AMD crashes Intel’s party: Powerful Zen CPUs are coming next year
A block away from Intel’s Developer Forum in San Francisco, AMD brought together a select group of media and analysts to make one thing clear: Its long-awaited Zen processor actually exists, and it’s on track to ship early next year for desktops. Surprisingly, the company is aiming directly at the high-end PC gaming market, whereas its last few chips appealed more to budget builders.
“Our focus is on high-performance CPUs and GPUs,” AMD CEO Lisa Su said, as she listed off the company’s most recent accomplishments. Those include building the chips powering both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One (as well as the One S and the upcoming Project Scorpio), and delivering a surprisingly powerful $200 video card in the Radeon RX480.
Beaming like a proud papa, AMD CTO Mark Papermaster listed off what makes the Zen processor so special: It’s built from the ground up with a focus on “performance, throughput and efficiency.” Using a 14nm FinFET (3D transistor) architecture, AMD’s engineers have increased the chip’s performance by 40 percent, compared to their last-gen hardware, all the while making it more power efficient. AMD has also finally implemented Simultaneous Multithreading (SMT), which lets Zen’s cores run multiple threads at the same time (basically, its own version of Intel’s HyperThreading).
“We have to be faster, we have to be more agile, we have to be more creative, because we’re the smallest player,” Papermaster said. Digging a bit deeper into the technical details, AMD says it increased Zen’s instruction scheduler by 1.75x and execution resources by 1.5x, added an 8MB L3 cache, and also implemented a larger shared L2 cache. Altogether, Zen should push around five times the amount of bandwidth to its core than AMD’s previous Excavator design.
So what does all that mean to you? Basically, you can expect the company’s Zen chip to be better at massive processing tasks (think 4K video and gaming, as well as VR), and easier on laptop battery life. It sounds like the sort of leap in performance AMD needs to better compete with Intel in high-end computing, but there’s still much we don’t know. Zen’s thermal profile, which would tell us just how efficient it actually is, remains a mystery. And naturally, AMD isn’t ready to talk about final clock speeds or pricing just yet. Papermaster says more technical details will be divulged at the Hot Chips conference next week.
AMD’s first product based on Zen will be an 8-core, 16-thread desktop chip called Summit Ridge, which will run on the new AM4 platform and will support DDR4 memory and “next-gen I/O.” But the company also hopes Zen will help it get back into the lucrative server market with “Naples,” a 32-core, 64-thread behemoth. AMD also expects to see the new chip design reach embedded computers in the future (mostly due to its increased power efficiency). Surprisingly, the company’s engineers are already hard at work on its followup platform, Zen+, Papermaster revealed.
To give us a sense of Summit Ridge’s performance, AMD pitted it against a Core i7-6900K, Intel’s top-of-the-line 8-core chip (which currently sells for around $1,100), using the Blender rendering benchmark. With both chips clocked at 3Ghz, the Summit Ridge machine managed to finish rendering a scene around half-a-second faster than Intel’s processor. AMD had to downclock its competitor from 3.2GHz to make the fight fair, but the benchmark as still a notable win. We also saw Summit Ridge, together with AMD’s R9 Fury X, playing Deux Ex: Mankind Divided in 4K with smooth frame rates (of course, we weren’t told the exact FPS figure).
You can expect Summit Ridge to hit the market in the first quarter of 2017, while Naples will launch in the second quarter. And if you’re aching to get Zen in a laptop, keep an eye out during the second half of next year (the company announced its latest batch of laptop chips back in May). Despite its progress with Zen, AMD will surely have competition from Intel, which is expected to debut its seventh-generation Core CPUs this fall.
French mayor bans ‘Pokémon Go’ in his town
In what is either great technological misunderstanding or extreme territorialism, mayor Fabrice Beauvois wants every digital pocket monster out of his village. He mailed a decree to Niantic, creators of the mobile game Pokémon Go, demanding they pull their game from the 800-person settlement of Bressolles northeast of Lyon.
His umbrage: the company didn’t ask for permission before setting up shop. When a cafe or restaurant owner wants to open in a French town, they are obligated to ask the mayor first, Beauvois told the Associated Press. The same applies to Niantic even if they’re settling in to the village’s virtual space.
While Beauvois isn’t trying to ban the game in response to particular incidents in his village, he does want to ensure a sense of tranquility and peace. Of course, his further comments to the AP veered toward fear: that the game is spreading in a “contagious” way, that young people could become dangerously addicted and that it was his duty to ensure order in his town.
Niantic has begun heeding calls to remove functionality in particular areas, from the US Holocaust Museum to the entire nation of Iran. But Beauvois’ protective rhetoric feels fiercely French, a territorial control of what is and isn’t allowed that’s hot on the heels of Cannes’ ban on the Islamic burkini beach garb.
Source: The Associated Press
‘Resident Evil 7’ gameplay vid proves safety is an illusion
Resident Evil 7 is looking as creepy as ever, if the latest trailer out of Gamescom 2016 is any indication.
The latest bit of footage to come out of what may be the most terrifying Resident Evil yet is a found footage nightmare, and this time it’s all gameplay from Resident Evil 7 proper rather than the Beginning Hour teaser.
A young woman is heard frantically communicating with an unknown person while trying to escape an unknown woman (“I can’t let her catch me again,”) traversing a ramshackle old bridge and deserted cabin. A creepy woman with a lantern is seen looking for the female protagonist, moving around erratically in pursuit. Just when she thinks she’s safe, the hideous stranger (bearing an uncanny resemblance to the ghost from P.T.), is in your face, hissing “Where do you think you’re going?”
Intense. Hopefully the rest of the game will follow suit when it releases in January 2017 for PC, PS4 and Xbox One with PlayStation VR support. You can check out the demo, Resident Evil 7: Beginning Hour right now if you’re a PlayStation Plus subscriber on PS4.
We’re live all week from Cologne, Germany for Gamescom 2016. Click here to catch up on all the news from the show.
Via: VG247
‘Gears of War 4’ writers are striving for a deeper story
Gears of War has never been known for its deep, imaginative storytelling. Each game is a popcorn-friendly thrill ride, pitting muscular soldiers against an army of bloodthirsty monsters. It’s a simple concept: Grab an assault rifle, dive behind some cover and empty your clip until it’s safe to move forward. Rinse and repeat. Gears of War 4, the first entry by a new developer called the Coalition, is trying to break that tradition. It’s still a brutal shoot-’em-up, but the characters and plot are more complex this time around. More nuanced. So much so, in fact, that for people who have cooled on the franchise, it might be enough to reel them back in.
A hint of horror
Take the world. It’s a bleak place, scarred from the weaponry that was required to wipe out the savage Locust and Lambent in the last game. Powerful storms known as “wind flares” rip across the sky, destroying nearby buildings and picking up loose debris. The government has walled off the few cities that remain, protecting what’s left of humanity and rejecting the “outsiders” who have chosen to live on their own. You play as J.D. Fenix, the son of series hero Marcus, as he uncovers a new threat called the Swarm. They’re vicious and creepy, especially at night, when much of the game takes place.
Chuck Osieja, creative director at the Coalition, said the team has been working hard to bring back the creepiness teased in the first game. “The characters are experiencing [the Swarm] for the first time, so we wanted to create a tone that was in line with that,” he said. “Before, everybody that was in the game already knew every enemy. It was never a surprise to them. They knew how to deal with them, they knew what they were named and they knew exactly what to expect from them. You as the player were the only one that didn’t know.”
With Gears of War 4, you’re uncovering the threat at the same time as J.D. and his two companions, Del and Kait. “How they react to it, and how you react to it, is part of what you experience,” Osieja added. “Creating a tone that is a bit more tense is in line with that type of experience.”
Old man Marcus
At Gamescom this week, I was shown a sequence where J.D. meets up with his father. Marcus is now an older man: He still has arms the size of a beer keg, but his beard is a silvery gray. He’s stubborn, telling the team to wait out a wind flare inside a barn. J.D. thinks it’s a bad idea, but Marcus stands firm, believing his plan is the right one. When the roof is torn to shreds, and the group is left exposed, it’s clear that Marcus — even with his decades of military experience — is far from a perfect soldier. He’s worn down from a life in the battlefield, and not as sharp as he used to be.
It’s a small but significant change in Marcus’ character. Before, he was mostly a meathead doling out shallow one-liners. Now, he’s an example of what happens to a warrior who no longer has a war to fight. “He’s had to deal with not being a soldier anymore,” Osieja explained, “and how him being a war hero has affected not only his own life but everyone around him. The government uses him, they hold him up as a hero of the Locust War, and he’s a reluctant hero. He’s got to deal with that and he’s also got to deal with his relationship with J.D., who has never dealt with war before.”
Marcus isn’t playable. He’ll join J.D. in his adventure — for how long, it isn’t clear — to show that he’s still most comfortable in times of war. “He reacts differently as an AI character,” Osieja said. “The way he observes the world and the way he reacts is different to J.D., because J.D. is a reflection of the player. When the player doesn’t know something, they instinctively ask questions — you want the main character to ask those same questions in the game so they can be answered by people inside the environment.”
Marcus is one of the characters that can play this role. “It gives him more range in what he can express and the things we can tease out of him, both in terms of his personality and the way he deals with problems,” Osieja said.
J.D. and his friends will get some character development too. The Coalition is staying tight-lipped at the moment, but each will have his own “journey” throughout the game. They’ll come together as a team and learn what it takes to be a soldier in this turbulent, war-ravaged world. Battling the Swarm and persuading the government that this new threat exists, all while evading the army, which considers them renegades — these elements have the potential to create a more compelling Gears story.
It’s a small but significant step forward for the franchise. Gears of War has a strong following because of its combat; the controls are responsive and the weapons have a satisfying heft to them. But after Gears of War: Judgment — and the departure of series creator Epic Games — many lost faith in the franchise. A better story could pull back gamers who have lost interest, while appealing to people who have skipped the series entirely. It won’t be the sole reason that people pick up the game, but it could restore the franchise to its pedigree status on Xbox (and PC) hardware, setting up future installments that the Coalition is clearly desperate to develop.
We’re live all week from Cologne, Germany, for Gamescom 2016. Click here to catch up on all the news from the show.
Microsoft says this might be the last console generation
Earlier today I sat down with Aaron Greenberg, Microsoft’s Head of Xbox Games Marketing, to talk about Xbox One, Project Scorpio and the future of console gaming. Here are Greenberg’s thoughts on three key topics.
On Project Scorpio-exclusive titles
At E3, Xbox head Phil Spencer said that all games and accessories will support all versions of the Xbox One, including Project Scorpio. I said at the time that this statement was not true, because only Project Scorpio will support a VR headset (an accessory), and there will definitely be VR-only games that only work with Project Scorpio. Greenberg shed some light on this, saying that the main reasoning behind Spencer making this point is that everything that works on Xbox One will work on Project Scorpio, rather than the other way around.
He added that while Microsoft is “not going to have console-exclusive games for Project Scorpio,” it doesn’t “think of [high-fidelity VR] as console gaming, and “VR experiences those will be new things that you will get on Project Scorpio.”
Here’s the full question and answer:
Q: Phil Spencer said that all accessories and all games work across all versions of the Xbox One. But he also said Project Scorpio is specifically the only Xbox that’s powerful enough to run VR. I don’t quite understand how those two statements can coexist.
Greenberg: “The idea was first, how can we innovate with hardware without sacrificing compatibility. Generally when you bring a new iteration of console hardware you lose compatibility with their games and accessories. So we’re saying, if you bought games and accessories for your Xbox One, or you buy an Xbox One S, those games and those accessories are going to work on Project Scorpio. When you think about backwards compatibility and our games lineup, we want gamers to know that when they’re ready to upgrade to Scorpio that content will go with them. That’s our promise and commitment around compatibility.
The next thing was ‘are you going to make games exclusively to Project Scorpio?’ And we said we’re not going to have console-exclusive games for Project Scorpio. It’s one ecosystem, whether you have an Xbox One S or Project Scorpio we don’t want anyone to be left behind, Now, with the power and capabilities we have we’ll be able to do high-fidelity VR. Now that space, we don’t think of that as console gaming ,we think of that as high-fidelity VR, and so with the VR experiences those will be new things that you will get on Project Scorpio.”
On the end of console generations
“The future of Xbox looks a lot like PC gaming.” That’s what Engadget editor Nathan Ingraham wrote after speaking with Phil Spencer earlier this year. Spencer spoke about wanting to see a steady stream of hardware innovation rather than seven-year gaps between consoles, citing the smartphone market as inspiration. Greenberg went one step further. In his opinion, this is the last console generation. “We think the future is without console generations,” he continued, explaining that Project Scorpio was a “big bet” that gamers will embrace that notion.
Q: The Xbox platform has moved forward to have such regular updates and new features coming all the time. It kind of seems like hardware is going the same way. There was a very short gap between the Xbox One and the Xbox One S, and we’re probably talking an even shorter gap before Project Scorpio. Do you see a future of console upgrades continually happening? Is this the last console generation?
Greenberg: “I think it is … For us, we think the future is without console generations, we think that the ability to build a library, a community, to be able to iterate with the hardware, we’re making a pretty big bet on that with Project Scorpio. We’re basically saying ‘this isn’t a new generation, everything you have continues forward and it works.’ We think of this as a family of devices.
But we’ll see, we’re going to learn from this, we’re going to see how that goes. So far I’d say based on the reaction there appears to be a lot of demand and interest around Project Scorpio, and we think it’s going to be a pretty big success. If the games and the content deliver, which I think they will do, I think it will change the way we think about the future of console gaming.”
On closing the gap between PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
Sony is “winning” this console generation, at least in sales. Microsoft hasn’t released any data in an age, but Sony passed 40 million sold months back while current estimates put Xbox One at around the 22 million mark. I asked Greenberg how Microsoft fixed that, and if it’s actually trying. He said that console sales were “really healthy,” and that more people were using Xbox One now than last year. A large focus for the company is in bringing the games to a bigger audience through Xbox Play Anywhere (a feature that lets you buy a game once and play on Xbox and PC), rather than just trying to sell new consoles.
Q: I was in [a company’s] briefing last week and they said by the end of the year you’d sell 29 million Xbox Ones versus 52 million PlayStation 4s. Obviously those are estimates, but the gap is there. How do you close that gap, and how focused are you on closing it versus just trying to make the 29 million Xbox gamers you do have happy?
Greenberg: “We’re focused on a few things. I’d say first we’re focused on growing the userbase of our games, bringing our games to as many gamers as possible, that’s why you see a lot of our big franchises on Windows 10. That allows more gamers than ever before to play titles like Gears of War, Forza Horizon, etc. From a console ecosystem standpoint, we’re seeing really healthy console sales really healthy engagement. Year-over-year for the month of July we saw Xbox One usage up 18 percent, so also really healthy.
Sony’s had a lot of success as well. I think what you’re seeing is that the console market is really healthy, console sales are doing really well in general, software sales are strong. It’s been a good industry for both of us, and we’re innovating in different ways. We’re innovating in a way where we know a lot of gamers are multi-device gamers, they don’t just buy one system, and so we want to be able to have the same types of experiences on Xbox Live, the same games, the same friends, both in the living room on their console or at work, on vacation or at school on their PC. You should be able to stay connected, and play the same games through things like Play Anywhere. That’s really been where we’ve been focused on.”
We’re live all week from Cologne, Germany for Gamescom 2016. Click here to catch up on all the news from the show.
Konami strikes out on its own for ‘Metal Gear Survive’
Thought you’d heard the last from the Metal Gear franchise? Despite creator Hideo Kojima’s departure from Konami to form his own studio, Kojima Productions, Konami has been hard at work on its own entry into the long-running series: Metal Gear Survive.
Metal Gear Survive is slotted right after the ending of Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes, exploring an alternate timeline caused by “unexplained wormholes” that start forming in the sky. As a result, players find themselves in an unfamiliar land where droves of what look like zombies are roaming around.
The trailer gives off a distinct Resident Evil vibe, offering stealth and co-op mechanics with 4-player online co-op, a variety of weapons and an assortment of creatures to tackle together.
Metal Gear Survive is slated for 2017 on PC, Xbox One and PS4. We’re at Gamescom and will bring you more on the game as soon as we learn more about it. For now, you can check it out for yourself via the video below.
We’re live all week from Cologne, Germany for Gamescom 2016. Click here to catch up on all the news from the show.
‘Mr. Robot’ has its own official mobile game
If you’re looking for some extra Mr. Robot while the second season plays out, then there’s now a mobile game to keep you entertained. Mr. Robot: 1.51exfiltratiOn is available for iOS and Android, and is packaged up like a fictional corporate messenger platform for the fictional E.Corp. Once inside, players will begin communicating with colleagues and hunt for data that can uncover the evils that lurk at the company’s heart.
The title is being published by Telltale Games, but was actually developed by Night School Studio, the creators of indie adventure Oxenfree. That title was roundly praised by our Jess Conditt earlier this year and the game’s soundtrack was released on vinyl a few months later. With a critically-acclaimed developer and a similarly-beloved publisher, snapping this up for $2.99 on the App Store or Google Play seems like a no-brainer.
We’re live all week from Cologne, Germany for Gamescom 2016. Click here to catch up on all the news from the show.
Source: App Store, Google Play
‘Destiny’ to add private matches and user-hosted tournaments
The reasons for Destiny splitting paths between the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions and their current-gen counterparts are becoming a lot clearer. With the “Rise of Iron” expansion, the team is adding private Crucible matches, support for clans and user-hosted tournaments with cash prizes.
The first is pretty self explanatory, and there are tons of granular options for ensuring your private matches are just the way you like them. Gametype, map, score limit, light level restrictions and even time of day for the selected map are customizable. The clan roster system essentially gives you a bird’s eye view of who in your clan is playing at a given moment, check out their gear and join in a Fireteam with them.
Where the update gets interesting is with what Bungie calls the “Destiny Competition License.” It’s a set of rules that outline what you can and cannot do when hosting your own Destiny tournament. From Bungie.net:
- The value of the total compensation including prizes, prize money, salaries, travel and accommodation stipends or reimbursements, and appearance fees paid by organizers and sponsors to the players, teams and team owners, for participating in the competition (“Compensation”), must:
- Not exceed Five Thousand US Dollars ($5,000 USD) or the equivalent for a single competition
- Not exceed Ten Thousand Dollars ($10,000 USD) or the equivalent for all of the events organized or hosted by you during the last 12 months pursuant to this Destiny Competition License
- Provided you comply with all applicable laws (including residency eligibility requirements), you may charge players and/or teams entry fees to compete in your community competitions under the following guidelines:
- Your local laws allow organizers to charge entry fees for participants to compete in the competition
- The value of the Compensation must be at least equal to the combined value of the entrance fees paid by players
Pretty cut and dried, right? Aside from that, you’re welcome to stream on any platform of your choosing, so long as the chat is moderated and doesn’t turn into a cesspool. Streams can earn up to $50,000 “in conjunction with the broadcast of your competition” which includes things like a sponsored stream. But you absolutely cannot charge admission for the event be it to watch online or in person. Donations and subscriptions on Twitch are totally okay, though. Oh, and you can’t broadcast your stream on TV.
So there you have it: Destiny year two is priming itself for eSports and wants you to be a part of it on September 20th. Are you coming along for the ride?
Source: Bungie
HP’s new Omen gaming PCs include a cube-shaped desktop
Gamers have many reasons why they steer clear of desktops from big-name brands, but one of the biggest is the poor expansion. You may have fewer upgrade slots (if any) versus a white label or home-built rig, and you’ll frequently have to contend with non-standard parts. HP thinks it can make you reconsider, however. It’s refreshing its Omen gaming PCs once again, and the highlight is a completely new Omen X Desktop that promises both the perks of a major company’s industrial design with the expansion that you crave. That cube-on-its-side look is not only relatively unique in a sea of generic towers, but genuinely functional. Its three-chamber structure separates hot components while giving you room for expansion that includes dual graphics cards, four tool-free hard drive bays and an M.2 SSD. Also, this is an industry-standard chassis — HP will sell you the barebones case if you prefer to supply your own internals, and Maingear will even build its own beastly gaming PC around the box in early 2017.
There’s one thing you won’t escape from major brand gaming PCs, though: the price. The Omen X Desktop will be available at HP’s website on August 17th for a starting price of $1,799, and that will get you an overclockable 4GHz Core i7, 8GB of RAM, Radeon RX 480 graphics, a 256GB SSD, a 2TB hard drive and a monstrous 1,300W power supply. That’s definitely not the most powerful system you could get for the money, and it’s going to get pricier if you want perks like a GeForce GTX 1080 or 16GB of RAM (the retail config due October 16th starts at $2,100). What you’re really paying for is that exotic shell. By itself, the case costs $600 — potentially worth it if you want the easy-access drives or a conversation piece, but overkill for most anyone else.
And don’t worry if you weren’t in the market for an over-the-top desk machine, as there’s more Omen hardware in the pipeline. An updated Omen 17 laptop now packs NVIDIA’s portable version of the GTX 1060 or GTX 1070 as well as a mini DisplayPort jack, making it friendly to both VR and dual external screens. It starts at $1,600. There’s also an Omen X Curved Display with support for NVIDIA’s extra-smooth G-Sync tech (due in early 2017 for an unknown price) and a range of SteelSeries accessories that include a customizable mouse ($60), a light-up keyboard ($100) and a headset ($80). All of the SteelSeries extras should arrive in mid-September.
Cherlynn Low contributed to this report.
Source: HP
‘Titanfall 2’ kicks off its open multiplayer test this Friday
Titanfall 2 is hosting its Open Multiplayer Technical Test beginning this weekend on Friday, August 19th to run for two weekends.
The test will be open to both PlayStation 4 and Xbox One owners, offering up three multiplayer modes across two maps for eager Titanfall fans to try out ahead of the game’s October 28th worldwide release.
Bounty Hunt (5v5) is a fast-paced team-based mode where Pilots and teammates work against an opposing team and the Remnant Fleet to kill grunts and other enemies while depositing points at the bank between waves. Pilots vs. Pilots (8v8) is a classic mode that has Pilots going at each other’s throats for supremacy. Amped Hardpoint (6v6) is a twist on the classic Hardpoint Domination mode from the original Titanfall, where defending a Hardpoint allows you to amp it for double the score for your team.
The modes will take place on Boomtown, Homestead and Forward Base Kodai, and players will have access to two new Titans: Ion and Scorch. There’s also a selection of new weapons to choose from while you’re slaying on the battlefield. In order to find players to match up with, there’ll also be a new feature called Networks that seeks to expedite the process.
Titanfall 2 officially launches on October 28th for Xbox One, PC, and PlayStation 4, but this is your chance to get in on the multiplayer mode early. If you’re interested in signing up, keep an eye out when the test drops this weekend.
Source: BusinessWire
AIVAnet 