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The ripples from Concords seismic implosion are still fanning out since Sony decided to take the game offline earlier this month. Now, the games director has reportedly decided to bow out gracefully. Kotaku reported that game director Ryan Ellis of Firewalk Studios told staff members that hes stepping down from his position. Ellis, who cofounded Firewalk after a stint as the creative director of Destiny 2, will remain with the studio but only in a support role. Meanwhile, the staff at Firewalk are still waiting to hear what Sony plans to do with their underperforming game. Just two weeks after Concords release, Sony pulled the team shooter offline on September 6 and issued refunds to everyone who bought the game for the PlayStation 5 or PC from Steam and the Epic Games Store. Sony said in a statement that it pulled the game in order to explore options, including those that will better reach our players. Naturally, Kotaku reports that a lot of Firewalks staffers are worried about the status of their jobs in the wake of Concords disappointing release. The extremely poor sales of Concord make it one of the biggest bombs in industry history. Analysts estimate that it only sold 25,000 copies on Steam and for PS5 in its first six days.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/playstation/concords-disastrous-launch-reportedly-leads-to-its-directors-self-demotion-215515013.html?src=rss
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Get ready to question humanitys control over the technology that surrounds us because another season of Netflixs Black Mirror is in the works. Earlier today, the official Black Mirror X page revealed the cast of the new season coming next year along with some other interesting clues and Easter eggs. The video features an old, flickering computer screen that appears to unload a complete data dump of the entire cast for season 7. Some of the names that jumped out at us includes Oscar nominee Paul Giamatti, Doctor Who star and Oscar winner Peter Capaldi (he won in 1995 with his live action short film Franz Kafkas Its a Wonderful Life), Awkwafina, Issa Rae, Tracee Ellis Ross and Rashida Jones. The list also included some of the cast who played virtual crew members of the USS Callister from the iconic fourth season episode of the same name. The names from the USS Callister episode that appeared on the list include Cristin Milioti, Jimmi Simpson, Billy Magnussen, Milanka Brooks and Osy Ikhile. Weve known for a while now that series creator Charlie Brooker has been planning to revisit the crew of the USS Callister. The season 4 opening episode starred Jesse Plemmons as the chief technology officer named Robert of a top tier game studio and a big fan of a Star Trek-esque TV show called Space Fleet. By day, he gets pushed around and little credit for the companys success from his colleagues and staff. He uses immersive virtual reality technology to play as Space Fleet Capt. Robert Daly away from work on a virtual starship and takes out his frustrations and anger on the crew in increasingly cruel and inhumane ways. The crew members were replicated in the game using his boss and staff members DNA that Robert obtained without their permission or knowledge. The crew revolt and escape to the open Internet while leaving a seething Capt. Robert stranded in the game. TCKR_Confidential_NotForDistribution.mp4 pic.twitter.com/NdaGRQYtba Black Mirror (@blackmirror) September 19, 2024 Of course, this wouldnt be a true Black Mirror reveal if it didnt contain some clues and hidden items in the teaser. The loading screen features the studio name Tuckersoft, a reference to the game studio in the interactive Bandersnatch movie. The cast names are listed in alphabetical order by first name but theyve been broken into eight groups. There are some cryptic phrases between the scrolling group names like Too soon?, A rose for a rose and Shields 58 percent. Could these be episode titles? The latter definitely sounds like a reference to the USS Callister and Brooker and company love symbolic episode titles taken from songs for their tech hell stories like Shut Up and Dance and Hang the DJ. The new Black Mirror episodes havent even landed yet and theyve already screwing with our heads.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/black-mirror-season-7-cast-revealed-in-a-cryptic-computer-message-203343148.html?src=rss
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An Austin-based startup best known for its VR and mixed reality workspace software for other companies headsets now has hardware of its own. The Immersed Visor appears to sit somewhere between a Vision Pro Lite and Xreal Plus: a lightweight head-worn device that creates a high-resolution spatial computing environment on the cheap (well, relatively speaking). Teased to death for months, Immersed founder Renji Bijoy finally unveiled the Visor at an Austin event on Thursday. The device, a bit more than glasses but much less than a full headset, gives each eye the equivalent of a 4K OLED screen. It has a solid 100-degree field of view. It supports 6DoF tracking (meaning it responds to motion on different axes, not just simple head rotations), and it offers hand and eye tracking and support for over five screens in a virtual or mixed reality environment. Immersed In the presentation, Bijoy revealed that the Immersed Visor only weighs 186g, slightly less than an iPhone 16 Pro. Its 64 percent lighter than the Meta Quest 3 (515g) and around 70 percent lighter than the Apple Vision Pro (600 to 650g). Weight and ergonomics have been drawbacks for many early adopters of VR and mixed-reality tech. (That includes some customers of the $3,500 Vision Pro.) So, trimming the Visors weight to about the same as a high-end smartphone could, in theory, help it succeed where competitors struggled. Part of that comes from (in borrowing a trick from Apple) a wired battery pack you stash in your pocket. But unlike those devices, the Immersed Visor doesnt include an app store or onboard experiences like games. Instead, its tailored for work: link it to your Windows, macOS or Linux computer (wirelessly or wired), and get stuff done on its immersive array of virtual screens. Its 6DoF tracking means you can stand up, lean or twist, and the virtual screens will remain planted where you put them, rather than awkwardly following you through space. Like the companys workspace app for Meta Quest and Vision Pro, you can operate either in a passthrough view of your space or an entirely virtual one. (It includes pleasant virtual environments like a mountaintop ski resort by a cozy fire.) You can also work with others in a shared space. The device runs on the Qualcomm XR2+ Gen 2 chip, which debuted at CES 2024. The chip supports up to 4.3K per-eye resolution and can handle content up to 90fps. Immersed Immersed has chosen an unconventional pricing scheme. The device starts at $1,050 to buy outright. But you can get it for $400 upfront if you agree to a subscription model: $40 monthly for 24 months or $60 monthly for a 12-month term. Oh, and that model doesnt ship until six months after October, meaning April 2025. If you want a device that starts shipping next month i.e., the Founders Edition that price increases to $1,350 outright or $700 plus the monthly subscription fee (same prices as the later-shipping version). In theory, the Immersed Visor could hit a sweet spot for many spatial computing-curious folks who want something cheaper than the Vision Pro, with a higher resolution than the Meta Quest 3 and thats (perhaps) less like a beta product than Xreals AR glasses. Whether it succeeds on those points, well, we wont have a clue until we get some hands-on time. As far as I can see, no major media outlets (including Engadget) have shared hands-on demos of the device. As this years wave of absurdly hyped AI gadgets reminded us, big promises mean nothing if you end up with a $1,000 paperweight. You can watch the presentation below and, if it tickles your fancy, pre-order from Immerseds website. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/the-immersed-visor-aims-for-spatial-computings-sweet-spot-201031456.html?src=rss
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