Latest News - Page 2431

Sony has just revealed how much space you'll need to make before playing its PlayStation VR headset, and the results are pretty surprising.

Although Sony wants you to remain seated while playing most PlayStation VR games, some games track movements. According to a new PSVR product pamphlet, the Sony's VR headset requires almost as much free space as the HTC Vive--even though the console-powered PSVR doesn't have full 360-degree room-scale tracking.

The PSVR's required play area dimensions call for 1.9m (6.2ft) of width and 3.0m (9.8ft) length, with the height being determined how high up you set the required PlayStation Camera. The HTC Vive's minimum room-scale play area calls for at least 2 m x 1.5 m (6 ft 6 in x 5 ft) of free space, with some games requiring even more room. The biggest difference is one of these VR headsets does room-scale VR and the other doesn't.

SPOILER WARNING: If you want to keep No Man's Sky a total surprise you may want to look away from this post. A gamer who apparently purchased an early copy of No Man's Sky has allegedly sold the game to an impatient space explorer for the insane sum of $1,250.

Interestingly enough, the tale is spun on a sports forum called Operation Sports, where user CampBlackMamba24 claims he's acquired pre-release copy of No Man's Sky and decided to share some info. The gamer claims he bought the copy of No Man's Sky for $150 off of Craigslist, likely a pre-release review copy, and proceeded to sell it on eBay for $1,250. This is actually the same user that made the $2,000 No Man's Sky eBay listing, but he accepted the $1,250 counter offer instead.

If you do manage to somehow get an early copy, No Man's Sky's servers are already live (presumably for press copies). Here's a quick list of the gamer's general impressions and a bunch of screenshots from the forum posts for your perusal.

It was over 18 months ago now that NVIDIA found itself in quite the predicament, with its GeForce GTX 970 advertised with 4GB of VRAM, but only had access to 3.5GB of it at high speeds, while the remaining 512MB was performance-limited.

NVIDIA agreed to settle 15 class-action lawsuits for undisclosed terms, but now the company has confirmed it will be paying each person who has a GeForce GTX 970, giving them $30 and covering $1.3 million in legal fees.

Right now this is only a preliminary settlement, so a court will still need to approve the terms before consumers can start claiming their $30. NVIDIA has said it will not be capping the total amount it will pay to consumers, which is actually surprising. Good guy NVIDIA, after all of the crap that happened 18 months ago.

Facebook has somehow continued its growth into 2016, with the company reporting its second quarter earnings, where we now know just how many people use Facebook daily, and monthly.

Facebook is now home to over 1.7 billion monthly active users (MAUs), which is a nice increase of 15% year-over-year, while we have 1.57 billion monthly active users on mobile. Facebook has also hit another milestone, where the social network is now home to over 1 billion mobile daily active users (DAUs).

The company defines MAUs as "Mobile-only MAUs are defined as users who accessed Facebook solely through mobile apps or mobile versions of our website, or used our Messenger app, in the last 30 days of the given quarter. The number of mobile-only MAUs do not include Instagram users unless they would otherwise qualify as such users based on their other activities on Facebook".

Pokemon GO is next to unstoppable at this point, but we've reached an interesting new peak: some parents are naming their babies after Pokemon GO characters.

BabyCenter says that the names of some of the Pokemon GO characters have spiked in popularity, with names like Evee, Onyx and Roselia jumping 1,394 spots, 2,191 spots and 5,896 spots compared to a year ago, respectively. BabyCenter says that in a recent survey, close to 50% of the moms in the community are active Pokemon GO players.

Pokemon GO isn't new in the way that it has influenced parents by naming their kids after characters they know and love, with shows and movies like Breaking Bad, Frozen, Game of Thrones and countless other shows and movies inspiring parents.

Despite originally flopping on release, Disney's adaptation of the indie comic 'The Rockeeter' is set to get a sequel over 25 years after the first.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the sequel/ reboot is in very early development, with a script currently being written by Max Winkler and Matt Spicer. The film is said to retain the 1930's timeline, which is said to occur six years after the original film and feature "a young African-American female pilot, who takes up the mantle of Rocketeer"

The 1991 release, which starred Billy Campbell, Jennifer Connelly and Timothy Dalton generated $46 million off a $35 million budget which was considered a huge disappointment at the time, but has gone on to enjoy a cult following in the intervening years. Disney will no doubt be hoping the next fares somewhat better.

Doom its receiving its second free content update tomorrow, July 29, just in time for the weekend. Aimed at multiplayer fans and content creators, it provides yet more reasons to jump back into the action, or to get into it for the first time if you haven't picked the game up yet (and we recommend you do).

First is up is the introduction of the Exodus game mode, which is described as a "one-flag capture-the-flag mode with an added twist of constantly moving bases and flags." As well, you get to try out Sector, which is effectively King of the Hill but with multiple hills. In it, you capture and attempt to hold multiple points.

Modding suite SnapMap receives some love too in the form of customizable weapon wheel functionality, jump pads, 30 Hell-themed modules, more weapons, a new playable demon known as The Mancubus, and various improvements to the Community HUB, editor, and logic.

Nintendo has successfully patented an external hardware accessory that boosts a console's processing power, meaning Nintendo could be the first to kick off external hardware upgrades for mainstream consoles.

Nintendo's new NX hardware is believed to be a mobile-based handheld hybrid that's lacking in power, but recent patents hint the NX could leverage external hardware to boost performance. The external box is called a Supplemental Computing Device, and hooks up to Nintendo games consoles to provide various improvements like "increased processing and/or storage resources to games consoles to assist in executing a game."

Based on the deluge of information in the patent filings, Nintendo's Supplemental Computing Device (SCD) is a huge game-changer. There's a ton of applications apart from the obvious hardware processing boost, but don't think of this a console version of Razer's external Core GPU enclosure. The SCD likely won't be that dramatic, and apparently won't affect graphics at all, just processing speed, network latency, and storage. It does, however, keep with Nintendo's penchant for uniqueness and incorporates some very interesting applications.

Since reports indicate Nintendo's new NX console is a transforming, mobile-based handheld-console hybrid, it only makes sense that mobile games like Pokemon Go will be compatible.

Nintendo's new 'unique and different' NX games system might not be a console after all--sources say that the NX is entirely mobile-based and won't have a dedicated console element. But what does this mean for its games? While the NX will have its own "full software lineup", Nintendo's mobile games may be supported as well. The NX being a mobile system folds neatly in with Nintendo's new push for mobile games, and it looks like all of them--including the wildly successful Pokemon Go game--will be supported on the NX.

"A person familiar with the matter said NX would be a handheld-console hybrid that would be compatible with its own smartphone games," reports Wall Street Journal's Takashi Mochizuki.

Microsoft's new $299 Xbox One S reportedly requires two separate day one updates in order to play 4K UHD video content.

Like any other console on the market, the new 40% slimmer Xbox One S apparently requires an initial system update in order to function properly. It appears that the Xbox One S doesn't support 4K UHD Blu-ray disc playback right out of the box and needs to be connected to the internet to download a day one firmware update to unlock the feature. This is actually nothing new: the Xbox One has to download a specific Media Player app to play Blu-ray discs. Consoles really aren't plug and play like companies lead you to believe--the reality is you have to download updates and install games before you can start playing.

This tidbit comes from a Norwegian gamer named Russian76 who received a 2TB Xbox One S console ahead of schedule, but his elation was short-lived as the console's main selling point has been switched off by default. The owner says that his Xbox One S won't play 4K UHD Blu-rays even after downloading a 4.5GB update, so it looks like Microsoft hasn't rolled out the official Xbox One S firmware update required for 4K playback just yet. So two updates might be required to enable 4K playback on the new slim Xbox.

Apple has just posted its quarterly results, where we now know that the company sold 40.4 million iPhones in the three-month period, compared to 47.5 million from the same time last year. This is a 15% drop, very similar to the 16% year-over-year drop, and it's not good.

When it comes to the money side of things, Apple pulled in $42.4 billion in revenue with a net income of $7.8 billion, or $1.42 per share. Comparing that to the same quarter of 2015, Apple generated $49.6 billion in revenue, had a net income of $10.7 billion, or $1.85 per share.

Analysts expected Apple to have $42.2 billion in revenue and have sold 40 million iPhones, so Apple barely beat analyst expectations. For 10 quarters in a row now, iPad sales have declined, down 9% to 9.95 million units sold. Apple sold 4.3 million Macs, which is down 11.3% year-over-year.

Dontnod's beloved fan-favorite indie Life is Strange is getting its own episodic live-action series.

Square Enix today announced that it'll be working alongside Legendary Pictures and dj2 Entertainment (who's working on Sony's new Sonic the Hedgehog movie) to make a digital series based around Life is Strange. The series will follow the game's episodic format and will be live-action with real-life actors portraying in-game characters in an adapted Arcadia Bay environment. The roles of Max and Chloe have yet to be cast.

"Life is Strange is one of those rare properties that combines incredibly developed characters and storylines with deeply engaging gameplay," said Greg Siegel, Senior Vice President of Development and Production for Legendary Digital Studios. "It lends itself perfectly to live-action imaginings. We couldn't be more excited to partner with Square Enix, DONTNOD Entertainment and dj2 to bring the world of Arcadia Bay to life in an exciting new way."

Pokemon GO might have exploded in popularity in its mere weeks on the market, but Nintendo's financials for their recent quarter are not good, at all.

Nintendo's net sales are down 31% compared to the same quarter of 2015, hitting $587 million. Nintendo also had an operating loss of $48 million, and only sold 220,000 Wii U consoles in the quarter, bringing the total number of Wii U consoles sold to over 13 million.

The Nintendo 3DS had another 1 million sales, and in regards to Pokemon GO - remember that Nintendo only owns parts of the game and not the entire game as Niantic steers that ship. Nintendo announced that it has delayed the Pokemon Go Plus accessory, which will now be released in September.

Crucial debuted its MX300 SSD range last month with the 750GB model, but now the company has just announced three new models in its MX300 line up.

We now have the 275GB, 525GB and 1TB models - with the 275GB MX300 SSD costing just $69.99, while the 525GB model costs $129.99. The 750GB model costs $189.99, while the 1TB jumps up to $259.99. The 525GB, 750GB and 1TB drives all have read/write speeds of 530MB/sec and 510MB/sec, respectively, while random performance is 92K IOPS for reads, while there's 83K IOPS for writes.

The smaller 275GB model is slightly slower, with 500MB/sec write speeds and reduced random read speeds of 55K IOPS. All four of the drives arrive in the 2.5-inch form factor, while M.2-based variants will be here next month. All of the drives include a 3-year warranty, with rated endurance of 220TB.

Siggraph 2016 - Walking through Siggraph 2016, there's something that caught my eye in a big way - Otoy had a 16K display on show, using 16 x 4K TVs, powered by AMD's new Radeon Pro graphics cards.

16K is pretty crazy, so let's clarify what we're talking about here:

It's virtually impossible to put into words what 16K looks like, but if you have seen a 4K TV or display before, 3840 x 2160 is made up of four times the pixels of a 1080p display. 16K, is made up of 16 of those 4K displays, which is made up of 32 x 1080p resolution. So, we're talking some mammoth numbers here.

Even in an ideal world, Microsoft's Windows Store can't compete with Steam. But Epic Games boss Tim Sweeney predicts that Microsoft will use nefarious tactics to overthrown Valve's reign on the PC games industry.

Epic Games boss Tim Sweeney doesn't trust Microsoft's Windows 10 UWP platform. Sweeney has been a vocal opponent of UWP, accusing Microsoft of "monopolizing PC games development", and now he claims that Redmond will slowly chip away at the foundations of Steam on an OS level and ultimately force gamers to use the Windows Store for their PC gaming needs.

"Slowly, over the next five years, they will force-patch Windows 10 to make Steam progressively worse and more broken. They'll never completely break it, but will continue to break it until, in five years, people are so fed up that Steam is buggy that the Windows Store seems like an ideal alternative," Sweeney said in a recent interview with Edge magazine. "That's exactly what they did to their previous competitors in other areas. Now they're doing it to Steam. It's only just starting to become visible. Microsoft might not be competent enough to succeed with their plan, but they're certainly trying."

Vizio has made a name for itself as budget TV maker in the US, with the company getting acquired by Chinese electronics maker LeEvo in a deal worth $2 billion.

The US-based budget TV maker will continue its day-to-day operations in California, where Vizio will now act as a subsidiary of LeEco. Vizio founder and CEO William Wang will be leaving the company in a way, with Vizio's data business, Inscape, being spun off into a privately held company where LeEco will hold 49% ownership.

Wang will act as chairman and CEO of Inscape where he will hold a controlling 51% stake. During the press event, Wang said he had mixed feelings regarding the deal, and as the owner and CEO of Vizio, he was reluctant to let it go. But, he said the acquisition deal was the best decision for Vizio's hard-working staff and loyal shareholders.

LG invested $905 million in flexible OLED displays last year, and apparently it liked the results, because it's putting $1.75 billion into it this year (the investment was rumored last month, and now the company has confirmed it). The end goal with its investment is to produce bendable screens for use in mobile phones, at least one of which doubles as a tablet.

It's said the company sees flexible phones as part of an "approaching era", and so is putting its gobs of money where its mouth is. Its already released the LG G Flex and G Flex 2 to that end as well. Market research firm IHS DisplaySearch says it anticipates flexible OLED shipments to grow from 59 million shipments this year to 416 million in 2020.

Microsoft is offering a particularly attractive Halo-themed Xbox One S bundle for $299, and Redmond also reveals when the 500GB and 1TB Xbox One S models will launch.

Although I've questioned Microsoft's coercive tactics regarding the Xbox One S' staggered launch, I have to give the company props for its new Halo bundle. The Halo Collection Xbox One S bundle comes with download keys for Halo 5 and Halo Master Chief Collection, and is priced at $299 for the 500GB model and $349 for the 1TB variant. The 500GB and 1TB Xbox One S models will launch August 23. Sadly it looks like the 1TB bundle has "very limited quantities" and can only be purchased at Microsoft's brick-and-mortar stores or the Microsoft Store website.

Microsoft also has a 1TB Xbox One S bundled with Madden NFL 17 for $349 for sports fans out there. The Madden bundle only comes in 1TB options so you won't enjoy the lower admission cost, but you do get some extra goodies like seven Madden Ultimate Team Pro Packs, a free month of EA Access, and a voucher for 20% off your next NFL order.

Burnout was one of the best racing franchises before it was hollowed out in the end, but now ex-Criterion co-founder Alex Ward has confirmed that "work has begun" on a new racing game.

Ward along with Criterion co-founder Fiona Sperry left the company back in 2014 and created Three Fields Entertainment. Three Fields Entertainment has since made Dangerous Golf, but the new racing game looks like it could be a spiritual successor to Burnout 3.

During an interview with Develop Online, Ward said that the new racing game will have support for both the PlayStation VR and Oculus Rift. Ward said to Develop Online: "Our second project will be a racing game. A spiritual successor to one of the Burnout series for PC, PS4 and Xbox One. We aim to support PlayStation VR and Oculus Rift".