Few companies in the history of capitalism have amassed as much wealth and influence as Meta.A global superpower in the information space, Meta — the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Threads — has a market cap of $1.68 trillion at the time of writing, which for a rough sense of scale is more than the gross domestic product of Spain.In spite of its immense influence, none of its internal algorithms can be scrutinized by public watchdogs. Its host country, the United States, has largely turned a blind eye to its dealings in exchange for free use of Meta's vast surveillance capabilities.That lack of oversight coupled with Meta's near-omnipresence as a social utility has had devastating consequences throughout the world, manifesting in crises like the genocide of Muslims in Myanmar, or the systemic suppression of Palestinian rights organizations.How do you uncover the harms caused by one of the most powerful companies on earth? In the case of public violence, the evidence isn't hard to trace. However, Meta's unprecedented corporate dynasty also creates less obvious harms, which scores of scholars, researchers, and journalists are devoting entire careers to uncovering.One prominent group of said investigators is GLAAD, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, which recently released its annual report on social media safety, privacy, and expression for LGBTQ people.The report notes that Meta has undergone a "particularly extreme" ideological shift over the past year, adding harmful exceptions to its content moderation policies while disproportionately suppressing LGBTQ users and their content. The tech giant has also failed to give LGBTQ users sovereignty over their own personal data, which it collects, analyzes, and wields to generate huge profits.While Meta collects all of our data — from which it draws over 95 percent of its revenue — the practice is particularly harmful to LGBTQ users, who then have to contend with algorithmic biases, non-consensual outing, harassment, and in some countries state oppression."It's a dangerous time, certainly for trans people, who as a minority have been so ridiculously maligned, but also a dangerous time for gay people, openly bi[sexual] people, people who are different in any way," says Sarah Roberts, a UCLA professor and Director of the Center for Critical Internet Inquiry.To address these shortcomings and the dangers they introduce, GLAAD made a number of recommendations. One key suggestion was to improve moderation "by providing training for all content moderators focused on LGBTQ safety, privacy and expression." The media advocacy group doesn't mince words, adding that "AI systems should be used to flag for human review, not for automated removals."However, it doesn't look like Meta got the message.Weeks after GLAAD issued its findings, internal Meta documents leaked to NPR revealed the company's plan to hand 90 percent of its privacy and integrity reviews over to "artificial intelligence."This will impact nearly every new feature introduced to its platforms, where human moderators would typically evaluate new features for risks to privacy and safety, and the wellbeing of user groups like minors, immigrants, and LGBTQ people.Meta's internal risk assessment is an already opaque process, and Roberts notes that government attempts at risk oversight, like the EU's Digital Services Act, are likewise a labyrinth of filings which are largely dictated by the social media companies themselves. AI, chock full of biases and prone to errors — as admitted by Meta's own AI chief — is certain to make the situation even worse.Earlier this week, meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal revealed Meta's plans to fully automate advertising via the company's generative AI software, which will allow advertisers to "fully create and target ads" directly, with no human in the loop.This includes hyper-personalized ads, writes the WSJ, "so that users see different versions of the same ad in real time, based on factors such as geolocation."Data hoarders like Meta — which track you even when you're not using its platforms — have long been able to profile LGBTQ users based on gender identify and sexual orientation, including those who aren't publicly out.Removing any human from these already sinister practices serves to streamline operations and distance Meta from its own actions — "we didn't out gay users living under an oppressive government," the company can say, "even if our AI did." It's no coincidence that Meta had already disbanded its "Responsible AI" team as early as 2023.At the root of these decisions — Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's right wing turn notwithstanding — is the calculated drive to maximize revenue."If there's no reason to rigorously moderate harmful content, then why pay so many content moderators? Why engage researchers to look into the circulation of this kind of content?" observes Roberts. "There ends up being a real cost savings there.""One of the things I've always said is that content moderation of social media is not primarily about protecting people, it's about brand management," she told Futurism. "It's about the platform managing its brand in order to make the most hospitable environment for advertisers."Sometimes these corporate priorities line up with progressive causes, like LGBTQ user safety or voter registration. But when they don't, Roberts notes, "dollars are dollars.""We are looking at multibillion-dollar companies, the most capitalized companies in the world, who have operated with impunity for many, many years," she said. "How do you convince them that they should care, when other powerful sectors are telling them the opposite?"Share This Article

AI could soon surpass Bitcoin mining in energy consumption, according to a new analysis that concludes artificial intelligence could use close to half of all the electricity consumed by data centers globally by the end of 2025.The estimates come from Alex de Vries-Gao, a PhD candidate at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Institute for Environmental Studies who has tracked cryptocurrencies’ electricity consumption and environmental impact in previous research and on his website Digiconomist. He published his latest commentary on AI’s growing electricity demand last week in the journal Joule. AI already accounts for up to a fifth of the electricity that data centers use, according to de Vries-Gao. It’s a tricky number to pin down without big tech companies sharing data specifically on how much energy their AI models consume. De Vries-Gao had to make projections based on the supply chain for specialized computer chips used for AI. He and other researchers trying to understand AI’s energy consumption have found, however, that its appetite is growing despite efficiency gains — and at a fast enough clip to warrant more scrutiny.“Oh boy, here we go.”With alternative cryptocurrencies to Bitcoin — namely Ethereum — moving to less energy-intensive technologies, de Vries-Gao says he figured he was about to hang up his hat. And then “ChatGPT happened,” he tells The Verge. “I was like, Oh boy, here we go. This is another usually energy-intensive technology, especially in extremely competitive markets.” There are a couple key parallels he sees. First is a mindset of “bigger is better.” “We see these big tech [companies] constantly boosting the size of their models, trying to have the very best model out there, but in the meanwhile, of course, also boosting the resource demands of those models,” he says. That chase has led to a boom in new data centers for AI, particularly in the US, where there are more data centers than in any other country. Energy companies plan to build out new gas-fired power plants and nuclear reactors to meet growing electricity demand from AI. Sudden spikes in electricity demand can stress power grids and derail efforts to switch to cleaner sources of energy, problems similarly posed by new crypto mines that are essentially like data centers used to validate blockchain transactions. The other parallel de Vries-Gao sees with his previous work on crypto mining is how hard it can be to suss out how much energy these technologies are actually using and their environmental impact. To be sure, many major tech companies developing AI tools have set climate goals and include their greenhouse gas emissions in annual sustainability reports. That’s how we know that both Google’s and Microsoft’s carbon footprints have grown in recent years as they focus on AI. But companies usually don’t break down the data to show what’s attributable to AI specifically.To figure this out, de Vries-Gao used what he calls a “triangulation” technique. He turned to publicly available device details, analyst estimates, and companies’ earnings calls to estimate hardware production for AI and how much energy that hardware will likely use. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), which fabricates AI chips for other companies including Nvidia and AMD, saw its production capacity for packaged chips used for AI more than double between 2023 and 2024. After calculating how much specialized AI equipment can be produced, de Vries-Gao compared that to information about how much electricity these devices consume. Last year, they likely burned through as much electricity as de Vries-Gao’s home country of the Netherlands, he found. He expects that number to grow closer to a country as large as the UK by the end of 2025, with power demand for AI reaching 23GW. Last week, a separate report from consulting firm ICF forecast a 25 percent rise in electricity demand in the US by the end of the decade thanks in large part to AI, traditional data centers, and Bitcoin mining. It’s still really hard to make blanket predictions about AI’s energy consumption and the resulting environmental impact — a point laid out clearly in a deeply reported article published in MIT Technology Review last week with support from the Tarbell Center for AI Journalism. A person using AI tools to promote a fundraiser might create nearly twice as much carbon pollution if their queries were answered by data centers in West Virginia than in California, as an example. Energy intensity and emissions depend on a range of factors including the types of queries made, the size of the models answering those queries, and the share of renewables and fossil fuels on the local power grid feeding the data center. It’s a mystery that could be solved if tech companies were more transparentIt’s a mystery that could be solved if tech companies were more transparent about AI in their sustainability reporting. “The crazy amount of steps that you have to go through to be able to put any number at all on this, I think this is really absurd,” de Vries-Gao says. “It shouldn’t be this ridiculously hard. But sadly, it is.”Looking further into the future, there’s even more uncertainty when it comes to whether energy efficiency gains will eventually flatten out electricity demand. DeepSeek made a splash earlier this year when it said that its AI model could use a fraction of the electricity that Meta’s Llama 3.1 model does — raising questions about whether tech companies really need to be such energy hogs in order to make advances in AI. The question is whether they’ll prioritize building more efficient models and abandon the “bigger is better” approach of simply throwing more data and computing power at their AI ambitions. When Ethereum transitioned to a far more energy efficient strategy for validating transactions than Bitcoin mining, its electricity consumption suddenly dropped by 99.988 percent. Environmental advocates have pressured other blockchain networks to follow suit. But others — namely Bitcoin miners — are reluctant to abandon investments they’ve already made in existing hardware (nor give up other ideological arguments for sticking with old habits). There’s also the risk of Jevons paradox with AI, that more efficient models will still gobble up increasing amounts of electricity because people just start to use the technology more. Either way, it’ll be hard to manage the issue without measuring it first. See More:

MegaSackman Member Oct 27, 2017 20,786 Argentina I've noticed many streams where all the lumina and overall builds went towards three members, or even just one and the rest were support. I've personally kept everything at the same lvl at all times, same lumina distribuition, same effort on builds (except for the last super boss that I "cheesed" with Maelle). When one or two characters got underleveled they were brought to the main team until they catched up. How did you play it?  Son of Sparda "This guy are sick" says The Wise Ones Member Oct 25, 2017 17,334 Tried to balance them as much as I could for the majority of the game. But in the end Maelle got most of the stuff since she is pretty OP. I think Verso got the least amount of stuff in the end tho. Just didn't really use them that much.  SimplePorter1 Member Dec 3, 2024 115 Currently in act 3 and pausing the main story to go around the map and side-quest as much as possible since for once in a game side questing does not feel like a chore. I have three members that are my main lineup but I keep everyone as balanced as possible, many times I won battles thanks to my reserve duo  Patitoloco Member Oct 27, 2017 28,279 Everything extremely balanced. Using the entire party worked wonders for many fights.   Agent Icebeezy Member Oct 27, 2017 2,898 MegaSackman said: I've noticed many streams where all the lumina and overall builds went towards three members, or even just one and the rest were support. I've personally kept everything at the same lvl at all times, same lumina distribuition, same effort on builds (except for the last super boss that I "cheesed" with Maelle). When one or two characters got underleveled they were brought to the main team until they catched up. How did you play it? Click to expand... Click to shrink... I'm currently still playing and my distribution is the same to yours. I've started to look at builds for beating some of the overpowered enemies in the game. My starting three is Verso, Sciel and Lune. Monoco and Maelle if they die. I have Maelle on the second team, even though she's currently the second strongest person I have, for balance.   Khanimus Avenger Oct 25, 2017 46,600 Greater Vancouver I just got my last party member. I already hadn't been using Sciel very much and now that I've got this new person, I'm wondering how I should mix it up.   Ravelle Member Oct 31, 2017 20,414 everyone leveled and specced because dugout gang came in clutch and saved my bacon multiple times.   Bran Member Oct 25, 2017 562 Leveling was an even split between Agility and Vitality until both got to 99. At that point, Recoat then dump into the stats for everyone's best weapons. Lumina points were distributed evenly among each character. It was super useful having everyone set up to fight because some characters work better for certain situations.  EduBRK Member Oct 30, 2017 999 Brazil Main party was Verso, Maelle and Monoco, but everyone was equal leveled. Stats: Agility up till 99, then luck 99, then might. All luminas distributed equally.  Lotus One Winged Slayer Member Oct 25, 2017 124,379 Khanimus said: I just got my last party member. I already hadn't been using Sciel very much and now that I've got this new person, I'm wondering how I should mix it up. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Don't sleep on Sciel  Kill3r7 Member Oct 25, 2017 29,150 Everything balanced. Especially since they are all useful.   GameAddict411 Member Oct 26, 2017 10,155 I have 3 characters maxed out and two are at level 96 so not horrible.   hydruxo ▲ Legend ▲ Member Oct 25, 2017 22,775 Maelle >>> Verso > Lune >>> Sciel > Monoco But later on you get way more lumina so I balanced them out closer  Adryuu Master of the Wind Member Oct 27, 2017 6,525 Voted and finished the game equally balanced over all characters. But now I'm doing endgame things after seeing credits and I've successfully done a Lune killing machine build with over 400 lumina points that destroyed all endless tower almost by herself. Also the Flying Manor end boss was finally managed by her solo (with Roulette lol). Now I'm going for the Maelle build just for the well known "hardest boss" but honestly if it takes too much work I may just watch the remaining journal in youtube and call it a day. Lune was entirely my build and while the things I'm seeing for Maelle are similar, it's not the same and not mine, so it's ok to just quit here, especially as there's not much more game for me. I was just doing this while postponing starting a new game but that time has come now.  Khanimus Avenger Oct 25, 2017 46,600 Greater Vancouver Lotus said: Don't sleep on Sciel Click to expand... Click to shrink... I used her a bit up until the big ending of Act 1. Since then, it'd been mostly Lune and Maelle backing me up.   Ouroboros Member Oct 27, 2017 16,219 focused on 3 main. towards endgame I worked on the backup 2 when Expedition 33 took their last stand (fucking love this game's details like that)   YozoraXV Member Oct 30, 2017 3,807 EduBRK said: Main party was Verso, Maelle and Monoco, but everyone was equal leveled. Stats: Agility up till 99, then luck 99, then might. All luminas distributed equally. Click to expand... Click to shrink... This is pretty much me as well. Lune and Sciel are my fallback party who can pretty much sustain themselves with healing and damage output.  Lotus One Winged Slayer Member Oct 25, 2017 124,379 Khanimus said: I used her a bit up until the big ending of Act 1. Since then, it'd been mostly Lune and Maelle backing me up. Click to expand... Click to shrink... I was ready to not engage with her because it felt too annoying, but that one weapon she gets that sets her up with 10 foretell on any sun-based move made me see the vision lol EduBRK said: Stats: Agility up till 99, then luck 99 Click to expand... Click to shrink... Agility is one thing, but I love how this is an RPG where everyone is a crit warrior and you're just better off tailoring towards that lol  BennyWhatever Member Oct 27, 2017 5,524 US Maelle, Verso, Lune only. I gave nothing to Sciel and Monoco lol. Distributed all Lumina points equally among the 3 mains. I basically had my end-game weapons about 10 hours in and would max those out and build around them. I did replace one or two with post-game weapons. Stat distribution for every levelup was 2 Vitality (until 99) then 1 in whatever the weapon stats were.  NightShift Member Oct 25, 2017 10,353 Australia I liked playing as everybody so I tried to keep it even but... yeah, Maelle and Verso were definitely above the rest most of the time.   Khanimus Avenger Oct 25, 2017 46,600 Greater Vancouver Lotus said: I was ready to not engage with her because it felt too annoying, but that one weapon she gets that sets her up with 10 foretell on any sun-based move made me see the vision lol Click to expand... Click to shrink... Oh I got that weapon and absolutely used it a ton with her, she just fell out of conversation with the story turn. Maelle had to be in the party from then on lol   Akiba756 Member Oct 1, 2020 1,634 Sao Paolo, Brazil Kill3r7 said: Everything balanced. Especially since they are all useful. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Everyone but (act 1 spoilers) Gustave, I kept forcing myself to use him when I noticed his damage output was falling behind everyone else, my thought was "I hope the rest of his skill tree opens up soon, and he gets weapons with perks"   closer Member Oct 25, 2017 5,647 i just played 3 chars the entire game, stat leveling seemed superfluous but I was only playing on normal   chanman Member Nov 9, 2017 1,727 I experimented with different teams but fell on Lune, Maelle and Monoco as my favorite team. Sometimes I swap Verso or Sciel with Lune.   Lotus One Winged Slayer Member Oct 25, 2017 124,379 Khanimus said: Oh I got that weapon and absolutely used it a ton with her, she just fell out of conversation with the story turn. Maelle had to be in the party from then on lol Click to expand... Click to shrink... I was using her before said turn because she was the first to reach the Act 1 damage cap 🤣 Only got a little into Act 2 though, so still plenty of story to go through  Agni Kai Member Nov 2, 2017 10,029 I went with Maelle, Lune, and Sciel for my main party. I used Monoco occasionally because he's groovy as fuck. Verso got the scraps.  Kill3r7 Member Oct 25, 2017 29,150 Akiba756 said: Everyone but (act 1 spoilers) Gustave, I kept forcing myself to use him when I noticed his damage output was falling behind everyone else, my thought was "I hope the rest of his skill tree opens up soon, and he gets weapons with perks" Click to expand... Click to shrink... Interesting because Gustave's overcharge is rather good at dps but he is a support character priming enemies for the rest of the team to shine. Maelle is ridiculously OP pretty early on, as long as you get good at counterattacking. Sciel is the best support from Act 2 onward.  TripleBee Prophet of Truth Member Oct 30, 2017 7,536 Canada Kept it pretty balanced.   Yurei Member Feb 28, 2023 1,321 For most of the game I used Sciel, Lune, Verso then towards the end I went with a Break build using Sciel, Verso and Monoco. I never switched out characters so it took a sec to get Monoco up to Sciel and Vero's level lol.  Renteka-Bond Chicken Chaser Member Dec 28, 2017 6,071 Clearwater, Florida Balanced for most of the game, but my Primary party was Lune / Sciel / Monoco, with Lune being my "Main" and getting the lion's share of Lumina in the endgame. Went with a fun Heal-Buff / DOT Nuke Team by basically using Typhoon as an AP / Buff Battery for the Squad, then Stacking Storm Caller and Terraquake for Passive Damage, then Elemental Genesis and Hellfire for big Damage nukes. Was a lot of fun having access to so much damage per turn for big waves and required a bit of Stain management to keep me awake.  watching alice Member Oct 5, 2024 48 Everyone leveled the same way until act 3 20 vit 45 agility 35 luck no points in other stats. When I got into act 3 and I had good weapons I respect-ed basing stats on weapons' scalings  Adryuu Master of the Wind Member Oct 27, 2017 6,525 Agni Kai said: I used Monoco occasionally because he's groovy as fuck. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Owowow!  NabiscoFelt One Winged Slayer Member Aug 15, 2019 8,691 I always try to level party members equally in RPGs Though yeah Maelle did end up getting a couple extra Lumina points towards the end of the game (like 10 ahead of the rest)  NotVeryFriendly Member Oct 27, 2017 4,228 I was mainly balanced, with the exception that I gave Maelle got 20/30 more Lumina points than the rest of the cast. My primary characters were Luna, Maelle, Monoco (I had wanted to use Verso instead of Monoco, but the risk of losing any missable skills forced me to use Monoco), with Verso and Sciel as my backup. My backup team were at a slightly lower level then my primary characters. For most of the game, I primarily levelled Vitality, Agility, and Luck, and ignored the other stats.  Nameless Member Oct 25, 2017 17,283 Maelle, Lune, and Sciel split everything more or less evenly(some slight, occasional build/situational favoritism aside). The others are basically ignored. I don't even bring in the bench players when the A-Team falls.   Sephiroth Member Oct 26, 2017 7,164 All you need is Maelle   dralla Member Oct 27, 2017 3,336 I used all the characters and leveled them up equally. Stat distribution was based on weapon scaling. You get plenty of re-spec items so changing weapons and stats was never an issue.   Sirank Member Oct 27, 2017 1,620 By the end I had Maelle and Lune 500+ lumina. Monoco was around 280. Really sorry Sciel and GustaveVerso, they only had 120ish.   Diogo Arez One Winged Slayer Member Oct 20, 2020 20,339 All in on Maelle, Verso and Lune, the rest got the leftover scraps   Prinny Member Oct 25, 2017 277 Moon, Clive, Maelle only.  

The first time you see it, your brain doesn’t register it as a keycap. It looks more like a diorama ripped straight out of a Pixar-directed sci-fi short – complete with a lone astronaut, and some sufficiently advanced quantum tech, all sealed in resin like they’re cryogenically frozen for your desk. That’s the Dwarf Factory Astrovert Quantum-ixer Spacebar. And calling it “just” a spacebar would be like calling the Millennium Falcon a cargo ship. This 6.25U artisan slab isn’t trying to be discreet. It demands attention, and frankly, earns it. Dwarf Factory’s MO has always leaned into visual storytelling, and the Quantum-ixer continues that trend with unapologetic whimsy. The SAR3 profile makes it ergonomically familiar if you’re already swimming in Cherry MX-compatible gear, but ergonomics are arguably beside the point. You’re not slamming this $99 artifact into your keyboard for WPM gains. You’re doing it because it lights up like a moonlit spaceship hangar when your RGB kicks in. Designer: Dwarf Factory Dwarf Factory doesn’t really do one-off designs. They build universes. The Quantum-ixer spacebar is the final chapter in their Astrovert series, and it plays like the climax of a well-paced space opera. According to them, this piece is the technological leap the Astrovert crew needed – essentially, the device that stabilizes their jumps through space-time. It’s less of a decorative flourish and more like the mission-critical core of their interstellar saga. The astronaut, the sidekick, the bizarre apparatus – they’re all locked in, mid-adventure, frozen inside resin like a scene from a comic book panel. This isn’t an homage to sci-fi; it’s an artifact from it, rendered in the same obsessive detail that defines everything Dwarf Factory touches. There are four colorways, each with its own visual flavor. T-800 channels a brutalist, chrome-heavy vibe – dark and industrial, almost noir. The 94B feels cooler and more clinical, with icy blue tones. PickIE takes a more playful turn, leaning into candy-colored optimism, while 14512F lands in deep-space territory with its moody purples and inky blacks. All of them look like artifacts pulled from different galaxies, unified by their surreal attention to detail. If your keyboard has backlighting (especially RGB) the translucent elements let that light filter through like some unholy alien core reactor. Sure, the spacebar has always been the most iconic key and never really needed labeling or backlit text, so something as whimsical as the Quantum-ixer feels appropriate for the keyboard. Why keep that piece of real estate empty? Why keep it boring? When you could, instead, outfit it with sci-fi tech? The spacebar fits like a dream on Cherry MX switches and clones, holding a 6.25u layout that’s standard for most mechanical keyboards. That SAR3 profile gives it a slight sculpt, comfortably sitting under your thumbs without disrupting the rhythm of your board. It’s plug-and-play in the most interstellar sense. Each one ships in a kraft box with stickers, finger gloves, and even a loose stem tightening kit, which somehow makes the whole thing feel like you’re unboxing lab equipment or a prop from a cyberpunk film. It’s silly. It’s self-aware. It’s perfect. At a glance, it might seem excessive to drop nearly a hundred bucks on a single keycap, but this isn’t about function anymore. It’s about expression. Dwarf Factory’s Quantum-ixer doesn’t improve your typing speed or enhance your workflow. What it does is transform your workspace into a miniature cosmos – something you interact with every day, but now through the lens of fantasy, imagination, and a little weirdness. And maybe, just maybe, that bit of storytelling is worth the splurge. The post The Most Ridiculously Cool Spacebar Ever Made Looks Like Some Quantum Alien Tech first appeared on Yanko Design.

Would you believe Google really wants to sell you on its AI? This week, we dive into the news from Google I/O 2025 with Engadget's Karissa Bell. We discuss how Gemini is headed to even more places, as well as Karissa's brief hands-on with Google's prototype XR glasses. It seems like Google is trying a bit harder now than it did with Google Glass and its defunct Daydream VR platform. But will the company end up giving up again, or does it really have a shot against Meta and Apple? Subscribe! iTunes Spotify Pocket Casts Stitcher Google Podcasts Topics Lots of AI and a little XR: Highlights from Google I/O 2025 – 1:15 OpenAI buys Jony Ive’s design company for $6.6B, in an all equity deal – 29:27 Fujifilm’s $850 X Half could be the perfect retro camera for the social media age – 39:42 Sesame Street is moving from HBO to Netflix – 44:09 Cuts to IMLS will lead to headaches accessing content on apps like Libby and Hoopla – 45:49 Listener Mail: Should I replace my Chromebook with a Mac or PC Laptop? – 48:33 Pop culture picks – 52:22 Credits  Hosts: Devindra Hardawar and Karissa BellProducer: Ben EllmanMusic: Dale North and Terrence O'Brien Transcript Devindra: [00:00:00] What's up, internet and welcome back to the Engadget Podcast. I'm Senior Editor Devindra Hardawar. I'm joined this morning by Senior Writer Karissa Bell. Hello, Karissa. Karissa: Hello. Good morning. Devindra: Good morning. And also podcast producer Ben Elman. Hey Ben, I'm muted my dang self. Hello. Hello, Ben. Good morning. It's been a busy week, like it's one of those weeks where. Three major conferences happened all at once and a varying like relevance to us. Google IO is the big one. We'll be talking about that with Karissa who was there and got to demo Google's XR glasses, but also Computex was happening. That's over in Taipei and we got a lot of news from that to, we'll mention some of those things. Also, Microsoft build happened and I feel like this was the less least relevant build to us ever. I got one bit of news I can mention there. That's pretty much it. It's been a crazy hectic week for us over at Eng Gadget. As always, if you're enjoying the show, please be free to subscribe to us on iTunes or your podcast catcher of choice. Leave us a review on iTunes, drop us email at podcast@enggadget.com. [00:01:00] Those emails, by the way, if you ask a good question, it could end up being part of our Ask Engadget section, so that's something we're starting out. I have another good one. I'll be throwing to asking Eng gadgets soon. So send us your emails podcast@enggadget.com, Google io. It's all about ai, isn't it? I feel like Karissa, we were watching the keynote for this thing and it felt like it went on and on of the thing about the things, like we all pretty much expect more about Gemini ai, more about their newer models a bit about xr. Can you give me, what's your overall impression of IO at this point? Karissa: Yeah, it's interesting because I've been covering IO long enough that I remember back when it used to be Android. And then there'd be like that little section at the end about, AI and some of the other stuff. And now it's completely reversed where it's entirely AI and basically no Android to the point where they had a whole separate event with their typical Android stuff the week before. So it didn't have to go through and talk about any of yeah, the mobile things. Devindra: That was just like a live stream that was just like a chill, live stream. No real [00:02:00] effort put into it. Whereas this is the whole show. They had a, who was it? But they had TOIs. TOIs, yeah. They had actual music which is something a lot of these folks do at keynotes. It's actually really disconcerting to see cool musicians taking the corporate gig and performing at one of these things. I think, it was like 20 13, 20 14, maybe the Intel one, IDF or something. But the weekend was there. Just trying to jam to all these nerds and it was sad, but yeah. How was the experience Karissa like actually going there? Karissa: Yeah, it was good. That keynote is always kind of a slog. Just, live blogging for our almost two hours straight, just constant is it's a lot. I did like the music. Towa was very chill. It was a nice way to start much. I preferred it over the crazy loop daddy set we got last year. If anyone remembers that. Devindra: Yeah. Ben: Yeah. Oh, I remember that. Mark Rub was at audio. That was so weird. Devindra: Yeah. Yeah, it was a little intense. Cool. So what are some of the highlights? Like there, there's a bunch of stuff. If you go look on, on the site on Engadget, we [00:03:00] have rounded up like all the major news and that includes a couple of things like hey, AI mode, chat bot coming to search. That's cool. We got more, I think the thing a lot of people were looking at was like Project Astra and where that's gonna be going. And that is the sort of universal AI assistant where you could hold your phone up and just ask it questions about the world. We got another demo video about that. Which again, the actual utility of it, I'm weirded out by. There was also one video where they were just like I'm gonna be dumb. I'm gonna pretend I'm very stupid and ask ask Astro, what is this tall building in front of me. And it was like a fire hydrant or something. It was like some piece of street thing. It was not a really well done demo. Do you have any thoughts about that, Krista? Does that seem more compelling to you now or is it the same as what we saw last year? Karissa: I think what was interesting to me about it was that we saw Astro last year and like that, I think there was a lot of excitement around that, but it wasn't really entirely clear where that. Project is going. They've said it's like an experimental research thing. And then, I feel like this year they really laid out that they want to [00:04:00] bring all that stuff to Gemini. Astra is sort of their place to like tinker with this and, get all this stuff working. But like their end game is putting this into Gemini. You can already see it a little bit in Gemini Live, which is like their multimodal feature where you can do some. Version of what ASRA can do. And so that was interesting. They're saying, we want Gemini to be this universal AI assistant. They didn't use the word a GI or anything like that. But I think it's pretty clear where they're going and like what their ambition is they want this to be, an all seeing, all knowing AI assistant that can help you with anything is what they're trying to sell it as. Devindra: It is weird, like we're watching the demo video and it's a guy trying to fix his bike and he is pointing his phone at like the bike and asking questions like which, which particular, I don't know. It's which particular nut do I need for this tightening thing and it's giving him good advice. It's pointing to things on YouTube. I. I don't know how useful this will actually be. This kind of goes to part of the stuff we're seeing with AI too, of just like offloading [00:05:00] some of the grunt work of human intelligence because you can do this right now, people have been YouTubing to fix things forever. YouTube has become this like information repository of just fix it stuff or home plumbing or whatever. And now it's just like you'll be able to talk to your phone. It'll direct you right to those videos or. Extract the actual instructions from those. That's cool. I feel like that's among the more useful things, more useful than like putting Gemini right into Chrome, which is another thing they're talking about, and I don't know how useful that is other than. They wanna push AI in front of us, just like Microsoft wants to push copilot in front of us at all times. Ben: What is a situation where you would have a question about your Chrome tabs? Like I'm not one of those people that has 15 chrome tabs open at any given time, and I know that I am. Yeah, I know. Wait, you're saying that like it's a high. Like it's high. Yeah, no I know. So I have a abnormally low number of chrome tabs open, but can you still come up [00:06:00] with an idea of why you would ask Gemini anything about your own tabs open? Hopefully you have them organized. At least Karissa: they should. A few examples of like online shopping, like maybe you have. Two tabs of two different products open. And you can say Devindra: exactly, Karissa: ask Gemini to like, compare the reviews. Or they use like the example of a recipe video, a recipe blog. And maybe, you wanna make some kind of modification, make the recipe gluten free. And you could ask Gemini Hey, make this how would I make this gluten free? But I think you're right, like it's not exactly clear. You can already just open a new tab and go to Gemini and ask it. Something. So they're just trying to reduce Devindra: friction. I think that's the main thing. Like just the less you have to think about it, the more it's in your face. You can just always always just jump right to it. It's hey, you can Google search from any your UL bar, your location bar in any browser. We've just grown to use that, but that didn't used to be the case. I remember there used to be a separate Google field. Some browsers and it wasn't always there in every browser too. They did announce some new models. We [00:07:00] saw there's Gemini 2.5 Pro. There's a deep think reasoning model. There's also a flash model that they announced for smaller devices. Did they show any good demos of the reasoning stuff? Because I that's essentially slower AI processing to hopefully get you better answers with fewer flaws. Did they actually show how that worked? Karissa. Karissa: I only saw what we all saw during the keynote and I think it's, we've seen a few other AI companies do something similar where you can see it think like its reasoning process. Yeah. And see it do that in real time. But I think it's a bit unclear exactly what that's gonna look like. Devindra: Watching a video, oh, Gemini can simulate nature simulate light. Simulate puzzles, term images into code. Ben: I feel like the big thing, yeah. A lot of this stuff is from DeepMind, right? This is DeepMind an alphabet company. Devindra: DeepMind and Alphabet company. There is Deep mind. This is deep Think and don't confuse this with deep seek, which is that the Chinese AI company, and they [00:08:00] clearly knew what they were doing when they call it that thing. Deep seek. But no, yeah, that is, this is partially stuff coming out of DeepMind. DeepMind, a company which Google has been like doing stuff with for a while. And we just have not really seen much out of it. So I guess Gemini and all their AI processes are a way to do that. We also saw something that got a lot of people, we saw Ben: Nobel Prize from them. Come on. Devindra: Hey, we did see that. What does that mean? What is that even worth anymore? That's an open question. They also showed off. A new video tool called Flow, which I think got a lot of people intrigued because it's using a new VO three model. So an updated version of what they've had for video effects for a while. And the results look good. Like the video looks higher quality. Humans look more realistic. There have been. The interesting thing about VO three is it can also do synchronized audio to actually produce audio and dialogue for people too. So people have been uploading videos around this stuff online at this point, and you have to [00:09:00] subscribe to the crazy high end. Version of Google's subscription to even test out this thing at this point that is the AI Ultra plan that costs $250 a month. But I saw something of yeah, here's a pretend tour of a make believe car show. And it was just people spouting random facts. So yeah, I like EVs. I would like an ev. And then it looks realistic. They sound synchronized like you could. I think this is a normal person. Then they just kinda start laughing at the end for no reason. Like weird little things. It's if you see a sociopath, try to pretend to be a human for a little bit. There's real Patrick Bateman vibes from a lot of those things, so I don't know. It's fun. It's cool. I think there's, so didn't we Ben: announce that they also had a tool to help you figure out whether or not a video was generated by flow? They did announce that Devindra: too. Ben: I've yeah, go ahead. Go Karissa: ahead. Yeah. The synth id, they've been working on that for a while. They talked about it last year at io. That's like their digital watermarking technology. And the funny thing about this is [00:10:00] their whole, the whole concept of AI watermarking is you put like these like invisible watermarks into AI generated content. You might, you couldn't just. See it, just watching this content. But you can go to this website now and basically like double check. If it has one of these watermarks, which is on one hand it's. I think it's important that they do this work, but I also just wonder how many people are gonna see a video and think I wonder what kind of AI is in this. Let me go to this other website and like double check it like that. Just, Ben: yeah. The people who are most likely to immediately believe it are the, also the least likely to go to the website and be like, I would like to double check Devindra: this. It doesn't matter because most people will not do it and the damage will be done. Just having super hyper realistic, AI video, they can, you can essentially make anything happen. It's funny that the big bad AI bad guy in the new Mission Impossible movies, the entity, one of the main things it does is oh, we don't know what's true anymore because the entity can just cr fabricate reality at whim. We're just doing that. [00:11:00] We're just doing that for, I don't know, for fun. I feel like this is a thing we should see in all AI video tools. This doesn't really answer the problem, answer the question that everyone's having though. It's what is the point of these tools? Because it does devalue filmmaking, it devalues people using actual actors or using, going out and actually shooting something. Did Google make a better pitch for why you would use Flow Karissa or how it would fit into like actual filmmaking? Karissa: I'm not sure they did. They showed that goofy Darren Aronofsky trailer for some woman who was trying to like, make a movie about her own birth, and it was like seemed like they was trying to be in the style of some sort of like psychological thriller, but it just, I don't know, it just felt really weird to me. I was I was just like, what are we watching? This doesn't, what are we watching? Yeah. Ben: Was there any like good backstory about why she was doing that either or was it just Hey, we're doing something really weird? Karissa: No, she was just oh I wonder, you know what? I wanna tell the story of my own birth and Okay. Ben: [00:12:00] Okay, but why is your relate birth more? Listen its like every, I need more details. Why is your birth more important? It's, everybody wants lots of babies. Write I memoir like one of three ways or something. Devindra: Yeah, it's about everybody who wants to write a memoir. It's kinda the same thing. Kinda that same naval ga thing. The project's just called ancestral. I'm gonna play a bit of a trailer here. I remember seeing this, it reminds me of that footage I dunno if you guys remember seeing, look who's talking for the very first time or something, or those movies where they, they showed a lot of things about how babies are made. And as a kid I was like, how'd they make that, how'd that get done? They're doing that now with AI video and ancestral this whole project. It is kinda sad because Aronofsky is one of my, like one of my favorite directors when he is on, he has made some of my favorite films, but also he's a guy who has admittedly stolen ideas and concepts from people like Satoshi kh as specific framing of scenes and things like that. In Requa for a Dream are in some cones movies as well. So [00:13:00] I guess it's to be expected, but it is. Sad because Hollywood as a whole, the union certainly do not like AI video. There was a story about James Earl Jones' voice being used as Darth Vader. In Fortnite. In Fortnite. In Fortnite, yeah. Which is something we knew was gonna happen because Disney licensed the rights to his voice before he died from his estate. He went in and recorded lines to at least create a better simulation of his voice. But people are going out there making that Darth Vader swear and say bad things in Fortnite and the WGA or is it sag? It's probably sag but sad. Like the unions are pissed off about this because they do not know this was happening ahead of time and they're worried about what this could mean for the future of AI talent. Flow looks interesting. I keep seeing play people play with it. I made a couple videos asked it to make Hey, show me three cats living in Brooklyn with a view of the Manhattan skyline or something. And it, it did that, but the apartment it rendered didn't look fully real. [00:14:00] It had like weird heating things all around. And also apparently. If you just subscribe to the basic plan to get access to flow, you can use flow, but that's using the VO two model. So older AI model. To get VO three again, you have to pay $250 a month. So maybe that'll come down in price eventually. But we shall see. The thing I really want to talk with you about Krisa is like, what the heck is happening with Android xr? And that is a weird project for them because I was writing up the news and they announced like a few things. They were like, Hey we have a new developer released to help you build Android XR apps. But it wasn't until the actual a IO show. That they showed off more of what they were actually thinking about. And you got to test out a pair of prototype Google XR glasses powered by Android xr. Can you tell me about that experience and just how does it differ from the other XR things you've seen from who is it from Several, look, you've seen Metas Meta, you saw one from Snap, right? Meta Karissa: I've seen Snap. Yeah. Yeah. I've seen the X reel. Yeah, some of the other smaller [00:15:00] companies I got to see at CES. Yeah, that was like a bit of a surprise. I know that they've been talking about Android XR for a while. I feel like it's been a little, more in the background. So they brought out these, these glasses and, the first thing that I noticed about them was like, they were actually pretty small and like normal looking compared to, met Orion or like the snap spectacles. Like these were very thin which was cool. But the display was only on one side. It was only on one lens. They called it like a monocular display. So there's one lens on one side. So it's basically just like a little window, very small field of view. Devindra: We could see it in, if you go to the picture on top of Chris's hands on piece, you can see the frame out. Of what that lens would be. Yeah. Karissa: Yeah. And I noticed even when we were watching that, that demo video that they did on stage, that like the field of view looked very small. It was even smaller than Snaps, which is 35 degrees like this. I would, if I had to guess, I'd say it's maybe like around 20. They wouldn't say what it was. They said, this is a prototype. We don't wanna say the way I thought about it, the way [00:16:00] I compared it to my piece was like the front screwing on a foldable phone, so it's you can get notifications and you can like glance at things, but it's not fully immersive ar it's not, surrounding your space and like really cha changing your reality, in the way that like snap and and meta are trying to do later when I was driving home, I realized it actually was reminded me like a better comparison might be the heads up display in your car. Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Karissa: If you have a car that has that little hu where you can see how fast you're going and directions and stuff like that. Devindra: That's what Google Glass was doing too, right? Because that was a little thing off to the side of your revision that was never a full takeover. Your vision type of thing. Karissa: Yeah. It's funny, that's what our editor Aaron said when he was editing my piece, he was like, oh, this sounds like Google Glass. And I'm like, no, it actually, it's, it is better than that. These are like normal looking glasses. The, I tried Google Glass many years ago. Like the Fidelity was better. Actually I was thinking. It feels like a happy medium almost between, meta ray bands and like full ar Yeah, like I, I've had a meta ray band glasses [00:17:00] for a long time and people always ask me, like when I show it to someone, they're like, oh, that's so cool. And then they go, but you can see stuff, right? There's a display and I'm like. No. These are just, glasses with the speaker. And I feel like this might be like a good kind of InBetween thing because you have a little bit of display, but they still look like glasses. They're not bulky 'cause they're not trying to do too much. One thing I really liked is that when you take a photo, you actually get a little preview of that image that like floats onto the screen, which was really cool because it's hard to figure out how to frame pictures when you are taking using glasses camera on your smart glasses. So I think there's some interesting ideas, but it's very early. Obviously they want like Gemini to be a big part of it. The Gemini stuff. Was busted in my demo. Devindra: You also said they don't plan on selling these are like purely, hey, this is what could be a thing. But they're not selling these specific glasses, right? Karissa: Yeah, these specific ones are like, this is a research prototype. But they did also announce a partnership with Warby Parker and another glasses company. So I think it's like you can see them trying to take a meta approach here, which [00:18:00] actually would be pretty smart to say let's partner with. A known company that makes glasses, they're already popular. We can give them our, our tech expertise. They can make the glasses look good and, maybe we'll get something down the line. I actually heard a rumor that. Prototype was manufactured by Samsung. They wouldn't say Devindra: Of course it's Sam, Samsung wants to be all over this. Samsung is the one building their the full on Android XR headset, which is a sort of like vision Pro copycat, like it is Mohan. Yeah. Moan. It is displays with the pass through camera. That should be coming later this year. Go ahead Ben. Ben: Yeah. Question for Karissa. When Sergey brand was talking about Google Glass, did that happen before or after the big demo for the Google XR glasses? Karissa: That was after. That was at the end of the day. He was a surprise guest in this fireside chat with the DeepMind, CEO. And yeah, it was, we were all wondering about that. 'cause we all, dev probably remembers this very well the, when Google Glass came out and cereal and skydive [00:19:00] wearing them into io. Yeah. Speaker: Yep. Karissa: And then, now for him to come back and say we made a lot of mistakes with that product and. Ben: But was it mistakes or was it just the fact that like technology was not there yet because he was talking about like consumer electronic supply chain, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Devindra: He's right that the tech has caught up with what the vision of what they wanted to do, but also I think he fundamentally misread like people will see you looking like the goddamn borg and want to destroy you. They want you will turn into Captain Picard and be like, I must destroy whoever is wearing Google Glass because this looks like an alien trying to take over my civilization. And the thing that meta did right, that you've seen Karissa, is that make 'em look like normal glasses and Yeah, but nobody will knows, Ben: Karissa does not look entirely human in this picture either. Karissa: Yes. But listen from, if you see 'em straight on, they don't, they look transparent. That was I used that photo because I was trying to. Devindra: You get the angle, show The display. Karissa: Yeah. Devindra: [00:20:00] Yeah. There's another one like you. This looks normal. This looks totally normal. The glasses themselves look like, they look like typical hipster glasses. Like they're not like a super big frame around them. You're they look like the arms seem big. The arms seem wider than a typical pair of glasses, but you wouldn't know that 'cause it's covered in your hair. A lot of people won't notice glasses, arms as much. Ben: Yeah, Devindra: that is cool. The issue Ben: still is that all of these frames are so chunky. And it's because you need to hide all of the internals and everything, but you're not gonna get like the beautiful, like thin Japanese like titanium anytime soon. No, because this stuff needs to shrink way more. Devindra: This stuff that's not, those the kind of frames they are. I will say I had a meeting with the one of the I believe the CEO of X reel who. Came not, I did talk to them at c so they, they had like a lot of ideas about that. I talked to the the head of space top, which is [00:21:00] the, that's the company that was doing the sort of AR laptop thing. And then they gave up on that idea because AI PCs have the nmps that they need to do that stuff. And they're all in on the idea that, more people will want to use these sorts of glasses. Maybe not all the time, but for specific use cases. Something that co covers your field of vision more. Could be a great thing when you sit down at your desk. I could see people doing this. I could see people getting these glasses. I don't know if it's gonna be good for society, right? It feels when Bluetooth headsets were first popping up and everybody hated those people, and you're like, oh, we must shun this person from society. This one, you can't quite see the screen. So you can pretend to be a normal human and then have this like augmented ability next to you. If they can hide that, if they can actually hide the fact that you have a display on your glasses that would help people like me who are face blind and I walk around I don't, I know this person. I've seen them before. What is their name? What is their name? I could see that being useful. Ben: On the other side of it [00:22:00] though, if you have one standard look for glasses like this, then you know, oh, this person is, I. Also interacting with like information and stuff that's like popping up in front of their eyes. It's a universal signifier, just like having a big pair of headphones is Devindra: I think you will see people looking off to the distance. Krisa, did you notice that your eye line was moving away from people you were talking to while you were wearing these? Karissa: Yeah, and that was also one of the issues that I had was that the. Actual, like display was like, was it like didn't quite render right? Where I'm not a farsighted person, but I actually had to look farther off in the distance to actually get it to like my eyes to focus on it. And I asked 'em about that and they're like, oh it's a prototype. It's not quite dialed in. They weren't calibrating these things to your eyeballs. Like the way when I did the Meta Orion demo, they have to take these specific measurements because there's eye tracking and all these things and this, didn't have any of that. There. Yeah, there definitely was. You're, somebody's talking to you, but you're looking over here. Devindra: That's not great. That's [00:23:00] not great for society. You're having a conversation with people. I like how they're framing this oh yes, you can be more connected with reality. 'cause you don't have a phone in front of your face, except you always have another display in front of your face, which nobody else can see, and you're gonna look like an alien walking around. They showed some videos of people using it for like street navigation. Which I kinda like. You're in a new city, you'll see the arrows and where to turn and stuff. That's useful. But there is this, there was one that was really overwrought. It was a couple dancing at Sunset, and the guy is take a picture of this beautiful moment of the sun peeking through behind, my lady friend. And it just felt like that's what you wanna do in that moment. You wanna talk to your virtual assistant while you should be enjoying the fact that you are having this beautiful dancing evening, which nobody will ever actually have. So that's the whole thing. I will say my overall thoughts on this stuff, like just looking at this, the stuff they showed before they actually showed us the glasses, it doesn't feel like Google is actually that far in terms of making this a reality. Karissa the, like I'm comparing it to. Where Meta [00:24:00] is right now, and even where Apple is right now, like when Apple showed us the vision Pro. We were able to sit down and I had a 30 minute demo of that thing working, and I saw the vision of what they were doing and they thought a lot about how this was. How long was your demo with this thing? Karissa: I was in the room with them for about five minutes and I had them on for about three minutes myself. That's not a demo. That's not a demo. Ben: Oh, goodness. So all of these pictures were taken in the same 90 seconds? Yes. Yeah. God. That's amazing. Devindra: It's amazing you were able to capture these impressions, Karissa. Yeah, Karissa: I will say that they did apparently have a demo in December, a press event in December where people got to see these things for a lot longer, but it was, they could not shoot them at all. We, a lot of us were wondering if that was why it was so constrained. They only had one room, there's hundreds of people basically lining up to try these out. And they're like very strict. You got five minutes, somebody's in there like after a couple minutes, rushing you out, and we're like, okay. Like Devindra: They clearly only have a handful of these. That's like the main reason this is happening. I am, this is the company, that did Google Glass and that was too [00:25:00] early and also maybe too ambitious. But also don't forget, Google Cardboard, which was this that was a fun little project of getting phone-based vr happening. Daydream vr, which was their self-contained headset, which was cool. That was when Samsung was doing the thing with Meta as well, or with Oculus at the time. So and they gave up on those things. Completely. And Google's not a company I trust with consumer Hardaware in general. So I am. Don't think there is a huge future in Android xr, but they wanna be there. They wanna be where Meta is and where Apple is and we shall see. Anything else you wanna add about io, Karissa? Karissa: No, just that AI. A i a ai Devindra: a I didn't AI ao, A IAO a IO starline. The thing that was a, like weird 3D rendering teleconferencing video that is becoming a real thing that's turning to Google Beam video. But it's gonna be an enterprise thing. They're teaming up with AI to, with HP to bring a scaled down version of that two businesses. I don't think we'll love or see That's one of those things where it's oh, this exists [00:26:00] in some corporate offices who will pay $50,000 for this thing, but. I don't, normal people will never interact with this thing, so it practically just does not exist. So we shall see. Anyway, stay tuned for, we're gonna have more demos of the Gemini stuff. We'll be looking at the new models, and certainly Chris and I will be looking hard at Android XR and wherever the heck that's going. Let's quickly move on to other news. And I just wanna say there were other events, Compex, we wrote up a couple, a whole bunch of laptops. A MD announced a cheaper radio on graphics card. Go check out our stories on that stuff. Build. I wrote one, I got a 70 page book of news from Microsoft about build and 99% of that news just does not apply to us because Build is so fully a developer coding conference. Hey, there's more more copilot stuff. There's a copilot app coming to 360 [00:27:00] fi subscribers, and that's cool, but not super interesting. I would say the big thing that happened this week and that surprised a lot of us is the news that OpenAI has bought. Johnny i's design startup for six and a half billion. Dollars. This is a wild story, which is also paired with a weird picture. It looks like they're getting married. It looks like they're announcing their engagement over here because Johnny, ive is just leaning into him. Their heads are touching a little bit. It's so adorable. You're not showing Ben: the full website though. The full website has like a script font. It literally looks, yeah, like something from the knot. Devindra: It Is it? Yeah. Let's look at here. Sam and Johnny introduced io. This is an extraordinary moment. Computers are now seeing, thinking, understanding, please come to our ceremony at this coffee shop. For some reason, they also yeah, so they produced this coffee shop video to really show this thing off and, it is wild to me. Let me pull this up over here. Ben: While we're doing that. Karissa, what do you [00:28:00] have to say about this? Karissa: I don't, I'm trying to remember, so I know this is Johnny Ives like AI because he also has like the love from, which is still Devindra: this is love from, this is, so he is, let me get the specifics of the deal out here. Yeah. As part of the deal Ive and his design studio love form. Is it love form or love form? Love form. Yeah. Love form are gonna be joining are gonna work independently of open ai. But Scott Cannon Evans Hanky and Ang Tan who co-founded io. This is another io. I hate these. Yeah, so IO is his AI. Karissa: Focused design thing. And then love form is like his design Devindra: studio thing. Karissa: Sure. Yeah. I'm just, he Devindra: has two design things. Karissa: I'm trying to remember what they've done. I remember there was like a story about they made like a really expensive jacket with some weird buttons or something like Devindra: Yep. I do remember that. Karissa: I was just trying to back my brain of what Johnny Iiv has really done in his post Apple life. I feel like we haven't, he's made Devindra: billions of dollars courses. What's happened? Yes. [00:29:00] Because he is now still an independent man. Clearly he's an independent contractor, but love like the other side of io. Which includes those folks. They will become open AI employees alongside 50 other engineers, designers, and researchers. They're gonna be working on AI Hardaware. It seems like Johnny, I will come in with like ideas, but he, this is not quite a marriage. He's not quite committing. He's just taking the money and being like, Ew, you can have part of my AI startup for six and a half billion dollars. Ben: Let us know your taxes. It's all equity though, so this is all paper money. Six and a half billion dollars. Of like open AI's like crazy, their crazy valuation who knows how act, how much it's actually going to be worth. But all these people are going to sell a huge chunk of stock as soon as open AI goes public anyway. So it's still gonna be an enormous amount of money. Devindra: Lemme, let me see here, the latest thing. Open OpenAI has raised 57.9 billion of funding over 11 rounds. [00:30:00] Good Lord. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, a big chunk of that is going to, to this thing because I think what happened is that Sam Altman wants to, he clearly just wants to be Steve Jobs. I think that's what's happening here. And go, I, all of you go look at the video, the announcement video for this thing, because it is one of the weirdest things I've seen. It is. Johnny I have walking through San Francisco, Sam Altman, walking through San Francisco with his hands in his pockets. There's a whole lot of setup to these guys meeting in a coffee shop, and then they sit there at the coffee shop like normal human beings, and then have an announcement video talking to nobody. They're just talking to the middle of the coffee bar. I don't know who they're addressing. Sometimes they refer to each other and sometimes they refer to camera, but they're never looking at the camera. This is just a really wild thing. Also. Yet, another thing that makes me believe, I don't think Sam Altman is is a real human boy. I think there is actually something robotic about this man, because I can't see him actually perform in real life [00:31:00] what they're gonna do. They reference vagaries, that's all. It's, we don't know what exactly is happening. There is a quote. From Johnny Ive, and he says, quote, the responsibility that Sam shares is honestly beyond my comprehension end quote. Responsibility of what? Just building this like giant AI thing. Sam Alman For humanity. Yeah, for humanity. Like just unlocking expertise everywhere. Sam Altman says he is. He has some sort of AI device and it's changed his life. We don't know what it is. We dunno what they're actually working on. They announced nothing here. But Johnny Ive is very happy because he has just made billions of dollars. He's not getting all of that money, but he, I think he's very pleased with this arrangement. And Sam Malman seems pleased that, oh, the guy who who designed the iPhone and the MacBook can now work for me. And Johnny, I also says the work here at Open AI is the best work he's ever done. Sure. You'd say that. Sure. By the way. Karissa: Sure. What do you think Apple thinks about all this? Devindra: Yeah, Karissa: their AI [00:32:00] program is flailing and like their, star designer who, granted is not, separated from Apple a while ago, but is now teaming up with Sam Altman for some future computing AI Hardaware where like they can't even get AI Siri to work. That must be like a gut punch for folks maybe on the other side of it though. Yeah, I Ben: don't think it's sour grapes to say. Are they going into the like. Friend, like friend isn't even out yet, but like the humane pin? Yes. Or any of the other like AI sidekick sort of things like that has already crashed and burned spectacularly twice. Devindra: I think Apple is, maybe have dodged a bullet here because I, the only reason Johnny and I just working on this thing is because he OpenAI had put some money into left Formm or IO years ago too. So they already had some sort of collaboration and he's just okay, people are interested in the ai. What sort of like beautiful AI device can I buy? The thing is. [00:33:00] Johnny Ive unchecked as a designer, leads to maddening things like the magic mouse, the charges from the bottom butterfly Karissa: keyboard, Devindra: any butterfly keyboard. Yeah, that's beautiful, but not exactly functional. I've always worked best when he Johnny, ive always worked best when I. He had the opposing force of somebody like a Steve Jobs who could be like, no, this idea is crazy. Or reign it in or be more functional. Steve Jobs not a great dude in many respects, but the very least, like he was able to hone into product ideas and think about how humans use products a lot. I don't think Johnny, ive on his own can do that. I don't think Sam Altman can do that because this man can barely sit and have a cup of coffee together. Like a human being. So I, whatever this is. I honestly, Chris, I feel like Apple has dodged a bullet because this is jumping into the AI gadget trend. Apple just needs to get the software right, because they have the devices, right? We are wearing, we're wearing Apple watches. People have iPhones, people have MacBooks. What they need to do, solidify the infrastructure the AI [00:34:00] smarts between all those devices. They don't need to go out and sell a whole new device. This just feels like opening AI is a new company and they can try to make an AI device a thing. I don't think it's super compelling, but let us know listeners, if any of this, listen to this chat of them talking about nothing. Unlocking human greatness, unlocking expertise just through ai, through some AI gadget. I don't quite buy it. I think it's kind of garbage, but yeah. Ben: Anything else you guys wanna say about this? This is coming from the same guy who, when he was asked in an interview what college students should study, he said Resilience. Karissa: Yeah. I just think all these companies want. To make the thing that's the next iPhone. Yes. They can all just stop being relying on Apple. It's the thing that Mark Zuckerberg has with all of their like Hardaware projects, which by the way, there was one of the stories said that Johnny I thing has been maybe working on some kind of. Head earbuds with cameras on them, which sounded [00:35:00] very similar to a thing that meta has been rumored about meta for a long time. And and also Apple, Devindra: like there, there were rumors about AirPods with head with Karissa: cameras. Yeah. And everyone's just I think trying to like, make the thing that's like not an iPhone that will replace our iPhones, but good luck to them, good, good Devindra: luck to that because I think that is coming from a fundamentally broken, like it's a broken purpose. The whole reason doing that is just try to outdo the iPhone. I was thinking about this, how many companies like Apple that was printing money with iPods would just be like, Hey we actually have a new thing and this will entirely kill our iPod business. This new thing will destroy the existing business that is working so well for us. Not many companies do that. That's the innovator's dilemma that comes back and bites companies in the butt. That's why Sony held off so long on jumping into flat screen TVs because they were the world's leader in CRTs, in Trinitron, and they're like, we're good. We're good into the nineties. And then they completely lost the TV business. That's why Toyota was so slow to EVs, because they're like, hybrids are good to us. Hybrids are great. We don't need an EV for a very long time. And then they released an EV that [00:36:00] we, where the wheels fell off. So it comes for everybody. I dunno. I don't believe in these devices. Let's talk about something that could be cool. Something that is a little unrealistic, I think, but, for a certain aesthetic it is cool. Fujifilm announced the X half. Today it is an $850 digital camera with an analog film aesthetic. It shoots in a three by four portrait aspect ratio. That's Inax mini ratio. It looks like an old school Fuji camera. This thing is pretty wild because the screen it's only making those portrait videos. One of the key selling points is that it can replicate some film some things you get from film there's a light leak simulation for when you like Overexpose film A little bit, a ation, and that's something Ben: that Fujifilm is known for. Devindra: Yes. They love that. They love these simulation modes. This is such a social media kid camera, especially for the people who cannot afford the $2,000 Fuji films, compact cameras. [00:37:00] Wow. Even the Ben: screen is do you wanna take some vertical photographs for your social media? Because vertical video has completely won. Devindra: You can't, and it can take video, but it is just, it is a simplistic living little device. It has that, what do you call that? It's that latch that you hit to wind film. It has that, so you can put it into a film photograph mode where you don't see anything on the screen. You have to use the viewfinder. To take pictures and it starts a countdown. You could tell it to do like a film, real number of pictures, and you have to click through to hit, take your next picture. It's the winder, it's, you can wind to the next picture. You can combine two portrait photos together. It's really cool. It's really cute. It's really unrealistic I think for a lot of folks, but. Hey, social media kits like influencers, the people who love to shoot stuff for social media and vertical video. This could be a really cool little device. I don't, what do you guys think about this? Karissa: You know what this reminds me of? Do you remember like in the early Instagram days when there was all these [00:38:00] apps, like hip, systematic where they tried to emulate like film aesthetics? And some of them would do these same things where like you would take the picture but you couldn't see it right away. 'cause it had to develop. And they even had a light leak thing. And I'm like, now we've come full circle where the camera companies are basically like yeah. Taking or like just doing their own. Spin on that, but Devindra: it only took them 15 years to really jump on this trend. But yes, everybody was trying to emulate classic cameras and foodie was like, oh, you want things that cost more but do less. Got it. That's the foodie film X half. And I think this thing will be a huge success. What you're talking about krisa, there is a mode where it's just yeah. You won't see the picture immediately. It has to develop in our app and then you will see it eventually. That's cool honestly, like I love this. I would not, I love it. I would not want it to be my main camera, but I would love to have something like this to play around when you could just be a little creative and pretend to be a street photographer for a little bit. Oh man. This would be huge in Brooklyn. I can just, Ben: Tom Rogers says cute, but stupid tech. I think that's [00:39:00] the perfect summary. Devindra: But this is, and I would say this compared to the AI thing, which is just like. What is this device? What are you gonna do with it? It feels like a lot of nothing in bakery. Whereas this is a thing you hold, it takes cool pictures and you share it with your friends. It is such a precise thing, even though it's very expensive for what it is. I would say if you're intrigued by this, you can get cheap compact cameras, get used cameras. I only ever buy refurbished cameras. You don't necessarily need this, but, oh man, very, but having a Karissa: Fuji film camera is a status symbol anyway. So I don't know. This is it's eight 50 still seems like a little steep for a little toy camera, basically. But also I'm like I see that. I'm like, Ooh, that looks nice. Devindra: Yeah. It's funny the power shots that kids are into now from like the two thousands those used to cost like 200 to 300 bucks and I thought, oh, that is a big investment in camera. Then I stepped up to the Sony murals, which were like 500 to 600 or so. I'm like, okay, this is a bigger step up than even that. Most people would be better off with a [00:40:00] muralist, but also those things are bigger than this tiny little pocket camera. I dunno. I'm really I think it's, I'm enamored with this whole thing. Also briefly in other news we saw that apparently Netflix is the one that is jumping out to save Sesame Street and it's going to, Sesame Street will air on Netflix and PBS simultaneously. That's a good, that's a good thing because there was previously a delay when HBO was in charge. Oh really? Yeah. They would get the new episodes and there was like, I forget how long the delay actually was, but it would be a while before new stuff hit PBS. This is just Hey, I don't love that so much of our entertainment and pop culture it, we are now relying on streamers for everything and the big media companies are just disappointing us, but. This is a good move. I think Sesame Street should stick around, especially with federal funding being killed left and right for public media like this. This is a good thing. Sesame Street is still good. My kids love it. When my son starts leaning into like his Blippy era, I. I just [00:41:00] kinda slowly tune that out. Here's some Sesame Street. I got him into PeeWee's Playhouse, which is the original Blippy. I'm like, yes, let's go back to the source. Because Peewee was a good dude. He's really, and that show still holds up. That show is so much fun. Like a great introduction to camp for kids. Great. In introduction to like also. Diverse neighborhoods, just Sesame Street as well. Peewee was, or mr. Rogers was doing Ben: it before. I think everyone, Devindra: Mr. Rogers was doing it really well too. But Peewee was always something special because PeeWee's Wild, Peewee, Lawrence Fishburn was on Peewee. There, there's just a lot of cool stuff happening there. Looking back at it now as an adult, it is a strange thing. To watch, but anyway, great to hear that Sesame Street is back. Another thing, not so quick. Ben: Yeah, let me do this one. Go ahead, if I may. Go ahead. So if you have any trouble getting audio books on Libby or Hoopla or any of the other interlibrary loan systems that you can like access on your phone or iPad any tablet. That's [00:42:00] because of the US government because a while ago the Trump administration passed yet another executive order saying that they wanted to cut a bunch of funding to the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the IMLS, and they're the ones who help circulate big quotation marks there just because it's digital files, all of these things from interlibrary loans. So you can, get your audio books that you want. The crazy thing about this is that the IMLS was created in 1996 by a Republican controlled Congress. What's the deal here, guys? There's no waste, fraud and abuse, but if you have problems getting audio books, you can tell a friend or if anybody's complaining about why their, library selection went down. By a lot on Libby recently, now you have the answer. Devindra: It is truly sad. A lot of what's happening is just to reduce access to information because hey, a well-formed population is [00:43:00] dangerous to anybody in charge, right? Terrible news. Let's move on to stuff from that's happening around in gadget. I wanna quickly shout out that Sam Rutherford has reviewed the ACEs RG flow Z 13. This is the sort of like surface like device. That's cool. This is the rise in pro Max chip. Sam seems to like it, so that's, it's a cool thing. Not exactly stealthy. He gave it a 79, which is right below. The threshold we have for recommending new products because this thing is expensive. You're paying a lot of money to get, essentially get a gaming tablet. But I tested out cs. It is cool that it actually worked for a certain type of person with too much money and who just needs the lightest gaming thing possible. I could see it being compelling. Let's see, what is the starting price? $2,100. $2,100 for a gaming tablet. Sam says it costs the same or more as a comparable RRG Zes G 14 with a real RTX 50 70. That is a great laptop. The RRGs Zes G 14, we have praised that laptop so much. So this is not [00:44:00] really meant for anybody ACEs lifts to do these experiments. They're getting there, they're getting there in terms of creating a gaming tablet, but not quite something I'd recommend for everybody at this point. All right. We have a quick email from a listener too. Thank you for sending this in, Jake Thompson. If you wanna send us an email, e podcast in gadget.com, and again, your emails may head into our Asking Gadget section. Jake asks. He's a real estate agent in need of a new laptop. He uses a Chromebook right now and it meets every need he has. Everything they do is web-based, but should they consider alternatives to a premium com Chromebook for their next computer, he says he doesn't mind spending $750 or more if he can get something lightweight, trustworthy with a solid battery life. What would we consider in the search? I would point to, I immediately point to Jake, to our laptop guides because literally everything we mention, the MacBook Air. The Asis [00:45:00] Zen book, S 14, even the Dell Xbs 13 would be not much more than that price. I think more useful than a premium Chromebook because I think the idea of a premium Chromebook is a, is insanity. I don't know why you're spending so much money for a thing that can only do web apps, cheap Chromebooks, mid-range Chromebooks fine, $500 or less. Great. But if you're spending that much money and you want something that's more reliable, that you could do more with, even if everything you're doing is web-based, there may be other things you wanna do. MacBook Windows laptop. There is so much more you can unlock there. Little bit, a little bit of gaming, a little bit of media creation. I don't know, Karissa. Ben, do you have any thoughts on this? What would you recommend or do, would you guys be fine with the Chromebook? Karissa: I like Chromebooks. I thought my first thought, and maybe this is like too out there, but would an iPad Pro fit that fit those requirements? 'cause you can do a lot with an iPad Pro. You Devindra: can do a lot that's actually great battery, Karissa: lightweight, lots of apps. If most everything he's doing is web based, there's. You can probably use iPad apps. Devindra: That's actually a good point. Karissa you can [00:46:00] do a lot with an iPad and iPad Pro does start at around this price too. So it would be much lighter and thinner than a laptop. Especially if you could do a lot of web stuff. I feel like there are some web things that don't always run well in an iPad form. Safari and iPad doesn't support like everything you'd expect from a web-based site. Like I think if you. There are things we use like we use Video Ninja to record podcasts and that's using web RTC. Sometimes there are things like zencaster, something you have to use, apps to go use those things because I, iOS, iPad OS is so locked down. Multitasking isn't great on iPad os. But yeah, if you're not actually doing that much and you just want a nice. Media device. An iPad is a good option too. Alright, thank you so much Jake Thompson. That's a good one too because I wanna hear about people moving on from Chromebooks. 'cause they, send us more emails at podcast@enggadget.com for sure. Let's just skip right past what we're working on 'cause we're all busy. We're all busy with stuff unless you wanna mention anything. Chris, anything you're working on at the moment? Karissa: The only thing I wanna flag is that [00:47:00] we are rapidly approaching another TikTok sale or ban. Deadline Yes. Next month. Speaker: Sure. Karissa: Been a while since we heard anything about that, but, I'm sure they're hard at work on trying to hammer out this deal. Ben: Okay. But that's actually more relevant because they just figured out maybe the tariff situation and the tariff was the thing that spoiled the first deal. So we'll see what happens like at the beginning of July, yeah. I think Karissa: The deadline's the 19th of June Ben: oh, at the beginning of June. Sorry. Karissa: Yeah, so it's. It's pretty close. And yeah, there has been not much that I've heard on that front. So Devindra: this is where we are. We're just like walking to one broken negotiation after another for the next couple years. Anything you wanna mention, pop culture related krisa that is taking your mind off of our broken world. Karissa: So this is a weird one, but I have been, my husband loves Stargate, and we have been for years through, wait, the movie, the TV shows, Stargate [00:48:00] SG one. Oh Devindra: God. And I'm yeah. Just on the Karissa: last few episodes now in the end game portion of that show. So that has been I spent years like making fun of this and like making fun of him for watching it, but that show's Devindra: ridiculously bad, but yeah. Yeah. Karissa: Everything is so bad now that it's, actually just a nice. Yeah. Distraction to just watch something like so silly. Devindra: That's heartwarming actually, because it is a throwback to when things were simpler. You could just make dumb TV shows and they would last for 24 episodes per season. My for how Ben: many seasons too, Devindra: Karissa? Karissa: 10 seasons. Devindra: You just go on forever. Yeah. My local or lamb and rice place, my local place that does essentially New York streetcar style food, they placed Arga SG one. Every time I'm in there and I'm sitting there watching, I was like, how did we survive with this? How did we watch this show? It's because we just didn't have that much. We were desperate for for genre of fiction, but okay, that's heartwarming Krisa. Have you guys done Farscape? No. Have you seen Farscape? 'cause Farscape is very, is a very similar type of [00:49:00] show, but it has Jim Henson puppets and it has better writing. I love Jim Henson. It's very cool. Okay. It's it's also, it's unlike Stargate. It also dares to be like I don't know, sexy and violent too. Stargate always felt too campy to me. But Farscape was great. I bought that for $15. On iTunes, so that was a deal. I dunno if that deal is still there, but the entire series plus the the post series stuff is all out there. Shout out to Farscape. Shout out to Stargate SG one Simpler times. I'll just really briefly run down a few things and or season two finished over the last week. Incredible stuff. As I said in my initial review, it is really cool to people see people watching this thing and just being blown away by it. And I will say the show. Brought me to tears at the end, and I did not expect that. I did not expect that because we know this guy's gonna die. This is, we know his fate and yet it still means so much and it's so well written and the show is a phenomenon. Chris, I'd recommend it to you when you guys are recovering from Stargate SG one loss and or is fantastic. I also checked out a bit of murderbot the [00:50:00] Apple TV plus adaptation of the Martha Wells books. It's fine. It is weirdly I would say it is funny and entertaining because Alexander Skarsgard is a fun person to watch in in genre fiction. But it also feels like this could be funnier, this could be better produced. Like you could be doing more with this material and it feels like just lazy at times too. But it's a fine distraction if you are into like half-baked sci-fi. So I don't know. Another recommendation for Stargate SG one Levers, Karissa Final Destination Bloodlines. I reviewed over at the film Cast and I love this franchise. It is so cool to see it coming back after 15 years. This movie is incredible. Like this movie is great. If you understand the final destination formula, it's even better because it plays with your expectations of the franchise. I love a horror franchise where there's no, no definable villain. You're just trying to escape death. There's some great setups here. This is a great time at the movies. Get your popcorn. Just go enjoy the wonderfully creative kills. [00:51:00] And shout out to the Zap lapovsky and Adam B. Stein who. Apparently we're listening to my other podcast, and now we're making good movies. So that's always fun thing to see Mount Destination Bloodlines a much better film. The Mission Impossible, the Final Reckoning. My review of that is on the website now too. You can read that in a gadget. Ben: Thanks everybody for listening. Our theme music is by Game Composer Dale North. Our outro music is by our former managing editor, Terrence O'Brien. The podcast is produced by me. Ben Elman. You can find Karissa online at Karissa: Karissa b on threads Blue Sky, and sometimes still X. Ben: Unfortunately, you can find Dendra online Devindra: At dendra on Blue Sky and also podcast about movies and TV at the film cast@thefilmcast.com. Ben: If you really want to, you can find me. At hey bellman on Blue Sky. Email us at podcast@enggadget.com. Leave us a review on iTunes and subscribe on anything that gets podcasts. That includes [00:52:00] Spotify. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/engadget-podcast-the-ai-and-xr-of-google-io-2025-131552868.html?src=rss

Image: Nintendo Life / Aniplex / XSEED Games Warning: This article delves into spoiler territory for The Hundred Line - Last Defense Academy. If you've yet to play the game and want to go in blind, we recommend you come back at another time... I’m not a fan of tactical RPGs… is what I would have told you before I played The Hundred Line - Last Defense Academy. Heck, I’m still not sure I would call myself a 'fan' of the genre, necessarily; one game perhaps isn’t enough to sway me that much. The Hundred Line, though..? Yeah, I’m a fan of The Hundred Line.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube814kWatch on YouTube In fact, it's easily my Game of the Year so far, and even with the Switch 2 on the horizon, it’s going to take something truly special to usurp its throne. Mitch gave it an 'Excellent' 9/10 in our review, but what he didn’t cover – what he couldn’t cover without spoiling anything – is just how ridiculously ambitious Too Kyo Games’ visual novel / tactical RPG hybrid really is. So, if you’re sensitive about spoilers and want to go into this one completely fresh, consider this your last warning. We’re going in, folks. Images: Nintendo Life / Aniplex / XSEED Games Before I waltz headfirst into what is undoubtedly The Big Twist™, I want to first look at the wonderful cast of characters. Much like Danganronpa before it, the entire premise of The Hundred Line — survive and protect your school against invaders over the course of one hundred days — would have crashed and burned were it not for the likes of Takumi Sumino, Darumi Amemiya, Shouma Ginzaki, Nozomi Kirifuji, and the rest of those loveable goofballs. Character work is truly where directors Kazutaka Kodaka and Kotaro Uchikoshi shine brightest. They managed to make every member of the 'Special Defense Unit' completely unique and special in their own way. Take Tsubasa Kawana, for instance. Whenever she’s placed in a stressful situation, she immediately feels nauseous, and it makes for some wonderful comedic relief. I lost count of the number of times I giggled whenever the story took a dark turn, and the camera switched over to Tsubasa loudly dry heaving. In addition to the comic relief, however, we also learn a lot about Tsubasa’s background, including her passion for machinery fostered by fixing cars with her grandfather as a child. We get similar deep dives into every character, to the point where we begin to understand the potential causes behind their various quirks. Even total prats like Ima Tsukumo, whose obsessive devotion to his ‘Dear Sister’ Kako proves deeply concerning, gets his own moment of redemption through both his backstory and the way the plot progresses. By the time I reached the credits, I really didn’t want the game to end. I’d grown to love these characters, and a couple of significant losses actually brought a tear to my eye during the final stages; something that no game before it has accomplished. Couldn’t I just keep going? Just for a bit..? Well, here’s the thing: it didn’t end. When you reach the last couple of days in the basic hundred-day timeline, you learn that through powers gained via absorption of your enemies, protagonist Takumi can actually go back in time to day one and re-do the whole thing again. Only this time, you’re free to make significant changes to the story and work your way toward one of a potential hundred different endings. Whoa – hold my beer, Nier Automata! Image: Nintendo Life / Aniplex / XSEED Games I know what you’re probably thinking, and no, you don’t have to play through the entire game a hundred times. Effectively, the story can branch off into several different paths, each of which has a number of potential endings, and the game even gives you the ability to jump back to specific days in order to change your decisions and alter the story’s path. Some endings may be exceedingly short, others a bit lengthier… some good, and some very bad. One might see you become the villain of the story, while another may conclude with the adorably loyal samurai Kyoshika Magadori being devoured by your zombified friends. The variety of avenues is simply absurd, and discovering each one is a joy. These are just a couple of the more, shall we say, ‘insignificant’ possible endings. I won’t go into those which might actually spoil the overarching plot; even if you’re still with me at this point, I’d like you to enjoy The Hundred Line’s story on your own terms. It’s safe to say, however, that the run through those initial one hundred days could definitely be considered a ‘prologue’, even though it comfortably stands as a compelling story in its own right with a beginning, middle, and end. Images: Nintendo Life / Aniplex / XSEED Games So you can definitely stop there and have a grand ol’ time, but if you’re looking for something a bit more ambitious — something that throws the rulebook out of the window — I’d encourage you to keep going and see exactly what The Hundred Line has up its sleeve. It’s simply magnificent. There are so many reasons why I love this game. I love figuring out what to do during ‘free time’ sessions in which you can either chat to your fellow students, venture out into the world in a board-game-inspired minigame of sorts, or dive straight into a few battle simulations to potentially upgrade your abilities. The biggest surprise for me, however, was how much I loved the battle system itself. As I mentioned at the start, I’m normally not one for tactical RPGs, but The Hundred Line’s turn-based structure just works so well. I often get overwhelmed when it comes to deciding how to approach tactical gameplay: how do these characters function? Why can’t I move more than two spaces? Just what the heck do I do? The Hundred Line made it easy, though, and it’s once again thanks to the remarkably unique and diverse cast. Their artistic design makes it easy to distinguish one from another, and it only took a couple of battles until I memorised their strengths and weaknesses, along with how their attacks play out on the field of battle. It got to the point where, after a handful of quiet days full of ‘free time’, the warbling alarm to signify an incoming battle filled me with excitement. Images: Nintendo Life / Aniplex / XSEED Games Most of the battles felt doable and I never felt completely helpless against the hordes of invaders, but there were still a few that I managed to botch straight away and lose within just a few minutes. In those instances, the game gives you the option to redo the battle with significant boosts to your manpower, instantly giving you 300% 'voltage' (which essentially gives you three uses of your extra-powerful special attacks) and refilling your squad's health. Is it cheating? Sure, I guess... But it also makes the game significantly more approachable for tactical newcomers like myself. I adore the Danganronpa series. I think they’re wonderful games that remain just as compelling now as they were back when they first launched, and if it weren’t for Danganronpa, I don’t think The Hundred Line would even exist. I have to be honest with myself, though… The Hundred Line is better. It’s a masterpiece. Co-director Kazutaka Kodaka has recently confirmed that the game is "selling well", but I still feel like not enough people are talking about it. I suspect, however, that as the years go by and more people play it through word of mouth, it’ll go down as one of the greatest visual novels of all time. There’s simply nothing else quite like it. Have you played through The Hundred Line - Last Defense Academy yet? What do you make of it? Do you have a favourite character / ending? Let us know with a comment in the usual place. Sirei-iously good According to its director, at least Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube814k Related Games See Also Share:30 3 Nintendo Life’s resident horror fanatic, when he’s not knee-deep in Resident Evil and Silent Hill lore, Ollie likes to dive into a good horror book while nursing a lovely cup of tea. He also enjoys long walks and listens to everything from TOOL to Chuck Berry. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment... 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Don't Feel Like Fighting? Check Out These Other Terrific PC Games Brawlhalla Brawlhalla (for PC) 3.5 Good The Blue Mammoth Games-developed Brawlhalla is a free-to-play fighting game—available on PC, console, and mobile—that builds upon Smash's wild, character-focused gameplay by introducing unlimited wall-jumps and various other movement options that facilitate fun combat.The expanding character roster also features the likes of G.I. Joe's Snake Eyes, WWE's Randy "Macho Man" Savage, Tomb Raider's Lara Croft, and Street Fighter’s Chun-Li. Many of these licensed fighters require spending cash, but that's fine; it's worth spending $20 for all current and future characters, because this platform-fighter is just that exciting. Capcom Fighting Collection 2 Capcom Fighting Collection 2 (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Capcom continues resurrecting its classic titles for modern audiences with Capcom Fighting Collection 2. This compilation features cool deep cuts not found in previous entries, including Power Stone and Project Justice. Along with the nostalgia, you'll enjoy new upgrades like online multiplayer (but no crossplay) and revamped display options. If you've had your fill of Street Fighter, this is a great way to broaden your fighting game horizons. Capcom Fighting Collection 2 (for PC) review Dead or Alive 6 Dead or Alive 6 (for PC) 3.5 Good Dead or Alive 6, much like its immediate predecessor, is one part fighting game, one part fashion show, and one part schlocky action movie. Individually, each of the game's widely differing elements might not stand up to scrutiny. After all, DOA 6 isn't the best fighter, doesn't offer the deepest character customization, and doesn't quite reach the Tekken series' level of story insanity.Still, Dead or Alive 6 is a fun and surprisingly strategic PC game that offers enough freshness to warrant playing with its new Break Blow and Break Hold tools. Plus, the game's familiar Triangle System and Danger Zones are highly entertaining, too. Divekick Divekick (for PC) 3.5 Good Iron Galaxy Studios' Divekick is the most hipster fighting game ever created. It's the product of the indie scene that mercilessly parodies fighting games and their die-hard community, yet demands that you be part of the underground circle to fully get all of the references and in-jokes.It's an odd game, but an interesting one if you open your mind to the insane concept of a two-button fighter based entirely on the idea of jumping and kicking. And 20-second rounds. And one-hit kills. And a line of scrimmage. Yes, Divekick is a fighting game freak show, but one worth checking out. Dragon Ball FighterZ Dragon Ball FighterZ (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Beside Fist of the Northstar and Jo Jo's Bizarre Adventure, there are few anime properties that are as intrinsically suited to the fighting-game treatment as the Dragon Ball series. Spanning multiple series, movies, and generations of characters, Akira Toriyama's manga-turned-anime-turned-game series is all about buff monkey men, humans, aliens, and androids trading blows in actual earth-shattering battles.The series' latest video game adaptation, Dragon Ball FighterZ, ditches the Xenoverse games' arena-brawling model in favor of 3-vs.-3, tag-team fighting on a 2D plane. The gameplay shift is just one of the many reasons Dragon Ball FighterZ is being held aloft as one of 2018's notable titles. Its beautiful design, intense combat, and accessible control scheme add up to a game that anyone can jump into for Super Saiyan thrills.Plus, you can kick Cell through a mountain. Dragon Ball FighterZ (for PC) review Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves (for PC) 4.0 Excellent The King of Fighters series is great, but Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves resurrects the SNK fighter that started it all. Familiar faces like Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui battle real-life guest characters like DJ Salavatore Gannaci and soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo gather for this excellent take on fundamental, 2D fisticuffs. Rich mechanics add depth to both offensive and defensive play, while comic book-inspired graphics give brawls a distinct visual identity. Crossplay multiplayer shines with rollback netcode. Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves (for PC) review Garou: Mark of the Wolves Garou: Mark of the Wolves (for PC) 4.5 Excellent Upon its 1999 release, Garou: Mark of the Wolves—a surprisingly deep and visually stunning entry in the long-running Fatal Fury series—was hailed as SNK's wondrous response to Capcom's Street Fighter III. Nearly 20 years later, SNK has finally given the fighting game the proper PC treatment by releasing it with numerous additional graphics options, leaderboards, and rollback, online versus play.Despite removing and downplaying some series-specific elements, Garou doesn't feel any less of a Fatal Fury game, however. It's set in the Southtown, and it features multiple fighters with classic Fatal Fury lineages, whether it's blood relationships to, or martial-arts tutelage from, older characters. Kim Kaphwan isn't in the game, for example, but his sons continue his legacy of swift, combo-heavy tae kwon do kicks.The result is an excellent game that boasts beautiful animation, Just Defend parries, and the strategic T.O.P. system that delivers increased attack damage, limited health regeneration, faster super-meter build up, and an exclusive special attack when your activate the mode. Guilty Gear Strive Guilty Gear Strive (for PC) 4.0 Excellent The Guilty Gear series reigns as the king of anime-style fighting games due to its gorgeous art style, and a rich, demanding, and lighting-quick combat system. Unfortunately, its oceanic depth and mountainous skill ceiling proved inaccessible to the causal player—until now. With Strive, developer Arc System Works streamlines the series’ unique combat mechanics to make them more newcomer-friendly, while retaining the older games' creative richness. Strive comes with fewer extra modes than its predecessors, but there is a lot to love in this PC game, including astounding visuals, impressive character play styles, and snappy, lag-free online play courtesy of top-tier, rollback netcode. Strive is an approachable series entry that shakes up the Guilty Gear formula in the best ways possible. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- (for PC) 3.5 Good Guilty Gear is a niche series within a niche genre, one that's enjoyed a cult following since its first appearance in 1998. With Xrd -SIGN-, developer Arc System Works ditches the series' 2D sprites in favor of 3D cel-shaded graphics in an attempt to expand its audience. Likewise, series creator Daisuke Ishiwatari sought a more approachable play style that maintains the depth and high skill ceiling that long-time Guilty Gear fans love.Still, Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- keeps the series familiar fighting action (Roman Cancels, Bursts, and Dusts) that enables creative offensive and defensive play. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- (for PC) review Killer Instinct Killer Instinct (for PC) 4.0 Excellent When Killer Instinct debuted for Windows 10 in March 2016, it represented the latest chapter in the continued PC fighting game renaissance. With its arrival, Microsoft's one-on-one game of fisticuffs joined the likes of Guilty Gear, The King of Fighters, Street Fighter, and other high-profile series that now grace the personal computer.Killer Instinct has a combo-heavy engine that caters to both novices and pros, incredibly detailed graphics that boast ridiculous particle effects (everything explodes!), and an over-the-top, NBA Jam-like announcer who screams your accomplishments ("C-c-c-combo Breaker!") at the top of his lungs.Killer Instinct is part of Microsoft's Play Anywhere initiative. So, if you buy Killer Instinct from the Microsoft Store, you'll also be able to play it on Xbox One at no additional cost. It has cross-platform play with Xbox One, too, thus expanding the online player base. There's a Steam version, too. Even better, the game's ridiculously good netcode ensures smooth play across the globe. Killer Instinct (for PC) review The King of Fighters '98: Ultimate Match Final Edition The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match Final Edition (for PC) 5.0 Outstanding The King of Fighters '98—with its hops, rolls, blowback attacks, and meter-filling Advance and Extra modes—is one of the best fighting games ever made, so it's no surprise that developer SNK has returned to the title many times since the game's original release.In 2008, SNK celebrated the game's tenth anniversary by porting the team-based fighter to the PlayStation 2 as The King of Fighters '98: Ultimate Match, a game loaded with extra characters (including the almighty '96 Boss Team!), stages, moves, and gameplay modes. Now, a tweaked Ultimate Match is available for purchase under the title The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match Final Edition.This version adds numerous graphics options and good, but not great, online connectivity that lets you battle other KOF fans around the globe in 3-vs.-3 action. The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match Final Edition (for PC) review The King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match The King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Like The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match Final Edition, The King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match is a dream match that eschews a storyline so that developer SNK could include as many characters as possible—even some that are canonically dead, like crime boss Geese Howard. As a result, Unlimited Match boasts one of the largest fighting game rosters of all time, with a 66-character strong lineup.King of Fighters 2002 Ultimate Match continues the series tradition of excellent combat. Although it lacks KOF '98 UMFE's three radically different fight mechanics (Advanced, Extra, and Ultimate), Unlimited Match has a lone system that resembles Advanced Mode. This fighting style gives you plenty of offensive (Dash, Run, Hops, Super Jumps) and defensive (Guard Cancel Strike, Guard Cancel Roll Throw) options for setting up or evading traps. Excellent rollback netcode lets you play people around the world without hiccup. The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition (for PC) 4.0 Excellent The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition brings SNK's incredibly dense, 3-vs.-3, team-based fighter to the PC via Valve's video game marketplace. It's an all-around excellent fighting game, and one of the best in SNK's rich catalog.If you've rumbled with friends and foes in the version that appeared on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, you'll feel right at home here: The intricate combat mechanics, meter management, and the best sprite-based graphics ever seen in a fighting game are brought over successfully in this Steam port.Even better, The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition contains all the console DLC and the King of Fighters XIII: Climax arcade features. Similar to The King of Fighters '98: Ultimate Match Final Edition, The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition has decent online play, but you can expect some hiccups. The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition (for PC) review The Last Blade The Last Blade (for PC) 4.0 Excellent SNK put weapons-based, 2D fighting on the map with 1993's delightful Samurai Shodown, but the developer went on to refine the idea of sword-based combat four years later in a somewhat lesser-known Neo Geo title: The Last Blade.Released to the Steam platform with several contemporary bells and whistles, The Last Blade boasts excellent swordplay, a dozen exquisitely designed characters, and a gorgeous anime- and manga-style presentation that make its 19th-century Japanese setting one of the most beautiful in fighting-game history. Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite (for PC) 3.5 Good Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite has taken its fair share of flack since its reveal, and the venom is not at all unwarranted. The initial trailer for the tag-team fighting game featured dull, washed-out graphics, and Capcom highlighted the new novice-friendly, auto-combo options that are designed to help casuals bust out cool-looking moves in an otherwise hardcore genre. As a result, fight fans were highly skeptical of the game, as was I.Fortunately, my Infinite sentiments changed upon logging several hours with the game. The Infinity Stone hook and the move to 2-vs.-2, tag team action make Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite an incredibly fun PC game to play in both casual and hardcore sessions.Still, Infinite has presentation and MCU-focused roster issues that prevent it from rising to the very top of the fighting game elite. Mortal Kombat XL Mortal Kombat XL (for PC) 4.0 Excellent When NetherRealm Studios released the blood-drenched Mortal Kombat X to consoles in 2015, the one-on-one fighting game continued to evolve via free and paid updates that added characters, balanced the roster, and improved online play. However, the High Voltage Studios-ported PC version of the game received zero post-launch support, much to the dismay of hardcore Mortal Kombat fans.Thankfully, that changed with the Mortal Kombat XL update, a version of MKX that finally gives PC gamers all the extras that console-based fight fans have enjoyed for some time now. I dislike the idea of paying more money for PC content released long after the console version, but it's hard not to love the additions, which include even more fighters, stages, costumes, and gore.Paid DLC added plenty of guest fighters, which has becoming commonplace in the fighting game circle. They include the Predator and Friday the 13th's Jason Vorhees. The King of Fighters XV The King of Fighters XV (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Developer SNK took KOF XIV's core, revamped the MAX meter, added the Shatterstrike counter system, and gave the character models an eye-catching redesign to create one of the best fighting games in recent history. KOF XV features an updated fighting engine that facilitates fast-paced, creative combat, and near-flawless rollback netcode that will keep you knuckling up with online rivals for hours on end.The game's dense with options. You can play the narrative-driven Story mode, use DJ Station to listen to more that 300 music tracks culled from SNK's rich, decades-long game library (many compositions unlock as you play Arcade mode), engage in casual and ranked online battles, view leaderboards, and check out match replays. In a community-fostering move, SNK included an esports-friendly tournament mode tailor-made for locals and majors like Evo. You can save 15 custom teams, set up brackets and rulesets, and register up to 32 entrants. It's a great touch. In addition, KOF XV lets you join online lobbies to play against others or simply spectate. Mortal Kombat 11 Mortal Kombat 11 (for PC) 4.5 Excellent Mortal Kombat 11 is far more than the guts and gore titles on which the series built its fame. The narrative sequel to Mortal Kombat X, Mortal Kombat 11 uses time travel to pit characters against their rivals in the past in order to alter the present. Whatever.Mortal Kombat 11 continues the series tradition of chop-socky action and otherworldly mysticism to lay the foundation for military operatives, ninjas, gods, and monsters to punch each other squarely in the face. With its character customization, HDR10 support, smooth animations, and new offensive and defensive meters, MK11 is the best Mortal Kombat game to date. Mortal Kombat 11 (for PC) review Samurai Shodown Samurai Shodown (for PC) 3.5 Good Clashing swords, blood spurts, and tense, measured play define Samurai Shodown, SNK's beloved weapons-based fighting game series. This series refresh, the simply named Samurai Shodown, carries those elements to PC after the game first appeared on console. If you've waited this long in hopes that Samurai Shodown would add many PC-exclusive extras, you may be disappointed; this is largely the same game that appeared elsewhere. Still, Samurai Shodown's unique, defense-orientated gameplay makes it a fighting game to check out for sword-swinging, blood-letting action. Prep for lengthy load times, though. Samurai Shodown Neo Geo Collection Samurai Shodown Neo Geo Collection (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Samurai Shodown Neo Geo Collection, SNK and Digital Eclipse's follow up to the delightful SNK 40th Anniversary Collection, contains all the SamSho games that appeared on the original Neo Geo, plus production art, SNK staff interviews, and a true surprise—an unreleased title that only briefly saw a location test. Overall, Samurai Shodown Neo Geo Collection is a wonderful piece of playable history, with the only blight against the PC game being its mediocre online components. Skullgirls 2nd Encore Skullgirls 2nd Encore (for PC) 4.5 Excellent Skullgirls 2nd Encore, the update to Reverge Labs's critically acclaimed original game, takes cues from many highly regarded fighting titles and blends it with the series' unique, cartoony, art deco-influenced visual style.However, Skullgirls 2nd Encore's graphics aren't all that separate it from the competition. The indie fighter boasts a Capcom vs. SNK-style ratio system that lets you select up to three characters to battle up to three rival characters, as well as a Marvel vs. Capcom-style assist system. The fighter also has a built-in system that automatically stops infinites, those annoying and abusive combos that never end. SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium SNK vs. Capcom: Match of the Millennium (for PC) 4.5 Excellent With Match of the Millennium's rerelease, the secret best fighting game in the SNK vs. Capcom crossover series finds a new audience. Featuring an 18-character default roster (Athena, Chun-Li, Dan, Felicia, Guile, Haohmaru, Iori, Ken, Kyo, Leona, Mai, Morrigan, Nakoruru, Ryo, Ryu, Sakura, Terry, and Zangief), and three deep groove systems that replicate beloved the companies' beloved fighting game engines, SNK vs. Capcom: Match of the Millennium sees two fighting game universes collide in marvelous fashion.That would be more than enough variety, but Match of the Millennium offers additional goodies. It features standard Sparring, Survival, and Time Attack fighting modes. Olympics, however, is the most intriguing mode, as it lets you indulge in several non-fighting game minigames. For example, you can blast Metal Slug's Mars People in a first-person shooting mode or guide Ghost 'N Goblins' Arthur across pits to snatch up treasure. The Versus points that you earn here unlock extra super moves for the default and secret characters. These contests have the depth of early mobile phone games, but they're a nice diversion from the standard fighting game action.Match of the Millennium is a genuinely entertaining and rich fighting game that combines challenge and strategy with a hefty helping of lighthearted humor. SoulCalibur VI SoulCalibur VI (for PC) 4.0 Excellent The weapons-based combat series has seen its ups and downs over the years, but with SoulCalibur VI, developer Bandai Namco has taken what's worked in the past—swift, strategic combat and robust character customization—and paired it with the new Reversal Edge and Soul Charge battle mechanics to create an engaging PC fighting game that'll shine in all sorts of battles, whether they're between buddies or on big esports stages like Evo.Combat is crisp and rewarding, with a universal control scheme that makes it a breeze to pick up a new character. Each fighter has a horizontal attack, vertical attack, kick, block, parry, sidestep, guard-crushing Break Attack, and Critical Edge super attack. This control scheme will feel familiar to anyone who's played recent SoulCalibur titles, and it leads to some tense combat moments as you attack and defend. Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection (for PC) 4.0 Excellent Film aficionados rely on The Criterion Collection to take vital classic and contemporary movies and present them in thoughtful, information-filled packages for modern audiences. Until very recently, the 40-year old video game industry lacked its own Criterion Collection, letting important pop culture contributions slip into oblivion due to incompatible hardware and software formats, expired licenses, and plain neglect. Thankfully, the games preservation experts at Digital Eclipse have taken up the task, blessing gamers with titles that celebrate classic titles via accurate emulation and a bounty of production-related extras and modern touches. The company's first foray into the fighting game genre is Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection.This collection doesn't include Street Fighter: The Movie, the Street Fighter EX titles, or X-Men vs. Street Fighter, but you will find all the core arcade releases. The lineup includes Street Fighter (1987), Street Fighter II (1991), Street Fighter II: Champion Edition (1992), Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting (1992), Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers (1993) Super Street Fighter II Turbo (1994), Street Fighter Alpha (1995), Street Fighter Alpha 2 (1996), Street Fighter III: New Generation (1997), Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact Giant Attack (1997), Street Fighter Alpha 3 (1998), and Street Fighter III 3rd Strike: Fight For The Future (1999).Even better, you don't just get the games. This collection includes a sprite/animation view, design documents, a historical timeline, and a jukebox. In short, Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection is a love letter to one of the most important video game franchises of all time. Street Fighter V: Champion Edition Street Fighter V: Champion Edition (for PC) 3.5 Good In February 2016, Street Fighter V arrived on PC with many flaws that detracted from the stellar gameplay, including awful server instability, no true single-player mode, and a surprisingly limited multiplayer Battle Lounge. However, over the course of the last few years, developer Capcom released several updates that addressed (most of) those issues while also adding new stages and playable characters.Street Fighter V: Champion Edition, with its fresh and returning characters, new fight systems (like the cool V-Skills and V-Triggers mechanics), interactive stages, Cinematic Story Mode, and cross-platform play with PlayStation 4 owners, finally makes the one-on-one fighting game a title to pick up even for gamers who don't have Evo dreams. Street Fighter V: Champion Edition (for PC) review Street Fighter 6 Street Fighter 6 (for PC) 5.0 Outstanding Following Street Fighter V's lukewarm reception, Capcom had much to prove with Street Fighter 6. Thankfully, the developer not only righted the previous title's wrongs, but exceeded expectations by including nearly everything that fans would want in a contemporary fighting game.The title's powered by the new Drive Gauge, a meter that's full and ready for action at the beginning of each round. With the Drive Gauge, you can unleash the Drive Impact, Drive Parry, Drive Reversal, Drive Rush, and Overdrive moves (read our review for a breakdown of each one). It, along with the Dynamic and Modern control schemes, gives you more combat flexibility than any previous Street Fighter game. The result is one of the best fighters ever crafted, one that enables hype-fueled moments in casual and competitive play. Street Fighter 6 (for PC) review Tekken 7 Tekken 7 (for PC) 4.5 Excellent Tekken 7, like the main-line Tekken games that came before it, is a tale of fathers and sons attempting to murder each other to purge the Mishima clan of the Devil Gene, a magical bit of DNA that transforms certain people into hell spawn.The excellent combat accentuates the narrative ridiculousness. Like its predecessors, Tekken 7 is a fighting game that features simple, limb-mapped controls, massive character move sets, and numerous juggles that let you keep a combo flowing, if you're skilled enough to input the correct move at the right moment. With Tekken 7, the series receives super moves (Rage Arts) and enhanced, special attacks that can blow through an opponent's attack (Power Crush).Tekken 7 is an incredibly tense game of jabs, feints, and sidesteps, because any hit may lead to a long combo sting. Factor in characters with move sets that emulate real martial arts, interactive stages that let you knock people through floors and walls, and terrific slowdown effects that happen when both fighters' health bars are in the red and they perform close-quarter melee attacks, and you have a fighting game that's essentially an interactive martial arts flick. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (for PC) 3.5 Good Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 pits Marvel's superheroes against Capcom's video game characters in a frantic 3-vs.-3, tag team brawl. The 48-character headcount is impressive, but it's the individual characters and visual aesthetic that truly make the game shine (unlike its Infinite sequel).Marvel's side has several popular and obscure characters, including Captain America, Iron Man, Iron Fist, and She-Hulk, and Spider-Man. Capcom's side mainly comprises characters from the company's fighting and action games, including Final Fight's Mike Haggar and Street Fighter's Ryu. The comic book-style graphics, with their bright colors and heavy black lines, gives Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 an eye-popping look.In terms of gameplay, Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 builds upon its Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds predecessor by including a three-button control scheme, the momentum-changing X-Factor mechanic, and retooled aerial combat. Ultra Street Fighter IV Ultra Street Fighter IV (for PC) 4.5 Excellent Ultra Street Fighter IV marks Capcom's fourth version of Street Fighter IV and the third version available on the Steam platform. Like vanilla Street Fighter IV and Super Street Fighter IV, Ultra's combat is centered on Focus Attacks, a move that lets your character tank a blow and unleash a counterattack.This final iteration adds five new characters (Decapre, Elena, Hugo, Poison, and Rolento), six new stages, a YouTube upload option, Edition Select (which lets you pick different versions of characters, based on their past Street Fighter IV iterations), and Double Ultra (which makes a character's Ultra Combos available simultaneously, in exchange for reduced damage).It's Street Fighter IV's best and meatiest update, though some balance issues prove a bit irritating in play. Still, Ultra Street Fighter IV is an excellent, competitive one-on-one fighting game.

After spending several months doing not much besides watching Tom Cruise movies, I now spend a lot of time wondering about Tom Cruise running. The Mission: Impossible star is a high-cadence runner. He’s famously short of stature, low to the ground and with short legs. But that build is perfect for cinema, because those arms swing and those legs churn and convey a viscerality, a violence, a constant labored activity that translates perfectly to the screen. What they convey is a man of action, a man summoning all of his energy and will in a single direction: to move as quickly as he can. What is he thinking about when he’s running? I like to think the answer is nothing. That Tom Cruise is able to empty his head when he runs, blanking out his career, his cultural meaning, his past and present personal relationships, and move in a state of pure being. Maybe he’s doing one of his infamous stunts, a run towards a large dangerous vehicle, or off the side of a cliff. Maybe that makes him run faster. Maybe he feels a drive toward oblivion (and for Oblivion), to make the ultimate sacrifice to cinema, resulting in a cultural afterlife even longer than eternal stardom allows. This, in many ways, has been Tom Cruise’s career-long relationship with action movies. They’re his port in the storm, a safe harbor, a place to go and find love and acceptance when there seemingly is none to be had elsewhere. When the press is digging into your religion or snickering about your failed marriages or accusing you of being awkward or crazy or scary, you can find refuge in a MacGuffin to track down, a bad guy’s plot to foil, a world to save. The challenge each writer and director must face is how to handle Cruise’s well-known persona. Do they lean in or subvert? And to what end? When gifted with perhaps the most charismatic, committed movie star ever, are you willing to grapple with this stardom, how it explains the actor at a given point in his career, and what our response to him means? Or do you run? The following is a ranking of Tom Cruise’s greatest action films. In the interest of gimmicky symmetry, we’ve once again capped ourselves at 26 titles. We didn’t cheat… much. The films below all contain shootouts, fistfights, corpses, and missile crises. Most importantly, they are (mostly) tense, suspenseful, violent, escapist popcorn, not to be confused with the other half of Cruise’s equation: the pool-playing, the bartending, the litigating, and the deeply felt character work with auteurs, intended to get him the ultimate prize, which has eluded him for nearly half a century. Let’s run the numbers. 26. Valkyrie (2008) Director: Bryan SingerWhere to watch: Free on Pluto TV, Kanopy, Hoopla You could make a decent argument that this piece of shit doesn’t even belong on this list. It’s mostly a plodding chamber drama about “good Germans” ineffectually plotting to not kill Hitler at the end of World War II. But there’s an explosion, a dull shootout, and a bunch of executions at the end, so it seems to qualify as an action movie. Making Valkyrie is one of the most baffling decisions in Cruise’s entire career. And yet it’s also one of the most important films of his career, one that arguably defines his late period, because it’s how he first met his future M:I steward Christopher McQuarrie. Run report: Ominously, Tom Cruise doesn’t run in this movie.   25. Oblivion (2013) Director: Joseph KosinskiWhere to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple Like Valkyrie, Oblivion technically qualifies as an action movie, but there’s little actual action or narrative tension to any of it. Cruise essentially plays the source code for a clone army created by a weird super-intelligence in space that runs Earth via killer droids, and the clones to service them. It comes out of a filmmaking period packed with sci-fi puzzlebox movies that were all atmosphere and often led nowhere, though this is probably the “best” example of that tiresome trend. The silver lining is that, like Valkyrie, this film led to Cruise meeting an important future collaborator: Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski. Run report: Cruise literally exercises by running on a giant sleek modern hamster wheel in this. It’s the physical manifestation of everything I hate about this film. 24. Legend (1985) Director: Ridley ScottWhere to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple This 1985 fantasy movie has its defenders, but I am not one of them. The action is completely disjointed and chaotic, a fractured fairy tale composed of an incoherent, weird/horny unholy union of J.R.R. Tolkien, Jim Henson, Peter Greenaway, Ken Russell, and a handful of psilocybin mushrooms. Legend looks like something pieced together by Jack Horner on a camcorder, so it’s hard to fault Cruise for looking clunky and uncomfortable. Who knows what a good performance in that role would look like?  Run report: A lot of odd almost skipping around in this, which adds to the “high school play” quality of the film. Cruise has a proper run toward the end, but it’s not fully baked yet.  23. The Mummy (2017) Director: Alex KurtzmanWhere to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple Rewatching 2017’s The Mummy actually made me slightly disappointed we didn’t get the Dark Universe Universal Pictures briefly promised us. The setup had potential: Cruise as Indiana Jones, with Jake Johnson as Short Round and Courtney B. Vance as the archetypal no-bullshit sergeant? Potential. But Alex Kurtzman’s take on Karl Freund’s 1932 Boris Karloff Mummy needed less plot and more screwing around. This is an instance where Spielbergian pacing actually ruins a blockbuster, because it entirely lacks Spielberg Sauce. It becomes a horror movie after the first act, with Cruise as a largely personality-free, mentally unsound Black Swan/Smile protagonist. Then they spend all this time with Russell Crowe as Dr. Jekyll, introducing this universe of monsters that never gets off the ground. No fun! Run report: Notable because co-star Annabelle Wallis did a ton of press speaking to how much thought Cruise puts into his on-screen running. She specifically said he initially didn’t want to run on screen with Wallis, because he doesn’t like to share his on-screen run time. He relented, to little effect.  22. Mission: Impossible II (2000) Director: John WooWhere to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus Folks, I rewatched this recently. I really wanted to love it because some close and valued colleagues sing its praises, and I love a good, hot contrarian take. Respectfully, I don’t know what the hell they’re on. The camera work in Mission: Impossible II is so berserk, it borders on amateurish. The series hadn’t figured out what it was yet, but not in an interesting exploratory way: This installment is more like trying on a pair of pants that are not your vibe. The idea that Ethan Hunt lost his team in Mission: Impossible and now he’s a broken lone wolf (plus Ving Rhames’ Luther and Thandiwe Newton’s Nyah), an agent with the weight of the world on his shoulders, is not a bad premise. But in the role that ruined his career, Dougray Scott is a wooden, toothless bad guy. And somehow, the stakes feel impossibly low, even with a world-killing bioweapon on the line. Mission: Impossible II does, however, get points for being far and away the horniest movie in the franchise. Run report: Unsurprisingly, Woo is great at filming running, and there’s a lot of clay to work with here: Cruise’s long hair flopping in the wind, slow motion, a rare mid-run mask-rip, the inevitable dove-release: It’s all good! A definitive ranking of love interests and partners in the Mission: Impossible movies 6. Claire Phelps (Emmanuelle Béart) in Mission: Impossible5. Julia Meade (Michelle Monaghan) in Mission: Impossible III and Fallout4. Grace (Hayley Atwell) in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning and The Final Reckoning3. Nyah Nordoff-Hall (Thandiwe Newton) in Mission: Impossible II2. Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, Fallout, and Dead Reckoning1. Jane Carter (Paula Patton) in in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol 21. American Made (2017) Director: Doug Liman Where to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple It’s a funny idea: What if Top Gun’s Maverick was a schmuck pilot turned drug-runner? It’s clearly Cruise reaching for a Blow of his own, but decades into this type of narrative, we know the beats by heart. American Made is sorely lacking in depravity. Cruise’s affected good ol’ boy Southern accent both has nothing to do with the film’s disposability, and explains everything. It’s a sanitized drug narrative in which we never see Cruise blow a line or fire a gun. We don’t even see his death on screen — Cruise dying in a movie is a big deal, and has only happened a few times. It’s almost like he knew this nothingburger wasn’t worth the distinction. Run report: Not much running, which is indicative of a larger problem with this film. But at one point, Cruise runs after a car with Caleb Landry Jones in it, and it explodes, in arguably the highlight of the film, for whatever that’s worth.  20. The Last Samurai (2003) Director: Edward ZwickWhere to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple The one’s a weird movie about a mercenary who, after participating in the genocide of Native Americans, goes native in 19th-century Japan, in the wake of the Meiji Restoration. But it’s a somewhat unusual approach to the standard Cruise narrative arc. In this, he begins as a broken, drunken husk, a mercenary arm of the growing American empire who belatedly regains his honor by joining up with some samurai. The aspects of that plotline which feel unusual for a Cruise movie don’t make up for all the story elements that have aged terribly, but they’re something.  Run report: Less running than you’d expect, but running with swords while wearing leather samurai armor. 19. Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016)  Director: Edward ZwickWhere to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple A lot of the films in the lower ranks of this list suffer from the problem of filmmakers settling, simply putting Cruise on screen and letting his iconography do the heavy lifting, sans interesting backstory or dialogue. In this sequel, thanks to Lee Child’s blunt dialogue, the deep-state rogue-army plotting in the source material, and Cruise’s typical level of meticulous fight choreo, it’s simply really entertaining, solid, replacement-level action. This sequel to 2012’s Jack Reacher gives the title troubleshooter (played by Cruise) a surrogate daughter and a foil in Cobie Smulders, which is great. But its primary sin is replacing Werner Herzog, the villain from the first movie, with a generic snooze of a bad guy. Run report: Some running and sliding on rooftops with guns, as fireworks go off in the night sky. Impressive for some action movies, a bit ho-hum compared to the bigger hits on this list.  18. Taps (1981) Director: Harold Becker Where to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple Fascinating film. A Toy Soldiers riff interrogating the military-school system, and suggesting that it’s probably not a bad thing that former American ideals like patriotic honor, duty, and masculinity are fading. It’s Cruise’s first major role (with George C.Scott, Sean Penn, and baby Giancarlo Esposito!), and you’ll never believe this, but he plays a tightly wound, thrill-addicted, bloodthirsty maniac. Run report: Great characterization via run here. Cadet Captain David Shawn is a hawkish conservative dick, and Cruise’s running reflects that. He’s stiff, carrying an automatic rifle that he looks like he’s going to start firing wildly at any minute.  17. Mission: Impossible III (2006)  Director: J.J. Abrams Where to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus In the last Mission: Impossible installment made before the filmmakers really figured out what the series was doing, J.J. Abrams assembles a mostly incoherent, boring clunker that has a few very important grace notes. It’s a film about Ethan Hunt trying to carve out a normal life for himself, with the great Philip Seymour Hoffman playing the bucket of ice water dumped on his domestic fantasy. Hoffman’s Owen Davian is the greatest bad guy in the Cruise filmography, and there’s really no close second. (I suppose, if there was a gun to my head, I would point to Werner Herzog in Jack Reacher, or Jay Mohr in Jerry Maguire.) There are many moments I could point to in Hoffman’s wonderful performance, but the one I’d recommend, if you want to feel something, is when Hoffman gets to play Ethan Hunt playing Owen Davian with a mask on for a few scenes during the Vatican kidnapping, roughly 50 minutes in. He was so fucking great.  Run report: A lot of running, but none of it is very good. No knock on Cruise, but Abrams is doing perfunctory work, shot poorly via shaky cam that has trouble keeping Cruise in the frame, from a perfunctory director making a perfunctory action film. There are two notable exceptions. “The Shanghai Run,” which we may have more on later, and Cruise running straight up a wall. A definitive ranking of Mission: Impossible villain performances 10. Dougray Scott in Mission: Impossible II9. Eddie Marsan in Mission: Impossible III8. William Mapother — that’s right, Thomas Cruise Mapother IV’s cousin! — in Mission: Impossible II7. Lea Seydoux in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol6. Sean Harris in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and Fallout5. Jean Reno in Mission: Impossible4. Esai Morales/The Entity in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning and The Final Reckoning3. Jon Voight in Mission: Impossible2. Henry Cavill in Mission: Impossible – Fallout1. Phillip Seymour Hoffman in Mission: Impossible III 16. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (2025) Director: Christopher McQuarrieWhere to watch: In theaters The franchise potentially falls with a thud — or is it an AI-generated death fantasy that plays out entirely in Ethan Hunt’s head when he gets trapped in a digital coffin early in the movie? Either way, the resulting film is something the McQuarrie-Cruise collaboration has never been before: clunky and imprecise, a disjointed watch that delivers some high highs, but is unfortunately thin on story. McQuarrie seems unconcerned with character arcs, or any substantive grand narrative that might land in any meaningful way. This movie plays out like an aimless succession of beats, allowing boredom to creep in. That hasn’t been a part of the franchise since M:I 3. It’s a Simpsons clip show masquerading as a Mission: Impossible film, signaling that this iteration of the franchise is exhausted, with little left to say or explore. Perhaps there was no other way for this series to go out than on its back.  Run report: A run through the tunnels to save Luther, oddly reminiscent of the run attempting to save Ilsa Faust, followed by the run out of the tunnels, allowing Ethan to escape the film’s first trap (or does he?) A definitive ranking of Ethan Hunt’s “best friends/allies” (non-love interest/boss division) 17. Wes Bentley16. Greg Tarzan Davis15. Aaron Paul14. Jonathan Rhys Meyers13. Maggie Q12. Shea Whigham11. Hannah Waddington 10. Katy O’Brian9. Pom Klementieff8. Rolf Saxon7. Vanessa Kirby6. Keri Russell5. Simon Pegg4. Jeremy Renner3. Emilio Estevez2. Bogdan (Miraj Grbić)1. Luther (Ving Rhames) 15. War of the Worlds (2005) Director: Steven Spielberg Where to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus A curious movie I liked better on a rewatch than I did on my initial watch 20 years ago. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is often misremembered as Spielberg’s darkest movie, but I’d argue that War of the Worlds beats it: It’s a divorced-dad-anxiety horror movie that has the most nightmare-inducing, traumatic, post-9/11 visuals in the master’s oeuvre. It can be read as Spielberg wrestling with his relationship with his son Max, who would’ve been around the age of Cruise’s disgruntled, estranged son in the movie. War of the Worlds has issues: Cruise never works when he’s cast in a “just some guy” role, as he’s meant to be here, and the plot goes off the rails in the third act. But it has some of the best set pieces Spielberg ever directed. What will haunt me for the rest of my life is a scene where Cruise’s character is forced to essentially make a Sophie’s Choice between his son and daughter (a great Dakota Fanning), and lets his son go. The ominous music at the end when he’s magically reunited with his son is completely bizarre and unsettling, and I don’t think is meant to be taken at face value.  Run report: This is why Cruise is the king. He’s playing a supposed normal, everyday schmoe in this movie. When you focus on the running, compared to other roles, you can see he’s running like a mechanic who is still a little athletic, but doesn’t know where he’s going, or what is happening from one moment to the next. It’s building character through running. Incredible. 14. Knight and Day (2010) Director: James Mangold  Where to watch: Free on Cinemax; rent on Amazon, Apple Knight and Day is a sneakily important film in the Cruise action canon because it’s the first time a movie really puts Cruise into the role of the creepy, charismatic, psychotically intense, beleaguered, put-upon invincible cartoon character he became in the Mission: Impossible franchise as of Ghost Protocol. This movie is based around a funny idea: It’s basically a Mission: Impossible movie from the perspective of a clueless civilian. It helps that the civilian is phenomenal, physical, funny, and fucking ripped: Cameron Diaz plays the world’s hottest mechanic, and makes me wish she had gotten her own Atomic Blonde-style vehicle. Run report: Some co-running with Cameron Diaz here, which is as you might imagine, is good.  13. The Firm (1993) Director. Sydney PollackWhere to watch: Free on Paramount Plus It’s easy to put The Firm on a pedestal because of Sydney Pollack, the jazz score, the ’90s outfits, Gene Hackman, and every other significant gravitas-oozing “That Guy” as a mobster, shady lawyer, or Fed in a great “They don’t make them like that anymore” legal thriller. But what really stood out to me on a recent rewatch is this movie is two and a half hours about the now laughably quaint notion of rediscovering purity in the law. It isn’t much more than a story about a shady law firm that gets hit with mail-fraud charges, plus several deaths and a few smartly tied up loose ends. Run report: A clinic in Tom Cruise running, a draft-version highlight reel of his running scenes. In my memory, this contains some of his most iconic early runs, and it signals the moment when “Tom Cruise running” became a whole cultural thing.  12. Top Gun (1986) Director: Tony Scott Where to watch: Free on Paramount Plus Top Gun set the template for Tom Cruise’s on-screen narrative, and it took a decade before filmmakers were willing to start subverting that narrative again. This is straight-up hero porn, without any of the humbling that the sequel eventually dishes out. Tom Cruise as Maverick is the best pilot on Earth. He loses his best friend and co-pilot Goose, due to a combination of a mechanical failure and another pilot’s fuck-up. He then has to find the courage to fly with the exact same lack of inhibition he did at the outset of the film, which he finally does, based on essentially nothing that happens in the plot. Scott makes the wise decision to center the action (or non-action) of the film on pure Cruise charisma and star power, and it works. Run report: Believe it or not, Tom Cruise does not run in this movie.  11. Days of Thunder (1990) Director: Tony Scott Where to watch: Free on Paramount Plus Scott and Cruise’s Top Gun follow-up is essentially Top Gun with cars instead of jets — but yes, it’s marginally better. Why? Because this is a quintessential “We didn’t know how good we had it” classic. It’s the film where Cruise met his future spouse Nicole Kidman on set. Robert Duvall is swigging moonshine. It’s Randy Quaid’s last performance actually based on planet Earth. Plus there’s John C. Reilly, Michael Rooker, Cary Elwes, Fred Thompson, Margo Martindale, and a rousing Hans Zimmer score. Need I say more? Run report: They cut the climatic race off, but Cruise’s character Cole potentially gets smoked by 59-year-old Robert Duvall?! 10. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning (2023) Director: Christopher McQuarrieWhere to watch: Free on Paramount Plus The metaphor that the Mission: Impossible franchise is a manifestation of Tom Cruise’s deep-seated need to save blockbuster filmmaking and the Hollywood star system has never been more overt. Cruise is literally up against AI, which is always a step ahead of him, dismantling his every gambit. It’s an update/remix of Ghost Protocol’s premise: The only antidote to the world-spanning AI known as The Entity is becoming a refusenik anti-tech Luddite in the spirit of John Henry, and using the raw materials of humanity to defeat an invincible machine.  Run report: Cruise running in confined spaces is a lot of fun, but the heavily CGI’d running up the side of a train losing its battle with gravity isn’t.  A definitive ranking of Mission: Impossible MacGuffins 8. Ghost Protocol’s Russian launch codes7. Fallout’s plutonium cores 6. Rogue Nation’s $2.4 billion Syndicate bankroll5. M:I2’s Chimera Virus4. Final Reckoning’s Sevastopol3. M:I’s NOC list 2. Dead Reckoning Part One’s cruciform key1. M:I3’s rabbit’s foot 9. Jack Reacher (2012)  Director: Christopher McQuarrie Where to watch: Free on Paramount Plus I loathe hyperbole: it’s a shortcut for unimaginative writers. I’ve never resorted to it in my entire life. So I hope you’ll take me at my word when I say that this movie is a fucking masterpiece. Amazon’s great Reacher series is made more in the image of Lee Child’s books, with a distinctive breakout lead in Alan Ritchson, who appears to have been designed in a lab to draw striking contrast to Tom Cruise in this role. But Reacher made us forget how good Jack Reacher gets. It’s a perfect elevated action programmer with a remarkable cast: David Oyelowo! Richard Jenkins! Rosamund Pike! A Days of Thunder reunion with Robert Duvall! Werner Herzog showing up in a completely brilliant, bonkers heel turn! McQuarrie made this one in vintage Shane Black ’90s style, with a dash of Don Siegel and Clint Eastwood. I totally get why Cruise decided to turn his career over to McQuarrie after this. I don’t understand why he didn’t let McQuarrie direct the sequel. Run report: There isn’t much running in this. At one point, Cruise is darting from shelter point to shelter point because a sniper is trying to pick him off, but that’s it. It’s because Jack fucking Reacher doesn’t have to run, which is simply good writing and filmmaking.  8. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)  Director: Christopher McQuarrieWhere to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus This film famously opens with Tom Cruise hanging from the side of a plane as it takes off. But to me, the key moment comes when he’s broken into the plane, attached himself to a package which isn’t named, but looks like a crate of rockets the size of a minivan. He gives a final raised eyebrow and shrug to a gobsmacked henchman, who watches helplessly as Cruise deploys a parachute and falls out the back of the plane’s cargo bay with a ton of atomic weapons, and no plausible way to land without killing himself and creating a Grand Canyon-sized nuclear crater in Belarus. This scene was practically drawn by Chuck Jones, which sets the tone for a film that repositions Ethan Hunt on the border of superherodom, in a film about Tom Cruise as the literal manifestation of destiny.  It also marks the return of Alec Baldwin, the first (but not last) M:I handler who carried over from one film to the next. Evaluating the handlers’ position in the franchise (see below) is challenging: They’re constantly shifting allegiances, at times working in service of Hunt’s mission, at times in direct opposition to it, either attacking him with governmental red tape, or colluding with nefarious forces. Run report: A lot of different looks when it comes to the running in this. Shirtless running, running with Rebecca Ferguson, running across the wing of a moving plane. It’s all good. A definitive ranking of the “most fun” M:I handlers 6. Theodore Brassel (Laurence Fishburne) in Mission: Impossible III5. Erika Sloane (Angela Bassett) in Mission: Impossible – Fallout and The Final Reckoning4. Eugene Kittridge (Henry Czerny) in Mission: Impossible3. John Musgrave (Billy Crudup) in Mission: Impossible III2. Commander Swanbeck (Anthony Hopkins) in Mission: Impossible II1. Alan Hunley (Alec Baldwin*) in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and Fallout * One of my only lingering complaints about the M:I movies is that aside from Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg, we don’t get enough big family continuity. The Fast & Furious franchise is an exemplar/cautionary tale of how found-family dynamics can be a great source of fun and emotion — and also tank the series, if creators keep piling on new recurring elements. It sounds like Baldwin didn’t want to stay on board, but I would love to live in a world where he didn’t jump ship — or where, say, Henry Cavill’s August Walker joined Ethan’s team at the end of Mission: Impossible – Fallout, as he would have if he’d had a similar role in an F&F installment. 7. Minority Report (2002) Director: Steven SpielbergWhere to watch: Free on Paramount Plus I’m guessing this placement on this ranking will upset some people. I’m surprised it’s this low in the rankings too — but that’s how good the next six films are. And honestly, Minority Report doesn’t hold up as the masterpiece I remember it being. It’s a very cool story. It marks the first fantasy-team matchup of Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg. They’re adapting a paranoid Philip K. Dick story, and largely delivering on the promise that implies. Minority Report is an inventive, dark, weird future horror movie, made with Spielberg’s standard stunning visual economy. But among the perfect elements in this film, I have to call out some aspects that didn’t age well. Janusz Kaminski’s lighting effects feel like the whole movie is stuck inside an iPod halo. and this dutch-angled high melodrama, sauced with a dash of Terry Gilliam dystopian/gross wackiness, which lends the film a degree of occasionally atonal, squishy gonzo elasticity you’ve likely forgotten.   Run report: Mileage may vary on white pools of light, but running through them in futuristic uniforms is decisively cool.  6. Mission: Impossible (1996) Director: Brian De PalmaWhere to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus Because MI:2 and MI:3 struggle with tone (and long, listless patches), and because it’s actually Brad Bird that sets the template for the McQuarrie era of the franchise, you could argue the first Mission: Impossible is the strangest, most personal vision of what this series is and what it can be. DePalma is asserting himself with every practical mask and stylized shot. Your mileage may vary with that approach to what has become this Swiss set piece machine, I love it. A few things stand out nearly three decades on: Of course, how ridiculously young Cruise looks, but perhaps crucially, how collegial, intimate, and even tender the first act is before his first team is eliminated and the movie becomes a DePalma paranoid thriller. It’s an element we never quite get from Mission: Impossible again, one that brings the arc of the franchise into focus and explains Ethan Hunt if you extend continuity: He’s a character betrayed by his father figure and his government in the first film, and spends the rest of the franchise running from this largely unspoken trauma, determined to never let that happen again. In the wake of this, he reluctantly pieces together a life, semblance of a family, and all the risks that come with those personal attachments. In honor of my favorite set piece in any of the films, one of DePalma’s finest taught masterpieces: A definitive ranking of the top 10 M:I set pieces  Honorable Mention: The Sebastopol Extraction- (Tie) The Train Fights– MI:1 & Dead Reckoning 10. The Plane Door- Rogue Nation9. The “Kick In The Head” Russian Jail Break- Ghost Protocol8. The Water Vault Ledger Heist Into The Motorcycle Chase- Rogue Nation7. The Handcuffed Car Chase- Dead Reckoning6. The Red Baron Plane Fight- Final Reckoning5. The Burj Khalifa- Ghost Protocol4. Kidnapping At The Vatican- MI:33. The Opera House Hit- Rogue Nation2. The Louvre Halo Jump Into the Bathroom Fight- Fallout1. The NOC List Heist- MI:1 Run report: Fitting that this franchise opens with Cruise putting on a running clinic, as that first op falls apart, then of course his run away from Kittridge and the massive fish tank explosion.  5. Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol  Director: Brad Bird (2011) Where to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus Nothing is working like it’s supposed to. Not the Impossible Mission Force, not the mask machine, not the radio comms, not the magnet gloves keeping Ethan Hunt tethered to the side of the world’s tallest building, not the Mission: Impossible franchise, and not Tom Cruise’s at-the-time fading movie stardom. But somehow, one incredible film made by a career animation director solves all of these problems, by stripping down, getting back to basics and reminding us what we always loved about these films and its star. It was supposed to be the beginning of a franchise reboot, with Jeremy Renner stepping in. Bird (and McQuarrie, in for a pass at the troubled screenplay and on deck to become Cruise’s Guy For Life) fights this decision off, gets away from trying to figure out the character Ethan Hunt and lets him be a superhero, more annoyed than concerned by the escalating difficulty of the impossible problems he has to solve. Through this, Bird correctly identifies the difference between Cruise and these other Hollywood candy asses: He’s a reckless warrior with a death wish who will do whatever is necessary to win, and he does. The team concept is back in full force with a genuinely showstopping stunt, and without the masks and tech, Cruise has to do it all with his wits, his hands, and his pure bravado. The series, and Cruise, never looked back.  Run report: Some of the most fun, imaginative set pieces built around running in this installment. A definitive ranking of who should replace Tom Cruise in the inevitable M:I reboot 10. Aaron Taylor Johnson9. Charlie Cox8. Sterling K. Brown7. Florence Pugh6. John David Washington5. Haley Atwell4. Miles Teller3. Jeremy Renner2. Aaron Pierre 1. Glen Powell 4. Top Gun: Maverick  Director: Joseph Kosinski (2022) Where to watch: Free on Paramount Plus It’s a death dream, it’s red meat nationalist troopaganda, it’s the greatest legacyquel ever made that no one asked for and you didn’t realize you desperately needed, it’s nostalgia porn, it saved the movie going experience post-COVID, it’s a finely calibrated joy machine. Cruise is downright mystical, shimmering in the sun’s reflection off the surf, dominating an endless football game with no rules that doesn’t make sense. He has actual chemistry with Jennifer Connelly, and he has the grace to cede the floor to his old nemesis — both in the first Top Gun and as a once contemporary Hollywood star/rival — the late Val Kilmer, to drive home the crush of time and destroy everyone in the theater, no matter how many times they went to see this monster hit that first summer back in theaters.  Run report: Immediately coming off of the stunning, emotional high point of the film, we get Cruise running in salt water soaked jeans shirtless on the beach. Are you not entertained? 3. Collateral  Director: Michael Mann (2004) Where to watch: Free on Paramount Plus An elemental, visceral faceoff that is radical in its simplicity of purpose. A film made by the second-best director on this list, and on a very short list of Cruise’s finest performances ever. He’s the salt and pepper terminator in a taxi, playing a pure evil bad guy, a classic Mann anti-hero samurai nihilist that also lives by a code and values being good at his job. Of course Cruise retains a kind of charm, but is also willing to get slimy and be deeply unlikeable and die on screen. Well worth the sacrifice.  Run report: Incredible running on display here. Once again he is running like a professional killer probably runs, almost always holding a gun, the hair matches the suit, so fucking bad ass.  2. Mission: Impossible – Fallout  Director: Christopher McQuarrie (2018) Where to watch: Free on Hulu, Paramount Plus As much time and energy as I just expended exalting Ghost Protocol, at a certain point you have to eschew poetic narratives and tip your cap, by the slightest of margins, to a fucking perfect movie. Ghost Prot is close, but you can feel its lack of a nailed-down shooting script at certain points towards its conclusion, as the action begins to wind down. McQuarrie becomes the first director in the franchise to get a second bite of the apple, and the result is a finely cut diamond. Fallout is about exhaustion and the impossibility of that manifestation of destiny idea from Rogue Nation. It makes the argument that you can’t actually save the day and save everyone without making any sacrifices forever, and because of that, sets up The Trolly Problem over and over again to try and get Ethan Hunt to compromise and/or give up. But, of course, he won’t, and neither, seemingly, will Cruise.  Run report: You can tell McQuarrie loves watching Cruise run as much as we do. He frames the runs in these wide shots and takes his time with them. It’s not conveying any additional information, a beat or two less would suffice, but the camera lingers and you get to just sit and appreciate the form and it really connects. It’s why he was the logical choice to take control of this franchise. He understands how a Tom Cruise action flick operates and what makes it special. And of course: A definitive ranking of the best runs in the franchise 10. The Opening Plane Run- Rogue Nation9. The Sandstorm Run- Ghost Protocol8. The Mask Rip Run- MI:27. Running through the alleys of Italy- Dead Reckoning6. Running Through the Tunnels for Luther (then out)- Final Reckoning5. Running down the Burj Khalifa- Ghost Protocol 4. Running from the fishtank explosion- MI:13. The Rooftop Run- Fallout2. The Shanghai Run- MI:31. The Kremlin Run- Ghost Protocol 1. Edge of Tomorrow  Director: Doug Liman (2014) Where to watch: Rent on Amazon, Apple Edge of Tomorrow is the best Tom Cruise action film had to be made in his late period of action stardom. You need the gravity and the gravitas, the emotional baggage earned through those decades of culture-remaking roles, the toll that exerted effort took on him, and the time spent and time passed on his face. The late, largely perfect Mission: Impossible films that dominate the top 10 of this list do much of that work: They feint, they allude, they nod to the realities of stardom, of life and death. But Ethan Hunt is a superhero, an inevitability, so the outcome is never in doubt — until, perhaps someday, it is. But for now, the masterpiece from Doug Liman — a director who either hits dingers or strikes out looking, with no in between — is a movie that punctuated Cruise’s post-Ghost Prot action renaissance: Edge of Tomorrow, or Live. Die. Repeat. It’s the unlikely on-paper melding of Starship Troopers and Groundhog Day, but in practice it’s the action film equivalent of Jerry Maguire, a movie that relies on your history with Maverick, and Mitch McDeere, and Ethan Hunt, and uses it to dismantle and subvert Tom Cruise, the infallible hero.  Liman is at the top of his game, particularly in editing, which uses repetition and quick cuts masterfully to convey the long and slow transformation of a public relations major named Cage — who becomes trapped in a disastrous, endless intergalactic Normandy scenario — from a marketing clown in a uniform to an alien killer badass while he falls in love and saves the world. We watch as Cruise has all his bravado and bullshit stripped away by “a system” (maybe the single best Paxton performance?!) with no time for that, a woman smarter and stronger than he is and immune to his charms, and an invading force that tears him to pieces over and over again. We watch the five-tool movie star — robbed of all his tools — regroup, rebuild, and in the process, grow a soul. It’s the platonic ideal of what a great blockbuster action film can be, one that only could’ve been made by one of its most important, prolific, and talented stars.  Run report: A beautiful physical metaphor for this film is watching the evolution of Cruise’s ability to move in that ridiculous mech suit. 

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With support for AirPlay 2, you can mirror your content from your iPhone seamlessly. Plus, its affordable price makes premium 4K streaming achievable for anyone. In 2021, our lead analyst, Will Greenwald, gave it an “Excellent” rating in his Roku Express 4K+ review. By bringing this streaming device to your home, you’re investing in a smooth, no-fuss entertainment experience for under $30.Keyboard DealsThe Logitech MX Keys S keyboard delivers a refined typing experience that makes daily work feel effortless. Its elegant design fits smoothly into your workspace with responsive backlighting and excellent battery life. With Smart Actions, you can automate tasks that save you time and reduce repetitive steps. The built-in USB-C charging is convenient and reliable. “If you're looking for an Apple Magic Keyboard alternative or are in the market for a new productivity daily driver, the MX Keys S is a great low-profile keyboard,” our expert Zackery Cuevas raved. He went on to give this one a “Good” rating in our 2023 review. Overall, this low-profile keyboard elevates your routine with practical features that make each keystroke both satisfying and efficient for just under $90. Fitness Tracker DealsThe Fitbit Inspire 2 is a great place to start if you're just getting into fitness tracking, especially at $43. It's super light, doesn’t scream “tech gadget,” and tracks your steps, sleep, and heart rate with barely any input from you. With 10-day battery life, you can forget to charge it for a week and still be covered. “It's a good, wallet-friendly option if you're just starting out on your fitness journey,” said Angela Moscaritolo in her “Good” rated 2021 Inspire 2 review. Plus, the free month of Fitbit Premium for new users is a legit bonus if you want guided workouts or mindfulness content.Recommended by Our EditorsMicrophone DealsThe HyperX QuadCast S is a must-have if you're into any kind of audio content creation. Our expert Will Greenwald calls it, "A gaming-focused USB microphone designed for streamers, Let's Players, podcasters, and anyone who might be putting themselves out on YouTube or Twitch." It has crisp, clear sound quality and supports multiple recording patterns, making it versatile for different setups. The built-in pop filter and adjustable gain control are super handy, and it even comes with customizable RGB lighting to match your style. With an "Excellent" rating in our 2020 HyperX QuadCast S review and an Editors' Choice award, it's one of the best USB mics out there, now at a 25% discount.Smartphone DealsFor only $40, the Galaxy A15 5G punches way above its weight. You get smooth everyday performance, a vibrant AMOLED screen, and bonus points for that microSD slot and headphone jack. Those features are rare even in pricier phones. Battery life is legit too; we streamed for hours and still had juice left. You will definitely find the cameras worth it, especially the main shooter. “The Galaxy A15 5G is one of the best Android phones you can get,” says PCMag's expert Iyaz Akhtar, who rated it “Excellent” in his Galaxy A15 review while giving it the Editors’ Choice award. If you're on a tight budget, this is the one to beat right now.Processor DealsThe AMD Ryzen 7 7700x is a fast and powerful processor with excellent eight-core performance that excels in single-threaded tasks and performs well in multi-threaded ones, making it ideal for demanding applications. It also includes integrated graphics, providing a solid option for light gaming or general display needs. "It's a very solid chip," said our expert, Michael Sexton, in 2022, rating it “Excellent” in his Ryzen 7 7700x review. The performance is competitive with its peers, and its lower power consumption is an advantage for efficiency. Overall, it’s a great choice if you desire strong performance without investing heavily in higher-end models, especially at this sale price.Security Camera DealsSetting up the Google Nest Cam (Battery) is a breeze. You can mount it pretty much anywhere without messing with wires. The magnetic base makes it super easy to adjust the angle or pop it off for charging. You’ll get crisp, colorful 1080p video and surprisingly sharp night vision, which is great for checking on your porch or driveway after dark. It even sends alerts for people, animals, or vehicles. As our expert John R. Delaney puts it in our 2021 Nest Cam review, “If you’re in the market for a security camera that installs in minutes and offers a good selection of features—particularly if you already use other Nest Devices and/or Google Assistant—put the Nest Cam on your short list." It earned an “Excellent,” as does today's near $50 discount.Robot Vacuum DealsThe iRobot Roomba Combo j7+ is a versatile robot vacuum and mop that effectively cleans various surfaces without wetting carpets, thanks to its retractable mop. It excels at both vacuuming and mopping, with features like AI-powered obstacle avoidance and a pet waste-avoidance guarantee. Ideal for homes with mixed flooring, it offers convenient app controls, auto-emptying, and voice command integration. In our Roomba Combo j7+ review, our expert Angela Moscaritolo said in 2023, "If you have a mix of hard flooring and carpets at home, the Roomba Combo j7+ is worth it." With the $236 discount, it's a steal!Monitor DealsThe 43-inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G7 monitor feels like you dropped a living-room TV on your desk, only for shooters instead of sitcoms. As Zackery Cuevas notes, “Indeed, for the most part, it’s an impressive screen with vibrant mini LED backlighting.” The picture smacks you with mini-LED punch, deep contrast, and a 144 Hz refresh that keeps Valorant razor-smooth while AMD FreeSync stomps tearing. Input lag is practically invisible at around 4 ms. Cloud-leaning Gaming Hub is a cool bonus for quick Xbox Pass sessions. Therefore, it earned a “Good” rating in our 2023 Odyssey Neo G7 review. But a $225 discount qualifies this as a great deal!Game Console DealsAs our lead analyst, Will Greenwald, said in 2023, “The refined PS5 remains a top-tier console.” This PlayStation 5 Disc Console Slim fits right into your living room, especially if you're short on space. It has a big 1TB drive to store more of your favorite titles, with the popular Astro Bot game already included. Whether you’re diving into the latest blockbusters or streaming classic shows, you'll find everything runs smoothly. The streamlined design makes it a conversation piece, too. It’s also simpler to place horizontally than before. That’s why it got an “Excellent” rating in our PS5 Slim review, and it’s even an Editors’ Choice winner, so you know you’re getting a standout system that handles your entertainment needs without any hassle, now for $110 less.Photo Printer DealsIf you’re itching to take photos from your phone and stick them on the fridge, the Instax Link Wide makes it ridiculously easy, especially with this $50 price cut. Pair over Bluetooth, drop a shot into the app, add a collage frame or goofy sticker, and in half a minute, a wide-format print pops out. The printed colors punch hard, and the gloss finish screams retro cool. As our lead analyst Jim Fisher says, “If you're tired of just looking at photos on your phone's screen, or just yearn for the days of Polaroid snapshots, this instant film printer might be the right remedy.” Consumables aren’t cheap, but for scrapbooks, party favors, or instant desk décor, this printer is straight-up joy, earning an Excellent rating in our 2021 Instax Link Wide review.We’re finding Memorial Day Deals everywhere, from retailers like Amazon to top brands like Apple, HP, and Dell.. And don’t forget to check out all of the Memorial Day Deals Under $100 and Under $50. But, if you’re looking for something more specific, we’ve rounded up the following holiday deals for you:

I’ll be honest, there have been times when I’ve tried (and failed miserably) to prop my iPhone up using my standard bifold wallet just so I could quickly set a timer and click a group photo. Needless to say, the traditional wallet isn’t designed for moonlighting as your phone’s tripod – but strangely enough, SUPCASE’s MagFlip wallet does just that. The MagFlip is, first and foremost, a MagSafe-ready card holder for your iPhone. But when you desperately need to prop your phone up for a video call, or watch a podcast, or even film yourself, the MagFlip opens up into a tripod of sorts, letting you consume (or create) content hands-free. It works at multiple angles, in landscape and portrait mode, and can even be used as a handheld selfie stick for better composition while filming content. Oh, and it also holds up to 5 cards, while also RFID-blocking them from digital theft. Designer: Jet Click Here to Buy Now: $27.99 $39.99 (32% off, use coupon code “YANKO552”). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours! The MagFlip’s design isn’t subtle. It looks as rugged as it feels, with an all-metal body that sports industrial detail, exposed screws, a shock-absorbing bumper, and built-in magnets that provide up to 3000g of attraction force so the wallet never accidentally slips off your phone like Apple’s own MagSafe wallet. In fact, the strong magnetic grip makes the MagFlip perfect for cases too, ensuring that it stays secure on the back of your device at all times. The design balances being a cardholder with being a stand rather seamlessly. As far as cards are concerned, they’re accessed using a metal flap on the top that opens to reveal the 5 cards inside. The flap click-locks so that it doesn’t ever open accidentally. You can choose to keep a combination of payment cards, access cards, and business cards (depending on what you tend to use or need the most). Along with the wallet, SUPCASE also provides a dedicated RFID-blocking card that prevents anyone from scanning/skimming your payment card details without your approval. Obviously, the real estate on the back of your iPhone is pretty important, and just having a wallet on the back of it feels like a ‘wasted opportunity’, which is why the MagFlip also doubles as a stand. The wallet itself flips outwards, on a fairly secure friction hinge that can hold your phone at any angle you want. It’s sort of like the hinge seen on laptop screens, but this one’s capable enough to hold your smartphone despite being ridiculously tiny. This ability makes it easy to use your phone hands-free, whether it’s watching something, attending a call/meeting, or even filming yourself. The magnets also allow you to rotate your phone, so the stand works in landscape as well as portrait mode… and if that wasn’t enough, remember the metal flap that secures your cards? You can open the flap a cool 45° and use it as an extra leg, turning your kickstand into an elevated tripod of sorts. While the MagFlip sits perpetually on the back of your phone, making it easy to track, there are a handful of people who prefer detaching their wallet at times to casually carry it in the pocket. For that niche group of folks, SUPCASE even has a separate variant of the MagFlip with a built-in AirTag holder, so you can track as well as ping your wallet when it isn’t on your phone! SUPCASE MagVault However, if the MagFlip isn’t your ‘flavor’, SUPCASE’s MagVault offers a simpler construction without the angle-adjusting stand. It does, however, have space for 6 cards, and comes with the same metal flap that holds the cards in place. The flap opens 45° too, becoming a rudimentary stand for your iPhone, without any of the selfie-stick and angle-adjusting features. Think of the MagVault as the iPhone and the MagFlip as the iPhone Pro! Both wallets are in the $30-something price range, making them more affordable than Apple’s own MagSafe accessories, and definitely more so than a separate wallet/card holder and a tripod. SUPCASE is also offering an additional 13-15% discount on the wallets, so grab them now before they sell out! Click Here to Buy Now: $27.99 $39.99 (32% off, use coupon code “YANKO552”). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!The post This MagSafe Wallet Also Acts As A Tripod For Docking And Content Creation first appeared on Yanko Design.