SOE Unveils Post-Zombie Apocalypse MMO Shooter H1Z1 for PC and PS4
Sony Online Entertainment President John Smedley unveiled SOE's latest project, an MMO zombie game entitled H1Z1, which can be played in first-person or third-person. While the overall premise may sound like DayZ, Smedley says that H1Z1 will contain many features that will set it apart, such as multiple servers with different rule sets housing thousands of players, a deep crafting system, an in-game economy, and even SOE's Player Studio for player-created content. Smedley says he wants "players to make Woodbury from The Walking Dead if they want to." If players do decide to set up a base, it's completely in the world, not instanced.
Powering H1Z1 is the proprietary Forgelight engine, which is used for PlanetSide 2 and EverQuest Next. Though system requirements haven't been unveiled yet, Smedley says, "If it can run PlanetSide 2, it can run H1Z1."
Source: H1Z1 Subreddit and PC Gamer
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Batman: Arkham Origins 'Cold, Cold Heart' DLC Gameplay Shown in New Video
After a New Year's Eve teaser, Batman: Arkham Origins' final piece of the Season Pass, Cold, Cold Night, was officially named and dated back in February during an episode of DC All Access. DC All Access was back today with more Cold, Cold Night, this time providing a first look at some gameplay, including some insight from Creative Director Eric Holmes and Game Director Benoit Richer.
Cold, Cold Night takes place one week after the events of Origins. It starts with the Humanitarian of the Year awards being hosted at Wayne Manor, which Mr. Freeze crashes. Ice obviously plays a huge role and Batman has a new suit, gadgets, and even combat moves to handle it all. One very interesting tidbit of info provided by the video below is that Mr. Freeze is typically one to go it alone, so he teams up with another character from the Batman universe to help him out and supply the goons.
When explaining the team-up, Holmes or Richer (sorry, can't tell which) states that, "you're going to see sparks fly." Is that a clue that Electrocutioner is his comrade in arms? Not to spoil anything, but Electrocutioner kind of got a bum rap in the main game, so maybe this is his time to shine alongside Mr. Freeze? Or maybe I'm just over-analyzing the choice of words? We'll find out in two weeks.
Source: DC All Access
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Secret Ponchos Confirmed for PC; Coming to Steam Early Access This Summer
Announced during Sony's E3 2013 Press Conference, Secret Ponchos is a spaghetti western multiplayer combat game currently in development by Vancouver-based indie studio Switchblade Monkeys. Originally billed as a PlayStation 4 exclusive, Switchblade announced today that the game will now be coming to PC as well. In fact, PC gamers will get to enjoy the game first, as it'll arrive on Steam Early Access this summer.
As seen in the original Reveal Trailer below, Secret Ponchos plays like a twin-stick shooter from an isometric perspective. According to Creative Director Yousuf Mapara, ever since the game was first previewed, there was "an overwhelming amount of demand to bring the game to PC." In addition to fulfilling that request, the studio realized that Early Access was a perfect environment that allowed the studio to not only self-fund the PC development, but also help balance and polish the game based on user feedback, which will ultimately benefit both PC and PS4 gamers. Because the game "blends exciting arena combat with the mastery of fighting games," Switchblade felt it was important to beta test the game with as many players as possible.
Source: Press Release
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Corsair Adds Options to Vengeance K70 Keyboard
The Corsair Vengeance K70 is a black aluminum keyboard with red backlit keys, originally available with Cherry MX Red switches. Corsair has now made the K70 available with Cherry MX Blue and Brown switches for users looking for a different feel in their keyboards. The backlighting can be adjusted to four different intensity levels, and the intensity can be adjusted on a key by key basis to add emphasis where it is most needed. The two new versions of the keyboard will be available sometime this month at an MSRP of $129.99.
Source: Press Release
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Seagate Announces New 6TB Hard Drive
Seagate has announced a new hard drive targeted at the enterprise storage market, the Enterprise Capacity 3.5 HDD v4, described by Seagate as "the world’s fastest 6TB hard disk drive." The drive is able to achieve up to 25% faster transfer speeds compared to other 6TB drives using 12Gb/s SAS connections. It is also available in a SATA 6Gb/s model for systems without a high speed SAS connection. Seagate has also included high rotational vibration tolerance and enhanced error correction for data reliability as well as making the drive self encrypting with Instant Secure Erase.
Source: Press Release
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ArcheAge Enters Alpha and Gets an Official Trailer
Last week, Trion Worlds published a video of the ArcheAge Press Demo shown at GDC 2014, which provided a good 20+ minutes of gameplay. At the time, ArcheAge was currently in Family & Friends Testing, but today, Trion Worlds announced that the game has officially entered Alpha. Alpha testing is limited to a very select few fansite operators, livestreamers, and community members, but Trion Worlds has lifted the non-disclosure agreement (NDA), so expect to see a lot of screenshots, videos, and first impressions. Along with Alpha announcement, Trion unveiled the official ArcheAge Alpha Trailer, entitled "What if...?". It's a purely cinematic trailer, so if you're unfamiliar with the game, you may want to go back and watch the aforementioned Press Demo.
Source: Official Site
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Facebook Reworks Right-Hand Column Advertisements
Although Facebook just recently implemented its auto play feature for advertisements found within the News Feed, the company has just announced that it is reworking advertisement designs found within the right-hand column of the social networking website. The new advertisements found within the right-hand column will mimic those located within the News Feed, and advertisers can even use the same image for both if they so choose. Fewer advertisements will be displayed as well, and distribution overall will be more efficient. With the new design, Facebook is claiming that engagement of advertisements is three times better than previously.
Later this month, some advertisers will be able to make use of the newly designed advertisement option. Others will not be able to access the new design until later this year, though Facebook will support both until the old advertisement design is phased out.
Source: Facebook for Business
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Disturbing New The Evil Within Gameplay Trailer Arrives for PAX East
The survival horror genre is making a comeback and The Evil Within is certainly at the forefront. Unlike some other survival horror games in the works that focus on what you cannot see, The Evil Within's chills come from the disturbing stuff you do see. It's as much a slasher flick as it is a psychological thriller. This is no more evident than in the newest gameplay trailer released today, which shows some never-before-seen gameplay and villains.
Source: Bethesda Blog
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DNS May Be Limiting Smartphone Speed
Back before one could save contacts on phones, we had to input phone numbers to call someone. Thankfully we have not had to do the same with the Internet as a site's domain name is translated to its IP address for us. Researchers at Northwestern University have recently found that the servers that perform that translation can have a significant impact on how quickly our smartphones perform when web surfing.
Domain Name Servers (DNS) are a crucial part of the Internet as without them one would have to keep track of the IP addresses for every site they visit. Like any piece of hardware though, a DNS can become bogged down with requests. The Northwestern researchers were curious if the particular DNS service a smartphone uses could influence its performance exploring the Internet. To their surprise, it not only had an impact, but a large one as well. When tested, some services improved performance by up to 150%, compared to the DNS service one's carrier uses.
To help users find the best DNS service, the researchers created the Namehelp app, which is currently available in the Google Play Store. While it may find a better DNS for your location and the sites you visit, you may not be able to achieve any of that improved performance, unless you have rooted your phone, as carriers lock down what DNS you use on their networks (Wi-Fi would be different though).
Source: Northwestern University
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Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel Officially Announced; Gameplay Video Released
Two days ago, it was leaked that 2K Australia was working on a new Borderlands game set during the five year gap between the first two games. Today, Gearbox officially confirmed that Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is indeed real! In fact, everything previously reported is true, from the four new characters, to the new weapon types, to the low gravity and oxygen. Those lucky enough to be attending PAX East this weekend will even get a first-hand look at the game at the 2K booth!
Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford officially announced the game to journalists along with explaining how it came to be, why it came to be, and why it's last-gen only. While the game tells the story of Handsome Jack's rise to power, the main impetus for the game was actually just going to the moon. Pitchford said that fans always saw the moon and moon base in the previous games and talked about going there – now that's happening.
The moon allows Gearbox and 2K Australia to play around and introduce new game mechanics, such as the aforementioned low gravity and need for oxygen. Aside from your need of oxygen to breathe and survive, it also powers your jetpack. Jetpacks allow you to double-jump and cover a lot of ground, but consumes your oxygen at a greater rate. But while you're up in the air, you can press crouch to quickly come slamming to the ground to damage enemies. Oz Kits will now drop from enemies and caches, allowing you to replenish your oxygen, but the most interesting revelation is the existence of oxygen generators. Oxygen generators, when activated, create a small breathable environment around it. What makes this interesting is that you can use these environments to enable elemental damage such as fire – yes, even in Borderlands, fire needs oxygen.
The one character that'll undergo some of the most drastic changes is Wilhelm. While he starts out as a human, we already know that by the time Borderlands 2 takes place, he's a giant Hyperion Loader. According to Pitchford, "Every skill point you add increases the amount of cybernetic attachments and modification that Wilhelm undergoes. And some of those skills have new features and new capabilities that are a lot of fun." Meanwhile, Claptrap the Fragtrap is the same Claptrap that greeted us in Borderlands and was then found abandoned in the frozen wasteland of Borderlands 2. The Pre-Sequel will explain just what happened between those events, and playing as him actually sets the camera lower since he's about half the size of a human, but he apparently has upgraded abilities to make up for it.
According to Pitchford, 2K Australia began work on the game around the March 2013 release of Bioshock Infinite, in cooperation with Gearbox. It was also decided early on that all the inhabitants of the moon will have an Australian accent and there will be plenty of Australian humor and gags present in the game. When asked why The Pre-Sequel is not coming to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, Pitchford was rather upfront about it: building a game for next-gen would cost money and the install base just isn't there yet to justify it. "There's over 150 million installed PlayStation 3s and Xbox 360s," he said. "There are currently fewer PlayStation 4 and Xbox Ones than the sold copies of Borderlands 2." For now, all the investment is focused on creation rather than figuring out how the new platforms work.
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is coming to PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 in Fall 2014.
Source: Gearbox and Eurogamer and Polygon
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Micro Fuel Cell Powered by Saliva Developed
A goal for many researchers is to develop biomedical micro-devices that can collect specific information easily and cheaply. While ultra-low-power chip-size electronics are becoming a reality, powering them is still a question, as the power source must be equally small. Researchers at Penn State may have a solution in the form of a micro microbial fuel cell, which can be powered by saliva.
Microbial fuel cells take advantage of the small amount of electrical charge bacteria produce as they process organic material. By capturing that charge with an anode, it can be run through a circuit to power a device. Microbial fuel cells have been developed before, and often use wastewater, but this new cell is able to operate off of the organic material found in saliva. It further differs from other microbial fuel cells by only using a single chamber with a graphene coated, carbon cloth anode. Other fuel cells possess two chambers and use platinum. Another important difference is it utilizes an open-air cathode, and the researchers do not quite understand why. Normally if oxygen is able to reach the bacteria, no electricity will be produced, but it works in this case, possibly due to the electrodes being microns apart.
Potentially this and similar microbial fuel cells could power devices to measure glucose levels and other useful pieces of information. They may not put out even a full microwatt, but not much is needed for some of these devices.
Source: Penn State
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Sesame Workshop Launches Sesame GO
Sesame Workshop, which is behind the popular Sesame Street television show, has launched a new video on demand service dubbed Sesame GO. The new subscription based service is ran off of an open source video platform known as Kaltura, which also powers the HTML5 player found on Wikipedia. Sesame GO provides classic and current episodes on demand through a web interface that is specifically optimized for Mac, PC, smartphones, and tablets. At this time, there is no information surrounding a dedicated application for Sesame GO, so those who want to watch the large catalog of available Sesame Street episodes will have to do so through a web browser.
Sesame GO is currently available in the United States only and will cost parents $3.99 per month, or $29.99 annually. International availability is expected sometime in the future, though no timeframe has been announced.
Source: The Next Web
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Hardware Roundup: Wednesday Edition
We have plenty to get into today, so let's get started. There's another take on the XFX Type 01 Bravo case, the first case from the long-time video card maker. We have a variety of DDR3 RAM from AVEXIR's Blitz 1.1's line to see just how well it can handle various activities. We also have plenty for the on-the-go crowd, like a review on the HTC One M8 smartphone and the Pivos MANA 2200mAh battery pack. There's also a portable Bluetooth in the shape of a car's side mirror from iui Design, and a smartphone stand from Gumstick. Everything here should help you get through this Wednesday, so hit up the links below to check them all out.
Cases
XFX Type 01 Bravo @ Neoseeker
Memory
AVEXIR Blitz 1.1 DDR3 DRAM @ Benchmark Reviews
Mobile
HTC One M8 @ TechSpot
Gumstick Smartphone Stand @ Bjorn3D
Gadgets
Pivos MANA 2200mAh Battery Pack @ Bjorn3D
Speakers/Headphones
iui Design Mirror Boombox @ ThinkComputers
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