A study suggests that catching COVID-19 significantly raises the risk of developing ME/CFS (formerly called "chronic fatigue syndrome"), a typically lifelong condition that can be debilitating.

Xbox has introduced the Xbox Excellence Awards, which picks its winners based on how players engaged with Xbox games over the past year. It has four different categories, and they're much different than the typical ones we've seen like "Game of the Year" or "Best RPG." The four categories are Store Rating, Player Engagement, Daily Active Users, and Units Sold.For Store Rating, it measures the highest-rated content across all of Microsoft and Xbox's stores in 2024, provided the games have a minimum of 500 ratings each. Player Engagement measures games with he highest average hours per player within the first six weeks of release. Daily Active Users measures games, expansions, and major updates with the highest single active user count in 2024. This particular category can also include games that weren't released in 2024.Lastly, Units Sold simply refers to the top-selling content across Microsoft and Xbox stores. The list also doesn't order them in terms of quantity or numerically like a "top-downloaded games" list, but rather alphabetically.As for Xbox this upcoming year, Xbox Games Studios is starting off strong during the first half of 2025. Avowed launches on February 18, followed by South of Midnight on April 8, and then Doom: The Dark Ages on May 15. As for third-party support, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and Ninja Gaiden 4 are set to release on April 24 and in Fall 2025, respectively, with both games launching day-one on Game Pass. Store RatingBalatroBanishers: Ghosts of New EdenBotany ManorLike a Dragon: Infinite WealthLittle Kitty, Big CityLollipop Chainsaw RePopMetaphor: ReFantazioNobody Wants to DiePersona 3 ReloadPoppy Playtime: Chapter 1, 2, 3Return to GraceRoundsSenuas Saga: Hellblade IIShin Megami Tensei V: VengeanceSonic x Shadow GenerationsStill Wakes the DeepThe Lord of the Rings: Return to MoraThe Outlast TrialsUnicorn OverlordWarhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 Player EngagementDragon Age: The VeilguardDragons Dogma 2EA Sports College Football 25EA Sports FC 25F1 Manager 2024Farming Simulator 25Final Fantasy XIV: DawntrailHouse Flipper 2Like a Dragon: Infinite WealthMetaphor: ReFantazioMLB The Show 24NBA 2K25New World: AeternumNHL 25Path of Exile 2Shin Megami Tensei V: VengeanceSkull and BonesStar Wars OutlawsWarhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2WWE 2K24 Daily Active UsersApex LegendsCall of Duty: Black Ops 6Dead Island 2Diablo IV: Vessel of HatredEA Sports College Football 25EA Sports FC 25Elden Ring Shadow of the ErdtreeFallout 4FortniteForza Horizon 5Grand Theft Auto OnlineIndiana Jones and the Great CircleMarvel RivalsMinecraftMLB The Show 24PalworldRobloxRocket LeagueStalker 2 Heart of ChornobylTom Clancys Rainbow Six Siege Units Sold7 Days to DieAvatar: Frontiers of PandoraCall of Duty: Black Ops 6Dragon Age: The VeilguardDragon Ball: Sparking! ZeroDragons Dogma 2EA Sports College Football 25EA Sports FC 25EA Sports Madden NFL 25Farming Simulator 25Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024MLB The Show 24NBA 2K25NHL 25PalworldPhasmophobiaStar Wars OutlawsThe Lord of the Rings: Return to MoriaWarhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2WWE 2K24

The lore of the Diablo franchise features stories of cultists, demons, and Prime Evils, and several of these horrific tales have been collected into Shadows of Sanctuary: A Diablo Short Story Collection. Out soon on March 18, you can preorder this tome of dark fantasy for $19.95 at Amazon. Shadows of Sanctuary: A Diablo Short Story Collection $19.95 Written by various authors and members of the Diablo development team, this book focuses on the pervasive evil of those games and the struggle to earn a single moment of reprieve in Sanctuary. "From the slums of Kingsport to the shores of the Cold Isles, the belching sewers of Khanduran holdfasts to a crumbling castle on the moors of Scosglen, Hell takes root in its varied forms. But a warning is offered to those who would challenge it: evil endures defeat, death, and time. Lose vigilance for but a moment, and it will return to claim what it is owed," the official book synopsis reads. See at Amazon For more Diablo reading material, you can pick up Diablo: Tales from the Horadric Library for $18.66 at Amazon (was $30). This is another compilation of short stories written by members of the Diablo development team and horror authors and should be the perfect companion to the upcoming Shadows of Sanctuary collection.You can also check out the five official Diablo character tomes written from the perspective of familiar Diablo characters, including Deckard Cain, the archangel Tyrael, Adria the witch, Lorath Nahr, and Reverend Mother Prava. Each hardcover book provides insight into the character's backstories and the various aspects of the Diablo universe they're most familiar with, along with illustrations for various characters, locations, monsters, and more. Continue Reading at GameSpot

Its time for Januarys Partners event in Monopoly GO. The new Plushie Partners event is here from January 24 to January 29. It brings lots of awesome rewards for participants, but to take part, you will need its tokens, and thats where the Polar Park solo event comes in.

New posters for Captain America: Brave New World from Thailand gave two major characters a twist. The artist infused the artwork with local folklore.

The Space-Time Smackdown cards are coming to Pokmon TCG Pocket before the end of January, adding more than 140 new cards across two booster packs.The Space-Time Smackdown expansion will focus on the Sinnoh region and will feature Dialga and Palkia as the figurehead Pokmon for the two new packs. The expansion also introduces Tool-type cards that will provide your Pokmon with even more support in battle.Below, weve created a table outlining all the new Space-Time Smackdown Expansion cards we know so far from the expansion trailer along with their typing, HP, and attack or ability.Every Space-Time Smackdown expansion card we know so farHeres every new Space-Time Smackdown card we know so far laid out in a handy table. Note that in some cases, certain stat lines werent visible. Well update this guide as more information becomes available.CardTypeHPAttack/AbilityTurtwigGrass80Bite (30)ChimcharFire60Scratch (20)PiplupWater60Nap — Heal 20 damage from this Pokémon.ShinxLightning——PachirisuLightning—Sparking Gadget (40+) — If this Pokémon has a Pokémon Tool attached, this attack does 40 more damage.HonchkrowDarkness100Skill Dive — ?GibleDragon60Gnaw (?)GarchompDragon——LucarioFighting100Submarine Blow (40)   Fighting Coach (Ability) — Attacks used by your fighting Pokémon do +20 damage to your opponent's active Pokémon.Togekiss———LeafeonGrass90Leafy Cyclone (90) — ?Dialga exMetal150Metallic Turbo (30) — Take 2 metal energy from your energy zone and attach to 1 of your benched Pokémon.   Heavy Impact (100)Palkia exWater150Slash (30) Dimensional Storm (150) Discard 3 water energy from this Pokémon. This attack does 20 damage to each of your opponent' benched Pokémon.CresseliaPsychic110Moonlight Gain (50) — Heal 20 damage from this Pokémon.CynthiaSupporter—During this turn, attacks used by your Garchomp and Togekiss do +50 damage to your opponent's active Pokémon.

Reddit communities dedicated to PC gaming, Nintendo, and Destiny have decided to blacklist links to X (formerly Twitter) due to owner Elon Musks recent Nazi-like saluting at an inauguration rally for President Donald Trump as part of a growing movement by users of the social media site to distance themselves from the controversial billionaire. All have millions of members and rank within the sites top 500 pages.Similar bans were also noticed by GameSpot on subreddits for the Steam Deck, Monster Hunter, and World of Warcraft.Speaking with Polygon, r/pcgaming mod Shock4ndAwe pointed to the slow degradation of X since Musk purchased the site as well as Musks own behavior as major factors in their teams decision to blacklist links to X.Weve all seen the hate and the toxicity rise, Shock4ndAwe said, speaking on behalf of the subreddits moderation team. The constant attacks and vilification of people who arent straight, white, and male. The usernames and profile statuses denigrating and belittling folks who simply want to exist. Good moderation practices being done away with. New rules requiring a user to login to view content which creates a bad experience for users that either dont have an X account or arent logged into one. Wed be lying if we didnt also include Elons actions. This is the billionaire owner that creates sock puppet accounts to defend himself in public. He suspends journalists who criticize him. He made a Nazi salute at a presidential inauguration.r/nintendo mod razorbeamz provided a similar, if more succinct, response: We felt it was the right thing to do after Elon Musk performed a Nazi salute on stage.Other gaming subreddits in the top 500 for Fortnite, The Legend of Zelda, Apex Legends, and Super Smash Bros. are currently having open discussions about banning X links as well. Opinions on blacklisting vary depending on the community, ranging from broad support to the asinine keep politics out of it refrain thats all too common in both gaming and other online communities. And while Reddit itself has promised not to interfere with subreddits that choose to ban X links, Shock4ndAwe believes the movement is important to improving Reddit as a whole.We want to be very clear in saying that Reddit isnt a perfect platform either, the r/pcgaming mod said. Reddit allows communities to exist on their platform that spread hate, sexism, racism, transphobia, and other forms of bigotry. This affects our community so much that weve had to take the extraordinary step of banning people from specific subreddits preemptively. So its even more important that when other subreddits decide that X needs to be banned that we join them. Because Reddit the company doesnt care.The response from the r/nintendo community has been overwhelmingly positive, razorbeamz explained, apart from a few outside agitators lodging complaints despite never posting on the subreddit. We heard the same from Shock4ndAwe, who said the r/pcgaming community is fine with the decision, while non-members have taken to participating in brigades organized attempts from outside entities to disrupt normal discussion on the forum and threatening the moderation team and their families. One of the offending messages provided to Polygon calls the mods raging f4gys, incorrectly states there are only two genders, and signs off with Epstein yrslf.This was reported to the Reddit admins who informed us that the threatening posts do not violate site rules and no action was taken on the offending account, Shock4ndAwe said. Polygon asked Reddit for comment on the situation but had yet to hear back at the time of publishing this story.What exactly Musk meant by striking his chest and extending his arm straight out continues to be a baffling debate among unserious people in mainstream media and conservatives who refuse to acknowledge the openly fascist goals of President Trumps inner circle for what they are. A group of elected Jewish officials from New York, however, was very blunt in a Jan. 22 statement on the matter, saying:On January 20th, we saw Elon Musk give what appeared to be two Nazi salutes otherwise known as a Sieg Heil or a Roman salute at an official presidential event, from a podium that bore the presidential seal. As Jewish elected officials committed to combating antisemitism in New York, we unequivocally condemn this action and the lack of apology. Given that Elon Musk has repeatedly pushed the antisemitic Great Replacement theory and endorsed the Nazi-supporting AfD party in Germany, it is not hard to imagine that he knew exactly what he was doing.Among many other sweeping executive actions taken on day one, President Trump pardoned hundreds of January 6th rioters, including one who notoriously wore a Camp Auschwitz shirt to the Capitol insurrection. Thousands of people will be materially harmed by the administrations sweeping actions on day one, and we stand in solidarity with those New Yorkers.It should not be hard to call any of this out. Any organization or leader that purports to combat hate against Jews and other minority groups must do so loudly and clearly. There is no room for ambiguity when it comes to Nazi symbology. The time is now to protect ourselves and our neighbors, not to normalize hate.With all that in mind, we had one more question for our Reddit mods: What needs to happen for X links to be reinstated in their communities? Both were less than hopeful of that ever being a possibility, but mentioned Musk divesting from the platform as being a good start.Realistically? Shock4ndAwe said. I dont think theres anything X can do that will make us comfortable linking to them in the future.

A recent software update meant to stabilize battery performance on the Pixel 4a has had an unexpected side effect: Some Pixel 4a owners are reporting that their phones can now barely hold a charge. There's a particularly egregious example on Reddit, where a user reported that their phone is down from seven hours of screen time on a single charge to just 30 minutes.Pixel 4a's battery performance issuesEarlier this month, Google published a detailed document explaining the Pixel 4a software update to Android 13. The company says that some people are experiencing a degradation in the battery's capacity, runtime, or performance, as is expected with lithium-ion batteries of a certain age. However, in the Pixel 4a's case, Google decided to push a software update to provide more stable battery performance, but the caveat is that it may lead to reduced battery life and slower charging.In the document, Google said, "For some devices (Impacted Devices), the update includes new battery management features to improve the stability of your batterys performance, so the battery may last for shorter periods between charges. Users of Impacted Devices may also notice other changes, like reduced charging performance or changes to how the battery-level indicator on your phone shows your battery capacity." As a result, some Pixel 4a users have been left with phones that can barely hold a charge.Google's solution for Pixel 4a battery issuesThe company has offered a few options for Pixel 4a owners impacted by this software update: a free battery replacement, a one-time payment of $50, or a $100 credit that you can use toward a new Pixel phone from Google. Reddit users appear to have had good experiences with battery replacements, with some of them reporting that they were able to get it done in under two hours. Most people have recommended taking in your device in-person in order to ensure the lowest possible turnaround time and to reduce the risk of loss or damage. Having said that, it involves some effort in backing up the device and a factory reset. Although people have got their batteries replaced without doing either, I don't recommend it. A complete backup is an essential step if you don't want to lose data. The factory reset step ensures that strangers can't access all the data on your unlocked phone.How to check if your Pixel 4a is impactedGoogle calls affected Pixel 4a "Impacted Devices." You can check if yours is one of them by going to this Google Pixel support page and follow the on-screen prompts to opt for one of the three offered solutions. You'll be able to either ask for a free battery replacement, request store credit, or take the cash payment.

Complicated cleaning hacks can be fun projects, but I love a simple one even moreand this one is really simple: You can use the lid of a pot or pan to clean your carpets and fabrics. It works like a charm, which is why its been all over TikTok for the past few years.To freshen up your upholstery or carpet, youll need:The lid from a pot or pan, with a handle in the centerA large microfiber ragA bowl of waterDish soapDepending on what youre cleaning and how you like to do it, you may want to add a few drops of vinegar or vodka, but otherwise, stick to the cleaning recipes youd normally use for whatever upholstery or carpet youre working on. Cleaning the upholsteryFill a bowl with your cleaning solution, whether its a mixture of liquid dish detergent and baking soda, water and vinegar, or a store-bought upholstery cleaner. (I used what I had on hand, which was laundry detergent.) Drop your cloth in the bowl, saturate it with the mixture, then squeeze out the excess, and lay the fabric down flat.Set your lid in the center of your damp cloth and pull the edges up around it, securing them over the handle with a rubber band. If they dont quite reach that far, just secure them tightly over the handle with your hand as you work. Credit: Lindsey Ellefson Now you have a fabric-covered disk that you can push around on your couches, chairs, carpets, rugs, or pillows. It will pick up lint and freshen the fabrics without making anything too damp. I recommend pushing the soapy rag around on the upholstery until it's decently damp and clean, then going back in with a plain wet rag on the lid instead of the soapy one and then either drying the area with a hair dryer or fan (or opening a window and letting the outside air take care of it).Why I like this cleaning methodThe goal here isnt to make your carpets and cushions wet, but to give them a damp refreshthe lid provides stability and works the solution in gently and evenly. It's easy to push the lid along the surface of a couch or chair cushion, and the heft of the lid gives you some extra power. When you're just using a rag, it's hard to push down enough to really clean the area, since both the rag and the upholstery are so soft. Inevitably, you end up pushing down too much and making the spot too wet, which is no goodif the cushion doesn't dry out fully, that can lead to mold or bad smells. I recently spilled coffee all over my couch; despite dabbing it up that day, I was left with hideous stains. This couch is old and cost me like $200 on Amazon years ago, so it's not really worth pulling out a bunch of stops or getting a professional machine to deal with. I decided to give the pan lid a try. Credit: Lindsey Ellefson To my horror, just one round of pot-lid scrubbing pulled up a lot of residual coffee. To my pleasure, it required very little elbow grease on my part and did not soak my poor, cheap couch in too much cleaning solution. The entire couch looks much better and was fine to sit on again in under an hour, after just a little bit of air drying. Not every TikTok hack works, but this one sure does.

The extremely popular strategy game Endless Legend is finally getting a sequel, ten whole years after the original game began blowing up sales charts. Developer Amplitude Studios, who made the first one, just dropped a trailer for Endless Legend 2 and it looks pretty darned cool.This game and its sequel fall under the 4X sub-genre of strategy games, meaning the crux of the gameplay involves building an empire of some kind. The Civilization titles are a great example of 4X strategy. 4X actually stands for eXplore, eXpand, eXploit and eXterminate. I guess 4E just didnt have the same vibe.In any event, Endless Legend 2 is set in a new location, the oceanic world of Saiadha. The trailer hints at the mysterious nature of this world and showcases the refined gameplay mechanics. It also looks like players could stumble upon an imprisoned god during campaigns. Good times.Players can adopt the role of various factions in the game, many of which are shown off in the trailer. Theres a human-like race, an insectoid race and a centaur-like race, among others.Here's more good news for fans of the original. While Amplitude hasnt announced a release date yet, it did say that it will enter early access in early 2025. Using my advanced math skills I have deduced that its early 2025 right now. The early access build will let players take control of four of the aforementioned factions, with two more coming with the full release.If that nebulous release date has got you down, there's a way to try the game out even earlier. The company has reopened applications for its insider program. Not everyone will be selected for the initial testing phase, but its worth a shot.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/endless-legend-2-is-real-and-theres-a-mysterious-trailer-to-prove-it-191206441.html?src=rss