Items tagged with Gaming
The developer behind Cyberpunk 2077, one of the most highly anticipated games of the year, is not keen on people streaming and spoiling the game's content before its official release date. So much so, in fact, that CD Projekt Red issued a warning on Twitter, saying it is going to send armed, tactical Max-Tac (or Psycho Squad) agents "after everyone who does." Not really, of course—those who defy CD Projekt Red and stream the game before it actually launches will not actually have a Max-Tac operative storm through their doors with riot gear and the whole nine. Max-Tac is a fictional sub-group of major police forces in the game, and not a real-life entity that bothers itself with spoilers....
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Intel has not been shy about in letting the world know it plans to update its desktop CPU lineup with its 11th Gen Core processors, codenamed Rocket Lake-S, sometime next year. It is some of the specifics that are currently kept in a Top Secret folder within Intel's labs, like specific CPU models and other details. If you are feeling impatient, however, a new entry at Geekbench sheds some light on one of the SKUs. Before we get to that, let's recap what we know for sure, straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak. Rocket Lake-S will feature Cypress Cove cores with up to 8 cores and 16 threads, and a memory controller supporting DDR4 speeds of up to 3200MHz. Intel also has let it be known that...
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AMD versus Intel is sort of a David versus Goliath story, only these days, AMD has armed itself with more than just a slingshot. Zen is the real deal. That is abundantly clear by now, but lest anyone needs reminding, a peek at Steam's latest hardware survey results for November 2020 show how well AMD's processors are being received by gamers, as it continues to, uh, chip away at Intel's share. I can hear the groans at the pun, but bear with me. The point is, this is a different AMD versus Intel battle than in past years, before Zen came along. AMD for a long time was the also-ran, while Intel dominated the market with better performing CPUs at the high end. But now? The Ryzen 5000 series is an...
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Even though Black Friday and Cyber Monday are officially done and over with, the deals keep coming. And that will likely continue throughout the holiday season. One interesting deal that is available right now is a Nintendo Switch Pro controller bundled with a download code for Super Mario Odyssey. You can get the bundle for just $69 right now. At full price, the Nintendo Switch Pro controller runs $69.99 all by itself, while Super Mario Odyssey goes for $59.99. So that works out a $129.98 value. But with this deal in place, you can score both the Nintendo Switch Pro controller and Super Mario Odyssey in bundle form, for $69 at Walmart. That is a heck of a bargain. Nintendo Switch Pro Controller...
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NVIDIA launched the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti today, and it offered some serious competition for the legacy GeForce RTX 2080 Super in our review. It is a beast of a card, and for only $399 to start off, it is a killer deal. If you are not into NVIDIA's reference design, however, you have plenty of other options from some of the company's board partners which we have rounded up for you below. ASUS ROG Strix 3060 Ti The Strix line of GPUs is notorious for being ASUS' top-end part with every graphics card launch, and this pattern is not set to change. ASUS took the wraps off the ROG Strix GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (pictured up top) to beat out the nine other graphics cards that launched alongside it from...
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PlayStation enthusiasts were likely disappointed to learn that some PlayStation 4 games may not get updated to run on the PlayStation 5 hardware for better performance. If you want a blast from the past, though, you can now play some classic PlayStation 2 games on the new Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S, thanks to some crafty gamers and handy Xbox features. Yesterday, a YouTuber by the name of Modern Vintage Gamer posted a video in which he played some PlayStation 2 games on his Xbox Series S. While the video is worth watching overall, we got to see Metal Gear Solid 2, Ace Combat 4, God of War, and several other games from the PS2. According to Modern Vintage Gamer, this trickery works mainly...
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As another season rolls around, so too does another Steam sale with deep discounts on games. If you do pick up some games, you can stock up on Steam points to decorate your profile for the season. However, let’s look at what Steam has to offer first, as there should be plenty of games for everyone. Shooters If you are looking to blast some bad guys or get into some mil-sim action, these are some of the top deals to get you going over the Tukey-day weekend and beyond. Far Cry 5 @ $11.99 (80% off) Doom Franchise Bundle @ $41.98 (72% off) Arma 3 And DLC Up To 75% Off Simulators Perhaps you just want to sit back and race a car, drive a truck, or build a PC. We get it, playing simulator games...
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Have you tried buying a next-generation game console? If so, you might have a hole in your wall, from where you punched it out of frustration. The Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and both PlayStation 5 consoles have been almost impossible to buy, thanks to a combination of factors—high demand, not enough supply, bots, etc. If it comes as any consolation, Xbox boss Phil Spencer feels your frustration and wants to change the pre-order process for the better. The question is, how can Microsoft (and Sony) go about doing that? Let me share my own experience, before diving in to that. Having missed out on the initial pre-order run, I've tried a few times to order one of the next-gen consoles. But...
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Fortnite has some big changes rumored to be in the works, and leaker Lucas7yoshi believes “modding” coming to Epic Games' battle royale game. In a series of tweets, the leaker claimed with absolute certainty that modding is on the way. He also delved into what this could look like in Fortnite, which you can see below. Obviously, people should take rumors and leaks with a gain of salt, but modding could be an exciting change for Fortnite. It could bring custom skins, tools, weapons, or vehicles to the game, depending on its implementation. In any case, Lucas7yoshi claims that modding is “100% in the works,” according to his tweets. Confidence for this is its 100% in...
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It is once again time for a new console generation and Microsoft has two shiny new products ready for the holiday 2020 shopping season. Continuing its tradition of sometimes fuzzy model branding, we have the new Xbox Series X and Series S, which succeed the previous-gen Xbox One X, Xbox One, Xbox 360 and the console formerly known as Xbox. This time around, Microsoft is focused solely on the gaming and entertainment experiences – there is no Kinect accessory or multimedia hub with HDMI input. The Xbox One X is all about improving the core gaming experience and all that comes with it. The two-tier console launch approach is unique this generation, with the Series X being the full-blown next-generation...
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Gaming laptops just keep getting better, and more recently, there has been a push for higher refresh rates to keep the action fast and smooth. Adding to the mix, a company called Eluktronics is laying claim to the world's first laptops to feature a 1440p display with a 165Hz refresh rate, which quite frankly is a delightful combination (depending on the rest of the hardware). These are not the fastest-ever refresh rates on a laptop—the bar has been set to a ludicrous 300Hz, as found on a spattering of models (MSI Dragonshield, ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17, and others). But those are all 1080p displays. Gaming at 1440p is gaining traction on the desktops (and the Xbox Series S is built with 1440p...
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About two years ago, NVIDIA started talking about a shader rendering method that applied varying levels of quality to different objects in the game world. That method was called Variable Rate Shading, or VRS. When applied skillfully and artfully in different areas of a scene that are less prominent in the gamer's field of view, the resulting rendered image quality wouldn't look all that different than if the whole scene had been fully shaded, though the graphics workload savings would improve performance significantly. Fast forward a year or so, and benchmarks became available for measuring the performance differences with and without VRS enabled. Indeed, there was performance to be...
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The evidence that a GeForce RTX 3060 Ti release is right around the bend is piling up. Every day seems to bring a fresh leak or rumor, and today is no exception—purported benchmark scores of NVIDIA's unannounced card have shown up at two different places, those being the Ashes of the Singularity database, and over at Geekbench. Before we get to the benchmark numbers, let's recap the leaked specifications. An apparent GeForce RTX 3060 Ti listing by Manli seemingly confirms the card will ship with 4,864 CUDA cores and 8GB of GDDR6 memory (14Gbps), with a 256-bit memory bus delivering 448GB/s of memory bandwidth. Manli's listing also showed it having a 1,410MHz base clock and 1,665MHz boost...
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Well that did not take long. Nintendo's reborn Game And Watch handheld console has been on the market for all of two seconds (technically, about a week and a half, but you get the point—it's brand spanking new) and already it has been hacked to run Doom. Because, you know, that is like a right of passage for electronics. Beside, if Doom can run on a Ti-Nspire or Ti-83 calculator (and it can!), then surely the Game And Watch should be up to the hell raising challenge of playing Doom, right? The answer is 'Yes!', though it was not a simple or straightforward hack that got it running. That said, no hardware modifications were required to get it to work. At this point you might be wondering,...
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In September, Apple revealed new App Store guidelines for game streaming apps. However, these rules were not conducive to streaming as they required games to be downloaded first from the App Store. This sort of requirement is not workable, so companies such as Microsoft with Project xCloud and NVIDIA with GeForce NOW sought workarounds. It seems NVIDIA was the first to the pass, as it is now offering GeForce NOW in the iOS browser, Safari. According to NVIDIA, “GeForce NOW transforms underpowered or incompatible hardware into high-performance GeForce gaming rigs.” Previously, only Android devices had the game streaming capability due to Apple’s draconian rules. That changes...
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Fortnite remains one of the most popular games around, and is a veritable golden goose for developer Epic Games, despite being free-to-play (there is big money earned through in-game purchases). Perhaps in an attempt to ensure it stays that way, Epic Games has just added a new and intriguing feature to Fornite, that being in-game video chat. The new feature comes courtesy of a partnership with Houseparty, a free social networking app that recently enjoyed a rise in popularity. Apps and services like Houseparty are seeing increased usage in large part because of COVID-19 and continued calls to social distance from one another, and work and play from home. The latest Fortnite update integrates...
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As we wait for the fifth episode of Night City Wire to showcase some of Cyberpunk 2077’s décor, CD Projekt Red has given us some in-game footage. The video released on YouTube today shows a player navigating around Night City in first-person on the Xbox One X and Xbox Series X. Without spoiling the game, CD Projekt Red jumps between several story-lines and locations in Night City. This isn’t just cinematic footage either, as we get to see some driving, NPC interaction, gunfights, explosions, and even a saber of some sort. Overall, the 10-minute video is well worth the watch. If you looked closely during the video, it looked like the Xbox One X struggled slightly more than...
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The folks at Nintendo are getting ready to serve up a free 'Winter Update' for its highly popular Animal Crossing: New Horizons game, and it can not get here quick enough. Fortunately, it is right around the corner. As in, Nintendo plans to push the update out on Thursday, November 19, which is now just a couple of days away. This could have just as easily been called a Holiday Update, because of two very distinct themes that will play out, those being Thanksgiving and Christmas. And it arrives just in time—the latest CDC guidelines point out that "small household gatherings are an important contributor to the rise in COVID-19 cases," and many families are opting to skip getting together...
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The next-generation Xbox and PlayStation consoles launched last week, but it looks like Bud Light felt left out? The design team at Bud Light decided to whip up a new console that combines two of our favorite things: beer and gaming gear. The BL6 is the “world’s first ever self-cooling six pack that also plays video games,” which is “½ koozie, ½ projector & ½ gaming console.” While we are not sure the math checks out there, it is still an interesting piece of tech that you could get your hands on soon. Bud Light did not give many details on their webpage for the device, but what we know is that the BL6 is a console, projector, and two-can...
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If there is one thing we can count on whenever hot new component hardware arrives, it's that it will not be long before Dell integrates it into their Alienware gaming systems. So naturally, with the release of Nvidia’s latest and greatest GeForce RTX 3080 and 3090 graphics cards, it was no surprise to see Alienware desktops already shipping out with these cards on deck. The Alienware Aurora R11 we have in our lab today features Dell's highest-performance configuration with an RTX 3090 to create what representatives at Dell are calling a “Benchmark Bruiser.” We will, of course, get to those benchmarks, but first let’s get familiar with this new Alienware machine itself....
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Imagine a company that has the audacity to revive a handheld game system from 40 years ago, and do it at a time when there is a glut of new and powerful gaming hardware on the market, including the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5, and a bunch of new graphics cards for PCs. That company could only be Nintendo, and what it has brought back into the limelight is a modern take on the ancient Game & Watch. Many gamers have fond memories of the original NES and Super NES, but the Game & Watch? The first version came out in 1980, before The Simpsons existed, and when a gallon of gasoline ran about a $1.20. A sort of precursor to the Game Boy, these were single-game handhelds with a LCD screen,...
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A handful of viral videos might have you believing that some early Xbox Series X adopters caught on video their shiny new consoles going up in smoke, an apparent result of overheating. Indeed, that would be a major fire hazard, if true. But it's not true. Instead, some dingbats figured out they could blow vape smoke into their console and have it exhaust through the top, which prompted Microsoft to put out a statement saying that is not a good idea. "We can't believe we have to say this, but please do not blow vape smoke into your Xbox Series X," Microsoft stated on Twitter. Microsoft is keeping a good sense of humor about the situation, posting several follow-up tweets, one of which reads, "The...
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