It’s Monday, and you know what that means; another Engadget HD Podcast. We hope you will join us live when the Engadget HD podcast starts recording at 8:45PM. If you’ll be joining us, be sure to go ahead and get ready by reviewing the list of topics after the break, then you’ll be ready to participate in the live chat.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD
Summer may not be officially over, but as preseason football rolls in, many of our warm-weather TV shows are heading out. While we wait for the next Grand Theft Auto epic, Saints Row IV arrives on consoles ready to spoof gaming culture in the way that only this series can, along with Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist and Divekick. Finally, Thursday night keep an eye out for a re-air of Sharknado on Syfy, followed by the next shark movie it could crank out quickly — Ghost Shark (trailer after the break). Look after the break for our weekly listing of what to look out for in TV, Blu-ray and videogames.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD
The YouTube app for Windows Phone may be having some troubles these days, but the Android version continues to get better and better. Today, YouTube started rolling out a big update for users, with the headlining feature being in-app multitasking — meaning you can minimize a playing video while you search through the rest of YouTube’s trove of moving pictures. The feature allows users to minimize a playing video to thumbnail size with a single tap, which relegates it to the bottom right corner of the screen. From there, you can dismiss said video by swiping it left or right, and bringing it back to full size is accomplished by tapping the video or an upward swipe. In practice, we found that the feature really shines when building out music video playlists, as you can listen to the tunes you’ve added while you search for new ones. Plus, the shrunken video can get a bit jittery at times and is too small to watch (especially on a phone), but the audio plays flawlessly.
Multitasking’s not all users get with the new version, of course, as the update has also made playlists searchable and improved the YouTube Chromecast experience, too. Now, once you’ve hit the cast button in the app and tap to play a video, a window pops up with a thumbnail image, video description and the option to either play the video or add it to your playlist. And, along with that particular improvement, the entire app has been refreshed with Google’s near-ubiquitous card UI first favored by Google Now. The update has just started rolling out to some Android users today, with more platforms set to receive the new features soon.
Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Software, HD, Mobile, Google
Microsoft listed off a list of titles coming to Xbox One back at E3, but it’s Gamescom time, folks, and that means we get to find out about quite a few more games coming to the console. As of August 19th, the number of Xbox One games has grown to 50, with titles that should appeal to almost any kind of gamer. Battlefield 4, Call of Duty: Ghosts, and FIFA 14 will be coming with exclusive Xbox content, joined by 19 other titles that are exclusive to Xbox or will be arriving first exclusively to Microsoft’s console. Joining exclusives we already knew about like Killer Instinct and Forza Motorsport 5, are Powerstar Golf, Sunset Overdrive and D4, among others. Naturally, there’s a whole host of other games coming to the One as well, but we’ll let you peruse the full list over at the source link, so head on down to see what gaming goodness awaits in your next-gen future.
Filed under: Gaming, HD, Microsoft
Source: Xbox Wire
Ever since Oculus Rift hired Doom co-creator and legendary game designer John Carmack as Chief Technology Officer a few weeks back, he’s been hard at work on the Rift’s SDK. “John likes to do what he likes to do,” VP of product Nate Michell told attendees of an Oculus panel at GDC Europe this evening. “He’s got a ridiculous amount of good ideas that he’s working into the SDK. Especially around mobile, frankly,” he added, coyly teasing an update to the Oculus SDK that’s apparently coming sooner than later.
Mitchell’s speaking to the SDK’s promised Android support, which company CEO Brendan Iribe revealed as a forthcoming goal in an interview earlier this year. When asked by a panel attendee when iOS support is coming, headset creator Palmer Luckey smilingly admitted, “It’s Apple’s fault!” Mitchell quickly jumped in, explaining that the Android platform is simply more open to peripherals like the Rift. We’ll have more from Oculus as the week goes on, so keep an eye out for even more.
Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals, Software, HD, Mobile
Welcome to Engadget’s back to school guide! Today we’re talking HDTV. Head to the back to school hub to see the rest of the product guides as we add them throughout the month. Be sure to keep checking back; in early September, we’ll be giving away a ton of gear, including some of the picks in our guides.
This year’s incoming class of freshmen is facing more than just lecture halls and 8 AM classes — there’s a brand-new generation of consoles to deal with, not to mention the question of going 4K. Luckily we’re here to help, with suggestions for set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, remotes and more to make the dorm feel just like home, no matter what your budget is.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD, Samsung, Sony, LG
Now that Barnes & Noble is backing away from producing its own Nook tablets, it has less incentive to keep Nook Video as an exclusive. Accordingly, it’s opening things up by launching Nook Video apps for ordinary Android devices, iOS and Roku boxes. Like on Barnes & Noble’s own hardware, the new apps let US viewers buy or rent movies for streaming; users can also watch any content stored in their UltraViolet collections. The releases may not get customers leaving one of the many existing alternative services, but those who already have an investment in Nook Video can grab an appropriate app at one of the source links.
Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, HD, Mobile
Source: App Store, Google Play, Barnes & Noble
Gamescom 2013: the year that games strike back? Okay, maybe not, but this is a huge year for the world’s biggest game show — to the tune of 250,000 attendees in the days the event is open to the public. Sony’s PlayStation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One are getting their last big showing before going up for sale this holiday, and it sounds like we’ll get final launch dates for both consoles. Beyond that…well, we’ve got a video co-anchored by Joystiq reviews editor Richard Mitchell. Weigh in with your own expectations and gawk at our goofy mugs in video form just below!
Filed under: Gaming, Software, HD, Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo
Oculus Rift is a pretty incredible little peripheral, enabling intense and thrilling virtual reality interaction with a variety of PC games. While the device is still in developer kit form, though, finding and sharing games can be a bit on the challenging side. Oculus is making its first attempt to fix that issue today in launching Oculus Share, a web subdomain which gathers Oculus-ready experiences from a variety of devs and runs them through a submissions process before making them widely available.
There are few details on the submissions process, but it sounds like it’s merely a temporary concept. “Initially, we’ll be vetting submissions to make sure the content isn’t offensive or malicious. If you’re planning to submit your work right away, please be patient as we improve and streamline the approval process,” company head Palmer Luckey wrote in an email to Rift backers.
Oculus also hired on a new head of developer relations, Aaron Davies, who’s officially on the lookout for new developers. Of course, considering Oculus just hired one of the most famous developers ever just recently in John Carmack, we’d say other prospects have a mighty high watermark to reach.
Filed under: Peripherals, Internet, HD
Source: Oculus Share
Microsoft’s attempt to reinvigorate its aging Age of Empires game franchise most recently resulted in a free-to-play game distributed on the company’s (now shuttered) Games for Windows Live service. The game, Age of Empires Online, launched as a free title with two civilizations available to play as; any additional civilizations (initially) cost $20 apiece, a hefty price despite the amount of content therein (30ish hours per civilization). Longtime AOE fans, understandably, reacted negatively to the game’s business model, which took the content previously offered in full from older AOE games and broke it up into an a la carte, F2P title.
As Microsoft AOEO executive producer Kevin Perry told a crowd of GDC Europe attendees this morning in a panel titled “F2P the Wrong Way: Age of Empires Online,” the game outright “wasn’t ready for launch” when it arrived in Summer 2011. Though Perry ran through a variety of ways that his team helped to fix AOEO‘s course, he brought up one particularly interesting factor: Valve’s Steam game service. When the game hit Steam in March 2012, the game’s DAU (daily active users) spiked by more than three times — a larger bump than any other change by far, including new content (as seen in the above image).
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