Nearly ten years ago, “Twitch plays Pokemon” brought together over a hundred thousand people to play Pokemon Red simultaneously, with each player’s keyboard commands registering as commands for one pixelated character. The evolution of technology has led to a new question, much like a Magikarp becoming a Gyarados. Seattle-based software developer Peter Whidden, has been…
Almost ten years ago, the online phenomenon “Twitch Plays Pokémon” convened over a million people to play Pokémon Red at the same time, with each player’s keystrokes registering as commands for the one pixelated avatar. Now, like a Magikarp growing into a Gyarados, the evolution of technology begs a new question: can AI play Pokémon?…
Microsoft has finally done it — nearly two years after first revealing plans to acquire gaming giant Activision Blizzard in a mammoth $68.7 billion deal, it has managed to secure the final regulatory clearance required to make Activision a fully-fledged subsidiary. But with one notable caveat. For the next 15 years, Microsoft is relinquishing cloud-streaming…
It has been a long time coming, but Microsoft’s near-two year attempt to buy gaming giant Activision is finally happening, after the U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) accepted a restructured proposal that addresses the CMA’s concerns about Microsoft dominating the cloud gaming market. The crux of Microsoft’s concession to get the deal over the…
French technology company Shadow has confirmed a data breach involving customers’ personal information. The Paris-headquartered startup, which offers gaming through its cloud-based PC service, said in an email to customers this week that hackers had accessed their personal information after a successful social engineering attack targeted the company. “At the end of September, we were…
This is a camera upgrade. Full stop. If photos and video aren’t your primary concerns when it comes to buying a new smartphone, there’s virtually no reason to upgrade from the Pixel 7 Pro to the Pixel 8 Pro (check Darrell’s review to see if the same is true for the Pixel 8). The Pixel…
Weeks after upsetting developers with a proposed runtime fee, only to quickly backtrack on the idea, Unity announced today that CEO John Riccitiello was stepping down from his multiple roles as president, CEO and board chair, going from having a ton of responsibility to having a lot of time on his hands. In a surprise…
Ohm’s Quest is a steampunk-inspired cubical device that acts as a sort of escape game console. You can scan an NFC-enabled card on a side of the cube, and it starts a new story with interactive challenges that you should solve as a team. While we don’t cover board games very often on TechCrunch, there…
Krafton India has launched a gaming incubator in the South Asian nation as it seeks to expand the local ecosystem and support the domestic talent looking to enter the fast-growing gaming market. Called Krafton India Gaming Incubator (KIGI), the program aims to support six to 10 teams annually, with the total duration ranging from six…
Epic Games is laying off 16% of its employees, impacting about 870 people, the Fortnite maker announced on Thursday. The company also announced that it’s divesting Bandcamp, an online audio distribution platform it acquired last year, and spinning off most of SuperAwesome, a kid-safe technology developer that it acquired in 2020. The layoffs news was…