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First Impressions of Battlegrounds Mobile India: PUBG Mobile Similarities and Differences (Early Access)

Leave a Comment / Gaming, News, Tech News / By Team YTS

Battlegrounds Mobile India Early Access launched on Thursday, with the Battlegrounds Mobile India game available in beta through Google Play. We were able to obtain it and play a full match. It’s clear that Battlegrounds Mobile India is essentially PUBG Mobile with a few minor tweaks, which we’ll go over shortly. We don’t know how long the open beta will last or when it will be released, as it was made available just ahead of the previously scheduled June 18 release date. Here is the initial thoughts on the Battlegrounds Mobile India Early Access build.

If you’re a fan of PUBG Mobile, you’ll feel right at home when you launch Battlegrounds Mobile India on your Android device. You are greeted with the same home screen and background music as in PUBG Mobile after logging in or creating an account with your previous PUBG Mobile credentials. The best part is that you can import your in-game data from PUBG Mobile. We will soon publish the how-to. Interestingly, there were prompts asking if the player was over the age of 18 and if they were in India, and unfortunately, it appears that you can do this as simply as ‘yes’ without needing any verification.

We immediately entered Erangel with the Traverse – Insectoid theme from Season 19 and heard the safe gaming narration stating that this is a simulation, that it does not represent real life, and that we should not spend long hours playing. This appears to happen every time you start a match of Battlegrounds Mobile India. Unsurprisingly, the match was filled with bots, with not a single real player to be found. It was like reliving the early days of PUBG Mobile.

The Erangel map in Battlegrounds Mobile India is the same as the one in PUBG Mobile, and you can pick up familiar weapons and equipment with the same customizable controls. The game, which is only available in India, has the advantage of being a quick and smooth experience with no lags, frame drops, or ping issues. However, the experience may differ slightly when actual players on the same server are present.

Battlegrounds Mobile India retains the same maps, weapons, game mechanics, and overall appeal as PUBG Mobile, but is repackaged for Indian users. It does, however, make a few minor changes. The game’s blood is now green rather than red. At the top left, where the number of players who are “Alive” and the number of players you “killed” is displayed, “Alive” and “Finished” are now displayed. Another precaution in the name of safety? Battlegrounds Mobile India does not allow you to select a server because the option has been disabled. It is unknown whether or not this option will be available in the future.

As previously stated, Krafton opened beta testing for Battlegrounds Mobile India for a limited number of users on Thursday, and we were able to gain access to the game.

Battlegrounds Mobile India required 6.06GB of storage on the device we tested it on (OnePlus 7 Pro) and is currently at version 1.4.0. It needs permission to access the phone’s storage, and no other permissions were requested. If you use in-game chat, you will be asked to grant microphone access. Krafton has not yet announced a release date for the game, and it is unclear how long it will be in open beta.

Team YTS

Xbox June Update Brings Party Chat Features And XCloud Gaming Forward; along with many other features.

Leave a Comment / Gaming, News, Tech News / By Team YTS

Microsoft announced the new features included in the latest Xbox update in a blog post on the Xbox website. The Xbox June update is now available, and it improves Party Chat by introducing speech-to-text and text-to-speech features. Along with these enhancements, the update changes the Xbox app, which now displays official posts from games, allows you to reorder groups in the Guide, and makes it easier to review and approve family member requests to play with users on different platforms. In the future, Xbox One users will be able to play next-generation games via Xbox Cloud Gaming.

Xbox Party Chat

Gaming should be welcoming, approachable, and accessible to all. This includes making it simple for gamers to play and communicate with one another. Party chat, which is used by gamers all over the world to communicate with their friends while playing, now supports speech-to-text and text-to-speech conversion. Each of these features can be used to assist gamers who are deaf or hard of hearing and/or who are unable or unwilling to speak.

Speech-to-Text Transcription: By enabling speech-to-text transcription, gamers can have all words spoken by members of a party converted into text that appears in an adjustable overlay on top of gameplay.
Text-to-Speech Synthesis: By enabling text-to-speech synthesis, gamers can type into party text chat and have it read aloud to the rest of the party by a synthetic voice (with a choice of several voices per language).

Speech-to-text and text-to-speech functionality can both be enabled in Settings > Ease of Access > Game and chat transcription. When you’re at a party, you can also get to this screen by going to Options > Configure Ease of Access settings.

The Xbox Mobile App

The Xbox app for Android and iOS keeps you in touch with the rest of your gaming community. Gamers can use the app to easily share game clips and screenshots, chat with friends, track their achievements, and even play games from their console via remote play. Throughout this month, you will begin to see official posts from your favorite games. You can view the posts from the app’s homepage and like, share, or comment on them.

Reorder Groups in the Guide

Groups allow you to make lists in the guide for easy access to your favorite games and apps. There is now a new “Move groups” button built right into the guide’s “My games & apps” screen, allowing you to rearrange the order of your groups. To use it, open the guide, then select My games & apps, then Move groups to rearrange your groups.

Family’s Cross-Network Play Requests

The Xbox family settings allow you to control how people interact with your family’s gaming. We will continue to innovate family settings on Xbox in order to be as unique as families are today and to meet their needs. To that end, we’ve made it easier for you to review and approve your children’s requests to play with people on other game platforms and Windows PCs on your console. Children who use Xbox child accounts as part of a family group can now request permission from their parent or caregiver to play games like Minecraft with others who use other gaming services. Parents can approve or decline their children’s requests by using the Xbox Family Settings app for Android or iOS, or by using the console itself.

Xbox Cloud Gaming

In a separate post detailing the E3 exclusive game lineup, Microsoft revealed that in the future, Xbox One users will be able to play next-gen console games like Microsoft Flight Simulator, Redfall, Starfield, and others via Xbox Cloud Gaming (formerly called xCloud). These games are currently available only on the Xbox Series X/Series S and PC.

This is fantastic news for owners of previous-generation Xbox consoles because, while some upcoming games will not officially launch with Xbox One support, they will still be able to play them via cloud gaming. It makes sense because older generation consoles lack the power to run the new upcoming games as intended, but with Xbox Cloud Gaming, they won’t need the extra graphics and processing power, just a stable internet connection. Microsoft has stated that more information will be released soon.

Team YTS

Alienware launches x15 R1 and x17 R1 gaming laptops with exceptional cooling technology.

Leave a Comment / Gaming, News, Tech News / By Annasha

Alienware has launched the brand new x15 and x17 of the x-series gaming laptops that are going to mark a new level of exceptional capability, design, quality, and performance. The company has always challenged itself to come up with something better and far more impressive every time with a new launch. With these new gaming laptops of the x-series, Alienware is presenting its thinnest 15” and 17” gaming laptops. The company has collaborated with Intel to help successfully design the thinnest form factor for such gaming laptops.

The newly launched laptops feature patent-pending cooling technologies, high-level performance components, and other designs so that one can play any latest games with minimal discrepancy. Alienware wanted to design something that will redefine the experience of mobile gaming and do more than just a thin laptop. With this massive breakthrough with x15 and x17, x15 became the world’s most powerful sub-16mm 15” gaming laptop.

Alienware Cryo-Tech Cooling Technology

Fast heating of a gaming laptop is an issue faced by every gamer and that’s why advancements in thermal technologies are requested. Alienware’s main focus was to expand these thermal limitations and in doing so they invented new engineering methods to resolve the issue. The Alienware Cryo-Tech cooling technology has been redefined by introducing Element 31[1]. It is an exclusive thermal interface material placed between the CPU and its elements. This will help in dispersing heat and prevent the spike in temperatures from affecting the performance of the laptop.

The x-series laptop offers HyperEfficient Voltage Regulation to extend high performance during long hours of gaming and more heat dissipation. Alienware has also designed an exclusive Quad Fan that blows air to the system, chassis, and internal hotspots to constantly cool the system. These new laptops are also featuring Smart Fan control technology which uses AI to enhance the application-based performance of each fan independently. With this newly cooling technology, gamers can enjoy a high-level gaming experience keeping their system cool and quiet.

Sleek Design

The new x-series laptops are designed very intricately keeping in mind every single detail adding up to its classic appearance. These laptops are featuring Alienware Legend 2.0 design identity which comes with a Dark Core that first appeared in Alienware m15 R5/R6 gaming laptops. The main purpose of this improved design is to enable high performance with the thin form factor.

These laptops have a continuous series of bold stadium lighting, illuminating the rear hexagon venting system (Alienware Arena). The laptops are designed in a way that mainly focuses on maximizing thermal benefits which explain the venting system both on the top and base of these x-series laptops. The thinness of x15 is 15.9mm while that of x17 is 20.9mm.

High Performance

Both the x15 and x17 gaming laptops are powered by 11th Gen Intel Core H-series mobile processors and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 Series Laptop GPUs. The graphics power supported by x15 and x17 is 110W and 165W respectively. The laptops have Thermal Control Circuit Offset which will allow the user to set a temperature for the CPU and the system will assure that the CPU temperature remains within the range. There are five options for power states that the users can choose from, namely, Full speed, performance mode, balanced mode, battery saver, and quiet mode.

The keyboards are also redefined as x17 features the CHERRY MIX keyboard which has a 3.5mm ultra-low-profile design with German stainless steel mechanical components for a better experience. The laptops also have Windows Hello IR camera ensuring quick and safe login and DirectX Raytracing providing FHD 360 Hz speed to 4K-UHD HDR400. The gamers can also personalize the lighting zone from Alienware Command Center. The packaging material of the laptops is coming from recycled products as a part of Dell’s 2030 Moonshot Goals.

For both the models, limited config models are already available and for full config models, gamers have to wait till 15th June. The starting price of the laptops are 1,999.99 (x15) and $2,099.99 (x17). Along with these, the Alienware m15 R6 and Dell G15 systems are also made available at $1,299.99 and $949.99 respectively.

Annasha

Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more

Qualcomm revealed Snapdragon 778 5G Mobile Platform during the Annual 5G Summit.

Leave a Comment / Gaming, News, Product, Tech News / By Annasha

The new 5G Mobile Platform, that is, the Qualcomm powered Snapdragon 778 is designed by the company with cutting-edge technology and better implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Qualcomm has announced the new platform for the next generation of high-tier mobile phones from Honor, Motorola, Oppo, Xiaomi, Realme, and IQOO. The new Snapdragon 778 5G claims to enhance the gaming experience and also video and imaging with better AI.

The demand for OEMs for more platforms is increasing at a global rate, especially for high-tier smartphones. Qualcomm designed the new 5G mobile platform to address this problem as it brings many latest premium technologies and a wide range of features for a better experience in the future. The demand for quality tech has accelerated especially during the pandemic so the companies are trying to design better products that will be highly efficient in terms of performance and provide a top-notch entertainment experience as well. So, let’s have a look at all the new features and tech of the Snapdragon 778 5G Mobile Platform.

Snapdragon 778 5G Features

The new Snapdragon 778 5G Mobile Platform is featuring a Triple ISP which will allow the user to capture three photos or videos simultaneously. The options included in this shooting type are wide-angle, ultra-wide, and zoom along with the option of shooting from three different lenses all at once. So, when the user is capturing or recording the same subject from three different aspects, the camera system automatically merges these shots to finally produce a professional photography-like result. The videos can be also captured in 4K HDR10+ which is hard to differentiate if recorded in a mobile phone or a DSLR camera. The Snapdragon 778G also has Staggered HDR image sensors which allows one to capture computational HDR videos with improved detailing.

6th Generation Qualcomm AI Engine

With every new platform released in the market, there is always improved technology behind it and one of the main reasons is more efficient AI-based applications. The Snapdragon 778G is featuring the latest 6th generation Qualcomm AI Engine with the Qualcomm Hexagon 770 processor. This assures high-performance delivery of up to 12 TOPs and twice the performance. The performance per watt has also increased as compared to its predecessor.

The capability of AI has been heightened as it will use AI-based noise suppression, AI-based camera, etc for a video call, zoom meeting, and even a voice call. The Snapdragon 778G also has the 2nd generation Qualcomm Sensing Hub which integrated a low power consuming AI processor for contextual awareness use cases. Honor has collaborated with Qualcomm as the brand new HONOR 50 series will be powered by Snapdragon 778G and this will set new industry standards for Honor.

Enhanced Gaming Experience

The new gaming features are one of the main attractions of the Snapdragon 778G. The platform is delivering select Qualcomm Snapdragon Elite Gaming features along with Variable Rate Shading (VRS) and Qualcomm Game Quick Touch. These are the features that have been unlocked in the 7-series. Users are looking for better gaming experience be it smartphones, laptops, or gaming consoles. The VRS feature which is enabled by the Qualcomm Adreno 642L GPU allows the user (developer) to specify and group the pixels being shaded with different game scenes. This helps in reducing the workload of GPU which leads to power saving by a huge amount while maintaining the highest visual fidelity. Along with this, the Qualcomm Game Quick Touch allows 20% faster input response which is also an advantage for a gamer.

Connectivity and Performance

Snapdragon 778G comes with the integrated Snapdragon X53 5G Modem-RF System which will deliver mmWave and sub-6 5G capabilities to more users around the globe. This new mobile platform is featuring Qualcomm FastConnect 6700 Connectivity and also supports multi-gigabit class Wi-Fi 6 speeds (up to 2.9 Gbps) with 4k QAM and access to 160MHz channels in both the 5GHz and 6GHz bands. It will support Bluetooth 5.2, lightning-fast Wi-Fi 6/6E, and 5G. The Qualcomm Kryo 670 is designed to generate up to 40% uplift in overall CPU performance and the Adreno 642L GPU will deliver up to 40% faster graphics rendering compared to the previous generations.

Annasha

Fortnite Developers Epic Games Drags Apple into Court; Calls Apple a Monopoly “Walled Garden”

Leave a Comment / apple, Gaming, News, Tech News / By Yashica Vashishtha

Apple and Epic Games attended the US court for the trial over App Store practices and regulations on Monday. Epic Games is the developer company of the famous Fortnite game, which accused Apple mainly for its high fees on App Store and Apple trying to establish its monopoly in the industry. The two companies clashed at the California federal court, and the revelations in the court have made people’s jaw drop.

Epic Games

Epic Games is a North Carolina-based video game and software developer and publisher company, best known for the development of Fornite and Unreal Engine. The company was founded by Tim Sweeney in 1991, who is also the current CEO of the company. Apart from Fortnite and Unreal Engine, Epic Games Store, Unreal series, and Gears of War series are Epic’s main products.

Why the Court Case?

Epic Games create games for both iOS and Android platforms. But recently, the company accused Apple of abuse of the power it holds over the software developers at the California federal court. According to Epic Games, Apple has an audience base of over 1 billion, and it charges up to 30% on in-app purchases and conducting App Store reviews, which is too much. Also, the company has got all the control over the apps on App Store, which gives Apple the power to deny access to apps whenever it wants.

The Epic lawyer, Katherine Forrest, stated in her first statement that Apple is trying to have its monopoly in the market and has turned into a monopoly “walled garden”, luring in developers and users to get more and more money out of them. Forrest also claimed that the tech giant currently is earning a profit of up to 78 percent from the apps. “The evidence will show unambiguously that Apple is a monopoly,” said Forrest while representing the case in the court.

Karen Dunn is defending Apple in the case, and she refused to accept that Apple is trying to have a monopoly. Despite she claimed that Apple has no problems if Epic Games run its games on rival companies’ devices. Apple is just trying to sell a broad array of services and making ways in different fields. She also said that Apple has created a safe and open environment for the developers and the users for easy access to apps, and it not at all charging a high fee for providing privacy, reliability, and quality to the developers and its consumers.

Fortnite Brought in Over $9 Billion in 2019, Shows Documents

The court case has made the two companies public their important financial records of the past few years. These documents have given a glimpse of the gaming company Epic Games’ annual reports. According to these financial documents, Fortnite made more than $5 billion in its first year for Epic Games, and by 2019, it had brought in over $9 billion in total for the company in the two years. Though the number is quite high, Epic Games revealed that it only gained around $5.5 billion in profit from the two years.

These documents also showed a prediction for the year 2020. It revealed that the predicted revenue for 2020 was $3.6 billion, but according to CEO Tim Sweeney’s recent testimony, the company made around $5.1 billion from Fortnite alone. The documents also show that the company gained around $8 million in 2018 and $100 million in the next year through its other games.

Is Apple Being Monopolistic?

For many years, Apple has been charging developers a heavy fee for letting users download their app from the App Store. The company has banned downloading of apps from other sources to be used on Apple devices. So the developers are forced to pay the ‘fee’ so that they can access the huge Apple user base.

According to Tim Sweeney, Apple forces its unfavorable rules on the developers or they can’t have the access to the one billion iPhone users. Many other app developers are on Epic Games’ side and have criticized Apple for its monopolistic behavior. The debate in the court is on whether Apple should have the power to set all the rules and control the payment system or not.

Yashica Vashishtha

Yashica is a Software Engineer turned Content Writer, who loves to write on social causes and expertise in writing technical stuff. She loves to watch movies and explore new places. She believes that you need to live once before you die. So experimenting with her life and career choices, she is trying to live her life to the fullest.

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Activision Blizzard – The Journey From Bankruptcy to World’s Largest Gaming Company.

Leave a Comment / Founder, Gaming, Story, Tech Story / By Yashica Vashishtha

Activision Blizzard is a famous gaming publisher based in Santa Monica, California, US. Though the company is only 13 years old, it has its roots related to the leading French media conglomerate, Vivendi SE, and 40 years old video game publisher, Activision, Inc. The two companies are big names in their industry, and Activision Blizzard is the result of an $18.8 billion merger held between the two in 2008. In the merger, Vivendi merged its game publishing unit with Activision and held a 52% majority stake in the new company. But by 2015, Activision acquired Activision Blizzard completely.

A Brief Introduction

Though the journey of Activision Blizzard has been quite small, it has been able to break many records in the field of the gaming industry. The company is now counted among the largest game companies in the world. In fact, it was the largest company in America and Europe based on its annual revenue in 2018. As of 2020, the recorded company revenue for Activision Blizzard was around US$8.09 billion, and 9,500 employees are working for it.

Activision, Blizzard Entertainment, King, Major League Gaming, Activision Blizzard Studios, and Activision Blizzard Consumer Products Group are some of its subsidiaries.

The Founding of Activision Blizzard

Despite Activision was a famous gaming publisher, as time went by, massively multiplayer online (MMO) gaming was taking all the limelight around 2005-06 and had become really popular in a very small time. Activision was struggling to reach out to a larger audience as it was still selling single-player games. To deal with this situation, Activision went on to talk to the French media conglomerate Vivendi, which owned a small gaming division itself. The two gaming subsidiaries of Vivendi were Sierra Entertainment and Blizzard Entertainment, and Bobby Kotick, the owner of Activision, offered to invest in the latter to have access to Blizzard’s successful MMO, World of Warcraft.

On top of the offer, the CEO of Vivendi, Jean-Bernard Lévy, proposed to merge Vivendi Games with Activision on the condition of Vivendi keeping the majority stakes in the resultant company. Despite Kotick was concerned about his position in the new company, he knew that the merger would open new doors for it in the gaming industry. After proposing the same to the board of Activision, finally, on 9 July 2008, Vivendi and Activision together built Activision Blizzard. It was a US$18.9 billion deal, and Kotick was named the President as well as the CEO of the newly formed Activision Blizzard. Lévy holds the position of the Chairman of the company after replacing René Penisson. Even after the merger, the headquarters of the company remains in Monica, California, US.

Only after two years of its founding, the company became the largest video game publisher in the world. The company did not publish the titles under its name but used the name of its studios to release those titles. Call of Duty was the first and the most famous title published by Activision Blizzard. Almost all of its parts broke its own biggest launch records. The first part of the game was launched in 2009, and it grossed $310 million in a day.

In 2011, Activision Blizzard started its Skylanders franchise, the creators of Spyro’s Adventure. Activision paid a sum of $5.83 billion to the partner Vivendi and acquired 80% of the latter’s share in the company, bringing Vivendi to 11.8% of the ownership of Activision Blizzard. In 2016, Vivendi sold the rest of its shares to Activision, exiting from the partnership. This way, Activision took the company under its control completely.

The next famous title from Activision Blizzard was Destiny, released in September 2014. It broke the launch day sales record by bringing in over $500 million in retail sales on the first day of its launch. In November 2015, the company acquired the social gaming company King, the developer of the famous Candy Crush Saga. The company listed in Fortune 500 in June 2017.

Titles Published by Activision Blizzard

Call of Duty series, Crash Bandicoot series, Guitar Hero series, Skylanders series, Spyro the Dragon series, Tony Hawk’s series, Diablo series, Hearthstone Heroes of the Storm, Overwatch StarCraft series, Warcraft series, and Candy Crush Saga, are some of the most in-demand titles by Activision Blizzard.

The CEO: Robert A. Kotick

Robert A. Kotick is currently serving as the President and the CEO of the company. He was born in 1963 and is a native of the US. Kotick is a famous businessman, and it was from his childhood when he started to show the qualities of a businessman. He was in high school when he ran a business renting out Manhattan clubs on off nights.

In the early 80s, he joined the University of Michigan, where he studied Art History. He was still in college when he started a software development company called Arktronics. He became part of Activision when he and his partner Brian Kelly bought a 25% stake in Mediagenic (which later became Activision) in December 1990. The company was at the stage of bankruptcy at that time. Kotick is responsible for the restructuring of Mediagenic into Activision, and later, into Activision Blizzard.