Author: Danielle

Madden NFL is EA Sports’ long-running football franchise, and like clockwork, another one is headed our way with new features and improvements from last year’s game. 

Madden NFL 20 is almost certainly shipping later in 2019 with a few tweaks to the time-tested formula. Here’s what the new game might bring to the table after last year’s much-loved entry in the series.

Cut to the chase

• What is it? The latest entry in EA Sports’ long-running football simulation series
• When can I play it? August 2 is the release date, but early access starts on July 31
• What can I play it on? Again, no official word from EA yet, but we would expect it to be playable on PS4, Xbox One and PC

Madden NFL 20 release date and special editions

Madden NFL 20 will officially be released on August 2, 2019, and will retail for $59. Pre-ordering will grant buyers five Gold Team Fantasy Packs as well as their pick of one out of 32 Core Elite Players from your favorite NFL team.

There will indeed be not one but two special editions. The first, Madden NFL 20 Superstar Edition, costs $79. For that extra cash, you get 12 Gold Team Fantasy Packs and one small Training Quicksell Pack in Madden Ultimate Team. Buyers also get early access to play the game on July 31, 2019, a full three days ahead of the standard launch date.

The $99 Ultimate Superstar Edition of Madden NFL 20 starts players off with 15 Gold Team Fantasy Packs, one large Training Quicksell pack in Madden Ultimate Team, one Past and Present Elite Player Pack, one Madden Championship Series Pack in Madden Ultimate Team, and your choice of one unique Legend Superstar Ability for your created player in Face of the Franchise: QB1.

Madden NFL 20 trailers

Madden NFL 20 news and rumors

EA Sports has already revealed a lot of the new features coming to Madden NFL 20. 

Face of the Franchise: QB1 is the big new single-player mode: craft your player, pick their college, guide them through a draft and begin their big career. Thereafter, Madden’s new Scenario Engine generates personalized playable scenarios, events, and dynamic challenges, per the game’s website.

The regular Franchise mode is back, and features the return of Pro Bowl. The whole mode has been refined with new scenarios and tweaks all around, from ratings spread to player progression.

There’s also a new category for elite players: Superstars. 50 players in the game will fit the bill, and at certain points of play, they’ll enter “the zone” and get bonus Superstar X-Factor abilities. These aren’t ratings boosts or modifications, the game’s site clarifies: “These are behaviors, characteristics, and situational outcomes, aspects of football, and it will be very clear to our players what impact they are having on the game by complimenting the player ratings, not modifying them.”

The popular Madden Ultimate Team (MUT) mode returns as well, and it’s got a couple new features. Missions is a new feature that acts more like guidelines than a task-and-reward system. “Think of it as a roadmap to upgrading your squad with the items you want, with a clearly laid out path of how to earn those items or rewards,” explains the game’s website. 

In MUT, Solo challenges have been replaced by Ultimate Challenges, and the Superstar abilities and X-Factors are also supported. Only some chemistries have been brought over from Madden 19 to Madden 20, though new ones have been added. The mode will include player archetypes, a reorganization that clarifies player strengths with their roles on the field, and a return of House Rules.

We’re also curious how the game will change given this is the first in the series without creative director Max Dickson, who left six months before the release of Madden NFL 19. 

Madden 20 will be the third in the franchise running the Frostbite engine, and given the smoother action in last year’s entry with Real Player Motion, we’re keeping an eye out for how this version has been tweaked.

What we want to see from Madden NFL 20

Madden NFL 20 for Nintendo Switch

We’ve put this on our wish list for years, and we’re still hoping the next Madden game comes to the Nintendo’s fantastic hybrid console. 

EA has released a Switch version of the past couple FIFA games, and while they haven’t had the full list of features and modes that are present in their PS4 and Xbox One counterparts, owners of the Nintendo console did get to play a mostly intact port. We’re hoping Madden NFL players get to do the same.

Longshot’s return

Perhaps Madden 19’s next chapter of the single-player mode introduced in Madden 18, Longshot: Homecoming, was underwhelming. But it was still a favorite experience when it appeared two years ago, and we’re hoping EA Sports has course-corrected to tell better chapters in the stories of underdogs Cruz and Colt. Or maybe just start from scratch and give us a couple (or handful) of new characters to invest in.

Alas, Face of the Franchise: QB1 seems like the single-player story/campaign mode that’s set to take Longshot’s spot, but as the internet wisdom goes, ‘Why not both?’

Project Atlas

Okay, this is a bit greedy given EA only announced its cloud-based, stream-to-any-device service Project Atlas last October. But we’d love to see this Google Stadia-before-Stadia-was-announced service start showing up somewhere, somehow in Madden NFL 20. 

How could it help? All that compute could give players much more context to their plays. In a Medium blog post introducing Atlas and explaining AI applications, EA CTO Ken Moss explained it this way: 

“Imagine that you’re playing Madden, and you’ve just thrown your second interception of the game against the same cover 2 defense that caused the first turnover. Instead of the commentator simply stating that you threw a pick, the AI enables contextual, real-time commentary to reference the fact that you’re throwing to the sideline against a cover 2 defense and should have thrown against the weak zone over the middle to your tight end, who was open on the route. 

“This would certainly push the game into a greater level of contextual and experiential realism. The AI is working with your gameplay. It’s responding to your needs as a player.”

• Here’s everything we’re looking forward to at E3 2019

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Apple didn’t just improve the processors within its existing MacBook Pro models, but apparently the company has also improved the keyboards that these refreshed laptops offer, teardown site iFixit has learned.

The new MacBook Pro has a high price, as have all MacBook Pro models before it. And, with a high price comes an expectation of high quality. But, for the last several years, Apple’s MacBooks have had keyboard issues with missed and repeated key presses. They’ve been a result of the Butterfly keyboards used in MacBooks from the 12-inch version to the MacBook Pro.

Apple has worked to address the issue in the past, making iterative changes to the butterfly keyboards, but the problems persisted. Apple even issue an apology over the keyboard failures many have experienced, and it went so far as extending its keyboard repair program to cover all MacBooks with Butterfly keyboards recently.

That coverage includes the newest MacBook Pro models, but apparent changes made to the Butterfly keyboards within may help avoid a need to.

What’s different?

Based on iFixit’s findings, there’s at least one change to the Butterfly keyboard. The previous version, which did have issues, used a different material in its switch covers. These are meant to keep debris away from the actual key switch that registers inputs.

A Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy analysis revealed that the new switch cover is made out of nylon, while the old cover seemed to be mostly polyacetylene with aromatic urethane side groups. In addition, Apple may have made a change to the metal dome switch itself, but that hasn’t been confirmed.

The changes are presumably to address the issues that have affected earlier Butterfly keyboards. But, since Apple has already tried to sort out the problems in the past, we’ll just have to wait and see if the latest Butterfly keyboard revision works out.

We’ve contacted Apple for comment, and will update this story should we receive a response.

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Exterior, day. We see a factory or something. A helicopter flies straight into it and explodes. Everything explodes! And then a man soars out of the explosion, holding a big metal claw in one hand. He looks at the camera.

“Are you…hooked?”

Anyway, they’re making a Just Cause film. That news, plus George R. R. Martin dabbles in video games, Call of Duty reboots Modern Warfare, Telltale’s catalog starts disappearing, Frostbite shows off its luscious locks, and a bevy of free games to carry you through your (hopefully) long weekend.

This is gaming news for May 20 to 24.

Cheap thrills

Hopefully you have a long weekend ahead of you to take advantage of all this week’s free games, because there are a lot of them. First up: Overwatch is celebrating its third anniversary this week, a fact I find personally horrifying as someone who played it at release. If you haven’t yet dug into Blizzard’s shooter though, you can download and play it free through Battle.net until May 28.

The Sims 4 is also free—this one, to keep. It’s been a while since EA’s given away a game, and The Sims 4 is more like giving away a platform (there are plenty of expansions to buy), but free’s free. All you need is an Origin account, and the offer’s good through May 28 as well.

Still not enough? You can pick up a copy of Jalopy through Humble, fixing up a crappy car and driving it mournfully across Eastern Europe. Note that you have until June 1 to pony up $1 for a Steam key, otherwise you’ll have to download direct from Humble—and the giveaway itself only lasts until tomorrow, May 25. No time to waste.

Last but not least, Rime is the latest freebie on the Epic Games Store, arriving as part of the Epic Games Mega Sale. It’s a gorgeous little puzzle game and worth grabbing, especially at this price. And if that’s not to your taste, City of Brass will be free starting next week.

The long holiday weekend is officially here, and that means Memorial Day sales are in full force. Walmart is participating in the big sale event with discounts sitewide on a variety of best-selling products. A standout deal is the latest model Apple iPad that’s on sale for $249. That’s an $80 discount and the lowest price we’ve found for the 32GB tablet.

The 2018 iPad features a 9.7-inch retina display and offers 32GB of storage. The tablet includes an impressive 1.2MP HD front-facing camera and an A10 Fusion chip which results in a powerful laptop-like performance. The additional power also allows you to use the latest apps that include augmented reality experiences. The Apple iPad features an all-day battery life of 10 hours and uses Touch-ID so you can securely unlock your tablet with a tap of your finger.

This is one of the best Memorial Day discounts we’ve seen, and a fantastic price for a newer-model iPad. This deal is a limited-time promotion, so you make sure you take advantage while you can.

Walmart also has the Apple iPad Mini on sale for $329. That’s a $70 discount for the 8-inch tablet that features 128GB of storage and 10 hours of battery life. 

Shop more deals with our roundup of the best Memorial Day sales of 2019.

Interested in other iPad models? We’ve listed even more of the cheapest iPad deals that are currently available.

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The company behind WordPress.com and WooCommerce, Automattic has acquired the startup Prospress as it looks to expand its digital subscription offerings.

The small startup made a name for itself by developing a recurring payment solution specifically designed for WooCommerce called WooCommerce subscriptions.

By acquiring Prospress, Automattic will be able to charge its customers regularly through digital subscriptions to WooCommerce while controlling a larger part of the ecommerce stack.

In addition to WooCommerce subscriptions, Prospress has also developed several other online tools including a marketing automation tool to remind customers when they have abandoned their carts while shopping online and a tool to test an online store’s checkout functionality before it goes live.

Prospress acquisition

Once the acquisition is complete, the Prospress team will continue work on its own products while joining the rest of the WooCommerce team.

Currently the company has 20 employees which gives you an idea of its size compared to Automattic which has 900 employees.

Shopify, which directly competes with WooCommerce, doesn’t provide subscriptions on its own and customers have to rely on third-party products like Bold or ReCharge.

WooCommerce’s head of payments Paul Maiorana explained in a press release how Prospress will help the company build out its subscription model, saying:

“The eCommerce subscription market has grown by more than 100 percent a year over the past five years. Subscriptions are an important part of the WooCommerce experience, so we’re excited to work even more closely with Prospress CEO Brent Shepherd and his team to create a unified, flexible solution.” 

Via TechCrunch

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While Microsoft’s game-streaming service isn’t ready for primetime yet, it’s further along than anyone thought: Project xCloud, which is currently being beta tested by Microsoft employees, can already stream 3,500 games from the cloud with another 1,900 games potentially titles on their way. 

Microsoft unveiled these and other key details today in a new blog on the Xbox Wire, and says even more details will be revealed soon. 

The key points in today’s post are that Microsoft has a number of games that are already compatible with the service from the Xbox One, Xbox 360 and original Xbox game library, and claims that any game published on the Xbox One could be xCloud-compatible without any extra work from developers. 

To stream these games to customers, Microsoft has deployed xCloud servers to data centers across 13 Azure regions – including North America, Europe and Asia – and says that it will continue to build more centers as development continues. 

Just as interestingly, Microsoft says developers like Capcom and Paradox are currently running tests on the servers, and has updated its developer kit to include cloud-specific APIs. In some examples provided by Microsoft, the new developer tools allow creators to make multiplayer matches in the cloud more seamless by moving all connections to the same server and enables games to scale font size depending on the screen you’re using.

xCloud vs Now vs Stadia

Numerical data, believe it or not, is Microsoft’s greatest weapon at this point. Its biggest rival, Google Stadia, has yet to announce any details about the streaming service, telling journalists that more details would be revealed soon. 

Knowing exactly how many games we can expect when the service launches (somewhere between 3,500 and 5,400) should give some credibility to Microsoft’s new game-streaming service, as should the number and locations of Microsoft’s Azure servers. 

That last bit of information is so powerful, in fact, that even longtime rival Sony has said it would partner with Microsoft on building game-streaming technology. The pair announced a partnership last week, and say that it’s primarily based around the shared development of Azure cloud technology – something Sony could use in the next iteration of its PlayStation Now service.

While details are still light right now about both Google Stadia and Project xCloud, we expect to hear more about both at E3 2019 or shortly after.

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Despite the introduction of GDPR last year, new research has revealed that consumers are still in the dark when it comes to how their data is collected, stored and used.

Mobile journey marketing company Ogury surveyed 287,571 consumers to better understand their attitudes towards marketing, advertising and data use to coincide with the one year anniversary of GDPR. Surprisingly just eight percent of those surveyed feel they have a better understanding of how companies use their data since the regulation was introduced.

Overall consumer awareness of GDPR was also quite low with 59 percent of respondents in the UK saying their understanding was no better than before the law came into effect while a further 29 percent said they did not even know what the regulation was.

Ogury’s CEO and co-founder Thomas Pasquet explained that businesses first need to understand what GDPR is before they can educate their customers, saying:

“GDPR has not been taken seriously enough by organizations. These might be disheartening numbers for lawmakers and regulators, who will have no doubt hoped for a far greater level of understanding from the very consumers that GDPR is designed to protect. But marketers should similarly take heed of this admission by users that the message is not getting through in sufficient numbers. Businesses need to deeply understand what GDPR is and in turn educate consumers around the importance of data sharing; this level of consumer education will become increasingly important across the globe.”

Explicit user consent

The study’s findings also revealed that businesses have not properly instituted a requirement for explicit and informed user consent in regard to data collection. Even when a consent notice does appear on a website, 78 percent of users globally don’t read these notices in their entirety.

Reading and understanding are also two very different things and roughly half of consumers globally (52%) said that even when they do read consent notices, they still do not understand how their data is used. This was even higher in countries where GDPR has been implemented with 58 percent of European respondents unsure of how companies use their data.

Ogury’s survey also revealed that wen given an explicit choice, 71 percent of those surveyed would be prepared to share data from mobile apps and website usage. In fact, they would even be willing to share their contact details as an alternative to paying for access to apps and online content.

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