The handheld's screen swivels using a 'self-developed ultra-thin alloy hinge built for lasting durability.' Even companies like Nintendo sometimes struggle with keeping moving parts durable on their devices, so hopefully Anbernic has come up with a hinge design that will last.
One of the greatest sins in video game design is when the developers put a cute animal into the game, but do not let you pet it. Crimson Desert yes-ands this desire by letting you pick up any kitten, cuddle them in your arms, and pet them as long as you like.
The competitive aspect of jigsaw puzzling dates back to the 1980s in the US, when Hallmark ran a national competition for several years. In 2022, the volunteer-run USA Jigsaw Puzzle Association partnered with Ravensburger to bring back a national championship.
"We want to make the Graham Norton of video games," says Kirsty Rigden, the chief executive of Brighton-based FuturLab, which makes PowerWash Simulator. Aspiring to emulate a talkshow host who has a reputation for being affable rather than for setting pulses racing is perhaps an unusual ambition for a gaming studio.
Mobile game developers have largely been locked into app store distribution as the primary way to reach players. RCS games live in the messaging inbox, the stickiest surface on mobile, where people are already spending huge amounts of time talking to friends and family. We're building on an interaction pattern people already use every day.
When we rolled out a custom-built company GPT to our 14,000 teammates several years ago, we saw three clear groups emerge. First, there was the 'jump-in-with-both-feet' crowd. These are the early adopters who treat anything new like a shiny toy. Next were the skeptics who wondered how much of an impact AI would have on their daily work lives. And finally, there was a big group that genuinely wanted to learn but didn't know where to start.
Timber Rush is about numbers going up in the crudest way imaginable, a clicker game that barely even features clicking, in which you move your woodcutter side to side as increasing numbers of increasingly silly logs fly around the screen.
Games did not suddenly become "worse." Games adapted. Attention got tired, schedules got tighter, and competition for free time turned brutal. A ten-minute gap now has to fight against messages, videos, and endless feeds. In that environment, long-form sessions still exist, but short sessions often win because they respect reality instead of demanding a perfect evening. That shift is visible everywhere, from mobile puzzlers to competitive titles and even casino-style experiences where a quick crore win feeling is part of the appeal.
During my week-long binge, I played games that paused their own tutorials to run ads. I saw endless fake X icons and banners that hid the close button under the iPhone's Dynamic Island. Now, I'm not against ads, but I hate it when they feel like a penalty. I'm a gamer, and from what I've seen, PC and console games integrate ads much better. If mobile devs followed suit, mobile games might finally climb out of the mess they're in.
The best new co-op games are those that do something a bit different, offering more than a single-player experience with another player thoughtlessly tacked on. These multiplayer games account for groups of friends all wanting their own role, with a shared goal in sight and plenty of chaos on the path to getting there.