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Following the Ferrari Roma's debut, automotive publications from all over the world are getting a chance to check out the details of the new coupe. Now, it's Top Gear's turn, and the video shows off some of the vehicle's less-discussed details. Top Gear notes the similarities between the Roma's nose, and the front of the Monza SP1 and SP2. Both of them feature prominent splitters. There are also similarly shaped grille openings, but the Roma puts the slats in body color to make them more noticeable. The bar that separates each headlight into two sections is another shared element. Gallery: Ferrari Roma Live Photos At the back, the Roma hides a secret. The black area with the Ferrari logo at the base of the rear glass is actually an active spoiler. It's invisible in the retracted state. Inside, the Roma does technically have rear seats. Although, there appears to be so little legroom that they would be functionally useless for anything except extra storage in the cabin. The Roma's cockpit layout is one of its standout design features. The driver grips a multifunction steering wheel and looks through it at a large digital instrument cluster. A portrait-oriented infotainment screen is at the top of the center stack. The gearshift is a series of switches that evoke the look of a gated shifter. The Roma packs a 3.9-liter twin-turbo V8 that makes 612 horsepower (456 kilowatts) and 561 pound-feet (760 Newton-meters). The only gearbox option is an eight-speed dual-clutch unit. This is enough for the Ferrari to reach 62 miles per hour (100 kilometers per hour) in 3.4 seconds and hits 124 mph (200 kph) in 9.3 seconds.

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In case you haven’t heard, Jaguar Land Rover has developed a new inline-six 3.0-liter engine with a mild hybrid twist. It debuted earlier this year in the Range Rover Sport HST where it pumps out 395 horsepower and 406 pound-feet (550 Newton-meters) of torque. The six-cylinder gasoline mill is now finding its way inside the engine bay of the larger Range Rover for the 2020 model year in the United States. You can have it with 355 horsepower in the entry-level P360 variant or with 395 hp in the hotter HSE P400. The latter will need only 5.9 seconds to reach 60 mph (96 kph) or 6.3 seconds for the 0-62 mph (0-100 kph) task, en route to a top speed of 130 mph (209 kph). The newly developed engine boasts an electric supercharger for better power response as it’s able to spool fully in just 0.5 seconds to virtually eliminate the dreaded turbo lag. Gallery: 2020 Range Rover he transition to the 2020MY for the U.S.-spec Range Rover also comes along with two fresh coats of paint: Portofino Blue (replacing Loire Blue) and Eiger Grey (replacing Corris Grey). To spice things up, Land Rover will be offering newly styled 22-inch wheels. Pricing for the 2020 Range Rover starts at $90,900 for the aforementioned P360 and rises to $209,500 for the range-topping SVAutobiography LWB. If you’re interested in the HSE P400, that’ll set you back $96,150 before options. On top of these prices, customers will have to pay an extra $1,295 for the compulsory taxes and fees. Launched in the second half of 2012, the current-generation Range Rover is approaching the end of its lifecycle as an all-new model is expected to debut sometime in 2020. The next-gen SUV should lose a lot of weight by switching to the all-new Modular Longitudinal Architecture bound to be used by a variety of JLR models in the next decade. A fully electric derivative might be in the works for a release later in the model’s life, but nothing is official at this point. As a final note, Land Rover has already announced the new straight-six doesn’t fit inside the Evoque’s engine bay.

Yes, the large and heavy SUV has been transformed into a race car. If a Hummer H1 can be a race car, then we shouldn’t be surprised the Urus will be getting a dedicated single-brand series next year. First previewed by Lamborghini Squadra Corse nearly a year ago, the ST-X is back in new images as part of a preview event organized this weekend in Spain on the occasion of the Super Trofeo World Finals. At the same event, the company’s motorsport division also previewed a new Aventador-based hypercar with 830 horsepower and crazy aero it will unleash in 2020. We should point out the ST-X will be more than just a Lamborghini Urus with a racing livery as the SUV is going to through massive hardware changes to lose about a quarter of weight compared to the road car. In other words, it’s estimated to lose about 550 kilograms (1,212 pounds) and bring the curb weight down to 1,650 kg (3,637 lbs). Gallery: 2020 Lamborghini Urus ST-X The significant diet will be achieved by making extensive use of carbon fiber, including for the hood and rear wing. Other changes compared to the standard Urus will include extra air intakes in the hood and a racing exhaust ending with new hexagonal tips underneath the corners of the rear bumper. “The first Super SUV in the world of racing” will be equipped with a twin-turbo 4.0-liter V8 engine delivering 650 horsepower and 850 Newton-meters (627 pound-feet) of torque inherited from the road-going Urus. Much like Squadra Corse uses the Verde Mantis paint scheme for its Huracan race cars, the ST-X will also be finished in the striking green shade contrasted by red accents. It will ride on 21-inch center-lock wheels made from aluminum and wrapped in Pirelli tires. Images of the interior have not been provided, but Lamborghini says the race-ready SUV will feature a reinforced cockpit benefitting from a steel tubular roll bar, racing seats, and a fire extinguisher in case something goes wrong.

A hot, hybrid 7 Series. Sign us up. BMW is committed to electrification – its upcoming lineup practically speaks for itself. The aptly named iNext will be the brand's first full EV, and soon everything (yes, even the lowly X2) will have a plug. But the first M Performance model in the plug-in portfolio may not be what you think; reports say the 7 Series could be the pioneer M Sport PHEV. The news comes from BMWBlog, which says BMW will offer a performance-oriented M750Le option when the next-gen G20 model arrives. Using a straight-six engine and an electric motor, the M750Le could have up to 550 horsepower (372 kilowatts) and 590 pound-feet (800 Newton-meters) of torque. Nearly 400 (298 kW) of those horses will come solely from the straight-six engine. Gallery: 2020 BMW 7 Series Using BMW's fifth-generation batteries (available on the electric X3 first), the M750Le should have much more range than its predecessor. The current 7 Series plug-in gets just 16 miles (26 kilometers) on battery power alone. The M750Le will be available in both extended- and standard-wheelbase options, as well. Those uninterested in the hot M Performance option, though, will still be able to pick up the plug-in 750Le minus M parts. And those wanting gas-powered models will still have the 740i and 730i models as alternatives, as well as the 735d diesel. Though, all three of those trims should have a mild-hybrid accessory on board.

Far Cry 4 has been out for a couple of days now, so I’m taking a break from my sojourn in Kyrat, and my mounting body count, to condense my thoughts on how the game fares on PC. I’m still relatively early in the game’s narrative, but I’ve put Ubisoft Montreal’s hunting and killing sequel through its paces. And I’ve got good news. While Assassin’s Creed Unity was inconsistent and has required a lot of post-launch attention from Ubisoft, Far Cry 4 is significantly more stable, with better performance on less beefy PCs. They recommended system requirements are the same as Unity’s lowest. And it’s absolutely stunning, from the snow and mist-shrouded mountains to the verdant forests lousy with animals. Tested on a Intel i5-3570K @3.40 GHz, 8 GB of RAM, GeForce GTX 670, Windows 7 Far Cry 4 has all the proper PC bells and whistles, offering settings fiddlers plenty to play with. The graphics menu contains the usual suspects like texture and shadow quality, even more fine tuning can be done by turning on or off realistic animal fur, godrays and the very fancy trees relief, which causes shadows on trees to be affected by the trunk’s geometry. Unfortunately, Far Cry 4 where the expectation is that players will know what trees relief is. It’s a bit baffling that Ubisoft didn’t provide proper descriptive text to the long list of options, because they made the effort to put in text that doesn’t explain anything. Hover over trees relief, and the text says “Set the quality of the trees relief.” Hardly informative, but a lamentably common oversight. Many of the options have an almost imperceptible impact on the game, both visually and in regards to performance, but they come together to make the game pop a bit more, changing how much shadows and lighting interact with objects and vegetation. There are quite a few presets, too: low, medium, high, very high, ultra and Nvidia. The first five are self explanatory, but Nvidia’s a strange name for a graphics preset, so what the hell is it? Far Cry is a Gameworks title, so it’s got an extra bit of wizardry when it comes to anti-aliasing and ambient occlusion. The Nvidia preset cranks everything to ultra, and then throws in HBAO+, TXAA4 and soft shadows. It’s impressive, and beat the crap out of my rig. The preset is only for monstrous PCs, and it will even make GPUs like the 780Ti or 970GTX struggle to get past 40fps. This setting is, of course, just for Nvidia users. The game defaulted to high for me, which finds a nice balance between visual fidelity and frame rate. I got an average of 50fps, with highs of 60 and lows of 40, though it was quite stable. Without FRAPS running, I really didn’t notice the dips. High sets everything to high with SMAA anti-aliasing and SMAO, while turning off godrays and trees relief. And everything still looks gorgeous. Even dead animals. Sad, but pretty. With the low and medium presets, the frame rate sat at 60fps, and while there’s a marked drop in visual quality, the things that make Far Cry 4 to damn striking persist. The muted palette that makes the air seem cold; the impressive mountain ranges and their constant companion, mist; and the views that seem to go on forever – they are all still there. Ubisoft haven’t messed about when it comes to control customisation, either. For mouse and keyboard, the key bindings are fully customisable, and you can invert the mouse for both look and flying pitch separately. If you want to play it from your sofa, you’re in luck, because the gamepad control options are pretty damn robust. There are options for inverting look and pitch, turning off vibration and switching on aim-assist, autodrive and auto-aim while driving. In the control scheme menu, you can’t change the face buttons, but you can swap between left and right handed controls, two different driving and flying presets, and you can change the layout to Xbox and PlayStation controllers. And if you didn’t pirate the game, you can change the field of view, too. Between the senseless slaughter of wildlife and soldiers, I took a bit of time to faff around in the map editor. It is, unfortunately, restricted to the creation of challenge maps, not competitive multiplayer ones, but the maps can still be shared with other players. It’s pretty comprehensive, and there are countless props, buildings and enemies waiting to be plonked on desert island or a Himalayan forest, while the terrain itself can be easily modified, from its texture to its elevation. It’s not too obtuse, either, and doesn’t require a lot of modding or map making experience. It’s so simple and flexible that it makes it even more of a shame that it’s limited, because it’s not hard to imagine some pretty bizarre competitive multiplayer maps coming out of this if users were able to make them. The difference in quality between the Assassin’s Creed Unity and Far Cry 4 PC versions is significant, and my experience with Ubisoft’s open world shooter has been nothing but smooth so far, other than a wee bit of stuttering while driving. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for some AMD players. Some report that it’s unplayable, though this is not the case across the board, with others not experiencing the same troubles. It is clear that it’s generally more stable for Nvidia users, though. If you’ve got an AMD GPU, I recommend waiting for patches and new drivers, just to be on the safe side. Otherwise, it’s an excellent port.

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This review isn't a First Drive of the 2020 Audi R8 Performance. Well, it is—but not really. You can best think of the following 2,000 words as a last drive of Audi's mid-engine, naturally aspirated, everyday supercar. The thing is, Audi didn't change a whole bunch about the updated R8 for the 2020 model year. Did the car need a reworking? I'll answer that in a bit, but for now let's pause and take a moment to think about a machine I've been driving for practically my entire career. Case in point, the first auto show I ever worked was when the R8 debuted. The original Acura NSX might have pioneered the notion of a daily-driven supercar, but it was the Audi Le Mans Quattro concept made of aluminum und steel flesh that perfected it. Word on the street is that this refresh is the final iteration of the V-10 Wundercoupé. Should a new R8 appear in five years, it certainly won't be mid-engine—because it won't have an engine! Today that possible future is neither here nor there (Audi's being tight-lipped). The new R8 is, however—to needlessly quote the Talking Heads—same as it ever was. Which is good, because the 2020 Audi R8—to SoCal slang it up a bit—is as awesome as it's ever been. What's New? Not much! The ABS and ESC have been reprogrammed, and the Dynamic Steering tune comes from the rear-wheel-drive 2018 R8 RWS (RWS stands for Rear Wheel Series). Oh, and the tires. The cars we drove—R8 Performance and R8 Spyder Performance—get Audi-specific Michelin Pilot Sport 4 tires stamped with "AO" right on the sidewall (245/30/20 front, 305/30/20 rear). Should you live in a rain-free locale such as Los Angeles or Scottsdale, you can opt for harder core Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 tires. A $1,100 carbon-fiber front anti-roll bar is also available, but none of the six R8s Audi brought along had that option. In Europe, the lusty 5.2-liter screamer of a V-10 gets more power—612 horsepower instead of 602, and 428 lb-ft of torque instead of 413 lb-ft—but the American cars get a louder exhaust. I'll run you through the performance numbers soon, but A) 10 extra horsepower means nothing; and B) trust me, you want more noise. The base car does get a power bump, going from 533 to 562 hp, and 398 lb-ft of torque to 406 lb-ft, but you're not here to read about the base car. As for the exterior, quite a bit has changed. Back in 2015 when this generation R8 launched (known internally as the Type 4S, as opposed to the previous, first-gen car which was billed the Type 42), I found the front end too plain for a world-beating supercar. To be blunter, it looked like an A3. Happy to report, it's all fixed now. The changes are mostly subtle. The grille loses its chrome surround. There are three little vents above the grille—yet still below the cut line—that help break up the mass of the hood/frunk lid. The headlights are actually darker. Not the lights themselves (now with laser beams, they are brighter than ever), but the nacelles are blacked out. Most important to the new snout are the Lamborghini-esque Y-shaped cuts in the side intakes. They look the business. As Audi owns Lamborghini, all is prego. The silhouette of the second-gen R8 still reminds me of the Type B Rekordwagen from the 1930s. Audi's designers tweaked the side graphics a bit for 2020, but the coolest change is on the R8's derrière. There's this fantastically complex 3D strip of hexagons/honeycombs that's intriguingly futuristic. There's a reshaped diffuser, and the black oval pipes on the sport exhaust are bigger and, as mentioned, louder. Most of the cars spec'd out for the launch had blacked-out badges, an option I highly recommend. There are a few new colors, as well, and a gold-wheeled Decennium limited edition built to celebrate 10 years of the V-10. The interior gets two new colors and a wireless phone charger. That's pretty much all that's new. Behind The Wheel What's the same is the driving experience of a steel fist in a soft leather glove. The new C8 Corvette might actually be a more usable daily driver of a mid-engine supercar, but just barely. Like the R8 has done from day one, this final iteration seamlessly blends a lovely version of what you spend 90 percent of your time doing with that 10 percent when you set your hair on fire and assault the roads you love. The R8 is still shockingly good at both. A McLaren 600LT, for instance, is wonderful in the canyons, but it's not built to run down and grab a latte. It just isn't. The Audi, on the other hand, really is. For some owners or potential owners, this matters a great deal. Especially if the R8 (or a Porsche 911 Turbo) is your main or only car. Own a few dozen cars? Buy the R8 and a Lamborghini Huracán Performante. Why not? Scott Evans, Angus MacKenzie, and I used to waste hours talking about our never-formalized-in-any-way Engine Hall of Fame. The Chevy LS7 is in, as is the 6.5-liter Ferrari V-12 and the AMG SLS Black Series' 6.2-liter V-8. There are others, and I'd like to get the word out that the Audi/Lambo 5.2-liter V-10 is super worthy of inclusion in our made-up museum. What a lovely lump of gasoline-chugging aggression. The revs, the power, the vibrations—I like everything about it. Especially the sound. I think the R8 Performance's base price just under $200,000 is totally and completely justified by the ludicrous, glorious, furious sounds this engine makes. Yeah, the Lamborghini version of the V-10 now gets 28 more horsepower out of the same lump due mostly to a different exhaust. Doesn't matter, really. As my two-year-old says when presented with very similar things, "Same same!" The Performance Of The Performance I can't imagine that the 2020 Audi R8's updates translate to any meaningful improvement in terms of straight-line speed and/or handling, though perhaps the tires would add or drop a tenth here and there. The last R8 V-10 Plus we tested a 2017 model, hit 60 mph in 2.6 seconds and ran the quarter mile in 10.6 seconds at 130.3 mph. Let's not forget that an R8 won our World's Greatest Drag Race 6, beating cars like the McLaren 570S, Nissan GT-R, and Acura NSX. I also remember hitting 189 mph in that car. Because I ran out of road. Braking from 60 mph takes place in a very good but not great 102 feet, and the R8 handles the Figure Eight in a respectable but not elite 23.5 seconds. For those last two metrics, I feel a retest is in order, preferably on both types of tire. Nobody's Perfect Like the engine, the seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox is also carryover. I gotta tell ya, seems as if time has passed the transmission's software programming by. The shift logic is no worse than before, but Porsche will never rest when it comes to PDK, Ferrari's dual-clutch might just be even better, and the new Corvette's eight-speed unit will be holding everyone's feet to the fire. By comparison, the R8's shifts seem long, almost languid. And it's not the hardware; when you shift manually, it's snick-snick quick. Plus, the Huracán Evo uses the same physical part, and that sucker mule-kicks. The solution is to simply drive around in manual mode, which isn't a bad solution. I should add that when I say "drive around," I mean when you're hammering the R8 up around the limits of your/the car's ability. For your daily drive, the transmission shifts just fine. Worlds better than the old R-Tronic single-clutch automated manual in the original car (a transmission that was ceremoniously dumped in favor of the current seven-speed S-Tronic halfway through Type 42's life cycle). Yes, it would be killer if Audi offered that six-speed manual with the gated shifter from the first car. But it doesn't. Maybe as a final edition model in a few years? All any manufacturer need do is look at the success of the GT3 Touring. The R8's handling remains stellar, with two caveats. As an increasing number of high-performance cars adopt active engine and transmission mounts, the ones that don't feel conspicuously obvious. This V-10 sits on passive motor mounts and swings around back there. Imagine a large boulder packed tightly in an oil drum. That's the sort of feeling. The biggish motor and transmission combo aren't going anywhere, but you feel them shifting about as you turn the wheel. Has the car always done this? Probably. Now it's just more noticeable because the R8's competitors have stopped. Not a huge deal, and really a pea under a mattress type complaint, if it weren't for the new tires. There's a level of squish present in the Michelins that simply wasn't present in the pre-refresh car. The tire squish only affects the first few degrees of steering wheel angle. The issue is that, through almost every single corner, you wind up putting in a little more turn than you need to. As such, you need to slightly pull the wheel back in the other direction almost instantly, making the R8 difficult to drive smoothly. Couple that with the movement of the engine, and the helm is a bit busier than need be. Fatal? No, not at all. But both issues are present; however, I bet you the tire squish will be eliminated by opting for the Sport Cup 2 tires. Here's a problem that hasn't been solved: Halfway through our drive, all the R8s pulled off the road, some friendly folks from the California Highway Patrol closed down a nice, straight section of road, and the 12 of us took turns running the quarter mile via the car's ridiculously easy to use launch control. Fun? Hell, yeah. The thing is, there were three Coupes and three Spyders. Now, I've already explained how the sound of the mighty V-10 justifies every single thing about the R8, yeah? Well here's something else to consider: The Spyder sounds about twice as good as the Coupe. There's no sealed rear glass to eat the engine note. I'm talking from outside the car toward the rear, where a dozen car journos stood and watched the cars launch. It's the Spyder, which costs $12,200 more, that sounds the best. The lousy part? Most people still can't fit in it! "I fit just fine," a 6-foot-4 Audi product planner assured our table at the previous night's dinner, after I asked if the R8 Spyder's wheelbase had been lengthened. The convertible soft top eats up a crazy amount of cabin space. I'm 5-foot-11, and I'm at the outer limit of barely fitting. I remember talking with Jethro Bovingdon about the R8 Spyder, and he said the first time he sat in one he assumed the seat was broken. That's how bad the lack of space is. It's a damn shame, too, because what a fantastic machine the R8 Spyder is. Fast, fleet, gorgeous, practical, fun—if you're short and rich, go for it! Finale I'll miss the Audi R8 when it's gone. Yeah, Audi might keep the name around and cram batteries into the spot where that legend of a V-10 once sat, but you know this future R8 E-Tron won't be the same. There are other supercars out there that land with more coveted badges, go a little quicker, and cost a lot more. I can't think of any, however, that so skillfully combine the exotic with the everyday, the cool with the practical, the super with the car. I know the car world is changing fast and will hardly be recognizable when the R8 as we know it exits the scene around 2023. But what an exit. Talk about going out on top: The R8's the best it's ever been.

You wake up confused – an amnesiac, vampiric being known as a revenant. All of your kind possess great power, but yours is greater still, as you can absorb further strength from blood. The world around you is in a terrible state; a strange miasma hangs in the air and turns those who inhale it into mindless beasts. A peculiar girl who is unreasonably well-endowed (the game is almost infuriatingly focused on titillation) tells you that she, too, has no memory, but knows she has to help you. That’s when it hits you; you’re in a melodramatic anime about vampires. Think Twilight but with sharper outlines. You fight your way through a series of cutscenes and into the first dungeon, little snippets of lore dropping like breadcrumbs all the while. It turns out that, surprise, surprise, there’s a lot at stake. Eventually, you defeat the first boss and find your way to the hub area that will be your home. It’s full of NPCs and companions who help guide you, shops for upgrades and new equipment or items, and lots of emo rock. The game sets its tone early with a walk through a creepy hot spring accompanied by these lashings of overly emotional music and melodrama. But Code Vein also impresses early on with its customisation options. Upon starting a new game you’re presented with a highly detailed character creator where you can do everything from changing your hair colour to the individual irises of your eyes and even your blood. You can then equip a wide variety of accessories, and the best part is that you can change all this at any time in the story, with the aid of a magic mirror. Mutability isn’t just skin deep, though; the same depth is found in the combat and class-building systems. You unlock new classes – or ‘Blood Codes’, in the game’s terminology – by obtaining blood from other revenants or by improving your relationships with NPCs, while others are granted through story progress or boss battles. Your equipped Code will dictate your core stats, and you can switch between them at will. This means if you feel like being a warrior and wielding heavy weapons for one fight, then you can, and then you can switch back to a mage Code with no hassle. You do level up, but that’s all you do – unlike Dark Souls, you don’t specify stats to improve, you just level up, and the game handles it. Each Blood Code levels up individually, and if you stick with one for long enough, you will master its ‘Gifts’ – the equivalent of magic and special abilities. Once mastered, you can then use these Gifts no matter which Code you have equipped. It allows you to mix and match things as you go, and it gives you a great deal of freedom in how you play. As flexible as it is, a lot of this system is also obscure and unreadable. Much like your first playthrough of Dark Souls, it’s hard to know exactly which equipment is helping you and how, beyond seeing a bunch of poorly explained numbers go up. It’s deep, which is good, but also somewhat convoluted. Some Blood Codes’ Gifts are locked behind Vestiges. You find these as you’re adventuring around, but they don’t just unlock new skills – due to your unique ability to assimilate these Blood Codes, you can explore the memories attached to these Vestiges, sharing the experiences of their owner. This is an elegant way to tell the backstory of certain NPCs, which often includes the most interesting lore about the world itself. It’s nice to be rewarded in both a gameplay sense and a world-building sense for your exploration, and it makes poking around the anthill-like world well worth it. You’ll also stumble across maps to the Depths – optional dungeons that let you pick up some extra abilities and experience points. They’re a fun distraction, but I’ve had issues with the bosses within them. The first two Depths I came across had the exact same final boss, which also happened to be the first boss of the main game. It feels a bit cheap when compared to Bloodborne’s chalice dungeons, which are very similar in concept. Combat is reasonably fast and fluid for the most part. Different weapon types have different move sets, so it’s important to try them all out when you pick them up in order to see what they can do. It’s the same with Blood Veils – these are magical coats that let you stab people with a long spike, maul them with claws, or other fantastical things. They also boost your stats and ability damage, and modify your parry, which differs in timing depending on which Veil you’re using. This is initially very frustrating, but it works quite well in the long run. Basically, you’re a lean, mean, blood-drinking machine, and one that will often run circles around your foes. So much so, in fact, that many enemies feel a little too easy, especially as you can bring a very capable ally with you if you choose. They hold their own in a way that few AI companions ever have, which may explain why a lot of the enemies you face feel a bit cheeky. They can shoot you from further away than you can shoot back, and they tend to hide unseen on a roof, or a wall, or off the side of a cliff. This makes many of the deaths you’ll experience feel a bit cheap, like for instance when the camera gains a mind of its own when locked onto a large enemy who then walks off a cliff and drags you to your death. It only happened once, but that’s once more than is ideal. There are some other irksome tech issues that hamper the experience. Hitboxes can be a little funky in certain combos – the third hit of the bayonet light attack seems to hit or miss depending on how many press-ups you’ve done in the last 24 hours, or something. Similarly, the backstab attacks are wonky, perhaps in homage to Dark Souls, but wonky nevertheless. There are a few technical hiccoughs here and there too, like frame rate drops and textures taking their time to load in. It’s not game-breaking at all, but it’s noticeable. Overall, Code Vein is a decent interpretation of the Souls-like formula. It lacks some of the nuances of more recent iterations in the genre, but it’s still a fun game. It’s also one that you can play with friends, and that does make it a lot more repayable than single-player-only affairs.

For veterans of the form, Magic: The Gathering plays both elegantly and fluidly. In the 26 years since it launched, it has grown into the defining collectable card game, and now brims with intricate balance. Many will even tell you it is a near-infallible game. Peering into the Magic scene from outside, however, can feel bewildering. To the non-aficionado the game can appear elaborately complex, fiercely competitive, and defined by the arcane art of building your own decks. That makes realising a digital version of Magic a rather tricky business. How to offer a meaningful version for old hands, while simultaneously welcoming the curious newcomer with an authentic experience? The answer comes via very specific subsets of game design; ‘user experience’ and ‘user interface’. One could argue that the gameplay design was already in place for Arena. This is, after all, a very faithful ‘port’ of the paper game. But Arena succeeds in the way it delivers Magic the Gathering. From the tutorial to the gameplay flow, it presents a meticulously crafted way to explore and interact with the Magic system. Despite the bounty of symbols, rules and off-game menu screens present, almost everything quickly makes sense, while play moves gracefully. It will never match the social experience of playing opposite and old friend, but Arena still moves with the energy of the physical game. To use the parlance of interactive design, it is ‘low friction’. There’s no excess of clicks and menu navigation needed to play a match. Arena’s designers – perhaps inspired by the approach of Hearthstone – have built a minimalist interactive layer over the complexity of the core game, and it’s a very smart approach. Arena doesn’t just play like Magic; it feels like Magic. That’s the most important thing this release could achieve. There is a lot going on in Arena, meaning newcomers to the system will benefit from a core understanding of board and card game jargon. But if you’ve never lifted anything more than a playing card, Arena still provides what might be one of the most welcoming entry points to a dazzlingly extravagant card game. Meanwhile, if you know Magic intimately, after a handful of skippable tutorial matches that introduce you to this digital realisation’s inner workings, you’ll likely find everything beyond there intuitive and well-structured. Of course, Arena is free-to-play, and that will inevitably irk some players. But then the physical version of Magic the Gathering has long been defined by spending small amounts on new packs of cards to boost decks. Many of us even started playing Magic with a free promo pack of cards, and have since gone on to put rather too much cash into expanding our collections. Arena offers pretty much the same model, but card packs simply aren’t as costly. They aren’t tangible, which isn’t the same, but Arena is certainly kinder on wallets. Arena is also broadly fairly generous, with a ready supply of free cards and in-game currency offered as reward for playing. Indeed, for the casual player there’s plenty to enjoy without spending a penny. Ultimately, a committed player will want to spend some money expanding their available cards, but that investment need not be infinite. You could put a tremendous amount into Arena, but you certainly don’t need to, and you’ll always be able to play without paying more. Not that Arena is without fault. Mythic and Rare cards seem a little bit too rare, for one thing. There’s also a sense that a shade too many matches see a Land-packed deck keep those all important Land cards held back when they’re needed to allow impactful spells to be cast. Some players are even suggesting the shuffling algorithm is simply broken. In the full-release build the problem doesn’t appear quite so pronounced; and it’s important to note that even with real-world games the shuffle is often a cruel master. But perhaps Arena could do with having its card delivery slightly tweaked. Elsewhere, for all the slickness and elegance of experience, editing and organising your decks and wider collection can prove a bemusing business. Arena isn’t a replacement for playing Magic with physical cards. Rather, it’s a beguiling alternative that serves as both a terrific entry point into the world of Magic the Gathering, and a tool through which CCG devotees can sate their need for a game when a competitor isn’t to hand out there in reality. Even more so, it’s ideal for the player looking to fully embrace Magic without it consuming all their gaming time and cash. The sublime Magic the Gathering physical game now has a worthy digital counterpart, and with a little refinement here and there, it could emerge as something truly special.

Over the last four years Acura has been on a mission to reassert the brand’s performance image. The process started with an all-new, second-generation NSX debuting in 2015, continued with the striking Precision Concept luxury sedan in 2016, then culminated in a commitment to two IMSA racing classes, GTD in 2017 and Prototype in 2018. That’s a lot of brand building in a short time, but Acura isn’t done yet. Type S Concept = More Performance The luxury brand just revealed its latest performance intentions with the all-new Type S Concept, debuting during Monterey Car Week. Meant to express the essence of “Precision Crafted Performance”, the Type S Concept uses a wide stance, contoured flanks, long hood and low roof to convey power and nimble dynamics. Subtle Styling Cues Effectively Integrated Looking past the Type S Concept’s proportions reveals a flurry of details seamlessly weaved together. The 4-lamp LED headlights, open-surface Diamond Pentagram grille and large air intakes below the headlights all impart a sense of performance. Acura deserves kudos on its concept car feature naming strategy, which gives us “Chicane” LEDs below the headlights and taillights, along with a silky exterior color dubbed “Double Apex Blue”. That silk effect comes from Nano pigments and a color-infused clear coat that impart of sense of motion while enhancing luster. The Type S Concept’s rear styling incorporates an upswept decklid and integrated “forged carbon” spoiler. This same forged carbon finish is seen on the concept’s front and rear splitters, side sills and multi-spoke 21-inch wheels wearing 285 series summer tires. Slotted and drilled Brembo high-performance brake rotors and four-piston calipers are also visible at each wheel. Those calipers are painted “Indy Yellow Pearl” and offer an effective contrast against the Type S Concept’s gray wheels and blue body. Acura representatives told this is the same new color offered on the 2020 Acura NSX as an homage to the original NSX’s Spa Yellow. What Does Type S Mean? Acura has used the Type S nomenclature on past models, including the CL, TL and RSX. In every case, Type S meant increased performance in terms of horsepower, handling and braking. This will hold true on future Type S models, including the next-gen TLX and another Type S model yet to be named. Unlike Acura’s “A-Spec” trim, which consists of appearance upgrades, Type S will once again indicate a genuine performance upgrade over mainstream models. The Performance Journey Continues Acura’s push toward Precision Crafted Performance has already produced a high-end sports car and two highly-capable race cars (the brand is in contention to win two IMSA championships this year). With the Type S Concept, Acura has committed to extending its performance pedigree across multiple vehicles in the coming years. These Type S variants will go beyond aesthetic upgrades, transforming Acura’s core models into certified performance cars. And if they look anything like this Type S Concept they’ll offer exceptional styling, too.

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