Microsoft’s big experiment in real-world augmented reality gaming, Minecraft Earth, is live now for players in North America, the U.K., and a number of other areas. The pocket-size AR game lets you collect blocks and critters wherever you go, undertake little adventures with friends, and of course build sweet castles. I played an early version […]

Microsoft has confirmed via its official Xbox Twitter account that a discless, tiny Xbox called the Series S will be released alongside its forthcoming Xbox Series X. The Series S was initially leaked late Monday, first by Brad Sams on Twitter, and also by Walking Cat. The Xbox account tweeted an image fo the same […]

The pandemic has resulted in a growth spurt for gaming, an industry that was already growing on the backs of esports and Twitch streaming. So it makes sense that startups big and small are flocking to the industry to find their own place in the ecosystem. One such company is Shotcall, founded by Thomas Gentle, […]

After years of heel dragging, Nintendo finally opened itself up to the smartphone world in late-2016. The gaming giant hasn’t exactly opened the floodgates in the intervening years, but Fire Emblem Heroes, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp and Dragalia Lost have filled the void in some form or other. There’s something to be said for the […]

Nintendo looks set to release wireless SNES controllers for the Nintendo Switch, which likely means it’ll also be bringing classic SNES titles to its Nintendo Online virtual gaming library. The news comes via an FCC filing (hat tip to Eurogamer) , which includes a diagram of what looks very clearly to be the backside of […]

The future of gaming is streaming. If that wasn’t painfully obvious to you a week ago, it certainly ought to be now. Google got ahead of E3 late last week by finally shedding light on Stadia, a streaming service that promises a hardware agnostic gaming future. It’s still very early days, of course. We got […]

Nintendo has unveiled a new Nintendo Switch called the Nintendo Switch Lite. As the name suggests, this console is a bit cheaper than the original Nintendo Switch, but it comes with a few drawbacks. The biggest difference between the Nintendo Switch and the Nintendo Switch Light is that you can’t connect the Switch Light to […]

Microsoft is about to launch an even cheaper Xbox One S. In order to cut costs, the company is removing the BluRay disc drive altogether. According to leaked marketing images spotted by WinFuture (via Thurrott), the console could launch on May 7th for €229 in Germany. Given that the launch is just a few weeks […]

Singapore-headquartered esports startup Ampverse has raised $12 million in Series A funding led by Falcon Capital. The company says this is the largest Series A raised by an esports organization in Southeast Asia, based on data from PitchBook and other third-party platforms. The round will be used to expand in Indonesia and the Philippines, acquire […]

It has always been considered a matter of if, and not when, Nintendo would begin capitalizing in earnest on content from beyond the SNES generation. The company is finally showing its intent to do so today — but with an uneven approach that leaves some fans worried about its intentions for other all-time gaming classics […]

I have in my hands the Legend of Zelda Game & Watch, the second in Nintendo’s line of whimsical throwback handhelds clearly meant as stocking stuffers for those who already have (or can’t find) a Switch. It does a fine job, and the three old-school Zelda games included are great options for Nintendo-hard adventure that […]

The new generation of consoles is both a hard and an easy sell. With a big bump to specs and broad backwards compatibility, both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X are certainly the consoles anyone should buy going forward. But with nearly no launch content or must-have features they also fail to make a […]

When you’re hot, you’re hot. And 1047 Games is making the most of the heat generated by Splitgate, its first game and a now a breakout success. After working on a shoestring for years, the team has since May raised three rounds, the latest for a massive $100M. Co-founder and CEO Ian Proulx credited a […]

The New York Times is turning the popular online word game Wordle into a board game by teaming up with toymaker Hasbro. The media firm said Thursday that the board game, called Wordle: The Party Game, will be released this October in North America. You can pre-order it on Amazon, Target, and Hasbro Pulse for […]

After spending a few hours with the PlayStation 5 and its completely redesigned DualSense controller, I can say with confidence that the new haptics and audio features certainly work — and could become integral to the gaming experience. But only if — and it’s a big if — developers truly embrace the tech. The DualSense […]

The next generation of gaming is here with the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X — except it isn’t, because there are almost no next-generation games to play on them. Demon’s Souls is the first title that can truly be called next-gen, and it shows — even though it’s a remake of a PS3 game… […]

Minecraft is getting a free update that brings much-improved lighting and color to the game’s blocky graphics using real-time ray tracing running on Nvidia GeForce RTX graphics hardware. The new look is a dramatic change in the atmospherics of the game, and manages to be eerily realistic while retaining Minecraft’s pixelated charm. The ray tracing […]

Pokèmon Go creator Niantic has acquired a small SF gaming startup building a league and tournament organization platform to help gamers create their own communities around popular titles. Mayhem was in Y Combinator’s winter 2018 batch and went onto raise $5.7 million in funding according to Crunchbase. Other backers include Accel, which led the startup’s […]

Google announced today that Google Play Games for PC, a program that lets users play Android games on Windows, is now in available to all users under an open beta in South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, and Australia. The company introduced a limited test earlier this year with interested players getting to try out […]

Nintendo will never stop mining its past for new nostalgia-based products, but at least it tends to do so with aplomb and occasionally even generosity. The former at least is on display with the Super Mario Bros. Game & Watch, a standalone handheld that plays the first Mario game, its unbelievably hard “Lost Levels” sequel, […]

Sony is officially introducing its revamped PlayStation Plus gaming subscription service, the company announced on Tuesday. The new offering is called PlayStation Plus and will bundle Sony’s two current subscription services, PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now into one. PlayStation Plus is seen as Sony’s take on Microsoft’s popular Xbox Game Pass subscription service. PlayStation Plus […]

Nintendo has revealed that it now has more than 100 million annual playing users. The company shared the new milestone as part of its fiscal year financial results for the period ending in March 2022. The results show that the company’s annual playing users have been growing steadily over the past few years. Between April […]

As one of four general partners at Andreessen Horowitz who are now investing the venture firm’s third crypto fund, a $2.2 billion vehicle, Arianna Simpson is very focused on how to return that capital and much more to the firm’s limited partners. Toward that end, she has been more focused of late on startups that […]

Have you ever had the itch to watch Twitch on Nintendo Switch? Available now as a free download on the Nintendo eShop, the Twitch app lets users watch both live and VOD content on the go in handheld mode, or on the big screen when the Switch is docked. Since Twitch is best known for […]

As esports grows and creates opportunities for gamers to level up to the pro or streamer level, there is still a huge barrier in the way. There is not a wealth of training options for gamers. If you can’t get better within the environment of the game itself, then you’ve peaked. Practice makes perfect, but […]

eBay is acquiring TCGplayer, an online marketplace for collectible trading card games, in a deal valued up to $295 million, the company announced on Monday. The deal is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the first quarter of 2023. eBay says the acquisition furthers its commitment to trading card enthusiasts […]

Cloud gaming — however a company chooses to define that — is shaping up to be a big part of the next generation of consoles and other platforms. But Mario creator and Nintendo veteran Shigeru Miyamoto says his company won't be so quick to jump on the bandwagon.

Nintendo’s latest mobile game is now available for iOS devices, a day before its official target launch date. The game is based on the Nintendo game created in 1990 for the NES and Game Boy, and re-released/re-made a bunch of times over the years for various Nintendo consoles. Dr. Mario World, the iOS game available […]

The official Sega Genesis Mini is coming in September and hopes to capitalize on some of the retro gaming hype that turned the Super Nintendo and NES Mini Classic editions into best-sellers. But there’s already a modern piece of hardware out there capable of playing Sega Genesis games on your HDTV — plus Mega Drive, […]

Discs! What are they good for? Well, if they're nice if you don't want to be tied to an online-only ecosystem. But if you don't mind that, Microsoft's latest Xbox One S "All-Digital Edition" might be for you. With no slots to speak of, the console is limited to downloading games to its drive — which is how we've been doing it on PC for quite some time.