Microsoft's Project Spark came around shortly after the release of the Xbox One. It was an ambitious concept in which players would have access to hundreds of assets and tools to form their own maps, levels and stories which would then be shared with everyone else. Unfortunately, it never quite …
Read More »Microsoft could have sold Lionhead, but it didn’t want to
When Microsoft announced earlier this year that it was closing longtime studio Lionhead, it was the end of an era. But it turns out that it didn't have to be. Many other companies wanted to buy up the studio rather than see it close, but Micorosft was unwilling to sell …
Read More »Microsoft’s UWP now supports variable refresh rates
Microsoft has caught a lot of criticism over the last few months stemming from its new Universal Windows Platform. While at first, many PC gamers were excited about the idea of more Xbox exclusive games heading to the PC, Microsoft's new platform was woefully lacking in necessary features and heavily …
Read More »Windows 10 will cost $120/£99.99 from July 30th onwards
When Microsoft initially unveiled its roll-out plans for Windows 10, one of the things it offered was a free upgrade to all Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 owners as long as they made the switch in the first year of Windows 10 being released. We are now coming up to …
Read More »Report says Windows 10 adoption is slowing down
While Microsoft may have managed to boost its Windows 10 numbers significantly over the last year thanks to things like automatic upgrades and free installs for those on Windows 7 or 8, a new report this week says that adoption is actually slowing down now. It only took Microsoft a …
Read More »Windows 10 locks down Cortana searches to Bing and Edge
Microsoft has been tinkering with a lot of features that launched with Windows 10 over the last year. The latest change made to the OS affects the Cortana feature, which is now completely locked to Microsoft's own Bing search engine and Edge browser. Obviously, this is the way Cortana ships …
Read More »Lionhead Studios is officially closing down today
After two decades as a staple game studio here in the UK, producing franchises like Black and White as well as Fable, Lionhead Studios is officially closing its doors today. We learned last month that Microsoft was ‘proposing' its closure after the cancellation of Fable Legends and now, it seems that …
Read More »Storing cat pictures in DNA: Microsoft buys up 10 million strands
While the world of mainstream computing seems to have finally caught on that an SSD is the only place to put your operating system, some companies are already looking to the future of long-term storage. One solution Microsoft is experimenting with, is very different than the norm: DNA storage and …
Read More »Remedy to address Quantum Break issues this week
While Quantum Break was a decent enough Sci-Fi shooter on the Xbox One, the game's PC version was definitely not up to par. However, Remedy is hoping to fix some of the most pressing issues with the PC version of the game later this week with a new patch and …
Read More »Microsoft and Google agree to try to stop battling in the court room
One of the more frustrating aspects of the tech world is the amount of lawsuits and legal complaints flying left and right between large companies. However, Google and Microsoft have agreed to make an effort to start to try to settle their differences outside of the court room going forward …
Read More »Microsoft testing ‘variety’ of new Xbox prototypes
While we know that at least Sony and Nintendo will be facing off soon with the PS4 NEO and the Nintendo NX, we haven't heard much about Microsoft's plans. However, according to reports, a “variety” of new Xbox prototypes are currently being tested, some of which do have upgraded internal …
Read More »Microsoft officially discontinues the Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is ten years old at this point and while it has served many over the years, it can't stay around forever. Today, Microsoft officially announced that it is discontinuing the Xbox 360, so once the existing hardware stock runs out, there won't be any more left to buy. …
Read More »Microsoft is suing the US government over cloud data searches
Microsoft is set to take on the US Justice Department in court claiming that it is “unconstitutional” to stop a company from informing its customers when their cloud data is being searched by the authorities. Microsoft's stance is that a customer has the right to know when a government obtains …
Read More »Microsoft to release three Surface phones next year
While Microsoft did initially buy Nokia to bolster its smartphone efforts with Lumia Windows Phones, the company has since moved away from the Lumia brand and will be expanding its Surface line of devices with smartphones. While the first Surface phones were expected this year, it looks like they won't …
Read More »Quantum Break’s PC version gives pirates an eye patch
Over the years, developers have come up with plenty of clever ways to mess with gamers playing pirated copies of titles and Quantum Break is just the latest example as the PC version of the game will give the main character an eye-patch if you did not buy it. The eye-patch …
Read More »There won’t be an Xbox One hardware upgrade like the PS4K/PS4.5
A few weeks back, Phil Spencer threw out the idea of an Xbox One mid-generation hardware upgrade and the reaction was pretty mixed. Since then, Microsoft has been going back on that idea, with Phil Spencer now saying that there won't be an Xbox 1.5, instead the company wants to …
Read More »Microsoft has officially begun shipping the Hololens
Microsoft's Hololens is one of the most interesting pieces of tech that the company is currently working on. While the likes of Sony, Oculus and Valve are chasing virtual reality, Microsoft is focussing on an augmented reality experience. The company announced that the Hololens would be selling to developers earlier this …
Read More »All Xbox One consoles can now double as dev kits
One of the big promises Microsoft made back when it first launched the Xbox One was the ability to turn any retail unit into a development kit. Now, after a couple of years of working on it, Microsoft is rolling out the feature but it does come with some fairly …
Read More »Microsoft: DirectX 12 adoption rate is fastest ever
It looks like developers are wasting absolutely no time in upgrading to DirectX 12 as Microsoft has revealed that its new graphics API has the fastest adoption rate of any DirectX version. DirectX 12 is the latest graphics API from Microsoft and it has strong ties to Windows 10, which …
Read More »Microsoft may reveal more AI bots today
While Microsoft's most recent bot, Tay, may have faced its share of issues after turning racist following its interactions with the Internet, the company may not have been deterred just yet as reports indicate that Microsoft might be revealing more AI bots later today at the annual Build developers conference. …
Read More »Microsoft’s impressionable teen-girl AI voiced pro-Hitler support
It turns out that even if you're a robotic teen girl, you can be just as susceptible to falling in with the wrong crowd, as Microsoft found when it launched its learning AI, Tay, on Twitter. Designed to converse with younger social networking users in a more engaging manner, as an …
Read More »Windows 7/8.1 will now have Skylake support until mid-2018
Earlier this year, Microsoft announced that it would not be supporting Intel's Skylake processors on Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 after July 2017. As you might imagine, this was seen as a very controversial announcement that was put in place to try and force those building a system using Intel's …
Read More »Would you sell back your digital games?
PC gamers have been getting used to digital-only gaming for years now and console gamers are adopting it pretty fast with this current generation of consoles. However, one of the big downsides to owning a game digitally is not being able to sell it on when you're finished, so over …
Read More »Microsoft launches Windows 10 preview with Edge browser extensions
Update: Just a few short days after our original report, Microsoft has officially launched a new preview version of Windows 10, containing a version of the Edge browser that officially supports extensions. Once public testing has wrapped up, everyone with Windows 10 will get access to the updated version of …
Read More »Universal Windows apps coming to Xbox One this Summer
Following a few weeks of building up, Microsoft has finally spoke out about universal apps coming to the Xbox One at the Game Developers Conference this week. At GDC, Microsoft announced that developers would soon be able to publish Universal Windows Platform apps (UWP) to the Xbox Store, on top …
Read More »Sony is open to discussing PS4 cross-play with other platforms
Earlier this week, Microsoft announced that it would be opening up Xbox Live to allow developers to implement cross-platform multiplayer on certain games. While Fable Legends was originally set to be the first game to show off this feature, that game has now been cancelled, so Rocket League will be …
Read More »Updated: Microsoft will continue accepting Bitcoin after all
Update: Earlier this week, Microsoft's support page was updated to say that the company would no longer be accepting Bitcoin transactions as a form of payment for Microsoft account credit, which could be used to make purchases on the Windows and Xbox Stores. However, it turns out that this was …
Read More »Microsoft will soon be testing Edge browser extensions
Back before the launch of Windows 10, Microsoft began talking about its new Edge browser and there has been plenty of talk about extension support but unfortunately, that got pushed back to 2016. Now, Microsoft is close to finally implementing extensions for the Edge browser, at first for Windows Insiders …
Read More »Xbox One vs PC: more gamers may soon face-off
Although there are always debates about who would win in certain titles: console gamers or PC gamers, it's not often been feasible, due to a variety of reasons, to have them find out. However now Microsoft may open it up to many more games, suggesting that theoretically, there's little stopping any …
Read More »Microsoft is dropping support for Bitcoin payments on its stores
The winds are constantly changing when it comes to Bitcoin, with values constantly rising and falling, so much so that Microsoft appears to have lost confidence in the digital currency and will no longer be supporting it or accepting it as a form of payment on its stores, including the …
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