Technology

Devolver Digital made its return to E3 with another no-holds-barred satirical swipe at the games industry, taking shots at subscriptions, games as a service, and even NFTs. Dubbed the Devolver MaxPass Plus — “the new era of monetization as a service” — the spoof showcase features the infamous Devolver executive Nina Struthers and her cohorts extolling the ridiculous virtues of its new service. But besides being the most irreverently entertaining segment of E3 (so far), the publisher also included some new game announcements. Here are the most notable: Trek to Yomi [embedded content] The first of these was the cinematic Trek to Yomi, with a trailer that’s refreshingly not actually a pre-rendered cinematic. The black-and-white game follows a young samurai who is sworn to protect his town and...

New outbreaks of COVID-19 in Asia could create delays in the global supply chain and exacerbate the global semiconductor shortage, according to a new report from The Wall Street Journal. Taiwan, which is a significant hub for chip manufacturing, is currently experiencing a surge of COVID-19 cases. On Saturday, Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Center announced that there were 251 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 26 deaths. On Friday, the agency reported 287 new cases and 24 deaths. And cases have been on the rise since early May. “Starting on May 10, COVID-19 infections jumped from one to three-digit figures within a matter of days,” South China Morning Post reported. The outbreak is having a big effect on at least one major chip company in Taiwan. “At King Yuan Electronics Co., one of ...

Blue Origin’s month-long auction for a trip to the edge of space with its billionaire founder Jeff Bezos ended on Saturday with a closing price of $28 million. The flight aboard New Shepard, slated for July 20th, will mark the company’s first mission flying humans, in which the winning bidder will bask in a few minutes of microgravity with Bezos, his brother Mark, and one other passenger before returning back to land. “The more you pay for it the more you enjoy it” The identity of the winner will be kept secret for a few weeks — “we need to complete some final paperwork with them,” says Blue Origin’s astronaut sales director Ariane Cornell during the live broadcast. The auction took place in a Boston, Massachusetts facility owned by RR Auction, the hosting company. Dozens of telephone oper...

Google will be adjusting the release cycle for Chrome OS later this year, moving to a schedule where it launches a new release every four weeks, the company announced on Friday. “To deliver new features more rapidly to consumers while also continuing to prioritize the key pillars of Chrome OS – security, stability, speed and simplicity – Chrome OS will move to a 4-week stable channel starting with M96 in Q4,” Chrome OS release TPM lead Marina Kazatcker said in a blog post. For enterprise and education users who may not want that fast of a release cycle, Google also plans to introduce a new update channel with a 6-month cadence by the time of the M96 release. The speed of Chrome OS’ release schedule will bring it on par with the Google Chrome browser, which will also be transitioning to a f...

Apple’s YouTube page currently has an unlisted video for a very clever iPad Pro ad featuring the song “Part of Your World” from Disney’s iconic animated film The Little Mermaid (via MacRumors). In the ad, PC users sing the lyrics to the classic song while looking upon their (of course) ugly-looking computer setups that are filled with peripherals and wires. (One woman’s leg is literally tied to her chair by a cord.) Often, they forlornly look outside, where people are happily using their iPad Pros to video chat, play games, and do work, seemingly free from the horrible confines of desktop computing. The lyrics, admittedly, do apply well for an ad where Apple is trying to prove that an iPad Pro can do everything that a “normal” computer can do without things like a dedicated monitor or a co...

Prime Day 2021 is happening in just a little over a week, kicking off on Monday, June 21st, and lasting through Tuesday, June 22nd. In addition to keeping up with our regular deals cadence each day, we’ve been working hard behind the curtain to ensure that we’ll be able to bring you the best Prime Day coverage out there once it starts. To that end, we’re updating each of our useful deal guides, so you’ll be able to tell more easily when something that we recommend is discounted. We recently updated our guide to helping you find the best deals on wireless earbuds, for instance. It’s going to be a busy but great week ahead for deals. If you’re looking for savings, you’ll definitely want to see what’s coming on Prime Day, whether it’s at Amazon or at other retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, an...

Amazon recently updated a couple of its Alexa-based Echo Show smart displays. The new Echo Show 8 (second gen) saw a couple of enhancements over its predecessor, but the smaller Echo Show 5 has received an even smaller refresh. There are only three basic changes in the new $84.99 Echo Show 5 (2nd Gen): it has a 2-megapixel camera instead of the 1-megapixel sensor of the first model; it comes in blue as well as the black and white color options; and the 3.5mm output jack on the back is gone. Unlike the larger Echo Show 8, the new 5 didn’t get a new processor, and its camera doesn’t feature the automatic panning and cropping that the Echo Show 8 and 10 offer. Verge Score 7.5 out of 10 Good Stuff Loud, full sound for its size Compact enough to put on a nightstand Does everything an Echo speak...

It used to be easy to hate pharmaceutical companies. Between soaring drug costs and the opioid crisis, the industry was widely perceived as one that put profits over people’s health. In a 2019 Gallup survey, pharma was ranked dead last for positive perception among United States institutions. People had more positive feelings about the federal government than Big Pharma. That year, technology companies were more popular. In a different survey, just under half of US adults had a positive view of the tech sector. It’s hard to compare two different polls head to head, but the general trend is clear: in 2019, people felt better about tech companies than they did about pharma. But then, the pandemic hit, and the country’s recovery depended on the success of vaccines. Government scrutiny of tech...

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On Friday, House Democrats introduced five new bills meant to chip away at the power of big tech companies, targeting a variety of practices that antitrust advocates say are stifling competition. These measures are the House Judiciary Committee’s historic, 16-month long investigation into the business tactics of companies like Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google. With this new slate of bills, Congress is getting ready to legislate based on the concerns raised by that investigation — and the move could reshape the tech industry as we know it. “Right now, unregulated tech monopolies have too much power over our economy” “Right now, unregulated tech monopolies have too much power over our economy. They are in a unique position to pick winners and losers, destroy small businesses, raise prices...

During the iOS portion of Apple’s WWDC keynote, it showed some amazing demos of 3D cities and AR transit directions, but amid all the beautiful features there were a few things missing from the stage and Apple’s iOS 15 feature list. Namely, some basic navigation tools that would let me get around easier. Since Apple seems to be focusing a lot on Maps (it got stage time at last year’s keynote, too), perhaps they’re also taking requests? Here’s my wishlist. Don’t forget, you’re here forever. Without a cellular signal or Wi-Fi, Apple Maps turns into a brick — you can’t search for locations, find routes, or do anything useful. This is, to put it lightly, a bit of a problem for a navigation app that’s been around for eight years. Imagine you used Apple Maps to navigate to somewhere that doesn’t...

E3 2021 is finally here. After being canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, E3 is back for 2021 in an all-digital format, kicking off on June 12th. Some big reveals have already hit — although technically not a part of E3, Thursday’s Summer Game Fest’s Kickoff Live event was packed with news, including a trailer and release date for the highly-anticipated Elden Ring and the announcement of Death Stranding: Director’s Cut for PS5. (You can catch a full replay of that show here.) And over the next few days there still are big conferences from Ubisoft, Microsoft and Bethesda, and Nintendo. If you want to attend the virtual E3 as a fan, you can register to attend on E3’s website. (I will warn you from personal experience that the E3 portal and website are pretty bad.) But if you just...