Gaming - Page 316

RTX Remix is a groundbreaking modding tool developed by NVIDIA that allows budding developers and modders to remaster DirectX 8 and 9 games with path tracing, DLSS, new assets, and even the ability to use AI to enhance existing textures.

The technology was used to develop the incredible Portal with RTX that brought path tracing and new visuals to Valve's classic game. Today NVIDIA is releasing the RTX Remix runtime as open source on GitHub, with an RTX Remix creator toolkit expected to hit Early Access soon.

"Our main goal is to expand game compatibility and extend the features of Remix in collaboration with the community," writes NVIDIA. "In keeping with that aim, NVIDIA will accept pull requests on Github for code submissions from the community, provide feedback, and help advance code until it is mature enough to be merged into the official RTX Remix runtime."

Nintendo has asked the District of Northern California courts to issue a subpoena to Discord in an attempt to catch the recent Zelda leaker.

Back in February, an unknown user leaked a copy of the unreleased Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom artbook that is included with the special edition of the game. Lots of information about the new Zelda game flooded backchannels of the internet, propagated through file sharing services and openly spread on the official Tears of the Kingdom Discord channel.

It's no surprise then that Nintendo, one of the most litigious companies on the planet, is now hunting down the identity of the leaker. A new case docket reveals that Nintendo legal counsel has requested that California courts issue a subpoena to compel Discord to hand over the personal identifiable details of certain users that are suspected to have leaked the materials.

Some of the world's largest billion-dollar video game publishers are using AI to save money and accelerate game releases, but gamers see past the computer-generated tricks.

The advent of AI promises to permanently change the world and usher in a new unknown era to the tech sector. Companies are using AI in a myriad of ways; Microsoft, for instance, invested $10 billion into ChatGPT to help propel its own Bing chat model and also plans to utilize AI in its games in some fashion, however Western adoption of AI to help make games has been muted.

This isn't the case in China. Reports from publication Rest of World indicate that some of the most powerful Chinese video games publishers are all using artificial intelligence tools to help speed along production of video game assets to release content more regularly. Tencent, the largest video games company on the planet, is embracing AI to help make promotional materials--Tencent was criticized for using AI generated images in promos for Tourdog's mobile game Alchemy Stars.

An employee of popular video game publisher Konami has been charged with attempted murder after attacking his boss with a deadly weapon.

A worker at Konami Digital Entertainment has been arrested and charged with attempted murder, Japanese news website Livedoor reports. The 41-year-old Konami employee admitted to hitting his boss in the head with a fire extinguisher with the intent to kill, saying that his former boss used his position of power to harass the suspect in a form of workplace bullying called "power harassment."

The assailant told police that he had informed Konami's corporate management about the harassment issues, however Konami is said to have not identified any instances of power harassment between the suspect and his boss.

The number of gamers across the globe is on the rise, and now half of the world's population plays video games.

There are now an estimated 3.7 billion people that play video games, analyst firm DFC Intelligence said in a new market report. The new figure indicates that the number of gamers worldwide has risen by 700 million people in the last 3 years. Back in 2020, DFC estimated that more than 3 billion people played video games.

Interestingly enough, DFC Intelligence says the global figure isn't as powerful as it seems. Out of the 3.7 billion gamers, only about 10% of them, or 370 million, are responsible for generating most of the industry's revenues.

Today Arkane Studios inadvertently kicked off another controversy for the gaming brand, and the PR fire is spreading rapidly.

Microsoft has confirmed that the next first-party Xbox game will come with a big performance caveat. Redfall, the new co-op survival shooter from Dishonored and Prey developer Arkane, will not be able to hit 60FPS on the Xbox Series X at launch.

Redfall will instead be locked to 30FPS at launch on both the Xbox Series X (4K 30FPS) and Xbox Series S (1440p 30FPS). Arkane says a 60FPS performance mode will be "added via game update at a later date." Gamers have responded with significant push back, with countless quizzical responses asking how the first-person shooter can launch without hitting the expected frame rate spec.

One of Sony's best-selling first-party PlayStation games is leaving PS Plus, and it might be a bad strategy for long-term subscription retention.

Today Sony revealed which games are coming and leaving its PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium subscription service tiers in May. The departing games lineup includes a surprising title: Spider-Man, one of the PlayStation 4's best-selling first-party games from Insomniac Games, will be taken off the PS Plus Games Catalog next month.

"As part of our normal content refresh, Marvel's Spider-Man, Resident Evil, and NBA 2K Playgrounds 2 will be among some of the titles leaving the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog in May. Members with Game Catalog benefits can still play by May 15," Sony said on the PlayStation Blog.

With each new generation of GeForce RTX hardware improving ray-tracing performance, alongside continued advances for tech like DLSS and the new DLSS 3 Frame Generation exclusive to the GeForce RTX 40 Series, NVIDIA has revealed some of its stats relating to the everyday use of RTX tech.

With the release of the highly-anticipated Ray Tracing: Overdrive Mode in Cyberpunk 2077, which brings full path-traced lighting to Night City, DLSS is now supported by over 280 games and apps. And these new GeForce RTX 40 Series stats from NVIDIA are fascinating.

Although we don't have specific sales figures outside of NVIDIA confirming that there are "millions of GeForce RTX desktop GPU owners," it does look like ray-tracing is a popular in-game feature for GeForce RTX 40 Series owners.

Gamers take another shot at blocking the Microsoft-Activision merger with an amended complaint that argues why the Microsoft-Activision merger should be blocked.

10 gamers have teamed up and hired legal representation to sue to block the Microsoft-Activision merger under grounds of violating section 7 of the Clayton Act. As per the FTC, section 7 "prohibits mergers and acquisitions where the effect may be substantially to lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly." As per Section 16 of the same Clayton Act, action may be taken by private parties to prohibit such an anti-competitive merger.

Following a dismissal of the original complaint by Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley, plaintiffs for the Gamer's Lawsuit have filed a new amended complaint that attempts to make a second shot at shutting down the merger. To be clear, plaintiff counsel is attempting to argue that the merger is anti-competitive--a goal that the FTC has spent lots of time and manpower also trying to do.

10 gamers have banded together to sue to block the Microsoft-Activision merger under parts the Clayton Act, and new court filings reveal that Sony has provided documents to the plaintiffs.

Microsoft wants to buy Activision-Blizzard for $68.7 billion, representing the largest video games acquisition in history. It's also the largest acquisition that Microsoft has ever proposed. The trillion-dollar tech firm attempts to assuage anti-trust concerns, the chief of which is making the $31 billion Call of Duty franchise exclusive to Xbox platforms, with multiple 10-year licensing deals to ensure the mega-hit video game series remains on multiple platforms.

While many gamers see tremendous benefits with the acquisition, including the addition of Activision-Blizzard titles to Microsoft's popular all-you-can-play Xbox Game Pass subscription, the deal faces staunch opposition from gamers and other industry players like Sony. Some gamers feel so strongly against the merger that they have banded together to collectively sue Microsoft in an attempt to block the deal. This is the 3:22-cv-08991-JSC "Gamer's Lawsuit" filed in the District of Northern California courts.

After being announced alongside the GeForce RTX 4090, the fully path-traced Ray Tracing: Overdrive Mode has arrived in Patch 1.62 for Cyberpunk 2077.

Patch 1.62 for Cyberpunk 2077 has just dropped, bringing the highly anticipated Ray Tracing: Overdrive Mode to the game, which presents a full ray-traced experience via path tracing for all lighting effects and things like shadows and reflections.

"We're proud of it," writes CD Projekt Red in the update. "It pushes the boundaries of what's possible in technology. However, because it is so new and fundamentally different from what we've been using so far, we know it's not going to be perfect from the start, and players might experience some issues - that's why we've decided to call it a Technology Preview."

Cyberpunk 2077's Ray Tracing: Overdrive Mode is set to arrive this week in technical preview form, bringing full path-traced lighting to the game. Going hands-on with the build and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090, tech channel Digital Foundry has released a new video showcasing the difference it brings.

The video features footage from the game without ray-tracing, with the game's current (technically demanding) RT Psycho Mode and the new Overdrive Mode.

The difference between the existing Cyberpunk 2077 ray-tracing and the new Overdrive mode proves to be the most interesting, as it provides a good look at what full path-traced lighting can bring to a game.

Sony's PlayStation VR2 headset has sold an estimated 300,000 units, which isn't terrible performance when compared to the original PSVR1 headset.

Reports indicate that Sony's PlayStation VR2 is failing to gain traction in the gaming market. According to IDC analyst figures reported by Bloomberg's Takashi Mochizuki, the PSVR2 has sold around 300,000 units in its first month on the market. Video game news outlets have responded to the news with reports that the PSVR2 is selling poorly, leading to doom and gloom coverage of the VR market.

IDC analyst Francisco Jeronimo even went so far to say that Sony may need to cut prices to avoid total disaster: "I suspect a price cut on the PSVR2 will be needed to avoid a complete disaster of their new product."

Candy Crush has been downloaded over 3 billion times, King has confirmed--a figure that underlines one of Microsoft's true motivations in buying Activision.

In a recent interview with Mobile Games.biz, Candy Crush general manager Todd Green revealed a very interesting piece of information: the mega-hit free-to-play mobile game has been downloaded over 3 billion times. The stat really underlines the power of the free-to-play mobile sensation, punctuating other incredible figures like the 233 million monthly active users (MAUs) that King enjoyed throughout Q4 2022, and the $5.5 billion of revenue that King has generated in the past 7 years (from 2016 - 2022).

It's important to keep these kinds of metrics in mind when considering Microsoft's proposed $68.7 billion buyout of Activision Blizzard King. We've talked about the sheer amount of active players that Microsoft would fold into the Xbox brand simply with the inclusion of King. MAUs remain one of the most important KPIs, or key performance indicators, that are used in the games industry.

A lower-quality Call of Duty game could ruin the PlayStation business, Sony's Jim Ryan told UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority.

The CMA recently filed an amended version of its provisionary findings report, and the new revision made some waves. The new report states that the UK regulator no longer believes Microsoft has the incentive or ability to withhold mega-hits like Call of Duty from PlayStation. The CMA has determined the downside of losing out on PlayStation revenues is just too high.

Sony's legal counsel opposes the CMA's new provisionary findings and has identified and explained four key errors with the CMA's data model that was used to make the agency's determination.

Microsoft has cracked down even harder on emulation and has consistently removed RetroArch uploads at a rapid pace to discourage gamers from downloading the emulator suite.

The Xbox Series X/S is the ultimate emulation machine. Or it was, until Microsoft started removing emulators from the Microsoft Store. Up until now, RetroArch frontend creator gamr13 was able to re-upload the emulation suite as a private app under a different name. Microsoft is now instantly removing the uploads and re-uploads of RetroArch, meaning gamers can't get the app that's required to emulate old-school titles.

The Series X/S consoles have two modes: Retail Mode, and Dev Mode. Through clever obfuscation, gamr13 was able to skate around Xbox store enforcement and release versions of RetroArch that run in Retail Mode, which makes full use of the Xbox Series X/S hardware.

Microsoft has signed multiple 10-year deals to bring Call of Duty to cloud and console competitors, including a drafted PlayStation deal that Sony has yet to sign. Even still, Sony does not trust that Microsoft will not make Call of Duty exclusive--or at least, pull it from PlayStation platforms.

Sony has reiterated its belief that Microsoft has a large incentive to make Call of Duty exclusive to Xbox and remove the franchise from PlayStation at some point. In a new response to the CMA's recent report, Sony legal counsel makes a case that Microsoft's exclusionary conduct following its $7.5 billion merger with ZeniMax is indicative of how Microsoft will also treat Activision-Blizzard games and content.

Microsoft has announced that multiple ZeniMax games including Redfall, Starfield, and The Elder Scrolls VI will be exclusive to Xbox platforms, and Sony believes that Microsoft could also do the same with Call of Duty.

A bit ago, the CMA determined that Microsoft has no ability or incentive to foreclose Sony in regards to the Microsoft-Activision merger. Now Sony has delivered a response to the CMA's findings, calling the agency's data modelling into question.

The CMA recently filed its own Provisionary Findings Addendum that concludes Microsoft has no incentive or ability to foreclose Sony using Call of Duty exclusivity. This determination is based on what is called an LTV model, or a system that attempts to quantify the lifetime value of a video game player, which was used to estimate how Call of Duty exclusivity would affect both Microsoft and Sony. The model attempts to gauge the implied lost or gained value from consumers switching from PlayStation to Xbox if Call of Duty were to become exclusive. Based on the CMA's findings, Microsoft has no real motivation to withhold Call of Duty on PlayStation, thus one of the CMA's theories of harms--the partial or full foreclosure of rivals in the console gaming segment--has been squashed.

Predictably, Sony did not approve of this assessment, and the CMA has published Sony's response to the new findings. Sony Interactive Entertainment legal counsel has identified four errors with the new PF (Provisionary Findings) report.

Microsoft tells UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority that it will not make Activision games and/or content exclusive to Xbox if the merger passes.

Today UK antitrust regulators published Microsoft's response to the CMA's provisional findings addendum--a document that officially satisfied one of the CMA's biggest worries about the Microsoft-Activision merger. In the new document, Microsoft says something very interesting: The company apparently has no plans to make Call of Duty or any other Activision games and/or content exclusive to Xbox.

"Microsoft has been clear since the announcement of the Merger: it has no intention to withhold or degrade access to Call of Duty ("CoD") or any other Activision content on PlayStation. Such a strategy would be in direct contrast to the interests of gamers in the UK and around the world. Rather than limit choice or access, Microsoft intends to use the Merger to bring more games to more people on more platforms and devices," reads Microsoft's response.

Sony has filed an interesting new controller patent that could lead to a next-gen DualSense controller with incredible levels of haptic feedback and input registration.

Note: The following is based on a patent, not a final consumer-ready product. There is a possibility this patent will not lead to an actual product, and the patent does not guarantee that Sony is working on such a device.

Sony's latest PlayStation controller patent is so radical that it sounds like something Nintendo would make. The patent, which was filed in 2020 and only now just published in English, outlines a thermally-reactive controller that has lots of implications for immersion and haptic feedback in PlayStation 5 (or possibly even PlayStation 6) games.