We've all been there. You jump into a new game and, before you know it, you've spent 90 minutes customizing your character. That was me with Monster Hunter Wilds, but recently players have been sharing their favorite pre-made design codes. Do you want to be God of War's Kratos? Or, anime fans, perhaps you'd prefer to look like the best girl, Frieren, from Beyond Journey's End. Whatever your preference, here are the best MHW character creation codes, as well as how to use them.Table of Contents [hide]Geralt of Rivia (The Witcher)Geralt of RiviaGeralt of Rivia (The Witcher)Creation Code: PN5AL8K78EY5Everyone's favorite silver-haired protagonist, Geralt can easily be replicated in Monster Hunter Wilds if you tweak the settings enough. If you want a tried and tested version, though, complete with facial scars and flowing locks Reddit user Gullible-Ad8788 has Witcher fans covered.Continue Reading at GameSpot

Although Pokemon TCG Pocket has been extremely successful since its debut last year, not everything in the game is popular with players. Case in point, the trade tokens introduced in late January were met with an extremely negative response, in part because players had to destroy their duplicate cards to earn them. Now, the game's developers, Creatures Inc. and DeNA, have revealed that they will be getting rid of the trading tokens and replacing them with another in-game currency.As shared on Pokemon's official site, trade tokens will be completely removed from the game by this fall. In their place, shinedust will now be the currency used to trade cards. Any trade tokens that remain in players' collections after the switchover will be converted to shinedust.Shinedust will only be required for trades involving cards with three-diamond, four-diamond, or one-star rarity. However, the exact breakdown of the cost in shinedust wasn't disclosed. Shinedust is automatically earned when players get a card they already have registered in their Card Dex. Since Shinedust will be used for trades, the developers are looking into increasing the amounts that are given to players.Continue Reading at GameSpot

Connections is back with another tricky puzzle, asking you to group sixteen words into four hidden categories. The rules of how to play Connections might make it sound simple and easy, but with difficult words, red herrings, and the fact that you can only make less than four mistakes, it is anything but.

Helldivers 2 fans got an item marked off their wish lists back in December when a drivable vehicle was added to the third-person shooter. Alongside the arrival of the Illuminate, Helldivers 2 brought forth the M-102 FRV, and it was immediately a game-changer.

The Sane Jewel is a decoration in Monster Hunter Wilds that is a bit challenging to locate, but the effects granted by it are worth the trouble.If youre struggling on how to get the Sane Jewel, or what it does, read on. We cover what the Sane Jewel is and tell you how to get one in Monster Hunter Wilds.What is the Sane Jewel in Monster Hunter Wilds?The Sane Jewel is a decoration type that can randomly drop at the end of hunts in Monster Hunter Wilds. But because its a rarity-5 decoration, many hunters havent found the jewel until theyve hit a very high hunter rank.The Sane Jewel provides the skill Antivirus, which could be useful in high-level fights found deeper in the game. Antivirus skill description is: Once infected, makes it easier to overcome the Frenzy and increase Affinity when cured. Frenzy is a two-stage status effect inflicted by some high-level monsters, like Gore Magala.GameRant has an excellent guide to Frenzys stages, but to keep this focused to Sane Jewel, its skill helps you harness the Frenzy ability to raise your affinity. The three levels of the Antivirus skill boost affinity between 3% and 15%; slotting the Sane Jewel in some armor with the skill, or while wearing the Sanity Charm, could be very effective if youre aiming to deal more critical damage.How to Meld the Sane Jewel in Monster Hunter WildsIf you havent had luck on random drops, the Sane Jewel is available to craft at the Melding Pot. It costs 80 Melding Points to create one Sane Jewel.The Sane Jewels availability at the Melding Pot seems to be gated behind a specific Hunter Rank. According to discussions on Reddit, some players discovered it after HR 100. These screenshots came from one Polygon team member who is HR 124 and who confirmed they could craft a Sane Jewel.

Both the Armorcharm and the Powercharm are powerful key items in Monster Hunter Wilds. Youll get both of them as rewards for High Rank quests. You only get them as rewards the first time you complete each quest.The Armorcharm raises your defense by 12. The Powercharm raises your attack by 6.Our Monster Hunter Wilds guide will tell you how to get the Armorcharm and Powercharm and how to use them.How to get the Armorcharm in Monster Hunter WildsThe Armorcharm is a reward youll get from the Secure Wounded Hollow quest. You get this quest from Cobb in Suja, Peaks of Accord.For Secure Wounded Hollow, youll head into the High Rank area of Wounded Hollow. In that regions arena, youll have to take on a pair of Hirabami.Once its completed, youll need to talk to Cobb again to get the Armorcharm. Youll only see a brief message about it on the right side of your screen and then it just kind of disappears in your item box.When youre done, head over to Rex to get another quest, As Gatekeeper, that youll need forHow to get the Powercharm in Monster Hunter WildsLike the Armorcharm, the Powercharm is a reward from an optional quest, As Gatekeeper. This one is from Rex (who is wearing the same armor as Cobb) in Wounded Hollow. As Gatekeeper has you head back into the Wounded Hollow arena to take on a pair of Ajarakan.When youre done, talk to Rex again to get the Powercharm.How to use the Armorcharm and Powercharm in Monster Hunter WildsWhen you get them as rewards, both the Armorcharm and the Powercharm will get dropped into your item box. For them to help you, though, youll need to move them to your item pouch.You dont actually use the Armorcharm or Powercharm as items. You get the benefits just by having them in your item pouch. Theyll take up a slot, but they do not get added to your item bar.To also help you understand Monster Hunter Wilds, we explain how to capture monsters, how to change weapons, provide some Seikret tips, and teach you how layered armor works.

It's been about six months now since Apple's big iOS 18 update introduced RCS support to the iPhone. In many ways, it's been a game changer: Ditching SMS for RCS has meant group chats function better, and videos are sent in higher quality. But there's still one big drawback to RCS on iPhone that has yet to be fixed: Your messages aren't encrypted. What is RCS?To fully understand the issue, it's important to know what RCS actually is. RCS stands for Rich Communication Services, and is basically a souped up version of SMS: The platform supports modern messaging features, like typing bubbles, high-quality image and video sharing, functioning group chats, and end-to-end encryption. SMS doesn't support these features, so using itespecially in group settingscan be a pain. RCS isn't available on all Android messaging services, but if your partner's Android setup supports it and you have it enabled on your iPhone, your conversations should feel very similar to iMessaging between other iPhones (minus the green bubbles, of course). Now, most of these features are currently working: You should be able to see when they're typing; you should be able to send photos and videos in high resolution; and group chats should function much as they do between iPhones. There's just one big issue.RCS on iOS isn't encryptedAt this time, messages sent and received via RCS between iPhones and Androids are not end-to-end encrypted. That means any conversations you have with Android friends are vulnerable, since these messages are sent without modern security protections. That's not a deviation from the norm for those of us on iOS: If you're used to texting over SMS with Android users, those chats weren't encrypted either. But the promise of RCS on iOS includes encrypted messaging. When you see that RCS tag in your green bubble chat, you should be safe in the knowledge that no one other than the parties involved in the chat can read these messages. That said, RCS isn't end-to-end encrypted everywhere, either. Google Messages is the biggest platform that supports default end-to-end encryption through RCS, but unless the other user is also using Google Messages and also has RCS enabled, your messages may not be encrypted after all. Other popular platforms, like Samsung Messages or Textra, do not support end-to-end encryption at all.RCS will soon be encrypted on iOSBut things are changing for the better. The GSMA, the association that works with mobile operators to set unified standards, announced new specifications for RCS that enable end-to-end encryption based on the Messaging Layer Security (MLS) protocol. In simplified terms, these new specifications mean that, no matter which platforms you're using, all RCS messages will be end-to-end encrypted.This isn't necessarily a surprise: The GSMA publicly said it was working on end-to-end encryption for RCS on iPhone. There's no timeline for this new standard, but Apple and Google both support adopting it as fast as possible. That's good news, and the standard can't get here soon enough. However, it doesn't change the fact that some may be using RCS with misunderstood assumptions about their security: Until this future update hits, RCS messages on iPhone are never end-to-end encrypted. If you want all of your conversations with non-iPhone friends to be protected, you'll need to stick to encrypted messaging platforms, like Signal or WhatsApp. Again, iMessage is end-to-end encrypted by default, so no worries there.Android users: Everyone can see your group chat namesIf you're an Android user who is used to how things work on Google Messages, listen up: Group chat names are not private when messaging with iPhones. On Google Messages, you can rename a group whatever you want, and only you will see it. That's helpful for keeping tabs on specific groups, without worrying that other people in the group will know how you've designated the chat. That's not how things work when iOS is involved, however. iPhones users will know that group chat names are controllable by everyone in the group, and are very much public: When one person changes the group name, it changes for everyone. If you're new to messaging iPhones on RCS and you happen to have one in your group chat, don't change the name to anything you wouldn't be happy with everyone in the group seeing as well.

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.It's a good time to be shopping for TVs, with many options available right now. The TCL QM7 is a great budget TV currently on sale and its main competitor, Hisense's U7, is also down to its lowest price. If you want a better-quality TV, though, LG's 75-inch QNED80T is $896.99 (originally $1,399.99), is also at the lowest price it has ever been, according to price-tracking tools. Screen Size: 55 Inches, Brand: LG, Display Technology:LED, Resolution: 4K, Refresh Rate:60 Hz LG 55-Inch Class QNED80T $546.99 at Amazon $799.99 Save $253.00 Get Deal Get Deal $546.99 at Amazon $799.99 Save $253.00 Screen Size: 75 Inches, Brand: LG, Display Technology:LED, Resolution: 4K, Refresh Rate:60 Hz LG 75-Inch Class QNED80T $896.99 at Amazon $1,399.99 Save $503.00 Get Deal Get Deal $896.99 at Amazon $1,399.99 Save $503.00 SEE -1 MORE The QNED80T's operating system, WebOS 24, comes with five years of guaranteed updates, which will keep your TV up-to-date until you're ready to upgrade again. WebOS 24 is great for cloud gaming, with GeForce NOW and Amazon Luna (among other services) easily accessible on the TV menu. If you're into sports, you can also customize the sports card to show your team's schedules and scores. Because this is an LG, you also get LG Channels, which consists of over 300 free live channels.The picture is an edge-lit 60Hz panel, which isn't great compared to the QM7 or U7, but because it is a QNED instead of a QLED, you get better colors and black levels than the QM7 and U7. So really, it comes down to what you value. The QNED80T has a wider viewing angle, which is great if you plan to use it in a living room and watch TV with many people sitting around.On the LG, games will look smooth with FreeSync and VRR. It also has a game optimizer setting so you can set the picture depending on the type of game easily to your liking. You also get four HDMI 2.1 ports if you like to have multiple consoles at once.

The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee is looking into whether the Biden administration tried to "censor" artificial intelligence. Representative Jim Jordan has sent subpoenas to sixteen different tech companies that work with AI in some capacity to ask for any and all communications from the previous administration about limiting "harmful bias" and "algorithmic discrimination."Subpoenas were sent to Adobe, Alphabet, Amazon, Anthropic, Apple, Cohere,International Business Machines Corp. (IBM),Inflection AI, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, Open AI,Palantir, Salesforce, Scale AI and Stability AI, and each requests an extensive amount of information, covering five years from January 1, 2020 to January 20, 2025. Essentially any and all documents and communications "referring or relating to the moderation, deletion, suppression, restriction, or reduced circulation of the content, input, or output of an AI model, training dataset, algorithm, system, or product," need to be included, whether between the companies and the previous administration, internal communications about those discussions or discussions with third-parties.Jordan and the committee are alleging that the former President's executive order calling for regulations on algorithmic discrimination and guidelines for how the federal government will use AI pressured private companies to censor speech. Digging up old documents and communications is an attempt to connect those seemingly distant dots.Pestering tech companies is not exactly new for Jordan. Just last week he subpoenaed Google over separate censorship concerns, and over the last few years he's regularly made a show of bringing in tech CEOs to testify about moderation. The main difference now is that companies that don't even run speech platforms like Adobe or Nvidia are receiving scrutiny, too.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/house-gop-subpoenas-tech-companies-over-ai-censorship-pressure-from-biden-administration-214543722.html?src=rss

OpenAI is calling on the Trump administration to give AI companies an exemption to train their models on copyrighted material. In a blog post spotted by The Verge, the company this week published its response to President Trump's AI Action Plan. Announced at the end of February, the initiative saw the White House seek input from private industry, with the goal of eventually enacting policy that will work to "enhance America's position as an AI powerhouse" and enable innovation in the sector."America's robust, balanced intellectual property system has long been key to our global leadership on innovation. We propose a copyright strategy that would extend the system's role into the Intelligence Age by protecting the rights and interests of content creators while also protecting America's AI leadership and national security," OpenAI writes in its submission. "The federal government can both secure Americans' freedom to learn from AI, and avoid forfeiting our AI lead to the [People's Republic of China] by preserving American AI models' ability to learn from copyrighted material."In the same document, the company recommends the US maintain tight export controls on AI chips to China. It also says the US government should broadly adopt AI tools. Incidentally, OpenAI began offering a version of ChatGPT designed for US government use earlier this year.This week, Google also published its own list of recommendations for the president's AI Action Plan. Like OpenAI, the search giant says it should be able to train AI models on copyrighted material."Balanced copyright rules, such as fair use and text-and-data mining exceptions, have been critical to enabling AI systems to learn from prior knowledge and publicly available data, unlocking scientific and social advances," Google writes. "These exceptions allow for the use of copyrighted, publicly available material for AI training without significantly impacting rightsholders and avoid often highly unpredictable, imbalanced, and lengthy negotiations with data holders during model development or scientific experimentation."Last year, OpenAI said it would be "impossible to train today's leading AI models without using copyrighted materials." The company currently faces numerous lawsuits accusing it of copyright infringement, including ones involving The New York Times and a group of authors led by George R.R. Martin and Jonathan Franzen. At the same time, the company recently accused Chinese AI startups of trying to copy its technologies.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/openai-and-google-ask-for-a-government-exemption-to-train-their-ai-models-on-copyrighted-material-212906990.html?src=rss