You’ll have to wait a bit longer than expected to explore the Lands Between on Nintendo Switch 2. FromSoftware and publisher Bandai Namco have delayed Elden Ring: Tarnished Edition — the Switch 2 version of the massively successful action RPG — until 2026. The port was announced back in April and it was originally slated to arrive sometime this year.

“While development on #ELDENRING Tarnished Edition continues wholeheartedly toward release, we have decided to move the launch to 2026 to allow time for performance adjustments,” a post on the Elden Ring X account reads. “We apologize to players looking forward to the game and thank you for your patience and support.”

Players got their first taste of the port during public demos at Gamescom in August, but performance issues were evident. At the time, IGN described the game as a “disaster” in the Switch 2’s handheld mode, citing “significant” frame rate drops and a “confusing” button layout. Nintendo Life saw “multiple instances of frame drops and stuttering while out in the open world.” So, taking extra time to make sure Elden Ring runs as smoothly as possible on the Switch 2 seems wise. 

The Tarnished Edition includes the Shadow of the Erdtree expansion as well as new classes, weapons, armor and customization options for your horse, Torrent (other versions of the game will get these additions as well). FromSoftware is also working on The Duskbloods, a Switch 2 exclusive that’s slated to arrive in 2026 as well. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/the-switch-2-version-of-elden-ring-is-delayed-until-2026-154500911.html?src=rss

Europe’s big three aerospace manufacturers are combining their space divisions to create a joint business. This “leading European player in space” could be a real rival to America’s SpaceX, according to reporting by Financial Times.

The companies Airbus, Leonardo and Thales have finalized this deal. The new unnamed entity will be based in France and will employ around 25,000 people. Airbus will own 35 percent, while the other two companies will each own 32.5 percent.

Executives are hoping this company will better serve Europe’s need for “sovereignty” in space and help it create a rival to SpaceX’s Starlink communications network. Increasing a presence in space is also seen as a good thing for security and defense.

“This proposed new company marks a pivotal milestone for Europe’s space industry. It embodies our shared vision to build a stronger and more competitive European presence in an increasingly dynamic global space market,” the companies wrote in a joint statement. “By pooling our talent, resources, expertise and R&D capabilities, we aim to generate growth, accelerate innovation and deliver greater value to our customers and stakeholders.”

This isn’t just bluster. Thales and Airbus have long been rivals in the satellite market, but it looks like they are friends now. Leonardo is known for space systems and services. Combining all three could actually give SpaceX a run for its money, but we will have to wait and see.

There are no planned site closures, as the companies say that each home country will keep its existing capabilities. This will be a standalone company, so think of it as an extremely well-financed startup. The first task for the upstart? Reporting indicates it’ll be to find more efficient ways to develop and manufacture satellites.

Discussions about this merger have been going on since 2019. Regulators still have to approve the deal, though the companies say they expect the new entity will be operational by 2027.

As for SpaceX, the company is currently developing a next-gen version of its Starship super-heavy lift vehicle. It’s also slowly planning a manned mission to the moon, but that recently hit a snag that could mandate a lengthy delay.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/europes-big-three-aerospace-manufacturers-combine-their-space-divisions-to-create-a-rival-to-spacex-153424228.html?src=rss

Donald Trump is eyeing taking equity stakes in quantum computing firms in exchange for federal funding, The Wall Street Journal reported.

At least five companies are weighing whether allowing the government to become a shareholder would be worth it to snag funding that the Trump administration has “earmarked for promising technology companies,” sources familiar with the potential deals told the WSJ.

IonQ, Rigetti Computing, and D-Wave Quantum are currently in talks with the government over potential funding agreements, with minimum awards of $10 million each, some sources said. Quantum Computing Inc. and Atom Computing are reportedly “considering similar arrangements,” as are other companies in the sector, which is viewed as critical for scientific advancements and next-generation technologies.

Read full article

Comments

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Fire TV sticks have one advantage over every other streaming stick: They’re owned by Amazon, which means they’re more likely to get discounted. Right now, for instance, you can get Amazon’s best streaming stick, the Fire TV Stick 4K Max, for $39.99 (originally $59.99).

Fire TV Stick 4K Max Streaming Player With Remote (2023 Model)

$39.99
at Amazon

$59.99
Save $20.00

$39.99
at Amazon

$59.99
Save $20.00

Two of the biggest competitors in the streaming stick market are Roku and Fire TV Sticks, and committing to one or the other comes with pros and cons, so make sure to know what they are before making your decision. Fire TV Sticks excel at their voice assistance, which makes sense since they use Alexa to execute your commands. If you already have Amazon’s Alexa devices in your house, you can take full advantage of this since you won’t even need to click on your remote to boot it up. If you have a soundbar hooked up, the Fire TV Stick will let you control it using the same remote.

It comes with a new 2.0 GHz quad-core processor, Dolby Vision support, DHR10+ support, 16GB storage, and more. One of the advantages of using a Fire TV Stick is that you can install Kodi on it, which essentially gives you free access to virtually anything you can stream. If you’re an Xbox gamer (or want to be one), you only need to get an Xbox remote to play their games over the cloud through the Xbox app (no console needed).

The Fire TV Stick 4K Max has the most storage with 16GB, the best wifi support with Wi-Fi 6E, and the best voice assistant with Alexa Voice Remote Enhanced. At its current price, it’s cheaper than the more budget alternatives.

Fujitsu has released a new laptop in Japan with a built-in Blu-ray drive. The FMV Note A A77-K3 includes a BDXL-compatible optical drive that can read and burn discs. Most laptop manufacturers globally stopped including optical drives in the second half of the 2010s. The Japanese market has refused to follow that trend.

Shops in Tokyo’s Akihabara district recently experienced a spike in demand for optical drives and systems capable of reading Blu-ray discs, Tom’s Hardware reports. Fujitsu sells two additional models in the FMV Note A line using Intel thirteenth-generation chips. Those systems include DVD drives instead of Blu-ray capability. Some other Japanese manufacturers also released optical-drive-equipped laptops earlier in 2025.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Apple’s iPhone Air was the company’s most interesting new iPhone this year, at least insofar as it was the one most different from previous iPhones. We came away impressed by its size and weight in our review. But early reports suggest that its novelty might not be translating into sales success.

A note from analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, whose supply chain sources are often accurate about Apple’s future plans, said yesterday that demand for the iPhone Air “has fallen short of expectations” and that “both shipments and production capacity” were being scaled back to account for the lower-than-expected demand.

Kuo’s note is backed up by reports from other analysts at Mizuho Securities (via MacRumors) and Nikkei Asia. Both of these reports say that demand for the iPhone 17 and 17 Pro models remains strong, indicating that this is just a problem for the iPhone Air and not a wider slowdown caused by tariffs or other external factors.

Read full article

Comments

The last 12 months have been pretty depressing for anyone invested in the long-term future of Xbox and the general health of the games industry. Back in May, Microsoft laid off 3 percent of its global workforce, with the company’s gaming division being one of the big casualties, and a number of upcoming titles were subsequently canceled. It painted a picture of a brand in crisis, but according to a new report, Microsoft has been setting its gaming division unrealistic profit targets for several years.

Sources told Bloomberg that in 2023, Microsoft implemented an “across-the-board goal” of 30 percent profit margins, which the report says Microsoft calls “accountability margins” internally. As Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier reports, this target, which was set by Microsoft’s Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood in fall 2023, is well above the recent industry average of 17-22 percent quoted by S&P Global Market Intelligence. Schreier adds that Xbox’s own average in the last six years is between 10 and 20 percent.

S&P Global analyst Neil Barbour told Bloomberg that Microsoft’s 30 percent target is the kind of margin “usually reserved for a publisher that is really nailing it.” This is despite its gaming division only landing at 12 percent in the first nine months of 2022, as quoted in the report.

A Microsoft spokesperson told Bloomberg that it views individual games and projects differently with regards to what constitutes success, adding that it sometimes has to making tough decisions, including ending development on games, so it can shift its resources toward the projects that are “more aligned with our direction and priorities.”

The new profit targets were introduced in the same year that Microsoft finally completed its $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, landing it hugely popular franchises such as Call of Duty and Diablo. Back in 2020 it acquired ZeniMax, the parent company of Bethesda, which means that long-running series like The Elder Scrolls and Fallout also now sit under the umbrella of Xbox’s gaming division.

Since 2018, Microsoft has been putting all of its first-party releases on Game Pass from day one, but this model has contributed to games failing to hit their 30 percent profit margin targets, according to Bloomberg’s sources. Xbox does offer developers a credit it calls “member-weighted value,” which takes into consideration factors such as the collective number of hours Game Pass subscribers have spent in a game, although this formula tends to benefit multiplayer titles the most. Going forward, Bloomberg’s sources said Microsoft is likely to favor funding games with cheap development costs and proven revenue-generators over riskier projects.

Xbox has been successful in bringing some of its first-party games to other platforms, including its primary rival in Sony’s PS5, with major titles such as Forza Horizon 5 and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle making the jump in the last 12 months. In the wake of Microsoft raising the price of Xbox consoles in the US last month, the second time it has done so in 2025, it also slapped Game Pass Ultimate with a 50 percent subscription fee hike at the start of October. This week the company increased the cost of Xbox dev kits by $500.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/microsoft-reportedly-ordered-its-xbox-division-to-boost-profits-to-an-unrealistic-level-150210398.html?src=rss

Breaches are an unfortunate reality of the digital era. Chances are, some of the companies you trust your data to are going to get hacked, and sensitive information stored on those servers is going to leak. If you’ve been online for a long time, that means quite a bit of your data is floating around various corners of the internet.

While there isn’t one centralized database for all the stolen credentials on the web, one researcher has compiled quite a large database, that you can check to see if your email address is affected.

183 million email addresses

Cybersecurity researcher Synthient has compiled a massive database of stolen credentials from sources across the internet, amounting to 3.5 terabytes of data. (That’s 3,584 gigabytes). The vast majority of this data—91% of it—has been noted by other researchers already. But because the database is so huge, the 9% that’s new represents a large pool of credentials we haven’t seen before.

The database itself contains 183 million unique email addresses, along with both the websites they were attached to, as well as the passwords used to log into them. According to security researcher and blogger Troy Hunt, 9% of that figure represents 16.47 million credentials that have never been reported in any previous data breach. Hunt reached out to “a bunch” of his subscribers to see whether any of them could find their credentials in this database. One subscriber verified that the database contained a password that they did previously use with their Gmail account, while another confirmed the database contained websites they frequently visited.

At this time, there’s no reason to believe the database isn’t legitimate. These 183 million email addresses—and their associated websites and passwords—are just floating around the internet, while over 16 million of them have never been seen before. Yours could be among them.

How to check if your credentials are in this database

The entire database of 183 million email addresses has been uploaded to Have I Been Pwned. The site catalogues websites that have experienced data breaches, as well as the accounts that were involved. All you need to do is enter your email address in the provided field, and Have I Been Pwned will check it against its database to see whether the address has been involved in any known breaches.

As such, if your email address is included in this latest database, it’ll show up here. It doesn’t look like any of my personal email addresses are in this database, but they’ve been included in plenty of other breaches.