Month: August 2024

Streaming prices love to go up, but here’s a rare instance in which one is going down. Paramount+ is lowering prices on its two annual plans for a limited time. The cheapest option is just $30 per year, and this gets you the Essentials plan. This is the basic subscription that allows access to Paramount+ programming with ads.

It doesn’t, however, offer access to Showtime. For that, the cost doubles to $60 per year. In addition to the secondary streaming service, this plan offers live CBS streaming and the ability to download shows to a mobile device. This is also an ad-free plan, though live TV still has ads (for obvious reasons.)
For the uninitiated, Paramount+ is home to most, but not all, new Star Trek shows. It also hosts the dad-friendly Tulsa King and the Jeremy Renner vehicle Mayor of Kingstown. As for genre fare, there’s the Sonic the Hedgehog spinoff Knuckles, the recently-canceled Halo show and a remake of Stephen King’s The Stand.
Showtime, on the other hand, is a long-standing cable institution that’s seen as “HBO’s younger sibling.” The platform offers access to hit shows like Yellowjackets, Billions and The Chi. The network also has a stable of older properties, including Dexter, Ray Donovan, Shameless and many more. Finally, it’s the best way to watch Twin Peaks: The Return, which is so dang good.
These deals only last until September 6, at which point the discounts disappear into a puff of smoke. The usual prices for these annual plans are $60 for Essential and $120 for the Showtime bundle. As for monthly subscription costs, they keep going up and up.
Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/paramount-annual-subscriptions-are-half-off-right-now-190017186.html?src=rss

Streaming prices love to go up, but here’s a rare instance in which one is going down. Paramount+ is lowering prices on its two annual plans for a limited time. The cheapest option is just $30 per year, and this gets you the Essentials plan. This is the basic subscription that allows access to Paramount+ programming with ads.

It doesn’t, however, offer access to Showtime. For that, the cost doubles to $60 per year. In addition to the secondary streaming service, this plan offers live CBS streaming and the ability to download shows to a mobile device. This is also an ad-free plan, though live TV still has ads (for obvious reasons.)

For the uninitiated, Paramount+ is home to most, but not all, new Star Trek shows. It also hosts the dad-friendly Tulsa King and the Jeremy Renner vehicle Mayor of Kingstown. As for genre fare, there’s the Sonic the Hedgehog spinoff Knuckles, the recently-canceled Halo show and a remake of Stephen King’s The Stand.

Showtime, on the other hand, is a long-standing cable institution that’s seen as “HBO’s younger sibling.” The platform offers access to hit shows like Yellowjackets, Billions and The Chi. The network also has a stable of older properties, including Dexter, Ray Donovan, Shameless and many more. Finally, it’s the best way to watch Twin Peaks: The Return, which is so dang good.

These deals only last until September 6, at which point the discounts disappear into a puff of smoke. The usual prices for these annual plans are $60 for Essential and $120 for the Showtime bundle. As for monthly subscription costs, they keep going up and up.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/paramount-annual-subscriptions-are-half-off-right-now-190017186.html?src=rss

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Black Myth: Wukong, considered China’s first true AAA game, has broken Steam’s concurrent players record for a single-player title, passing Cyberpunk 2077 for the single-player record. In addition, it’s now the game with the second-most all-time concurrent players to date (including multiplayer), moving past Palworld. Based on the 16th-century novel Journey to the West, the souls-like action-adventure epic peaked at 2,223,179 players.
Industry analyst Simon Carless of GameDiscoverCo posted on X (Twitter) early on Tuesday an estimate that Black Myth: Wukong’s regional breakdown heavily favored its home country. The agency’s pie graph showed China claiming 88 percent of the game’s players. (In second place was the US at a mere three percent.) Although some interpreted that as potentially showing inflated numbers, the game launched in the middle of the night in the western hemisphere, and Carless’ stats were posted around 5AM ET.
The title’s records come against a backdrop of misogyny and censorship accusations aimed at developer Game Science. Streamers who were granted early access keys were given a (non-legally-binding) document that raised some eyebrows.
Game Science / Sony
The document included a list of banned topics the streamers were to avoid discussing while broadcasting gameplay. The New York Times reported that the off-limits subjects included politics, “feminist propaganda,” COVID-19, China’s gaming industry, and anything else that “instigates negative discourse.” (While streamers were given the list, reviewers weren’t.)
Of course, the COVID mention is easily tied to the nation’s “zero-COVID” restrictions.
As for the “feminist propaganda” restriction for Black Myth: Wukong’s streamers, you can easily draw a straight line from widespread accusations of misogyny from developer Game Science and individuals working there, including some of its cofounders. Among the many instances (summarized in a 2023 IGN story) were Game Science recruitment posters from 2015, one of which implied friends with benefits were an office perk and another featuring a dumbbell with the text (translated) “fatties should fuck off.” (Yikes.) The accusations go on from there.
Game Science / Valve
Game Science has ties to the Chinese government, which is no stranger to accusations of misogyny and censorship. To cite only a few examples, the #MeToo hashtag was censored or blocked on Chinese social platforms during the height of the movement, posts from feminist and LGBTQ+ groups and voices are routinely blocked or deleted on the country’s social media, feminist perspectives are frequently restricted or censored in China’s academic institutions and activists are no strangers to harassment, surveillance or arrests.
Tencent Holdings, a five-percent stakeholder according to The NY Times, has direct ties to Xi’s government. Meanwhile, the game’s publisher, Zhejiang Publishing & Media, is majority-owned by the Zhejiang provincial government. Finally, Hero Games, the company that sent out the streamer keys on Game Science’s behalf, has financial ties to “several state-owned enterprises,” according to The NYT. Hero Games owns around 20 percent of Game Science.
Some streamers supplied with keys (and the attached red tape) decided not to cover the game. “I have never seen anything that shameful in my 15 years doing this job. This is very clearly a document which explains that we must censor ourselves,” the prominent French streamer Benoit Reinier said (translated) in a YouTube video.
In Engadget’s preview of Black Myth: Wukong from earlier this summer (which didn’t include provisions about censored topics like streamers received), Mat Smith found the game visually stunning. We found the demo “elevated by how good the environment looks, the bizarre monster design and the quiet, unsettling soundtrack.” The game is available now on PC and PS5.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/black-myth-wukong-breaks-steams-concurrent-single-player-record-within-hours-of-launch-184559634.html?src=rss

Black Myth: Wukong, considered China’s first true AAA game, has broken Steam’s concurrent players record for a single-player title, passing Cyberpunk 2077 for the single-player record. In addition, it’s now the game with the second-most all-time concurrent players to date (including multiplayer), moving past Palworld. Based on the 16th-century novel Journey to the West, the souls-like action-adventure epic peaked at 2,223,179 players.

Industry analyst Simon Carless of GameDiscoverCo posted on X (Twitter) early on Tuesday an estimate that Black Myth: Wukong’s regional breakdown heavily favored its home country. The agency’s pie graph showed China claiming 88 percent of the game’s players. (In second place was the US at a mere three percent.) Although some interpreted that as potentially showing inflated numbers, the game launched in the middle of the night in the western hemisphere, and Carless’ stats were posted around 5AM ET.

The title’s records come against a backdrop of misogyny and censorship accusations aimed at developer Game Science. Streamers who were granted early access keys were given a (non-legally-binding) document that raised some eyebrows.

The document included a list of banned topics the streamers were to avoid discussing while broadcasting gameplay. The New York Times reported that the off-limits subjects included politics, “feminist propaganda,” COVID-19, China’s gaming industry, and anything else that “instigates negative discourse.” (While streamers were given the list, reviewers weren’t.)

Of course, the COVID mention is easily tied to the nation’s “zero-COVID” restrictions.

As for the “feminist propaganda” restriction for Black Myth: Wukong’s streamers, you can easily draw a straight line from widespread accusations of misogyny from developer Game Science and individuals working there, including some of its cofounders. Among the many instances (summarized in a 2023 IGN story) were Game Science recruitment posters from 2015, one of which implied friends with benefits were an office perk and another featuring a dumbbell with the text (translated) “fatties should fuck off.” (Yikes.) The accusations go on from there.

Game Science has ties to the Chinese government, which is no stranger to accusations of misogyny and censorship. To cite only a few examples, the #MeToo hashtag was censored or blocked on Chinese social platforms during the height of the movement, posts from feminist and LGBTQ+ groups and voices are routinely blocked or deleted on the country’s social media, feminist perspectives are frequently restricted or censored in China’s academic institutions and activists are no strangers to harassment, surveillance or arrests.

Tencent Holdings, a five-percent stakeholder according to The NY Times, has direct ties to Xi’s government. Meanwhile, the game’s publisher, Zhejiang Publishing & Media, is majority-owned by the Zhejiang provincial government. Finally, Hero Games, the company that sent out the streamer keys on Game Science’s behalf, has financial ties to “several state-owned enterprises,” according to The NYT. Hero Games owns around 20 percent of Game Science.

Some streamers supplied with keys (and the attached red tape) decided not to cover the game. “I have never seen anything that shameful in my 15 years doing this job. This is very clearly a document which explains that we must censor ourselves,” the prominent French streamer Benoit Reinier said (translated) in a YouTube video.

In Engadget’s preview of Black Myth: Wukong from earlier this summer (which didn’t include provisions about censored topics like streamers received), Mat Smith found the game visually stunning. We found the demo “elevated by how good the environment looks, the bizarre monster design and the quiet, unsettling soundtrack.” The game is available now on PC and PS5.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/black-myth-wukong-breaks-steams-concurrent-single-player-record-within-hours-of-launch-184559634.html?src=rss

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