gaming

Xbox on Tuesday unveiled its new wireless controller in Aqua Shift, a shimmering light blue hue with color swirl grips. The device features a color-shifting blue shimmer, a hybrid D-pad and textured grip on the trigger, bumpers and back case. A dedicated share button allows users to easily capture and share screenshots, while the controller can be easily paired and switched between devices including Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, Windows 10 PC, Android, and iOS using bluetooth. The special edition controller offers up to 40 hours of battery life and can be used alongside the Xbox Accessories app to remap other buttons. The device retails for $69.99 USD and is available for preorder online in select markets before its official August 30 release. In other news, Sony recently release...

Amid the recent widespread sexual misconduct allegations and lawsuits against Blizzard Entertainment, including stories of unacceptable behavior by company leaders, Blizzard president J. Allen Brack has announced his departure from the company. Starting today, Jen Oneal and Mike Ybarra will step up to co-lead the company going forward. Jen is the former executive vice president of development overseeing the Overwatch and Diablo franchises and was previously the head of video game studio Vicarious Visions. Mike spent many years at Microsoft‘s Xbox division before joining Blizzard as executive vice president and general manager of platform and technology, overseeing Battle.net and the studio’s development services organization. “Both leaders are deeply committed to all of our employees; to t...

After releasing a series of high-performance GPUs earlier this year, AMD Radeon is now introducing a more budget-friendly option for those looking to build a more humble PC with the unveiling of its RX 6600 XT graphics card. A direct successor RX 5600 XT, the new offering has been labeled by AMD as its “new standard for 1080p,” although like its predecessor, it can probably also push out a decent 1440p gaming experience. RDNA 2 performance has been upgraded to 9.6 teraflops over the previous 7.19 teraflops, and the GDDR6 RAM now comes in at a more reasonable 8GB instead of 6GB. Other features include 2,359 MHz clocking, 32 compute units, 160W power supply and potential ray-tracing, although don’t expect it to perform too well at this budget level.  All of this allows the RX 6600 XT to...

Last year, SEGA closed its Akihabara landmark arcade after almost two decades. Since then, the Japanese gaming giant has been hit with a turbulent year amid the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, at one point even requesting 650 employees to voluntarily retire, and now the company is forced to close yet another one of its iconic arcade centers in Tokyo. Located in Toshima, the SEGA Ikebukuro Gigo arcade opened its business 28 years ago, catering to both local and international gaming enthusiasts who’d visit the branch as part of a must-see tourist attraction. The center would often feature new and innovative games to test their market appeal and subsequently opened a taiyaki stand on its first floor in order to give hungry tourists and gamers somewhere to eat. Unfortunately, due to a lack of to...

Bungie and Ubisoft have now taken Ring-1 to court over the latter’s manufacturing of cheats for numerous games. According to new reports, Ring-1 creates cheats for players online and makes them accessible through subscription-based memberships. The cheats span across a number of games — including AAA titles — such as Bungie’s Destiny 2, Ubisoft’s Rainbow Six Siege, PUBG, Escape From Tarkov, and even Dead by Daylight, and offers hacks like infinite ammo and aimbots. To make things worse, subscriptions also come with access to hardware ID spoofers so in-game anti-hacking systems won’t be able to trace and ban players employing those cheats. “Defendants’ sale and distribution of the Cheating Software therefore has caused Plaintiffs to suffer irreparable damage to their goo...

Intel is preparing for the global semiconductor shortage to last until 2022 or 2023, meaning that purchasing a next-gen consoles such as the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S will continue to be difficult. According to reports, CEO Pat Gelsinger shared during a Q2 earnings call earlier this week that it could take two more years to meet the demand for the chip due to an increasing request and the strain of COVID-19. “While I expect the shortage to bottom out in the second half, it will take another one to two years before the industry is able to completely catch up with demand,” he said. “With major fab construction projects underway in Oregon, Arizona, Ireland, and Israel, we are investing for the future, but we are also taking action today to find innovative ways to help mitigate industr...

As the world has its eyes on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, a petition has been launched to make the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game an official Olympic sport. Launched by YouTuber Xiran Jay Zhao, the description for the petition notes that “it is an absolute injustice that the game of Yu-Gi-Oh! The Trading Card Game is not a legitimate sport in the Olympics.” Going on to outline exactly why the popular card game based on the manga/anime series of the same name deserves the distinction. “The playing of Yugioh requires dexterity (when drawing the cards), athleticism (when playing the cards), and endurance (when you’re in round 10 of a YCS).” The petition to make the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game an official Olympic sport currently has over 4,000 signatures and is quickly approaching its initial goal of...

Following McDonald’s announcement to give away custom Playstation 5 DualSense controllers in celebration of its 50th birthday in Australia, Sony immediately put a stop to the release. Taking on the fast-food giant’s color scheme, each controller features illustrations of burgers and fries and the McDonald’s logo centered up top. The PS5 controller was only supposed to be an internal concept and was never meant to be advertised to fans according to IGN. McDonald’s initially planned to include the controllers in a giveaway during the stream week event, but Sony PlayStation did not authorize any inclusion in promotional efforts as there is no official partnership or collaboration. “Unfortunately, McDonald’s stream week has been postponed and won’t be going ahead this Sunday,” as per McDonald’...

Star Wars is releasing its first Tamagotchi which allows you to own your own R2-D2. The classic egg toy has housed a slew of digital pets in recent years ranging from Demon Slayer to Neon Genesis Evangelion characters. Unlike the usual process of hatching an egg and raising the pet, players will be training their R2-D2 to learn 19 skills. Artoo owners will have to keep him charged, cleaned and entertained by playing two initial games such as firefighting and holochess (Dejarik) before being upgraded to seven more mini-games by keeping him happy. Rather than just dying if uncared for, Arto will be abducted by Jawas and turned into scrap or sold to moisture farmers while getting thrown in galactic squabbles. The new edition will also showcase mini pixelated clips from the film series. The St...