Vessel brings its YouTube-like subscription service to Android
Vessel launched as a YouTube alternative with exclusive early access to ad-free content for $3 a month. Beginning today, it’s available for Android in beta form. The service launched in March for iOS with videos from A&E, Rheet & Link, Unbox Therapy, Warner Music Group and others. While most of the content is available for free, subscribers get early access to select videos and an ad-free experience. To help it become a destination for impatient video fans, the company has been attempting to lure YouTube stars away from the Google-owned video site. Now it just needs to lure eyeballs away.
Filed under: Handhelds, Internet, Mobile
Source: Vessel
‘Deus Ex: Mankind Divided’ has something new: female combatants
Among the upgraded abilities, new weapons and winding metal passageways in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, there’s one important, yet subtle, change to the series: women in combat roles. There were of course women in the previous game, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, but they were largely removed from battles, producer Olivier Proulx tells Engadget at E3.
“They had some social functions in the game world, but actually going into stealth and playing against them in combat, you didn’t see that,” he says. “It was just guys all the way through.”
Mankind Divided changes this. Women in Human Revolution had a strictly “social” role, Proulx explains. When Mankind Divided launches in early 2016, women will be on the front lines.
It was really important to have females in the Deus Ex world.
“Basically, now when you explore the environments it’s not only, like, males everywhere,” Proulx says. “We have females as well, female characters that you can interact with. In a Deus Ex game, you don’t have to kill everyone — so we call them ‘combatants’ but we could say they’re just NPCs in the environment. We have a much more — sort of mix of different characters. For us, it was really important to have females in our world, in the Deus Ex world.”
Mankind Divided isn’t alone in emphasizing the role of women in games: Minecraft recently revealed its first free female character, FIFA 16 will feature women players for the first time and The Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment in California recently highlighted the accomplishments of women in game development. There’s a big conversation about diversity bubbling beneath the gaming industry right now and it appears the creators of Deus Ex: Mankind Divided are happy to be a part of it.
Check here for everything happening at E3 2015!
The many Amiibo collectors can look forward to not collecting
This one goes out to all the Amiibo collectors. Here’s Nintendo’s delectable and drool-making spread of upcoming, sure-to-be sold out Amiibo on display at its E3 booth. There’s really nothing more to say other than click through the gallery and gaze longingly at a figurine you’ll likely never get your hands on.This ultra-efficient robot walks just like people do
You don’t have to worry about robots rising up against humanity anytime soon — the bipedal ones, at least. When they aren’t constantly falling down, two-legged robots are running down their power supplies due to inefficient gaits and wasted motion. During a recent DARPA competition, teams from Sandia National Labs and SRI International squared off to see whose robot could walk the furthest. SRI’s robot, dubbed the “DURUS,” won out by walking 2.05 kilometers in just over two and a half hours while using just 350 watts of power. For those of us who aren’t electrical engineers, that’s a really impressive feat. In fact, the DURUS uses up to 30 times less power than the ATLAS robot employed in the DARPA challenge.
In standardized terms, the DURUS offers a cost of transport — how the rate of energy efficient in moving from point A to point B — of 1.5. It’s magnitudes higher than a human’s cost of transport of .2 or the DARPA cheetah-bot’s .5 rating but it’s a massive improvement over the ATLAS whose cost of transport is around 20. Sandia labs researchers accomplished this impressive feat by systematically improving every mechanical component’s energy efficiency — from the motors and actuators to the wiring itself. They even improved the robot’s gait to make it more fluid like a human’s, rather wobbling back and forth like a wind-up Godzilla toy. With some minor tuning, the Sandia team hopes to get the DURUS’ cost of transport under 1, which could give it a range of up to 10km using its existing 2.2 kWh lithium-polymer battery.
Filed under: Science
Via: Spectrum IEEE
Source: SRI
Titan Quest will fight its way to Android sometime this year, courtesy of DotEmu
Originally released for the PC in 2006, popular action role playing game Titan Quest found itself to be a fan favorite among the hack and slash crowd. THQ ended up releasing an expansion called Immortal Throne the next year, along with the game’s release on Steam. Fans of the original game will now be happy to hear that at E3 2015, DotEmu has just announced its plans to bring the game to Android devices sometime this year.
DotEmu is a video game company that specializes in revamping retro games and re-releasing them to modern consoles. Taking into account the company’s past work, I’d say the mobile release of Titan Quest will most likely impress fans of the original.
If you’re unfamiliar with Titan Quest, you play as a warrior in Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt and throughout various regions in Asia, trying to save the world overrun by ancient mythological creatures that are terrorizing just about everywhere you look. The game features iconic beasts such as harpies, centaurs and even giant scorpions, as well as numerous gods such as Prometheus and Hades. The game is quite lengthy, and features both single and multiplayer modes.
Check out the video review below for a quick overview of the original Titan Quest game for PC.
No specific release date has been given, but we should expect the title to come to the Google Play Store sometime in late 2015.
CBS releases the Colbr app for Android ahead of Stephen Colbert’s Late Show debut
Although Stephen Colbert’s wonderful show on Comedy Central is no more, that doesn’t mean he’s going away forever. He’s decided to take over David Letterman’s spot on The Late Show, which will air with the new host for the first time on September 8th. And to give us a sneak peek at what’s to come, CBS has just released the new Colbr app for Android.
Colbr: the best way to follow Stephen Colbert without risking a restraining order.
The app aims to deliver a slew of early content to fans of the new Late Show host. According to the description in the Play Store, it features “full-color comedy videos, medium-fidelity behind-the-scenes podcasts, and several other things!” CBS is constantly adding more content to the app, and will continue to until the show’s debut.
There’s already a good amount of content available so far, which should help tide fans over until The Late Show comes back on. It should also be noted that the app is only available for folks in the United States. If you’re interested, Colbr is now available for free in the Google Play Store.
Rupert Murdoch out, son James in as Fox CEO
The Murdoch dynasty continues at 21st Century Fox as the company announced today that Rupert Murdoch’s son, James Murdoch will take over as CEO beginning July 1. The elder Murdoch will join his other son Lachlan Murdoch as Co-Executive Chairman. Rupert announced he was stepping down as CEO less than a week ago. Placing James in charge isn’t a surprise, he has been pushing Fox into the digital era with a heavy focus on streaming. In a joint statement the brothers said that they were, “humbled by the opportunity to lead, with our father and the talented team of executives at 21st Century Fox, this extraordinary company.”
[Image credit: Adrian Sanchez-Gonzalez/AFP/Getty Images]
Filed under: Misc
Via: Deadline
Source: Fox
HTC is testing ads in its BlinkFeed app
HTC opened up its BlinkFeed stream of info to more apps and to other Android devices last year. Now, it’s getting a new form of content: ads. In a blog post, the company announced that it’s testing “a limited number of promotions” to folks “in a limited number of markets.” Specifically, users in the US, UK, Germany, Taiwan and China can expect to see the trial advertisements appear in the feed. Rather than a pop-up window or banner, the ads are displayed natively in a BlinkFeed post (see the example after the break). If that’s sounds super annoying, don’t worry, HTC will offer a way for you to opt out. But, of course, the company recommends that you leverage the promotions as a way to find new apps, goods and services.
Filed under: Software, Mobile, HTC
Source: HTC
Apple nixes Monster’s licensing over Beats lawsuit
Monster’s lawsuit against Beats Electronics last January has come back to bite it now that Beats is an Apple subsidiary. The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple has killed Monster’s official licensing agreement deader than that reported Beats WiFi speaker. Monster has been producing licensed accessories (lightning cables, headphones and whatnot) since 2005. Plus, it’s reportedly paid more than $12 million in licensing fees since 2008 for the honor of selling “Made for iPhone/iPod/iPad” devices, some of which retailed in Apple stores.
Chief counsel for Monster, David Tognotti, told the Wall Street Journal that Apple terminated the companies’ agreement on May 5th citing it no longer being “mutually beneficial” due to the lawsuit. The lawsuit itself stemmed from Monster CEO Noel Lee accusing Beats’ co-founders Jimmy Iovine and Dr Dre of fraud regarding the potential proceeds of its sale to Apple. The lawsuit is ongoing. Monster will continue to sell of its remaining stock of products until September. “It shows a side of Apple that consumers don’t see very often,” Tognotti told the WSJ. “Apple can be a bully.”
[Image Credit: Getty Images]
Filed under: Apple
Source: Wall Street Journal
Snapchat CEO posts a grainy video explaining how his app works
Snapchat may be four years old and raking in tons of investment money, but that isn’t stopping the messaging service from acting like a basement-based startup from 2007. The company has posted a an extra low-quality (240p!), obviously handheld video where CEO Evan Spiegel explains his app’s functionality and popularity using little more than hand-drawn sketches. The lack of production values is frankly baffling (splurge on a camcorder and a tripod, Mr. Spiegel, you’ve earned it). However, this grainy clip is at least insightful — you’ll find out why Snapchat relies on a swipe-driven interface, why the younger crowd likes the service so much and why the Stories feature is so important. We’ve reached out to Snapchat to unravel the mystery behind this footage, but it’s still worth watching even without the missing context.
Filed under: Cellphones, Internet, Mobile
Via: TechCrunch
Source: Snapchat (YouTube)
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