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PlayStation VR works on the PC with SteamVR... for now

Anthony Garreffa | Extended Reality (XR) | Dec 18, 2016 6:33 PM CST

Well, it happened sooner than I thought it would - which I kinda didn't think it would happen at all, but Sony's new PlayStation VR headset is already working on the PC with an unofficial (of course) method.

The latest version of Trinus PSVR works with PSVR, adding side-by-side support for non-VR games, a PSVR Box switch off button, a fix for switched colors, the ability to check for updates, PSVR display selector, and improved lens correction.

PSVR with Trinus PSVR won't work with the Oculus Touch or HTC Vive controllers, so all games have to be played with the gamepad. For now, Trinus PSVR is also limited to 60Hz, so don't blame us - or Trinus PSVR if you get sick.

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Continue reading: PlayStation VR works on the PC with SteamVR... for now (full post)

RAF ex-commander think gamers as potential drone pilots

Ma Yong Kang | Drones | Dec 18, 2016 2:17 PM CST

Retired RAF drone operation deputy commander said their future potential drone pilots might be the teens who are playing games on their PCs, Xbox and PlayStation consoles.

RAF ex-commander think gamers as potential drone pilots

Greg Bagwell, former Air Marshal that oversaw RAF drone operations in Syria, states that they need more new blood to pilot their drones since most of the current batch are quitting due to the enormous pressure in an exchange with theguardian: "The problem we have had is that in seven years of constant operations we have not been allowed to have a break point, to step back and take stock without having to keep pushing crews. It was stressful for the operators to mount complex attacks over Syria and Iraq and then to return at night to a family home in the UK."

The ex-deputy commander believed that the RAF need to test the viability of making pilots out of teenagers who spend their days on video games: "We need to test harder whether we can take a young 18- or 19-year-old out of their PlayStation bedroom and put them into a Reaper cabin and say: 'Right, you have never flown an aircraft before [but] that does not matter, you can operate this."

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Vulkan provides 60% perf improvement in Unity Engine

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 18, 2016 12:27 PM CST

Unity has announced that the beta version of their new Unity Engine has support for the fresh Vulkan API, something that starts with Unity 5.6 beta - allowing Personal Edition users to even jump in and use Vulkan.

Vulkan is allowing rendering performance leaps of up to 60% out of the box, without having to dive into the deep ocean that is the Vulkan API. Unity adds: "Vulkan is a new generation graphics and compute API that provides high-efficiency, cross-platform access to modern GPUs on desktop and mobile platforms. It's designed to take advantage of multiple CPU cores by allowing multiple threads to run in parallel. This means increased speed with reduced driver overhead and CPU workload, leaving the CPU free to do additional computation or rendering".

Unity 5.6 beta also includes improvements to graphics, with Metal Compute, Particle System, and GPU Instancing all receiving some developer love. Unity also has future plans to add in new features into the next beta, something that will include a new Progressive Lightmapper for baked lightmaps that will provide fast iterations and predictable ETA.

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Continue reading: Vulkan provides 60% perf improvement in Unity Engine (full post)

Star Citizen dev asks for more money in Alpha 2.6 stream

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 18, 2016 3:45 AM CST

Cloud Imperium Games is celebrating the holidays by showing off Star Citizen Alpha 2.6, where it teased a bunch of the game - except for Squadron 42, which was recently delayed from October, to 2017.

The team didn't show anything off from Squadron 42, instead there was plenty of advertising ship sales for the days leading up to Alpha 2.6, with the "all-ships" sale from the recent Anniversary stream returning, with discounts on a bunch of star-exploring ships. The first-person shooter module Star Marine had plenty to tease, but it wasn't much different to what the developer showed off last month.

Chris Roberts said in an email to backers: "After all the effort we expended for CitizenCon, we didn't want to spend additional developer time polishing intermediate solutions if it wasn't going towards the final product. A slick demo isn't that helpful if it pushes back the finished game, so we decided that the priority should be completing full systems over getting the vertical slice into a showable state".

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Continue reading: Star Citizen dev asks for more money in Alpha 2.6 stream (full post)

No Twitch stream of MLG Vegas Overwatch tournament

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 17, 2016 10:25 PM CST

Overwatch fans will want to know that Major League Gaming will broadcast its upcoming MLG Vegas tournament through YouTube, as well as its own EVE player on MLG.tv, with no confirmation of a Twitch stream being made available.

In previous MLG matches, the company has broadcast matches, news, and analysis on the official MLG YouTube page. Yahoo reports: "Earlier this year parent company Activision Blizzard announced that it was expanding its MLG.tv streaming platform through a partnership with Facebook, although there has been no confirmation that MLG Vegas will be streamed to the platform".

The upcoming major Overwatch tournament is on right now, with 8 teams competing for a $100,000 prize pool in Las Vegas.

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Continue reading: No Twitch stream of MLG Vegas Overwatch tournament (full post)

id Software removes anti-temper tech from DOOM

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 17, 2016 8:41 PM CST

id Software has removed Denuvo's anti-tamper technology from DOOM, but didn't mention it in DOOM's latest patch notes. The anti-temper tech was stopping gamers can using mods in DOOM, but that's no longer the case with the update 5 patch.

Denuvo said its anti-temper tech was removed from DOOM because it had done its job, protecting the game from piracy during its launch window. Denuvo's Robert Hernandez told Kotaku: "The simple reason why Denuvo Anti Tamper was removed from Doom was because it had accomplished its purpose by keeping the game safe from piracy during the initial sales window. The protection on Doom held up for nearly four months, which is an impressive accomplishment Hernandez for such a high-profile game".

The latest on DOOM is that AMD's next-gen Vega 10-based graphics card was running the game at 4K 60FPS+ on Ultra/Nightmare settings during their recent AMD Tech Summit 2016 in Sonoma, California.

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GTX 1080 Ti spotted alongside 'Club GeForce Elite'

Anthony Garreffa | Graphics Cards | Dec 17, 2016 6:22 PM CST

We've been hearing rumbles of the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti for a while now, but it seems we might be closer to the release than we thought - now that NVIDIA is reportedly preparing "Club GeForce".

GTX 1080 Ti spotted alongside 'Club GeForce Elite'

What is Club GeForce? PCWorld reports that NVIDIA's own GeForce Experience software teases it as: "I think of GFE Rewards as more than giveaways-it's a Club with exclusive benefits for GFE users. Through the Club we can help improve our customer's gaming experience and build a GeForce/GFE community". The benefits? One free indie game once a year, as well as a free skin or in-game item for a AAA game once every quarter. There's also weekly giveaways of full games, beta codes, hardware, and more.

In the post, there is a tease for "980 Ti users get first spot in line for 1080 Ti pre-orders"... which is, well, rather interesting to see. The post itself is from a LinkedIn post by NVIDIA looking for a Senior Marketing Manager - GeForce, Gamer Loyalty & Advocacy.

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Continue reading: GTX 1080 Ti spotted alongside 'Club GeForce Elite' (full post)

Huawei introduces concept phone - Honor Magic

Lana Jelic | Mobile Devices | Dec 17, 2016 12:50 PM CST

Huawei decided to end the year with their new concept phone introduced under Honor brand - Honor Magic.

The Honor Magic does have the word "magic" in it, but there is very little magic in this concept phone. Yes, it is Huawei's curviest phone so far, but when a company is introducing a concept phone, it is expected that they will try to push the boundaries of conventional phone design and introduce something new or different. But that's not the case with the Honor Magic.

As mentioned earlier, the Honor Magic has every edge and corner curved which gives a somewhat different look to the phone. The device comes with a 5.09-inch AMOLED display with a resolution of 2560 x 1440 pixels.

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Dynasty Warriors 9 announced, has open-world gameplay

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 17, 2016 6:52 AM CST

Koei Tecmo today announced Dynasty Warriors 9, a new chapter to the landmark strategy fighting game.

Dynasty Warriors 9 announced, has open-world gameplay

Dynasty Warriors 9 was announced during Koei Tecmo's "Greatest Games Lineup in History" stream, with the game set to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the Dynasty Warriors series. A platform or release date was not revealed, and we're not sure if the game will even cross over to the West.

Koei Tecmo promises that Dynasty Warriors 9 will be a "rebirth" for the series with major changes and overhauls, and will be set in an open-ended world this time around. Official details are slim, but we do know that Zhou Cang will be a new character in Dynasty Warriors 9.

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Final Fantasy 15's NewGame+ mode drops Dec 22

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 16, 2016 5:41 PM CST

If you've already beaten Final Fantasy 15's main game, you'll soon be able to blast through it a second time: the game's anticipated NewGame+ mode will drop on December 22.

Final Fantasy 15's NewGame+ mode drops Dec 22

Final Fantasy 15's first DLC pack drops next week, and includes two different Holiday Pack packages for free users and season pass owners alike. The free Holiday Pack features a new song, a unique a Level Stopper accessory which will cancel out all EXP gains (which is actually a nice touch if you feel like you're progressing too fast--or if you need a challenge), a new T-shirt, and tickets for the special January event. The Holiday Plus pack is exclusive to FF15 season pass holders and includes everything in the free Holiday Pack in addition to a bunch of accessories and items.

Read Also: Final Fantasy XV first impressions

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Nintendo shares slide by 5% after Super Mario Run launch

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 16, 2016 4:16 PM CST

Nintendo's new Super Mario Run mobile game is expected to rake in an impressive $60 million in its first month, but the company's actual investors aren't happy about the mobile game's business plan. This disapproval triggered a noticable slide in Nintendo's share prices, which dropped by 5% after the game's reveal.

Nintendo shares slide by 5% after Super Mario Run launch

Investors aren't too enthusiastic about Nintendo's current path: they hated the Switch handheld-and-console hybrid, and now they disapprove of Nintendo's business tactics surrounding its first-ever mobile game, Super Mario Run. Sky News reported that Nintendo's market shares dropped by 5% on Super Mario Run's release on Apple iOS devices, representing a staggering $2 billion in potential market value loss.

Nintendo's investors aren't keen on the company's "free to start" model, which allows mobile users to download the game for free in a limited trial capacity, then prompting users to pay $10 to unlock the full game. The biggest concern investors have is that most players may not actually convert over and buy the full game.

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Konami president joins Hideo Kojima's new dev team

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 16, 2016 11:20 AM CST

In a delightful twist of ironic events, Konami Europe's top brass has defected over to Hideo Kojima's new Kojima Productions dev team to work on Death Stranding.

Konami president joins Hideo Kojima's new dev team

Shinji Hirano, the ex-president Konami Europe, has crossed over to join forces with Hideo Kojima, Konami's estranged superstar and beloved creator of Metal Gear Solid series. The update was spotted on Hirano's updated LinkedIn profile. What's even more deliciously ironic is that Hirano now serves as acting president of Kojima Productions--a role he's well-suited for given his past experience spearheading Konami's European branch.

According to the Koalition, Hirano has been serving as KojimaPro's president for the last two months, joining the team in November 2016.

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This 681 HP Ferrari will be released in only 10 units

Lana Jelic | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 16, 2016 10:31 AM CST

Ferrari unveiled their new limited edition car - J50. The two-seater car is introduced to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Ferrari in Japan, which is why the car is named J50.

Based on the 488 Spider, the J50 is powered by a specific 690 cv version of the 3.9-litre V8 that won the overall International Engine of the Year Award this year. The output is up by 20 horsepower, giving the J50 a total of 681 HP.

The design of this mid-rear-engined roadster is futuristic, but the inspiration for the car's bodywork was inspired by iconic Ferrari cars such as the F40 and F50.

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Continue reading: This 681 HP Ferrari will be released in only 10 units (full post)

Spin the globe and listen to stations around the world

Lana Jelic | Internet & Websites | Dec 16, 2016 9:28 AM CST

There are a lot of online platforms and apps that let you listen to the radio stations around the world, but Radio Garden, a Dutch project, shows the radio stations around the globe on one interactive map. Basically, it's the Google Maps for radio stations.

When you open the page, you will see our planet and green dots. Each green dot represents a radio station. The page will automatically start playing a radio station that is closest to your location. But then, you can spin the globe, click the green dot and listen to radio stations in any part of the world.

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Facebook turns Messenger's camera into a Snapchat copy

Lana Jelic | Software & Apps | Dec 16, 2016 8:35 AM CST

Instagram recently added a new feature Stories, which is a clear copy of Snapchat. Now, Facebook introduced a new camera feature in their Messenger that lets you add special effects and art on your photos and videos. Sounds familiar?

On their official blog, Facebook says that users send over 2.5 billion emojis, photos, stickers and videos every day on Messenger, and they expressed hope that this new feature will enable even more visual messaging.

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Netgear: 11 routers vulnerable to remote hacking

Anthony Garreffa | Connectivity & Cloud | Dec 16, 2016 1:33 AM CST

Security researcher Andrew Rollins has discovered 11 different models of Netgear routers that have been vulnerable to remote hacks, with Rollins even warning Netgear about the problem all the way back on August 25, but didn't receive a reply.

Rollins went public with the announcement after waiting 3 months, which saw Homeland Security throwing out a warning a few days ago, and now Netgear is finally in the fold, admitting that it knows about the problem. Netgear has announced the affected models, and will release patches... for some of them.

Here's the list of the affected routers:

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Colorful's iGame Z270 mobos teased, ready for Kaby Lake

Anthony Garreffa | Motherboards | Dec 16, 2016 12:04 AM CST

Intel is poised to unleash its next-gen Kaby Lake family of processors at CES 2017 in January, and now we're getting a glimpse of Colorful's incredible stack of 200-series motherboards.

Colorful's upcoming 200-series motherboards will use both the Z270 and B250 chipsets, and will fall into the iGame and Tomahawk series. Colorful's iGame Gamer Customization is their high-end motherboard that sports a slick red and black color scheme, and armor plating that is placed across the entire board.

The board will include an 8-pin power connector, 14-phase IPP digital power supply for overclocking, VRMs are found under large heat sinks for heat load management, 4 x DDR4 DIMMs that support up to 64GB, 3 x PCIe 3.0 x16 ports, 4 x PCIe x1 ports, 1 x M.2/U.2 port, and 6 x SATA 6Gbps ports. There's also Killer LAN, HDMI/DisplayPort outputs, USB 3.1, 6 x USB 3.0, and 8 x USB 2.0 ports. We should expect a price of $250 or so.

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Continue reading: Colorful's iGame Z270 mobos teased, ready for Kaby Lake (full post)

Nier Automata: 900p 60FPS on PS4, 1080p 60FPS on PS4 Pro

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 15, 2016 9:30 PM CST

Nier Automata is headed for the PS4 in March 2017, and during a recent livestream it has been revealed that the game will run at 1600x900 on the PS4, while it'll run at 1920x1080 on the PS4 Pro - both at the glorious 60FPS (which should be a new minimum).

The action RPG will see an improved experience on the PS4 Pro, with better lighting, effects, higher resolution shadows, and more detail - but, there will be no 4K available, and I'm okay with that. I think 1080p at a locked 60FPS is better than 4K and up to 30FPS - and in a game like this, 60FPS is a big deal.

Nier Automata launches on the PS4 and PS4 Pro in March 2017, with a PC version promised - but there have been no more details released about the PC version just yet.

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Continue reading: Nier Automata: 900p 60FPS on PS4, 1080p 60FPS on PS4 Pro (full post)

7700K delidded, 30C reduction in temps - WTF, Intel

Anthony Garreffa | Processors | Dec 15, 2016 8:11 PM CST

If you've been keeping up with Intel's upcoming Kaby Lake-based Core i7-7700K, you'll know that they run - well, rather freakin' hot. Way hotter than the previous 6700K, and normally double the temps of the 6700K on the current 7700K engineering samples that are being sent around to various tech press.

New work has been done on the 7700K with retail samples, and cooled by the Thermalright 6 cooler by AnandTech forum member 'RichUK'. Out of the box, the temperatures of the Core i7-7700K hit 60C under load, but when the 7700K was pushed to 5GHz and pushed to 100% load, the temperatures spiked at a mammoth 96C.

Even at 96C, the 7700K was stable at 5GHz with 1.34V coursing through its silicon, while 1.264V was used at a stable 4.7GHz (and hitting 83C) on a Corsair H110i cooler on quiet mode.

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Continue reading: 7700K delidded, 30C reduction in temps - WTF, Intel (full post)

Nintendo Switch has higher GPU, CPU perf while docked?

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 15, 2016 5:25 PM CST

Nintendo's new Switch console-and-handheld hybrid may have variable GPU and CPU performance across its two different modes, portable on-the-go handheld mode and stationary docked console mode, with the latter providing extra processing power while hooked up to an active power source over USB Type-C.

Nintendo Switch has higher GPU, CPU perf while docked?

Note: It's vital to realize that patents aren't 100% confirmations, and there's a chance that this information, specs, and embodiment details may not manifest in the finalized Nintendo Switch hardware.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office just published new Nintendo Switch patents that seem to corroborate past reports on the Switch's variable processing power. According to the patent, the Nintendo Switch's processing clock speeds are variable, and can be controlled by specific games, apps, and programs on the Switch tablet. So in essence, games and programs will control the CPU and GPU scaling, whereas the resolution is hardware-based.

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Continue reading: Nintendo Switch has higher GPU, CPU perf while docked? (full post)

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