Twitch rolls out two-factor to reduce profile hijinks
Twitch announced today that it is implementing optional two-factor authentication on its user profiles. The increased security measures, while “100 percent voluntary” according to the streaming site’s release, are meant to improve user experiences while reducing the need for conventional, easily hackable passwords.
Source: Twitch
Break out your paintbrushes again: Twitch launches Bob Ross Mondays
When Bob Ross began painting happy trees and sunlit fields on public television in 1983, there was no such thing as Twitch, no online streaming and certainly no KappaRoss. But now, there’s Bob Ross Mondays on Twitch. The streaming site will air The Joy of Painting, Ross’ beloved show, every Monday from 3PM PST to 9:30PM PST, starting tonight. Isn’t life in the future grand?
Here are the first Xbox 360 games that will work on Xbox One
Microsoft’s Xbox One is getting its big “New Experience” update on November 12, which also includes the long-awaited backwards compatibility feature for playing Xbox 360 games. Now, we’ve finally got the full list of 104 Xbox 360 titles that’ll work on the system. That includes some games we’ve previously known about, like Borderlands, along with fan favorites like Just Cause 3 and Mirror’s Edge. There are also plenty of Xbox Live Arcade titles included, though many popular titles still aren’t supported, including Rockstar titles like Grand Theft Auto IV and Red Dead Redemption. Microsoft says it’ll start announcing new titles in December, including Halo Reach and Bioshock Infinite, and you can vote for future titles to be included on the Xbox Feedback site. Check out the full list of backwards compatible Xbox 360 titles below.
Source: Microsoft
‘Resident Evil’ the play is better than I expected
The first Resident Evil games were my favorites. With comically bad dialogue like the now infamous “Jill sandwich” meme, tension built on scare tactics, gore and the thrill of a shotgun blast, simpler was better, or at least more fun. As soon as the franchise started to take itself too seriously, I stopped paying attention. So when Capcom decided to make the video game horror franchise into a stage play, I feared it’d either steer straight into closed-space melodrama (i.e., actors trapped in a room; one has a dark secret) or that it’d simply have little to no relevance to Resident Evil. So, with trepidation, I went to see Biohazard: The Stage (the series’ title here in Japan) when it opened for a limited one-week run right before Halloween. Was I going to be bored to tears? Despite an unnecessarily fashionable Tyrant and a severe lack of blood, I was hooked for all two-and-a-half hours of it. And that even included a pop-dance interlude.
Source: Biohazard The Stage
Fallout 4’s Pip-Boy is a glorified smartphone case
“The Pip-Boy is an important part of Fallout and we love it so much we made a real one.” Those words, delivered by game director Todd Howard at developer Bethesda Softworks’ first-ever E3 media briefing this year, triggered cheers around the world. And thus, the Fallout 4 Pip-Boy Edition was born: a $120 special edition peripheral bundled with Fallout 4 that aims to mimic the game’s wrist-bound menu and stat-tracking system. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the premium version of the game proved insanely popular, prompting Bethesda to apologize when it couldn’t make any more units to meet demand. Not bad for a rather awkward looking piece of light brown plastic that sits on your arm and holds your cellphone. But is it actually worth the hype and high price?
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18 ways to (nearly) die with Lara Croft, Tomb Raider
Lara Croft is basically a superhero. She leaps with the power of someone bitten by a radioactive kangaroo, climbs sheer rock faces like her hands are coated in glue and spontaneously zip-lines down hundreds of ancient, convenient ropes like she’s strolling down to Starbucks on a Monday morning. In Rise of the Tomb Raider, players will most certainly die a few times, whether in firefights with hordes of gunmen, while running across a rapidly crumbling sheet of ice or jumping across gigantic crevasses. What’s incredible (and absurd) is all of the times Lara Croft survives.Slideshow-339802
BuzzFeed returns to SXSW lineup following online harassment fiasco
BuzzFeed said it would only come back to the South by Southwest festival panel roster if organizers put online harassment back on the agenda, and it’s making good on its word. The web firm tells Recode that it’s returning to SXSW 2016’s lineup now that the event has instituted a day-long Online Harassment Summit. The SXSW team has “moved in the right direction,” BuzzFeed says. There’s no word yet on whether or not fellow abstainer Vox Media is returning, although it won’t be surprising if the online publisher follows suit.
Source: Recode
Former Sony Pictures exec snags the rights to a ‘GamerGate’ movie
Former head of Sony Pictures Amy Pascal is working on a film based on a coming memoir from Zoe Quinn, the game developer at the heart of the online controversy known as “GamerGate.” Quinn’s memoir, Crash Override: How To Save The Internet From Itself, is due to be published in September 2016 by Touchstone (a Simon & Schuster imprint), Deadline reports. Pascal, who now heads a production company under Sony, won the rights to Crash Override following a bidding war, according to the site. The film is tentatively named Control Alt Delete and Scarlet Johansson is looking at the script.
Source: Deadline
Playdate: We’ve got the ‘Need for Speed’ on PlayStation 4
It’s time to kick some tires and light some fires, folks. The new Need for Speed, out this week, is awesome. More importantly, it shows exactly what can happen when a video game publisher (Electronic Arts, in this case) says that a developer can take a year off to work on a game rather than churn out sub-par sequels on an annual basis. Usually when the word “cinematic” is thrown around to describe a game, that means big explosions and scripted events — not usually the visual style. The team at Ghost Games doesn’t subscribe to that theory and rather than focusing on “water-cooler moments” that only happen once, it instead made Need for Speed look as much like a movie shot on film as possible. Need proof? At 6PM Eastern / 3PM Pacific Sean and myself are broadcasting two hours of the game on Twitch.
The first full ‘Warcraft’ movie trailer is, in a word, epic
Whether you’re a veteran World of Warcraft player, a Hearthstone newbie or someone who loves a great fantasy story, the trailer for Legendary Pictures’ Warcraft is captivating. Warcraft is due in theaters on June 10th. It’s Activision Blizzard’s first foray into movie-making — but it’s definitely not the last. The company today announced its own, in-house film and TV business, Activision Blizzard Studios. It’s already working on a Skylanders cartoon series and films based on the Call of Duty franchise. Warcraft doesn’t fall under this new studio’s umbrella.
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