Modder ‘jquaidark’ has released a brand new version of The Final Remastered Edition Mod for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. This mod aims to overhaul the graphics of this classic GTA game, and we highly recommend downloading it. According to the modder, GTA Vice City The Final Remastered compiles many mods from talented moders in … Continue reading Grand Theft Auto Vice City – The Final Remastered Mod Released →
A new study finds that some people really are "mosquito magnets" and it probably has to do with the way they smell. From a report: The researchers found that people who are most attractive to mosquitoes produce a lot of certain chemicals on their skin that are tied to smell. And bad news for mosquito magnets: they stay loyal to their favorites over time. "If you have high levels of this stuff on your skin, you're going to be the one at the picnic getting all the bites," said study author Leslie Vosshall, a neurobiologist at Rockefeller University in New York. There is folklore about who gets bitten more, but many claims are not backed up with strong evidence, said Vosshall.
The researchers designed an experiment pitting people's scents against each other, explained study author Maria Elena De Obaldia. Their findings were published Tuesday in the journal Cell. They asked 64 volunteers from the university and nearby to wear nylon stockings around their forearms to pick up their skin smells. The stockings were put in separate traps at the end of a long tube, then dozens of mosquitos were released. "They would basically swarm to the most attractive subjects," De Obaldia said. "It became very obvious right away." Scientists held a round-robin tournament and ended up with a striking gap: the biggest mosquito magnet was around 100 times more attractive to the mosquitoes than the last place finisher.
A game developer has expressed their frustration with Xbox's mandatory declaration that all Xbox Series X games must also run on its lesser-powered pal, Xbox Series S — Noting that the requirement can be, and frequently is, a hindrance to the forward progression of next-gen gaming.
As reported by VGC, these comments were made by Bossa Studios' VFX developer Ian McClure, speaking in a conversation on Twitter with Giant Bomb founder Jeff Gerstmann. Gerstmann had previously commented that the Xbox Series X/S "forced compatibility" was unlikely to be preventing forward momentum of development within the industry — the latter being a commonly referenced talking point by many gaming communities, regardless of their platform of choice.
However, McClure then offered up an alternate viewpoint, suggesting that the cheap Xbox Series model has been forcing awkward limitations on multiple studios and their respective game developers.
"It might sound broken, but the reason you are hearing it a lot right now is because MANY developers have been sitting in meetings for the past year desperately trying to get Series S launch requirements dropped," opined McClure in since-locked tweets. "Studios have been through one development cycle where Series S turned out to be an albatross around the neck of production, and now that games are firmly being developed with new consoles in mind, teams do not want to repeat the process."
While McClure might be the most recent developer to make these candid comments, they are most certainly not the first. Speaking with Gamerant, Rocksteady artist Lee Devonald pointed to the "lowest platform compatibility" dictum as a frequent thorn in the side of developers, suggesting that an "entire generation of games [are being] hamstrung by that potato." (It should be noted that Devonald was likely referring to the ruling as a potato, and not the Xbox Series S itself.)
And, in other testimony, Alexander Battaglia of the technically-focused Digital Foundry has noted that they frequently hear of studio frustrations, hindered by the Xbox Series S' reduced memory limitations and facilitating the need to adapt design plans specifically to fit a "next-gen" game's design onto the cheaper model. Xbox itself has recently updated its Xbox Series S dev kit model, freeing up additional memory space in order to allow developers to "stretch their wings" a little further.
No matter which way war, the global economy, or superstorms are headed, one thing remains constant: ransomware threats continue to persist and evolve. That’s not new information, of course, but understanding the sophistication of emerging attacks is useful for anyone responsible for defending vulnerable infrastructure. Cybercriminals continue to target more industries such as healthcare and education that might not be as well-equipped to defend themselves. New strategies have allowed them to do more damage.
The landscape continues to change, but staying informed is one of the best ways to protect your organization against the ever-present threat of ransomware. It’s no substitute for comprehensive training for your team and a safely object-locked backup solution, but it never hurts to know too much. Here are a few of the biggest stories in ransomware from Q3.
This post is a part of our ongoing series on ransomware. Take a look at our other posts for more information on how businesses can defend themselves against a ransomware attack, and more.
With businesses ramping up their ransomware protection, cybercriminals have begun shifting toward more so-called “soft targets” including hospitals and small municipal governments. This has proven dangerous, as not only do these targets have fewer resources to devote to cybersecurity, but a compromise of their systems can lead to real-world disaster.
Three different hospitals around the country—CHI Memorial Hospital in Tennessee, hospitals in the St. Luke’s system within Texas, and Virginia Mason Franciscan Health in Seattle—were all recently hit with ransomware attacks, causing widespread delays in patient care. This has become a sadly common story, as attacks continue on healthcare targets.
Ransomware groups have increasingly been targeting school systems as well. One such group, The Vice Society, were recently the subject of an FBI warning, identifying their activity as “disproportionately targeting the education sector” and that those attacks against school districts “may increase as the 2022/2023 school year begins and criminal ransomware groups perceive opportunities for successful attacks.”
Key Takeaway: No vertical is safe from the threat of ransomware, but the rise of these threats has led to greater protections specifically for soft target sectors. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has provided a wealth of tools for education, and companies have begun pivoting to create budget-friendly options for cash-strapped public sector CIOs.
2. Ransomware Gangs May Now Be Deploying “Triple Extortion”
This past quarter saw several high-profile attacks against larger businesses, including Cisco, Uber, and Rockstar Games, but it also saw signs that the ongoing war between black hat and white hat hackers may be entering a new realm.
In June, LockBit Ransomware was able to infect systems at Entrust, giving the ransomware gang access to nearly 300GB of data which they threatened to publish if their demands were not met. Entrust did not pay the ransom, and while the company did not claim credit for it, someone shortly after launched a DDoS attack against the site that LockBit was going to use to publish the data.
In retaliation, the Lockbit ransomware gang began actively recruiting DDoSers to begin executing a “triple extortion” tactic, layering the possibility of a DDoS attack on top of attacks via ransomware. In a post to a popular forum for black hat hackers, LockBit’s public face LockBitSupp wrote, “have felt the power of dudos [DDoS] and how it invigorates and makes life more interesting.”
Key Takeaway: Time and time again we see hackers creating new tactics, and simple non-negotiation doesn’t protect your business or solve for operational downtime. We’ve seen that paying ransoms doesn’t stop attacks, and engaging in counterattacks rarely has the desired outcome. Strong defensive strategies, like object lock capability, can’t block cybercriminals from accessing and publishing information, but it does ensure that you have everything you need to bring your business back online as quickly as possible.
3. The Geopolitical Landscape is Impacting Cybercrime
The Council on Foreign Relations recently released a bombshell report titled, “Confronting Reality in Cyberspace: Foreign Policy for a Fragmented Internet” that outlined the extent to which state-sponsored hackers have begun undermining American sovereignty through attacks. This dovetails with recent reports of the information wars between Russia and Ukraine spilling out beyond the battlefield. A report from Wired showed how pro-Russia group Killnet has launched cyberattacks against 10 different countries for supporting Ukraine.
This isn’t necessarily new information: the 2020 Homeland Security Threat Assessment calls out several nations, including Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran, as likely to employ cybersecurity attacks against the U.S. What is new is that the Senate voted $45 million in support of cybertools that are specifically earmarked to protect the U.S. power grid. Some groups—including the U.S. Government Accountability Office—don’t think that we’re doing enough. The impact here is that we’re not just talking about ransomware attacks exposing private data; we’ve evaluated as likely, and have started protecting ourselves against, attacks that will functionally shut down basic utilities.
Key Takeaway: As the lines blur between malicious hacking and state-sponsored attacks, the sophistication of the threats faced by most businesses and individuals will only grow. New laws and policies may eventually emerge to combat this trend, but until then it will be on you to ensure your infrastructure is safe.
The Bottom Line
The threat of cybercrime will only continue to expand in coming years. No matter what industry you’re in or what size organization’s infrastructure you have been tasked with protecting, continuous vigilance is crucial.
This week, the Uncharted: Legacy Of Thieves Collection came to PC, marking the first time Nathan Drake's Tombraider-but-a-bro adventures have arrived on our fair platform. It is also, err, a collection of the last games in the series. The bundle comprises Uncharted 4: A Thief's End and The Lost Legacy, a standalone Uncharted adventure featuring ladythieves Chloe Frazer and Nadine Ross (they are thieves who are ladies, they don't steal women). Uncharteds 1-3, on the other hand, are nowhere to be seen. In fact, the only way to play them on PC right this second is to buy an expensive PlayStation Plus Premium subscription and stream them via the cloud as part of the Nathan Drake Collection - a far from ideal solution.
This puts us PC lot in a bit of a pickle. Naturally, if you haven't played any of these PlayStation exclusives until now, you're missing three entire games worth of story context. So, is it worth starting with Uncharted 4? The short answer is, "Yes". The long answer is, "Yeeeeeeeeeees - probably".
Ah, but the story took a major turn on Tuesday, as Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier stepped into the fray with new information that supported Kamiya’s stance that Taylor wasn’t telling the whole truth. Taylor was reportedly offered $3000 to $4000 per session to voice Bayonetta 3, with five sessions likely being required (so $15,000 to $20,000 for the whole job). Apparently, Taylor turned down Platinum’s offer, asking for a “six-figure sum” and residuals from sales of the game. It was at this point Platinum walked away and recast Bayonetta 3 with Jennifer Hale in the lead, although word is they still wanted to bring back Taylor for a cameo, offering her $4000 for a single voice recording session, which she also turned down. Taylor has called this account is an “absolute lie,” but has provided no evidence to counter it, while Schreier’s reporting is based on actual documents and has been corroborated by other journalists.
Whew, got all that? Throughout all this, we haven’t received any sort of comment from Nintendo or Platinum Games on the situation, with many assuming we never would. Well, surprise, Platinum has finally issued a statement. It tries to strike a conciliatory tone, offering “sincerest appreciation” to anybody who’s contributed to Bayonetta over the years, while extending full support to Jennifer Hale as the “new Bayonetta.”
“We at PlatinumGames offer our sincerest appreciation to everyone who has contributed to creating the Bayonetta series over the years, as well as the community that has served as its foundation.
We give our full support to Jennifer Hale as the new Bayonetta, and align with everything in her statement. We ask people to please refrain from any further comments that would disrespect Jennifer or any of the other contributors to the series.”
This situation could have been handled better by many of the people involved, but it has brought to light some of the inequities of the voice-acting business. Perhaps that awareness will lead to something positive. Regardless, hopefully this doesn’t overshadow the release of Bayonetta 3 too badly, as it promises to be an ambitious celebration of the series as a whole.
Bayonetta 3 launches on Nintendo Switch on October 28.
A customer on Newegg recently a Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4090 through the retail outlet but instead of getting a graphics card, he got weights.
Newegg Customer Finds His Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4090 Box Is Filled With Weights & Not A Graphics Card
The Redditor who goes by the username, u/NuclearInnardsBeep, recently bought a Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card at Newegg. Upon getting the package shipped to him, the user found out that instead of a graphics card, the box had two sets of weights to fake the customers into thinking that there was an actual product inside. What makes this worse is that instead of responding back to their customer, the user account seems to have been locked out.
This isn't the first time that we are hearing of such a scam. We have seen some customers buying new graphics cards and ending up with either different graphics cards or even products and items that don't even represent an actual graphics card such as Sand.
We are in contact with @Newegg pertaining to the latest controversy and are investigating now. Likely will update in next HW News if we have one. We hope the user sees we want to buy the weights off of them for the video. Context: https://t.co/4jckEePxpu
The fact that this happened several months after Newegg apologized to their customers for such issues and promised to "Providing the best customer experience" shows that there's still a lot of work that needs to be done at Newegg in examining the products and making sure that customers get the product in pristine condition.
The after-sales services also need to improve if it's true that the customer had his account locked out upon asking for assistance. The other side of the story is that the user hasn't provided any details and it would have been quite easy to detect the weights unless the package was shipped to his doorstep which means that the only point he could know if his product was real or not was to bring it inside his house and open it up. Let's see if Newegg has something to respond about this and if the user has more information to share such as the reciept or the chat (if any) before his account got locked up.
If Hell is a teenage girl (as Diablo Cody once observed), then the title character in "Wednesday" is about as ordinary as high schoolers come.
Created by "Smallville" and "The Shannara Chronicles" duo Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, the upcoming Netflix series casts Jenna Ortega ("Scream," "X") as Wednesday, the infamously stone-faced, mayhem-loving daughter of Addams Family heads Gomez (Luis Guzmán) and Morticia (Catherine Zeta-Jones). It's a role that was originated in live-action by Lisa Loring, who was only six years old when she first played the Addams' ghoulish offspring on the 1960s sitcom "The Addams Family" (inspired by Charles Addams' satirically warped single-panel comics for The New Yorker). Most of the "Addams Family" movies and TV shows produced since then have similarly depicted Wednesday as a darkly comical spin on the evil kid trope established by films like "The Omen."
Christina Ricci, who many people now associate the most with the Wednesday character, was a bit of an outlier in that regard. She was already around 10 years old when she first played the role in Barry Sonnenfeld's 1991 film "The Addams Family," which meant she was a pre-teen by the time Sonnenfeld's sequel, "Addams Family Values," arrived in 1993. "Wednesday" takes things even further in that respect, casting Ortega (who turned 20 in September 2022) as a full-blown teenage version of its namesake. In a piece published by Interview Magazine, Ortega and Ricci — who, in a bit of meta-casting, costars in "Wednesday" — talked about this age change and how, slight it may seem, it makes Wednesday all the trickier a role to manage.
'You Don't Want Her To Be Nasty'
The joke at the heart of the Wednesday character, much like that for the rest of the Addams Family (well, perhaps not Uncle Fester and Cousin It), is that she looks like a fairly harmless, if rather pale, girl with pigtails. But she harbors a deep fondness for murder and all things macabre. Of course, it's one thing for a child to try and murder her brother or threaten someone with violence, and play it for laughs. (Kids sure do say the darndest things, eh?) It's another thing to try and do that with a teenager, as Ortega pointed out:
"... Another thing is every time we've seen Wednesday, she's been 5 years old, 10 years old. So when someone is saying really dark, twisted things out of a place of pure honesty and innocence, that naive aspect of a child, it's a bit different when you get older and become a teenager, because then you just sound like a b***h. You don't want her to be nasty."
Ricci agreed with Ortega, having gotten a first-hand experience of what that's like back when she played Wednesday for the second time. "The note back from rehearsals was now that [Wednesday is] a teenager, it just sounds nasty and bratty," she explained. This may also account for some of the creative choices in "Addams Family Values," like how Wednesday spends most of the film at a summer camp run by obnoxiously chipper counselors, so as to make her bloodlust and moodiness all the more relatable. It absolutely works, too, because "Addams Family Values" is one of the rare sequels that outdoes its predecessor across the board.
We shall see how Ortega fares as a teen Wednesday Addams when "Wednesday" begins streaming on Netflix on November 23, 2022.
Wherein we discuss horror movies, Elden Ring, Shovel Knight Dig, Scorn, Amnesia, Overwatch 2, battle passes, She-Hulk, Harrison Ford in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Batman Beyond, and the Super Mario Movie. Starring Ryan Scott, Justin Haywald, and Ryan Higgins, with special guest Josh Epstein.
Marvel fans went without a She-Hulk: Attorney at Law episode this week because of Season 1’s conclusion, and in light of the show’s finale, the term ‘Rule 63’ is being thrown around the internet again and we explain what it means.
The Disney Plus series ended on a meta note, when She-Hulk exited her own show in order to change the ending, and Jennifer Walters’ debut has received controversy throughout its longevity.
Created by Jessica Gao for Disney+ and based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law follows Jennifer Walters’ transformation into the green superhero, starring Tatiana Maslany, Mark Ruffalo, Jameela Jamil, Tim Roth, and more.
She Hulk: Attorney At Law | Official Trailer | DisneyPlus Hotstar
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She Hulk: Attorney At Law | Official Trailer | DisneyPlus Hotstar
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What Does Rule 63 Mean?
Rule 63 is internet slang that states for every male character, there is a female counterpart, and the term is also referred to as a meme.
The rule also applies to female characters that have a male counterpart and the meme first came about in 2006 during the “Rules of the Internet”, which came from a Netiquette guide on 4chan.
In response to this guide, many rules were created out of mockery, Rule 63 being one of them, and it soon became a general term used within a number of fandoms.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law – Cr. Marvel Studios, Disney Plus.
Examples of Rule 63 Characters
The idea that a genderswapped version of any character exists largely pulls from fan art, fan fiction, or cosplay, as two genders of the same character rarely exist in official canon.
Genderswapping is also very popular within the anime and manga community, where fandoms will regularly conceptualize romantic, gender-swapped relationships.
An example of Rule 63 in action comes from the creation of the character Bowsette, which is a female, genderswapped version of the antagonist Bowser from the Super Mario franchise, and the creation quickly became a meme in 2018.
Genderswapping is also very popular in comic-book fandoms, like Marvel or DC, and the 2016 reboot of Ghostbusters, starring four female protagonists instead of four male, is another light example of Rule 63, despite the four female protagonists being different characters to the original.
Marvel Fans Once Thought She-Hulk Was a Rule 63 Incredible Hulk
It’s no secret that prior to She-Hulk: Attorney at Law premiering on Disney Plus, some Marvelites were convinced She-Hulk was a Rule 63 of The Incredible Hulk, created purely for the series.
In some respect, She-Hulk is a Rule 63 Hulk and a canon one at that, however, the character has her own comic-book series independent of The Incredible Hulk’s narrative, meaning she was not created as a direct female version of Bruce Banner.
Jennifer Walters is her own character with a fulfilled arc, and the Rule 63 debate only demonstrates the controversy around the show which ended up dividing audiences.
Oh, God, I remember reading a comment where they thought they were just pulling a Rule 63 with the Hulk for this show… nevermind she's been her own character for 42 years now :P
Two state legislators in New Jersey are proposing a bill that would ban car companies from "[offering consumers] a subscription service for any motor vehicle feature" that "utilizes components and hardware already installed on the motor vehicle at the time of purchase." The Drive reports: The bill has one stipulation, however. The subscription would only be unlawful if there was no "ongoing expense to the dealer, manufacturer, or any third-party service provider." In other words, if an automaker or other associated party can prove that it costs money to maintain the feature and/or service in question, then it'd be legally allowed. This would include services like OnStar and such.
The way "ongoing expense" is interpreted is going to be key here, assuming the bill makes it into law. This, obviously, is not guaranteed. In theory, a car company could claim that over-the-air updates and their associated data costs constitute an ongoing expense. That means anything to do with connected features could theoretically be charged for. Since a car needs an internet connection in order to purchase subscriptions, well, that might make this particular piece of legislation worthless. On the other hand, if the core value of the subscription is derived from the pre-installed hardware as opposed to the data connection itself, then there is probably a case to be made.
Besides heated seats, the bill also mentions "driver assistance." That could be a problem for systems like Tesla's autopilot or General Motors' Super Cruise, both of which are going to a subscription model. Both of these systems cost money to maintain, though, especially Super Cruise. The system requires enabled highways to be scanned with Lidar. Tesla's AutoPilot and "Full Self-Driving" are also actively updated and maintained, which costs money. If automakers don't comply, they risk "civil penalties of up to $20,000 per violation," notes the report.
About three years after I graduated, I returned to the city where I went to University. Immediately after arriving, I embarked on an early-evening pilgrimage of sorts, my only goal to wander once familiar paths in an attempt to capture a spark of the life I no longer lived. As I ambled past houses that used to be homes, local haunts and darkened lecture halls, it was the differences that stood out the most. Pubs with names I didn’t recognise. Shops in locations that were more convenient than the ones I used to rely upon. Huge buildings that had seemingly sprung out of deserted scrubland. The city felt intimate yet alien. I was both a stranger and a local, a foreigner in a place I’d once adored.
I was thinking about this experience a lot when I was invited to play a short hands-on demo of Capcom’s upcoming Resident Evil 4 remake. Here is a remake of my favourite game ever made, a title I have replayed countless times in the 17 years since its original debut, and all I can do is think about the little things. Tiny alterations that feel much larger when surrounded by something so immediately recognisable. This was the same Resident Evil 4 I’ve always known, but one that feels bigger, better and more dynamic. I left my session excited to play more, cautiously optimistic that Capcom may be in the process of crafting their best remake to date.
"Good news, readers: After using nearly every virtual reality headset made in the last seven years, including the latest $1,500 goggles from Mark Zuckerberg's Meta, I've seen the best of what the metaverse could offer," writes the New York Times' Brian Chen. "Yes, the best is already here, and has been for quite some time. It's video games." An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from his report: At Meta's Burlingame office, I strapped on the Quest Pro to see what was new. Meta highlighted three features: the headset's higher-definition picture, which is receiving quadruple the number of pixels of its predecessor, the $400 Quest 2; the array of cameras embedded into the headset, which can now create a real-time rendering of your facial expressions and eye movements; and new motion controllers with improved pressure sensitivity so you can squeeze a virtual object gently or grab it aggressively.
Meta employees and app developers gave me an hourlong tour through software tailored for the headset. I created a digital avatar of my face that mimicked my grins and frowns as I raised a curious brow. I made 3-D drawings and tossed virtual darts. I found the improved graphics and controllers impressive (and my animated avatar a bit creepy), but after I removed the headset and returned to reality-reality, I could only imagine wanting to use these new features to play games. My favorite virtual-reality game, Blaston, which was released in 2020 and involves players shooting one another in a virtual arena, would probably benefit from the improved motion controllers to make trigger squeezes for the different guns more realistic.PokerStars VR, where gamers gather around a virtual card table to play Texas hold 'em, would be more fun if we could pick up tells through each player's facial expressions.
By the end of the demo, I was also doubtful that I would get any work done with this headset. In a promotional video for the product, Meta suggested that the Quest Pro could be a multitasking tool for workers juggling meetings while scrolling through emails and other tasks. But the device's battery lasts only one to two hours, according to Meta. (The headset can still be used while plugged in, but using a computer is less complicated.) This is the reality on which we should base our buying decisions. Not even Meta seems to believe many people will buy the Quest Pro. It said the device's target audience would be early adopters, designers and businesses. If you fall into any of those camps, I recommend a wait-and-see approach to gauge whether useful virtual-reality applications become available for your profession.
The company left a more obvious niche off its target list: hard-core gamers willing to spend lots of money on every piece of new gaming hardware. They are in for a treat. In addition to providing access to high-resolution virtual reality games made for the Quest Pro, the headset will work with hundreds of games already made for the Quest 2. Many of those older Quest 2 titles are quite good. Games that get your heart pumping and make you break a sweat, likeBeat Saber and FitXR, which both involve swinging your arms around to hit objects, are a boon in an era when people need to wear smartwatches to remind them to stand up. None of this -- a first impression that the Quest Pro will be great for playing games and primarily be used for entertainment -- is a bad thing. The fact that we can get visually stunning, immersive gaming in a lightweight, wireless headset means virtual reality has come a long way in less than a decade. For now, that's the only reason to buy one of these.
Stuntman-turned-director Chad Stahelski is keeping awfully busy these days. The "John Wick" creator is set to release the fourth installment of the action-packed franchise, and according to The Hollywood Reporter he has just been tapped to direct the upcoming "Black Samurai" movie for Netflix. Stahelski is teaming up with Leigh Dana Jackson, one of the co-executive producers of the superpower series "Raising Dion" to write the script, which will be an adaptation of Marc Olden's "Black Samurai" novel series.
Netflix hasn't provided much information regarding the film, but the "Black Samurai" book series is comprised of eight novels, all Blaxploitation stories set in the 1970s and centered on American soldier Robert Sand, who is on leave in Japan and learns the most powerful forms of martial arts to become the Black Samurai. It seems safe to assume that the film will focus on the vengeance plot of the first novel after terrorists butcher Sand's sensei (Stahelski has experience with revenge plots, after all).
Stahelski will also produce the film along with Jason Spitz and Alex Young of his banner 87Eleven Entertainment. According to THR, John Schoenfelder and Russell Ackerman of Addictive Pictures are also producing, and were "instrumental in securing the rights." This is not the first time Olden's story has been given the adaptation treatment, as prolific exploitation director Al Adamson ("Psycho A-Go-Go," "Dracula vs. Frankenstein") tried his hand with 1977's "Black Samurai." That film starred Jim Kelly (pictured above), whom martial arts film fans may recognize for his role opposite Bruce Lee in 1973's "Enter the Dragon."
Netflix Is All In On Black Samurai Stories
The "Black Samurai" movie will be the third (well, fourth if you count a character in the one-season series "Daybreak") time that Netflix has ventured into the world of Black samurai. The streamer currently hosts the animated series "Yasuke," which sees LaKeith Stanfield voicing the titular hero loosely based on the real-life historical figure of the same name. Yasuke was an African warrior who served under Japanese daimyo Oda Nobunaga during the Sengoku period of samurai conflict in 16th-century Japan, and has been borderline deified in the centuries that followed. Just last month it was announced that "Lupin" star Omar Sy had been cast to play Yasuke in a live-action series -- not based on the streamer's existing anime, but instead a more accurate interpretation of the figure's history.
"Black Samurai" takes a very different approach to the world of martial arts, but it's important to note that Marc Olden was a student of martial arts for his entire life. At the time of his death in 2003, Olden held advanced degree black belts in both aikido and karate. Aligning Olden's books with Chad Stahelski and Leigh Dana Jackson sounds like a perfect combination, and considering Netflix was willing to go full-on Blaxploitation appreciation with "Dolemite is My Name," this new film has all the ingredients necessary for success.
As you might be aware if you're a regular Wccfteach reader, the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has expressed concerns that Microsoft's potential acquisition of Activision Blizzard might foreclose rivals such as Sony in the growing cloud gaming market. As such, they recommended a deeper investigation into the massive deal worth nearly $70 billion.
In their lengthy reply, Microsoft carefully but strongly counters this point (and others) by somewhat downplaying the importance of cloud gaming in the present and near future.
Cloud gaming is a new and immature technology which the CMA has recognized faces significant challenges, particularly on mobile devices. While this may grow, particularly on mobile devices, adoption is not expected to be rapid as it requires a significant change in consumer behaviour. Research published by the CMA show that, both worldwide and in the UK, where cloud gaming app users had a choice between a provider’s native or web app on Android, around 99% of users used the native app, with 1% using either the web app or a combination of the web and native app. Microsoft and many industry experts expect that gamers on PC and console will continue to download the vast majority of the games they play.
[...] The Referral Decision rejects Microsoft’s views on the basis that they “fail to recognise the impact of cloud gaming services on demand for consoles, PCs, and games”, arguing that “cloud gaming services can be seen as an alternative for gamers to owning a console or PC”. This vastly overstates the relevance and importance of cloud gaming services in the gaming space at present and over the medium term. Microsoft agree that in future cloud gaming services may mean that hardware distinctions will become less important.
However, the reality is that today cloud gaming remains in its infancy and unproven as a consumer proposition. Evidence from Microsoft’s internal documents, data and third-party reports shows that cloud gaming services are not relevant in any meaningful way to gamers’ “demand for consoles, PCs, and games”, nor is this expected to change in next few years. No evidence is presented in the Decision to suggest otherwise.
Formerly known as Project xCloud, Xbox Cloud Gaming is indeed still in beta, and even the Xbox cloud division admitted that the best way to play is still locally due to latency. While this statement was shared nearly three years ago, the situation hasn't meaningfully improved, given that the 5G rollout is far from ideal.
At the same time, cloud gaming is the only way for Microsoft to get close to the aspirational goal of three billion users stated by CEO Satya Nadella. The PC and console markets are far smaller than that, while mobile has a big growth opportunity once 5G becomes more widespread. According to the latest Newzoo report, the overall cloud gaming market revenue for 2022 will be $2.4 billion, with a projected +51% CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) until 2025's estimated $8.2 billion revenue.
While Microsoft is publically dealing with the concerns of UK regulator CMA, we're still waiting to hear from the United States Federal Trade Commission. Brazil, on the other hand, already approved the Activision Blizzard deal.
Executive producers Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan say making their new Amazon show The Peripheral was like being “futurists with an infinite R&D budget.”
Christmas definitely came early for PC gamers this year. AMD has yet to show its hand with its next-gen graphics cards, but Nvidia and even Intel already have, and there’s a lot to talk about. Different approaches, yes, but extremely interesting nonetheless. Nvidia, true to form, has gone right for the jugular with its new flagship, the GeForce RTX 4090.
We’re running out of cliches to use when describing whatever Nvidia does next in GPU tech. The RTX 30 series was already pretty incredible, from the low end right up to the massive, power-hungry RTX 3090 family. The RTX 4090 is something else, though.
Naturally, the new generation is more powerful than the old. But the promises made of gains over the previous generation are mind-blowing. The new architecture promises to be another monumental leap forward. For years we’ve been talking about ray tracing and 4K gaming, and the RTX 4090 has arrived to make both of those the norm, and to provide a GPU unlike anything we’ve seen before.
Games have never had it so good.
About this review: This review was conducted using the RTX 4090 Founders Edition, provided by Nvidia for the purposes of testing. Nobody at Nvidia has had any input on the content of this review.
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 is available at major retailers
It starts at $1,599 in the U.S. for the Founders Edition and some third-party cards with extra features
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 went on sale on Oct. 12, 2022, at major retailers such as Amazon, Newegg, and Best Buy. Prices start at $1,599 in the U.S. for the Founders Edition and a selection of third-party cards.
Some third-party versions with extra features like custom cooling or factory overclocks cost more than the base price, but this will vary. As a high-demand item, the early stocks sold very quickly, but restocks will continue to happen.
Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 specs, hardware, and design
The graphics card is so big it might block slots on your motherboard
Despite its size, there wasn’t any noticeable sagging
It has lighting, but we’re not sure what triggers it
Specification
Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090
GPU
Ada Lovelace | AD102
GPU Cores
16,384
Base Clock
2235 MHz
Boost Clock
2520 MHz
Memory
24GB GDDR6X
Memory Bandwidth
1,018 GB/s
Memory Interface Width
384-bit
RT Cores
128
TDP (W)
450
Required System Power (W)
850
Everything about the RTX 4090 is huge. The spec table is huge, the price is huge, and the actual graphics card is huge. The Founders Edition actually seems to be the smallest of the bunch, but don’t let that fool you.
As we discovered when comparing it to a selection of other items, the size is potentially a problem. It takes up officially three PCIe slots in a PC case, and depending on your motherboard layout, you may lose the use of actual PCIe x16 slots. On my ASUS Prime Z690-P, for example, with the RTX 4090 in the top slot, I lose the use of a full-sized PCIe 4.0 expansion slot simply due to this card’s thickness. And custom coolers on third-party versions could be even worse.
The depth is also an issue, though not entirely just down to the size of the card. Coupled with the necessity (for many of us, at least for a while) of using the 16-pin to 4 x 8-pin adapter cable to provide power, well, you need a deep case. In my Lian Li Lancool 205 Mesh, I simply cannot get the glass side panel on when using the adapter. With a dedicated cable, I might, but realistically, Cablemod’s right-angled adapter is going to be the way for a lot of us.
Banana for scale
The PCB itself isn’t particularly large. It’s just all heatsink. The Founders Edition is essentially one giant piece of metal with fins on both sides to help airflow. It’s got two big fans at opposing ends and on opposing sides of the card. One thing it doesn’t suffer with, surprisingly, is sag. Despite its overall size and weight, it’s remarkably rigid. Indeed, my old MSI RTX 2080, which is significantly smaller than the RTX 4090, suffered much, much worse. I was expecting a support bracket to be necessary, but that hasn’t been the case. I still have one, just in case, but I am very surprised.
Despite being massive, the Founders Edition doesn't suffer from any sagging.
The Founders Edition also has very subtle lighting, but I’m not entirely sure what triggers it. The GeForce RTX logo lights up, as does a strip between the fan and the RTX 4090 logo. But the logo lighting was sporadic and would turn off randomly, and the strip never came on at all until I installed Corsair iCue for something completely unrelated. Regardless of how it turns on, it looks quite nice when it does.
The RTX 4090 12VHPWR to 8-pin adapter cable
Rectifying the power adapter mess doesn’t necessarily require a new power supply. While there are ATX 3.0 units starting to appear from brands such as MSI and Thermaltake, many more are already starting to offer a 12VHPWR to 8-pin cable that you can use on your existing unit. Check with your power supply manufacturer to find out more.
The RTX 4090 also falls behind a little in its lack of support for the latest display outputs. While it does have HDMI 2.1, it doesn’t have DisplayPort 2.0. That’s not a huge deal right now, but it’s not like you can add it down the road when it does become more relevant. This is a graphics card that could and should last for many, many years, and it’s a little hamstrung by not having the latest and greatest. Even Intel has DisplayPort 2.0 on its sub-$400 graphics cards.
Gaming performance
Literally nothing else on the market compares to the RTX 4090 right now in terms of performance
It’s so powerful that it practically demands you play games at 4K
You can even play games at 8K — if you have a display that can support it
The RTX 4090 is part of the GeForce family, which means it’s targeted primarily at gamers. However, I would question whether your average PC gamer would ever need to consider one of these graphics cards.
The performance is ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous. I love it, but I’m not sure I need it. I’m not sure anyone’s really ready for it.
The performance from the RTX 4090 is ludicrous and I love it.
When talking about the RTX 4090’s performance, there’s absolutely nothing to compare it to. Everything we’ve seen so far suggests as much as a 70% performance gain over the RTX 3090 in some scenarios. AMD will have to throw some serious heat to keep up, and until the RTX 4080 arrives, the 4090 is almost in a vacuum.
Either way, let’s look at some benchmarks. The tables below show what kind of performance you’ll get from the RTX 4090 in a range of games at both 1440p and 4K. In all cases, every single graphics setting was set to its highest, and we identified where ray tracing was involved. In some cases, you’ll see comparison data from the Intel Arc A770 16GB, a recently reviewed 1440p graphics card. The two aren’t remotely competitive, but it’s an indicator of just how far out front the RTX 4090 really is.
Benchmark
Intel Arc A770 16GB
Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition
Fire Strike Ultra
7,106
24,473
Time Spy (DX12)
13,412
35,278
Time Spy Extreme (DX12)
6,334
19,275
DirectX Ray Tracing
31.5 FPS
136.73 FPS
Toss in scores of 9,921 in the new 3DMark Speed Way test and a whopping 25,520 on the Port Royal ray tracing test, and the GeForce RTX 4090 is just making all the numbers go brrr. It’s without equal right now, and the DXR test between the A770 and the RTX 4090 shows that if you actually care about ray tracing at all, you still need to go for a high-end GPU. On that same test, the RTX 4090 is about 10x better than the old RTX 2080, the original high-end ray-tracing graphics card. So you can see how far we’ve come.
Next, let’s examine some games.
Game
RTX 4090 Founders Edition (1440p)
RTX 4090 Founders Edition (4K)
Intel Arc A770 16GB (1440p)
Forza Horizon 5
180 FPS
153 FPS
71 FPS
Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered
94 FPS (max RT, no DLSS)
190 (max RT + DLSS 3.0)
78 FPS (max RT, no DLSS)
159 FPS (max RT, DLSS 3.0)
68 FPS
49 FPS (w/ RT)
Gears 5
161 FPS
125 FPS
N/A
Metro Exodus: Enhanced Edition
113 FPS (w/ RT max settings)
130 FPS (w/ RT + DLSS)
72 FPS ( w/ RT max settings)
114 FPS (w/ RT + DLSS)
61 FPS (w/ RT normal settings )
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
205 FPS (w/ RT)
234 FPS ( w/ RT + DLSS)
121 FPS (w/ RT)
198 FPS (w/ RT + DLSS)
87 FPS
106 FPS (w/ XeSS)
Hitman 3
116 FPS (Dubai w/ RT)
141 FPS (Dubai w/ RT + DLSS)
92 FPS (Dartmoor w/ RT)
110 FPS (Dartmoor w/ RT + DLSS)
64 FPS (Dubai w/ RT)
118 FPS (Dubai w/ RT + DLSS)
55 FPS (Dartmoor w/ RT)
93 FPS (Dartmoor w/ RT + DLSS)
114 FPS (Dartmoor)
125 FPS (Dubai)
119 FPS (XeSS Ultra, Dartmoor)
55FPS (China, XeSS Ultra, RT)
Cyberpunk 2077
159 FPS
85 FPS (w/ RT Ultra)
128 FPS (w/ RT Ultra + DLSS 2.0)
121 FPS
77 FPS (w/ RT Ultra)
121 FPS (w/ RT Ultra + DLSS 2.0)
N/A
Watch Dogs Legion
99 FPS (w/ RT)
61 FPS (w/ RT)
99 FPS (w/ RT + DLSS)
N/A
The RTX 4090 almost makes 4K mandatory. I game at 1440p, and I have a really fantastic Dell 165Hz 1440p gaming monitor that I see no reason to part with. And yet, it’s completely beaten by the RTX 4090. There are games, such as Hitman 3, where you can really crank up the ray tracing, or leave DLSS off, and you’re within that 165Hz at 1440p. But most of the time, the RTX 4090 is crying out for more pixels to push.
It also makes 8K gaming a reality for the first time. Not just that it can do it, but it can do it at frame rates you might actually want to play at. I don’t have an 8K display to test on, and I don’t intend to buy one soon, but the information is out there.
Thermals and performance tuning
What is somewhat surprising is how well, the Founders Edition at least, handles, everything. Thermals, memory speed, fan speed — everything is great. OK, it draws plenty of power, but on stock settings, I haven’t seen it rise above 400W.
But there is so much headroom. The stock power limit is the 450W you see on the box, but the actual maximum power limit of the Founders Edition seems to be a ridiculous 600W — even with that sketchy looking, but I’m sure still perfectly safe, adapter. Tools like MSI Afterburner will allow the usual tweaks, increasing memory speed, core speed, and the power limit within whatever boundaries your particular card allows.
No matter what I’ve tried, on stock settings, temperatures will peak around 60-65 degrees Celsius, even when pulling 420W and using as much of the GPU as it can. Those two big fans and the giant heatsink do a pretty good job of keeping things cool without sounding like a jet engine. On past Nvidia graphics cards, I’ve often found the stock fan curves to be great for keeping the noise down but useless at cooling the GPU, but the RTX 4090 seems to have struck a happy medium. The fans will also stop turning at idle because the GPU will run cool enough that it just doesn’t need them. When you’re working for the day, you won’t hear endless fan noise in your ears.
There does seem to be some mileage that can be extracted from the RTX 4090, though. The graph below shows a set of results from the Unigine Superposition benchmark on the 8K optimized preset. In this instance, the core clock was fixed, but the memory speed was increased.
The almost linear scaling indicates that while Ada Lovelace seems to be memory bandwidth starved when GPU bound, there are performance gains to be had. At the minimum, we’d expect all RTX 4090 cards to be able to add between 1,000 and 1,500 offset with as much as 2,100 possible. Rough estimates in the same test put performance up to 75% improved on the RTX 3090. But that’s also taking into account a seriously overclocked, liquid-cooled RTX 3090 and a fresh-out-of-the-box RTX 4090.
For gaming, you can increase your benchmark scores and average FPS in the same way. For example, adding +1,000 to the memory added about 10 FPS average to Borderlands 3, while taking its power up to 450W. It will be up to you if you think that’s worth it. The unit I have seemed to run into stability issues when increasing the core clock up to 3 GHz, though its gains up to that point were minimal in games anyway. Even so, the Founders Edition didn’t come close to the 600W absolute limit, nor did temperatures ever exceed the low 70s. So if you’re into tinkering, you’ve got a playground to enjoy yourself in.
DLSS 3.0
The launch of the RTX 4090 isn’t just about the gargantuan power of the hardware. Nvidia has also launched the latest iteration of its DLSS upscaling technology, which requires a 40 series GPU to even run. There’s plenty to get into with it, but the tl;dr is more frames per second — sort of. According to Nvidia:
Building upon DLSS Super Resolution, DLSS 3 adds Optical Multi Frame Generation to generate entirely new frames, and integrates NVIDIA Reflex low latency technology for optimal responsiveness. DLSS 3 is powered by the new fourth-generation Tensor Cores and Optical Flow Accelerator of the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace architecture, which powers GeForce RTX 40 Series graphics cards.
The DLSS Frame Generation convolutional autoencoder takes 4 inputs – current and prior game frames, an optical flow field generated by Ada’s Optical Flow Accelerator, and game engine data such as motion vectors and depth.
Some have questioned whether it’s a true FPS increase or some kind of trickery. All I can say is that if you go on the results, then it works as intended. If you look really closely side-by-side with DLSS 3.0 on and off, you will be able to find faults. Edges can be softer, there can be a little more flickering akin to a DLSS performance mode, and you can probably pick out areas where detail has suffered. But here’s the kicker: You can only find these issues if you scrutinize really hard.
DLSS 3.0 seems capable of doubling frame rates, which is astonishing.
But if you play a game like a normal person, it’s almost indistinguishable, in part because you’re going to be getting some serious FPS. I haven’t tested Cyberpunk 2077 yet because it was only available as a pre-launch update through Steam, and it hasn’t been made available in the GOG version yet, but it has been added to Spider-Man Remastered, and the results speak for themselves. The visuals are still excellent, but the reported frame rates double. And when you’re stepping up to 4K (or even 8K) and using ray tracing, this kind of magic is welcome.
The list of titles getting DLSS 3.0 is currently fairly small, but there’s a good selection, including everyone’s favorite, The Witcher 3. I’m not really sure The Witcher 3 needs DLSS 3.0, at least not for the RTX 4090, but never turn down a little help in the performance department.
Encoding performance
This card has an NVENC encoder and an AV1 encoder
We found the RTX 4090 can render out a 4K60 clip at a 40,000 bitrate in under two and a half minutes
The 24GB VRAM makes using any piece of software a breeze
As a gamer rather than a content creator, I can appreciate the sheer monstrous power of the RTX 4090, but also that I could probably live happily without it. But its professional applications place this graphics card in a league of one. OK, so does the gaming performance, but it’s still mind-blowing.
For starters, besides the excellent NVENC encoder that many have become reliant upon, the RTX 4090 takes it up a notch with a hardware AV1 encoder. Decoding has been possible on RTX cards for a while, but this is the first time we’ve been able to go the other way. Our explainer on AV1 will help you understand why it’s a big deal. But what you’re not necessarily getting from AV1 on the RTX 4090 is faster encoding, since it’s about the same as regular old h.264 using NVENC.
Whether using AV1 or NVENC, the RTX 4090 is an encoding juggernaut.
That’s not to say the encoding performance of this thing isn’t supremely impressive. In DaVinci Resolve 18 Studio, the RTX 4090 can render out a 4K60 clip at a 40,000 bitrate in under two and a half minutes. Comparing the h.264 and AV1 exports in ICAT, it’s impossible to tell the difference in quality. The AV1 export is, of course, a much smaller file.
Beyond just exporting, the combination of the GPU power and the massive 24GB of VRAM makes using software like Resolve 18 a breeze. Even with high-resolution footage and timelines, there’s no sign of slowdowns or sluggishness. It simply devours everything as if it were nothing.
I also tried out AV1 encoding in OBS Studio. The feature is coming in a future update but can be tried out early in the version 28.1 beta. The sample clip below was captured at the “indistinguishable” quality setting (for the sake of a smaller file than a true lossless capture) at 1440p using AV1. Since the hardware encoders are separate from the bits of the GPU pushing the game, there’s no noticeable impact on its performance. And the RTX 4090 is such a beastly thing that it has absolutely no problem juggling both tasks.
The end result is fantastic as well. The file is smaller than a comparable non-AV1 encode but still retains all the detail.
Those are just two applications that make good use of the non-gaming parts of the RTX 4090. Others to add AV1 support soon include Discord, while XSplit also supports it. The simple explanation is that if you already use NVENC, the RTX 4090 will turn that performance up a good few notches. For content creators, this is a serious but smart investment. What may have taken more than one PC before can easily be achieved by a single machine with an RTX 4090. Just the horsepower alone makes workflows easier and quicker.
Should you buy the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090?
I know that you want to buy an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090, but should you? That’s more complicated than a simple yes or no answer.
You should buy the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 if:
You’re an enthusiast looking for the best of the best
You’re into overclocking
You’re a content creator or professional who can leverage GPU power
You intend to game at 4K or even 8K
You shouldn’t buy the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 if:
Your sole purpose is gaming
You aren’t gaming at 4K
The price is offputting
There are plenty of reasons to buy an RTX 4090 but those aren’t necessarily reasons why you should buy one. To most people reading this, I can quite confidently say you don’t need one. You could spend the money more wisely and build an entire PC for the same price. As exciting as it is, it’s completely overkill.
You have to game consistently at 4K if you’re entertaining buying one. There are still times that you can trip it up mildly at 1440p with a lot of ray-traced reflections. But largely, if you play games on this below 4K resolution, it’s just going to laugh at you. Nothing you can throw at this graphics card right now will truly phase it.
Moving to an RTX 4090 is like getting out of a Volvo and into a Lamborghini.
It’s also not necessarily the smartest buy if your sole purpose is gaming. It’s just so ridiculously powerful. Enthusiasts and those who enjoy overclocking and pushing hardware to its breaking point will absolutely love it, and largely need no justification to buy one. But even if it is up to 70% better at times than the RTX 3090, no games exist right now that are remotely challenging to it.
The RTX 4090 makes the most sense when combined with something else, whether you’re leveraging GPU acceleration in machine learning or creative work, or you’re looking for something to game and stream with on a single machine. When you step back from just gaming and appreciate everything else you get with this graphics card, it’s easier to make it make sense.
Generation on generation, the RTX 4090 is a huge leap and hasn’t come with a huge price increase. But it’s still very expensive and quite probably not what you need. But if you fall into owning one, you’ll have an insane experience. It’s like getting out of a Volvo and into a Lamborghini. Nothing can touch this graphics card right now. We’ll have to wait for Nvidia to do that to itself.
Hello again! In this GOG 2022 update, we want to talk about online games and their place on GOG. Many great titles designed to be played with friends are not available here, and we want to change that. For us, it is crucial that we explain our thoughts on introducing more online games and better understand how you feel about it.
GOG was founded as a place to preserve games and make them last forever. We believe in freedom of choice and are committed to developing GOG as a gamer-first platform where you can collect and play the games you love – from all-time classics all the way to modern hits.
For the last 14 years, we’ve built a catalog for various tastes: for those who want to (re)discover classics, the fans of CD PROJEKT RED games, for people who love unique indies and exceptional single-player hits. We’ve also added GWENT: The Witcher Card Game to scratch that itch for multiplayer online games. Introducing more online-only games on GOG will help us cater to the needs of our growing audience, who are seeking a broader range of games, which will also allow us to continue our efforts to make games last forever.
Many of you already enjoy playing online titles, while some might question “since online-only games require an internet connection, how is this DRM-free?”. It is not – online-only games that are designed to be played with others are a separate category of games.
Rest assured this will not influence our DRM-free approach. GOG will remain the best platform for single-player DRM-free gaming, with a dedicated approach to classics and game preservation – something that’s at the very core of who we are.
Going forward, online-only multiplayer games will be marked as such on the game page – it’s up to you to decide whether you want to play them.
We’re happy and proud of the value we are creating for you to enjoy single-player games on GOG. We believe we can also bring new, unique value to those of you seeking online-only experiences. We’re eager to listen to your feedback on that in the comments.
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This week, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson shifts into superhero mode with "Black Adam," a film he's been connected to for at least 15 years. I can't comment on the quality of that film as I haven't seen it (you can read our review right here), but based on the marketing alone, it looks like more of the same from the wrestler-turned-actor. And I don't say that in a disparaging way — The Rock has clearly found a niche for himself, acting-wise, and he's been successful. For the last several years, Johnson has more or less played the same character: a big, muscular guy who is charming, funny, and fond of wearing khaki. He's the perpetual leading man, too massive to be a supporting player.
But it wasn't always like this. When Johnson first shifted from wrestling to acting, his roles were more varied. He dared to stretch himself, especially in films like "Southland Tales," where he played against type. And then there was "Pain & Gain." Released in 2013, "Pain & Gain" happens to be the best movie Michael Bay has ever made, so it's only fitting that it also features The Rock's best performance. It's the last real film of his experimental, risk-taking phase; you can see the glimmer of the action-heavy leading man poking through the seams of the deranged, destructive character he plays in Bay's films. After this, Johnson's days of supporting roles were mostly done (save for his supporting turns in the "Fast and Furious" movies, and a supporting role playing himself in "Fighting With My Family."
But "Pain & Gain" shows us what could've been. Specifically, it shows us The Rock: Character Actor. Like another wrestler-turned-actor, Dave Bautista, Johnson could easily slip into more complex, challenging, character actor roles. But it doesn't seem like he wants to do that anymore, and again: that's fine. He's too big, in every sense, to fail, but that's also part of the reasoning behind his current filmography. He has almost no choice but to play the indestructible heroic lead — it's difficult for an actor to project vulnerability if that actor happens to be a giant muscleman with oodles of charisma and overwhelming confidence.
Fall To Extreme Levels
Based on a grisly true story, "Pain & Gain" is an inherently Micahel Bay movie — hyper-stylized, over-the-top, and almost shockingly cruel. And yet, Bay is firing on all cylinders here, making a "Wolf of Wall Street"-style send-up of abysmal human beings who want to be stinking rich, no matter what. The main character is muscle-bound lunkhead Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg, in the role he was born to play), a personal trainer and gym rat who talks a lot about the American Dream without seeming to know what that means. While Lugo speaks about earning the American Dream, it's clear that he has no real interest in earning anything. He just wants to take it, like his heroes, Scarface and "all the guys in 'The Godfather.'" In his mind, the fact that he's chiseled his body to perfection is all the work he needs. He looks great — so why shouldn't he be rich, too?
Lugo decides to get rich quick by ripping off one of his clients, odious jerk Victor Kershaw, played by Tony Shalhoub. Teaming up with his friend Adrian Doorbal (Anthony Mackie), Lugo aims to kidnap Kershaw and make the wealthy man sign over all his assets. But Lugo reasons they need a third member of the team, and they find one in Paul Doyle, played by Johnson. "Pain & Gain" takes plenty of liberties with the truth, and Johnson's character is based on several different real people. And in Johnson's large hands, Paul becomes the most interesting character in the film. Sure, he's muscular as hell, but he's not quite the massive hulk Johnson is today. He's also decidedly un-Johnson-like (especially since this is a supporting role; Johnson said when he first got the script he assumed Bay wanted him to play Lugo).
"The characters I play, whether it is an action drama or a family comedy, there [are] inherent qualities of those characters that were a part of me," Johnson said, adding:
"Even if they weren't heroic in the beginning, by the end they were pretty heroic. By the end, they were in a leadership position. By the end, everybody got better. This guy, Doyle, continued to fall, and continued to make poor decisions, and continued to fall to extreme levels."
Paul is a recovering addict who has turned to Jesus (Johnson wears several amusing Jesus-themed t-shirts throughout the film). He's the only member of the gang who seems to have a conscience, as well as street-smarts. When the group goes to buy weapons from a store that only serves cops, Paul is able to sweet-talk the clerk into helping them by using charm — something Lugo and Doorbal could never muster.
The Audience's Conscience
Despite his objections — "You can't just kidnap a guy and take all his stuff! That is so illegal!" he says when he first hears the plan — Paul goes along with the kidnapping. And while he's nice to Kershaw, the other two members of the gang torture the man until he gives them everything they need. That's not to say Paul is innocent — he freely keeps Kershaw prisoner, and even forcibly baptizes the hostage when he learns he's Jewish. Paul also goes along with the final stage of the plan: killing Kershaw. After failing several attempts to murder the man, Lugo finally instructs Paul to run him over — which Paul does. When they think Kershaw is finally dead, Lugo and Doorbal immediately point out that the murder was all Paul's doing, even though it was their idea.
But Kershaw lives, and the gang's days are numbered, although they don't know it yet. During this period, Paul spirals out of control. His sobriety goes out the window, and he begins drinking and snorting massive amounts of coke. Again: this is quite out of character for The Rock! Imagine him snorting coke in any of his new movies. Imagine if Black Adam swooped down from the sky and suddenly bumped a rail of white powder.
A series of unfortunate events befall Paul over the rest of the movie. His big toe gets shot off (he feeds it to a dog); he attempts to rob a bank only to get a face full of green dye; he steals the jewelry off corpses; he literally puts a pair of severed hands on top of a charcoal grill and cooks them to burn the fingerprints off (can you smell what The Rock is cooking? It's human hands). Through it all, Johnson goes big — but not too big. He plays Paul as a morally conflicted bag of energy; a guy who wants to do good, and come back to Jesus, but also a guy who is unable to control himself. As Johnson put it:
"One of the lengthy discussions I had with Michael is that this character will become the audience's conscience. When they want to see kindness, they'll see it through Paul Doyle. They want to see someone who is extreme, especially using external substances [like cocaine], they are going to see it through Paul Doyle."
Of course, it's worth pointing out that while Paul may be "the audience's conscience," he's still pretty awful (remember the "grilling some severed hands" thing I just mentioned?). He's just not as awful as his sociopathic conspirators.
'I'm Going To Jump Off This Cliff'
Bay's extremely bleak sense of humor comes through "Pain & Gain," and while Wahlberg's tough-guy scumbag gets the biggest laughs, Johnson's Paul is hilarious in how out-of-touch he is with everything going on. One of the funniest scenes in the film involves Lugo having to "get a pump in" in the midst of a new murder scheme. As Lugo pumps dumbells, Paul has a conversation with him, only to pause in the middle of that conversation to tell Lugo to "get it" with the weights. Even during this insane, bloody time, Paul still cares about being swole.
As Paul grows increasingly unhinged, Johnson perfectly makes the character morally gray and morally complex. He's the only human-seeming member of the gang, but his actions grow increasingly worse (again: remember that "grilling some severed hands" thing?). You can see Johnson wrestling with his own personality here, working hard to make Paul one of the most conflicting characters he's ever played. In other words, you can see Johnson putting in the work.
I'm not implying Johnson is lazy now — no one who can bench-press a tank is lazy. But the actor has settled comfortably into the type of roles that better reflect his personality, or at least the personality he wants the public to see. He's a hero — sure, Black Adam is supposed to be a villain, but we all know he'll become heroic by the end of the movie; that's how this works. But when I watch the man work in "Pain & Gain," I can't help but feel a little sad that we missed out on years of The Rock in character actor mode, playing complex individuals drowning themselves in booze and coke and struggling with their own inner turmoil.
When Bay was courting Johnson for the role, he sent Johnson a letter that stated "I brought you this role because of the complexities of it. I know there is no one in Hollywood but you who can do this." According to Johnson, the letter did the trick: "The fear went away. The insecurity went away. Okay, I'm going to jump off this cliff. It was one of the best decisions I ever made."
I'm sure The Rock is perfectly content making his current string of big blockbuster films, but I'll always be hoping he dares to jump off that metaphorical acting cliff again. Bring back Dwayne "The Character Actor" Johnson.
In A New Generation, the team talks about showing off Fallout 3 to Tim Cain, a creator of the franchise: and how Bethesda was able to move into the "next generation" of Fallout
Fallout Retrospective: How to Reveal a Fallout Live
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSePOZU2WsQ
As we move into the more polarizing parts of the series' history, this video features Todd Howard, and his role in presenting Fallout games to the world (and how he had the idea to do one giant presentation instead of multiple ones per game). We also get some talk about the pressure to succeed from Fallout 3 to Fallout 4.
No matter how some of these entries turn out, you can't really deny that Bethesda is one of the best in the business in terms of promising early gameplay.
Fallout Retrospective: The Great Green Debate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vnznzZFd_g
In one of the more interesting videos so far, Bethesda defends its "green color palette" in games, and talks about the "right" colors for the series. The team recounts "endless discussions about the color green."
The main point they hit is the need to really get it right for the Pip Boy UI, as the player is going to be looking at it constantly over the course of the game.
Last week, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game canceled the winter snow crab season in the Bering Sea due to their falling numbers. "Officials suggested that a combination of climate change and some kind of crustacean health crisis might be to blame," reports TIME Magazine. "But that's only part of the story, says Wes Jones, the Fisheries, Research, and Development Director for the Norton Sound Economic Development Corporation." The most immediate cause of their death: "a mass cannibalism frenzy." An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from the report: To understand what really happened in the icy depths of Alaska's Bering Sea this year means going back to 2017, when fishermen started reporting an unprecedented population explosion of juvenile snow crabs -- what is called, in crabber speak, a "recruit." The population boom continued into 2018 and 2019, creating what Jones says was the largest recruitment event on record. Jones is something of a local piscine historian. He can quote fishery statistics going back 30 years in the same way a Red Sox fan might quote batting averages. At the time the young crabs were too small for a legal harvest -- juvenile snow crabs take four to five years to mature -- but there were enough of them for seasoned crabbers to start the count-down to huge hauls starting in 2022.
In the meantime, Bering Sea temperatures, which usually hover around freezing, were on the rise, spiking several degrees between 2017-2019. Unlike mammals, who use less energy when temperatures rise, cold-water fish and crustaceans speed up their metabolism. The faster the crabs grow and expend energy, the faster they have to replace it, says Jones. Some of the crabs may have headed north into cooler Russian waters, but most seem to have stayed put. "All of a sudden you had this huge number of little crabs coming up, eating themselves out of house and home," says Jones. "Then the water warmed, which meant they had to eat more." It was a double whammy, he says, and the results were inevitable for a hungry, omnivorous species that has run out of its usual food source: "They basically cannibalized each other."
The Xbox Series S is apparently becoming a bigger problem for many developers, especially now that current-generation-only games are in the works.
Answering a tweet from Jeff Gerstmann regarding the console by Microsoft holding back games, VFX Artist for Bossa Studios Ian Maclure revealed that the reason why we are hearing this so much lately is that many developers have been trying for the past year to get the Xbox Series S launch requirements dropped, adding that the console has been an albatross around the neck of production in the previous development cycle and developers do not want to repeat the process.
Studios have been through one development cycle where Series S turned out to be an albatross around the neck of production, and now that games are firmly being developed with new consoles in mind, teams do not want to repeat the process. 2/2
What Ian Maclure revealed today definitely makes a lot of sense, as more developers are making their displeasure about the Xbox Series S known. A few days back, Rocksteady Senior Character Technical Artist Lee Devonald commented on the console, saying that the entire generation of games will be hamstrung by a potato.
I wish garners understood what 60fps means in terms of all of the things they *lose* to make the game run that fast. Especially taking into account that we have a current gen console that's not much better than a last gen one.
Series S GPU mostly. Multi-platform games always have to optimise for the lowest performer.
The Series S exists, though, and Microsoft won't let you launch on one without the other. An entire generation of games, hamstrung by that potato.
While developers aren't too happy the Xbox Series S, the console seems to have been embraced by the market, providing a budget entry in the current generation, as we highlighted in our review.
If you have a big display from which you want to play a massive library of games, if you have a shelf full of physical Xbox One, 360, and original Xbox titles, if you want to see the cleanest possible image presentation, then you want the Xbox Series X, not the Xbox Series S.
If your entertainment center is more modest, you have a 40" TV at the most or a monitor, and you just want to play the digital library of games you have, in addition to those coming in the future to services like Xbox Game Pass, then the Series S only makes sense. It will still play all of the games you want, and on a smaller screen, you won't even notice the visual differences. If you're looking for a way to play Xbox Game Pass titles are seldom much more, then the Xbox Series S is a perfect choice for you, and at the price point it's at, I predict that we'll see a lot more people entering the Xbox ecosystem this generation with Xbox Series S.
