Latest News - Page 2523

Warner Bros. won't be finishing development on the Mac or Linux versions of Batman: Arkham Knight. If you happened to pre-order on the pretense that those would eventually be released, they're asking that you apply for a refund through Steam, which will be granted.

When it finally released, after much anticipation, Batman: Arkham Knight suffered from performance issues that rendered it near unplayable on a variety of hardware. The game was removed from Steam after receiving more than 1000 negative reviews at launch and sales were suspended in retail stores until they could find and fix the issues. It was assumed that the inclusion of GameWorks might have been related to the issues at hand, though it was only a correlation.

Rocksteady was able to fix the majority of the issues with the help of NVIDIA, though the damage had already been done. Performance with NVIDIA's GameWorks turned off did eventually become acceptable, however it was perhaps too late in the eye of the consumer.

To celebrate the release of its WP100 chassis, Thermaltake has announced the '2016 Modding Fighting Championship' (MFC).

The first round will see world-renown modder and winner of the 2015 Thermaltake CaseMOD competition (season one) Suchao Prowphong from Thailand take on Jesse "JP Modified" Palacio, the winner of Thermaltake's 2015 CaseMOD season two.

This mod-off involves these two master artists creating a system build that suits their styles and will be showcased in the Tt Community forum starting from March 2016. Both of these experts will be using Thermaltake's liquid cooling, digital power supplies (RGB models) and a Core WP100 Super Tower each.

EA is giving away the 2012 version of Need for Speed: Most Wanted as part of their On the House program. That means you can enjoy it completely free and for as long as you have an EA Origin account.

The 2012 reboot of Most Wanted was an enjoyable game on it's own, though it wasn't exactly the most fast-paced for ground breaking title to ever come from Criterion Games' collaboration with Ghost Games. Free is a good price, and if you were ever curious, head on over and download the 6.25GB game (remember when games were that small?).

EA's On the House program has been an interesting success for EA, with them having given away Sim City 2000, Plants vs Zombies, Peggle, Command & Conquer Red Alert 2, Dead Space, Wing Commander 3 and Battlefield 3 in the past. Games are rotated frequently enough as well. Free is always the best price.

Now available in over 60 countries, offering ridesharing, food delivery and working on driverless transportation, there is no denying that Uber is a force to be reckoned with, showing extremely successful performance in its short history.

Sometimes when a business expands they start releasing weird promotional videos and blog posts, with a new promotion seeing Uber likened to the invention of the bit and also to atoms. Attached to a new logo, this Uber promotion discusses current services and the advancement of driverless technology, explaining this company as some form of futuristic technology service.

Uber explains that to them the Atom is represented by "growing cities," then hinting that they are the pioneers of bringing atoms and bits together. Reading this explanation might make it sound like satire, but it's not. Read the full blog and watch the video here

The darknet, or dark web, is a conglomeration of hidden services and websites that are accessible only through the Tor network. And as it would turn out, recently published research shows that over 57% of those hidden websites also happen to have some kind of illegal content on them.

The researchers, Daniel Moore and Thomas Rid from King's College London, created a custom script that parsed through some 5,025 live .onion based websites and found that 1,547 hosted some kind of material that's criminal in nature. The leading activity seems to surround drugs, with financial related criminal enterprises taking in a close second.

It's not necessarily a surprising finding, given that the idea of privacy and security tend to attract the unsavory types by their very nature. But the researchers do note that it doesn't have to be that way. And that perhaps removing hidden services from Tor could help, somehow.

The Fine Brothers Entertainment company has seen a lot of internet hate recently, attempting to fully copyright 'reaction videos' and telling members of the YouTube community that partnering with (and paying them) for this type of content is beneficial for all.

In response to this announcement was a 'reaction to the Fine Bros React' by satirical comedians Mega64, releasing a video depicting its plans to react videos made outside.

Giving a shoutout to 'money', this comedy trio explains that the new trademark is made purely to be beneficial to the wider social networking community, sacrificing themselves for the greater good.

Winning the best demo of the year award from MEGA64's famous and over the top yearly game awards was one of Electronic Arts' biggest 2015 releases, Star Wars Battlefront.

"Yo, they gave you 90% of the game in the demo!" Proclaimed the enthusiastic hosts, explaining that this title was their favorite demo (or beta) throughout the entirety of 2015. Also making the list was a shout out to the best mini game, poking fun at The Order 1866 and its short storyline.

Other comedic inputs included the worst 'story mode' being Minecraft (there is no story) and plenty of other over the top gaming references. Without spoiling any other award-winning titles for you, check out the full video above if you're interested in dry gaming humor. There are some possibly-NSFW things happening throughout the show, so you might want to wait until you're home to witness the action.

Square Enix is preparing for the launch of Hitman, which is now in episodic form, with a new 'World of Assassination' trailer - check it out, below.

The trailer says "we live in a world of assassination, and once you know... there's no going back". It does a great job of pulling you into the Hitman world without playing the game, and I felt better after watching the 1-minute 50-second video than I did watching the absymal Hitman movie late last year.

The PS4 version of Hitman will also be receiving exclusive content, as we reported on yesterday.

Blizzard will be re-opening the closed beta of Overwatch on February 9, after it was taken offline in December, and pushed into February 2016 release from its original January 2016 re-release into the beta world.

Once the Overwatch beta is back and kicking again, it'll feature two new maps, a new game mode, a new progression system, and new updates to both the private games, and character balancing. Blizzard has said that these are the areas it would work on the most when it took the beta down in December.

You can sign up for the Overwatch beta, but those who were involved in the original beta will get in without a problem. Overwatch officially launches later in the spring, for the PS4, Xbox One and PC.

Audio streaming service Deezer will come pre-loaded on Huawei's Honor smartphones in Europe, Latin America, Middle East, North Africa, Russia and South East Asia starting today.

Deezer boasts 40 million songs as well as 40,000 podcasts and audiobooks, and includes features like personal mixes. The company also hosts great live sessions like this one.

If you haven't been keeping up, Huawei recently became the #1 smartphone provider in China and #2 provider in Europe. Speculation says they're poised to overtake Samsung before long; the Deezer deal should only help that aim.

Rainbow Six: Siege has received its first major update, with Operation Black Ice now available for the PC. The update provides gamers with the new Yacht map, two new JTF2 operators, new weapon skins, a spectator camera, and a bunch of fixes.

The new patch includes operator shouts being muted for the enemy team, which allows for stealthy approaches. Ranked and custom games see defenders being able to vote for the objection location they want to defend. Rainbow Six: Siege's latest update also reduces bull train intensity, increased the flashbang's range of effect, reduces noise levels of multiple Defender gadgets, adds map and mode name display during loading and planning phase screens, alters matchmaking timer display, and introduces individual spawn location selection for each Attacker.

Here's a full list of what the update includes:

We're finally seeing the fruits of Alphabet's labor with YouTube Red, with the company promising original content for subscribers who cough up $10 per month.

Well, the first YouTube Red original series features none other than infamous YouTuber 'Pewdiepie', with 'Scare Pewdiepie' being the first show off the rank. Pewdiepie's "reality-adventure" will continue his work from YouTube, but there will also be three movies released onto YouTube Red from Astronauts Wanted and Lilly Singh, AwesomenessTV and Rooster Teeth.

There'll also be a release from Lazer Tech, a documentary called A Trip To Unicorn Island, which covers Singh's 30-city world tour. When YouTube Red's original shows were announced in November 2015, we were promised 10 projects - so we should expect 7 more programs and movies to be released, including a project from CollegeHumor.

Crytek's free-to-play first-person shooter Warface is getting a fresh dab of paint, with the developer announcing a new cooperative "Earth Shaker" challenge on its way. Crytek released a trailer, which we've got below for your viewing pleasure:

As for Earth Shaker, Crytek explains: "Operation Earth Shaker invites players to join forces and ascend through an enemy base constructed inside a cavernous volcano. As they progress, Warface operatives will face new trials at every turn, including a hailstorm of incoming fire from the advanced gun turrets that guard the facility".

The developer continues: "Each of the five turret types poses a unique strategic threat that can only be neutralized with tactical teamwork. Alongside the turrets, enemy personnel wielding heavy duty weapons add another explosive element to contend with - ensuring players have to be at the top of their game to clear one secured area and move on to the next. Those who survive to see the base's uppermost level will soon discover that they've stepped out of the frying pan and into the fire as they encounter a deadly new boss. This final layer of high-tech security proves Blackwood will stop at nothing to protect - and eventually detonate - the giant Seismic Activity Generator housed within the volcano".

Market leading fitness tracking outfit Fitbit announced a forthcoming new model overnight, dubbed 'Alta', which the company hopes will reinvigorate the low-end of the market.

With a slimmer profile thanks to the use of a new OLED display, and a stylish design which caters for the more fashion-conscious who like to bling their accessories, the Alta will come to market with an array of replacement bands, including a 'stainless steel silver bangle' (and a gold option coming down the line) and looks to be unashamedly marketed at the ladies. Unlike the top-end Fitbit Charge HR and Surge activity trackers, the Alta doesn't feature an in-built heart rate monitor, but does include the usual features such as activity and exercise tracking, alongside sleep monitoring and a new 'reminders to move' nudges to get you up and away from the computer desk, and SMS and call notifications previously only found in the Surge.

The Fitbit Alta is due to hit the market next month for $130 USD and $199 AUD, alongside the new Fitbit Blaze.

We know that the Galaxy S7 will be unveiled in just a couple of weeks time, but now we have confirmation that LG will be launching its G5 smartphone on February 21.

The news comes directly from LG, which posted a huge tease on their Twitter page with a picture of a person pretending to hold a smartphone with the number '5' in the middle. LG also said: "#LGG5, February 21st. #MWC16". When it comes to the G5 itself, we should expect a totally new design - that has me super excited.

I reached out to my good friend Anshel Sag of Moor Insights & Strategy, who had the following to say when it comes to the mysterious slot on the G5: "The purported expansion slot is a very interesting idea that will very likely harness the power and flexibility if USB Type-C which allows for more power and data than ever before. It also should give the LG G5 something to differentiate with and I think one of those accessories will be a VR headset of some sort. Expect to see LOTs of VR at MWC this year. LG has tried it in the past, but put almost no effort behind it. However, I expect it to be Google Cardboard-based rather than like GearVR".

It looks like the NSA wants to do some spring cleaning, where it wants to combine its intelligence gathering and cyberdefense groups. But, this creates its own issues, as the intelligence group might be using security flaws to spy on people, and governments, that its cyberdefense team don't even know about - leaving critical systems open to various attacks.

The US spy agency is now reportedly preparing a reorganization that would combine its offensive and defensive capabilities, a move that would help them better coordinate its fight online. The NSA isn't talking specifics just yet, but we should hear more about it this week. The Washington Post reports that it could be more of a cultural shift, versus a technical one. The two divisions already share similar processes, but this move would create a better line of communication between the divisions.

Toshiba and OCZ are following up the Trion 100 budget SSD series with the Trion 150, a $150 solution with added performance over its predecessor.

The 150 is built on Toshiba's 15nm Triple-Level Cell (TLC) NAND flash technology. Specs-wise, it features sequential read speeds of up to 550MB/s, sequential write speeds of up to 530MB/s, random write I/O performance of up to 91,000 IOPS, and as much as 240TB total bytes written.

Four capacities with four different price points will be offered: 120GB ($50), 240GB ($70), 480GB ($140), and 960GB ($270).

Ever since Silent Hills was cancelled by Konami, the entire industry has been looking forward to the next collaboration between MGS creator Hideo Kojima and beloved director Guillermo Del Toro. Now it looks like we might get a few clues, as the dynamic duo is meeting up to host a keynote session at DICE Summit 2016.

The session is called "A Conversation with Hideo Kojima and Guillermo Del Toro", and will be centered around the duo's "creative vision and the driving forces behind their artistic pursuits". The keynote will be held on Thursday afternoon, and will also be moderated by Geoff Keighley, so we may see a few zinger questions and curveballs in there about future games and projects.

The renowned creators have remained friends well after Silent Hills' cancellation, and have expressed interest in another collaborative effort.

Samsung brought adblocking to mobile browser this week which promptly caught the ire of Google. Now pulled from the Play Store, the Adblock Fast app -- which used Samsung's custom API -- exceeded 50,000 downloads and appeared in the top charts in its short lifespan.

Fast was developed by Rocketship Apps; one of its staff members Brian Kennish posted this e-mail from Google which was sent to them after the app was pulled without warning:

With the huge financial success of 2015's 'Furious 7', Universal Studios made it pretty clear they were turbo-charging their plans for the franchise, by quickly greenlighting an 8th entry in the long running franchise. Well today, they've admitted that's not enough and announced a further two films!

Star Vin Diesel took to Instagram to make the announcement that 'Furious 9' and 'Furious 10' will be released on April 19, 2019 and April 2, 2021, ensuring that fans will have at least five more years of films to look forward to - which even eclipses Disney's current plans for the 'Star Wars' franchise.