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This will be a tall order for coffee lovers. Sleep specialist and clinical psychologist Michael Breus says that the best way to mitigate sleeplessness is to cut off java consumption early in the day. “The No. 1 mistake coffee drinkers make that impacts sleep is drinking it past noon,” he told Well+Good this week. “Because caffeine can have a lasting stimulant effect, it can get in the way of your sleep and raise your risk of insomnia,” Breus added. If the idea of eliminating your afternoon cup is too much to bear — or bean, as it were — Breus says that you can stretch the cutoff time to 2 p.m. “Experts often suggest keeping away from caffeine for at least eight hours before bed, but you can adjust this based on your own sensitivity to caffeine,” he noted. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, around 80% of US adults consume caffeine every day — and research shows the first sip is the strongest. Within 45 minutes of consumption, 99% of caffeine is absorbed by the body. But the half-life of that caffeine — the amount of time it takes your system to reduce it to half of its original amount — ranges from 1.5 to 9.5 hours. Caffeine can make it more difficult to fall and stay asleep since it competes with adenosine, a naturally occurring chemical in the body that promotes drowsiness. Adenosine, a neurotransmitter, collects in the body throughout the day and helps to regulate sleep-wake cycles. Caffeine disrupts this process, keeping us wide-eyed when it’s high time for shut-eye. It’s important to note that everyone metabolizes caffeine differently. Genetics play a role in how long caffeine keeps you wired — some folks only need a single cup to power them through the day, while others maintain a full-pot habit. https://nypost.com/2024/06/13/lifestyle/sleep-expert-says-drinking-coffee-after-noon-causes-insomnia/

The US Supreme Court has unanimously rejected an effort to restrict access to the abortion pill mifepristone. The decision, which came two years after the court rescinded the nationwide guarantee to an abortion, was welcomed by pro-choice activists. The justices decided the plaintiffs, a group of anti-abortion doctors and activists, did not have a legal right to sue. But they left the door open to other attempts to limit the availability of the drug. Mifepristone is one of two drugs used in a medication abortion, now the most common method of terminating pregnancies in the US. The plaintiffs, known as the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, had argued that approval for the drug from US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) should be withdrawn. But during arguments on the case in March, several of the court's nine justices sounded sceptical that any of the plaintiffs had suffered harm from the availability of mifepristone - which is necessary to have the legal standing to sue. "The plaintiffs have sincere legal, moral, ideological objections to elective abortion and to FDA's relaxed regulation," wrote Justice Brett Kavanaugh for the court, "but they failed to demonstrate" any actual injury. "A plaintiff’s desire to make a drug less available for others does not establish standing to sue," he also wrote. The top court overturned Roe v Wade, effectively rescinding a federal right to abortion, in June 2022. Since then, 21 states have moved to restrict abortion earlier in pregnancy than the standard it had set. Seventeen of those have barred the procedure at six weeks or earlier. Thursday's ruling has no bearing on these laws - medication abortion remains illegal in states that prohibit abortion. But abortion pills have acted as an effective workaround to the bans, with thousands of pills flowing into restrictive states through the mail. Pro-choice activists were encouraged that access to abortion pills had been preserved, but warned the Supreme Court's decision was a qualified victory. At least three states - Missouri, Kansas and Idaho - have also opposed the FDA's approval of the drug in court. The Supreme Court's decision on Thursday does not rule out these future challenges. "This ruling is not a ‘win’ for abortion, it just maintains the status quo," said Nancy Northup, president of the pro-choice Center for Reproductive Rights in a statement. "The attacks on abortion pills will not stop here - the anti-abortion movement sees how critical abortion pills are in this post-Roe world." In a statement, President Joe Biden echoed those comments, saying the ruling "does not change the fact that the fight for reproductive freedom continues". "The stakes could not be higher for women across America," he said. Anti-abortion groups criticised the decision. But these groups, too, indicated the fight would continue. "It is a sad day for all who value women’s health and unborn children’s lives," said Katie Daniel, state policy director for Susan B Anthony Pro-Life America. "But the fight to stop dangerous mail-order abortion drugs is not over." Abortion is expected to be a leading issue at the ballot box this fall. Since Roe v Wade was overturned, it has posed a problem for some Republicans, caught between a base that opposes the abortion, and a general electorate that broadly supports access to the procedure. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2qq1wqw3w2o

Yes, it's that time of the week again. The time we write about Fortnite making its return to iOS! But hold the phone, this isn't about the UK or the US, but about Japan. Yes, you read that right, Japan's government and Diet (parliament) have passed a new law opening up mobile app stores. Naturally, Fortnite (and likely Sweeney behind the scenes) was quick to point this out as an obvious victory on their part. However, we do note that their promise is for the prompt arrival of Fortnite and the Epic Games Store to iOS (cough) in late 2025 (cough). What does this tell us? Well, it might indicate the international rollout of the Epic Games store may slide into 2025 anyway. Legislation doesn't take place overnight of course, and given the time to put it in place (and assuming any legal challenges don't take too long) late 2025 is a sadly quite realistic timeframe, especially given this is the same date it's projected to arrive in the UK too. So what else? Japan's new law is effectively the same as other legislation like the DMA and other proposed changes in the US. Basically, Japan has legislated that neither Google nor Apple can prevent competing services, like alternative app stores, from being sold on their storefronts. It's yet another move to open up the app ecosystem, something Apple has railed against on the grounds of security. For the average user and mobile gamer, this could prompt a wave of new stores offering exciting incentives for adoption, or a whole new era of confusion. Either way, however, it looks like a real sea-change in favour of companies that have duked it out with Apple for years, like Epic Games. Still, there's no reason to go running to alternative app stores just yet. Especially with new games coming out weekly. Speaking of, why not take a look at the latest entry in our regular feature of the top five new mobile games to try this week? https://www.pocketgamer.com/fortnite/coming-to-ios-in-japan/

Rumor mill The highly anticipated Xbox Games Showcase is just days away, with the event scheduled to kick off on June 9. Ahead of that, a report from The Verge's Tom Warren has revealed a lot of what could appear at the showcase, including the release date for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, a new Doom game called Dark Ages, a Halo: Combat Evolved remaster for PS5, a fresh look at the new Fable, and more. You can subscribe to Warren's newsletter to get all the information directly from the source. In this gallery, we're running through some of the information from the report. Bear in mind, all of this information is unofficial and should be taken with a grain of salt prior to the Xbox Games Showcase. There may also be additional announcements and surprises to come that haven't been leaked as of yet, so keep checking back with GameSpot for the latest. Microsoft is conducting its Xbox Games Showcase amid a tumultuous year for the company. So far in 2024, Microsoft made dramatic decisions like laying off thousands of people and closing studios. Halo: CE Remaster The report said Microsoft is working on "some form" of a remaster of Halo: Combat Evolved, and that it could launch on rival systems. This game may not be announced during the showcase, though, as the project is described as being in the "early days" of development. Microsoft released a Halo: CE remaster under the title Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary in 2011 alongside co-developers Certain Affinity and Saber Interactive. It is included in Halo: The Master Chief Collection. Bringing a potential Halo: CE remaster to rival systems like PS5 would not be a big surprise, given that Microsoft is putting more and more of its games on competitors' consoles lately as part of a strategy shift. Warren reported that this new strategy is internally known as "Project Latitude." Starfield on PS5 + Project Latitude According to Warren, Project Latitude is the internal name for Microsoft's new plan to bring more of its games to rival systems. The first batch of these (beyond Minecraft) were Hi-Fi Rush, Sea of Thieves, Pentiment, and Grounded. These have been made available on PS5 and Nintendo Switch, and more could be coming. The report said Microsoft is considering bringing an unspecified Gears of War game and Starfield to PS5 later this year. It's also possible that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle comes to PS5, Warren said, but not until "several months" after it comes to Xbox. Project Latitude could also see Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition come to "rival consoles" in early 2025, the report said. Age of Mythology: Retold and Senua's Saga: Hellblade II may also come to PS5 down the road, the report said, adding that nothing is certain and that Microsoft is continually weighing its options based on a number of considerations. The Xbox Games Showcase on June 9 is not expected to include many details on Xbox games coming to rival platforms, as the showcase will instead focus on the Xbox platform specifically, the report said. Black Ops 6 release date (and more dates) The report also revealed that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is expected to release on October 25, which tracks with previous rumors and reports. Black Ops 6 will have its own dedicated showcase taking place directly after the Xbox Games Showcase, so fans are likely to get many more details on the game very soon. The report added that Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will launch in November, with Indiana Jones and the Great Circle coming in December. Diablo IV's Vessel of Hatred DLC, meanwhile, is reportedly set to debut in early October with World of Warcraft's The War Within expansion landing in late August. It was also reported that Towerborne could hit early access this year, while Obsidian's RPG Avowed is said to be targeting a November launch. New Doom And Gears The Xbox Games Showcase will have two major first-party game announcements, the report said. The first of these is said to be Doom: The Dark Ages, which is expected to launch simultaneously across Xbox and PlayStation 5 in 2025. No other details about the game were revealed, however, but id Software is likely the developer. A new Gears of War game will be announced at the Xbox Games Showcase as well, the report said. This may not be a Project Latitude game, however, and is expected to be exclusive to Xbox and PC. Microsoft's long-in-development new Fable game, from Forza Horizon studio Playground, is expected to get a new look at the Xbox Games Showcase, the report said. South of Midnight, the next game from Compulsion Games, may appear as well. The report said both the new Fable and South of Midnight could launch in 2025, and both games are said to be in consideration for Project Latitude. Xbox hardware? Finally, the report said it "feels possible" that Microsoft might show off an Xbox handheld device during the showcase. Microsoft has also spoken about a powerful new gaming console, so it's possible this could be revealed, or hinted at, during the event. Microsoft has also said it's working on "more console and controller options" for Holiday 2024, and Warren said he wondered if this might be the time that Microsoft reveals a white Xbox Series X with no disc drive. Surprises! Microsoft's Xbox Games Showcase is rumored to be two hours long and feature 30 games. While some of the big announcements may have leaked already, it's likely there are still some surprises in store. It's not a stretch to imagine Microsoft making some Xbox Game Pass announcements during the event. In any event, GameSpot will bring you all the news from the event as it's announced! https://www.gamespot.com/gallery/xbox-games-showcase-rumors-black-ops-6-release-date-xbox-handheld-new-doom-starfield-ps5-and-more/2900-5455/

One of the challenges faced by the Chinese chip design industry is the lack of advanced domestic electronic design automation (EDA) tools. Market leaders Cadence and Synopsys are unable to supply the chipmaking software to Chinese entities due to U.S. export controls. Also, until recently, no EDA tools for chip design software could work on China's domestically produced CPUs. Things are starting to change, and a Chinese firm, Xinhuazhang, introduced its first EDA software that can work on China's domestically produced processors. At the Kunpeng Developer Day on April 25, 2024, Xinhuazhang delivered a keynote speech on its progress in developing a domestic EDA platform that can use Huawei's Kunpeng processors (powered by the Armv8 instruction set architecture) for servers and Phytium's FeiTeng processors (which use SPARCv9-derived ISA) for supercomputers. This is a significant development for China's semiconductor industry as domestic chip designers can now design devices and simulate them using solely domestic software and hardware. Xinhuazhang says it offers a comprehensive suite of EDA tools covering all aspects of digital chip verification, from hardware simulation to system debugging and verification cloud. Xinhuazhang has completed extensive adaptation and optimization work to port its core EDA software to the Kunpeng platform. This includes adapting the compilation environment, C++/ASM compilation, cmake compilation scripts, and third-party libraries. These efforts ensure compatibility and performance optimizations for Kunpeng server clusters. Xinhuazhang's products passed Huawei's OpenLab compatibility test in 2021 and won first place in the Kunpeng Innovation Competition in 2022, a report at X-Epic claims. According to the company, performance improvements have been notable. Xinhuazhang's tools, such as GalaxSim and GalaxFV, can now use Huawei Kunpeng-based high-performance clusters and achieve a 2x to 3x simulation performance improvement in multiple customer test cases over non-optimized software. These enhancements significantly reduce simulation testing time and improve system-level chip simulation verification efficiency. Unfortunately, there is no word about optimizations for FeiTeng processors. In general, this collaboration not only strengthens the Huawei Kunpeng ecosystem but also provides a set of EDA solutions for China's domestic semiconductor industry. https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/chinese-company-unveils-sanctions-defying-chip-design-tools-that-work-on-china-chipmakers-huawei-and-phytium-processors

You may remember that Microsoft introduced a new Outlook app for Windows 11 (and Windows 10) at the end of last year, though plenty of users have stuck it out and held onto the ‘classic’ Outlook email app. If you aren’t willing to move over to the new app but don’t want to be left behind, don’t fret - Windows Copilot, Microsoft’s AI assistant, is finally coming to the older app. Yes, this is a major feature that diehard old Outlook users won’t miss out on. According to a blog post, Microsoft stated that the classic Outlook app will get a trio of Copilot features: Summarize, Coaching, and Draft. The Summarize option will be available in the top-right corner when you’ve got an email thread open. As you might guess, it gets Copilot to summarize the main points of that thread. Coaching will offer tips on how to write the perfect email and hit the right tone in the message, as well as considerations such as clarity of the writing. That’s about honing an email you’ve already written, whereas Draft will let Copilot take the reins and create the entire email on the basis of a few prompts. You can then edit the results naturally as necessary. With these AI-powered features on tap, you can still cling to the original Outlook app without missing out on some very useful time-saving functionality. In the blog post, Microsoft also noted that there are plans in place to add more Copilot features to the classic Outlook app for Windows in the near future. We assume these inbound features will debut on the new Outlook app first, then possibly the Mac version and even the mobile app, before reaching the classic Outlook app. The reason for this is doubtless to persuade people to move over to the newer app by holding off on introducing new features to the old client. So, if you are planning to stay rooted in the classic Outlook, you may be in for a long wait as fresh features are drip-fed into the other app versions. Microsoft says that new Copilot features are expected to arrive in the classic Outlook app in the next 3 to 12 months, so at least you’ve got something to look forward to in the next year or so! https://www.techradar.com/computing/windows/still-using-classic-outlook-you-can-get-copilot-features-without-migrating-to-the-new-outlook-version

iQoo 13 is expected to launch later this year. The purported smartphone will succeed the iQoo 12, which was unveiled in China in November 2023. Although the iQoo 12 launched alongside an iQoo 12 Pro model, the iQoo 13 lineup is said to not include a Pro option. Details regarding the upcoming iQoo flagship recently started surfacing online. A tipster has now leaked some key features of the rumoured iQoo 13. It is said to offer a periscope telephoto camera and a high-resolution display. iQoo 13 specifications (expected) Tipster Digital Chat Station (translated from Chinese) shared in a Weibo post that the iQoo 13 is likely to come with a 2K flat screen. He also stated that the phone will get a periscope telephoto camera with up to 3x optical zoom. It is unclear if it will be the same 64-megapixel periscope telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom found in the iQoo 12. iQoo 13 is also tipped to get a single-point ultrasonic in-display fingerprint scanner for security, which means that the sensor will not cover a large area of the screen. He added that the upcoming iQoo 13 will be equipped with a "super-large" X-axis linear motor and is likely to have an IP68-rated build. Notably, the tipster had previously also hinted at some of these features for the handset. He added earlier, that the phone could be powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 SoC. More details about the smartphone are expected to surface over the coming few weeks. iQoo 12 specifications The base iQoo 12 sports a 6.78-inch 144Hz quad-HD LTPO AMOLED screen and is powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. It is backed by a 5,000mAh battery with 120W FlashCharge support. The handset offers an IP64 rating for dust and water resistance. For optics, the phone features a triple rear camera unit that includes a 50-megapixel primary rear sensor, a 50-megapixel sensor with an ultra-wide-angle lens, and a 64-megapixel periscope telephoto shooter. The handset also carries a 16-megapixel front camera sensor. https://www.gadgets360.com/mobiles/news/iqoo-13-specifications-expected-features-leak-5881747#pfrom=topstory

Name of the game: Redout 2 Price: $5.19 - FREE Link Store: https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/redout-2 Offer ends up after X hours: Sale ends 6/20/2024 at 4:00 PM Requirements:

When members of artist collective turned game developer Studio ZA/UM thanked Marx and Engels in their 2019 Game Awards acceptance speech for the RPG triumph Disco Elysium, I felt like I was looking at the future, the ecstatic debut of my new favorite developer, but that isn't how things panned out. Disco Elysium has been #1 on our yearly Top 100 games list four years in a row, but for much of that time, ZA/UM has been engulfed in an existential crisis. Since 2019, A Disco Elysium sequel, a sci-fi RPG in a new setting, and a full-size Elysium spin-off game have been canceled or "paused," while a heated personal and legal dispute between founding members hangs over ZA/UM's every move. That last canceled game, described as "a spin-off about one of the most beloved characters in Disco Elysium" and spearheaded by one of the first game's principle writers, wowed other teams at the studio in an internal demo at the end of last year. It could have been on our SSDs as early as 2025. This project was cancelled in February, much to the shock of most ZA/UM employees, and nearly the entire team⁠—including that Disco Elysium writer, Argo Tuulik⁠— was laid off. I spoke with 12 current and former employees, including Tuulik and fellow X7 lead writer Dora Klindžić, to find out what went wrong. Studio ZA/UM itself did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication. The fall In late 2021, three of Disco Elysium's most senior developers, including the setting's original creator, Robert Kurvitz, lead artist Aleksander Rostov, and Final Cut lead writer Helen Hindpere, left the company on acrimonious terms. The ousted artists have alleged financial malfeasance on the part of company management, with much of their ire focused on Tõnis Haavel, a producer on Disco Elysium who had previously been convicted of investor fraud in the developers' native Estonia in 2014. ZA/UM studio management, meanwhile, insists that the three were fired for refusing to return to work and creating a hostile environment. After the departure of Kurvitz and friends was revealed in 2022, fan sentiment largely aligned with the ousted creatives, with a backlash against ZA/UM escalating into harassment and threats against developers still at the studio. That situation cooled down somewhat with the release of People Make Games' 150 minute-long documentary on ZA/UM, which featured interviews with senior developers still at the studio who had worked on Disco Elysium. Disco Elysium writer Argo Tuulik, a longtime friend of setting creator Kurvitz, gave a raw appraisal of the studio and the ousted writer's respective missteps, asking fans to let those still at the studio prove themselves with their work. Tuulik and his team didn't get that chance: They were laid off from ZA/UM in February alongside nearly a quarter of the studio's staff, predominantly developers on Tuulik's now-canceled project, X7, which would have been a spin-off "standalone expansion" to Disco Elysium featuring some returning characters and an advancement of that game's distinctive conversation and "psychological RPG" systems. Tuulik and fellow X7 lead writer Dora Klindžić lay the blame for X7's end squarely with management, particularly Tõnis Haavel, while 10 other current and former ZA/UM developers spoke with me under anonymity. They described a confused, rudderless studio that expanded too quickly in the pandemic, struggled to adapt to remote work, and has canceled three projects as the afterglow of its triumphant debut faded in the intervening five years. "Most hardcore Disco since Disco" In the absence of a full sequel to Disco Elysium, X7 was going to be a spin-off⁠—smaller than Disco, but still full-scale⁠—headed up by Tuulik, someone who has been part of the Elysium creative project from the start and who wrote some of Disco Elysium's standout characters like the foul-mouthed urchin Cuno and the Hardy Boys, a vigilante militia whose frat boy veneer conceals a strange nobility. "It was a spin-off about one of the most beloved characters in Disco Elysium," explained one developer who worked on the project. "I feel like it was the best possible shot at a Disco-like game without [Kurvitz], Rostov, and other people that made the original Disco Elysium." Klindžić said, "It was something no one else but Argo could have done, and it would have been 110% authentic, most hardcore Disco since Disco." She added that X7 "would have advanced the story, the emotional threads, and gameplay elements all at once to truly evolve the genre of psychological RPG as Disco Elysium started it. "For a while it seemed like miracles were possible, and with them, redemption." The internal response to a company-wide showcase of the game at the end of 2023 seems to have been uniformly positive, with developers on other teams at ZA/UM telling me they were impressed with the demo. "Everyone was looking forward to its development," one of them said. "Its internal announcement lifted a lot of spirits after a rough time of bad press around the studio." They also thought it was "exactly the sort of game [ZA/UM] needs to put out," and that it could "reassure fans that ZA/UM is not a husk, that the IP is in safe hands and that the studio is full of talented people with a genuine love for the world of Revachol." My sources disagree on when X7 could have been ready for release, with some saying a 2024 launch wasn't out of the question, while others argued 2025 was more realistic. Klindžić, for her part, thought that with less interference from management, "it could have perhaps been a three-year development cycle start to finish." Project X7 began development in 2022. One thing everyone I spoke to agreed on was that X7 was the closest major project ZA/UM had to release at the time of its cancellation, and that ZA/UM's main project in active development, codenamed C4, is still a long way out. The smaller-scale project M0 seems much closer to completion, but the mobile and tablet-oriented Elysium spin off, while well-received internally, doesn't seem to be the full Disco Elysium successor promised by projects Y12, C4, or X7. X7 was promising: positively received internally and poised to be a long-awaited second outing from ZA/UM after a five or six-year wait since Disco Elysium. Multiple current and former employees also attest to ZA/UM president Ed Tomaszewski having assured staff in a December 2023 all-hands meeting that the studio was on strong financial footing, and that they did not have to fear the layoff crisis sweeping the industry. Two months later, X7 was cancelled and nearly a quarter of ZA/UM was laid off, primarily impacting the former X7 team. Interference Following the departure of Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindpere, there seems to have been an understandable crisis at the studio. "Executive leadership and management did not provide any information about what was happening," said one developer who witnessed the transition. "It was very uncomfortable for everyone there." Work on a full Disco Elysium sequel codenamed Y12 was eventually halted⁠. My sources described flagging morale and a lack of direction after Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindperre's departure leading to a decision to regroup on new projects. Multiple sources describe the cancellation of Y12 as having caused friction between Tuulik, Klindžić, and management, with one stating that Y12 was cancelled without input from the senior writers, and that it looked like they were being "pushed out." "In February 2022, I left my job as an academic physicist and space mission scientist in order to work on Y12, the sequel to a masterpiece, Disco Elysium," Klindžić said of this time. "Upon my arrival, I was told all the leads were gone and replaced, but this was framed as a good thing, a healthy thing. Four months later the project was shelved overnight. I began raising concerns, as I felt I had just abandoned my entire life and career only to end up in a studio where the people I had come to work with were fired, and the project I was meant to work on shelved with no reason given." Tuulik and Klindžić were subsequently offered their own project, but under highly irregular constraints. "In August 2022, after production on the sequel was stopped, management approached Argo and I to come up with a pitch for a standalone expansion under the Disco Elysium label," said Klindžić. "We were given only around a week to come up with a fully-fledged game pitch, and we worked around the clock to come up with a new story, new characters, new gameplay mechanics, and a new creative direction, including an initial vision for design, art, and audio. We presented the pitch to management, it was a resounding success. It was greenlit and codenamed X7, and its initial production schedule was set for one year." Tuulik, Klindžić, and everyone I spoke to who worked on X7 attest to it not having been allowed a pre-production period, the industry standard planning phase of developing a game. Making a game without pre-production is analogous to writing an essay without an outline, or building a house without blueprints. "We were set up to fail from the start and it was impossible to catch up," said Klindžić. "Whenever we raised concerns about this and expressed we needed more writers if the deadlines were to be met, we were accused of not wanting to do our jobs." "Pretty much from the moment the writing team's pitch was approved in August of 2022, the other teams started production," Tuulik said. "We didn't even really know what the story or the characters were gonna be, when art teams were already making first character and environment concepts. I'm sure you can see how this is a big problem, when you're making a narrative-lead game. "Essentially, the writing team had to work double-time from day one to supply other disciplines with work, whilst trying to write the first dialogues and sketch out the rest of the game at the same time. The writing team consisted of myself and Dora at the time." A "be careful what you wish for" moment came for X7 with the cancellation of P1, a sci-fi RPG in development under Disco Elysium producer Kaur Kender, who after leaving the company sued ZA/UM with allegations similar to those from Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindpere before dropping his lawsuit at the end of 2022. While the P1 writers added more hands to the project, X7's breakneck pace and lack of planning in pre-production led to Tuulik and Klindžić struggling to bring the new writers up to speed while still building the narrative of the game. One thing that may have fundamentally doomed X7 was an issue of hierarchy: even though Klindžić and Tuulik pitched the project and effectively led development at the beginning, neither was formally designated X7's project lead. "I don't know if Dora and Argo ever felt in control," observed one ZA/UM employee. "You can't back people into corners and expect them to behave." "I didn't ask for a title, because titles used to be meaningless back then," said Tuulik, noting that previously for ZA/UM, "writers who started projects had also been effectively leading them. "That's how it had been, and was at the time on other projects. That's how it was on X7 in the first four months, the most productive months." "The work we were required to do throughout 2022 and 2023 was analogous to the work of other directors in the studio, but we were not given a title upgrade nor a wage adjustment to match," Klindžić said. "It resulted in a situation where I performed labor well outside my original role for the studio for over a year without being properly compensated or recognized for it." That lack of specified roles seems to have quickly become a problem. Tuulik, Klindžić, and other members of X7 say there was fruitful collaboration between departments and good progress in the early months of development, despite the extreme workload taken on by the two-person writing team, and everyone I spoke to, both on the X7 team and outside, praised Tuulik and Klindžić as thoughtful, professional collaborators. Klindžić and Tuulik described having been increasingly sidelined by management and unable to directly communicate with the X7 team⁠—ZA/UM had become fully remote, with most communication occurring through a company Slack⁠—while management introduced a new project coordinator/creative director the two had to go through instead of directly communicating with their colleagues. The two characterized much of this interference as coming from Tõnis Haavel, the Disco Elysium producer at the center of the company's dispute with Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindpere. Indeed, according to Tuulik, toward the end of the project Haavel was officially the project's coordinator/director and "interim narrative lead." "Nobody says that things are going to change," recalled one member of the X7 team, "But suddenly you have no more meetings with writers for some reason and you're not allowed to send them your work for feedback." Another ZA/UM employee who was not part of the X7 team told me that "in internal docs there was a lot of shifting around who was responsible for leading the project." Klindžić characterizes this as a form of retaliation for Tuulik's statements in the People Make Games documentary: while the developer made a case for those still working at ZA/UM, he also criticized some of the studio management's decisions and expressed some admiration and understanding for Kurvitz. "I felt that a strong resentment developed towards Argo for growing too big for his shoes, so to speak," Klindžić said. "I got the sense that there was resentment for the fact Argo was getting so much support from fans, while [ZA/UM CEO Ilmar Kompus], Tõnis, and the company weren't. "They put Argo through a humiliation campaign. They made him apologize to people for what he said in the interview. They undermined his confidence and tried to make him doubt himself. They told him he was incompetent, unqualified, and unfit to lead his own project, demoted him and made him invisible inside the studio." A one-game studio? X7's direction as laid out by management seems to have been incredibly fluid, with shifting targets including a 2022 Game Awards teaser to announce the game that was ultimately scrapped. Despite producing the well-received internal demo at the end of 2023, the X7 team has been laid off and the project cancelled. Employees still at the company expressed confusion and frustration over the decision, especially considering president Tomaszewski's remarks regarding layoffs in 2023. One common sentiment among those I talked to was that it was just hard to tell if there was a problem on another project or even in a different department on the same project, such is the extent to which ZA/UM's employees are isolated from each other in its remote work environment. ZA/UM expanded from 30 to 100 employees following the release of Disco Elysium, the sort of expansion that can drastically change the character of a company, and one that demands a commensurate increase in output to keep up with the costs. Five years later, the studio has canceled its major project that was closest to launch. It's unclear how much runway the studio has for an intensive, multi-year development cycle like the one demanded by project C4 without substantial new revenue coming in, while the legal battle with Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindpere continues to haunt its every move. And we'll never get to play X7, a follow-up to Disco Elysium masterminded by one of its principle writers, produced by a team that hit a major milestone and impressed its peers despite what they describe as a scrambled and untenable working environment. The livelihood of that team has been completely upended, and some developers' immigration statuses have been imperiled by their layoffs. The developers I spoke to share the same sense of disappointment I do, that the idea of ZA/UM as a different kind of game developer, one driven by artistry and capable of pushing the medium forward with more games like Disco Elysium, was never meant to be. "For a supposedly 'leftist' company, this is a real mask-off moment," one current employee told me. Another mused that "We're not the first studio to go through that, it just feels worse when it's ZA/UM." There's a quote from Disco Elysium itself that springs to mind here, one about capital taking off its mask of humanity to kill everything you love, but it feels a little on the nose. "The entire X7 team loved the Elysium world⁠," Klindžić told me in our last interview. "As fan artists, musicians, iconic voices⁠, we only wanted to keep it going, rather than leave it to wither in some dark decrepit cellar of corporate intellectual property." https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/game-development/for-a-while-it-seemed-like-miracles-were-possible-and-with-them-redemption-a-follow-up-to-the-legendary-disco-elysium-might-have-been-ready-to-play-within-the-next-yearzaums-devs-loved-it-management-canceled-it-and-laid-off-the-team/

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Normally I would disagree since you started your activity just yesterday. But since we are in need of members, I'd say Pro. Have a lovely day!

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Accepted. Contact me via PM or discord: saad.tebba

Around September or October each year, Burketown in outback Australia becomes the scene for a remarkable and rare natural phenomenon: the Morning Glory. At the end of a very long road in Australia's far north, on a remote stretch of coastline along the isolated southern shore of the Gulf of Carpentaria, is Burketown (po[CENSORED]tion 238). Caught between savannah and sea, beneath a big outback sky, the town is not on the road to anywhere: if you're in Burketown, you either took a wrong turn, or you really wanted to be here. This is a land of climate extremes. Droughts scour the inland in the Dry (as the locals call the dry season), which runs from May to September or October. Sometime in October, perhaps November, the rains arrive. These are not light showers. Rain comes down in torrential sheets. Before the road here was paved, Burketown could be cut off for weeks. Even now, a big Wet can cause flooding that submerges an area the size of a small European country. At the tail-end of the Dry, just before the transition into the Wet, Burketown becomes the scene for one of the most remarkable natural phenomena in Australia: the Morning Glory, an immense and rare formation of tube-shaped clouds that has long drawn curious crowds and dedicated storm chasers. Forming out over the tropical seas of the Gulf at a point where two wind systems collide, the Morning Glory takes shape at night when onshore air cools and slips beneath layers of warm air. The result is a turbulent formation of cylindrical roll or wave clouds in fronts hundreds of kilometres long. Although this dramatic and photogenic weather event occasionally occurs elsewhere in the world, including the Gulf of Mexico, Burketown is the only place on Earth where it happens on a regular basis, thanks to a unique mix of geography and local climate systems. When the Morning Glory appears, it's an astonishing, almost apocalyptic vision that well reflects the power of this remarkable weather system. "The Morning Glory moves so much air that it can even be picked up on a seismograph," said Ernie Camp, lifelong resident and mayor of Burketown for the past decade. The Morning Glory signifies power of a very different kind for the local Gangalidda indigenous people. To the Gangalidda, Walalu, the Rainbow Serpent, creates each Morning Glory – or kangólgi, as they call it. According to tradition, the Gangalidda ancestors ride along on the cloud to watch over their people and their land. For the modern Gangalidda, this is a good omen of the highest order. Other than for those closely studying meteorological charts, the first hint that a Morning Glory is on the way may be in the town's pub: when condensation forms on the beer glasses in the evening, there's a good chance a Morning Glory will arrive the following dawn. Amanda Wilkinson, owner of Burketown's Savannah Lodge and town resident for 30 years, uses a different early warning system: "In the evening, you notice a nice sea breeze. Then, if you walk outside in the morning and it's very dewy on the grass and on the railings and on your car, you'd straight away look out to the north-west to see if there was something on the horizon." It used to be easier to predict, said Camp. "Before there was easy access to electricity and air-conditioning, everybody knew it was coming. If you were suffering in the heat all night, you'd have your windows open, and you'd feel the cool air. It usually comes through between 04:00 and 07:00, and it was just glorious to have that drop in temperature. We're less likely to notice it now because we're in comfort inside our houses with the air-con running." When the Morning Glory rolls in, your first sight is unlike anything you've ever seen before. "It's quite an eerie sensation as the wind picks up and the temperature drops," said Wilkinson. "And then it's amazing. You get some that are whoppers, with smooth, cylindrical clouds, others with fluffy bits at the top. When you get a nice big one, it's absolutely unbelievable." When it passes over the town, she added, you feel like you can almost reach up and touch it. Even those who have seen it often, never tire of the experience. "It's up there with the Northern Lights," said Michelle Zimmerman, a repeat visitor to the town. "You never quite know when it's going to show up, and it's different every time. The only thing for sure is that it will take your breath away." "You never become blasé," Camp added. "It's like watching the breakers roll in." The surfing analogy is apt. As spectacular as the Morning Glory is from land, it's the experience of seeing it from the air that has caused its fame to spread far and wide. After a pair of gliders chanced upon the phenomenon in the late 1980s, the Morning Glory has become the Holy Grail for gliders in Australia. Every year, from around mid-September, gliders arrive from across the country hoping to "surf" the Morning Glory, as the long, wave-like formations and relatively predictable air movement along the cloud front make for ideal conditions. As with all unpredictable weather events, no-one really knows when the Morning Glory will appear. Prior to the pandemic, Burketown hosted a Morning Glory Festival in September. "During one of the more recent festivals, we had a week of festivities, and not one Morning Glory turned up," said Camp. "The festival finished on a Sunday, and on the Monday morning a Morning Glory rolled in." When conditions suggest that a Morning Glory has formed out to sea, the gliders take to the air. Most use touring motor gliders with a 100-horsepower engine, which they then switch off when in position. Garrett Russell, from Caboolture Gliding Club, more than 2,000km from Burketown, has twice been here to "surf" the Morning Glory, gliding the rising, warmer air along the front of the cloud, much as a surfer does along an actual wave. He even made a film about it called The Tsunami in the Sky. On his last morning in town, he got lucky. "We were over the savannah and looking at the front of this cloud coming at us. We were perhaps 3,000ft above the Earth, but it felt like nothing. We turned the engine off and we flew in silence towards this thing, and I felt like a shrimp being sucked into the lips of a whale. We were going down and down, and then suddenly we were going up. We got the lift and turned left and surfed along the face of that wave. That was the most exciting thing I've ever done in a glider. We did seven waves." Experienced gliders surf the Morning Glory for hours, kept aloft by rising air along the front of the vast cylinder of cloud, sometimes travelling at more than 100km/h. Some fly so close that they dip their wing tip into the cloud, like a surfer reaching out with their hand to gently touch the wave. "You just feel very small," said Russell, "and you feel the true majesty of nature." Gliders like Russell know how lucky they are. "Because of the remoteness of Burketown, and because of what you need in terms of equipment to do it, the total number of people who've flown the Morning Glory would be way less than the number of people who've stood on the summit of Mt Everest." But as exclusive as their club is, the gliders don't have to say anything to locals like mayor Ernie Camp. "They don't have to tell us how good it is," Camp said. "They just keep coming back." https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220503-where-people-surf-tubular-clouds

Realme GT 7 Pro launch in India was recently confirmed by Realme Vice President Chase Xu. The purported handset is expected to be unveiled in China before it is brought to other markets, including India. Several leaks related to the Realme GT 7 Pro have surfaced online over the past few days. A new leak suggests the display, camera, battery and storage details of the phone, and reasserts an earlier SoC-related leak. Its predecessor, the Realme GT 5 Pro, was not introduced in India. Realme GT 7 Pro Specifications (Expected) The upcoming Realme GT 7 Pro will sport a 1.5K 8T LTPO OLED screen, according to a Weibo post by tipster Digital Chat Station, which also claims that the panel will likely be provided by a domestic display manufacturer. The post also suggested that the Realme GT 7 Pro is expected to feature a 50-megapixel periscope telephoto camera with support for up to 3x optical zoom. The handset is also expected to pack an "ultra-large" 6,000mAh battery. The tipster adds that the Realme GT 7 Pro is expected to get Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 SoC paired with 16GB of RAM and up to 1TB of onboard storage. This backs an earlier leak which claimed that the upcoming handset could be the first smartphone in global markets outside China to carry the yet-unannounced Snapdragon chipset. An earlier report suggested that the Realme GT 7 Pro may be equipped with an ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensor for security, which is claimed to offer more accurate more accurate fingerprint readings compared to optical scanners. Realme GT 7 Pro launch timeline (expected) The Realme GT 5 Pro was launched in December 2023, and that the company could follow a similar launch cycle and introduce the Realme GT 7 Pro towards the end of the year. https://www.gadgets360.com/mobiles/news/realme-gt-7-pro-specifications-leak-display-soc-camera-storage-battery-details-5839391#pfrom=topstory

Are you ready to stare down skyscraper-size Behemoths, box your way through Shardfall’s terrors, and power wash a time-traveling DeLorean? This past month that’s what I’ve been up to thanks to the help of my Meta Quest 3 (and the new Quell immersive fitness system), and I’m here to break down my experience playing them all. Slight spoiler, this month’s VR games and apps were all superb – I highly recommend you pick up at least one of these as soon as you can. So let’s get into what I thought of Behemoth, Power Wash Simulator and its Back to the Future DLC, and the new Quell game Shardfall. But first, something a little different. Ahead of the trailer reveal I had the pleasure of chatting with Ryan Payton – the Studio Director of Camouflaj (the team behind the game) – to find answers to my most burning questions. Payton revealed that the main villain isn’t Ratcatcher like we expected – instead, he’s merely a follower of the actual big bad, the Rat King. He described the gameplay to me in great detail, calling Arkham Shadow a VR Translation of everything that made Arkham Asylum the smash hit it was – from the exploration to the story and characters to the dynamic combat. Payton also outlined why this game had to be a Meta Quest 3-exclusive. You can read my full chat with Ryan Payton on Arkham Shadow for a more in-depth look at these topics, but just know that I’m even more hyped for this game than I was already. Its ‘Holiday 2024’ release date can’t come soon enough. This past month I was lucky enough to try an early demo of Behemoth. The roughly 15-minute slice of the game introduced me to some of the enemies, weapons, puzzles, and monstrosities the game has in store for players. My victory over the demo’s Behemoth was slightly lessened when I was told the boss was nerfed a little for the experience. However, the team tried to boost my spirits by explaining that’s because players would usually face it after a few hours rather than 10 minutes – so they’d be prepared for a tougher fight. I guess I’ll just have to try the full game so I can prove myself in a full-power rematch – and I can’t wait. You can think of it as a virtual reality version of Shadow of the Colossus (to be a little reductive). You’re on a quest to hunt and kill massive behemoths that roam the lands, with the boss fights feeling more like action-based puzzles than a typical brawl. That’s not to say you won’t get your fill of Dark Ages-style duels. As you adventure you’ll face off against many human-sized enemies looking to finish you off before you even have a chance to spy one of the beasts you’re searching for. Yes, they’re a lot less imposing, but fighting these smaller foes is still challenging and exhilarating thanks to Behemoth’s sandbox approach to combat. You’re given access to a good variety of weapons to whirl around, as well as techniques to string together, like blocking, parrying, and grapple-hook acrobatics, to find interesting ways of decimating your foes. Alternatively, you can rage out, dealing massively powerful hits for a limited time, and just blow your enemies away. Speaking to Shawn Kittelsen, Vice President of Creative at Skydance Interactive for Behemoth, after the demo, he explained that after working on The Walking Dead Saints & Sinners the team wanted to basically make the complete opposite of that game. “The Walking Dead Saints & Sinners has all these dark intimate spaces, and you never know if a Walker is waiting around the corner to grab you. We thought, what if we take our arc of motion physics that players love, our experience designing different weapons and enemy varieties, and apply that to something completely different – an epic fantasy game with wide open arenas.” When the team considered what enemies players would find in these large spaces the answer was clear, Behemoths. From here the team crafted these antagonistic puzzles for players to best – giving them a few nasty tricks like player responsiveness. This means that rather than simply cycling through attacks these monsters will react to your actions. This is something I noticed in my demo as my decision to run under the monster to dodge the giant ball and chain it wielded merely resulted in it choosing to kick me instead. If you’re interested in trying Behemoth when it launches, it’ll be coming to Meta Quest 3, Oculus Quest 2, PSVR 2 and PCVR. When discussing the power difference between these hardware systems, Kittelsen assured me that while the PS5 and PC-powered experiences will offer better visuals (and a few extra immersion features like PSVR2’s headset rumble) the Quest 2 experience will feel the same in terms of gameplay and with smooth framerate. He added, “It was important that we didn’t leave Quest 2 players behind.” After my experience with Lawn Mowing Simulator, I was a little reluctant to try out another chore sim – my girlfriend even laughed at me when she heard I’d be spending my time doing virtual busywork for a second month in a row. But PowerWash Simulator manages to deliver everything I expected from Lawn Mowing Simulator and more. It’s a cathartic cleaning experience that I’ve been oddly addicted to since downloading it a couple of weeks ago. Yes, the main game is very simple. With enough patience, and some help from the in-game checklist and dirt viewer, you can wave your cleaning wand over every surface and get the van/house/playground dinosaur looking as good as new with no difficulty. But there’s something meditative about meticulously scrambling over surfaces looking for the last specs of dirt you need to wipe off. For those of you after more of a challenge, some modes task you with recleaning every level under a time restraint and water restriction, respectively. I’ve given these modes a whirl but feel my cleaning prowess is not yet up to snuff – the water trials are particularly challenging, requiring a level of cleaning precision I currently lack. To continue my training, PowerWash Simulator offers additional bonus levels. Some are included in the base game, while some licensed locations are available via paid DLC – like the recently released Back to the Future pack. While it’s not quite the immersive Back To The Future experience fans of the series might have hoped for, if you enjoy what PowerWash Simulator has to offer then these themed levels are a delight. I hope we’ll see more. Despite my reaction being the reverse of how I felt about Lawn Mowing Simulator, I’ll admit that this monotonous chore sim won’t be for everyone. Trying to compare it to an action-packed hit like Behemoth it seems almost a little boring. But at the same time, I’ve found PowerWash Simulator to be deceptively moreish. Whenever I try to put it down I want to slip my Meta Quest 3 back on and get straight back to cleaning. Okay, so Quell isn’t a Meta Quest 3 game. It’s not even a VR game. But I needed to talk about it here as I feel it’s a great alternative to the VR fitness apps I’ve been talking about since I did my month-long VR workout challenge back in April. This fitness-first gaming platform offers a lot of what I’ve fallen in love with from VR apps like Supernatural. Rather than working out just for the sake of it (something that can be a struggle for motivation), there’s a gamified element. In Quell’s case, that’s the enemies you face off against in its first game Shardfall – a high-fantasy adventure. It’s not just an upper-body workout. You also have to jog, sprint, squat and jump your way past obstacles that occupy the space between fights. Because this adventure isn’t in VR, the team’s been able to incorporate these elements without as much risk of the player injuring themselves, or feeling nauseous. It’s also added resistance bands – with three difficulty levels – which make punching more challenging. When I first tried Quell I was surprised how much more effort I was putting into my shadow boxing. For a more in-depth look at this new immersive fitness experience, I’d recommend checking out my full feature about my experience with Quell. But TL;DR I’ve really enjoyed using it, even though I had the occasional frustrating issue with the tracker not syncing perfectly with my movements. If you’ve struggled to get into VR fitness, or more traditional workouts then Quell could be what you’re after. But do think if Quell is definitely for you before you buy it as it is a little pricey at $339 / £299 (it’s, unfortunately, not available in Australia), with a subscription on top that’s $9.99 / £9.90 per month or $79.90 / £79.90 for a year. When it comes to dedicated fitness equipment this isn’t an unreasonable amount, though. https://www.techradar.com/computing/virtual-reality-augmented-reality/i-tried-vrs-shadow-of-the-colossus-and-cleaned-doc-browns-delorean-my-favorite-meta-quest-3-games-and-apps-for-june-2024

3D printing has made manufacturing more affordable, especially for low-volume production. However, 3D printers are often huge and heavy devices that need a stable platform to work properly — until now. MIT News reports that its researchers have worked closely with a team from the University of Texas at Austin to create a prototype 3D printer that is smaller than a coin. This photonic chip focuses its beam into a resin well that rapidly cures when it’s hit by a particular wavelength of light emitted from the chip. The palm-sized 3D printer also saves space by eschewing moving parts — instead of using arms and motors to change the beam’s focal point, the prototype uses tiny optical antennas to move it around and create the desired shape. If the team is successful in turning this concept into a viable product, it could change the face of instant manufacturing. The portability and speed of this palm-sized printer could allow anyone — engineers, doctors, or even first responders — to create solutions on the fly without needing to lug around a big and heavy device. For example, an orthopedic surgeon could bring a 3D scanner into the operating theater and scan a patient’s broken bones. From there, they could bring in a biomedical engineer to craft a custom bone implant to help fractures heal and then print it with the portable 3D printer using a biomedical resin. Alternatively, this small 3D printer would be much easier to bring on the Artemis moon exploration program, especially as it is lighter and more compact than other alternatives. It could then be useful for creating tools that the crew will need on the fly. These are just some of the exciting possibilities that this 3D printing concept brings to the table. According to MIT Professor Jelena Notaros, “This system is completely rethinking what a 3D printer is. It is no longer a big box sitting on a bench in a lab creating objects, but something that is handheld and portable. It is exciting to think about the new applications that could come out of this and how the field of 3D printing could change.” 3D printing has quickly changed over the years since it was first introduced. Today, we are getting metal 3D printers in the International Space Station that can print tools and parts needed for moon and Mars missions, as well as cheap $77 AliExpress 3D printers that let you start making your own builds at a fraction of the cost. We’ve even seen affordable new 3D printers that are large enough to print a small child. If this project makes it to retail, then, soon enough, we’ll have a 3D printer you can fit in your pocket. https://www.tomshardware.com/3d-printing/worlds-first-chip-based-3d-printer-is-smaller-than-a-coin-benefits-from-having-no-moving-parts