HTC 10 review: Iconic, impressive, imperfect

HTC returns in style, with one of the best Android phones of the year so far.

The quick take

After a disappointing couple of release cycles, HTC’s 2016 flagship is a confident return to form, and a reason for high-end buyers to start paying attention to the company once again. This impressive all-rounder gets a lot of important things right — performance, build quality and, for the most part, the camera. And although it’s trumped by the Galaxy S7 in some key metrics, the HTC 10 is arguably the closest competitor Samsung has right now.

The Good

• Well-built aluminum unibody
• Fast performance and clean, uncluttered UI
• Impressive audio features
• Capable all-round camera

The Bad

• Display not great in sunlight
• Camera focusing can be finicky, particularly in macro
• Battery life inconsistent, sometimes wildly so
• Expensive SIM-free price

A return to glory?

HTC 10 Full Review

It’s easy to write off HTC. With its declining market share and shrinking revenue, it’s been some time since it was a major force in the mobile world. Today, the Taiwanese firm is outspent by Samsung and Apple, and increasingly outmaneuvered by leaner upstarts. It’s a small fish in a very big pond.

Nevertheless, HTC’s strong history in design has left many of us with fond memories of the company’s storied back catalog. Phones like the spectacularly ahead-of-its-time HTC One M7, and the beautiful and unique One S, and even the landmark Nexus One stand out as some of the best handsets of their time.

HTC needs a hit now more than ever.

However it’s been a good couple of years since the last real trailblazer from HTC, and competing in the the cut-throat phone market of 2016 demands more than just nostalgia. With diminished resources and brand value, HTC needs a hit now more than ever before.

HTC 10 is what’s hoped will fuel the recovery: A new, simpler brand backed up by a marketing message promising nothing less than perfection across the board. Sure, some of the key ingredients will be familiar to HTC alumni — BoomSound audio, metal construction and an “Ultrapixel” camera. But can a modern interpretation of these tentpole HTC features make a big enough splash — especially when it’s got to go up against the almighty Galaxy S7?

Let’s find out.

	5.74 in145.9mm
2.83 in71.9mm		0.11-0.35 in3-9mm

• Display:
  • 5.2-inch Quad HD
  • SuperLCD5 Display
  • 2560×1440 resolution (564ppi)
• Camera:
  • 12MP Ultrapixel 2, ƒ/1.8 lens, OIS, laser AF
  • 5MP Ultraselfie front camera, ƒ/1.8 lens, OIS
• Battery:
  • 3000mAh capacity
  • Quick Charge 3.0
• Chips:
  • Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor
  • Quad-core 2.2GHz
  • 4GB RAM
  • 32-64GB internal storage
  • microSD slot with adoptable storage

About this review

We’re publishing this review after a week with an unlocked European HTC 10 (model 2PS6200 / M10h) on the EE and Vodafone networks in the UK. We’ve been using the phone in Manchester and London, UK, in areas with generally good 4G LTE coverage. Our device has been running software version 1.21.401.4, and it’s been paired with a Moto 360 (2015) smartwatch during most of our testing. Security patch levels aren’t shown in the menus, however the AIDA64 app shows that it’s got the March 1, 2016, patch.

Our review unit is the “carbon gray” color option with 32GB of storage, and we’ve used it with a 64GB microSD card for photo storage and Google Play Music download cache.

We’ve also been using an unlocked North American model for two weeks now, in New York City and Pensacola, Fla. We’ve not seen any noticeable differences between them, and the vast majority of this review is based on our European device.

15 minutes of 10

HTC 10 Video Review

Metal to the max

HTC 10 Hardware

The HTC 10 represents a return to the manufacturer’s design roots. An aluminum unibody with familiar angles and curves, accented by a deep chamfer circling the back, make up a modern interpretation of a classic smartphone design. Aside from the prominent branding on the back, there’s a ton of HTC design DNA here. Everything from the contrast between the lustrous machined trim and the softer matte back, to the trademark antenna bands, is pure HTC.

A modern interpretation of a classic smartphone design — An M7 on steroids.

Veterans of the brand might recognize it as a refined, souped-up version of the company’s past few flagships. Essentially, it has the look of an M7 on steroids.

It’s also HTC’s most ergonomic and easy-to-hold phone in recent years, and all without sacrificing the premium design elements we’ve come to expect. The curved back is a comfortable fit for the hand, while that enormous chamfer — combined with the flat, angled side walls — ensures a steady grip.

The HTC 10 isn’t the thinnest or lightest handset you’ll come across. (Nor, with an enormous metal enclosure, would you expect it to be.) That’s not a bad thing — it’s easy to overstate the value of both properties. What’s more important is a phone which feels sturdy and well-built, and that’s exactly what’s conveyed by the HTC 10’s somewhat chunky unibody and clean, uncluttered glass front. Its overall vibe is more industrial than the sleek, glassy Samsung Galaxy S7, but there’s nothing at all wrong with that.

The rear chamfer shimmers as the HTC 10 rotates through light.

The main decorative feature — that oversized chamfer — may be a little polarizing. But there’s no denying it gives the HTC 10 a necessary visual differentiator in an incredibly crowded field. And when combined with the darker antenna band in the carbon gray model we’ve been using, it works. On the gold and silver models, it’s more pronounced — the chamfer is far more reflective, and makes the phone appear to shimmer as it tilts through different angles of light.

The HTC 10’s rear camera — a 12-megapixel “Ultrapixel 2” shooter which we’ll discuss in greater detail later — protrudes ever so slightly through the metal back, but not enough to cause any real issues in day-to-day use. (In fact, the slight camera bump means the phone doesn’t wobble quite so much when placed on a flat surface.)

Up top, that extravagant metal design is broken up by two engineering necessities — a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a plastic section for antenna reception. It’s easy to ignore on the dark gray model, but stands out a little more in the gold and silver versions.

Meanwhile, you’re looking at a fairly standard port and button arrangement — a textured power key and smooth volume rocker on the right edge, below the nano-SIM slot, and a microSD tray over on the left. Down below you’ll find a USB Type-C cable (supporting USB 3.1 Gen1, which means faster data transfer speeds) alongside one of the HTC 10’s two loudspeakers.

HTC once again brings some serious audio credentials to the table.

Unlike its past few flagships, HTC’s latest does away with the front-facing stereo speakers that had become a staple of the “M” series. Instead there’s a new “BoomSound Hi-Fi” setup consisting of one front-facing tweeter (in the earpiece) and a bottom-facing woofer, each with its own amp, and Dolby lending its expertise on the processing end. Although it functions differently from earlier BoomSound implementations, the results are still impressive — powerful bass, and more volume than you’re likely to ever need without any noticeable loss in clarity.

There is one trade-off, however. Because you’ve got one speaker facing towards you and another pointing downwards, the HTC 10’s output is prone to more distortion when holding the phone in-hand, mainly due to the woofer being so close to your palm or index finger. The effect is less noticeable if the phone is lying flat — as it may well be if you’re playing music.

Of course the phone’s built-in speakers aren’t your only option for music playback. HTC has some serious power behind its headphone port too, with a dedicated amp capable of delivering an output level of 1V, according to the company’s own numbers. And using wired studio headphones, the difference is clear: HTC’s pushing more power than Android rivals like the Galaxy S7.

The company is also keen to highlight the HTC 10’s status as a high-definition audio certified device, with support for 24-bit audio and HD audio earphones bundled in the box in some countries. (Not including the United States, unfortunately.) It’ s a neat addition sure to appeal to audiophiles, if not those of us mainly playing compressed music from streaming services.

Nevertheless, phone audio is important — it’s where many of us listen to music the most. So it’s great to see HTC continuing to pay close attention to audio hardware, even though the days of front-facing speakers seem to have passed.

The display is equally important, of course. It’s a 5.2-inch SuperLCD5 panel at Quad HD resolution, just as we’d expect from a modern Android flagship. Generally speaking it’s a good-looking screen, with vivid colors and ample brightness without appearing excessively over-saturated. (There’s an optional sRGB mode in Display Settings for colorspace purists.) Off-angle visibility is decent too, with only slight color shifting noticeable on our unit at wider angles.

Sadly, wonky auto-brightness and less than spectacular sunlight visibility conspire to make the HTC 10 a little challenging to use in brighter conditions. Like a handful of other phones, including most of Samsung’s high-profile models, the HTC 10 has a display overdrive mode that over-brightens the screen when very bright ambient light is detected. The problem is this doesn’t kick in anywhere near as consistently as we’d like to see. Furthermore, the 10’s screen appears more reflective than Samsung’s latest round of SuperAMOLEDs, so it’s hobbled from the outset.

It’s possible some of these nagging issues with auto-brightness will be addressed in a software update. Even so, the HTC 10 is clearly a step behind the Galaxy S7 and iPhone 6s in outdoor visibility.

But there’s more going on around the front than just the screen. The HTC 10 has a unique new button arrangement built around the capacitive fingerprint scanner, which doubles as your home key. On either side you’ve got capacitive back and recent apps keys which illuminate, Samsung-style, for a couple of seconds when pressed.

In fact the similarity to Samsung’s way of doing things makes the HTC button setup particularly vexing if you’re coming from a Galaxy phone, as the button order is reversed. It’s not a huge thing, but it’s definitely a thing.

HTC nails it once again, with an excellent fingerprint security setup.

The fingerprint scanner itself is among the best we’ve used on an Android phone. Setup is quick and painless, as is using your fingerprint to instantly power on and unlock the phone. Apple’s Touch ID is faster, sure. But we’re talking tiny fractions of a second here. We’ve also noticed fewer fingerprint-related failures in day-to-day use on the HTC 10, compared to Samsung’s sensor on the GS7.

Powering this whole assembly is a collection of parts fit for any high-end smartphone. Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 820 chip lurks within, paired with a hefty 4GB of RAM and 32 or 64GB of storage, with microSD expandability. Unlike many rivals, HTC supports Android 6.0’s Adoptable Storage (also known as Flex Storage), letting you directly tag your SD storage onto your internal memory and use it for just about anything. (It’s possible to find apps that can’t save to it, but that’s the exception, not the rule.)

Rounding off the spec sheet. there’s a 3,000mAh fixed internal battery, along with support for Qualcomm QuickCharge 3.0. Unsurprisingly, the HTC 10 also appears to be backwards compatible with QuickCharge 2 in the handful of older chargers we tried.

As a whole then, the HTC 10 is an impressive hardware package — the latest 2016 internals brought together in a beautiful unibody enclosure, with a high-end audio setup, a decent screen and convenient fingerprint security.

Meet the Ice View case

The HTC One M8 in 2014 brought us the Dot View case, the neat dot-matrix flip cover that showed you the time, missed calls, weather and other info through a low-res grid of dots on the front cover.

With the HTC 10, we’re introduced to the successor to Dot View — a higher-res interpretation of the same idea, dubbed Ice View.

Read our introduction to the HTC 10’s Ice View case

Googley Sense

HTC 10 Software

Of all the numerous flavors of Android, HTC has generally presented some of the most coherent UI concepts atop Google’s OS. HTC Sense has been unique yet attractive, with meaningful changes, and not completely removed from Google’s vision of Android.

Then in late 2015, the HTC One A9 pared things back dramatically with a new Sense version — 7.0 G — that included many stock Android elements and design cues in place of HTC’s.

Now on the HTC 10, we’ve got Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow and an all-new version of HTC Sense. The Sense software on HTC 10 doesn’t actually have a version number — at least you won’t find one in the Settings app. Instead it’s advertised as simply “Android with HTC Sense.” And that’s a reflection of what Sense has become in 2016 — a collection of differentiated apps, UI tweaks, under-the-hood optimizations and standout features that complement the Android OS without completely redesigning it.

A 50-50 mix of Google and HTC apps, but a very Googley visual style in the most pared-back HTC Sense yet.

Through a close partnership with Google, HTC has reduced the number of duplicative apps bundled on its new flagship, using its own apps in cases where it makes sense, and in others ditching these offerings in favor of Google’s. So you’ve got HTC’s Sense Home with BlinkFeed, but the Google Calendar app. Sense Dialer, Google Photos — and so on. The overall app mix is about 50 percent Google and 50 percent HTC, but because HTC’s software has adopted a Material Design look and feel, Sense manages to avoid looking like two systems haphazardly tacked together.

When it comes to the overall look and feel, the HTC 10 is way closer to vanilla Android than what HTC One M7 and M8 owners might remember as Sense on their phones. Key elements like the notification tray, quick settings and the Settings app match the “Nexus” software experience almost identically, while the color scheme of the default Sense theme also mirrors that of vanilla Android.

As vanilla as Sense now is, HTC’s comprehensive theming engine remains in place, giving HTC 10 owners endless possibilities for customization of colors, wallpapers, fonts and sound effects. And new in the latest version of Sense, Freestyle mode is a wacky home screen layout that lets you replace traditional icons with stickers, and make your home screens an interactive scene where tapping stickers opens your favorite apps. Being increasingly old and boring, we played around in Freestyle mode for just a few minutes before retreating to the familiar territory of our grid of icons.

BlinkFeed, HTC’s social and news reader, once again gives you a scrolling panel for Twitter updates (but oddly not the preloaded Facebook or Instagram — they need a separate social plugin) and news stories. And the service continues in a similar vein to what we first saw on the One A9, with more prominence given to the News Republic brand. BlinkFeed news stories display in the News Republic app, and customization is handled through that system as well. This means HTC doesn’t need to update this component itself, but with notification nags and account sign-in pop-ups, it’s a definite step back in terms of user experience. (Either way, BlinkFeed is easy to turn off if it’s not your cup of tea.)

HTC has ton of software audio enhancements — with one odd omission.

HTC’s focus on audio extends into its software, too. When playing stuff through the built-in speakers, you’ll be able to choose between music mode and theater mode, which tweaks the EQ levels for different types of content. And when you’re connected to headphones you’ll have four options to choose from depending on the type of headset. Only problem is everything except “Other,” the generic option for all headphones, sounded weirdly muffled to our ears, regardless of which headphones we were using.

Annoyingly, these “BoomSound” software enhancements conjure up a persistent notification whenever any audio or video is playing — including silent videos in Instagram and Twitter. What’s more, the notification pops up even if all BoomSound enhancements are turned off, which is mildly irritating.

HTC’s sound setup also includes the ability to make audio profiles that tune the phone’s output to individual listeners or different audio hardware. This is done either by listening to a series of tones and answering questions, or by telling the software a few things about you (for example how old you are, what kind of music you listen to.) For us, the result was slightly louder output, with a bit more oomph given to the low end.

For all the HTC 10’s audio tweaks and preset modes, the one thing that’s missing is a dedicated software equalizer for setting your own levels. It’s easy enough to download one from Google Play, but for a phone with such a musical focus, it’s an odd omission.

Another software oddity is the “Boost+” app preloaded on the HTC 10, an application which does a handful of useful things — like letting you lock away sensitive apps behind fingerprint security, or tweak games’ performance for better battery life. It can also help clear up “junk” files like old downloads and cached stuff.

Boost+ does some useful things, but randomly clearing apps out of memory isn’t one of them.

But strangely, Boost+ also, by default, sits in the background clearing apps out of memory periodically. It’s not clear why this is necessary — Android’s memory management is pretty good, and in the Linux world free RAM is mostly considered wasted RAM. The only real upside: We didn’t notice any performance difference either way with “Auto Boost” either on or off. So at least it didn’t appear to be doing any harm.

Not that the Sense of 2016 needs any help being smooth and responsive. As you might expect, HTC’s software absolutely flies, and we experienced no instances of stuttering, animation lag or performance bottlenecks anywhere during our time with the HTC 10. Part of that’s surely due to the sheer hardware muscle of current high-end phones, but the manufacturer also claims it’s fine-tuned things under the hood for maximum performance. Given its track record in eking smooth, responsive performance out of less than stellar hardware (like the One A9), we have no reason to doubt it. But it’s arguable that we’re reaching the point of diminishing returns in smartphone smoothness and performance. Though for sure it’s blazing fast, I can’t say the HTC 10 felt noticeably quicker than either the Nexus 6P or Samsung Galaxy S7.

Overall, HTC has employed a lighter touch than ever in its software customizations, and the result is an experience we think will please Android purists and HTC fans alike. It’s fast, it looks good, and the feature set, though not extravagant, brings enough unique stuff to the table to add real value.

A handful of related software bits:

• HTC’s Motion Launch has grown a couple of new useful features, the most helpful of which is a double-swipe down on the screen when asleep to jump straight into the camera app.
• HTC Connect — the feature which lets you swipe up with three fingers to stream content to other devices — now supports AirPlay. In fact, the feature has already rolled out to older HTC phones through an app update.
• The setup wizard on our European HTC 10 gave us the option to install a selection of stuff from a list of “popular” apps. Ostensibly that’s a useful feature that saves you time poking around the Play Store later. But some of the apps on offer here toed dangerously close to bloatware territory. (Money had obviously changed hands to get stuff on this list.)
• The unlocked HTC 10 we reviewed works with EE’s Wi-Fi calling in the UK, however we were unable to get Vodafone’s Wi-Fi calling to work on the device. As Vodafone isn’t planning on ranging the HTC 10, it’s unclear whether there’ll be any official solution here. We also used Wi-Fi calling on T-Mobile in the U.S.
• When it does work, Wi-Fi calling dumps an unsightly persistent notification in your notification tray, which is less than ideal.

Ultrapixels and Ultraselfies

HTC 10 Cameras

If there’s one area in which recent HTC phones have thoroughly disappointed, it’s photography. Through a combination of hardware misadventure and lack of competent software tuning, the M7, M8 and M9 were pretty sub-par cameras compared to their competition.

Forget all that. HTC finally — finally — has a good camera.

It starts with an impressive collection of specs. The HTC 10’s rear shooter is a 12-megapixel “Ultrapixel 2” setup, with the Ultrapixel brand referring to larger pixels on the sensor. HTC’s camera setup has 1.55-micron pixels (like the Nexus 6P), letting each tiny dot take in more light than traditional smartphone cameras, which tend to measure around the 1.1-micron mark. HTC’s paired that beefy sensor with an f/1.8 lens, optical image stabilization (OIS) dual-tone flash and a laser autofocus unit. On paper, then, you couldn’t ask for much more out of a high-end smartphone camera.

Around the front, Ultrapixel morphs into Ultraselfie, with a new optically-stabilized 5-megapixel front facer — the first selfie camera we’re aware of with OIS. It’s got smaller pixels than the M9’s Ultrapixel front-facer (1.34 microns versus 2.0), but the addition of OIS and a higher overall resolution tilts the balance in favor of the HTC 10.

HTC’s Ultrapixel 2 camera is unfazed by most lighting conditions, be they bright, backlit pics or night scenes lit by streetlights.

Technology is one thing, but it doesn’t guarantee you’ll be able to take great pictures. Fortunately, HTC has mostly nailed it with its new flagship’s camera. It’s quick to launch, lightning-fast to capture and reasonably speedy to focus. Crucially, it exhibits none of the metering and exposure weirdness we’ve seen from earlier HTC cameras. With its large pixels and optical stabilization, the HTC 10 is unfazed by darker conditions, and we’ve been able to get some great-looking night shots out of the phone — with one or two caveats.

The HTC 10 is pretty trigger-happy with its ISO levels in darker shots. Compared to major rival Samsung’s Galaxy S7, the HTC 10 tends to crank up sensitivity levels to ensure a steady shot in low light, as opposed to leaning on its OIS and opening the shutter for a little longer. This results in some visible chroma noise in darker shots — although HTC’s camera routinely captured more realistic colors in night shots than the GS7, which gives things a yellowish tint.

Photos from the HTC 10 generally have true-to-life, realistic colors. HTC’s photos appear a little less punchy than Samsung and LG’s more saturated output, but look great in their own right. At the same time, it’s clear HTC isn’t sharpening its images as aggressively as its chief Android rivals, leading to pics that appear a little softer when viewed up close. On the flip side, we sometimes noticed areas of fine detail being mushed out by HTC’s noise canceling and HDR algorithms, an issue that’s less apparent with the competition.

Dependable in most conditions — but HTC’s software occasionally stumbles in macro mode.

But the main point of contention has to do with macro shots, where HTC’s software can get a bit confused. Despite the use of laser-assisted autofocus, the HTC 10 takes noticeably longer to focus on close subjects than competitors, sometimes failing to focus entirely. And on multiple occasions the phone told us the laser was being blocked when trying to take macro shots. All of these small frustrations combine to make a camera that’s just a little bit wonky when it comes to snapping food pictures, flowers or other shots where the camera is close to its subject. Hopefully some of this can be ironed out through future software updates.

Tapping the screen to focus doesn’t set the exposure level, either. The phone instead uses the entire screen to figure that out, and that can be frustrating if you’re trying to highlight something in the foreground, with light coming from behind the subject. While that’ll keep you from blowing out what’s behind, it also means what’s in front may be darker than you want.

Like most Android flagships, the HTC 10 can shoot video at up to 4K resolution, with a time limit attached: in this case, 6 minutes per clip. There’s no such limit when shooting at 1080p, which is the default for the video camera.

OIS, 4K resolution plus high-definition audio makes for an impressive video camera.

Overall, the HTC 10 shoots great-looking video with similar characteristics to its still camera — realistic colors without oversaturation, and a little focus hunting in scenes with lots of movement. Optical stabilization kicks in to make camera movement smooth and shake-free, even when walking with the device in one hand. The phone’s impressive mics, combined with optional high-res audio capabilities, are able to capture a wide range of sounds in louder conditions like concerts or noisy bars.

As for the front camera, HTC’s new stabilized selfie shooter mostly lives up to the hype. In all but extremely dark conditions, it’s able to pick out your mug and successfully focus in on it. And when it is darker, the phone can overdrive the screen’s brightness briefly to act as a makeshift flash. If we were to nitpick, we’d point out that the front camera’s focus seemed a little soft in places. On the whole, however, we have no major complaints.

HTC has also overhauled its camera app, finally including single-tap shortcut keys for flash and HDR. And there’s now an Auto HDR mode — on by default —which does a great job of automatically detecting shots with bright and dark areas. Just about everything else is tucked away slide-out menu over on the left — features like Panorama, Pro mode, which includes RAW capture, and Zoe shot, a combination of burst shots and a few seconds of video. HTC’s camera app also boasts slow-motion video, as well as a built-in Hyperlapse mode for stabilized time-lapse video, both at 720p. And there’s a regular old “settings” menu tucked away in there too, which is a bit of a rat’s nest. Fortunately there’s nothing crucial buried back there.

A big change (and part of this new Google-HTC relationship) is that Google Photos is used as the gallery app. It’s a fully functional gallery app, but it can get a bit busy and confusing, especially if you’re importing photos from other sources into Google Photos. If you just have to use HTC’s gallery app, it’s available in Google Play. Or you’re certainly free to use any other gallery app.

One thing we’d like to see is a faster quick shortcut for launching the camera app when the display is off. It’s possible to double-swipe down on the screen to open the camera, but this isn’t as quick as the double-tap shortcuts we’ve seen on other phones.

Not a perfect smartphone camera, but still a really great one.

This isn’t a perfect smartphone camera. There are minor complaints here and there. There are numerous instances where the Galaxy S7 or iPhone 6s will take subjectively better-looking photos than the HTC 10, mainly because of Samsung and Apple’s lead in image processing. But equally — particularly at night — there are times when the HTC 10 will come away the better-looking shot.

HTC has come a long way in the past year, and we’re way more confident in the HTC 10’s photo capabilities than any of the company’s previous phones. This is a camera worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as the Galaxy S7 — even if there are still some software issues to be worked out.

A ‘one day’ phone

HTC 10 Battery Life

The HTC 10 comes with a fixed 3,000mAh battery, with Qualcomm QuickCharge 3.0 support, and a unique charger from HTC. In addition to Qualcomm’s latest rapid-charging tech, the plug incorporates power management circuitry from HTC in order to regulate current in the brick itself, as well as integrated surge protection. (Perhaps in an effort to avoid damage to the phone or the charger if a dodgy USB-A to C cable is used.)

Rapid charging is a hugely important feature for a high-end smartphone, allowing a dead handset to quickly return to life with a reasonable amount of charge. HTC claims the 10 can go from zero to 50 percent in 30 minutes, and our real-world experiences back this up.

As for battery life itself, it’s been something of a mixed bag. Longevity hasn’t been poor per se, more inconsistent — and sometimes wildly so. Indoors on Wifi, the phone sips power. Outdoors on LTE, it can guzzle juice alarmingly quickly. This isn’t a universal trait. Some days, even on LTE, the phone would easily last us to the end of the day. But on other occasions we’d hit the 50 percent mark in just a couple of hours.

Ignore the hype: There’s no way you’re getting two days out of the HTC 10.

Following a week of use, battery life seems to have stabilized somewhat, and we’ll update this review with any long-term findings.

That said, on a typical day we were getting between 12 and 14 hours out of the HTC 10 with mixed, moderate-to-heavy use on Wifi and LTE, both indoors and outdoors. That consists of browsing in Chrome, chatting on WhatsApp, Slack and Hangouts and streaming music through Google Play Music, along with capturing a few dozen photos. Nothing to sniff at there, but it’s a far cry from the vaunted “two-day” battery life proclaimed in HTC’s marketing materials.

Bottom line: Expect battery life that’s passable — decent, even — but nothing spectacular. Certainly nothing near the two days HTC claims in its marketing material (which undoubtedly makes heavy use of the software-enabled power-saving features.) Even so, the bonus of rapid charging with the bundled plug makes it easier than ever to translate a brief time on charge to a meaningful boost in battery level.

The bottom line

Should you buy the HTC 10? Yes

The HTC 10 is unquestionably HTC’s best phone ever. It’s also a great Android phone in its own right, with an attractive metal unibody, top-notch audio credentials, fast and uncluttered software, speedy fingerprint security and a camera capable of taking great photos.

Even in the areas where it doesn’t shine so brightly — the distinctly one-day battery life, and the display that’s unspectacular in daylight — there’s nothing it’s straight-up bad at. Is it a “perfect 10?” Probably not. But then what is?

The HTC 10 doesn’t exist in a vacuum — HTC will be asking for flagship money in a world where the Galaxy S7 exists.

The biggest issue here is that the HTC 10 doesn’t exist in a vacuum. HTC will be selling the 10 for flagship smartphone money in a world where the Samsung Galaxy S7 exists. It’ll be dropping a great phone into a veritable ocean of great phones.

Samsung has set the bar really high this year with two truly excellent handsets. This is what you get when a corporate giant pours its enormous resources into making the best smartphone it can. By comparison, HTC doesn’t have the vertically-integrated tech, or the scale, or the financial might of its major rival. It’s not even close to being a fair fight.

Nevertheless, this is the comparison HTC invites with its claims to perfection.

And this leads into what in my view is the HTC 10’s Achilles’ heel: The areas where HTC actually truly beats Samsung are so very few and far between. The speaker’s a bit better. It can drive headphones with more power. You’ll get more accurate looking night shots, sometimes. The software is somewhat closer to stock Android, if that’s your thing. Even build quality is mostly a question of personal taste — do you prefer glass or metal? By contrast, Samsung can point to its its superlative displays, wireless charging, water resistance, VR integration and, in the case of the GS7 edge, market-leading battery life.

A worthy challenger, if not quite the very, very best.

The HTC 10 is nevertheless a phone that deserves your consideration, and potentially your money too. And given that LG’s G5 seems to have fallen flat, it’s probably the closest competitor Samsung has right now. That the HTC of 2016 can create a phone like this is impressive, and a reason for its continued relevance.

Depending on how things play out in the months ahead — and how well HTC’s marketing is received — this phone could emerge as the de facto alternative to the Galaxy S7. Ultimately, that’s what the HTC 10 is: a worthy challenger, if not quite the very, very best there is.

24 hours in the Oculus Rift

The enemy pilot that has been on my ass for the last 45 seconds finally caught up to me.

It was my own fault. I ran out of debris when I cut left instead of right, and now there’s nowhere for me to hide. Alarms are going off all through the cockpit, cracks have formed across the glass canopy, and I’ve just burned through my countermeasures. There’s no way out of this, and just as I start rotating the ship to face my enemy head on, everything explodes. Glass flies inward toward me, and then all of the air in the cockpit is sucked out into space.

In the real world, I exhale deeply and my heart rate increases. It happens every time I die in Eve: Valkyrie, and it’s the first of dozens of times my body has reacted physically to something I’ve seen in the Oculus Rift CV1.

VR hardware is nothing new, but this generation’s efforts in head tracking, higher resolution displays, and pricing that works in some but probably not enough homes has created a compelling place to play. In many ways, the current rush in VR started in promises made when future owners clicked on the Oculus Rift Kickstarter for the first time. An immersive environment for games, compatibility with the Xbox One, and a whole new world for video experiences were at the top of the list, and even as far back as the first developer kit it was clear Rift was going to be something special. Two years and several revisions later — not to mention a separate mobile partnership with Samsung — it’s clear the early vision for the hardware capabilities of the Oculus Rift has been realized.

The most important things for Oculus to have accomplished with the retail Rift are ease of use and a healthy selection of launch content. The former Oculus has mostly nailed. Out of the box, it couldn’t be more clear what you’re supposed to do with the Rift. Plug in the cables, follow the simple step-by-step instructions on the setup guide linked in the box, and put the headset on.

Oculus is a big fan of telling people you can put the headset on like a baseball cap, and for the most part that is true. If you wear glasses you’re going to want to put the headset on eyes-first instead of the way the instructions tell you, and the fit is more than a little tight — weirdly less comfortable than using the Samsung Gear VR in fact — but it works. Once the headset is set on your head correctly, the eye adjustment tool is easy to use and effective. The headset sits on your head without resting on your nose, depending on the shape of your face. If you’ve got a slender nose, you’ll find you can stare down your nose into the real world, which also causes a little bit of light bleed in virtual reality itself.

Playing a game is clearly the main event, and that part works amazingly well.

A few hours into use, and one thing that is clear about the design of this headset is a need for nearly constant cleaning. Dust on the lenses, skin particulates after letting someone else use it, and fingerprints everywhere will have you scrambling for alcohol wipes and microfiber cleaning cloths. Curiously, Oculus doesn’t include anything in the package for cleaning. Most of the rubbery surfaces are easy enough to wipe out, but the IR-friendly cloth around the outer shell is going to collect anything and everything. The same is likely true of the velcro straps over time, though that’s unlikely to be a problem unless you’re constantly adjusting.

Similar to what we’ve seen with the Samsung Gear VR, Oculus has built a virtual environment with a friendly menu system to explore. The wall of content is broken out into a couple of simple groups, with large icons and text so you’re not squinting to see what’s going on. The virtual environment is currently a futuristic apartment, with you at the center on a large rug with books and a fireplace surrounding you. The content wall is filled with games, but few of them will be immediately familiar to most. Eve: Valkyrie and two other games are available immediately to install, but if you’re looking for a big familiar name from traditional PC or console lineups you’ll be disappointed. That’s not to say there aren’t plenty of interesting things here, they’re just unfamiliar. What does seem to be missing are video apps. The Oculus-powered Gear VR has dozens to choose from, including Hulu and Netflix. It’s possible these apps are delayed or require different licenses to work with the desktop hardware out of a browser, but it’s strange to see them missing.

Installing a new game through the Oculus environment is currently a little on the frustrating side. You hit the install button with your included Xbox One controller, and when it is finished you’re told to remove the headset and complete a “final installation” on your monitor. This means removing the headset, clicking a single button on your PC, and putting the headset back on. With Eve: Valkyrie, this happened a second time after installation so you can link your Eve and Oculus accounts. This process feels unnecessary; rendering the desktop in VR for you to click that one button would be trivial, and would put significantly less work on the user. There’s even a Virtual Desktop app you can install from Steam to do exactly this, but it’s not available out of the box and installing third-party software requires navigating through Settings to enable the option.

Playing games is clearly the main event, and that part works amazingly well. Head tracking is incredibly smooth in every title we tried, but head positioning is a little more finicky. There’s a button in the Oculus quick menu for re-positioning yourself in the game, and it is frequently used at the start of Eve: Valkyrie. Games that recommend standing or sitting state it clearly, and getting those two confused is a great way to fall down or become nauseated, but the overall experience is fantastic. Visually, Oculus has delivered.

The level of immersion is exactly what we’ve come to expect from all the demos we’ve had so far with the developer hardware, but the inclusion of headphones is something new. The simple padding hides how capable these headphones are, as they look a little on the cheap side at first glance. Positioning them correctly over your ears is a great way to feel completely immersed with decent audio, but if you’ve got over-the-ear headphones you prefer you’ll probably want to swap them out quickly.

The transition from Oculus Rift Developer Kit to the now shipping CV1 version of this generation’s first big VR headset has been a long and exciting process. There aren’t many opportunities to watch a company and their first product grow and change over time, and that’s exactly what we got with the Oculus Rift as it moved from Kickstarter to trend starter. Now that we’ve finally had some time with the retail version of this VR headset, it’s a lot easier to appreciate the journey so far and at the same time feel excited about the accessories and software that are on the way for this headset.

Airbnb’s new iOS and Android apps promise to help you live like a local

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky just took the stage at a lavish event held in the company’s San Francisco headquarters to introduce new apps for iOS and Android that he says are a reflection of the company’s philosophy to let its users “live” in the places the visit, not just view them as tourists do. “We asked people what the number one reason they travel on Airbnb, 86 percent said they want to live like a local,” Chesky said. The new apps are meant to further that goal and keep people from cookie-cutter “drive-by tourism” — what Chesky said you get when you just follow a guidebook or TripAdvisor recommendations.

The new apps further this goal in three ways. The first is a new “matchmaking” system to help you find hosts that fit with you. Furthermore, it helps the hosts hone in just the type of people they want staying in their home, as well. “Every time you do a search, we learn more about you,” Chesky said, “and through machine learning the searches become better, higher quality and more relevant to you.” What data specifically Airbnb is using to match you with your hosts isn’t entirely clear yet, but the idea is that everyone who searches on Airbnb will get different results based on their profile and history.

That idea extends to the next major new part of the app, the neighborhood matching system. Much like hosts, every time you search you can tell the app what types of neighborhoods you’re looking for (central, walkable, family-friendly and so forth) and it’ll return results based on those criteria. The program includes with 691 distinct neighborhoods in 23 cities, all covered with pretty excellent photography to give you a feel of what the place it like. When you view a particular neighborhood, you can scroll down to see places to stay based on the criteria you’ve entered.

It’s worth nothing that Airbnb launched its neighborhood system way back in 2012, but now it’s directly integrated into the app itself. Presumably, as you use the app and its neighborhood system, it’ll get better at recommending places for you to stay. The company has touted its massive data set in the past as a way to help hosts get more bookings, and it seems like that data will also be used to make the guest experience better as well.

The last component of the app sounds like the most useful — host-created guidebooks will now be integrated right into the app. At the neighborhood level, you’ll get to see what local hosts recommend as the best things around for travelers to check out. It definitely sounds like the kind of thing that’ll further Airbnb’s goal of helping its users feel more integrated into the city they’re visiting.

It sounds like these new apps are just the tip of the iceberg for Airbnb’s mission to make its users feel more like locals, as well. Chesky ended his presentation with a quick video and a tease of a November announcement that would take Airbnb “beyond the home” — it sounded a lot like he was teasing a broad rollout of the Journeys pilot program that the company started last fall. For now, though, these new apps will have to suffice.

What is Magic Leap and why might it kill all screens?

Magic Leap is the future of augmented reality. It is everything Minority Report style controllers envisaged and more. It is the death of the screen.

All those things are pretty big statements but they’re all things Magic Leap could represent. With over $540 million in funding and with backers like Google and Qualcomm, even the big names in tech seem to think this is the future.

Magic Leap, essentially, uses a head-worn display to project virtual images on the real world. But unlike other examples, like Microsoft’s HoloLens, this uses a proprietary technology to make the blend between real and virtual almost undetectable.

So how does Magic Leap work and what does it mean for the future?

Magic Leap projects into your eye

The technology that sets Magic Leap apart from other augmented reality competition is pretty secretive. All the company has revealed so far is that it invented the system and it works like nothing else.

The tech is called Dynamic Digitised Lightfield Signal, or Digital Lightfield for short. This, essentially, projects images directly into the eye so it hits the retina. Traditional projectors would fire the light at a surface which bounces it back into the eye. By going directly it is able to “trick” the brain into thinking it’s real.

Describing how it’s done the company say it uses “hardware, software, sensors, core processors, and a few things that just need to remain a mystery.”

The software is so smart the demo videos show that light created in the virtual projects even bounce off real world items and create shadows. The final result is a seamless, real-looking projection.

So far Magic Leap has only shown off the lens part of it’s system of hardware. This it called a Photonics Chip. It won’t commit to what the headset, if that’s what it ends up being, will look or work like.

Magic Leap could kill the screen

By creating a headset that projects directly onto the retina there is no need for screens anymore. Since the resolution and focus of the images are going to be near real, it’s likely that no screen will compare. It also means everything can be adaptive so the display suits the information.

Video examples show menus being scrolled as if they were on a physical wheel. Items, like an email inbox, could be placed on a real-world desk as if it were a real mailbox.

How about checking out the score of a sports game when out and about? Imagine looking up and seeing the scoreboard floating right there as if you were at the game. Or watching a film on a flight, just let the screen take up your field of view and be immersed like being at the cinema.

There are even rumours that Steven Spielberg is working on the movie adaptation of the Ready Player One book with Magic Leap. Imagine a movie experience in total virtual reality? Very exciting potential indeed.

READ: Spielberg to adapt Ready Player One gamer novel, may use Magic Leap tech for AR movie

Magic Leap could re-invent gaming

One of the huge applications for Magic Leap is gaming. Imagine being able to enjoy virtual reality immersion while still moving freely around a room and not banging into things. That’s what augmented reality does as the wearer can still see the world about them.

Microsoft showed off a HoloLens doing exactly that, even using the real-world furniture as part of the gameplay environment.

The fact that the Magic Leap unit appears to recognise hands means holding virtual objects like guns appears to be easy. Although perhaps a real-world prop will help in these instances.

READ: Microsoft HoloLens gets $3,000 price and Project X-Ray mixed reality game revealed

Magic Leap hardware is a mystery

While demo videos have been shown of what Magic Leap can, or could do, there’s no hardware reveal, yet. That lens, it’s calling a Photonics Chip, that was shown just looks like any other to the naked eye. It’s described by the CEO Rony Abovitz as: “A three dimensional wafer like component that has very small structures in it. They manage the flow of photons that ultimately create a digital lightfield signal”.

The headset will have to be mobile and comfortable on the face for it to work effectively while moving. That likely means it won’t be cheap. But if it’s replacing every screen and television in your life maybe that’ll be worth it.

Magic Leap demo videos

Magic Instruments’ digital guitar makes it easy for anyone to jam

Magic Instruments co-founder and CEO Brian Fan knows the pain of learning new instruments. A Juilliard-trained pianist before starting his own company, he spent years trying to learn the guitar, only to put it down after realizing that all his work didn’t help him suck any less. What young, would-be rocker hasn’t been there? His version of rising to the challenge was a little different than you might think, though. Rather than dedicating another chunk of his life to mastering the basics, Fan dedicated a chunk of his life to building a new kind of guitar. He calls his $299 Bluetooth-connected brainchild a “digital rhythm guitar,” and its raison d’etre is to let anyone to feel the thrill of playing music.​

Now, here’s the thing: It isn’t meant to teach you how to play a real guitar. Some aspects of using the rhythm guitar, like strumming its six strings, can unintentionally help with your traditional playing. Still, there’s plenty of hardware out there specifically meant to make you a better guitarist. Instead, this is meant to get you playing music quickly; to more easily experience the unique joy that comes with powering through a Bon Jovi tune in one shot.

The Magic Instruments formula has two parts. The first is a big plastic guitar (available in either black or white) that has a distinctly Les Paul vibe to it. (The company also considered a wooden version, but eventually shelved it.) From a distance, it’s nearly indistinguishable from a regular electric guitar. A quartet of effect-selector knobs sits low on the guitar’s body, just where you’d expect them to be. There’s also a standard 1/4-inch output for running the thing into amplifiers. The differences are only apparent when you get up close. Next to that amp output is a headphone jack and a MIDI-out to make the guitar play nice with Logic Pro or Ableton. There’s a speaker between where the pickups on an electric guitar would be. Most importantly, though, the fretboard is full of buttons.

Holding the fat button on the right side of a fret and strumming the strings plays a root chord, while strumming and holding a different button on that fret allows you to plays a variation of that chord. As you move down the fretboard, you get different root chords and, well, that’s the long and short of it. If you’re feeling fancy, you can do some fingerpicking too; the strings vary in volume depending on how hard you pluck them. Eight AA batteries power the device, and the body itself is only a little lighter than most electric guitars. In other words, this is no chintzy Guitar Hero controller.

The other half of the setup is an app for iOS and Android that contains the equivalent of sheet music: carefully annotated, karaoke-style lyric pages that scroll as you play the right notes. You can buy songs for $0.99 a pop, or shell out $6 a month for unfettered access to Magic Instruments’ entire catalog. To that end, Fan says that music publishers have been surprisingly open to letting Magic Instruments sell their stuff. After all, the overlap between people who buy sheet music and the people who’ll buy digital files to jam with on a plastic guitar is probably close to nil. Marking all that music up for use with the guitar’s companion app is going to take some time, which is partially why the team isn’t planning to ship its first units until early 2017.

As you might expect, Fan’s vision has drawn its share of haters: people who feel the ability to play music is something to be earned through dedication and practice. I’ll be honest, I sort of felt the same way when I first met him. Once upon a time, I got an electric guitar for Christmas, and wouldn’t you know it: wee Velazco was god-awful. I plugged away at it for ages, but even now, I can just barely noodle my way through the classics. I suck at playing guitar because I never put in the time; wouldn’t using MI’s rhythm guitar feel like a cop-out? Personally, I got over that quickly. My strumming was terrible and it took a minute to get used to the kooky fretboard, but after a while I started to feel… cool? The nagging voice saying “you’re not really playing guitar” gave way to “well, you’re playing something,” which eventually led to “you’re really playing this thing!” The experience is, for lack of a better phrase, fun as hell. It’s also obviously not for everyone.

Ultimately, haters will still consider the Magical Instruments guitar as a toy. That’s an awfully reductive way to look at it, but let’s say you agree with them: Does it really matter as long as you feel good playing it? The most rapturous pieces of music in history were crafted by people with an immense grasp of theory and instrumental mechanics, but Fan doesn’t think they should get to have all the fun. With a new Indiegogo campaign and a full release on the horizon, we’ll soon see who was right.

Engadget giveaway: Win an LG G5 courtesy of Spigen!

With spring upon us, you may have cleaned your house and refreshed your wardrobe, but this week you could also win a fresh new smartphone to brighten up the season. Case and accessory maker Spigen has given us two new LG G5 phones and a selection of five cases for two lucky readers this week. LG’s latest handset has a 5.3-inch display, expandable memory and a unique fast-swappable battery feature. To keep this new phone safe, Spigen has included five of its most popular case designs: the Tough Armor, Neo Hybrid, Rugged Armor, Crystal Shell and lastly the Style Armor, which accommodates quick access to the G5’s battery without needing to remove the case. Just head to the Rafflecopter widget below for up to three chances at winning. You can also find discount codes below to buy Spigen’s G5 and S7 Edge cases or even opt to write some reviews in exchange for a few freebies.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

LG G5 Cases : Just $5 with code
Style Armor – Black (FXNEN5VX), Rose Gold (58HJBUI2)
Neo Hybrid Crystal – Gunmetal (Z8HKZY7N), Satin Silver (QBG8MCNU)
Wallet S – Black (IGEJJX76)

GS7 Edge Cases : Just $5 with code
Rugged Armor – Black – (CGOZ8AHZ)
Ultra Hybrid – Crystal Clear – (2CVC4EFG)

• Entries are handled through the Rafflecopter widget above. Comments are no longer accepted as valid methods of entry. You may enter without any obligation to social media accounts, though we may offer them as opportunities for extra entries. Your email address is required so we can get in touch with you if you win, but it will not be given to third parties.
• Contest is open to all residents of the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Canada (excluding Quebec), 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so direct your anger at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
• Winners will be chosen randomly. Two (2) winners will each receive one (1) LG G5 smartphone (T-mobile, Gold) and a set of LG G5 Spigen cases including: Tough Armor, Neo Hybrid, Rugged Armor, Crystal Shell and Style Armor.
• If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of being contacted. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Make sure that the account you use to enter the contest includes your real name and a contact email. We do not track any of this information for marketing or third-party purposes.
• This unit is purely for promotional giveaway. Engadget and AOL are not held liable to honor warranties, exchanges or customer service.
• The full list of rules, in all its legalese glory, can be found here.
• Entries can be submitted until April 20th at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!

Magic Leap reveals more about its ‘mixed reality’ tech

Despite billions in funding and board members like Peter Jackson and Sundar Pichai, there’s still a lot of mystery around Magic Leap’s augmented reality (AR) tech. We know that it’s making a self-contained, high-resolution AR headset that seamlessly inserts digital elements into the real world, much like Microsoft’s Hololens. We’ve also seen a patent application and a spectacular gaming concept video. However, the company has revealed a bit more new information about its vision for Magic Leap via a new demo video (below) and a feature article from Wired.

The company made a significant step by doing its first press demo, but Wired didn’t say what the product looked like or how it worked, exactly. There’s still no timeline for release, either, but Magic Leap did give a few more clues about its tech. For one thing, CEO Rony Abovitz prefers to call it “mixed reality” rather than AR. He also says the product differs from AR systems like Microsoft’s Hololens or Meta AR. To create the illusion of depth, those products use beam-splitting tech to reflect light into users’ eyes, which can make it difficult to focus on near and far objects.

Magic Leap, by contrast, uses a “three-dimensional, wafer-like component that has very small structures in it, and they manage the flow of photons that ultimately create a digital light-field signal,” according to Abovitz. That doesn’t clear things up much, but according to its patent, the company has some kind of fiber-optic projection that simulates how light naturally gets into your eyes, helping them focus on far and near objects more naturally. In addition, the system eliminates the “screen door” effect seen in regular VR displays, according to Wired.

The company says the new video was “shot directly through Magic Leap technology,” and contains no special effects or compositing. In it, you can see Minority Report-style notifications and graphics floating in mid-air, a 3D view of Mount Everest and a school of jellyfish swimming through the room. The digital elements look formidably realistic, despite occasional jitter. However, Microsoft’s Hololens also looked great in videos, but the limited field of view and other shortcomings only became clear during extended demos.

Microsoft has started shipping developer kits for Hololens, so it clearly has a big lead on Magic Leap. However, the company says it’s willing to be patient in order to create an engrossing, natural experience. “That to me is the real Magic Leap, like you crossed through the looking glass and you’re on the other side,” says Abovitz. Fantasy aside, the clock is starting to tick on the company at least showing a prototype, so hopefully the PR push is a sign that it’s nearly ready. With Google as a backer, perhaps we’ll hear more news at the I/O conference next month.

Source: Wired

Play with your pets from anywhere with PlayDate’s smart ball

We’ve seen connected food dispensers and health trackers for pets, but we’re still waiting for the first truly great smart pet toy. That’s what PlayDate is aiming for with its smart ball, which resembles Sphero’s devices and LG’s upcoming Rolling Bot. It can be controlled remotely and has an integrated webcam, so you can use it to keep an eye on your furry friends throughout the house, as well as give them something to chase. And of course, it also lets you snap photos and videos of their playtime. PlayDate is launching an Indiegogo campaign today to raise $60,000, and you can snag an early engraved model for $129. That price jumps to $149 for the “Indiegogo special,” which is still less than the proposed $249 retail cost.

As PlayDate CEO Kevin Li tells it, he started experimenting with connected pet gadgets after adopting his dog Hulk several years ago. His first idea was to build a wearable to track Hulk’s activity, but he quickly learned that pet owners faced a bigger issue: the guilt of leaving their beloved animals home alone all day. That set him down the path of building a mobile device that could be controlled from anywhere, and help owners stay in touch with their pets.

If you’ve seen Star Wars’ BB-8 in action (which was built by Sphero), you already have a sense of how PlayDate works. You control it with an iOS or Android app, which also lets you see what’s happening via its stabilized webcam. Even though the ball can move in any direction, patented technology keeps the video looking smooth. You can also speak to your pet through the app, as well as hear their response with the ball’s microphone. And, in a wise move, the app features a “squeek” button, which spits out a high pitched noise to get your pet moving.

PlayDate’s outer shell is made out of shatterproof plastic, so your pets can bash and bite it as much as they like, and it’s removable. That could be a way the company lets you customize the robots down the line. It’s also working on shells made specifically for cats, which feature ribbons.

Compared to LG’s Rolling Bot, Li says the PlayDate is considerably smaller, which means there’s less of a chance your pet will be afraid of it. He also emphasized that the PlayDate is engineered to be durable for pet play — LG’s device isn’t protected from overzealous dog chewing.

While I’ve become increasingly wary of crowdfunding campaigns for gadgets (my wife is still waiting for her Bistro cat feeder), PlayDate also seems like it could be an ideal way for me to play with my cats at work. I’ve only seen a prototype in action at this point, but you can be sure I’ll be checking in with the company over the next few months.

Source: Indiegogo, PlayDate

‘Mafia III’ drops you in a 60s gang war this October

A new Mafia III trailer dropped today, teasing more of the game’s mobster action from the late 1960s. It all takes place in the fictional city of New Bordeaux, a locale loosely inspired by New Orleans, as Vietnam veteran Lincoln Clay returns from war. When his surrogate family, the black mob, are attacked by the Italian mafia, Clay seeks all-out revenge. There are some brutal scenes, however the two-minute teaser is also incredibly stylish in its depiction of the new setting. Much of that can be attributed to Son of a Preacher Man, which plays in the background throughout.

To coincide with the new trailer, publisher 2K has also revealed the game’s release date: October 7th. The fall is always the busiest season for so-called “triple-A” video game releases, however Mafia III shouldn’t have a problem standing out from its competition. After all, when the game hits store shelves, it’ll have been more than six years since Mafia II was released on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. After laying dormant for such a long period, there should be plenty of interest in the franchise’s return.

Source: Mafia III

HBO and Discovery make major investment in virtual reality

Virtual reality isn’t just seeing a revival when it comes to gaming, immersive content is taking root in journalism, movies and television as well. In fact, two networks made an investment in a virtual and augmented reality company to help drive future production projects. OTOY, a company that makes cloud-based graphics software covering the capture, rendering and streaming of VR and AR content announced today that both HBO and Discovery are backing it “to create universal publishing platform for TV, movies and original holographic content.” While holograms are mentioned throughout the press release, VR and AR factor heavily into the networks’ plans.

HBO was already familiar with OTOY, as the company is working with Jon Stewart on his upcoming project using its technology. “OTOY has a roadmap for the future of entertainment and technology,” said HBO president Michael Lombardo in the news release. “Their creativity and drive perfectly aligns with HBO’s.” Discovery already offers VR content of its own through Discovery VR, but it says OTOY can lend a hand in taking its virtual and augmented reality experiences “to a whole new level.”

OTOY’s founder and CEO Jules Urbach explains that the company’s goal is to make “holographic and immersive content” accessible options for viewers, publishers and artists. Not only are HBO and Discovery investors, but they’re also content partners, and Urbach says the trio will collaborate “to map out the future of entertainment.” The company has been working on a number of VR solutions, including streams that the viewer can move around in. Jon Stewart’s upcoming short-form content for HBO will likely be the first fruits of the relationship, which will be available via HBO Now when it debuts.

Source: OTOY