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GDC 2016 - During the Game Developers Conference, Oculus held its own event where it showcased Minecraft running on the GearVR. The GearVR is Samsung's own VR headset, something the South Korean company collaborated with Oculus on over the last few years.

Minecraft is an interesting game to hit the GearVR as it's an IP that's now owned by Microsoft, who didn't show any VR technology at GDC - especially when compared to its competitor in Sony, and the PS4. Sony displayed PlayStation VR in a big way at GDC, going as far as announcing the $399 price during the show in San Francisco.

As for Minecraft on the GearVR, it was running on a Samsung Galaxy S6 smartphone and was super-smooth. It was quite the experience to be playing Minecraft in VR, and even more so when you realize it's powered by a smartphone - and not a PC or console.

I've always thought that one of the best things about The Witcher 3 is the way the characters feel so believable, and the dialogue interactions went far to add that extra spark of immersion and magic to the game. Contrary to popular belief, CD Projekt RED aren't actual wizards--their sorcery is built around code and algorithms rather than grimoires--and the studio reveals how it spun those magical dialogue sequences.

At a recent talk at GDC, CD Projekt RED animation technical director Piotr Tomsinski discussed the science behind The Witcher 3's natural character dialogue. Rather than animate each individual scene by hand and piece together the dialogue, the devs utilized a rather powerful algorithm that compiles different ingredients like location, character type, and dialogue into a fully animated scene. Since the game has some 35 hours of dialogue alone, handcrafting each individual scene with custom mo-capture sequences would take an eternity.

"The generator requires three different types of inputs: information about the actors, [some cinematic instructions], and finally the extracted data from voiceovers," Tomsinski said at the talk. "We use an algorithm to generate markers, or accents, from the voiceovers, so later we can match the events in animation with the sound. It generates camera movement and placement, facial animation, body animations, and the lookats."

Much to the joy of fans like myself, a film adaptation of the popular post-apocalyptic game and novel series Metro 2033 is in the making.

The Metro 2033 movie will be based on Dmitry Glukhovsky's book series, and will follow the harrowing journey of Artyom's heroic struggle against the supernatural Dark Ones in the blasted ruins of Russia. The movie is expected to portray the full grit and psychological horror depicted in the landmark game series, complete with humanity's desperate efforts to survive in the underground metro tunnels.

Glukhovsky says that he's been waiting for a Metro 2033 adaptation for quite some time, but wanted to make sure the property was handled just right. "My novel and I have been waiting for this to happen for the last 10 years. I have previously been extremely careful about handing my 'baby' over to Hollywood producers for adaption for a feature film, but now I feel that it has landed in the right hands. De Luca and L'Heureux have a great vision for this project, and I feel it's an honor to work with them."

GDC 2016 - AMD was all systems go at its Capsaicin event during the Game Developers Conference, unveiling its new dual-GPU video card, the Radeon Pro Duo. The company also talked about its massive commitment to VR, DirectX 12, its next-gen Polaris architecture, and more.

AMD was super confident during this event, where it had a fair amount of hands to play in its battle with NVIDIA. The laser-focused commitment to VR has me excited, as I believe that being a VR-focused company this early on, will only benefit Radeon Technologies Group, and AMD. The company has made partnerships with both Oculus and HTC, for the Rift and Vive, respectively. The company has gone all-in with VR to the point of having its own APU inside of a headset, partnering with Sulon for the Sulon Q headset.

With HDR-enabled TVs and video cards thanks to its next-gen Polaris card, the company had working 14nm at the show. The Radeon Pro Duo was on stage being used during the demonstration, requiring 3 x 8-pin PCIe power connectors to power the dual-GPU video card, rocking 8GB of HBM (4GB per Fiji GPU).

Remedy is one of my favorite developers, and as a gigantic Max Payne fan, Quantum Break is a complete mess. After letting the press see the game earlier this year, EuroGamer has published their story on the game - but with a much more watered down fashion.

The site says Quantum Break has a "native resolution of 720p" instead of the promised 1080p 30FPS from Remedy, with no word from the developer on the resolution being dropped to Xbox 360 levels, and below what Remedy has said was fact until now. The site adds that "we've yet to see evidence of full HD 1080p gameplay in close analysis - barring the title's HUD elements and menus. In every scene tested so far, a native resolution of 720p is the consistent result found in each pixel count test".

Not only but, but the report says: "the use of film grain, depth of field, and camera and object blur sets the tone for the game, creating a distinctly soft-focused look that squarely hits the cinematic target the developers are aiming for. Image quality stands out here, for both good and bad reasons". So the image quality is good, but there are bad reasons too.

The Witcher 3 is pretty much a masterpiece of third-person action, but I've always wondered what the game would be like in first-person. Imagine adding Skyrim-esque dungeon diving and combat to Andrzej Sapkowski's dark fantasy world--it'd be pretty epic.

Thanks to the talented efforts of modder Skacikpl, gamers may one day experience The Witcher 3 in first-person. Skacikpl has been tirelessly working on the new mod, but it turns out that game doesn't play nicely with the new perspective, leading to motion sickness from the camera jouncing. Plus CDPR's limited modding tools aren't much help either.

It's great to see modders completely rewrite the rules and open the doors to brand new experiences. It's also crazy to think that a simple perspective change would affect the game so dramatically. Don't expect the mod to release any time soon, as Skacikpl isn't sure if he'll even be able to optimize the mod enough to even support active gameplay...but it's a great effort nonetheless.

AMD has released its new Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.3.1 hotfix drivers, which add Crossfire support to Need for Speed, and an updated CF profile for Hitman.

Not only that, but the 16.3.1 release also fixes issues with games running on Unreal Engine 4, as well as V-Sync no longer automatically being enabled when running DX12 applications. Frame rates are also no longer tied to the display's refresh rate with the 16.3.1 drivers.

Various other issues have also been resolved, including flicking issues for Crossfire users on The Division, and graphical corruption on characters death animations in Crossfire when running League of Legends.

Netflix is spending more money, securing the rights to Bright in a bidding match with Warner Bros./MGM and PalmStar.

Bright is pitched as an R-rated thriller with fantasy elements, costing Netflix a reported $90 million. The streaming giant just secured the rights to War Machine with Brad Pitt recently, to the tune of $60 million, so Netflix is spending big in order to have the names Brad Pitt and Will Smith on its content.

Smith will reportedly play a cop partnered with an orc, who will be played by Aussie actor John Edgerton. $45 million of the total cost will be used to shoot it, with $45 million being spent on talent, and the back end residual fees Netflix won't get because of its anticipated limited cinema release.

We have teamed up with Thecus this week who is giving away a N2810 NAS to one lucky winner!

Thecus Technology Corp. today announced the launch of its newest 2-bay NAS, the N2810, a NAS server designed to optimize multitasking and provide seamless 4K multimedia playback. The N2810 is equipped with the newest generation Intel Braswell N3050 1.6 GHz dual-core processors (burst to 2.16 GHz) and 2 GB DDR3 RAM. Furthermore the N2810 supports AES-NI encryption engine for increased performance and enhanced security.

"The N2810 steps up to the challenges that 4K playback creates and provides a robust hardware platform that is able to handle multiple tasks with ease," said Florence Shih, CEO at Thecus Technology Corp. "With the recent development of our newest operating system, ThecusOS 7.0, we are elated to announce that the N2810 will be the first Thecus NAS to be released with the new software."

GDC 2016 - Who would've thought that playing a game where you are an eagle could be so awesome, well - it is. Eagle Flight is an open-world, mission-based game from Ubisoft - and it's really an amazing game on VR.

The game is very simple, where you easily control an eagle flying through Paris. The controls are very intuitive, where you look at where you want to go, and raise, turn or tilt your head on where you want to fly or glide. If you tilt your head left or right, you will bank - which allows for some tricky manoeuvres.

I was flying under bridges, through small gaps in walls, and over buildings like it was nothing - within 30 seconds of getting into Eagle Flight, it's that easy. I was genuinely blown away at how easy it was, so let's put it this way - I could put anyone into the Rift - no matter if they're a gamer or not, young or old - and they would get the hang of the game within 30 seconds.

The hype machine for Cyberpunk 2077 is set to go into full swing this year, with developer CD Projekt Red (the studio behind The Witcher franchise) still be "a long ways away" from releasing the game, but the developer is now teasing that it's working on a "far bigger" scale with Cyberpunk 2077 being an "even more ambitious" project.

But now, CD Projekt Red has teased that we can expect some "f**king great" stuff from Cyberpunk 2077. CD Projekt Red's CEO and co-founder, Marcin Iwinski talked with GameSpot recently, where he said: "Right now, we have the success of the Witcher 3; people played it and people loved it. So it's even more responsibility. The fact that Witcher 3 performed so well allows us to be even more ambitious with Cyberpunk 2077. Right now, it's on our shoulders to deliver here. The next time you hear about Cyberpunk 2077 we will show something and it must be f**king great". Inwinski also added: "People really expect something great and that's what we have to stand up to and deliver".

Inwinski was asked if CD Projekt Red was excited to move over to making Cyberpunk 2077 after finishing with The Witcher 3, with Inwinski replying that "they definitely are". He added: "After a decade working with dragons, swords, and medieval themes, the team is feeling energized to work on a project involving guns, ammo, mutants, and implants".

GDC 2016 - Sony had a killer Game Developers Conference, announcing the $399 price on the PlayStation VR for the PS4, but what did Microsoft have? Well, nothing in the form of new hardware announcements - but the company did just drop the price on the Xbox One to $299 for a "limited time".

The normal price on the Xbox One is $349, with the $50 discount applied for now - but there's no news on if, or when the price will bounce back up to its original price. The discounted Xbox One pricing will include all of the current console bundles at participating retailers across the US.

Not only that, but the Xbox Spring Sale promotional event will also see discounts on a bunch of digital games on PC, Xbox One and Xbox 360 backwards compatible titles. This will kick off on March 22, two days after the Xbox One price was cut, where gamers can grab their game of choice and "save up to 40 to 60 percent off, with some at more than 60 percent off".

GDC 2016 - Ever since Lucky's Tale was introduced, I've been trying to get my hands-on playing it. Well, I got my chance at the Game Developer's Conference, and I was not disappointed. It's no wonder Lucky's Tale is included in the box with the Oculus Rift, as it's an awesome VR gaming experience.

Lucky's Tale, if you haven't played it or read/seen it yet, is a VR platformer like nothing you've ever seen before. It reminds me so much of Mario 64, with a blend of Banjo-Kazooie, with developer Playful Games rebuilding levels from both games in Lucky's Tale, so that they would better understand level design in VR.

The biggest change with Lucky's Tale is the way you interact with the camera, as normally it doesn't move (unless you are moving in the world itself) in games like Mario 64. By moving your head in the real-world, with the Rift on of course, the camera moves in the game - which is completely unique, because that's not how we've been playing games for the last 20+ years.

GDC 2016 - NVIDIA was displaying various VR demos at the Game Developers Conference this year, where we got to step onto the dangerously real Everest VR demo.

In the demo, NVIDIA is using their latest version of GameWorks with PhysX on top - and while it might sound like much, the additional immersion and presence that is provided is well worth it. The use of PhysX in Everest VR sees snowflakes and snow floating around at the top of the mountain, so that when you look up, you can see snow floating around - which for me, created an entire new layer of presence.

As my viewpoint was going up the mountain, I looked to the absolute peak of Everest where I could see the great use of PhysX in Everest VR. I'm not someone who would normally be sitting here bragging up PhysX, but if you ever had doubts of NVIDIA's PhysX, then Everest VR with PhysX will change your mind. It created something that Oculus, HTC and Valve have been saying since introducing VR headsets - a huge layer of presence.

Prepare to have your TV, no matter how big it is, feel inadequate by Tabler Systems. The company unveiled its huge 200-inch 8K TV at CEBIT 2016, with it coming in at 5m (16.4 feet) wide and 2.4m (7.8 feet) high.

The 200-inch 8K TV has a seamless 0mm bezel which makes it perfect for a video wall, as well as a truly gigantic touchscreen surface. How did Tabler Systems seemingly come out of nowhere with a 200-inch 8K TV? Well, the company is using light-emitting plastics, with the panel capable of being designed to be in any shape, with no bezel at all, flexible and the panel is just 1mm thick.

If you can't remember what resolution 8K rolls in with, we're talking about 7680x4320. It's a huge increase on 4K which has a resolution of 3840x2160 and makes 1080p look like nothing at 1920x1080. Back to the TV, which can be connected to a gaming PC for huge 200-inch 8K goodness, filling your entire vision and pulling you right into the game.

GDC 2016 - After getting rather excited over Valve announcing The Lab recently, we had to stop by and try it out while we were at the Game Developers Conference.

The Lab is a gigantic playground with VR experiences and games that really show off what Valve has been doing behind closed doors with the HTC Vive. There are multiple parts to the demo, with a beautifully rendered scene of the real-world mountain, Vesper Peak - and that's just the start of it.

There's also Longbow, which lets you use the Lighthouse controllers as a bow-and-arrow, fighting off enemies in a tower defense style game. Next up was Slingshot, which lets you fling around spherical robots into huge towers, destroying them for points.

With only weeks left until NVIDIA's GPU Technology Conference, where we'll be formally introduced to the Pascal architecture and everything that makes it tick. We've already been teased by the purported GeForce GTX 1080, GTX 1080 Ti and Titan X successor, but now we have some early performance numbers on the purported Pascal GPUs.

The performance numbers are coming from WCCFTech, who have spotted an unidentified NVIDIA video card with 7680MB (7.6GB) of RAM - 512MB less than 8GB, which should find itself onto the GP100-based GeForce GTX 1080 Ti (that's what we're going to call it for now, but I don't think NVIDIA will call the Pascal range by the GTX 1080 moniker).

Now, the performance numbers on 3DMark 11 were hitting 9038 - but an Intel Core i3-2100 processor was used - it lost out to various other video cards, but there were more details in the 3DMark results worth looking at. Firstly, the unidentified NVIDIA video card had 8GB of GDDR5 clocked at 8GHz - now this is noteworthy, as there are no video cards on the market with 8GB of RAM with performance close to the GTX 980 Ti.

Windows 10 Insiders get the benefit of some major enhancements to the Maps app today, namely to search, but also navigation and interface, among other areas.

For search, there's the new ability to conduct and view multiple searches simultaneously (e.g. see nearby hotels and restaurants at the same time, or see multiple directions at the same time), with the option to view them separately if need be. Algorithms are improved, too, which closer and better results.

Regarding the interface and navigation, navigation buttons are now at the top of the app on desktop and at the bottom on mobile, making everything more intuitive whatever device you're on; labels are now found directly on the map; elements can be hidden or shown at will; public transit routes are easier to follow with more precise instructions and an improved design, and Cortana will give you instructions when enabled.

There seems to be some substantial information regarding a minor (or fairly major) refresh of Sony's PlayStation 4. In fact, some developers have reportedly told Kotaku that there have been actual discussions behind closed doors about a "PlayStation 4.5" that could include a more powerful GPU for actual 4K gaming.

More than three independent sources in the developer community seem to have been able to confirm the existence of some type of evolution in hardware and design. This information seems to be even more substantiated after a supposed behind-closed-doors meeting from Sony at GDC. And just what does it mean for current owners?

Well, it would be the anti-thesis of what makes a console such a valuable ecosystem. The hardware is similar for a full generation of development, meaning no one has to upgrade to experience their games at the greatest possible settings for that platform. Having different versions, even if one is discontinued, defeats the purpose of the fixed-specification console. This is even in line with Microsoft's want to have upgradable console hardware in the future. The console as we know it, then, might be doomed. Or we could be looking at the definitive next generation, earlier than usual.

IBM Japan has a big surprise in store for MMO fans. Out of nearly 100K applicants they only took a small sample of 208 people and showed them what they're calling a Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. They've transformed, in what looks like just a technical experiment at the moment, Sword Art Online into a massive VR experience.

They had hinted at such a project this past February, but there hasn't been much word about how they were going to make the futuristic MMORPG into a VR game, but now we have some more details on what they did. They've created their own VR headset based off of the Oculus Rift DK2, called the Navugia. They added additional sensors, including a Leap Motion sensor and a Kinect V2 attached to a helmet device. The resulting experience literally puts you into the years 2022, when the game is set.

The whole thing is running off of IBM's SoftLayer cloud service with their own cognitive layer, a showcase of what their deep learning tech can do. But really it's to show what life could be like if you wanted to literally live inside an MMO. Take a walk on the wild-side and you're likely never to come back. They're taking the "role-playing" quite literally here. The photos were taken by Inside Games while they took a look at it. It's an interseting use of VR, but perhaps cumbersome at this point. Nonetheless very impressive.