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LG teases world's largest OLED display, with 140 x 55-inch 4K OLEDs

Anthony Garreffa | Displays | Nov 18, 2015 11:59 PM CST

LG is riding the marketing train with its new 4K-capable OLED TVs, showing off two of the world's largest OLED displays in the world - found at South Korea's Incheon International Airport.

The company worked with French design firm Wilmotte & AssociƩs on the project, which uses 140 x 55-inch curved 4K OLED TVs. The huge structure is 13 meters high, and 8 meters across - or the equivalent of three large-sized shipping containers. President and CEO of Incheon International Airport, Park Wan-su, said: "These OLED displays perfectly complement the advanced technology that our airport has become known for. We are always eager to showcase to the millions of travelers every year the cutting-edge technology that originates from Korea. OLED is a prime example of that".

Meanwhile, Senior VP and Head of Business-to-Business Solutions at LG Electronics, Ro Se-yong, said: "While the world's largest OLED sign is certainly something to be proud of, we are more excited about the opportunity to introduce travelers from across the world to the magic of OLED. The benefits of OLED technology can only be viewed, they cannot be described with mere words".

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Remedy PR boss praises Star Wars: Battlefront, says 'less is more'

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 10:38 PM CST

Star Wars: Battlefront is finally here, and while gamers might be torn on the first-person shooter from EA and DICE, the PR boss of Remedy had some choice words to add. Remedy Entertainment is the developer behind huge hits like Max Payne, Alan Wake and the upcoming Xbox One exclusive Quantum Break.

Remedy PR boss Thomas Puha posted on his Twitter account some of his thoughts on Battlefront, where he said: "[I'm] really glad #StarWarsBattlefront is simple and has less modes and stuff. I don't get into many games anymore since they have so much stuff". Now, while I understand that in a way, we don't want watered down games because some people are too busy, or find it hard to get a handle on the game.

Puha added: "Having a lot of features and 'stuff' in a game doesn't mean it's giving lotto value for my money. Less is more". Now this is a quote to keep... "less is more". We should remember that for Quantum Break, as it will most likely be a play once and forget it game, so maybe this is why Puha hints towards this type of mantra. To finish it off, Puha said it's fine to "complain Battlefront does not have a lot of features, but don't be surprised. Game had to be made in about two years". He added: "Its stunningly good considering that".

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Continue reading: Remedy PR boss praises Star Wars: Battlefront, says 'less is more' (full post)

Xbox One's new button mapping feature is actually quite limited

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 6:49 PM CST

Microsoft has made good on its promise to bring customized button-mapping to all Xbox One controllers, adding a new level of interaction to the platform. The Xbox community requested the feature as part of the feedback program, and Redmond decided to cater to its fans and roll it out to the console. But as most Xbox fans already know, any good Xbox One news is accompanied by the inevitable bad news disappointments.

Xbox One's new button mapping feature is actually quite limited

The button mapping appears to be universal for all Xbox One games; rather than having different control schemes on a game-by-game basis, it's a hard preset that games will recognize, meaning you won't have to reconfigure anything in-game. Being able to map your control scheme is a nice addition as it lets players change things up and universally tune up their controls to funky settings. The mapping feature also returns functionality to those controllers with broken buttons. Thankfully, we can now swap out the horrible analog-breaking sprinting control for games like Destiny and assign it to something less destructive.

Unfortunately, this feature has a caveat, just like nearly every functionality on the Xbox One. You can customize every in-game button but the left and right triggers, which can only be swapped. Games like Halo 5 already let you swap out different controller presets, but if you were hoping to use the left or right triggers to do something different, then you're out of luck.

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Continue reading: Xbox One's new button mapping feature is actually quite limited (full post)

Xbox Black Friday sale cuts prices up to 70% on 150 games

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 6:04 PM CST

As part of its huge holiday push, Microsoft is hosting its own Black Friday sale on Xbox LIVE that promises huge price cuts of up to 70% off across 150 different games.

Xbox Black Friday sale cuts prices up to 70% on 150 games

Microsoft is really breaking out the big guns for the holiday season, and is actively trying to sway users over to Team Lime-Green's court. The Redmond tech giant knows that a ton of people are going to snag the $299 Xbox One bundles on Black Friday, so its slashing prices on more than 150 digital games so users can fill out their library.

From November 20-23, Xbox LIVE Gold subscribers will get early access to the Black Friday sale with savings up to 40-60% off select games. Major Nelson was quick to note that Gold members will also get an extra 10% off, so you might want to re-up your subscription to take part. If you've let your subscription lapse, Microsoft will let you get a full month of Gold for just $1 if you re-up from your Xbox 360, but we're not sure if this price counts towards renewed or brand new subs.

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Continue reading: Xbox Black Friday sale cuts prices up to 70% on 150 games (full post)

Intel bundles free games with select Core i7 CPU's

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 5:09 PM CST

Intel has launched a new promotion that bundles three free games with purchases of select Skylake and Haswell Core i7 CPU's, including the anticipated Just Cause 3.

Intel bundles free games with select Core i7 CPU's

The Intel Enthusiast Game bundle emphasizes chaos and action, with over $100 of free games including Avalanche's upcoming open-world Just Cause 3, a copy of Valve's immortal shooter CS: GO, and premium credit for the free-to-play World of Warships game. After buying a qualifying Haswell or Skylake CPU, users can redeem their voucher at Intel's promo site. We're not sure if the keys are for Steam versions of the games, but likely so.

Qualifying purchases include the full range of Intel Core i7 Haswell CPU's from the Core i7-4770 S to the expensive Core i7-5960X, as well as the new Skylake Core i7-6700 and Core i7-6700K processors. Newegg notes that all keys must be used and redeemed by February 16, 2016.

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Continue reading: Intel bundles free games with select Core i7 CPU's (full post)

Egyptian telecom investment in North Korea becomes a disaster

Chris Smith | Internet & Websites | Nov 18, 2015 12:32 PM CST

Encompassing 3 million subscribers on Pyongyang and more, an Egyptian 3G telecom service that launched in North Korea has told news outlets that it has now lost control of its business.

In a bid to modernize and expand North Korea, Orascom Telecom began offering services to North Korea soon after an announcement in 2008. Orsacom chairman Naguib Sawiris wished to offer the North Koreans what they desperately needed, technology. With the North Korean branch being known as Cheo Technology and the service as Koryolink, Orsacom controlled 75 percent of all shares, with the North Korean Government taking care of the rest.

In June, an auditor's report stated that Orsacom had received a competitor in this small market, set up by the North Korean Government themselves. Orsacom proposed and was accepted to enter a merger with this new competitor, however talks went stale and Orsacom was unable to contact the Government for some time. In the latest news, Orsacom reported that "in the group management's view, control over Koryolink's activities was lost."

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Deus Ex: Mankind Divided gets significantly delayed

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 12:06 PM CST

Eidos Montreal today announced some disappointing news for Deus Ex fans: the newest entry, Mankind Divided, has been hit with a significant delay. Mankind Divided was originally planned to release in February, but has now been pushed back all the way to August to "exceed player expectations".

In a recent update, the devs revealed that Mankind Divided will now release on August 23, 2016, pushing back the game into a new quarter of 2016.

"Expectations for Mankind Divided are extremely high, and we not only want to meet those expectations but exceed them," said Eidos-Montreal studio head David Anfossi. "We're confident and proud of the game so far. However, as we are now playing through the game in full we can see that it will require more time in post-production for tuning, iterations, and refinement to meet your high standards. In order to achieve this, we need to move the release date of the game to August 23, 2016."

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PSN hack sees $500 debt, Sony promises refund then backpedals

Chris Smith | Gaming | Nov 18, 2015 10:27 AM CST

A well-constructed post on Reddit by user 'serfbufo' has so far earned them three lots of Reddit gold and major support from the /r/gaming community. The topic at hand is a botched PlayStation network refund due to an account hand and unauthorized payments.

Serfbufo says that they have been in discussion with Sony over the past three months, something that began due to $499.1 of unauthorized charges being issued to a debit card. After being promised money back by Sony representatives at multiple occasions, in the end Sony has delivered only $230 in total back to this disgruntled user.

This hack has seen serfbufo contact Sony through live chat, phone calls and emails alike, with another claim being launched as you read this. There's no saying whether the full funds will be ever sent back, but it's obvious that this user is jumping through every hoop they can in order to win back what is rightfully theirs.

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AI program achieves above average score in Japan's college exam

Anthony Garreffa | Science, Space, & Robotics | Nov 18, 2015 4:30 AM CST

Japan's National Institute of Informatics has said that its AI program has achieved an above average score on the country's standardized college entrance exam.

Corporate and university researchers have been developing the AI system since 2011, with the latest exam by the AI scoring 511 out of a possible 950. The national average is 416, with the institute adding that the AI system would have an 80% chance of being accepted into the 33 national universities, and 441 private colleges.

The text covers five subjects, with the AI program performing the best when it comes to history and math. In physics, the AI system wasn't so great, which is said to be because of its shortcomings in processing language.

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AMD bundles Star Wars: Battlefront with their Radeon R9 Fury cards

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 17, 2015 8:08 PM CST

Now that Star Wars: Battlefront is here, AMD has announced it is bundling the new first-person shooter from EA DICE with their latest Fiji-powered video cards, including the Radeon R9 Nano, R9 Fury and R9 Fury X.

AMD owners will be able to redeem their Star Wars: Battlefront key until January 31, 2016, when the promotion ends. AMD doesn't have an unlimited number of keys, with the chipmaker noting that the campaign period ends on January 31, 2016 or "when supply of Key Codes is exhausted, whichever occurs first".

In order to redeem your Star Wars: Battlefront key, you'll need to redeem it by February 29, 2016 at the latest, after which the AMD Unique ID you'll need to redeem your key will be invalid. You'll need to visit this site to redeem your key.

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Continue reading: AMD bundles Star Wars: Battlefront with their Radeon R9 Fury cards (full post)

ASUS, XFX, GIGABYTE R9 380X images leaked, 4GB VRAM pictured

Sean Ridgeley | Graphics Cards | Nov 17, 2015 5:27 PM CST

Hardware.info has leaked images of the forthcoming ASUS, XFX, and GIGABYTE versions of the R9 380X video card in preparing its reviews. The images, now pulled, show the R9 380X has 4GB GDDR5 memory, as previously rumored. As well, you can expect DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI and DisplayPort for all display output configurations.

The ASUS card is known as the STRIX R9 380X and is said to come factory overclocked; the XFX card is known simply as the XFX Radeon R9 380X and looks similar to the 380, and the GIGABYTE card -- known as the GIGABYTE R9 380X G1 GAMING -- will employ dual-fan WindForce 2X cooling.

Last we checked in, other specification rumors for the R9 380X included pointed to a 256-bit memory bus, a core clock speed of 1000MHz, and a memory clock between 5500MHz and 6000MHz. We should have these confirmed one way or the other come November 20, if 4Gamer is to be believed.

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Continue reading: ASUS, XFX, GIGABYTE R9 380X images leaked, 4GB VRAM pictured (full post)

EA hires Ubisoft dev to make open-world Assassin's Creed-like game

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 17, 2015 3:33 PM CST

Not content with reigning over almost every facet of gaming, industry titan Electronic Arts has set its sights on conquering the open-world action genre that's currently dominated by Assassin's Creed.

EA hires Ubisoft dev to make open-world Assassin's Creed-like game

In order to make its own Assassin's Creed-style game, EA will use the prowess of ex-Ubisoft dev Jade Raymond who played a critical role in the Assassin's Creed franchise. Raymond joined up with EA earlier this year to found the Montreal-based studio Motive.

"We've never really operated in the largest genre of gaming, and that's the action genre," EA's CFO Blake Jorgensen said during a presentation at the UBS Global Technology Conference. "That's the Assassin's Creed-style games; more open-world, more single-play versus multiplayer. It's not been an area that we've operated in. We recently hired Jade Raymond, who was behind the Assassin's Creed franchise for Ubisoft and she will be building an action genre for us through a studio we're building out in Montreal right now. So a lot of excitement around the action genre."

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TZFix boosts Tales of Zestiria maximum framerate to 60

Sean Ridgeley | Gaming | Nov 17, 2015 2:28 PM CST

JRPG fans rejoiced when they heard Tales of Zestiria was making its way to PC this year, the first game in the series to do so, but one of many similar titles in recent years.

It's a great port, too, except for the crippling 30 FPS cap. Fortunately, the community has come together to release TZFix, a tool that not only increases the maximum framerate to a much smoother 60 FPS, but fixes various issues, including stutter, Steam broadcasting, the aspect ratio in FMVs, the UI, and in the field, and the Field of View in the field as well. And then there are the feature additions of significantly increased character shadow detail, and a framerate counter with "instantaneous frametime" (not precisely sure what this means, but possibly a handy frametime graph for stutter detection and such).

You can download TZFix here. Most user reports indicate it's flawless though there are some concerning reports of specific issues as well. At least some of these are likely to be patched out at some point, but in the meantime, if you experience any issues, hit the sources below for information on workarounds and more.

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Continue reading: TZFix boosts Tales of Zestiria maximum framerate to 60 (full post)

EA plans to make tons of new Star Wars: Battlefront games

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 17, 2015 1:14 PM CST

Star Wars: Battlefront has just been released, and EA is already teasing sequels. Big surprise, huh? We've known for a while that EA signed a 10-year licensing deal with Disney to make Star Wars games, and it looks like these titles will carry through the original trilogy and beyond.

EA plans to make tons of new Star Wars: Battlefront games

"We struck a licensing deal with Disney a few years back that's almost ten years in length," EA exec Blake Jorgensen said during a company presentation. "The game that comes out tomorrow, Star Wars Battlefront, is a traditional first-person style shooter game. Our goal is to make future Battlefront games as well as other style games around the Star Wars franchise, both on mobile as well as console and PC. It's a huge opportunity for us."

"We get access to all of the historical content as well as all the new content developed. The beauty of the Star Wars franchise is it's almost unlimited in what you can do with it," the exec continued. "We know Disney has done a great job with other franchises and we believe they'll do the same with Star Wars over time in delivering new worlds, new characters, new vehicles, all the things that make great video games. Our goal is not to make video games directly about the movies, it's to use the IP in the movie to make great, exciting games."

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Continue reading: EA plans to make tons of new Star Wars: Battlefront games (full post)

Windows 3.1 brings Paris airport to a halt

Chris Smith | Software & Apps | Nov 17, 2015 11:28 AM CST

Did you know that Windows 3.1 is now 23 years old and still used as a major kingpin in some global infrastructures?

ZDNet reported that November the 7th was a particularly harsh day for Paris' Orly airport. A system running Windows 3.1 called 'DECOR', something that controls a link between air traffic control and the French weather bureau, crashed and suspended all operations.

There has been a promise to upgrade France's airport infrastructure by 2017 announced by the French transport minister, however, air traffic controller union executive Alexandre Fiacre thinks that it will take four or more years after this set date for things to be fully operational.

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Facebook's 'better than human' level AI, will be here in 5-10 years

Anthony Garreffa | Science, Space, & Robotics | Nov 17, 2015 6:18 AM CST

It looks like Facebook's investments into artificial intelligence are going to be quite important in the years to come, with Mark Zuckerberg confirming that Facebook's AI could outperform humans within 10 years. Facebook's AI system has been dubbed M, after James Bond's secretary, Moneypenny.

During an interview with Fast Company, the Facebook CEO and founder said that the social network's investments into AI are extensive. Zuckerberg hoped that the AI would eventually organize diaries, and recognize pictures of friends and family automatically. Zuckerberg said: "One of our goals for the next five to 10 years. is to basically get better than human level at all of the primary human senses: vision, hearing, language, general cognition". Zuckerberg added: "Taste and smell, we're not that worried about".

Facebook wants to take advantage of the huge amount of data that people producing every day, with Facebook's VP of Engineering Jay Parikh adding: "There's just going to be a lot more data generated about what's happening in the world, and the conventional models and systems that we have today won't scale. If there's 10x or 20x or 50x more things happening around you in the world, then you're going to need these really, really intelligent systems like".

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Continue reading: Facebook's 'better than human' level AI, will be here in 5-10 years (full post)

Intel's new Xeon Phi co-processor has 16GB of RAM, 5x faster than DDR4

Anthony Garreffa | Processors | Nov 17, 2015 3:39 AM CST

Intel has provided more details on its second-generation Xeon Phi co-processor at the annual SC conference, with the new Knights Landing beast nearly ready to be shipped.

The company has said they've already sent out various pre-production systems to clients through its early ship program, with Cray enjoying the new Xeon Phi co-processor, with it handling multiple customer applications in preparation for supercomputer deployments at Los Alamos and NERSC. Intel has said that the new Knights Landing chip has various innovative features that provide unmatched performance.

For example, Xeon Phi co-processor powered systems will be capable of delivering single-precision performance that is over 8TFlops with double-precision performance sitting at around 3TFlops. Inside, the Xeon Phi co-processor features 16GB of stacked memory that Intel says has 5x the bandwidth of DDR5, and is also 5x more power efficient and 3x denser than GDDR5 that is used on today's video cards.

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Continue reading: Intel's new Xeon Phi co-processor has 16GB of RAM, 5x faster than DDR4 (full post)

Google is working on not one, but three new Google Glass headsets

Anthony Garreffa | Extended Reality (XR) | Nov 17, 2015 12:37 AM CST

I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Google Glass, but then they stopped working (the screen is faulty) and I'm too lazy to send them in to get replaced. But rumor has it, Google is working on not one, but three new Glass headsets.

According to sources of The Information, Google is working on three next-gen Glass headsets, where one of them doesn't even include a screen. The audio-focused model is meant for the "sport crowd", making it a Bluetooth headset on steroids, in a way. Google is still reportedly working on an enterprise-focused model with a display, where I'm sure it'll be much higher resolution and quality than the Explorer Edition.

We should expect Google to unveil the new Glass headsets next year.

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Bethesda shipped 12 million copies of Fallout 4 for day one sales

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 16, 2015 10:43 PM CST

Last week we reported that Bethesda had secured a huge $750 million from Fallout 4, but this is because the company shipped some 12 million copies worth $750 million, but this number doesn't represent $750 million in actual sales.

Bethesda announced that it shipped 12 million copies for day one sales, or $750 million worth of the game. The developer is reportedly already shipping more copies of the game to retailers in order to "meet ongoing market demand". Bethesda Softworks President Vlatko Andonov said: "We're extremely proud of Todd Howard, Game Director at Bethesda Game Studios, and his experienced team of developers for their talent and dedication in creating this extraordinary game. Fallout 4 is a masterpiece in game development and storytelling, providing fans hundreds of hours of fun as they explore and are challenged by this fascinating, beautifully crafted world".

According to SuperData, Fallout 4 has been selling well through digital sales, too. SuperData says that 1.87 million units were sold digitally in the first 72 hours, 1.2 million of these were on the PC through Steam, while the rest were sold on the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live. SuperData's Joost van Dreunen said that $100 million in revenue was secured through digital sales, with van Dreunen saying that Fallout 4's success is proof that PC gamers don't "exclusively purchase games at a huge discount and instead prove themselves willing to shell out full price for select titles".

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EA wants to 'wait and see how big' the VR market is before stepping in

Anthony Garreffa | Extended Reality (XR) | Nov 16, 2015 9:46 PM CST

With the impending release of the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and PlayStation VR, virtual reality is right around the corner. But what does Electronic Arts think about the VR market?

Well, according to EA's Chief Financial Officer, Blake Jorgensen, the company is cautious about VR. Jorgensen said during the UBS Global Technology Conference: "There's some challenges still and I think the biggest challenge is just the size of the market. We don't make games anymore for the Wii or the Wii U because the market is not big enough, the PS Vita - the Sony product - we don't make games for that anymore because the market is too small, so it's all about the size of the market".

Jorgensen continued: "As one of the largest software producers we have all of the manufacturers of equipment coming to us to try to sell us on their equipment and giving us development kits to try to build software for it. So we'll build software for various ones but we'll really wait and see how big the market is going to be. I think the reality is, the next one to three years, it's probably going to take some time to build up a sizable market place and you might see alternative uses for virtual reality first before it becomes gaming. Longer term, five plus years away, I think there's certainly a market there and it will be another exciting way to enjoy gaming".

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Continue reading: EA wants to 'wait and see how big' the VR market is before stepping in (full post)

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