The Artemis II crew is almost at the moon , and the astronauts spent this weekend carrying out preparations for their lunar flyby on Monday. That included manual piloting demonstrations, reviewing their science objectives for the six-hour observation period and evaluating their space suits, which are there for life support in the event of an emergency and for their return home. But, they've had plenty of time to take in the views, too and those views sure are spectacular. In the latest series ..

While the US and Anthropic are in the midst of a major dispute , the UK is trying to sway the San Francisco-based AI company to expand its presence on English soil. According to a report from The Financial Times , staffers at the UK's Department for Science, Innovation and Technology have worked on proposals that include expanding Anthropic's office in London, along with a potential dual stock listing. The UK's strategy follows a public fallout between Anthropic and the US Department of Defense ..

Pinball video games have been around for years I cut my teeth on Space Cadet 3D Pinball , which was pre-loaded on Windows 95. They range from realistic recreations of pinball tables youll find at arcades to games that could never exist in real life like 2019s Demons Tilt or older ones like Metroid Prime Pinball for the Nintendo DS or Pokmon Pinball for the Game Boy Color. I didnt expect to find a detailed pinball game for the humble and delightful Playdate, but a pair of developers working ..

There's finally a release date for the Spaceballs sequel but before you get too excited, it's a whole year away. As first reported by Deadline , Amazon MGM Studios announced on Friday night that the upcoming Spaceballs movie will hit theaters on April 23, 2027, right around the 40th anniversary of the first film. Several members of the original cast will be reprising their roles, according to Deadline , including Mel Brooks, Rick Moranis, Bill Pullman, George Wynder and Daphne Zuniga. ..

Instead of raising prices again, Netflix may have to lower its subscription costs in Italy. A court in Rome recently ruled that Netflix owed its Italian users a refund for price hikes between 2017 and January 2024 and a reduction to previous subscription costs. On top of the refunds, Netflix Italia would have to inform its affected subscribers of their right to a refund. The lawsuit was originally filed by Movimento Consumatori, a consumer rights organization based in Rome. The group's ..

Before it's publicly available later this year, the Irish government is trialing its Government Digital Wallet , which includes a way to verify a user's age to access social media platforms. In its press release , the government's Department of Public Expediture, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation said people can store digital versions of their birth certificates, driving licenses, European health ca

Welcome to our latest roundup of what's going on in the indie game space. As ever, we've got a whole bunch of new games for you to dive into this weekend, along with announcements and updates on several others that are coming down the pike. I love how spoiled we are for game showcases these days, and I'm really looking forward to the latest installment of the indie-focused Triple-i Initiative at noon ET on April 9 as the first two editions were really strong. The trailer for this one features ..

HarperCollins is tapping into AI to bring some of its book franchises to life. Specifically, the publisher is teaming up with Toonstar , an AI animation studio, to turn them into digital shows. The first project will be an adaptation of Lisa Greenwalds Friendship List series, which will also be joined by a graphic novel. Youd be forgiven for being unaware of Toonstar, a studio that received some buzzy early on for simplifying typically complex animation pipelines with AI, but has mostly ..

Jason Blundell, a former creative lead on Activision Blizzard's Call of Duty: Black Ops series, has announced that he's formed a new development studio called Magic Fractal Studios . Blundell announced the studio on a livestream with former Dark Outlaw Games coworker JC Farmer, a little over a week after the previous studio was closed by Sony . Little is known about Magic Fractal beyond its logo and social media accounts. Dark Outlaw Games was similarly mysterious, and closed before it could ..

Cutthroat capitalism sure does bring out the best in humanity. Take, for example, Elon Musk. He reportedly set a condition for banks, law firms, auditors and advisors who want to work on the SpaceX IPO. They're required to subscribe to the bastion of nonconsensual deepfakes and occasional Hitler praise known as Grok. Surely the best and brightest banks our nation has to offer would refuse such a pay-to-play demand, right? Well, no. The New York Times reports that some of them have agreed to ..

Take-Two, the owner of Grand Theft Auto developer Rockstar Games, has seemingly laid off the head of its AI division, Luke Dicken, and several staff members working under him. "Its truly disappointing that I have to share with you that my time with T2 and that of my team has come to an end," Dicken shared in a LinkedIn post spotted by Game Developer . When asked to confirm the layoffs in its AI division, Take-Two declined to comment. Dicken writes that his team was "developing cutting edge ..

Amid Microsoft's hacking and slashing of its Xbox division , you wouldn't be crazy for thinking State of Decay 3 was dead. After all, the title was announced nearly six years ago , and, well, we haven't heard much since. But the survival game is still in the pipeline, and developer Undead Labs will hold a series of playtests beginning in May. In the announcement, franchise co-creator Brant Fitzgerald emphasized the role of community input in the game's continued development. "We've read your ..

The Trump administration's labor board has ordered Amazon to recognize and bargain with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters union, which represents workers at a warehouse in Staten Island. This is just the latest chapter in a multiyear standoff between Staten Island warehouse workers and Amazon, according to a report by The Washington Post . The union has been trying to bring Amazon to the bargaining table for years to negotiate pay, benefits and workplace safety. The labor board's ..

I realized something was genuinely wrong with The Super Mario Galaxy Movie about 30 minutes in: I hadn't laughed even once. My audience of around 15 people, including a few families, was dead silent as well. The guy sitting behind me, a Nintendo fan decked out in Mario gear, was so bored he fell asleep. Sure, this is made for kids, but as a Nintendo devotee myself, and someone who has to watch a ton of children's films on repeat, even the Despicable Me films are more entertaining. To be fair, ..

For a 50-year-old company, Apple remains pretty hip and nimble. This week, Devindra and Senior Reporter Igor Bonifacic dive into Apple's big birthday, the state of the company today and what the next 50 years could bring. It remains one of the few PC companies thats still firmly committed to the idea of personal computing. Also, we celebrate the successful launch of NASA's Artemis II mission, which will bring us back to the Moon (but just for a close look). Subscribe! iTunes Spotify Pocket ..

The famous fan fiction website Archive of Our Own or AO3 has finally exited open beta, 17 years after it launched way back in 2009. AO3 is a nonprofit created by the by the Organization for Transformative Works. In an announcement, the team reminisced about its early days and how volunteers had to manually send out invitations to prospective writers. Upon launching the website on open beta, it only had 347 accounts and hosted 6,598 works. Now, it has 10 million registered users and is hosting ..

NASAs Artemis II successfully launched on April 1 , with its crew on a 10-day mission to circle the Moon. Its the first crewed Artemis flight and a major step toward humanity returning to our little neighbor in the future. Since launch, the vehicle has separated from its launch system and been manually piloted, testing how the Orion capsule will dock with future lunar landers. There have been some snags, however: The onboard toilet went awry, and Microsoft Outlook has been acting screwy . Jokes ..

The Integrity, the name of the Orion capsule carrying Artemis II astronauts on a trip around the moon, has left Earths orbit . NASA has announced that it has successfully completed a key burn of Orions main engine. That six-minute firing of the engine provided approximately 6,000 pounds of thrust, which gave the spacecraft the acceleration it needed to set it on its path to the moon. Today, for the first time since Apollo 17 in 1972, humans have departed Earth orbit, said Dr. Lori Glaze from ..

Ahead of its premiere , Dave Filoni has revealed that the Star Wars animated series Maul: Shadow Lord will return for a second season. The Lucasfilm co- president revealed that season 2 is already in the works, telling Esquire that "at the end of the day, people like that character." Filoni didn't reveal any other details about the plot or release date for season 2. However, the news isn't a great surprise given Lucasfilm's past history with its animated series The Clone Wars ran seven seasons, ..

For April Fools' Day, the developer of Look Outside released an update that added a new option to your interactions with NPCs: kissing. Instead of just fighting or talking to enemies and surviving neighbors in the cursed apartment building, you could give 'em a smooch. Their dialogue and sprites were updated accordingly, too. Cue stammering eldritch horrors with bright red blushing cheeks. April Fools' Day is (thankfully) over now, but there's good news for anyone who has been enjoying the ..

Sony Interactive Entertainment, owner of the PlayStation brand, has acquired Cinemersive Labs , a UK startup developing tools to convert 2D photos and videos into 3D volumes. The startup team will join Sony's Visual Computing Group , a research engineering team focused on graphical technology, including game rendering, video coding and generative AI models. Cinemersive's most recent product is a virtual reality app called Parallax that works as a viewer for parallax photos three-dimensional ..

Everyone's four favorite anthropomorphic turtles are returning to the world of video games. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City will be released on April 30 for the Meta Quest, Steam VR and Pico. It is made by VR game company Cortopia Studios and will retail for $25. Empire City is a first-person action game that youll be able to play solo or co-op with up to four people. And yes, that means all four of the turtles are playable. We've seen a lot of the quartet flexing their fighting form ..

In a surprise release , OpenAI has made ChatGPT's Voice mode available through Apple CarPlay. If you're running the latest version of both iOS and the ChatGPT app, and own a CarPlay-compatible vehicle, you can check out the experience. To get started, download all the necessary software, connect your iPhone to CarPlay and select "New voice chat" from ChatGPT. When the in-app text indicates ChatGPT is "listening," you can start a conversation. There are some notable limitations to using ChatGPT ..

The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission is suing Illinois, Arizona and Connecticut for attempting to outlaw or regulate prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket. The CFTC believes it has sole jurisdiction to regulate these platforms, and that states attempting to classify them as illegal gambling are overstepping their authority. CFTC defines prediction markets as designated contract markets where futures contracts are traded, essentially letting people bet on the outcome of events ..

Coachella officially kicks off next Friday, April 10. But for anyone who doesnt want to fly out to the desert or fork over upwards of $650 for a ticket, YouTube is going to livestream the concert for free so you can enjoy it on your own terms. Heres a quick overview of all the programming that will be available in just over a week. With YouTube planning on providing feeds of seven different stages, there will be no shortage of content. This includes the Quasar stage in both horizontal and ..

Publisher and game management platform indie.io just announced the pending launch of something called Indie Pass . This is a subscription service, so it's sort of like Game Pass but for indie titles. It launches on April 13 and will offer over 70 games on that date, with more coming down the line. Not a single person on this planet wants another monthly subscription to manage, but this one costs just $8. That's a pretty good deal, considering Game Pass Ultimate costs a whopping $30 per month . ..

Russia has closed a loophole that allowed its citizens to pay for Apple digital services. "As of April 1, 2026, payment processing is no longer available for purchases made on the App Store or other Apple Media Services in Russia," the company wrote in a support document (via 9to5Mac ). The change affects all Apple services. However, the company says iCloud+ subscribers' data will remain available after their subscriptions end, even after losing premium cloud storage. Customers' previous ..

When Google released Gemini 3 Pro at the end of last year, it was a significant step forward for the company's proprietary large language models. Now, the company is bringing some of the same technology and research that made those models possible to the open source community with the release of its new family of Gemma 4 open-weight models. Google is offering four different versions of Gemma 4, differentiated by the numberof parameters on offer. For edge devices, including smartphones, the ..

Uber is expanding its EV incentive program across the US. The company began testing the service in select cities last year. This is a program in which Uber offers drivers a $4,000 grant to switch from their current vehicle to an EV. These grants are available for both new and used electric vehicles, which is nice because new cars are expensive and could be out of financial reach for many Uber drivers. This program is available to Platinum and Diamond drivers who complete 100 eligible rides by ..

Flipboard has been one of the biggest boosters of decentralized social media . Now, the company, which is known for its social news reading app, is rolling out its latest experiment, "social websites." The project offers publishers and creators an easier path into what's often called the "open social web," which includes the fediverse, as well as other protocol-based platforms like Blueksy. The company says it could also help creators of all stripes wrest back control of their audiences from ..

After sharing pricing and availability for its new Mini LED TVs in March, Samsung is ready to detail some of the other TVs it introduced at CES earlier this year. The 2026 versions of Samsung's The Frame Pro and OLED TVs are both available to order today save for some notable exceptions and they start for as little as $1,200. The Frame Pro was originally introduced in 2025 as the more premium version of Samsung's popular The Frame art TVs. The big advantage of stepping up to a Pro model over ..

The four history-making Artemis II crew members are cooped up with each other in a tiny space for 10 days. And yet the most uncomfortable aspect of the mission might be having to deal with not one, but two instances of Microsoft Outlook . Commander Reid Wiseman sent a literal "Houston, we have a problem" message to mission control in the early hours of Thursday. He sought tech support for internet connectivity issues on a PCD (personal computing device), which is a Microsoft Surface Pro . ..

With gas prices rising across the country, consumers are turning to electric vehicles as a way to save money on their commute. And while there werent a ton of all-new EVs on display at the 2026 New York International Auto Show, we did see some notable debuts from automakers including Subaru, Kia, Hyun

Two fantastic indie titles just dropped for Apple Arcade . The platform has received versions of Dredge and Unpacking , both of which have been optimized for mobile devices. Dredge+ is the complete edition of the game, with all released DLC content. This is pretty much a perfect video game that combines fishing with bone-chilling horror. During the day, you sail around and fish, which involves a fishing minigame and a "pack the fish in the bag" minigame. At night, you are hunted by Lovecraftian ..

Every now and then, I test a gadget so wild that I cant believe a company actually made it. Soundcores $5,000 Nebula X1 Pro projector is the embodiment of that: an ultra bright projector and a 400-watt Dolby Atmos 7.1 speaker system combined in a massive enclosure. With a fast and flexible setup, it lets you screen movies or watch sports nearly anywhere. Its not just a projector crammed into a big speaker system, though. Everything is elegantly integrated and setup is nearly automatic, thanks ..

Jay Blahnik, who served as Apples Fitness chief for almost 13 years, has announced that hes retiring this July. According to The New York Times , Blahnik told employees in an email that he was leaving to spend time with his family and make an exciting move to New York City. Blahnik is retiring less than a year after The Times reported on allegations that he was "verbally abusive, manipulative and inappropriate towards his employees, creating a toxic workplace environment. Approximately 10 out ..

Google's $20 per month AI Pro plan , which includes Gemini, Veo and Nano Banana, got a big storage boost and some other new perks. Users of the plan (also available for $200 per year ) will see their cloud space jump from 2TB to 5TB at no extra cost. That extra storage can be used not only for AI but also Gmail, Google Drive and Google Photos backups. Gemini can now pull context from Gmail and the web for Drive, Docs, Slides and Sheets, provide summaries for your Gmail inbox and proofread ..

The Artemis II mission successfully launched into space on April 1, at 6:35pm Eastern time, from Launch Complex 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It will take NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, as well as Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, on a 10-day trip around the moon. This mission is the first crewed Artemis flight and will lay the groundwork for future trips to the moon itself, the first flight with a crew onboard the SLS rocket and Orion ..

Resident Evil legend Shinji Mikami's new studio, Unbound Inc., has been acquired by Shift Up, the company behind Stellar Blade and Goddess of Victory: Nikke . Unbound's unannounced games will be fully supported and distributed by South Korean publisher Shift Up, which is led by CEO Hyung-Tae Kim. Mikami is an icon of Japanese horror as the director of Resident Evil , its 2002 remake and Resident Evil 4 , as well as a founder of PlatinumGames and Tango Gameworks. Tango was responsible for The ..

In January, a Finnish-Estonian startup proclaimed it had developed a truly solid state battery, a holy grail for the technology industry. Donut Labs cell wasnt just solid state, however. It claimed it was made from cheap and easily available materials, would charge to full in a few minutes and last for hundreds of years. If real, such a device would change the face of the world, which is why plenty of people dont think it is. And, as the company makes more effort to demonstrate it is telling ..