Gears of Wars 4 is perhaps one of the most anticipated games of the year. HyperX, a division of Kingston Technology, has introduced its second official Xbox-licensed gaming headset, CloudX Revolver Gears of War.
The head comes with a 3.5mm plug and a 2M PC extension cable. It is certified by Team Speak and Discord and is further compatible with SkypeTM, Ventrilo, Mumble, and RaidCall. The headset is backed by a 2-year warranty and is available on Amazon for Rs 11,999. Users can visit the company’s homepage HyperX for more information.
It has been over three months since Niantic released its popular location-based augmented reality game Pokemon Go. Still, it is yet to come to several Asian countries, including India, China, and South Korea, which happen to be among the world’s biggest gaming markets. Now, there are high chances of gamers in these countries losing interest due to the delay.
Niantic has said that it would release Pokemon Go in about 200 countries, and it has released in over 100 nations so far. As many as 31 countries, including Egypt, Morocco, Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Mauritius, got the popular game earlier this month.
Pokemon Go has been released in several Asian countries, but not without running into issues. Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam have restricted gamers from playing it at select places. It has run into the problem in South Korea, as the country restricts the use of uncensored map data from overseas while the game requires real-time geospatial technologies and Google’s map data to play.
Pokemon Go is a free augmented reality (AR) mobile phone game that lets players catch virtual characters in a real-life environment.
The game has also run into problems in India even before its release, with a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed in the Gujarat High court seeking a ban claiming that its release in the country could create mayhem. It stated that Go eggs were spotted in places of worship, thus amounting to hurting religious sentiments of certain communities.
There is no hurdle insight in China as far as the release of Pokemon Go is concerned, with Hong Kong already receiving it a couple of months ago. But it is not known why Niantic is holding back the release of the game in China.
The game could be released in more countries in the next few weeks, and it is inevitable with its popularly taking a nosedive in the West. Still, it appears like curiosity among gamers will vanish by the time it is launched.
The reason for this choice emerged in a chat Gadgets 360 had with Vamsi Krishna, Head – Consumer Marketing, South Asia, Nvidia. He let slip some interesting snippets on gamers in the country and what the graphics card giant is up to, aside from pushing out new hardware.
“It also meets a great platform where gamers can get the best gameplay experience,” he adds. “That’s the reason we chose Overwatch. What we also chose was to enable the premium cafes for Nvidia with Overwatch, so they also encourage people who are coming to the cafes with this new game.”
For the GeForce Cup, Nvidia resorted to third-party suppliers for Overwatch PC codes, Krishna says. With Blizzard not bringing in the game officially or offering any support, it makes us wonder if the company is too early to the e-sports bubble – while lucrative internationally, it has yet to hit similar heights in the country.
“The way the Indian e-sports scenario is, most of the global publishers don’t think there’s a sufficient size for e-sports in India, but we have a sufficient size,” claims Krishna. “It’s a matter of fact, and it’s time before they realize we have a sufficient crowd, and they come one by one officially to India.”
Unlike other recent e-sports events that have taken place online, cyber cafes will play a crucial role in the GeForce Cup. But are they still relevant? According to Nvidia, very much so, likening their effect on adopting video gaming in the nation similar to China or South Korea.
“It’s actually not cyber cafes; it’s gaming cafes,” he says. “They are very relevant in India. If gaming has to grow in India, gaming cafes play a significant role in this particular growth. What we believe is India and China when we compare, these are the two countries that are very similar in terms of society.”
“China is way ahead of India in the perspective of the gaming category,” he adds. “China has around 145,000 gaming centers and close to 60 million gamers.” India is nowhere close, but Krishna’s hoping that Nvidia can change this by working with cybercafes and getting them to convert to gaming cafes when Internet connectivity is getting cheaper and more accessible anyway.
“We believe there are 12 to 15 million PC and console gamers in India, and we only have 300 to 350 decent gaming centers in India for this crowd,” says Krishna. “There is a significant opportunity for gaming vendors in India, and that’s the reason why Nvidia is putting a lot of effort in terms of helping these cafe owners to understand best business practices and to allow more gamers to get encouraged to get into gaming cafes.” Nvidia’s cafe program – which guides and rates cafes according to their gaming readiness – helps in this.
“We’re looking at close to 150 cafes in the last five months, and out of 150 cafes, we’re close to 29 certified cafes,” he says. “All these 29 cafes have made significant changes or investments to their cafes to meet the certification standards. If you go to a platinum-rated cafe, you will find a minimum of GTX 960 and above, and that’s a platform where gamers can get a good gaming experience.”
“While we certify cafes, we also help them with initiatives like the GeForce Cup that takes place in platinum-rated cafes to start with, and with season one, we’re doing with eight of these,” he explains. “There will be a significant footfall in these cafes. There will be a new set of gamers to play new genres creating incremental revenue sources for these cafes.”
For Nvidia, the upside to this is getting to sell more cards without reaching the consumer market. A cybercafe is likely to buy more GeForce GTXes in a single order than most consumers would in their entire lifetime, several times over. “This is a long-term strategy for Nvidia. It’s never a quick strategy for us,” Krishna says. “Nvidia is one of the key gaming brands in India whose actually seriously investing in gaming cafe category.”
“Our audience is an active mix of everything [lapsed, active, and soon to be gamers]. Of 25 million who have an active interest in video games, around 10 to 15 million of them have platforms physically present with them,” he adds. “When we look at the number of people showing active interest in video games and related interests, we close to 25 to 30 million people who are active on Facebook. That’s a big number. We’re only talking about connecting two to three million people, but the opportunity is a lot more than what we’re reaching right now.”
The term “platform,” we’re told, refers to both PCs and consoles. Of which, PCs are “significantly dominant,” according to Krishna. Drilling down further, he tells us that only one to one and a half million people have “decent” platforms to play at resolutions of 1080p and above. But this isn’t a reflection of the interest in the category, he insists.
“While the balance nine-plus million people do have a PC but no good platforms. They consume a lot of data. If we announce any game titles or talk about any games that release in the market, they go active on social and consume the content,” Krishna explains. “They check out what’s happening around the world; they follow and post. The balance shows an active interest, and that’s untapped potential that will eventually get into the fold.” One method used to tap into this segment, Krishna tells us, is its live stream of marquee events such as the GeForce 1070 and 1080 launch in Bengaluru.
“On that day, we reached close to two million gamers. Close to 200,000 video views on that day alone,” he says. “If you look at the demographics of gamers, 50 percent are in the demographic of 18 to 24 and are predominantly male, and these guys are one of the most socially active audiences in the world today.”
And it isn’t just the top 20 cities either. In addition to the GeForce Cup, the company is bringing its GamerConnect event – where consumers can check out the latest games on Nvidia hardware to tier-II cities such as Mangalore and Jaipur.
“It’s a growing gamer community, and most gamers in tier-II haven’t got exposed to the brand directly. Tier-II cities are also very well connected today. The kind of response we get in tier-II cities is a lot more encouraging these days,” he says, adding that the spending power is on par with bigger cities. GamerConnect appears to be a way for the company to let customers – existing or otherwise – of its presence.
While Krishna’s focus is squarely on evangelizing gaming, we had to ask of the company’s plans for the GeForce GTX 1050 – the alleged budget GPU successor to last year’s GTX 950.
“I can’t comment on that. There is no announcement of any other products from the Pascal architecture perspective,” he says. “The only products we are formally announced in India are 1080, 1070, and 1060 in two formats – 6GB and 3GB. Having said that, Nvidia constantly apprises the market scenarios and product gaps – as and when there is a right time or opportunity, we will talk about those accordingly.”
GURGAON: After nine weeks of frenzied competition, the finale is at hand. On Sunday, Gurgaon and gaming come together in what promises to be a battle between smart wits and smarter minds.
Gathering in the city for the final leg will be 100 of India’s best gamers, with teams flying in from Chennai, Bangalore, and Mumbai. And on Sunday, 40 elite gamers will be slugging it out for a funky accolade (having their name on a bottle of a popular fizzy drink) and a prize pool totaling Rs 10 lakhs.
In the ‘Dew Arena,’ contenders squared off on personal computers, consoles, and mobile phones. Of these, the ‘mobile’ game allowed gaming enthusiasts the opportunity to play in the ‘arena’ from any place (and at any time).
Akshat Rathee, MD of NODWIN Gaming (gaming partner of ‘Dew Arena’), says it’s no longer considered “weird” to be a gamer. This is, he says, gaming’s time. “We’ve been adamant in saying that gaming is here. It’s just something that’s been under the radar – we didn’t realize it has grown into a subculture of entertainment and youth,” Rather told TOI.
“You’ll not find anyone in India under the age of 25 who’s not played a game, whether it be ‘Candy Crush’ or ‘Temple Run,’ or ‘FIFA’ on the console – these are words that have become part of the lexicon now,” claims Rather.
Gaming, he adds, is far from being a nerdy pursuit, and plenty of multi-tasking and stamina is required. “These are people whose fingers move faster than you can see – they’re not the fat boy in the basement with big glasses!
“These are guys whose left fingers are on the keyboard doing one thing, whose right hand is on a mouse doing something else, and whose eyes are not blinking for at least three-and-a-half minutes in a row to make sure he doesn’t miss a second of anything.”
Also, on the finale day, there’s a chance for visitors to take part in a ‘cosplay’ (that’s costume play for the uninitiated), where people dress up as characters from comics, video games, or those Japanese staples, manga, and anime. It’s time for this subculture to take the limelight.
Taiwan-based computer hardware company ASUS and Republic of Gamers (ROG) launched two new gaming laptops equipped with the latest Nvidia Pascal GeForce GTX10 series graphic card in India. The laptops ASUS ROG GL502VS and G752VS are priced at Rs 1,81,990 and Rs 2,47,990, respectively.
ROG GL502 comes with a sixth-generation Intel i7 processor clocked at 2.70 GHz. It comes with a VR Ready NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 GPU. GL502 comes with 32GB of DDR4 RAM. The laptop features a 15-inch display that allows for 178-degree viewing angles. The laptop uses a Hyper Cool Duo-Copper cooling system to keep the CPU, and GPU cool independently. It also comes with USB Type-C ports for up to 10Gbps data transfer speeds. The laptop weighs 2.3Kgs.
ROG G752VS comes with the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 GPU, Windows 10 Pro, 6th generation Intel Skylake unlocked Core i7 processor, and up to 64GB overclocked DDR4 RAM. The laptop features a 17-inch Full-HD display. The laptop also comes with a 512GB SSD along with a 1TB HDD.
The laptops are available at leading stores along with Asus exclusive outlets.
The Indian Games Expo (IGX 2016) made its way to India last Saturday, but more importantly, so did PlayStation VR. With all this hype surrounding VR and hearing tales of it being the best thing to happen since sliced bread, we just had to check out. Luckily for us, Sony brought the PSVR to India and demoed it at IGX.
Let’s start with the headset itself. Looking at the spec sheet, it’s easy to dismiss the PSVR as the budget alternative to the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, and it is exactly that, but it has surprising potential.
Unlike the Rift and the Vive, which are festooned with sensors and require fancy tracking cameras to function, the PSVR uses simple LEDs and the PS Camera to track orientation. If you’re familiar with TrackIR, the PSVR uses a similar system.
The tracking wasn’t as fluid as I’ve experienced on the Vive or the Rift, but it was more than enough for the kind of games on offer. Tracking aside, my second concern with the PSVR was the screen resolution. The Rift and the Vive both use 2K screens, and even then, images aren’t very sharp. If you’ve ever tried Google Cardboard with a Full HD screen, you’ll have noticed severe pixelation. The PSVR uses a Full HD screen.
Interestingly, I saw no pixelation whatsoever, which was a pleasant surprise. Sony did say that the PSVR uses three subpixels per rendered pixel vs. the two subpixels per pixel on the Rift and the Vive. In effect, this means that Sony’s PSVR is actually rendering a denser image than the Rift and the Vive, making for a perceivably better VR experience.
Sadly, the PS4 itself doesn’t seem to be able to do that amazing headset justice.
Oculus and HTC recommend a pretty beefy system for handling VR. In comparison, the PS4’s graphics capabilities are very tame. In VR, that performance difference is very apparent.
We tried many games on the PSVR: Drive Club, Batman VR, and Resident Evil 7. In all those games, the one factor that stood out was the low resolution of the game. Jaggies and low-res textures were everywhere. It was so bad, in fact, that it felt like we were watching something like a 360p video on a 1080p screen.
Barring resolution, the experience was pleasant enough. We did have controller and tracking issues in Batman and Resident Evil, but those issues were more down to set up issues than PSVR issues. We couldn’t try the Move controllers in-game because they weren’t properly set up at the demo time.
I only spent a total of 20 minutes at most with the PSVR, but those 20 minutes convinced me of two things. The first is that Sony’s done a better job with games and with the headset than either Oculus or HTC. The second is that the PS4 is the wrong console for VR. I hope the PS4 Pro manages to render higher resolution VR gaming because it would be a shame to waste PSVR on just the PS4.
“Gooooaaaal by Messi,” screamed the commentator as we entered India’s gaming extravaganza ‘IGX Gaming Expo.’, which was recently held at the World Trade Centre in Mumbai. With a boom in technology, a whole new generation of gamers is emerging. At IGX, serious gamers participated in competitive tournaments for the newest video games, such as FIFA 17 (released in September), WWE 2K17 (released on October 11), and PES (Pro Evolution Soccer) 2017 (rival to FIFA).
Other new games like Mortal Kombat XL, Injustice II, Watch Dogs 2, Star Wars, Mafia III, Tomb Raider, W2K17, etc., were introduced. Games were available for a hands-on gaming experience. “I just play a few games, and I am not a gamer, but I really loved the Mortal Kombat XL game,” said one of the guests at the expo.
But what really drew the crowd was the Play Station section, which launched the Play Station Virtual Reality. The serpentine queue to try the VR headset spoke volumes about how gaming enthusiasts are growing in numbers in India.
Roosh, an Indian start-up founded in 2013, has made mobile game development its passion by launching games for Android and IOS. Ogre Head Studio brought an Indian flavor to gaming through ‘Asura,’ a game inspired by Indian mythology. The presence of tech giants like Alienware and Asus, computer hardware distributors like Acro engineering made for a wholesome technological experience.
Superman, Wonder woman, Flash, Ironman, Pikachu, or Goku, you name any cult character, their T-shirts, mugs, and other souvenirs were available for sale, much to the delight of gamers.
“The Lenovo Legion Y740 and Legion Y540 are touted as professional-grade gaming laptops.”
Lenovo has refreshed Legion its gaming-centric computer collection with the launch of Legion Y740 and Legion Y540 in India. The laptops are the successor to the closing year’s Legion Y730 and Legion Y530, respectively. The layout stays identical between the generations. However, the internals of both Legion Y740 and Legion Y540 has been progressed with new GPUs and the ninth-gen Intel processor. The machines additionally function up to date display alternatives that now help as much as 144Hz refresh charge. The enterprise claims that the brand new Legion laptops are redesigned from the ground up and integrate features based on the comments from online game enthusiasts.
Their charge and availability haven’t been introduced but. Lenovo Legion Y740, Legion Y540 specifications The Lenovo Legion Y740 and Legion Y540 each ship with a close to bezel-less 15-inch show that bears complete HD resolution and 144Hz refresh charge. The 9th-gen Intel Core i7 processor paired with up to 32GB RAM and 1TB SSD at their middle. The machines also rock the trendy NVIDIA portraits card. The Legion Y540 employs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 GPU, while the Legion Y740 employs up to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Max-Q card. The Max-Q processors permit for thinner laptops; but, they may be considered much less effective than the ordinary versions.
The Legion Y740 dons machined aluminum chassis with anodized Iron Gray coloration coating up top. The pc also consists of customizable RGB lighting fixtures at the back of the keyboard and thermal venting. Other capabilities encompass Dolby Atmos Speaker System with Dolby Sound Radar, options for a Dolby Vision HDR four hundred 500-nit display, and widespread stressed out and wireless connectivity, including Type-C, audio jack, and HDMI port.
The inexpensive Legion Y540 is available in Raven black color choice and functions Harmon speaker with Dolby Atmos, white-backlit keyboard, and the same connectivity options because of the Y740. Apart from this, each of the laptops runs Windows 10 out of the field and houses a battery. This is rated to last as long as six hours on a single charge. They also characteristic Lenovo Legion Coldfront twin-fan thermal layout to dissipate warmth from the machine.
Smartphone gaming sometimes feels like a relentless rush forward. New apps are being created every day, and while the odds are low for anyone in particular to succeed, the good ones rise to the top pretty naturally. That means there’s always a new, exciting game to try out, or even a whole new genre starting to emerge. In the past year or so, though, we’ve started to see some bigger changes in how Android users can approach gaming. They’re not all changes that you’d necessarily notice when you open up the Google Play store, but they’ve all had significant impacts on the market as a whole.
The most subtle change was probably Google’s decision to change how permissions were handled for games to make it easier for players to sign up for in-game transactions. The move was made to catch up to Apple, which has always had more of a built-in method for gamers to pay for material within games. The Android operating system had to be altered to make it happen, but it’s now easier for users downloading mobile games from the Google Play store to enjoy all aspects of those games seamlessly.
A bigger shift in Android gaming came when Google released its Pixel smartphone last year and the Daydream VR headset. The announcement came out of nowhere, but it situated Google as the chief competitor to Samsung in the mobile-based VR business. We’ve seen Android programs working with VR headsets before through those same Samsung phones, but this maneuver by Google represented another step forward and a significant shift in gaming. VR isn’t poised to replace typical mobile gaming, but it will represent a major new branch of the mobile entertainment industry.
There have also been some more game-centric shifts in Android gaming in the last year. One that stands out is the continued growth of the casino market through mobile phones. There is now a large collection of gaming apps that fall under this umbrella, where not so long ago, most legitimate digital casinos existed online in browsers and on desktops. The software has been tweaked in a way that allows established casino developers to put out games specifically built for mobile phones, and Android stores are now packed with legitimate, impressive options. It’s not a genre for everybody, but it is trendy, representing a pretty big development in Android gaming.
And then, there was the migration of Nintendo content to the Google Play store after it had started exclusively with Apple. This is the most recent development, given that Super Mario Run was just made available for Android devices in March, but it’s a change that has major implications. Nintendo is one of the most popular names in gaming, and if more mobile games are to come from them, it will be reassuring for countless users to know that Android can get in on the action.
