Hasta La Gadget!

Apple has never been entirely keen on the idea of people hacking in to their smartphones, and here in 2013 its becoming apparent that developers of games for iOS devices aren’t finding the situation to be entirely positive either. What this week has turned up is the creators of Dues Ex: The Fall have included a code which, if your iPhone is jailbroken, will result in your complete inability to fire guns. And that’s important.

When you’re playing a game like Dues Ex: The Fall, you’ll find it rather difficult to get anywhere without the firing of guns. This news comes from Kotaku where users have flocked to flip out over the situation due to their full purchase of the game and essentially complete inability to play it. This game was released this week for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

When one downloads The Fall for $6.99 USD on the Apple App Store, it will work completely fine if you’ve got a factory-fresh iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. If you’ve taken the time to jailbreak the device, on the other hand, you’ll be unable to play.

At the moment it’s not entirely clear why the developers behind the game do not warn users that they’re so very against the jailbreaking process that they’ll stop anyone who does it from playing their game. Jailbreaking is not illegal at the moment here in the USA, just warrantee-breaking. Game developers certainly – again, at the moment – appear to have the right to initiate a break like this, but we imagine the situation wont be around for long.

At least, not with no warning as we’re seeing here.

UPDATE: It would appear that Square Enix has been quick on the pistol with a response to this public relations mistake of a release. These words were provided by the developers to Penny Arcade Report:

“We have not been clear in our communication earlier this week when we launched Deus Ex: The Fall. We did not state clearly that the game would not support jailbroken devices and so we will be switching this off via an update, so that all the supported iOS devices will be able to play the game in the near future

We feel it is the right thing to do in this situation and apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. No customer should be out of pocket when we were not clear from the start, so we’ll get the game updated as soon as possible so that everyone who wants to play Deus Ex: The Fall can do so regardless of whether their device is jailbroken or not.

As soon as this update is live we will communicate this via the Eidos Montreal Community channels” – Square Enix

This sort of situation has appeared with several other games in the recent past, notably Game Dev Tycoon which, having expected their game to be pirated immediately after having been released to the wild, added a bit of a break inside it.

As players played, they found their (pirated) game to be giving them massive amounts of bad sales reports due to in-game pirating. Irony at its best.

Jailbreakers beware: games continue to cut service to hackers [UPDATE: Statement] is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

What once was just a simple website for hosting online auctions is now a company that does so much more. eBay just launched a new service called Exact, which is essentially an online store dedicated entirely to 3D-printed products that shoppers can choose from and even customize, including phone cases, accessories, and jewelry.

The service comes in mobile app form only available on iOS at this point, and the experience will remind you a lot of Etsy, the online store where you can buy handcrafted products. eBay Exact does the same thing, except its for 3D-printed products only, and there are items from a handful of companies so far, including MakerBot.

Prices on items vary greatly. You can get a custom iPhone case for as low as $25, but products that are a bit more complex will cost more, including a 3D-printed ring that can cost as much as $350. Buying items through the app is very similar to paying for an item after winning an eBay auction. All payments are done through PayPal and orders are usually sent out 7-14 business days after payment was made.

Some products also have more customization options than others. A figurine may only have two options to choose from, but other items, like an iPhone case, may have an assortment of colors that you can pick from, choosing your favorite one.

While the 3D-printing craze has been around for awhile now, eBay’s entrance into the industry is still an early move for them, seeing as how 3D printing is fully mainstream yet. Plus, the company has plans to expand Exact with more items and more companies to offer their 3D-printed products. We reckon this is only the beginning for eBay’s adventure into 3D printing.

eBay Exact arrives for customizable, 3D-printed products is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Nokia has posted some sample images from its new half-camera, half-phone Lumia 1020. Since we weren’t allowed to shoot and keep any photos of our own during yesterday’s hands-on, for now we’ll have to draw conclusions from these official samples. If they’re at all reflective of real-world shooting conditions, we could be looking at something special.

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Nokia has apparently reinvented zoom with the newest addition to the Lumia family, the Windows Phone 8-powered Lumia 1020, with a 41-megapixel PureView camera. It lets you zoom after the fact and still see ultra high resolution detail and sharpness. Meanwhile, Microsoft underwent a huge reorganization moving most of the company’s high-ranking leadership into new positions.

Is the Lumia 1020 worthy of its $299 price tag? Are we excited Microsoft is streamlining its leadership and services?

We discuss all this and more on this week’s TechCrunch Gadgets Podcast, featuring John Biggs, Jordan Crook, Chris Velazco, and Natasha Lomas.

Enjoy!

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Intro Music by Rick Barr.

For your digital storage pleasure, today’s Amazon Gold Box has discounted a plethora of Sony memory cards and external hard drives. These are some of, if not the best prices we’ve seen on these items, and the variety means you should be able to grab exactly what you need at a great price. Start saving and storing. [Amazon]

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