Month: February 2024
Rockstar Games: Grand Theft Auto 6 developers ordered back to office
Rockstar Games, the developers behind the incredibly popular Grand Theft Auto franchise, have told staff that they are expected to
The post Rockstar Games: Grand Theft Auto 6 developers ordered back to office appeared first on ReadWrite.
Rockstar Games, the developers behind the incredibly popular Grand Theft Auto franchise, have told staff that they are expected to be in the office five days per week starting in April, reports Bloomberg.
A subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive, Rockstar announced in November 2023 that Grand Theft Auto 6 was on its way, though leaks as far back as September 2022 had all but confirmed that the game was in development.
It’s the threat of leaks along with the need for productivity and focus that have resulted in this decision by Rockstar. In an email to staff Jenn Kolbe, Rockstar’s Head of Publishing, cited security and productivity as the key factors. “Making these changes now puts us in the best position to deliver the next Grand Theft Auto at the level of quality and polish we know it requires, along with a publishing roadmap that matches the scale and ambition of the game,” said Kolbe in the email.
In addition to these earlier leaks, the Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer was leaked just days before the official trailer launch date. This resulted in some disappointment from Rockstar but didn’t harm the launch – people loved the trailer. It was found that a British teenager performed the trailer leak from a hotel room.
Rockstar is moving into the final stage of development as staff return to offices in April
An early 2025 release might actually happen y’all! pic.twitter.com/qTQLvx0wld
— Synth Potato (@SynthPotato) February 28, 2024
Rockstar Games’s Culture of Crunch
While a desire to prevent further leaks in the last phase of development is an understandable one, some eyebrows will be raised at the second part of the reasoning – “productivity”. The topic of working from home versus in-office is a contentious one, and often split on managerial lines, with workers saying they get more done at home and managers saying they see higher productivity when people are in offices. It is undeniably much harder to enforce crunch (compulsory overtime) when people are working from home.
Rockstar is notorious for crunch, and staff were regularly working over 100 hours per week in the run-up to Red Dead Redemption 2’s launch. With the games industry in an incredibly volatile state (studio after studio announcing mass layoffs and game cancellations), it becomes much easier to manipulate those who have stayed employed into tolerating harsh working conditions.
A pervasive fear that it could be your studio and your job next in line will lead to developers doing more for less, and with their stated focus on “productivity,” it’s hard not to see this as a euphemism that Rockstar is hiding behind to ensure Grand Theft Auto 6 meets its planned release window.
Rockstar Games has offices in the USA, UK and India. It is unclear if the work-from-office mandate applies to all staff.
A UK-based Rockstar Games employee, who did not want to be named, told Readwrite.com: “People are speculating that it’s a soft mass layoff” and “by making conditions worse” people will quit “so there wouldn’t be any severance.”
Rockstar Games have been approached for comment.
Featured image credit: Rockstar Games
The post Rockstar Games: Grand Theft Auto 6 developers ordered back to office appeared first on ReadWrite.
The Morning After: Nintendo steps up its fight against Switch emulators and game piracy
Nintendo has filed a lawsuit against the creators of a popular Switch emulator called Yuzu, which gives users a way to play games developed for the platform on their PCs and Android devices. In the lawsuit, the company argues Yuzu violates the anti-circumvention and anti-trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
While Nintendo taking down online offenders isn’t new, this case could set a precedent for future lawsuits against emulators, which aren’t themselves illegal. Nintendo is arguing their very nature is unlawful. It could be a big deal.
Nintendo says it protects its games with encryption and other security features meant to prevent people from playing pirated copies: “Without Yuzu’s decryption of Nintendo’s encryption, unauthorized copies of games could not be played on PCs or Android devices,” the company wrote in its complaint.
Nintendo revealed The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was illegally distributed a week and a half before its official release. It was apparently downloaded over a million times from pirated websites, which specifically noted people can play the game file through Yuzu. The company also mentioned that Yuzu’s creators are making money from their emulator: $30,000 a month from their Patreon supporters and around $50,000 from the paid version of their Google Play app.
— Mat Smith
The biggest stories you might have missed
The Apple Car never felt real
This is the Nothing Phone 2(a)
More news organizations sue OpenAI and Microsoft over copyright infringement
TikTok is muting all Universal Music-related songs
You can get these reports delivered daily direct to your inbox. Subscribe right here!
Biden executive order aims to stop Russia and China from buying Americans’ personal data
The bulk sale of geolocation, genomic, financial and health data will be off limits.
SAUL LOEB via Getty Images
In a fun bleak imagining of future late-stage capitalism, President Joe Biden is issuing an executive order to limit the mass sale of Americans’ personal data to “countries of concern,” including Russia and China. The order specifically targets the bulk sale of geolocation, genomic, financial, biometric, health and other personally identifying information.
Researchers and privacy advocates have long warned about the national security risks posed by the largely unregulated multibillion-dollar data broker industry. Last fall, researchers at Duke University reported that they could easily buy troves of personal and health data about US military personnel by posing as foreign agents. The loophole: This order will do nothing to slow the bulk sale of Americans’ data to countries or companies not deemed to be a security risk.
Continue reading.
LG’s latest OLED evo TVs start at $1,500
And go up to a sky-high $25,000.
LG
LG’s 2024 OLED evo TVs finally have prices. They’ll start at $1,500 for the midrange C4 models and go up to an impressive $25,000 for the 97-inch G4 flagship. The big theme this year is AI, and the company’s latest Alpha 11 processor is supposed to boost graphics performance by 70 percent, but it’ll only be in the high-end G4 series. The C4 models, meanwhile, will get the updated Alpha 9 Gen 7 chip. Both promise improved brightness (150 percent for the G4 compared to the G3), along with more AI features, like upscaling.
Continue reading.
Samsung’s new microSD card is faster than some SSDs
If your device supports SD Express.
Samsung’s upcoming microSD card will not only cram in 256GB of space but will offer a dramatic speed boost. The company’s 256GB SD Express microSD — Samsung’s first SD Express card — can read data at up to 800 MB/s, significantly faster than the microSDs you can buy today. However, we don’t yet know how much it will cost, and the card won’t be available until later this year. It will probably be pricey, but it may be worth the premium depending on how you use microSDs.
Continue reading.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-nintendo-steps-up-its-fight-against-switch-emulators-and-game-piracy-121549460.html?src=rss
Nintendo has filed a lawsuit against the creators of a popular Switch emulator called Yuzu, which gives users a way to play games developed for the platform on their PCs and Android devices. In the lawsuit, the company argues Yuzu violates the anti-circumvention and anti-trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
While Nintendo taking down online offenders isn’t new, this case could set a precedent for future lawsuits against emulators, which aren’t themselves illegal. Nintendo is arguing their very nature is unlawful. It could be a big deal.
Nintendo says it protects its games with encryption and other security features meant to prevent people from playing pirated copies: “Without Yuzu’s decryption of Nintendo’s encryption, unauthorized copies of games could not be played on PCs or Android devices,” the company wrote in its complaint.
Nintendo revealed The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was illegally distributed a week and a half before its official release. It was apparently downloaded over a million times from pirated websites, which specifically noted people can play the game file through Yuzu. The company also mentioned that Yuzu’s creators are making money from their emulator: $30,000 a month from their Patreon supporters and around $50,000 from the paid version of their Google Play app.
— Mat Smith
The biggest stories you might have missed
This is the Nothing Phone 2(a)
More news organizations sue OpenAI and Microsoft over copyright infringement
TikTok is muting all Universal Music-related songs
You can get these reports delivered daily direct to your inbox. Subscribe right here!
Biden executive order aims to stop Russia and China from buying Americans’ personal data
The bulk sale of geolocation, genomic, financial and health data will be off limits.
In a fun bleak imagining of future late-stage capitalism, President Joe Biden is issuing an executive order to limit the mass sale of Americans’ personal data to “countries of concern,” including Russia and China. The order specifically targets the bulk sale of geolocation, genomic, financial, biometric, health and other personally identifying information.
Researchers and privacy advocates have long warned about the national security risks posed by the largely unregulated multibillion-dollar data broker industry. Last fall, researchers at Duke University reported that they could easily buy troves of personal and health data about US military personnel by posing as foreign agents. The loophole: This order will do nothing to slow the bulk sale of Americans’ data to countries or companies not deemed to be a security risk.
LG’s latest OLED evo TVs start at $1,500
And go up to a sky-high $25,000.
LG’s 2024 OLED evo TVs finally have prices. They’ll start at $1,500 for the midrange C4 models and go up to an impressive $25,000 for the 97-inch G4 flagship. The big theme this year is AI, and the company’s latest Alpha 11 processor is supposed to boost graphics performance by 70 percent, but it’ll only be in the high-end G4 series. The C4 models, meanwhile, will get the updated Alpha 9 Gen 7 chip. Both promise improved brightness (150 percent for the G4 compared to the G3), along with more AI features, like upscaling.
Samsung’s new microSD card is faster than some SSDs
If your device supports SD Express.
Samsung’s upcoming microSD card will not only cram in 256GB of space but will offer a dramatic speed boost. The company’s 256GB SD Express microSD — Samsung’s first SD Express card — can read data at up to 800 MB/s, significantly faster than the microSDs you can buy today. However, we don’t yet know how much it will cost, and the card won’t be available until later this year. It will probably be pricey, but it may be worth the premium depending on how you use microSDs.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-nintendo-steps-up-its-fight-against-switch-emulators-and-game-piracy-121549460.html?src=rss
How to make Britney Spears in Infinite Craft
Are you at the point where you are so entrenched down an Infinite Craft rabbit hole you need somebody to
The post How to make Britney Spears in Infinite Craft appeared first on ReadWrite.
Are you at the point where you are so entrenched down an Infinite Craft rabbit hole you need somebody to hit you one more time to bring you back to reality? Is your relationship with this browser-based phenomenon becoming toxic? Are you a slaaaaaaaaaaaave…. Okay, I don’t know any more Britney songs so I will stop there.
We recently created movie icon John Rambo so we thought we would soften things up with former pop-princess who was once the best-known person on the planet. And to prove that, she’s made it into Infinite Craft. Let’s craft us some Britney Bitc…
How to craft Britney Spears
Surprisingly not much in the way of shaved heads in here, but getting to Britney is not an overly arduous process and begins with some of the more basic element mixing.
Earth + Wind = Dust
Fire + Water = Steam
Earth + Water = Plant
Dust + Earth = Planet
Plant + Steam = Tea
Planet + Wind = Storm
Water + Water = Lake
Storm + Tea = Tempest
Planet + Steam = Steampunk
Lake + Water = Ocean
Tea + Tempest = Typhoon
Earth + Fire = Lava
Ocean + Steampunk = Steampunk Pirate
Tempest + Wind = Tornado
Lava + Typhoon = Volcano
Plant + Steampunk Pirate = Steampunk Plant
Fire + Wind = Smoke
Planet + Tornado = Cyclone
Ocean + Ocean = Sea
Dust + Volcano = Ash
Smoke + Steampunk Plant = Steampunk Tree
Dust + Water = Mud
Cyclone + Fire = Fire Tornado
Fire + Steam = Engine
Lava + Sea = Stone
Ash + Dust = Cinder
Earth + Tea = Teapot
Mud + Steampunk Tree = Swamp
Engine + Fire Tornado = Fire Truck
Fire + Mud = Brick
Cinder + Stone = Glass
Swamp + Teapot = Witch
Steampunk Pirate + Wind = Airship
Brick + Fire Truck = Fireplace
Fire + Glass = Lens
Smoke + Witch = Wizard
Airship + Lava = Dragon
Plant + Wind = Dandelion
Fireplace + Stone = Oven
Airship + Fire = Crash
Lens + Swamp = Microscope
Steam + Wizard = Cloud
Dandelion + Dragon = Dragonfly
Crash + Oven = Toast
Cloud + Microscope = Rain
Dragonfly + Dust = Fairy
Rain + Toast = Cereal
Fairy + Plant = Flower
Cereal + Lava = Pop
Flower + Steam = Perfume
Perfume + Pop = Britney Spears
There are a few obscure bits to get there, and again if you have been following all of our Infinite Craft Guides you will likely have a bunch of the items you need on the way already. Perfume + Pop was always going to give us Britney though!
Featured Image: Ai-generated by Ideogram 1.0
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How to make Rambo in Infinite Craft
The post How to make Britney Spears in Infinite Craft appeared first on ReadWrite.
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A big boost to Europe’s climate change goals
A new policy called CBAM will assist Europe’s ambition to become carbon neutral.
Enlarge / Materials such as steel, cement, aluminum, electricity, fertilizer, hydrogen and iron will soon be subject to greenhouse gas emissions fees when imported into Europe. (credit: Monty Rakusen/Getty)
The year 2023 was a big one for climate news, from record heat to world leaders finally calling for a transition away from fossil fuels. In a lesser-known milestone, it was also the year the European Union soft-launched an ambitious new initiative that could supercharge its climate policies.
Wrapped in arcane language studded with many a “thereof,” “whereas” and “having regard to” is a policy that could not only help fund the European Union’s pledge to become the world’s first carbon-neutral continent, but also push industries all over the world to cut their carbon emissions.
It’s the establishment of a carbon price that will force many heavy industries to pay for each ton of carbon dioxide, or equivalent emissions of other greenhouse gases, that they emit. But what makes this fee revolutionary is that it will apply to emissions that don’t happen on European soil. The EU already puts a price on many of the emissions created by European firms; now, through the new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, or CBAM, the bloc will charge companies that import the targeted products—cement, aluminum, electricity, fertilizer, hydrogen, iron, and steel—into the EU, no matter where in the world those products are made.