‘Snake Rewind’ modernizes the Nokia game for touchscreen devices
Snake — that addictive, reflex-testing mobile game on old Nokia brick phones — is attempting a comeback. A version for modern smartphones and tablets called Snake Rewind will be released on May 14th by game developer Rumilus Design and Taneli Armanto. The latter’s the Nokia engineer who preloaded it on the 6110 back in 1997 and the one you can blame for all those wasted hours and bouts of Snake-induced rage. For the young’uns who have no idea what it’s about: the game gives you control of a slithering serpent during feeding time. You’d have to get its mouth in the same line as its pixel food, often by twisting and contorting its continuously elongating body using the keyboard. It might sound lame described like that, but over a decade ago, it occupied the throne Candy Crush is sitting on.
We don’t think it’s possible to replicate the feel of the original Snake without a physical keyboard; it sure was strange trying to play the bootleg apps (there are many for various platforms) on a touchscreen device. However, we’d say the developers were gunning for a complete reboot anyway, one that’s more colorful with a bunch of power ups to be able to entice a new generation of players.
The biggest change is perhaps the power to “rewind” the game (hence, the name) after getting a Game Over. Its developers are also promising different themes and various special effects. At the moment, it’s unclear if Snake Rewind will be a paid or a freemium app, but it will be available for iOS, Android and Windows devices when it comes out. As to whether it can reclaim its throne, your guess is as good as ours — we’re just hoping nobody injures themselves trying to feed a hungry a virtual serpent.
Source: The Guardian, Rumilus Design
Facebook test allows users to curate their own News Feed
Facebook is testing a revolutionary feature that gives you the power to choose which friends you’d like to see prominently displayed on your News Feed. As you likely know, the social network has a mind of its own, an algorithm that decides what you see based on your interactions. This test feature, which has recently started popping up for some mobile users as a prompt, promises to let you “See more of what you love,” as shown below the fold. That prompt lists your friends and Pages you Liked — posts of users you end up picking will override the algorithm and always appear on your feed. Like every other Facebook test feature, though, this might take years to assess and might never even make it to public release. So if you’ve ever shouted “Give me freedom from the oppressive News Feed algorithm!!!” then cross all your fingers and hope you’re lucky enough to be one of the testers.
[Image credit: Social Times]
Filed under: Misc, Mobile, Facebook
Via: Marketing Land
Source: Social Times
‘Guild Wars 2’ cheater faces public humiliation before ban
Most cheaters in online role-playing games face an ignominious end. The developers ban them, and that’s all she wrote. Not one particularly egregious Guild Wars 2 offender, however. When game developer ArenaNet finally took action against a hacker who had been terrorizing player-versus-player battles for weeks, the security team decided that some public humiliation was in order. It stripped one of the player’s characters naked, jumped this persona off a ledge, and proceeded to delete every character linked to the account — all recorded for posterity on video, as you can see below.
The move is ostensibly a shot across the bow for other cheaters: keep it up and you’ll suffer an embarrassing fate. However, the ban raises questions about not just whether or not humiliation is an effective deterrent (if they cared about their reputation, why would they cheat?), but the ethics of ArenaNet’s response. Some are concerned that this wasn’t very professional, and that the security team should spend more time looking for game hackers than devising clever punishments. Players had been complaining about this culprit for a long while, after all, and it wasn’t until they recorded a video that justice was served. This isn’t necessarily an either/or situation, however, so here’s hoping that the studio both improves its anti-cheating efforts and delivers the comeuppances that malicious gamers deserve.
Via: Kotaku
Source: Guild Wars 2 Forums
TestFlight Experiencing Extended Downtime for Many Developers
It has not been a good week for Apple’s developer services. Less than a day after iTunes Connect experienced a lengthy outage that lasted several hours, TestFlight is now unavailable for many developers. The beta testing service for iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch apps has been returning a “currently unavailable” message since as early as Wednesday afternoon around 6:00 PM Pacific.
Because hardly a day can go by without #itunesconnect or #testflight screwing up. pic.twitter.com/682GTFEm5g
— dhcmrlchtdj (@dhcmrlchtdj) May 7, 2015
Apple has yet to update its system status page for developers to reflect the outage, although the company has historically been rather delayed at doing so. The outage has been confirmed to be affecting developers in the United States, Canada and Europe, and likely elsewhere, preventing developers from seeding pre-release versions of their apps for testing for the meantime.
AT&T Scales Back Throttling of Grandfathered Unlimited Data Plans
AT&T has quietly updated one of its policies to reflect that it will now only throttle customers that are connected to a cell tower experiencing network congestion, reports Ars Technica. The carrier previously throttled all grandfathered customers with unlimited data plans that exceeded 5GB of 4G LTE data usage in a single monthly billing period, regardless of network congestion.
The updated policy reads as follows:
“As a result of AT&T’s network management process, customers on a 3G or 4G smartphone or on a 4G LTE smartphone with an unlimited data plan who have exceeded 3 gigabytes (3G/4G) or 5 gigabytes (4G LTE) of data in a billing period may experience reduced speeds when using data services at times and in areas that are experiencing network congestion. All such customers can still use unlimited data without incurring overage charges, and their speeds will be restored with the start of the next billing cycle.”
Last October, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission filed a federal court complaint against AT&T, accusing the carrier of misleading its smartphone customers by charging them for unlimited data while reducing their data speeds by up to 90 percent. The FTC claimed that AT&T did not adequately inform its customers that they would be throttled for using more than a certain amount of data during a billing cycle. AT&T could still face penalties from the FTC if it loses the case, despite changing its policies.
AT&T customers with unlimited data plans have experienced speeds as low as half a megabit per second when being throttled, according to the report, resulting in barely usable service. By throttling unlimited data plans, AT&T is naturally encouraging customers to switch to one of the tiered data plans that it introduced in the years after discontinuing unlimited plans. Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile have similar throttling practices where there is network congestion.
Here are the specifications of the ZTE Nubia Z9 with a borderless 2.5D display
ZTE’s Nubia Z9 smartphone has been teased for quite some time now, but the device has finally gone official sporting a very impressive specs sheet and an interesting design.
While the display of the handset is 1080p (5.2 inch panel), it’s the design that will grab your attention at first glance. ZTE has utilized a 2.5D curved glass, which we’ve also seen on the Samsung Galaxy Note 4.
There are practically no side bezels here, which was a trend sparked off by the LG G2 a couple of years ago and has positively impacted the market. Other features of the smartphone include an octa core Snapdragon 810 SoC, 3 or 4GB of RAM, 32GB/64GB of internal storage, a 16-megapixel f/2.0 camera on the back, an 8-megapixel front camera, Android 5.0.2 Lollipop and a 2,900 mAh battery.
The top end model also comes with TIO (three-in-one) fingerprint scanning technology, which lets you scan fingerprints from the power button as well as the volume rockers. The exact functionality of this feature is yet to be understood completely, but it seems to be a novel idea.
In the audio department, the Nubia Z9 uses the NeoSound 4.0 and a AKM4961 Hi-Fi processor with Dolby 7.1 surround sound, so multimedia lovers will instantly be attracted to the handset.
The company will have three tiers of the smartphone known as Classic, Elite and Exclusive. The Classic model features 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage and is priced at 3,499 CNY ($563). The Elite variant has 4GB of RAM and 64GB storage on board with a price tag of 3,999 CNY ($644).
The top end Exclusive edition model has same amount of RAM and storage as the Elite version, but comes with the aforementioned TIO fingerprint scanner. This model is pretty expensive with a quoted price of 4,499 CNY or $725.
Come comment on this article: Here are the specifications of the ZTE Nubia Z9 with a borderless 2.5D display
Leaked 2015 Xiaomi roadmap reveals imminent arrival of the Mi 5 and three other devices
Chinese juggernaut Xiaomi is expected to launch a handful of new devices this year. We’ve already seen the likes of the Mi Note, Mi Note Pro and the Mi 4i breaking cover this year, so it’s understandable that the company would have more devices in its arsenal.
One of these is obviously going to be the Mi 5 which will supposedly be unveiled during November. Another device in the pipeline could be the successor to the popular budget phablet, the Redmi Note.
The roadmap also reveals the existence of the Mi Note Pro 2 and the Mi 4s. The mention of the Mi Note Pro 2 has taken us a bit by surprise given that the Mi Note Pro is only making its way to the markets now. The Mi 4s will supposedly be the first to launch with a June launch mentioned in the roadmap.
It is revealed that the Mi 4s will sport a 5 inch 1080p display, a Snapdragon 810 SoC, a 13-megapixel camera on the back, a 4-megapixel front camera possibly with Android 5.0 out of the box.
Xiaomi’s presence has been mostly limited to the Chinese and the surrounding markets, so we’re not really sure if the company will be bringing its devices outside those markets anytime soon.
Via: Gizmo China
Come comment on this article: Leaked 2015 Xiaomi roadmap reveals imminent arrival of the Mi 5 and three other devices
Vivo X5Pro, touting iris scanning tech, to be revealed on May 13
As children, and even adults, a little piece of us wishes we were like James Bond, mainly for his arsenal of marvelous spy gadgets. That dream might soon become a reality, as the Vivo X5Pro, said to have an iris security scanner, will be officially unveiled later this month.
A teaser image, posted on Vivo’s official Weibo account, shows that the smartphone will be revealed on May 13.
One thing Vivo’s X5Pro is going to make clear: iris scanning technology is the way of the future, adding a whole new layer of personal security to our devices. It’s only a matter of time before we see this tech in our favorite brands.
source: Weibo
Come comment on this article: Vivo X5Pro, touting iris scanning tech, to be revealed on May 13
Note 5 and Project Zen rumors arise
With the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge released and the dust finally settling over Samsung’s almost perfect smartphone, attentions are turning toward Samsung’s other flagship series, the Note line. While last year’s Note series kicked off the curved Edge line with the Note Edge, the most current of rumors highlights on what we may not see this year.
According to SamMobile sources, Samsung may only release one variant of the Galaxy Note 5 and it could sport a 2-4K flat-screen Super AMOLED display. IT will also sport a Exynos 7422 processor and Samsung’s very own modem. The Exynos 7422 will be Samsung’s first all-in-one processor, housing the CPU, GPU, RAM, modem and internal storage, all on one chip.
Samsung will also be toying with some Note 5 devices having the Exynos 7430 chipset, but those will be just an engineering example and there isn’t any plans for that specific model to be a consumer release. The same can be said about the Note 5’s display and Samsung is currently bouncing around between the 2k and 4k displays.
As far as the Edge variant that we probably won’t see, the phone that is actually set to allegedly replace the device is codenamed “Project Zen.” The device will not be a curved variant of the Note 5 but will be a device with its own non-completely high-end specs. The device is rumored to pack a 5.4-5.5-inch Super AMOLED curved display, an S Pen, a hexa-core Snapdragon 808 processor, 16GB of internal storage, an 8MP front-facing camera and a 16MP rear shooter complete with OIS.
Of course, as per the norm, all this should be taken with a grain of salt. Given we’re still about four months away from seeing anything announced officially from the Korean company, a lot can change between now and then. What would make you consider the Note 5?
source: SamMobile
Come comment on this article: Note 5 and Project Zen rumors arise
Samsung’s round Galaxy Gear A smartwatch delayed
While there hasn’t been any news on a product launch just yet, sources at SamMobile allegedly revealed that Samsung’s next Gear smartwatch, the rounded Gear A, has been delayed until later this year.
SamMobile says that the Gear A will be launching alongside the Galaxy Note 5 at IFA later this year, which makes sense, since Samsung’s smartwatches have a history of launching alongside major devices. However, the publication does say that a launch time frame is still in discussion. That said, launching alongside the Galaxy Note 5 is not set in stone, yet.
If the rumor is true, Samsung is making a wise decision, as it would do the Korean tech giant no good to launch the Gear A around Apple’s smartwatch debut.
Keep in mind that this is just rumor, and is by no means a confirmation of a guaranteed launch at IFA. The only thing we really know for a fact is that it’s in the works, and it’ll be interesting to see what the Gear A brings to the table, especially with Googles recent Games in Motion sample.
Smartwatches are quickly becoming the norm to see in the news. Do you have one? What do you think of it? Let us know in the comments.
source: SamMobile
Come comment on this article: Samsung’s round Galaxy Gear A smartwatch delayed
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