Kalakshar US

Square Enix just announced a new sub-brand called Dragon Quest Golf, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a team dedicated to making golf merchandise and accessories based on the long-standing JRPG franchise. As expected, one of the brand’s initial offerings is a golf ball based on the iconic blue Slime. This is typically the first enemy players encounter in a DQ game.

The company will showcase more merch at the 59th Japan Golf Fair on March 7, though Square Enix hasn’t yet revealed any other gear besides the aforementioned ball. I could see a golf bag based on a Weartiger or tees designed to resemble an Eggsoskeleton. Maybe a super-powerful driver named after a Golem? The possibilities are endless, though it’ll probably just show off a bunch of golf shirts and khakis with DQ branding.

Why is Square Enix doing this? The company said it’s all about shifting demographics, according to a translation by Siliconera. The franchise has been incredibly popular in Japan since its introduction in 1986, which was almost 40 years ago. Folks who started with the first game could now be grandparents. Also, Japan loves golf.

Incredibly, this isn’t even the weirdest gaming-adjacent merch to pass our eyeballs this week. Honda just announced an absolutely bizarre “near life-size recreation of the Legendary Pokémon Koraidon.” It’s powered by the company’s self-balancing technology, so Honda says it’ll be able to walk on all four legs. Just like Dragon Quest Golf merchandise, this thing goes on exhibit on March 7.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/square-enix-is-making-dragon-quest-themed-golf-merch-because-og-fans-are-now-grandparents-194314177.html?src=rss 

Developer Necrosoft Games has assembled another huge bundle of games on Itch.io to support a good cause. It includes more than 400 games that can be yours if you pony up at least $10 to support wildfire relief efforts in Southern California.

Tunic, one of our favorite games of 2022, is arguably the highest-profile game in the California Fire Relief Bundle. Buying this beautiful, Zelda-esque adventure on Steam right now would cost you $30. That alone makes the bundle great value, though it includes over $3,200 worth of games.

There are a few other particularly notable games on the list. You may have heard of restaurant sim Cook, Serve, Delicious! 2!!, the fairly self-explanatory SkateBird or the utterly ridiculous Octodad: Dadliest Catch. There’s also Hidden Folks, a charming puzzle title that we reckon is a great way to help you destress. Hundreds of other lesser-known games await your curiosity too. For instance, there’s a pretty puzzle-platformer called Hoa that I’ve been meaning to get around to.

Along with video games, there are physical table-top roleplaying games (including a Bugsnax card game you can print and play), asset packs, books, comics and other projects in the bundle. You’ll find a few Playdate games in there as well. Note that there are no Steam keys available through this bundle, but it’s not too complicated to set up an Itch.io launcher on Steam Deck.

Organizers are aiming to raise $100,000 for CORE (Community Organized Relief Effort). The Los Angeles-based organization “offers direct monetary support to survivors of the fires and supports projects for fire resilience in affected areas (and potential disaster zones),” the bundle’s page states. Save for processing fees, all proceeds will go to CORE. The campaign, which will run until just before midnight ET on March 13, is already over three-quarters of the way to its goal.

The wildfires that struck Southern California in early January damaged or destroyed more than 18,000 structures and led to the evacuation of more than 200,000 people. As of February 12, 29 people are known to have died in the fires.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/tunic-and-400-other-games-can-be-yours-for-just-10-thanks-to-a-charity-itchio-bundle-202504116.html?src=rss 

Fubo TV is bringing in more subscribers and revenue but still losing loads of money. Ahead of its proposed Hulu + Live TV merger, the broadcast streaming service increased its subscriber count by about four percent in Q4 2024 and its quarterly revenue by eight percent from a year earlier. And hey, it only lost about $41 million in the quarter, so things aren’t too shabby!

The streaming service ended Q4 with 1.676 million paid subscribers. That’s up from 1.61 million in Q3 and 1.45 million in Q2, so the company is doing something right in attracting new customers. Its total revenue has also grown: nearly $1.59 billion for the year (up 19 percent from 2023) and $433.8 million for the quarter (up eight percent from Q4 2023). Not too shabby!

But Fubo is losing boatloads of money — just less than before. It posted a net loss of nearly $178 million for the year, more than enough to ruin most individuals and small- or medium-sized businesses. But since this is corporate America, things are looking up there, champ! That’s because Fubo improved its losses by over $115 million from a year earlier.

The company is headed for some big changes. Pending shareholder and regulatory approval, Disney will buy a 70 percent stake in the company and merge it with Hulu + Live TV. The deal would create a new entity to manage the two brands, although the plan is for them to continue as separate services (at least at first).

Fubo is arguably the best live TV service for sports, but it still has some notable missing pieces. For starters, you won’t find any Warner Bros. Discovery content. That means subscribers will miss out on a bunch of NBA games (before TNT’s deal with the league expires at the end of the season) and MLB games on TBS.

It also recently increased its prices, with the cheapest plan coming in at $85, slightly more than YouTube TV. Like the traditional cable it’s gunning to replace, live streaming TV is increasingly an expensive hot mess.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/fubo-grows-its-subscribers-and-revenue-as-disney-deal-looms-183344157.html?src=rss 

Microsoft is officially getting rid of Skype as of May 5 and encouraging its users to pick Teams once and for all. In its announcement, the company stated that the move will allow it to “streamline our free consumer communications offerings so we can more easily adapt to customer needs.” 

Microsoft is also far from subtle in its push for Teams and included step-by-step instructions for migrating over. All users need to do is log in with their Skype credentials and their chats and contacts should appear. Teams and Skype users will be able to communicate with each other until the latter shuts down. Microsoft also published an entire YouTube video illustrating how to transition user data. However, anyone who doesn’t want to move to Teams can choose to export all of their data and history before May 5.  

The news is hardly surprising given recent moves such as removing credits and phone numbers from Skype in favor of subscriptions. XDA initially reported the possibility of Skype shutting down, with a Skype for Windows code preview reading, “Starting in May, Skype will no longer be available. Continue your calls and chats in Teams.” New users won’t be able to access paid Skype features, while current subscribers can use credits and their plan through the end of their renewal period. 

Skype launched over two decades ago in 2003. Microsoft acquired Skype for $8.5 billion in 2011 — right around the time myself and everyone I knew was desperately searching for a strong enough Wi-Fi connection in their home to talk with friends (yes, really tough situation here) and before video chats became the norm at work. 

While Skype doesn’t really have much to differentiate it in a world filled with the likes of Zoom, FaceTime and, yes, Teams, it’s still hard to say goodbye to a service that provided such excitement and connection. Skype felt like a new era of communication and it will be missed. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/skype-will-take-its-final-curtain-and-video-call-may-5-144256172.html?src=rss 

The only surprise in Amazon’s reveal of Alexa+ this week was the price. With inflation rampant and many more impactful subscription services to choose from, $20 per month is an absolutely bonkers price for an as-yet unproven AI chatbot.

Recall that Alexa has historically not cost anything as long as you’ve had hardware to run it. The same goes for Google Assistant (and now the basic version of Gemini) as well as Apple’s Siri. They’ve always been tools to enhance hardware, not the product itself.

What’s stranger is that $20 per month, which I will reiterate is bonkers, is essentially fake — the equivalent of an inflated MSRP. And the reason I know that is because a whole-ass subscription to Prime costs $5 a month less, and includes Alexa+. You can read this one of two ways. Amazon thinks Alexa+ is worth more on its own than the entirety of Prime. Or, the ridiculous pricing is an artificial speedbump to steer people into Amazon’s ecosystem while also encouraging them to buy some Echo hardware while they’re at it. Somehow a company accused in the US and Europe of deceptively separating customers from their money hasn’t tried this trick yet.

In a vacuum, $20 for Alexa+ does line up with some other premium AI services — OpenAI’s ChatGPT Plus and the Google One Gemini Advanced plan both cost the same. And Amazon is doing something at least a little different by letting a generative AI voice assistant loose on your smart home, just as it did with the original Alexa. And I do find the option to build a library of uploaded documents within Alexa+’s memory intriguing, much as I’d prefer anyone but Amazon be the one storing that info. But despite some potentially useful features, it’s impossible to recommend spending that kind of money on Alexa+ now, given that Amazon predictably flubbed some demos in its presentation and hardly let any journalists at its event really test it out.

I don’t think Amazon is expecting a ton of sign-ups at that $20 monthly price. Besides prodding more people to sign up for Prime, this wild price for Alexa+ telegraphs a move to jack up the cost of Prime sooner than later. It’s been just over two years since Amazon increased Prime’s price, so we’re certainly due for another gouging.

Of course, the company will point to Prime’s “increased value” over that time, and to be fair you do get a lot your dollar at this point — assuming that you want to continue spending more cash at Amazon. And Alexa+, with its built-in ability to make a grocery list and order it through Amazon Fresh or Whole Foods, slots nicely into that framework. Vanilla Alexa’s propensity to order regular, non-perishable goods from Amazon — sometimes without users intending it — will of course carry over.

My recommendation? Given the economy, just back the hell away from this entirely. There are plenty of services that are more entertaining or useful for your money. Google’s Gemini Advanced plan comes with 2TB of Drive storage and a handful of other perks. Or you could sign up for Xbox Game Pass. Or blow your money on a couple video-streaming services and let the #content wash over you as we slide into the abyss. At least those options aren’t a portal to handing Amazon more of your hard-earned cash.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/20-a-month-for-an-ai-chatbot-in-this-economy-150021310.html?src=rss