Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City shares something in common with Half-Life: Alyx and Walkabout Mini Golf. You don’t need to play the “game” to enjoy your time in their places. You can go to virtual reality just to be there.
I’m down in the sewers exploring the lair with Raphael, Michelangelo, Donatello, and…me. There’s a mirror on the wall so I can see myself making turtle muscles, three fingers on each hand and some fat nails. April is over at a table looking at blueprints, and she makes eye contact with me as I walk by checking out all the rooms. I note the potted plants on my way, suggesting one of the turtles is a gardener growing chives and “oregano.”
Master Splinter is over there meditating in his room. As I form a mental map of this space, it’s hard not to fall in love with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles all over again when it is clear they’ve worked together to make their rooms so cozy down in the sewer.
There are mattresses stuffed in corners far enough away from their brothers for a bit of privacy, yet close enough to hang out. This is a family, after all, and their messy space underneath the feet of New York City is home. They’ve scrounged together everything from the refuse of the humans above, repurposed with love and placed in just the perfect spot for their enjoyment below. One of them is chilling and watching TV in his own little corner.
I spoke with Ace St. Germain, creative director on Empire City, in a face-to-face interview in Manhattan. He described the spark of inspiration in games like Walkabout Mini Golf:
“My best friend lives here in New York. I obviously live in Stockholm, Sweden, now, and we don’t get to see each other. We had a whole lifetime pass us by with kids and stuff. But he picked up a headset, I did too, and we would do stuff like hanging out in Walkabout…instead of jumping on Zoom. And it was rad.”
And then applying that idea to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
“How would I want to just hang with my other turtle buddy friends? How could we make that a thing? It’d be cool if we set up a situation where we just could log in and just, like, sit in the lair and talk. So when I made it, I gave him a build, jumped in, and we sat there, and we talked about our kids for an hour and a half. And it was like, yeah, this works.”
There’s a basketball hoop in the middle of the living room and an arcade cabinet over to the side. Just press one of its buttons to switch your shell.
I found the computer room and sat at the desk, a mess of wires and screens with a modem buzzing somewhere around the open cabinet of a PC and its fans whirring inside. This is awesome, and I’d be happy just chilling down here with friends and watching any of the Turtles movies, if I could.
Development is still very early in Empire City, so other than eating some pizza and tossing a few objects, I haven’t really “played” the game here. And yet, with this first hands-on, the developers show they understand exactly where the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles need to start in VR.
At home, with a nice place to hang out with your family.
You can add Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City to your wishlist on the Meta Horizon Store for Quest and Steam for PC VR.
The Chevrolet Bolt was one of the earliest electric vehicles to offer well over 200 miles (321 km) of range at a competitive price. For Ars, it was love at first drive, and that remained true from model year 2017 through MY2023. On the right tires, it could show a VW Golf GTI a thing or two, and while it might have been slow-charging, it could still be a decent road-tripper.
All of this helped the Bolt become General Motors’ best-selling EV, at least until its used-to-be-called Ultium platform got up and running. And that’s despite a costly recall that required replacing batteries in tens of thousands of Bolts because of some badly folded cells. But GM had other plans for the Bolt’s factory, and in 2023, it announced its impending death.
The reaction from EV enthusiasts, and Bolt owners in particular, was so overwhelmingly negative that just a few months later, GM CEO Mary Barra backtracked, promising to bring the Bolt back, this time with a don’t-call-it-Ultium-anymore battery.
Sigma Sports has a flash sale running this weekend, starting today. Sigma’s Big Deal Days are focused on road and gravel products, and it’s a great opportunity to update your wardrobe or stock up for winter riding.
There are discounted prices on almost 500 products, including electric pumps, smart trainers and wheels. There are also some bikes on sale, if you’re looking for something new.
To save you hunting through Sigma’s site, we’ve picked out some top products that are on our shopping list. You’ll need to sign up for Sigma+ to get access to the best prices.
This multi-tool from boutique brand Silca combines beautiful design with every tool you’ll need.
There are 20 hardened steel tools, including a chain tool with a magnetic slide-lock design for increased length and ease of use. There’s also a hidden storage area for a spare chain link.
The tool is coated with high-grip chrome plating and weighs 172g.
The Mondo is Specialized’s endurance road tyre – and one that’s designed to be quick, too. So much so, it was used in the Spring Classics by Specialized’s sponsored WorldTour teams.
The Mondo uses the brand’s Gripton T2/T5 dual-compound construction to balance speed, grip and durability.
It’s available in three sizes: 700x28x, 700x32c and 700x35c.
It’s indoor training session and the Wahoo KICKR CORE has everything you need to get started. It’s a direct-drive smart trainer, meaning the resistance will automatically change when the gradient rises or you start an interval on an indoor training app.
The KICKR CORE can simulate gradients of up to 16 per cent, while also being capable of measuring power to an accuracy of two per cent.
It will also be supplied with a cassette, so you just need to hop on your bike to get going.
The CarBack from Trek combines a 90-lumen rear light with radar technology to detect rear-approaching vehicles from up to 240m. The light then delivers audio and visual alerts through your paired GPS unit.
There are four modes to choose from: Day Flash (90 lumens), Day Steady (25 lumens), Night Steady (5 lumens) and Night Flash (5 lumens).
Trek says the Day Flash mode is visible from distances of up to 2km, making this a light that features the latest in safety tech.
With turbo season upon us, now’s the time to get set up to keep yourself occupied indoors.
The Shokz OpenRunPro 2 bone conduction headphones are a lot more comfortable than in-ear and over-ear designs when training. They will run for up to 12 hours and five minutes of charging will give you 2.5 hours of use.
If your gravel bike needs a saddle upgrade, this Selle San Marco option includes variable-density extra-dense padding and a wide cut-out. The brand says this adapts to your saddle movement and ensures long-distance comfort.
The claimed weight is 213g, and there are three colours on offer to match your gravel bike. Sigma Sports has a range of other saddles on offer from Prologo, Selle Italia, Fizik and more.
The SunGod Ultras feature a frameless lens for good peripheral vision, also offering a low 26g weight. Three nosepieces allow you to tailor the fit so they shouldn’t slip around when riding.
The photochromic lens is a great option for off-season riding, offering between 34 per cent and 79 per cent light transmission, to see you through sun and shade on sunnier winter days, as well as gloomy ones.
There are other SunGod sunnies and lens options on offer, as well as discounted sunglasses from Oakley, 100% and more.
Scope claims its Artec wheels offer best-in-class aerodynamics thanks to its fishscale-like surface finish, in a wheelset that weighs only 1,384g in this 85mm depth. The 23mm hookless internal rim width will support wider tyres for lower rolling resistance, and the carbon spokes contribute to the low weight.
If you’re after a choice of flashy wheel upgrades, Sigma Sports has a similar discount on Princeton CarbonWorks Grit and Peak wheels.
Transporting your bike on a car usually involves clamping hardware to your vehicle.
The Seasucker bike racks do away with that, using large suction cups to attach to your car roof, so there’s much less hardware to stash away when not in use.
It works via the same suction cups as used by glazers to move large panes of glass and high-rise window cleaners to keep them aloft.
Lazer updated its classic Z1 helmet in 2024, adding its KinetiCore crumple zones for additional rotational impact protection. The update also removed weight, with our size-M helmet coming in at 236g.
Along with the large vents, the KinetiCore treatment in the shell makes the Z1 KinetiCore a very well-vented helmet, too. Sigma Sports has a range of sizes and colours in stock.
The arrival of the updated Aethos 2 means the original Aethos is at a discount. If you can bear to have your brake cables exposed – the horror – this SRAM Rival AXS spec gets you a similarly lightweight frame to the Aethos 2, but for £2,000 less cash than the updated bike.
Sigma Sports has sizes from 54cm up available in a couple of colours, both equipped with a Rival power meter and Roval C38 carbon wheels paired with 28mm S-Works Turbo tyres.
Available in 40mm and 45mm widths, Challenge’s gravel tyres’ aggressive, spaced-out lugs are designed for grip in muddy conditions or over rocks, so they’re ideal for the coming winter.
The tyre is built on a 260 tpi casing for a supple ride feel and is compatible with hookless rims. There’s bead-to-bead puncture protection and Challenge’s high-durometer rubber compound for good wear resistance and low rolling resistance.
We’ve been blown away by electric pumps here at BikeRadar, to the extent that Warren has thrown away his mini-pump collection. Fumpa was the original portable electric pump maker and this pump will get a 25c tyre up to 100psi in around 25 seconds.
There’s a built-in pressure gauge and the capacity to inflate five or six tyres on a charge, with USB-C fast charging replenishing the battery in just one hour. The more portable miniFumpa is also discounted in the sale.
At 310 lumens, Lezyne’s alloy front light puts out more illumination than its name suggests. It can run for up to 4.5 hours in peak mode, or 27 hours in economy mode, so runtimes are better than some lights with greater headline output.
What’s more, the light is StVZO-compliant, so its lens is designed not to dazzle and annoy oncoming traffic, but direct the beam downwards for good illumination of the road ahead.
An anonymous reader shares a report: Last week, Amazon launched a major update of its line of Alexa-enabled Echo smart speakers and displays. The redesign — led by former Microsoft design chief Ralf Groene, whom Amazon Devices & Services head Panos Panay coaxed out of retirement — included two new Echo Show smart displays. According to Panay, these new models are the first step on a road to building “products that customers love.”
But there’s one big barrier to customers loving their Echo Shows: ads. In recent months, full-screen display ads with the tag “sponsored” have been appearing on current Echo Shows, and users are not happy. They just started popping up on my device this week, and they are very intrusive, appearing between photos when the Show is set to Photo Frame mode or between content if it’s set to show different categories (such as music, recipes, news). As I type, the last-gen Echo Show 8 on my desk showed an ad for an herbal supplement between a snapshot of my daughter dancing at her aunt’s wedding and a baby picture of my son. The ad reappeared two photos later, and then again. And again.
With this week’s release of Python 3.14 bringing performance improvements, debugging improvements, a new Zstd compression module, and other enhancements I have been eager to run some benchmarks seeing how Python 3.14 compares to prior Python releases.
Today is Battlefield 6 launch day and while the minimum and even recommended system requirements to play on PC are not all that stringent, you can also play the title on NVIDIA’s GeForce NOW cloud gaming service. It’s one of half a dozen new game additions to the platform. It also arrives with support for NVIDIA’s upgraded GeForce RTX 5080
Derek Gee has said he terminated his contract with Israel–Premier Tech following “serious concerns related to racing for the team” and a “personal-belief standpoint”.
Gee revealed in August that he had terminated his contract with Israel–Premier Tech, while the team said the Canadian’s contract was valid until 2028. Gee was pulled from the team’s Vuelta a España squad at short notice.
Providing an update on his situation yesterday, the 28-year-old said in a statement published on social media that he is facing what he understands to be damages of approximately €30m.
When Gee first announced the termination of his contract with Israel–Premier Tech, he said “certain issues simply made my continuation at the team untenable”.
Gee explained yesterday: “I terminated my contract with just cause, as is every person’s right when they are unable to continue performing their work under existing circumstances.
“The decision was not taken lightly – it followed an irreparable relationship with the team principal, as well as serious concerns related to racing for the team, both from a safety and personal-belief standpoint that weighed heavily on my conscience.
“But what moves me most is how, when human issues are involved, money becomes the headline; money was not the issue that led to my termination. Leaving has meant the risk of having no team or protection if I get injured without [a] contract. It is a risk I was – and still willing – to take, as I was simply unable to continue racing for the team.
“I understand the team sees it differently, and that this will be for the competent authorities to decide; however, I am now facing what I understand to be a damages claim said to exceed approximately 30 million euros – for doing nothing more than exercising my fundamental rights as a professional and a person.
“These are not the kind of numbers, or the kind of situation, any athlete expects when they dream of becoming a professional cyclist, and I believe it flies in the face of the very values that sport seeks to uphold. These actions are also a reflection of the very issues that led to the breakdown of the relationship to begin with.
“It strengthens my belief that leaving the team was the right decision, regardless of the recent announcement of branding changes and cosmetic structural shifts.”
Israel–Premier Tech were the subject of continued protests throughout La Vuelta from pro-Palestine demonstrators, who objected to their participation in the race and accused the team of “sportswashing”.
Since the race, Factor and Premier Tech, two sponsors of Israel–Premier Tech, threatened to withdraw their support if the team did not change its name.
On Monday, it was revealed that Israel–Premier Tech would change its name and national identity, while co-founder Sylvan Adams will also step back from his day-to-day involvement and will no longer speak on behalf of the team.
The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has officially designated Google with strategic market status (SMS) under the new digital markets competition regime. Specifically, it found that Google holds “substantial and entrenched market power and a position of strategic significance” when it comes to general search and search advertising services. The digital markets competition regime came into force on January 1, 2025 and will enable the agency to “promote competition in fast-moving digital markets, while protecting UK consumers and businesses from unfair or harmful practices by the very largest technology firms.”
So what does getting the “strategic market status” designation mean, exactly? As the CMA clarifies, it doesn’t automatically mean Google did something wrong, but it does allow the agency to launch interventions that ensure general search services in the UK are “open to effective competition” and that businesses relying on Google are being treated fairly. The company is expecting to face new rules and regulations on how Search works in the near future. UK’s CMA launched an investigation on Google’s standing in the search industry on January 14 to confirm its status.
“We have found that Google maintains a strategic position in the search and search advertising sector – with more than 90% of searches in the UK taking place on its platform,” said Will Hayter, Executive Director for Digital Markets at the CMA. To be clear, the designation applies to the company’s AI Overviews and AI Mode features, as well, but not to its Gemini AI assistant, at least for now.
The CMA said it’s expecting to start consulting on possible interventions later this year. In an announcement of its own, Google said that “many of the ideas for interventions that have been raised in this process would inhibit UK innovation and growth, potentially slowing product launches at a time of profound AI-based innovation.” The company believes that some of those ideas would “pose direct harm to businesses” and could lead to higher prices for consumers.
“The UK enjoys access to the latest products and services before other countries because it has so far avoided costly restrictions on popular services, such as Search. Retaining this position means avoiding unduly onerous regulations and learning from the negative results seen in other jurisdictions, which have cost businesses an estimated €114 billion,” Google wrote. By “other jurisdictions,” Google means the European Union, whose similar Digital Markets Act law designated the company as a gatekeeper in 2023.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/the-uks-antitrust-regulator-will-keep-a-closer-eye-on-google-search-130021994.html?src=rss
The all-new 3T RaceMax2 Italia takes 3T’s original gravel race bike template and adds fully revised geometry, more tyre clearance and lower drag.
The RaceMax2 Italia sports a steeper head angle, longer fork offset and increased bottom bracket drop than the previous incarnation.
This is combined with super-short 420mm chainstays. That’s the shortest I’ve seen on a bike with tyre clearances of 50mm or more.
The new geometry is intended to make the new RaceMax2 much more of an all-road all-rounder, with a road-steep 71.5-degree head angle, 74-degree seat angle, low stack and long reach.
3T says the aerodynamic improvements to the new RaceMax make it the brand’s fastest gravel bike yet.
The new head tube has an arrow-like front profile and a much deeper tail. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
Alongside the new geometry is a frameset with all-new aerodynamics. At the front end, a fresh head tube design combines a pointed front nose and elongated tail. It’s a design feature more common to the latest aero road bikes, such as our current race bike of the year, the Cervélo S5.
Even the fork dropouts have seen aero optimisation, with a caliper bolt cover smoothing the fork’s leading edge, and there’s no thru-axle hole in the fork on the driveside.
The front end is completed with a combination of 3T’s aerodynamic More stem and Aeroghiaia aero-gravel bar.
3T says it will also have updated cockpits built to suit the Racemax2 early next year.
The RaceMax2 down tube is wide enough to shield a 750ml bottle. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
The down tube is massively oversized at 75mm. This enables it to fully shield a bottle mounted there.
The down tube also features a wheel cutout on the underside, behind the fork, with a new, large storage port with two positions for the bottle cage on the Fidlock magnetic mini-hook locking cover.
Inside is a custom storage bag made for 3T by Miss Grape.
Miss Grape provides the bag for the down tube storage. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
At the rear end, the aero-profile seat tube features a wheel cutout, which helps keep the chainstays short.
The lowered seatstays meet the seat tube via an aerodynamically sculpted junction. It’s topped by an aerodynamic seatpost that incorporates a clip-in rear light.
The RaceMax2 Italia has generous tyre clearances. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
Despite the short stays and aerodynamic optimisation, the RaceMax2 is compatible with both 1x and 2x drivetrains, with a maximum chainring size of a whopping 52 teeth.
3T claims this has given the RaceMax2 a 1.5% aerodynamic improvement over the previous RaceMax Italia – previously the brand’s fastest gravel bike. That may be a small gain, but when you factor in it’s with a 50mm tyre, it’s quite the achievement.
Less weight, more speed
The frontal profile of the RaceMax2 shows the new aero design. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
Even with the aerodynamic overhaul and increased tyre clearances, 3T has managed to shave a few grams. The frame remains the same at a claimed 990g. This rises to 1,050g when you include the Miss Grape internal storage bag.
The fork loses 5g down to a claimed 380g for a size-medium frameset.
3T claims weights as low as 7.9kg for a complete bike (SRAM Red XPLR, Zipp 303 XPLR).
3T RaceMax2 Italia GRX Di2 spec details
2x GRX is a surprise from a brand that pioneered 1x drivetrains on drop-bar bikes. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
My sample test bike tips the scales at 9.21kg (56cm/L including storage bags, integrated rear light and 2x bottle cages).
The bike comes equipped with Schwalbe’s 45mm G-One RS Pro tanwall tubeless tyres wrapped around 3T’s own Discus 45/40 LTD wheelset. That’s surprising for a brand that pioneered 1x drivetrains on the road and for gravel.
This model comes with Shimano’s 2x GRX Di2. The pairing of a 48/31 chainring and a 12-speed Ultegra 11-34 cassette should give a usable range for trail and road.
The bike is finished with 3T’s dedicated aero-shaped carbon seatpost with integrated rear light. That’s topped by Fizik’s 3D-printed version of the classic Antares saddle.
Up front, it’s the combination of 3T’s More stem and Aeroghiaia gravel bar.
3T’s More stem and Aeroghiaia gravel bar combine to make for an aerodynamic cockpit. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
At first glance, the RaceMax2 combines its compact wheelbase with steep angles, making it look far more like a fast all-road take on gravel.
It’s more similar to the similarly priced Cervélo Áspero 5 than a trail and technical-capable bike such as Parlee’s Taos.
I’ll have a full test of the RaceMax2 Italia as soon as I’ve had a chance to get plenty of miles in on it.
SIZE
S
M
L
XL
Rider height* (CM)
157-171
168-180
176-186
183-195
Rider height* (IN)
5’2″-5’8″
5’6″-5’11”
5’9″-6’1″
6’0″-6’5″
Stack
547
569
589
609
Reach
367
377
385
393
Head tube angle (degrees)
70,5
71,5
71,5
71,5
Fork axle-crown (mm)
383
383
383
383
Head tube length (mm)
138
152
173
197
BB drop (mm)
79
79
79
76
Seat tube angle (degrees)
74
74
74
74
Seat tube length (mm)
463
491
510
537
Top tube length (mm)
522
538
552
566
Front Center (mm)
609
607
622
636
Rear Center (mm)
420
420
420
420
Wheelbase (mm)
1017
1015
1029
1045
FiZik provides a 3D-printed Antares saddle for our 3T RaceMax² Italia test bike. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
3T RaceMax2 Italia range and pricing
3T claims the latest Racemax² is its fastest gravel race bike yet. Warren Rossiter / OurMedia
Framesets
Racemax² Italia with 3T More stem and 3T Aeroghiaia Integrale LTD handlebar: £4,425 / $6,499 / €4,917
Complete bikes
Racemax² Italia with Shimano GRX 2×12 and 3T Discus 45|40 LTD wheels: £7,303 / $10,999 / €8,114
Racemax² Italia with SRAM Force XPLR AXS 1×13 and 3T Discus 45|40 LTD wheels: £7,304 / $11,699 / €8,115
Racemax² Italia with SRAM Force XPLR AXS 1×13, Torno Wide crank and 3T Discus 45|40 LTD wheels: £7,745 / $11,699 / €8,605
Racemax² Italia with SRAM Red XPLR AXS 1×13 and ZIPP 303 XPLR SW wheels: £9,368 / $13,899 / €10,409
Racemax² Italia with SRAM Red XPLR AXS 1×13 with Torno Wide Crank and ZIPP 303 XPLR SW wheels: £9,368 / $14,399 / €10,409
Racemax² Italia with Campagnolo Super Record 2×13 Gravel and 3T Discus 45|40 wheels: £9,662 / $14,599 / €10,736
Meta’s web browser now uses depth sensing for WebXR Hit Testing on Quest 3 & 3S, enabling instant mixed reality object placement without a Scene Mesh.
The WebXR Hit Testing API lets developers cast a conceptual ray from an origin, such as the user’s head or controller, and find where it first intersects real-world geometry. The API is a part of the WebXR open standard, but how it works on the underlying technical level will vary between devices.
Previously on Quest 3 and Quest 3S, in WebXR the headset would use the Scene Mesh generated by the mixed reality setup process to determine which real-world geometry the raycast hits. But that approach had several problems. If the user hadn’t set up a mesh for the room they’re in they’d need to do so if the developer called the hit testing API, adding significant friction. And even if they had a Scene Mesh, it wouldn’t reflect moved furniture or other changes since the scan.
With Horizon Browser 40.4, rolling out now, the WebXR Hit Testing API now uses Meta’s Depth API under the hood, not the Scene Mesh.
Supported on Quest 3 and Quest 3S, the Depth API provides real-time first person depth frames, generated by a computer vision algorithm which compares the disparity from the two tracking cameras on the front. It works up to around 5 meters distance, and is typically used to implement dynamic occlusion in mixed reality, since you can determine whether virtual objects should be occluded by physical geometry.
For hit testing, the Depth API enables instantly placing virtual objects on real world surfaces without the need for a Scene Mesh. This capability has been easily available to Unity developers for around a year as part of Meta’s Mixed Reality Utility Kit (MRUK), and Unreal and native developers can implement it themselves using the Depth API. Now, it’s easily available for WebXR developers too.
Keep in mind, however, that this is only appropriate for spawning simple stationary objects and interfaces. If entities need to move around surfaces or interact with any of the rest of the room, a scanned Scene Mesh will still be needed.
Welcome to Edition 8.14 of the Rocket Report! We’re now more than a week into a federal government shutdown, but there’s been little effect on the space industry. Military space operations are continuing unabated, and NASA continues preparations at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, for the launch of the Artemis II mission around the Moon early next year. The International Space Station is still flying with a crew of seven in low-Earth orbit, and NASA’s fleet of spacecraft exploring the cosmos remain active. What’s more, so much of what the nation does in space is now done by commercial companies largely (but not completely) immune from the pitfalls of politics. But the effect of the shutdown on troops and federal employees shouldn’t be overlooked. They will soon miss their first paychecks unless political leaders reach an agreement to end the stalemate.
As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don’t want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets, as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Danger from dead rockets. A new listing of the 50 most concerning pieces of space debris in low-Earth orbit is dominated by relics more than a quarter-century old, primarily dead rockets left to hurtle through space at the end of their missions, Ars reports. “The things left before 2000 are still the majority of the problem,” said Darren McKnight, lead author of a paper presented October 3 at the International Astronautical Congress in Sydney. “Seventy-six percent of the objects in the top 50 were deposited last century, and 88 percent of the objects are rocket bodies. That’s important to note, especially with some disturbing trends right now.”
After years of trying, a dedicated team has managed to download and archive a fully playable version of the long-lost canceled mobile game, Ratchet & Clank: Clone Home. The story of its search and recovery has been detailed in a new video by YouTuber The Golden Bolt, who helped kick off the search himself back in 2019.
Ratchet & Clank: Clone Home has usually been attributed to Handheld Games, which developed a string of mobile titles in 2005 including Spider-Man 2: The Hero Returns and Ratchet & Clank: Going Mobile, the predecessor to Clone Home. Originally set to debut in 2006 for Java phones, it was quietly canceled just prior to release.
It wasn’t forgotten, though. Rumors persisted that it was a fully playable game, helping elevate it to mythical status among fans. Then, The Golden Bolt heard from one of the original developers that the game was indeed finished and may have found its way to a handful of mobile devices. His 2019 video on the subject helped kick off a new search.
The most dedicated fans researching the game were college students “Emily” and “Super Gamer Omega Clank.” The latter posted on Reddit four years ago that they found someone with the game on a Sony Ericsson W880i. It was encrypted, though, and as little as a few weeks ago, they said that their quest to extract it from that device was proving to be “hopeless.”
Then, a breakthrough. The team managed to safely crack the phone’s encryption, extract Clone Home and archive it for anyone to download. Miraculously, it’s complete and fully playable, if a bit unpolished. Golden Bolt now believes that the game was actually developed not by Handheld Games but a company called JavaGround, which made Sony’s last few Java (J2ME) games. It may have been uploaded by accident to mobile networks like Cingular or Sprint for a brief period, then downloaded by a handful of people before being pulled.
People who have played the game so far say it’s surprisingly good and even better than Going Mobile. It’s a wonderfully eccentric entry to the R&C canon (which now counts 17 titles), thanks to the nonsensical plot, solid mechanics, ability to play as two different Lombaxes and a gun called the “Ewezie” that turns your enemies into sheep.
So why was Clone Home canceled? It may have been due to potential litigation between Sony and Handheld Games, The Golden Bolt speculated. In any case, it’s a gem for game preservationists and an amazing reward for the years of work put in by R&C fans.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/a-long-lost-ratchet-and-clank-mobile-game-has-been-found-123008739.html?src=rss
Hellsweeper VR reaches version 2.0 with the new Obscura Update, two years after its initial launch.
Originally launched in September 2023, Hellsweeper VR by Mixed Realms has seen a continuous series of post-launch updates. While it already featured poisonous enemies, yesterday’s Obscura Update lets you use toxic magic as well. This grants a Toxic Whip, a Thorn Hook, and more that can also inflict the ‘Decay’ effect, which gradually damages enemies and makes them drop health pickups.
Multiplayer now supports Endless Mode, while the Roguelike Mode now saves your progress after every three acts. It’s also introducing new gameplay systems such as Inverse Gravity, an optional choice activated in your movement settings, while changes were also made to your energy resources and ammo pool. Finally, guns and bows have also been tweaked. The full patch notes can be found here.
Obscura marks the third major update we’ve seen for Hellsweeper VR across 2025, which began with April’s Reckoning patch bringing the Chakram weapon, move upgrades, and additional combat abilities. Following this up in July was the Deadeye update that added more dynamic environments, new enemy variants, and finger guns as a weapon.
China’s antitrust regulator has opened an investigation into Qualcomm’s acquisition of Israeli connected-vehicle chip company Autotalks. The State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) alleges that Qualcomm is suspected of violating China’s anti-monopoly laws by not disclosing certain details of the deal.
Qualcomm had initially agreed to acquire the fabless chip company in 2023 to expand its Snapdragon portfolio into more automotive applications. Autotalks creates chips, sensors and vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication tech centered in part on safety for vehicles. It has been a few months since the acquisition was finalized, with the new probe coming amid trade negotiations between the United States and China.
The deal was previously investigated by both the US Federal Trade Commission and the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority, with Qualcomm temporarily abandoning the acquisition in early 2024. The exact process of how the deal was reopened is not clear, as the acquisition was only announced once it had been finalized and received regulatory approval
Last month, SAMR said that NVIDIA’s $6.9 billion acquisition of Mellanox also ran afoul of national regulations. The regulators also said the deal violated conditional terms outlined by regulators on initial approval. The Financial Times reported that China’s regulators held on to that decision for months, purportedly to gain leverage in trade discussions with the US.
The bulk of these investigations have come while the US and China are engaged in negotiations around a TikTok deal, tariffs, trade and more. Today China drastically expanded its export controls for rare earth minerals, targeting defense and semiconductor companies outside the country.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/chinese-regulators-are-investigating-qualcomms-acquisition-of-autotalks-121540269.html?src=rss
Control: Ultimate Edition will be available on the iPhone, the iPad and the Apple Vision Pro in early 2026, its developer Remedy has announced. The developer says you can either “tap into the action with touch controls,” which presumably includes hand tracking and gestures on the mixed reality headset, or use controllers to play the game. Remedy first made it available for the Apple ecosystem when it released Ultimate Edition for Mac back in February this year.
Remedy originally released Control in 2019 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows computers. In the action-adventure game, you take on the role of Jesse Faden, the new director of the Federal Bureau of Control (FBC) who’s also searching for her kidnapped brother Dylan. The game is set in the Oldest House, the headquarters of the clandestine US agency that studies and contains paranatural phenomena.
Ultimate Edition is the definitive version of the title and bundles the base game with the Foundation and AWE (Altered World Events) expansions. While both are continuations of the main game, AWE is a crossover between Control and Alan Wake, an older title by Remedy about a crime author whose wife disappears during a trip to a small mountain town. Remedy hasn’t announced a specific release date or price for the game yet, but it’s currently listed for $40 on the Apple Store for Mac computers.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/remedys-control-is-coming-to-iphone-ipad-and-vision-pro-early-next-year-120100226.html?src=rss
