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What you need to know about Apple's iPhone 12 and 12 Pro
What is the iPhone 12 Pro series? The iPhone 12 Pro Max, on the other hand, just might be the biggest iPhone Apple has ever made. What is the iPhone 12 series?
Here's everything Samsung announced at its Unpacked 2020 event
Here are all of the highlights from today's Samsung Unpacked event.
Here's everything Apple announced at its WWDC 2020 keynote
Here's everything you need to know from Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference today.
Here's everything Samsung announced at its Galaxy S20 event
After weeks of leaks, Samsung officially revealed its Galaxy S20 series at its Unpacked event today. The company also shared its next attempt at a foldable phone, the Galaxy Z Flip, and had a lot to say about its new camera tech.
Our readers tell us what’s wrong with the Google Pixel Slate
Though he's well-known around the Engadget office for being a Chromebook enthusiast, deputy managing editor Nathan Ingraham found little to recommend about Google's Pixel Slate. It would appear, given the responses from our user reviews page, that many real-world owners feel the same. Despite having a lovely 12.3-inch display, a comfortable keyboard folio and solid battery life, the Pixel Slate floundered on the software side: Its poor implementation of Android apps ultimately earned it an embarrassing score of 69. However, the Pixel Slate owners in our user reviews section were a bit more forgiving, giving it an average of 77.
Sony’s E3 2018 show: Our verdict
Last month, Sony poured cold water on the idea that its E3 press conference would be a big, blockbuster show. Instead, Sony said that we could expect more intimate, deeper-dives on games like Death Stranding, Ghosts of Tsushima, The Last of Us: Part II and Spider-Man. Sony was aiming for something close to a Revival Meeting vibe, hosting its event in a church hall with ribbons of bulbs running along the ceiling and pews for the attendees.
Here are all the trailers from the Nintendo Switch event
When Nintendo revealed its mysterious NX game console as the Switch in October, we still didn't know much. Yes, it was a hybrid portable game console with new games in the Super Mario, Legend of Zelda and Splatoon franchises -- but how much was it going to cost? When was it coming out? What else would we be able to play? Now that the console's official reveal is over, we have answers: $300, March 3rd and a whole lot. On top of teasing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Super Mario Odyssey, Nintendo's Switch reveal event showed us trailers for a new Fire Emblem game, a second Xenoblade Chronicles, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and so much more.
What happened at WWDC 2016?
Need a quick recap on all the news from WWDC 2016? Our own Dana Wollman and Chris Velazco were on the scene and are ready to run through all the news about macOS, iOS, watchOS, tvOS and any other platforms Apple may have introduced. Most of these changes won't hit your devices until the fall, but this way it will only take a few minutes to get familiar with all the new features immediately.
Wearables are inching toward a purpose in 2016
Before CES 2016 began, I was expecting wearable technology to occupy less space on the floor than in 2015. I'd reasoned that the industry's failure to make the devices essential for life would cause it to retreat until the problems were fixed. Quite the opposite has happened, and there are enough wearable companies out there to justify splitting off to fill their own, dedicated event. The usual frustrations are still evident, but smart minds are beginning to craft gear that does one job, and does it well. Right now, nobody has been able to make a wearable that everyone needs, but that's no longer the goal.
What you missed on day five at CES
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-482866{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-482866, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-482866{width:100%;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-482866").style.display="none";}catch(e){} The longer CES goes on, the weirder it gets -- and not just because five days is wayyy too much time in Vegas. Rather, the big consumer announcements have already been made, so we're left with the more prosaic technology. Luckily, that's often the most fun. We saw a motion simulator called Moveo that could help you explore virtual reality's full vomit potential, for one. If you'd rather keep your thrills more grounded, BMW launched a connected motorcycle helmet with a heads-up display. And now that you've finally accepted the idea of 4K, guess what? Here comes 8K! Let Editor-in-Chief Michael Gorman give you the lowdown on these and other stories, or read more in the gallery below.
The Think Tank: Repairing the 'social' in MMORPGs
Our writeup of the Why aren't MMOs more social? panel from PAX South last weekend racked up almost 500 comments, and for good reason: Interaction is at the heart of making MMOs more sticky. But is it going away, and if so, why, and how do we get it back? That's the subject of this week's Think Tank.
The Think Tank: Analyzing Elder Scrolls Online's B2P model
Yesterday's reveal that The Elder Scrolls Online will go buy-to-play in March has prompted much speculation about the nature of the cash shop, the ethics of the switchover, the continued viability of the game, and the quality, cost, and frequency of the promised DLC. In today's Think Tank, the Massively staff will discuss the decision. Is B2P the right call for ESO? Was the exceedingly long delay of the console launch a huge mistake? What do we expect from the DLC? And is "Tamriel Unlimited" in fact the worst rebrand ever?
Perfect Ten: My mobile MMO experiment, part 2
Last week on Perfect Ten I began an experiment to "taste test" a batch of mobile MMOs to see if there's anything out there that's worth playing in this day and age (apart from the often-recommended Order & Chaos Online and Spacetime Studio's lineup). For the record, I would absolutely love a great mobile online RPG, but it would need to be a game that's tailored to such devices and offers a compelling experience beyond trying to clone a generic MMO. Let me sum up my adventures so far: While I did discover a couple of interesting titles, there was nothing in the first five games that made me want to keep them on my smartphone. Let's hope that this week's group brings out the big guns because I will be despondent if this experiment is in vain!
Perfect Ten: My mobile MMO experiment, part 1
I'm often mystified that we haven't seen or heard much about MMOs on mobile devices. You'd think that with such a massive potential audience that studios would be racing to bust this market wide open, but whether it's the limitations of such devices (size, lack of input) or some stigma against developing "serious" games for app stores, we've seen remarkably few of them over the past few years. I've grown increasingly curious what MMOs, if any, might be out there for my tablet and smartphone. Practically every list I've read begins with both Order & Chaos Online and the Spacetime Studio games (both strong entries) and then quickly peters out with titles that nobody writing those lists have ever played. Search engine inquiries are helpful with that, I assume. So I decided that I'd undertake an experiment. I would scour the internet and app store for 10 MMOs that have come at least slightly recommended by some list maker, sample them, and see if they compelled me to play more. Will any of these 10 prove to be interesting enough to stay on my phone after this series is done? Find out as I start with the first five of the bunch...
The Think Tank: The MMO server merge stigma
Last week, Turbine announced that it plans to address Lord of the Rings Online's ongoing population problems. New executive producer Athena "Vyvyanne" Peters wrote, "We're taking measures to get everyone onto the more populous servers" and "working on [...] improved server transfer tools." And later, she clarified, "We are still working through the details, but part of our efforts here are to make the transition as seamless as possible for Kinship leaders to keep the players together. The idea is to bring you together, not spread further apart." In our post, we called this process "server merges of a sort," but some loyal LotRO fans went ballistic at the idea that mass server transfers to, you know, merge players onto populous servers might be called "server merges." The term has such negative connotations and implications for a game's health that neither studios nor fans will dare use it even when it's a reasonable term to use and when it heralds good things for an aging game. The stigma might even make some studios leery of doing merges at all. What do you think -- is there a better term for these sorts of faux-merges? Have you been through a merge and found it a worthwhile experience? Can we be done with the merge stigma already? We're talking server merges in today's Think Tank.
The Think Tank: On MMO rollbacks
Let's talk about rollbacks. ArcheAge, Elite: Dangerous, Neverwinter -- whenever an MMO pops up in the news with a bug, there's usually an accompanying cry for a rollback, and each of these games has seen such in the last few months. Rollbacks used to be quite common, but modern MMO companies almost never risk them. For today's Think Tank, I asked the Massively writers whether they'd ever suffered rollbacks, whether they'd lost anything, whether it was worth it, and just what they think of the whole issue.
What you've missed at CES so far
According to the CEA's official schedule, CES 2015 actually starts today -- but the onslaught of unfiltered news actually started two days ago. Before the Las Vegas Convention Center even opened its doors, Samsung and LG both held press conferences; Intel and NVIDIA outed new processors; and Lenovo put its latest laptop designs on display. What happened at CES before CES started? Read on, and we'll fill you in.
The Think Tank: One MMO wish for 2015
Every year when we roll out our prediction articles with anything negative (because of course something negative is likely to happen in this industry over the span of a year), a commenter invariably accuses us of wishing for the negative thing to occur. It just ain't so. Predictions aren't wishes. In many cases, we're hoping to be wrong about our suspicions and hunches and dread. We're crossing our fingers that the wind turns and statistical likelihoods are flukily wrong. Can't bet the ranch on hopes and dreams. But wishes can be fun too. That's what we're doing in this first Think Tank of the new year. This, my friends, is what wishes look like.
After the hype: here's what the internet thinks of 'The Interview'
So you resisted the pressure to watch The Interview the second it became available, and you're not willing to rely on one review to decide whether it's really worth a download or theater trip just to stick it to hackers. No worries -- we've rounded up some of the more prominent reviews to give you a sense of whether or not the North Korean adventures of Franco and Rogen are any good. You may already have a sense of how well this over-the-top comedy fares, but don't be too quick to judge. You might find a few reasons to shell out some cash (or at least wait for that rumored Netflix release) to see The Interview, even if it's far from a cinematic masterpiece.
Perfect Ten: New MMOs to watch in 2015
As I've done for 2013 and 2014, I'm going to use the turn of the year as an excuse to look ahead at what MMO releases we may have to look forward to enjoying in the next 12 months. As always, it's a mixture of research, guesswork, and weeks of anguished ranking to come up with 10 titles that I think will define the new year. After the huge launch year we had in 2014, 2015 will most definitely be a smaller year for big-name releases. That doesn't mean it will be a complete write-off, but perhaps it will challenge us to look beyond the heavy hitters to find more diamonds in the rough. A couple of notes before we launch into the list, if you please! First of all, I limited this list to MMOs that at least have a shot of launching in 2015; games that are popular but are definitely not going to make it this year had to be excluded. Second, I am expanding the "honorable mentions" section this year to include more upcoming MMOs and my brief thoughts on them. So you are really getting 50 games for the effort of reading 10! You are welcome.
