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Far Cry 6 delayed to FY2022, won't release in February 2021 as planned
Ubisoft has delayed both Far Cry 6 and Rainbow Six Quarantine to its FY2022 timeline, which lasts from April 1, 2021 - March 31, 2022.
Today Ubisoft confirmed two high-profile AAA games will skip its FY2021 slate: Far Cry 6 and Rainbow Six Quarantine have been backdated to an unspecified period. Both games were delayed due to coronavirus work-from-home measures that have disrupted development. Works are no longer making games in offices and must work remotely, which is tough to do for a global company like Ubisoft.
FY2021 was to be Ubisoft's most ambitious year for game releases, however the delays won't significantly impact expected yearly earnings. After the delays, Ubisoft now expects FY2021 net bookings to sit between 2.2 billion Euros (-6.8%) and 2.35 billion Euros (-11.3%). Operating income is expected to hit between 420 million Euros (+5%) and 520 million (-13.3%).
Continue reading: Far Cry 6 delayed to FY2022, won't release in February 2021 as planned (full post)
The PlayStation 5 PSVR dongle is a USB adapter
The upcoming PlayStation 5 is compatible with almost the entire back catalogue of PS4 games, including most PSVR titles, but the system won't launch with a new PSVR headset. The new console is compatible with the existing headset, but you will need a dongle to make it work.
If you're not familiar, the PlayStation 4 console featured a unique proprietary port for the PlayStation 4 camera required to run the PSVR. The new console, however, does not include that port, and the PS5 camera is not compatible with the VR headset.
Sony said you'll need an adaptor to make the PSVR work on the new console, and you'll need your existing PlayStation 4 Camera. The adaptor is a USB dongle with Sony's proprietary end on one side and a standard USB A plug on the other end. The adaptor supports SuperSpeed USB 5Gbps.
Continue reading: The PlayStation 5 PSVR dongle is a USB adapter (full post)
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War PC trailer details PCMR version in 4K
Activision has just dropped the latest and final Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War PC trailer, detailing the very best version of the game. Check it out in all of its 4K glory:
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War will be on virtually all consoles including the next-gen PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X consoles, but the PC version will be the most special. Uncapped frame rates, Ultra-wide and multi-monitor support, 4K ray traced graphics, and most importantly -- NVIDIA DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) support.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War drops on Battle.net for PC gamers, and available online and in physical form on consoles on November 13.
Continue reading: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War PC trailer details PCMR version in 4K (full post)
NVIDIA's new GeForce 457.09 WHQL drivers out, support GeForce RTX 3070
NVIDIA has just released its new GeForce Game Ready 457.09 WHQL drivers, which support the new GeForce RTX 3070 (our review on that here) and Ubisoft's just-released Watch Dogs: Legion.
The new GeForce Game Ready 457.09 WHQL drivers have Game Ready support for Watch Dogs: Legion, but also have optimal day one support for DiRT 5, Ghostrunner, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered, and Xuan-Yuan Sword VII.
NVIDIA also add in support for 4 new G-SYNC compatible monitors, with the Acer XB323U GX, ASUS VG279QL1A, Dell AW2521HFLA, and GIGABYTE AORUS FI25F monitors.
Continue reading: NVIDIA's new GeForce 457.09 WHQL drivers out, support GeForce RTX 3070 (full post)
Microsoft shifting the Windows Mixed Reality platform to OpenXR
Microsoft announced that it would transition its Windows Mixed Reality platform exclusively to OpenXR in future game engine releases.
This year, Khronos Group released the OpenXR 1.0 specification, which saw immediate support from the biggest names in the XR space. Oculus and Microsoft quickly released OpenXR compatible runtimes, followed by SteamVR and HTC shortly after that. Now that Unity and Epic Games are on board, Microsoft is preparing to move away from its WinRT API and shift exclusively to OpenXR.
The idea behind Khronos Group's OpenXR specification is that developers can write code once, which would be compatible with all OpenXR devices. That means developers could build one application that would run on OpenXR-compatible VR or AR hardware.
Continue reading: Microsoft shifting the Windows Mixed Reality platform to OpenXR (full post)
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War requires RTX 3080 for 4K ray tracing
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is right around the corner, but you'll need to prepare your storage for a huge 250GB installation if you want the entire experience with 4K ray traced graphics.
At a minimum you're going to need an Intel Core i3-4340 or AMD FX-6300 processor, 8GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 / GeForce GTX 1650 or AMD Radeon 7950 graphics card. You'll need 50GB of storage minimum for the multiplayer, and 175GB for all game modes in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War.
The recommended specs see you needing a higher-end Intel Core i5-2500K or AMD Ryzen 5 1600X processor, 12GB of RAM, and then an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 / GTX 1660 SUPER or an AMD Radeon R9 390 / RX 580 graphics card.
Continue reading: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War requires RTX 3080 for 4K ray tracing (full post)
Immersed adds virtual keyboard overlays to its VR workspace platform
Immersed pushed a new update for its virtual workspace application, making it far easier to type in VR. With the Virtual Keyboard Overlay, putting a headset on no longer hides your keyboard.
Immersed is a VR application that integrates wirelessly with your PC to give you an expansive, private workspace wherever you are. Immersed offers multi-screen computing, multi-user shared environments with shared displays or whiteboards, and a virtual webcam so you can join zoom meetings as a virtual avatar.
Today, Immersed solved one of the most significant limitations of its system. Now you can see your keyboard while you have your headset on. Previously, you had to use your motion controllers to type or fumble to find your keyboard blindly. Now with Virtual Keyboard Overlay, you'll be able to see it on screen.
Continue reading: Immersed adds virtual keyboard overlays to its VR workspace platform (full post)
NBA 2K21 looks pretty swish, instant load times on next-gen consoles
NBA 2K21 is shaping up really, really well on next-gen consoles with 2K Games unleashing a new trailer showing gameplay footage from the game on one of the next-gen consoles. Check it out:
You can see that there's tons of graphical improvements, but those instant load times are out of this world good. 2K Games says that it has next-gen lighting, textures, physics, animations and more than push the "visual presentation to the bleeding edge" in NBA 2K21.
NBA 2K21 drops on Xbox Series X and S on November 10, and on the PlayStation 5 on November 12 in the US and November 19 in Europe.
Continue reading: NBA 2K21 looks pretty swish, instant load times on next-gen consoles (full post)
Sony raises gaming earnings forecast by $945 million on software surge
Sony has significantly boosted its FY2020 gaming sales revenue projections by nearly $1 billion as software sales continue to spike.
In its latest Q2'20 earnings report, games titan Sony has raised its total fiscal year Games and Network Services sales earnings targets by 100 billion yen ($945 million as per Q2 exchange rates). Sony now expects gaming to earn 2.6 trillion yen ($24.57 billion) in FY2020, a rather sizable 35% increase over FY2019's performance.
This substantial increase will be driven by strong software sales, Sony predicts, as well as in-game purchases in titles like Genshin Impact, the latest free-to-play Chinese sensation that's now generated nearly $250 million in its first month.
Continue reading: Sony raises gaming earnings forecast by $945 million on software surge (full post)
PlayStation 4 sales hit 113.8 million, Q2 sales dip 46% to 1.5 million
As more gamers eye the next-gen PS5, Sony's PS4 shipments are starting to dwindle.
Sony's PlayStation 4 console has now shipped 113.8 million units worldwide since its launch in November 2013, the company reports in its latest earnings filings. Overall, console shipments are dropping considerably in the PS4's seventh year. The PS4 sold-in 1.5 million units in Q2'20, Sony reports, a 46% year-over-year reduction. This is the lowest Q2 for PS4 shipments since the system launched all those years ago.
Sony has currently shipped 3.4 million PS4s throughout FY2020, which is likewise the lowest performance in combined Q1 and Q2 sales since the console's initial 2013 release. PlayStation 4 console hardware sales made up 20% of the gaming segment's Q2 revenues, or $960 million (101.586 billion yen), a revenue decrease of roughly 20% year-over-year. This makes sense given the lower hardware shipment drop.
Continue reading: PlayStation 4 sales hit 113.8 million, Q2 sales dip 46% to 1.5 million (full post)
Travis Scott goes beyond all limits in new PlayStation 5 promo ad
Rapper Travis Scott, Sony's new creative partner, introduces a dramatic new advertisement for next-gen PlayStation 5 gaming.
Sony rolled out its new PlayStation 5 launch ad that makes some pretty big claims. There's talk about pushing boundaries past current-gen gaming as part of the new Play Has No Limits tagline. Admittedly the footage feels more like a motivational video on YouTube than an ad for a new console.
The biggest takeaway from the trailer is how Sony is pushing a new era of gaming with hardware and peripheral innovations. The PS5's DualSense controller opens new doorways to sensory interaction and play, giving games more immersive feedback in all types of games from shooters to racing games. The PS5's ultra-fast SSD ensures instant loading, and its higher-end Navi RDNA 2.0 GPU enables 4K 60FPS gaming. In short, console gaming will now look, play, and feel better than ever--something that's really dramatized in the latest ad.
Continue reading: Travis Scott goes beyond all limits in new PlayStation 5 promo ad (full post)
Tilt Five lands $7.5 million to fund its AR tabletop gaming platform
Tilt Five, the AR tabletop gaming platform led by former Valve engineer Jeri Ellsworth, just secured millions of dollars to bring its product to the market.
Tilt Five launched a Kickstarter campaign last year to help bring its augmented reality tabletop gaming platform to life. The company secured $1.7 million, which gave it an excellent runway to develop its AR gaming system, but it will need a bigger team as it prepares to launch its product.
In a new Series A funding round, Tilt Five secured an additional $7.5 million, which will help the company prepare for its product launch in the coming months. SIP Global Partners led the investment round, for which Jeffrey Smith, a General Partner at the firm, will assume a position on Tilt Five's Board of Directors. BITKRAFT Ventures, Galaxy Interactive, Logitech, and Ken Birdwell also pitched in.
Continue reading: Tilt Five lands $7.5 million to fund its AR tabletop gaming platform (full post)
HP Reverb G2 in full production, first units out to partners
Joanna Popper, HP's Global Head of Virtual Reality for Location Based Entertainment, revealed on Reddit that the Reverb G2 VR headset is now in full production. The company recently signed off on the final production design and the first units are already out the door to partner warehouses.
The HP Reverb G2 is HP's latest entry in the consumer VR space. The headset features 2160x2160 per-eye resolution, inside out tracking provided by Microsoft's Windows Mixed Reality platform, and creature comforts pulled from Valve's Index headset, such as the lenses and the over-the-ear headphones.
HP previously announced that the Reverb G2 would begin shipping in November. Popper's announcement confirms that plan is in full motion, and it may even speed things up a little bit. Popper said that the first customers could expect to see their headsets in early to mid-November.
Continue reading: HP Reverb G2 in full production, first units out to partners (full post)
Xbox to experiment with new business models outside of monetization
Microsoft's Phil Spencer wants to embrace any and all successful gaming business models and help push new innovations in the industry space.
Xbox has transformed dramatically into a multi-platform ecosystem of hardware, games, and online services. The kind of forward-thinking that led to Game Pass, console-PC unification, and interwoven services isn't going to stop. According to Phil Spencer monetization, xCloud, free-to-play, premium games, Game Pass...all of these things will still converge to innovate and push the Xbox brand.
In a recent interview with Game Reactor, Spencer outlines where Xbox is and where it's going vis-a-vis business models. Spencer also says Microsoft doesn't mandate monetization in first-party games, which is interesting considering mTX is a big part of the live service/Game Pass symbiosis.
Continue reading: Xbox to experiment with new business models outside of monetization (full post)
Upgrade to PCIe 4.0 SSDs with up to 50% off on super-fast Sabrent SSDs
Sabrent is throwing a huge sale today on Amazon -- where you can get yourself a super-fast new NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD with some serious discount.
Sabrent's kick ass 1TB Rocket NVMe 4.0 Gen4 PCIe M.2 SSD is just $199, down from $319 -- a large 38% discount. You can read Jon's review on the Sabrent's Rocket NVMe 4.0 PCIe Gen4 x4 M.2 SSD. In the review, Jon gushed on Sabrent's delicious Rocket NVMe 4.0 Gen4 x4 M.2 SSD where he said: "Looking back at our benchmark results leads us to conclude that Sabrent is serving up Gen4 SSD goodness at the same level as the competition, but at a better price than we've seen so far".
He added: "The drive is a quality piece that looks as good as it performs. Even the packaging is of high quality. When you factor in the included copy of Acronis True Image, and five-year factory warranty, you have one of the best values in solid state storage".
Continue reading: Upgrade to PCIe 4.0 SSDs with up to 50% off on super-fast Sabrent SSDs (full post)
Intel details next-gen Rocket Lake-S architecture, ready for Q1 2021
Intel teased its next-gen Rocket Lake-S family of processors were coming in Q1 2021, but the company has taken the time in the 24 hours after AMD's new Zen 3 processors were unveiled, to detail their new 11th Gen Core CPU architecture.
Intel details its new 11th Gen Intel Core S-series desktop processors as bringing a new desktop architecture known as Cypress Cove to the table. The company says that Cypress Cove was "designed to transform hardware and software efficiency and increase performance".
The company is promising the new Rocket Lake-S family of CPUs will profit double-digit IPC improvements over the previous generation, as well as beefier integrated graphics with Intel UHD graphics featuring the new Intel Xe Graphics architecture.
Continue reading: Intel details next-gen Rocket Lake-S architecture, ready for Q1 2021 (full post)
What is AMD's new RDNA 2 feature Infinity Cache, and what does it do?
AMD's big exciting reveal of their next-gen RDNA 2 graphics architecture is here, with one of the shining stars of the reveal being the new Infinity Cache. But what is it?
The new revolutionary Infinity Cache technology allows AMD to use a smaller 256-bit memory bus and slower GDDR6 memory on its Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards, but it will offer some tremendous memory bandwidth with even more impressive power savings with Infinity Cache.
There's not much known about it so far -- but we know that ALL of the Radeon RX 6000 series cards -- Radeon RX 6800, Radeon RX 6800 XT and the flagship beast Radeon RX 6900 XT all have 128MB of Infinity Cache, 16GB of GDDR6, and a 256-bit memory bus.
Continue reading: What is AMD's new RDNA 2 feature Infinity Cache, and what does it do? (full post)
AMD Smart Access Memory: Zen 3 + RDNA 2 = Intel, NVIDIA destroyer
If you are about to build a new gaming PC then you would be crazy to not be buying a new Zen 3-powered AMD Ryzen 5000 series CPU.
AMD's Smart Memory Access gives the new Zen 3-based Ryzen 5000 series processors get full access to GPU memory if you have the Zen 3 chip on an X570 chipset with the new RNDA 2-powered Radeon RX 6000 series graphics card.
Before that, there's "RAGE" mode -- a throwback to the old ATi days for the old school gamers in our audience. RAGE mode is AMD's new one-click overclocking for the Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards -- something I will be experimenting heavily with when my samples arrive.
Continue reading: AMD Smart Access Memory: Zen 3 + RDNA 2 = Intel, NVIDIA destroyer (full post)
AMD's new RDNA 2 architecture revealed, 2x perf over the RX 5700 XT
The wait for RDNA 2 is nearly over, with AMD detailing its new Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards and a couple of teases of what is growling underneath the hood of Big Navi.
RDNA 2 has an incredible performance uplift that is 2x over the previous RDNA-based flagship Radeon RX 5700 XT graphics card. Not only that, but we have 50% generational performance-per-watt improvement goals being hit by AMD, too.
AMD explains that during the development of RDNA 2 it wanted to build a high-performance architecture that could scale into many products. Not just the flagship Radeon RX 6900 XT, but up and down the stack with high performance.
Continue reading: AMD's new RDNA 2 architecture revealed, 2x perf over the RX 5700 XT (full post)
Microsoft: Xbox Series X and S get full RDNA 2 tech, not PlayStation 5
AMD officially unveiled their new RDNA 2 architecture with the new Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards in the last 24 hours, and now Microsoft is coming out big noting its next-gen Xbox Series X and S consoles.
Microsoft posted a blog on its Xbox Wire website, written by Technical Fellow Andrew Goossen and Director of Program Management Jason Ronald that congratulate AMD on the RDNA 2 unveiling and dive a little into how it powers the next-gen Xbox consoles.
In the post, Microsoft explains that the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles "are the only next-generation consoles with full hardware support for all the RDNA 2 capabilities AMD showcased today".
Continue reading: Microsoft: Xbox Series X and S get full RDNA 2 tech, not PlayStation 5 (full post)






















