The Enduring Appeal of Usher

Last summer, a video of Usher serenading actor Keke Palmer onstage at his Las Vegas residency made the rounds online. In the clip, Usher slow-dances with the star like she’s the only person in the room, while crooning his falsetto-laden 2010 ballad “There Goes My Baby.” It was all enough to leave Palmer star-struck and giddy. That song, the dance, Usher’s undivided attention were the stuff of a romantic fantasy the R&B star has been cultivating for three decades—seductive but respectful, flirtatious, and wholly charming. Palmer’s unfettered joy was so tangible, so infectious, that I could feel myself blushing, falling under the irresistible spell of Usher, even through a screen.

Usher’s magnetism has been well documented over the course of his career. His charisma is so arresting that it inspired a 2007 episode of The Boondocks in which the animated Usher’s mere presence leads to a marital separation. In an iconic cameo as himself in the 2019 fi…

‘Sekiro was a big turning point’- After Elden Ring Hidetaka Miyazaki says, ‘there’s one more level we can crank it up to’-

If you’ve ever played Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, then you’ll probably remember just how rhythmic and fluid the fighting is. Armed with a samurai sword and a prosthetic arm, there’s more of an onus placed on precise timing and dancing around your opponent than you may find in other souls games. But this style isn’t as much of a one-off as it may seem. While later souls games like Elden Ring certainly share some DNA, studio president Hidetaka Miyazaki believes the future of souls games will build off what Sekiro tried to perfect. 

In an interview with Game Informer, Miyazaki talks about how the relationship between offense and defense during battles has changed: “It’s become something much more fluid and active, I think, which was a very defining characteristic of Sekiro, and it’s something I’ve been thinking about since Bloodborne.” 

I found that one of the most significant changes to combat in Sekiro is the posture meter, which fills up each time you block an e…

Blizzard pulls Diablo Season 2 trailer that got almost everything wrong, its fumbled sums stunlocking this streamer with laughter-

Diablo 4’s Season of Blood drops tomorrow. In the run-up, the game’s social media accounts have been in overdrive—dropping trailers, explainer videos, memes, all that good stuff. One such video, however, came and went like a vampire in the night.

As spotted by PCGamesN, a video promising to explain “the best quality-of-life changes coming with Season of Blood” was pulled from Diablo 4’s official Twitter account earlier this week after it… didn’t do that. It’s gone now, but the internet’s collective all-seeing eye has immortalised it forever.

“Let’s observe what we have here,” says seasoned Diablo 4 YouTuber and streamer Raxxanterax, barely able to contain his laughter before he gets into the muck of it. First up, the screenshots of the Nightmare Dungeons, headlined with a proud Before and After, were actually in reverse. Comparing it to a wrap-up of a recent developer livestream, the Season of Blood’s dungeon map is actually the one contained under the “Befo…

ผู้พัฒนาเกม Honkai- Star Rail เผยการประยุกต์ใช้ AI ในการสร้างเกม

Honkai: Star Rail เกม RPG ที่เพิ่งเปิดตัวใหม่จาก HoYoverse เพิ่งเปิดเผยว่าพวกเขาได้ใช้เทคโนโลยี AI ในระหว่างการผลิตเกม ซึ่งต้องบอกก่อนว่าการใช้ AI ในการพัฒนาเกมกำลังเป็นที่นิยมมากขึ้น และไม่น่าแปลกใจที่บริษัทอย่าง HoYoverse จะใช้เทคโนโลยีนี้ โดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่งสำหรับเกมขนาดใหญ่อย่าง Honkai: Star Rail แม้ว่าเกมนี้จะออกมาเพียงช่วงสั้น ๆ แต่ก็ประสบความสำเร็จอย่างมากและได้รับการตอบรับอย�…

ลองเล่น Star Wars- Hunters เกม PVP 4 – 4 สุดมันส์

เกมรูปแบบ PvP Shooting ที่ให้ผู้เล่นรับบทเป็นเหล่านักล่าค่าหัวจากจักรวาลของ Star Wars ที่เดินทางมาสู่ดาว Vespaara เพื่อแข่งขันในสมรภูมิสุดมันส์ เน้นย้ำการใช้สกิลเฉพาะตัว การวางกลยุทธ์ และปรับแต่งความสามารถเพื่อประสานพลังทีมเวิร์คในการทำภารกิจต่างๆ โดยแต่ละฉากจะมีกิมมิคที่แตกต่างกันทั้ง Ewok Village บน Endor, Dune Sea Outpost ป้อมปราการร้างใน Tatooine หรือลานจอดรถไฟของ Vandor ที่ล้วนออกแบบตามสถ�…

Behold, the 61.44 TB ruler drive capable of forming petabytes of storage in a single server-

Solidigm has a new SSD on the way that’s fit to burst. The Solidigm D5-P5336 is stuffed with up to 61.44 terabytes of QLC NAND, which is likely equivalent to a lifetime supply of storage for a good few gamers.

Rated to 7000 MB/s sequential read and 3100 MB/s sequential write, this is a pretty quick drive considering it’s built from QLC NAND, which is quite a bit slower than other types. That probably means once you get down to the raw NAND for big transfers, or when the drive starts filling up, it won’t be anywhere near as quick, but we’re not really talking about a gaming SSD here so you don’t have to worry.

The reason it’s not for gamers is that this newer drive will come in U.2 and E1.L form factors when it launches later this year (via TechSpot). That means it’s practically a server-only drive. You absolutely can fit a U.2 drive into your machine, but if you end up with one of those E1.L drives at 318.75mm long, it’s going to be a bit of a squeeze. You’ll also have t…

Elden Ring’s friendly dog actually wants to rip you to shreds-

A minor theme in FromSoftware’s peerless Soulsborne games is the occasional appearance of an enemy that, for whatever reason, doesn’t aggro on you. My favourite example of this is a mass of crows in Bloodborne’s Hemwick Charnel Lane, all of which bar one will attack, while the remaining crow just sits there all dopey-like. In a world where everything’s out to eviscerate you, something not attacking almost makes it seem like a friend.

The Elden Ring equivalent of this is a dog in Leyndell, which is found next to another enemy, the Leonine Misbegotten. When the player approaches, the latter enemy will trigger as usual and the fight is on: but the dog doesn’t move. It just sits there watching on (unless you attack it, in which case it will defend itself).

It adds an especially piquant touch that it’s a dog, because in the Souls games dogs are such irredeemable bastards, but the effect is to create a mini-mystery. Why is this dog, of all the dogs, friendly?

Well, turns…

Hacking wizard gets Linux to run on a 1971 processor, though it takes almost 5 days to boot the kernel


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Blazing speed or top value-for-money- Take your pick with these two great SSD deals

Every week, I hunt through the usual online retailers for the best gaming SSD deals around and it’s been a bit disappointing to see how little prices have changed over the past nine months. There are still plenty of great deals to be found, though, but it really comes down to what you want from your SSD.

If you need the fastest possible speed then you’ll be paying a premium for it. On the other hand, if you want value for money, then it’ll be speed that you’ll have to sacrifice. Most SSDs sit somewhere in between but sometimes compromise just won’t do.

And if that’s the case for you, then I have just the SSDs that fit either bill—blistering performance or the most bytes for your bucks, there’s an ideal pick for either choice.

Quick links

  • Crucial T700 | 1 TB | 11,700 MB/s read | 9,500 MB/s write | $139.99 @ Newegg (save $12)
  • Nextorage G-LE | 2 TB | 7,400 MB/s read | 6,400 MB/s write …