The iPad mini 7 was received pretty well by the tech community after its launch, but there are still areas that Apple needs to work on. The size and form factor of the device is ideal and a favorite for many, but the display is where things could have been better. The iPad mini lineup has featured an LCD display for years, and it appears that the seventh iteration could be the last one. The latest suggests that Apple is testing an OLED display for the iPad mini, which will be made by Samsung Display.Apple's 2026 version of the iPad mini could get an OLED upgrade, slated to be supplied by SamsungA Weibo-based leaker who goes by the name of Digital Chat Station on the platform claims that Apple's next iPad mini could feature a Samsung-made OLED display, which will be a major step up from the current display type. The leaker also claims that even though the display will be supplied by the South Korean tech giant, it remains to be seen if Apple will use a 60Hz or a higher refresh rate panel.The existing iteration of the LCD panel on the iPad mini 7 features a 60Hz refresh rate, but if we are lucky, the company could announce the next version with an OLED display with 120Hz ProMotion technology, which will also fix an essential issue with the device. This is not the first time that we have heard details on the iPad mini's display upgrade, and some reports have also coined that Apple has requested OLED panels for the iPad mini from its suppliers.It was also reported last year that Samsung has already started developing a sample 8-inch OLED display for the future iPad mini. It plans to initiate mass production at its Cheonan facility in the second half of this year. The same report also claimed that the company will upgrade the iPad Air lineup with an OLED display as well. However, these notions are slightly different from the reports shared by Ross Young from DSCC, claiming that the company is working on a slightly bigger 8.5-inch OLED display for the iPad mini, which will be released in 2026. while the iPad Air lineup will be upgraded the following year.There are various benefits associated with an OLED display compared to an LCD panel, which could make the next iPad mini upgrade a significant one compared to previous years. For one, the picture quality on the OLED display is far better than that of the LCD. It features inkier blacks, improved contrast ratio, and better saturation, allowing the panel to deliver punchier and crispier content.Apart from this, the OLED display is also more power efficient than the LCD panels, allowing the device to consume less power and deliver better overall battery life. The iPad mini has also faced jelly scrolling issues in the past, and while Apple has fixed it to some extent, it is not entirely gone. The OLED display on the iPad mini could finally eliminate jelly scrolling from the iPad mini lineup.Deal of the Day

ASUS has released a new BIOS update for their GeForce RTX 5080 ROG Astral model, which has apparently bumped up TGP to 450W.ASUS Has Released a BIOS Update For Its ROG Astral RTX 5080 That Will Increase Power Limits, Now 90W Higher Than Base ModelsIt seems that ASUS knows that its ROG Astral variants have far greater potential, and with the new BIOS update, the company plans to capitalize on this. The GeForce RTX 5080 ROG Astral, in particular, will now come with a TGP rated at 450W, marking a 50W bump from its original figures. It is important to note that the ROG Astral already has a higher TDP than the base GeForce RTX 5080 models, so it is safe to say that with the new increase, power limits have exceeded new levels.The BIOS update was released on March 14, mainly featuring the TGP rating change. While ASUS hasn't specifically mentioned the reason behind bumping up the power consumption, it would likely be to position the ROG Astral model as a top-tier offering and squeeze out the extra performance they can by increasing the limits.Apart from the GeForce RTX 5080 ROG Astral, only Gigabyte's GeForce RTX 5080 Gaming comes with a 450W TGP, which is an interesting choice given that this model isn't seen as a high-end variant.The ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5080 will now have higher power limits out of the box, but in terms of performance differences, we aren't anticipating much, likely a 2%-5% increase. So, the decision to increase TGP here won't be of much benefit to ASUS, but it is still exciting to see the company compete for high-end variants in the GPU segment, given that there aren't many left out there.News Source: VideocardzDeal of the Day

Inworld AI had abig presence at GDC 2024, where it demonstrated new tech demos of its AI Character Engine in collaboration with gaming giants like Microsoft, Ubisoft, and NVIDIA. One year later, during the recent GDC 2025, their presence was undoubtedly way more understated, with less flashy partnerships to talk about. That doesn't mean there's no development going on behind the scenes, though. During the recent convention in San Francisco, we caught up with Inworld AI CEO Kylan Gibbs to discover what they've been up to lately.Let's talk about your company's evolution over the past few years.We've been around for almost four years now. The first thing we started out with was this character engine that was a server-side application connected to your game engines via an SDK. It was largely meant to abstract away a lot of the complexity of AI, mainly for designers and narrative writers. The biggest learning that we had was that people wanted much more control, and they wanted the logic and everything to run locally.A big focus for us product-wise has been shifting away from that server-side application to take the logic and tools that we built our own engine with and turn them into a series of libraries that developers can actually use directly in the engine to build their own AI engines effectively. That means it's a C++ runtime that can be transformed as needed for other engines.That has been the transition from character engine to framework. As part of that, we've had a focus on observability and telemetry. One of the challenges is that, with AI, a lot of game developers don't have the transparency that they need to actually understand when something breaks, what went wrong, and when something is good, what might happen.That's our portal tool, which allows developers to access the telemetry built into that framework. The big thing, though, is we need to bring not just the logic locally but, ideally, the models locally, which is what every game developer wants, so we've had a huge focus on that as well.What we've built is a tool that allows us to use our cloud to actually distill down models that can be used locally. Of course, the challenge there is that a lot of consumer hardware is not ready to run everything locally. What we end up building into a lot of these applications is what we call a hybrid inference model where you have the actual model locally stored, but it detects if it can run on the hardware and if not, it backs up to a cloud version. For example, if it lands on a PC with a GeForce RTX 5090, you run it locally. If it lands on a Nintendo Switch, you're going to use the cloud.The other big focus that we had is what we call controlled evolution. The biggest challenge with AI overall right now for games and for consumer apps in general is if you launch a game today with a given model, and you keep that model, in six months, it will be outdated because AI is moving too quickly. You need to basically constantly be able to select from all the third-party or our own models that are available, figure out which one is the best at that given time, and then do a bunch of optimization on it based on your user usage.We try to work with developers so that they do not have to make a $20 million commitment to a specific cloud provider model provider but to use whatever the best model is at any given time and optimize that specifically for their use case, because every model is built for these kinds of huge general-purpose tasks. We need to do one thing super well, and so we do a lot of work there.Because AAA games and all the largest studios that we work at Inworld with have obviously very long development cycles, the biggest launches today are largely mobile browser-based applications. The AAA ones take a little longer. The ones that I think are most exciting are Status, for example, which is from a company called Wishroll. It's a game where you roleplay as a character in another universe's Twitter.Crazy idea. But they hit 500K users in 19 days from launch with an average spend of an hour and a half per user per day, which is crazy traffic and the whole thing is powered by your achievements, the content. It's just mindblowingly creative in terms of what they built.The other one is Little Umbrella. They have another part of the company called Playroom, which might be familiar. They built Death by AI as their first game and just released another one called The Last Show, which is effectively a JackBox-style party game powered by AI. Those are super fun because they lean into AI orchestrating multiplayer scenarios in real time.A few other cool ones are Streamlabs, where we created a streaming assistant in a collaboration between us, Streamlabs with Logitech and Nvidia. The game that we're using for it is Fortnite. In that case, you have this system that's living alongside the game in real time, seeing what's happening in the game, understanding the game's state, observing the user comments, hearing what the streamers are saying and being able to take complex actions, like do I need to overclock the GPU? Do I need to change the camera settings? Do I need to trigger an in-game event? All of those different things can actually happen, and they have to happen with millisecond latency. So, to make it all work performantly, that kind of mix of hybrid and local inference has to be required.Speaking of StreamLabs, does it have functionality for a sort of gaming coach where it can monitor how you're proceeding with the game?Yes, with Streamlabs, that's basically how it performs. In this case, these are professional streamers often using it, so they really don't need coaching. But if you were a player going into the game, you'd belike, what the heck does this item do, right? What's the best next thing for me to do? It can do all of that.The biggest class of use cases that we're seeing, which I call companions and assistants, are two different varieties of companions: disembodied and embodied companions. Disembodied is your Streamlabs assistant. It's outside the game, able to observe it, but not actually literally within the game. It's often used for coaching, assistants, questions, and live walkthroughs.The other is embodied. You would use it for onboarding, which is a huge use case. Instead of having your blocks of text and everything starting, a character sees what you're doing, gives you suggestions, tells you how to play the game, and gives you comments. It can also be used later on, for example, for things like difficulty assistance. Maybe if you're stuck, it can show and tell how you're going to do this.There are other use cases like player emulation, especially when you're doing multiplayer co-op games and MMOs. You jump in, and you're in hour one. You want to get a feel for the game, but you don't want to die, so how do we make it feel like you're playing with other players, maybe even with speech and everything else? Or, maybe you and I are playing a co-op game and you drop off, and then I want a character that comes along and makes it feel like I'm still playing with you. There are a lot of different use cases in that companion assistance space that are super exciting.Is the monitoring integrated as an SDK within the program itself, or does it have the functionality to read video inputs, for example?The logic is integrated into the application itself as much as possible. We actually integrate all the model understanding in it. You can embed local visual models that can understand things in real time. Really, the constraint is what hardware you want to run on. We have a demo that is fully running on an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090, an AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, or a Tenstorrent QuietBox. In that case, you can run it all locally. In that case, your application is just as old-school as it can be. It just happens to have AI logic in there and models that are embedded. That's where I think the industry needs to be going now, because everybody doesn't have the hardware power, we're still in the case where some of that needs to back up to the cloud. But really, the only thing you're ever using in the cloud is just a stored model, and you have an endpoint to it, but we try and keep all that logic locally because the developers need control over that.For video monitoring, one example I've heard from NVIDIA showing off their gaming co-pilot assistant is being able to monitor a region of the screen. Say you're looking at a mini-map, you're playing a MOBA and you want to know when something disappears. How difficult would it be for either an end user or programmer to set up the variables to have it monitored for something like that?That's a great question. You can think about two things. The ideal for this is to do a full screen view visual language model or OCR. With OCR, you're basically taking screen captures. The reason you want a visual language model ideally is because it gives you that spatial awareness, but we see two ways to do that.For a developer, what you'd probably do is set it up so that you're having it pointed at specific pixels on the screen and understanding based on those. What we often actually push people to think about as well is that sometimes you don't need to understand vision because you have the game state. You have code on the backend.People often miss that, or they're like, we're trying to just understand the visuals, whereas actually, the code in the backend is telling me everything I need to know. It's kind of that dance between what I am actually not able to capture based on the game code and what I need that visual for.What's the possibility of using Inworld AI for quality assurance testing?You could use it. To be honest, our focus is primarily on player-facing AI. As I engage with more studios, my answer is you should build that yourself. And my reason for that is, I just think it's going to be continually driven down in terms of cost to use these large language models. Anything that's QA is a bit different, but for any kind of content creation productivity stuff, I think they just need to build it in-house and do it themselves.For QA specifically, we don't build agents for testing or anything else. You could build that yourself using our tech. It's ultimately a more infrastructural piece of technology. We have some groups trying to create player emulating bots that they can send into the world and use.We don't build a specific solution for QA testing, but we've often seen it used for prototype testing. In this scenario, you might set up a world with a general cityscape, and I want to see a hundred different varieties of this where the agents are responding in slightly different ways. It helps with rapid prototyping so that you can identify, out of that set of a hundred different options, which one is the most fun or engaging.But in terms of core quality assurance or bug fixing, it's something that developers could build, but my honest response is use our tech if you want for that, but it's probably a good area for you to build yourself because it's going to be a core part of your workflows in the future.The main reason I was asking for it is that it can monitor the game state, setting up variables where you're looking at, say, unintended interactions.Right, that's super interesting. As I was mentioning, that telemetry piece that we have is super valuable there. Because it's built into the game code, you can set it up so that you're running telemetry against any part of the game. If you want to detect what types of character responses or NPC interactions tend to result in the player completing the mission, you need to know what kind of AI stuff is actually happening there.So, I guess I would say this. We don't do general QA. We certainly are really focused on making sure that you can QA the crap out of your AI. Anything that is AI in there, we need to give you all the data, all the metadata, everything that you possibly need so that you can figure out how that actually works.I think it's essential because I honestly think one of the broken parts of AI today is it's all a black box and if you're building and iterating on a game and doing playtest, you need to know when it breaks, how it breaks, and how that's all connected. We don't do QA for the broader space of game development, but as people are integrating AI, you need to QA the crap out of that. And that's where the telemetry piece comes in.'Crowds are one of those areas that have just not really evolved in about 10 years. For example, instead of just random people walking back and forth, as you kind of see in every game or standing still, they notice each other. Someone says something, someone walks up, they start having a conversation, they decide to do something, and they go off. As a player, you might not be able to put your finger on what is more immersive in that case, but it just feels more alive. We do a lot of that kind of stuff in terms of environmental awareness, too. We don't just power characters; we can power any part of the game state. How does the environment adapt to different people? How do you create different parts of quests or event generation?'Have you noticed any issues that you're resolving with Inworld AI, such as hallucinations?Not as much anymore, because we have the ability to distill down these models and train them for specific tasks and run a lot of filters over them. The hallucinations can be controlled as much as you want and you can also perform data structure validation. So if you're outputting, for example, a JSON format, you can constrain it to specific JSON formats, certain lengths, and certain types of words.Where hallucination comes in, for example, is with that game that I mentioned earlier, Status. They kind of take advantage of it to a degree because they want characters to come up with crazy ideas but still stay within character.It depends on how you define hallucination. In some cases, breaking outside of IP norms is one form of hallucination. Another form of hallucination is coming up with completely made-up stuff that doesn't make sense in the game and breaks the data structures. We focus a lot on that former one because we work with many IP holders who are super sensitive to it. On the other side, that's a pretty solved problem, but both are solvable. One just requires a lot moremachine learning depth there.Can you talk about the dynamic crowd tech that you are working on?Yeah, I love this. One of the big problems I encounter when I engage with studio heads who work on any kind of open-world game is that there are two ways that people have tried to build better player experiences. They just make worlds bigger and bigger, and they think a bigger world means more playtime. And I'm like, I can't go on horseback for another 20 minutes. That's one part of it. The other is graphical fidelity. Effectively, they try to consistently increase the graphical fidelity, thinking that if they have a bigger world with higher fidelity, people will like it.Dynamic crowds is part of the general solution to that, which is how to make the world feel more alive. Crowds are one of those areas that have just not really evolved in about 10 years. For example, instead of just random people walking back and forth, as you kind of see in every game or standing still, they notice each other. Someone says something, someone walks up, they start having a conversation, they decide to do something, and they go off.As a player, you might not be able to put your finger on what is more immersive in that case, but it just feels more alive. We do a lot of that kind of stuff in terms of environmental awareness, too. We don't just power characters; we can power any part of the game state. How does the environment adapt to different people? How do you create different parts of quests or event generation?Maybe, if you have just completed a quest, I want to generate an event. For example, OK, I just saved this cat. I'm walking up to an ice-cream vendor. The cat jumps on the ice cream vendor, they shoo it away, and someone comes over. It's those little parts of the world that come more alive and make it feel more immersive, which is almost like a new form of fidelity that we are pushing now.Is there a toolset that Inworld AI is building so that developers can integrate a sample of the technology?That's a great question. As I mentioned, we build these templates with our framework. As soon as we start working with developers, we provide them with a sample to get started and understand how the tech works, and then they build around that. But it's not a black box component that they plug in. It's basically a chunk of code that they get to go in and change because how you might want to build crowds is different from another, not to mention how it interfaces with your assets and the rest of your system. That's why we think in terms of templates rather than components.Absolutely, especially when you're trying to adapt to the same game and engine framework across a broad spectrum of devices, some of which may be intended to be played offline.Exactly. That's where the story of local hybrid is really important, because most people want to launch their games on multiple devices. How do we create a sense of player parity? We all know there's different graphics, right? If I play The Witcher 3 on another device, it's a completely different graphical experience. There's also that kind of level of how do we give the sense of parity while also recognizing the different constraints of the different devices.Do you think Metahumans are a technology worth investing in, or is itpetering out?Honestly, I see so many people - especially because people who come to us want to feel innovative, where there's this idea that it needs to be hyper-realistic fidelity. Every time you go to Metahumans, you end up being like, oh man, facial animations are really hard and anything becomes difficult. Also, players get this uncanny valley effect.Generally, we've seen people migrate away from that direction towards more stylized characters that engage people. For example, Metaphor: ReFantazio has super high-fidelitycharacters, but it's not Metahumans. So, I feel like there is certainly a transition in the other direction. I feel like there are certain interested parties who want to maximize that fidelity so you can maximize your GPU capacity, but I personally have just consistently seen stylized characters and worlds play out a little bit better, and it makes the development a lot easier. It also allows you to feel more differentiated for your players because, otherwise, every game feels like it has the same Metahumans in it. I don't necessarily want to say it's petering out, but there's certainly a recognition that it's not the right solution for most players.Tell me a little bit about what Inworld AI is building with Nanobit for Winked.In that case, they had this interactive novel type of game. It's a great experience where they release every few weeks or months a new pack of episodes. Those take a while to develop, and what happens is people get very attached to the characters during those experiences, and then go oh, I'm going to wait for the next month to get my favorite character back in the next episode.In that case, they integrated these characters as a kind of stopgap. Now, every time you finish an episode, you can have a conversation with a character from the world. The work we did there was, how do we make these beloved characters that people are really attached to feel the same as the ones in the human-written stories so that people can continue experiencing them?A lot of it was about how to achieve that dialogue quality without breakingthe bank. A lot of that was custom model training to fit the specific character persona.Lastly, for players who want to experience Inworld AI technology firsthand, can you talk about the next commercial release in which they might be able to see that technology in a game?I can't mention any of the AAA games because they all want to be secret, but there's probably going to be some stuff this Summer that will hopefully see some very large titles announced. We will also have another large showcase happening around June where we'll be showing off some new case studies and have our own event. So, I would look around the summer for some big stuff to happen.Thank you for your time.Deal of the Day

Life simulation game inZOI arrived in early access last week on March 28, 2025, and in its first seven days, the new game from developer inZOI Studio and publisher Krafton has already eclipsed 1 million copies sold.The studio announced the milestone through a post on its official X account, thanking the players who've already jumped into the new highly detailed life simulation."It's a number that still feels unreal to us and a milestone we could not have reached without each and every one of you," the studio said in its post."Your excitement, your creations, your feedback, your content, and your support have brought inZOI to life in ways we could have never imagined. From the very beginning, you've been shaping inZOI with us, and we're deeply grateful for the passion and love you've poured into it. We'll continue working hard to bring that promise to life - where every life becomes a story in inZOI."Right at launch, inZOI jumped to the top of Steam's leaderboards just 40 minutes after the game went live. The game has clearly struck a chord with gamers who love a life-sim game and perhaps have been looking for a Sims alternative for a while, but the jury is still out if it'll have the legs to really challenge EA's long-running, genre-dominating series.Krafton has already said that it considers inZOI a"long-term franchise IP," so at least for now, Krafton will continue to support it and try to make the new life-sim game a strong competitor to The Sims.One key element to inZOI potentially having legs is that there's clearly a potential for the game to be involved in plenty of meme-able content and the odd scandal since inZOI Studios already had to patch out what the team said was an "unintended bug," that let players run over and kill little children. Players quickly turned to kidnapping babies instead.Deal of the Day

Nintendo Switch 2 pre-orders in the United States won't begin on April 9th, as originally announced, to allow the company to evaluate the potential impact of tariffs in the country.As reported on Bluesky by GameSpot Managing Editor Tamoor Hussain, Nintendo confirmed that the Nintendo Switch 2 pre-orders will not begin on April 9th in order to "assess the potential impact of tariffs and evolving market conditions." The console's release date is unchanged, so it will still be released on June 5th in the United States as it will in the rest of the world. Needless to say, this is extremely concerning, as the chance of a price increase has now skyrocketed.Statement from Nintendo: Statement from Nintendo: Pre-orders for Nintendo Switch 2 in the U.S. will not start April 9, 2025 in order to assess the potential impact of tariffs and evolving market conditions. Nintendo will update timing at a later date. The launch date of June 5, 2025 is unchanged. Tamoor Hussain (@tamoorh.com) April 4, 2025 at 4:35 PMEven with a price higher than the previously announced $449.99, will the Nintendo Switch 2 be a worthy purchase? Probably not for some, as Nathan found the console to be maybe too pricey even for $50, despite offering a significant improvement over its predecessor in every possible way, as he highlighted in his hands-on preview.If youre one of the sizable number of folks who have affection for their trusty Switches, it seems quite likely youll enjoy the Switch 2. The system looks better, feels better, the Joy-Cons are sturdier and more versatile, and playing Nintendo games with some decent hardware grunt behind them is a nice change of pace. Whether the Switch 2 reaches the commercial heights of the OG Switch will largely depend on its library of games, but titles like Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza show Nintendo can still deliver fun, and sometimes unexpected, experiences with their long-running franchisesThe Nintendo Switch 2 launched on June 5th worldwide. We will keep you updated on the new US pre-order date and any changes in the system's price as soon as possible, so stay tuned for all the latest news.Deal of the Day

Investment bank JPMorgan continues to be bearish on electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla's shares as it stuck with an Underweight rating and a $120 share price target for the firm in a note released earlier today. In its note, the bank laments "unprecedented" brand damage to Tesla as it outlines that the firm's Q1 deliveries were far below JPMorgan's worst-case estimates. JPMorgan's $120 share price target for Tesla is less than half of the EV firm's current share price, and its note is the latest in a series of bearish coverage for the firm.JPMorgan Wonders If It Underestimated Consumer Reaction To Tesla CarsJPMorgan's Tesla Q1 delivery estimate was the lowest in the market, as it expected the firm to deliver 355,041 vehicles while the market had expected deliveries to sit at 377,592, according to figures compiled by Tesla. Yet, Tesla's Q1 deliveries were 355,041, which is what JPMorgan calls "unprecedented brand damage" to the firm.As per JPMorgan, the Q1 report confirmed: "the unprecedented brand damage we had earlier feared in our March 12 report." In fact, the bank wonders whether it "may have underestimated the degree of consumer reaction" to Tesla's cars in the wake of Musk's political activities. While JPMorgan focuses on brand damage, other analysts have speculated that Tesla's production upgrades, which have reduced output, are also behind some of the firm's delivery woes.Yet, investors' reactions to Musk's government role are clear. Earlier in the week, Tesla's shares gained 5% during the day after reports claimed that Musk would leave his government role to focus efforts on his car company. However, the stock then bled 3.5% in after-market trading after Musk denied the reports. After yesterday's bloodbath, the stock lost 6.6% in premarket trading to extend its woes in 2025 before paring back the losses to 5.6%.JPMorgan also reduced its Q1 EPS estimates for Tesla to $0.36 from $0.40 and its fiscal year EPS estimates to $2.30 from $2.35. The bank adds that the new estimates "are predicated in part on a lower outlook for deliveries (404K in 2Q25, down from 418K prior; 1,715K in FY25, down from 1,775K prior; and 1,975K in FY26, down from 2,025K prior)," noting that it continues to "see large downside to [its] $120 December 2025 price target."While Tesla's shares have taken a beating due to lower vehicle deliveries, the jury is still out on the extent of the impact of President Trump's tariffs on the firm. Trump's tariffs have roiled markets, with futures down by 4% today across key indices in response to China's retaliatory tariffs. However, analysts have maintained that Tesla's shares are a standout in terms of being insulated from tariff impact. Yet, the firm's unsigned letter to the US Trade Representative and Musk's comments have indicated that it will experience some headwinds nevertheless.Other analysts have stressed that investors need to consider Tesla's assisted driving platform, FSD, and its humanoid robots when evaluating the firm's long term performance. Yet, some have questioned whether Tesla will be able to sustain high FSD subscription prices given competition in the assisted and autonomous driving market which has seen rival car companies offer solutions as a add-on to their cars.Deal of the Day

Intel and TSMC have reportedly agreed to a "joint venture" with Intel Foundry, which would allow the Taiwanese giant to manage Intel's US facilities.Rumors of an Intel-TSMC Deal Are Pretty High, But a Collaboration Would Make Things Much More Complicated For The IFSWell, this is undoubtedly a twist of events, especially considering the fact that Intel and TSMC are two of the biggest rivals in the semiconductor industry. However, with the Trump administration in office, it seems like the main objective here is to revive the US's chip glory, and Intel would likely play a massive part in it. According to a report by Reuters citing The Information, Intel and TSMC have reached an agreement to collaborate on operating Team Blue's US facilities, and this step would likely be the start of a "revolutionary" technology transfer to the United States, given that the deal pans out as expected.While the exact details are unknown, it is claimed that TSMC would likely keep a 20% stake in Intel's Foundry division. The rumor mill around an Intel-TSMC deal has been revolving for quite some time now, and they are fueled by the fact that TSMC needs to escape Trump tariffs, and the only way they could do so is by showing extended cooperation with Intel, apart from their investments in the US. There's optimism for Intel's future, but claiming that a deal with TSMC would be fruitful for Team Blue isn't certain, and we'll discuss why.TSMC and Intel are two-way different companies with unique management, workforce, and technology roadmap planning, meaning that fundamentals cannot be merged. And, given the Taiwan giant's ambitions in the US, partnering up with Intel means that the company is having a pretty difficult task on its hands. The only way this could succeed is if TSMC could obtain "complete" management control, but this will be a process that will involve years if not decades.And, if you look at Intel Foundry's recent progress, the division has managed to find a hold on the market. It has recently announced "risk production" of its highly anticipated 18A process, which is an achievement that could mark the firm's economic turnover. Along with this, with Intel's new CEO Lip-Bu Tan, the core focus will be to "build for clients," with foundry services being a priority, so a TSMC collaboration doesn't settle here as one might expect.Deal of the Day

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion remake is still scheduled to be revealed and released this month, according to an extremely reliable insider.A few hours ago, extremely reliable insider NateTheHate replied to a question regarding the remake, which was rumored to launch yesterday, confirming that, as things stand, the game will still be released this month. Plans can obviously change, but with the insider's track record, it is safe to say that chances are high that we will soon be able to return to Cyrodiil soon, and experience it like we never did before.While The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion remake has yet to be officially announced, we have known it has been in development in some capacity for almost two years, when the game's existence was revealed in an FTC investigational hearing held with Xbox's head Phil Spencer. According to rumors, the remake is being developed by Virtuos in Unreal Engine 5 and will feature many new features and improvements over the original, including combat mechanics changes, some of them inspired by modern action games, HUD improvements, and more. If all of these changes will indeed be implemented in the final game, they should make for a far more enjoyable experience.Those who haven't experienced The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion ahead of the remake still have the chance to do so on PC, as the GOTY edition, including all additional content, is now available on Steam. Console players, unfortunately, have no other option at the moment other than playing the game on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.Deal of the Day

NVIDIA's H20 AI accelerators are in tremendous demand in China, and it is now reported that the domestic markets are experiencing a shortage as big tech gobbles up all the units available.NVIDIA Once Again Experiences an "AI Gold Rush" In China; H20s Are Now Said To Be In Massive ShortageWell, with the US export restrictions, China was barred from accessing high-end AI hardware from the likes of NVIDIA and, as a replacement, was offered severely cut-down AI chips, like the H20. However, it seems like, despite the performance gap from mainstream options, NVIDIA's H20 AI GPU has been a favorite of Chinese tech giants, and according to MyDrivers, it is claimed that companies like ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent have placed orders for the H20 worth over $16 billion, which is a massive achievement for NVIDIA and its Chinese market venture.While DeepSeek did create an impact on NVIDIA's stock pricing, washing out hundreds of billions, it seems like the firm's AI models have managed to once again re-ignite the AI hype in China. It is reported that models like the DeepSeek R1 and V2 have managed to create a race between Chinese tech giants for model superiority, which is why they are acquiring NVIDIA's hardware in large quantities, and this has created a supply chain bottleneck once again, a situation which isn't easy to deal with for Team Green.Apart from this, it is also claimed that an upgraded version of the H20 AI accelerator is available to the Chinese markets, and it is equipped with a superior HBM technology, likely the HBM3E. This is one of the reasons why there's a surge in demand for H20, to the point that NVIDIA is anticipating a six-month delivery delay for many of the orders, given that TSMC's production lines are busy catering to Team Green's latest architectures, like Blackwell Ultra.But with the H20, Chinese tech firms always have a risk, given that the US could decide to ban the export of the AI accelerator anytime, which could cause an abrupt halt in production. And for NVIDIA, well, that would be a big hit to its AI/DC revenue from China.Deal of the Day

As promised, CAPCOM has released the first major Monster Hunter Wilds update today. On Steam, the update is a 6GB download or 16GB if you have high-resolution textures installed. There are a lot of bug fixes, of course, but the main highlights are listed below:New monsters can now be hunted after meeting certain in-game conditions.Mizutsune has been added. Reach HR 21 to unlock an extra mission that can be started by speaking to Kanya in the Scarlet Forest Base Camp. Complete the mission to unlock Mizutsune.Tempered Mizutsune has been added and will appear when you are HR 41+ after completing the Mizutsune extra mission.Zoh Shia has been added as a high-rank monster. Reach HR 50 to unlock a story mission that unlocks Zoh Shia.New story, extra, and side missions have been added to Monster Hunter Wilds.New weapons, armor, and skills have been added.The upgrade limit has been increased for armor of rarity 5 and above.The Grand Hub has been added. It can be unlocked by completing a tutorial mission that appears from HR 16.The following features have been added to the Grand Hub: Barrel Bowling; the Diva; Arena Quest Counter; the Canteen; the Arm Wrestling Barrel.The Expedition Record Board has been added to the Grand Hub, along with rankings for time attack quests.Arena Quests have been added.Challenge Quests and Free Challenge Quests (Challenge Quests with no equipment restrictions) have been added and will be made available at a later date.New status ailments have been added.New voice lines for Alma (the Handler) have been added.An arena log page has been added to hunter profiles.The Change Appearance menu in the camp now has an option to change Alma's outfit.New pop-up camp gear options have been added.New limited bounty categories have been added.New voice lines, pose sets, and gestures have been added.Preparations have been made for the Festival of Accord, planned to run from April 23 to May 6.The following features will be temporarily modified during the Festival of Accord: the Handler's Outfit; Seikret decoration; the Diva's song list; the Grand Hub decorations; the Canteen's menu.There's also a limited-time Event Quest where hunters can head to the Ruins of Wyveria and face a Guardian Doshaguma in "Anguish and Atrocity". Successfully completing the quest will see them earn extra Hunter Rank Points. The Event Quest is available until April 8 at 4:59 PM Pacific Time.By the way, the developer warned players of a known issue where the game crashes when talking to Nata and selecting Sekka to trade items at the Village Intermediary. The current workaround requires waiting a certain amount of time or resting at the BBQ Menu.CAPCOM has recently confirmed that Monster Hunter Wilds broke the publisher's all-time records for first-month sales, with over 10 million units sold across all platforms. It is, therefore, well on its way to surpassing its predecessor, Monster Hunter World, which currently leads with 21.30 million units sold; still, the developer's continued support with patches and DLCs will be critical to reaching that objective.Products mentionedMonster Hunter WildsUSD 62.99Buy from AmazonDeal of the Day

Product InfoMSI GeForce RTX 5070 Gaming Trio OCMarch, 2025TypeGraphics CardPrice$649It's been two years since NVIDIA introduced its Ada Lovelace GPUs, kicking things off with the RTX 4090 and finishing up the initial lineup with the SUPER family At CES, the company unveiled its new RTX 50 "Blackwell" family which features a brand new architecture and several changes such as new cores, AI accelerators, new memory standards, and the latest video/display capabilities.NVIDIA has released the fourth entry within its "RTX 50" portfolio, the GeForce RTX 5070. The GeForce RTX 5070 retains its high-end positioning with the green team promising lots of performance at a price point of $549 US which is $50 US lower than the 4070 SUPER. Today, we will be trying out MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Gaming Trio OC, a custom variant designed with a ton of cooling potential and retails at MSRP.NVIDIA GeForce GPU Segment/Tier PricesGraphics Segment20252023-20242022-20232021-20222020-20212019-20202018-20192017-2018Titan TierGeForce RTX 5090GeForce RTX 4090GeForce RTX 4090GeForce RTX 3090 TiGeForce RTX 3090GeForce RTX 3090Titan RTX (Turing)Titan V (Volta)Titan Xp (Pascal)Price$1999 US$1599 US$1599 US$1999 US$1499 US$1499 US$2499 US$2999 US$1199 USUltra Enthusiast TierGeForce RTX 5080GeForce RTX 4080 SUPERGeForce RTX 4080GeForce RTX 3080 TiGeForce RTX 3080 TiGeForce RTX 2080 TiGeForce RTX 2080 TiGeForce GTX 1080 TiPrice$999 US$999 US$1199 US$1199 US$1199 US$999 US$999 US$699 USEnthusiast TierGeForce RTX 5070 TiGeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPERGeForce RTX 4070 TiGeForce RTX 3080 12 GBGeForce RTX 3080 10 GBGeForce RTX 2080 SUPERGeForce RTX 2080GeForce GTX 1080Price$749 US$799 US$799 US$799 US$699 US$699 US$699 US$549 USHigh-End TierGeForce RTX 5070GeForce RTX 4070 SUPERGeForce RTX 4070GeForce RTX 4070GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 16 GBGeForce RTX 3070 TiGeForce RTX 3070GeForce RTX 3070 TiGeForce RTX 3070GeForce RTX 2070 SUPERGeForce RTX 2070GeForce GTX 1070Price$549 US$599$549$599 US$499 US$599$499$599$499$499 US$499 US$379 USMainstream TierGeForce RTX 5060 TiGeForce RTX 4060 TiGeForce RTX 4060GeForce RTX 4060 TiGeForce RTX 4060GeForce RTX 3060 TiGeForce RTX 3060 12 GBGeForce RTX 3060 TiGeForce RTX 3060 12 GBGeForce RTX 2060 SUPERGeForce RTX 2060GeForce GTX 1660 TiGeForce GTX 1660 SUPERGeForce GTX 1660GeForce GTX 1060GeForce GTX 1060PriceTBD$449$299$399 US$299 US$399 US$329 US$399 US$329 US$399 US$349 US$279 US$229 US$219 US$249 US$249 USEntry TierGeForce RTX 5060RTX 3050 8 GBRTX 3050 6 GBRTX 3050RTX 3050GTX 1650 SUPERGTX 1650GTX 1650 SUPERGTX 1650GTX 1050 TiGTX 1050GTX 1050 TiGTX 1050PriceTBD$229$179$249 US$249 US$159 US$149 US$159 US$149 US$139 US$109 US$139 US$109 USNVIDIA GeForce RTX 50 Gaming Graphics CardsWith Blackwell, NVIDIA is going full-on into the AI segment with loads of optimizations & AI-specific accelerators.The Blackwell GPU does many traditional things that we would expect from a GPU, but simultaneously breaks the barrier when it comes to untraditional GPU operations. To sum up some features:New Streaming Multiprocessor (SM)New 5th Gen Tensor CoresNew 4th Gen RT (Ray Tracing) CoresAI Management ProcessorMax-Q Mode for Desktops & LaptopsNew GDDR7 High-Performance Memory SubsystemNew DP2.1b Display Engine & Next-Gen NVENC/NVDEC2 of 9The technologies mentioned above are some of the main building blocks of the Blackwell GPU, but there's more within the graphics core itself which we will talk about in detail so let's get started.ContentsNext page

NVIDIA's upcoming GeForce RTX 5060 Ti graphics cards will reportedly cost the same as the RTX 4060 Ti models with 16 GB & 8 GB options.NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB GPUs To Be Priced At $499, 8 GB Variants For $399In a few weeks, NVIDIA will be launching its brand-new mainstream gaming solution, the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti. This graphics card has already seen various leaks, and it looks like the latest one from Board Channels is about the pricing.Starting with the details, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti will be launching on the 16th of April and is going to be priced the same as the RTX 4060 Ti. Both cards were available in two options, a 16 GB and an 8 GB model. With the RTX 5060 Ti, NVIDIA has decided to stick with the same pricing as the RTX 4060 Ti. Hence, the 16 GB variant will be priced at $499 US while the 8 GB variant will be priced at $399 US.Previously, the 16 GB model was going to launch earlier than the 8 GB model, but these plans later changed and now, both models will be available on the same day. The $100 US price difference between the 16 GB and 8 GB models will mean that users will have to pay a more significant difference to access the larger VRAM capacity.As per what we already know about the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti graphics card, the GPU will be the GB206-300-A1 with 4608 cores, and it will come with a 128-bit memory bus featuring 16 GB and 8 GB VRAM configurations. Due to faster 28 Gbps GDDR7 pin speeds, the card will offer 448 GB/s of total bandwidth, offering a 55% boost over the RTX 4060 Ti. The GPU will come with a 180W TDP or 20W higher than the RTX 4060 Ti.For $50 more, one can also find the RTX 5070, though those aren't available at MSRP a lot, plus the RX 9070 Non-XT variant can also be accessed. That is if the RTX 5060 Ti itself will be available in decent quantities and at MSRP. What we have noticed with the previous launches is that some of the cards are priced at MSRP at launch, but as soon as the week 1 supply extinguishes, the prices see a massive hike.Also, NVIDIA isn't cutting the prices down like the last two models, the RTX 5070 Ti & the RTX 5070, both of which saw a $50 US reduction versus their predecessors. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti will be followed by the GeForce RTX 5060 and RTX 5050 GPUs, which will complete the Blackwell RTX 50 Gaming lineup for now.NVIDIA GeForce RTX 50 GPU Specs (Preliminary):Graphics Card NameNVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 TiNVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 TiNVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050GPU NameBlackwell GB202-300Blackwell GB203-400Blackwell GB203-300-A1Blackwell GB205-300-A1Blackwell GB206-300Blackwell GB206?Blackwell GB207-300GPU SMs170 (192 Full)84 (84 Full)70 (84 Full)50 (50 Full)36 (36 Full)3020 (20 Full)GPU Cores217601075289606144460838402560Clock Speeds2.41 GHz2.62 GHz2.45 GHz2.51 GHzTBDTBDTBDMemory Capacity32 GB GDDR716 GB GDDR716 GB GDDR712 GB GDDR716 GB / 8 GB GDDR78 GB GDDR78 GB GDDR6Memory Bus512-bit256-bit256-bit192-bit128-bit128-bit128-bitMemory Speed28 Gbps30 Gbps28 Gbps28 Gbps28 Gbps?28 Gbps?TBDBandwidth1792 GB/s960 GB/s896 GB/s672 GB/s448 GB/s448 GB/sTBDPower Interface1 12V-2x6 (16-Pin)1 12V-2x6 (16-Pin)1 12V-2x6 (16-Pin)1 12VHPWR (16-Pin)1 12VHPWR (16-Pin)1 12VHPWR (16-Pin)TBDLaunch30th January, 202530th January, 202520th February, 20255th March, 2025April 2025April 2025April 2025TBP575W360W300W250W180W150W135WPrice$1999 US$999 US$749 US$549 US$449-$399?$299?$249-$199?News Sources: Gazlog, Harukaze5719

G.Skill has rolled out the fastest high capacity Trident Z5 Royal DDR5 memory kit with 128 GB capacity and 8000 MT/s speeds.G.Skill Combines High Capacity With High Speeds In Its Latest DDR5 Trident Z5 Royal Memory Kit Launch: Up To 128 GB Kits With 8000 MT/s SpeedsPress Release: G.SKILL International Enterprise Co., Ltd., the worlds leading brand of performance overclock memory and PC components, is thrilled to announce a new high-speed memory overclock DDR5 specification with an ultra-high kit capacity DDR5-8000 CL44 with 128GB (64GBx2) kit capacity. This is the world's first DDR5 memory kit with 64GB high-capacity modules to reach the extreme overclock level of DDR5-8000, setting a new milestone for high-performance computing, content creation, AI applications, and advanced workstation workloads."We are very excited to announce the world's first overclocked DDR5-8000 memory with a total kit capacity of 128GB," says Frank Hung, Product Marketing at G.SKILL. "This is yet another milestone for DDR5 overclock performance that G.SKILL has successfully reached, surpassing all previous limits to demonstrate never-before-seen memory specifications."New Era of Overclocking High-Capacity DDR5 64GB ModulesEngineered for high-capacity overclocked performance, the DDR5-8000 128GB (64GBx2) combines ultra-high memory speed with massive memory kit capacity, surpassing the previous module capacity maximum at 48GB per module. Finally, power users and content creators who seek overclock performance memory for capacity-hungry applications will have the ideal DDR5 memory solution. Refer to the validation screenshot below to seeDDR5-8000 CL44-58-58 128GB (64GBx2)tested on theASUS ROG CROSSHAIR X870E APEXmotherboardAMD Ryzen 9 9950Xdesktop processor.Extreme Speed DDR5-9000 CL48-64-64 64GB (32GBx2) Kit SpecificationDedicated to the continual development of extreme-overclock performance memory kits, G.SKILL is also announcing an extreme-speed DDR5-9000 CL48-64-64 memory specification at a 64 GB(32GBx2)kit capacity. See the Memtest screenshot below to see this memory specification running on theASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z890 APEXmotherboard with anIntel Core Ultra 7 265Kdesktop processor.Deal of the Day

MenuHomeNewsHardwareGamingMobileFinanceDealsReviewsHow ToWccftechDealsORICOs e7400 4TB SSD Gets A 15 Percent Discount Coupon On Amazon, Get Up To 7,400MB/s For Just $203.99 And That Too, Without Having To Become A Prime MemberOmar Sohail Apr 3, 2025 at 09:25pm EDTThe last time the ORICO e7400 4TB SSD was available on Amazon at a discount, buyers had to become a Prime member to take advantage of the offer. Thankfully, that paywalled barrier has been lifted, with the listing on the online retailer back to delivering a discount coupon that reduces the price, and it is as simple as making a few clicks. Previously, customers would get a 20 percent coupon, which allowed the e7400s price to be reduced below the $200 mark.Now, you get a 15 percent discount coupon, which, when applied, reduces the $239.99 price to just $203.99. For a 4TB SSD that supports the PCIe NVMe Gen 4 protocol, that updated figure exudes a ton of value, especially when you want to upgrade the storage on your gaming PC, gaming laptop or PS5. With read speeds that go up to 7,400MB/s and write speeds peaking at 6,600MB/s, the ORICO e7400 is pretty much at the edge of the PCIe NVMe Gen 4 standards bandwidth, so it is nice to see that you will get to experience the full performance.Also, since the e7400 features a standard size, it can be slotted into every machine that offers an M.2 slot. For that extra peace of mind, the SSD comes with a 5-year limited warranty, plus a 2,400TBW endurance, ensuring that the 4TB SSD will last you for years. Perhaps the most important difference is that you will not be forced into subscribing to Amazon Prime, which helps you negate a few steps, and in the end, you get exceptional value from this deal.Get the ORICO e7400 4TB PCIe NVMe Gen 4 SSD from Amazon - $203.99 (apply a 15 percent discount coupon to reduce the price)Explore more 4TB SSDs hereSee what else Amazon has discounted todayDeal of the DaySubscribe to get an everyday digest of the latest technology news in your inboxFollow us onTopicsSectionsCompanySome posts on wccftech.com may contain affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLCAssociates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earnadvertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com 2025 WCCF TECH INC. 700 - 401 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada

The RTX 4060 is finally at the number one spot at this big US retailer but not many editions are available, considering the GPU shortages.MSI Ventus RTX 4060 2X OC Takes the Number One Position at Newegg as the Best-Selling GPU; The Majority of Best-Sellers are Still Radeon RX GPUsNewegg's top-selling GPU list shows that the GeForce RTX 4060 is finally at the top despite being an 8 GB GPU. The RTX 3060 remained one of the best-selling GPUs for a long time previously, and that was due to its incredible performance for $300 before the Ada made it to the market.The card had two variants: 8 GB and 12 GB. However, the RTX 4060 only brings the 8 GB VRAM configuration to the table. Despite lower VRAM capacity, the GPU has managed to climb up to the first spot, which is mostly due to the GPU shortages and the sky-high prices of other GPUs. The RTX 50 series and RX 9070 series are mostly out of stock, but even if you find them available, they are incredibly expensive.The RTX 4060 is currently one of the handful of budget GPUs one can afford and while AMD and NVIDIA have focused heavily on $500+ GPUs, millions of gamers around the world want something more pocket-friendly. Not surprisingly, only one RTX 4060 edition can be seen in the top 10 list and the second RTX 4060 card is in the 16th position.Both cost a whopping $450+ even though the MSRP is $299. The card used to be abundantly available before NVIDIA launched the RTX 50 series and started to see shortages, beginning in February this year as the card has been discontinued. There are still stocks left with the retailers and, seeing how bad the GPU market currently is, retailers are able to charge $150 higher than its official MSRP tag.For $400 and above, one could easily buy the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB and even the 16 GB edition a while back, but, unfortunately, you probably won't find a 16 GB NVIDIA card right now for less than $400. The Radeon RX 7700 XT has also disappeared from the market completely and the RX 7800 XT is available for over $600.Newegg's top-sellers list shows that despite the RTX 4060 taking the first position, the following GPUs are mostly from AMD, including the RX 6000, RX 7000, and the RX 9000 series. Fortunately, the RTX 3060 12 GB from MSI is available at $319, which is a far better deal than the RTX 4060 8 GB at the moment and will perform better at 1440p in select titles.Keep in mind that the GPU top-sellers list on Newegg doesn't show the entire story, as different NA retailers have different GPUs as bestsellers. For instance, on Amazon US, you will find the RTX 5080 as the top seller, and there is not a single RTX 4060 in the top 10.News Source: @TechEpiphanyYTDeal of the Day

Gamers aren't the only ones who are doing everything they can to get their hands on a Nintendo Switch 2 as soon as possible. According to a report from The Game Business, game developers are "desperate" to get their hands on a Nintendo Switch 2 development kit.Obviously, you can count out all the publishers and developers who were able to announce thattheirgame is coming to Nintendo Switch 2 on launch or sometime later this year during Wednesday's Nintendo Direct presentationfrom having this issue. Nintendo has, perhaps expectedly, prioritized the biggest studios and publishers when it comes to who gets a dev kit first.Those left out of the loop expressed their frustrations to The Game Business, with one studio co-founder expressing why it's so important that studios get their hands on development kits for new consoles as soon as possible."New console audiences are often willing to try new things at the start, so we were desperate to get our hands on dev kits early. Nintendo has finally responded to us, but we still dont think well get anything for a few months," the studio co-founder said.That same studio also claimed they could have had a game ready to go with the launch of the Nintendo Switch 2 this coming June had they heard from Nintendo earlier. The Game Business also reports that most of the studios they spoke to had not received a development kit or any word from Nintendo as to when they would see one coming their way.The Game Business did add, though, that those teams who have not heard yet are hopeful things will change now that the console's release date and launch lineup have been revealed.Nintendo might have covered the biggest bases with its first wave of Switch 2 development kits, but alongside the first-party titles Nintendo brings to its platforms, the popularity of indie games on the Nintendo Switch is a key cultural aspect of its player base. And those smaller, independent developers are all the ones who've likely been left out of the loop on development kits.It would be interesting to see if any studios speak out in the coming months about how their game could have arrived on Nintendo Switch 2 sooner if only Nintendo had been more willing to share its wealth of development kits.Deal of the Day

The Starship Flight 7 booster during its static fire for Flight 9 earlier today. Image: SpaceXSpaceX has confirmed that it will reuse a booster for the first time on the next Starship test flight. The firm shared details about a static fire of the Super Heavy booster that flew on Starship Flight 7 earlier today and added that the rocket will fly on Starship Flight 9. Flight 9 will be perhaps the most critical test flight of the program so far as SpaceX will attempt to successfully fly its second-generation upper-stage rocket for the third time after consecutive failures on Starship Flights 7 and 8 earlier this year.SpaceX Asserts Starship Super Heavy Reuse Will Enable It To Fly Rockets Through A No-Touch ProfileSpaceX's latest update about the Starship program comes as the firm lifted the 232-feet-tall rocket to the launch pad earlier this week. As SpaceX geared up for its tests, officials in Boca Chica, Texas, sent out non-flight testing notices to the general public. True to form, SpaceX tested the Super Heavy booster earlier today and confirmed it through a social media update.The firm revealed that 29 out of the 33 engines on the rocket are flight-proven, or, in other words, flew for the first time on Flight 7. It also confirmed that the booster tested earlier today will fly on Starship Flight 9. As a result, Flight 9 will be the first test in the Starship program where SpaceX attempts to reuse a rocket booster. It will also be a first in aerospace history for a rocket with more than two dozen engines to attempt re-flight.2 of 9Successful re-use of a Super Heavy booster will mark a key step for SpaceX when it comes to Starship's progress as it will pave the way for the firm to upgrade its booster design and focus on the upper-stage ship. Unlike the booster, which has been recovered multiple times through the launch tower, SpaceX is yet to successfully recover the upper-stage ship.During all Starship flights so far, the ship has either disintegrated during flight or successfully and softly splashed down in the water. Ahead of Starship Flight 7 in January, SpaceX was gearing up to catch the rocket with the tower as it introduced catch hardware to evaluate it ahead of a potential attempt.However, during Flights 7 and 8, the ship failed to complete the mission and exploded soon after separating from the first stage. For Flight 7, SpaceX explained that vibrations in the rocket's propulsion system led to its engines shutting down. While the FAA has closed SpaceX's Starship Flight 7 investigation, neither SpaceX nor the agency have shared any updates for the Flight 8 mishap.A booster static fire isn't any indication of an upcoming launch either, as SpaceX has previously tested the booster more than a month ahead of liftoff. It also didn't share details about engine performance, making it likely that today's static fire was to evaluate the rocket's systems for re-use and to make potential corrective actions ahead of Flight 9.Deal of the Day

The Nintendo Switch has exceeded most everybodys wildest expectations, moving over 150 million units on the way to (most likely) breaking console sales records set by Sonys PlayStation 2. Following up on that sort of success is no simple or easy feat, and Nintendo has taken what some have deemed the safe route by simply delivering a more powerful, feature-enhanced Nintendo Switch 2. Of course, sometimes the appeal of new hardware isnt obvious at first glance. You need to actually go hands-on to get that exciting new console feel.I recently had the opportunity to do just that, going hands-on with the Nintendo Switch 2 for several hours at a press event in Paris, tackling recently-announced games, such as Mario Kart World, Donkey Kong Bananza, and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond. While Ill have deeper thoughts to share about individual Switch 2 games in the near future, were going to focus on the hardware itself in this article. Has Nintendo delivered a new level of Switch splendor or should you keep your expectations docked? Scroll on for my early hands-on impressions2 of 9Form FactorThose who have had a Nintendo Switch rattling around in their backpack for the past eight years will find themselves on familiar ground with the Switch 2 in terms of basic form and function, although almost everything about the new system feels a bit more polished and cohesively designed. While slightly larger than its predecessor, the Switch 2 still feels manageable to hold, and despite packing a lot more processing power, the system remains surprisingly thin and light (perhaps even lighter than the original Switch). The matte plastic the system is made of feels nice to the touch, and, hopefully, wont be a magnet for palm sweat.Various small tweaks to the Switch 2 make it feel like a more modern, deluxe device, including a sturdy new flexible kickstand and dual USB-C ports, which could open the way for a broader range of accessories, like the newly-announced Nintendo Switch 2 Camera. I didnt spend a lot of time examining the new Switch 2 dock closely as they were almost all hidden behind glass, but Nintendo has said it has a fan to actively cool the system now, boosting performance gains when playing docked.The Switch 2 offers up a larger (approximately 8-inch) 1080p screen, with a slimmer bezel. The screen looked quite sharp, lacking the jagginess often seen when playing the OG Switch in handheld mode, although it is noticeable that the screen is a touch less bright and vibrant than the Switch OLEDs screen. For now, greater sharpness in exchange for a bit less brightness is a trade-off youre going to have to make (as somebody who only plays Switch in handheld mode on occasion, I dont mind, but your mileage may vary).Overall, the Switch 2 is a handsome little devil that you may want to spend a few minutes just admiring in your hands before you jump into a game, although Id be lying if I said the design upgrades are truly transformative. This is the Switch you know, just polished up a bit.The Joy-Con Grows UpArguably the lions share of the Switch 2s design upgrades have gone towards improving the detachable Joy-Con controllers. The OG Switchs Joy-Cons always felt like a good idea that hadnt been fully realized too small, too finicky, too flimsy and prone to stick drift and other failures. While the Switch 2s new Joy-Cons have been extended less than an inch compared to the original models, they do feel more substantial in the hand. The sticks feel less flimsy, and a Nintendo rep present at the preview hinted theyve been re-engineered to head off drift (something the NY Times got hints about too). Whether the new Switch 2 Joy-Cons will be more resilient in the long term remains to be seen, but they felt sturdier to me.The Switch 2 Joy-Cons also come with some new functionality, including an IR sensor that allows the player to use a Joy-Con like a mouse. I had a chance to test the mouse functionality with several games, including Metroid Prime 4 and the updated Switch 2 version of Mario Party Jamboree and the controls were perfectly responsive and holding the Joy-Con on its edge felt surprisingly comfortable. That said, Nintendo may still have to hone their approach to mouse controls, as some games, particularly Metroid Prime 4, still require you to press the face buttons on the Joy-Con youre using as a mouse, which doesnt feel intuitive. The new Joy-Cons HD Rumble also feels as though its been subtly updated.Oh, and yes, as somebody who likes messing around with anything magnetic, the way the new Joy-Cons satisfyingly snap onto the side of the Switch is an immense improvement over the old janky rail system. Once connected to the main Switch 2 unit, the Joy-Cons felt fully secure, but again, well have to wait and see regarding long-term durability.Nintendo PowerNintendos developers are a talented lot, but theyve been working with more or less the same toolbox for well over a decade, given the Switch was only marginally more powerful than the Wii U. While Nintendo remains largely mum about the Switch 2s under-the-hood improvements, its clear the toolbox has finally received an upgrade. That said, its also clear it will likely take Nintendo devs a while to adapt to the new power at their fingertips. Much like the earliest crop of Wii U titles, which marked Nintendos first foray into HD gaming, Switch 2s first games look better than most of what weve seen from the company before, but it also feels like theyre leaving a lot of potential on the table.Most of the first-party content shown by Nintendo at the hands-on event can be roughly sorted into three piles new big AAA-style experiences (Mario Kart World, Donkey Kong Bananza, and Metroid Prime 4), enhanced Nintendo Switch 2 Edition versions of older Switch games (The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, Kirby and the Forgotten Land + Star-Crossed World, Super Party Jamboree + Jamboree TV), and quirky stuff designed to show off the systems new control features (Drag x Drive, Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour, and, uh, Super Party Jamboree again).The most successful group were the big headline games. Mario Kart World very much feels like a direct follow-up to Mario Kart 8, and thats not a bad thing. While Mario Kart World doesnt necessarily stand out that much visually next to MK8, Nintendo is undoubtedly putting the Switch 2s power to some use with the games higher 24 racer playercount and interconnected open world. Donkey Kong Bananza offers up a bold reboot of the Kongiverse and looks to provide all the varied challenges, collectibles, and hidden extras youd expect from a major Nintendo release. The slice of Metroid Prime 4 I got to play left me with some questions, but there was no denying its technical prowess, running an impressive 120fps in Performance mode, with none of the rough un-aliased edges we've become used to seeing from some Nintendo games.The Nintendo Switch 2 Edition upgrades didnt land with quite as much impact. While playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom with 4K visuals and a smooth framerate was certainly nice, it wasnt the transformative experience I expected it to be. Perhaps my favorite upgraded Switch experience was Kirby and the Forgotten Land, which looks better than ever (it was already one of the prettiest Switch titles) and adds the new Star-Crossed Worlds content, which promises to be just as fun as the original game.The Quirky Stuff bag was a bit more mixed. The additions to Mario Party Jamboree were all quite entertaining, but Im not sure how much theyll extend the life of the game. Drag x Drive was, frankly, a bit of a drag. Perhaps the best of the quirky crew was actually Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour, which features some fun diversions and ought to come at a nice price.Each individual games pros and cons aside (again, I'll have more to say about that in the future), it really does have to be stated how refreshing the technical polish of all of them were. Almost every game I played, from Mario Kart World, to Donkey Kong Bananza, to Metroid Prime 4 ran at an unblemished 60fps (or more). The OG Switch has been showing its age for some time now, so just the clarity, smoothness, and general technical prowess of most of the games I played felt revelatory in its own small way. Im particularly excited to see what Nintendo might do with the hardware a few years down the line.Current Thoughts on Nintendo Switch 2Its been a long time since Nintendo last chose to simply iterate on a successful formula with a new console. Since the 90s with the Super Nintendo, arguably. Theyve been so dedicated to throwing the baby out with the bathwater for so many successive generations, that the Switch 2 ends up feeling rather refreshing in a way. That said, theyre also asking quite a bit for this Super upgrade $450 for the console itself, with games perhaps as much as $80. That may complicate the Should I buy this right away? math for some people.If youre one of the sizable number of folks who have affection for their trusty Switches, it seems quite likely youll enjoy the Switch 2. The system looks better, feels better, the Joy-Cons are sturdier and more versatile, and playing Nintendo games with some decent hardware grunt behind them is a nice change of pace. Whether the Switch 2 reaches the commercial heights of the OG Switch will largely depend on its library of games, but titles like Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza show Nintendo can still deliver fun, and sometimes unexpected, experiences with their long-running franchises. While I need more time with the Switch 2 to render a final verdict, it feels like the pieces are there for another hybrid hit.Keep an eye out for my hands-on impressions of Switch 2 games, including Mario Kart World, Donkey Kong Bananza, and more over the coming days. The Nintendo Switch 2 launches on June 5 with pre-orders going live on April 9.Deal of the Day

Marvel Rivals developer NetEase Games has just revealed new details about the upcoming Season 2: Hellfire Gala update that will go live next week on April 11, 2025. The new season adds X-Men Emma Frost to the lineup, and Ultron, who spoils the gala Frost is hosting in the Mutant nation of Krakoa.This is also the setting of the new maps that'll be added with Season 2, which, according to a press release, will feature "dreamy botanical landscapes and beautiful fireworks."Weekly missions will also be added with Season 2 on top of the already included daily missions, just to give players a little more to do during the three-month-long season.Speaking of season length, NetEase also revealed that beginning with Season 3, a season in Marvel Rivals will only be two months long, with a new playable character introduced each month.For Season 2, the first half will introduce Emma Frost as a new Vanguard character, with Ultron, and details about his character type, still to come in the second half of the season. Season 2 will also feature the first time NetEase adjusts or removes certain team-up abilities, which means the game is about to undergo some of its first major changes.Marvel Rivals launched at the end of 2024, and has so far accomplished what many big publishers have tried and failed to do, which is carving out a slice of the live service pie for itself. NetEase boasts that the game has grown to beyond 40 million players since its launch, and it doesn't show any signs of slowing down. Marvel Rivals definitely has an advantage over games like Sony's failed Concord, which was also attempting to establish a new set of characters and a new world for players to enjoy, but as we saw in Marvel's Avengers, a big IP backing up your game doesn't mean it'll be a smash-hit.NetEase even admits in its developer vision presentation that the studio understands the pressure it is under to sustain the success Marvel Rivals has enjoyed so far. These changes coming in Season 2, which are still to be laid bare in the full patch notes still to come, could prove to be the beginning of a turning point for the game, with the next check coming with the arrival of shorter seasons in Season 3. This was a move made specifically to try to keep players engaged and not let the game stay too stale.Deal of the Day

T-Mobile has been working with SpaceX for a long time to bring cellular coverage to remote areas through the Starlink satellites. To extend this feature, it launched the satellite powered direct-to-cell beta program in December 2024. This was meant to bring early access to U.S. customers and allow them to test the program. The full service is expected to launch in July 2025. Some of the beta testers are complaining about the service and questioning whether the partnership offers underwhelming services despite the constant hype about the feature.T-Mobile and SpaceX's satellite-powered direct-to-cell service beta program has left users feeling disappointedBy leveraging the Starlink satellite internet constellation, T-Mobile and SpaceX partnered up to bring connectivity in far-flung areas where communication is often compromised. It has not been long since both partners launched their service in the beta program to be able to test it before it is fully launched. However, contrary to expectations, beta users are dismayed with the service as it fails to deliver what has been promised and offers subpar performance instead.One of the users shared about their testing experience on Reddit, expressing that they used it across the Southwestern US on spring break and were left disappointed. The service was called a hot mess:So, I took my family on an epic spring break tripVegas, Grand Canyon, Death Valley, Red Rock Canyon, and Valley of Fire. Tons of these spots have zero cell coverage, so I figured itd be the perfect chance to test out T-Mobiles Starlink beta for satellite texting. Spoiler: its a hot mess.Death Valley seemed like the ideal testing groundwide open skies, no interference. On the valley floor and up at Dantes View on a mountain peak, Id get 1-2 bars of T-Mobile Starlink signal. Promising, right? Nope. Not a single SMS or iMessage would send. Four days of trying, and nothing.The user pointed out that most of the locations had no traditional cell coverage and was where it made sense to test out the satellite service. While the phone would catch a satellite connection, it was not working as no messages were either received or sent out during the four-day testing period. If this is to be compared with the iPhone's built-in messaging, the latter outperforms with its ability to send messages seamlessly.This experience was not limited to a single user but many others shared about a similar experience and the T-Mobile's satellite service failing to deliver messages in remote areas across the U.S. It is important to highlight that T-Mobile feature is currently in beta and the limitations might not come up when the program is fully launched. For now, users can try sending messages and test data capabilities.Deal of the Day

According to two reliable leakers for news about Apex Legends, the long-awaited Titanfall 3 is not dead, and it is currently in the works at Respawn.Yorotsuki and Osvaldatore, two leakers with a solid reputation for Apex Legends leaks, took to X to reinvigorate players' hopes that Titanfall 3 is not lying in a ditch somewhere (or the digital equivalent on EA's servers).Yorotsuki was a little clearer than Osvladatore, claiming that Respawn is working on the game and that it will be revealed during The Game Awards 2025 showcase set for December 2025. Osvladatore simply posted a graphic of the game's alleged logo.The Titanfall franchise is arguably one of the best franchises in video game history that got dealt the worst hand possible. The first Titanfall game definitely wasn't perfect, but it brought a new and exciting flavor to the FPS genre that was dominated by Call of Duty and Battlefield.Then, Titanfall 2 stepped everything up, and if EA hadn't aided in Titanfall 2 being overshadowed by Battlefield 1 launching right beside it in EA's effort to keep up with Call of Duty launching its annual release, Infinite Warfare, in 2016, then there's a solid chance Titanfall 2's story ends differently.It still has what is regarded as one of the best single-player campaigns, not just in a first-person shooter, but in any game in gaming's history. And the rise and sustained popularity of Apex Legends continues to be proof that there's no other franchise that has mastered movement in a first-person shooter quite like what Respawn was able to accomplish with Titanfall.That's just a part of what has made Titanfall 3 a topic its fans bring up nearly as often as Bloodborne fans cry out for a sequel or remake. It's also why Respawn's chief executive officer and one of the original creatives behind Titanfall, Vince Zampella, has had to answer questions about Titanfall 3 time and again.Even though Zampella has previously stated that the studio is not working on Titanfall 3, the reality of the video game industry, of which EA is no exception, is that things can change on a dime. Just last month, another multiplayer FPS game Respawn was incubating was canceled, so it's entirely possible that the cancelation of that project has led to Titanfall 3 being kicked up again, which is where today's rumor comes from.There are plenty of unknowns here, but crazier things have happened during The Game Awards than a franchise that's beloved by millions coming back from the dead.Deal of the Day

Well, President Trump's new tariffs are now officially in, and the numbers aren't looking good for consumers at all since it is now expected that hardware prices could rise massively.President Trump's Newest "Reciprocal Tariffs" Are Expected To Target IT Manufacturers The Most Out of All OthersWe knew that with Trump 2.0, there would be consequences for the trade world, but with the reciprocal tariffs announced yesterday, the supply chain could potentially witness devastating impacts. The administration claims it is an "eye-for-eye" move, but based on what experts are claiming, the tariff percentages are higher than expected. It won't be wrong to say that nations where the consumer hardware supply chain lies, such as China, Vietnam, Indonesia, and many more, will now find exporting to the US much more costly, and the end user will ultimately pay for this.With China effectively witnessing a 54 percent tariff, Morgan Stanley claims that all significant IT products, including smartphones, PCs, wearables, and peripherals, are expected to see a massive increase in taxation. The decision lies with the manufacturer about whether to prioritize raising prices or taking a hit on margins. In light of this, it is claimed that prices could rise by up to 50% if companies decide to burden consumers, which means that all consumer PC hardware prices could soar massively.Judging by this estimate alone, we have compiled a list of PC hardware that is popular among users nowadays, and based on their MSRPs alone, we have estimated the post-tariff pricing. Here's how pricing could evolve under the new Trump tariffs:NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 ($1,999 MSRP)25% Increase: $2,498.7550% Increase: $2,998.50NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 ($999 MSRP)25% Increase: $1,248.7550% Increase: $1,498.50AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D ($500 MSRP)25% Increase: $62550% Increase: $750Intel Core Ultra 9 285K ($600 MSRP)25% Increase: $75050% Increase: $900It is important to note that the above pricing is deduced from factoring in the MSRPs, and it doesn't take into account real-time price tags, which are far larger for products like the GeForce RTX 5090. It is safe to say that the overall price increase should be estimated to be around 25% to 50%, and this is given the fact that manufacturers decided to put pressure on the end consumer from Trump tariffs, which will most likely be the case.Another devastating factor with Trump's new policies is that hardware manufacturers cannot benefit from the "China+1" strategy anymore, given that the tariffs are also imposed on nations like Vietnam, Thailand, India, and Taiwan, which are deemed to be a viable alternative to China. So, a workaround to these tariffs isn't possible at all, and given how big the US markets are, manufacturers will be forced to make a tough decision.Morgan Stanley says companies like Apple, Cricut, Dell, Garmin, GoPro, HP, Logitech, and Sonos are expected to be influenced the most by these tariffs, and PC hardware manufacturers, such as AIBs like MSI, Acer, Gigabyte, will also face much higher taxes the next they export products to the US. The decision certainly isn't in consumers' favor, and will create devastating impact for those looking to get their hands on new hardware.Deal of the Day

This is not investment advice. The author has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Wccftech.com has a disclosure and ethics policy.Super Micro Computer (NASDAQ: SMCI), a major retailer of servers and liquid-cooled AI racks, is surprisingly still up 6 percent so far this year, despite the ongoing carnage across the tech avenue. It is hardly a surprise, therefore that Goldman Sachs recently crowned SMCI as the "best performing stock" in the hardware sphere. Today, Super Micro Computer is out with another stellar development, this time touting the AI performance leadership of its cutting-edge systems that are based on NVIDIA's B200 GPU.To wit, Super Micro Computer is now claiming that its "4U liquid-cooled and 10U air-cooled systems," based on NVIDIA's HGX B200 8-GPU, "demonstrated more than 3 times the tokens per second (Token/s) generation for Llama2-70B and Llama3.1-405B benchmarks compared to H200 8-GPU systems."The company went on to note:"Within the operating margin, the Supermicro air-cooled B200 system exhibited the same level of performance as the liquid-cooled B200 system."Super Micro Computer's NVIDIA HGX B200 systems feature newly developed cold plates and a 250kW coolant distribution unit. These new designs feature vertical coolant distribution manifolds that no longer take up valuable rack space, enabling "eight systems, comprising 64 NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs in a 42U rack, and up to 12 systems with 96 NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs in a 52U rack."The company added:"The new air-cooled 10U NVIDIA HGX B200 system features a redesigned chassis with expanded thermal headroom to accommodate eight 1000W TDP Blackwell GPUs. Up to 4 of the new 10U air-cooled systems can be installed and fully integrated in a rack, the same density as the previous generation, while providing up to 15x inference and 3x training performance."For the benefit of those who might not be aware, U is a standard measurement of server heights, where 1U equals 1.75 inches.Loop Capital recently disclosed that Apple has officially entered the "large server cluster Gen AI game," with the "Siri kerfuffle" prompting a strategy change at the company that now seemingly favors NVIDIA's commercial GPUs:"AAPL [Apple] is in the process of placing orders for ~$1.0B of GB300NVL72s (or ~250 servers at $3.7M - $4.0M each) comprised of both SMCI [Super Micro Computer] & DELL."This order represents another win for Super Micro Computer and Dell, both of whom are currently the leading suppliers of AI server racks.Deal of the Day

MenuHomeNewsHardwareGamingMobileFinanceDealsReviewsHow ToWccftechGaming7.0South of Midnight Review Boring Combat Drags Down A Beautiful And Emotional StoryDavid Alexander Carcasole Apr 3, 2025 at 12:00 PM EDTCopy ShortlinkGame InfoSouth of MidnightApril 8, 2025PlatformXbox Series X/S, PCPublisherXbox Game StudiosDeveloperCompulsion GamesSince December, or more accurately, since the release of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, theres been a feeling that Xbox has turned a corner for the better. Following up MachineGames' excellent Indiana Jones adventure was Obsidian, with a more than solid outing in Avowed. Which, in a few days from the time of publishing, will be followed up by Compulsion Games latest, South of Midnight, which hopes to keep that momentum going.South of Midnight is the third game in the studios history since its founding in 2009 and the first full game the team has made primarily under the Xbox banner after it was acquired by Microsoft in 2018. After the studios last batch of DLC for We Happy Few, the six years since have been spent crafting Hazel and her mother Laceys story, complete with stop-motion animation. The Southern gothic tale begins with a hurricane far worse than anyone in her small fictional town of Prospero could have predicted and a fight between Hazel and Lacey.After storming out of the house, Hazel looks on in horror as she watches the hurricane take her home, with her Mom in it, down the river. While chasing after the floating house to try and save her Mom, Hazel is chosen to become a new Weaver. A Weaver is a person who is able to see the strings and strands that make up what the game calls the Grand Tapestry. Basically, it is the fabric of life and the world, and its now Hazels job to help untangle the knots caused by the tragedy and pain we experience in life, either by choices of our own making or at the hands of evil people.The story in South of Midnight is a bit of an odd thing. Hazels journey toward understanding her Mom better and how their story plays out is kind of the least interesting part. At the same time, the games story is one of its strengths, and that all comes from the people you meet along Hazels journey to finding her Mom. South of Midnights story constantly surprised me because, from the outside, you wouldnt guess that this game is nearly as dark or serious as it is. In each chapter, youll be charged with helping someone put the pain of their worst memories to rest by untangling the knot the bad parts of their lives caused.And in each chapter, I was taken aback with just how intense and tragic all of these memories were. It was actually what helped to keep the story grounded, especially in the moments where Hazel is wall-running on a floating wall that looks like its been ripped off the side of a building.Thats not to say the relationship between Hazel and her Mom was boring or entirely uninteresting, just that it was out-shined by every other story told, whether in a short scene of a memory you witness or an old journal entry you find along the path. It also didnt help that, more often than not, Hazels first words just after witnessing the memory of an extremely tragic event rarely fit the moment, with too many of her lines sounding like generic barks you might hear in any video game where the protagonist is constantly commenting on the world around them.But there are a few moments of real, excellent storytelling with strong performances from the entire voice cast, including the voice behind Hazel, Adriyan Rae. This only made it all the more upsetting when Hazel would have a line that felt like she wasnt paying attention to the events she just witnessed. Still, even with those disappointing moments, South of Midnight delivers an emotional story that packs a heavier punch than its bright visuals and stop-motion animation might have you expect.Speaking of its visuals, the art design and the look of South of Midnight is arguably the best part of this game. I dont mean that as a slight towards other aspects, or that its not worth playing. It often feels like if the best thing you have to say about a game is that it looks nice, then it probably has little to offer beyond that. Not the case with South of Midnight, as it definitely brings more to the table, but the design of this game and the detail poured into every corner is absolutely spectacular.Unfortunately, the stop-motion animation effect did not agree with my eyes, and I did have to turn it off after playing the opening few chapters with it. I think your mileage with that effect may vary since my issues with it could also be traced to the number of stuttering bugs I witnessed during my playthrough. I was playing an early build of the game on my Xbox Series X that did not include the day-one patch, so I can only hope that the issues I have will be sorted by the time everyone else can jump in for themselves.Speaking of jumping, good as the story and performances are, the main gameplay of South of Midnight is whats unfortunately lacking. The platforming isnt bad. But it also isnt great, and even though it evolves somewhat throughout the 14 chapters of the games story, particularly with the sections that have you running from a dark fog, it only starts to get interesting by the time youre on the last couple of chapters. And by that point, these sections had been so repetitive that I was more peeved than excited to go through another one. Even if the design of these sections was starting to get good, which shouldnt be the case in chapter 12 of a 14-chapter game.The combat is, unfortunately, the worst part of the gameplay. Put simply, its boring and repetitive, and it wouldnt detract from the game so much if you werent thrust into a combat arena every five minutes. The small skill tree you work through never adds to the combat in interesting ways; the best part about upgrading your skills is that it can help you move through these sections faster. A key issue is that theres no flow to combat. Hazel doesnt have a parry or a block mechanic, so all you can do is dash and dodge away from incoming attacks, which means youre constantly pulling yourself out of the action in order to stay alive. And whether youre locked on to a single enemy or not, the camera is awful at keeping pace with the combat, so youre almost surely going to take a few hits that you just couldnt prepare for because you didnt see them coming.Even when an enemy is in front of you, some attacks are more telegraphed than others, and you can only knock an enemy out of an animation by performing a ground-pound attack. It also doesnt help that when you do take a hit, the knock-back effect makes Hazel so slow to react that youre likely to take another hit before you can dodge to safety. Thats also where all the challenge in the combat lies, not dying from hits you cant see coming. Which makes any deaths you suffer frustrating for the wrong reasons. Even when you are performing well and not dying, the feedback on your attacks doesnt feel satisfying, as you repeat the same set of animations again and again. And while the look of each enemy is interesting, what each of them adds to combat doesnt evolve it in interesting ways or make you change your approach. This then feeds into the other issue that you dont really get many different ways to approach combat. Youre mashing attack and dodge ad-nauseam, and when its over, you get a tragic, emotional scene about something awful that happened in a characters life. The actions couldnt feel more disconnected if they tried, which adds to combat feeling like a slog.South of Midnight would be a tighter, more interesting game if the combat sections were instead replaced with gameplay akin to that of an adventure game or puzzle game, where youre piecing together the past events to properly untangle what has become knotted. The gameplay there would also more easily weave into the games narrative instead of feeling like its trying to be an entirely different kind of game the moment combat starts.If there are any combat sections I could call out as good, it would be the few boss fights scattered throughout the game. But those sections arent good because the combat suddenly becomes fun, theyre good because of the scale of the bosses youre fighting, and how well executed the presentation of each set piece is. So even though getting through to the end of a chapter isnt all that fun with how many combat sections you have to get through, at least the set piece at the end was always visually stunning and a fun spectacle.Thats also why Id say the best of these chapter-ending set-pieces is actually one that members of the press, including Wccftechs own Kai Tatsumoto, got to experience in previews. How the music tied in with the story you had just witnessed, and the complete understanding you have about this giant tree that youre climbing, still sticks out in my mind, days after seeing the credits roll. It was really beautiful, and I wish more of the game was able to weave gameplay and narrative as strongly as it was done there.Lastly, speaking of the music, that is the final aspect of the storytelling that really makes South of Midnight special. The original songs written for each of the key characters from Prospero that you meet and help out are all so well done. Its something you really have to experience for yourself, and its a big part of why Id still recommend that you play South of Midnight. On top of the other visual and storytelling aspects Ive already talked about, the music wraps it all together so beautifully.Overall, South of Midnight has excellent storytelling, excellent artistic and visual design, a wonderful cast of characters and voice actors, and an original soundtrack that punctuates each big narrative beat in a way that will stay with you long after you put the controller down. Unfortunately, the same creativity that went into the rest of the game is missing in its combat and platforming, and Compulsion Games does itself no favors by launching you into the same boring combat scenarios again and again in each level.Reviewed on Xbox Series X (code provided by the publisher).7.0WCCFTECH RATINGSouth of MidnightSouth of Midnight has some incredibly strong storytelling chops, brought together by its stunning visual design and excellent soundtrack. Unfortunately, the experience is bogged down by boring, repetitive combat and lackluster platforming, but it's worth rushing through those parts to experience everything else South of Midnight has to offer.ProsAmazing visual designStrong storytelling with a solid cast of charactersGreat performances from the voice actorsOriginal music that punctuates the storytelling in a unique way that stays with you ConsBoring and repetitive combatLackluster platforming that doesnt begin to get interesting until the very endA number of bugs that may or may not be ironed out in the day-one patch Buy for from AmazonThe links above are affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Wccftech.com mayearn from qualifying purchases.Deal of the DaySubscribe to get an everyday digest of the latest technology news in your inboxFollow us onTopicsSectionsCompanySome posts on wccftech.com may contain affiliate links. 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This is not investment advice. The author has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Wccftech.com has a disclosure and ethics policy.Chip designer NVIDIA Corporation is losing its GPU pricing power, according to a fresh note from investment bank HSBC. The note cuts NVIDIA's share price target to $120 from $175 and downgrades the shares to Hold from Buy. NVIDIA's GPU prices, driven by the firm's considerable technological advantages, short supply and high manufacturing costs, have set the narrative around its products and share price. They were at the heart of January's DeepSeek selloff, which wiped off close to $600 billion from the firm's market value as investors wondered whether the GPUs would be in high demand after purported efficiency demonstrations by the Chinese AI startup DeepSeek.HSBC Doesn't See Significant Pricing Boost Between NVIDIA's B200 & B300 Blackwell AI GPUsNVIDIA's shares are among the worst performers in 2025 due to investor skepticism about the firm's AI GPU demand. Year-to-date, the stock has 24% and is down 4.9% at market open today after the Trump administration's latest set of tariffs roiled US and global stock markets.Amidst the chaos, HSBC believes that NVIDIA is losing the pricing power with its AI GPUs. In a fresh analyst note, the firm's analyst Frank Lee analyzes the pricing trend between NVIDIA's B200 and B300 Blackwell AI GPUs and GB200 and GB300 NVL72 server racks. The B300 GPUs are among the latest AI products from NVIDIA and is build on TSMC's N4P manufacturing process node.According to HSBC, there has been no significant average selling price (ASP) bump between the B200 and B300 GPUs. "[W]e have seen no significant ASP boost between B200 and B300 GPU or the GB200 and GB300 NVL72 rack architecture," notes Lee and adds that there appear to be limited upgrades in GPU specifications as well apart from the next-generation Vera Rubin GPUs relying on HBM4 memory.HSBC adds that NVIDIA's systems will support 72 GPUs per rack until 2027, when the firm launches its Rubin Ultra products. As a result, the bank has downgraded NVIDIA's shares to Hold from Buy, a downgrade that appears to have come just in time as the firm's shares extended their losses to 5.34% as trading commenced today.HSBC's latest remarks about NVIDIA follow NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang's remarks last month where he justified his firm's GPU prices. In an interview after NVIDIA's GTC conference, Huang shared that not only do his firm's GPUs allow users to generate money and save money by being more efficient, by added that they are pricey due to manufacturing complexities.Huang also added that his company is working with TSMC and Foxconn to manufacture GPUs onshore in the US. Trump's latest round of tariffs left NVIDIA out of the loop, and the firm is also reportedly pressuring the US government to scrap the latest set of rules that prevent unlimited sales of its AI GPUs to most countries except for 18 that are determined to be key US allies and partners.Deal of the Day

The physical release of Cyberpunk 2077 Ultimate Edition won't require an additional download to run, as the entire game will be included in the cart.Speaking on X, CD Projekt Red's Vice President of Business Jan Rosner confirmed the game will ship on a 64 GB cart that includes both the base game and the Phantom Liberty expansion, so no additional download will be required to run the game. The game will launch the same day the Nintendo Switch 2 launches worldwide for the price of $69.99, 69.99.At the time, we haven't seen much of Cyberpunk 2077 Ultimate Edition running on Nintendo Switch 2 besides the short trailer shown during yesterday's Nintendo Direct, but it seems like a high refresh rate experience is out of the cards, even in docked mode. Earlier today, Bloomberg's Jason Schreier confirmed, after a hands-on session, that the game runs at 40 FPS in Performance Mode with the console docked, which is definitely disappointing for those who expected a 60 FPS mode, but not completely unexpected, considering how demanding the game can be.Some other Switch 2 observations:- The "Welcome Tour" app is surprisingly cool (one minigame reminded me of Mario Paint) and it is insane that Nintendo is charging for it- Metroid looks and feels fantastic- Cyberpunk 2077 runs at 40fps in performance mode while docked (oof) Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier.bsky.social) April 3, 2025 at 3:37 PMCyberpunk 2077 Ultimate Edition launches on June 5th on Nintendo Switch 2 worldwide. The game is also available on PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S and Xbox One.

A Vietnamese retailer builds AI servers with RTX 5090s to leverage higher memory capacity for AI workloads. Builds machines using various configurations.Nguyencongpc Unveils RTX 5090-Powered AI Server PCs: Uses as Many as Seven RTX 5090 GPUsThe GeForce RTX 5090 was launched at the end of January, and it has been over two months, and yet we don't have sufficient stocks of the GPU. While this is common across all the released RTX 50 series GPUs, the RTX 5090 is particularly more affected due to its high demand and lower supply.The RTX 5090 is the only gaming GPU to feature 32 GB of memory, which makes the 5090 a special one even for non-gaming tasks. As higher memory is highly beneficial for AI tasks, a Vietnamese retailer called "Nguyencongpc" has started to build AI servers using as many as seven RTX 5090 GPUs.2 of 9In the pics, you can see seven Gigabyte RTX 5090 models installed on the server, amounting to almost 4000W of total power consumption. Similarly, there are rigs built using two MSI RTX 5090 GPUs that are aimed at less intensive AI tasks. We don't know the exact specifications of servers with seven RTX 5090s, but the ones with the MSI Gaming Trio RTX 5090 use the AMD platform, featuring the ROG Crosshair X870E Hero motherboard.Image Credit: @I_Leak_VNIt appears the retailer has plenty of cards not only to sell to gamers but also for dedicated AI servers for small businesses. The price of the dual RTX 5090 rig must be around $10,000 and around or over $30,000 for the AI server with seven GPUs. This is because an individual RTX 5090 generally costs $2500+ for most editions at the moment, even though the card was launched for $2000.The Gaming TRIO RTX 5090 is a premium edition, so it might be worth around $3000. The current state of the GPU market and the emergence of such AI servers remind us of the early 2018 era when GPU mining was at its peak, and you would hardly find a gaming GPU. The same repeated in 2021, making it extremely difficult to get your hands on an RTX 30 series GPU.Hopefully, this AI 'mining' servers trend won't pick up the pace, or it will be hard to find the RTX 5090 GPUs. For such purposes, there are already professional GPUs available with higher VRAM capacity, and we have already seen RTX 4090 with 48 GB memory to do such jobs, but the card is hardly good at gaming.News Sources: @I_Leak_VN, FacebookDeal of the Day

Tim Sweeney capitalized on yet another opportunity to take a dig at both Apple and Google during a Y Combinator event that happened on a Wednesday. The Epic Games CEO believes that the practices of massive technology entities continue to disrupt the positive flow of Sweeneys software business while also discouraging developers from gravitating to the platform. During the time that he was on stage, Sweeney stated that both Apple and Google have adopted gangster-style businesses, implying that they would stick with illegal strategies because they believe they can easily get away with it.Apart from categorizing Apples and Googles way of doing business as gangster, Tim Sweeney also comments that both firms do not operate in good faithAnyone who has followed the legal skirmish of Epic Games and Apple knows these two companies share a ton of history and bad blood. Tim Sweeney pulls no punches when it comes to criticizing the Cupertino giant regarding its behavior in stifling competition or preventing companies from generating extra income by forcing them to use the in-app payment system. Sweeney made the following remarks about both Apple and Google, stating that their illegal practices can only go away unless there is stricter enforcement of laws.The sad truth is that Apple and Google are no longer good-faith, law-abiding companies. Theyre run, in many ways, as gangster-style businesses that will do anything they think they can get away with. If they think that the fine is going to be cheaper than the lost revenue from an illegal practice, they always continue the illegal practice and pay the fine.Crime pays for big tech companies. Obviously, we shouldnt expect that to change until enforcement becomes much, much more vigorous.The grudge against Apple is due to the fact that no major game developer has been willing to distribute their titles through the Epic Games Store because of Apples associated fees. Apps that have more than one million downloads are required to pay the California-based titan a core technology payment of 50 cents per installation per year. Sweeney states that unless those games are generating immense levels of revenue, they are discouraged from going this route and says that Apple would end up bankrupting them instead of letting them thrive.As for Google, Sweeney states that the advertising behemoth does not take Apples direction, but users are dissuaded from trying out new apps because when they install the Epic Games Store on their Android handsets, they will receive a warning saying that the software is from an unknown source and might harm their device. This warning forces around 50-60 percent of users to abandon the installation process, severing yet another potential revenue stream for Epic Games. Given how Apple and Google profit from these practices, it is foolish to believe they will change their ways.News Source: TechcrunchDeal of the Day

MenuHomeNewsHardwareGamingMobileFinanceDealsReviewsHow ToWccftechDealsWant The Latest-Generation Gaming PC Hardware At A Not So Outrageous Price? The Andromeda Insights Galaxy Gaming PC Offers An RX 9070 XT & Ryzen 7 9800X3D For $2,099.99 On AmazonOmar Sohail Apr 3, 2025 at 06:35am EDTThe price of AMDs Ryzen 7 9800X3D has stabilized a few months after it launched, and it will not be difficult for you to get a hold of a unit for $479.99 on Amazon. Unfortunately, the Radeon RX 9070 XT graphics card is another story, but that is the case with every new release of GPUs, as these are never available at their MSRP. Even if you search the online retailer at this time, the most affordable variant you can get at this time is the XFX Mercury AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT, which is available for $959.99, and that too, if you become a Prime member.If you do not want to jump around these incessant loopholes, the best way to overcome these problems is to purchase a gaming PC. Now, a couple of years ago, we would have been strongly against this suggestion, as it would have been far more affordable to build this machine with parts that were purchased separately, but we are living in different times where GPUs will almost always be sold at outrageous prices. Fortunately, the Andromeda Insights Galaxy gaming PC does not have to give you those headaches because at $2,099.99 on Amazon, it is not a cheap purchase, but it does not go insanely overboard either.For this price, you not only get a combination of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D but you can also drive the Radeon RX 9070 XT daily, which sports a whopping 16GB of GDDR6 VRAM. Complementing the rest of the specifications are 32GB of DDR5 RAM operating at 6,000MHz, a 2TB PCIe NVMe Gen 4 SSD, a B650 motherboard that supports Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and an 850W power supply. The operating system is Windows 11 Home, and for after-sales support, Andromeda Insights states that buyers will receive a lifetime labor warranty and a lifetime service warranty. However, it is important that you read the finer details.Do keep in mind that computer hardware is not quite as affordable as it was a few years ago, so you need to have realistic expectations of your budget if you want to immerse yourself in fluid, high-resolution gaming sessions. A budget of $2,099.99 is not something that the everyday consumer can entertain, but it still provides some middle ground considering the other options you have at this time.Get the Andromeda Insights Galaxy gaming PC from Amazon- $2,099.99Get the Ryzen 7 9800X3D from Amazon- $479.99Explore AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT GPU options hereSee what else Amazon has discounted todayDeal of the DaySubscribe to get an everyday digest of the latest technology news in your inboxFollow us onTopicsSectionsCompanySome posts on wccftech.com may contain affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLCAssociates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earnadvertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com 2025 WCCF TECH INC. 700 - 401 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada

It's time for the first analyst reactions to the Nintendo Switch 2 announcements, starting with the higher-than-expected pricing for both the console itself and its games. According to MIDiA Research's Rhys Elliott, whom we often interviewed exclusively on Wccftech, the console is poised to become a smash hit even at the $450 price.The Nintendo Switch 2 is slightly more expensive than many of us analysts thought, but $450 is still within the $400-500 price range I expected. While I still reckon $400 is the sweet spot, and we'll see a cheaper SKU eventually, $450 is still affordable and in line with other consoles and the Steam Deck.Unlike other manufacturers, Nintendo relies almost solely on its console and console software business, so loss-leading pricing simply wasnt in the cards. At $450, the Switch 2 is still cheap enough for mass-market adoption, and given the stacked and diverse software lineup, I believe it will sell well among core gamers, casuals, families, and more.Perhaps an even tougher pill to swallow for consumers is the increase in Nintendo Switch 2 game prices, chiefly Mario Kart World, which will cost $80 (90 in Europe) if you buy a physical copy. According to Elliott, the rationale is mainly to drive users to purchase digital instead, since Nintendo's split is currently around fifty-fifty (whereas the other consoles made by Microsoft and Sony already skew much more toward digital sales).While the orange mans tariffs and Nintendo wanting to increase ARPPU factor into the reasoning behind Nintendo charging $80 for Mario Kart World, I think theres more at play. Nintendo also wants to nudge consumers to buy games digitally. The lower prices for digital games versus boxed (true for Donkey Kong and Mario Kart) point to this. Another factor is last weeks announcement of the Digital Game Card, which lets players lend games to their Switch Online Family Plan members.A little bit of context here: PlayStation and Xbox have already pushed their platforms to become digital-first, driven by strategies like multi-game subscriptions, digital-only consoles, free-to-plays rise, and platform holders pushing consumers to digital versions via perks (like extra cosmetics and the ability to pre-load a game so its instantly ready to play at launch). So PlayStation and especially Xbox are very digital-first. But Nintendo is different, more 50-50. For consumers, a unique value proposition of physical games is the preowned and rental markets. But Nintendos reliance on physical impacts its bottom line, hence the nudging. Nintendo does not gain revenues from physical renting and resales. After all, a copy of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe could be sold on the reseller market 100 times or rented 100 times, but Nintendo would only capture revenues from that first sale. A digital-only market means more revenue and price control for Nintendo. Long story short, Nintendos use of framing (sticker shock for physical) is actually pushing people to digital, which benefits Nintendo.Are you planning to pre-order a Nintendo Switch 2 when pre-orders open on April 9? Vote in the poll below and let us know your take on the reveal in the comments section.Are you going to buy the Nintendo Switch 2?Deal of the Day