How to personalize your Android phone with themes, launchers, and more!

Every Android user has a theme on their phone. They just don’t know it yet.

Updated March 2017: Links were added to newer content and images were refreshed.

Even if you don’t know what icon packs or launchers are, if your phone has a home screen on it, it’s got a theme. Android users don’t have to live in their app drawers; they can choose how their phone looks and functions. They can use widgets to interact with apps without opening them. They can use custom icons to theme or obscure the apps on their phone from prying eyes. They can even use gestures and contextual data to help their phone adapt to where they are and what they’re doing.

So, what are Android themes and how can you get started with one?

What’s in a theme?

There are many types of themes within Android, but the kinds we’re going to refer to throughout this article are home screen themes or launcher themes. A theme is the visual styling of your home screen, through the choice and use of launchers, wallpapers, widgets, icon packs, sounds, and other elements.

When most users think of themes, they imagine complex elements and high-maintenance setups. They imagine custom KWGT widgets and elaborate icon packs. And while there are many people who do completely overhaul their launchers regularly, for most of us, a theme does not mean changing the way your phone is set up, only how that setup looks.

Even if you’re not interested in making your home screen look pretty, there are some other uses for launcher themes and customization that you may be interested in:

• Hiding apps: Most launchers have the option of hiding an app from the app drawer, but for apps that you want easily accessible but away from prying eyes, many launchers also allow you to rename apps and give them icons less likely to draw the eye. Or make them invisible all together.
• Transferring themes and setups: Your mother just got a new phone, but she just wants everything where it was on her old one. Well, with theme backups, you can make all her Android devices look like her old one.
• Efficiency: The less time you spend fumbling around your app drawer looking for the app you need, the quicker you can get back to doing something with your life besides staring at your phone. Many launchers will re-order your apps based on your location, and through the use of your launcher’s folders, you can cut down on the clutter, both in your app drawer and on your home screen.
• Choice: Don’t like the way your app drawer is alphabetized? Don’t like only having a 4×4 grid on your home screen and not being able to resize your widgets? A third-party launcher can let you choose just about everything about your launcher experience.

Launchers and how to use them

All phones come with a launcher, which is the interface through which users interact with their phone’s apps and customize their home screens. [Samsung](/samsung] phones come with the TouchWiz launcher, HTC phones come with Sense Home, LG simply calls its launcher the Home launcher, and Pixel phones use the Pixel Launcher, and so on. Some of these launchers have more options than others.

Samsung’s TouchWiz launcher allows you to resize the home screen grid. Both TouchWiz and Sense allow custom system themes, with theme galleries for users to select from, and the benefit of these themes go beyond the home screen. These themes also reach the notification shade, and system apps like Settings, Messages, and the Phone dialer. So, even if you’re looking into getting a third-party launcher, if you phone has these themes, you might want to browse through them.

If you’re ready to jump into the wonderful world of third-party launchers, there’s a lot out there to choose from, but here are three launchers that should help you get your feet wet.

• Nova Launcher: Nova is one of the most popular launchers out there that doesn’t ship on a phone. While being highly customizable, it’s still a launcher that is easy for most beginners to ease into. Nova is also has a free version for you to cut your teeth on before you invest in Nova Prime.
• Action Launcher 3: Action Launcher 3 is a fan favorite — and an editor favorite, too — and if you’re looking for a launcher with a new twist on efficiency, AL3 may be just the ticket. Quickdrawer can replace the app drawer with a fast-scrolling app list on the left side of the screen, and features like Shutters and Covers help conserve space using folders and widgets in new ways.
• Yahoo Aviate: If you want to let your launcher do the organizational work for you, perhaps try Aviate, the launcher that Yahoo acquired. Aviate adapts to your schedule and your locations to arrange the apps and widgets it thinks you need right now.

If you’re looking for more launchers to try, see our favorite launchers!

It all begins with a wallpaper…

No matter what launcher you use, you need something to put up behind your widgets and apps. Wallpapers come from all corners of the internet and beyond. If you’re not using a picture of your kids or your dog or that lovely little cabin up in Denver that you’re gonna own just as soon as the stock market improves, you may want to consider replacing the wallpaper that came on your phone with pictures from one of these sources:

• Muzei: If you’re looking for beautiful wallpapers that will rotate out on a regular basis, Muzei and its many, many extensions are here for you. Muzei is a live wallpaper, meaning it’s a program rather than a single static image. Muzei will pull pictures from one or more gallery sources and set a new one as your wallpaper every few hours.
• Android Central’s Wallpaper Weekly: We showcase five new wallpapers every week to help give you some topical, top-notch wallpapers for your home screen
• Zedge: Zedge is kinda like the Walmart of wallpapers, ringtones and other theme elements. Zedge hosts tens of thousands of wallpapers for you to download and apply, from dozens of categories.
• DeviantArt: If you’re looking for some more artistic fare for your wall? Go to the venue tens of millions of artists use to share their art with the world. DeviantArt has it all, from nouveau tableaus to digital renderings to classic paintings.
• Icon Packs: If you’re intending to use an icon pack, many packs come with wallpapers to compliment the icons they’ve worked so hard on.

Widgets, widgets everywhere

Widgets are basically miniature apps that run on your homescreen. There are several types of widgets, from toggle widgets to control your Hue Lights to forecast widgets for your local weather to playback widgets to control your music. Most of your apps probably came with some kind of widget, and in addition there are third party widgets you can download if you don’t like those.

They allow us to access and interact with data from our apps without having to open the full app every time. I can go to the next track in Play Music without having to go into my current queue. I can mute my phone and turn off my mobile data without going into Settings. I can turn on my Hue lights without ever leaving my home screen.

Widgets also serve as shortcuts into apps, or better yet into specific functions of an app. The Google Keep widget lets me access my most recent notes or start a new one without keeping the icon in my dock. The Netflix widget can take me to the next episode of my current shows. My weather widget can take me to current conditions of one of my forecasts, depending on what I click.

Also falling under the category of widgets are Shortcuts, which are lumped into Widgets with many launchers including Nova. The icon for your app drawer is a shortcut. Other popular shortcuts are contact shortcuts, to call your spouse or text your kids, and setting shortcuts, such as Tethering, Location, and Power. In addition, shortcuts can take you into certain playlists, albums, or activities within an app.

Make your apps pop — or blend in — with icon packs

Much as we wish it weren’t so, not all icons are created equal. Google has guidelines for app icons, but Samsung and HTC and LG do, too. And each developer may have their own ideas about how their icon should or shouldn’t fit with those guidelines. As a result, our app drawers often look like a melting pot of icon styles. Well, never fear! Icon packs are here to make our apps look uniform again… at least in the launcher.

Now, most launchers that come preloaded on your phone do not allow you to use icon packs from the Google Play Store. Even the themes on HTC and Samsung phones don’t allow you to apply icon packs from the Play Store, only from their proprietary stores. So, if you’re interested in theming your icons without doing it one at a time, you’ll need to seek out a third-party launcher with custom icon support, such as Nova Launcher or Action Launcher 3.

As mentioned before, custom icons can help make your app drawer look uniform, but it can also help apps fly under the radar, as it were. Using a false icon or a blank icon can help turn a curiosity into an innocuous calculator or word processor. We’re not here to judge, we’re just here to help.

Check out some of our favorite icon packs

Can you hear the smartphones ring?

There’s a broadway adage that goes “Nobody leaves the theater humming the scenery”. No matter how beautiful your theme may be, the portion of your theme that those around you will notice most isn’t something they’ll see on their screen. It’s what they’ll hear from your phone every time you get a call, text, or notification. And while you can get sounds for your theme nearly anywhere, here are a few resources for finding sounds that suit your themes, your personality, and your environment.

• Zedge: Zedge has just about every ringtone you can imagine and some more that you can’t. They even have that ungodly Samsung Whistle that my mother just has to have… Anyways, Zedge is a great resource, and you can set the sounds directly in the app instead of having to download them and copy them into the proper system folder.
• Reddit: Even if you’re not much of redditor, Reddit is a wonderful place to look for ringtones and other theme elements. There are threads in r/Android every few months, if not every few weeks, where users will swap ringtones and ringtone ideas, and ringtone/wallpaper threads pop up in fandom reddits all the time.
• Audacity: Okay, this isn’t actually an Android app, it’s a desktop program. I’ve made plenty of themes in my day, and I have to say that my best themes’ sounds usually come from me sampling something from a YouTube video or a track in my music library. So if you’re not finding what you want elsewhere, clip it yourself!

And remember: sounds can be magical, nostalgic, or downright annoying. A co-worker had an Eric Cartman notification tone for two months. Every time he got a text, I wanted to throw his phone through the wall.

Be memorable, not maddening.

For adding sounds to your Android device, check out our guide to custom ringtones!

This is only the beginning…

Once you get used to your new launcher and some new widgets, we’ll be ready to dive into gesture controls, Kustom widgets, Tasker shortcuts, and much, much more… the world of Android customization is out there, just waiting to be explored. But for now, show us your screen and what you’re using on it! Have a launcher you’ll use forever? Which widget never leaves your home screen? Swear by your icon pack? Share them below! And stay tuned for more Android theming goodness!

Cutting the cord: How Modern Dad ditched cable TV

How my family took the plunge and unplugged cable TV for good.

It’s sort of a rite of passage for folks of a certain age — especially those of us who grew up in a time before cable TV. Our kids? They don’t know the differences between networks and cable news. It all looks the same — who cares how it comes in, right? But for me, the time came when the $150 a month I was paying for cable TV just wasn’t worth it.

It was time to unplug.

I’m hardly the first to cut the cord. And while it hasn’t necessarily been painless, it’s definitely been a bit easier than I expected. And the best part is that there’s no single way to do it.

What works for me may work for you, or maybe it won’t. But at the very least I think it’ll get you moving in the right direction. Here’s a breakdown of everything I’m using.

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The hardware

Android TV

Le Eco sent me a Super4 X65 TV to check out. It’s not the most high-end display out there, and there a number of nagging little software bugs. But it’s pretty darn good for the price and looks great in my living room. (I’d wait for those bugs to be worked out before buying, though.)

Android TV built into the TV is glorious.

But the big difference for me is that it’s got Android TV built in. I’ve been using Android TV since its inception, of course. (Hell, since before it was Android TV, really.) And while it’s great in a box, it’s even better when it’s built in. You don’t have to worry about switching inputs on a remote — you just scroll down through the UI to pick what you want. That’s made things a good bit easier on the wife and kids.

A downside, though, is that if you want to use a separate Android TV box, you’ll essentially be running Android TV on top of Android TV, which was a little crazy when I plugged in an NVIDIA Shield TV. (But that’s also something most folks are unlikely to do.)

Why’d I even attempt that little bit of inception? The Shield TV is the only Android TV instance that has access to Amazon videos. (Damn exclusives strike again.) That’s another thing to consider. If you just have to have Amazon Video, you’ll need a separate piece of hardware to get it.

See at Amazon

In the bedroom: Apple TV

In the bedroom I’ve got an aging dumb TV that I’m using with a latest-gen Apple TV. It’s definitely got more of an app-launcher feel than an embedded OS. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, just different. And there are a ton of apps, and all the content you’d expect to find from Apple.

There’s not a whole lot of fault to be found in Apple TV.

The screen savers are beautiful. Ridiculously so. I’m seriously considering upgrading the TV back there just so they look better. I could spend all day watching the aerials. For as good as the Chromecast backdrops are, these are even better. (And not clunked up by the optional on-screen chrome that Google goes for.) And Airplay is as easy as Chromecast when it comes to shooting things over from an iPhone, iPad or Mac. Maybe even easier. (And it’s seamless when it comes to using one of those devices to input text.)

Apple TV has the added bonus of a proper ethernet port for better connectivity — again, that’s a concern when it comes to streaming. (But even then you’re still at the mercy of the stream itself.)

See at Apple

The only real down side to Apple TV is that the remote is awful. I’m not even talking about the weird touchpad — just the lack of ergonomics and ridiculous button scheme. Which leads me to …

Logitech Harmony remotes

Investing in a couple good universal remotes has made a world of difference. This is especially true if you’ve got multiple boxes connected to a single TV. (I can’t stand having to deal with more than one remote.)

In the living room I’ve been using a Logitech Harmony Pro system. The gist is that the remote doesn’t actually control the TV — it fires commands to a little Wifi-connected hub, and that shoots commands to the TV. The advantage here is that the remote doesn’t actually have to have line-of-sight access to what it’s controlling. (And there’s a little IR extender you can use on the Harmony hub, so you can tuck these things in fun, out-of-the-way locations.

It’s a little overkill. The remotes can control a lot of things. Sonos. Nest. Philips Hue lights. Plus everything in your entertainment system. The Elite has a touchscreen to help out, but I haven’t ever really wanted to change the thermostat on this thing. It’s easier to just yell at Alexa or Google Home to do that.

In the bedroom I’ve got a Harmony Companion. It’s basically the same thing, with a scaled down remote. No touchscreen, but damned if this isn’t the most beautifully designed device I own. The curves on the back of the remote are to die for. (I desperately want this thing to be made into a phone.) It’s also a lot less expensive, but it still lets me control the Hue lights in the bedroom. This is probably the remote I’d recommend for most folks.

Harmony CompanionHarmony Elite

Yeah, but what about …

I know, I know. There are a million different ways to cut the cord. And I’ve tried a lot of hardware in the past few months. Some other serious contenders include:

• OTA HD antenna: Not every service covers everything yet. I’m using a couple indoor over-the-air antennas for networks. These things are directional, though, so check first to see what’ll work best for you.
• Roku 4 Ultra: This is the best solution for most people, I think. It has access to more services than either Google or Apple alone. (And it includes Amazon video.) It’s also a relatively inexpensive $99.
• NVIDIA Shield TV: This is the only standalone Android TV box you should consider. It’s way powerful, and needs to be because it’s also a pretty good gaming console. Plus it’s got access to Amazon video.
• Xbox One S: It’s a gaming console first, and a streaming box second. But also having a Blu-Ray player built-in makes it pretty compelling. Problem is it doesn’t have access to two of the streaming services I use.
• Streaming sticks: They’re small. They’re cheap. And I don’t use them. They’re just not very powerful, and streaming is prone to lag and freezes even on good hardware. Spend a little extra and get good hardware.

The streaming services

This is where you have to do a little homework if you want to save some money. First I looked at what we were spending on cable TV every month. Then I started comparing streaming plans. If we broke $150, then none of this would be worth it.

The really nice part here is that there aren’t any contracts, and generally speaking there are free trials. So you can try things out, and come and go as you please.

Also, yes: You get live TV. And a good bit more.

We started out with Sling. It’s not bad at all, and certainly worth a look. But ultimately we’ve ended up on PlayStation Vue. We’re on the most expensive plan at $65 a month, which is what we had to do to get all the channels we wanted. (Some things — like bundles — may never change, I guess.) We probably have about as many channels as we did with cable (I never actually counted), including some we didn’t have before.

The bottom line

So let’s do some math.

Our previous cable TV bills were $152 a month, including taxes and fees and box rentals and lord knows what else.

We’re now paying $65 a month for PSVue. I haven’t even been counting the $10 a month for Netflix, and $7.99 for Hulu, for which we already were paying. (And if you break Amazon Prime costs down monthly, that’s another $8.35 a month.)

You need to do a little homework (and math) if you want to save money. But I’m now saving hundreds of dollars a year.

So that all totals out to $91 a month for more channels and content than any of us at home can (or should) watch. For the math-impaired, we’re saving about $732 a year, and not watching any less.

Is it as easy as cable TV? Nope. Menus are a little slower and not as simple. Picture quality isn’t always 100 percent as good — but generally it’s good enough.

And this one’s going to be a thing going forward — my ISP gives us 1 terabyte of data before it starts charging us extra. That’ll be something we have to watch as we consume more 4K content. (And is maybe a reason to deal with Blu-Ray disks.)

Again, your mileage will vary. There’s no one way to do this. You need to do your homework to see if the available services will actually save your any money in the first place, and then whether it’ll save enough to make the switch worth it.

For my family, though? We haven’t looked back.

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How to turn off the LG G6’s ‘squircle’ icon frames

There’s a fix for that rounded square issue.

When it comes to squircle-shaped icons, there are two distinct groups: those who don’t care at all and those who feel like they’re nails on a chalkboard. If you land in the latter group, you’ll be scrambling to turn off the LG G6’s “rounded square” icon frames, which are turned on by default in order to normalize the size and shape of all icons on the phone.

It only takes a few taps to turn everything back to normal, though, and here’s a quick step-by-step process to get it done.

Open the Settings and scroll down to Home screen
Tap on Icon shape in the list
Tap the circle next to Original

• For a quick comparison between the two styles, toggle back and forth to watch the icons change above

Tap OK in the bottom right corner
Press the Home button to see the new icons on your home screen!

And there you are! All of your icons will be back to their own unique shapes. It’s worth noting that LG’s own apps will still retain their squircle shapes, though that may not be nearly as bothersome as forcibly applying the same shape and framing to other apps.

LG G6

• LG G6 review!
• LG G6 specs
• These LG G6 features are exclusive to some countries
• LG forums
• Latest LG G6 news

Nest might soon launch a cheaper thermostat and new security system

Nest practically disappeared after it became an Alphabet company, but a new report has suggested it’s coming back in full force.

A report from Bloomberg claimed Apple is working on new connected products, including a home security system, a smart doorbell, a refreshed version of the indoor Nest Cam, and a cheaper version of its popular Nest smart thermostat. That’s a whole lot of goods coming from a company that’s stayed relatively low key ever since Google bought it for $3.2 billion in 2014.

However, Nest has actually been rumored to be working on a home security system since last May. Bloomberg said it might feature a central keypad hub, alarm sensors for doors and windows, and a key fob that you’d use to activate and deactivate the alarm. You’d also be able to control the entire security system through a connected phone app, similar to other Nest products.

• Nest 3.0 review: The smartest thermostat just got smarter
• Nest Cam Outdoor review: Secure enough as a security camera?
• Nest Cam review: The next level in home security?

Bloomberg also detailed the cheaper thermostat and smart doorbell, the latter of which could feature a camera so you can talk with visitors through a connected app. The thermostat should cost under $200, a $49 price difference from the current Nest. The company is also working on new sensors to pair with the thermostat, allowing you to finely control temperatures in each room.

Nest is supposedly readying the smart doorbell for sometime in 2018, while the security system should release this year. Keep in mind Nest hasn’t released a completely new product since the Nest Protect smoke detector in 2013, though it did rework a Dropcam product in 2015, with the release of Nest Cam. It also launched a waterproof version of the camera, the Nest Cam Outdoor.

We’ll know more in the coming months. Meanwhile, we’ve contacted Nest for a comment and will update if we hear back.

A renewable planet is almost inevitable

When the leader of the free world denies climate change and fills his cabinet with like-minded individuals, it’s hard not to panic. The world is, after all, hurtling toward an irrevocable ecological catastrophe that threatens all of our lives. There may be a reason to be slightly less pessimistic, however, thanks to the mechanics of the energy business. Shortly before leaving the White House, Barack Obama said that clean power had an “irreversible momentum,” and it looks as if there might be evidence to justify his optimism.

There are generally two kinds of arguments against renewable energy: the cost and the lack of consistency. After all, solar panels can’t work in the dark and wind turbines don’t turn on still days, but we still need to charge our smartphones 24/7. The solution here is to build large-scale energy storage (read: really big batteries), but they’re not economically viable.

Except that isn’t true — not anymore, anyway. Bloomberg recently reported that the price of batteries has fallen 40 percent since 2014. These plunging prices have been so pronounced that big financial institutions are now throwing their weight behind the energy-storage market. Bloomberg also reports that institutions like Investec and Prudential have piles of cash earmarked to put behind industrial battery projects. Indeed, the International Renewable Energy Agency (IREA) believes that we’re on track to be able to store 250 gigawatts of electricity by 2030.

And as costs fall for big business, they begin to slide for the rest of us, with James Forrest at business consultancy Capgemini claiming that the current “adoption of renewable energy” is “driving down the price for everyday people.” There’s more good news, since Bloomberg believes that deals for battery projects will hit $2.5 billion in 2017, and that figure doesn’t even take into account what Elon Musk is up to. During Tesla’s most recent earnings call, Musk claimed that he would build up to five Gigafactories to mass-produce batteries for the Model 3 and Powerwall 2.

If Tesla is successful, it will create a seismic change in the way that we store and use energy in the home. You will not only be encouraged to buy a (cheap) battery to connect to your solar roof but also have a car that can power your home in an emergency. Not to mention, the running costs for an electric vehicle are continuing to fall, providing further incentives for buyers to make a switch.

It’s not only batteries that are helping to effect massive change either but also the increasing efficiency of solar panels in general. Damien Ryan, acting CEO of environmental nonprofit the Climate Group, says the world is “producing more megawatts of green energy for the same amount of money.” He adds that the resulting price drop is a “powerful driver for change.”

And such change is coming, because the economic argument for investing in carbon-intensive energy gets less credible by the day. Saudi Arabia — home to the world’s second-largest oil reserve — has outlined its plan to build a huge 300MW solar plant. Electrek believes that the facility’s eventual energy cost will be a staggering 1.99 cents per kWh. For comparison, the average price of electricity in the US at the end of 2016 was 12.75 cents per kWh — and no coal-fired power station is likely to compete.

Speaking of which, the Navajo Generating Station is the largest coal-fired power station in the western US. It was originally going to be mothballed in 2044, but it’s now expected to close in 2019, several decades ahead of schedule. As Fast Company explains, it’s the seventh-largest individual source of pollution in the US, pumping 14 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere per year. The cause of the plant’s closure is the advent of natural gas stations and renewable energy, which is cutting deep into profit margins to the point where operations are no longer sustainable.

The falling cost of both panels and storage is a boon for the developing world, where 1.2 billion people live without energy each day. The head of the IREA believes that the cost of large solar installations will fall by more than half in the next two decades. That, combined with cheap batteries, will help poor communities get power and escape extreme poverty.

Of course, many will scoff and say that the renewable energy industry has so far survived on government subsidies. When those subsidies are withdrawn, the industry’s unprofitability will be exposed once and for all, right? Not so, says Dr. Chris Case of the solar panel company Oxford PV. He is optimistic, saying that we’re now on the cusp of living in a solar world. The use of photovoltaic panels “has doubled seven times since the year 2000,” he said, “and only needs to double six times more by 2030 to generate 100 percent of our global power needs.” He later added, citing the Saudi Arabia project, that it offers “the cheapest form of electricity anywhere in the world and has been achieved without subsidy.”

He also said that while even a few years ago solar power would have needed help, the business is now strong enough to stand on its own. “Solar has the lowest cost of generation in many places,” he said, “and when that statement can be made without the caveat of ‘in many places,’ then it’ll be unstoppable.” Case believes too that this force is enough to overcome even the most crafty of governments with a mission to rig the game in oil’s favor. “There’s no political or social force that can resist [lowering prices]” he said. “Not even the president of the United States can fight it.”

But while the global market for renewables might be getting stronger, the US itself stands at a crossroads as to its future policy on climate change. Rachel Bronson of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, told the AV Club that any climate backsliding could be catastrophic. “It’s not that far away where our children will be dealing with more difficult outcomes than if we got serious now,” she said.

Bronson describes the hope that the success of President Trump, Rex Tillerson and Scott Pruitt represents the “last gasp” of climate denial because the evidence is overwhelming. But Bronson knows that “when carbon gets into the atmosphere, it can stay there for 10,000 years.” She added, “Given the amount that we’re pumping into the atmosphere, the changes have to happen now.” As optimistic as we could be, unfortunately it’s still going to take a lot of effort before we can say that our planet’s future is safe.

Image credits: Roberto Baldwin/Engadget (Gigafactory); Isaac Kasamani/AFP via Getty (Ugandan solar power)

NASA highlights women in STEM with a virtual field trip

NASA and Google Expeditions are celebrating International Women’s Day with a series of virtual field trips highlighting the careers of seven women and their contributions to America’s space program. The tours are part of the Modern Figures program, which continues the conversation started by the film Hidden Figures, and allow viewers to step into a 100,000 square-foot aircraft hangar, a simulated Martian landscape, a space flight operations facility and other locations where NASA’s women engineers, scientists and directors work towards the next milestone in space exploration.

The commemorative partnership also marks the first time Google Expeditions has visited the space agency for a VR-based career day. Because the expeditions are designed for classrooms, users will need the Google Expeditions app loaded on their iOS or Android device and a Google Cardboard kit (or compatible viewer) to follow along. (You can also explore on your own in “Lead” mode.) In addition to the Women’s Day field trips, NASA also contributed three other Google Expeditions: a 3D tour of the International Space Station, a ride-along on the Juno mission to Jupiter and views from the surface of Mars.

Source: NASA

‘No Man’s Sky’ update adds more than just ground vehicles

When Hello Games teased big things coming with No Man’s Sky’s Path Finder update, it wasn’t joking around. The studio has taken the wraps off the upgrade, and there’s a lot more than what was hinted at. For one thing, there are multiple ground vehicles (exocraft in NMS lingo) — you can travel across vast landscapes in a speedy hovercraft, the previously leaked buggy or a “lumbering” but capacious cargo hauler. You can even participate in custom-built races when you’re done exploring.

This is also a major improvement if you have high-end gaming hardware. PS4 Pro owners will get 4K rendering and subtler graphics improvements (such as delta color compression and automatic depth buffer decompression). Hello is also promising gamers higher-resolution textures, an HDR mode and more accurate lighting effects. And if you have to show off this visual refresh, there’s a dedicated photo mode that lets you change the time of day, cloud cover and filters to achieve the effect you’re looking for.

Most of the other additions are nuts-and-bolts improvements. You can now own multiple spaceships and store them in a freighter. There are ships with specializations, too, in case you want a fighter to deal with pirates or a hauler to carry resources. A Permadeath mode, as the name suggests, ends your game if you meet an untimely fate. Also, you can share your bases with others — you no longer have to take screenshots or capture video to show your sweet setup. This is crucial to racing (you can try to beat others’ split times if they have circuits), and adds a much-needed social element to a game whose early multiplayer plans never really panned out.

As with the Foundation Update, Path Finder isn’t likely to have you racing to buy a copy of No Man’s Sky if you weren’t already sold on the concept. However, it’s clearly a far meatier game than it was on launch. This could keep you playing if you’re an avid fan, or give you a reason to come back if your copy of the game has been gathering dust.

Source: No Man’s Sky, PlayStation Blog

Snapchat ‘celebrates’ women with more insensitive filters

Snapchat has a really hard time celebrating without coming off as offensive. Last 4/20, the app introduced a Bob Marley filter that prompted accusations of racial insensitivity. A few months later, it rolled out an anime-inspired filter that sure looked a lot like yellowface. Now, it’s National Women’s Day, and the company has messed up yet again.

Snapchat users can celebrate with new filters based on three historic women: painter Frida Kahlo, civil rights activist Rosa Parks and scientist Marie Curie. While the Curie filter features beakers and a ribbon identifying the female luminary, users are wondering why it also adds digital eye shadow and smooths out their skin. While it seems Snapchat had good intentions, it’s not clear why it thought a face-enhancing filter was an appropriate way to celebrate the scientific achievements of a legendary woman.

I appreciate the effort @Snapchat but why add the makeup to the Marie Curie filter? #InternationalWomensDay pic.twitter.com/CQ1MZ9S3ZJ

— Eileen Dawson (@MarrowNator) March 8, 2017

The Parks filter doesn’t reach full Marley blackface levels of embarrassment, instead using her signature hat, hair and glasses — but still turning a person of color’s likeness into a costume. Similarly, the Frida Kahlo filter adds her historically accurate hairstyle and thick eyebrows, but reducing her to a few facial characteristics comes off as pretty clueless and insensitive. As of this writing, all three International Women’s Day filters still available to use.

As The Verge points out, the company only has one woman on its board of directors, so perhaps there was a lack of female insight here. Then again, it shouldn’t take a woman to realize that honoring the first woman Nobel Prize winner with cosmetics isn’t a great idea. Considering its past filter-related controversies, it’s surprising that Snapchat isn’t much more careful about this sort of thing.

Via: The Verge

Switch owners will wait longer (and pay more) for ‘Rime’

If The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has piqued your interest in whimsical open-world adventure games featuring young men solving puzzles, Rime has you covered. It’s coming out on May 26th for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC, developer Tequila Words announced in a tweet. But Nintendo Switch owners are going to have to wait — and pay $10 more.

Rime was supposed to be a PS4 exclusive when it debuted in 2013. But, after buying full rights to the game back from Sony, Tequila Works decided to bring it to other platforms, most notably the Switch. It’s one of more than 60 indie games supposedly coming to Nintendo’s new console this year. In today’s tweet, however, the studio said a release date for the Switch version “will be announced soon.”

Rime will be available both digitally and at retail for $29.99 on the PS4, Xbox One and PC, but it will cost $39.99 when it comes to the Switch. We’ve reached out to Nintendo and Tequila Works to ask about the price difference, and we’ll update this story if we hear back.

Via: IGN

Source: Tequila Works (via Twitter)

Pinterest acquires Jelly, the startup from Twitter’s Biz Stone

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone’s startup Jelly has seen plenty of twists and turns since its 2013 introduction: it launched as a crowdsourced question-and-answer service, pivoted, and then pivoted back to its original concept in 2016. Now, however, it’s poised for its biggest change yet: Pinterest has acquired Jelly. The terms of the deal aren’t available, let alone the ultimate intentions, so it’s unclear just what will happen. Will Jelly be independent, or melt into its new owner? Stone sees the deal as important to the “future of human powered search and discovery,” though, so you know what his focus will be.

As our TechCrunch colleagues point out, this isn’t coming out of the blue. Stone is an angel investor in Pinterest, so he has an incentive to sell to them. And while Jelly’s financials aren’t public, it’s safe to say it hasn’t enjoyed nearly as much (relative) success as Twitter. This could be as much about ensuring that the technology and team survive as it is giving them a chance to grow as part of a larger company.

Source: Jelly (Medium)