Dutch Apple store evacuates after likely iPad battery incident

 

By Roger Fingas
Sunday, August 19, 2018, 01:54 pm PT (04:54 pm ET)

Apple’s Amsterdam store was briefly evacuated on Sunday afternoon following what appears to the overheating of an iPad battery.

Image Credit: AT5

After trouble began store staff immediately put the tablet in a bin with sand, which seemed to halt the situation, Dutch blog iCulture noted. By around 2:20 p.m. local time, the city’s fire department was on the scene. Though there was no obvious smoke, three people reported respiratory issues.

The incident moved quickly enough that by 3 p.m., workers and shoppers were allowed to come back in.

While normally safe, lithium-ion batteries are still volatile — they can potentially explode or catch fire if something like leakage isn’t dealt with immediately. This year alone Apple stores have seen multiple battery incidents/a>, including some fires.

This may be related to Apple’s discounted replacements, instituted to placate people upset about the company throttling iPhones with weakened batteries. While the company has since made it possible to toggle throttling, people with older iPhones have been flooding Apple stores looking to get battery replacements before they return to $79 from their current $29. More foot traffic may mean a higher likelihood of discovering faults.

Rome: Total War arises on iPhone next week

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears! Feral Interactive have just announced that the release date for the iPhone port of Rome: Total War.

The iOS specialist developer originally brought us Rome: Total War on iPad in November 2016, and then preceded to port both the Barbarian Invasion and Alexander expansions as separate apps in 2017. We first heard about the iPhone version of Rome: Total War back in October last year, but the iPhone version will finally be releasing ten months later on August 23rd, 2018. That’s next week!

This is not a separate app – Rome: Total War is now essentially going ‘universal’ on iOS, so you’ll be able to play the same saves on both devices, and if you already own the game you’ll be able to install the iPhone version for free. Here’s a new trailer showcasing the iPhone UI to get you excited:

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Remember, you will need an  iPhone 5S or later, iOS 11, and 4GB of free space to install the game on your iPhone. We reported on the full list of requirements and compatible devices at the start of the month.

Rome: Total War is currently available on iPad for $9.99/£9.99/€10.99.

Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice VR Edition



The VR Edition of the critically acclaimed BAFTA award-winning Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. From the makers of Heavenly Sword, Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, and DmC: Devil May Cry, comes a warrior?s brutal journey into myth and madness.

Publisher: Ninja Theory

Release Date: Jul 31, 2018

The Survival Fish Trap is a craftable, deployable item used to catch fish. It is part of the new, experimental fishing system in Rust. 




Usage

The fish trap can only be deployed on shores, in relatively shallow, knee-deep waters.

Once deployed, you can access the contents of the trap and load it with bait by placing Food inside the trap's inventory. Many food items can be used to catch fish such as; Apples, Mushrooms, Pumpkins, Raw & Cooked Meats, and Corn. Seeds do not work for catching fish. Minnows can no longer be used to catch more fish. The fillets from a gutted trout can be used as bait.

Periodically, either Small Trout or Minnows will be caught, triggering a splashing animation and sound, and exhausting a portion of the loaded bait. Caught fish will appear in the trap's inventory. On average, you can expect to catch a fish about every 3 minutes, as long as a player is nearby.

Catching fish will reduce the trap's health by 10 Points. The trap has 100 health points in total and can be repaired with a Hammer (This may not work anymore). It is highly recommended to keep fish traps in constant maintenance.

If you are looking for the most calories out of your food, fishing will guarantee that. The lowest yield of a fish trap is 4 minnows per bait totaling 40 calories, which is equal to that of corn or pumpkin. That said when using mushrooms as bait, which only yield 15 calories when eaten, you will always get more calories from the caught fish than eating the mushroom alone. Waiting for the fish can yield great results especially when small trout are caught.


Crafting

The Survival Fish Trap can be crafted with:

•  200 Wood
  

• 5 Cloth
  

Shadow Of The Tomb Raider's Early Hours Feel Familiar: The Highs And Lows

Lara Croft's origins trilogy comes to a close with Shadow of the Tomb Raider where she's now hunting down the villainous organization known as Trinity, instead of piecing together their motives and escaping their grasp. The new game doesn't stray too far from what you've come to expect from this current era of Tomb Raider, though--beginning with the reboot in 2013 and the follow-up, Rise of the Tomb Raider. We spent about four hours with Shadow of the Tomb Raider at a preview event, and while we hoped some minor flaws would be addressed this time around, the best parts of the series' formula still shine through.

You can count on an action-adventure game about seeking ancient relics to bring you on a tour of exotic locations. The lush vegetation of Central and South America provides some wonderful exploration through branching paths and optional side quests, and makes the tried-and-true process of discovery feel refreshing. The dense foliage affords some creative approaches in combat like covering yourself up in mud to blend in or using overgrown vegetation as cover.

The tropical setting isn't solely tourist eye-candy either. One of the game's early hub areas, a Peruvian village called Kuwaq Yaku, showcases the rough nature of a small community holding itself together. We wish the expansive main hub Paititi was playable in the demo, because it's promising to see Shadow of the Tomb Raider create a more vibrant world than past games, with culture and society now a large part storytelling.

Puzzles have been a highlight of Tomb Raider, and the clever solutions that accompany them let you flex your mental prowess. Although the rewards don't seem too gratifying early on in Shadow, the process of unraveling the sequence of steps is the fun part. The fluidity of movement and combat is still intact, too. Slipping into cover at the last second or lining up an arrow for a kill just before getting spotted remains satisfying. However, if either aspect gives you too much trouble, the game allows you to tweak the difficulty of combat, puzzles, and exploration separately. Puzzle and exploration difficulty in particular affect the number of visual cues on screen, while combat difficulty affects enemy health and damage and resource availability.

Unfortunately, enemy behavior still leaves a bit to be desired. They'll often walk into dubious situations that are easy to exploit. One sequence allowed me to pull off a series of stealth kills off the ledge of a boardwalk since each enemy saw suspicious activity in my area. Patrol patterns and enemy placement don't offer much of a challenge, with many guards conveniently having their backs turned to Lara. We expect the action to ramp up, but there just isn't enough to chew on in the early stages.

Moments of close calls have gotten pretty stale in action-adventure games. The cliche of escaping death at the very last second to keep up the intensity would be fine if it was saved for key moments, but when they become too frequent--especially as a narrative device--it gets predictable. Shadow is filled with these close calls, even in the opening hours, and its effectiveness in ratcheting up tension wears thin. Even during normal gameplay, Lara will occasionally slip while scaling walls or jumping to ledges in which a QTE button prompt is your savior. Thankfully, an early ability that costs one skill point negates this altogether.

We had previously seen the early chapter that takes place during Day of the Dead festivities in Conzumel, Mexico, which was part of this hands-on demo session. After Lara swoops in on an ancient artifact that's said to cause a catastrophe, a flood consumes the entire village, leaving several dead and many more in a state of crisis. Although Lara's companion Jonah scolds her for not even considering the situation at hand, the consequences of her actions aren't really felt in that moment. In the context of a campaign where you're essentially racking up a body count, this may not seem like a big deal, but even a hardened Lara might want to reflect on a foreign town's destruction. The loss of lives feels like an afterthought, but we can assume that Lara's focused on the bigger stakes since Trinity escapes with this mysterious artifact. It remains to be seen how she'll internalize these events and if this will come back to haunt her as the story progresses.

If you've been a fan of the franchise's new direction this generation, you'll be happy to know the formula remains strong, though not without some lingering issues. Lara's latest adventure appears to be taking on a darker tone, and hopefully that comes with narrative surprises. You can experience it for yourself when Shadow of the Tomb Raider launches for PC, Xbox One, and PS4 on September 14.

Watchmen Series Officially Ordered By HBO

There have been rumors that HBO was considering picking up a new version of the Watchmen series, adapted for TV, for some time. Now, the company has announced it has officially green lit the show, which is being written and produced by Damon Lindelof, the co-creator of Lost and films like Star Trek Into Darkness and Prometheus. There aren't many details on the series yet, but we know it will debut in 2019.

"Set in an alternate history where 'superheroes' are treated as outlaws, Watchmen embraces the nostalgia of the original groundbreaking graphic novel while attempting to break new ground of its own," HBO wrote in a blog post, confirming the story will start at the beginning of the comic series, while introducing some new elements at the same time. Earlier this year, Lindelof took to Instagram explaining why the series wouldn't be a sequel or a reboot.

"Those issues are sacred ground and will not be retread nor recreated nor reproduced nor rebooted," he said. "They will however be remixed. We are not making a 'sequel' either. This story will be set in the world its creators painstakingly built… but in the tradition of the work that inspired it, this new story must be original. It has to vibrate with the seismic unpredictability of its own tectonic plates," he continued.

"It must ask new questions and explore the world through a fresh lens. Most importantly, it must be contemporary. The Old Testament was specific to the Eighties of Reagan and Thatcher and Gorbachev. Ours needs to resonate with the frequency of Trump and May and Putin and the horse that he rides around on, shirtless. And speaking of Horsemen, The End of the World is off the table… which means the heroes and villains--as if the two are distinguishable--are playing for different stakes entirely."

Watchmen first made it to the screen in 2009, when Zach Snyder adapted the graphic novel for film. HBO tried unsuccessfully to get a TV series based on the story off the ground in 2014. Lindelof has a history with HBO; his acclaimed drama The Leftovers was also shown on the network, recently ending with its third and final season.

First published by DC in 1986, Watchmen is a much-loved and celebrated 12-part graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons. It's credited with introducing a darker and more mature tone to the traditional superhero comic. In 2005, it was even featured on Time's list of the 100 greatest novels of the 20th century.

Watch Phantom Doctrine’s lead designer talk about abandoning RNG

Video: How to design games with user experience in mind

New Kick Off Mode Reinvigorates Local Multiplayer in FIFA 19

For many gamers, their first FIFA experience was probably a head-to-head matchup with a friend, on the couch, in a dorm room or childhood bedroom. Kick Off mode is traditionally a pure FIFA experience in which two (or four) people pick teams and face off in a straightforward, two-team, 90-minute match. Bragging rights are achieved after every win, until the next match occurs.

But this year, Kick Off mode is getting a makeover. The new Kick Off experience in FIFA 19 opens local multiplayer for everybody, providing a wealth of customizable options for every match, as well as a system for tracking your stats and record against friends on any console.

Aside from the traditional match, now called Classic Kick Off in FIFA 19, there are five new types of matches that can be played: UEFA Champions League, House Rules, Best of Series, Home & Away, and Featured Cup Finals. Most of those are self-explanatory, but players will probably be the most intrigued by the House Rules option.

If you’ve ever played a Kick Off match and wanted the change up the rules a bit, or play without any rules at all, you’ll enjoy the House Rules match type. Right now, there are five different sets of rules that you can select for your match:

• Survival Mode: When someone scores a goal, a random player from the scoring club is taken off the pitch (except the goalkeeper)
• No Rules: No offside calls, fouls, or bookings; pure chaos
• Long Range: Goals scored in the box count as normal, but anything scored from outside the box count as two goals
• First to…: Set up a custom win condition, whether it’s golden goal (first to score), first to three goals, etc. The match will play to the clock as normal, unless the condition is met
• Headers & Volleys: Headers, volleys, free kicks, and penalties are the only ways that you can score goals in this match type. Any other type of goal will be disallowed

In addition to the different types of matches that you can play in FIFA 19 Kick Off, a new stat tracking system has been integrated into the mode on Xbox One. Wins, goals scored, average possession, and shots on target are among the stats being tracked for every match you play in the mode.

This also means that you can track head-to-head stats with friends, using a new Kick Off ID system that you can create and link to your Microsoft account. Log in to your Kick Off ID on your friend’s Xbox One (and vice versa) to track and view all your stats and records.

Thanks to all these little details, Kick Off mode is finding new life in FIFA 19, ready to impress an entirely new generation of gamers. Pre-order FIFA 19 on Xbox One today so you can jump right into this exciting new feature as soon as the game is released worldwide on September 28.

Your Choices In Digimon Survive Can Lead To The Death Of In-Game Friends

Some new details surrounding the upcoming Digimon Survive have been shared, giving us a look at two of the game’s characters and some interesting information on story choices.

The information is still only coming in drip feeds here and there, but we’re slowly starting to form a clear picture of what to expect. The first character detailed is Aoi Shibuya, a gentle and honest upperclassman. She manages the cooking and admirably handles the security of the base. Her partner is Labramon, and she has an articulate personality.

Next up is Minoru Hyuga, a classmate of the main protagonist Takumi. Described as the talkative optimist of the group, he opens up to just about anybody and really hates getting into arguments. His partner is Falcomon. He’s a stable person but occasionally takes wild actions.

We’ve already seen some screenshots of the decision-making story elements taking place, with the choices you make having significant impacts on how the story unfolds around you. You’ll be able to decide who you’d like to meet and how you’d like to interact with them through this method, and various outcomes are possible in these scenarios. 

As it turns out, in a rather terrifying twist, some of these decisions can even lead to the death of your friends, with several characters present who can see their untimely demise in this way. If the choices you make weren’t quite important enough for you before, we imagine they will be now. Maybe it’s best not to get too attached to your favourite characters on screen.

Remember, Digimon Survive is scheduled to launch in the west next year to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Digimon anime series. Are you liking what you’ve seen so far?