Bandai Namco’s Sand Land finally has a release date of April 26. This is a video game adaptation of a classic manga by artist Akira Toriyama. That’s the same Akira Toriyama who created Dragon Ball, and also created the character designs for Chrono Trigger and many entries in the Dragon Quest series.
Sand Land is a manga dating back to the mystical year of 2000 and it follows the adventures of the literal Devil’s son, Beelzebub, as he explores a desert world accompanied by a human sheriff and a demon thief. Interestingly, the game seems like a beat-for-beat recreation of the anime, only in the form of a fast-paced action RPG.
There’s also a heavy emphasis on vehicle customization in the game, as the desert is vast and requires diverse transportation methods. This allows you to fuse different weaponry and components to improve performance or offer unique tactical advantages. However, your first vehicle will be a bare-bones golf cart, another nod to the source material.
Sand Land releases for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S and PC, with pre-orders available now. There’s a number of different versions available for collectors. The Standard Edition includes just the base game, while the Deluxe Edition comes with various digital add-ons, along with decals. The Collector’s Edition comes with everything listed above, plus postcards and Steelbook packaging.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/sand-land-a-game-adaptation-of-akira-toriyamas-manga-drops-on-april-26-184008528.html?src=rss
CES 2024 in Las Vegas had all kinds of tech, from attention-grabbing AI gadgets to, uh, whatever this is. There were also a whole bunch of laptops. Like, an endless array of laptops. So many laptops, in fact, that we had a real tough time deciding between them to choose our best of CES award winners.
These weren’t just any laptops with minor spec bumps. The theme of the year was, of course, AI, with many computers adopting dedicated AI chips. OLED displays with speedy refresh rates were also all over the show floor and, of course, there were several unique designs that just about defy description. We’ve gone through them all and come up with a list of the best laptops at CES.
ASUS Zenbook Duo
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
The dream of a dual-screen laptop isn’t dead! The ASUS Zenbook Duo is a technical marvel, with a dual-screen display and a detachable Bluetooth keyboard. In other words, you can use it in a traditional clamshell mode, with a keyboard in front of one of the displays, or you can balance the screens on top of one another. This is great for those who want the convenience of a laptop, but with added screen real estate.
The aesthetics are on point and the Duo includes high-end hardware like Intel's Core Ultra chips and gorgeous OLED screens. The price is also fairly reasonable, given the tech, as this laptop starts at $1,500.
ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 and G16
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
ASUS strikes again. The ROG Zephyrus G14 and G16 line has gotten a full redesign, with an attractive aluminum chassis and plenty of power underneath the hood. These laptops can run just about any AAA game on the market, thanks to its AMD Ryzen 8000 series processors and the optional NVIDIA RTX 4070 GPU at the high end.
We called it a “grown up” and “sophisticated” gaming laptop because, well, that’s what it is. It’s incredibly sleek and would feel at home in an office and in a basement-turned-gaming-paradise. It’s also lighter than previous generations, making it more portable. Each model ships with a simple LED slash across the front that can be programmed to glow in gray or white, instead of the typical Skittles rainbow of colors found with most gaming laptops. There’s no pricing on these yet.
HP Omen Transcend 14
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
There’s a new record-breaker in town. The HP Open Transcend 14 is the lightest 14-inch gaming laptop in the world, weighing just 3.5 pounds. Even cooler? HP seems to have hit this milestone without cutting too many corners. Despite being closer in size and weight to an ultraportable than an average gaming laptop, you still get support for the 14th-gen Intel Core Ultra 7 or Ultra 9 processor, up to 32GB of DDR5 RAM, 2TB of storage and an RTX 4070 GPU. This thing won’t struggle to play modern games.
Despite the teeny-tiny dimensions, you still get two USB-A and two USB-C ports (one of which supports Thunderbolt 4) plus a full-size HDMI 2.1 jack on the back. You’ll also have the option to upgrade to Wi-Fi 7 card with Bluetooth 5.4. This laptop starts at $1,600 and goes on sale later this year.
Dell’s new XPS line
Devindra Hardawar/Engadget
Dell has upgraded its entire XPS line, with form factors that resemble last year’s XPS 13 Plus. The redesign covers the new XPS 13, 14 and 16, and there’s no longer a Plus line. Each of these laptops boasts a glass wrist wrest that hides an invisible haptic touchpad. There’s also touch-sensitive function buttons above the keyboard and large key caps for comfortable typing.
The XPS line includes Intel’s Core Ultra chips, which feature NPUs for AI tasks. The ports are on point, with the XPS 14 and 16 boasting a headphone jack, three Thunderbolt 4 USB-C slots and a microSD card reader. The minimalist design here is gorgeous and these laptops nearly made our best of CES list, but not quite. Once these are out in the wild, however, they could wind up on our list of the best laptops in 2024, just like the XPS 13 Plus.
Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
We promised unique and funky designs, and here’s one. The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 is a Frankenstein’s monster of sorts, with a design that’s basically two gadgets smashed together. This is anything but your typical 2-in-1 device. At first glance, the ThinkBook Plus looks like an ordinary clamshell, but the display lifts right off and becomes a 14-inch tablet.
Not that big of a deal right? Here’s where things get interesting. Once removed, both components remain fully functional. So you can use the tablet as a standalone Android device, a wireless monitor for the laptop base or a Wacom-like inking display via Lenovo’s Freestyle app. Meanwhile, you can also use the deck as a mini desktop by plugging in an external screen. Now that’s some modular thinking. This thing starts at $2,000, however, which is fairly steep.
Everything else
There were many laptops that just missed this list, but still deserve mention.
MSI 18-inch laptops - The company went big this year, introducing a trio laptops with 18-inch displays. Now you won’t have to sacrifice screen real estate for portability.
Acer Predator Helios 18 - This is another large laptop with an 18-inch screen. However, the Predator Helios 18 also features a uniquely-designed hinge absolutely stuffed with RGB lights.
Acer Swift and Aspire - These are basic refreshes that don’t offer much by way of innovation, but will certainly sell like absolute hotcakes. They are stuffed with AI, however, with Intel's new Core Ultra processors and dedicated keys that can summon Microsoft's Copilot AI assistant.
Alienware m16 R2 - What would CES be without some Alienware goodness? The m16 R2 is a sleek gaming laptop with a large 90 Whr battery, slim bezels and a beefy touchpad – all in a package with a 15 percent smaller footprint than previous iterations.
Lenovo Legion updates - Lenovo announced a slew of new Legion gaming laptops at CES, each featuring proprietary cooling technology and performance-enhancing AI chips. These all ship with Windows 11 and come with three free months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.
Sightful Spacetop - Well, here’s another funky one. The Spacetop doesn’t have an actual screen. It ships with AR glasses that allow for a 100-inch virtual display. The design is nifty, but the execution is iffy.
We're reporting live from CES 2024 in Las Vegas from January 6-12. Keep up with all the latest news from the show here.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-best-laptops-of-ces-2024-174531438.html?src=rss
Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown launches next week, but players are likely to encounter an amusing bug as they make their way through the game, as reported by IGN. One of the game’s NPCs is voiced by a text-to-speech program, complete with the slightly robotic tones we’ve come to associate with these services.
It’s not quite Siri or Alexa, but it’s close and certainly doesn’t fit the game’s Persian-inspired setting. The NPC-in-question is a tree spirit named Kalux and seems to be voiced by a TTS program that’s available online for free and typically used by streamers.
This isn’t an “AI is coming for your jobs” type thing, but rather a mistake on Ubisoft’s part, as each and every other NPC is attached to a voice actor. IGN notes that Kalux doesn’t have a voice actor in the credits. Additionally, Kalux only has a few lines, so it likely won’t be a tough fix to assign an actor to deliver that dialogue. Ubisoft has readied a day-one patch, but it won’t handle the Kalux issue. Look for another patch in late January or early February that replaces the bot with a human.
Ubisoft confirmed the error and said that the “English version of these eight lines of text for this character were not properly implemented," going on to note that the game has more than 12,000 lines of dialogue across multiple languages. Game developers often use TTS services and AI voices to create placeholder dialogue, which is eventually replaced by human actors. The company just forgot to handle this one character.
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown releases on January 15 for just about every platform out there, including the Nintendo Switch and PC. It’s the first franchise installment since 2010’s Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands. This is a Metroidvania-style platformer that brings the series back to its 2D roots. Reviews are mostly positive, with many praising it for offering a true AAA Metroidvania experience in the spirit of Nintendo’s recent-ish Metroid Dread.
However, just because this particular instance was a mistake, doesn’t mean that AI-enhanced TTS services aren’t going to radically change the industry. CD Projekt Red recently used AI to include a deceased actor's voice in Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty and SAG-AFTRA recently struck a deal with an AI voice acting platform to make it easier for actors to license their voice as a digital replica for use in games.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ubisoft-accidentally-used-text-to-speech-to-voice-a-character-in-the-new-prince-of-persia-game-193448687.html?src=rss
Dashlane’s subscription-based password manager is on sale for $40 per year, as part of a New Year’s offer. This is for the Premium Plan, which typically costs $60 each year. So this represents a savings of 40 percent or $20 per year. The sale ends on January 15 at 8PM ET, so you only have four days to take advantage of the discount.
Here’s how you can access the deal. Just sign up for the company’s Premium Plan and type in the code NY24 at checkout. That’s it. You’re good to go. The Premium Plan includes password protection for unlimited devices, with no limit on the number of passwords and passkeys. You also get a VPN for web-browsing, real-time phishing alerts and access to a sharing portal that allows you to safely share passwords and private information with friends and family.
Dashlane is a reputable service, up there with market leaders like 1Password, NordPass and LastPass. As a matter of fact, the service made our list of the best password managers. We loved the secure sharing feature, mentioned above, and the company’s VPN, which is included with the Premium Plan. The only downside is that there’s no support for Linux.
The company offers other plans, but those aren’t covered by this deal. The friends and family plan, for instance, offers complete access for up to ten people. There are also a couple of robust plans intended for commercial use. Again, the discount on the Premium Plan ends on January 15.
The best part about CES 2024 has been all of the cool product announcements. Many of these products are early in development, so not available for purchase. Some, however, are already on store shelves, allowing tech-crazed consumers to see what all the fuss is about. Here are some of the niftier items displayed at this year’s CES that are ready, willing and able to empty your bank account. These products range from cool smartphone accessories to gaming laptops and some items that simply defy description.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/25-gadgets-from-ces-2024-that-you-can-buy-right-now-202332730.html?src=rss
Amazon is laying off hundreds of people across Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios, as reported by Variety. This is for the usual reason. The company found a way to save some money and went for it. You know the drill. Amazon's entertainment chief Mike Hopkins wrote in an email to staff that it has “identified opportunities to reduce or discontinue investments in certain areas while increasing our investment and focus on content and product initiatives that deliver the most impact.”
Hopkins didn’t give an exact number, but did note that “several hundred” employees would be given walking papers and that most American workers will know by the end of the day, with global employees following suit by the end of the week. He also wrote that “it is hard to say goodbye to talented Amazonians.”
Amazon says it’ll help laid off workers with benefit packages that will include a separation payment and external job placement support. The company promises “continued investments in programming, marketing and product," despite the layoffs.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amazon-is-laying-off-several-hundred-employees-at-prime-video-and-mgm-studios-161307199.html?src=rss
Netflix’s long-anticipated sci-fi series 3 Body Problem finally has a full trailer, following a short teaser released last year. This new trailer is over two minutes long and absolutely filled with exciting moments and tantalizing clues. Watch it below.
The show’s based on a hit book series by Chinese author Liu Cixin. The showrunners include David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, formerly of Game of Thrones. Yes, everyone hates them because of the ending of HBO’s fantasy epic, but here’s the thing. 3 Body Problem is the first novel in the finished Remembrance of Earth's Past series, and the earlier seasons of Game of Thrones, when working from pre-existing material, were absolutely iconic. So this could be very good, though it has suffered from delays.
As for the plot, well it’s complicated and hard to even discuss without getting into spoilers. The books are out there if you can’t wait until the show’s March 21 release date. As a clue, the clunky title actually refers to a common problem with both classical physics and quantum physics involving Newton’s laws of motion and universal gravitation. In other words, it’s hard sci-fi, but the books have plenty of action and mystery set-pieces, and the show looks to follow suit. Expect plenty of advanced technologies and otherworldly weirdness.
3 Body Problem stars Benedict Wong, Eiza González and several Game of Thrones alums including Jonathan Pryce and John Bradley. Besides Benioff and Weiss, screenwriter Alexander Woo is on-board as a co-showrunner. Woo’s best known for his work on True Blood and The Terror, among other well-regarded series.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/netflixs-sci-fi-adaptation-3-body-problem-finally-gets-a-full-sized-trailer-200027248.html?src=rss
The modern classic mystery game Immortality is finally coming to PS5 on January 23 and it’ll cost $20, which is in line with the price on other platforms. It already exists on PC, Xbox Series X/S, Android and iOS. The game was originally released back in 2022.
For the uninitiated, Immortality is more of an interactive film trilogy than a video game, recalling full-motion titles from the 1990s. The surreal narrative tasks you with solving the disappearance of an actress named Marissa Marcel. You do this by scrubbing through video clips and gathering clues. Creator Sam Barlow has likened the gameplay to a “mental Metroidvania”, in that you return to previously-viewed clips once you have a new understanding of some aspect of the mystery.
We loved the title upon release and it made our list of the best games of 2022. The script, penned by writers behind films like Wild at Heart and TV shows like Mr. Robot, is not just good for a video game, but engaging throughout. The atmosphere is moody and tense, recalling the cinematic stylings of Alfred Hitchcock and, especially, David Lynch. Immortality is geared more towards cinephiles than mainstream gamers, so don’t expect a lot of action. The acting performances, however, are excellent.
Sam Barlow made a similar game called Her Story, which was also well-received, and the less popular Telling Lies. He’s been involved with several entries in the Silent Hill franchise, including Silent Hill: Origins and Silent Hill: Shattered.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cinematic-mystery-game-immortality-comes-to-ps5-on-january-23-191054771.html?src=rss
It’s official. The Mandalorian and his little green buddy are coming to the big screen, and before Dave Filoni’s long-anticipated crossover film event. The movie, appropriately titled The Mandalorian & Grogu, will be helmed by Jon Favreau, who created the Disney+ streaming TV show.
Fans have been speculating why there hasn’t been a renewal announcement regarding a new season of The Mandalorian, and this could be why. The film’s going into production this year, which is likely when a new season of the show would have been created. Beyond Favreau, the producers include franchise luminaries Kathleen Kennedy and Dave Filoni. There’s no plot synopsis, but Kennedy says the “new story is a perfect fit for the big screen.”
Director Jon Favreau not only created The Mandalorian TV show, but kickstarted the entire MCU when he directed a little film called Iron Man. He also helmed Elf, Swingers and live-action remakes of The Lion King and The Jungle Book.
Disney has offered no information regarding where in the timeline this film would take place, but one assumes it would be set directly following the events of both The Mandalorian season 3 and the first season of Ahsoka. This means that Mando and his ridiculously cute ward could become involved with Grand Admiral Thrawn’s attempts to rebuild the empire.
In a short span of time, we’ve gone from wondering if there would ever be another Star Wars movie to there being, well, a whole bunch of them. The Mandalorian & Grogu will likely lead to Dave Filoni’s unnamed crossover movie that features characters from across ‘The Mandoverse’, including Ahsoka, Boba Fett, Ezra Bridger, CGI Luke Skywalker and more.
There’s also a movie in the works chronicling the further adventures of Rey, directed by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, and a film exploring the origins of the Jedi and Sith directed by James Mangold. On the TV side of things, Ahsoka has been greenlit for a second season. Before that, however, there’s the Jude Law vehicle Skeleton Crew and a show set hundreds of years before the Skywalker Saga called The Acolyte. Star Wars: The Bad Batch is also getting a third and final season.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-mandalorian-and-grogu-are-coming-to-theaters-with-series-creator-jon-favreau-directing-174732996.html?src=rss
Vehicle-based voice assistants are the next great frontier, incorporating artificial intelligence into the driving experience. At CES 2024, Amazon and BMW announced a partnership to significantly improve the pre-existing experience, marrying a large language model (LLM) with Alexa and the actual driver’s manual. The end result? You can ask the Alexa-powered chatbot anything about your car and receive accurate real-time information. That’s right. That thick and unwieldy manual can stay in the glovebox, for good.
Amazon says this tool offers a “more natural way of getting to know your new car.” You can ask how various features work, like the parking assistance system, and get conversational answers. Both companies suggest that this voice technology will “strip away complexity and minimize distractions in the car.”
It’s not just an information delivery system. You can also ask the bot to take actions on your behalf, like entering a specific drive mode. Additionally, this will fully integrate with the infotainment system, so you’ll be able to ask the assistant to turn on music, navigate to a destination, change the internal temperature and just about anything else.
BMW has been using Amazon Alexa in its infotainment systems for years, but this is a significant step forward. The companies previously announced a partnership to build a custom BMW in-vehicle voice assistant that used Alexa as a framework, and this looks to be part of that effort.
There’s something of an arms race with this tech. Volkswagen announced something similar in Las Vegas this week. It plans on merging ChatGPT with its current IDA voice assistant, and this feature will begin showing up in forthcoming vehicles. Mercedes also made an announcement regarding ChatGPT integration last year.
We're reporting live from CES 2024 in Las Vegas from January 6-12. Keep up with all the latest news from the show here.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amazon-and-bmw-are-replacing-the-drivers-manual-with-ai-173031770.html?src=rss