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Unity’s new real-time Lion demo runs at 4K 30FPS on PlayStation 5

Unity's new real-time Lion demo runs at 4K 30FPS on PlayStation 5 01 | TweakTown.com

Unity teased its new real-time demo at SIGGRAPH 2022, with Lion debuting in the glorious 4K resolution and running at 30FPS on the Sony PlayStation 5.

The new Lion demo from Unity utilizes a bunch of Unity Engine features including some real-time hair and fur rendering, powered by Weta Digital’s new Wig hair and fur tool. Remember Unity purchased Weta Digital in late 2021, where Unity Technical Artist Sara Hansen explained the use of their tools in the new Lion demo: “Wig is a different way of working – it’s actually the fastest grooming tool that I’ve ever used“.

“A high-quality hero groom – which would take me several months in another grooming package – is much faster to create in Wig. It takes just a couple of weeks, and some grooms go from weeks to create in other tools to only one or few days in Wig, and at far better quality levels and with greater artist controllability… Even when you have to react to detailed art direction feedback notes, like adjusting a specific strand from a reference shot, it’s easy to author in Wig“.

Unity had to be updated in order to get the rendering of millions of individual strands of fur, which all over independently. The developer explains that “One set of improvements includes a new GPU-driven clustered hair simulation that enables millions of hair strands to react dynamically in real-time, part of the new Hair System released on Unity’s GitHub. This approach builds on the hair simulation used for the incredible Digital Human showcase, Enemies, and expands the method to handle several orders of magnitude more hair strands efficiently on GPU“.

“For hair and fur rendering, the graphics developers at Unity designed a set of improvements to a GPU tile-based software rasterization algorithm in HDRP, with significant optimization to render several million unique hair strands. This method achieved smooth visuals with analytic anti-aliasing with compute-sorted order independent transparency for hair strands and improved advanced physically-based hair lighting models for film-quality hair strand rendering“.

Unity's new real-time Lion demo runs at 4K 30FPS on PlayStation 5 01 | TweakTown.com

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Dragon Ball franchise to make nearly $1 billion this year

Dragon Ball franchise to make nearly billion this year 1 | TweakTown.com

Bandai Namco expects the Dragon Ball franchise to generate nearly $1 billion in revenues this year, potentially breaking a four-year streak of earnings.

Dragon Ball franchise to make nearly billion this year 1 | TweakTown.com

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Mega-hit sensation Dragon Ball is Bandai Namco’s most popular franchise. Every year from 2019 to 2022, Bandai Namco has made over $1 billion from sales of Dragon Ball games, services, and collectibles.

Weaker yen-to-USD conversions may end up breaking this billion-dollar streak in the company’s FY23 period. dragon ball is expected to make 133.5 billion yen throughout Fiscal Year 2023which is above all previous years except for the record highs set in 2020, but current foreign exchange rates put Dragon Ball earnings at about $989 million.

Dragon Ball franchise to make nearly $1 billion this year 2 | TweakTown.com

While forex rates change and fluctuate every month, the current values ​​are responsible for dropping all Japanese games company earnings. Sony slid by 50%, Capcom also dropped by 50%, and Bandai Namco dropped about 18% year-over-year. Bandai Namco actually delivered 880 billion yen in net sales, but the weaker yen values ​​(135 yen to every 1 USD) was actually less than 2021’s converted 740 billion yen net sales.

The publisher will launch the new Dragon Ball Breakers game in October and Dragonball Fighterz will get a new PS5/Xbox Series X/S re-release soon as well.

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Planning to buy Nothing Phone (1), you may be ‘late’ for now

Planning to buy Nothing Phone (1), you may be 'late' for now

Planning to buy Nothing Phone (1), you may be 'late' for now

Nothing Phone (1) has gone out of stock minutes after it went on sale at 12 pm earlier today. It’s not clear how many units were available for sale. All the models of the smartphone are showing ‘Currently Unavailable’ right now. There’s so far also no update when the phone will go on sale again. It seems delivery issues still persist for the brand. Soon after the smartphone went on sale there were reports that several buyers who had pre-ordered the smartphone did not get the device on the promised date. Flipkart reportedly sent Rs 1000 gift card to these buyers to ‘apologise’ for the delay in delivery. While Nothing has officially not said anything about the delayed delivery of the Nothing Phone (1), it does seem to be an issue.

Nothing Phone (1) price, offers and more
Nothing Phone (1) launched to much fanfare last month. The smartphone comes in three variants– 8GB+128GB (Rs 32,999), 8GB+256GB (Rs 35,999) and 12GB+256GB (Rs 38,999). The smartphone comes in two color options– Black and White. So far, Nothing has only launched Black version of the phone in India.

Flipkart is also showing discounts up to 13% on the phone. With discounts, customers can get the 8GB+128GB version at Rs 31,999, while 8GB+256GB and 12GB+ 256GB versions can be purchased at Rs 34,999 and Rs 37,999 respectively. But then, as mentioned above no model is available to purchase right now.

Nothing Phone (1) features and specifications
Nothing Phone (1) features a transparent back with a unique design composed of over 400 components. On the back, it has to Glyph Interfacewhich according to Nothing, is a new way of communicating to help minimize screen time.

Nothing Phone (1) sports a 6.55-inch OLED display with a 2400×1080 pixels resolution. Phone (1) comes with 60Hz-120HZ of adaptive refresh rate. The smartphone is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G+ chipset designed specifically for Nothing and runs Nothing OS.

The handset features a dual camera setup with a 5OMP sensor, where the main camera is powered by Sony IMX766.

Nothing Phone (1) offers 18 hours of usage on a single charge and gets 50% charged within 30 minutes.

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PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 53 | TweakTown.com

PlayStation division operating income has been nearly cut in half due to unfavorable market conditions and increased game development spending.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 53 | TweakTown.com

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Sony’s recent Fiscal Year Q1’22 results show sharp declines in its billion-dollar gaming segment and highlight the tumultuous market that could inhibit consistent growth. Games & Network Services, which includes the mighty PlayStation brand, saw substantial drops in both total sales revenues when converted from yen to USD based on foreign exchange market rates provided by the company.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 4 | TweakTown.com

According to the data, PlayStation net sales revenues dropped to $4.67 billion in Q1’22, a decline of $890 million or 17% year-over-year.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 77 | TweakTown.com

Operating income in Q1’22 was $408 million, representing a year-over-year drop of $52 million or 46%.

There’s multiple causes for these drops. Tough competition from the previous year is a big one. as we explained with Capcom’s results, which also dropped by 50%, Sony had set a high water mark in FY20 and FY21 due to coronavirus spending boons as consumers sheltered in place, alongside more favorable conversion rates. Consumers are also being hit with inflation and are apparently spending less money on–and in–video games.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 30 | TweakTown.com

Sony says that first-party and third-party game sales declined in Q1’22, as reflected by the hard data provided by the company. First-party games were down 4.1 million units, and third-party games were down 12.4 million units.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 17 | TweakTown.com

Microtransaction spending in PlayStation’s Add-Ons segment was also down by nearly half a billion dollars year-over-year. Add-Ons make the lion’s share of PlayStation revenues every quarter/year due to the sheer volume of microtransaction spending opportunities in heavy-hitting, mega-popular F2P games like Fortnite, Apex Legends, and Warzone.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 20 | TweakTown.comPlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 23 | TweakTown.com

Revenue from video game sales and add-on content has also dropped 27% to $2.33 billion, but hardware sales are up 13% year-over-year to $1.04 billion, reflecting the strong adoption rate of the PlayStation 5 as well as Sony’s improved profit margins on each console sold.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 19 | TweakTown.com

Unfavorable exchange rates have primarily affected PlayStation’s USD conversions. Yen to USD exchange rates went from 109.5 in Q1’21 to a whopping 129.4 in Q1’22, representing 18% increase in USD value when compared to yen. The US dollar has more buying power in Japan during the comparative period.

Sony is also spending more money on games development and acquisitions. The company is readying a bunch of live games and wants to release 12 live service titles by 2025. It also recently purchased Haven, a new studio led by Assassin’s Creed vet Jade Raymond, and Bungie, the developer of Destiny and legacy Halo games.

Below we also have data on Sony’s growing Other segment, which includes PC game revenues, and Network Services, which includes PlayStation Plus.

PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 21 | TweakTown.com
PlayStation operating income down nearly 50% on Q1 earnings crash 22 | TweakTown.com

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PlayStation loses 4 million MAUs as major Q1 metrics drop

PlayStation loses 4 million MAUs as major Q1 metrics drop 5333 | TweakTown.com

One of Sony’s most important gaming metrics is down by 4 million users as overall sales earnings slip in Q1’22.

PlayStation loses 4 million MAUs as major Q1 metrics drop 5333 | TweakTown.com

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PlayStation Monthly Active Users (MAUs) are down to their lowest point in the last 11 quarters. Throughout Q1’22, PlayStation MAUs dropped to 102 million to reflect downward trends in subscriptions, game sales, and overall PlayStation segment earnings.

This drop in MAUs will be weighted more heavily as Sony pivots into live service games and free-to-play titles on the PlayStation Network, however the diversification across PC and mobile will cushion any kinds of drops–at least eleven PlayStation live games are established on these platforms.

PlayStation loses 4 million MAUs as major Q1 metrics drop 27 | TweakTown.com

It’s worth noting that the drop in MAUs reflects consistent trends in Sony’s playerbase over the past two years. Typically, MAUs drop from the Q4 to Q1 periods (corresponding with January-March and April-June months); The drop from Q4’20 to Q1’21 was likewise 4 million MAUs. Q3 periods are typically the highest because of holiday rush spending and engagement.

Sony’s Q1’22 earnings have slid as much as 46% year-over-year on weak yen, lower game sales, and lower engagement/monetization across services and subscriptions.

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