Gaming - Page 1158

Kids love to play games on tablets and smartphones. The problem that some parents have is that many of the games available for the iPad and iPhone aren't exactly educational. Some would also prefer their kids to play with toys that aren't digital. A new series of games have surfaced from a company called Tangible Play that combines digital and real-world play for an interesting experience.

The game series has three games known collectively as Osmo for kids that are able to connect with physical toys that children can touch and feel in the real-world. The games include Newton, Words, and Tangram. The games come with a stand to hold the tablet at a specific angle and a clip that goes over the camera.

That clip directs the camera to the surface where the game is being played. The game is then able to mimic the actions kids take in the real-world on the screen of the tablet. Newton is a drawing app that can create obstacles to play a game. Words is sort of like Scrabble. Tangram is a puzzle game that lets you match the shape on the screen using flat pieces. Osmo is currently crowdfunding and needs $50,000. During funding, the game will sell for $49 with the normal street price being $99.

In a twist of fate, a game about hacking the world around you, has malware and hacks built into the illegal copy of it. The torrent of Ubisoft's upcoming open-world hacking game Watch Dogs is hiding some serious malware.

For those who are downloading Watch Dogs over torrents are finding themselves with some pretty serious malware, that makes the people who distributed the copy money through installing a Bitcoin miner onto gamers' PCs. Not only that, but the pirated copy of Watch Dogs is plagued with bugs, with it increasing CPU consumption by as much as 25% by running a process named "winlogin.exe" which shouldn't be confused with the legitimate "winlogon.exe".

We would suggest not downloading Watch Dogs illegally in the first place, grabbing it from the store or Steam, but if you have downloaded the torrent - the best and most thorough way of ridding your PC of the malware and Bitcoin miner associated would be to format your entire drive. Sure, you can run an anti-virus or anti-malware software, but a Bitcoin miner isn't a virus, so you might find yourself in a spot of trouble.

Computex kicks off for another year next week, but the teases are coming in thick and fast - this time, from ROCCAT. ROCCAT has a new website that is telling gamers to Own the Couch, teasing that it will announce something that is its "contribution to your living room experience" on June 10.

With a June 10 tease, ROCCAT is poised to show off or announce something big at E3 3014. ROCCAT's new website is its first step toward a game-changing product announcement on June 10, something we look forward to seeing. The video above is what you see on the Own the Couch website, so I'm going to take a guess that we're going to see some new gaming peripheral, but we could be surprised yet.

Star Citizen's crowdfunding has no signs of stopping, reaching a world-record crowdfunding total of $44 million. This surge in funding is most likely due to the upcoming dogfighting module which drops in a few days.

The last time we heard about Roberts Space Industries' space shooter was late last month, when Star Citizen reached $43 million in funding. There are more than 450,000 backers - myself included - and with the total of $44 million raised, $34 million of that has been raised since June last year.

The next stretch goal is at $46 million, which I'm sure will be hit before the end of next month, where backers will receive in-game "scanning software" which will allow them to find resources within the world of Star Citizen. The latest fundraising milestone has seem creator Chris Roberts release a piece of concept art for a "negotiation room" where players can make deals inside their ships.

Video game hardware purchases grew 47 percent, reaching $983 million during Q1 2014, according to The NPD Group research company. Both next-generation consoles from Microsoft and Sony, along with a resurgence in PC gaming, led to a great market for gamers wanting to purchase new hardware, software titles, and gaming accessories.

"For the first quarter of 2014, content spending increased for used games, digital full games, DLC, and mobile with a modest increase in subscription revenue," said Liam Callahan, NPD Industry Analyst, in a press release. "This is another example of the interplay of physical media as well as digital downloads as consumers transition further into this console generation."

The Sony PlayStation 4 game console outsold the Microsoft Xbox One for the fourth consecutive month in the United States - though both game consoles have doubled combined sales of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, respectively. It will be fun to see what both companies do in the next quarters, especially the 2014 holiday shopping season.

Sony is doing some good business with the PS4, but where's the next-gen Uncharted game everyone wants to see? Well, when Uncharted 4 finally arrives, the next adventure could be a little darker than the previous Uncharted games that have been released.

The news is coming from Tidux, an industry insider, who has tweeted that Uncharted 4 would be a "darker" entry in the franchise, with an even heavier focus on the story. Tidux tweeted "Uncharted 4 is a darker, story heavy game," with another tweet teasing "Blended with awesome epic moments," but if that wasn't enough, he adds "latest version of Uncharted 4 is bananas, simply bananas".

I'm looking forward to seeing what both Sony and Naughty Dog can do with the increased horsepower in the PS4 with a next-gen Uncharted game, but I'm hoping it's not too constrained if it's going to work on the slower, ageing PS3.

Weeks before E3 2014 kicks off, we're hearing about Half-Life 3 from the co-creator of Counter-Strike, Minh Le. Le has said that he's personally seen artwork of Half-Life 3, and even captured a look at Left 4 Dead 3, too.

Le talked about Half-Life 3, where he said: "I don't know if I can talk about that, to be honest, but I think it's kind of public knowledge that people know that it is being worked on. And so if I were to say that yeah, I've seen some images, like some concept art of it, that wouldn't be big news, to be honest".

He continued: "But yeah, I guess I could say that I did see something that looked kinda like in the Half-Life universe. It wouldn't surprise anyone if I said they're doing it, they're working on it, yeah. So to go on a limb I'd say I did see some concept art for Half-Life 3". When it comes to Left 4 Dead 3, Le had much more to say: "The one thing I'm really excited about is Left 4 Dead, the new Left 4 Dead. I saw it, it looks great. I was really excited when I saw that. I was like 'wow, this looks great'".

Apart from arriving on 3 trillion 1.44-inch floppy discs, Watch Dogs on the Commodore 64 would look like the video below - kinda. Balazs Kalocsai's retro look at Watch Dogs is quite funny.

But if you're after the real Watch Dogs, that arrives on May 27 on the PS4, PS3, Xbox One, Xbox 360 and PC. On the PS4 it will be running at 900p, with the Xbox One version running it at 792p - both versions will be running the open-world game at 30FPS. PC users on the other hand, have a much bigger, better looking version of Watch Dogs waiting for them when it's released - not long to go now, folks!

Over $6 million has been raised for the prize pool of Valve's DotA 2 International tournament, making nit the largest tournament in gaming history! Last year, the DotA 2 International saw a huge $2.8 million prize pool, but the 2014 tournament has dwarfed it.

Where is all of this money coming from? Crowdfunding, that's where. Anyone who buys a DotA 2 Compendium from Valve contributes $2.50 to the growing prize pool, which has a heap of stretch goals attached to it. Most of them have been unlocked because it has ballooned out to $6 million now.

Ubisoft accidentally posted the name of its upcoming Far Cry 4 which also outlined more details about the game's storyline. The protagonist of the game 'Ajay Ghale' will be travelling to Kyrat to fulfil his mother's dying wish but getting caught up in a civil war to overthrow the oppressive regime of dictator Pagan Min.

Currently, Ubisoft has altered the description of the game in its Ubi story, but Redditors were quick enough to spot it. The first name 'Ajay' is one of the most common Indian names, whereas Ghale is from Nepal. However, its most likely that the lead is from the fictional country 'Kyrat'.

Alex Hutchinson, Ubisoft Montreal's creative director, said via Twitter,"Just so it's clear for those jumping to conclusions: He's not white and that's not the player.". Hutchinson responded to another article claiming that the promo art depicts 'a blonde light-skinned man in a shiny pink suit against the backdrop of the Himalayas, smirking as he uses a defaced statue as a throne'.

If you've been waiting for a better look at Bungie's upcoming first-person multiplayer shooter, Destiny, then now is your time to check out some new gameplay footage from the PS4, below.

In the video, Bungie talks about how it made the world of Destiny, and the various skills and abilities that players will be able to use to play against, or with each other. Destiny won't just be hitting the PlayStation 4, but the PlayStation 3, Xbox One and Xbox 360. Destiny should be quite the game, with Activision already spending $140 million, with $500 million prepared for a massive marketing campaign to start soon.

Activision sees Destiny as its next $1 billion franchise, which should join Call of Duty in that cash-creating club.

According to Crytek's US Engine Business Development Manager, Sean Tracy, the 8GB of RAM in the next-gen consoles isn't that much. Tracy has said that the 8GB of RAM in the Xbox One and PS4 isn't impressive.

Tracy elaborated: "8 gigs can easily be filled up. But also keep in mind that developers don't necessarily even have access to all 8 gigs of it. For example the Xbox One retains some of the RAM for OS purposes". He continued, saying that the computational requirements of games will quickly hit the new 8GB ceiling, noting that his team has already struggled with the 8GB of RAM ceiling on Ryse: Son of Rome on the Xbox One.

"[8 GB of RAM] will be one of the limiting factors surely in this generation," added Tracy, he also added: "As hardware gets stronger the complexity of scenes can be increased and the dynamism within them. However, with that said it's not the raw power alone that will allow for photo-realistic graphics but technology that intelligently scales and utilizes all that the hardware has to offer".

The Worms saga is one of those game series that has managed to hold on for more than a decade and still remain relevant to new generations of gamers. Today Team 17 Digital Ltd announced via Sony's official PlayStation blog that the series' latest installment, Worms Battlegrounds, will be heading to the PlayStation 4 on June 3rd of this year.

Worms Battlegrounds features a massive single player campaign spanning 25 story missions and 10 "Worm-Ops" time-attack missions, which have been set across five stunning environments (Inca, Viking, Feudal Japan and Industrial Revolution) with new day-to-night lighting transitions as well. "We've even added in multiplayer clan support! Create your own clan and choose your own clan emblem or simply join another existing clan and take part in league matches! All of these earn you community points, which allow your clan to level up and grow larger," said the blog post. "A particularly cool thing is that if we were in a clan together we could - for the first time - play controlling the same team! I'd take control of two of the worms, and so would you. Just don't let me down; we're fighting for our clan's reputation as the best global Worms clan after all!"

According to a new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council, the PS4 and Xbox One use a large amount of power even when in standby mode. Then we have some astounding numbers to look at.

The NRDC's new report has said if the PS4, Wii U and Xbox One replace the 110 million current-generation consoles sold in the US between 2005 and 2013, the total energy use of the three current-generation systems will be over 10 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year - enough juice to power the United States' fourth-largest city, Houston.

At what cost? Well, this would cost American households over $1 billion per year in energy costs, with 40% of it coming from the consoles' standby mode alone. The report reads: "The new consoles consume more energy each year playing video or in standby mode than playing games". The Xbox One in standby mode uses 15.7W of power, while the PS4 uses 8.5W and the Wii U with just 0.4W.

After being delayed back in October last year, and the various next-gen console resolution wars, Watch Dogs has finally gone gold. Ubisoft is now all systems go for the May 27 launch on PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Jonathan Morin, Watch Dogs' Creative Director, says: "It's exciting to be gold. But it'll be more exciting when people are playing. For the fans it means that it's true. It means there will be no such thing as another delay. But for us, it's not done until they actually have it in their hands".

Ubisoft is really expanding Watch Dogs when it comes to special editions, with nine special edition versions being made available. When it comes to the resolution Watch Dogs runs at on next-gen consoles, we have 900p on the PS4 and 729p on the Xbox One. Alienware even chimed in on that one, too.

When we found out that Watch Dogs would only be running at 792p on the Xbox One and 900p on the PlayStation 4, we weren't surprised - but these "next-gen consoles" are running the latest games that have had tens of millions of dollars pumped into them, at resolutions us PC gamers have been using for years.

Well, Alienware stepped up to the plate to smack talk the 'next-gen' consoles as it puts it, where it said on its Facebook page regarding the low resolution of Watch Dogs on the PS4 and Xbox One: "if these 'next-gen' consoles can't even get to 1080P from 3+ years ago... how do they expect to hold up for another seven years?". Alienware is right, something I've been saying for a number of years now. What do you think about this?

We started hearing the rumors of Far Cry 4 late last year, and then again earlier in the year, but now it is official: Far Cry 4 is coming, on November 18 in the US for the PS3, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox 360 and PC.

Ubisoft has said that we'll continue to see the open-world first-person shooter setting, but it will be based in Kyrat, a fictional region of the Himalayas. This region is controlled by an appointed king, who is the blond-haired person you see in the image above. We should see the usual beautiful graphics and wildlife throughout the game, with five Ubisoft studios working on the game with Ubisoft's Montreal studio being the lead.

Far Cry 4's Executive Producer, Dan Hay, explains: "Following the success of Far Cry 3, we wanted to take the franchise to the next level and create a game that will surprise players and exceed fans' expectations. Given the unique setting, we feel Far Cry 4 will stand out as a top first-person shooter and we're eager to reveal more about the game in the coming months".

We've heard rumors that Nintendo would unveil its next-gen console at E3 next month, and while this might not happen, the company is already talking about its next-gen console. Nintendo President, Satoru Iwata, teased that the company is "always developing new hardware" during a recent Q&A.

During the company's recent financial briefing, Iwata said that once Nintendo has launched a platform, it begins preparations for the next one. Iwata explained: "The most difficult question for us to answer in public in concrete terms is when we are going to launch our new hardware and what kind of hardware we are going to launch, and I am afraid that I cannot talk about this in more detail. However, I can certainly assure you that we are not at a dead end of any kind in which we are out of ideas for developing new hardware".

Nintendo aren't just a hardware company, but mainly a software company - it plans to stay that way, and keep consumers happy with their current devices, such as the Wii U. Iwata continued: "We will continue to work hard to ensure that consumers who already own our platforms are satisfied, and make sure that people will continue to see great value in our software. But I would like to say that we are preparing for our next hardware system, and in fact, we already have a clear idea to some extent about the direction our next hardware is going to take".

Microsoft is set to release the Xbox One without the Kindle bundled in, available on June 9 with a $399 price tag. The company also is shaking things up so Live Gold subscription will no longer be necessary for access to Netflix, YouTube, HBO Go, Hulu Plus - and also won't be necessary for OneGuide, Internet Explorer, or other premium services.

Microsoft still believes the Xbox One game console bundled with Kinect offers gamers "the best experience," though understands that a cheaper solution must be made available to customers. However, the $399 price point puts it on the same level of the Sony PlayStation 4 game console, which continues to outsell the Xbox One worldwide.

Just a few days ago, research group IDC predicted Microsoft would unbundle the Xbox One and Kinect by 2015, as Microsoft continues to try and compete with Sony.

Most gamers don't even have 4K yet, but we know how the industry works - give them one set of technology, while pushing another, but work on an even better technology behind closed doors.

Well, 8K is beginning to show up, with a new Crysis 3 hack that allows the first-person shooter to be run at 8000x3333 pixels, or 8K. The screenshots don't really do it justice, while they do look pretty, I think the effect of 8K would be better seen in person, on the display itself. Even if you ran 8K, you would need some serious, serious GPU horsepower to get there. You can see more of the screenshots of Crysis 3 running at 8K right here.

But, 8K? Is that all you've got? Keep an eye here at TweakTown for even higher resolutions in the coming months.