Apple : Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas live stream: watch the boxing online anywhere |
- Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas live stream: watch the boxing online anywhere
- GDC 2020 “indefinitely postponed” after losing Microsoft, Sony, Epic to coronavirus
- GTA 6 news and rumors: when will Grand Theft Auto 6 be announced?
- Pokémon Go updates: all the news and rumors for what's coming next
- Disney Plus UK release date, price, deals, Sky Q integration and what we know
- Apex Legends Season 4: latest update news, tips, patch notes and more
- Watch the PGA Tour: how to live stream golf in 2020 from anywhere in the world
- Spotify vs Tidal: which music streaming service is best for you?
- Best N64 games
- Aston Villa vs Man City live stream: how to watch the Carabao Cup 2020 final from anywhere
- Watch Real Madrid vs Barcelona from only $10 this weekend thanks to Sling's El Clasico offer
- I got to see Baldur's Gate 3 in action – and it may just be the future of RPGs
- PS5 and Xbox Series X will have cross-gen games – does that put you off?
- Windows 10 is falling apart – so it’s a great time to fall in love with a Chromebook
- Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite: what we want to see
- Real Madrid vs Barcelona live stream: how to watch El Clasico 2020 online from anywhere
- South Africa vs Australia live stream: how to watch ODI series 2020 cricket from anywhere
- TalkTalk's cheap fibre broadband deals now come with £40 Amazon gift cards
- These are the five leading SIM only deals this weekend: Three, EE, Vodafone and more
- Internet access hangs by a thread for hundreds of millions
| Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas live stream: watch the boxing online anywhere Posted: 29 Feb 2020 02:00 PM PST Few recent bouts have pitted two fighters with such a wealth of experience against each other - don't miss a moment of the action with our Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas live stream guide. Watch all the boxing action from this weekend's big fight online the easy way. Saturday's showdown in Texas marks the return to the ring of four-division world champion Garcia, who fights for the first time since his points defeat to Errol Spence Jr - which ended an impressive 39-fight winning streak. Meanwhile, former WBA and IBO super lightweight champion Vargas comes into the fight off the back of a TKO win over Humberto Soto - a victory which ended a frustrating run of two draws in his previous fights. The fight sees Vargas dropping down in weight. That could play into Garcia's hands, as Vargas boasts a considerable three-inch reach advantage over his opponent and, perhaps more significantly, is also a massive five-inches taller. The big question remains how will Garcia respond to stinging defeat to Spence Jr which ended one of boxing's greatest ever winning streaks. There's loads at stake, too, with tonight's victor being tipped to a big-money showdown with Manny Pacquiao, one of the sport's all-time legends. Read on to find out how you can watch the fight with our Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas live stream guide.
How to watch the Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas fight from outside your countryIf you want to watch the boxing outside of your country you may find that the content is geo-restricted. That could mean that, despite having access when on home turf, you are blocked while away. Fret not, that can be rectified with the use of a clever piece of software called a VPN - far better that than hunting for an illegal stream. How to live stream Mikey Garcia vs Jessie Vargas in the US
How to live stream Garcia vs Vargas in the UKHow to watch the Garcia vs Vargas fight for free in CanadaHow to live stream Garcia vs Vargas in AustraliaGarcia vs Vargas: main card fights
Garcia vs Vargas: undercard fights
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| GDC 2020 “indefinitely postponed” after losing Microsoft, Sony, Epic to coronavirus Posted: 29 Feb 2020 12:41 PM PST For all its antivirus protection, the tech world is coming to a realization that it’s no match for deadly biological viruses. Not only has IDC already predicted that this novel coronavirus could lead to a decline in PC sales this year, with so many factories shutting down and demand already dropping. But also, many tech trade shows and events have already been cancelled. The latest in this string of cancellations is the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2020 in San Francisco. It was supposed to take place from March 16 through 20. According to an update on the GDC website, Informatech, the organization behind GDC, “made the difficult decision to postpone the Game Developers Conference this March” after a “close consultation with our partners in the game development industry and community around the world.”
All the big companies have pulled outIt’s no surprise that GDC 2020 finally threw its hands up in defeat. GDC 2020 has been gradually shrinking in the last few days due to big exhibitors pulling out. Sony and Oculus were the first ones to go, pulling out more than a week ago, followed by EA, Hideo Kojima, PlayStation and Facebook. A day before the cancellation, Microsoft, Epic and Unity also dropped out, with Microsoft citing concerns for the “wellbeing of our teams & community” due to the “growing public health risks associated with coronavirus (COVID-19).” With so many of its big players dropping out, it was just a matter of time before other exhibitors followed suit. And, the number of conference attendees would have considerably dropped as well – Facebook, for one, has said that it’s “advising all employees to refrain from traveling to the show.” The San Francisco Bay Area has recently announced two community transmission cases of COVID-19. This has prompted some media outlets to dub Northern California the “epicenter of what officials are calling the turning point in the spread of the highly contagious coronavirus.” So, having a massive conference with attendees from all over the world sharing gaming consoles, VR headsets and other gaming-related tech might not be the best idea. It’s not all bad news, however. Microsoft is planning to host a “digital-only event" from March 16-18, so it’s still set to make the announcements it planned to make at the conference. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| GTA 6 news and rumors: when will Grand Theft Auto 6 be announced? Posted: 29 Feb 2020 09:47 AM PST Is GTA 6 on its way? While the next instalment in the Grand Theft Auto franchise is yet to be formally announced by its developer Rockstar, that doesn't stop those of us hungry for more trying to figure it out. Now that most of us have traipsed through the gorgeous world of Red Dead Redemption 2 on console or PC and gamers are looking ahead to the next open-world Rockstar game. It's been a whole seven years since GTA 5 launched on consoles, meaning an announcement could be imminent, and the latest news and rumors suggest that GTA 6 could be on its way sometime soon – likely landing on the upcoming PS5 and Xbox Series X consoles. Although 2020 is still in its early days, a release this year doesn't seem likely without any kind of development announcement – especially with Rockstar's Dan Houser leaving the studio. But with the next generation of consoles coming at the tail end of the year hopes are increasing that we might hear something from Rockstar at some point. Details may be thin on the ground, but that doesn't stop us gathering together the best pieces of gossip, rumor and fact for your personal pleasure. Here's everything we know so far about GTA 6. UPDATE: Some new images on the official Rockstar website have set tongues wagging. Read on to find out more. Check out our video below on GTA VI: predictions on characters, locations, story and GTA Online. Cut to the chase
GTA 6 release date : when can I play it?Grand Theft Auto (Image credit: Rockstar Games) Red Dead Redemption 2 has now been in the wild for more than a year, which means we're hoping a GTA 6 announcement isn't far away – even though we're likely to be waiting a while to play it. According to some rumors, we could see the next Grand Theft Auto announced in 2020, with a potential release in 2021, which would make sense considering we're heading into a new console generation at the end of 2020. However, Rockstar has been focused on getting Red Dead Online up and running which may have diverted attention, not to mention the potential delays potentially caused by Dan Houser's departure from Rockstar. However, according to reputable industry analyst Michael Pachter, the game's actual release could be as far away as 2022. In an interview with Gaming Bolt, Pachter said that he thinks a 2020 announcement with a 2021 release would be the best case scenario, while a 2021 announcement with a 2022 release or later would be more likely. Given 2020 has only just begun, expecting any news of GTA 6 in the immediate future is unlikely. But the Xbox Series X and PS5 are due to launch at the end of the year and if GTA 6 followed the release pattern of its predecessor, Grand Theft Auto 5, it'd be released at the very tail end of the current generation, comfortably released on the new generation and straddle both for the widest install base possible. With no announcement thus far that seems optimistic but, hey, anything could happen. GTA 6 trailer: when can I watch one?The thing about Rockstar Games is that it’s an incredibly secretive games publisher. No trailer is getting out of that studio unless someone seriously screws up. Just look at what Rockstar did with both GTA 5 and Red Read Redemption 2. It teased an announcement a few days before dropping the first trailer for either game. If there’s a GTA 6 trailer, you’ll know about it because the internet will explode – and we'll let you know too, of course. But we're not expecting one anytime soon. GTA 6 news and rumors: what do we know so far?Grand Theft Auto (Image credit: Rockstar Games) Below we've collected together all of the latest leaks and rumors that hint at when GTA 6 might be launched – and what we can expect from the new game. As always, take these details with a pinch of salt – some are old, some are from now deleted sources and others might just be keen fans getting carried away. Website artwork It's really not much (though does it ever take much when it comes to Rockstar excitement?) but some recent additions to the Rockstar website have caused excitement amongst fans. The additions (via GamesRadar) are some new pieces of artwork to the site's menus that appear to be unrelated to any of Rockstar's existing games. The first piece of artwork is an android hugging a champagne bottle with the year 1998 on it (that's Rockstar's founding year) while the second is a red and blue logo with Rockstar's various slogans on it. Like we said, this isn't much at all but any changes Rockstar makes tend to grab the attention of fans hoping for some kind of new game announcement. After all, the announcement of Red Dead Redemption 2 was preceded by a Twitter logo change so it's not like subtlety like this would be off the cards. Or this could simply be Rockstar updating its website with some interesting new evergreen imagery—the fact that the images are generally relevant to Rockstar as a company and that they appear in the background of the site's menu suggests that they're not hugely important. Until any kind of official announcement is made we won't know for sure. Take-Two plays down AAA releases In an earnings call for Take-Two Interactive – the publisher that owns GTA developer Rockstar – shareholders were told to expect the "most robust pipeline" in the company's history. However, Take-Two CEO Strauss H. Zelnick also stressed that some years would be thin on releases – which, given the launch of Red Dead Redemption 2 last year, doesn't make us hopeful for any new GTA titles in the coming year. "Given that we're a company that depends on our creative teams to make as close to perfect products as possible," said Zelnick, "we have to be willing to live with the vagaries of product deliveries. And that means, sometimes, we will have thin frontline years." Dan Houser leaves Rockstar Houser, who has variously acted as writer, producer and voice actor at Rockstar, led Rockstar Games to become one of the biggest developers in the industry. It's currently unknown whether this will have an impact on GTA 6's development. CJ voice actor shoots down rumors This doesn't rule out the return of CJ as a character entirely (Rockstar could always cast someone else in the role) but it does confirm that Bellard isn't involved and doesn't intend to be if asked. Rockstar hasn't commented on rumors and we won't know anything certain about any cast for GTA 6 until it speaks out. Steven Ogg at Brazil Game Show Ogg's reasoning, rather than any kind of inside knowledge as far as we can tell, is that Rockstar games "take 7-8 years to make, do the math." Doing the math from GTA 5's 2013 release date would mean that GTA 6 could release in 2020 or 2021, right in time for the next generation of consoles. That seems very soon for a game we've seen very little about but, hey, it's not impossible. We'll be watching this space. Scouting areas in Florida The letter was to a Florida store asking permission for Rockstar Games to inspect the premises, presumably for use or inspiration in the forthcoming game – mentioning a location scout Leah Sokolowsky who hinted at a large digital media client in a podcast back in May 2019 (via Daily Star). Grand Theft Auto (Image credit: Rockstar Games) Edinburgh Rockstar HQ Project Americas Regardless, it's still fun to get our imaginations going for what the future of the Grand Theft Auto franchise may hold. According to the Reddit poster behind the leak, the game, known as Project Americas, has been in production since 2015 though it was placed on ice while Red Dead Redemption 2 was the focus. GTA 6 could be expansive, set across multiple decades (1970s to 1980s) and locations (one of which is Vice City, another Liberty City and another is a fictional city based on Rio de Janeiro). The game will apparently deal with one playable protagonist named Ricardo and play through their story as a rising drug lord with heavy inspiration from Netflix's Narcos series. The story will be told through chapters, with a heavy emphasis on the visuals of changes in time as the story progresses. While there's no estimated release date given, the post says that the plan is to release the game for the next generation only. While it's unlikely that the whole report is true (even the poster says that the game's pre-alpha status means things are likely to change) that's not to say some elements are impossible. Certainly a next-gen only release seems entirely plausible. Before you get too excited,though, the post has already been debunked by Kotaku's Jason Schreier. Another rumor leak? According to the post, GTA 6 will allow players to travel between several big cities, including Liberty City and Vice City. The poster also claims you start off as a small-time drug runner before joining an infamous gang and kicking it with the big dogs. In addition, the post claims Rockstar is waiting to see how the new-generation consoles sell (PS5 and Xbox Two) as GTA 6 wouldn't be able to be released on the PlayStation 4 or Xbox One due to memory restrictions. The anonymous poster also claimed GTA 6 will feature both major cities along with a vast stretch of highways and Blaine County-like countryside in the middle of it all. Finally, the post claims that, despite the game being set in a timed era, there will be flashbacks between missions and Red Dead Redemption 2-type stranger dialogues that implement the greet/antagonise format. While location rumors seem to be leaking in abundance, the anonymous Pastebin post has been backed up by review on Glassdoor by a Rockstar Games QA tester, which has since been removed (via Dexerto). Alongside reading out Rockstar for its institutionalized crunch, the post leaves a cryptic message that sees the first letter of each sentence spelling out 'GTA6LSVCLC'. This may be pointing to the potential locations of Grand Theft Auto 6: Los Santos, Vice City, and Liberty City. Wonder what these locations would look like together as an actual map? Graphic designer RealityDesign posted a concept image on GTA Forums, showing what this map could potentially look like. Check it out below: Image credit: RealityDesign Job listings The Know report on Vice City The reason for this code name is apparently because players will be able to fly between the US and South America in the game, though the majority of the action will take place in the former. This in combination with the source's assertion that the game will largely be set in Vice City (the Rockstar version of Miami) suggests there could be a focus on drug running which would draw on the popularity of shows and movies like Narcos and Tom Cruise's Made in America. Particularly if Rockstar holds on to that 80s setting. With no comment from Rockstar, these rumors remain nothing more than, well, rumors. But they do pose an interesting proposition that would seize upon the particular fondness many fans of the series have for Vice City. Grand Theft Auto (Image credit: Rockstar Games) GTA 6 is definitely coming and there are ideas “We don’t know what GTA 6 will be, but we’ve got some ideas,” said Benzies in the interview. Okay, so it’s not much, but it’s certainly a snippet of solid information direct from the source. Benzies went on to talk about what kind of ideas get the creative juices flowing over at Rockstar. “We’ve got about 45 years’ worth of ideas we want to do,” he added. “We’ll pick the right ones.” “It comes from the idea first. Where it is going to be set is the first question. That then defines the missions; you’re doing different things in LA than in New York or Miami. “The map and story get worked up together, and the story is a basic flow of how it works out so you can layer the mission in.” We’re just pleased that Rockstar has so many ideas for what it wants to do with GTA 6. We just hope it sorts them into some kind of organised system and gets that game to us sharpish. GTA 6 map: where will GTA 6 be set?Grand Theft Auto (Image credit: Rockstar Games) Although there haven’t been any concrete reports as yet, every online titbit and juicy gossip morsel is pointing towards GTA 6’s map being absolutely massive. We’re even not talking city-size massive, we’re talking potentially the entire of the United States massive. Some rumors are suggesting that GTA 6 may end up spanning the entirety of the US, with some kind of teleportation system that cuts down the journey time between cities. There are even some incredibly exciting rumours that Rockstar Games might have a ‘70s theme up its sleeve, so crack out those old bell-bottoms and disco balls. But there’s also another rumor that’s gathering strength, which would put GTA 6 a little closer to Rockstar Games’ British home – a London setting. The reports actually started with a comment from Rockstar Games’ co-founder Dan Houser: “At the moment, it feels like GTA’s DNA is contemporary-ish, American-ish, English-speaking-ish, because that’s what it has been… But that doesn’t necessarily limit it to those, that’s just what we’ve done so far.” Rockstar Games sources suggest that London is the only non-US location to be whispered as a potential GTA setting. For our money, we think a return to Vice City is on the cards, which would tie in to the rumors mentioned above. A recent report from The Know suggests that a return to Vice City in the 80s is actually in the works and that players will explore the rise in drugs at the time through the missions. In this rumored game, players will move between Vice City and South America, which would create a very interesting and entirely new kind of map. The GTA 3 trilogy was set across three locations, Liberty City, Vice City, and San Andreas. This mirrored the original Grand Theft Auto Game, which was also set across the same three locations. The most recent Grand Theft Auto games, GTA 4 and GTA 5, have so far been set in Liberty City and San Andreas respectively, meaning that Vice City is the only location yet to be explored by the recent games. The only question now is whether Rockstar will be tempted to complete the set.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Pokémon Go updates: all the news and rumors for what's coming next Posted: 29 Feb 2020 09:08 AM PST Pokémon Go: the world's first augmented reality app to become a household name. Niantic's mobile AR game is still going strong two years after it first released, with a constant drip of events and updates keeping budding trainers glued to their phones and pounding the streets. And while it hasn't managed to top the peak of its popularity in 2016, it's still going strong and finding plenty of new ways to improve its player experience. So what's the latest news for Pokémon Go? As you'd expect, brand new features are being added all the time and community events are still going strong. Plus we have some more themed events and brand new Pokémon being introduced at regular intervals. But without further ado, here's our guide to all the latest Pokémon Go news and updates.
Pokémon Go news and Pokémon Go updates
Research Breakthrough Encounter The starring Pokémon for March's Research Breakthroughs has been announced: it's Ferroseed. This Grass/Steel-type and its bonus stardust will be available from March 1 through to April 1. Thundurus comes to Raids Thundurus, the Electric/Flying-type Pokémon, is making its Pokémon Go debut and will appear in five-star Raids from March 2. Legendary Raid Weekends Speaking of Raids, each weekend in March will bring a new Legendary Pokémon to Raids as well as the chance to catch a Shiny version of that Pokémon.
Pokémon Go Battle League Niantic has rolled out the long-awaited Pokémon Go Battle League to trainers of Level 10 and above. At the moment, the League is in Preseason, the time before competitive play really begins. Niantic is using this as a kind of testing period in which they can "optimize and balance" the new feature as well as decide on things like season lengths and ranks. Trainer Battles within the GO Battle League will rotate between three leagues and players will be able to rank against fellow Trainers, earning rewards for ranking. For preseason, the GO Battle League is beginning with the Great League, which will be followed by the Ultra League then the Master League. Even though preseason isn't competitive, players can still rank but it will be partially reset when Season 1 properly starts. Rewards for battling and winning can also be earned during preseason. Entering the Battle League isn't possible until a player has walked 5km (although in preseason this requirement is waived). They'll then unlock five online matches up to three times a day by doing this. Players can earn Stardust depending on rank and number of battles won as well as items like Rare Candies and TMS as well as the chance to get exclusive Pokémon encounters. Other rewards will include Pikachu Libre and exclusive avatar items inspired by it. Niantic has also announced that it's turning Premium Raid Passes into Premium Battle Passes. The pass will have a double function, allowing players to enter Raid Battles or the premium track in the Go Battle League. Winning using the Premium Battle Pass could yield better rewards and will lower the number of wins needed to earn a Pokémon encounter. The Great League is currently underway and will rotate to the Ultra League on Monday, February 10, before going into the Master League on Monday 24 February. Things will go back around to the Great League on March 9. Niantic has promised more details on when Season 1 of the Go Battle League will officially begin soon. What's the next Pokémon Go Event?Team GO Rocket Takeover From March 6 to March 9, Team Rocket will be up to no good in Pokémon Go. During this period Poison- and Dark-type Pokémon will be appearing more often in the wild and it's believed that Absol will be one of the Pokémon appearing more often. On March 7 specifically, Team GO Rocket will be doing a global take-over. As part of this, Rocket Grunts will be attempting to seize more PokéStops while Sierra, Cliff, Arlo and Giovanni will be more active and more commonly encountered. During the take-over, players will be able to use Charged TMs to change the exclusive attack of a Shadow Pokémon to another attack and defeating Grunts and Leaders will earn twice the usual Stardust. Mysterious Weekend Event From March 20 to March 23 there will be a special weekend event in Pokémon Go. During the event, Normal-, Fire-, Water-, Electric-, and Ice-type Pokémon will appear more often in the wild. Karrablast and Shelmet will also be hatching more from 5 km Eggs and one to four-star Raid Battles across the weekend will feature Bug or Steel-type Pokémon. Bonuses during the event will double catch and double hatch Stardust. Live Events Niantic has announced that Pokémon Go Live Events will be coming to Taiwan, the US and the UK this year. The first event in Taiwan which celebrated the Lantern Festival has passed, while the others are still to come and will be ticketed at a cost of $12/£12 for General Admission and $18/£18 for Early Admission.
When's the next Pokémon Go Community Day?
The votes are in and Niantic has confirmed that Rhyhorn is going to be the starring Pokémon for February's community day with the special attack Rock Wrecker. Then, the Community Day will take place on February 22, running from 11am to 2pm on the Northern Hemisphere and 3pm to 6pm on the Southern Hemisphere. Pokémon Go update: what's next?Now that Go Battle League has arrived in Pokémon Go, Niantic has ticked another big promised feature off its list. At the moment, we're not sure what's next for the game aside from, naturally, new Pokémon being added. We'll update here when the roadmap becomes more clear.
Pokémon Go Plus dealsWant to buy yourself a Pokémon Go Plus wearable? Check some of today's best deals down below. (Image credits: Niantic/Pokémon Company) This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Disney Plus UK release date, price, deals, Sky Q integration and what we know Posted: 29 Feb 2020 08:38 AM PST Disney Plus UK is almost here in the UK. The final Disney Plus release date in the UK and Ireland is March 24, a week earlier than March 31 as was originally announced. In just a few weeks, you can stream all the Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars content available on the service. Pre-orders have gone live, and you can save £10 if you want to buy a year's subscription now. The regular Disney Plus UK price is £5.99 per month or £59.99 per year. But Disney is also running a limited time offer when you pre-order now, of £49.99 for a whole year (sign up here). Subscribers to the UK-only Disney Life service will be migrated over to Disney Plus, but we still don't know exactly how that'll work. Below, save £10 on a Disney Plus UK year-long subscription: Disney Plus previously launched back in November in territories like the US and Australia, but if you were hoping we'd get every episode of The Mandalorian at launch in the UK, episodes will only start to 'roll out' on the March 24 launch. Still, future originals are more likely to keep pace with US releases. Below, we'll talk you through everything we know about Disney Plus's UK launch, price, compatible devices, shows, movies and the possibility of Sky Q integration. Disney Plus UK release date: start streaming in MarchDisney Plus has an updated release date in the UK: March 24, a week earlier than initially planned. It launches in Ireland, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria and Switzerland at the same time. It's been an absurdly long wait for Disney Plus to arrive in the UK, but it's getting close now. No one's been thrilled about getting the streaming service – including originals like The Mandalorian and Lady and the Trap – four months after the US, especially when we've had to fend off Baby Yoda memes for that entire time. That said, although many Disney fans in Europe might've felt a bit left out by the staggered release date of Disney Plus, Disney fans in South America and Asia will be doubly disappointed as they still have yet to get a Disney Plus release date for the service for Brazil, Japan, Argentina and dozens of other Disney-loving countries. It does feel like the delayed rollout of the service has made piracy Disney Plus's worst enemy, even knowing a firm date is on the horizon for many European countries. We saw the UK release date for Rick & Morty Season 4 brought forward after fan backlash over the delay, but doing so for a whole platform such as Disney Plus was likely too big a task. After all, a lot of Disney movies were still on Sky over the holidays, including most of the Star Wars films. The delay is presumably more to do with available programming than anything else. We know The Mandalorian, though, will only start releasing episodes on March 24 – meaning UK viewers may have to wait longer to see the Star Wars show in full. Disney Plus: UK price, subscription tiers and pre-order deal explainedDisney has confirmed that Disney Plus will cost £59.99 for an annual subscription, or £5.99 per month. As mentioned above, until March 23 you can pre-order a year's subscription and bring the price down to £49.99. Monthly and yearly, then, are the two available tiers, and you can cancel at any time. Unlike in the US, where it's bundled in with ESPN and Hulu, in the UK Disney has so far only been announced as a standalone service. Either tier gets you four concurrent streams, unlimited downloads with a maximum of 10 devices and the option to create seven profiles. Disney UK doesn't specifically mention 4K resolutions, just 'high-quality' viewing. Since it's available in the US and Australia, though, expect to see that for the same price tier. We'll explain more about compatible apps below. In the US, you can gift a year of Disney Plus either digitally or in the form of physical cards, but no such option has been announced for the UK yet. Disney Plus may launch in the UK with Sky Q and Now TVAccording to a report by The Telegraph, Disney Plus may be integrated into Sky Q and Now TV at launch. That means Sky Q users will be able to access content through the Sky interface, similarly to how it currently incorporates Netflix. We'll update this page if the deal gets confirmed – but you can assume that The Telegraph scoop was made with some confidence. Disney Plus UK: shows and moviesStar Wars series The Mandalorian is the clear highlight of Disney Plus originals. As mentioned, episodes will only start to 'roll out' on March 24. Expect the live-action Lady and the Tramp, High School Musical: The Series, Encore!, The World According to Jeff Goldblum, Togo, Diary of a Future President, Forky Asks a Question and The Imagineering Story at launch, too. An important thing to note: UK Disney Plus content will differ to Disney Plus US, which already has movies like the live-action Lion King and Aladdin pictures from 2019 to stream. As of mid-February, Disney started sending out marketing emails with samples of what to expect from Disney Plus UK at launch, which will include over 1000 films, series and originals, according to the email. Here's everything we spotted on there that isn't an existing Disney Plus original, as well as content the official Twitter account has discussed – most notable is X-Men: Days of Future Past, as none of the Fox X-Men movies are currently on the US version of the service.
Now, everything else from the archives is more of a question mark. Will Disney Plus UK get 30 seasons of The Simpsons, for example? We're not sure either way. Sky has the exclusive rights to new episodes here, but it doesn't offer any episodes for on-demand streaming. We've asked Disney about The Simpsons on Disney Plus UK specifically, and we'll update you if there's an answer. Fans on Reddit have noticed, though, that while the launch trailers for Disney Plus France and Spain tease The Simpsons' presence, the UK trailer does not. Let's wait and see what happens. Likewise, Sky has a pretty deep archive of Disney movies right now, including 2019's Aladdin. It's hard to tell how that might affect the content on Disney Plus, so for now we'll have to wait and see. In the future, Disney Plus is getting plenty of big exclusive shows. From the Marvel Cinematic Universe side of things, new shows include The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (August), WandaVision (November), Loki (2021), Hawkeye (2021) and animated show What If?. Further off, expect TV shows based on Moon Knight, Ms Marvel and She-Hulk. Unlike Marvel's Netflix shows, too, these will canonically be part of the MCU, and feature actors crossing over between the movies and these TV series. Lucasfilm has a second season of The Mandalorian coming in October 2020, then further off it's making shows featuring Ewan McGregor's Obi-Wan Kenobi and Diego Luna's Cassian Andor from Rogue One. Disney Plus UK: apps and supported devicesDisney Plus should launch on pretty much any device you can name in the UK, including mobile devices, games consoles, streaming media devices and smart TVs. You can take Disney Plus shows on the go, too, downloading as many movies and shows as you can fit on your device, as long as you have an active subscription and connect to the internet every 30 days. In the US, the app launched on Apple TV, Roku streaming devices, Android, iOS, PS4, Xbox One, Nvidia Shield, Hisense TVs, Google Chromecast and Amazon's Fire range of streaming devices. One notable exception is the Nintendo Switch, which is still pretty poor at supporting streaming services. Philips has confirmed its Android-based smart TVs will support Disney Plus.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Apex Legends Season 4: latest update news, tips, patch notes and more Posted: 29 Feb 2020 08:25 AM PST EA surprised many with the sudden announcement of Apex Legends back in February 2019, a free-to-play battle royale shooter that sees the publisher going toe-to-toe with genre mammoths PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds and Fortnite Battle Royale. Developed by Respawn Entertainment and set in the Titanfall universe, Apex Legends is a squad-based battle royale shooter where teams of three go up against 57 other players to try to gather loot and be the last person (or squad) standing. However, unlike Fortnite and PUBG, Apex Legends sees players take on one of eight classes, each represented by a unique character (imagine Fortnite mixed with Overwatch and you’ll be on the right track.) Apex Legends has now celebrated one year of play and is into its fourth season, Assimilation, which began on February 4 2020. If you're new to Apex Legends and looking to see what you're missing or you've dropped off the map for a while and you'd like to catch up on the latest, we're here to keep you up to date on what's fresh in Apex Legends.
As we said in our full Apex Legends review: "Truth be told, the Battle Royale movement has never quite grabbed me. I dabbled in PUBG and spent a dozen hours or so with Fortnite, yet nothing ever quite stuck the landing. Apex though, has got me hook, line and sinker. Featuring intuitive controls, an outstanding comms system and remarkable rogue’s gallery, Respawn has created what feels like the AAA outing for the genre." Apex Legends update news
System Override The next Apex Legends event has been announced: System Override. Running from March 3 to March 17, System Override introduces a new limited time mode called Deja Loot. In this mode there's one ring pattern per day and loot spawns will be permanent, so if you find something good in one match, it'll be there the next as long as someone else doesn't get to it before you. This limited time mode should make strategising more interesting and is playable on the World's Edge map for the first week of the event before moving to Kings Canyon for the second week. While playing Deja Loot, there's a chance to find a new shield called the Evo Shield. Initially, it's not particularly powerful but it becomes stronger as you damage other players and there are four levels of strength through which you can build. Respawn is looking to gather player feedback on the Evo Shield to see if and how it might add it to the rest of the game outside of Deja Loot. Like January's Grand Soiree event, System Override has an Exclusive Prize Track through which players can earn rewards. This time, though, it's been improved with more rewards and more frequent challenges to complete. There's up to 1000 points per challenge set up for grabs and the sets will refresh daily. As a Collection Event, System Override also has a set of 24 themed, limited-time cosmetics. All of the items can be purchased directly or found in Event Apex Packs, with each Event Pack containing one event item and two non-event items. Players who unlock all 24 items will also unlock an Octane Heirloom set for free. Apex Legends AssimilationAs of February 4 2020, Apex Legends: Assimilation is underway. So what's new? Well, there's a new Legend, a new weapon, some map changes and an all new Battle Pass to get started on. Read on for a rundown of what to expect. New Legend As with previous seasons, Apex Legends Season 4 has introduced a brand new Legend. This time, things went a little differently. Originally, Forge, a robotically enhanced fighter was introduced as the legend for Season 4. However, he was then murdered and replaced by Revenant (the character fans long-suspected to be the Season 4 legend anyway). Revenant, also known somewhat more tellingly as the "synthetic nightmare" was once human and the "greatest hitman the Mercenary Syndicate ever had". But when his programming failed, he saw what his employers and Hammond Robotics had turned him into: "a walking nightmare of steel and vestigial flesh.” Revenant vowed to get revenge and killed everyone involved in ruining his life. Now, two centuries later Hammond Robotics has returned to the Outlands and he's renewed his vow to take out anyone involved with Hammond Robotics. Those familiar with the Titanfall universe will know Hammond Robotics as the creators of the Titans and it seems that they're going to be playing a bigger role in Apex Legends this season. As far as abilities are concerned, Revenant's tactical ability is "Silence" which allows his to throw a device that deals damage and disables enemy abilities for ten seconds. His passive ability is "Stalker", which makes it possible to crouch-walk faster and climb higher than the other Legends can. Finally, his ultimate ability is "Death Totem" which allows him to drop a totem that protects those who use it from death for a set amount of time. Instead of being killed or downed, a player will be returned to the totem instead. New Weapon The Sentinel has been confirmed as the new weapon in Season 4 of Apex Legends. It's described as a powerful bolt-action sniper rifle which stands apart from other weapons of its ilk as it comes with a charge mechanic. In the dev stream released before the season launch, it was hinted that this mechanic will give players a little more decision making to do when making a shot and could provide some interesting gameplay. Map Changes Season 4 has brought some map changes, the designs for which have been driven by a desire to "get players to make new decisions". The Planet Harvester is a key addition to the World's Edge skyline. Hammond Robotics are using the device to harvest materials from the core of the planet for unknown (but likely nefarious) reasons. The Planet Harvester offers a large, multi-level space in which to play and since there's not been anything like it before, it brings new gameplay options. According to Respawn, fights in this area tend to be "self-contained as squads will tend to enter the fights through the long hallways that lead to the center of the structure." The expectation is that this will make third parties more predictable. As well as being a change, Planet Harvester has wrought some changes of its own: it's split Capitol City in two. Now the city is made up of two zones, Fragment East and Fragment West, with a large fissure of dead space between them. This fissure can only be crossed in two locations by means of a zipline and a fallen skyscraper bridge. If you do happen to fall into the fissure between the zones because of a poorly timed jump or sheer curiosity, you'll find yourself carried slowly back up and allowed to land on the other side you were probably trying to get to. The downside is you'll take 25 damage for the fall and, as you float up, you run the risk of being a sitting target for enemies. A smaller addition is the Survey Camp. This area will have Weapon Racks which will have guaranteed weapons up for grabs, making it a tempting place to visit. Anniversary Event As Season 4 is launching on the one year anniversary of Apex Legends, there's going to be a special event. According to Respawn, those who log into the game in the first week of Season 4 (that's February 4 to February 11) will receive an Anniversary Gift. this includes a Year 1 Origami Flyer charm, a Year 1 loyalty badge and 10k XP for your first match of the day for every day the event is running. Battle Pass It wouldn't be a new season of Apex Legends without a brand new Battle Pass. For 950 Apex Coins you can pick up this pass which offers 110 levels to climb by completing daily and weekly challenges, with more than 100 exclusive items including Legendary Skins, Apex Packs, Loading Screens and Music Packs to earn. Players who pick up the battle pass immediately unlock the Legendary R99: Zero Point skin and three new Epic Legends skins. Getting through the rest of the levels could see you earn Rare and Legendary rewards like the Health Drain Lifeline, Blue Steel Crypto, Cyber Punked Wattson and Heat Sink Flatline. Ranked League Series 3Alongside Season 4, Ranked League Series 3 has also launched. Ranked League Series 3 brings a few changes, including Splits and a new tier: Master Tier. As Respawn is seeing more players move into the upper echelons of the rankings to become Apex Predators, it's finding that it's getting harder to "showcase the skill between any two Apex Predators this season." As a result, a new tier, Master Tier, has been added between Diamond and Apex Predator. Players will need to reach 10,000 RP to make it to Master Tier as was the case with Apex Predator. The Apex Predator Tier will now be exclusive to the top 500 players per platform, so players who reach Apex Predator Tier could find that they drop down to Master Tier if other players earn more RP than them. Respawn has said "We feel this should give more prestige to making and keeping your Apex Predator rank, while still keeping the tiers above Diamond very exclusive." As far as Splits are concerned, after looking at the lengths of previous Ranked Series, Respawn has decided that Series 3 will be three months long, like Series 1, but that it will be divided into two Splits. This means that Ranked Series 3 essentially comes in two parts, with Split 1 taking place on World’s Edge, while Split 2 will freshen things up by taking place back at King’s Canyon. Split 1 is to take place between February 3 and March 23, and Split 2 will follow on from March 24 to May 5. Soft resets will take place between each Split and Respawn has confirmed that "ranked rewards will be granted for the highest tier achieved in either split of the series, but exclusive animated badges will be granted if you can make it to the same tier both splits." There are also some new party restrictions as the game moves into the new Ranked Series. Players will find that once they get to Platinum Tier or higher, they'll only be able to party with players who have 1 Tier of difference from them. It's hoped this will keep matches more tight when it comes to higher skill levels. As far as what's staying the same, players will still see soft resets take place going into the new series. So, "at the start of Series 3 everyone will be soft reset on their ranked position by 1.5 Tiers down. That means if you ended Season 3 in Gold II, you’ll be reset to Silver IV. Players in Platinum IV will be reset to Silver II, and Apex Predators will be reset to Platinum II." As previously said, the soft reset will also now take place at the beginning of each Split. Entry RP cost to Ranked Series is also the same and there won't be any further changes to the scoring system. Apex Legends tips and tricksApex Legends can be difficult to get to grips with. There are a lot of different characters each with their own abilities and skills, plus this battle royale arguably leans more heavily on strategy and teamwork than some of its competitors. Get ahead of the pack with our selection of Apex Legends guides, designed to help you become a champion.
How to download Apex LegendsApex Legends can be downloaded for free from the PlayStation Store, Xbox Store, Origin Store or Apex Legends website. Simply search for the title, download the game and enjoy! But do keep in mind that a good internet connect and subscription to either PS Plus, Xbox Live or Origin Access is required to play. The good news is that Apex Legends is also coming to mobile in the future, following in the footsteps of Fortnite and PUBG. Apex Legends roadmap - what's next?Respawn Entertainment has shared the season roadmap for Apex Legends. Apex Legends Battle Pass seasons run for approximately three months. Currently four seasons have officially been announced:
Now that Season 4's launch date has been confirmed for February 2020, we're reaching the end of the known world for Apex Legends. No doubt, in the coming months, Respawn will establish and reveal its new goals for the game's second year. Is Apex Legends coming to mobile?Yes. In EA’s quarterly earnings report, the publisher announced that it’s looking at bringing the Respawn Entertainment-developed game to mobile platforms and to both South Korea and China. “We’re in advanced negotiations to China and mobile”, EA’s CFO Blake Jorgenson stated, before later mentioning South Korea as another expansion point. We shouldn't expect to see Apex Legends on mobile for at least a year, though. According to EA Chief Executive, Andrew Wilson, the game won't launch until the fiscal year 2021.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Watch the PGA Tour: how to live stream golf in 2020 from anywhere in the world Posted: 29 Feb 2020 08:19 AM PST Quite simply, it has never been easier to watch PGA Tour golf online. Wherever you are in the world, you can find a reliable 2020 PGA Tour live stream that's easy to access and allows you to follow all the drama as it unfolds. Our guide explains how to do just that, so you don't have to miss a single shot of this season's action. So far, Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy has gotten off to a hot start and currently tops the world rankings, but he's being closely chased by Spain's mercurial Jon Rahm and a trio of supremely talented Americans in Brooks Koepka, Justin Thomas and Dustin Johnson. A resurgent Tiger Woods also prowls dangerously at number 10 in the world right now - all it would take is one strong performance from the legend to see him climb the table and deliver a record 83rd PGA Tour win. With September's Ryder Cup showdown between Europe and America already looming large, it's perhaps a taste of what's to come at Whistling Straits this autumn. Before that though, we've got all four of golf's major tournaments to look forward to, starting with the biggest of them all - the Masters 2020, which takes place in April at the legendary Augusta National course in Georgia. Below are all the dates of 2020's golf majors along with the venues they will be held at this year - or scroll down to learn how to watch PGA Tour golf and live stream all of the drama in 2020 from anywhere in the world. Golf majors 2020: dates and venues of the four biggest tournaments
How to watch PGA Tour golf: live stream every tournament in 2020There are loads of easy ways to watch PGA Tour golf in 2020 including in the US, UK, Canada, Australia and almost anywhere else in the world. Scroll down for a full breakdown of options, but the first thing you should know is that anyone away from their home country can still tune into the action as usual by using one of the best VPNs. These services will allow you to get around any geo-blocking restrictions your local broadcaster may have in place and and let you watch a perfectly legal, high-quality golf live stream if you're out of your country. Best of all, they only takes a few minutes to set-up. How to watch PGA Tour golf: live stream every tournament in 2020 in the USIf you're outside the US but want to watch the PGA Tour just like you would after a round at your local country club, then you can use a US VPN to effectively transport your computer, phone or tablet's IP back to an American location. Watch PGA Tour golf: stream every tournament live in 2020 from the UKHow to watch the PGA Tour golf live in 2020 from CanadaLive stream the PGA Tour 2020 and watch golf online in AustraliaAs with Canada, full-fat options to live stream PGA are limited in Australia. Once again, it's a case of snapping a GOLFTV pass or going without the PGA Tour golf for much of the year. Pricing is just as competitive as in the Great White North, too, so those Down Under can grab a GOLFTV subscription from $9.99 a month.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Spotify vs Tidal: which music streaming service is best for you? Posted: 29 Feb 2020 08:03 AM PST Choosing the best music streaming service for your needs can be a little tricky; while streaming is still relatively new in the grand scheme of music-listening, there are so many platforms to choose from these days, two of the biggest being Spotify and Tidal. Spotify is currently the world’s most popular streaming service, hitting 113 million subscribers in October last year, and continuing to grow; and that’s in spite of mounting competition from the likes of Apple Music. However Spotify isn’t perfect as a service, and its lossy audio streams have left audiophiles craving a little more fidelity – which is where Tidal comes in. With a focus on providing Hi-Res Audio at a CD-like level of quality, the platform was acquired in 2015 by hip-hop star Jay-Z, becoming the first major music service to be owned by the artists themselves. As such, Tidal claims to pay higher royalties than its competitors to artists and songwriters. It’s not just about ethics and audio quality though; both Spotify and Tidal offer different user experiences, pricing structures, and music catalogues. Making the best choice for your needs can be confusing, to say the least. That’s why we’ve put together this handy guide to both services so you can compare them in one easy place, and hopefully find out whether Spotify or Tidal is the best streaming service for you.
Price and availabilityBoth Spotify and Tidal offer a number of different subscription tiers – but only Spotify offers a free plan (though it is ad-supported and you can’t listen to tracks in the order you want). The cheapest paid Spotify plan is Spotify Premium, which costs $9.99 / £9.99 / AU$11.99 per month, and gives you unlimited access to its 30 million-plus track library on your laptop, phone, and tablet. Spotify Premium also lets you download tracks to three devices at a time for offline playback. Discounts are available for students, and you can even get Premium and access to mindfulness app Headspace under one discounted plan. Students get Headspace access as part of their Premium package. If there are a few people in your household that want to use Spotify, you can save money by signing up to a Spotify Premium for Family account, which allows up to six people to connect to Spotify at one time (if you try to do this with a regular account, you’ll get bumped off the service as soon as another user plays a song). This tier costs $14.99 / £14.99 / AU$17.99, and requires all members to live under the same roof. Tidal offers two subscription plans, the cheapest being Tidal Premium, which costs $9.99 / £9.99 / AU$11.99, and offers streams at a bitrate of 320kbps – the same audio quality as Spotify. If it’s Hi-Res Audio you’re after, you’ll need to shell out for $19.99 / £19.99 / AU$23.99 per month for Tidal HiFi. So, Spotify offers cheaper subscription plans, but it doesn’t provide a higher fidelity tier for audiophiles like Tidal does. User interfaceOne of the reasons that Spotify is so popular is down to its easy-to-use interface. When you open up the app, you’ll find a number of personalized playlists - your ‘Daily Mixes’ – that have been curated by Spotify based on your listening habits, alongside your top artists, top playlists, and new releases. That’s a thing to note about Spotify; there are a lot of playlists. That might sound daunting, but it’s a strategy that works as its algorithms ultimately tailor the app to each user. Everything is laid out in colorful tiles that pop against Spotify’s dark background. The tile system is just small enough to make selecting new albums and playlists easy while packing in plenty into a timeline of content that’s ultimately curated to what you’ve been listening to and what you might want to jump into next. On the desktop app and web player, there’s a sidebar on the left of the screen that lets you navigate new music releases, radio stations, as well as your library, playlists, recently played songs and more. In the mobile app these sections are a little more hidden away to save space, and it’s worth noting that the layout of the desktop and mobile platforms are a little different. Searching is very intuitive and even if you misspell an artist’s name, Spotify will generally find what you’re looking for. Tidal uses a similar tile-based interface on a dark background, and you’ll find curated playlists, recommended albums, and charts on your home screen. Clicking the sidebar will take you to your ‘My Music’ area, where you’ll find all your saved tracks, and browsing is generally very easy. You can’t search by genre, unlike Spotify, which is a shame for a platform aimed at true music lovers. Search generally isn't terribly smart - misspell an album or artist name even by one character or one piece of punctuation, and you'll be left with zero results. A bit of optimization here wouldn't hurt, but as long as you're careful you won't have any problems with it. Saying that, Tidal does boast one cool feature that Spotify doesn’t; audio-search is essentially like having Shazam built directly into the app. Press the button and it’ll listen out for any song it can pick up in your environment, identify it, and allow you to save it to your own Tidal library. CompatibilityYou can get Spotify on Android, iOS and Windows Phone devices. If you use a laptop or desktop, Spotify also supports OS X and Windows, and there’s a flash-based web player, too. Support for Tidal is largely the same, so you can get it on devices that run iOS 11 and higher, Android 5 and higher, macOS, and Windows. Both streaming platforms are also supported by a number of more left-field gadgets, including AV receivers, TVs, and even cars. Music catalogue and discoverySpotify currently boasts over 50 million songs, whereas Tidal claims to have 60 million tracks in its catalogue. Spotify’s strong influx of tracks helped it take off in its early days, and with a reported 40,000 tracks added on average every single day – and it’s showing no signs of slowing down. The streaming giant has a heavy focus on promoting new tracks and breakthrough artists, through curated playlists like New Music Friday acting as a launch pad for fledgling artists to break through into the big time. Curated playlists are almost always the first thing you see when you load any version of the app, with the service seemingly designing playlists for almost every musical sub-genre. These are constantly being updated too, so your favorite ones never grate following extended use. As we mentioned before, you’ll also find personalized playlists based on your listening habits, which is a fantastic way to discover new music, as well as revisiting some of your favorite tracks. Spotify does have some glaring omissions in its music catalog, however, largely down to artists who don’t want to make their music available to stream anywhere or artists who have a particular dislike of Spotify’s royalty payments. You won’t find artists like Joanna Newsom and Garth Brooks on Spotify, and until fairly recently you couldn't even listen to The Beatles – though you’ll find their entire discography on the streaming platform these days (thank goodness). Some of the artists who are absent from Spotify have close ties to Jay-Z and therefore favor his platform, Tidal. Beyoncé’s 2019 album Lemonade debuted on Tidal exclusively, for example. That means Tidal’s catalogue can feel somewhat skewed towards hip-hop and rap artists, though it’s possible that this is down to the platform’s editorial curation of its tracks. That being said, Tidal does a good job of curating music playlists based on your listening habits, and you’ll find that just a few weeks of use will give its algorithms enough information to serve you truly exciting recommendations. Aside from these personalized recommendations, Tidal also signposts the most popular playlists and releases on its service, as well as mood-based playlists, and the Tidal Rising section, which flies the flag for new talent. Both platforms also offer podcasts, though it seems like Spotify is taking this area a little more seriously, having spent over $200 million to acquire two podcast production companies in 2019. Audio qualityIf you subscribe to Spotify Premium, you can choose between three sound quality levels: normal, high and extreme. When using the mobile and desktop apps, Spotify uses Ogg Vorbis. This was a semi-popular format a decade ago, and Spotify continues to use it because it's open source. Spotify doesn't have to pay a license fee for it. At Standard setting, music streams at 96kbps, which sounds a lot better than MP3 at 129kbps. Switch up to the high quality setting and the bitrate bumps up to 160kbps. The extreme setting uses 320kbps, which is perceptually close to lossless. Spotify doesn't offer any lossless or Hi-Res streaming, which is one reason why audiophiles might want to consider another service. If you’re dead-set on the best possible audio quality, then Tidal is your best bet. For that, you’ll need a Tidal HiFi subscription, which allows you to stream lossless 16-bit FLAC and ALAC audio – though there are also thousands of TIDAL Masters files that stream at 24-bit. Even if you opt for Tidal Premium, its catalogue is still available to stream in 320kbps, the same quality as Spotify’s highest setting – and you may even find that Tidal’s tracks sound a little richer at this setting. So, why bother with lossless streaming? Well, Hi-Res Audio codecs are capable of reproducing the full range of sound from recordings that have been mastered from better-than-CD quality music sources, a sound that closely replicates the quality that the musicians and engineers were working with in the studio at the time of recording. The increased bit depth of HRA improves the dynamic range, basically giving you a greater breadth of things to actually hear from the recording, making tracks sound more detailed and clear. It’s a little like the difference between SD and HD television; the former works just fine, but you’ll notice a real difference in quality if you make the upgrade to higher resolution audio. TakeawayChoosing between Spotify and Tidal largely comes down to whether you care about Hi-Res Audio; if you do, you won’t find it in Spotify, and you should absolutely opt for Tidal. It’s also worth considering Tidal if you’re a devoted fan of specific artists like Jay-Z, Beyoncé, Kanye West, and others – these artists are likely to release music exclusively on Tidal, at least to begin with, with releases trickling down to Spotify months later. Even with these few omissions, Spotify and Tidal are pretty much on the same level in terms of music catalogue and discovery, and both platforms’ cheapest subscription tiers cost the same (though only Spotify offers a free service). Spotify does win out in terms of its interface; while the two platforms are pretty similar in this regard, Spotify’s search function is much better than Tidal’s, and it’s just a little bit easier to navigate as a platform.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Posted: 29 Feb 2020 07:00 AM PST The rumbling controller, the pressure-sensitive analogue stick, the 4 built-in controller ports on the console’s front – the N64 had some incredible ideas which would evolve to become mainstays of modern gaming. But when we look back on the history of the Nintendo 64, it’s the games themselves that live most fondly in our memories. From Super Mario 64 to Perfect Dark, what the console’s catalogue lacked in breadth (only 296 games were released for the N64 in North America) it made up for with quality. Some of the greatest gaming adventures of all time, like The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time or Banjo-Kazooie, flourished on what was in its day an incredibly powerful console.
The commitment to 3D gaming and to (usually, at least) colorful, impactful characters and game worlds mean that, though now some titles are approaching 25 years old, they’re still incredibly playable today. Thinking of diving back in? These are the best N64 games that any self-respecting gamer can’t afford to miss. The best N64 gamesThe Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time In some ways, the N64 was a little too reliant on Zelda and Mario – an extended software drought meant the console went months at a time without any big hitters. Nonetheless, Ocarina of Time was well worth waiting for. This long, packed adventure game translated everything great about the 2D Zelda games into 3D, including the dungeons, tools, the series' iconography and the sense of scale in its world. It's hard to imagine modern open world games even looking the same without those first moments stepping out onto Hyrule Field. It's still a classic, even if playing it on 3DS is the way to go these days. Super Mario 64 The daddy of 3D platformers. Heck, the daddy of 3D gaming, full stop. A true game changer, when Mario made the jump to 3D with the N64’s then-innovative analogue stick in tow, it was not only the evolution of the portly plumber, but of games as a whole. Now more than 20 years old, it still stands up as a joy to play thanks to Nintendo’s water-tight control scheme and solid camera management options, which had been notoriously troublesome to nail in the early days of 3D gaming. Packed with interesting things to do and secrets to unearth, it has that Nintendo magic touch, in that every task it sets you is enjoyable in its own right. It’s just surprising that it took the launch of the Nintendo Switch before Nintendo would return to the ‘free roaming’ format with Super Mario Odyssey. GoldenEye 007 Released almost two years after the Pierce Brosnan Bond movie it was based on hit cinemas, GoldenEye popularized first-person shooter games on consoles, particularly with its local multiplayer competitive mode. Its singleplayer campaign, which sometimes adapts just a few seconds of the film into dense levels packed with secrets, was fantastic. But it was the multiplayer that made the N64 the centerpiece of any gathering of friends. Licence to Kill, slaps. DK mode. So much about this game entered the popular vernacular. Now it just needs a proper remaster. Super Smash Bros By no means the best in the series – that's still up for debate, though the modern Switch version is the most comprehensive – it's hard to explain the sheer novelty of seeing Mario, Link, Pikachu, Samus Aran and more in a single game back in the late '90s. It was so exciting. The original Smash Bros is an incredibly light affair compared to later offerings in its selection of fighters and levels, and good god Kirby is OP in this one. But its multiplayer was yet another great use of those four controller ports on the N64. WWF Wrestlemania 2000 What may look like pantomime in the ring was turned by THQ into a chunky brawler in WWF Wrestlemania 2000. Remaining one of the best wrestling games ever, it was slightly slower than the likes of WWF Attitude, focusing on light and heavy grapples that would become battles to pull off moves and counter attacks. In terms of pacing, nothing else has quite managed to give the impression that you’re taking part in a legitimate wrestling match, spectacle and all, as WWF Wrestlemania 2000. Its follow up, No Mercy, is also well worth a look. Mario Kart 64 In retrospect, it may be one of the weaker Mario Kart games. But just by having that Nintendo mascot-powered core, it’s still head and shoulders above the copycat kart racers that the series inspired. Mario Kart 64 took full advantage of the N64’s four controller ports, making for a riotous local multiplayer experience. Star Wars: Rogue Squadron The PC had the X-Wing and TIE Fighter intergalactic flight sim series, but it wasn’t until Rogue Squadron did console gamers feel the full force of the Star Wars films’ aerial combat. Sure, we had a taste of it with ambitious-if-janky launch title Shadows of the Empire’s opening Hoth battle, but Rogue Squadron took it to new heights. A lengthy, challenging campaign that puts you in control of a fleet of classic Star Wars ships, it had some great unlockable secrets and a fantastic medals system that made for high replayability. Donkey Kong 64 One of the few Nintendo 64 games to require the RAM-injecting expansion pack add-on, Donkey Kong 64 was the zenith of the late-'90s obsession with platforming collectathons (arguably to the point of overkill, in fact). Putting everything it had learnt on the console thus far into one giant simian-themed adventure, it gave you expansive levels to explore, five different Kongs to control (each with their own unique skill sets) and even a reasonably well-executed multiplayer shooter mode. Banjo-Kazooie Mario may have been the mascot for Nintendo, but Rare’s Banjo and Kazooie gave him a run for his money when it came to pure joyous gameplay. Colorful, inventive and with densely-packed levels, Banjo Kazooie found a good balance between tight 3D platforming and the era’s collect-all-the-things gameplay model. Perfect Dark The Bond license escaped Nintendo after GoldenEye, leading to the dreadful Tomorrow Never Dies from EA on PSone. Rare instead decided to make a spiritual successor called Perfect Dark, which had an entirely different fictional setting, and a lot more sci-fi weaponry. Otherwise it felt comfortably similar, and its multiplayer was unbeatable – it even carried a few of the better maps from GoldenEye across, under different names. Another important, influential addition to Perfect Dark was the option to add AI bots to multiplayer, giving you the option to play this part of the game without friends. F-Zero X If Mario Kart was about the power ups, F-Zero X was about pure sci-fi speed. Remaining one of the fastest-feeling racers to this day, it took the SNES game’s 2D sprites and tracks, reimagining them as twisting, turning, gravity-defying roller coasters. A series that’s well overdue a return. Pokémon Snap This is the best Pokémon game. No, seriously, stay with us! Rather than having to catch-'em-all, you’ve got to snap-'em-all. It is, essentially, an on-rails first person shooter, except your AK is swapped out for a Polaroid, and your enemies are little cute portrait subjects. Though it’s a short game as you simply take photos of the Pokémon out in the wild, being rendered in 3D (a novelty at the time) proved to be a big sell, as you used a number of lures and gadgets to coax rare Pokémon out of hiding and to perform their most photogenic poses. Paper Mario Mario is no stranger to jumping into different genres, but it was irregular to see him in an RPG during the N64 era. Paper Mario takes a few cues from Super Mario RPG on the SNES, fleshing out the Mushroom Kingdom in a way the platform games couldn’t, but also introduced a smart new aesthetic that saw Mario transformed into a 2D cutout – with some clever puzzle elements using the perspective along the way. Mario Party The N64 had three Mario Party games, and you can take your pick as to which was actually the best – there's not a lot in it. But the series made good use of the console's ability to support four controllers, getting players to compete at a whole slew of minigames to see who was the best or the fastest. Those N64 controllers took a lot of damage during more intense multiplayer showdowns, and these days the series has little credibility. But this once again cemented the N64 as the place to enjoy multiplayer with friends. Star Wars Episode I: Racer Largely considered the only good thing to come out of The Phantom Menace other than Duel of the Fates, Episode I: Racer is basically an easier version of WipEout set on various Star Wars worlds. Tatooine gets well-represented, of course, with both a training track and the Boonta Eve race seen in the movies. But it's being able to customize your racer that makes journeying through this game such a treat. It's a racing game for people who don't usually enjoy them. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater Skateboarding is hard – just ask anyone who has ever worn a pair of Vans and scrapped a knee while listening to The Offspring. But Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater not only made a cool sport seem easy, it made it cooler. Stringing together impossibly intricate trick runs around outlandishly imaginative skateparks, no kid that played Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater didn’t end up with a real life skateboard on their Christmas lists. And the soundtrack was banging, too. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask If Ocarina of Time is Star Wars, then Majora’s Mask is The Empire Strikes back. An inventive remixing of the cast and locations of Ocarina of Time, Majora’s Mask may reuse assets from that first 3D adventure, but has a dark attitude all of its own. Using a wild Groundhog Day-like time-turning conceit that sees you working against the clock to prevent the end of the world, it’s the wackiest and (at times) most unsettling Zelda there’s ever been. A cult classic. Star Fox 64/Lylat Wars This third-person arcade shooter is still the best of the Star Fox games. It's essentially Star Wars with talking animals, and with multiple paths across the game, you have to replay it a bunch of times to see every stage. Levels vary from Death Star-style space stations to lava-spitting fire planets, and it's easy to finish a run in a single sitting. The 3DS offers the best version of Star Fox 64, but no N64 collection is complete without it. Blast Corps A bizarre puzzle-action game that saw developer Rare at perhaps its most inventive, Blast Corps saw you take on the role of a wrecking crew that has to carve a path for an explosives-laden truck to pass through. Using a menagerie of vehicles and robots, this would see you levelling cities and towns, crashing mechs and digger trucks into buildings, to protect your cargo. Challenging and addictive for anyone that’s ever fancied themselves as a demolitions expert – or a Godzilla wannabe. Conker’s Bad Fur Day Having made some of the console’s most cutesy platformers, Rare let its devilish British humour shine through with Conker’s Bad Fur Day. Yes, it was essentially another (ace) 3D platforming collect-a-thon in the same mould as Banjo-Kazooie, but Conker was so ridiculously crude that it came with a warning on the box. He may have looked cute, but Conker was a randy badass. Come for the poop jokes, stay for the solid platforming action.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Aston Villa vs Man City live stream: how to watch the Carabao Cup 2020 final from anywhere Posted: 29 Feb 2020 06:29 AM PST A third EFL Cup triumph in-a-row seems to beckon for Pep Guardiola's men, but could Wembley witness a historic shock on Sunday? Read on for a full Aston Villa vs Man City live stream guide and learn how to watch the Carabo Cup final 2020 wherever you are. The omens certainly don't seem good for relegation-threatened Villa, who have lost their last three Premier League matches in the run-up to this showdown at Wembley. Their chances look even bleaker when factoring in how much of a boost City will have following their superb 2-1 win against Real Madrid in the Champions League on Wednesday. By way of contrast, Villa put forward an insipid display in their crucial last Premier League outing against Southampton. This may mean Villa boss Dean Smith rings the changes on Sunday, with suggestions that half of his outfield players from that game could be dropped. City therefore will go into the match as clear favourites to pick up their first silverware of the season, and will be keen to not be complacent and lose focus following their huge victory in Spain. With Sergio Aguero and Raheem Sterling fit and ready to start, the only negative for City coming into the game is the injury sustained by defender Aymeric Laporte in Madrid which will rule him out of Sunday's final. Read on to find out your options for watch the Carabao Cup final in the UK and the rest of the world and ensure you can easily live stream Aston Villa vs Man City.
Live stream Aston Villa vs Man City and watch the Carabao Cup final 2020 outside your countryFurther down the page we have details of catching the Carabao Cup final in the UK, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. All require some kind of subscription if you want to live stream Man City vs Aston Villa and see who takes home EFL Cup silverware this season. If you've paid for that subscription but are outside the country this weekend, then you'll soon find your access geo-blocked when you try to watch. To stop feeling like you've wasted your money (and assuming it's within the services Ts&Cs), you could use a VPN to watch as if you were back at home. How to live stream the Carabao Cup Final in the UK: watch Aston Villa vs Man CityHow to live stream Villa vs City: watch the Carabao Cup final in the USLive stream Aston Villa vs Man City in AustraliaLive stream the Carabao Cup final in Canada: how to watch for freeLive stream Aston Villa vs Man City in New ZealandThis posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Watch Real Madrid vs Barcelona from only $10 this weekend thanks to Sling's El Clasico offer Posted: 29 Feb 2020 06:00 AM PST The biggest match on the Spanish football calendar arrives on Sunday - the brilliantly named El Clasico! And this Real Madrid vs Barcelona clash is looking as important as ever, with the teams battling things out at the top of La Liga table. Thankfully, watching it is super easy, thanks to Sling TV's current offer. For $10, you can choose between either of Sling TV's World Sport or Best of Spanish packages. Both include subscription sports channel beIN Sport which is hosting this weekend's huge game. And because with Sling you only have to pay one month at a time, you don't have to feel like you're having to commit to a lengthy contract. Once the dust has settled on El Clasico and you decide that there isn't enough content to warrant any further payments, you can simply cancel at any time.
Your Real Madrid vs Barcelona options in full:What else does Sling TV have to offer?If the only lure for you is that Real Madrid vs Barcelona game, then paying your $10 will be all you're interested in. But if you've been considering cutting the cable or changing up your home's TV streaming service, then Sling TV has more comprehensive packages for you to tackle, too. Sling Blue has the most channels available, with popular stations like AMC, the NFL Network, CNN, Fox, NBC and Comedy Central all included. While Sling Orange has fewer channels but you may prefer its roster - for example, ESPN and Disney are both available. For all the variations, head straight to the Sling TV website or consult our guide to the best Sling TV packages and prices. Both cost $30 per month (after your first month costing $20), or you can pay $45 a month for both. After that, you can then bolt further channels on like the beIN packages described above. When is El Clasico on?If this has piqued your interest and you're now desperate to watch the huge La Liga clash, then 3pm ET / midday PT on Sunday is the time you need to tune in for kick-off (or about 30 minutes beforehand for all the buildup and hype). As well as Sling TV, beIN can be added to your cable TV package or accessed via a FuboTV subscription. Read more:
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| I got to see Baldur's Gate 3 in action – and it may just be the future of RPGs Posted: 29 Feb 2020 06:00 AM PST Back when Baldur's Gate 3 got that way-too-short teaser back at E3 2019, I was already sold. While the trailer was very body horror-esque, the idea that mindflayers would be at the forefront of an RPG on PC was really exciting to me. But then Larian invited me to go see the game actually played in front of me in the basement of some fancy hotel in New York, and it was there that I really fell in love with the game, and now I can't wait to actually get my hands on it. In short: I'm incredibly biased and you should take all of this with a grain of salt. On the other hand, there's a giant tentacle airship in the intro cinematic, and if that doesn't immediately sell you on it, you just have to live with the fact that we just have inherently different tastes. I stan Let's talk about that cutsceneLarian gathered up a bunch of people in that dark New York hotel basement and showed all of us Baldur's Gate III. And after doing some brief character creation – more on that later – we got to soak in the intro cinematic. Now, after a sufficiently scary looking Mindflayer puts Mindflayer-worm-things into the eyes of both your player character and a badass-looking Orc Woman (I stan), the cutscene cuts away to show the giant tentacle-equipped airship that you're presumably riding in on. That formidable airship then proceeds to absolutely decimate a city, warping a bunch of people into pods that look like they come fresh out of The Matrix. I'm assuming that all of these people will be transformed into Mindflayers themselves. But then, because this is a Dungeons and Dragons game, there are of course a bunch of folks riding in on Dragons to fight back the Mindflayer, eventually destroying the S.S. Tentacle and leading into the actual game. I went ahead and inserted that cutscene down below so you could share in the splendor, but needless to say it sets a tone. Gameplay, hooray!So after we were treated to that glorious trailer, we were shown a frankly absurd amount of gameplay, and generally it looks amazing. It's a top-down RPG like Larian's previous flagship series Divinity: Original Sin, but it takes a unique approach. The environments are genuinely next-level graphically, to the point where Baldur's Gate 3 executive producer Dave Walgrave told Eurogamer that current-generation consoles like the PlayStation 4 Pro and Xbox One X simply couldn't handle it. But beyond simply looking good, dialog takes an interesting turn. Rather than maintaining the top-down perspective that combat and exploration have, the game will zoom in during dialog, giving it a cutscene-like perspective that really makes it seem like a AAA game. This alone makes Baldur's Gate 3 seem like the future of PC RPGs, combining that complex isometric RPG combat we all know and love with the type of dialog that we'd expect from something like the Witcher III: Wild Hunt. When I say the combat is complex, I mean it. This is a turn-based RPG like other games in the series, and this demands that players think their actions through. Not only do you have to take actions that your enemies might take into consideration before you start combat, but environmental elements like elevation or hazards play a major role. One segment that really stood out to me was above the major dungeon, where some bandits were gathered in a courtyard. The person playing the game maneuvered their archer up the stairs in a flanking position before battle started, while a mage and a warrior came up front. When combat started, the player's archer was able to just push the enemy archer from its elevated position, starting combat in the player's advantage. The dice weren't kind, though. Which reminds me: we really have to talk about the dice. Tell me this conversation doesn't look like it came from a major AAA RPG, I dare you. Let's talk about the diceMost isometric RPGs are designed to evoke the feeling of playing a pen and paper RPG, and most of them pull it off. But Baldur's Gate 3 is adding dice rolls that you can actually see to really add to that feeling. Most actions you take in the game will bring up an actual dice on the screen that will show the number you need to beat to be successful, along with a D20 that will actually roll on the screen. This is such a small addition to the game, but I think it's pretty amazing. It adds so much weight to everything you do, adding to the drama of the game. I can't speak for everyone, of course, but I know that I'll be at the edge of my seat for most of these spinning dice moments. Now, we were told that folks could save scum (basically where you spam your quicksave before everything you do) but eventually this should lead to folks just accepting the consequences of bad rolls. After all, when you're actually playing a pen and paper RPG, you can't just load up a prior save because that risky action you took didn't work out. I'm in awe of how gorgeous this game looks A truly replayable RPGThere are several origin stories that you can play through at the beginning of the game, as characters trying to cure themselves of a Mindflayer-borne parasite in the brains. You only get to play through one of these origin stories to play through, but it was heavily implied that you'll meet all the other characters throughout the surely lengthy story. I got to see at least a part of Astarion's origin story. This character is a vampire spawn that is still partially under the control of his master. There are a couple points throughout this opening section where he has to struggle with this fact – as Astarion can't return to his master with a brain worm in his head, he might be punished. Right off the bat, this means there are plenty of reasons to play through this game multiple times. Even if you do meet all these characters later on, there is likely a bunch of story information you'll gain by playing through all of them – which means to get all the story you'll have to play through the game multiple times. Some people might not like that, but I love it. I don't actually have time to play through a long RPG like this multiple times, of course, but I like to pretend I do. Combine the multiple starting points with the focus on dice rolls, and there are so many different ways Baldur's Gate 3 can play out that you'll potentially always have a reason to go back to the game. There has been this wonderful resurgence of isometric RPGs over the last few years, and while I absolutely adore games like Divinity: Original Sin and Wasteland 3, I've felt like they were living a little bit too much in the past. For years I've been waiting for an RPG to really take this style of gameplay to the modern age with gorgeous visuals and AAA production quality. I didn't think it would be Baldur's Gate 3 that would finally get us there, but I'm so happy it was. We were told that the game is still in early stages of development and that when Early Access does come, it'll last a while. Generally I avoid Early Access games, but with Baldur's Gate 3, the sooner I can get my hands on it the better. I want to live in this game, but more than that, I can't wait to see the games that are further inspired by it. I fully expect this game to push PC games, especially RPGs, to another level and I'm so here for it. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| PS5 and Xbox Series X will have cross-gen games – does that put you off? Posted: 29 Feb 2020 05:00 AM PST I bought my PS4 in 2014, and by 2018, it started auto-ejecting discs. I bought my precious backwards-compatible PS3 (secondhand) in 2007, and by 2009, I got the yellow light of death. I got my PS2 for Christmas 2001, and by the end of 2002, it'd stopped playing blue discs. By 2006, it stopped playing discs altogether, and I bought a Slim model to replace it. Look, I'm not saying all PlayStation consoles break – my Vita and PSP are still going strong – but I've always had bad luck buying home consoles early in the machine's lifespan. With the PS5, I'm unclear on whether I want to rush into buying one, especially since I own a gaming PC that'll keep up with third-party games. If I wait a year or two, they might release a model with a bigger SSD, or drop the price, or iron out any issues the launch units might have. With Microsoft and publishers like Ubisoft and Square Enix committing to cross-generation games in the early part of the next generation, too, it sounds less like I'm going to have to upgrade on day one to play the latest games. "It will therefore be somewhat father down the road that we release titles exclusively for the next-generation consoles," is how the Final Fantasy publisher put it. What difference will it make, that publishers seem more conscious of releasing games across both generations this time around? Let's go through it.
Cross-gen games: a quick historyCross-gen games aren't a new thing, but they've been a bigger deal since the last generation started. With the launch of the PS4 and Xbox One, games like Watch Dogs, Assassin's Creed 4, Destiny, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Far Cry 4 and Alien: Isolation all released across both the previous and new generation of consoles. Metal Gear Solid 5 landed two years after the consoles launched, and still came to PS3 and Xbox 360. 2016's Persona 5 even had a PS3 version. It makes sense for publishers, because the enormous user bases of older consoles guarantee sales – and blockbuster games have been ludicrously expensive to make since the start of the HD era. Console manufacturers traditionally make exclusives for early adopters, because the goal isn't just to sell games, it's to sell hardware. Microsoft, we know, will not launch with any games that only work on Xbox Series X – you'll also see them on Xbox One for some time after launch. And the unveiling of Xbox Smart Delivery means that you'll only have to buy one version of the game to enjoy it on both Xbox consoles, which arguably makes it easier to wait on upgrading. Sony's response will be interesting. I expect they're much more likely to release a game just on PS5 at launch to guarantee interest in the console, which could be seen as one-upping Microsoft. But even PlayStation's Mark Cerny hinted in this Wired piece that late-generation games like Death Stranding will release on both PS4 and PS5. Whether this will apply to unannounced games is a big question mark. What actually sells consolesWe haven't seen games running on either machine yet, though, and that's what will sell hardware. Cross-gen games don't put off early adopters, because the next-gen versions of these games always look superior – that's why most people still played Destiny and Watch Dogs on PS4, not Xbox 360. But it is a marked difference to have a major console manufacturer committing to not making games solely for a next-gen console at launch, and to futureproof your purchases. Both Sony and Microsoft have already talked about backwards compatibility for next-gen, too, and neither bothered doing this for the announcement of the PS4 and Xbox One. It feels like we're seeing more signs of a platform-agnostic era than before – and rumors of Sony bringing Horizon Zero Dawn to PC suggest it's not just Microsoft that has this in mind. Talk of teraflops and promises around SSD loading times are ultimately a small part of why people get excited about consoles. Do you remember seeing the first trailer for The Witcher 3 at E3 2013? It felt clear that you were looking at something simply beyond the possibilities of existing consoles. That's what we haven't seen yet. That's when people will start making up their minds about whether they'll buy on day one or not. And both console manufacturers would be smart to show off games that are exclusively coming to next-gen consoles when they reveal their hardware – even if they're years away. Cross-gen games might just make this next generation a little easier to wait for, this time, while you figure out which machine looks like a winner.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Windows 10 is falling apart – so it’s a great time to fall in love with a Chromebook Posted: 29 Feb 2020 04:00 AM PST Windows 10 is a mess these days thanks to a series of faulty updates that have been introducing more problems than they’ve solved, making it the perfect time for me to fall in love with a Chromebook… the Pixelbook Go, to be specific. I’ve been increasingly annoyed by Windows 10 recently. Not only have recent updates been causing problems – for example I lost the ability to search for files and apps for a day a while back, which was particularly frustrating – but there have been some long-running issues that have been getting to me as well. My trusty Dell XPS 13, for instance, has been bugging me with its awful battery life. Not only does it only last a few hours, but it doesn’t hold its charge well either. So, more often than not, if I pick up the XPS 13 to work on it, the battery is dead. Windows 10 laptops have never held their charge as well as MacBooks or Chromebooks, and I’d had enough. So, one day on my way to work, rather than taking the Dell XPS 13, I thought I’d give the Pixelbook Go a… go. I’d heard a lot of good things about the Pixelbook Go - our review of it is glowing, and it’s currently sitting at the top of our best Chromebook list. However, I’ve never been really convinced by a Chromebook. Sure, they’ve come a long way since the first generation of devices, which were essentially useless unless you had an internet connection, but I still dismissed them as basic curios that just wouldn’t be of use to me. How wrong I was. Chrome OS now feels much more like a fully-fledged operating system with a file explorer and a desktop, and everything feels fast and smooth – even if there are a few bugs here and there. The ability to use Android apps is a game changer here, as it’s instantly made Chrome OS more useful, as it allows me to run apps like Slack as a desktop-like program. So, as far as day-to-day work goes, the Pixelbook Go meets my demands perfectly. I didn’t miss The XPS 13 – or Windows 10 – at all. The fact that the lightweight Chrome OS felt faster and snappier than the bloated Windows 10 on my aging XPS 13 was the icing on the cake. But there were other things that really made me fall in love with the Pixelbook Go. The keyboard, for example, is brilliant, and despite the Pixelbook Go and the Dell XPS 13 being similar sizes (13-inch laptops are perfect for working on buses and trains), the Pixelbook Go’s keyboard is so much more comfortable to type on. There is one thing I’m not too keen on: the lack of a physical delete key. I had to search the internet to find out the keyboard shortcut (you press the Search key plus Backspace). The Pixelbook Go is also lighter than the XPS 13, and while Dell’s Ultrabook is by no means heavy, I did notice the difference when carrying it around all day. Then there’s the battery life. Oh, that battery life. Going from an aging Windows 10 laptop to the Pixelbook Go is a revelation. A single charge easily lasts all day, so when I’m out and about I’m not having to search for a power outlet. And it holds its battery life as well! I can open it up after a few days of not using it, and the battery life is still there. This makes it an ideal machine for pulling out of a rucksack and making some quick notes. All too often, with the XPS 13, I’d take it out, open it up, and find there’s no battery left. Perhaps best of all, though, was for the past few weeks as I was using and falling in love with the Pixelbook Go, there wasn’t a single dodgy update forced upon me. Seeing Microsoft continue to break Windows 10 didn’t give me any pleasure - but it made me even more glad to be using Chrome OS – and I now can’t see myself going back.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite: what we want to see Posted: 29 Feb 2020 03:00 AM PST The Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite could be launched shortly, based on the growing number of leaks and rumors surrounding it, and it could offer much of the appeal of the full-fat Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 at a lower price. In fact, if leaks are to be believed it both sports a similar design and comes packing a stylus, which could give it a boost over other budget slates. Below you’ll find everything we’ve heard about the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite so far, along with a wish list of things that we want from it. We’ll also be updating this article as soon as we hear anything new, so make sure to keep checking back if you’re interested in Samsung’s next slate. Cut to the chase
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite release date and priceWhile there aren’t any release date rumors for the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite, the fact that we’ve seen it mentioned by name in an official Bluetooth certification database suggests it’s probably almost here. Plus, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e was announced in February 2019, and the Tab S6 Lite is something of a successor to that, further suggesting it should land soon, since the S5e landed around a year ago. As for what it will cost, it might be similar to the Galaxy Tab S5e, which starts at $399/£379/AU$649. Certainly it should be a fair bit less than the $649.99 / £619 / AU$1,099 Samsung Galaxy Tab S6. The Tab S6 Lite might have a similar price to the Tab S5e Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite leaks and newsThe biggest Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite leak takes the form of a render, which you can see below. This looks like it could be an official press render, and if so then that’s further evidence that the slate is probably landing soon. As for what it shows, there are black bezels along every edge of the screen, and a design that from the front (which is all we’ve seen) looks a lot like the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6. You can also see that there’s a single-lens front-facing camera, and most notably that there’s an S Pen stylus. The stylus is notable because while the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 comes with one, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e doesn’t. So including one here could help the Tab S6 Lite stand out in the mid-range market. The design of the stylus also looks similar to the one that comes with the Tab S6, which might mean the features are the same too. So it’s possible that there’s a magnetized slot on the back of the slate to house and charge the stylus. It might also support Air Actions, which let you interact with the slate by making gestures with the stylus in the air above the screen. The source of the image above additionally claims that the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite will have a mid-range Exynos 9611 chipset, 4GB of RAM, Android 10, and either 64GB or 128GB of storage, depending on where in the world you buy it. We’ve previously seen that chipset, RAM amount and Android version mentioned in a benchmark, so there’s a good chance those details are accurate. What we want to see in the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 LiteEven assuming the rumors are right, there’s still a lot that we don’t know about the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite just yet, but below you’ll find what we’re hoping to see. 1. A stylusLeaks suggest the Tab S6 Lite will have a stylus Based on leaks, the inclusion of a stylus looks very likely, and we hope there is one, as this accessory could transform the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite from an identikit mid-ranger to something with a real selling point. It would also likely be a much cheaper way to get a stylus-packed slate than most iPad options or the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6. And if the stylus comes packing all the same tech as it does in the Tab S6 then it will be a good one too. 2. A headphone portHeadphone ports are clearly on the way out, but there’s just as clearly still an audience for them, and in a device as big as a tablet the argument for removing them is less compelling than in a phone, where every tiny amount of space matters. We don’t expect the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite will have a headphone port, given that the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 and Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e don’t, but it would be nice if it did. 3. A reasonable price tagHopefully the Tab S6 Lite will be a lot cheaper than the Tab S6 Back in the realms of likely features is an affordable price. We don’t expect the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite to be cheap, but it’s likely to have a mid-range price, and might even undercut the iPad 10.2. If it does that while including a stylus then Samsung could have a real winner on its hands in the cheap Android tablet space. 4. A great screenIf there’s one thing Samsung knows how to do well, it’s screens, and even its mid-range slates tend to have good ones, so we’re not asking for much with our wish for a great screen. A Super AMOLED display of over ten inches with a QHD+ resolution is likely, and that should just about be enough for us to consider the screen great, but if Samsung could pack in HDR support too then it would be even better. 5. A keyboard coverThe Tab S6 has lots of productivity potential. We want the same here As well as a stylus, we’d also love for the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite to launch alongside an official keyboard cover. But we’re not greedy, we don’t need this to be bundled with the slate, it can be sold as an optional extra just as it is with the standard Samsung Galaxy Tab S6. Even with the extra expense, the ability to turn the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite into a true productivity device could be enormously desirable for some people, while those who just want a tablet can enjoy the Tab S6 Lite as is, without splashing out on expensive accessories.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Real Madrid vs Barcelona live stream: how to watch El Clasico 2020 online from anywhere Posted: 29 Feb 2020 02:36 AM PST With just two points separating both sides in the La Liga table and only 13 games remaining, this weekend's El Clasico showdown looks unmissable - don't miss a second of the action by following our Barcelona vs Real Madrid live stream guide. Trailing in second and coming into Sunday's top-of-the-table La Liga showdown off the back of a stinging midweek Champions League defeat at home to Man City, the pressure would appear to be on Zinedine Zidane and Real Madrid. That said, Barcelona are experiencing a major defensive injury crisis that could leave them vulnerable at the back. First choice full-backs Sergi Roberto and Jordi Alba are both injured, while Gerard Pique is doubtful for the clash. No doubt Real will look to take advantage of this playing at home at the Bernabeu, but they haven't always been able to hit the mark this season and have failed to score on no less than eight occasions. Scoring seems less of a problem for away side Barcelona, with Lionel Messi ending what has been a relative drought of four games by bagging all but one of Barcelona's goals in their 5-0 victory over Eibar last Saturday. That match saw shock signing Martin Braithwaite make an encouraging debut from the bench, setting up two goals and casting aside the memories that this was once a player who struggled at Middlesbrough. Watch all the El Clasico drama unfold as it happens with our Real Madrid vs Barcelona live stream guide below.
Use a VPN to watch Real Madrid vs Barcelona: live stream El Clasico from outside your countryFurther down this page, you'll discover how to watch Real Madrid vs Barcelona in El Clasico from numerous countries all over the world, including the UK, US, Canada and Australia. It's even free in some places! You can generally tune in on TV or online. But if you go to watch La Liga online from overseas on the same channel or service you would at home, you'll quickly discover an obstacle - geo-blocking. That means it's unlikely you'll be able to watch a Madrid vs Barca stream as usual - unless you use a VPN. This useful bits of software are trustworthy, reliable, and totally legal, allowing you tap into your local La Liga coverage without resorting to dodgy streaming sites.
How to stream Real Madrid vs Barcelona live in the UKHow to watch El Clasico: US Real Madrid vs Barcelona live stream detailsHow to live stream Real Madrid vs Barcelona in CanadaEl Classico live stream: watch Real Madrid vs Barcelona in AustraliaHow to watch Madrid vs Barca in El Clasico from New ZealandThis posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| South Africa vs Australia live stream: how to watch ODI series 2020 cricket from anywhere Posted: 29 Feb 2020 02:07 AM PST With the hosts in confident mood after their T20 series draw to England, and the visiting Baggy Greens looking to get back on track after a tight defeat to India, this has the makings of a fascinating trio of matches. We'll help you discover how to watch every minute with a South Africa vs Australia cricket live stream - no matter where in the world you are. The Proteas have won eight of their last nine ODI meetings with the Aussies, including their nail-biting 10-run victory in the World Cup last summer. Australia, meanwhile, will be looking to push on from their 2-1 series win in the T20 series over South Africa earlier this week. The Aussie trio of David Warner, Aaron Finch and Steven Smith have looked particularly formidable in recent months and could give the visitors the edge here. That threesome looks likely to be supplemented by Marnus Labuschagne, who is et to come into the middle order. The hosts are set to shake up their bowling attack from the one that faced England, and should be boosted by the return of Anrich Nortje and Kagiso Rabada. Follow the instructions below to watch all of the action where we'll tell you how to grab a South Africa vs Australia live stream from pretty much anywhere on Earth.
Watch a cricket live stream when away from your countryFor cricket fans in the UK, South Africa, Australia and the US looking to find out how to watch the cricket, we've got all the details about the broadcasters with the rights to show a South Africa vs England live stream of the ODI series in your region below. If you're away from home country and looking to see the action you'll likely to find you won't be able to thanks to geo-blocking. Thankfully there's a way to alleviate that frustration. By using a VPN you'll be able to watch the game without having to resort to watching via an illegal feed from a dodgy website you've discovered on Reddit. How to live stream South Africa vs Australia in AustraliaHow to watch the Proteas play cricket in South AfricaHow to watch South Africa vs Australia in the UKHow to watch South Africa vs Australia: US live streamThis posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| TalkTalk's cheap fibre broadband deals now come with £40 Amazon gift cards Posted: 29 Feb 2020 02:00 AM PST When you're investing a decent amount of money into your broadband deals each month, you want to feel like you're getting wined, dined and the full star customer treatment is being given out. And with TalkTalk's latest offering, that's what they're doing...kind of. Up until March 5, when you buy TalkTalk's Faster Fibre plan, you'll receive an Amazon.co.uk gift card, M&S or Tesco Voucher or even just a good old pre-paid Mastercard - all at the value of £40. That way, you can wine and dine yourself...but on TalkTalk's behalf. And looking past the voucher, TalkTalk's fibre plan is pretty great all on its own. It only costs £22.95 a month, while landing you speeds averaging 38Mb and not charging any set-up fees.
TalkTalk's great value cheap broadband deal:
What other broadband deals are there?Want to go even cheaper than this. Well if you don't mind taking a bit of a drop in the speeds you're getting, the Post Office currently has the very lowest internet bills in the UK for just £15.90 a month. If speed is more of a consideration though, then two offers really stand out. Firstly BT's Superfast Fibre plan cranks things up to 50Mb. It costs a decent amount more than TalkTalk but it is currently at the monthly price of £28.99 and pairing it with a £80 reward card. And then there's Vodafone and its affordable fibre pricing. Go for Vodafone's Superfast 2 plan and you'll be paying just £23.95 (£21.95 for existing Voda customers) to land speeds averaging 63Mb. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| These are the five leading SIM only deals this weekend: Three, EE, Vodafone and more Posted: 29 Feb 2020 01:00 AM PST Now that the UK is in a perpetual cycle of bad weather, stormy winds and heavy rain, there isn't a whole lot of point in going outside this weekend. So what to do instead? Finally finding that SIM only deal you need to put in your phone now your contract has ended? Yes, we're aware that in the long list of the funnest ways to spend your weekend, that ranks pretty low. With that in mind, we thought we might help speed the process along a little bit by picking out the five best SIM plans around right now. With big cashback options on Vodafone, 1-month rolling contracts in a while and a Three unlimited dataoffer which just refuses to let anything else top it, there are a lot of great choices out there right now.
Our top 5 best SIM only deals this week:This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Internet access hangs by a thread for hundreds of millions Posted: 28 Feb 2020 10:00 PM PST Despite what Wi-Fi and mobile data might lead people to believe, the internet is less of a nebulus cloud of data in the air above us, and more of an intricate mesh of wires firing away beneath our feet. The world’s online networks are powered by a complex system of underwater and underground cabling, supplemented in some regions by satellite links. Around 380 undersea cables carry over 99.5% of all transoceanic data, running for 750,000 miles across the ocean floor. These fiber optic wires connect the massive data centers supporting cloud behemoths such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.
The total number of submarine cables shot up during a period of rapid growth in the mid-2000s, followed by an interval during which relatively little new cable was laid, but available capacity was slowly exhausted. A renewed demand for bandwidth, caused by the rapid growth of connected devices, is now propelling a new wave of cable initiatives. The first submarine cable to use fiber optics was TAT-8, which went live in 1988. It had two operational fiber pairs and one backup pair, and reached speeds of up to 280MB per second. The current fastest cable (MAREA, owned jointly by Microsoft and Facebook) has eight fibre pairs, and achieved record speeds of 26.2TB per second in 2019 – that's almost 100,000 times faster than TAT-8. However, despite exponential growth in quantity and capacity, whole countries can be plunged into blackout if just one cable is damaged or snapped, with ramifications for household users and businesses alike. Undersea cables are usually run through areas of deep ocean to minimize the possibility of damage. But the deep sea is a harsh environment, and cables laid at extreme depth can be challenging to access if repairs are required. According to telecoms research firm Telegeography, there are over 100 cable breaks per year. Many of these go unnoticed in developed regions with extensive redundancies, but the infrastructure keeping us online is still far more fragile than any of us realize. FragilityIn many developed countries, particularly in the West and Asia, internet access is more or less taken for granted as a constant – even a moment’s downtime is met with anger and frusatration. But this isn’t the case for much of the world, where connections are intermittent, unreliable, or even non-existent. In 2018, the west African nation of Mauritania was taken offline for two whole days after the Africa Coast to Europe cable (owned by a syndicate of telecoms companies) was severed by a fishing trawler. Nine other countries in the region also experienced outages at the hands of the wayward fisherman. In the former Soviet bloc nation of Georgia, an elderly woman scavenging for copper to sell as scrap cut through an underground cable with her spade, causing neighbouring Armenia to lose connection for five hours. She was dubbed “the spade-hacker” by local media. Millions in Yemen were also thrown off the internet last year after the submarine Falcon cable was severed, with its repair made even more complex by the ongoing civil war in the country. Stories about sharks biting down on cables in the Pacific and causing intermittent outages have also become common in recent years. Various articles have suggested that the creatures mistake electromagnetic waves for bioelectric currents produced by schools of fish, although some experts are skeptical of the phenomenon. “This is probably one of the biggest myths we see cited in the press. While it’s true that in the past sharks have bitten a few cables, they are not a major threat,” Alan Mauldin, Research Director at Telegeography, said in a blog post. “There’s a cable fault somewhere in the world about every three days. These tend to be from external aggression, such as fishing and anchors – cables are damaged unintentionally [all the time],” he told TechRadar Pro via email. Sharks or no, the list of incidents involving damage to critical cabling goes on and on. All it takes is a misplaced anchor for millions to lose their invaluable connection. On the cusp of blackoutIt might seem staggering that whole nations can so easily be taken offline, even if only temporarily. But not all countries enjoy the luxury of extensive redundancies in the event a cable is damaged. Japan is served by a total of 26 submarine cables, the UK is supported by 54 cables, and the US by a whopping 91, but a significant proportion of the world relies on just a single cable for connection, or two if they’re lucky. TechRadar Pro looked at the number of countries reliant on either one or two cables. In total, 19 countries – about 10% of countries globally – are supported by only a single submarine cable. The largest of these (by population) include Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Togo and Sierra Leone. If you include countries supported by just two cables (a further 11 nations), the total number of people relying on a tenuous connection rises to almost 450 million, or 5.57% of the global population. It’s true that some of these nations likely supplement the connection delivered by submarine cables with satellite links, which can provide a measure of support. According to Nicole Starosielski, author of The Undersea Network and Associate Professor at NYU, satellites are an acceptable backup, but don’t compare to the speed and bandwidth offered by fiber optic cables. “Satellites are a viable option as a supplement to the current network – reaching areas cables cannot reach and providing redundancy in some locations. But they are not a replacement for the cable network,” she explained over email. In other words, low-bandwidth satellites would be quickly overwhelmed if an entire nation attempted to connect at once, making them effectively useless in the absence of the cable system. Fail to prepare, prepare to failReliable internet connection was once viewed as a luxury, but loss of internet can now have severe and wide-reaching consequences, both for individual businesses and entire economies. Businesses in regions that suffer from poor internet penetration and intermittent connection have likely acclimatized, leaning more heavily on offline ways of working. However, in regions utterly dependent on connection, companies are often ill equipped to handle downtime. Research carried out by UK-based ISP Beaming found that British businesses lost almost 60 million hours of working time to internet outages in 2018. On average, UK firms experienced two major outages and 16 hours of downtime each. Beaming estimates these outages cost the UK economy more than £700 million in lost productivity and extra overtime. While they're unable to influence goings-on in the world of undersea cabling, there are measures businesses can take to limit downtime, and the damage it causes. According to Kevin Kong, Product Manager at another UK-based ISP, KCOM, “the primary solution to mitigate against downtime is tried and tested: resiliency and diversity. “Services need to be designed for the worst case – this means having appropriate resiliency via a failover service (e.g. dual Ethernet circuits), which allows your organization to continue running critical, if not all, business systems.” Given that infrastructure design appears unlikely to change any time soon, software could play an increasing role in keeping businesses online. “The future could revolve around smarter network software that can work around hardware infrastructure failures. We are seeing interesting efforts in this area,” says Martin Levy, Distinguished Engineer at US web infrastructure and security company Cloudflare. But Levy also notes that the introduction of new technologies brings with it an additional element of risk. “With more complex technology comes more complex systems to manage it,“ he says. “This requires sophisticated training and experienced individuals. There are places in the world where additional deployed technology doesn’t equal improved quality.” Demand for bandwidthIn response to ever-increasing capacity requirements, the world’s technology giants have taken it upon themselves to fund and manage many undersea cabling projects. Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook all hold stakes in high-profile submarine cable networks. Between them, these companies own or lease more than half of undersea bandwidth. Google alone owns four cable networks: Curie, Dunant, Equiano and Junior. These firms need to satisfy a rapidly accelerating customer demand for bandwidth, driven by the adoption of mobile, the proliferation of IoT devices, the transition to 5G, and the volume of data produced by and exchanged between businesses. “The biggest shift in the last decade is that the users of the most international bandwidth have become content providers, not telecom carriers,” notes Mauldin. “We are seeing higher capacity cables entering service, which have 12 to 16 fiber pairs. Future cables may have even more. Eventually, some of the older cables laid in the late 1990s and early 2000s will be decommissioned.” To put this in perspective, each fiber pair is capable of carrying four million high-definition videos simultaneously. With a greater number of pairs, it’s expected that future cables will reach speeds that far exceed the 26.2TB per second achieved by MAREA. As fiber optic technology improves, more cable networks are laid, and old cables are replaced with high-capacity models, the quantity of data able to pass through our seas will soon reach unimaginable levels. Underwater geopoliticsDespite this potential, massive submarine cabling projects also face a diverse range of obstacles, including budget, logistics, and dense bureaucracy. Perhaps chief among them, though, is geopolitical conflict, as demonstrated by the ongoing trade war between the US and China. Google and Facebook recently filed to activate the Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN) between the US, the Philippines and Taiwan. The project is an excellent case-study in how geopolitics can stand in the way of progress. The network, announced in 2016, was originally billed as the first to connect the US and Hong Kong. However, sections running to Hong Kong and China will remain inactive amid security concerns and ongoing conflict between Washington and Beijing. PLCN boasts 12,800km of cabling and an estimated capacity of 120TB per second, which would make it the highest-capacity trans-Pacific route, bringing lower latency and greater bandwidth to the APAC region. Google and Facebook might be the most high-profile stakeholders in PLCN, but much of its fiber optics belong to an organization called Pacific Light Data Communication. The sale of this company to a Beijing-based private broadband provider, Dr Peng Telecom & Media Group, in 2017 triggered concerns that have dogged the initiative ever since. Dr Peng itself is not state-owned, but has strong links with Huawei, the mobile giant accused by the US government of posing a significant security threat. Google and Facebook have requested permission to activate only the self-owned portions of the undersea cable network (running between the US, the Philippines and Taiwan), effectively cutting Pacific Light Data Communication from the project. When the project was first announced, Google spoke of ambitions to provide enough capacity for Hong Kong to have 80 million concurrent HD video conferences with Los Angeles; in the end, geopolitics put paid to this particular ambition. Given the critical importance of connection to nearly all aspects of life and business, the idea that submarine cabling could become the target of terror attacks or sabotage efforts has also been debated. Following the Mauritania outage in 2018, Stuart Petch, Chief of the UK Defence staff at the time, spoke of the “catastrophic” threat to connection and trade posed by foreign powers interfering with deep-sea cables. The same event saw Conservative MP Rishi Sunak (since appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer) refer to the possibility that terrorists might use grappling hooks attached to fishing trawlers to deal Britain’s network a “crippling blow”. This perceived threat, however, appears to be overblown, dwarfed by the much more tangible threat posed by chance events and natural wear. “The cable system has not been a frequent target of attacks. Cables are much more frequently disrupted by anchors and nets, accidentally, than anything else. Cables break all the time and we don't ever realise it,” noted Nicole Starosielski. “Certainly the cable system could be the site of attack, but it doesn't have the high visual impact that other targets afford.” State of playAlthough new speeds are reached with each passing year, and new cables laid connecting different areas of the globe, avoiding chokepoints in London and San Francisco, much of the world’s connection remains at the mercy of chance incidents. The ability to improve internet penetration, speed and reliability in countries with limited infrastructure sits primarily with big tech – the companies driving today’s most ambitious projects. The total number of internet users is on the up, especially in African nations, but service reliability is an issue (acutely felt by many) that still needs to be addressed.
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| You are subscribed to email updates from TechRadar - All the latest technology news. To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |
No comments:
Post a Comment