to that leak, there are already references to an option to enable call notifications as well as receive calls on an Android TV device. The text related to those options suggests that, when enabled, users will be able to receive calls from supported apps. It isn't clear what those supported apps will be, or what developers might need to do in order to make the feature work.

Microsoft and Xbox are celebrating 75 years of Porsche by launching a special edition version of the Xbox Series X console, but there's one big catch - you can't actually buy it.

Microsoft Xbox Series X - image: Xbox.com

The new console is instead only going to be available via a sweepstake, with people able to enter between now and midnight on October 1. After that, you'll just have to hope that one of these things pops up on eBay and even if it does, it's likely to cost a small fortune. As for the sweepstake, that's available to anyone who is 18 or over and happens to live in the United States, the UK, or Germany.

The sweapstake website says that Porsche has been fueled by a relentless pursuit of bringing dreams to life for its 75 years of existence, so Xbox has decided to celebrate by making 75 of these special consoles available. They're covered in a custom design that is inspired by Porsche racing colors, we're told, and they look pretty stunning. There is even a custom Xbox controller included in the package as well.

The next round of flagship phones will likely be powered by a new chip, and that chip is shaping up to be one well worth getting excited about.

That new chip is of course the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 from Qualcomm, with the silicon set to replace the current Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 that powers flagships like the Samsung Galaxy S23 lineup. Now, new details show the upcoming chip's expected performance when compared to the old one, and it makes for good reading.

The information comes via Twitter leaker Revegnus, with the stats suggesting that there will be up to a 30% speed improvement depending on the type of thing you're doing.

In a world where building a competitor for Twitter seems to be the thing everyone is trying to do, the idea of Meta and Instagram getting involved shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone. Now, that Instagram project has leaked with screenshots shared online.

Twitter logo - image: Twitter.com

The leak comes after one of Meta's executives showed employees a preview of what the project looks like in its current state. Dubbed Project 92, the unnamed social network will be based on Instagram but integrate with ActivityPub, the social media protocol that's decentralized in a similar way to Mastodon. As a result, there is a possibility that accounts will work across both platforms which is something that traditional social networks like Twitter and Facebook simply don't allow.

The Verge reports that Meta chief product officer Chris Cox told those in attendance yesterday that the new project is the company's response to Twitter. He went on, saying that creators Meta has spoken to have said that they want a platform that "is sanely run," something that was a clear jibe at Twitter and current owner Elon Musk.

Like Proton for Linux, which makes Windows-based games playable on the OS within Steam, Apple is looking to make it just as easy for developers to make DirectX 12 games like Cyberpunk 2077 and Diablo IV playable on Mac computers with a new Game Porting Toolkit based on CodeWeaver's CrossOver source code.

Diablo 4 running on Mac is possible thanks to the new Game Porting Toolkit from Apple.

The tool allows developers to quickly and easily fire up their games to see how they run on macOS, with Apple noting that it has been designed to make the whole Mac game port process as easy as possible. Powered by the source code from CrossOver, it can instantly translate Windows API calls so they can run on macOS - with Apple showcasing the technology by running the DirectX 12 survival horror game The Medium via the Game Porting Toolkit.

"The new Game Porting Toolkit provides an emulation environment to run your existing unmodified Windows game," Aiswariya Sreenivassan, an engineer at Apple, said during the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). "You can use it to quickly understand the graphics feature usage and performance potential of your game when running on a Mac."