E3 2019: Final Fantasy VIII Remastered Comes to Xbox One This Year
At long last, we’re excited to celebrate with fans of Final Fantasy VIII! For the first time in its 20-year history, the beloved adventure of Squall Leonhart comes to Xbox One with a visual overhaul as Final Fantasy VIII Remastered.
A widely embraced franchise favorite, Final Fantasy VIII has always stood out for its realistic art style and authentic storytelling – fans have been clamoring for this title to receive the same remastered love and attention as its peers. We heard you!
The uniqueness of Final Fantasy VIII’s design, characters, and gameplay mechanics differentiate the game from its predecessors. For the first time in the franchise’s history, characters are modelled to be realistic and true-to-life, moving away from the established high fantasy feel in favor of a grounded, modern story.
Final Fantasy VIII also introduced Guardian Forces, providing a new level of customization to battle strategy. Like our fans, we believe this title’s uniqueness is not to be overlooked, a testament to the series tradition of innovating with each new title. We wanted to give more players a chance to discover Final Fantasy VIII with a newly refreshed look!
For new fans, the story of Final Fantasy VIII casts unlikely heroes in a war to save the world. The setting: military nation Galbadia has declared war on the Dukedom of Dollet, left with no choice but to hire a mercenary force for their defense. Enter SeeD and its newest member: Squall Leonhart. Together with his friends, Squall joins Rinoa Heartilly, a member of the resistance, on a journey that holds the fate of their world in its balance.
In Final Fantasy VIII Remastered, we aimed to revitalize these beloved characters without compromising the feel of the original game. We hope players and fans alike will enjoy seeing them come to life like never before!
Hands On: Creature In The Well Is The Most Beautiful Game We Played At E3
You read that title right. Creature In The Well is indeed the most beautiful game we played at E3.
Yes, we’re aware of the shiny, toy-box wonderland that is the Link’s Awakening remake. We all know Cyberpunk 2077 is next level. Mosaic, the upcoming, multi-platform indie game that transforms pure banality into hypnotizing symmetry still ain’t as pretty. Even Luigi’s Mansion 3, the cartoonish ghost game that is ironically alive with detail, isn’t as downright fun to gawk at as Creature In The Well.
Led by two developers from Flight School Studio, Creature In The Well is an isometric adventure game that somewhat defies genre. Sure, it’s an action-adventure title at heart, but is it actually a little bit of a Metroidvania? There are multiple paths with secrets to be had, after all. Is it a dungeon-crawler? The dev told us that, in fact, there are eight dungeons to explore. But how do you ignore the fact that everyone who plays this game immediately remarks that it’s a pinball title? Yet you combine that pinballing with all the ducking and dodging you’ll be doing and what you’re left with is a bullet-hell, “shmup” sort of experience.
Whatever. Here’s what we do know: this game is super freaking cool.
In Creature In The Well, you play as “the last remaining BOT-C unit” that’s spelunking into an ancient, unpowered facility. You’re swinging – literally – to restore power to this left-for-dead place, all the while a massive, shadowy creature the size of half your television screen sneaks ominous peaks at you. It will also occasionally reach down and grab at you or the ground you walk on. Watch out, by the way.
There’s a story in there somewhere. What we could play at E3 instead focused on the gameplay. Let’s elaborate on the graphics to start because they’re worth talking about; we asked Adam Volker, the title’s art director, who or what his inspiration was. It turns out to be heavily inspired by Mike Mignola, iconic illustrator of the Hellboy comics, and that comparison makes sense. Every part of this game is drawn with thick, black lines and alternating colour palettes stacked around or on top of each other, producing this sort of flat-but-deep, comic book effect. Take a look at the screenshots if you don’t get it. It’s going to look gorgeous on the Switch’s handheld mode, but do yourself a favour and play this game at least once on the nicest, largest TV screen you’ve got.
What exactly do you do in this game, though? Well, you’ve got a sword, and it sucks up projectiles from enemies and turns them into little orbs of white – or – you walk into a room and find the white orbs where you can get them and shoot them towards objects in the room that need triggering. The gameplay lies in the interplay between the energy your weapon charges and your ability to bounce it back and forth towards enemies, bumpers, or stuff needing hit in the correct order. With every successful enemy and bumper flattened, you gain (electrical?) energy, which allows you to open doors. Hold down “R” until at every doorway and a bar fills up. Collect enough energy to open it, and on you go.
It sounds a little bit confusing. It plays a little bit confusing, at first. “Why not just let me hack-and-slash pinballs everywhere without all this charging stuff?”, we thought, to which the developers keenly explained that in that scenario, the levels would play themselves with you sitting in the corner.
But once you sharpen your skills a little bit, you begin to morph into a running-and-gunning conductor, your symphony the pinball mayhem you reign down on the world. Every room is just a little bit different than the last, and the camera often shifts enough to give new perspectives on similar layouts. The sound effects are also neat, growling, clanking, and reverbing along with the buzz of your sword. The game is still a touch unpolished yet, but the overall experience is very fresh and satisfying. Did we mention it’s fun to look at?
No word on how long (or short) this game is. Again, by the numbers: there are eight dungeons with 20 weapons and various secret paths. In the demo, dying just meant you tried again from where you stood, but we were told the final version will force you to use your in-game currency to maintain your hard-earned progression, which is probably where the pinball analogy is most apt; you’ll probably spend the most time just trying to survive, then starting over and over again.
Creature In The Well comes out on Nintendo Switch, PC, and XBox One this summer. Keep an eye on Nintendo Life for our final review.
Apple chief Tim Cook on Tuesday was once again named to job website Glassdoor’s list of the top 100 CEOs in America, marking his seventh consecutive appearance on the annual employee rankings chart.
Cook achieved an average 92% approval rating to take the No. 69 spot on Glassdoor’s Employees’ Choice Awards, up significantly from last year’s 96th place finish. He was ranked 17th in Canada with a 94% approval in that country.
Cook’s best result came in 2016 when the executive reached the No. 8 spot with a 96% approval rating.
As noted by CNET, Cook is among a total of 27 tech sector executives to make the top 100 CEOs list for the U.S. in 2019.
VMware’s Pat Gelsinger took first position with an impressive 99% approval, while T-Mobile’s John Legere, Adobe’s Shantanu Narayen and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella landed in the No. 4, No. 5 and No. 6 spots, respectively. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, the only other tech executive aside from Cook to make the list since its inception, fell from No. 16 in 2018 to No. 55 this year.
Glassdoor forms its list by calculating results from anonymous employee reviews collected over the past year, according to a press release. More specifically, employees are asked whether they approve, disapprove or have no opinion about their CEO’s performance.
The Employees’ Choice Awards ranks 100 top CEOs in the U.S., 50 in the UK, 25 in Canada and 10 each for France and Germany.
Under Cook, Apple has become one of the world’s most valuable companies, though much of its success is derived from a single product: iPhone. The executive is an outspoken proponent of human rights, often leveraging his station to forward not only business-related initiatives like consumer privacy, but also wedge issues like LGBT equality.
The nCine Engine is a C++ powered, open source MIT licensed 2D game engine that has been under development for over 7 years. It is a lower level code based framework, although it does support Lua scripting out of the box. The engine also integrates the ImGui framework making creating tools and UIs a breeze. The nCine engine works on Windows, Linux, Mac and Android.
With so many game engines on the market, you may be wondering… why another one? Well the author explains exactly that right here. The cCine project is hosted on GitHub and provides a Pong demo to get you started, implemented in both C++ and Lua.
Earn Exclusive Skins And Gear In Mortal Kombat 11’s Brand New Seasonal Mode
Originally announced within the game’s news section, the Mortal Kombat 11 Kombat League is at last upon us. The first season has been (unsurprisingly) branded “The Season of Blood“.
Starting from 18th June and running for the next four weeks, all players will be able to climb from Apprentice to Elder God rank. Levelling up will depend on how well you fare against online opponents and moving up ranks will reward participating “kombatants” with exclusive event armour and equipment. So, if you like to stand out among your friends, this might be a better way to achieve your desired look, rather than spend hours on end in the Krypt.
Coincidently, if you have purchased the complete Season Pass, 18th June is also the date Shang Tsung will become available for early access. There’s also the option to buy Shang Tsung as standalone DLC next week on 25th June. Update: Early access to Shang Tsung does not include the Switch version.
Will you be participating in the Kombat League? Will you uphold the values of Earthrealm against the tyranny of lag and packet loss? Let us know down in the comments.
Win More My Nintendo Gold Points In The 4th Tetris 99 Maximus Cup
If you’re still playing the addictive battle royale game Tetris 99 months after its release and have been training up in preparation for the next big event, you’ll be pleased to hear Nintendo has now revealed the 4th Maximus Cup will be taking place later this week on 21st June. Below is the official announcement for North America:
This one is likely to be slightly more difficult than certain other previous events – with only 999 players (with the most points) eligible for the reward of 999 My Nintendo Gold Points. Even if you don’t win during this period, you can still earn points.
Will you be participating in this upcoming event? Are you still enjoying Tetris 99? Tell us in the comments.
Posted by: xSicKxBot - 06-19-2019, 12:25 AM - Forum: Windows
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Driving lessons for autonomous vehicles
Paul Shieh, Founder and CEO of Linker Networks, says his company is now working with global auto manufacturers that are trying to create AI systems that can drive vehicles with flawless image recognition functionality. To attain that, the systems use machine learning to recognize millions of digital images of other objects, including other vehicles, roads, signs, pedestrians, and a myriad of other features and objects.
To do that, images of all these things must first be identified and labeled.
Shieh explains, “At present, many companies are finding it difficult to hire thousands of workers that want to manually do this image work. It is labor-intensive and time-consuming. Moreover, each worker must maintain unrelenting focus on the task, leaving open the possibility of natural human error. A single mistake is all it takes to affect a dataset’s quality and drag down the overall performance, and therefore the safety level, of a model.”
Manual tagging is labor-intensive and time-consuming. For example, labeling a single car takes a worker up to 30 seconds to complete.
As an example, Shieh says labeling a single car takes a worker up to 30 seconds to complete – placing the duration needed for a thousand workers to process larger quantities of images, say 100 million, at more than a year.
But imagine being able to label all that data in a single click. That is the promise of auto-labeling – Linker Networks’ latest AI venture.
Inventing the fast track
Using a pre-trained model to label digital images, the system recognizes objects using transfer learning technology – a method that lets machines apply existing knowledge to various similar scenarios. For example, systems trained to recognize cars can apply the same algorithm to recognize other vehicles, like buses or trucks.
“If you input an image with about a hundred cars in it and hit the auto-label button, most of them will be auto-labeled in just a few seconds with very high accuracy,” Shieh says. “That saves a lot of time and improves image recognition quality.”
Employees like Cindy Chao, who used to do manual labeling have been upskilled to do quality control of the auto labeling algorithms, also known as machine teaching.
Accuracy rates have also increased. At the same time, manual inspections and corrections are still carried out, to ensure close to 100 percent data accuracy.
The process allows millions of images to be labeled in less than a day, which is a 70 percent reduction in time compared to manual labeling. The company is also seeing cost savings of more than 60 percent.
Shieh shares, “Linker’s auto-labeling model uses Microsoft Azure Machine service to reduce costs, boost productivity and improve accuracy by enabling customers to handpick images to auto-label and store.”
Ultimately with AI, Linker Networks’ goal is for auto manufacturers to build smarter, safer vehicles.
Employees that used to do manual labelling have been upskilled to do quality control of the auto labelling algorithms, also known as machine teaching. The AI model seeks to gain knowledge from people rather than extracting knowledge from data alone. With people guiding the AI systems to learn the things that they already know, the job requires critical thinking and fewer repetitive and monotonous tasks.
“Linker’s data scientists are able to focus on developing the AI and let Azure take care of scaling their AI training jobs,” Shieh explained.
Other possibilities
Ultimately with AI, the company’s goal is for auto manufacturers to build smarter, safer vehicles. With auto labelling technology, Linker Networks envisions safe self-driving capability in the near future.
Besides autonomous driving, auto-labelling can be used in factories to detect product defects, identify theft at retail stores and profile vehicles to strengthen security. Shieh said, “the auto-labeling system allows us to take advantage of all the benefits of AI, empowering humans to do what they do best, while improving efficiency and safety.”
Join your lil? Mech buddy to plan a flawless strategy, then marvel at just how wrong you were. Not to worry, play some power actions to get your team back on track, or dare to trust in your instincts and crafty skills, and pull off a stunning win.
Get Borderlands: The Handsome Collection (PC) For Only $3 This Week
The hype is building around Borderlands 3 as its September 13 release date draws closer, but if you haven't had a chance to play any other games in the franchise or would be interested in owning them on PC, here's a great opportunity: Digital PC key retailer Green Man Gaming is currently offering Borderlands: The Handsome Collection for only $3. That's a full 95% off the bundle, which still sells for anywhere between $15 and $60 elsewhere. (Rather play on PS4? The Handsome Collection is also free on PS4 for PS Plus members in June.)
After purchasing, you'll receive a Steam key, so you must have a Steam account to redeem. Borderlands: The Handsome Collection also has full controller support on Steam, if you prefer to use a controller over a mouse.
Borderlands: The Handsome Collection includes remastered versions of Borderlands 2 and Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, with the latter taking place between the events of Borderlands and Borderlands 2. The compilation includes all DLC for the games, including additional campaigns and playable characters. With online or local split-screen multiplayer for up to four players, Borderlands: The Handsome Collection is an excellent multiplayer game for anyone's collection, although you can play it solo as well.
In GameSpot's Borderlands 2 review, the game received an 8.5. "Borderlands 2 doesn't reach far beyond its predecessor's scope, but it does do almost everything better," wrote critic Chris Watters. "Additions, refinements, and fixes all combine to create an appreciably improved experience, one that fully delivers on the promise of the first game. While Borderlands felt empty at times, this sequel is bursting with content and brimming with life, making it an absolutely delightful way to spend hours and hours and hours of your free time."
Meanwhile, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel earned a 7 in its review. "Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is different enough to separate itself from the shadows of its older siblings. Elpis provides some gorgeous scenery, and the low-gravity environments bring an exciting new dynamic exploration and combat," critic Cameron Woolsey wrote. "No, it never reaches the furthest edges of space, but Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel still offers some the best of what the series has to offer: good loot, good laughs, and good times for many hours."
Video: Witness Annihilation In The New Daemon X Machina Story Trailer
Despite everything we already know about the ravaged world of Daemon x Machina – even after the latest E3 Treehouse Live presentation which showed us an extensive look at the mechanized destruction ballet – the producers remain tight-lipped about the player’s role in the single-player campaign.
Sadly, Nintendo’s new story trailer that you can now watch above has left us with even more questions than answers. At the very least, it has certainly got us interested. We guess we’ll just have to wait and find out more on 13th September, when the game is released.
Are you still on the fence about this mecha epic or are you locked in and ready for battle after last week’s Treehouse presentation? Share your thoughts below.
