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You can even stack multiple codes if you want to get ready for the forthcoming onslaught of day-one releases. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Unless you’re flush with cash and time is only conceptual in your world, it may be tough to finance and find the time to enjoy all of the games announced during Microsoft’s recent Xbox Showcase. An Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription can help, though, as it’ll provide day-one access to many of the titles currently in development.
Thankfully, CDKeys is now selling one-month subscription codes for $10.19 (about $7 off) and three-month codes for $27.99 (about $23 off), the latter of which is a better deal. CDKeys is a trusted merchant here at The Verge, so don’t feel deterred if you’re unfamiliar with the name. The online retailer specializes in selling heavily discounted key codes for gaming products, whether you’re looking to save on subscriptions, full games, in-game currency, or post-launch DLC.

You can redeem the codes no matter which region you’re in, and you should be able to purchase and stack as many as you’d like so long as you’re under Microsoft’s 36-month pre-pay limit. (Not all of the codes at CDKeys are region-free and stackable, so double-check that you’re buying the correct one using the links above.) Plus, in this instance, both new and existing subscribers can redeem the digital codes.

You’ll certainly want to consider extending your subscription or finally making the jump from Game Pass Core, as Xbox has put together arguably one of its strongest gaming lineups ever going into 2025. Perhaps the most significant launch is an all-new Gears of War prequel subtitled E-Day, which follows the friction that Marcus Fenix, Dom, and the rest of their COG cohorts experienced when the locusts first emerged. If that’s not enough, Black Ops 6 marks the first time a Call of Duty game will be available on Game Pass day one. Other titles that will hit the service immediately upon launch include upcoming reboots and follow-ups to fan-favorite series such as Fable, Perfect Dark, and Doom.
In the meantime, you can enjoy other perks that come with Game Pass Ultimate, such as exclusive deals and online multiplayer, plus a large rotating library of Xbox and PC games. Its permanent catalog features nearly all of the first-party titles under Microsoft’s banner, including Halo Infinite and surprise hits like Hi-Fi Rush. There’s also a large catalog of third-party games — including Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Cocoon, Starfield, and several titles from the beloved Persona series — all of which are worth sinking your time into if you haven’t already.
Other ways to save today

When watchOS 11 arrives in the fall, it will only be available for the Apple Watch Series 6 or later (sorry Series 5 stans). Fortunately, if you have yet to upgrade to one of Apple’s newer smartwatches, the premium Apple Watch Ultra 2 is on sale at Amazon for $719 ($80 off). The 49mm wearable is the most rugged and feature-packed model in Apple’s current lineup, and although we’ve seen it dip below $700 once or twice before, we rarely see a discount this steep extend to all three strap configurations. Read our review.
The Philips Hue Go portable table lamp is available from Dell right now for $127.99 ($32 off), which is easily one of the best prices we’ve seen on the versatile lighting option. The battery-powered smart lamp isn’t quite as sophisticated as the company’s new sunrise lamp, though it does offer 370 lumens of brightness, plenty of preset lighting effects, and a svelte design that allows you to easily ferry it between rooms or outside. It also supports the same platforms as most Hue lighting, meaning there’s no need to worry if you use Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, or Google Home.
If the recent announcement of The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom has you itching for a return to Hyrule — or, in this case, the island of Koholint — you can still pick up a physical copy of Link’s Awakening for the Nintendo Switch at Walmart for $39.99 ($20 off). The 2019 remaster features the same charming, diorama-like aesthetic as Nintendo’s forthcoming Zelda title, only it rehashes a timeless Game Boy classic as opposed to a totally new adventure starring the Nintendo’s titular heroine. Read our review.

You can even stack multiple codes if you want to get ready for the forthcoming onslaught of day-one releases. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Unless you’re flush with cash and time is only conceptual in your world, it may be tough to finance and find the time to enjoy all of the games announced during Microsoft’s recent Xbox Showcase. An Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription can help, though, as it’ll provide day-one access to many of the titles currently in development.

Thankfully, CDKeys is now selling one-month subscription codes for $10.19 (about $7 off) and three-month codes for $27.99 (about $23 off), the latter of which is a better deal. CDKeys is a trusted merchant here at The Verge, so don’t feel deterred if you’re unfamiliar with the name. The online retailer specializes in selling heavily discounted key codes for gaming products, whether you’re looking to save on subscriptions, full games, in-game currency, or post-launch DLC.

You can redeem the codes no matter which region you’re in, and you should be able to purchase and stack as many as you’d like so long as you’re under Microsoft’s 36-month pre-pay limit. (Not all of the codes at CDKeys are region-free and stackable, so double-check that you’re buying the correct one using the links above.) Plus, in this instance, both new and existing subscribers can redeem the digital codes.

You’ll certainly want to consider extending your subscription or finally making the jump from Game Pass Core, as Xbox has put together arguably one of its strongest gaming lineups ever going into 2025. Perhaps the most significant launch is an all-new Gears of War prequel subtitled E-Day, which follows the friction that Marcus Fenix, Dom, and the rest of their COG cohorts experienced when the locusts first emerged. If that’s not enough, Black Ops 6 marks the first time a Call of Duty game will be available on Game Pass day one. Other titles that will hit the service immediately upon launch include upcoming reboots and follow-ups to fan-favorite series such as Fable, Perfect Dark, and Doom.

In the meantime, you can enjoy other perks that come with Game Pass Ultimate, such as exclusive deals and online multiplayer, plus a large rotating library of Xbox and PC games. Its permanent catalog features nearly all of the first-party titles under Microsoft’s banner, including Halo Infinite and surprise hits like Hi-Fi Rush. There’s also a large catalog of third-party games — including Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Cocoon, Starfield, and several titles from the beloved Persona series — all of which are worth sinking your time into if you haven’t already.

Other ways to save today

When watchOS 11 arrives in the fall, it will only be available for the Apple Watch Series 6 or later (sorry Series 5 stans). Fortunately, if you have yet to upgrade to one of Apple’s newer smartwatches, the premium Apple Watch Ultra 2 is on sale at Amazon for $719 ($80 off). The 49mm wearable is the most rugged and feature-packed model in Apple’s current lineup, and although we’ve seen it dip below $700 once or twice before, we rarely see a discount this steep extend to all three strap configurations. Read our review.
The Philips Hue Go portable table lamp is available from Dell right now for $127.99 ($32 off), which is easily one of the best prices we’ve seen on the versatile lighting option. The battery-powered smart lamp isn’t quite as sophisticated as the company’s new sunrise lamp, though it does offer 370 lumens of brightness, plenty of preset lighting effects, and a svelte design that allows you to easily ferry it between rooms or outside. It also supports the same platforms as most Hue lighting, meaning there’s no need to worry if you use Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, or Google Home.
If the recent announcement of The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom has you itching for a return to Hyrule — or, in this case, the island of Koholint — you can still pick up a physical copy of Link’s Awakening for the Nintendo Switch at Walmart for $39.99 ($20 off). The 2019 remaster features the same charming, diorama-like aesthetic as Nintendo’s forthcoming Zelda title, only it rehashes a timeless Game Boy classic as opposed to a totally new adventure starring the Nintendo’s titular heroine. Read our review.

Read More 

California Governor Gavin Newsom attends an event with fellow governors in the East Room of the White House on February 23, 2024 in Washington, DC. | Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

California Governor Gavin Newsom has pledged to “get smartphones out of schools.”
“I look forward to working with the Legislature to restrict the use of smartphones during the school day. When children and teens are in school, they should be focused on their studies — not their screens,” he said in a statement on Tuesday.
Newsom plans to work with the California legislature to pass those restrictions by August, Politico first reported. That would put California in line with other states that already have strict limits on smartphone use in schools. The move could also be particularly meaningful in California, the nation’s most populous state and home to Silicon Valley.
“They should be focused on their studies — not their screens.”
Momentum is growing across the nation to protect kids from potential harms associated with smartphones and social media — from cyber bullying to body image issues. Schools have been battlegrounds for the issue, with concerns rising over distracted students using their phones during class.
In 2019, Newsom signed legislation that authorizes school districts to limit or completely prohibit students from using smartphones while in school. Newsom aims to go further with new legislation that would establish statewide limits.
Newsom also signed a law in 2022 that pushes social media companies to increase protections for underage users, including limiting how much data from young people they collect and sell. Last year, he wrote a letter to urging the tech industry to drop a lawsuit challenging that legislation. “It is time for the tech industry to stop standing in the way of important protections for our kids and teens, and to start working with us to keep our kids safe,” he wrote.
The governor’s new call to action on Tuesday follows the US Surgeon General’s plea to Congress on Monday to institute warning labels on social media platforms. “It is time to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms, stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents,” Vivek H. Murthy wrote in a guest essay in The New York Times.

While Congress is in gridlock, states and school districts have taken their own action. Florida and Indiana already have laws restricting smartphone use. Yesterday, the Los Angeles Unified School District board voted to craft policies to prohibit students from using cell phones and social media throughout the entire school day.

California Governor Gavin Newsom attends an event with fellow governors in the East Room of the White House on February 23, 2024 in Washington, DC. | Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

California Governor Gavin Newsom has pledged to “get smartphones out of schools.”

“I look forward to working with the Legislature to restrict the use of smartphones during the school day. When children and teens are in school, they should be focused on their studies — not their screens,” he said in a statement on Tuesday.

Newsom plans to work with the California legislature to pass those restrictions by August, Politico first reported. That would put California in line with other states that already have strict limits on smartphone use in schools. The move could also be particularly meaningful in California, the nation’s most populous state and home to Silicon Valley.

Momentum is growing across the nation to protect kids from potential harms associated with smartphones and social media — from cyber bullying to body image issues. Schools have been battlegrounds for the issue, with concerns rising over distracted students using their phones during class.

In 2019, Newsom signed legislation that authorizes school districts to limit or completely prohibit students from using smartphones while in school. Newsom aims to go further with new legislation that would establish statewide limits.

Newsom also signed a law in 2022 that pushes social media companies to increase protections for underage users, including limiting how much data from young people they collect and sell. Last year, he wrote a letter to urging the tech industry to drop a lawsuit challenging that legislation. “It is time for the tech industry to stop standing in the way of important protections for our kids and teens, and to start working with us to keep our kids safe,” he wrote.

The governor’s new call to action on Tuesday follows the US Surgeon General’s plea to Congress on Monday to institute warning labels on social media platforms. “It is time to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms, stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents,” Vivek H. Murthy wrote in a guest essay in The New York Times.

While Congress is in gridlock, states and school districts have taken their own action. Florida and Indiana already have laws restricting smartphone use. Yesterday, the Los Angeles Unified School District board voted to craft policies to prohibit students from using cell phones and social media throughout the entire school day.

Read More 

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Qualcomm’s shareholders have managed to achieve something that Apple and government regulators across the globe tried to and failed to do: get Qualcomm to pay up over its aggressive licensing practices.
In a court filing on Tuesday, Qualcomm said it would agree to pay $75 million to settle a lawsuit brought by shareholders, who claim that the company misled them about how its business practices worked and artificially inflated its stock price as a result. The settlement was earlier reported by Reuters.
Shareholders took issue with Qualcomm’s failure to fully disclose how it handled patent licensing. At the time, the company refused to license standard essential patents to certain competitors and in some cases made buying its chips a requirement to get a deal.
Qualcomm won, its stock price rose, and the shareholder lawsuit started looking shaky
Apple, the US Federal Trade Commission, and other regulators sued Qualcomm over that same issue. The lawsuits claimed that Qualcomm was engaged in unfair business practices by tying negotiations for essential patents to requirements that companies buy its chips, too.
Qualcomm largely won those battles, with the Apple lawsuits ending in settlements and regulators’ actions largely being overturned.
The result left the shareholder lawsuit in a funny place: Qualcomm’s stock price rose as a result, so their claim that Qualcomm artificially inflated its share price was left looking pretty shaky. As a result, the shareholders argue that this settlement is a good outcome — they’re actually getting paid, unlike everyone else.
A judge still needs to approve terms of the settlement. Qualcomm didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Qualcomm’s shareholders have managed to achieve something that Apple and government regulators across the globe tried to and failed to do: get Qualcomm to pay up over its aggressive licensing practices.

In a court filing on Tuesday, Qualcomm said it would agree to pay $75 million to settle a lawsuit brought by shareholders, who claim that the company misled them about how its business practices worked and artificially inflated its stock price as a result. The settlement was earlier reported by Reuters.

Shareholders took issue with Qualcomm’s failure to fully disclose how it handled patent licensing. At the time, the company refused to license standard essential patents to certain competitors and in some cases made buying its chips a requirement to get a deal.

Apple, the US Federal Trade Commission, and other regulators sued Qualcomm over that same issue. The lawsuits claimed that Qualcomm was engaged in unfair business practices by tying negotiations for essential patents to requirements that companies buy its chips, too.

Qualcomm largely won those battles, with the Apple lawsuits ending in settlements and regulators’ actions largely being overturned.

The result left the shareholder lawsuit in a funny place: Qualcomm’s stock price rose as a result, so their claim that Qualcomm artificially inflated its share price was left looking pretty shaky. As a result, the shareholders argue that this settlement is a good outcome — they’re actually getting paid, unlike everyone else.

A judge still needs to approve terms of the settlement. Qualcomm didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Read More 

Image: The Verge

The European Union is getting closer to passing new rules that would mandate the bulk scanning of digital messages — including encrypted ones. On Thursday, EU governments will adopt a position on the proposed legislation, which is aimed at detecting child sexual abuse material (CSAM). The vote will determine whether the proposal has enough support to move forward in the EU’s law-making process.
The law, first introduced in 2022, would implement an “upload moderation” system that scans all your digital messages, including shared images, videos, and links. Each service required to install this “vetted” monitoring technology must also ask permission to scan your messages. If you don’t agree, you won’t be able to share images or URLs.
As if this doesn’t seem wild enough, the proposed legislation appears to endorse and reject end-to-end encryption at the same time. At first, it highlights how end-to-end encryption “is a necessary means of protecting fundamental rights” but then goes on to say that encrypted messaging services could “inadvertently become secure zones where child sexual abuse material can be shared or disseminated.”

Official statement: the new EU chat controls proposal for mass scanning is the same old surveillance with new branding.Whether you call it a backdoor, a front door, or “upload moderation” it undermines encryption & creates significant vulnerabilitieshttps://t.co/g0xNNKqquA pic.twitter.com/3L1hqbBRgq— Meredith Whittaker (@mer__edith) June 17, 2024

The proposed solution is to leave messages wide open for scanning — but somehow without compromising the layer of privacy offered by end-to-end encryption. It suggests that the new moderation system could accomplish this by scanning the contents of your messages before apps like Signal, WhatsApp, and Messenger encrypt them.
In response, Signal president Meredith Whittaker says the app will stop functioning in the EU if the rules become law, as the proposal “fundamentally undermines encryption,” regardless of whether it’s scanned before encryption or not. “We can call it a backdoor, a front door, or ‘upload moderation,’” Whittaker writes. “But whatever we call it, each one of these approaches creates a vulnerability that can be exploited by hackers and hostile nation states, removing the protection of unbreakable math and putting in its place a high-value vulnerability.”
Several organizations, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Center for Democracy & Technology, and Mozilla, have also signed a joint statement urging the EU to reject proposals that scan user content.
Privacy advocates aren’t the only ones raising alarm bells about the proposal. This week, dozens of Parliament members wrote to the EU Council to express their opposition to the proposal. Patrick Breyer, a German member of the European Parliament, has also spoken out about the bill, saying that “indiscriminate searches and error-prone leaks of private chats and intimate photos destroy our fundamental right to private correspondence.”
“Children and abuse victims deserve measures that are truly effective and will hold up in court, not just empty promises.”
According to Breyer, renewed discussions surrounding the chat control law didn’t appear out of nowhere. He says that chat control supporters are pushing ahead now to take advantage of the period after the European Elections “during which there is less public attention and the new European Parliament is not yet constituted.”
In a statement to The Verge, Breyer also points out that the Belgian Presidency ends later this month, and the country’s current Minister of the Interior has been at the forefront of the chat control bill. “Proponents failed last year to secure a majority,” Breyer says. “This may be their last opportunity.”
If the legislation gains support, negotiations will begin between the EU’s Parliament, Council, and the Commission to form the final text of the law. But even with an endorsement from EU governments, chat control supporters may still have trouble pushing it forward. Last year, a poll conducted by the European Digital Rights (EDRi) group suggested that 66 percent of young people in the EU disagree with policies allowing internet providers to scan their messages.
“Many lawmakers understand that fundamental rights prohibit mass surveillance, but they don’t want to be seen opposing a scheme that’s framed as combatting CSAM,” Breyer says. “My message is that children and abuse victims deserve measures that are truly effective and will hold up in court, not just empty promises, tech solutionism and hidden agendas.”

Image: The Verge

The European Union is getting closer to passing new rules that would mandate the bulk scanning of digital messages — including encrypted ones. On Thursday, EU governments will adopt a position on the proposed legislation, which is aimed at detecting child sexual abuse material (CSAM). The vote will determine whether the proposal has enough support to move forward in the EU’s law-making process.

The law, first introduced in 2022, would implement an “upload moderation” system that scans all your digital messages, including shared images, videos, and links. Each service required to install this “vetted” monitoring technology must also ask permission to scan your messages. If you don’t agree, you won’t be able to share images or URLs.

As if this doesn’t seem wild enough, the proposed legislation appears to endorse and reject end-to-end encryption at the same time. At first, it highlights how end-to-end encryption “is a necessary means of protecting fundamental rights” but then goes on to say that encrypted messaging services could “inadvertently become secure zones where child sexual abuse material can be shared or disseminated.”

The proposed solution is to leave messages wide open for scanning — but somehow without compromising the layer of privacy offered by end-to-end encryption. It suggests that the new moderation system could accomplish this by scanning the contents of your messages before apps like Signal, WhatsApp, and Messenger encrypt them.

In response, Signal president Meredith Whittaker says the app will stop functioning in the EU if the rules become law, as the proposal “fundamentally undermines encryption,” regardless of whether it’s scanned before encryption or not. “We can call it a backdoor, a front door, or ‘upload moderation,’” Whittaker writes. “But whatever we call it, each one of these approaches creates a vulnerability that can be exploited by hackers and hostile nation states, removing the protection of unbreakable math and putting in its place a high-value vulnerability.”

Several organizations, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Center for Democracy & Technology, and Mozilla, have also signed a joint statement urging the EU to reject proposals that scan user content.

Privacy advocates aren’t the only ones raising alarm bells about the proposal. This week, dozens of Parliament members wrote to the EU Council to express their opposition to the proposal. Patrick Breyer, a German member of the European Parliament, has also spoken out about the bill, saying that “indiscriminate searches and error-prone leaks of private chats and intimate photos destroy our fundamental right to private correspondence.”

According to Breyer, renewed discussions surrounding the chat control law didn’t appear out of nowhere. He says that chat control supporters are pushing ahead now to take advantage of the period after the European Elections “during which there is less public attention and the new European Parliament is not yet constituted.”

In a statement to The Verge, Breyer also points out that the Belgian Presidency ends later this month, and the country’s current Minister of the Interior has been at the forefront of the chat control bill. “Proponents failed last year to secure a majority,” Breyer says. “This may be their last opportunity.”

If the legislation gains support, negotiations will begin between the EU’s Parliament, Council, and the Commission to form the final text of the law. But even with an endorsement from EU governments, chat control supporters may still have trouble pushing it forward. Last year, a poll conducted by the European Digital Rights (EDRi) group suggested that 66 percent of young people in the EU disagree with policies allowing internet providers to scan their messages.

“Many lawmakers understand that fundamental rights prohibit mass surveillance, but they don’t want to be seen opposing a scheme that’s framed as combatting CSAM,” Breyer says. “My message is that children and abuse victims deserve measures that are truly effective and will hold up in court, not just empty promises, tech solutionism and hidden agendas.”

Read More 

The Verge

Pornhub plans to block access to its website in Indiana and Kentucky in response to age verification laws designed to prevent children from accessing adult websites. The website has now cut off access in at least half a dozen states in protest of similar age verification laws that have quickly spread across conservative-leaning US states.
Indiana will lose access on June 27th, according to the Indiana Capital Chronicle, and Kentucky will lose access on July 10th, according to Kentucky Public Radio.
Pornhub says it’s blocking access to its website over privacy concerns around the new laws. The laws generally require adults to upload some form of government ID to prove they’re 18 or older. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has criticized the laws as “surveillance systems” that could lead to misuse or theft of sensitive data. “This scheme would lead us further towards an internet where our private data is collected and sold by default,” the organization wrote last year.
Aylo, the parent company of Pornhub, told the Capital Chronicle that it supports age verification but views the current laws as “ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous.” The company implemented ID-based age verification in Louisiana last year and says traffic dropped by 80 percent as a result. Aylo argues that the policy will drive consumers to websites that don’t follow the law and may otherwise fail to moderate their content.
So far, Pornhub access has been blocked in states including Texas, North Carolina, Montana, Mississippi, Virginia, Arkansas, and Utah. Aylo didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment.

The Verge

Pornhub plans to block access to its website in Indiana and Kentucky in response to age verification laws designed to prevent children from accessing adult websites. The website has now cut off access in at least half a dozen states in protest of similar age verification laws that have quickly spread across conservative-leaning US states.

Indiana will lose access on June 27th, according to the Indiana Capital Chronicle, and Kentucky will lose access on July 10th, according to Kentucky Public Radio.

Pornhub says it’s blocking access to its website over privacy concerns around the new laws. The laws generally require adults to upload some form of government ID to prove they’re 18 or older. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has criticized the laws as “surveillance systems” that could lead to misuse or theft of sensitive data. “This scheme would lead us further towards an internet where our private data is collected and sold by default,” the organization wrote last year.

Aylo, the parent company of Pornhub, told the Capital Chronicle that it supports age verification but views the current laws as “ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous.” The company implemented ID-based age verification in Louisiana last year and says traffic dropped by 80 percent as a result. Aylo argues that the policy will drive consumers to websites that don’t follow the law and may otherwise fail to moderate their content.

So far, Pornhub access has been blocked in states including Texas, North Carolina, Montana, Mississippi, Virginia, Arkansas, and Utah. Aylo didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment.

Read More 

Astro Bot. | Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment

An adorable platformer, mythological tower defense, RPG / puzzle hybrid, and open-world Star Wars. With Summer Game Fest over, it’s time to take a look back at some of the stand-out hits of the show. I don’t mean the most exciting reveals, but the best games I actually got to play. The SGF space was full of interesting games, some from high-profile studios and others from indie outfits. And there were some games that were surprisingly fun that I only discovered by just picking up a controller and playing.

Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess
Though I’ve seen trailers for Capcom’s sumptuous-looking game, I was never quite sure what it was about. I thought it was a generic hack-and-slash game dressed up in the richness of Japanese mythology, but I was surprised and frankly delighted to discover it’s a tower defense game. Your job is to protect a shrine maiden as she works to purge corruption from the land. Gameplay is divided into two sections: day and night. In the daytime, you go through a village rescuing inhabitants from the corrupting infection. At night, you protect the shrine maiden from demons as she slowly works her way through the village purging it of evil.
I really enjoyed Kunitsu-Gami’s novel twist on the genre. The villagers you rescue become part of your army, and you assign them jobs to assist in the maiden’s defense. The woodcutter is a powerful melee attacker that works as your first line of offense, while the monk uses their holy power to freeze demons in place, making them easy targets. Once the fight is over, there’s a base-building element that has you upgrading and unlocking jobs and acquiring new powers for your warrior.
I’m really glad I took a chance to play Kunitsu-Gami. I love strategy-type games, especially when they’re dressed in such a richly ornate art style. I found myself staring at everyone’s clothing, looking at the details, and wondering what significance each little piece had. It releases July 19th on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC.

Star Wars Outlaws
I’m not a Star Wars person — but Star Wars Outlaws was enough to intrigue my Force-agnostic ass. My hands-on was divided into three chunks: ship-to-ship combat, stealth combat, and platforming. Since the children (i.e., me) yearn for Ace Combat (Thanks, Bandai Namco!), I decided to try the ship first. Before setting off, I had to do a little stealth section to get to my ship that involved a couple of hacking mini-games. Usually, hacking mini-games are tedious and terrible (looking at you, Mass Effect), but I enjoyed both of them, especially the data spike mini-game that involves turning a tumbler in time with rhythmic clicks.
Once in space, I had a great time. The controls were very responsive, and I didn’t feel like I had to fight to keep my target in front of me like in other aerial combat games. I also enjoyed how the game doesn’t automatically reorient you if you turn the ship upside down, because it’s space, and there is no up or down. Toward the end of the demo, there was a moment where I flew down from space to the surface of a planet, and it all looked very seamless, a true “you can go anywhere” moment (even though I’m sure there’s some game developer trickery involved).
For the stealth mission, I wasn’t very stealthy, frequently blowing up an enemy instead of distracting them with Nix, my pet axolotl-looking thing. It turns out Nix is very useful as a distraction and a retriever. You can have it fetch the guns your enemies have dropped for when you need a bit of extra firepower. Your main weapon is a simple blaster equipped with special ammo; the default blaster setting takes out humanoid enemies, while the plasma setting is effective on droids. During one encounter involving a shallow water feature, I thought it’d be clever to shoot the water with plasma in hopes of electrocuting the enemies standing in it. Unfortunately, the game didn’t work that way.
The platforming section was the weakest bit because it didn’t really do much new. There’s a grappling hook to make use of, but other than that, my scoundrel Kay Vess simply runs, jumps, and climbs up bright yellow grates and ledges like anyone else. Overall, I was once again pleasantly surprised. Star Wars Outlaws launches on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC on August 30th.

Arranger: A Role Puzzling Adventure
Arranger is a puzzle game well-suited for mobile, which might explain why it was prominently featured in the Netflix booth. You play as a messy girl named Jemma who has a quirky way of moving through the world. As you slide your finger up and down or side to side, the world moves with her, either horizontally or vertically, moving everything on that axis along with her. You use that unique movement to solve puzzles or get around impassable obstacles. To Jemma, a locked door means nothing: she can warp to the other side once she reaches the end of a row or column.
One thing I appreciate about games is how you are always in conversation with the developers; I enjoy when I’m able to hear their voice in the way they design their games. There was a moment early on when I couldn’t figure out how to solve a pressure plate puzzle. Confused, I left the room only to find two strategically-placed planters. I didn’t yet know you could bring objects from room to room, so upon seeing the planters, I had this very obvious (and audible) “Aha!” moment. The developers could have left a planter or other object in the room with me to make the puzzle easier, but I would have missed out on deepening my understanding of the game’s mechanics.
Arranger comes out on Switch, PlayStation, PC, and mobile via Netflix on July 25th.

Astro Bot
Playing Astro Bot was joyful. I, of course, enjoyed all the games I’ve highlighted here, but Astro Bot was the one that had me giggling and kicking my feet like a 10-year-old given free rein of a candy store. A mascot platformer, in the year 2024… we might be back, y’all! Astro jumps, kicks off walls, and can hover in the air evoking the feeling of Mario. But even though the game is mechanically similar, Astro Bot feels uniquely charming. Astro squeaks, squeals, cheers, and waves — his enthusiasm and happiness are so infectious that it’s impossible not to hurt your face grinning as you play.
Strewn throughout bright and cheery levels are robots to rescue, some representing characters from PlayStation’s past. I thoroughly loved panning the camera looking for places off the beaten path and figuring out the best way to get there. I was rewarded every time with a collectible or a secret bot in need of rescue. The different levels also contain different movement abilities akin to the special powerups you might find in Mario. One ability that inflates Astro like a balloon, allowing him to float to out-of-reach areas. Another involves a dog that acts like a jet engine that rockets Astro through tough glass or bounces him off special platforms.
Astro Bot, on sheer charm alone, is my game of the show. It launches September 6th on PS5.

Astro Bot. | Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment

An adorable platformer, mythological tower defense, RPG / puzzle hybrid, and open-world Star Wars.

With Summer Game Fest over, it’s time to take a look back at some of the stand-out hits of the show. I don’t mean the most exciting reveals, but the best games I actually got to play. The SGF space was full of interesting games, some from high-profile studios and others from indie outfits. And there were some games that were surprisingly fun that I only discovered by just picking up a controller and playing.

Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess

Though I’ve seen trailers for Capcom’s sumptuous-looking game, I was never quite sure what it was about. I thought it was a generic hack-and-slash game dressed up in the richness of Japanese mythology, but I was surprised and frankly delighted to discover it’s a tower defense game. Your job is to protect a shrine maiden as she works to purge corruption from the land. Gameplay is divided into two sections: day and night. In the daytime, you go through a village rescuing inhabitants from the corrupting infection. At night, you protect the shrine maiden from demons as she slowly works her way through the village purging it of evil.

I really enjoyed Kunitsu-Gami’s novel twist on the genre. The villagers you rescue become part of your army, and you assign them jobs to assist in the maiden’s defense. The woodcutter is a powerful melee attacker that works as your first line of offense, while the monk uses their holy power to freeze demons in place, making them easy targets. Once the fight is over, there’s a base-building element that has you upgrading and unlocking jobs and acquiring new powers for your warrior.

I’m really glad I took a chance to play Kunitsu-Gami. I love strategy-type games, especially when they’re dressed in such a richly ornate art style. I found myself staring at everyone’s clothing, looking at the details, and wondering what significance each little piece had. It releases July 19th on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC.

Star Wars Outlaws

I’m not a Star Wars person — but Star Wars Outlaws was enough to intrigue my Force-agnostic ass. My hands-on was divided into three chunks: ship-to-ship combat, stealth combat, and platforming. Since the children (i.e., me) yearn for Ace Combat (Thanks, Bandai Namco!), I decided to try the ship first. Before setting off, I had to do a little stealth section to get to my ship that involved a couple of hacking mini-games. Usually, hacking mini-games are tedious and terrible (looking at you, Mass Effect), but I enjoyed both of them, especially the data spike mini-game that involves turning a tumbler in time with rhythmic clicks.

Once in space, I had a great time. The controls were very responsive, and I didn’t feel like I had to fight to keep my target in front of me like in other aerial combat games. I also enjoyed how the game doesn’t automatically reorient you if you turn the ship upside down, because it’s space, and there is no up or down. Toward the end of the demo, there was a moment where I flew down from space to the surface of a planet, and it all looked very seamless, a true “you can go anywhere” moment (even though I’m sure there’s some game developer trickery involved).

For the stealth mission, I wasn’t very stealthy, frequently blowing up an enemy instead of distracting them with Nix, my pet axolotl-looking thing. It turns out Nix is very useful as a distraction and a retriever. You can have it fetch the guns your enemies have dropped for when you need a bit of extra firepower. Your main weapon is a simple blaster equipped with special ammo; the default blaster setting takes out humanoid enemies, while the plasma setting is effective on droids. During one encounter involving a shallow water feature, I thought it’d be clever to shoot the water with plasma in hopes of electrocuting the enemies standing in it. Unfortunately, the game didn’t work that way.

The platforming section was the weakest bit because it didn’t really do much new. There’s a grappling hook to make use of, but other than that, my scoundrel Kay Vess simply runs, jumps, and climbs up bright yellow grates and ledges like anyone else. Overall, I was once again pleasantly surprised. Star Wars Outlaws launches on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC on August 30th.

Arranger: A Role Puzzling Adventure

Arranger is a puzzle game well-suited for mobile, which might explain why it was prominently featured in the Netflix booth. You play as a messy girl named Jemma who has a quirky way of moving through the world. As you slide your finger up and down or side to side, the world moves with her, either horizontally or vertically, moving everything on that axis along with her. You use that unique movement to solve puzzles or get around impassable obstacles. To Jemma, a locked door means nothing: she can warp to the other side once she reaches the end of a row or column.

One thing I appreciate about games is how you are always in conversation with the developers; I enjoy when I’m able to hear their voice in the way they design their games. There was a moment early on when I couldn’t figure out how to solve a pressure plate puzzle. Confused, I left the room only to find two strategically-placed planters. I didn’t yet know you could bring objects from room to room, so upon seeing the planters, I had this very obvious (and audible) “Aha!” moment. The developers could have left a planter or other object in the room with me to make the puzzle easier, but I would have missed out on deepening my understanding of the game’s mechanics.

Arranger comes out on Switch, PlayStation, PC, and mobile via Netflix on July 25th.

Astro Bot

Playing Astro Bot was joyful. I, of course, enjoyed all the games I’ve highlighted here, but Astro Bot was the one that had me giggling and kicking my feet like a 10-year-old given free rein of a candy store. A mascot platformer, in the year 2024… we might be back, y’all! Astro jumps, kicks off walls, and can hover in the air evoking the feeling of Mario. But even though the game is mechanically similar, Astro Bot feels uniquely charming. Astro squeaks, squeals, cheers, and waves — his enthusiasm and happiness are so infectious that it’s impossible not to hurt your face grinning as you play.

Strewn throughout bright and cheery levels are robots to rescue, some representing characters from PlayStation’s past. I thoroughly loved panning the camera looking for places off the beaten path and figuring out the best way to get there. I was rewarded every time with a collectible or a secret bot in need of rescue. The different levels also contain different movement abilities akin to the special powerups you might find in Mario. One ability that inflates Astro like a balloon, allowing him to float to out-of-reach areas. Another involves a dog that acts like a jet engine that rockets Astro through tough glass or bounces him off special platforms.

Astro Bot, on sheer charm alone, is my game of the show. It launches September 6th on PS5.

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Illustration: The Verge

AT&T is pushing prices up for customers who have stayed on old, retired “unlimited” data plans.
In August, customers can expect to see their bills rise by up to $20 for plans with multiple lines. “This is the total monthly increase, not per line increase,” the company says on its website. Customers with just a single line of service will see their charges go up $10 each month.
AT&T says it’s offering customers more high-speed data and hotspot data in return for the price hike. That’s supposed to allow people to keep their old plans that have been grand-fathered in, but with some added perks.

AT&T Unlimited Choice, Choice II, Choice Enhanced, Unlimited &More, and Unlimited Value plans will now include 75GB of high-speed data and 30GB of hotspot data.
AT&T Unlimited Plus, Plus Enhanced, Unlimited &More Premium, and AT&T Unlimited (with TV) plans will now include 100GB of high-speed data and 60GB of hotspot data.

Connected Car plans will still have the same high-speed data benefits but won’t get hotspot data, AT&T says.
Some customers might be able to save money by ditching their old plans and switching over to one of AT&T’s newer “unlimited” plans, Ars Technica notes. AT&T’s current “unlimited” plans range from $65.99 to $85.99 per month for a single line plus taxes and fees.

Illustration: The Verge

AT&T is pushing prices up for customers who have stayed on old, retired “unlimited” data plans.

In August, customers can expect to see their bills rise by up to $20 for plans with multiple lines. “This is the total monthly increase, not per line increase,” the company says on its website. Customers with just a single line of service will see their charges go up $10 each month.

AT&T says it’s offering customers more high-speed data and hotspot data in return for the price hike. That’s supposed to allow people to keep their old plans that have been grand-fathered in, but with some added perks.

AT&T Unlimited Choice, Choice II, Choice Enhanced, Unlimited &More, and Unlimited Value plans will now include 75GB of high-speed data and 30GB of hotspot data.

AT&T Unlimited Plus, Plus Enhanced, Unlimited &More Premium, and AT&T Unlimited (with TV) plans will now include 100GB of high-speed data and 60GB of hotspot data.

Connected Car plans will still have the same high-speed data benefits but won’t get hotspot data, AT&T says.

Some customers might be able to save money by ditching their old plans and switching over to one of AT&T’s newer “unlimited” plans, Ars Technica notes. AT&T’s current “unlimited” plans range from $65.99 to $85.99 per month for a single line plus taxes and fees.

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Existing Home Key-capable smart locks like this Aqara lock won’t work with the new hands-free unlock feature for Apple Home. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge

Last week, Apple announced it’s bringing hands-free unlocking for smart locks to Apple Home when iOS 18 arrives this fall. The new capability leverages the U1 ultra wideband (UWB) chip in many iPhones and Apple Watches to allow a smart lock to open automatically as you approach the front door — no tapping required.
But hands-free unlocking isn’t coming to your existing Home Key smart lock because no current locks have the hardware to support it. To use this cool new feature, you’re going to have to buy a new lock, and we likely won’t see any UWB-enabled smart locks until the end of 2024 at the earliest.
Apple’s hands-free unlocking won’t be coming to your existing Home Key smart lock
The new capability is part of Home Key — a feature of the Apple Home smart home platform that lets you unlock compatible locks by tapping your iPhone or Apple Watch to them. With hands-free unlocking, you won’t have to pull out your phone or tap your watch to the lock to open it; instead, if you’re wearing your watch or your phone is in your pocket and it’s been unlocked by you in the last 24 hours, the door will unlock when you are six feet away and approaching from outside.

Image: U-tec

U-tec announced its first Apple Home Key lock at CES 2024 and says it will have a lock that supports UWB later this year.

A smart lock can work with both Home Key unlocking options or just one, but as mentioned, it may be a while until we see any locks that support the new feature.
I spoke to several smart lock manufacturers following Apple’s announcement, and they all confirmed that their existing locks do not support UWB. This includes Aqara, U-tec, Yale, August, Level, Lockly, and SwitchBot. (Schlage did not respond.)
Almost universally, the manufacturers I talked to said they were exploring potentially incorporating the tech, but only U-tec said it had a UWB lock in development. Clark Ruan, VP of U-tec, told me the next-gen Ultraloq smart lock will support UWB and is estimated to arrive in Q4 of this year.
With a UWB-capable smart lock, your phone / watch can communicate directly with the lock
Hands-free auto unlocking isn’t a new concept, versions of the feature have been available for years. August first developed the capability to have your door unlock as you approach in 2013, and today several smart locks have this feature.
Apple Home also lets you set an automation to unlock a door automatically using geo-fencing. But it asks for permission to run the automation on your phone or watch every time, making this not hands-free and frankly a bit of a pain. In my experience, neither solution — August’s auto-unlock tech nor Apple’s geo-fencing — is all that reliable.
What’s new with Apple’s UWB-unlocking implementation is the technology. Instead of using the combination of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), Wi-Fi, GPS, and a third-party app that most other solutions do, the feature uses UWB and BLE.
It’s the same tech we’ve seen implemented for digital car keys, such as BMW’s Digital Key Plus, which uses UWB to know when you’re close to your car and unlock it automatically. With a UWB-capable smart lock, your phone/watch can communicate with it directly with no need to jump through several hoops to verify your location before unlocking your door. In theory, this should provide a more reliable, secure, and faster auto-unlock experience.

Image: Apple

Hands-free unlocking is enabled using Express Mode in the Home app, which bypasses the need to use Face or Touch ID to unlock a door.

UWB is a short-range, wireless communication protocol that operates at very high frequencies. It can provide secure, precise, real-time location data without needing line of sight — making it ideal for this type of use case.
According to Sujata Neidig, marketing director of NXP, which makes UWB chips, the technology provides accurate distance and angle measurements without line of sight. Meaning it’s precise enough to know if you are inside the home approaching the door so it won’t unlock, outside approaching the door so it will unlock, or walking away from your door outside so it can lock as you leave.
For the car lock technology NXP has worked on, Neidig said the auto-unlock feature uses BLE for the initial connection between car and phone and then switches to UWB for precision unlocking to know which side to unlock first. She said a similar implementation can be used for a smart home door lock. The BLE radio is needed because, according to Neidig, UWB has a high power consumption. By using BLE initially to establish a connection the UWB radio can stay off for longer, reducing its power use.
While the higher power use of UWB isn’t great news for smart locks, which already struggle with battery life, the use cases for UWB in the smart home are exciting. I’ve been hoping to see Apple do more with its U1 chip, which has also made it into the HomePod Mini and second-gen HomePod.

Image: Apple
In 2021, Apple added a music hand-off feature from your iPhone to a HomePod that uses the U1 chip in both devices.

Prior to this new auto-unlock capability for the home, Apple has used UWB for things like, music hand-off, finding an AirTag, and unlocking your car. But the potential is there for advanced smart home automations. With such precise location data, a HomePod could turn on lights in the bedroom when you walk past it from the living room into the bedroom, and then turn them on in the living room when you walk in the other direction. That would be very cool.
Hands-free unlocking for smart home locks will likely extend beyond Apple Home. Aliro, a universal standard for smart locks that Apple is helping develop, plans to include UWB, along with BLE and NFC (which Apple uses for its tap-to-unlock Home Key technology), in its first specification.
We may well see hands-free unlocking come to more smart home platforms
While Aliro is in the very early stages, considering most high-end Android phones also support UWB, we may well see this hands-free unlocking capability come to more smart home platforms if the smart lock industry ultimately adopts it. Unlike with Apple’s tap-to-unlock Home Key feature, hands-free unlocking with UWB won’t require specific HomeKit certification; if the lock has Matter certification and the necessary hardware, it will work with Apple Home’s hands-free unlocking.
So, while it looks like we’re going to have to wait a while for this better, faster auto-unlock feature — and invest in new hardware — there are promising signs here. The very fragmented smart home industry is starting to coalesce around exciting new technologies with the potential to make our homes significantly smarter.

Existing Home Key-capable smart locks like this Aqara lock won’t work with the new hands-free unlock feature for Apple Home. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge

Last week, Apple announced it’s bringing hands-free unlocking for smart locks to Apple Home when iOS 18 arrives this fall. The new capability leverages the U1 ultra wideband (UWB) chip in many iPhones and Apple Watches to allow a smart lock to open automatically as you approach the front door — no tapping required.

But hands-free unlocking isn’t coming to your existing Home Key smart lock because no current locks have the hardware to support it. To use this cool new feature, you’re going to have to buy a new lock, and we likely won’t see any UWB-enabled smart locks until the end of 2024 at the earliest.

The new capability is part of Home Key — a feature of the Apple Home smart home platform that lets you unlock compatible locks by tapping your iPhone or Apple Watch to them. With hands-free unlocking, you won’t have to pull out your phone or tap your watch to the lock to open it; instead, if you’re wearing your watch or your phone is in your pocket and it’s been unlocked by you in the last 24 hours, the door will unlock when you are six feet away and approaching from outside.

Image: U-tec

U-tec announced its first Apple Home Key lock at CES 2024 and says it will have a lock that supports UWB later this year.

A smart lock can work with both Home Key unlocking options or just one, but as mentioned, it may be a while until we see any locks that support the new feature.

I spoke to several smart lock manufacturers following Apple’s announcement, and they all confirmed that their existing locks do not support UWB. This includes Aqara, U-tec, Yale, August, Level, Lockly, and SwitchBot. (Schlage did not respond.)

Almost universally, the manufacturers I talked to said they were exploring potentially incorporating the tech, but only U-tec said it had a UWB lock in development. Clark Ruan, VP of U-tec, told me the next-gen Ultraloq smart lock will support UWB and is estimated to arrive in Q4 of this year.

Hands-free auto unlocking isn’t a new concept, versions of the feature have been available for years. August first developed the capability to have your door unlock as you approach in 2013, and today several smart locks have this feature.

Apple Home also lets you set an automation to unlock a door automatically using geo-fencing. But it asks for permission to run the automation on your phone or watch every time, making this not hands-free and frankly a bit of a pain. In my experience, neither solution — August’s auto-unlock tech nor Apple’s geo-fencing — is all that reliable.

What’s new with Apple’s UWB-unlocking implementation is the technology. Instead of using the combination of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), Wi-Fi, GPS, and a third-party app that most other solutions do, the feature uses UWB and BLE.

It’s the same tech we’ve seen implemented for digital car keys, such as BMW’s Digital Key Plus, which uses UWB to know when you’re close to your car and unlock it automatically. With a UWB-capable smart lock, your phone/watch can communicate with it directly with no need to jump through several hoops to verify your location before unlocking your door. In theory, this should provide a more reliable, secure, and faster auto-unlock experience.

Image: Apple

Hands-free unlocking is enabled using Express Mode in the Home app, which bypasses the need to use Face or Touch ID to unlock a door.

UWB is a short-range, wireless communication protocol that operates at very high frequencies. It can provide secure, precise, real-time location data without needing line of sight — making it ideal for this type of use case.

According to Sujata Neidig, marketing director of NXP, which makes UWB chips, the technology provides accurate distance and angle measurements without line of sight. Meaning it’s precise enough to know if you are inside the home approaching the door so it won’t unlock, outside approaching the door so it will unlock, or walking away from your door outside so it can lock as you leave.

For the car lock technology NXP has worked on, Neidig said the auto-unlock feature uses BLE for the initial connection between car and phone and then switches to UWB for precision unlocking to know which side to unlock first. She said a similar implementation can be used for a smart home door lock. The BLE radio is needed because, according to Neidig, UWB has a high power consumption. By using BLE initially to establish a connection the UWB radio can stay off for longer, reducing its power use.

While the higher power use of UWB isn’t great news for smart locks, which already struggle with battery life, the use cases for UWB in the smart home are exciting. I’ve been hoping to see Apple do more with its U1 chip, which has also made it into the HomePod Mini and second-gen HomePod.

Image: Apple
In 2021, Apple added a music hand-off feature from your iPhone to a HomePod that uses the U1 chip in both devices.

Prior to this new auto-unlock capability for the home, Apple has used UWB for things like, music hand-off, finding an AirTag, and unlocking your car. But the potential is there for advanced smart home automations. With such precise location data, a HomePod could turn on lights in the bedroom when you walk past it from the living room into the bedroom, and then turn them on in the living room when you walk in the other direction. That would be very cool.

Hands-free unlocking for smart home locks will likely extend beyond Apple Home. Aliro, a universal standard for smart locks that Apple is helping develop, plans to include UWB, along with BLE and NFC (which Apple uses for its tap-to-unlock Home Key technology), in its first specification.

While Aliro is in the very early stages, considering most high-end Android phones also support UWB, we may well see this hands-free unlocking capability come to more smart home platforms if the smart lock industry ultimately adopts it. Unlike with Apple’s tap-to-unlock Home Key feature, hands-free unlocking with UWB won’t require specific HomeKit certification; if the lock has Matter certification and the necessary hardware, it will work with Apple Home’s hands-free unlocking.

So, while it looks like we’re going to have to wait a while for this better, faster auto-unlock feature — and invest in new hardware — there are promising signs here. The very fragmented smart home industry is starting to coalesce around exciting new technologies with the potential to make our homes significantly smarter.

Read More 

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

AMD is looking into a potential cyberattack. A threat actor that goes by the alias “IntelBroker” is selling data that it claims was obtained from an AMD.com breach this month, BleepingComputer reports, and the company confirmed in a statement that it’s looking into the purported theft. IntelBroker claims that the data for sale includes future products, employee databases, and customer databases.
“We are aware of a cybercriminal organization claiming to be in possession of stolen AMD data,” AMD said in the statement given to BleepingComputer, PCMag, and Bloomberg. “We are working closely with law enforcement officials and a third-party hosting partner to investigate the claim and the significance of the data.”
AMD didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment from The Verge. In the past, IntelBroker has attempted to sell data allegedly stolen from Europol, The Home Depot, and the health insurance marketplace DC Health Link.
In 2022, AMD confirmed it was investigating claims that the hacking group RansomHouse stole 450GB of data.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

AMD is looking into a potential cyberattack. A threat actor that goes by the alias “IntelBroker” is selling data that it claims was obtained from an AMD.com breach this month, BleepingComputer reports, and the company confirmed in a statement that it’s looking into the purported theft. IntelBroker claims that the data for sale includes future products, employee databases, and customer databases.

“We are aware of a cybercriminal organization claiming to be in possession of stolen AMD data,” AMD said in the statement given to BleepingComputer, PCMag, and Bloomberg. “We are working closely with law enforcement officials and a third-party hosting partner to investigate the claim and the significance of the data.”

AMD didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment from The Verge. In the past, IntelBroker has attempted to sell data allegedly stolen from Europol, The Home Depot, and the health insurance marketplace DC Health Link.

In 2022, AMD confirmed it was investigating claims that the hacking group RansomHouse stole 450GB of data.

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One remote to rule them all (but in the darkness, you probably still can’t find them). | Photo: Cantata

Universal remotes might be on a comeback tour if devices like Cantata’s Haptique RS90 and RS90X actually materialize and are as good as advertised. The connected remote purports to double as a comprehensive smart home controller, but it’s merely a Kickstarter hopeful for now. Serial remoters (remotees?) have pledged more than $300,00, with less than $10,000 needed to fully fund the project as of writing, and there’s currently an estimated ship date of August 2024.

What separates this from the sparse competition is that it’s hub-free. You won’t need a separate box plugged in to the TV or IR repeaters to make this work. It comes with a charging dock and has a relatively roomy 3.2-inch color touchscreen for the Android-based OS. The display sits above a suite of 24 essential physical buttons to navigate and control it all, including one that initiates voice control. In addition to compatibility with more than 3,000 traditional devices with infrared like TVs, projectors, Blu-ray players, and A/V receivers, the sleek phone-shaped RS90 has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to interface with newer smart home devices and platforms (and even the PS5, eventually).
Cantata is promising early support for smart home integrations with devices from popular brands such as Philips Hue and Sonos, third-party and otherwise open-source hubs and platforms like Samsung SmartThings, Homey, and Home Assistant, and direct control for web-based services like Spotify and Netflix. That’s in addition to receivers from the likes of Yamaha and Denon, plus popular streaming devices such as the Amazon Fire TV Stick, Nvidia Shield TV, Apple TV, and Roku.

Photo: Cantata

Cantata hopes the Haptique RS90 will fill the sizable void left in the universal control market (and our hearts) when Logitech abandoned the category and spurred a whole new remote repair business niche. In 2021, we felt morally and emotionally obligated to ask then-CEO Bracken Darrell to justify the heartbreak.
“Now you’ve got a whole bunch of apps instead of remotes,” he said to The Verge’s Nilay Patel in the extensive interview. “The real question was, ‘Can we be an app selector? Can we somehow be the interface between all those apps and you?’ We looked at it. We all thought hard about it. We realized that app selection is the domain of players that are already in the market doing a good job. We’ve got to be able to do something special for customers.”
Which is true! I’m now able to get by with a single LG magic remote to control most simple functions for my soundbar, TV, streaming boxes, and even my Xbox Series X / S (mostly thanks to HDMI-CEC). I only need to keep track of a few remotes for the odd occasion that I need to do something more specific. But that equation changes if you have dozens of other smart home devices or a more complicated A/V setup with pieces from different brands, but to this point, my smartphone fills those gaps well enough.
Cantata’s remote isn’t the first disruption in the underserved space. Competitors like Sofabaton already sell connected remotes that reach beyond the infrared barrier, but it’s not as ubiquitous as the RS90 claims to be. Others (like Caavo’s early labyrinthian setup) are often expensive, complicated, require a hub, or are otherwise limited to select industries.
The Haptique RS90 aims to solve all of that. The thought that it can adequately serve as a one-stop smart home hub sounds too good to be true, considering it’s already a little behind the curve — it lacks Matter support, for example — but at least someone’s trying. You can currently pledge €240 (about $258) for the new Kickstarter darling, but the listing suggests it’ll retail starting at €360 (about $387) once early bird preorders dry up.

One remote to rule them all (but in the darkness, you probably still can’t find them). | Photo: Cantata

Universal remotes might be on a comeback tour if devices like Cantata’s Haptique RS90 and RS90X actually materialize and are as good as advertised. The connected remote purports to double as a comprehensive smart home controller, but it’s merely a Kickstarter hopeful for now. Serial remoters (remotees?) have pledged more than $300,00, with less than $10,000 needed to fully fund the project as of writing, and there’s currently an estimated ship date of August 2024.

What separates this from the sparse competition is that it’s hub-free. You won’t need a separate box plugged in to the TV or IR repeaters to make this work. It comes with a charging dock and has a relatively roomy 3.2-inch color touchscreen for the Android-based OS. The display sits above a suite of 24 essential physical buttons to navigate and control it all, including one that initiates voice control. In addition to compatibility with more than 3,000 traditional devices with infrared like TVs, projectors, Blu-ray players, and A/V receivers, the sleek phone-shaped RS90 has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to interface with newer smart home devices and platforms (and even the PS5, eventually).

Cantata is promising early support for smart home integrations with devices from popular brands such as Philips Hue and Sonos, third-party and otherwise open-source hubs and platforms like Samsung SmartThings, Homey, and Home Assistant, and direct control for web-based services like Spotify and Netflix. That’s in addition to receivers from the likes of Yamaha and Denon, plus popular streaming devices such as the Amazon Fire TV Stick, Nvidia Shield TV, Apple TV, and Roku.

Photo: Cantata

Cantata hopes the Haptique RS90 will fill the sizable void left in the universal control market (and our hearts) when Logitech abandoned the category and spurred a whole new remote repair business niche. In 2021, we felt morally and emotionally obligated to ask then-CEO Bracken Darrell to justify the heartbreak.

“Now you’ve got a whole bunch of apps instead of remotes,” he said to The Verge’s Nilay Patel in the extensive interview. “The real question was, ‘Can we be an app selector? Can we somehow be the interface between all those apps and you?’ We looked at it. We all thought hard about it. We realized that app selection is the domain of players that are already in the market doing a good job. We’ve got to be able to do something special for customers.”

Which is true! I’m now able to get by with a single LG magic remote to control most simple functions for my soundbar, TV, streaming boxes, and even my Xbox Series X / S (mostly thanks to HDMI-CEC). I only need to keep track of a few remotes for the odd occasion that I need to do something more specific. But that equation changes if you have dozens of other smart home devices or a more complicated A/V setup with pieces from different brands, but to this point, my smartphone fills those gaps well enough.

Cantata’s remote isn’t the first disruption in the underserved space. Competitors like Sofabaton already sell connected remotes that reach beyond the infrared barrier, but it’s not as ubiquitous as the RS90 claims to be. Others (like Caavo’s early labyrinthian setup) are often expensive, complicated, require a hub, or are otherwise limited to select industries.

The Haptique RS90 aims to solve all of that. The thought that it can adequately serve as a one-stop smart home hub sounds too good to be true, considering it’s already a little behind the curve — it lacks Matter support, for example — but at least someone’s trying. You can currently pledge €240 (about $258) for the new Kickstarter darling, but the listing suggests it’ll retail starting at €360 (about $387) once early bird preorders dry up.

Read More