Latest News - Page 2408

Imagine a Call of Duty with third-person action and first-person combat set in ancient Rome--you've just envisioned the cancelled Call of Duty: Roman Wars.

The Call of Duty franchise is notorious for going back and forth in the timestream--from World War 2 all the way to the deep future with cyborgs and the like. But what if it went to, say, ancient Rome? The ancient world is replete with massive wide-scaled battles with thousands of sword-toting centurions, lumbering siege engines, and thundering cavalry--thus it'd be perfect for a game like Call of Duty. Activision, however, didn't think so, and that's why CoD: Roman Wars never saw the light of day.

Roman Wars was being developed by Vicarious Visions--the devs responsible for Skylanders and the new Crash Bandicoot PS4 remaster trilogy--and had a massive scope. Players would take the different roles within the 10th Legion of Roman legionnaires, from high-ranking officers and lowly grunts to archers, praetors, and even Caeser himself, and take part in an over-arching campaign based on Julius Caesar's Commentarii de Bello Gallico, chronicling the nine-year Gallic war against Celtic and Germanic barbarians.

There's a huge change coming to Wi-Fi technology, with the industry body behind Wi-Fi meeting, and signing off on a new level of performance that's going to blow the walls off of your house. The only issue is it won't roll out instantly, as we'll need new smartphones, tablets, routers, and Wi-Fi adapters to be upgraded to this super-quick new standard.

The new standard is 802.11ac Wi-Fi, which has individual 5GHz channel speeds of up to 867MHz. The update known as 'Wave 2' is coming, pushing the Wave 1 speeds from 802.11 to new heights, including technologies like MU-MIMO (multi-user, multiple input multiple output) and wider channel bandwidth that will allow for faster than ever Wi-Fi transfers.

The Wave 2 update to 802.11ac Wi-Fi has maximum channel widths of up to 160MHz, which provides twice the potential throughput of the current 802.11ac devices on the market. Previous chips used up to three input/output streams, but the new standards can do four input/output streams.

Microsoft's huge Ultimate Game Sale is back, and this time Redmond has slashed prices on both console and PC games.

The new Ultimate Game Sale slashes prices on 250 Xbox One, Xbox 360 and Windows 10 games like Quantum Break and Rise of the Tomb Raider are discounted up to 60% off, with Xbox LIVE Gold members getting an additional 10% off on all sale prices.

Notable deals include the newly minted backward compatible Red Dead Redemption for just $7.50, Halo 5, Assassin's Creed: Syndicate and The Witcher 3 for $29.99, Batman: Arkham Knight, The Evil Within, Saint's Row IV, and Wolfenstein: The New Order for just $15; and Metro Redux Bundle for just $7.50. Check below for the full list, or head over to Major Nelson.com for all the links.

Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Game of the Year Edition has been officially rated on German USK ratings site on PC, PS4 and Xbox One.

Although CD Projekt RED has no plans to release a Witcher 3 Enhanced Edition, it looks as though a Witcher 3 GOTY SKU is in the works. Presumably the Witcher 3 GOTY Edition will include the base game, the two huge Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine expansions, all the free DLC packs, and new patch updates on a single disc. Before now the only way to get the expansions was to buy a $74.99 digital bundle or the $24.99 Expansion Pass, so this route will be much more affordable for gamers.

The Witcher 3 GOTY Edition was rated just a month after the game's one-year anniversary (June 22), but we still have no actual release information. Given Witcher 3 has been on sale on PSN and Steam for $24.99 or thereabouts (and will be 50% off starting today on the Xbox Ultimate Sale) I think it's fair to say almost everyone owns the game already, so CDPR isn't really losing much cash by bundling the game + expansions for $59.99.

Apple has unleashed the second developer beta of iOS 10, which includes a slew of tweaks and improvements to Apple's mobile operating system.

MacRumors has put together an informative video that highlights a bunch of the new features and improvements in iOS 10 beta 2, which includes the new Messages app, sticker packs from Apple, changes to the Control Center 3D Touch actions, Apple's new organ donor signup, and more.

Apple will officially launch iOS 10 in September, so begin preparing your iPhones and iPads now. Personally, I've been using an iPhone 6S for over a month now and iOS severely lags behind Android, so I'm hoping there's some big improvements in iOS 10.

AMD has released an update regarding the impending release of their new Radeon Software 16.7.1 drivers, which will fix the Radeon RX 480 from drawing excess current from the PCIe bus. If you haven't seen it, we just posted up an article on the Radeon RX 480s in CrossFire beating out the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080.

The company posted on their AMD Gaming Facebook page that they are "confident that the levels of reported power draws by the Radeon RX 480 do not pose a risk of damage to motherboards or other PC components based on expected usage, we are serious about addressing this topic and allaying outstanding concerns. Towards that end, we assembled a worldwide team this past weekend to investigate and develop a driver update to improve the power draw. We're pleased to report that this driver-Radeon Software 16.7.1-is now undergoing final testing and will be released to the public in the next 48 hours".

AMD's upcoming Radeon Sofware 16.7.1 drivers include a tweak that will handle the power distribution on the Radeon RX 480, which will decrease the current drawn from the PCIe bus. Not only that, but AMD has included an option to reduce the total power drawn from the Radeon RX 480, with a "minimum performance impact". This new option will be found in the "compatibility" UI toggle in the Global Settings menu of Radeon Settings.

Microsoft is in quite the position with Windows 10, but it hasn't fully realized what it can do with DX12... yet.

The company has just announced it will be offering game developers a new abstraction layer that will allow developers to have better multi-GPU support in DX12 games. This new layer will also allow game developers to add multi-GPU support into their games with minimal additional code required.

Developers will still have to work much harder to add Explicit Multi Adapter, which is Microsoft's way of allowing multi-GPU setups to work under DX12 from NVIDIA and AMD... combined. That way, you can use something like a GeForce GTX 980 alongside a new Radeon RX 480, with both of the GPUs working together under Explicit Multi Adapter and DX12.

Nintendo has been in the headlines for most of the year with the teases of its next-gen Nintendo NX console, which should be powered by an upcoming, but yet unannounced Pascal-based Tegra processor from NVIDIA.

Well, Nintendo has hit the headlines in another big way, with Shinya Takahashi - the GM of Entertainment Planning and Development for Nintendo talking with Polygon recently, where he said: "Physical controllers for smart device applications are available in the market and it is possible that we may also develop something new by ourselves".

Takahashi continued, saying: "I believe Nintendo's way of thinking is to look at whether action games are really not impossible (without a physical controller for smart device applications) to create and how we can make it happen to create such a game".

AMD has just launched its new Radeon.com website, with it being a new hub for all things Radeon.

Radeon.com offers feature articles, details on RTG's new Radeon RX 480 video card, and entire section at the bottom dedicated to recent social media posts, and so much more.

AMD's new Polaris architecture is detailed, with the latest 'VR For All' featured article at the top, and an easier spot to grab the latest Radeon Software drivers for your video card in an easy-to-reach location at Radeon.com.

The leaks continue on NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 1060, which is reportedly set for an official announcement for July 7. The latest leak is from a 3DMark performance result, which gives us a taste of what to expect from NVIDIA's upcoming GP106-based mid-range video card. NVIDIA will want to hit AMD where it hurts, which is with their new Radeon RX 480.

NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 1060 will reportedly feature 1280 CUDA cores, 80 TMUs, and 6GB of GDDR5 RAM at 8GHz on a 192-bit memory bus. As for the nitty gritty, it'll feature the GP106 GPU which is a different ASIC than the GP104 used on the GeForce GTX 1080 and GeForce GTX 1070 - and for clock speeds, we're set to see 1506MHz on the Base clock, while we have 1708MHz on Boost.

Now what about that 3DMark performance? XFastest has leaked out some results of the GTX 1060, with it scoring 3014 in 3DMark FireStrike Ultra (the 4K run of the benchmark) which is higher than the 2712 that the AMD Radeon RX 480 scored in our benchmarks of the card. 1080p performance is just as good, beating out the AMD Radeon RX 480 once again - with 11,225 on the GTX 1060, while the Radeon RX 480 manages 10,600.

We have teamed up with Synology to giveaway a DiskStation DS916+ NAS to one lucky winner.

A NAS built for professionals' growing needs, ready to deliver high productivity with flexible scalability

Meet the ambitious DS916+ designed to satisfy professional NAS users' needs. With a powerful quad-core CPU, AES-NI hardware encryption engine, scalability up to nine drives, and 2GB or 8GB memory options, DS916+ brings better support for multitasking, and increases business dynamics.

Sega is cementing itself as a premiere PC strategy game publisher with its acquisition of Endless Space developer Amplitude Studios today. The company already owns Total War developer Creative Assembly (CA) and as of more recently, Dawn of War developer Relic Entertainment.

The studio commented on the deal on Amplitude community site Games2Gether.com, noting its relief in not having to deal with sales and marketing anymore.

"What we want to do is to focus on making games; that is why we created Amplitude. But with the pressure on sales and marketing we found that more and more time was dedicated to everything else - everything that we didn't have the size and scale to deal with. So we decided to look for the best partner we could to protect us from these distractions so that game development did not become a chore, but remained a passion."

True to its word last week, Microsoft has altered the Windows 10 upgrade notification for Windows 7 and 8 users to be more clear and actually stop nagging you when you tell it to (at least it appears that way). However, as part of the alterations, the notification now goes fullscreen.

Your options upon seeing the message include upgrading, delaying the notification for another three days, setting the notification to go off three more times, or permanently dismissing the notification.

Microsoft notes the notification will not appear if any of these things are true:

America's biggest wireless carrier Verizon is about to make its plans more expensive but include more data, someone familiar with the matter claims.

Here are the changes expected, many of which are already in line with rival carriers:

It's also said Verizon will introduce rollover data, better access to Canada and Mexico, and "Safety Mode", the last of which slows down your connection once you hit the data limit, and costs $5/mo unless you're on the XL or XXL plan.

There are new reports out that AMD's new Radeon RX 480 4GB cards can be upgraded to 8GB through a BIOS upgrade, meaning that AMD is shipping each and every RX 480 with 8GB of RAM, and then using a BIOS to downgrade/hide the additional 4GB of framebuffer.

Right now it's only confirmed on the early retail cards, so this might change in the coming weeks - so do not buy an RX 480 with 4GB of RAM absolutely, 100% hoping it has 8GB of RAM as this will change. Right now, WCCFTech purchased a retail Radeon RX 480 4GB model and flashed it with the vBIOS for the 8GB model, and 8GB of RAM appeared - a nice, free upgrade, eh?

Considering the 4GB model costs just $199 and the 8GB model costs $239, this is quite the savings - and makes the RX 480 an even better purchase at this price. As it stands, AMD is looking at losing $40 per RX 480 sold if it's using a vBIOS to downgrade the RAM to 4GB in order to meet the demand from consumers.

Fitness tracking company Fitbit have launched a great initiative for Australian customers, which will see a lump sum donation made to the Heart Foundation if its users hit a collective activity goal.

Starting in just five days time, the FitForGood promotion encourages users to take part in a collective 2 billion step goal between July 11 and July 25. Should that goal be met, Fitbit will make a $100,000 donation to the Heart Foundation to continue their work to educate the public about heart disease and encourage Australians to remain active. With physical inactivity a leading factor in nearly 10,000 deaths in Australia each year, the FitForGood challenge hopes to raise awareness around heart health and get Australians moving.

With registrations in the program now open , if you're in the land down under, strap on your Fitbit Charge HR or Fitbit Blaze and help meet the goal!

To celebrate this week's release of '10 Cloverfield Lane' on Blu-ray and DVD, we have fifteen Blu-ray copies to give away thanks to our friends at Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

Soon after leaving her fiancé Michelle is involved in a car accident. She awakens to find herself sharing an underground bunker with Howard and Emmett. Has she been saved from an apocalyptical event as Howard & Emmett tell her or are there other motives for her being held against her will?

To go into the running to win a prize, simply answer the following question in 50 words or less:

I really love seeing these 'only in Japan' news articles, but the latest is a gold mine. Japan has hosted their first-ever VR porn festival, but it ended prematurely as there were too many people trying to enter the building.

At the VR porn festival, companies were showing off the latest and greatest adult entertainment content in VR, with the festival featuring some of the most unique "accessories" to ever be made. Some of these included a rubberized, moving hand that is attached to a machine, while another is a scary looking blow up doll that doesn't have arms, legs or even a head - well now, Japan.

Hatenblog reported on VR Talk, in a translated post that read: "The event didn't start until 2pm, so I went there in high spirits an hour before then, but the city was already overflowing with people. There were so many that it was almost impossible to keep the situation under control. While waiting for my friends, I couldn't help but think that if they couldn't control the mass of people, a riot or something similar could happen. The 20 lucky guys closest to the building were let in by the staff".

It looks like Microsoft is going to be looking after PC gamers in a big way with the announcement that every new game published by Microsoft Studios will be on the PC.

All of these new Microsoft Studios games will support Xbox Play Anywhere, which is used through the Window Store. This means the new Halo game will be released on the PC, which is beyond exciting. Microsoft claimed in its "Windows 10 Anniversary Update Available August 2", the company teases:

"With the Xbox Play Anywhere program, you can buy a game once and play on your Windows 10 PC and Xbox One with shared progress, shared game saves and shared achievements. Every new title published from Microsoft Studios will support Xbox Play Anywhere and will be easily accessible in the Windows Store".

NVIDIA has been on a roll lately with its new Pascal architecture, with the huge releases of the new GeForce GTX 1080 and GTX 1070 cards, while the rumors of an imminent launch of the mid-range GTX 1060 could be around the corner.

How does it get better? Well, news is now arriving on the next-gen Pascal-based Titan X successor. VR World is reporting that they've had hands-on time with the GP102-based GeForce GTX Titan card, with a few details on NVIDIA's new monster.

NVIDIA's next-gen Titan X successor will feature both 8+8 and 8+6-pin PCIe power connectors, with the PCIe power connectors being found at the front of the card, and not on top. The 8+8-pin power connectors will provide up to 375W TDP, while the 8+6-pin version will provide 300W. Performance-wise, it should be a monster with around 50% more horsepower over the already lightning quick GTX 1080.