‘Destiny’ sequel set for next year
Destiny‘s Valentine’s Day event is well under way, but developer Bungie is taking an extra step toward proving its devotion to fans. The long-rumored (and apparently delayed) sequel to the sci-fi online shooter is slated for release next year, corroborating earlier reports from Kotaku.
And sooner than that, the game is getting a larger update this spring with a “significant” Light level increase and a bunch of new loot and challenges for folks who’d rather not duke it out adversarially in the Crucible. The Bungie blog post also mentions another big expansion is coming this year. So, after a stretch of silence and a new CEO, perhaps Destiny players can grind easy knowing their guardian will be getting some new adornments perhaps rather soon.
Source: Bungie
WSJ: Google is working on a standalone VR headset, too
Clues have been circulating about Google’s plans for a new VR headset in recent weeks. Now, the Wall Street Journal reports that Mountain View is working on a second virtual reality device. Unlike the headset we’ve seen tipped already, the second gadget is said to be a standalone unit that doesn’t require a phone or PC in order to work. If this is true, it will be the first device to function without being connected to a computer or mobile device. A few days ago, a report surfaced stating that Google had a new headset in the works that would be a much more advanced version of Cardboard, but would still use a handset to drive the visuals.
The WSJ report goes on to explain that Google is actually working on two separate pieces of hardware. That unit we heard about last week, which could be something like Samsung’s Gear VR, is said to still be on tap this year, packed with chips and sensors of its own. By joining the virtual reality fray, Google would be competing with Samsung, HTC, Sony and Oculus in the space. However, three of those four companies have products that need a PC or game console in order to work.
Google is reportedly working with Movidius on motion-tracking cameras for the standalone headset. If you’ll recall, the duo also worked together on the Project Tango, a smartphone that packed in 3D depth-sensing tech. In terms of a release date, details are understandably scarce as it seems to be early in the development phase. One source told the Wall Street Journal it may debut this year while another claimed Google could decide to scrap it entirely. However, the report does indicate that we could see the headset for phones debut at this year’s Google I/O developer conference. That piece of hardware would arrive alongside the annual update to Android, including features to properly accommodate VR gadgets.
Source: Wall Street Journal
VR is better when virtual objects feel real
For all the amazing experiences virtual reality enables (the illusion of flight, the exhaustion of exercise and even the emotional fatigue of trauma), it still has one major flaw: Virtual objects are intangible and have no physicality. If you want to walk through a wall, the game can’t stop you. If you try to lean on a table, you’ll probably fall down. It’s a limitation of first-generation VR technology I’d grown to accept — at least until I played Survios’ Raw Data, a game that tricked me into pretending its completely virtual objects were real.
In Raw Data, two players use an assortment of weapons to protect a shared VR play space from an oncoming horde of killer robots. At first blush, this feels a lot like any other motion-controlled first-person VR action game: aiming with virtual guns, fanatically shooting in all directions and generally feeling like an action hero while doing it — but when I swung the game’s laser sword at another blade, something weird happened. It stopped. And, despite there being absolutely no physical force present to stop me, my arms stopped too.
Stopping my arms felt natural, but I had no idea why I did it. By all rights, I should have followed through on the swing. I asked James Iliff, Survios’ co-founder and chief creative officer, for his thoughts as I pulled off my VR headset. “There’s this trigger mechanism in the brain about mimicry,” he told me. “Like, as kids we were playing around in the yard with sticks, or doing air guitar. We mimicked those actions. When a game gives you 100 percent feedback visually, auditorily and haptically that you’ve stopped, a lot of times the user will play along and they won’t even realize it.” In other words, the game feels more realistic if you pretend it’s real. When the swords stopped in game, clanged on impact and sent a sharp vibration to my motion controller, it was using visual, audio and haptic cues to coax me into playing make-believe.
The trick worked on me, but only because I decided to play along. Not everybody will follow the rules, Iliff told me. “We call it contextual physics feedback,” he said, explaining the system further. “The system decides, based on context, when not to enable physics feedback.” While this system encourages playing by the rules, it seems to favor keeping in-game action consistent with player movement over abiding by VR physics — if I had followed through on my slice, the swords would have slid past each other. “But if you do stop, it continues to play along with you,” Iliff reiterated. “That essentially gives you the sensation of real feedback.”
This contextual physics feedback system is one of the “big problems” Survios is trying to solve. Having collision that makes sense is essential to enabling the kind of social multiplayer Raw Data is built around. The team is also working on a contextual gaze system to simulate eye contact with other VR players, and a phonic detection system is poised to animate character mouths in tune with voice chat. To top it all off, Raw Data features a cinematic spectating system that broadcasts VR game play from “dynamically generated camera angles” to services like Twitch.
That, Iliff says, could be the key to helping the masses understand virtual reality. “If we can make this easy in all our apps, for users to broadcast to their friends … that’s the fastest way to get everybody talking about VR.”
There won’t be an ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game this year
Time-traveling parkour people, take it easy this year. Ubisoft will not release a new Assassin’s Creed game in 2016, breaking the franchise’s annual launch schedule for the first time since 2009. Ubisoft says it’s listened to fan feedback since the release of Assassin’s Creed Unity, a game that was plagued by technical glitches when it launched in 2014. Sales of last year’s installment, Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, were slower than expected, Ubisoft noted in its quarterly financial report released today.
“We are now in a position to take the decision not to release a new Assassin’s Creed game in 2016-17, in order to give the brand a new dimension, while still presenting very solid targets for the fiscal year,” Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot said.
This may mean there’s room for another Ubisoft franchise to land in the fall — the company plans to launch a sequel to Watch Dogs before April 2017, as laid out at the end of its earnings report. Other games on Ubisoft’s slate include For Honor, South Park: The Fractured But Whole, Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: WildLands and “a new high-potential AAA brand with strong digital live services.”
Kotaku reported in January that Ubisoft would pause its annual Assassin’s Creed drop in 2016. The site also said the next Assassin’s Creed game was code-named Empire and would take place in Egypt, and the new Watch Dogs would be set in San Francisco. These details are not confirmed, but with today’s news, they’re looking fairly solid.
Source: Ubisoft blog
I broke my DS and it broke my heart
I never really loved my first Nintendo DS. It was gray, plastic and chunky thanks to its weird angular shape. It didn’t have a lot of interesting games at launch. That first DS (aka the “DS phat”) was a corporate gift from my bosses at The Pokémon Company, and that initial transaction always tainted my interactions with the thing, because it wasn’t something I’d have bought for myself. It never really felt like it was “mine.”
I warmed up to the DS a little over the next two years, if only for games like Phoenix Wright and Animal Crossing. But still, I resented having to carry around the DS phat in my bag because it was so damn big and ugly. It also wasn’t a spring chicken anymore, accumulating a collection of dents and dings despite my (admittedly weak) efforts to keep it safe.
But then the announcement came: Nintendo was going to release a sleeker, smaller version of the DS — the DS Lite. It was pretty. It was damn sexy. So first chance I got, I snapped a glossy black model up and brought her home. That’s right: HER. This was my new lady and our relationship was a dream.
I spoiled my baby. I got a snazzy blue case to carry her around in. I bought an extendable stylus all the way from Japan. I put a Pokémon decal on her lid and it was a bit tacky but I didn’t care. She was my DS and I was gonna gussy my darling up. And I took her everywhere. I played her at the office on a daily basis (I did work at Pokémon, after all). I had her with me at comic and anime conventions. I brought her on bus rides and long flights. She was my main source of portable entertainment, my co-worker and just flat out one of my favorite companions for eight years.
Oh, I played her a little less when I was unemployed some years ago, since I wasn’t exactly riding the subway to an office every day (especially one where my job involved playing games). My “pile of shame” started to grow thanks to all the DS games I was still buying for my girl but not playing. But I still loved her, even as I eventually upgraded to a 3DS XL. It wasn’t a clean break for me: I still chose to play DS titles exclusively on the old gal, and even some Game Boy Advance games (my pile of shame runs deep).
And that’s ultimately what led to her downfall.
I was muscling my way through Lunar Knights about two years back — which admittedly, is not a very good game — when I decided to take a break. I put my beloved DS on top of a pile of books near me and thanks to her glossy plastic underside worn smooth by years of constant use, she slid right off and… boom, crashed to the ground.
I frantically rushed to her side, but the damage was done: a small crack in her case had now blossomed into a full-on break. The right corner (where the indicator lights and the hinge live) came completely off. I was devastated.
I attempted emergency surgery, sliding the broken segment back into place and adding a touch of super glue. It didn’t take at first, and in my grief I went a little crazy, reaching a level of super glue application that practically mummified the plastic. Sure, the shoulder button stays in place now, but it’s pretty stiff. And there are spots of glue splattered pretty much everywhere. (I should not be trusted with super glue.)
I had another DS Lite at my disposal, so I decided to change devices rather than play with a mangled system. I charged up the newer one and started playing again. At the time it made perfect sense: in addition to the now-stiff ‘R’ shoulder button, the ‘A’ and ‘B’ buttons on my original DS Lite were loose, and the screen was scuffed up to the point where parts were unresponsive. But, even though the newer DS Lite works perfectly, it doesn’t feel right. It feels like… cheating.
I haven’t finished Lunar Knights. I haven’t finished any DS game since. It’s just not the same. It can never be the same.
Do you have fond memories of your first tech love or maybe a gut-wrenching tale of gadget heartbreak? Share them using #LoveAtFirstByte
Twitch streamers raised $17.4 million for charities in 2015
Twitch is huge. There’s no getting around this fact: Video giant YouTube basically copied Twitch’s gameplan last year, the site launched Twitch Creative and Twitch Plays sub-sections, it dominated the streaming eSports market, and debuted a successful convention that attracted more than 20,000 people. Twitch has grown so rapidly since its launch in 2011 that it’s already jumped the shark at least once.
Just in case anyone was still confused about the bright purple future of live streaming, today the company shared some internal statistics from 2015, including the fact that it helped streamers raise $17.4 million for more than 55 charities last year.
Twitch boasts an average of 1.7 million streamers every month, with an average of 550,000 concurrent viewers. Plus, Twitch argues, its audience watches videos for longer stretches of time than they do no YouTube: 421.6 minutes per viewer for Twitch versus 291 minutes per viewer for YouTube, based on comScore data. Twitch topped out at more than 2 million concurrent views on August 23rd, thanks to two eSports events, the League of Legends NA LCS Finals and ESL One: Cologne 2015.
Last year’s top games on Twitch were League of Legends and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, while Destiny and FIFA 15 were newcomers to the top 10. Mobile views now make up 35 percent of Twitch’s audience.
For perspective, rival (and dominant) online video outlet YouTube boasts more than 1 billion users who watch hundreds of millions of hours on the site every day. But, these services have different markets — Twitch focuses on live content, while YouTube is all about those jump cuts. Both services are clearly learning from each other as they, and their audiences, evolve.
Source: Twitch
Immersit’s crazy 4D motion sofa kit hits Kickstarter
Immersit thinks that your gaming, virtual reality or home cinema experience could be a little more dynamic. To fix that, it just launched its Immersit 4D motion sim for your sofa on Kickstarter. The device consists of four hydraulic pads that lift the corners of your couch or chair via a central controlling “brain.” By moving the pads, it can make your couch tilt, rotate, or vibrate with up to a thousand different motions. All of that is powered by another box that connects to a PC, game console or AV device.
I experienced Immersit myself in Paris last year and enjoyed it, though I found the movements a bit too mild. However, we had another look at the device last month at CES and actually thought it overly rough, so the company seems to have jacked up the power a bit (it can be dialed down, luckily). Immersit has also addressed safety concerns and promised that it won’t wreck your sofa.
The team has pre-programmed a number of movies so that the visuals corresponds with the movement, but it hasn’t said which titles, exactly. It’s obviously best suited to action movies, where it can make a car chase or flying scene a bit more thrilling. As we found out at CES, the best way to use it may be with a virtual reality headset, as it makes it more real and less virtual. The company hasn’t tested the incoming HTC Vive or Oculus Rift models yet, but said compatibility shouldn’t be a problem, considering that it works with the Oculus DK2. As for games, the device supports over 120 titles on the current and last-gen Xbox and Playstation consoles and PCs, though again, it hasn’t listed which ones yet.
Immersit has tested couches and chairs weighing up to 1,100 pounds, and even x-rayed one to make sure it wasn’t stressed too much. There’s also a built-in safety feature that will deactivate it a person or animal crawls under the sofa. The company doesn’t specify the range of motion on its Kickstarter page, but last year CEO Valentin Fage told Engadget it would be around four inches. It now has the final design after building three prototypes, and will start manufacturing it soon, with the early bird units set to ship by September or October.
As for the price, it won’t be an impulse buy. The €449 early bird special has sold out, so the cheapest deal is the €649 special (around $735). That’s obviously not cheap, so most folks will no doubt want to try before they buy. We’ll try to get our hands on a prototype to do our own tests, and Fage said the company would organize demo days in Paris (and hopefully elsewhere) later this year. The campaign went live earlier today, and is nearly halfway to its €85,000 ($96,000) goal.
Source: Kickstarter
Xbox One thriller ‘Quantum Break’ is coming to PC too
Quantum Break‘s time-altering escapades are no longer tied to Microsoft’s Xbox One console. When the game launches on April 5th it’ll also be available on PC, giving players with beefy rigs the chance to push its visual prowess to the limit. That’s not all developer Remedy Entertainment is announcing today though. Anyone that buys the game on Xbox One will also get a copy of the studio’s previous title, Alan Wake, as well as its two DLC packs through backwards compatibility. If you pre-order Quantum Break you’ll gain access to Alan Wake’s American Nightmare too, a downloadable sort-of-but-not-quite sequel that came out in 2012.
The kicker? If you pre-order Quantum Break for Xbox One, Microsoft will grant you the Windows 10 version too. So to recap, dropping your cash now on the console version will net you absolutely everything. It’s quite an offer and one clearly designed to push people towards the new IP. Alan Wake was a critical success but its sales — 4.5 million as of March 2015 — weren’t enough to green-light Alan Wake 2. (Some of Remedy’s ideas ended up in American Nightmare, however.) Quantum Break is, therefore, a crucial game for Remedy to prove it can play in the big leagues.
The title is unusual though, blending a third-person action game with live-action TV episodes. The two are designed to weave through one another, showing different perspectives or moments happening in another location. It has star pedigree, with actors Shawn Ashmore (X-Men), Dominic Monaghan (Lord of the Rings) and Aidan Gillen (Game of Thrones) taking some of the lead roles. But how does it actually play? Are the time mechanics more than another bullet-time gimmick? We won’t know until April — in the meantime, here’s another live-action trailer to muse over.
Source: Xbox Wire
You can run over 1,000 Windows 3.1 programs in your browser
The Internet Archive has spent many years gathering and storing digital content from the past. It now hosts millions of web pages, texts, videos and audio snippets, but recently the site expanded its collection to include software, or more specifically, games. After making more than 2,400 DOS titles available to play in the browser, the Internet Archive has embraced the GUI and done the same for Windows 3.1.
It’s kicked things off by adding more than 1,000 programs to its Windows 3.1 Software Library. The vast majority of them are games, including Taipei and Ski Free, but there’s plenty of browser-based shareware to get stuck into. There’s also a curated collection called the “Windows Showcase,” which lists some of the best known programs and games from 20 years ago.
It’s been made possible by Boris Gjenero’s EM-DOSbox emulator, which converts Windows runtimes into JavaScript code that can be interpreted by your browser. It’s what underpins the Archive’s DOS collection and testers have already used it to boot Windows 95. That suggests we may only have to wait a short while to see more Windows programs added to the collection.
Source: Windows 3.1 Software Library
GamerGate target drops case against harasser that started it all
Game developer Zoë Quinn has been through an awful lot in the 18 months since an ex-boyfriend posted details of his relationship with her online. But now she’s dropping harassment charges against the man who essentially started the GamerGate firestorm because it’s not worth the emotional trauma to carry the case forward anymore. “Ironically, getting a restraining order against Creep Throat [Quinn’s pseudonym for her ex] was the least effective thing I could do in terms of getting him out of my life for good, and for protecting myself,” she writes.
Quinn explains that whenever something happened within the case, her ex would go back and stoke the GamerGate sympathizer fire, and in turn, she (along with family and friends) would be subjected to a new round of threats and abuse. “People kept getting hurt for being close to me, for a poorly worded restraining order that did nothing,” Quinn says.
She mentions that law enforcement officials, judges and lawyers are incredibly ignorant about how the internet works and at one point someone told her to give up her career and stop going online if she didn’t like the abuse. “He barely bothered to look at my huge stack of evidence before declaring he had no idea what the internet was about and didn’t want to know.” The continual threats are something that’s affected her work with Crash Override, the support group she and Alex Lifschitz founded for victims of online abuse, as well.
She says that even if she kept pushing her suit forward, if her ex was imprisoned his legions of followers would see it as martyrdom. Which, based on previous harassment she’s endured, Quinn says the would only give them more fuel for their attacks. So rather than continue the fight in vain, Quinn hopes her withdrawal of charges will help her heal and move on.
Source: Zoe Quinn (Tumblr)
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