Popular game development engine, Unity, will receive native Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) support before the end of 2021, allowing developers to easily implement it in their games.
Nvidia made the announcement as part of its GTX 2021 event, stating that its proprietary AI-powered downsampling would enable better performance for Unity titles that make use of raytracing. Games using traditional rasterized graphics will also see a performance uplift, as has been seen in many titles that already make use of the tool.
DLSS was recently added to Unreal Engine as a development plugin, which means that two of the most widely used game engines in the industry will support the technology by the end of the year. This means that a large majority of the games you play on PC could support DLSS, which allows you to downscale your game for performance gains and allow Nvidia’s machine-learning algorithm to upscale the image with minimal visual impact.
The Fast & Furious saga has seen a series of directors place their stamps on individual installments, but only one director has helmed more than one: Justin Lin. The director of The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Fast & Furious, Fast & Furious 5, and Fast & Furious 6, Lin has returned to the series to direct F9. He’s also signed on to direct the 10th and 11th films, which will reportedly close out the core saga.
In the lead-up to today’s debut of the final trailer for F9, IGN spoke with Justin Lin about what he’s been doing throughout the film’s lengthy delay, the wild success of the franchise, and his desire to repair the Han-sized hole that the continued presence of Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw created in the series.
IGN: From your side, as a creator, when you watch folks discuss and speculate about an upcoming film like Fast 9, is there any frustration on your end about the things that they’re getting wrong, and maybe even the things that they’re getting right, potentially spoiling things for themselves? Or is it just great to have people that are so enthusiastic about a project of yours that they just can’t stop talking about? Or is it a mix?
Justin Lin: That’s a great question, I mean, I actually think that the way this franchise has evolved, it’s been very interactive, in a way. There’s always speculation, I think, with the timeline, with character relationships. So it’s always been a lot of fun creating – and creating new chapters – and, at the same time, just seeing what people around the world are speculating. You know, for me, there’s no frustration; it’s always just fun because it’s when people are invested. I think, for me, the first time was when the decision to put Han in Fast 4 [was made], and there were a lot of worries that, ‘Hey, well, he died in Tokyo Drift.’ There was a real concerted effort to see if we could do something so that we could really share this idea of timeline and mythology. And it was amazing how people picked it up, and it never tripped. I think it was interactive in the sense that, creatively, once we were able to try different things that people engage with, that’s always been fun.
IGN: Touching on Han, a few years ago we spoke with Fast & Furious writer Chris Morgan ahead of Hobbs & Shaw regarding despite how much we enjoyed watching Jason Statham as an actor, it was always difficult to reconcile with the fact we were being corralled into getting behind the character that killed Han. So, thanks for making it far easier to retroactively enjoy The Fate of the Furious and Hobbs & Shaw more. Once Han appeared in that Fast 9 trailer last year, what did you see from the reaction?
JL: You know, when I left, I really did leave. I was not part of anything and, actually, I hadn’t watched [Furious 7] or [The Fate of the Furious]. It was actually during a screening of my first independent film that somebody brought it up in a Q&A, and it baffled me too, you know? So it was gratifying; I think part of coming back, being able to, for me, correct certain things that didn’t make sense. But when we were in Miami and we had the trailer launch and to be able to see the immediate reaction, just the visceral reaction from the fans and then see it spread around the world within minutes; it meant a lot. It meant that, you know, people care about our characters and that, you know, it is a weird glitch. To this day, I don’t know what happened, but I’m glad that I’m able to come back and participate and, in a way for me, to be able to correct something that just felt really off.
[poilib element=”quoteBox” parameters=”excerpt=I%20don’t%20know%20what%20happened%2C%20but%20I’m%20glad%20that%20I’m%20able%20to%20come%20back%20and%20participate%20and%2C%20in%20a%20way%20for%20me%2C%20to%20be%20able%20to%20correct%20something%20that%20just%20felt%20really%20off”]IGN: Looking back, obviously you steered this series from Tokyo Drift through to Fast & Furious 6 and were part of the franchise as it became a true phenomenon – but if you were to speak to yourself coming off Tokyo Drift, how could you have explained not only that Fast & Furious was going to become the biggest thing Universal has, but that ultimately you would personally direct seven of them?
JL: Am I directing seven of them? Yeah, I guess so! You’re going into the future; I get it. Wow, that’s a lot! I mean, look, I’ll be honest, I think when I first joined up Fast and Furious obviously wasn’t where it is now, you know? And I think talking to people who were big car fans, they weren’t fans of the franchise. And that was one of my first conversations with people who love cars and whose passions were in cars and I felt like I had to really learn to respect their passion. So that was really the journey of Tokyo Drift. I’ll be honest, we didn’t have Vin, we didn’t have Paul, but it was great in the sense that it was all about earning the respect and hopefully building, or rebuilding, this community.
And so every time we got an opportunity, I felt like it was my job to not only keep evolving our characters, but to keep pushing the envelope, you know? I don’t know if I expected it, but I did have a conversation with Vin, and I remember that in Tokyo Drift and I said, ‘Look, if you come back, it really does kind of connect everything, even though it’s only one scene. And if we’re lucky enough and we have another chapter, then let’s keep building, let’s keep evolving.’ And so it’s always been our mantra that we don’t take anything for granted, but we’re going to go all out, and if we get to earn the next chapter, then we’re going to go all out again. And, and luckily, I could tell you, going to the premieres – we used to travel around the world for all the premieres – you could see the fan base and the community grow. That inspired us to keep evolving and not ever be complacent.
IGN: Like a host of films Fast 9 has had to endure a very long delay, and it’s an understandable one, obviously, but what has this meant on your side? Has there been a desire to keep going back and finessing parts of the film, or has it been complete for some time and you’d say ‘We like it; let’s not touch it!’ How do you approach that lengthy delay?
JL: It’s interesting because I think usually, you know, a film of this size, they literally rip the film from me. I mean, there’s been instances in the other Fasts where I’m going from final sound mix, you know, and I see the sunrise and I jump on a plane to fly to Europe for the UK premiere. That’s always been how these films get made. And I’m the type where I don’t ever just sit back; like, if I have a year, I’m going to keep pushing. I mean, I literally will go through every frame.
[poilib element=”quoteBox” parameters=”excerpt=If%20I%20have%20a%20year%2C%20I’m%20going%20to%20keep%20pushing.%20I%20mean%2C%20I%20literally%20will%20go%20through%20every%20frame”]I’m very fortunate and the studio has been great because up until even last week, I’m always going back, and sometimes I don’t end up doing anything. But I like to tweak; I’m a tweaker. I don’t like to stop. And I feel like that’s the energy when we make these films. I think as we sit here, for the first time I actually have a completed film as we’re talking, because usually they’re still colour timing stuff and I’m still trying to go through it. But it’s been kind of a luxury, process-wise.
F9 hits cinemas in Australia on June 17, 2021, and on June 25 in North America.
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Luke is Games Editor at IGN’s Sydney office and spectacularly breaking out of an arm cast to “go to work” is still on his bucket list. You can find him on Twitter every few days @MrLukeReilly.
But if you want to import it you’ll have to keep in mind a few caveats. For one, the price is pretty steep. The CD soundtrack set itself is 11,000 yen (roughly $100 USD) and when you factor in shipping the total comes up to nearly $120. Plus, the listing comes with the unusual caveat that you cannot cancel after the order is placed, so be sure you definitely want it.
The soundtrack consists of four BGM CDs, capturing the full array of hourly songs that change throughout the day’s game clock as well as weather arrangements. It also includes the 173 BGM songs for each facility and event, along with a recording of the virtual performance released in May 2020. The other three CDs contain 95 KK Slider instrumental songs. The listing also notes that the first run includes an earphone case.
The upcoming penultimate chapter in the Fast Saga, Fast 9, has more prominent roles for its cast of women, according to Michelle Rodriguez.
Talking as part of a cast roundtable, Rodriguez revealed that there has been an effort to improve the roles and storylines of the movie’s female characters. “I was really, really like my heart warmed when I saw that there was actually not one single bit of resistance against the idea of bringing the females of the franchise into the forefront,” she said. “Justin was super, super onboard with it. Vin was super onboard with it. He’s always been supportive of strong women.”
Rodriguez explained that an additional writer was brought on to help with these characters. “The studio hired an amazing SLP writer to come on board and touch up all the female characters,” she said.
“When I actually watched the movie, I was like, ‘Yeah, okay, drop mic.’ I can chill now because I felt like all the females in the franchise got equal amounts of love. And that to me, warmed my heart.”
Rodriguez went on to offer some vague examples of what people can expect from the film’s women. “To see Natalie [Emmanuel] doing something other than typing into a computer and doing techie stuff, to see this wonderful new character who’s a walking weapon – Anna [Sawai] – just kick ass and take names, to see Jordanna Brewster’s character come in and get her hands dirty again in full-on fight action sequences, I was like, ‘Yes, that’s what I’m talking about, guys. Let’s do this.’”
Fortnite is coming to print and digital comic shops starting next week for the Batman/Fortnite: Zero Point six-issue comic book run. That much we already knew, as we also knew buying the comics physically or digitally via a DC Universe Infinite subscription would net readers as many as seven new DC Comics cosmetics to use in Fortnite. What we didn’t know until now is that in all cases, you won’t have to buy the comics to get the Fortnite items.
With the debut issue of Batman/Fortnite: Zero Point set to arrive next week on April 20, Epic has shared more details about what to expect if you’re eager to read the story or get some new in-game items. Included in the FAQ is a note that most items included with the comics will be sold in the Fortnite Item Shop day-and-date with their corresponding comic book release.
The only exception is the first one, Rebirth Harley Quinn, dressed in her red and black leather jacket and shorts she’s often been clad in since DC soft-rebooted its entire comic line in 2016. Those wishing to unlock Rebirth Harley as soon as possible will need to get the first issue of the comic book when it launches next week.
Either physical or digital copies will include a code to unlock the item, but if you’re getting it digitally, note that only DC Universe Infinite will offer these codes. No third-party digital comic stores, such as Comixology, will net you Rebirth Harley. You also can’t get the code with the one-week free trial DC offers to new subscribers as the crossover comic isn’t part of the trial. To put it plainly, there’s no way to get these new DC items for free.
Following that first issue, the subsequent five issues launching every other week through July 6 will include additional DC Comics cosmetics, but you can buy the items in-game if you no longer wish to buy the comics or keep an active DC Universe Infinite subscription. Rebirth Harley will also come to the Shop later in 2021, so if you unlock her by way of the comic beginning next week, you’ll have her a few months ahead of schedule.
Epic is keeping these additional items a secret for now, though it’s probably expecting too much to think each cosmetic will be a new DC hero or villain. More likely, they’ll include items such as Back Blings, Emotes, or Harvesting Tools. Players who redeem codes for all six items will earn a bonus seventh cosmetic, Armored Batman, though it’s unclear if that Style will later be sold separately as well.
As for what else is new to Fortnite, our second Spire Quest guide can help you complete this week’s lore-heavy challenge.
At a recent roundtable interview, the director and cast of Fast 9 spoke about the creation of the penultimate chapter of the Fast series. They discussed elements that bridge the franchise’s past and future, with the return of old faces and the recruitment of a new important cast member.
On bringing things back from the series’ past, Justin Lin spoke about his return to the series, having previously left the franchise behind after directing 2013’s Fast & Furious 6. “When I left, I thought, ‘Okay, this is time for me. I don’t have any more to contribute,’” Lin recalled.
“And I remember I would be shooting a film or being in a cutting room, and Vin [Diesel] would call me,” he continued. “And we’d just be talking about Dom and the Fast family. And I think it’s through that and also just a lot of the conversation through the years, whether it’s just fans stopping me, talking about character and the world. And when the right idea and the right themes landed, it just felt very organic. It felt like I wasn’t really away at all.”
Justin Lin is not the only returning member of the Fast crew; Fast 9 will also see Sung Kang reprise his role as Han Lue. Believed to have died during the events of Tokyo Drift, Fast 9 will bring him back into the family. For Vin Diesel, this was an important part of the story.
“This instalment is in so many ways about fatherhood. And fatherhood, to really grasp the significance of that, we have to examine the brotherhood,” said Diesel. That comes in the introduction of Jakob Toretto – Dom’s actual brother – played by John Cena. But, explains Diesel, this allows the film to examine the non-blood brotherly bond between Dom and Han.
In regards to his return, he celebrated Universal allowing him and the team creative freedom to push beyond the series’ established ground. “I think a lot of times with sequels, it’s like ‘let’s do the same thing over’. That’s not the case here,” he said. “We’re always challenging each other to evolve and to push. And so, it felt like I was away, but it also felt very poetic to be back, trying to wrap everything, at least the saga, up.”
“If you go back to Tokyo Drift, there was no brotherhood between Dom and Brian,” he explained. “Brian was a cop, obviously Dom was an outlaw. There was a brotherhood between Han and Dom. They were outlaws in Mexico. They were brothers. So in creating this whole mythology, the presence of Jakob was beautifully balanced by the return of Han, the return of a brother. There’s a relevance and a power that lives in this mythology that only Sung Kang Han could bring to our mythology.”
This return of a character from the series’ past ties into the franchise’s future, with brand new character Jakob. Finding the right person to play a Toretto brother was something of a sticking point for Diesel and Lin.
“Once we started getting closer to production, Justin and I would talk about how harrowing it would be actually have to cast a new Toretto,” he recalled. “There’s so many different directions you can go.”
But an encounter with John Cena caused Diesel to have an emotional reaction that made him realise that Cena was perfect for the role of Jakob Toretto. “ I remember John Cena coming into this Dom shrine that I had, where I would kind of go meditate and train and start getting into that Dom state of mind,” revealed Diesel. “Call this crazy, but I remember feeling as though Pablo Paul Walker had sent him in. And I remember talking to Justin that night and saying, ‘My gut and my heart feels like this was meant to be.’”
The English-language version of Ask Iwata: Words of Wisdom from Satoru Iwata is now available in the US, and Amazon is offering the hardcover edition for 11% off its cover price.
The late CEO of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata, started his career as a part-time programmer at HAL Laboratory, the developer of games like Kirby’s Adventure. Nintendo and HAL had a close relationship long before HAL Laboratory was officially part of the Nintendo family, and Satoru Iwata was its brightest star.
Iwata worked for HAL, but also developed games for Nintendo for the Famicom ath the time, such as Balloon Fight. There’s a fantastic, subtitled episode of GameCenter CX where Iwata plays Balloon Fight with host Shinya Arino and shares some of his experiences as a programmer and eventually, Nintendo CEO. It’s a shame the episode is no longer on YouTube, because it’s one of my favorite looks into the history and development of video games.
Iwata died of complications from a rare form of cancer in his bile duct in 2015, leaving a lasting impression on gamers the world over. While the Wii U was a flop, failing to even come close to the success of the Nintendo Wii, Iwata took the failure with humility and grace, opting to cut his own CEO salary in half due to Nintendo’s lackluster financial performance in 2014.
Those of us who owned the Wii U generally feel like it’s a good little system that failed to live up to its potential, but Iwata’s brilliance would shine through again, although sadly, after his death. He worked on development of the Nintendo Switch during its earliest days, days that would ultimately be his last.
I’m personally extremely excited to dive into it. As a fan of gaming history, video games, business, and game development, as well as someone fond of Satoru Iwata, this book ticks off a lot of boxes for me. The hardcover edition is $20.59 and the Kindle version is $11.99.
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Seth Macy is IGN’s Executive Editor, IGN Commerce, and just wants to be your friend.
From the outside, the MSI Stealth 15M has quite a different look than the MSI GP66 Leopard that I recently reviewed, with the Stealth featuring a more compact overall footprint, weighing just 3.73-pounds. However, on the inside, the two gaming laptops are fairly similar. The Stealth 15M maxes out with an RTX 3060 Laptop GPU and boasts an 11th Gen Intel Core i7.
Nvidia has moved away from using Max-Q or Max-P with its mobile GPUs. Instead, the company is now referring to them as a “Laptop GPU,” which makes sense. In addition to the new name, the chip-maker is giving manufacturers more control tuning the GPU inside their laptops. After a few weeks of using the Stealth 15M, I’ve found it to offer surprising performance in a fairly compact design, but you’re going to have to be willing to pay for it.
Here are the specifications of the MSI Stealth 15M Leopard I’ve been testing:
Model: MSI Stealth 15M (A11UEK-010US)
Display: 15.6-inch FHD 144Hz (1920 x 1080)
Processor: 11th Gen Intel Core i7-11375H 3.3GHz (12M cache, 5.0GHz Max Turbo)
Graphics: Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU with 6GB GDDR6
Memory: 32GB DDR4 3200MHz
OS: Windows 10 Pro
Storage: 1TB NVMe SSD
Webcam: 720p
Ports: 1 x Thunderbolt 4 with Power Delivery, 1 x USB-C USB 3.1 Gen 2 with DisplayPort, 2 x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A, 1 x HDMI, 1 x 3.5mm headphone jack, 1 x microSD port
There are several different configurations listed on MSI’s website, including the model I tested at the top of the chart (or furthest right, in this case). That said, all of the models listed come with the same display, processor and GPU. The biggest differences between the builds come down to storage and RAM. It’s either 512GB or 1TB of storage. For RAM, your options are 16GB or 32GB. Best Buy has the same model I tested, with the only difference being it has 16GB of memory instead of 32GB, for $1,599.
Design
The Stealth 15M comes in two color options. I tested the carbon gray model, but there’s also a pure white model. Looking at the photos, I think the white version looks slick. The gray housing has a slight blue tint to it. The downside to that color is it shows every little bit of oil from my hands. Measuring 14.10 x 9.76 x 0.63 inches and weighing 3.73 pounds, the Stealth 15M is clearly made for portability and power. Even though it has a 15.6-inch display, the footprint of the 15M is small enough you don’t feel like you’re toting around a huge laptop. As a point of reference, the MSI GP66 Leopard also boasts a 15.6-inch display while measuring 14.09 x 10.51 x 0.92 inches and weighing 5.25 pounds. In other words, the 15M is not only slightly thinner, but MSI trimmed 1.5 pounds off of the weight.
When we get back to regularly traveling or trekking across campus, it’ll be easy to carry this around in a backpack without breaking your back. With the lid open, you’ll see a honeycomb pattern above the keyboard, and if you look close enough, you can see the fans just underneath it. That same pattern is found on the bottom of the laptop’s housing, allowing air to freely travel through the housing.
The 84-key keyboard has single-zone RGB lighting you can adjust in the Dragon Center app. Single zone lighting means you can’t do anything terribly fancy, but it does provide a gaming look and feel to the otherwise standard-looking laptop.
The trackback is centered on the housing. It’s small for my liking, especially with the extra space that’s left available, but it gets the job done. Either way, most people will want to plug in an external mouse for gaming.
Just above the display is a 720p webcam, making the bezel that goes along the top of the screen slightly thicker than the bezels on either side. The webcam looks OK, not great. As is the case with most built-in webcams, the picture is overexposed. It’s good enough for Zoom work meetings and calls with loved ones and that’s about it.
There’s a wide variety of ports on the 15M, giving gamers enough spots to plug-in accessories, but also use it for assignments or work tasks. On the left side of the deck are a microSD card reader, the charge port, a standard USB 3.2 Gen 1 port and a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Flanking the opposite side of the deck you’ll find two USB-C ports, one with Thunderbolt 4 and Power Delivery support, the other with DisplayPort support. There’s another USB 3.2 Gen 1 port, and finally an HDMI port with 4K@60Hz support.
It’s a welcome mix of old and new ports, allowing for high-speed hubs and accessories thanks to Thunderbolt 4 support, while still providing standard USB support for things like wireless mic or headset adapters.
The only thing I would change about the 15M’s design is the keyboard, as I’d prefer firmer keys more like the ones MSI used on the GP66 Leopard. The 15M’s keyboard is okay for quick typing, but it’s far too easy to get lost when gaming or typing long-form documents.
Performance and gaming
The 15M checks all the boxes you want to look for in a gaming laptop spec list. It has an 11th Gen Intel Core i7-11375H, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU with 6GB GDDR6, 32GB of 3200MHz memory, and a 1TB NVMe SSD.
As I do with every gaming laptop that lands on my desk, I took a look at the boost clock speed of the 15M’s GPU in GPU-Z (and the Nvidia Control panel). It registers at 1282MHz, instead of the 1357MHz MSI’s spec sheet lists, with a base clock speed of 817MHz.
Part of the transition away from Max-Q nomenclature is that manufacturers are supposed to list the max graphics power on the spec sheet. MSI honored that by listing the 65W maximum for the RTX 3060 in the 15M. What does all that mean? Well, look at the benchmarks below:
Benchmarks
MSI Stealth 15M
MSI GP66 Leopard
Acer Predator Triton 300 SE
Price as tested
$1,899
$1,799
$1,399
CPU
Intel Core i7-11375H
Intel Core i7-10870H
Intel Core i7-11375H
GPU
Nvidia RTX 3060
Nvidia RTX 3070
Nvidia RTX 3060
3DMark Time Spy
6294
10266
6377
3DMark Fire Strike
14091
21626
14416
3DMark Night Raid
28015
47377
30238
Total War: Three Kingdoms
56
84
54
Borderlands 3
61
87
60
Metro Exodus
48
69
48
Hitman 3
110
158
93
Unigine Heaven 4.0
85
126
85
PCMark 10
5698
6499
5892
PCMark 10 Battery Test
3:00
2:20
6:30
The Stealth 15M and Acer Predator Triton 300 SE, which also features an RTX 3060 Laptop GPU, are competitive with one another across the IGN benchmark suite, but both fall short of matching the performance of something like the Razer Blade 15 Advanced with a 2080 Super. For example, the 15M’s 3DMark Night Raid score of 28,015 is well below the Blade 15 Advanced’s score of 35,805 in the same test.
However, both laptops remained competitive on the Borderlands 3 benchmark with scores of 61 and 65 fps, respectively. And of course, the Stealth 15M doesn’t fare so well compared to the GP66 Leopard and its RTX 3070 Laptop GPU (and 130W total power). Look at 3DMark’s Fire Strike benchmark, and you’ll see the GP66’s score of 21,626 shows a big performance boost over the 15M’s score of 14,091. You can go down the line of benchmarks and without exception the GP66 outperforms the 15M.
In real-world use, the 15M feels fast. Apps open and are ready for use without any hesitation. Browsing with multiple tabs open doesn’t cause any slowdowns.
All the while, gaming performance was surprisingly positive. I spent a lot of time digging into the deluxe edition of Need For Speed: Heat for the first time, along with Call of Duty Warzone. I played both games without the performance-boosting gaming mode turned on to get a feel for what the core experience is like, and then turned on gaming mode.
I used the Xbox Game Bar app to monitor the average frames-per-second over the last 60 seconds, sporadically recording the average at least five times, then averaging those numbers.
This is the first time I’ve spent time racing around in Need for Speed on a review laptop, so I can’t make any direct performance comparisons. However, I have played it on my personal gaming PC with an RTX 2070 Super. Maybe it was a placebo effect, but the experience on the 15M felt smoother with faster loading times.
As for Call of Duty’s Warzone, the 15M’s average frame rate was 94 FPS with Normal graphics settings. I originally had it set to High, but Warzone warned me that I had gone over the safety limit for VRAM and that I would see degraded performance. Looking back, I should have taken that chance, just to see how big of an impact it had on performance.
However, I opted to stay under the limit. My Warzone experience on the 15M wasn’t overly impressive, but it wasn’t poor, either. That is to say, it was quick, responsive and free of any tearing or hiccups. You’re not going to get anywhere near the screen’s 144Hz refresh rate in any AAA games, but nonetheless, you’re getting a solid gaming experience.
Lastly, I did play with gaming mode disabled to see how much of an impact it had on overall performance. As I experienced with the GP66, the difference was negligible. The frame rate dropped only a few points.
What surprised me the most about gaming on the 15M was the clarity in the display. Even though it’s still just a 1080p screen, the color reproduction in Need for Speed was clear and crisp. The rain hitting the car and the road had a glossy sheen to it that I enjoyed.
The Stealth 15M comes in either 512GB or 1TB storage configurations, and I’m thankful the review unit I was sent came with the larger option. Trying to squeeze several AAA games and personal files on 512GB of storage feels like playing Tetris, trying to decide which files and games can go on internal storage, and which need to remain on an external drive.
Battery life
With less space to cram full of spare cells, battery life always seems to suffer when I’m testing gaming laptops as thin and light as the 15M. After putting the 15M through the PCMark 10 battery life test, my skepticism was confirmed.
The 15M powered through exactly three hours of use before powering down. Compared to the Predator Triton 300 SE’s 6.5 hours of battery life in the same test, I can’t say I’m all that impressed with battery performance in the 15M.
Just like the GP66 Leopard, the 15M does have an extended battery performance mode that should limit power usage, but testing in balanced mode didn’t return impressive results.
Software
I’ve opined numerous times about passive-aggressive preinstalled antivirus software and how annoying it is when random popups interrupt what you’re doing to let you know your free trial is about to expire. But nothing annoys me more than when a popup is able to interrupt me mid-game. That’s exactly what happened when Norton butted into a Warzone match. I had to alt-tab out of the game, close the small popup, and then go back into the game. By that time, I was dead and on my way to the Gulag.
Why does this continue to happen? How is this still a thing? Sigh. I’ll stop there, but I really wish PC makers would think about the overall user experience before preinstalling software that obviously cares more about using scare tactics to get people to sign up for a paid plan.
Outside of Norton security, the 15M had the core Windows 10 apps, along with MSI’s gaming app Dragon Center. In Dragon Center, you can see system stats customize the color of the RGB keyboard, and switch between the various power modes the 15M offers. Out of the box, Game Center will automatically switch to a dedicated gaming mode that boosts performance (and the fans) to squeak out every last FPS it can.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki has fielded multiple questions from a fictitious reporter known as Kacey Montagu, a Roblox player who wasn’t present in the room and – per reports – doesn’t actually exist.
In a Politico report, it was revealed that Montagu is an active Roblox player who managed to convince officials that they were a member of the White House Correspondents Association and a reporter for The Daily Mail. Montagu was reportedly in touch with numerous officials close to the president and top White House reporters, and took part in COVID-19 response Zoom press briefings.
Montagu told Politico “I love journalism, and I think the Press Corps is doing a pretty bad job at the moment, so I decided I would ensure some transparency and ask some questions me and some friends wanted the answer to.” They used the opportunity wisely, asking real questions about COVID travel bans and ambassadorships.
Montagu’s “official“ backstory was that they were an 18-year-old student from the UK studying Political Science. Politico reports that Montagu’s biography is also a fiction, citing “acquaintances online”, who believe that Montagu‘s ruse started life as “something to boast about” in Roblox. One acquaintance said that the social media accounts created to support the Montagu persona were “just for the memes” and that they didn’t expect it would go this far.
Montagu was reportedly part of a Roblox role-playing group simulating the US Government, but resigned from their virtual role as nUSA Secretary of State after disagreeing with the Roblox US President’s decision to start a conflict with the UK.
IGN’s Summer of Gaming is returning this year, and E3 2021 will be a part of the event.
Just like last year, our summertime event will include exclusives, trailers, gameplay demos, and developer interviews – but unlike last year, we’re partnering with E3 to bring the world’s most famous games event into our lineup. That means, from Saturday, June 12 to Tuesday, June 15, you’ll be able to check out the first ever all-digital E3 right here on IGN.
E3 will be free in 2021, and feature announcements and showcases from Nintendo, Xbox, Capcom, Konami, Ubisoft, Take-Two Interactive, Warner Bros. Games, Koch Media. Organiser, the ESA promises that E3 2021 will include “major publisher showcases, press conferences, thrilling reveals, extended livestreams and special guest appearances, available free online for all attendees.”
The whole of E3 has been redesigned as a digital event that, alongside the usual mixture of announcement events, will include an online portal, charitable initiatives, and more. “We are focused on ensuring that E3 continues to be the most innovative and collaborative event in the video game industry, so enlisting some of the industry’s biggest media partners to help deliver the highly-anticipated news, reveals and more is crucial to a successful showcase,” said Stanley Pierre-Louis, President & CEO of organisers, the ESA.
As for us, E3 is just one piece of IGN’s Summer of Gaming this year – we’ll have many more details for you soon, but suffice it to say that you can expect IGN’s own announcements, exclusives you won’t see anywhere else, and more brand new additions to our line-up. Events like Gamescom and Comic-Con are on the horizon too, so be sure to check back for other events you can watch with IGN.
If you need a reminder, last year’s Summer of Gaming included brand new game reveals, interviews with some of the industry’s biggest developers, celebrity Animal Crossing island tours, an awards show, and much more, set over the course of a month. You can check out more of what we got up to in the gallery below:
