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Today Ubisoft confirmed Ashraf Ismail, who served as creative director on Assassin's Creed Origins and Valhalla, has been fired from the company.

Ubisoft is cleaning house in an attempt to weed out abusers at its company, and has let go of some of the highest-level executives responsible for big decisions. Now it has fired another employee embroiled in abuse allegations: Ashraf Ismail. Back in June we reported Ismail had left Ubisoft after being caught cheating on his wife, but that wasn't entirely true. Ismail didn't leave Ubisoft but instead left his position. Now Ubisoft has officially fired him.

This is the latest step in Ubisoft's push back against its endemic abuse culture. The company was careful to say Ismail wasn't fired for infidelity, rather using his position as creative director to meet with a fan privately. Ismail was the creative director on two of the three recent Assassin's Creed games. Recent firings include longtime PR director Stone Chin, who was also accused of abuse, but was fired for workplace-related issues.

After years of development, Warner Bros. Montreal will finally reveal its new Batman game on Saturday, August 22 at 1:30PM.

WB Montreal's new Batman game, which is apparently called Batman: Gotham Knights, will be revealed at the DC Fandome event next week, the event's website confirms. The game will be announced in a 20-minute session and give gamers a "first look" at the title, complete with a Q&A panel from developers.

Gotham Knights is believed to follow the Batman comic series with the same name. Just like the comic series, the game is expected to have at least four playable characters, which folds into older Arkham Legacy rumors of a playable "Bat family". Main protagonists may include--but are not limited to--Batman, Batgirl, Robin and Nightwing.

Multiple reports say Sony's PlayStation 5 will cost more than the Xbox Series X. No one knows for sure how much the PS5 will cost, but Sony's yearly forecast gives us clues on an attractive mass-market price point.

The PlayStation 5 will be more expensive than the PS4. That's a given. The console features high-end specs that usher in the enthusiast age of console gaming, complete with a Navi GPU capable of native 4K (and even 8K) gaming, an 8-core, 16-thread Zen 2 CPU at 3.5GHz, both of which are on an SoC with variable clock rates and set voltages, 16GB of GDDR6 RAM, and the fastest storage ever to be put in a console with a 6-channel PCie 4.0 SSD that can hit 5.5GB/sec speeds. But how much will it be? Could the PS5 break $600? That's not very likely.

We don't know exactly how much the PlayStation 5 will cost, nor do we claim to. All we can do is tally up the evidence with current reports and look at what Sony's said so far--and more importantly, what its yearly earnings forecasts lay out for investors.

Micron just finished outing NVIDIA's not-yet-announced GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card, which we now know packs 12GB of ultra-fast GDDR6X memory at 21Gbps.

But they weren't finished with their surprise announcement of the new GDDR6X standard, where Micron has now just announced the development of its next generation memory standard: HBMnext. The new HBMnext memory is most likely what HBM3 was meant to be, but possibly with a new name.

Our friends at VideoCardz report: "Micron expects to produce JEDEC-compliant HBMnext memory in 4-stack 8Gb and 8-stack 16Gb densities. The manufacturer also revealed that the data rate is expected at 3.2 Gb/s. For comparison, the NVIDIA A100 accelerator based on HBM2e technology has a bandwidth of 2.4 Gbps, while AMD Radeon VII based on HBM2 features 2.0 Gbps data rates".

It seems today is another huge day for NVIDIA leaks on the purported new Ampere-based flagship GeForce RTX 3090, with Micron confirming the new card will use its next-gen GDDR6X memory.

Our good friends at VideoCardz have spotted a new technology brief, Micron confirmed it had worked with NVIDIA on the new GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card -- outing it right there in the documents itself. The company says it will have 12GB of GDDR6X on a 384-bit memory interface on the GeForce RTX 3090.

Micron explains: "Micron GDDR6X is the world's fastest graphics memory, delivering legendary performance to help driveray tracing, shadow mapping and silky-smooth animation for an immersive PC gaming experience".

Heavy breathing intensifies.

This could be our first look at NVIDIA's next-gen GeForce RTX 3090 and its beefy PCB, thanks to a new leak over on the NVIDIA subreddit.

NVIDIA's purported GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card and its leaked PCB is coming from a non-reference board from COLORFUL, which would eventually form into the flagship iGame GeForce RTX 3090 Vulcan-X graphics card.

Apex Legends is about to receive its new Season 6 update, with developer Respawn Entertainment taking to the official Apex Legends Twitter account to tease the news.

Respawn gives us a YouTube link to where the Apex Legends Season 6 - Boosted Gameplay Trailer will premiere. The gameplay video will go live on August 4 at 8AM PT, where I'm sure we'll also get some more details on Season 6 itself, and its upcoming Battle Pass.

Apex Legends upcoming Season 6 will introduce a new legend with Rampant, who seems to love huge guns and bubble gum. There will be over 100 exclusive items included in the Boosted Battle Pass, crafting -- where you'll need to collect materials and build yourself some better weapons and gear -- and a new Ranked Season for people to get addicted to.

We all remember James Cameron's massively successful 1997 movie Titanic, catapulting its stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet into Hollywood super-stardom.

Well, Titanic is being turned into a board game with Titanic: The Game. Spin Master Games has used the 1997 movie Titanic for its inspiration for the game, pulling the characters that Cameron used in the movie with players able to play as Jack, Rose, Cal, Ruth or the Captain.

But get this, they thought it was a good idea to market Titanic: The Game, a tragedy where over 1500 people died on April 15, 1912. But yeah, they're serious -- check out how they describe the game:

We've had a couple of fresh nuggets of info about Battlefield 6, where industry insider Tom Henderson tweeting that the team at DICE have been designing Battlefield 6 maps for 128 players -- with 32 v 32 still a key focus.

But it was the second tweet about Battlefield 6 that had my attention, where Henderson tweets: "Battlefield news; There's also been increased interest in Battle Royale due to the success of Warzone. No confirmation of a BR in the next Battlefield yet, but could EA and DICE be planning a F2P Battlefield experience?"

So the EA DICE team have been eyeing off that huge success of Call of Duty: Warzone and its incredibly addictive battle royale mode. He has "no confirmation" of battle royale in Battlefield 6 just yet, but does note that the team could be planning a free-to-play Battlefield experience.

I'm sure EA DICE have been taking down some serious notes over the mega-success of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and more specifically its battle royale mode that is addictive AF: Warzone.

In some new Battlefield 6 leaks, we have industry insider Tom Henderson tweeting out some "Battlefield news". Henderson tweeted: "Maps have been designed with 128+ players in mind. But 32 vs 32 will also be a standard playlist".

We recently saw an entire building collapse in Battlefield 6 -- or at least we thought we did, and we also heard about Battlefield 6 having a modern setting and supporting up to 128 players, and EA boss Laura Miele recently saying the team are "creating epic battles at a scale and fidelity unlike anything you've experienced before" in Battlefield 6.

It seems with each passing day the hype train for NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere GeForce RTX series graphics cards grow, with the Ultimate Countdown... well... counting down until the big special event on September 1.

The latest news on NVIDIA's next-gen GeForce RTX series is that the GA102 GPU board design will pack some delicious power delivery, seeing enthusiasts eyebrows raise (well, at least just one of them). NVIDIA has been slowly providing better and better power delivery designs with its high-end Founders Edition cards, but this is taking it to the next level.

NVIDIA's highest-end Ampere GA102 GPU board design should be the one expected in the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti or GeForce RTX 3090, or GeForce RTX 3090 ULTRA or ULTIMATE -- whatever-the-hell NVIDIA end up calling it.

I think at this point we all know UFOs are real and it's only a matter of time before we're introduced to another race of beings from somewhere so far away we can't even fathom it. We knew the Pentagon's UFO department would turn dark to light in regards to UFOs soon, but soon is now very soon.

CNN is now reporting that the Pentagon is forming a new task force that will investigate UFO sightings by US military aircraft, "according to two defense officials". Deputy Secretary of Defense David Norquist will oversee the task force, which will "be officially unveiled in the next few days, according to the officials".

Previously on UFOs we had Eric W. Davis who was a consultant on the Pentagon's UFO program, describing the mysterious UFOs as "off-world vehicles not made on this earth". That article blew up so much that Joe Rogan himself even shared it, with the The New York Times article titled 'No Longer in Shadows, Pentagon's U.F.O. Unit Will Make Some Findings Public' detailing it all.

Intel is not so why with its Xe GPU architecture, where it hosted a virtual Architecture Day detailing a mountain of information on its technologies -- including the huge Arctic Sound GPU.

The new Arctic Sound GPU is an MCM-based design with 4 tiles and a huge 16,384 cores -- a multi-chip module with multiple tiles that add huge amounts of performance. The card was benchmarked at 1.3GHz with its 16,384 cores across the 4-tile Arctic Sound Xe GPU with an insane 42 TFLOPs of FP32 compute performance with near-perfect scaling (3.993x better).

Raja Koduri, the chief architect and senior vice president of Intel's discrete graphics division explained that the company is working on a 1-tile version with 512 EUs and 4096 cores, a 2-tile version with 8192 cores, and a 4-tile version that was teased at Architecture Day with a blistering 16,384 cores.

We should expect some real 4K fakery when both next-gen consoles are here, but the slower of the two -- the PlayStation 5 -- seems like it is going to struggle in 4K and that gamers might be "disappointed" by some major third-party games with "fake 4K" games.

Well people, get ready to be "disappointed" with some of the third-party games on the PlayStation 5 with some fake 4K gaming coming our way according to industry insider Jeff Grubb and his latest comments on the Basement Radio Arcade Podcast.

It seems that AMD SmartShift technology inside of the PlayStation 5, is going to cause some issues. Grubb said that game developers are having a hard time wrapping their heads around Sony's decision to use a variable frequency approach in the PS5 (through AMD SmartShift) and that many third-party PS5 games will leave gamers disappointed.

Epic Games is suing Apple for unfair practices, a move that could force an anti-trust investigation into the App Store. But now its motivations become more clear.

Today Epic Games decided to take Apple, who controls half of the world's mobile market. Epic started the coup by opening its own payment option within Fortnite in iOS, allowing gamers to buy V-Bucks at a 20% discount. This completely eliminated the 30% revenue cut that Apple usually takes. Predictably, Apple removed Fortnite from the App Store. Then Epic fired back with a lawsuit alleging monopolistic behavior.

The case actually makes some good points, and it's possible the courts will set new rules and precedents for Apple. The move was a well-orchestrated and planned maneuver on Epic's part in the guise of freeing developers from the "iOS stranglehold." But the documents reveal there's more to Epic's motivations than goodwill of consumers and developers.

If Halo: Infinite had released in 2020, it may have launched as an incomplete product missing a few things, including multiplayer.

In a recent interview with Gary Whitta, Xbox boss Phil Spencer shed a lot of light about Halo: Infinite's recent delay to 2021. According to Spencer, delaying the game was the right call. The project simply wasn't where it needed to be for a big blockbuster AAA hit. There's lots of reasons for this, including the complexities of developing a new engine alongside a new game, and work-from-home measures thanks to COVID-19.

The reality is that if Halo: Infinite did release in 2020, it probably would've only had campaign or multiplayer--not both. This aligns with recent reports we heard back in late July that claimed Halo: Infinite would ship without multiplayer. 343i quickly jumped in to say the rumors weren't true, but it looks like the info could've been closer to the truth than the studio was willing to admit.

Epic Games, one of the most powerful titans in the games industry, is tired of paying the 30% 'Apple tax' on all iOS revenues. Now Epic is standing up to Apple, and is suing them in a case that could set precedent for the entire games industry.

Today Epic Games decided to flat-out challenge Apple. First Epic added in an option for direct payments into Fortnite, which completely bypassed Apple's 30% revenue cut altogether. Apple takes 30% of all games revenues from the iOS storefront. Apple, of course, pulled the game from the App Store for terms and conditions violations.

Now Epic is suing Apple and seeks to end its "dominance over key technology markets."

Sony has already shown off the PS5's high-end gaming capabilities with the stunning Gran Turismo 7 trailer, and revealed how the console's ultra-fast 5.5GB/sec PCIe 4.0 will destroy load times in the new Ratchet and Clank game. Now a single screenshot exhibits what the console will be capable of at launch.

A new Spider-Man Miles Morales screenshot from Entertainment Weekly speaks volumes about the PlayStation 5's ability at launch. First-party devs like Insomniac Games apparently are pushing ray tracing right out of the gate, complete with new ambient weather and lighting effects. The puddle alone shows evidence of ray-traced reflections and mirrors the kind of thing we see in Control on PC.

We also know Spider-Man Miles Morales will be incredibly optimized on PlayStation 5. Insomniac has baked in a performance mode that hits 4K 60FPS, which is unheard of for this kind of game mode. Usually performance modes target 1080p 60FPS and don't deliver dazzling 4K 60FPS gameplay. This possibly hints the game will hit upscaled 8K resolution to complement Sony's new high-end 8K TVs.

Sony wants to buy AT&T's Crunchyroll anime service, but it's not willing to pay the huge $1.5 billion asking price.

AT&T is interested in selling its Cruncyroll division to Sony, sources tell The Information. Sony also wants to buy. But there's just one big problem: The price tag. AT&T wants $1.5 billion for Crunchyroll, and Sony simply isn't willing to pay that much. For perspective, that's more than the all time record $1 billion profit high the PlayStation division made in Q1'20.

If Sony acquires Crunchyroll (and right now it seems to be a matter of when, not if) it'll be an undisputed king of on-demand anime content. Sony Pictures already owns Funimation, which it bought in 2017 for $143 million.

UPDATE 2: Fortnite has also been banned from the Google Play Store on Android.

UPDATE:Fortnite has been delisted from the App Store following this move. Gamers who already have it downloaded can still play, and can still buy in-game V Bucks.

Epic Games is brazenly defying Apple and Google by offering direct payments for Fortnite V-Bucks on iOS and Android.