Black Friday Sales leak console bundle prices for $250

Emma Tucker | Gaming | Nov 10, 2016 9:21 AM CST

Black Friday is not far away now and for gamers that means cheap consoles and games. Throughout America, numerous retailers will be selling both the PS4 and Xbox One S for the low price of $249, along with deals and bundle packages depending on retailer.

A leaked flyer from Sam's Club was listed on the Bestblackfriday website, avertising the PS4 Uncharted 4 bundle for $249, along with the two Xbox One S bundles, that includes Battlefield 1 or Minecraft content with an extra controller for the same price.

Dell flyers were also among the leaked holiday content as they too will be jumping on the Black Friday Sales. Gamers will receive a Xbox One S, Battlefield 1 along with an extra controller and Gears of War 4, again at the bargain price of $249.

Continue reading: Black Friday Sales leak console bundle prices for $250 (full post)

PS4 Pro's native 4K games trigger FPS drop

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Nov 10, 2016 8:01 AM CST

Sony's new 4K-ready PlayStation 4 Pro launched today, kicking off a new evolution of console gaming. Although the system uses new Polaris GPU tech, the PS4 Pro is still beholden to the age-old console rules: balancing frame rates with resolution. As such, native 4K resolution in specific games like Skyrim: Special Edition means lowered frame rates on the PS4 Pro, showing we haven't exactly come that far after all.

PS4 Pro's native 4K games trigger FPS drop

Consoles are about balance: developers have to implement dynamic resolution scaling that drops the resolution to sub-1080p in order to hit consistent frame rates on PS4 and Xbox One. Sony's new PlayStation 4 Pro isn't so different to last-gen consoles in this regard, and we're starting to see the trend continue in this new iterative cycle, meaning native 4K games on PS4 Pro could potentially run worse than they would on normal PS4 systems.

According to Digital Foundry, Skyrim: Special Edition is a prime example of this FPS-and-resolution balancing act. Skyrim: SE can run at native 4K on the PS4 Pro, but the frame rates take a hit as a result, leading to "visible drops in performance where the GPU is pushed more heavily," as well as "noticable stutters."

Continue reading: PS4 Pro's native 4K games trigger FPS drop (full post)

Super Mario Run will be debuting on Unity this December

Emma Tucker | Gaming | Nov 10, 2016 7:16 AM CST

Super Mario Run will soon be appearing on Unity. The news was first released via their official Twitter account:

"We are thrilled that the legendary creators Nintendo America are bringing Mario to mobile for the first time, and it's made with Unity."

Up until recently, Nintendo had been developing games for its own hardware system. With smartphone game an/or apps debuting on a regular basis, it seems that the company will be branching out with other development teams in joining Unity.

Continue reading: Super Mario Run will be debuting on Unity this December (full post)

Huge YouTuber offered money for positive Clinton videos

Anthony Garreffa | Business, Financial & Legal | Nov 10, 2016 5:48 AM CST

Amidst the rubble of the 2016 presidential election, comes an interesting nugget of information from popular YouTuber Philip DeFranco. DeFranco was asked why he was not a part of the 2016 YouTube Rewind, and his answer might surprise you.

DeFranco said that the company that was behind YouTube Rewind, was the same company that offered him money to make a video supporting Hillary Clinton. The company in question is Portal A Interactive, and they state on their Facebook page that they collaborate with Hillary and the top YouTubers in order to hit the millennial voters.

I remember the day the biggest vlogger in the world uploaded a video to YouTube... when Casey Neistat came out in an utter surprise video that smelt, looked like, and now looks like was in fact, a paid advertisement by Hillary Clinton.

Continue reading: Huge YouTuber offered money for positive Clinton videos (full post)

Overwatch's next free weekend starts on November 18

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 10, 2016 2:27 AM CST

I have been spending far too much time playing Overwatch - how good does Sombra look?! - but now there's another free weekend of Overwatch coming very soon, on November 18.

Blizzard will be hosting the free Overwatch weekend between November 18-21 from 4PM PST on all platforms, and in all gameplay regions. Console gamers will need Xbox Live Gold or PlayStation Plus membership, while the PC is all good with a Battle.net account.

The developer adds that during this free weekend, they are "making Overwatch's full roster of 22 heroes and 13 maps available for play in a variety of modes, including Quick Play, Custom Games, and the latest Weekly Brawl". This means the new Sombra character won't be playable just yet, but she's in the PTR.

Continue reading: Overwatch's next free weekend starts on November 18 (full post)

Battlefield 1 damage reduced, 200% to 140% in hardcore

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 10, 2016 12:16 AM CST

Battlefield 1 desperately needs its hardcore mode update, and now EA DICE is teasing that it has been tweaking the hardcore mode for BF1, but it's still not being released just yet.

DICE producer Ali Hassoon said on Twitter: "Reducing Bullet Damage in HC from 200% to about 140% provides a more well-rounded experience", adding: "We're still testing Hardcore mode, we dont want to release it until we are sure it lives up to our and your expectasions. Stay tuned!"

There are also some other fixes and changes coming, with Lead UI/UX Designer Erik Ortman confirming that the team is working on fixing the medals issues, fixing the game leaderboards, and not being able to quit at the end of the game. He said: "for sure, it's being looked at and there are fixes in the pipeline".

Continue reading: Battlefield 1 damage reduced, 200% to 140% in hardcore (full post)

New 'Spider-man' actor reveals six film contract

Ben Gourlay | Celebrities & Entertainment | Nov 9, 2016 10:49 PM CST

Making his debut in this year's 'Captain America: Civil War', the young actor who'll portray Spider-Man has revealed he's signed on the dotted line for a long career as the web-slinging hero.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Tom Holland revealed that he's signed a six picture contract with Disney, but it's a package that offers flexibility to the his career outside of the much loved Marvel character. "They give you options, and those could be exercised whenever. Like a cameo in Avengers. I'm unclear as to which movies, though. I do know I have three Spider-Man movies and three solo movies contracted. But if you have another movie, Marvel is so good at working around it. They're very respectful of your life, really. They understand that you have to work on other movies, and they try and fix it up so you can work around each other."

Spider-Man: Homecoming' is due to hit 2D, 3D and IMAX cinemas worldwide next July.

Continue reading: New 'Spider-man' actor reveals six film contract (full post)

Dishonored 2 running like crap on PC... shocking, NOT

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Nov 9, 2016 9:55 PM CST

Well, well. Dishonored 2 looks like it'll be a steaming pile of crap on the PC - at least until it's been updated 50 times post-launch, with early reports from NeoGAF user "Dmax3901' who has a review copy of Dishonored 2 for the PC.

Equipped with an AMD Radeon R9 290, an Intel Core i5-4690K, 16GB of RAM and running at 1080p with "mostly High settings and some of the more demanding on/off settings switched to Off (volumetric lighting, depth of field). This allowed me to maintain 60fps with dips down into the high 40s". Not that great considering Dmax3901's specs are pretty good.

He continued: "After that is where things started going really pear-shaped. I was playing with my compromised settings, putting up with the occasional frame rate dip, when I leaned around a corner and saw the FPS counter drop to 18. I turned down all the settings to Very Low and all the on/off settings to off and the frame rate didn't change. To be fair this particular room, the throne room right at the start of the game, is quite detailed with lots of flowers adorning the columns and there's several dead bodies littering the floor. But I'm afraid something weird is happening here, check out the following shots, taking note of the FPS counter in the top left".

Continue reading: Dishonored 2 running like crap on PC... shocking, NOT (full post)

Trump victory forces last minute 'South Park' re-write

Ben Gourlay | Celebrities & Entertainment | Nov 9, 2016 9:33 PM CST

The media, the polls and the political class all got the U.S. election result, and now it seems that South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker also didn't see the Trump victory, with the crew of the long running Comedy Network show having to quickly rewrite and reanimate the latest episode following the events of yesterday.

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