Latest News - Page 2586

Fans have been waiting almost a decade for Final Fantasy XV, and Square Enix has finally locked in a 2016 launch for the open-world adventure.

In a recent blog post, beloved Final Fantasy director Hajime Tabata rang in the new year with some great news: Final Fantasy XV will release in 2016. "We will finally release FFXV this year, in 2016! In development, previous phases required wisdom and strength. However, moving forward the final phase will focus on effort and willpower."

'Star Wars' creator George Lucas has issued an apology for a bizarre comment on the Charlie Rose U.S. talk show, where he likened Disney, the new owners of the 'Star Wars' franchise to "white traders" before wisely abandoning that train of thought.

In a somewhat grovelling statement published by The Hollywood Reporter, Lucas says he "misspoke and used a very inappropriate analogy and for that I apologize". Providing further contrition to the house of mouse, he went to say "Disney is doing an incredible job of taking care of and expanding the franchise. .. I am thrilled that Disney has the franchise and is moving it in such exciting directions in film, television and the parks. Most of all I'm blown away with the record breaking blockbuster success of the new movie and am very proud of JJ and Kathy."

I guess it's going to be a while before Lucas does media again, and forever if Disney had anything to say about it, I'm sure. Meanwhile, 'The Force Awakens' continues to smash records, overtaking 'The Phantom Menace' to become the eighth highest grossing film of all time.

Due to surging demand, Microsoft's premium customizable Xbox One Elite controller is projected to be in limited supply until March 2016.

Despite the peripheral's steep $149 price tag, gamers everywhere want to get their hands-on the Xbox One Elite controller. Microsoft has had a hard time keeping up with demand since launching the new gamepads, leading to shortages throughout November. Now the controller's popularity has grown even more, and supply is expected to be scarce for three months into the new year. The sleek chrome-and-onyx gamepad is sold out across multiple retailers, including the Microsoft Store.

"While the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller is sold out in many retailers around the world, we are working quickly to get more units in the hands of fans," a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement to the press. "We expect more units to arrive at retailers each week, but supply may be limited through to March 2016."

The RTS, particularly the true 3D environment kind where you can use the entire map (and astronomical objects) to your advantage kind, doesn't get as much love as it should. One indie project headed up by a small team is making some stellar (pun intended) progress with theirs, Shallow Space.

They've got an influx of new ship models to help round everything off. The MFC Vindicator is featured above. Previously they were using placeholders from the Unity store itself until they could get their project Omega off of the ground. The new ships have their own design flavor that's reminiscent of ships found in Jupiter: The Nexus Incident, of which Shallow Space is the spiritual successor.

Also coming soon are some new maps and areas so that you can take those aforementioned ships and duke it out with the opposing factions. Just AI for now. But in those maps you'll find a huge expanse occupied by NPC traffic and lots of enemies strewn about an objective laden area. Zooming in and watching the ensuing dogfights is going to be a lot of fun.

Valve writer Chet Faliszek has stated on Twitter that virtual reality (VR) means a sales boom for high-end computers in 2016.

"Thanks to VR," he says, "In this coming year we will see a resurgence of high-end PCs in the home."

This comes just after NVIDIA stated VR requires seven times more powerful computers.

Samsung has a new "bio-processor" that's able to track up to five different biometrics at any one time to help keep tighter tabs on your state of health.

The little processor that they've developed is designed to be able to give more metrics and more data to the user. It'll support biometric impedance analysis, ECG readings, skin temperature, galvanic response and a whole lot of other metrics so that you can actually have real measurements of important health data. This should be far more efficient and accurate than any previous non-specific processors for the job. Theoretically at least.

Could you imagine being able to predict a heart attack before it gets to a critical point, letting you get to a doctor well before any permanent damage. That would be a very useful feature. Samsung envisions being able to put this type of technology in their future wearables like the Gear Watch S2.

Despite some rather strained enthusiasm for the first 'Star Wars' film he had nothing to do with, creator George Lucas has dismissed 'The Force Awakens' in a recent interview, and used some particularly loaded language.

Speaking to Charlie Rose on his long-running talk show (via Collider), Lucas said "They wanted to do a retro movie. I don't like that. Every movie I work very hard to make them completely different, with different planets, with different spaceships, make it new." Lucas even compared new 'Star Wars' owners Disney to the slave trade, in a particularly unwise analogy, saying "I sold them to the white slavers that takes these things, and.." before deciding not to finish his sentence.

Lucas also went on to describe how he parted ways with Disney after they decided to abandon his story outlines for the sequel series. "They decided they didn't want to use those stories, they decided they were going to do their own thing. They weren't that keen to have me involved anyway. But if I get in there, I'm just going to cause trouble, because they're not going to do what I want them to do. And I don't have the control to do that anymore, and all I would do is muck everything up. And so I said, 'Okay, I will go my way, and I'll let them go their way."

Chinese telecommunications company Huawei has had a killer 2015, with year-on-year revenue up 35% to 390 billion yuan (approximately $60.1 billion USD). In the third quarter, it passed Xiaomi as the #1 smartphone seller in China and became the #2 Android phone seller in Europe (thanks to its Honor sub-brand).

9 to 5 Google expects 2016 will be even bigger, given the impressive Nexus 6P and Huawei Watch devices, and goes so far as to say it may soon overtake Samsung as the #1 Android phone seller globally. Huawei shipped 100 million smartphones this year versus Samsung's 400 million, and it hasn't even launched the Honor brand in the US yet (it will in 2016). Seeing the massive success in Europe, it's likely to do great there as well.

Final Fantasy IX is going to be making its debut on PC, via Steam, and on Android and iOS devices sometime next year. A new trailer for the classic JRPG has sprung up on the new teaser site. There's no word on when it'll be released, nor if there'll even definitively be a western release, despite the site being in English.

When the titular Final Fantasy IX does hit digital shelves, it'll be compatible with devices running Android 4.1 or later and iOS 7.0 or later. This will almost complete the collection of Final Fantasy games on Steam and mobile.

And for those not familiar, the story is as follows: "Princess Garnet of Alexandria will soon celebrate her birthday, and to commemorate the occasion, a theater troupe has come to put on a show. However, these traveling performers have come not to entertain but to kidnap Her Highness. What starts as a seemingly simple seizure escalates into an incredible adventure. Join Zidane, Princess Garnet, and a party of extraordinary characters on a journey to discover the truth of the Crystal and save their world from an encroaching darkness." It truly is a classic that should be enjoyed by everyone. We'll look for more details soon, we hope.

Although PC's and consoles share a similarity in hardware, consoles are much more closed off and limited to first-party firmware. Today marks a possible end to these restrictions, as hackers have finally jailbroken Sony's PlayStation 4 console.

As you see in the video above, the skilled homebrewers at Fail0verflow successfully ported Linux over on the PS4, which pretty much opens the door to Sony's console transforming into a full-fledged PC. The hackers further demonstrated the flexibility of the exploit by emulating a Pokemon Game Boy Advance game and playing it on the PS4.

To get a stable port of Linux running on the PS4, Fail0verflow used Cturt's recent PS4 kernel exploit. Using the gateway provided by the exploit, the team was then able to rewrite over 7,000 lines of code. Be advised that the crack is based on PS4's running v 1.76 firmware, so don't expect it to work on PS4's running the latest v3.11 updates.

NVIDIA is excited about VR moving into 2016, but in order to actually run games comfortably without getting sick and at acceptable framerates, they say that we'll need PC's to be 7 times more powerful than they are now. Pascal might not be up to the task all on its own.

VR is going to put demands on our systems like we've never before, especially if we want a VR headset to have a resolution high enough that we can't see individual pixels. In some instances this is higher than 2K in each eye, or higher than 4K across the entire screen. And with Unreal Engine 4, Unity 5.x and the future of CryEngine, that'll be no easy feat.

NVIDIA spoke with VentureBeat about the challenges of VR and what they're doing to help provide the best experience possible. The bigest and most obvious answer is that they're building ultra-fast GPU's to help handle the workload. But it'd be a stretch to say that even Pascal, with HBM2 will be 7x faster than big Maxwell is. The next piece is GameWorks VR, tools similar to AMD's VR initiative that'll decrease latency and optimize for VR.

Microsoft is joining the small list of companies that now inform their users if they suspect that they're the target of state-sponsored hacking attempts.

This policy is in response to an inquiry by Reuters about having not said anything to victims of a hacking campaign by the Chinese government that happened in 2011. Something that has spurred them to go beyond simple notifications with few details to now alert users if they suspect it's state-sponsored or not.

Microsoft will be joining Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo and Google as part of a more concentrated effort to evolve methods to keep your information secure. In a statement in a recent blog post they explained that they'll send out these notifications to those they think are targeted and not just if you've been compromised. This way you can take additional measures to keep things nice and secure.

Now here's something interesting that's going around the Internet just before the New Year hits in North America. Several sources are claiming that the next generation architecture from AMD, previously thought to be codenamed Arctic Islands, might actually be called "Polaris".

The sources of the supposed leak, HWBattle and WCCFtech are citing the information based off of a photo that doesn't appear to have any context whatsoever to corroborate the evidence. WCCFtech is also reporting that the Polaris name was tweeted about just before the RTG Summit was held by AMD.

The photo, however, has recently been taken down from HWBattle at the request from the leaker of the image and in its place is a cautionary statement from slides that are no longer under embargo from AMD that references the codename "Polaris" as well. The tweet above also specifically refers to Polaris being 2.5x brighter today than it was in the time it was first observed. That number might have significance. I can say that we'll just have to wait and see. Perhaps more information will be revealed at CES. I'd take the above information with a huge pile of salt, however. The information could very well be fabricated and not necessarily correlative to anything.

With the release of the Oculus Rift just around the corner in early 2016, Oculus has announced that each Rift will include a copy of Lucky's Tale.

Lucky's Tale is a VR platformer, with it being an Oculus Studios title. The made-for-VR platformer lets you take control of Lucky, a fun-loving fox, where you'll venture into a "charming new world, with dozens of locales and lush environments".

Oculus founder Palmer Luckey said that playing Lucky's Tale, was one of the defining experiences in VR for him. Luckey said: "We always believed there was an opportunity for platformers in VR, but it wasn't until playing Lucky's Tale and working with the Playful team that we truly realized its potential to change how people view this genre of gaming forever. Lucky's Tale delivers on everything you want in a next-generation VR game - it's thrilling, full of adventure, and incredibly fun to play".

HTC and Valve will be celebrating on NYE, as their Vive headset has just been certified by the Federal Communications Commission.

The FCC needs to put its regulatory stamp of approval on products before their consumer release, with HTC aiming for an April launch window. Road to VR reports that the FCC's certification was expected to hit some roadblocks, courtesy of its laser tracking and possibly safety issues, but it seems to be A-OK.

HTC also has lofty plans for its Vive headset, which could hit hundreds of millions of Internet cafe users in China if HTC can play its cards right.

Following from recent announcements by distributors 20th Century Fox and Sony Pictures, Warner Bros. have announced their first batch of titles to hit the 4K UltraHD Blu-ray format, which include the summer's blockbusters 'Mad Max: Fury Road', 'San Andreas' and 'Pan', alongside the 2013 CG animated hit 'The Lego Movie'.

Ron Sanders, President of Warner Bros Worldwide Home Entertainment Distribution said in a statement, "Ultra HD with HDR is the next, and most exciting, advancement in home entertainment, and with the anticipated proliferation of Ultra HD televisions in the coming years, our Ultra HD Blu-ray product offerings will truly complement the stunning capabilities of this new generation of home entertainment hardware. Warner Bros is fully committed to releasing a wide range of Ultra HD Blu-ray titles, including both new release titles and offerings from our vast catalog".

The studio promises to expand their UltraHD Blu-ray range to over 35 releases by the end of 2016, including some of the more popular titles in their back catalogue such as Superman reboot 'Man of Steel' and Guillermo Del Toro's monster epic 'Pacific Rim'.

On the eve of the franchise's 50th anniversary, 'Star Trek' rights holders Paramount and CBS have teamed up to defend their intellectual property by sending a cease and desist to the makers of an upcoming full length fan film 'Axanar', which is being billed as the first of its kind to be made with studio-level production quality.

In a statement to BleedingCool, producer Alec Peters said "like everything related to Axanar Productions, we take this matter very seriously and remain open to discussing solutions with all parties that can be mutually beneficial"

With a budget of over $1 million dollars predominantly raised by Kickstarter and with behind the scenes luminaries such as 'Free Enterprise' director Robert Meyer Burnett, who previously produced the award winning documentary material for the recent 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' Blu-ray releases and visual effects producer Tobias Richter who contributed to that series' newly remastered visuals. To date, the studios have tolerated and even encouraged the production of fan films, but 'Axanar' has apparently incurred the wrath of the studios due to the professional nature of the production, which could overshadow the release of the upcoming 'Star Trek Beyond' film - the third film in the rebooted film franchise.

Valve explains how the Steam Christmas privacy mix up happened, and how many users were affected.

This year's Christmas turned out to be anything but merry for Steam gamers. The digital storefront was assaulted on all fronts, leading to users accidentally seeing other users sensitive account information. Billing addresses were revealed, and gamers everywhere were spooked, choosing to stay well and clear of Steam despite the holiday sale.

According to Valve's official statement, the account information of 34,000 users were seen by others. Valve says that no full credit card information was leaked and that if you didn't access the storefront between 11:50 PST and 13:20 PST "your information could not have been shown to another user". Check below for Valve's statements, and a brief synopsis detailing how the cache error happened.

Sony just posted the game lineup that'll be included free for PlayStation Plus members. There are a few good games, lead by the incredibly good Grim Fandango: Remastered. If you've never had a chance to try Hardware: Rivals, now is as good a time as any, with its hilarious vehicular mayhem. All the below games will be available starting January 5th through the PSN.

PlayStation 4

PlayStation 3

Today iBuyPower announces the successor in the popular sleek and modern Revolt gaming desktop, the Revolt 2.

The Revolt 2 gaming desktop is all sleek angles and curves, and the chassis very much resembles a work of futuristic art. The tantalizing design doesn't take away from its utility: the Revolt 2's smallish stature can house enthusiast-grade hardware including a mini-ITX motherboard, a 280mm liquid cooler, 2x SSD's, an HDD and a full ATX power supply.

"[With the Revolt 2], we were inspired to create a PC that highlighted the most important components in a gaming rig and allowed customers to create a PC that's as unique as they are. We chose to lead the revolt against the standard, the generic, the boring, and instead forge a new path," iBuyPower said in their official press release.