Google Play Games - Game Center for Android ?

Details of Google Play Games, the Android alternative to Apple’s Game Center, have leaked, with suggestions that the cloud-syncing, leaderboard-scoring, and multiplayer-matchmaking system will debut officially at Google I/O this coming week. Evidence of the refreshed gaming component was unearthed from a prerelease version (v3.1.36) of the Google Play Services APK, with Android Police sifting through the shared files to discover a new “Play Games” feature intended for managing gaming on the Android platform.

The Play Services system is the underlying Android component which all games will be able to tap into, allowing them to share a single notifications path, multiplayer gamer matching, leaderboards and achievements records, and more. Unsurprisingly, the multiplayer duties are shared with Google+, with the social network’s circles used to manage who can invite you to play a game, whose achievements you see, and who your own achievements are shared with.

Meanwhile, there’s also synchronized saved games, meaning if you have a favorite you play on both your Android phone and tablet, you should be able to pick up where you left off on either. Similarly, there are various achievements and leaderboards, with a number of icons to flag top scores and the ability to sort by recent play, by your own position in the charts, and more. All can be pushed over to Google+ to publicize your success.

Currently, the new service isn’t fully functional, leading to suggestions that there could be another, potentially user-facing app which works in conjunction with the background system. That would presumably be the equivalent of iOS’ Game Center app, with its hub of scores and various lobbies for handling multiplayer and gamer-matching based on skill level.

The Android gaming ecosystem has expanded considerably in the past year. Last May, Google was tipped to be working on a Game Center alternative, while even earlier the Google+ team was confirmed to be collaborating with developers on social games for the Facebook competitor.

Several Kickstarter projects have sought to reboot classic titles for Android and other mobile platforms, most recently seeing 90s favorite Carmageddon relaunch after having raised more than $600,000 on the crowdfunding site. Meanwhile, dedicated Android-based gaming hardware has also grown in popularity: OUYA was another Kickstarter success, for instance, while this past week BlueStacks revealed GamePop, a compact games console that borrows the Netflix-style subscription model for title access.

Both OUYA and GamePop have been forced to create their own gaming system on top of Android, to some extent, but with the new Play Games structure, Google could considerably streamline that process for other hardware developers. The system has potential beyond just Android phones and tablets, too; Google TV boxes could instantly become Xbox and PlayStation rivals, with support for second-screen play turning mobile devices into controllers and private status monitors. A hook into Chrome, meanwhile, could bring the system to the desktop and to Chromebooks.

That would leave plenty of room for innovation in pricing. Google could follow BlueStacks’ example with an all-you-can eat gaming subscription, perhaps, with a set monthly fee promising access to hundreds of premium titles across as many devices as are registered to the same account. SlashGear

iPad (2022) and iPad Pro with M2 announced

Apple has announced their latest iteration of the iPad (entry level model) and the iPad Pro lineup with the new M2 processor. The event, held on the 18th of October as a recorded session displayed the key features of the iPads with the most significant being the base model iPad which has now received an upgrade. iPad 2022 This model of the base model iPad ditches the almost 12 year old home button and display layout and goes for a cleaner display only design found on the iPad Air . The chassis, which now comes with flatter sides and a TouchID fingerprint sensor on the top has also abandoned the lightning port in favor of USB C and it also comes with a set of pogo style connectors for accessories including a keyboard with trackpad. Internally, the iPad comes either as a Wifi only (Wifi6) and a 5G cellular model and is offered with 64 or 256GB of storage. The processor has also been upgraded to the Apple A14 which is the same found on the iPhone 12 series and last year's iPad Air. L

Nikon D850 is official

Nikon D850 has probably been the company's worst kept secret . The camera , which was announced a month back during Nikon's 100 year anniversary just explained in brief ,but thanks to leakers some of that information managed to hit the internet and inadvertently lead the camera to be the most talked about topic in the camera world . But now , after a month of waiting anxiously for the official pricing (rumors made headlines after many quoted $1000-2000 more than the official one ) , the Nikon D850 is finally official . Nikon D850 The Nikon D850 is Nikon's jack of all trades semi - flagship camera which sits below the D5 but above the D750 . The model which succeeds the D810 from almost 3 years back is armed with a new backlit 35mm sensor and the largest optical viewfinder and pentaprism for any camera . Video features on the camera include 4K with full sensor readout and features 8K timelapse . The camera features 7 fps at full resolution and 9fps when connecte

Google Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 pro along with Pixel watch unveiled.

Google announced their latest Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro smartphones along with the Pixel Watch - google's first wearable at a special launch event today. The devices, which are powered by Google's second generation Tensor SOC bring major improvements in photography which has always been Google's highlight. Google Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. Google's Pixel 7 and the Pixel 7 Pro are Google's latest flagship phones for 2022. The devices, which have been developed around the Tensor G2 - Google's second generation processor developed on a 4nm architecture. The chipset, which consists of 2 Cortex X1 cores, 2 Cortex A78 cores and 4 Cortex A55 cores with a Mali G710 MC10 GPU cores and the chip is paired with 8GB of RAM for the Pixel 7 and 12GB RAM for the Pro variant. Both models come with 128 / 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage and the pro model comes with 512GB. The phones, which come with two different display sizes consist of a 6.3" 2400x1080 AMOLED display with 90Hz refre

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