It’s been an interesting year for gaming, as the current generation of consoles slowly creep towards the end of their lifecycles. The PS5 and Xbox Series X are officially on the way, landing in late 2020, meaning we’re in a kind of limbo between developers releasing games for this generation and announcing plans for next-generation games – some might even crossover.
Despite being in this weird limbo, we’ve played some fantastic games this year. We’ve revisited Raccoon City, cursed FromSoftware once again, tried to catch em’ all and bothered villagers as a troublesome goose. But which games have truly stood out in 2019?
It’s been a hard task, but the TechRadar team has put their heads together and thrashed out which games were our favorites this year. These aren’t necessarily the games we think have had the most cultural or technological impact, nor are they ranked, they’re simply the team’s favorite games from this year. Let’s be honest, you may not agree with all our picks – as we all have different tastes and opinions – but it’s hard to put together a list that will please everyone.
So, without further ado, these are TechRadar’s games of the year 2019.
Best Virtual Reality Game
(Image credit: SIE London Studio)
Blood & Truth
Blood & Truth is one of our favorite VR games ever, never mind this year. Sony London Studio truly knocked it out of the park with this Guy Ritchie style FPS that shows that VR shooters can be wondefully immersive – and downright fun.
Its storyline is super cheesy but, mechanically, Blood & Truth is a marvel, allowing you to interact with objects and weapons as you would in real life (well as much as is possible in VR) and smoothly move from cover to cover through levels.
Honorable mentions: Trover Saves the Universe and Wolfenstein: Cyber Pilot.
Pokémon Masters was somewhat of a surprise success. We always knew it wouldn’t hold a light to Niantic’s Pokémon Go, but the free-to-play mobile game has definitely held its own in 2019.
Allowing players to battle their way through the Pokémon Masters League, Pokémon Masters emphasizes teamwork and puts the focus on trainer battles. It’s been a great year for Pokemon.
Honorable mentions: What the Golf? and Sayonara Wild Hearts.
Best Action Game
(Image credit: FromSoftware/Activision)
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
FromSoftware isn’t known for making easy breezy games and Sekiro is no different. But that’s exactly why we love it. Sekiro is what happens if DDR was an action game set in a gothic ancient Japan. It’s breathtaking.
However, if you can’t quite get a hang of the rhythm, then things are pretty tough going. FromSoftware’s most recent offering is more punishing than we’ve seen before, but rare moments of success are extremely rewarding – you just need the patience for it.
Honorable mentions: Resident Evil 2 Remake and Devil May Cry 5.
2019 has been a fantastic year for remasters and Link’s Awakening is one of the best. Nintendo took the original 1993 and redesigned it for the Switch, giving it a new toy-like art style that simply adds to the charm.
Link’s Awakening brings classic Zelda to a younger generation, while improving upon issues that original fans may have had. It’s a wonderful trip down memory lane for fans while also being easily accessible for newbies. We love it.
Honorable mentions: Luigi’s Mansion 3 and Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
When Obsidian Entertainment announced it was releasing a new RPG, there was little doubt that the Fallout: New Vegas developer would let us down. And it didn’t.
Although it’s not totally perfect, The Outer Worlds is as close to a new Fallout game as we’re going to get right now. Blending interesting characters, peculiar creatures, choices galore and a heap of satire, The Outer Worlds sees Obsidian securing its crown as the king of RPGs.
Honorable mentions: Disco Elysium and Pokémon Sword and Shield.
Apex Legends took us all by surprise when it kicked down the battle royale door back in February, introducing some fantastic quality-of-life features like sliding and pinging that have since been lifted by its competitors.
While Apex Legends may not have quite taken the crown from Fortnite, its certainly taken 2019 by storm and we’re hoping Respawn Entertainment has some tricks up its sleeves to keep players interested in 2020.
Honorable mentions: Destiny 2: Shadowkeep and Tetris 99.
Now, we know that not everyone will agree with this choice. CTR isn’t the most technical racing game but it’s a lot of fun and we love this remaster just as much as the original – if not more.
Following in the footsteps of the N.Sane Trilogy, Nitro-Fueled sees Crash and co getting a modern makeover. This remaster rolls together content from Crash team Racing, Crash Tag Team Racing and Crash Nitro Kart into one madcap game that you can play solo or online.
Honorable mentions: FIFA 20 and Need for Speed: Heat.
It’s not been a great year for fighting games, so this wasn’t a particularly difficult choice. Mortal Kombat 11 sees the brutal series returning better (and bloodier) than ever before, while introducing some fresh new features, like Fatal Blows) that move the series forward.
The campaign is solid but really, MK11 does what we expect: let us beat the living heck out of eachother.
Honorable mentions: None (it’s been a poor year for fighting games).
Best Narrative Game
(Image credit: ZA/UM)
Disco Elysium
Disco Elysium has been the dark horse of 2019 for a lot of people, releasing at the tail end to critical acclaim. And it deserves every ounce of that recognition.
Disco Elysium is like if someone made an RPG about Hunter S. Thompson as a grizzled detective. It’s bizarre and wonderful. The best part of Disco Elysium? The writing and story. The conversation trees are unlike anything else we’ve seen this year and show that a game doesn’t need to be big budget to tug at our emotions.
Honorable mentions: Control and Outer Wilds.
Best Indie Game
(Image credit: House House)
Untitled Goose Game
It’s a lovely day and you’re a horrible, horrible goose. That’s right, Untitled Goose Game sees you wreaking havoc on some (probably lovely) unsuspecting villagers in House House’s indie meme machine.
But the memes aren’t the only reason we love Untitled Goose Game. It’s the exact type of (almost) wholesome content we love to see in an indie game, artistically beautiful and the synchronization between the music and slapstick humor is sheer brilliance. HONK.
Honorable mentions: Outer Wilds and Disco Elysium.
Game of the Year
(Image credit: Capcom)
Resident Evil 2 Remake
It’s the biggie and it was a tough call. But Resident Evil 2 Remake is officially TechRadar’s Game of the Year.
Resident Evil 2 shows how a remake should be done, elevating the original game into a masterful modern horror experience. The attention to detail is astounding, encouraging players to properly explore RCPD and soak in the experience. Plus, exploring is a welcome break from trying to solve Resident Evil 2’s head-scratching puzzles.
Best of all, you don’t just have to play it once, you can replay again and again. And we sure will.
Once again Cyberpunk 2077 is the game we’re most excited about. It won the same category last year but, now that we know more about it (like that Keanu Reeves will be in it), we’re more hyped than ever.
CD Projekt Red’s massive dystopian RPG will finally hit shelves on April 16, 2020 and we cannot wait to get our hands on what’s sure to be one of the best games of 2020 – well, if the Witcher 3 is anything to go by.
Honorable mentions: The Last of Us Part 2 and Final Fantasy 7 Remake.
Although no one likes a know-it-all, they dominate the Internet.
The Internet began as a vast repository of information. It quickly became a breeding ground for self-proclaimed experts seeking what most people desire: recognition and money.
Today, anyone with an Internet connection and some typing skills can position themselves, regardless of their education or experience, as a subject matter expert (SME). From relationship advice, career coaching, and health and nutrition tips to citizen journalists practicing pseudo-journalism, the Internet is awash with individuals—Internet talking heads—sharing their “insights,” which are, in large part, essentially educated guesses without the education or experience.
The Internet has become a 24/7/365 sitcom where armchair experts think they’re the star.
Not long ago, years, sometimes decades, of dedicated work and acquiring education in one’s field was once required to be recognized as an expert. The knowledge and opinions of doctors, scientists, historians, et al. were respected due to their education and experience. Today, a social media account and a knack for hyperbole are all it takes to present oneself as an “expert” to achieve Internet fame that can be monetized.
On the Internet, nearly every piece of content is self-serving in some way.
The line between actual expertise and self-professed knowledge has become blurry as an out-of-focus selfie. Inadvertently, social media platforms have created an informal degree program where likes and shares are equivalent to degrees. After reading selective articles, they’ve found via and watching some TikTok videos, a person can post a video claiming they’re an herbal medicine expert. Their new “knowledge,” which their followers will absorb, claims that Panda dung tea—one of the most expensive teas in the world and isn’t what its name implies—cures everything from hypertension to existential crisis. Meanwhile, registered dietitians are shaking their heads, wondering how to compete against all the misinformation their clients are exposed to.
More disturbing are individuals obsessed with evangelizing their beliefs or conspiracy theories. These people write in-depth blog posts, such as Elvis Is Alive and the Moon Landings Were Staged, with links to obscure YouTube videos, websites, social media accounts, and blogs. Regardless of your beliefs, someone or a group on the Internet shares them, thus confirming your beliefs.
Misinformation is the Internet’s currency used to get likes, shares, and engagement; thus, it often spreads like a cosmic joke. Consider the prevalence of clickbait headlines:
You Won’t Believe What Taylor Swift Says About Climate Change!
This Bedtime Drink Melts Belly Fat While You Sleep!
In One Week, I Turned $10 Into $1 Million!
Titles that make outrageous claims are how the content creator gets reads and views, which generates revenue via affiliate marketing, product placement, and pay-per-click (PPC) ads. Clickbait headlines are how you end up watching a TikTok video by a purported nutrition expert adamantly asserting you can lose belly fat while you sleep by drinking, for 14 consecutive days, a concoction of raw eggs, cinnamon, and apple cider vinegar 15 minutes before going to bed.
Our constant search for answers that’ll explain our convoluted world and our desire for shortcuts to success is how Internet talking heads achieve influencer status. Because we tend to seek low-hanging fruits, we listen to those with little experience or knowledge of the topics they discuss yet are astute enough to know what most people want to hear.
There’s a trend, more disturbing than spreading misinformation, that needs to be called out: individuals who’ve never achieved significant wealth or traded stocks giving how-to-make-easy-money advice, the appeal of which is undeniable. Several people I know have lost substantial money by following the “advice” of Internet talking heads.
Anyone on social media claiming to have a foolproof money-making strategy is lying. They wouldn’t be peddling their money-making strategy if they could make easy money.
Successful people tend to be secretive.
Social media companies design their respective algorithms to serve their advertisers—their source of revenue—interest; hence, content from Internet talking heads appears most prominent in your feeds. When a video of a self-professed expert goes viral, likely because it pressed an emotional button, the more people see it, the more engagement it receives, such as likes, shares and comments, creating a cycle akin to a tornado.
Imagine scrolling through your TikTok feed and stumbling upon a “scientist” who claims they can predict the weather using only aluminum foil, copper wire, sea salt and baking soda. You chuckle, but you notice his video got over 7,000 likes, has been shared over 600 times and received over 400 comments. You think to yourself, “Maybe this guy is onto something.” What started as a quest to achieve Internet fame evolved into an Internet-wide belief that weather forecasting can be as easy as DIY crafts.
Since anyone can call themselves “an expert,” you must cultivate critical thinking skills to distinguish genuine expertise from self-professed experts’ self-promoting nonsense. While the absurdity of the Internet can be entertaining, misinformation has serious consequences. The next time you read a headline that sounds too good to be true, it’s probably an Internet talking head making an educated guess; without the education seeking Internet fame, they can monetize.
TORONTO – A new survey says a majority of software engineers and developers feel tight project deadlines can put safety at risk.
Seventy-five per cent of the 1,000 global workers who responded to the survey released Tuesday say pressure to deliver projects on time and on budget could be compromising critical aspects like safety.
The concern is even higher among engineers and developers in North America, with 77 per cent of those surveyed on the continent reporting the urgency of projects could be straining safety.
The study was conducted between July and September by research agency Coleman Parkes and commissioned by BlackBerry Ltd.’s QNX division, which builds connected-car technology.
The results reflect a timeless tug of war engineers and developers grapple with as they balance the need to meet project deadlines with regulations and safety checks that can slow down the process.
Finding that balance is an issue that developers of even the simplest appliances face because of advancements in technology, said John Wall, a senior vice-president at BlackBerry and head of QNX.
“The software is getting more complicated and there is more software whether it’s in a vehicle, robotics, a toaster, you name it… so being able to patch vulnerabilities, to prevent bad actors from doing malicious acts is becoming more and more important,” he said.
The medical, industrial and automotive industries have standardized safety measures and anything they produce undergoes rigorous testing, but that work doesn’t happen overnight. It has to be carried out from the start and then at every step of the development process.
“What makes safety and security difficult is it’s an ongoing thing,” Wall said. “It’s not something where you’ve done it, and you are finished.”
The Waterloo, Ont.-based business found 90 per cent of its survey respondents reported that organizations are prioritizing safety.
However, when asked about why safety may not be a priority for their organization, 46 per cent of those surveyed answered cost pressures and 35 per cent said a lack of resources.
That doesn’t surprise Wall. Delays have become rampant in the development of tech, and in some cases, stand to push back the launch of vehicle lines by two years, he said.
“We have to make sure that people don’t compromise on safety and security to be able to get products out quicker,” he said.
“What we don’t want to see is people cutting corners and creating unsafe situations.”
The survey also took a peek at security breaches, which have hit major companies like London Drugs, Indigo Books & Music, Giant Tiger and Ticketmaster in recent years.
About 40 per cent of the survey’s respondents said they have encountered a security breach in their employer’s operating system. Those breaches resulted in major impacts for 27 per cent of respondents, moderate impacts for 42 per cent and minor impacts for 27 per cent.
“There are vulnerabilities all the time and this is what makes the job very difficult because when you ship the software, presumably the software has no security vulnerabilities, but things get discovered after the fact,” Wall said.
Security issues, he added, have really come to the forefront of the problems developers face, so “really without security, you have no safety.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 8, 2024.
As online shoppers hunt for bargains offered by Amazon during its annual fall sale this week, cybersecurity researchers are warning Canadians to beware of an influx of scammers posing as the tech giant.
In the 30 days leading up to Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days, taking place Tuesday and Wednesday, there were more than 1,000 newly registered Amazon-related web domains, according to Check Point Software Technologies, a company that offers cybersecurity solutions.
The company said it deemed 88 per cent of those domains malicious or suspicious, suggesting they could have been set up by scammers to prey on vulnerable consumers. One in every 54 newly created Amazon-related domain included the phrase “Amazon Prime.”
“They’re almost indiscernible from the real Amazon domain,” said Robert Falzon, head of engineering at Check Point in Canada.
“With all these domains registered that look so similar, it’s tricking a lot of people. And that’s the whole intent here.”
Falzon said Check Point Research sees an uptick in attempted scams around big online shopping days throughout the year, including Prime Days.
Scams often come in the form of phishing emails, which are deceptive messages that appear to be from a reputable source in attempt to steal sensitive information.
In this case, he said scammers posing as Amazon commonly offer “outrageous” deals that appear to be associated with Prime Days, in order to trick recipients into clicking on a malicious link.
The cybersecurity firm said it has identified and blocked 100 unique Amazon Prime-themed scam emails targeting organizations and consumers over the past two weeks.
Scammers also target Prime members with unsolicited calls, claiming urgent account issues and requesting payment information.
“It’s like Christmas for them,” said Falzon.
“People expect there to be significant savings on Prime Day, so they’re not shocked that they see something of significant value. Usually, the old adage applies: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”
Amazon’s website lists a number of red flags that it recommends customers watch for to identify a potential impersonation scam.
Those include false urgency, requests for personal information, or indications that the sender prefers to complete the purchase outside of the Amazon website or mobile app.
Scammers may also request that customers exclusively pay with gift cards, a claim code or PIN. Any notifications about an order or delivery for an unexpected item should also raise alarm bells, the company says.
“During busy shopping moments, we tend to see a rise in impersonation scams reported by customers,” said Amazon spokeswoman Octavia Roufogalis in a statement.
“We will continue to invest in protecting consumers and educating the public on scam avoidance. We encourage consumers to report suspected scams to us so that we can protect their accounts and refer bad actors to law enforcement to help keep consumers safe.”
Falzon added that these scams are more successful than people might think.
As of June 30, the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre said there had been $284 million lost to fraud so far this year, affecting 15,941 victims.
But Falzon said many incidents go unreported, as some Canadians who are targeted do not know how or where to flag a scam, or may choose not to out of embarrassment.
Check Point recommends Amazon customers take precautions while shopping on Prime Days, including by checking URLs carefully, creating strong passwords on their accounts, and avoiding personal information being shared such as their birthday or social security number.
The cybersecurity company said consumers should also look for “https” at the beginning of a website URL, which indicates a secure connection, and use credit cards rather than debit cards for online shopping, which offer better protection and less liability if stolen.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 8, 2024.
