Latest News - Page 1831

If you thought deepfake foolery only happened in video form, then you would be wrong -- some fraudsters have slammed a manager for $243,000 in something called vishing (voice phishing).

This method involves using fake voice technology, with the Wall Street Journal reporting a case of voice fraud in which the company was caught with its pants down over $243,000.

Criminals used commercially available voice-generating AI software that tricked the CEO of a UK-based energy firm into thinking "he was speaking on the phone with his boss". The CEO heard the voice, thinking it was his boss and not thinking anything suspicious -- requesting him to transfer $243,000 urgently for an order with a Hungarian supplier.

ASUS has one of the best gaming monitors right around the corner with its huge 43-inch 4K 120Hz FreeSync beast, the upcoming ROG Strix XG438Q.

The new ASUS ROG Strix XG438Q is one of the first larger 4K 120/144Hz monitors coming, wtih ASUS opting for FreeSync over G-Sync. Of course, NVIDIA GeForce graphics card owners will be able to jump into the ASUS ROG Strix XG438Q as well.

ASUS is using a VA panel with a 4ms response time, DisplayHDR 600, an anti-glare coating, and 90% of the DCI-P3 color gamut.

Epic is longer setting tentative timelines for new features on its storefront, meaning gamers still don't know when basic additions like a shopping cart, wishlists, and mod support.

The Epic Store has made some moderate progress by adding in cloud saves to select games, but the marketplace is still missing a lot and has a long way to go. Now Epic is no longer setting delivery dates for requested EGS features. The company says its Trello board roadmap wasn't meant to be a deadline or hard ETA, but instead a general guideline to give gamers an idea of what's in the pipeline. It's worth mentioning that EGS achievements, wishlists, and mod support didn't have official delivery targets, but Epic did say the features could take 3-4 months. Back in March, Epic said a shopping cart was more than 6 months away (it should be here by now).

"The Trello roadmap is not fulfilling the goal we set when it was introduced. The goal with the Trello roadmap is to provide visibility into the development cycle for the store's more player-centric feature set," Epic said.

Konami's biggest franchises like Metal Gear could come back with a bang when next-gen console drop in 2020.

Konami's IP slate has dwindled considerably over the years. The publisher, a once-mighty games-maker commanding multiple respectable franchises like Silent Hill and Metal Gear Solid, changed quite a bit over the years. After it fired its star Hideo Kojima, Konami became interested in recurring earnings rather than big AAA hits, depending strongly on PES, mobile gaming, Yu-Gi-Oh, and live service content.

That could change with next-gen consoles. We could see Metal Gear Solid return with a triumphant sequel on the PlayStation 5 and Project Scarlett. In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Konami Europe president Masami Saso said development other key franchises is underway.

The performance of Control on consoles is definitely an issue right now, and developer Remedy Entertainment is aware of this.

The original Xbox One and PS4 consoles are dropping into the 10FPS territory, which is just not good at all. Remedy is optimizing the console versions of Control, with a new blog post stating: "Right now, the team are looking at possible ways of improving console optimization in Control, but as you can hopefully understand, these things do take time and don't happen at the press of a button (as much as we wish they did)".

It continues: "We are also examining specific issues that some players have been experiencing and looking for fixes on those. When we have more info, we will be sure to let you know across our community channels".

Yes, another delay has hit Star Citizen -- this time, it's the single-player portion of it in Squadron 42, delayed into Q3 2020.

Squadron 42 had an original release window of Q2 2020 but that has been shifted into Q3 2020, with developer Cloud Imperium Games explaining it's because of their "Staggered Development" approach.

What is "Staggered Development" you ask? The developer explains it as "an approach that splits the various development teams between multiple delivery dates. This puts teams into a cadence whereby they are delivering larger features every couple of quarters instead of every quarter, but due to their staggered nature, you would still receive an update every quarter".

CD PROJEKT RED has announced that the cutscenes in Cyberpunk 2077 will be in first-person, including the "rather naughty scenes".

Cyberpunk 2077 is in the first-person perspective, so it won't break immersion when going into cut scenes in first-person unlike The Witcher 3 that was a third-person game.

In a new interview with Senior Level Designer on Cyberpunk 2077, Miles Toast, and the German fansite for Cyberpunk 2077 the cutscenes will be in first-person. Toast explained:

The addition of Unreal Engine 4 and a new progression system into The Master Chief Collection is maxing out Xbox One console memory, causing a hindrance on Halo: Reach testing.

A bit ago we reported on an issue that's basically delayed Halo: Reach console flighting indefinitely. The team at 343i is running into console memory limitations while trying to cram its big new progression system into the game, which should bring stats, armor customization, and rankings to all MCC games. Now the studio says it's still having issues with memory while making Reach, which is caused by tons of new UI content, the progression system, and inclusion of Unreal Engine 4 into the collection. 343i also says every single other Halo game will need special attention because the studio is quite simply breaking pieces of the games and re-molding them back together.

"Getting MCC Console to run within memory constraints with the addition of UE4 and our additional feature set is the most challenging thing we have to do. We've been working at this for a long time now and are making good progress but there's no magic bullet," said MCC senior producer Michael Fahrny. "It's a unique problem that just takes a lot of trial and error, figuring out what worked, what didn't work, and continuing to iterate. We are tweaking these games in ways that they were not designed or architected for."

Alec Holowka, who helped design, program, and compose music for the indie hit Night in the Woods, has died.

Today Eileen Holowka confirmed the news that her brother, Alec Holowka, had passed away following abuse allegations from inside the games community. The controversy caused Infinite Fall, the team behind Night in the Woods and Holowka's friends, to cut ties with the creator.

Alec's sister Eileen gave a statement on Twitter:

Obsidian goes full tongue-in-cheek with its latest trailer for its new FPS RPG The Outer Worlds, complete with some nifty snippets of gameplay, weapons, and more.

The Outer Worlds is a sardonic, sarcastic, and humorous take on our incoming corporate future. It's a space age dominated by snark, high-tech hijinks, and that distinct Obsidian look and feel. It channels that classic Fallout humor, and rightly so since Fallout creators Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky are leading the project. Now the devs rolled out a new trailer to sell you on a vacation to the Halcyon Colony, the system of planets ruled by a corporate entity where the game takes place.

The footage is a general highlights reel that underlines core features of gameplay, albeit with a goofy style. We get to see lots of weapons and mechanics used, from the awesome shrink ray that miniaturizes your foes to devastating 2H hammers and and a weird bubble gun that makes enemies float. There's even tidbits on the new flaw system lifted right from an old-school Fallout cRPG.

AMD launched its Radeon RX 5700 and Radeon RX 5700 XT nearly two months ago now, and since then we've seen custom Navi cards from MSI (RX 5700 XT EVOKE OC review), SAPPHIRE (RX 5700 XT PULSE OC review), XFX (THICC review coming soon), PowerColor, and now ASRock.

The upcoming Radeon RX 5700 and Radeon RX 5700 XT Taichi OC+ models look absolutely awesome, with a large 2.5-slot design and triple-fan cooler.

I love the style of the backplate, well the whole design really -- it'll look awesome sitting inside of a new Ryzen-powered gaming PC and ASRock's own X570 Taichi motherboard.

Crytek might be teasing a Crysis remaster or remake in its new high-end games engine, complete with amazing lighting effects, physics, and visuals.

Crytek's new CryEngine 5.6 tech demo is pretty insane, showing a glimpse at some next-gen tech that'll power new games. Most of the footage was for its Hunt: Showdown IP, but around the 2:17 mark we got a big surprise: Crysis music accompanied by island footage that closely resembles the game's setting, and the nanonsuit camo sound effect at the very end. Is this Crytek's not-so-subtle way at teasing a new Crysis remake?

The studio could use a big hit right now and remember EA might still hold exclusive publishing rights for the Crysis franchise. Crytek probably owns the IP, but they can't make any new games without EA's approval if the publisher still holds the rights. But this could be huge for both EA and Crytek. What if we got a new Crysis remaster on the PlayStation 5 and Project Scarlett next-gen consoles?

The new Modern Warfare reboot will indeed have microtransactions, but details have been quite light and fans are worried. Infinity Ward says more info is coming soon but we can make some guesses how monetization will work.

Like all of Activision's games (especially big AAA juggernauts like Call of Duty) the new Modern Warfare shooter will indeed be monetized. There's no way it won't be. The company enjoys billions every year from microtransactions thanks to strong online engagement and Call of Duty is always a big cash crop. This time around the publisher has a new trick with cross-play on PS4, Xbox One and PC that'll maximize player counts. This new method is so potentially potent that every new Activision-Blizzard game should support it.

So why hasn't Infinity Ward or Activision talked about microtransactions yet? It's a sore topic, something that has to be handled with finesse. They've all but confirmed mTX by saying Modern Warfare has the biggest post-launch DLC pipeline out of any CoD game, and that MW won't have a season pass. Why not just spill the beans and confirm cosmetic microtransactions? That's the least harmful way to monetize games these days--just toss in a bunch of skins and vanity items, and bam. It's the lesser of two evils.

Deep Silver says it'd like to do more timed-exclusivity deals with the Epic Games Store, hinting its biggest future hits could skip Steam.

Epic is paying big bucks to buy up timed exclusives for its storefront, and publishers like Deep Silver, 2K Games, and Ubisoft want in on the action. Deep Silver in particular caused a big ruckus by switching Metro Exodus from Steam over to EGS, delaying the game's Steam launch until 2020. The move was controversial but it was also quite lucrative for Deep Silver thanks to the Epic Store's 88-12 revenue split, and the switch didn't impact sales.

In the quest for more money, the games-maker wants to sign more exclusives with Epic, which could mean its biggest upcoming titles like Saints Row V, Dead Island 2, and 4A Games' brand new Metro game could all skip Steam for an entire year.

Remedy's new supernatural sci-fantasy shooter Control is getting some much-requested features, including a motion blur toggle and a photo mode.

Launching a game as beautiful and dazzling as Control without a photo mode is a crime. But Remedy redeems itself in many other ways; the game is a spectacle of environment destruction physics, a unique artistic style, and wickedly fun gunplay. Gamers are still annoyed with some things though, namely the motion blur and incredible performance drops on base PS4 consoles. Now Remedy says fixes are on the way...but they could take some time.

Remedy plans to add an on/off toggle for motion blur with the game's next update, which could come out mid-September. A photo mode is also coming so gamers can easily freeze frame bizarre moments, snap them, and share them online. The big FPS drops on consoles will take longer to adjust and there's no ETA on that front.

Cyberpunk 2077 has fast-travel, but CD Projekt RED's own devs don't use it much. The game is simply too immersive and amazing to skip through.

CDPR is going above and beyond with Night City, the in-game world for Cyberpunk 2077. It's a world within itself, a high-tech metropolis bustling with real-time AI, next-gen dynamism, and tons of stuff to see and do. It's kind of like a Blade Runner wonderland or a playground right out of Johnny Mnemonic; you can hack practically everything, go buy some fancy new guns or robot arms, or just zoom around the city on a cyberbike or a supercar like a futuristic GTA game.

In a recent Q&A session stemming from the new Cyberpunk 2077 footage, CD Projekt RED devs talked about how jam-packed Night City is with life and content. It's a dazzling and brilliant hub full of crime, mayhem, and living, breathing cultures. Fast-travel is a part of locomotion, but you really probably shouldn't use it. You'll be missing out on all the crazy things Night City has to offer.

CD Projekt RED's latest sci-fi shooter will have tons of vehicles straight out of a high-tech Grand Theft Auto.

Cyberpunk 2077 isn't just a FPS RPG. It also takes cues from GTA and lets you jump into a spruced up high-tech car to roam around Night City's seedy neon-lit streets. And like Grand Theft Auto, the game will have tons of vehicles to choose from--all of which can be claimed.

We've seen a few examples of the different types of vehicles from past videos--Jackie's sweet supercar from the E3 2018 demo, and now the Akira-esque Yaiba Kusanagi bike and armored muscle car--but there's a lot more in the actual game. Sadly we won't be able to operate the flying cars (known as AVs, or Aerial Vehicles) but CDPR did tease some "special vehicles" during a recent stream.

Today CD Projekt RED dropped the new 14-minute Cyberpunk 2077 demo from E3 2019, and it's jam-packed with info. First we saw how Netrunners can hack pretty much anything in the world, and now we get a taste of the game's dynamic skill system.

Cyberpunk 2077 is a huge choice-driven RPG where you can mix and match abilities at will. There's no hardline classes, and it's up to you how you want to play: as a melee specialist who dukes it out and blasts baddies with huge guns or a stealthy Netrunner who melds with the shadows, CDPR gives you opportunities to fill out all the variations in between. The skill system is actually pretty familiar and takes cues straight from games like Morrowind and Skyrim.

Cyberpunk 2077 doesn't really have skills. Instead it has perks that buff your proficiency in things like hacking, rifle handling, and augmentation efficiency. All of Cyberpunk 2077's perks are governed by an attribute similar to Morrowind or Oblivion, but the perks are straight out of Skyrim.

In Cyberpunk 2077's high-tech futuristic Night City, everything's connected. That means everything can be hacked and turned into a weapon, including bench presses and a boxing training robot that punches people's heads off.

Cyberpunk 2077 has a ton of playstyle options, but choosing a stealthy Netrunner lets you hack the world around you in creative ways. It's kind of like Watch Dogs, but with a more involved and ambitious next-gen scope. Being a seasoned Netrunner means you can manipulate the massively connected world of Night City and turn practically everything into a weapon or a much-needed distraction--including actual enemies. Pretty much everything is electronic and connected to a network, making the city a playground for your amusement. The results are often pretty humorous--hacking a bench press machine so it fails and crushes a guy's head

"Just develop your Netrunner skills to hack into enemy tech to have it do the dirty work for you."

Spiders Studios' (The Technomancer, Bound by Flame) new RPG Greedfall might just fill the BioWare-shaped void in the games market.

Greedfall looks to be Spiders' best project yet and is kind of a mix of Dragon Age, The Witcher, and even Assassin's Creed, all wrapped up in an exotic colonial style. A new gameplay video on IGN narrated by a Spiders dev illustrates the game's ambitious scope. Set in the fantasy world of Teer Fradee, the game merges a kind of expeditious realism with myth and magic straight out of a sword and board epic. Strange beasts roam the lands, including enchanted tree guardians, hulking monstrosities, and a manner of shadowy creatures--all of which drop loot and materials to fuel gameplay.

The real power of Greedfall comes in its mechanics. It might be a AA game, but it seems to blend some big AAA aspects together in a nice mix. It's a singleplayer-only RPG replete with BioWare influences like a party system with cinematic dialog sequences, action-based combat combined with a strategic freeze-frame quick menu to change things around, and an intuitive mix of sword and sorcery variety. There's swords and firearms and combat is third-person lock-on hack-and-slash action.