Consoles Hub

Amazon and Walmart are currently offering the Sony PlayStation Classic micro-console for US $30, its lowest price ever. The console is pre-loaded with 20 original PlayStation titles but can be easily modded to load several other retro emulators. Sony has also cut prices on controllers and several games.

Atari's VCS game console is now available for pre-order from Atari, Walmart, and GameStop. The console starts at US $249 and comes in a two models with three different designs (depending on retailer). Walmart and GameStop are expected to ship pre-orders in March 2020.

Microsoft announced a new Xbox Game Pass for PC at its E3 2019 keynote that offers curated games for PC gamers for just US$10 a month. The company also announced a new Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription that brings together Game Pass for console, Xbox Live Gold, and Game Pass for PC for a combined price of just US$15.

Microsoft has announced that its xCloud-based game streaming service will be arriving in October. The platform will allow Xbox One gamers to play the games they own anywhere, whether on PC, TV, tablet or smartphone in or out of the house.

Microsoft has launched its all-new Xbox Elite gaming controller at E3. The new Series 2 model offers 30 new features and improvements including introducing adjustable thumbstick tensioning for precision movement and control.

A few details about Project Scarlett were revealed at the Xbox E3 2019 briefing, but it seems in the end it was the next episode in a very famous game franchise that did most of the talking for the next-generation console. A teaser video offered some familiar glimpses at what is expected from future Xbox consoles, but it was the game engine footage of Halo Infinite that stole the show.

Microsoft has been busy wowing the audience with its E3 2019 Xbox briefing. A lot of people will be very interested in what the company has got planned and will share in regard to the Xbox Scarlett console family. However, it seems some Xbox Scarlett devkit specifications have already been leaked, and they are not going to disappoint expectant fans.

The CBS-owned tech outlet has a beef with how YouTube gamers and influencers are "riling up the crowd" with their rants and negativity toward game publishers.

Microsoft has embedded Easter eggs in its Xbox E3 countdown videos that combine to form the RGB code for Scarlett, the codename for the next generation of Xbox consoles. Microsoft is expected to talk about Scarlett and also reveal 14 first-party games for the Xbox along with new developments on Windows 10 gaming and Project xCloud.

Sega released the full list of games that will be on the Sega Genesis Mini console, which is set to release in September. The list includes 42 classic 16-bit Sega games, exactly twice as many games as the SNES Classic Edition. There is a good mix of recognizable classics and hidden gems.

Since Sony is not going to present anything at E3 2019, PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan went ahead and revealed a few more PlayStation 5 features to hype up the fans until the official announcement scheduled later this summer. The rumored custom SSD is now confirmed to be the default storage option, while the 7 nm AMD hardware will offer support for 4K @120 Hz, and there will also be a "cross-generational play" feature.

The video-game industry could accrue as much as US$179.1 billion by 2024. This is in line with a new market-research report on the subject. This valuation may be driven by conventional platforms such as mobile devices, PCs and consoles; however, VR and AR are also likely to have an increasingly large influence on the space.

The creator and executive director of the famed Yakuza series of games has been singing the praises of the PlayStation 5 and its performance capabilities. While discussing the latest entry to the action-adventure franchise, Toshihiro Nagoshi offered up some interesting comments about Sony’s next-generation console.

War Thunder 1.89 "Imperial Navy" comes with a full naval tech tree for Japan, a first — premium, as usual — helicopter for the same nation, a few new ground vehicles — the long-awaited French Leclerc tank is one of them — and planes for most nations, two new locations, reworked clouds, and more.

Some revealing patents have been unearthed that give the impression Sony has overhauled the SSD units that will eventually be integrated into the upcoming PlayStation 5 console. It seems “basic” SSDs had too many limitations that would prevent the next-generation console from reaching peak performance levels.

GPD has posted a video of one of its upcoming P2 MAX devices being put through its paces. An intense fight sequence from Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition is shown and the console/mini laptop hybrid seems to take the high demands on its hardware in its stride. The gameplay looks seamless, which will please those considering a purchase.

Intel used to be the biggest semiconductor maker up until 2017, when Samsung began ramping up the DRAM and NAND memory chip production. Now that memory chip demand is bottoming out and Intel is almost out of the woods with the CPU shortages, Samsung drops to second position again, but things could change by Q4 2019 when the DDR5 memory standard is expected to hit the market.

Sony has finally shown the PlayStation 5 in action, although unfortunately you don’t get a glimpse of the console itself. A short video clip shared by Wall Street Journal writer Takashi Mochizuki shows the loading times for Marvel’s Spider-Man on both the PlayStation 4 Pro and the next-generation console. The difference is astonishing.

The trailer of F1 2019 — the official videogame of the 2019 FIA Formula One World Championship — is now live. The trailer shows a "stunning visual uplift" and features the official F1 theme music written by Brian Tyler. The list of cars present in the game starts with the 1972 Lotus 72D and goes all the way to the 2010 Red Bull RB6, McLaren MP4-25, and Ferrari F10.

The recently unveiled Minecraft Earth is a free-to-play, augmented reality Minecraft title to be added to the Minecraft universe. However, those interested can only sign up for a chance to play the limited beta — which is scheduled to arrive this summer — for now. Signing up will also get them a free Earth skin for Minecraft Bedrock.

Khronos Group, the consortium behind the development of the Vulkan API, has listed the Google Games Platform Gen 1 aka Stadia as being powered by a custom AMD datacenter GPU based on the GCN 1.5 architecture in its Vulkan Conformant Products page. Google Stadia's GPU is said to be a custom Vega 56 with 56 CUs and a memory bandwidth of 484 GBps. The platform is based on Google's customized Debian Linux and SDK, and uses Vulkan as the graphics API of choice.

It’s been reported that some of the executives at BioWare, the EA-owned game developer, have been blaming Anthem’s issues on the gamers that play it. Great things were expected from the title, but within days of its release in February it was already facing a lukewarm response from critics and complaints about hardware crashes from players.

As if the Playstation 5 and XBox rumors haven't been rampant enough, we can expect even more speculation pieces once AMD gives the deep technical dive into both Zen 2 and Navi during the private Hot Chips 2019 conference.

An interesting new custom kit has been discovered that can turn a simple-looking Raspberry Pi board into a handheld gaming console with keyboard and game controls. The Hyper Keyboard Pi is currently being sold for ¥6,980 (~US$64), although users will have to purchase the rest of the key components separately.

According to a new report, the virtual reality (VR) gaming market will grow from its most recent US$10.3 billion valuation to one of $40.2 billion in 2024. This is likely to be driven by advancements in VR equipment design and function. However, the cost of the same is also thought to be what is holding this market back at present.

Today (May 16, 2019), the corporations Microsoft and Sony unveiled plans to collaborate on the development of new technology. This partnership will see the 2 electronics giants team up on new image sensors and cloud computing applications. This may enhance platforms such as PlayStation and Azure AI in the future.

A modder known as Madmorda has created an amazing fully functional miniature version of Nintendo’s immensely popular GameCube. Nintendo has had great success with the NES and SNES Classic Edition mini consoles, but there has been no sign that the Japanese company would turn its sights onto the GameCube.

An analyst for the Ace Research Institute has compiled a financial results report about Sony’s PlayStation business. Among the big numbers and forecasts, the researcher has detailed some information about the upcoming PlayStation 5 console, which includes an expected launch date of November 2020. There are also predictions for price and sales.

Lisa Su will kickoff Computex 2019 in less than two weeks and then tease even more gaming technologies two weeks later at the Next Horizon Gaming conference in E3 2019. Expect a cluster of hopefully exciting AMD announcements in the coming month.

Earphones and headphone sales drive a healthy market in the United States. The market analysis firm ReportBuyer estimates that it will grow at a compound rate of over 12% until it is worth approximately US$9 billion in 2024. The products in question are mostly used in fitness, entertainment and gaming pursuits.

EA's latest quarterly earnings report shows a slight growth slowdown for Apex Legends in the last month, so the company is now planning to release a version for the mobile platforms and expand the Origin marketplace in the SEA region. A switch version could also be released at some point, but the port is said to be problematic.

An advert from One-Netbook Technology seems to show that the company is preparing to enter the handheld gaming PC market. Depending on the development time involved, any product could end up being a rival to the upcoming GPD Win Max and the Smach Z. The new brand name (and possibly the name of the console) is OneGx.

Walmart is offering some great deals on popular consoles at the moment. One of the current picks of the bunch is for the Microsoft Xbox One X that comes bundled with a copy of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. The list price is US$499.99, but it can be picked up for US$349.99 and will help banish those boring rainy weekends.

Following up on a promise to combat cheating in Apex Legends more than ever, developer Respawn announced in a blot post today that the company has banned over 770,000 players for cheating so far. The company also banned over 4,000 spam accounts in the past 20 days alone.

A new investor presentation from AMD has been published online and there are numerous interesting additions and omissions from the previous presentation. In comes mention of Zen 3, Zen 4, Milan and cloud gaming connected to Navi, and no doubt to the dismay of HEDT processor fans, out goes the 3rd Gen Ryzen Threadripper CPU.

An executive for Slightly Mad Studios has admitted that the future development of the Mad Box console is looking “questionable”. Slightly Mad, which is the company behind the Project CARS series of games, revealed it was planning on producing a console that could offer incredible VR support amounting to 60 FPS per eye, or 120 FPS in total.

The Recon 70 headset already exists for the Nintendo Switch; now, Turtle Beach has released variants of the same that are compatible with the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. The headphones have faux-leather cups over 40mm drivers, complemented by the OEM's flip-up mic.

Sony has already announced the PlayStation 5 is in development and even shared some scant but vital component details about the next-generation console. However, there is still no real idea of what the gaming hardware will actually look like when it finally hits the shelves, which will hopefully be sometime in 2020.

With the 1.5 update, World of Tanks brings a few new Swedish medium tanks that feature hydropneumatic suspension, the ability to choose which map to avoid in standard battles, changes — mainly nerfs — to Japanese heavy tanks, the infamous FV 4005, and the artillery branch. A special deal for Twitch Prime members is also available.

A new purported leak about the PlayStation 5 has offered up some more detailed information about the key components. Sony already announced that the next-generation console will feature an AMD APU with a 7nm Zen 2 CPU and Navi GPU. But a new leaker claims to have specific clock rates that were apparently obtained from a more recent Sony meeting.

An image of a mock-up of a GPD Win Max handheld gaming PC has been shared on Reddit, drawing out a mixed response from redditors. The picture shows a printed cut-out that has been placed on top of a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop to give an idea of the Win Max’s dimensions. A list of rumored specifications has also been posted online.

Interesting renders of a new handheld console have been posted by its manufacturer, Evercade. The device is still in the development phase, although apparently it’s in the later stages as the company has announced it will be available in 2019. The console offers straightforward cartridge-based gaming with retro games and publishers being targeted for inclusion.

Nintendo is currently looking for people to apply to the beta-testing phase of the upcoming mobile game Mario Kart Tour. At the moment, the company is only accepting applications from Android users (although the game is planned for iOS too). The application schedule window is already open, but it is only available to potential testers living in either the US or Japan.

A law firm has filed a suit against Epic Games on behalf of its client, a musician who believes his trademark appearance and moves have been stolen in order to build one of the Emotes found in the game Fortnite. These Emotes are Battle Royale features that often require micro-transactions in order to be enabled.

Nintendo's latest earnings report covers the years ending March 2018 and 2019. They show generally positive results, including a 13.7% year-on-year increase in net sales. The text of this report also states that the release of Pokemon Shield, Pokemon Sword and the Link's Awakening remake are indeed set for this year.

Paradox Interactive has released a video on YouTube that shows an animated clan introduction to the upcoming game Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. After watching the clip, viewers are treated to a very short (and small) look at pre-alpha gameplay, giving gamers a vague idea of what to expect from the eagerly awaited title.

The device-diagnostics company Blancco claims to have bought over 100 second-hand hard drives on the eBay sites of 4 different counties, to see what data, if any, could be accessed on them. It claims that 42% of these drives still stored information from their previous owners that can be thought of as sensitive.

The 4K display standard is likely to be immediately succeeded by its 8K counterpart in the fullness of time. ResearchandMarkets has estimated that, even though this next-gen solution only pulled in about US$2 billion worldwide in 2017, this will increase to just over $68 billion in 2026.

Sony has released its consolidated financial results for the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2019 (FY2018). Although hardware sales for the PlayStation 4 have slowed down, they are still selling at an impressive rate. Total sales for the PS4 stand at 96.8 million units and should easily top 100 million before the PS5 is released.

The creator of the Metal Gear franchise envisions a future where streamers could directly interact with their viewers in new types of games, thanks to increased Internet speeds and more stable cloud gaming services. Advanced AI developments will also play an important role not only in games, but in movies as well. AI may also help consumers choose movies and games according to preset preferences.