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“I want to make a big announcement,” said Faryar Shirzad, the chief policy officer of Coinbase, to a nearly empty room. His words echoed across the massive hall at the Bitcoin Conference, deep in the caverns of The Venetian Expo in Las Vegas, and it wasn’t apparent how many people were watching on the livestream. Then again, somebody out there may have been interested in the panelists he was interviewing, one of whom was unusual by Bitcoin Conference standards: Chris LaCivita, the political consultant who’d co-chaired Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. “I am super proud to say it on this stage,” Shirzad continued, addressing the dozens of people scattered across 5,000 chairs. “We have just become a major sponsor of the America250 effort.” My jaw dropped. Coinbase, the world’s largest crypto exchange, the owner of 12 percent of the world’s Bitcoin supply, and listed on the S&P 500, was paying for Trump to hold a military parade.No wonder they made the announcement in an empty room. Today was “Code and Country”: an entire day of MAGA-themed panels on the Nakamoto Main Stage, full of Republican legislators, White House officials, and political operatives, all of whom praised Trump as the savior of the crypto world. But Code and Country was part of Industry Day, which was VIP only and closed to General Admission holders — the people with the $199 tickets, who flocked to the conference seeking wisdom from brilliant technologists and fabulously wealthy crypto moguls, who believed that decentralized currency on a blockchain could not be controlled by government authoritarians. They’d have drowned Shirzad in boos if they saw him give money to Donald Trump’s campaign manager, and they would have stormed the Nakamoto stage if they knew the purpose of America250. America250 is a nonprofit established by Congress during Barack Obama’s presidency with a mundane mission: to plan the nationwide festivities for July 4th, 2026, the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. “Who remembers the Bicentennial in 1976?” the co-chair, former U.S. Treasurer Rosie Rios, asked the crowd. “I remember it like it was yesterday, and this one is going to be bigger and better.” But then Trump got re-elected, appointed LaCivita as co-chair, and suddenly, the party was starting earlier. The week before the conference, America250 announced that it would host a “Grand Military Parade” on June 14th to celebrate the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday, releasing tickets for prime seats along the parade route and near the Washington Monument on their website, hosting other festivities on the National Mall, and credentialing the press covering the event. (Their celebrations and events are a different operation from the U.S. Army, which had never planned for a parade to celebrate its 250th birthday, much less a military parade, but is now spending up to $45 million in taxpayer dollars to make the parade happen.) According to the most recent statements from Army officials, the parade will include hundreds of cannons, dozens of Black Hawk and Chinook helicopters, fighter jets, bombers, and 150 military vehicles, including Bradley Fighting Vehicles, Stryker Fighting Vehicles, Humvees, and if the logistics work out, 25 (or more) M1 Abrams tanks. Trump had spent years trying to get the government to throw a military parade — primarily because he’d attended a Bastille Day parade in France and became jealous — and now that he was back in office, he’d finally eliminated everyone in the government who previously told him that the budget didn’t exist for such a parade, that the tank treads would ruin the streets and collapse the bridges, that the optics of tanks, guns and soldiers marching down Constitution Avenue were too authoritarian and fascist. June 14th also happens to be Donald Trump’s birthday.And Coinbase, whose CEO once told his employees to stop bringing politics into the workplace, was now footing the bill — if not for this military parade watch party, then for the one inevitably happening next year, when America actually turns 250, or any other festivities between now and then that may or may not fall on Trump’s birthday. (This wasn’t the first party they helped fund, though. Earlier this year, Coinbase wrote a $1 million check to Trump’s inauguration committee. One month later, the SEC announced that it was dropping an investigation into Coinbase.) I had to keep reminding myself that I was at the Bitcoin Conference. I’d been desperately looking for the goofy, degenerate party vibes that my coworkers who’d covered previous crypto conferences told me about: inflated swans with QR codes. Multimillionaires strolling around the Nakamoto Stage in shiba inu pajamas. Folks who communicated in memes and acronyms. Celebrity athletes who were actual celebrities. “Bitcoin yoga,” whatever that was. Afterparties with drugs, lots of drugs, and probably the mind-bending designer kind. And hey, Las Vegas was the global capital of goofy, degenerate partying. But no, I was stuck in a prolonged flashback to every single Republican event I’ve covered over the past ten years – Trump rallies, conservative conferences, GOP conventions, and MAGA fundraisers, with Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA” playing on an endless loop. There was an emcee endlessly praising Trump, encouraging the audience to clap for Trump, and reminding everyone about how great it was that Trump spoke at the Conference last year, which all sounds even stranger when said in an Australian accent. In addition to LaCivita, there were four GOP Congressmen, four GOP Senators, one Trump-appointed SEC Commissioner, one Treasury Official, two senior White House officials (including David Sacks, the White House crypto and A.I. czar), and two of Trump’s sons. All of them, too, spent time praising Trump as the first “crypto president.” (Vice President J.D. Vance would be speaking the next day to the general admission crowd, but he was probably going to praise Trump, too.) The titles of the panels seemed to be run through some sort of MAGA generative AI system: The Next Golden Age of America. The American Super Grid. Making America the Global Bitcoin Superpower. The New Declaration of Independence: Bitcoin and the Path Out of the U.S. National Debt Crisis. (Speaker: Vivek Ramaswamy.) Uncancleable: Bitcoin, Rumble & Free Speech Technology. (Speaker: Donald Trump Jr.) The only difference was that this MAGA conference was funded by crypto. And if crypto was paying for a MAGA conference, and they had to play “God Bless the USA,” they were bringing in a string quartet.Annoyed that I had not yet seen a single Shiba Inu — no, Jim Justice’s celebrity bulldog was not the same thing — I left Nakamoto and went back to the press area. It hadn’t turned into Fox News yet, but I could see MAGA’s presence seeping into the world of podcasters and vloggers. A Newsmax reporter (great blowout, jewel-toned sheath dress, heels to the heavens, very camera-ready) was interviewing White House official Bo Hines (clean-cut, former Yale football player and GOP congressional candidate, nice suit), right before he was hustled onstage for a panel with a member of the U.S. Treasury. Soon, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) was doing an interview gauntlet while his senior aides stood by, one wearing a pink plaid blazer that could have easily been Brooks Brothers. Over on the Genesis Stage, the CEO of PragerU, a right wing media company that attacks higher education, was interviewing the CEO of the 1792 Exchange, a right-wing nonprofit that attacks companies for engaging in “woke business practices” such as diversity initiatives. (Leveraging Bitcoin’s Values to Shift the Culture in America.) I walked into the main expo center, past a crypto podcaster in a sequined bomber jacket talking to a Wall Street Journal reporter. For some reason, his presence was a relief. Even though he was clearly a Trump supporter — his jacket said TRUMP: THE GOLDEN AGE on the back — there was something more janky and homegrown, less corporate, about him. But the moment I looked up and saw a massive sign that said STEAKTOSHI, the unease returned. A ghoulish-looking group of executives from Steak ‘n Shake, the fast food company with over 450 locations across the globe, had gathered under the sign in a replica of the restaurant. They were selling jars of beef tallow, with a choice of grass-fed or Wagyu, and giving out a MAKE FRYING OIL TALLOW AGAIN hat with every purchase an overt embrace of the right-wing conspiracy that cooking with regular seed oils would lower one’s testosterone. (Relevant to the conference: they were also advertising that their restaurants now accepted Bitcoin.)Andrew Gordon, the head of Main Street Crypto PAC, had been to five previous Bitcoin Conferences and worked on crypto tax policy since 2014. He’d seen Trump speak at the last conference in Nashville during the election, and the audience – not typically unquestioning MAGA superfans – had melted into adoring goo in Trump’s presence. But now that Trump was using his presidential powers to establish a Bitcoin reserve, roll back federal investigations into crypto companies, and order massive changes to financial regulatory policies — in short, changing the entire market on crypto’s behalf with the stroke of a pen — Gordon clocked a notable vibe shift this year. “There are people wearing suits at a Bitcoin conference,” he told me wryly back in the press lounge. (He, too, was wearing a suit). The change wasn’t due to a new breed of Suit People flooding in. It was the Bitcoin veterans the ones who’d been coming to the conference for years, dressed in loud Versace jackets or old holey t-shirts – who were now in business attire. “They’re now recognizing the level of formality and how serious it is.”According to the Bitcoin Conference organizers, out of the 35,000-plus attendees in Vegas this year, 17.1 percent of them were categorized as “institutional and corporate decision-makers” — a vague way to describe politicians, corporate executives, and the rest of the C-suite world. Whenever they weren’t speaking onstage, they were conducting interviews with outlets hand-selected from dozens of media requests that had been filtered through the conference organizers, or in Q&A sessions with people who’d bought the $21,000 Whale Pass and could access the VIP Lounge. (Yes, the industry-only day of the conference had an even more exclusive tier.) They were sidebarring with crypto CEOs outside the conference for round tables, privately meeting Senators for lunch and White House officials for dinner. Gordon himself had just held a private breakfast for industry insiders, with GOP Senators Marsha Blackburn and Cynthia Lummis as special guests. And for the very, very wealthy, MAGA Inc., Trump’s primary super PAC, was holding a fundraising dinner in Vegas that night, with Vance, Don Jr., and Eric Trump in attendance. That ticket, according to The Washington Post, cost $1 million per person.It was the kind of amoral, backroom behavior that would have sent the General Admission attendees into a rage — and they did the next day, when the convention opened to them. During one extremely packed talk at the Genesis Stage called Are Bitcoiners Becoming Sycophants of the State?, a moderator asked the four panelists what they’d like to say to Vance and Sacks and all the politicians who’d been there yesterday. And Erik Cason erupted.“‘What you’re doing is actually immoral and bad. You hurt people. You actively want to use the state to implement violence against others.’ 
That’s like, fucked up and wrong,” said Cason, the author of “Cryptosovereignty,” to a crowd of hundreds. “If you personally wanna like, go to Yemen and try to stab those people, that’s on you. But asking other people to go do that – it is a fucked up and terrible thing.” He grew more heated. “And also fuck you. You’re not, like, a king. You’re supposed to be liable to the law, too. 
And I don’t appreciate you trying to think that that you just get to advance the state however the fuck you want, because you have power.”“These are the violent thugs who killed hundreds of millions of people over the last century,” agreed Bruce Fenton of Chainstone Labs. “They have nothing on us. All we wanna do is run some code and trade it around our nerd money. Leave us alone.”The audience burst into cheers and applause. Bitcoin was the promise of freedom from the government, who’d murdered and stolen and tried to control their lives, and now that their wealth was on the blockchain, no one could take their sovereignty. “Personally, I don’t really care what they [the politicians] think,” said American HODL, whose title on the conference site was “guy with 6.15 bitcoin,” the derision clear in his voice. “They are employees who work for us, so their thoughts and opinions on the matter are irrelevant. Do what the fuck we tell you to do.
 I don’t work for you. I’m not underneath you. You’re underneath me.” But the politicians weren’t going to listen to them, much less talk to them. The politicians spent the conference surrounded by aides and security who stopped people from approaching – I’m sorry, the Senator has to leave for an engagement now – or safely inside the VIP rooms with the $21,000-dollar Whale Pass holders and the million-dollar donors. By the time American HODL said that the politicians worked for him, they were on flights out of Vegas, having gotten what they wanted from Code and Country, an event that was closed to General Admission pass holders.Coinbase’s executives were at Code and Country, however. Coinbase held over 984,000 Bitcoin, more coins than American HODL could mine in a lifetime. And Coinbase was now a sponsor of Donald Trump’s birthday military parade. The Nakamoto Stage during Code + Country at the Bitcoin Conference.After David Sacks and the Winklevoss twins finished explaining how Trump had saved the crypto industry from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (or as one Winklevoss called her, “Pocahontas”), I was jonesing for a drink. A few other reporters on the ground had told me about “Code, Country and Cocktails,” the America250 afterparty held at the Ayu Dayclub at Resort World, and I signed up immediately. Reporters at past Bitcoin Conferences had promised legendary side-event depravity, and I hoped I would find it there. As I entered the lush, tropical nightclub, I saw two white-gloved hands sticking out the side of the wall, each holding a glass of champagne at crotch level. I reached out for a flute, thinking it was maybe just a fucked-up piece of art, and gasped as the hand let go of the stem, disappeared into the hole, and emerged seconds later with another full champagne glass. Past the champagne glory hole wall — there was really no other way to describe it — was a massive outdoor swimming pool, surrounded by chefs serving up endless portions of steak frites, unguarded magnums of Moët casually stacked in ice buckets, the professional Beautiful Women of Las Vegas draped around Peter Schiff, the famous economist/podcaster/Bitcoin skeptic. When not booked for private events, the crescent-shaped pool at Ayu would be filled with drunk people in swim suits, dancing to DJ Kaskade. No one was in the pool tonight. Depravity was not happening here. In fact, there was more networking going on than partying, and it was somehow more engaging than Bone Thugs-N-Harmony suddenly appearing onstage to perform. And it was distinctly not just about making money in crypto. A good percentage of this crowd wore some derivative of a MAGA hat, and anyone who could show off their photos of them with Trump did so. This, I realized, was how crypto bros did politics — a new game for them, where success and influence was not necessarily quantifiable. “Crypto got Trump elected,” Greg Grseziak, an agent who manages crypto influencers, told me, showing me his Trump photo opp. “In four years, this is going to be the biggest event in the presidential race.”Grzesiak walked off to do more networking, I finished my glory hole champagne, and in the meantime, Bone Thugs had started performing “East 1999”. A fellow reporter leaned over. “Who do you think those guys are?” he asked, pointing to a group of extremely tall white men in suits and lanyards, standing behind a velvet rope to the left of the stage.I walked over to investigate. They looked like the group of Steak ‘n Shake executives I met at the Expo Hall — the ones with the beef tallow jars and derivative MAGA hats — and they were lurking next to the stage, watching the rappers like vultures but barely moving to the music. This scene was too preposterous to actually be real: Steak ‘n Shake executives, at the Bitcoin Conference, attending a party for America250, in the VIP section, during a Bone Thugs-n-Harmony set? “Shout out to Steak ‘n Shake for being the first fast food restaurant to accept Bitcoin!” announced one of the Bones. The company logo appeared on a screen above his head.No flashy Vegas magic (or dancers in cow costumes, now shimmying onstage with Steak ‘n Shake signs) could mask what I just saw. This party was co-sponsored by a MAGA-branded fast-food chain owned by Sardar Biglari, a businessman who had purchased Maxim, became its editor-in-chief, and used the smutty magazine to endorse Trump in 2024. So was Frax, the stablecoin exchange, and Exodus, one of the biggest crypto wallet companies in the market. Bitcoin Magazine’s logo flashed across the stage at one point, as editor-in-chief David Bailey, in his own derivative MAGA hat, tried to hype up the crowd for J.D. Vance’s speech the next day. (“You only get to live history once,” he said, to faint cheers.)For some unknown reason, these companies were all putting their money into America250, and as I had to keep reminding myself, America250 — the government nonprofit in charge of planning the country’s celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration’s signing — was currently working to get tanks in the streets of Washington DC for Donald Trump’s birthday. I went for one last champagne flute from the glory hole, just for the novelty, and as the hand disappeared back into the wall, I caught something I’d missed earlier: above the hole was a logo for TRON, the blockchain exchange run by billionaire Justin Sun. He had faced several fraud investigations from the SEC that magically disappeared after he invested $75 million in a Trump family crypto company, and seemed more than happy to keep throwing crypto money at Trump. Recently, he won the $TRUMP meme coin dinner, spending over $16 million on the token in exchange for a private and controversial dinner with the president.TRON was also cosponsoring the America250 party.Earlier, I’d run into the Australian emcee in the elevator of The Palazzo. She’d spent the day teetering across the Nakamoto Stage in dainty kitten heels, a pinstriped blazer and miniskirt suit set, and given the gratuitous Trump praising and the fact she was blonde, I had stereotyped her as MAGA to the core. But the program was over and she was holding her heels by their ankle straps, barefoot and sighing in relief. This was not her usual style, she told an attendee. She’d take a pair of sneakers over heels if she could. But the conference organizers had told her to dress up because there were senators in attendance. “Tomorrow, the real Bitcoiners are coming,” she said, and she’d get to wear flat shoes. And the next morning, on the day of Vance’s speech, I found myself stuck outside the conference with the “real Bitcoiners.” In spite of all the emails that the conference had sent me reminding me of how strict security measures would be, possibly to overcorrect from last year’s utter shitshow around Trump’s appearance, I’d woken up too late, eaten my bagel too leisurely, got sidetracked by a police officer-turned-Bitcoin investor excited I was wearing orange (whoops), and barely missed the cutoff for the Secret Service to let me in. But the conference had set up televisions with a live feed of Vance’s speech, and the rest of the general admission attendees were remarkably chill about it, opting to mingle in the hallways until the Secret Service left. I found myself in a smaller crowd near the expo hall door, next to a young man carrying a live miniature Shiba Inu (“It’s a tiny doge!” he said proudly), and the podcaster I’d seen earlier in the sequined bomber jacket. He introduced himself as Action CEO, and with nothing else to do but wait — “You can watch the [Vance] replay,” he reassured me, “these events are mainly about networking” — we got to talking. “I’m actually excited that Trump isn’t even here, I’ll be honest with you,” he said, speaking with a rapid cadence. Trump was ultimately just one guy, and the fact that he sent his underlings and political allies — the ones who could actually implement his grand promises for the crypto industry — proved he hadn’t just been paying lip service. That said, it had come with some uncomfortable changes, including the re-emergence of Justin Sun. “It’s a little bit concerning when you say, All right, we don’t care what you did in the past. Come on out, clean slate,” he continued. “That’s the concern right now for most people. Seeing people that did wrong by the space coming back and acting like nothing happened? That’s a little concerning.” And not just that: Sun was back in the United States, having dinner with Trump, and giving him millions of dollars. “If you’re sitting in a room and having a conversation, people are literally gonna go, yeah, it’s kind of sketch that this guy is back here after everything that’s happened. You’re not gonna see it published, because it’s not a popular opinion, but we’re all definitely talking about it.” If Action’s friends weren’t comfortable talking about it openly, that fraudsters with enough money were suddenly back in the mix, it was certainly not the kind of conversation the CEOs were going to have in front of the General Admission crowd. (Though it did mean that the emcee, looking much happier than she did the day before, got to wear low-heeled boots and shorts.) But behind closed doors — or at least at the Code and Country panels, where the base pass attendees couldn’t boo them — they gave a sense of what their backroom conversations with the Trump administration did look like.“I was actually at a dinner last night and one of the things that someone from the admin said was, What if we give you guys everything you want and then you guys forget? Because there’s midterms in 2026, and hopefully 2028, and beyond,” said Sam Kazemian, the founder and CEO of Frax, which had sponsored the America250 party. “But one of the things I said was: We as an industry are very, very loyal. The crypto community has a very, very, very strong memory. And once this industry is legalized, is transparent, is safe, all of the big players understand that this wasn’t possible without this administration, this Congress, this Senate. We’re lifelong, career-long allies.”“Loyalty” is a dangerous concept with this president, who’s cheated on his three wives, stopped paying the legal fees for employees who’d taken the fall for him, ended the careers of sympathetic MAGA Republicans for insufficiently coddling him, withdrew security for government employees experiencing death threats for the sin of contradicting him in public by citing facts. It was only weeks ago that he and Vance were publicly screaming at Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, who was at the White House to request more aid in the war against Russia, for not saying “thank you” in front of the cameras. It would be less than a week before he began threatening to cancel all of Elon Musk’s government contracts when the billionaire criticized the size of Trump’s budget, even though Musk had given him millions and helped him purge the government. And if you were to find a photo of any political leader, billionaire or CEO standing vacant-eyed next to Trump and shaking his hand, the circumstances are practically a given: they had recently made him unhappy, either for criticizing him, making an imagined slight, or simply asserting themselves. The only way they could avoid public humiliation, or their businesses being crushed via executive order, was to go to Mar-a-Lago, tell the world that the president was wonderful, and underwrite a giant party for his birthday military parade. Maybe Kazemian knew he was being tested, or maybe the 32-year old Ron Paul superfan had no idea what the administration was asking of him. Either way, he responded correctly. At least one person at the conference was thinking about ways that the government could betray the Bitcoin community. As the panel on Bitcoiners becoming sycophants of the state wrapped up, and the other panelists finished telling the government pigs to go fuck themselves and keep their hands off their nerd money, the moderator turned to Casey Rodarmor, a software engineer-turned-crypto influencer, for the last question: “Tell everyone here why Bitcoin wins, regardless of what happens.”“Oh, man, I don’t know if Bitcoin wins, regardless of what happens,” he responded, frowning. He had already gamed out one feasible situation where Bitcoin lost: “If we all of a sudden saw a very rapid inflation in a lot of fiat currencies, and there was a plausible scapegoat in Bitcoin all over the world, and they were able to make a sort of marketing claim that Bitcoin is causing this — Bitcoin is making your savings go to zero, it’s causing this carnage to the economy — 
If that happens worldwide, I think that’s really scary.” The moderator froze, the crowd murmured nervously, and I thought about the number of times Trump had blamed a group of people for problems they’d never caused. An awful lot of them were now being deported. “I take that seriously,” Rodarmor continued. “I don’t know that Bitcoin will succeed. I think that Bitcoin is incredibly strong, it’s incredibly difficult to fuck up. But in that case… man, I don’t know.” I had asked Action CEO earlier if Kazemian, the Frax CEO, was right — if the crypto world was unquestioningly loyal to Trump, if their support of him was unconditional. “Oh, it’s definitely conditional,” he said without hesitation, as his Trump jacket glittered under the fluorescent lights. “It’s a matter of, are you going to be doing the right things by us, by the people who are here?” We walked down the expo hall, past booths promising life-changing technological marvels, alongside thousands of people flooding into Nakamoto Hall, ready to learn how to become unfathomably rich, who paid $199 to be there.The audience of “Are Bitcoiners Becoming Sychophants of the State?”, Day Two of the Bitcoin ConferenceSee More:

Chris Kerr, Senior Editor, NewsJune 5, 20252 Min ReadSwitch 2 promotional photo via NintendoMultiple consumers on social media claim GameStop employees who chose to staple receipts to the packaging of Switch 2 hardware have inadvertently caused screen punctures.As clocked by IGN, a number of Switch 2 owners who managed to secure a device on launch day say they began unboxing their device only to find the display sported puncture wounds.The culprit, it seems, were receipts that had been stapled to the cardboard packaging by retail workers. "My Switch 2 has staple holes in the screen. They stapled the receipt to the box," wrote one X user, who also posted pictures of the damage."GameStop stapled the receipt for me and my friends Switch 2s to the box. FML," said another person on X before sharing similar images. "Genuinely insane now I’m gonna have to wait 3 months for the restock. And yes we were there for the midnight release so I bet everyone in this line is gonna have this same issue."There have also been similar posts on Reddit, where multiple users claim to have encountered the same issue and suggested the problem might be widespread. It seems many of those impacted picked up their console from GameStop's Staten Island branch."Me and my homie here (we never met before) were unfortunately at the same GameStop and this happened to me and another buddy! Think the entire pre-order batch is completely fucked," they wrote in a thread.Related:Who decided to package Switch 2 consoles with the screens facing outward?It's an issue that raises questions about the decision to package the Switch 2 with the screen facing outward. As shown by the images being shared on social media and multiple unboxing videos (like this one posted by CNET), the console's 7.9 inch display is visible as soon as the box is opened and is only protected by a plastic wrap and the cardboard lid of the box itself.Game Developer has reached out to Nintendo for comment. Read more about:Nintendo Switch 2Top StoriesAbout the AuthorChris KerrSenior Editor, News, GameDeveloper.comGame Developer news editor Chris Kerr is an award-winning journalist and reporter with over a decade of experience in the game industry. His byline has appeared in notable print and digital publications including Edge, Stuff, Wireframe, International Business Times, and PocketGamer.biz. Throughout his career, Chris has covered major industry events including GDC, PAX Australia, Gamescom, Paris Games Week, and Develop Brighton. He has featured on the judging panel at The Develop Star Awards on multiple occasions and appeared on BBC Radio 5 Live to discuss breaking news.See more from Chris KerrDaily news, dev blogs, and stories from Game Developer straight to your inboxStay UpdatedYou May Also Like

What just happened? Enthusiast-class discrete graphics cards typically dominate conversations about high performance, but integrated GPUs aren't far behind when it comes to overclocking records for clock frequency. The latest world record holder recently explained how he managed voltage and temperature levels to push an Intel iGPU past the 4GHz mark for the very first time. Overclocker Pieter Massman recently detailed how he set a new graphics clock frequency world record at Computex 2025. While most recent record holders have used Nvidia's flagship RTX 4090, Massman surpassed them using the integrated GPU from an Intel Core Ultra 9 285K. With help from Asus overclocker Peter "Shamino" Tan, Massman pushed the Arrow Lake processor's Xe2-LPG 64EU iGPU to 4.25GHz – more than double its stock boost clock. The team achieved the feat twice, validating the results in CPU-Z during a livestream in the early days of this year's Computex event in Taiwan. According to Massman's blog, Skatter Bencher, the achievement marks a new world record for both integrated GPU clock frequency and GPU clock frequency overall. Since the RTX 4090 launched in 2022, frequency records have steadily climbed from around 3.3GHz to 4.02GHz in 2023. Massman had previously set the iGPU record at 3.9GHz during an Arrow Lake launch event late last year – using the same chip he would later overclock at Computex. The overclock involved setting the GT ratio to multiply the default reference clock by a factor of 85, the highest available setting. Initially, Massman supplied 1.3V to the integrated GPU via a VccGT voltage rail dedicated to the CPU's graphics tile cores, but this only reached 3.1GHz. // Related Stories Pushing further required a delicate balance of overvolting and liquid nitrogen cooling, ultimately achieving 4.25GHz with 1.7V and a temperature of -170°C. However, measuring the iGPU's performance at those settings overwhelmed several common benchmarking tools. Furmark crashed after reaching 2,800 points in 1080p, 3DMark Speed Way halted around 650 marks, and GPUPI 1B only ran for about 17.9 seconds. To stabilize the system, the team overclocked the graphics die-to-die interface and increased the reference clock. While discrete and overall GPU clock frequency records have steadily risen since the early 2000s, progress with iGPUs only resumed recently. After breaking the 2GHz barrier in 2011, integrated GPU overclocking plateaued for nearly a decade before surpassing 3GHz in 2023. Whether graphics overclocking will stagnate as CPU frequency gains have since 2010 remains to be seen.

US-based brokerage firm Robinhood has officially acquired Luxembourg-headquartered crypto exchange Bitstamp. In an announcement posted on June 2, Robinhood said that it paid $200 million (roughly Rs. 1,709 crore) in cash to complete this acquisition. With this, Robinhood has now added over 50 licences held by Bitstamp to its own network. Johann Kerbrat, the general manager of Robinhood Crypto had first spoken about the plan to acquire Bitstamp last year during an interview with the Wall Street Journal.Bitstamp was founded in 2011 and is touted as the longest running crypto exchange in the world. Its offices are located in Singapore, Slovenia, the UK, as well as the US. Robinhood plans to use Bitstamp's resources to bring service offerings to institutional investors, Vlad Tenev, the CEO and co-founder of Robinhood, indicated on X."Bitstamp is now part of Robinhood, adding a globally-scaled crypto exchange and our first-ever institutional crypto business. Our work is just beginning," Tenev posted.Following the announcement, Bitstamp changed its name to "Bitstamp by Robinhood" on various online platforms including X.In an official blog post, Bitstamp said that it "has been trusted for 14 years by institutions for its reliable trade execution, deep order books and industry-leading API connectivity and offerings like crypto-as-a-service, institutional lending, and staking. Robinhood is entering the space with an active and highly trusted business with established relationships."Key Highlights on the AcquisitionRobinhood published some important details about Bitstamp and its acquisition for its investor community on June 2.The American firm disclosed that Bitstamp was catering to over 500,000 retail and around five thousand funded institutional customers as of April 30, 2025. Bitstamp's yearly revenue up till April 30 was clocked at $95 million (roughly Rs. 811 crore)."In 2025, for the remaining seven months of the year post close, Robinhood expects to record approximately $65 million (roughly Rs. 555 crore) of Bitstamp-related costs. These costs are nearly all Adjusted Operating Expenses and are primarily driven by business operations, along with some anticipated integration and deal-related costs," Robinhood's announcement post added.Robinhood will now integrate Bitstamp's infrastructure into its own services and offerings."Bringing Bitstamp's platform and expertise into Robinhood's ecosystem will give users an enhanced trading experience with a continuing commitment to compliance, security, and customer-centricity," JB Graftieaux, CEO of Bitstamp said as commenting on the development.Robinhood's crypto trading service had faced legal challenges with the US SEC last year on allegations of having violated the US Securities laws. However, following Donald Trump's return to the White House as the 47th US President, the SEC closed its investigation into Robinhood and did not take any action.(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Menu Home News Hardware Gaming Mobile Finance Deals Reviews How To Wccftech HardwareLeak AMD Octa-core Ryzen AI Max Pro 385 Processor Spotted On Geekbench: Affordable Strix Halo Chips Are About To Enter The Market Sarfraz Khan • May 31, 2025 at 08:29am EDT After a long time, we finally saw a glimpse of a mid-range Zen 5 Strix Halo chip, which is usually rare to find on devices. AMD Ryzen AI Max Pro 385 Benchmarked on Geekbench; Scores 2489 Points in Single and 14136 Points in Multi-Core Tests It has been quite a while since AMD launched its premium segment Zen 5 mobile chips. The Strix Halo is the strongest-ever lineup based on the Zen 5 architecture, which offers up to a staggering 16-cores/32-threads configuration. However, most of the machines, including AI mini PCs and laptops, are mostly equipped with the flagship model, even though AMD also launched several SKUs in the lineup. AMD's Ryzen AI Max Pro 395 is usually seen on high-end mobile devices, boasting 16-core/32-threads and a Radeon 8060S, but this is probably the first time we have witnessed a mid-range 8-core/16-thread SKU. It's the Ryzen AI Max Pro 385, which offers 8x Zen 5 cores clocked at 3.6 GHz with boost clock of up to 5 GHz and carries the RDNA 3.5-based Radeon 8050S graphics. Unlike the Pro 395, the Pro 385 is significantly weaker in the CPU department but is fairly strong when it comes to the integrated graphics. While the iGPU needs to be tested for comparison, the Radeon 8050S is only 8 Compute Units behind the Radeon 8060S. This will surely put the latter in a noticeably higher position in graphical performance, but the Radeon 8050S is likely the second strongest iGPU you will currently find on the mainstream market. Nonetheless, coming to the CPU itself, the Ryzen AI Max Pro 385 is used on an HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14-inch mobile workstation laptop. We have seen such laptops and mini PCs with faster Strix Halo variants, but it's good to see that manufacturers are going to offer more affordable options. The processor scored 2489 points in single and 14136 points in multicore tests, but that will hugely vary from test to test, and we all know that Geekbench 6 isn't exactly a reliable test platform for CPUs. What's more important is that we can finally see cheaper alternatives to Ryzen AI Max Pro 395-based devices, offering excellent iGPU performance. Mini PCs and laptops equipped with Ryzen AI Max Pro 385 can easily play games at 1080p with playable framerates, but keep in mind that many of these devices will be targeted towards professionals and content creators. Being able to offer up to 50 NPU TOPS and over 100 TOPS of AI performance overall, the Ryzen AI Max Pro 385 can be a solid option for AI workloads as well. Ryzen AI Max Pro 395-based laptops and mini PCs usually cost nearly $2000 and above, but with the availability of Ryzen AI Max Pro 385, we can finally see sub-$1500 systems. News Sources: Geekbench, Videocardz Subscribe to get an everyday digest of the latest technology news in your inbox Follow us on Topics Sections Company Some posts on wccftech.com may contain affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com © 2025 WCCF TECH INC. 700 - 401 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada

In this post, we describe FrodoKEM, a key encapsulation protocol that offers a simple design and provides strong security guarantees even in a future with powerful quantum computers. The quantum threat to cryptography For decades, modern cryptography has relied on mathematical problems that are practically impossible for classical computers to solve without a secret key. Cryptosystems like RSA, Diffie-Hellman key-exchange, and elliptic curve-based schemes—which rely on the hardness of the integer factorization and (elliptic curve) discrete logarithm problems—secure communications on the internet, banking transactions, and even national security systems. However, the emergence of Quantum computers leverage the principles of quantum mechanics to perform certain calculations exponentially faster than classical computers. Their ability to solve complex problems, such as simulating molecular interactions, optimizing large-scale systems, and accelerating machine learning, is expected to have profound and beneficial implications for fields ranging from chemistry and material science to artificial intelligence. Spotlight: AI-POWERED EXPERIENCE Microsoft research copilot experience Discover more about research at Microsoft through our AI-powered experience Start now Opens in a new tab At the same time, quantum computing is poised to disrupt cryptography. In particular, Shor’s algorithm, a quantum algorithm developed in 1994, can efficiently factor large numbers and compute discrete logarithms—the very problems that underpin the security of RSA, Diffie-Hellman, and elliptic curve cryptography. This means that once large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computers become available, public-key protocols based on RSA, ECC, and Diffie-Hellman will become insecure, breaking a sizable portion of the cryptographic backbone of today’s digital world. Recent advances in quantum computing, such as Microsoft’s Majorana 1 (opens in new tab), the first quantum processor powered by topological qubits, represent major steps toward practical quantum computing and underscore the urgency of transitioning to quantum-resistant cryptographic systems. To address this looming security crisis, cryptographers and government agencies have been working on post-quantum cryptography (PQC)—new cryptographic algorithms that can resist attacks from both classical and quantum computers. The NIST Post-Quantum Cryptography Standardization effort In 2017, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) launched the Post-Quantum Cryptography Standardization project (opens in new tab) to evaluate and select cryptographic algorithms capable of withstanding quantum attacks. As part of this initiative, NIST sought proposals for two types of cryptographic primitives: key encapsulation mechanisms (KEMs)—which enable two parties to securely derive a shared key to establish an encrypted connection, similar to traditional key exchange schemes—and digital signature schemes. This initiative attracted submissions from cryptographers worldwide, and after multiple evaluation rounds, NIST selected CRYSTALS-Kyber, a KEM based on structured lattices, and standardized it as ML-KEM (opens in new tab). Additionally, NIST selected three digital signature schemes: CRYSTALS-Dilithium, now called ML-DSA; SPHINCS+, now called SLH-DSA; and Falcon, now called FN-DSA. While ML-KEM provides great overall security and efficiency, some governments and cryptographic researchers advocate for the inclusion and standardization of alternative algorithms that minimize reliance on algebraic structure. Reducing algebraic structure might prevent potential vulnerabilities and, hence, can be considered a more conservative design choice. One such algorithm is FrodoKEM. International standardization of post-quantum cryptography Beyond NIST, other international standardization bodies have been actively working on quantum-resistant cryptographic solutions. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is leading a global effort to standardize additional PQC algorithms. Notably, European government agencies—including Germany’s BSI (opens in new tab), the Netherlands’ NLNCSA and AIVD (opens in new tab), and France’s ANSSI (opens in new tab)—have shown strong support for FrodoKEM, recognizing it as a conservative alternative to structured lattice-based schemes. As a result, FrodoKEM is undergoing standardization at ISO. Additionally, ISO is standardizing ML-KEM and a conservative code-based KEM called Classic McEliece. These three algorithms are planned for inclusion in ISO/IEC 18033-2:2006 as Amendment 2 (opens in new tab). What is FrodoKEM? FrodoKEM is a key encapsulation mechanism (KEM) based on the Learning with Errors (LWE) problem, a cornerstone of lattice-based cryptography. Unlike structured lattice-based schemes such as ML-KEM, FrodoKEM is built on generic, unstructured lattices, i.e., it is based on the plain LWE problem. Why unstructured lattices? Structured lattice-based schemes introduce additional algebraic properties that could potentially be exploited in future cryptanalytic attacks. By using unstructured lattices, FrodoKEM eliminates these concerns, making it a safer choice in the long run, albeit at the cost of larger key sizes and lower efficiency. It is important to emphasize that no particular cryptanalytic weaknesses are currently known for recommended parameterizations of structured lattice schemes in comparison to plain LWE. However, our current understanding of the security of these schemes could potentially change in the future with cryptanalytic advances. Lattices and the Learning with Errors (LWE) problem Lattice-based cryptography relies on the mathematical structure of lattices, which are regular arrangements of points in multidimensional space. A lattice is defined as the set of all integer linear combinations of a set of basis vectors. The difficulty of certain computational problems on lattices, such as the Shortest Vector Problem (SVP) and the Learning with Errors (LWE) problem, forms the basis of lattice-based schemes. The Learning with Errors (LWE) problem The LWE problem is a fundamental hard problem in lattice-based cryptography. It involves solving a system of linear equations where some small random error has been added to each equation, making it extremely difficult to recover the original secret values. This added error ensures that the problem remains computationally infeasible, even for quantum computers. Figure 1 below illustrates the LWE problem, specifically, the search version of the problem. As can be seen in Figure 1, for the setup of the problem we need a dimension \(n\) that defines the size of matrices, a modulus \(q\) that defines the value range of the matrix coefficients, and a certain error distribution \(\chi\) from which we sample \(\textit{“small”}\) matrices. We sample two matrices from \(\chi\), a small matrix \(\text{s}\) and an error matrix \(\text{e}\) (for simplicity in the explanation, we assume that both have only one column); sample an \(n \times n\) matrix \(\text{A}\) uniformly at random; and compute \(\text{b} = \text{A} \times \text{s} + \text{e}\). In the illustration, each matrix coefficient is represented by a colored square, and the “legend of coefficients” gives an idea of the size of the respective coefficients, e.g., orange squares represent the small coefficients of matrix \(\text{s}\) (small relative to the modulus \(q\)). Finally, given \(\text{A}\) and \(\text{b}\), the search LWE problem consists in finding \(\text{s}\). This problem is believed to be hard for suitably chosen parameters (e.g., for dimension \(n\) sufficiently large) and is used at the core of FrodoKEM. In comparison, the LWE variant used in ML-KEM—called Module-LWE (M-LWE)—has additional symmetries, adding mathematical structure that helps improve efficiency. In a setting similar to that of the search LWE problem above, the matrix \(\text{A}\) can be represented by just a single row of coefficients. FIGURE 1: Visualization of the (search) LWE problem. LWE is conjectured to be quantum-resistant, and FrodoKEM’s security is directly tied to its hardness. In other words, cryptanalysts and quantum researchers have not been able to devise an efficient quantum algorithm capable of solving the LWE problem and, hence, FrodoKEM. In cryptography, absolute security can never be guaranteed; instead, confidence in a problem’s hardness comes from extensive scrutiny and its resilience against attacks over time. How FrodoKEM Works FrodoKEM follows the standard paradigm of a KEM, which consists of three main operations—key generation, encapsulation, and decapsulation—performed interactively between a sender and a recipient with the goal of establishing a shared secret key: Key generation (KeyGen), computed by the recipient Generates a public key and a secret key. The public key is sent to the sender, while the private key remains secret. Encapsulation (Encapsulate), computed by the sender Generates a random session key. Encrypts the session key using the recipient’s public key to produce a ciphertext. Produces a shared key using the session key and the ciphertext. The ciphertext is sent to the recipient. Decapsulation (Decapsulate), computed by the recipient Decrypts the ciphertext using their secret key to recover the original session key. Reproduces the shared key using the decrypted session key and the ciphertext. The shared key generated by the sender and reconstructed by the recipient can then be used to establish secure symmetric-key encryption for further communication between the two parties. Figure 2 below shows a simplified view of the FrodoKEM protocol. As highlighted in red, FrodoKEM uses at its core LWE operations of the form “\(\text{b} = \text{A} \times \text{s} + \text{e}\)”, which are directly applied within the KEM paradigm. FIGURE 2: Simplified overview of FrodoKEM. Performance: Strong security has a cost Not relying on additional algebraic structure certainly comes at a cost for FrodoKEM in the form of increased protocol runtime and bandwidth. The table below compares the performance and key sizes corresponding to the FrodoKEM level 1 parameter set (variant called “FrodoKEM-640-AES”) and the respective parameter set of ML-KEM (variant called “ML-KEM-512”). These parameter sets are intended to match or exceed the brute force security of AES-128. As can be seen, the difference in speed and key sizes between FrodoKEM and ML-KEM is more than an order of magnitude. Nevertheless, the runtime of the FrodoKEM protocol remains reasonable for most applications. For example, on our benchmarking platform clocked at 3.2GHz, the measured runtimes are 0.97 ms, 1.9 ms, and 3.2 ms for security levels 1, 2, and 3, respectively. For security-sensitive applications, a more relevant comparison is with Classic McEliece, a post-quantum code-based scheme also considered for standardization. In this case, FrodoKEM offers several efficiency advantages. Classic McEliece’s public keys are significantly larger—well over an order of magnitude greater than FrodoKEM’s—and its key generation is substantially more computationally expensive. Nonetheless, Classic McEliece provides an advantage in certain static key-exchange scenarios, where its high key generation cost can be amortized across multiple key encapsulation executions. TABLE 1: Comparison of key sizes and performance on an x86-64 processor for NIST level 1 parameter sets. A holistic design made with security in mind FrodoKEM’s design principles support security beyond its reliance on generic, unstructured lattices to minimize the attack surface of potential future cryptanalytic threats. Its parameters have been carefully chosen with additional security margins to withstand advancements in known attacks. Furthermore, FrodoKEM is designed with simplicity in mind—its internal operations are based on straightforward matrix-vector arithmetic using integer coefficients reduced modulo a power of two. These design decisions facilitate simple, compact and secure implementations that are also easier to maintain and to protect against side-channel attacks. Conclusion After years of research and analysis, the next generation of post-quantum cryptographic algorithms has arrived. NIST has chosen strong PQC protocols that we believe will serve Microsoft and its customers well in many applications. For security-sensitive applications, FrodoKEM offers a secure yet practical approach for post-quantum cryptography. While its reliance on unstructured lattices results in larger key sizes and higher computational overhead compared to structured lattice-based alternatives, it provides strong security assurances against potential future attacks. Given the ongoing standardization efforts and its endorsement by multiple governmental agencies, FrodoKEM is well-positioned as a viable alternative for organizations seeking long-term cryptographic resilience in a post-quantum world. Further Reading For those interested in learning more about FrodoKEM, post-quantum cryptography, and lattice-based cryptography, the following resources provide valuable insights: The official FrodoKEM website: https://frodokem.org/ (opens in new tab), which contains, among several other resources, FrodoKEM’s specification document. The official FrodoKEM software library: https://github.com/Microsoft/PQCrypto-LWEKE (opens in new tab), which contains reference and optimized implementations of FrodoKEM written in C and Python. NIST’s Post-Quantum Cryptography Project: https://csrc.nist.gov/projects/post-quantum-cryptography (opens in new tab). Microsoft’s blogpost on its transition plan for PQC: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/microsoft-security-blog/microsofts-quantum-resistant-cryptography-is-here/4238780 (opens in new tab). A comprehensive survey on lattice-based cryptography: Peikert, C. “A Decade of Lattice Cryptography.” Foundations and Trends in Theoretical Computer Science. (2016) A comprehensive tutorial on modern lattice-based schemes, including ML-KEM and ML-DSA: Lyubashevsky, V. “Basic Lattice Cryptography: The concepts behind Kyber (ML-KEM) and Dilithium (ML-DSA).” https://eprint.iacr.org/2024/1287 (opens in new tab). (2024) Opens in a new tab

Nvidia’s RTX 5060 is finally here, and many people hoped it’d put up a fight against some of the best graphics cards. Does it really, though? Reviewers are split on the matter. Alas, I’m not here to judge the card. I’m here to show you some alternatives. While Nvidia’s xx60 cards typically become some of the most popular GPUs of any given generation, they’re not the only option you have right now. The RTX 5060 might not even be the best option at that price point. Below, I’ll walk you through four GPUs that I think you should buy instead of the RTX 5060. Recommended Videos Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 Jacob Roach / Digital Trends I’m not sure whether this will come as a surprise or not, but based on current pricing and benchmarks, the GPU I recommend buying instead of the RTX 5060 is its last-gen equivalent. The RTX 4060 is one of the last RTX 40-series graphics cards that are still readily available around MSRP. I found one for $329 at Newegg, and it’s an overclocked model, meaning slightly faster performance than the base version. However, you might as well just buy a used RTX 4060 if you find it from a trustworthy source, as that’ll cost you a whole lot less. The RTX 5060 and the RTX 4060 have a lot in common. Spec-wise, they’re not at all far apart, although Nvidia’s newer Blackwell architecture and the switch to GDDR7 VRAM give the newer GPU a bit more oomph. But, unfortunately, both cards share the same 8GB RAM — an increasingly small amount in today’s gaming world — and the same narrow 128-bit bus. Some reviewers note that the RTX 5060 isn’t far ahead of the RTX 4060 in raw performance. The newer card gets the full benefit of Nvidia’s Multi-Frame Generation, though. Overall, they’re pretty comparable, but if you can score a used RTX 4060 for cheap, I’d go for it. AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT (or the RX 9060 XT) Jacob Roach / Digital Trends I wasn’t a big fan of the RX 7600 XT 16GB upon launch, and I still have some beef with that card. Much like Nvidia’s options, AMD equipped its mainstream GPU with a really narrow memory interface, stifling the bandwidth and holding back its performance. Still, in the current climate, I’ll take that 16GB with the 128-bit bus over a card that has the same interface and only sports 8GB VRAM. The cheapest RX 7600 XT 16GB costs around $360, and you can find it on the shelves with ease. But it’s the same scenario here — if you can find it used from a trustworthy source, it might be worth it, assuming you’re on a tight budget. The state of the GPU market as of late has made me appreciate second-hand GPUs a lot more. The RX 7600 XT is slower than the RTX 5060, and it’ll fall behind in ray tracing, but it gives you plenty of RAM where Nvidia’s card offers very little. That alone makes it worthy of your consideration. AMD’s upcoming RX 9060 XT could be a great option here, too. I expect it to offer better ray tracing capabilities than the RX 7600 XT, and it’ll have the same $300 price tag as Nvidia’s RTX 5060. Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB Gigabyte If your budget is a little bit flexible, you could go one level up and get the RTX 5060 Ti with 16GB of RAM. Unfortunately, the cheapest options are at around $479 right now, which is well over the MSRP and a whopping $180 more than the RTX 5060. However, for that price, you’ll get yourself a GPU that’s better suited to stand the test of time. With 16GB of video memory and the full benefit of GDDR7 RAM, the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB offers an upgrade over the last-gen version. It’s not perfect by any stretch, though. Reviewers put the GPU below the RX 9070 non-XT, the RTX 5070, and even the RTX 4070 when you consider pure rasterization. This means no so-called “fake frames,” which is what Nvidia’s DLSS 4 delivers. That leaves the RTX 5060 Ti in an odd spot. Basically, if your budget can stretch to it, the RX 9070 and the RTX 5070 are both better cards; they’re also a lot more expensive. Intel Arc B580 Jacob Roach / Digital Trends Less demanding gamers might find an option in Intel’s Arc B580. Upon launch, the GPU surprised pretty much everyone with its excellent performance-per-dollar ratio. The downside? That ratio is now a lot less impressive, because unexpected demand and low stock levels brought the price of the Arc B580 far above its $250 recommended list price (MSRP). The Arc B580 is a little bit slower than the RTX 4060 Ti, so it’ll be slower than the RTX 5060, too. It also can’t put up a fight as far as ray tracing goes. But it’s a budget-friendly GPU and a solid alternative to the RTX 5060 if you’d rather pick up something else this time around. My advice? Wait it out Jacob Roach / Digital Trends It’s not a great time to buy a GPU. The more successful and impressive cards from this generation, such as AMD’s RX 9070 XT or Nvidia’s RTX 5070 Ti, keep selling above MSRP. Those that aren’t quite as exciting may stick around MSRP (which is where the RTX 5060 sits right now, mere days after launch) … but that doesn’t make up for their shortcomings. Given the fact that reviews of the RTX 5060 are still pretty scarce, I’d wait it out for a week or two. Read some comparisons, check out the prices, and then decide. Gambling on a GPU just because the previous generations were solid doesn’t work anymore, and that’s now clearer than ever.

Game Dev Digest Issue #283 - Retro, Graphics Tricks, Multiplayer, and more posted in GameDevDigest Newsletter Published May 23, 2025 Advertisement This article was originally published on GameDevDigest.comEnjoy!“ZLinq”, a Zero-Allocation LINQ Library for .NET - I’ve released ZLinq v1 last month! By building on structs and generics, it achieves zero allocations. It includes extensions like LINQ to Span, LINQ to SIMD, LINQ to Tree (FileSystem, JSON, GameObject, etc.), a drop-in replacement Source Generator for arbitrary types, and support for multiple platforms including .NET Standard 2.0, Unity, and Godot.neuecc.medium.comPathfinding - I've recently been working on the pathfinding for NPCs in my game, which is something I've been looking forward to for a while now since it's a nice chunky problem to solve. I thought I'd write up this post about how I went about it all.juhrjuhr.itch.ioMy Work at Unity - I worked as a developer at Unity Technologies from 2009 to 2020. When I started, there were around 20 employees worldwide and Unity was still largely unknown. When I left, there were over 3000 employees and Unity had become the most widely used game engine in the industry.runevision.comIndie Game Marketing Examples: Campaigns We Loved - From Crabs to Chess: Creative marketing lessons from indie game campaigns that really worked!impress.gamesMaking Video Games in 2025 (without an engine) - I genuinely believe making games without a big "do everything" engine can be easier, more fun, and often less overhead. I am not making a "do everything" game and I do not need 90% of the features these engines provide. I am very particular about how my games feel and look, and how I interact with my tools.noelberry.caWelcome to Unity Design Patterns - Examples of programming design patterns in Unity C#NaphierPalette lighting tricks on the Nintendo 64 - Below I have some notes on the directional ambient and normal mapping techniques I developed. They are both pretty simple in the end but I haven’t seen them used elsewhere.30fps.netCan Itch.io Success Translate To Steam Success? - In my previous blog I looked at the stats for an itch.io game and what an over performing game looked like. Today I want to deep dive on a couple games that took their early itch.io success and parlayed it onto Steam with varied results.howtomarketagame.comWork with strings efficiently, keep the GC alive - This tip is not meant for everyone. If your code is simple, and not CPU-heavy, this tip might be overkill for your code, as it's about extremely heavy operations, where performance is crucial.old.reddit.comIndie Survival Guide - ProductsThe Indie Survival Guide is your ongoing archive of real talk and hard-won insights from the devs and industry experts making games happen—often against the odds. Whatever tools you’re using, this growing library of Q&As, livestreams, and VODs is here to help. There’s no magic formula, but we believe shared experience—across design, business, and survival—can give you the best shot.Unity VideosMultiplayer Systems in 10 Minutes/1 Hour/1 Day | Clocked and Loaded - Unity Developer Advocate Esteban Maldonado shows us how he scales multiplayer systems based on time constraints and how his approach differs depending on the circumstances.UnityFrom States to Trees: How Behavior Trees Revolutionized Game AI - In this final video of our NPC evolution series, we explore how Behavior Trees transformed game AI. Moving beyond the limitations of Finite State Machines, Behavior Trees introduced hierarchical decision-making that allowed NPCs to evaluate complex situations, prioritize actions, and respond intelligently to player choices.Mindplay with AaronInside Doom: The Dark Ages - Creating id Tech 8 - Interview With id Software - Want to know more about Doom: The Dark Ages and the technical make-up of the new id Tech 8? John Linneman has this extensive interview with id Software's Director of Engine Technology, Billy Khan. Every key aspect of the new technology is discussed here, along with answers to key questions like why The Dark Ages simply isn't possible without hardware accelerated ray tracing.Digital FoundryLet's Fix Unity's Animator - Let's fix the missing animation preview in Unity's Animator!Warped ImaginationWhy Did Older Games Feel So Much Bigger? - The evolution of game design has taken an interesting turn, where modern level design often feels more constrained despite technological advances. While retro games created vast worlds with limited resources, today's AAA games sometimes sacrifice that sense of wonder for visual fidelity.Devin ChaseMind-blowing graphical tricks in classic games - Your questions answered! | White_Pointer Gaming - It's time to answer even more viewer questions about how classic games achieved their graphical tricks! This video includes not just Mega Drive/Genesis and Super Nintendo games, but Neo Geo as well. Plus the big one that you might have been waiting for - Final Fantasy VI / Final Fantasy III! What mindblowing tricks will be unveiled this time?White_Pointer GamingJetBrains AI Assistant Just Got a Lot More Useful (and FREE) - JetBrains AI Assistant, improved in version 2025.1 with enhanced context awareness and deeper IDE integration, brings intelligent code generation, inline prompts, and web-enhanced context directly into our workflow. Together, we’ll explore how it uses these upgrades to incorporate external knowledge into its suggestions as we refactor a simple C# class into a clean and reusable programming pattern—then save that refactoring as a custom prompt for future use.git-amend AssetsLevel Up: 5K World Building Assets Bundle - Build the game of your dreams in any setting or scenario with our Level Up: 5K World Building Assets Bundle.__The Supreme Unreal & Unity Game Dev Bundle - Dive into an asset collection that offers the widest range of stylized towns, buildings, and more with The Supreme Unreal & Unity Game Dev Bundle! Save time and money by accessing this library of 50+ asset sets, ranging from medieval Viking villages to deserted military outposts—specific standouts include Whispering Grove Environment and Asian Dynasty Environment. Get the assets you need to help bring your game to life, and help support the charity of your choice with your purchase!Humble Bundle AffiliatePoiyomiToonShader - A feature rich toon shader for unity and VR Chatpoiyomi Open SourceAPFrameworkUI - A Text Mesh Pro based text only UI system for Unitydklassic Open SourceUnityProcgen - Library of procedural generation code for use in Unitycoryleach Open SourceGeneLit - GeneLit is an alternative to standard shader for Unity built-in pipeline.momoma-null Open Sourcebarelymusician - a real-time music engine.anokta Open SourceColliderMeshTool - Generate custom mesh colliders in Unity with hulls or hand-drawn outlines.SinlessDevil Open SourceGraphlit - Custom node shader editor for Unityz3y Open SourceEasy Peasy First Person Controller (FREE) - Easy Peasy First Person Controller is a user-friendly, ready-to-use first-person controller for Unity. It provides a wide range of customizable features for seamless integration into your game.assetstore.unity.com AffiliateUnityInGameConsole - A powerful Command Line Processor and log viewer for Unity. It can be run in the editor or in a built out player for any platform, allowing you to see your log and callstacks in you final product, without having to search for unity log files.ArtOfSettling Open SourceDescant - An enhanced and user-friendly Unity dialogue system pluginOwmacohe Open Sourceposition-visualizer - Unity editor tool to visualize positions in the scene.mminer Open SourceLua-CSharp - High performance Lua interpreter implemented in C# for .NET and Unitynuskey8 Open SourceUnityNativeFilePicker - A native Unity plugin to import/export files from/to various document providers on Android & iOSyasirkula Open Sourceusyrup - A runtime dependency injection framework for the Unity Game Engine!Jeffan207 Open SourceUnityIngameDebugConsole - A uGUI based console to see debug messages and execute commands during gameplay in Unityyasirkula Open SourceContentManagementSystem - CMS based on XK's realization for unitymegurte Open SourceIsoMesh - IsoMesh is a group of related tools for Unity for converting meshes into signed distance field data, raymarching signed distance fields, and extracting signed distance field data back to meshes via surface nets or dual contouring.EmmetOT Open SourceNavigathena - Scene management framework for Unity. Provides a new generation of scene management.mackysoft Open SourceUI Cursors - UI for Mouse Cursors is a great start for the development journey you are looking for either testing or a finished game it offers a great variety. Animatable and make the game look alive!verzatiledev.itch.io25% Off Unity Asset Store - Get 25% off your next purchase—even on discounted assets! Use code TWXJ982ND at checkout and keep building something amazing. Limited to 5 redemptions.Unity AffiliateShop up to 50% off Kyeoms - Publisher Sale - I'm an individual game VFX artist. I'm interested in Cartoon style and Stylized VFX. PLUS, get New Stylized Explosion Package for FREE with code KYEOMS2025Unity AffiliateUltimate World Building Asset Bundle - Imagine it—build it—love it Elevate your next project with elite 3D assets, textures, references, and more from the Ultimate World Building Asset Bundle by ScansMatter—featuring 300 free commercial credits on ScansMatter.com, Rooftop Asset Kit, Office Environment Kit, and much more. This limited-time partnership with ScansMatter gives Humble Bundle members a unique opportunity to access countless professional-quality assets at a fraction of the price. Get the assets you need to bring your next visual project to life—and help support the World Wildlife Fund with your purchase!Humble Bundle AffiliateUnlock Pro 3D Modeling Skills With Blender - Software Bundle - Unlock awesome 3D tools for Blender__ SpotlightBrine - An upcoming boomer shooter from Studio Whalefall, a 3rd year university team from Falmouth's Games Academy.Slippery fishy enemies are attacking your quaint Cornish town, and it's up to one disgruntled fisherman to save the day. Fight your way through waves of local seafood and paint the town with red.[Get the demo on Itch.io]Studio WhalefalMy game, Call Of Dookie. Demo available on SteamYou can subscribe to the free weekly newsletter on GameDevDigest.comThis post includes affiliate links; I may receive compensation if you purchase products or services from the different links provided in this article. Comments Nobody has left a comment. You can be the first! You must log in to join the conversation. 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