Latest News - Page 2450

Sony will launch its new 4K-upscaling PlayStation 4 Neo console in Holiday 2016 to beat Microsoft's 6TFLOPs "monster" Project Scorpio to the market, according to recent sources.

Although Sony's new PS4K won't be as powerful as Microsoft's Xbox Scorpio, nor will it leverage AMD's new 14nm Polaris GPU and Zen CPU SoC combo, the Japanese console-maker will likely take advantage of an earlier console release to soak up a full year of sales. We've known for a while that Sony would likely launch its PS4K in 2016 (French retailer Innelec said its coming in October), "several sources" have told Eurogamer to expect a PS4K release this year.

Instead of revealing its PS4K at E3 2016 like Microsoft did with Project Scorpio, Sony took the more reserved route by officially confirming the console is indeed on the way. Sony Computer Interactive President Andrew House confirmed that the PlayStation 4K (aka Neo) will upscale 1080p games to 4K, and that it will be up to developers to optimize games for the "enhanced mode". House also confirmed that the PS4 Neo won't have exclusive games, and that all existing PS4 games will be compatible with the PS4K.

E3 2016 - Bethesda game director Todd Howard confirmed the studio is working on two absolutely massive projects that overlap, are "totally different" than anything Bethesda's done before, and require next-gen technology that "isn't quite here yet."

Remember when Bethesda's Todd Howard said this back in February? "We actually have three kind of longer term projects we're doing that are all - we'll talk about them at a future date - but they're different than anything we've done before, while also being a Bethesda-style game....Big and crazy, but in many ways different than things we've done before. It's an exciting time." At E3 2016 Todd Howard told Geoff Keighley even more details about these ambitious new games and what they hold for the future of the studio.

These two new massive projects will be fully-fledged Skyrim- and Fallout 4-sized games that come before The Elder Scrolls VI--but all three games (which were described as 'big and crazy' before) will basically be under the same umbrella in terms of planning. "I could sit here and explain the game to you, and you would say, 'That sounds like you don't even have the technology. How long is that going to take?' So it is something that's going to take a lot of time, what he have in mind for that game, and we actually have two other large projects we're also doing that are bigger than everything we've done. People will probably hear about those even before Elder Scrolls 6. That'll make sense many years from now."

E3 2016 - Square Enix unloaded a staggering volume of Final Fantasy 15 content at E3, blowing the doors off of the new action-based RPG with tons of gameplay footage, screenshots, and details.

Thanks to Square Enix, E3 2016 wasn't lacking for RPGs (although we did expect Sony to showcase more JRPGs at their press conference!). Gamers were given a huge buffet of Final Fantasy 15 awesomeness to chew on--not just the small morsels and teasers we're used to. In fact, I'd say that there's so much footage and info out there right now that we can hardly digest it all-in-one sitting.

The first bit of gameplay footage has FF15 game director Hajime Tabata walking us through the first 24 minutes of gameplay, revealing key details and tidbits along the way--like Noctis' companions being living, breathing comrades with personalities rather than stale NPCs, level-up systems and side abilities like fishing, photography and survival, real-time combat mechanics, dynamic 24-hour day-and-night cycles, and pretty much everything under Eos' sun.

A few lucky people got to try PlayStation VR at a handful of Best Buy locations during E3 week, but now Sony is dramatically expanding the reach of its demos. How dramatically? Beginning June 24 the PS4 virtual reality system will be available to try in 300 locations across the United States.

Demo attendees will get to go hands-on with PlayStation VR Worlds, EVE: Valkyrie, Headmaster, Battlezone, and SUPERHYPERCUBE. More game demos will be added leading up to PS VR's launch in October, and hopefully those will include the newly announced PlayStation VR titles from Sony's E3 press conference.

Want to try it on for yourself? Visit this URL, punch in your zip code, and Sony will spit out store locations close to you, including the hours it's available to play each day. Sony is definitely going all out to get PlayStation VR maximum exposure at retail. Have you tried it yet?

E3 2016 - Capcom's zombie game Dead Rising 4 will be exclusive to Xbox One for one full year and Windows Store for 90 days, Microsoft has confirmed. After the exclusivity periods end, it may end up on PlayStation 4 and/or Steam.

Dead Rising 3 was exclusive to Xbox One as well before releasing 10 months later on PC, while the game was permanently out of the question for PS4 owners. So in both cases, Microsoft is more lax on restrictions this time around, which should come as great news to all.

Dead Rising 4 will launch December 6 on Windows Store and Xbox One.

The Serious Sam franchise has always done one thing exceptionally well: balls-to-the-wall FPS action focused on twitch reflexes, overpowered weapons, absurdly large hordes of demons, and unapologetic brutality. So when Croteam announced they were bringing their shooter to virtual reality, I may or may not have literally jumped up and down with excitement. I recently played a small slice of an early build of Serious Sam VR: The Last Hope, and it's almost everything I expected from a Samuel Stone adventure.

I played using the Oculus Rift and its forthcoming Touch controllers, but a demo station was also set up with an HTC Vive, and the developers tell me they're currently talking to Sony about getting the game onto PlayStation VR.

Serious Sam VR: The Last Hope finds the titular action hero traveling from planet to planet to fend off Mental's endless hordes of demon warriors, and it's no surprise that (as always) Sam is basically the universe's last hope. Fortunately, Sam's packing a fairly deep arsenal of weaponry and skills, all of which are upgradeable between missions, lending a nice sense of progression to the game that's absent from most "shooting gallery" style VR games right now. In fact, this is the most fleshed out shooter I've seen, particularly for the HTC Vive, as most of the FPS style games on that system are just a single level. Croteam has clearly been busy. Serious Sam VR: The Last Hope will launch with at least 8 worlds and a slew of guns when it debuts this summer on Steam Early Access.

A Battlefield 1 closed alpha or something close to it is currently being played by members of the press, which Gamespot says will be available next week. Available to who isn't exactly clear, but based on past DICE closed alphas, it's likely a small selection of those who signed up for Battlefield Insider.

The news is affirmed by Game Informer's recent takedown of closed alpha footage, which we've heard from those who attended EA Play that it was supposed to be under NDA for two weeks.

Multiple maps are said to be featured in the alpha, including the one shown at EA Play.

CD Projekt RED is one of the many dev studios that's very familiar with Nintendo's new NX console hardware, and says that the system will be "spectacular" for gamers.

Not too long ago Nintendo America President Reggie Fils-Aime said something that worried Nintendo fans: "For us, it isn't about specs, it's about content," he said. But...the NX is supposed to be powered by a next-gen 16nm Pascal-based Tegra chip! It's supposed to be powerful! Does this mean the NX will be another hardware flop like the Wii U? CD Projekt RED's Fabian Döehlahe tells us not to worry: the NX is going to be "fantastic".

"The Nintendo NX will be fantastic," CD Projekt RED communications manager Fabian Mario Döehlahe told German games publication Rocketbeans TV. "As a developer you get access to the hardware and everybody [at CD Projekt] is looking forward to the NX. We know things."

I'll be honest. With a flurry of meetings to attend during E3 and free time nonexistent, I wasn't initially excited about seeing Astro's updated A50 wireless headphones. Don't misunderstand me, I'm a fan. I've used the crap out of my 1st generation pair for gaming, Rock Band, and VR sessions. But when I hear "updated," I envision a few new bullet points to put on the retail box for marketing purposes, just barely justifying a new version. This is thankfully not the case with the new Astro A50s.

I went hands-on and ears-on with an Astro engineer during E3, and walked away super impressed. My only criticism? Astro probably should have stamped these with a brand new model number because they're a substantial improvement over not just the originals, but even the most recent iterations.

The staples are still here: Dolby 7.1, superior sound, 5GHz wireless, and compatibility with PC, PS4, and Xbox One. And they're still one of the most comfortable gaming headsets I've ever put on my head.

Computex 2016 - Finally, our last video on Computex 2016 now that I'm not so busy and running around doing 15 trillion things at once - is of NVIDIA's huge 'booth' at the Grand Hyatt during Computex.

The company was showcasing its next-gen, Pascal-based GeForce GTX 1070 and GeForce GTX 1080 video cards, as well as it's huge push into VR. Not only that, but NVIDIA detailed Ansel with some truly beautiful pictures hanging on walls taken in-game, as well as huge VR Experience rooms where we got to play a bunch of games.

The energy in the room was intense, with gamers and everyone else enjoying themselves. What was your favorite part of the 10-minute video?

This isn't something I thought I'd be writing in 2016, but a team at the University of California, Davis, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering have hit a world's first. The team have designed the first "KiloCore" processor, which has 1000 independent programmable processors, with a maximum computation rate of 1.78 trillion instructions per second.

The new 1000-core processor has 621 million transistors and was shown off during the recent 2016 Symposium on VLSI Technology and Circuits in Honolulu on June 16. Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Bevan Baas, who led the team that designed KiloCore, said: "To the best of our knowledge, it is the world's first 1,000-processor chip and it is the highest clock-rate processor ever designed in a university".

Up until now, there has been no other chips made with over 300 processors, with most of them being made for research purposes and only a handful are sold commercially. The new 1000-processor KiloCore was fabricated by IBM on their 32nm CMOS technology, so we're not even talking anything radically advanced like the 14nm and 10nm nodes that are being used and played with now.

With the much anticipated release of 'Independence Day: Resurgence' just a few days away, you'd expect that the first movie reviews might be imminent, right? Wrong.

According to U.S. based movie critics, 20th Century Fox has cancelled the organised press screenings for the film, leading to some speculation that the quality of the film isn't up to snuff. In contrast, Disney let critics publish their 'Captain America: Civil War' reviews a week in advance, when it was clear that the film was pretty decent.

As a long term fan, I'd be very happy if 'Resurgence' turns out to be a sequel worth waiting 20 years for, the lack of buzz and the latest move by the studio doesn't instill a whole lot of confidence. Our review will be published next week.

To celebrate this week's release of 'London Has Fallen' on Blu-ray HD and DVD, we have ten Blu-ray copies to give away thanks to our friends at Roadshow Home Entertainment.

The world's leaders have assembled. So have their enemies. The sequel to the worldwide smash hit 'Olympus Has Fallen' begins in London, where the British Prime Minister has passed away under mysterious circumstances. His funeral is a must-attend event for leaders of the western world. But what starts out as the most protected event on earth, turns into a deadly plot to kill the world's most powerful leaders, devastate every known landmark in the British capital, and unleash a terrifying vision of the future. Only three people have any hope of stopping it: the President of the United States, his formidable secret service head (Gerard Butler), and an English MI-6 agent who rightly trusts no one.

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

It looks like Samsung is continuing to out-innovate everyone else, announcing that Samsung and even TSMC are producing chips using the new FoWLP yield technology. What the hell is FoWLP yield technology you ask?

FoWLP, or Fan-Out Wafter Level Packaging platform, allows smartphone OEMs to reduce the thickness of their devices by a great degree, which has multiple benefits. FoWLP also doesn't need a PCB, and also increases the efficiency of chips by 30%, as well as reducing the thickness of smartphones by at least 0.3mm.

Apple is reportedly using TSMC as its main supplier of 10nm FinFET processors, and Samsung wants a cut of that business - which is where FoWLP comes into play. Samsung might end up winking just right at Apple, especially if TSMC can't keep up with Apple's high demand. With smartphones hitting the whole no bezel, super-thin, more battery wishlist - Samsung's impressive new FoWLP technology is going to come in handy big time over the coming years.

Roberts Space Industries has been doing some amazing things with the CRYENGINE and its ambitious as hell space game, Star Citizen, which has just had its latest v2.4 patch released.

Star Citizen's new v2.4 patch allows access to the new Shopping experience, full Hangar interactivity from within the actual game client - which can be accessed through new options, and the Port Modification app. Cloud Imperium Games have been making countless changes to the Crusader and Port Olisar, which includes the addition of new missions, Alpha Currency and Defender reputation.

But marvel over these new screenshots, which look out of this world.

At just 27 years old, actor 'Anton Yelchin', best known for roles in 'Star Trek', 'Terminator Salvation' and 'Green Room' has tragically died in a freak car accident.

According to Variety, the young actor died when he became pinned by a vehicle in his driveway. Yelchin portrayed Chekov in J.J. Abram's 'Star Trek' and 'Star Trek Into Darkness'. His colleagues has rallied, posting heartfelt tributes on social media today.

Yelchin will be seen in the forthcoming 'Star Trek Beyond', which hits cinemas next month.

Over the last two weeks, I've been addicted to doing Facebook Live videos for TweakTown - and that's something I will be doing much more of, but there are dangerous sides to Facebook Live video, too.

Chicago man Antonio Perkins was doing a Facebook Live broadcast and was shot to death during the stream in an "otherwise normal evening" reports Engadget. Facebook didn't take down Perkins' video, and while the social network usually removes videos that sensationalize violence, it's leaving Perkins video - and others like it on Facebook, as the social network believes it will help awareness of violence, and its dire consequences.

GIGABYTE has had some of the most impressive showings of GeForce GTX 1070 and GTX 1080 cards, especially with the super-fast GeForce GTX 1080 Xtreme Gaming card, which has a manual OC of up to 2.3GHz on the GP104. Yeah, insane.

Well, now we have the GTX 1070 Windforce OC video card, as well as the GTX 1070 G1 Gaming card - both of which are on their way to my lab. The GTX 1070 Windforce OC features a single 8-pin PCIe power connector, with a dual-fan cooler with two 90mm fans that will keep the card nice and cool under those heavy gaming sessions.

GIGABYTE's GeForce GTX 1070 Windforce OC has a maximum Boost clock of 1582MHz in its OC mode, while the Gaming mode has the Boost hitting 1556MHz. There's the usual 8GB of GDDR5 clocked at 8GHz on the 256-bit memory bus, and the same 3 x DP1.4 ports, 1 x HDMI 2.0b and 1 x DVI.

AMD has been in the headlines virtually every day this week, and here we are again with some even better news - AMD's stock continues to drive upwards, rising 9.8% yesterday. The reason? Zen and Polaris.

AMD has been pushing its upcoming Zen architecture for CPUs and APUs, and from what we've seen it is impressive. Then we have the bigger part of the puzzle; Polaris, which is the new GPU architecture from the newly-formed Radeon Technologies Group. Polaris will debut later this month with the Radeon RX 480 4GB model at $199, while the 8GB variant is $30 more expensive at $229.

Lisa Su, the CEO of AMD, has been chatting with various financial groups, TV appearances and her appearance at E3 2016 to debut the Radeon RX 460 and RX 470 - Su has been reiterating AMD's multi-year investment program, something she talked about during her chat with CNBC yesterday.

E3 2016 - Bethesda teased a new Wolfenstein game at their E3 2016 showcase.

Renowned Swedish FPS developer Machine Games, who's responsible for such amazing games as Wolfenstein: The New Order and The Old Blood expansion, is likely developing another Wolfenstein game. A mysterious title called "The New Colossus" was shown on a fake command prompt on Bethesda's E3 showcase, pretty much confirming that the sequel is in development.

Keep in mind we don't know for sure that Wolfenstein: The New Colossus is a brand new sequel, but given how much time has passed since the original game and its expansion, I'm betting on it. We originally reported that Bethesda would reveal the new Wolfenstein game at E3 alongside Prey 2 and The Evil Within 2, but those plans ultimately fell apart. Prey 2 as we know it is dead, and the game is instead getting a reboot, and there was absolutely no mention of The Evil Within 2.