While Nintendo will be selling Switch 2-enhanced versions of some of its titles, it looks like players that already own the original Switch versions of the game can simply grab an upgrade to the Switch 2 edition at a fraction of the games price.As caught by ResetEra user Uzupedro, the Japanese website for Nintendo eShop indicates that players that already own Switch versions of games like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Super Mario Party Jamboree or Kirby and the Forgotten Land can get a copy of the Switch 2-enhanced versions for 1,000 or 2,000.Where both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdoms upgrades are priced at 1,000 each, upgrades that add more content to the game are seemingly priced higher. Kirby and the Forgotten Land and Super Mario Party Jamboree, for instance, are priced at 2,000 for the upgrade.Nintendo had announced its plans to release Switch 2-enhanced versions of Switch titles during its recent Direct. During the show, the company confirmed that the Switch 2-related enhancements include improved performance and better visuals as well. The Switch 2 Editions for games will be released at various points over the coming year, kicking things off with both The Legend of Zelda titles getting their upgrades at launch on June 5.

Hello everyone, Im happy to share my first artwork I created in UE5, inspired by Elden Ring. I modeled almost everything except the foliage and sculptures, which were free to use assets. A short animation can be view

Trending TodayThe Science Behind the MLB Torpedo Bats That Everyones Talking AboutHow Do They Work? And Are They Really Better?Developed by a physicist, these bats have their widest part, called the barrel, closer to the players hands to offer a better chance of hitting the ball on their sweet spot "Torpedo bats," like the one shown here used by New York Yankees player Jazz Chisholm Jr., have a slightly bulbous shape that's similar to a bowling pin. Mike Stobe / Getty ImagesEver since the New York Yankees hit nine home runsa team recordagainst the Milwaukee Brewers on Saturday, the internet has been abuzz with chatter about the torpedo bats some players used during the staggering 20-9 win.But what are torpedo bats, exactly? And how do they work?To the untrained eye, torpedo bats dont look all that different from standard bats. But to the athletes and coaches who live and breathe professional baseball, they represent a major advancement in the sports equipment.The same bat design has been in existence for a century and a half, maybe, says Alan Nathan, a physicist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, to NPRs Bill Chappell. And to come up with something new, to me, is always very exciting.With a torpedo bat, the barrelor the widest part of the batsits closer to the hitters hands. The bat is thinnest at the handle, then widens out at the barrel, then slims down toward the tipsort of like a bowling pin.Torpedo bats are custom-made for each player, with the barrel placed where that specific hitter tends to strike the ballan area known as the sweet spot.This means more woodand, thus, more massat the area of the bat that will be making contact, increasing a players margin for error at that area. The goal is to help hitters connect with the ball on the bats barrelat their specific sweet spotmore frequently. More sweet spot strikes, the thinking goes, translates to more hits and more homers.Shifting the center of mass closer to the hitters hands reduces the bats swing weight, which can make it feel lighter and easier to control. In theory, this design change not only allows players to swing faster, but it also makes them more agilethey should be able to make quick adjustments to their swing once the ball leaves the pitchers hand. Moving the barrel down the bat might also make that area easier to see in the players peripheral vision, allowing them to line up their swing more accurately.Because youre able to swing the bat faster, you have a little longer to watch the ball before you commit, says Lloyd Smith, a mechanical engineer at Washington State University, to Scientific Americans Stephanie Pappas.Even seemingly small adjustments can be helpful when pitchers are throwing balls at close to 100 miles per hour. Torpedo bats probably dont help players hit the ball harder or faster. But the shifted barrel may help them hit more accurately, which should improve their overall batting average.These nontraditional bats were developed by Aaron Lenny Leanhardt while he was working for the Yankees. (Hes now a field coordinator with the Miami Marlins.)Leanhardt is a scientist. Before starting his baseball career in 2017, he earned a bachelors degree in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan and a doctorate in physics from MIT. After that, he was a physics professor at the University of Michigan for seven years.Leanhardt came up with the idea for torpedo bats after talking with lots of players, who all wanted to make better contact with the ball and hit it with their bats sweet spot, reports the Athletics Brendan Kuty. He spent roughly two years honing his invention.Its just through those conversations where you think to yourself, why dont we exchange how much wood were putting on the tip versus how much were putting in the sweet spot? Leanhardt tells the Athletic.He adds: Its just about making the bat as heavy and as fat as possible in the area where youre trying to do damage on the baseball.Some Major League Baseball (MLB) players began quietly using the bats in 2023 and 2024. But public awareness of them skyrocketed last weekend, after the Yankees monster day against the Brewers. Yankees players hit three home runs in a rowon the first three pitches in the game.Are torpedo bats legal? Officials have confirmed they dont break any MLB rules, which require that a bat shall be a smooth, round stick not more than 2.61 inches in diameter at the thickest part and not more than 42 inches in length. The bat shall be one piece of solid wood.Its too early to tell whether the bats will measurably improve players performance. But, so far, they seem to be boosting the Yankees: The team has hit 17 home runs through their first four games, which is a new MLB record, per Bleacher Reports Scott Polacek. (Though NPR notes that three of the Yankees nine homers were hit by Aaron Judge, who was using a regular bat.)Regardless of the bats true efficacy, they do seem to be giving players a confidence boostand that could be just as important.The game of baseball is so superstitious, Dan Russell, an acoustics scholar at Penn State University, tells NPR. It doesnt matter what the thing is, if you found something that makes you more confident, its going to work.Yankees shortstop Anthony Volpe echoed that sentiment. He used a torpedo bat to hit a home run during the teams win over the Brewers on Saturday.Its probably just a placebo, Volpe tells MLB.coms Bryan Hoch. A lot of it is just looking up at your bat and seeing how big the barrel is, but its exciting. I think any 0.01 percent mentally that it gives you confidence, it helps.Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Art Meets ScienceArt Exhibition Immortalizes Switzerlands Rhne Glacier, Predicted to Disappear by 2050Ohan Breidings Belly of a Glacier combines experimental film and photography to reflect on a moment of lossand to fight against it Photographs of the Rhne glacier and the attempts to save it Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary ArtIn 2019, researchers installed a memorial for the first Icelandic glacier to disappear due to climate change. The plaque at the base of what was once theOkjkull glacier read: In the next 200 years, all our glaciers are expected to follow the same path. This monument is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we did it.In the past six years, glaciers have not stopped melting. Researchers have predicted that more than half of the worlds glaciers coulddisappear by 2100.Funerals and memorials continue.The latest effort to reflect on these losses is Belly of a Glacier, an experimental film and photography exhibition by Swiss-American artistOhan Breiding, which will be on view at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art through mid-December.The focus of Breidings exhibition is SwitzerlandsRhne glacier, which feeds the Rhne river and Lake Geneva. In recent decades, it has melted with alarming speed: It loses roughly33 feet of ice thickness annually. Scientistspredict that the Swiss Alps will lose half of their glacier volume by 2050.None of us was prepared for what it would feel like to open this show in this exact moment with what were facing in climate disasters across the world,Lisa Dorin, the deputy director at theWilliams College Museum of Art, which presents the exhibition in collaboration with Mass MoCA, tells theArt Newspapers Barbara Reina.In a half-hour film, which theBerkshire Eagles Jennifer Huberdeau calls one part documentary, one part eulogy, Breiding captures residents of Obergoms, a Swiss village, draping the Rhne glacier withthermal blankets to insulate it from the rising temperatures. Thermal blanket draped across the Rhne glacier Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary ArtBreiding intersperses sounds of a glacier losing chunks of ice with close-up footage of a calf emerging from its mothers birth canala play on the word calving.Calving is for the mother calf to give birth to a calf, but in glaciologists terms, its about the death of a glacier, about the breaking off of a big iceberg into a glacial lake, or an ocean, Breiding tells theWilliams Records Tahlia Gerger and Amita Khurana.The film also spotlights researchers at the National Science FoundationsIce Core Facility in Colorado. Drilled from glaciers, ice cores preserve key climatic data over time. Visitors can watch the short film while sitting on ice core boxes. Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary ArtI became just so deeply fascinated with ice as one of our oldest record keepers of time, Breiding says to the Berkshire Eagle.Like the ice cores, Belly of a Glacier creates a record of the earths changing climate, freezing the Rhne glacier in time and allowing viewers to enjoy its beauty, even as it melts away in real life.Weve never experienced [these changes] as humans. Weve never experienced a loss of something thats so ancient within our short lifetimes, and so its about what our feelings are doing and the loss thats deeply inside of us, and what were going to do with that loss, Breiding tells the Williams Record. A plaque memorializing a lost glacier Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary ArtA wall of 111 photographs titled To dress a wound from the light that shines in it features images of the Rhne glacier from various perspectives, including shots of the villagers trying to protect it with blankets. These photos are interspersed with close-up shots of parts of the artists body.The stunning photographs and video make the loss feel very personalas it should, given that we are part of the ecosystem being forever transformed by climate change, saysSusan Cross, a curator at the museum, in astatement.Belly of a Glacier is on view at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams through December 14, 2025. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

CoTools uses hidden states and in-context learning to enable LLMs to use more than 1,000 tools very efficiently.Read More

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn MoreThe sleeping giant has awoken!For a while, it seemed like Amazon was playing catchup in the race to offer its users particularly the millions of developers building atop Amazon Web Services (AWS)s cloud infrastructure compelling first-party AI models and tools. But in late 2024, it debuted its own internal foundation model family, Amazon Nova, with text, image and even video generation capabilities, and last month saw a new Amazon Alexa voice assistant powered in part by Anthropics Claude family of models. Then, on Monday, the e-commerce and cloud giants artificial general intelligence division Amazon AGI has announced the release of Amazon Nova Act, an experimental developer kit for building AI agents that can navigate the web and complete tasks autonomously, powered by a custom, proprietary version of Amazons Nova large language model (LLM). Oh, and the standard developer kit (SDK) is open source under a permissive Apache 2.0 license, though the SDK is designed to work only with Amazons in-house custom Nova model, not any third-party ones.The goal is to enable third-party developers to build AI agents capable of reliably performing tasks within web browsers. But how does Amazons Nova Act stack up to other agent building platforms out there on the market, such as Microsofts AutoGen, Salesforces Agentforce, and of course, OpenAIs recently released open source Agents SDK? A different, more thoughtful approach to AI agentsSince the public rise of large language models (LLMs), most agent systems have been limited to responding in natural language or providing information by querying knowledge bases. Nova Act is part of the larger industry shift toward action-based agentssystems that can complete actual tasks across digital environments on behalf of the user. OpenAIs new Responses API, which gives users access to its autonomous browser navigator, is one leading example of this, which developers can integrate into AI agents through the OpenAI Agents SDK.Amazon AGI emphasizes that current agent systems, while promising, struggle with reliability and often require human supervision, especially when handling multi-step or complex workflows. Nova Act is specifically designed to address these limitations by providing a set of atomic, prescriptive commands that can be chained together into reliable workflows.Deniz Birlikci, a Member of Technical Staff at Amazon, described the broader vision in a video introducing Nova Act: soon, there will be more AI agents than people browsing the web, carrying out tasks on behalf of users.David Luan, VP of Amazons Autonomy Team and Head of AGI SF Lab, framed the mission more directly in a recent video call interview with VentureBeat: Weve created this new experimental AI model that is trained to perform actions in a web browser. Fundamentally, we think that agents are the building block of computing, he said. Luan, formerly a co-founder and CEO of Adept AI, joined Amazon in 2024 as part of an aqcui-hire. Luan said he has long been a proponent of AI agents. With Adept, we were the first company to really start working on AI agents. At this point, everybody knows how important agents are. It was pretty cool to be a bit ahead of our time, he added.What Nova Act offers devsThe Nova Act SDK provides developers with a framework for constructing web-based automation agents using natural language prompts broken down into clear, manageable steps. Unlike typical LLM-powered agents that attempt entire workflows from a single promptoften resulting in unreliable behaviorNova Act is designed to incrementally execute smaller, verifiable tasks.Some of the key features of Nova Act include:Fine-Grained Task Decomposition: Developers can break down complex digital workflows into smaller act() calls, each guiding the agent to perform specific UI interactions.Direct Browser Manipulation via Playwright: Nova Act integrates with Playwright, an open-source browser automation framework developed by Microsoft. Playwright allows developers to control web browsers programmaticallyclicking elements, filling forms, or navigating pageswithout relying solely on AI predictions. This integration is particularly useful for handling sensitive tasks such as entering passwords or credit card details. For example, instead of sending sensitive information to the model, developers can instruct Nova Act to focus on a password field and then use Playwright APIs to securely enter the password without the model ever seeing it. This approach helps strengthen security and privacy when automating web interactions.Python Integration: The SDK allows developers to interleave Python code with Nova Act commands, including standard Python tools such as breakpoints, assertions, or thread pooling for parallel execution.Structured Information Extraction: The SDK supports structured data extraction through Pydantic schemas, allowing agents to convert screen content into structured formats.Parallelization and Scheduling: Developers can run multiple Nova Act instances concurrently and schedule automated workflows without the need for continuous human oversight.Luan emphasized that Nova Act is a tool for developers rather than a general-purpose chatbot. Nova Act is built for developers. Its not a chatbot you talk to for fun. Its designed to let developers start building useful products, he said.For example, one of the sample workflows demonstrated in Amazons documentation shows how Nova Act can automate apartment searches by scraping rental listings and calculating biking distance to train stations, then sorting the results in a structured table.Another showcased example uses Nova Act to order a specific salad from Sweetgreen every Tuesday, entirely hands-free and on a schedule, illustrating how developers can automate repeatable digital tasks in a way that feels reliable and customizable.Benchmark performance and a focus on reliabilityA central message in Amazons announcement is that reliability, not just intelligence, is the key barrier to widespread agent adoption. Current state-of-the-art models are actually quite brittle at powering AI agents, with agents typically achieving 30% to 60% success rates on browser-based multi-step tasks, according to Amazon.Nova Act, however, emphasizes a building-block approach, scoring over 90% on internal evaluations of tasks that challenge other modelssuch as interacting with dropdowns, date pickers, or pop-ups.Luan underscored why that reliability focus matters. What weve really focused on is how do you actually make agents reliable? If you ask it to update a record in Salesforce and it deletes your database one out of ten times, youre probably never going to use it again, he said.Amazon AGI benchmarked Nova Act against competing models including Anthropics Claude 3.7 Sonnet and OpenAIs CUA model. On the ScreenSpot Web Text benchmark, which tests instruction-following on textual screen elements, Nova Act achieved a score of 0.939, outperforming Claude 3.7 Sonnet (0.900) and OpenAI CUA (0.883). Amazon Nova Act benchmarks. Credit: AmazonOn the ScreenSpot Web Icon benchmark, which focuses on visual UI elements, Nova Act scored 0.879, again ahead of the other models. However, on the GroundUI Web benchmark, which tests general UI interaction, Nova Act scored 0.805, slightly behind its competitors.These scores were measured internally by Amazon using consistent prompts and evaluation criteria.Amazon also highlighted early results in Nova Acts ability to generalize beyond standard environments. For instance, team member Rick Liu demonstrated how the agent, without explicit training, successfully interacted with a pigeon-themed web gameassigning stats, battling opponents, and progressing in the game.According to Luan, that ability to generalize is central to the long-term vision. Our goal with Nova Act is to be a universal browser-use solution. We want an agent that can do anything you want to do on a computer for you, he said.Flexible for use in different clouds, but locked to Amazons Nova modelWhile Nova Act is accessible to developers globally through nova.amazon.com, Luan clarified that the system is tightly coupled to Amazons in-house Nova foundation models. Developers cannot plug in external LLMs such as OpenAIs GPT-4o or Anthropics Claude 3.7 Sonnet, unlike with OpenAIs Agents SDK, and to a lesser extent, Microsofts AutoGen and Salesforces Agentforce platforms (which allow switching to a few different provider companies and model families).Nova Act is a custom trained version of the Nova model, he said. Its not just a scaffolding over a generic LLM. Its natively trained to act on the internet on your behalf.However, Nova Act is not restricted to AWS environments. Developers can download the SDK and run it locally, in the cloud, or wherever they choose. You dont need to be on AWS to use it, Luan stated.Thus, for businesses looking for maximum underlying model flexibility for their agents, Nova Act is probably not the best choice. However, for those looking for a purpose-built model specifically designed to navigate the web and perform actions across a wide variety of websites with very different user interfaces (UIs), its probably worth a look especially if youre already in the Amazon or AWS developer ecosystem. Security, licensing and pricingThe Nova Act SDK is released under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (January 2004), an open source license. However, this applies only to the SDK software. The Nova Act model itself, along with its weights and training data, is proprietary and remains closed-source. The approach is intentional, according to Luan, who explained that the model is tightly integrated and co-trained with the SDK to achieve reliability.At launch, Nova Act is offered as a free research preview. There is no announced pricing for production use yet. Luan described this phase as an opportunity for developers to experiment and build with the technology. Our belief is that the majority of the most useful agent products have not yet been built. We want to enable anybody to build a really useful agent, whether for themselves or as a product, he said.Longer term, Amazon plans to introduce production-grade terms, including usage-based billing and scaling guarantees, but those are not yet available.Whats next for Nova Act?The release of Nova Act reflects Amazons broader ambition to make action-oriented AI agents a foundational component of computing. Luan summed up the opportunity ahead: My personal dream is that agents become the building block of computing, and the coolest new startups and products get built on top of what our team is developing.The Nova Act SDK is available now for experimentation and prototyping on Amazons website and on Github.Daily insights on business use cases with VB DailyIf you want to impress your boss, VB Daily has you covered. We give you the inside scoop on what companies are doing with generative AI, from regulatory shifts to practical deployments, so you can share insights for maximum ROI.Read our Privacy PolicyThanks for subscribing. Check out more VB newsletters here.An error occured.

Before this morning, I knew I was going to buy the Nintendo Switch 2 but I didnt know when. After watching Nintendos Switch 2 Direct today, in which a purple block traced the GameCubes stylized G logo, followed by high-res footage from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker and F-Zero GX and an announcement that theyll be playable at launch, I realized Ill be doing my damndest to get it on day one. It was the cherry on top of a stellar presentation that made the consoles $449.99 price tag way easier to swallow.GameCube games are coming to the Nintendo Switch Online (NSO) subscriptions Classic Game Library feature, which the company is now shortening to Nintendo Classics. It lets you play games from the NES, SNES, and Sega Genesis. Like the Game Boy and Nintendo 64 game collections, youll need the NSO Expansion Pack for GameCube games. The existing catalog of playable Classic Game Library games is far from complete, but together (and combined with DLC for contemporary Switch games), they make the Expansion Pack well worth it.The subscription gets even more enticing on the Switch 2, starting before the console even comes out Nintendo is prioritizing long-time subscribers (with certain caveats) when it sends out Switch 2 preorder invites. The Expansion Pack will also let you play the Switch 2 editions of Zelda games Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom (provided you own their respective Switch 1 versions). But the GameCube games are what Im most excited about. Id love for the Wii Us Wind Waker HD to get a Switch re-release, but the GameCube version is still one of the most beautiful games Ive ever played and looks great in Nintendos trailer for it. So does F-Zero GX, a game with such well-executed style and tight control that I would pit it against any futuristic racer today. The Switch 2 is also launching with Soul Calibur II, a game that featured adult Link as a playable character in his post-Ocarina of Time fighting-people-for-sport era.The company flashed a few other re-releases coming down the line, like Super Mario Strikers and Chibi-Robo!, in the latter of which you play a tiny, toothbrush-armed robot tasked with cleaning up a very messy house. Its way more fun than it sounds, and gives me hope for what Nintendo could announce. There are some excellent, but more obscure gems that never really leapt beyond the GameCube, like the creepy, Lovecraft-inspired Eternal Darkness: Sanitys Requiem and Cubivore, in which you play a small, wild cube trying to bring color back to the world by eating other boxy creatures, winning the chance to mate, die, and be reborn over and over again until youve become the fittest survivor of them all. And all of these will be playable with a forthcoming wireless recreation of the GameCube controller, as they should be. The GameCube wasnt an abject failure, but it sold nowhere near as well as the Wii or the Switch. Theres no guarantee that the Switch 2 will keep up the sales pace set by its predecessor, but even if it manages half that consoles sales, it could give some games a well-deserved second look. See More:

The Switch 2 is here well, almost. Nintendo took the wraps off its new console during its latest Direct event, providing us with a closer look at the $449.99 console ahead of its release on June 5th.In many ways, the sequel is a generational leap from the original console / handheld hybrid that rocked the gaming world over eight years ago. Nintendo is building upon the successful foundation it laid with the original Switch by offering a larger screen, more internal storage, and magnetic Joy-Con controllers that can operate like mice. Its also introducing some new features, like GameChat, which lets players make voice calls, screen share, and video chat.RelatedBelow, were taking a closer look at the on-paper differences between the Switch 2 and its various predecessors specifically, the original Nintendo Switch and the Nintendo Switch OLED. Weve even thrown in the handheld-only Nintendo Switch Lite, just for good measure.In this articlePricing and availabilityThe Switch 2 will retail for $449.99 at launch, or you can buy it bundled with Mario Kart World a Switch 2 exclusive for $499.99 through the fall 2025 or while supplies last. The standard Switch, meanwhile, still retails for $299.99 while the newer OLED edition costs $349.99. Both models can often be found on sale, as can the cheaper Nintendo Switch Lite, but the OLED variant rarely dips below $299.99.Fortunately, like the Switch 2, Nintendo also continues to occasionally sell discounted bundles containing the Switch OLED, a three-month subscription to Nintendo Switch Online, and select games. The latest, which launched less than a month ago for MAR10 Day, contains a digital copy of Super Mario Bros. Wonder for $349.99.The Nintendo Switch 2 features a larger, 7-inch screen with HDR support. Image: NintendoDisplay technologyWith a 7.9-inch 1080p LCD screen, the Switch 2s display is noticeably larger than that of prior Switch models. The original Switch panel comes in at 6.2 inches while the display on the Switch OLED stretches the screen to a respectable seven inches (both support 1,280 x 720 resolution in handheld mode or 1080p when docked). The Switch Lite is the smallest of the bunch with a 5.5-inch 720p display and no docking option.Performance and battery lifeThe Switch 2s predecessors use a custom version of Nvidias Tegra X1 chipset, which uses an octacore Arm CPU and a Maxwell-based Nvidia GPU thats in league with the 900-series graphics cards that ruled the era. The power handily eclipsed smartphones of the time, but lagged well behind the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One that launched years prior. Still, that hasnt stopped developers from producing critically acclaimed games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and excellent ports of several popular titles within the last several years.Nintendo has yet to divulge many technical details about the Switch 2s new Nvidia chipset, only stating that it offers significantly improved CPU and GPU performance compared to the original Switch. We also know that the processor will allow for 4K gameplay at up to 60 frames per second in docked mode or 1080p at up to 120fps (with a variable refresh rate) in handheld mode. As for battery life, you can eke out between 4.5 and nine hours on the Switch and Switch OLED. Nintendo says the Switch 2 can last between 2.5 and 6.5 hours, depending on usage, and takes approximately three hours to charge, just like previous models. The Joy-Con 2 controllers, which magnetically attach to the Switch 2, are a welcome spin on the originals. Image: The Verge / NintendoJoy-Cons and other controllersThe Switch 2 will feature longer, magnetic Joy-Con slots for a more secure connection. Instead of sliding the controllers into a side-mounted rail, you instead push them into a recessed slot. In addition, each Joy-Con 2 will feature more durable analog sticks and function like a mouse in certain scenarios, allowing you to control functionality in select games by simply sliding them across a flat surface.The Joy-Cons that came with the original Switch were available in multiple colors. The Switch 2 controllers, meanwhile, come in a black colorway with red and blue accents surrounding the analog sticks. Matching colors drape the entirety of the attachment point where the shoulder buttons are located, which is visible when using a Joy-Con as a single controller. The inside of the attachment area also matches the Joy-Cons respective colors, and the right Joy-Con now features a C button for accessing various GameChat features.RelatedIf you find Joy-Cons too cramped, rest assured that Nintendo also introduced a new Pro Controller during its recent Direct event. Along with customizable rear buttons and a 3.5mm audio jack, it sports the aforementioned C button found on the Joy-Con 2, which launches a chat menu when pressed. Like Nintendos original pro-grade model, it also features bigger buttons and triggers than the Joy-Cons, but will cost $79.99 (up from $69.99).The Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller comes with a new C button for accessing various GameChat features. Image: NintendoStorage, dock, and moreIn terms of storage, the Switch 2 offers 256GB of internal space, which is eight times the storage capacity of the original Switch and four times that of the Switch OLED. You can add up to 2TB of additional storage using microSD Express cards, too, which offer faster read and write speeds than your standard microSD card.Other notable hardware tweaks include an additional USB-C port on the top of the console and a built-in microphone with noise filtering, so you can chat with friends using Nintendos new Discord-like GameChat feature. GameChat also lets you screen share and make video calls via the new Nintendo Switch 2 Camera. Nintendo has added a redesigned, U-shaped adjustable kickstand to the Switch 2 as well, which spans the width of the display.As for the Nintendo Switch 2 dock, it comes with a built-in ethernet port just like the Switch OLED dock, whereas the original dock requires an optional adapter. The new dock also features a pair of USB-C ports, as opposed to just one, while retaining an HDMI port. The Nintendo Switch 2 console, Joy-Cons, and dock. Image: NintendoGames and softwareThe original Switch had about a dozen titles available at launch, with dozens more released by the end of 2017. As of writing, Nintendo has announced a number of Switch 2 launch titles, including first-party games like Mario Kart World and third-party titles such as Split Fiction and Cyberpunk 2077. Nintendo also announced that select GameCube games are coming to Nintendo Switch Online and that several enhanced Switch 2 Edition games will be available at launch, most notably The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom.You will have plenty more to play on the Switch 2, however, as its backward compatible with most Switch 1 games. That said, Nintendo says some older titles may have some in-game compatibility issues, including Doom: Eternal, Rocket League, NBA 2K25, and Warframe. You also wont be able to make use of Nintendos creative VR kit (sorry, Labo fans).By the numbersThe standard Switch and Switch OLED are nearly identical on paper, but the Switch 2 has many notable upgrades. You can see how all three compare, along with the Switch Lite, in the chart below.SpecificationNintendo Switch 2Nintendo SwitchNintendo Switch OLEDNintendo Switch LiteProcessorCustom Nvidia chipset (details TBD)Nvidia Tegra X1 custom chipsetNvidia Tegra X1 custom chipsetNvidia Tegra X1 custom chipsetScreen type7.9-inch LCD6.2-inch LCD7-inch OLED5.5-inch LCDResolution (handheld)1,920 x 10801,280 x 7201,280 x 7201,280 x 720Resolution (docked)3,840 x 2,1601,920 x 1,0801,920 x 1,080N/AHDR10 support?YesNoNoNoInternal storage256GB32GB64GB32GBExpandable storagemicroSD Express (up to 2TB)microSD (up to 2TB)microSD (up to 2TB)microSD (up to 2TB)SensorsAccelerometer / gyroscope, mouse / brightness (in console)Accelerometer / gyroscopeAccelerometer / gyroscopeAccelerometer / gyroscopePorts (handheld)2x USB-C / 3.5mmUSB-C / 3.5mmUSB-C / 3.5mmUSB-C / 3.5mmPorts (dock)2x USB-C / HDMI / ethernet3x USB 2.0 / USB-C (power adapter) / HDMI2x USB 2.0 / USB-C (power adapter) / HDMI / ethernetN/AWireless connectivityWi-Fi 6 / Bluetooth / NFCWi-Fi 5 / Bluetooth 4.1 / NFCWi-Fi 5 / Bluetooth 4.1 / NFCWi-Fi 5 / Bluetooth 4.1 / NFCWired connectivityEthernet (docked mode)Ethernet via optional adapter (docked mode)Ethernet (docked mode)N/ABuilt-in mic?YesNoNoNoSpeakersStereo speakersStereo speakersStereo speakersStereo speakersBattery capacity5,220mAh lithium-ion4,310mAh lithium-ion4,310mAh lithium-ion3,570mAh lithium-ionBattery life (est.)2 to 6.5 hours4.5 to 9 hours4.5 to 9 hours3 to 7 hoursCharging timeAbout 3 hoursAbout 3 hoursAbout 3 hoursAbout 3 hoursGame card slotSwitch 2 and Switch cartridgesSwitch cartridgesSwitch cartridgesSwitch cartridgesWeight (grams)399.16g (or 535.24g with Joy-Con 2 controllers attached)299.3g (or 399g with Joy-Con controllers attached)322g (or 422g with Joy-Con controllers attached)275gDimensions4.5 x 10.7 x .55 inches4 x 9.5 x .55 inches4 x 9.4 x .55 inches3.6 x 8.2 x .55 inchesStarting price$449.99$299.99$349.99$199.99AvailableJune 5th, 2025NowNowNowSee More:

The rapid progress in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) research underscores the importance of accurately evaluating AI agents capabilities in replicating complex, empirical research tasks traditionally performed by human researchers. Currently, systematic evaluation tools that precisely measure the ability of AI agents to autonomously reproduce ML research findings remain limited, posing challenges in fully understanding the potential and limitations of such systems.OpenAI has introduced PaperBench, a benchmark designed to evaluate the competence of AI agents in autonomously replicating state-of-the-art machine learning research. PaperBench specifically measures whether AI systems can accurately interpret research papers, independently develop the necessary codebases, and execute experiments to replicate empirical outcomes. The benchmark comprises 20 papers selected from ICML 2024, covering areas including reinforcement learning, robustness, and probabilistic methods. Detailed rubrics, co-developed with original paper authors, specify 8,316 individually gradable tasks to facilitate precise evaluation of AI capabilities.From a technical perspective, PaperBench requires AI agents to process provided research papers and supplementary clarifications to develop comprehensive code repositories from scratch. These repositories must include complete experimental setups and execution scripts, notably the reproduce.sh file. To ensure genuine independent replication, agents are prohibited from referencing or reusing code from the original authors repositories. Rubrics are structured hierarchically to detail explicit pass-fail criteria at various levels, allowing systematic and objective assessment. Evaluation is conducted using SimpleJudge, an automated large language model (LLM)-based judge, which simplifies the grading process. SimpleJudge achieved an F1 score of 0.83 on JudgeEval, an auxiliary evaluation dataset specifically designed to validate automated grading accuracy.Empirical evaluations of several advanced AI models indicate varying performance levels on PaperBench. Claude 3.5 Sonnet exhibited the highest capability with an average replication score of 21.0%. Other models such as OpenAIs GPT-4o and Gemini 2.0 Flash attained significantly lower scores of 4.1% and 3.2%, respectively. Comparatively, expert human ML researchers achieved considerably higher accuracy, reaching up to 41.4% after 48 hours of dedicated effort. Analysis of model performance revealed strengths in initial rapid code generation and early experimental setup but highlighted substantial weaknesses in managing prolonged tasks, troubleshooting, and adapting strategic approaches over time.These results provide critical technical insights into current AI system capabilities. While AI models demonstrate competence in certain coding tasks and initial experiment implementation, significant gaps persist, particularly regarding sustained task execution, adaptive problem-solving, and strategic planning. Additionally, the introduction of PaperBench Code-Dev, a streamlined variant emphasizing code correctness without experimental execution, offers a practical alternative for broader and resource-limited community use due to reduced computational and evaluation costs.In summary, PaperBench represents an important step toward methodically evaluating AI research capabilities. It provides a structured and detailed assessment environment that highlights specific strengths and limitations of contemporary AI models relative to human performance. The collaborative development of rubrics ensures precise and realistic evaluations. OpenAIs open-sourcing of PaperBench supports further exploration and development in the field, enhancing understanding of autonomous AI research capabilities and informing responsible progression in this area.Check outthe Paper and GitHub page.All credit for this research goes to the researchers of this project. Also,feel free to follow us onTwitterand dont forget to join our85k+ ML SubReddit. Asif RazzaqWebsite| + postsBioAsif Razzaq is the CEO of Marktechpost Media Inc.. As a visionary entrepreneur and engineer, Asif is committed to harnessing the potential of Artificial Intelligence for social good. His most recent endeavor is the launch of an Artificial Intelligence Media Platform, Marktechpost, which stands out for its in-depth coverage of machine learning and deep learning news that is both technically sound and easily understandable by a wide audience. The platform boasts of over 2 million monthly views, illustrating its popularity among audiences.Asif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Nomic Open Sources State-of-the-Art Multimodal Embedding ModelAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Meta AI Proposes Multi-Token Attention (MTA): A New Attention Method which Allows LLMs to Condition their Attention Weights on Multiple Query and Key VectorsAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Meet ReSearch: A Novel AI Framework that Trains LLMs to Reason with Search via Reinforcement Learning without Using Any Supervised Data on Reasoning StepsAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/How to Build a Prototype X-ray Judgment Tool (Open Source Medical Inference System) Using TorchXRayVision, Gradio, and PyTorch

The Nintendo Switch 2 is finally here and as previously reported the Switch 2 will be largely backwards compatible with Switch 1 games. However, there appears to be a concerted effort from Nintendo to introduce specially enhanced versions of Switch 1 games to the Switch 2. And these seem to go beyond just a graphical boost and framerate bump.PlayWhat Games are Playable on Switch 2?As Nintendo breaks down, there will be primarily three types of games playable on the Switch 2. Native Switch 2 games that are developed for the system and cannot be played on the original Switch. Compatible Switch 1 games whose cartridges can slot right into the Switch 2 and be played natively on the console. And Switch 2 Edition games which are Switch 1 games that will receive new features and performance enhancements when played on Switch 2.This doesnt include classic games that are available through Nintendo Switch Online which includes a library of games from the NES, SNES, Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, and now GameCube.So What Comes in a Switch 2 Edition Game?The main takeaway from the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct is that Nintendo appears to be trying to throw in a little extra for anyone playing a Switch 2 Edition of a Switch 1 game. For example, Super Mario Party Jamboree was a Switch game and the Switch 2 Edition will come with a new suite of content called Jamboree TV that will take advantage of the Joy-Con 2 mouse controls, Switch 2 microphone, and the Switch 2 USB-C camera that will be sold separately.PlayAlong with upgraded resolution up to 1440p in TV mode and better frame rate, there will be new minigames and online functions as well.Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, which will be a cross-gen game, will support mouse controls with Joy-Con 2, and multiple display modes like Quality Mode which runs at 60fps in 4K when docked, or 1080p at 60fps on handheld; or Performance Mode which runs a 120fps in 1080p when docked, or 120fps in 720p in handheld mode. All modes will support HDR.PlayOther Switch 2 Edition titles will get new story content like Kirby and the Forgotten Lands Star-Crossed World add-on, while The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom will gain additional support for the Zelda Notes service in the Nintendo Switch App that will give you guides and game help.Some games, like Pokemon Legends: Z-A will only feature performance and resolution bumps as part of the Switch 2 Edition label.When are the Switch 2 Edition Games Coming?The Switch 2 is set to be released on June 5, 2025 and thats around when the first batch of Switch 2 Edition games will arrive.The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will get Switch 2 Editions on the day of the consoles launch on June 5, 2025.Switch 2 Editions for Super Mario Party Jamboree + Jamboree TV will arrive a little later on July 24, 2025. Same for Kirby and the Forgotten Lands update which will arrive on August 28, 2025.Neither Metroid Prime 4: Beyond of Pokemon Legends: Z-A have release dates yet so both Switch 2 Editions are scheduled for sometime in 2025.PlayHow Much Will Switch 2 Editions Cost?That depends. If you dont own the Switch 1 version of the game, then you can purchase the Switch 2 Edition at retail, which will be distinct thanks to the new red-colored physical game case. The digital versions will also feature a prominent Switch 2 logo so you know youre buying the right edition for your Switch 2.If you own the game on Switch 1 and want the upgrades that will be added in the Switch 2 Edition you will need to purchase an upgrade pack from Nintendo. The upgrade packs will be available at select retailers, the official My Nintendo Store, and Nintendo eShop. However, Nintendo has not revealed how much an upgrade pack will cost just yet.Some upgrade packs, like the upgrade to the Switch 2 Edition of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom will be included in a Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack membership. This is the same membership that gives Switch owners access to online features and the classic library.Nintendo Direct: Nintendo Switch 2 Zelda Nintendo Switch EditionsSo there you have it, thats everything you need to know about the Switch 2 Editions of a game. Weve detailed previously how Nintendo is making the jump to the Switch 2 fairly seamless thanks to its backward compatibility stance, and it looks like Nintendo is looking to bolster its launch library with improved versions of Switch classics.For more on Nintendo Switch 2 check out all the news announced during the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct as well as how much it costs, and when pre-orders go up.Matt Kim is IGN's Senior Features Editor.