Bethesda takes on Hearthstone with The Elder Scrolls: Legends card game coming this year
A free to play Elder Scrolls-themed card game is coming to PC and mobile later this year.
Bethesda announced the new title during its keynote ahead of the E3 gaming trade show starting tomorrow. The event brought us close looks at the upcoming console/PC titles Fallout 4, Doom, and Dishonored 2, but the surprise announcement of The Elder Scrolls: Legends has a mobile component as well – the game will be available for PC and the iPad, and while no details are available for now, there’s a good chance Legends will eventually hit Android as well.
Bethesda’s announcement lacked details, but the developer released a brief trailer suggesting Legends will feature various classes inspired by the rich lore of the Skyrim universe …and that’s pretty much all we know about the game for now.
TES: Legends appears to be Bethesda’s take on the “strategic card game” genre or, to simplify things, an answer to Hearthstone. Blizzard’s World of Warcraft-themed card game is hugely popular, thanks to its addictive, yet accessible gameplay and engaging P2P action. While the game is free to play, the inclusion of thoughtful in-game purchases (card packs, etc.) ensures a steady stream of revenue for Blizzard. With that said, purchases are not forced upon players in any way, and, as this writer can attest, you can have a superb experience without spending a dime.
Judging from the reactions on the trailer for The Elder Scrolls: Legends, fans were expecting something else from Bethesda (read The Elder Scrolls 6), but this spinoff makes a lot of sense. There’s clear interest in card games right now, especially ones that work cross platform.
While Blizzard sure took its time, the studio eventually brought Hearthstone to Android tablets and smartphones, and we expect Bethesda to follow the same path with The Elder Scrolls: Legends.
Stay tuned for more gaming news this week, as E3 is about to open its gates. Mobile is a big component this year, and our Joshua Vergara and Andrew Grush will be on the ground to bring you hands-on coverage.
Diablo-esque Torchlight series coming to Android
Over the weekend, it was announced that Perfect World will be producing a new game in the Torchlight series specifically for mobile devices. Dubbed Torchlight Mobile, the upcoming game should feature the same charming cartoonish visuals and dungeon-crawling gameplay of its predecessors.
Beyond this, there’s not a lot of details on what to expect just yet. Perfect World does mention that online multiplayer will be incorporated, but there’s no word on the story, whether it will be a dungeon-only affair like the original, or if we can expect an expanded world similar to Torchlight 2.
For those that have never heard of the series, it’s basically a Diablo clone with even the same music producer behind it as was behind the original Diablo games, though it has its own art style and other changes (like the addition of pets) that makes it feel different enough to stand on its own. Personally, I loved Torchlight 2 as much, if not slightly more, than Diablo 3 — though your opinion may vary.
Here’s a trailer from the original Torchight, to give you a better idea of what to possibly expect:
There’s no exact word on when the game will arrive to Android, other than “sometime this year”, but it will be featured this week at E3 2015 where we hope to get a peek at it. What do you think, excited to see this one hit Google Play later this year? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Huawei P8 Lite review
The Bottom Line
- Reliable and long lasting battery life
- Expandable storage
- Limited yet fluid user experience
- Poorly lit display
- Uninspired build
- Ships with old software
Priced at just $250, the Huawei P8 Lite is a good entrant in the budget-friendly smartphone space, but it does fall short in some key areas when compared to its competition.
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Quickly becoming one of the most talked about popular categories in the Android world, budget-friendly smartphones have seen an impressive improvement in quality, while also becoming more easily available to consumers in demanding markets like the US.
Chinese OEM Huawei has some fantastic devices on offer in other key markets around the world, and now the company is making a play to get a piece of the market in the US. What does Huawei’s latest budget-friendly offering bring to the table? We find out in this Huawei P8 Lite review!
Design
The Huawei P8 Lite retains the design language of the P8, but swaps out the premium metal build of the flagship in favor of plastic, which makes sense given the low-cost nature of this device. With the move away from metal though, the P8 Lite doesn’t do much in the way of distinguishing itself from the competition, and the design isn’t particularly striking. Protruding sides with a brushed finish and plastic that wraps around from the front and back to meet the silver sides, are design elements that are quite common in the budget friendly sector of the Android world.
The SIM card slot and microSD card slot can be found to the right, and the power button sits just below the power button on the same side. The power button comes with a different feel to the touch, and there shouldn’t be any issues with accidentally pressing the volume keys instead of the power button or vice versa. Up top is a microphone and the headphone jack, and at the bottom is the microUSB port, flanked by the speaker grilles. Above the display is the 5 MP front-facing camera and the notification LED, with the Huawei branding adorning the chin below the screen. On the back, the camera module sits on the upper left, with the flash surrounded by a glossy plastic bar that stretches over the whole top.
As mentioned, the body of the device is made entirely of plastic, but resembles the P8 thanks to the faux brushed-metal design, with its smooth texture making for a somewhat slippery surface, even though it is comfortable to the touch. The rectangular design, along with its thickness of just 6.7 mm, help with the handling experience, and the relatively smaller size making the device easy to pocket.
Display
The Huawei P8 Lite sports a 5-inch IPS LCD display with a 720p resolution, resulting in a pixel density of 294 ppi. This resolution and pixel count may not be all that impressive given the world of Full HD and Quad HD that we now live in, but the smaller size means that there isn’t a lot of loss in sharpness overall, and the display proves to be quite capable.
The screen tends to a warmer color palette, but you have the option to play around with the default settings in the Settings menu. The major problem with this display is that it’s quite dim, and that means you will need to keep the brightness at 100% to use it comfortably. That aside, the display is quite good overall, with colors on the screen looking really good, with a certain pop to them.
Performance and Hardware
Under the hood, the Huawei P8 Lite packs an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 processor, clocked at 1.5 GHz, and backed by the Adreno 405 GPU and 2 GB of RAM. This processing package is what you get with a lot of other devices that fall in a similar price segment, and has proven to be quite an able performer. That is also the case here, and there’s hardly any noticeable lag. The overall experience was mostly fluid, and the UI was fast and responsive most of the time.
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The P8 Lite comes with 16 GB of on-board storage, further expandable via microSD card by up to 32 GB. The device comes with a standard suite of connectivity options, along with support for 4G LTE. With its official release in the US, you don’t have to worry about compatibility, as the phone packs the LTE bands necessary for high-speed internet access on the AT&T and T-Mobile networks.
Despite the appearance of a dual speaker setup, the device houses just a single speaker on the bottom left, that actually produces a surprisingly loud and crisp sound. The audio quality isn’t as full bodied as some other, more expensive options out there, but the sound is clear, with no hint of the annoying tinny sound that plagues a lot of smartphones in this price segment. As is the case with any phone with bottom-firing speakers, it does become quite easy to cover up and muffle the sound when holding the device with two hands in the landscape orientation.
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One of the highlights of the Huawei P8 Lite has to be the battery, with the 2,200 mAh unit lasting an impressively long time. Getting through a full day of use is guaranteed, and you are likely to have it survive for most of the next day, as well, with light usage. Attempting to drain the battery in one day required using the device mostly for watching videos, along with a lot of web browsing. I managed around 5 hours of screen-on time, which would have been a lot more if I didn’t need the brightness to be at a 100% all the time.
Camera
The P8 Lite features a 13 MP rear shooter with a f/2.2 aperture, and for a camera with no OIS, it does take decent photos, particularly outdoors. Colors aren’t too saturated, and might be on the duller side in some cases, but they are still more than acceptable. As with most smartphones, the camera suffers in low light conditions, which results in a lot of noise and a general lack of details.
The camera app is quite simplistic, but does come with a few modes and filters, including HDR, All-Focus Mode, that lets you change the focus of the shot after the fact, and the now popular Beauty Mode. It is also very quick and easy to start the camera and take a shot, by simply double tapping the volume down button when the phone is idle.
The front-facing 5 MP camera comes with an f/2.4 aperture, and unfortunately, proves to be quite mediocre. The shots look about average when outdoors, as they lack any richness in color and leaning towards the darker side. It doesn’t fare much better in low light conditions either, and you might not be able to depend on this shooter all the time to get that perfect selfie.
Software
The Huawei P8 Lite running Android 4.4.4 KitKat, and the use of older software is very disappointing. While there are talks of an eventual upgrade to Android 5.0 Lollipop, a fixed timeline is yet to be established on that front. Huawei’s Emotion UI is to be found on top of KitKat, and like what is seen from most Chinese OEMs, leans towards a rounded look with the icons and a generally more colorful interface.
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No application drawer is available, which can take some getting used with, and leaves users dependent on using folders to keep things organized. Features such as motion controls and Smart Assistance are available with the Emotion UI, as well as a one-handed UI mode that allows the dialer on the phone to either sit on the left or right side depending on your preference. The navigation bar can also be adjusted to whatever arrangement you are comfortable with, including the option to add a key to open the notification dropdown. A Theme store is also available to let you completely change the look of the UI. Unfortunately, not a lot of options are included as of now, but that should change over time.
Gallery
Pricing and Final Thoughts
The Huawei P8 Lite is available now from Amazon for $249.99 unlocked, with the color options including white and black.
So there you have it for this closer look at the Huawei P8 Lite! The P8 Lite is certainly a solid entry to the budget-friendly smartphone segment, and gets some things right, especially in terms of battery life. That said, things are already extremely competitive in this space, with some fantastic offerings from other OEMs like Asus, Alcatel, and Motorola fighting for dominance. The P8 Lite falls short in some key areas when compared to its competition.
Rumour: BlackBerry and Samsung to release smartphone with Android Lollipop and BlackBerry services later this year
Last week’s rumour that BlackBerry was considering the idea of using the Android operating system for an upcoming smartphone might not be so far-fetched after all, at least according to a tweet from Eldar Murtazin.
Samsung + Blackberry = Android Smartphone with Lollipop + BB services
— Eldar Murtazin (@eldarmurtazin) June 15, 2015
As you can see from the tweet above, he alludes to a joint venture between Samsung and Blackberry, with the device running Android Lollipop and having BlackBerry services baked in. This joint venture is believed to be released later this year.
After rumours of both Samsung and Microsoft making offers to buy the Canadian company, it seems that BlackBerry has chosen instead to strengthen its ties with Samsung. Firstly by teaming up to improve Knox security on Android and now apparently with an upcoming device running Android firmware with BlackBerry services baked in. It has to be said that BlackBerry aren’t in a great position financially, barely holding on to a 1% share of the smartphone market and having to cut jobs.
It’s an interesting rumour for sure. If true, what traditional BlackBerry features would you like to see included? Would you like to see an Android smartphone with a physical keyboard? Let us know in the comments.
Source: Eldar Murtazin (Twitter)
Come comment on this article: Rumour: BlackBerry and Samsung to release smartphone with Android Lollipop and BlackBerry services later this year
Sony hack ’caused’ f-bombs to go out on British daytime TV
Did you know that the Sony hack, amongst other things, caused scores of British children to hear some salty language on TV? That’s what the UK’s telecommunications authority believes after the company showed the adults-only version of a classic film in the early afternoon. Sony-owned channel Movie Mix showed the Paul Newman courtroom drama The Verdict on December 14th, and in one scene, characters drop f-bombs as if they were candy wrappers. The excuse for such flagrant sweariness was that when Sony’s servers were hacked, a nefarious type had “erased” the safe-for-daytime-viewing version of the flick, with the unedited version taking its place.
As far as excuses go, it’s a bit like using the death of a relative you didn’t know you had to justify not doing your homework a year after the event took place. That’s mostly because the film was meant to be checked by a human operator before broadcast, who clearly omitted to make sure the characters said “don’t duck with this case” instead of the other thing. Sony, for its part, apologized for the error and said that procedures had been tightened up ensure it wouldn’t happen again. The company managed to get away with a stern warning, but heavier penalties could be brought to bear should it, for instance, arrange a 3pm screening of The Wolf of Wall Street during the school holidays. Of course, we do have to ask — how many tweens are watching 1982 courtroom dramas when they could be vegging out in front of Teletubbies or, you know, playing with their Amiibos.
[Image Credit: Getty]
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Sony
Source: Ofcom (.PDF)
Spotify Taste Rewind time-shifts your music library
Spotify has quietly rolled out its latest feature: a time machine. Accessible through a dedicated site, ‘Taste Rewind’ accesses your current Spotify collection to suggest decade-specific playlists. The idea is to time-shift your current tastes to help open your mind to music from other eras. It works pretty well. After you log into the site, the process starts by asking you to select “three artists that you love” from a small but diverse selection (I went with Tom Waits, Jurassic 5 and Sia). It’ll then craft a set of five playlists; one for the ’00s, ’90s, ’80s, ’70s and ’60s. The site lets you preview the first track on each, share them or add them to your Spotify account.
A few Engadget editors tried the feature out already, and all got completely different results. My playlist set is pretty great, featuring a nice mix of tracks that I’d either heard and not added to Spotify, or had straight up never heard before. I liked them all, but the strongest of the five was the ’90s selection, which makes sense given that was the decade when I started forming my music tastes. You can check out the site for yourself here, or just listen to “my” ’90s playlist and call it a day:
Filed under: Software
Via: Spotify (Twitter), VentureBeat
Source: Spotify Taste Rewind
StarVR is a QHD headset with an ultra-wide field of view
Starbreeze, the game developer behind Payday 2, Syndicate and Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, is getting into VR. The company has acquired hardware startup InfinitEye and is developing its prototype VR headset under a new name: StarVR. The device is unique because it offers a super-wide 210-degree field of view, which is more than double the 100 degrees found on the Oculus Rift. The headset also boasts two 5.5-inch Quad HD (2560×1440) displays, coupled with a fresnel lens design to give players an immersive VR experience. Motion tracking is handled with fiducial markers on the headset (not shown) and a combination of gyroscopes, accelerometers and magnetometers.
Starbreeze believes it can stand out with a hardware and software “integrated vision.” The first example of this is The Walking Dead, an upcoming game developed by its internal studio Overkill. The company is entering an already crowded space, but with a few exclusives there’s a slim chance it could compete with HTC, Sony and Valve.
Filed under: Gaming
Via: PCGamesN
Source: StarVR
StarVR is a QHD headset with an ultra-wide field of view
Starbreeze, the game developer behind Payday 2, Syndicate and Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, is getting into VR. The company has acquired hardware startup InfinitEye and is developing its prototype VR headset under a new name: StarVR. The device is unique because it offers a super-wide 210-degree field of view, which is more than double the 100 degrees found on the Oculus Rift. The headset also boasts two 5.5-inch Quad HD (2560×1440) displays, coupled with a fresnel lens design to give players an immersive VR experience. Motion tracking is handled with fiducial markers on the headset (not shown) and a combination of gyroscopes, accelerometers and magnetometers.
Starbreeze believes it can stand out with a hardware and software “integrated vision.” The first example of this is The Walking Dead, an upcoming game developed by its internal studio Overkill. The company is entering an already crowded space, but with a few exclusives it could stand a slim chance of competing with HTC, Sony and Valve.
Filed under: Gaming
Via: PCGamesN
Source: StarVR
Sony comments on Xperia Z3+ overheating issues
Comments around the thermal management have been plaguing Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 810 chipset ever since it was announced and these issues have passed through to handsets running the next-generation processor. The metal-clad HTC One M9 ran hot on intensive tasks and the Sony Xperia Z4 and Xperia Z3+ have also suffered from overheating with the processor.
Qualcomm has previously come out and called reports of the overheating issues ‘rubbish’ while Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo has put advisory warnings on handsets running the processor. HTC has released an update for the One M9 and Sony has now finally responded to the heating issues that are plaguing its newest flagships.
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Dutch website GSMinfo.nl found that their Xperia Z3+ sample would overheat frequently and apps such as the camera and other games would automatically close due to overheating. Responding to these issues, a statement from Sony read:
“The Xperia Z3+ is a high-performance 64-bit octa-core device with advanced camera technology, in some cases, additional heat can cause functions to stop. Enabling applications can also be felt by the user through the glass on the back. This is normal for the unit and should cause no concern.”
Sony then went on to confirm that, like HTC, it would be releasing a software update later this summer to address the thermal issue but there are worries that Sony will throttle the processor in order to keep the heating issues to a minimum. Until the update rolls out, Sony says that customers who are unhappy with the handset’s thermal management can contact its service centre in their country to discuss their options.
HTC’s One M9 is powered by the Snapdragon 810
The Xperia Z3+ is essentially the same handset as the Xperia Z4 but sold under the Xperia Z3 Plus name in markets outside of Japan. The reason for the name change is that the modest upgrades offered by the Xperia Z4 – which include the advanced 64-bit octa-core processor, higher LTE speeds and a lighter, thinner build – are enough to be worthy of a new model number in Japan but not so in other markets.
The overheating issues in the Snapdragon 810 chipset may have resulted in Samsung switching to the Exynos 7420 in its Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge flagships this year but others have still stuck by Qualcomm. LG worked closely with Qualcomm to optimise the Snapdragon 808 for its G4 flagship while Google is working with Qualcomm on a Snapdragon 810-powered Project Tango smartphone.
Snapdragon flagships:
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The jury’s out however on whether Qualcomm and its OEM partners can fix the thermal issues without impacting on the performance and with its Snapdragon 820 chipset not far away, Qualcomm will be hoping to rid itself of the very-public 810 thermal issues.
iOS 9 iPad Keyboard Scales to Larger Size, Hinting Towards ‘iPad Pro’
iPhone developer Steven Troughton-Smith has discovered that the new iPad keyboard on iOS 9 beta is capable of scaling to a larger size with rearranged keys, providing further evidence that Apple could be planning to release the much-rumored 12.9-inch “iPad Pro” in the future.
UIKeyboard view on iOS 9 scales to a larger iPad size (Image: Twitter/Steve T-S)
At a larger resolution, the UIKeyboard view automatically adjusts with repositioned keys to fill the extra screen space available. Specifically, the new keyboard has wider keys, a new row of symbols at the top, Caps Lock and Tab keys on the far left and some other moved keys.
The secondary keyboard view has also gained the new chiclet-sized row of symbols and has enough room to fit all symbols and characters on one page, potentially eliminating the need for a tertiary keyboard view normally accessed by tapping the “#+=” button on the left or right.
iOS 9’s new Slide Over, Split View and Picture in Picture features on iPad Air 2 further suggest that Apple may be working on a larger iPad, as the new split-screen multitasking views would be ideal for a larger screen and take advantage of the tablet’s extra processing power.
The so-called “iPad Pro” is rumored to feature a 12.9-inch flexible display with increased pressure sensitivity, built-in NFC chip, Force Touch, USB-C port and possibly a pressure-sensitive Bluetooth stylus. The tablet would also likely have an A9 processor with 2GB of RAM and Touch ID.
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