Stardew Valley officially launches on iOS

Popular farming simulation and role-playing game Stardew Valley is now officially available on mobile through Apple’s iOS platform. The game is available for both the iPhone and iPad. If you’re unfamiliar with the title, it’s similar to games like Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing. You’ll be tasked to take over a small, failing farm and you work to make it a successful farm once again by planting and tending to crops, raising animals, and crafting goods to sell. You also do things like fight monsters to earn money, engage with townspeople, and mine ores or fish, among other things. The game cycles through seasons so there will always be new crops and activities to partake in year round. The game costs $10.99 but comes with no in-app purchases.

Latest hyper-reality feature at The Void puts participants inside Star Wars

Imagine joining the Star Wars Rebel Alliance, infiltrating an Imperial ship and sneaking into a stronghold on the planet Mustafar only to engage Stormtroopers in battle. Because of the collaboration between ILMxLAB and The Void titled Star Wars: Secrets of the Empire, coming to The Void at the Rec Room in downtown Toronto.

As one of the first to experience the immersive hyper reality feature, I was brought in The Void to get briefed on the mission, i placed on my 20 pound VR jacket and headset and the next thing I knew, me and my co-player were immersed in the Star Wars universe. Flying inside a shaking ship, trading blaster fire with Stormtroopers and sneaking around a very hot Imperial stronghold.

Initially disorienting, the experience engages participants on every level and can be intense. How intense? They make you sign a waiver before suiting up. 

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New Logitech Capture public beta to simplify video production with professional controls

Logitech will announce that its newest webcam software, Logitech Capture, has entered public beta for customers using the Logitech C920, Logitech C922 and BRIO 4K Pro Webcam. Logitech Capture aims to simplify video production by incorporating professional controls in an easy-to-use app.

Logitech Capture is designed to help aspiring content creators easily create polished content directly with their Logitech webcams. Serious gamers, however, should continue to use Logitech G HUB advanced gaming software to get the most of their webcams during gameplay.

The public beta will be available at Logitech.com through a free software download. Please keep in mind that, as with any public beta software that has not yet been commercially released, it may contain bugs and may not function as well as commercially released software.

HTC launches blockchain phone you can only purchase using cryptocurrency

While HTC has been scaling back on its hardware business, it hasn’t fully left. In fact, the Taiwanese company just launched a blockchain-centric phone it’s calling the Exodus 1. Said device is now available for pre-order and can be bought online for 0.15 bitcoins or 4.78 ether tokens (which is roughly US$960 or around CA$1,250). It’ll ship in December. As a niche, premium device, the Exodus 1 does pack in some high-end specs. It features a 6-inch quad-HD+ display, 16-megapixel dual rear camera and 8-megapixel dual front camera with 4K video, Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor, 6GB of RAM, and 128GB internal storage.

What makes it special though is the software inside the device. It comes with HTC’s own Zion cryptocurrency wallet and a secure enclave for your private keys, virtual cash, and, in the “very near future,” all of your data, too. It’s an area isolated from the Android operating system. The phone will also run decentralized apps on the blockchain and have a “Social Key Recovery” function that will give you access to your funds if you lose your keys. It’ll use a designated number of trusted contacts.

Source: Engadget