BlizzCon 2017 is in full swing, and that means big news for Blizzard’s most popular franchises, including a little game you might have heard of called Buy Now . During the keynote on Friday, November 3, we saw Blizzard unveil a new hero, a new map, and a new animated short starring everyone’s favorite cyber knight, Reinhardt.
The animated short delves deep into Reinhardt’s tragic past, and offers some context for some of the design elements we see on the Eichenwalde map, like the collapsed knight sitting in the throne room, overgrown with moss. We won’t spoil it for you, but it’s worth a watch.
Next up, let’s talk about Moira, the newest addition to the Overwatch roster. She’s a support healer, but like Zenyatta, she’s capable of dishing out some serious damage.
“Moira’s biotic abilities enable her to contribute healing or damage in any crisis. While Biotic Grasp gives Moira short-range options, her Biotic Orbs contribute longer-range, hands-off damage and healing; she can also Fade to escape groups or remain close to allies in need of support,” reads her description on the Overwatch official site. “Once she’s charged Coalescence, Moira can save multiple allies from elimination at once or finish off weakened enemies.”
She features a short-range teleport, which means she’s sort of a blend of Reaper and Zenyatta, with some new tricks of her own. So where did she come from? Once a member of Reyes’ secretive Blackwatch team, Moira has had to look for alternative funding for her scientific research after Overwatch was disbanded, allying herself with the shadowy Talon. For a deeper look at her backstory and abilities, check out her page on the Overwatch official site. She will debut on the public test server before rolling out to Overwatch proper, so keep an eye out.
Along with Moira, we were introduced to a map called BlizzardWorld, which is exactly what it sounds like — a Blizzard theme park. While an actual Blizzard theme park would have also been big news, the new map is nice, too. Featuring elements and regions from each major Blizzard franchise — and some non-major ones, like The Lost Vikings — the BlizzardWorld map is playable now on the BlizzCon floor, and should hit the public test server in early 2018.
Right around the same time, you will be seeing a host of Blizzard-themed skins rolling out to Overwatch, including Nova Widowmaker, Blackhand Doomfist, and Barbarian Zarya. These new skins will be included in base loot boxes, not tied to any specific timed events.
Updated to include information about the forthcoming skins.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Google DeepMind's AI world model Genie 4 can now build interactive worlds that you can explore and reshape as they run. It also generates ambient sounds, music, and dialogue that respond to your actions.
The new world model builds on Genie 3 with improved realism, more natural human movement, and better simulations of real-world physics. It could eventually help with everything from game development to training robots.
Apple has an incredible talent for making me admire its products while simultaneously questioning what on earth it's thinking with the pricing. This isn't even something as bizarre as a monitor stand, but the audacity for starting a new laptop lineup from $2,000 doesn't surprise me.
The newly announced 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 is just the latest to showcase this. The funny thing is, I already know that it's going to be a reliable workstation. You get a powerful new 2nm M6 processor, a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display, and up to 24 hours of battery life. We were impressed by the M5 MacBook Air, so the high-end M6 powered MacBook Pro definitely won't let us down.