Final Fantasy 14 patch 3.2 begins the Gears of Change

Jeff Williams | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 12:04 PM CST

Final Fantasy 14 isn't nearly at the end of the road, as some might have thought with the introduction of Heavesward. Despite that particular story coming to its inevitable end, the game is getting more new content than you can shake a stick at.

Final Fantasy 14 patch 3.2 begins the Gears of Change

The story was never over, not completely. This magical world has a lot of life left to breath into it. The Holy See is on the brink of war, once again, as peace finally washes over the land. Inevitable someone isn't quite happy with the the motives behind that peace and they wish to stand up against that change.

The main story is accompanied by even more side quests that delve deeper into Hildibrand Helidor Maximilian Manderville, a sort of Sherlock Holmes it would seem. Yours is to investigate the case of a missing man, and much more. There are also new beast side quests should you be interested. Aside from that, they're adding in a new raid dungeon that looks incredibly challenging. Certainly not for the lower levels here. And of course the obligatory solo, or group, PvE dungeons. New areas that should test your mettle.

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Google's 'right to be forgotten' initiative extended to every domain

Jeff Williams | Internet & Websites | Feb 12, 2016 11:03 AM CST

The right to be forgotten, or the set of regulations that were passed in the EU that allow people the right, and ability, to ask that search results pertaining to them be hidden or outright deleted, is being extended thoroughly.

It used to be that only the particular countries Google domain would remove those search results, but now all domains within Google will subsequently erase that information. That means that someone in Belgium requesting info be forgotten won't have those same search results available on Google.de either. It seems that this is a result of a Canadian court case forcing Google to apply the rules worldwide combined with France's threat of a fine if such widespread forgetfulness wasn't implemented.

The original idea was quaint because it didn't quite cover the entire worldwide web as it should have from the very beginning. You could just as easily find the same info by doing searches from other country domains, so it really amounted to doing next to nothing.

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Battlefield Hardline: Betrayal brings a sword to a gun fight, and more

Jeff Williams | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 10:04 AM CST

Battlefield: Hardline might not be the most popular of the bunch, but that isn't stopping EA from vehemently supporting it with as much new content as possible to entice the dwindling crowd. Visceral Games is introducing a their Betrayal DLC, the last scheduled DLC which is coming out just next month.

The new update has four new maps that should add some much needed variety. The most significant is the almost perfectly modeled rendition of Alcatraz, giving you a desperate close-quarters fight where you'll likely not escape. To help you fight there'll be seven new weapons and two new vehicles. Though I doubt you'll be driving around in Alcatraz with any of them.

And just in case a knife or baton wasn't quite enough of a melee weapon for you, you'll now be able to wield a mighty sword to slay your enemies. Or be cut down to pieces as you scream your war cry trying to rush someone. I can imagine the sword fights breaking out now though. No more calling for "knives only", but instead having an all out duel.

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For Honor not meant for the mass market, more of a 'core' game

Jeff Williams | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 9:01 AM CST

The CFO of Ubisoft, Alain Martinez, doesn't think that For Honor, their upcoming sword-fighting game, is going to be a huge profit maker for them. Instead it's been described as a "core" game, something that's important but will attract far less gamers than something like Assassin's Creed, the next Far Cry or even The Division.

During the earnings earnings call this week, the comment was made in response to a question that an analyst asked regarding what they estimated the games success would be. Martinez said simply that "For Honor is more of a core game, less mass market." Thus they don't expect to ship many units when it releases.

The reasoning could be due to the type of game that it is, a hack and slash with more technical underpinnings. It won't necessarily appeal to a larger audience despite the new IP and potential for new avenues of gameplay that can be introduced to other games in the future. In other words, the difficulty might be somewhat off-putting.

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Bungie confirms Destiny 2 for 2017, 'large expansion' coming in 2016

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 8:32 AM CST

Bungie has finally shed some light on secret-filled future, revealing a tentative roadmap for the game's sequel and expansion, giving Guardians a much-needed boost of hope for the ailing franchise.

Bungie confirms Destiny 2 for 2017, 'large expansion' coming in 2016

In a recent blog post, Bungie exec DeeJ confirmed in his clipped, no-frills tone that a Destiny sequel is planned to release in 2017. For 2016, Bungie will unleash a large expansion (possibly The Taken King-sized) later this year.

"The team is focused on delivering a large expansion later this year, and a full Destiny sequel in 2017," DeeJ wrote. Bungie's update echoes Activision's latest earnings call, which broke the news beforehand: "Activision Publishing, along with its partners at Bungie, expects to bring a large new expansion to Destiny in 2016 and to release a full game sequel in 2017," investors report.

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Plants vs. Zombies Garden Warfare 2 gets 12 maps when it launches

Jeff Williams | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 8:03 AM CST

When Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 finally hits the vegetation filled streets, we'll be able to battle it out across twelve different maps right from the start.

Plants vs. Zombies Garden Warfare 2 gets 12 maps when it launches

A new video from EA shows off all 12 of the multiplayer maps, which are all very unique, helping to keep you on your toes in each match. The different, and distinct visual styles are all pretty fantastic to look at, and the different layouts are sure to get you to try different tactics in each game.

You'll get to enjoy the mighty Great White North and even try to fend off the horde on two separate lunar levels. Garden Warfare 2 is coming out at the end of the month on the 23rd of February for PC, Xbox One and of course the PlayStation 4. The full list of maps is below.

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Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X16 modem capable of 1Gbps over LTE

Qualcomm doesn't want to rest with its continued dominance of the mobile world, unveiling its new Snapdragon X16 modem. What makes the new Snapdragon X16 modem newsworthy? Well, it can push up to 1Gbps over LTE... which is just insane.

The new Snapdragon X16 modem, together with the WTR5975 transceiver is capable of up to 1Gbps over Category 16 LTE. Right now, we have a ceiling of 300Mbps to 450Mbps, with the upcoming Snapdragon 820 the only one capable of hitting 600Mbps. The Snapdragon X16 from Qualcomm will also support upload speeds of 150Mbps, too.

Qualcomm said in its press release: "The Snapdragon X16 LTE modem is designed to reach Gigabit Class LTE speeds using the same amount of spectrum as Category 9 LTE devices. By using carrier aggregation and 4x4 MIMO, the Snapdragon X16 LTE modem can receive 10 unique streams of data using only three 20 MHz carriers. Its support for 256-QAM boosts the peak throughput of each stream from ~75 Mbps to ~100 Mbps, with additional gains possible with modem data compression".

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Hitman is part of AMD's Gaming Evolved program, includes DX12 features

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Feb 12, 2016 1:32 AM CST

We're beginning to hear more and more about the Hitman reboot, where we now know that AMD pushing out a press release that teases that Hitman is part of their Gaming Evolved program.

This means that AMD Radeon owners with Windows 10 installed will be able to enjoy luscious DX12 features, with the press release saying: "Hitman will leverage unique DX12 hardware found in only AMD Radeon GPUs-called asynchronous compute engines-to handle heavier workloads and better image quality without compromising performance. PC gamers may have heard of asynchronous compute already, and Hitman demonstrates the best implementation of this exciting technology yet. By unlocking performance in GPUs and processors that couldn't be touched in DirectX 11, gamers can get new performance out of the hardware they already own".

Hitman will also feature support for AMD's multi-monitor technology, Eyefinity, as well as support for Ultrawide monitors with 21:9 aspect ratio resolutions of 2560x1080 and 3440x1440.

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Kanye West begins showing off his new video game

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Feb 11, 2016 9:25 PM CST

While Kayne West is preparing the release of his forthcoming album, the husband of Kim Kardashian has released a trailer to his new video game... yeah, Yeezy has a new video game on its way.

Kanye West begins showing off his new video game

West's new album is called The Life of Pablo, while his new clothing line is on the way, and then the video game. Yeezy has been busy, it seems. The game is called Only One, and it's about the passing of his late mother. Kanye explains: "I worked on a video game and I wanted to show y'all. The idea of the game is, my mom traveling through the gates of heaven".

Kanye is proud of his game, but he wasn't happy with how people received the trailer, as it was meant to commemorate his late mother. Kanye said: "That's not easy to do, man! Ya'll just be acting like that sh*t is regular". He added: "No, you don't understand. I go out and meet with everybody in San Fran, and they'll diss the f*** out of me. And I'll be like, 'I wanna make a game,' and they'll be like, 'F*** YOU.' That was hard to do, bro!".

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Unity answers Unreal's VR Editor with its own VR-in-VR dev toolset

Not content with letting Unreal have all the fun, Unity has revealed its own toolset that enables devs to build games while in virtual reality. Now developers can literally tweak games while standing in their creations, which could open up the doors to amazing possibilities down the road.

Unity answers Unreal's VR Editor with its own VR-in-VR dev toolset

Unity's VR-in-VR scene editing toolset is called SceneVR, and is a direct contender to Unreal's recently unveiled VR Editor. Using an Oculus Rift headset, Unity engineer Timoni West showcased a SceneVR preview at this year's Vision AR/VR Summit.

Using SceneVR, West was able to manipulate in-game objects in real-time. She started off with filling in a basic modern rooftop scene, all the while discussing basic features of the suite. West affirmed that the team is still working on optimizing SceneVR to make it more user-friendly, and that it'll be just as customizable in VR as Unity is to 3D.

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