Latest News - Page 2555

Having one's own ideas and completely original IP seems like a positive direction to take for any developer, but it seems that it might not necessarily be the most practical route for everyone. Platinum Games, of Bayonetta fame, explained why that's a very difficult route to take.

Speaking to Famitsu, Tatsuya Minami, the chief executive for Platinum Games said that "We used to have the idea that we wanted to be a studio that only made 100 percent original games," He then continued, "However, it turns out that only doing that is considerably difficult, and so now we take on various work."

There are a tremendous amount of risks involved in developing your own and paving your own path. And they don't always pay off it seems. Popularity of your own idea is never guaranteed and you never know what the reception will actually be. You and your team could be incredibly excited about a particular game, but then it might flop before your eyes.

Things aren't looking good for Deep Silver's new Homefront sequel. Initial tests of the upcoming closed beta reveal that the game has tons of problems on the Xbox One, and needs a lot of work before it's ready to hit store shelves.

According to analyses from Eurogamer's Digital Foundry, Homefront: The Revolution's beta suffers from a myriad of dysfunctions, including FPS drops, jittery and jerky animations, and frequent glitches. Digital Foundry further notes that the wonky animations and enemy glitches can be attributed to the CryEngine's poor networking optimization.

The graphical hiccups and disruptive frame rates ultimately break the immersive fluidity that's vital to first-person shooters. Homefront: The Revolution beta apparently runs with an entirely unlocked frame-rate on Xbox One, which is a bad idea given the console's limitations. On top of the unlocked framerates, the game also has an adaptive v-sync that creates ugly tear lines on the screen.

Trackmania has never been your typical racing game anyway, with the ability to put together some of the most insane tracks, limited only by your imagination. And the newest insane addition, Trackmania Turbo, now has a March 24th release date.

The dynamic racing game was originally intended to be released in late 2015, but that release date was pushed into 2016 back in October so that the developer, Nadeo, could further refine the mechanics of the game based on feedback from fans. The expectations are rather high for a series that's won a Guinness World Record for being the most popular online racing sim with the largest content base of any racing game.

When it releases it'll be available on the Xbox One, PC and the PlayStation 4. It'll support the Oculus Rift and eventually have support for PlayStation VR as well.

With its new LED-lit DDR4 RAM kits, Apacer aims to inject a bit of stylish flair to enthusiast builds while maintaining ultra-fast performance.

Apacer's new Blade Fire system memory configurations sport "heartbeat" LED's that pulse scarlet light up to 44 times a minute. The Blade Fire DDR4 kits are available in 4GB, 8GB and 16GB single-stick capacities and max out in 32GB configurations (16GBx2) with clock frequencies ranging from 2400MHz at 1.2V to 3200MHz at 1.35V, with tight 16-16-18-38 timings.

The striking-looking DDR4 modules are fully compatible with Intel's Z170 platform and feature XMP 2.0 support for easy overclocking, and maintain heat spreaders fashioned from high-quality aluminum with a matte black finish to ensure optimum heat dissipation.

There are concerns that The Division might not be as big as some think it is, with Ubisoft only teasing us with the beta. The developer reportedly opened 22% of the full map from the final version of the game.

The news comes from Reddit users who did some great work, overlaying the map from the beta (purple = 22%), while the blue part of the map is from the version of The Division. They put the map onto a grid, with 8165 squares - with the beta taking up 1167 squares. The full game however, has 5315 squared, meaning the beta represented just 22% of the full game.

So we know that the full version of The Division is going to be quite big, but what about the Dark Zone - where that glorious PvP action happens, with better loot and rewards? The Dark Zone is reportedly 18% of the entire map, which is just shy of the size we experienced during the beta. Not too bad at all.

Facebook is reportedly deleting the pages of medical marijuana dispensaries, according to NJ.com, with three New Jersey-based ones being removed, as well as others across the United States.

Why is Facebook deleting these pages? Well, they're violating the social network's terms of service, with Facebook leaving a note behind when it removed the pages: "We remove any promotion or encouragement of drug use. Your page is currently not visible on Facebook. It looks like content on your page does not follow the Facebook Community Terms and Standards".

New Jersey law "law strictly regulates what information can and cannot be displayed on a dispensary's website, which has led many of the organizations to use Facebook as a supplemental information source", reports Engadget. Strain names can't be listed on a New Jersey-based dispensary site for example, with Facebook's move on removing the pages leaving patients pissed off, and rightly so.

Well... Google is offering its super-fast optic-based 1Gbps Internet service for free to residents living in public housing, once the company hooks its Fiber lines up to the properties.

The news is coming directly from Google, from their new blog titled "Connecting Public Housing at Gigabit Speeds". It all started in July 2015 when Google partnered with ConnectHome - a joint initiative led by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the White House, where it wanted to speed up Internet adoption for families with school-aged children, living in public housing.

Soon, public housing tenants will be able to access 1Gbps up/down from Google, for free. Google will begin its free 1Gbps Fiber rollout starting with residents in West Bluff, an affordable housing community in Kansas City, Missouri. Around 100 homes have been connected to the service, but Google is working with nine low-income property regions that would eventually connect over 1,300 local families.

360-degree video and VR content are all the rage right now, and as were preparing for Mobile World Congress 2016, notorious mobile leaker Evan Blass (aka @evleaks on Twitter) posted something on Twitter regarding the 'LG 360 VR'.

Blass tweeted "LG 360 VR", which we're expecting to see as a VR headset in the fashion of Samsung's Gear VR headset. But, the LG 360 VR could also be a 360-degree camera, which makes just as much sense. Better yet, the LG 360 VR could plug into that mysterious "magic slot" on the bottom of the G5 smartphone that LG teased yesterday.

We'll know more on February 21, which is when LG will unveil its new G5 smartphone - the same day that Samsung will show off its next-gen Galaxy S7 handset.

The forums for the popular zombie apocalypse MMO DayZ have recently been hacked, and the devs at Bohemia Interactive say that the situation is much worse than they anticipated.

According to the dev's Twitter update, the forum user data has been compromised and downloaded by cyber criminals. The security breach is so severe that the developers are advising users to change their global passwords if they match those used on the DayZ forums. So if you use the same password for your banking as the DayZ forums, change it ASAP.

"A security incident occurred on forums.dayzgame.com recently. According to our investigation, all usernames, emails and passwords from the forums were accessed and downloaded by hackers," reads the update. "While the passwords were not stored in plain text, but in a more secure form, it is highly reccommended that you if you have used the same password elsewhere that you change it immediately on all applicable websites and services."

Fusion power is seen as the holy grail for renewable and clean energy sources. Harnessing the power of the stars would propel mankind to extraordinary heights, and instantly resolve our growing energy crises to boot. Now thanks to the nuclear fusion experiments conducted by the Max Planck Institute of Physics in Germany, we're one step closer to unlocking the secrets of fusion power.

The world's largest nuclear fusion stellarator, the Wendelstein 7-X, has just made history by being the first stellarator-type fusion device to produce hydrogen plasma. Hydrogen plasma is vital to re-creating and molding the specific conditions of our Sun, thus facilitating fusion reactions.

"It's a very clean source of power, the cleanest you could possibly wish for. We're not doing this for us, but for our children and grandchildren," Karlsruhe Institute of Technology physicist John Jelonnek said.

If you're a prospective tinkerer or modder of all things PC, and you live in Australia, then you'll love the AMD Modder Manifest project that's set to kick off next month.

The project is designed by two very prolific modders in the community that want to show off relatable and realistic examples of modding, park picking and really how modding is done. They're focusing on entry-level gaming to show that modding can be an activity for everyone with every budget.

The project will run for six weeks and have weekly updates showing off the progress they'll make. You can sign-up to participate right here. After the first project, more will happen for six weeks at a time with appropriate increases in value and performance of the parts. The winner can win a modded gaming system.

After a month-long lapse, the Overwatch closed beta test is set to wreak FPS chaos once again starting February 9.

Blizzard today announced the schedule, revealing that the beta test will be tweaked with a few content updates. Overwatch will now sport a brand new progression system, two new maps with a fresh game mode to keep things interesting, hero balances (which spells nerfs for some overpowered avatars) and a bevy of Private Game updates such as AI-on-AI battles.

If you had access to the Overwatch beta before the break, then you'll still be able to get in once it resumes next week. Blizzard says they're going to start enlisting fresh players, so if you haven't already, be sure to sign up today.

Logitech has toned down the overt aggressive "gaming" design with their newest addition to their G-line of keyboards. The G810 Orion is a more subdued mechanical keyboard that still has the gaming accolades of the more, noticeable, Orion G910 Orion Spark.

Just like its big brother, it has the same Romer-G switches that have increased measured durability compared to CherryMX switches as well as a shorter press, with an actuation point at only 1.5mm deep. And it'll have the per-key RGB lighting as well, letting you customize to your hearts content. And just in case, you'll be able to disable individual keys, such as the Windows key or even the ALT key. This can be quite useful in frantic gaming sessions.

Of course mechanical keyboards are nearly a must-have for the modern gamer, though which type of switch is a personal preference. Some like the quick actuation that comes with these Romer-G's or even CherryMX Red's or others, while others might prefer a bit longer of a press with less force required. It's such a personalized preference that you almost have to try everything to determine what you like. It's a trial and error affair. But now Logitech has a more subdued selection for those looking for something a little less garish.

USB Type-C is the new connectivity standard that aims to do it all--video, sound, and data--and even allows mobile devices to be charged super fast. Given the format's capabilities, a Google engineer proves that you can't get away with cheap third-party USB Type-C cables lest you fry your precious new gadgets.

Google engineer Benson Leung has been reviewing various brands of USB Type-C cables to ensure and check performance. His findings are actually quite surprising: only three out of the ten USB Type-C cables he's reviewed are spec compliant to charge his Chromebook Pixel. If that wasn't enough, one of the cheap third-party cables actually fried the $1,000 laptop's ports.

Surjtech's 3M USB A-to-C cable is the culprit, and Leung says that the cord was so badly wired that it burnt out both of the Pixel C's USB Type-C ports and fried two separate USB PD Sniffer devices. "I directly analyzed the Surjtech cable using a Type-C breakout board and a multimeter, and it appears that they completely miswired the cable. The GND pin on the Type-A plug is tied to the Vbus pins on the Type-C plug. The Vbus pin on the Type-A plug is tied to GND on the Type-C plug," the Google engineer said in his review.

Microtransactions are a fact of life now, something that's inevitable in any online multiplayer experience. Of course there's a right way and a wrong way to implement them, and in this case, the $25 spent within Halo 5 is actually the right way; for optional items only.

The new singular Arena REQ bundle contains a whole host of different armor, weapon and other skins to help you define your individuality within the Halo universe. You don't want to be just any ol' Spartan, now do you? But this is a limited offer with 14 separate packs smashed together that have "Mythic" and "Legendary" items that you likely won't find elsewhere. It'll be available starting February 16th.

But, even though it seems like a lot of money, it's cosmetic only and doesn't change the gameplay or give you an advantage. Aside from people staring at your newly applied weapon, armor and other skins. So don't fret, because you don't have to buy it.

Virtual reality is poised to completely change our lives and shake up a number of industries. We've seen how VR can be used for tons of different applications, but what about games development? Thanks to Epic's new Unreal VR Engine, devs can now build games in fully immersive VR spaces. It's like VR-ception!

In a new video, Epic Games' Mike Fricker is seen developing a game in real-time while ensconced in a HTC Vive headset. Using the new Unreal Editor's VR mode, developers can literally create video game environments while standing in them, adding a whole new depth to content creation. The editor is rendered virtually in a VR environment and contains the full scope of utilities and tools as traditional 2D software, and devs will be able to use Oculus Rift motion controllers to mold and shape digital world's.

VR expert and Moor Insights and Strategy analyst Anshel Sag adds some perspective to the new Unreal VR Editor: "With this new tool, developers can finally preview their games as they are making them in VR and get a good idea of how things will feel for the gamer, immediately. I don't see someone building or finishing a game in this tool, but I do see someone making minor changes to a game with it and making it a part of the development phase."

After blocking auto-play flash ads back in September and "social engineering attacks" in November, Chrome will now throw up a full page warning (pictured below) when you arrive at a page with deceptive download links and ads (like those that tell you to 'click this link' to clean your viruses). Well, sometimes, maybe: the new feature of sorts will be likely be rolled out gradually.

The warning represents an expansion of Google's Safe Browsing, which warned you about malware and such.

It must be noted deceptive ads like this can be difficult for webmasters to control, as they are often generated by random ad servers. If nothing else, this could well discourage ad providers from creating these type of ads in the first place. With Chrome's massive browser share, it's not hard to believe.

As promised, and a little quicker than expected perhaps, AMD's updated 16.1.1 driver has been released. This one includes all the fixes from yesterday, as well as a new one for flickering in Fallout 4, as seen post-version 1.3 and with Crossfire enabled.

If you missed the news yesterday, the driver includes Crossfire profiles for Rise of the Tomb Raider and Fallout 4, plus resolved issues for Radeon Settings and three high profile games (Battlefront, Assasin's Creed Syndicate, Battlefield Hardline). For all the details and the download, click here.

Gaming inception just happened. As it seems to happen with Grand Theft Auto games, someone went and recreated the look and feel of The Last of Us in Grand Theft Auto 5, complete with clothing and weapons.

The creator, taltigolt, captured the whole essence of the decrepit and dilapidated atmosphere. Nature has started to take back the city and there's detritus everywhere and a general feeling of despair with vehicles in the street and even a crashed airplane.

Despite being a simple visual recreation, the level of detail, care and time that put into the mod is pretty incredible. Sure, the vegetation isn't quite as lush as it is in the actual The Last of Us, plus there's no AAA actors voicing the character, but they've done a great job. There's a lot of other great mods for GTA V out there as well, with nearly anything you could possible imagine.

id Software and Bethesda have announced the release date for their hellishly chaotic Doom reboot, choosing a very fitting date of Friday, May 13th to launch the game.

According to id, the game is all about "badass demons, big 'effing' guns, and moving really, really fast", and based on the new bloodthirsty campaign trailer, the new reboot is everything we'd expect in a Doom game. The FPS mechanics are gracious and fluid, delivering obscene death to nightmarish hellions with equally insane weapons. We even get to see a three-barreled minigun tear through demons like tissue paper. Based on the trailer, the game will most likely be in full 1080p 60FPS on all platforms.

As with most modern games, Doom will release with its own $120 collector's edition that includes a 12-inch Revenant statue based on an in-game 3D render. The dastardly skeleton statue also sports LED lighting and a low-power, spinning turbine to boot. The Doom CE also includes multiplayer skins and a stylish metal case, but all in all it seems like the standard fare for these types of deals.