Halo Infinite developer 343 Industries smashed a piano into pieces to record sound effects, the studio revealed in a new blog detailing many aspects of the game’s audio production. I really recommend watching the video of the piano-smashing at the top of this post. It’s quite satisfying.
But 343’s audio team didn’t just use the piano as a target for various blunt instruments. Before they smashed it, they placed a subwoofer on the piano to use it as a resonator. And after they had destroyed it, they put dry ice on numerous pieces of the piano’s remains, “which yielded a large offering of singing, bellowing, screeching and everything in between,” the developers said. Some of the resulting sounds are spine-chilling. (Interestingly, the audio team for Death Stranding also messed with a piano to record a variety of sounds for the game.)
In addition to detailing the destruction of the piano, the blog goes in-depth on things like how some gunshot effects differ between Halo 5 and Halo Infinite, the acoustic system that simulates how sound travels through the game’s environments, and how sound design differs between single-player and multiplayer. 343 also revealed that Halo Infinite will support the Dolby Atmos, Windows Sonic, and DTS Headphone:X virtual surround sound technologies, which will allow you to hear spatial audio even when you’re wearing stereo headphones.
If you love learning about sound and music in games, you should definitely put aside some time to read the whole blog and listen to what 343 is working on. It’s fascinating stuff.
Halo Infinite is currently scheduled to release this fall.
iOS 14.5 beta 5 is now available to developer beta testers. This comes as the beta testing process continues ahead of an expected release to the general public sometime this spring. iPadOS 14.5 is also available to developer beta testers today.
iOS 14.5 beta 5 s available to developers and public beta users via an over-the-air update in the Settings app. As usual, if the update does not immediately appear for download, keep checking, as it sometimes takes a few minutes to roll out to all registered developers. The build number for today’s update is 18E5186a.
iOS 14.5 and watchOS 7.4 include a notable change to the integration between iPhone and Apple Watch. For the first time, your Apple Watch will now unlock your iPhone when you’re wearing a face mask. Learn more about that in our full hands-on right here.
More new features in iOS 14.5:
New “Items” tab in the Find My app for tracking AirTags and other third-party accessories
iOS 14.5 code suggests support for Apple Card Family Sharing, but it’s unclear if this feature will make the cut for the final release
Horizontal boot screen on the iPad
Updates to the Music app, including swipe gestures, a lyrics sharing feature, and more
AirPlay 2 support for Fitness+ workouts
Waze-like features in Apple Maps and groundwork for business busy data
PS5 / Xbox Series X controller support
Other new releases from Apple today:
tvOS 14.5 beta 5 – 18L5193a
watchOS 7.4 beta 5 – 18T5190a
HomePod 14.5 beta 5 – 18L5193a
iPadOS 14.5 beta 5 – 18E5186a
macOS Big Sur 11.3 beta 5 – 20E5217a
If you spot any changes in iOS 14.5 beta 5, or the other new betas from Apple today, let us know in the comments below or on Twitter @9to5Mac. Stay tuned for our full hands-on coverage with the new releases right here at 9to5Mac today as we dig into all of the updates to find out what’s new.
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Enlarge / Now you can do all of these things but faster.
Rockstar Games
A couple of weeks ago, we reported that a Grand Theft Auto Online player sick of the game’s notoriously long load times took matters into his own hands, broke out the disassembler, and crafted his own fix. The long load times were due to the inefficient way that the GTA Online developers chose to parse and then sort the data in a large multi-megabyte JSON file.
The fix—created by a coder known as t0st—resulted in a 70-ish percent decrease in loading times, going by t0st’s own informal benchmarks. For players suffering from the JSON parsing issue, this means that they only have to wait perhaps one or two minutes to enter a GTA Online game, rather than the six-plus minutes they were previously stuck watching the loading screen.
In the two weeks since t0st’s fix was made public, GTA Online developer Rockstar got in contact with t0st and acknowledged that t0st had indeed fixed a legitimate issue with the game and that he’d be receiving a $10,000 payment under Rockstar’s bug bounty program.
According to PC Gamer, Rockstar communicated the following in a statement:
After a thorough investigation, we can confirm that player t0st did, in fact, reveal an aspect of the game code related to load times for the PC version of GTA Online that could be improved. As a result of these investigations, we have made some changes that will be implemented in a forthcoming title update.
There is no timeframe on when that “forthcoming title update” will be released, but in his original write-up of his fix, t0st explained that the core JSON parsing and storing problem “shouldn’t take more than a day for a single dev to solve.”
iOS 14.5 beta 4 is rolling out to registered developers and public beta users today, coming two weeks after the release of iOS 14.5 beta 3. iOS 14.5 packs a variety of new features including the ability to unlock your iPhone using Apple Watch, and beta four makes further refinements to these new features.
iOS 14.5 beta 4 is available to developers and public beta users via an over-the-air update in the Settings app. As usual, if the update does not immediately appear for download, keep checking, as it sometimes takes a few minutes to roll out to all registered developers. The build number for today’s update is 18E5178a.
Perhaps most notably, iOS 14.5 and watchOS 7.4 include a major change to the integration between iPhone and Apple Watch. For the first time, you can now use your Apple Watch to unlock your iPhone when you’re wearing a face mask. Learn more about that in our full hands-on right here.
Other new features in iOS 14.5:
New “Items” tab in the Find My app for tracking AirTags and other third-party accessories
iOS 14.5 code suggests support for Apple Card Family Sharing, but it’s unclear if this feature will make the cut for the final release
Horizontal boot screen on the iPad
Updates to the Music app, including swipe gestures, a lyrics sharing feature, and more
AirPlay 2 support for Fitness+ workouts
Waze-like features in Apple Maps
PS5 / Xbox Series X controller support
Other new releases from Apple today:
tvOS 14.5 beta 4 – 18L5186a
watchOS 7.4 beta 4 – 18T5183b
HomePod 14.5 beta 4 – 18L5186a
iPadOS 14.5 beta 4 – 18E5178a
macOS Big Sur 11.3 beta 4 – 20E5210c
If you spot any changes in iOS 14.5 beta 4, or the other new betas from Apple today, let us know in the comments below or on Twitter @9to5Mac. Stay tuned for our full hands-on coverage with the new releases right here at 9to5Mac today.
Read more about iOS 14.5:
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Google introduced swipeable Tiles for Wear OS back in 2019 as a way to offer information, such as the weather or a user’s fitness info, on a quick-access interface. The Tiles users can add to their smartwatches are pretty limited, though, and all of them are first-party offerings from Google or from their device’s manufacturer. That’s bound to change in the near future, because the tech giant has announced that the Jetpack Tiles library, which third-party developers can use to create custom Wear OS Tiles, is in alpha.
The fate of Google’s Wear OS has been hanging in the balance for a while now. It hasn’t gotten a new version in years, and some believe that the tech giant’s Fitbit acquisition could spell death for the platform. Regardless, Wear OS is still around, and Google has been rolling out small updates for it. Back in November, for instance, it added three new Tile options for those who want a shortcut to recent workouts, to weather information and to guided breathing sessions. The company says it will also roll out an update this spring that would give users access to any third-party Tiles that gets developed for the OS.
UPDATE 6TH MARCH 2021: People Can Fly has stepped in again to change the Outriders demo in response to complaints over a previous change designed to tackle heavy farming.
The developer issued a server-side update to enable the Gauss boss chest to drop legendaries after yesterday preventing all chests from dropping legendary items.
Update Regarding Chests Dropping Legendaries in the Outriders Demo:
Having listened to very reasonable community feedback, we have enabled the Gauss boss chest to drop Legendaries again as we should indeed be rewarding boss runs.
Other chests still cannot drop Legendaries.
— Outriders (@Outriders) March 6, 2021
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“Having listened to very reasonable community feedback, we have enabled the Gauss boss chest to drop legendaries again as we should indeed be rewarding boss runs,” People Can Fly said in a tweet.
However, other chests still cannot drop legendaries. This means the popular no combat triple-chest run previously available remains unavailable to those farming for legendaries ahead of the launch of Outriders on 1st April.
Eurogamer news cast: all about the Nintendo Switch Pro.
ORIGINAL STORY 5TH MARCH 2021: The Outriders demo has been popular – over two million people have downloaded it – but it also has a few issues the developers are keen to address.
Chief among them is heavy farming for powerful items, which players are doing in anticipation of the release of the game proper on 1st April 2021.
Progress in the Outriders demo carries forward into the main game, and you’re able to repeat much of the content in the demo, over and over again, in the hope of snagging a super powerful item from a chest or enemy.
So, players are farming the demo to fill their mod library and acquire multiple legendaries (I managed to snap a legendary myself while playing).
In a reddit post, developer People Can Fly said this “front-loading” of progression within the demo may impact the balance of the progression system in the main game.
“Of course, it’s every player’s decision how to play the game for themselves and we do not want to prevent people from farming the demo for gear if they enjoy it,” People Can Fly said.
“However, we would like to ensure that this process is not overly simplistic, easy or prone to exploitation.”
It didn’t take long for Outriders demo players to discover a “lootcave” via a triple chest-run, as well as a vendor exploit, and use them for heavy farming.
Here’s how it works (soon, worked): get to world tier level five (this gives you the best chance of a legendary drop available in the demo), select “confront the altered at the tower” story point from the lobby, load into the game and then run around opening the three chests nearby. No combat needed. Once you’ve opened all three chests, head back into the lobby and repeat.
In response, People Can Fly will issue a backend update to the demo at 3pm UK time today, 5th March, that redirects farming to mechanics in the game “that may be more enjoyable for players to play through and repeat”.
To that end, epic items will no longer appear in shops and vendors within the demo, and chests will no longer drop legendary items. Instead, side quest rewards (on repeat runs) will now have a chance to drop legendary items. The upshot of this is those who want to farm for legendaries in the demo will now have to actually play the side quests.
Of note: drop rates for enemies are not being changed. So, go ahead and kill that captain. Again and again and again.
Here’s my Outriders legendary snagged from the demo.
There’s more changing in the demo. People Can Fly said a patch, set to go live early next week, adds a motion blur toggle for all platforms, cuts down the matchmaking time, and tackles crashing on PC.
Moving towards the launch of the game, People Can Fly said it’s looking into the annoying camera shake during cutscenes, will improve the cover system, and is looking into a way to help players restore items that have mysteriously disappeared.
Meanwhile, People Can Fly said it has noticed cheating in the Outriders demo (that didn’t take long!), with some players using third-party software to alter the game files and save data in their favour. For an online co-op game, that’s obviously an issue.
People Can Fly said it can identify cheaters “with relative ease” via its backend system and promised “their actions should not affect your regular playing or your co-op experience”. Fingers crossed.
Solid stuff all round. Check out our Outriders demo impressions to see what we think of the game.
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Earlier today, CD Projekt Red announced that the second major patch for Cyberpunk 2077 will be delayed until late March, and it cited a recent ransomware attack as well as the patch’s extensive scope as reasons why. The company didn’t go into detail, but a report from Bloomberg cites anonymous sources who say that things are even worse than we probably thought. For employees, already facing the nightmarish prospect of hackers exposing personal ID information, “most” have been locked out of their workstations for the last two weeks.
With the ransom unpaid, developers can’t get into the VPN to access the tools they need from home, and they were apparently asked to ship their computers to the IT department so they could be scanned for malware. Cyberpunk 2077 was already a uniquely troubled project, and the recent attack is only making things worse. If you were planning on taking a trip to Night City once the major issues were resolved — or planning a replay once the DLC or next-gen upgrades arrive — you will probably have to stretch those plans even later into the year.
Ubisoft and Massive Entertainment have confirmed today that The Division 2 will receive more content this year, doubling down on statements made by Ubisoft’s CEO earlier this week during a call with investors.
The current season of The Division 2 is named “End of Watch” and wraps up a storyline and character arc that began all the way back in the first game. That fact, along with news of Division 2 developer Massive working on a big newStar Wars game, led many players to speculate that the most recent update, Title Update 12, was the last planned content update.
It turns out those players were correct. But since then, plans have changed. Massive announced today on Twitter and Reddit that TU12 was indeed the planned final update for the game, but that the studio is now changing course. It will release more content later this year, but had no additional details to share at this time.
“Today, we are thrilled to confirm that there will be additional content for The Division 2 released later this year! It is your continuous passion and support which enables us to continue to build upon The Division 2 experience, and we cannot thank you enough for that.”
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News of more Division 2 content was first vaguely announced by Ubisoft’s CEO Yves Guillemot earlier this week. During a February 12 call with investors, he said Massive would work with other Ubisoft studios together on the series. “You’re going to see more on The Division in this year and the year after,” said Guillemot. Today’s announcement from Massive specifies that players can look out for more Division 2 content and not some big new sequel from the looter-shooter franchise. Beyond that though, Massive’s announcement is vague and doesn’t really explain what kind of content will be added or when, beyond later this year. Almost as if they too didn’t know there was going to be more content until Guillemot declared it.
I don’t expect a Warlords of New York-sized DLC to be released this year, but instead more seasons of content with small new missions, and some new weapons added every few months. Not super exciting, but for fans of The Division 2 at least the game isn’t dead.
Thomas Mahler’s been making the news this week. The Game Director for Ori and the Blind Forest and Ori and the Will of the Wisps offered some strong criticisms of “snake oil salesmen” on Wednesday via ResetEra, taking aim specifically at Peter Molyneux, No Man’s Sky and Cyberpunk 2077.
As you can imagine, that led to some rather heated debate. Given that Will of the Wisps notably suffered with performance issues at launch, he’s been accused of hypocrisy in several quarters and criticised for a “reductive” viewpoint.
Since then, however, Mahler has issued an apology. Releasing a statement via Twitter yesterday, he’s backtracked on his previous comments and admitted that he “screwed up”:
My intention was definitely not to hurt anybody, but to offer up a discussion starter on current issues the industry is facing. We all share a common love for this artform and we should always remain respectful with each other. And I wasn’t yesterday.
Was Mahler right to apologise? Do you agree with his original points or did he get wrong this time? Let us know down below.
Apple’s new privacy feature requiring developers ask for permission to track iOS users for ad targeting is at last going live in the next iOS 14 beta with a planned full release some time this spring for non-beta users, the company tells The Verge.
The announcement coincides with Data Privacy Day, as well as a speech on privacy from Apple CEO Tim Cook later today at the Computers, Privacy and Data Protection conference in Brussels. Apple initially planned for the feature to go live with the launch of iOS 14 last fall, but it delayed its implementation to 2021 in September of last year to give developers more time to comply. Today’s announcement narrows the launch window to this spring, but Apple is not commenting further on when exactly we might see it to go live for everyone.
Called App Tracking Transparency, the new opt-in requirement will mark a significant shift in how mobile app developers are able to collect data on iPhone owners and share that data with other firms to aid in advertising. Prior to the change, Apple let iPhone owners dig into their settings to disable this type of tracking. Now, instead of forcing users to be proactive about disabling it, Apple will demand developers ask for permission or risk suspension or removal from the App Store if they don’t comply or try to skirt the rules.
The primary way advertisers are able to, say, know when you are shopping for a new hat on one app before serving you ads for that same hat on another app is that a unique identifying code, the so-called Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA), is linked to your device, collected by the first app, and shared with the second. That allows those apps to serve targeted ads and to measure whether the ad actually worked, for instance if you ended up purchasing that hat you saw in an Instagram ad by clicking an ad for the company’s online store in Google Chrome.
Apple’s new opt-in requirement will make it so developers must have express consent from iOS device owners to allow their IDFA to be collected and shared across apps. App makers can still use other information you give them for the purpose of targeting advertising even if you opt not to let the app track you, but that information cannot be shared with another company for the purpose of ad tracking under Apple’s new policy. The sharing with other third-party companies is effectively what Apple refers to when it uses the word “tracking.”
Apple intends to strictly police any attempt to get around the opt-in requirement. For instance, it says app developers will not be allowed to disable app functionality of any kind if users say no to the opt-in, and that developers will also be barred from charging money or incentivizing users with in-app perks or giveaways to sway their decision one way or the other. Any app that tries to replace the IDFA with another identifying piece of information, like an email address, will be in violation of the opt-in requirement.
Apple says the rules will also apply to its own apps, and the company already lets users disable personalized advertising the company serves within the App Store, Apple News, and the Stocks app using data it collects from your device. (It’s worth noting that ad personalization is not the same as ad tracking, and mobile app companies can still personalize ads so long as they can disclose that with an App Store privacy label.) Apple has no history of sharing the information it collects with other companies, either, and it makes that clear in its ad personalization toggle in the iOS settings.
This is expected to affect both the companies that run ad networks, like Facebook, and the companies paying for the ads, like the aforementioned unnamed hat seller. That’s precisely why Facebook has come out as arguably the biggest opponent to Apple’s new privacy measures, which include not only this new opt-in requirement but also app privacy labels it launched on the App Store last month.
Facebook has positioned itself as a champion of small businesses that risk getting hurt by this privacy change, and small businesses do rely on Facebook’s ad network and its powerful targeting tools to reach customers. Past privacy changes to Apple’s mobile Safari browser did also have legitimate negative consequences for ad-supported businesses like news websites. (The Verge is an ad-supported news website.)
But in full-page newspaper ads and statements to the press, Facebook has gone a step further and cast Apple as a hypocrite trying to exempt itself from the rules it forces on other developers and as greedy for encouraging app business models that rely less on advertising and more on subscriptions, of which Apple would theoretically get a cut.
“Apple has every incentive to use their dominant platform position to interfere with how our apps and other apps work, which they regularly do to preference their own,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on an earnings call on Wednesday. “This impacts the growth of millions of businesses around the world, including with the upcoming iOS 14 changes.” Zuckerberg added that, “Apple may say they’re doing this to help people but the moves clearly track their competitor interests.”
Apple has consistently defended its choice as a way to give users more freedom over their privacy and refuted Facebook’s claims it intends to hold its first-party software to different standards. The showdown has emerged as one of the largest and most visible tech company feuds in recent memory, though it’s clear now Facebook has little to no leverage in the situation despite its defensiveness and public posturing. The changes are imminent, and Facebook will be forced to comply as it was with the privacy labels last month.
To further hammer home its privacy philosophy, Apple has created a new online guide it’s calling “A Day in the Life of Your Data” that breaks down common ad tracking and targeting practices in the mobile app and web industries and presents statistics on the prevalence of these practices. Apple says the average mobile app contains six trackers that share your data with other apps, and that a “large and opaque industry has been amassing increasing amounts of personal data.”
“A complex ecosystem of websites, apps, social media companies, data brokers, and ad tech firms track users online and offline, harvesting their personal data. This data is pieced together, shared, aggregated, and monetized, fueling a $227 billion-a-year industry,” the guide reads. “This occurs every day, as people go about their daily lives, often without their knowledge or permission.”
