Author: Mobile Syrup

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Mobile Syrup

PlayStation’s Critics’ Choice sale offers up to 60 percent off hit games

PlayStation has a kicked off a ‘Critics’ Choice’ on the PlayStation Store, offering up to 60 percent off acclaimed PS4 and PS5 titles.

See below for some of the most notable deals:

Altogether, there are 336 “items” featured in the sale (some are different versions of the same game) — you can see the full list here. Deals end on February 16th.

Image credit: Square Enix

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Mobile Syrup

You can now remove movies and shows from Netflix’s ‘Continue Watching’ tab

Netflix has updated its in-app ‘Continue Watching’ section to allow users to manually remove TV shows or movies that they don’t want displayed front and center on the list, according to a new blog post from the company.

Netflix that the update went live on January 27th on all supported devices, including TVs, mobile, desktop, consoles and more.

To access the new feature on the desktop or TV app, simply head to the “Continue Watching” section, find the show or movie that you want to remove from the list and hover over it.  Click on the ‘X’ icon and choose a reason for removing it from the list.

The cleanup process works similarly on the mobile app. Head to the “Continue Watching” section, find the title you want to get rid of, tap on the three dots and “Remove From Row.”

While not a massive update, it does allow users to get rid of shows that would normally pop up front and center when you open Netflix, helping you avoid what could potentially be an embarrassing moment when you initiate the app in front of friends and family.

Image credit: Netflix

Source: Netflix

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Mobile Syrup

3-month PlayStation Plus membership is 50 percent off for new subscribers

From now until February 13th PlayStation is offering50-percent off a three-month PlayStation Plus membership.

Currently, the subscription costs $14.99, and on the 14th the price goes back to $29.99.

Unfortunately, this deal is not available for existing PlayStation Plus subscribers.

PlayStation Plus memberships allow users to play free monthly games from PS4 and PS5 titles. Additionally, users with PS Plus members have access to multiplayer games online and exclusive game discounts.

Source: PlayStation

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Mobile Syrup

3-month PlayStation Plus membership is 50 percent off for new subscribers

From now until February 13th PlayStation is offering50-percent off a three-month PlayStation Plus membership.

Currently, the subscription costs $14.99, and on the 14th the price goes back to $29.99.

Unfortunately, this deal is not available for existing PlayStation Plus subscribers.

PlayStation Plus memberships allow users to play free monthly games from PS4 and PS5 titles. Additionally, users with PS Plus members have access to multiplayer games online and exclusive game discounts.

Source: PlayStation

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Mobile Syrup

Musk says Canadians can expect FSD Beta to drop in February

Back in January, Elon Musk announced that Full-Self Driving Beta (FSD) for Tesla vehicles in Canada should release in roughly two to four weeks. We’ve now entered February, which is near Musk’s shared timeframe, and yet, FSD still isn’t available for Canadians.

However, in a Twitter reply to @NoahWebb_, Musk has raised hopes once again, stating that Canadians can expect FSD Beta to release later this month.

 

According to Musk, the delay in release is due to safety concerns, and because the team need to “confirm [there are] no significant issues, given slightly different road rules,” before proceeding with the rollout.

Though as we’ve seen in the past, Musk’s promises on Twitter should be looked at with an air of skepticism. Further, while delays are annoying, I wouldn’t consider Musk’s statements over the past few months to be empty promises, as Tesla employees have been testing FSD across Canada since February 2021.

This comes soon after Musk said that self-driving Tesla vehicles will be on road in 2022 and that the technology is safer than human drivers.

In other Tesla-related news, a Full-Self Driving feature that allowed some Teslas to roll through stop signs is now being disabled through an over-the-air update.

Source: @elonmusk

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Mobile Syrup

PS5, PC exclusive Ghostwire: Tokyo confirmed for March 25 release

Bethesda has confirmed that its upcoming PS5 and PC exclusive, Ghostwire: Tokyo, will release on March 25th.

While that date had been leaked by the PlayStation Store earlier this month, the publisher has now corroborated it. What’s more, a special Ghostwire-centric presentation has been set for Thursday, February 3rd at 5pm ET. Bethesda is promising “new gameplay and behind-the-scenes details” in the showcase.

Originally revealed back in June 2019, Ghostwire: Tokyo is a first-person action-adventure game from The Evil Within developer Tango Gameworks, the team overseen by Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami. The game portrays a Tokyo that has been overrun by paranormal Visitors, leaving Akito, one of the last living humans, to join forces with a spirit and save the city.

Ghostwire: Tokyo is one of many high-profile PS5 games this year, including this month’s Horizon Forbidden West, March’s Gran Turismo 7, May’s Forspoken and God of War: Ragnarök (TBA 2022).

It’s worth noting, however, that Ghostwire: Tokyo is expected to come to Xbox at some point down the line. As it stands, PlayStation has a one-year console exclusivity on the game, so it could, in theory, release on Xbox after March 25th, 2023. Interestingly, though, Xbox now owns Bethesda, which makes this the second Xbox Game Studios title to be published first on PlayStation, after last year’s Deathloop.

This will be PlayStation’s second showcase of the week, following February 2nd’s Gran Turismo 7-focused stream.

Image credit: Bethesda

Via: PlayStation

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Mobile Syrup

PlayStation will use Bungie to help launch more than 10 live service games by 2026

Earlier this week, Sony made significant waves in the gaming space by announcing that it will acquire Bungie for $3.6 billion USD (about $4.6 billion CAD).

Now, the company has revealed more about its plans for the Destiny studio during its latest investor call.

“The strategic significance of this acquisition lies not only in obtaining the highly successful Destiny franchise, as well as major new IP Bungie is currently developing, but also incorporating into the Sony group the expertise and technologies Bungie has developed in the live game services space,” said Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki. “Through close collaboration between Bungie and PlayStation Studios we aim to launch more than 10 live service games by the fiscal year ending March 2026.”

This makes a lot of sense for PlayStation. While the studio has built up a reputation for delivering massively successful single-player games like The Last of Us, God of War, Marvel’s Spider-Man and Ghost of Tsushima, it hasn’t had a major standout multiplayer title. By contrast, rival Xbox has lacked the same strong single-player output but has had multiple ongoing popular multiplayer titles, including Sea of Thieves and, most recently, Halo Infinite.

To compensate for that, PlayStation has largely relied on exclusive content and marketing deals with popular multiplayer games like Destiny or Call of Duty. Therefore, Bungie’s extensive history in creating successful online titles should prove invaluable in PlayStation’s efforts to expand its catalogue.

As for what those 10-plus live service games will be? Well, we have a few ideas.

In terms of Bungie, job listings from last year suggested that the developer’s new IP will be a multiplayer “character action” game, although it’s not expected to come before 2025.

Meanwhile, Naughty Dog is confirmed to be working on multiple projects, including a standalone multiplayer suite for The Last of Us Part II. The 2020 action-adventure game was originally supposed to have multiplayer like its predecessor, but it was scrapped in favour of focusing on the campaign.

And finally, Horizon Zero Dawn developer Guerrilla and PlayStation VR Worlds developer London Studio have been hiring for unknown online games.

Via: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Mobile brought in $93 billion in revenue in 2021, more than console and PC combined

While it’s no surprise that the mobile gaming market is massive, a new report sheds light on just how much it contributes to overall games industry revenue.

According to research firm Newzoo, mobile gaming made up 52 percent of the market in 2021, bringing in over $93.2 billion USD (about $118.2 billion CAD) in revenue last year alone.

To put these numbers into perspective, the mobile gaming market made more in 2021 than consoles and PC combined. Specifically, consoles generated $50.4 billion USD (about $63.9 billion CAD) in revenue, while PC accounted for $36.7 billion USD (about $46.5 billion CAD). That works out to a total of $87.1 billion USD (about $110 billion CAD), which is $6.1 billion USD (about $7.7 billion CAD) short of the mobile earnings.

Of that $93.2 billion USD, $16.4 billion USD (about $20.8 billion CAD) came from North America — a five percent growth from 2020. Asia-Pacific, meanwhile, dominated the market with $59.8 billion USD (about $75.8 billion CAD), which was a 7.9 percent year-over-year growth.

Interestingly, the report breaks the mobile figures down further by noting that $11.7 billion USD (about $14.8 billion CAD) was earned on tablets, while the remaining $81.5 billion USD (about $103.4 billion CAD) came from smartphones. However, there is no mention on the breakdown of Google Play vs. App Store revenue.

All of this data came from a larger Newzoo report commissioned by TikTok on the video-sharing platform’s efforts to reach mobile gamers. The full report can be found here.

Via: Android Police

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Mobile Syrup

Telus brings its PureFibre X internet to Edmonton

Telus has launched its new internet speed tier, PureFibre X, which offers upload and download speeds of 2.5Gbps, in Edmonton.

The carrier claims this is the fastest speed in Canada compared to other major internet providers.

It’s the only major provider in Western Canada to offer a 100 percent fibre optic connection to the home, Telus says in a statement. This means the network is built with the best fibre optics to ensure customers have the fastest available network. The 100 percent fibre option connection is “critical” to the function of PureFibre X.

The PureFibre X internet plan also includes a Wi-Fi 6 compatible router. Combined with PureFibre X, users have access to faster internet speeds over multiple devices resulting in simultaneous streaming in 4K, video conferencing, gaming, and more.

Telus first launched the service in Calgary over the summer.

Source: Telus

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Mobile Syrup

New update to revamp YouTube mobile full-screen viewing experience

After revamping the YouTube Music experience by testing a new ‘Add to Playlist’ interface, Google is now redesigning the way the YouTube video player looks on Android and iOS.

When you’re watching a full-screen YouTube video on your smartphone, you normally need to swipe up to gain access to the Like/Dislike, Share, Save and Subscribe buttons. With the update, however, all these buttons have been brought forward and can be used while viewing a video in full-screen mode.

The app looks the same in portrait, but the portrait mode never really needs work anyway as all the interactable buttons were available front and center, even while watching a video. The update makes the landscape mode more usable for mobile users as it eliminates the need to pull up the ‘more videos’ tab by swiping up, and relocates the section to a small floating button on the bottom right.

Comments are also viewable directly from the full-screen mode, unlike when users would previously have to exit full-screen mode, open the comments and then go full-screen again to be able to read the comments while viewing the video in landscape.

According to a statement given to The Verge, the new user interface started rolling out on Monday, January 31st for both iOS and Android devices. While the update hasn’t widely released yet, it likely should in the coming days.

Via: The Verge