Hasta La Gadget!

Google DeepMind has just revealed Genie 2, a world-modelling AI capable of creating 3D worlds and sustaining those environments for significantly longer. Genie 2 isn’t a game engine. It’s a diffusion model that generates images as the player (either a human being or another AI agent) moves through the world the software is simulating. All it needs to start is a single image prompt either generated by AI or from a real-world photo.

There are limitations: DeepMind says the model can generate “consistent” worlds for up to 60 seconds, with the majority of the examples the company shared on Wednesday running for significantly less time — most videos are between 10 to 20 seconds long. Image quality also softens and comes undone the longer Genie 2 needs to maintain the illusion of a consistent world.

— Mat Smith

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The biggest tech stories you missed

• Overwatch 2 will test 6v6 role queue matches starting December 17

• Android’s latest round of AI features improves accessibility, file sharing and more

• Samsung’s One UI 7 is out in beta, and it’s chock full of security features

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review

Great movie, good game.

Bethesda

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is here. Sure, that’s not Harrison Ford, but Troy Baker’s impersonation is an excellent Indie, augmented by the writing, audio and direction, which makes it feel like classic Spielberg and Lucas fare. The game has a few rough edges, but it’s all unashamedly Indiana Jones.

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Oura ring sickness detection comes to Ring Gen 3 and Ring 4 users

Wearers should have access to Symptom Radar by December 9.

Oura

Oura is rolling out its respiratory sickness detection feature to Ring Gen 3 and Ring 4 wearers. Users with an active subscription should get Symptom Radar by December 11. The feature looks at metrics, including resting heart rate, skin temperature, sleep data and breathing rate, to see if there are any differences from your baseline stats. If there are, Oura may inform you it has detected possible common cold- or flu-like symptoms. Just in time for the holidays!

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This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-intels-ceo-just-suddenly-retired-120401039.html?src=rss

It’s Thursday, which means that Epic Games has a fresh pair of PC games on its storefront for folks to claim for free. One of this week’s options is a humdinger. Until 11AM on December 12, you can snap up Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga for exactly zero dollars.

This is easily the best Lego game I’ve played, and probably the best Star Wars title. You don’t have to start with The Phantom Menace if that name still causes you anguish 25 years later, though you’ll play through the stories of all nine core Star Wars films. The game has that trademark Lego brand of silly humor with clever (and often very funny) riffs on famous moments from the movies. As you might imagine, Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is packed with Easter eggs. It looks terrific too. There are a lot of reasons why this was one of my favorite games of 2022.

Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is not perfect, though. Reports that developers at TT Games were pushed to work long hours to finish the game cast a dark shadow over it. In addition, the collectathon aspects may start to feel like a slog if you plan to reach 100 percent completion. Still, there’s potentially dozens of hours of family fun here, and you’ll be able to hop in gratis.

There’s one other free title on the Epic Games Store this week in the form of Bus Simulator 21 Next Stop. I hope that’s also a fun game for people who check it out, but I’ll never know myself!

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/lego-star-wars-the-skywalker-saga-is-free-on-the-epic-games-store-160712375.html?src=rss

If you’re an Android user, today is your lucky day; Google has announced a swath of new AI features for the entire ecosystem. Broadly speaking, the features make Android devices more accessible, but there’s something here for everyone.

For instance, one of the new enhancements, Expressive Captions, automatically generates subtitles that attempt to capture the emotion and intensity of what’s being said. So, let’s say you’re video chatting with a friend who groans after you make a lame dad joke. The feature will not only transcribe what they said, but it will also include “[groaning]” in the transcription. This works for other subtleties of human speech, too, such as when someone gasps or whispers something, and is compatible across Android, including streaming and social media apps. Per Google, Expressive Captions are available on Pixel 6 and newer Pixel phones, as well as “other compatible” Android devices.

Separately, Google has enhanced Android’s Image Q&A in Lookout feature. The latest version of the tool makes use of the company’s Gemini 1.5 Pro model to provide more helpful image descriptions. Image Q&A is primarily designed to assist blind and low-vision users, but in reality, anyone can use the feature to get Android to describe a picture in a natural-sounding voice.

Speaking of Gemini, Google is supercharging the AI agent with new extensions that provide better integration with some of the most popular Android apps. For instance, a new Spotify plugin allows Gemini to play your favorite songs for you and find playlists that suit your current mood. In the future, the company is promising tighter integration with Google Maps and even smart home devices that are linked to your Google account.

Additionally, Gemini now features the capability to remember things about you so that it can provide more personalized responses. For example, you can tell Gemini you’re a vegetarian, and the agent will remember that about you the next time you ask it to recommend a new dinner recipe. Google notes it has made it easy to view, edit and delete any personal information you’ve told Gemini to remember.

Google

Another more practical update comes in the form of a Google Drive feature called auto-enhancements. The next time you upload a scanned document to the service, it will automatically edit the image to optimize the contrast and adjust the white balance, as well as remove any shadows and blurring.

And if you want to share a file with someone, Google has made that easier, too, with an improvement to Android’s Quick Share functionality. There’s a new feature that allows you to transfer pictures, videos and documents by displaying a QR code on your phone. Using this tool, you don’t need to add the recipient as a contact or fiddle with your Quick Share settings.

Lastly, if you’re a Pixel user, you can look forward to all of the above features and more. Most notably, there are improvements to the Pixel Screenshots app. For one, now you can save things you find with Circle to Search directly to the software. Google suggests this feature will be handy for holiday gift ideas. Pixel Screenshots will now also automatically categorize your snaps for you and provide suggestions, such as calendar invites and directions, based on the information you saved. 

As with most Android updates, it can take some time for Google to roll out all the new features it announced today to every user, so be patient if you don’t see them on your device right away.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/androids-latest-round-of-ai-features-improve-accessibility-file-sharing-and-more-170020518.html?src=rss

EA has just made 23 accessibility patents open-source, as reported by Game Developer. This means that other developers throughout the industry can use the technology at no cost. The news comes after EA made a pledge back in 2021 not to sue rival companies for co-opting these types of tools.

As of today, third parties can openly use a whole lot of patented tech to improve accessibility for users. This includes new speech recognition tools, simplified speech tech in games and the ability to create personalized speech detection algorithms. EA says other devs can use this technology to “make it possible for those players’ speech to be more effectively recognized and reflected in-game in a way that is representative of their age, emotion, language and speaking style.”

There’s also an internal plugin for Unreal Engine 5 that went into the open-source pile. This one incorporates EA’s photosensitivity analysis tech, called IRIS, and should allow developers to quickly catch potential problems that could impact players with certain health issues related to vision or the nervous system.

Kerry Hopkins, EA’s SVP of global affairs, says this new group of open-source patents “encourages the industry to work together to make video games more inclusive by removing unintended barriers to access.” The company also says that this is just the beginning of its efforts to improve accessibility across the industry, as it’s going to start running accessible design workshops and expanding its testing capabilities.

This isn’t the first time EA has made some of its proprietary accessibility technology free for competitors. It has done so for the ping system originally found in the battle royale hit Apex Legends, which gives players a way to discuss in-game strategy without having to rely on voice chat. It also makes it easier to relay location data to teammates. The tech has popped up in other games like Call of Duty: Warzone and Fortnite.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/ea-just-made-a-whole-bunch-of-accessibility-patents-open-source-181131893.html?src=rss

OpenAI kicked off its “12 Days of OpenAI” series of livestreams with the announcement of a new, more expensive tier for its flagship chatbot. Starting today, ChatGPT users can pay $200 per month for ChatGPT Pro. Included in the package is unlimited access to the company’s latest model, o1, which following a limited preview earlier in the year, is now faster and 34 percent less likely to produce a major error when answering difficult real-world questions.

ChatGPT Pro also comes with access to GPT-4o, o1-mini and the company’s Advanced Voice mode, but the reason most power users are likely to splurge is the addition of an o1 “pro mode” that gives the chatbot additional compute power to reason through the most complex problems. “In evaluations from external expert testers, o1 pro mode produces more reliably accurate and comprehensive responses, especially in areas like data science, programming, and case law analysis,” OpenAI says of the feature.

In the future, OpenAI says it will add more “powerful, compute-intensive productivity features” to ChatGPT Pro, with some of those enhancements arriving as early as later this week and into next week as the company continues to show off what it’s been working on over the last 11 months. More broadly, ChatGPT users can expect support for web browsing and file uploads to arrive in the future, though during the company’s livestream, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman didn’t definitively say when those features would arrive.

For the rest of us, OpenAI will continue to offer its existing ChatGPT Pro subscription, which will continue to cost $20 per month and include early access to new features.  

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/openai-wants-200-a-month-for-its-most-advanced-features-191054506.html?src=rss