Epic Games changed game marketing forever with its huge Fortnite stunt to usher in Chapter 2, with a black hole sucking the entire game out of existence, and then Epic removing the game from the internet.

How did it go? Well, it was one of the largest single online gaming events ever. Epic saw over 7 million concurrent viewers across Twitch, Twitter, and YouTube. It was one of the most-viewed YouTube gaming events ever, too.

Moving over to Twitch, Epic noticed 1.7 million people viewing the event through either the official Fortnite stream Epic hosts, or streams from popular Twitch streamers. Epic added: "the platform's peak concurrent record on a single game category".

I don't know about you, but I'd trade positions with Elon Musk in a second. The owner of SpaceX and Tesla Motors has had some financial details revealed, through a defamation lawsuit against him.

British diver Vernon Unsworth is suing Musk for defamation against him when the SpaceX and Tesla Motors CEO called him a "pedo guy" on Twitter in 2018. If you remember back in 2018, Unsworth was involved in the huge rescue of a young soccer team and their coach who was trapped in a cave in Thailand.

At the time, Musk sent a small submarine to Thailand to help in the efforts to save the kids and their coach. But Unsworth said the submarine would've been ineffective in the rescue, and was just a publicity stunt by Musk.

Activision-Blizzard is really going through the blender over the current climate in China, but now the company has revealed its BlizzCon 2019 preview. Now we have details on the schedule of BlizzCon 2019, the map, and the mobile application.

The new BlizzCon 2019 Map and App can be downloaded now, which includes the BlizzCon 2019 Schedule, while the Map can be looked at here. Blizzard will have demo stands for a bunch of its games including World of Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, Warcraft 2, and the upcoming Warcraft III Reforged.

The new BlizzCon 2019 mobile app is available for both Android and iOS devices, which will let Blizzard fans watch the live streams directly from the app. You can also check out the Map, shop for gaming goods, and even plan your actual trip to BlizzCon 2019 if you're lucky enough to attend.

We know Sony's next-gen PlayStation 5 is coming... and we know it'll be fast... but "world's fastest console", fast? I don't know. I think Microsoft's flagship Xbox Scarlett console will have that title, but we'll have to wait and see in 2020.

Sony has recently listed a job looking for a new Senior Cloud Engineering Manager at Sony Interactive Entertainment, with the listing looking for someone "to build next generation cloud infrastructure".

This person, if they're accepted, "will also be one of the leaders of an elite team that is super excited to launch the upcoming world's fastest console (PS5) in 2020".

Google's new Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL smartphones have the option to have their OLED displays cranked up to 90Hz, but it will deplete battery life much quicker -- and now there's another issue.

Enabling the 90Hz refresh option requires the Pixel 4/Pixel 4 XL to have its screen brightness at above 75%, meaning that if the screen brightness is turned down, then the refresh rate falls back to 60Hz with it. This works when you're outside, but you won't want that super-bright OLED at maximum brightness inside.

This means that having the OLED panel cranking at 90Hz with high brightness, will deplete battery much faster than other uses. You could use it at 60Hz and enjoy longer (but still not great) battery life on the Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL, but if you want to enjoy that 90Hz refresh you're going to have to trade battery life (and your eyes) for it.

Shenmue 3 is almost here, but Kickstarter backers need to respond to an email before their copies are sent out.

Fangamer today confirmed all Shenmue 3 backers need to re-confirm their addresses before physical PS4 or PC copies will be sent in the mail. If you don't reply, your copy could be delayed indefinitely.

"Shenmue III physical copies will be shipping soon, separately from other backer rewards (if applicable). Before we can ship yours, we require you to confirm that your shipping address is still correct, even if it hasn't changed, so that your physical copy isn't lost. If you do not confirm your address soon, your physical copy may be delayed. Please verify your address as soon as possible; your game(s) will NOT be shipped until your address has been verified," the company said.

The Last of Us Part II won't release in February, and has now been delayed to May 29, 2020, Naughty Dog today confirmed.

Naughty Dog was caught between a rock and a hard place with The Last of Us Part II. It was clear the game simply wouldn't be complete by February, so the team had to make a decision: Cut a lot of content out, or delay the game. They chose the latter and the experience should be all the better for it.

"During the last few weeks, as we were closing out sections of the game, we realized we simply didn't have enough time to bring the entire game up to a level of polish we would call Naughty Dog quality. At this point we were faced with two options: compromise parts of the game or get more time. We went with the latter, and this new release date allows us to finish everything to our level of satisfaction while also reducing stress on the team," Naughty Dog's Neil Druckmann said.

After Ghost Recon Breakpoint and The Division 2 missed earnings targets, Ubisoft learns a sobering lesson about over-saturating the live games market. Now it's spreading its online games out for longer periods, leading to big delays.

Today Ubisoft announced some of its biggest marquee titles like Watch Dogs Legion and Rainbow Six Quarantine are getting delayed indefinitely to the next fiscal year (April 1, 2020 - March 31, 2021). The reasoning for this is simple: Ubisoft wants to give gamers more time to digest and play the massively grindy online games the publisher releases. The company is starting to hit a wall when it comes to online engagement and monetization, namely with The Division 2 and the more recent (and more disastrous) Ghost Recon Breakpoint with its dearth of microtransactions.

The response is decidedly mature and shows Ubisoft is flexible even under failure, which is extremely important. It's willing to disrupt its planned release timeline to ensure its games are properly tailored to what players actually want to engage with. Expect the publisher to take its misses with The Division 2 and Breakpoint to heart and utilize all player feedback for its upcoming games.

Death Stranding's star-studded cast expands with clueless gamer Conan O'Brien.

Hideo Kojima's new game Death Stranding is full of big names: Mads Mikkelsen, Norman Reedus, Lea Seydoux, Lindsay Wagner, Troy Baker, and Tommy Earl Jenkins to name a few. Even some of Kojima's personal friends make an appearance, with Guillermo del Toro showing up as the cryptic Deadman, and games media host Geoff Keighley (also Kojima's good bud) is in too.

Now Conan O'Brien will be in the game, too. He won't play a pivotal role like Norman Reedus, but instead be one of the dozens of holographic quest-givers that send you out on deliveries throughout the world.

Ex-Xbox exec Mike Ybarra joins Blizzard in a big leadership position, and will help guide the company's newest games lineup (and bounce back from the recent PR nightmare).

Mike Ybarra recently left Microsoft after 20 years of service. Now Ybarra will be Blizzard's new executive vice president and general manager, sitting below Blizzard VP Jeff Kaplan in the company hierarchy.

This appointment comes at an interesting time for Blizzard. The company is suffering a PR fiasco thanks to its recent Hong Kong controversy, but it's also on the cusp of announcing big new games, which is pivotal for its future. Blizzard's been developing new IPs and sequels for years now and some of these projects should be center stage at Blizzcon 2019. We could see Diablo IV, Diablo II Remastered, and Overwatch 2 unveiled at the event.

Activision may be working as many as 10 new games as part of its big new business restructuring focusing on games development.

Rumor has it that Activision is strongly ramping up its games slate along with Blizzard, and could be developing nearly a dozen new titles that includes a new Destiny-like MMO-FPS hybrid. The info comes from Call of Duty YouTuber The Gaming Revolution, who cites a friend at Activision as a source.

Apparently Activision wants to make their own wholly-owned IP to replace Destiny. The idea is to create something they don't have to pay royalties on, that can completely control, and something that continually makes money over time via online engagement tactics. The company may enlist Call of Duty FPS experts at Treyarch and Infinity Ward for this project, which could mean Call of Duty will shed its annualized structure. Otherwise it'll be a third-party project.

MMO RTS hybrid Kingdom Under Fire is back with huge Dynasty Warriors-esque battles and strategic RTS action.

It's been 11 years since the last Kingdom Under Fire game, and Blueside has been busily chipping away at their most ambitious game yet. Kingdom Under Fire II is happening, and it's actually releasing quite soon on November 14, 2019. The sequel preserves the mystical high fantasy setting with its deep lore and medieval magic style, set around the land of Bersia and three powerful factions--the Human Alliance, the Dark Legion, and the Encablossians. KUF II takes place 50 years after 2004's Crusaders game on the original Xbox.

Although it's billed as a unique MMO-RTS hybrid, Kingdom Under Fire II has a full campaign that can be enjoyed solo. The game lets you choose a hero class that's kind of like a general that leads your troops into war. You can switch between playing as the hero with hack-and-slash combo-based combat, or switch over to a battlefield commander and play full RTS mode.

Since their discovery, brain hemorrhages have always been a doctors nightmare as missing even the tiniest hemorrhage can leave the patient in a fatal state. Now the responsibility might not all be on the doctors, AI has now been developed to shoulder some as well.

UC Berkeley and UCSF researchers have managed to conceive an algorithm that is able to detect brain hemorrhages with better accuracy than two out of four radiologists. This algorithm was created using massive amounts of data, 4,396 CT scans and convolutional neural network. While that sample size of CT scans might sound relatively on the smaller side, it should be noted that the AI was able to detect abnormalities within the scans "at the pixel level".

This means that the AI is able to siphon noise and other errors (that normal human doctors may run into) out of the equation. Therefore giving a more technical analysis on the brain scans which would then result in a more accurate assessment of what needs to be done. While you might think that is AI will be replacing doctors, it won't be. Instead, it will be assisting doctors in discovering abnormalities that they might of originally missed, essentially saving the doctors massive amounts of time.

Back in early July, Amazon issued out a press release about an upcoming Lord of the Rings MMO currently in development. Amazon are still yet to find a Creative Director, according to job listings.

The press release from back in July detailed that Amazon Game Studios would be partnering up with development veterans who worked on titles such as Destiny, Planetside, WoW, Everquest, Defiance and Rift. Other game studios such as Leyou Technologies and Althon Games are also tagging along for the adventure.

The job listing has been posted on glassdoor and details a 'Creative Director' position for a Lord of the Rings MMO title being built on the Lumberyard engine. The position requires extensive knowledge in building MMO games, people management, previously released titles, and much more. At the moment this listing has been present on glassdoor for 22 days, meaning Amazon still hasn't secured a position as of yet.

Stalking on public Instagram accounts is no doubt a massive thing that people without Instagram accounts do. Now its almost impossible with this very small but extremely impact-full change.

In early October, Instagram decided to remove the 'Following' tab from its app in an effort to keep Instagram users' activity private. Now the company is moving towards not letting people browse public Instagram profiles without having an Instagram account.

Originally, normal people could search up a persons Instagram profile that they knew was under 'public' and browse through all of their photos and videos. Now, after a certain amount of videos, most likely one or two scrolls, Instagram will force pop-up a request to log-in or create an account. This pop-up cannot be navigated away from, essentially stopping any further Instagram stalking from happening until the user joins Instagram.

If you know zombie shooter games, you know Left 4 Dead 2. You also probably know that game is coming up on its 10-year anniversary (November 17th, 2009 release date) and what better way to celebration than a it being revived?

Unfortunately this revivification won't be in the title itself, but instead in a crossover with fellow zombie creator and destroyer Dying Light. According to the above Tweet sourced from the official Dying Light Twitter page, Left 4 Dead 2 will be crossing over for "some serious zombie slaying?".

What could this possibly mean? Since the post is painfully vague in what the specifics of this crossover are, I can only help to speculate that Dying Light 2 will feature some form of Left 4 Dead 2-style game mode. I mean what else could it mean? Players will most likely be able to pair up in four player co-op, just like in Left 4 Dead 2, and battle it out against some Dying Light zombies. It also wouldn't be surprising if the crossover brought some cosmetics to go along with it.

Tesla has just finished up its quarterly earnings meeting and one of the aspects the company talked about was the recently rolled out Smart Summon feature for Tesla vehicles.

Smart Summon enables Tesla owners to be able to 'summon' their car from a location and then have it drive itself over to the owner. Tesla owners have been using this feature in a variety of different places, such as parking lots, around the corner trips and if they are feeling particularly lazy. This feature can be used from a maximum distance of 200 feet, and as long as the owner is in the line of sight of the vehicle.

Some users have experienced some extremely close calls with this feature, but just like any omelette, you have to break some eggs a long the way. In all in all though, the Smart Summon feature has been quite the success for Tesla with their quarterly earnings report saying the feature has been used "over one million times" since its release back in mid September. Tesla also said that "Our neural network learning approach enables us to continue to iterate and improve functionality over time."

If there is a god, he has blessed us all with this new announcement from HBO Max. Adventure Time will continue to live on, but this time it will be in hour long episodes.

Just as Adventure Time concluded its massive 10th season on the Cartoon Network, a new announcement has come out from the Cartoon Network Twitter page. The announcement says that the adventure will continue, but this time on exclusively on HBO Max and under the name Adventure Time: Distant Lands.

Each of these episodes will be one hour long, and at the moment HBO has already released the descriptions for each of them. The four episode titles are as follows; BMO, Obsidian, Wizard City and Together Again. The press release says that Adventure Time: Distant Lands will be released on HBO Max sometime in 2020. In other news about HBO Max, Studio Ghibli's Howl's Moving Castle and Spirited Away will be exclusively available on the service, more on that here.

NASA will be partnering its newest planet-hunter satellite with the already established team that is searching for alien life among the stars.

NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite or TESS for short will be collaborating with the Breakthrough Listen project that currently in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). Pete Worden, executive director of Breakthrough Initiatives said "It's exciting that the world's most powerful SETI search, with our partner facilities across the globe, will be collaborating with the TESS team and our most capable planet-hunting machine."

TESS launched from Earth back in April of 2018, and since then it has been measuring the slight dips in star brightness when a planet or object crosses in-front of a star. TESS has already found 10,000 or more new exoplanets since its launch, and from its findings the team has found more than 1,000 "objects of interest". TESS is a great addition to the search for alien life and TESS Deputy Science Director Sara Seager, planetary scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said "We are very enthusiastic about joining the Breakthrough Listen SETI search.

A new study has pointed fingers towards climate change adding to the ageing affects of thousands of bridges across the United States.

A new study measures the impact that climate change is having on bridge infrastructure across the nation. Hussam Mahmoud, a Professor of Civil Engineering out of Colorado State University, and Susan Palu a master's graduate student in civil engineering did an analysis on about 80,000 "simply supported steel girder bridges". The researchers took into account the expansive higher temperature rates projected for the years 2040, 2060, 2080 and 2100.

What they found was that bridges and infrastructure located in the northern portion of the United States would be more susceptible to higher average temperatures that weren't accounted for when they were first built. This means that bridges and their infrastructure could have their joints expanded and cause buckling or cracking over long periods of time. The engineers aim with this research was to be able to rank the bridges in order of most needed maintenance to the least.