This week, Alexa learns a new language, B.C.‘s Coroners Service finds a way to use interactive mapping, and Brave is a browser for a new world. But first, the new games coming to PlayStation VR.

PlayStation VR goes where no virtual reality has gone before

In New York last week, I spent an afternoon trying out some of the new games coming to PlayStation’s virtual reality system.

There were 8 games to sample, although limited time meant I could only try out half of those. I skipped Everybody’s Golf VR, Five Nights at Freddy’s VR, Ghost Giant, and Trover Saves the Universe.

Here’s what I did play.

Concrete Genie

This game, from Sony studio Pixelopus, is a companion to the upcoming PS4 game of the same name, in which a young boy discovers his paintings come to life. The VR experience is sublime, and proves what creative director Dominic Robilliard told me as I was donning the headset: “Anyone can be an artist.” You use the Move controllers as paint brushes and, guided by a cute creature from the PS4 game, you really just create colours and textures in the virtual space around you. It’s a peaceful experience, and reminded me a lot of the gentle creativity that came from playing Flower. It will be something different to everyone.

Blood & Truth

One of the first VR demos I experienced was the London Heist, which became part of the PlayStation VR Worlds sampler. It’s from Sony’s London Studio, and Blood & Truth was informed by development of that early experience. The idea is to make you feel like you’re in the middle of a Guy Ritchie film, so there’s lots of well acted, snappy dialogue in this authentic, on-rails shooter with an action hero aesthetic.

No Man’s Sky

One of the most exciting games these days is No Man’s Sky. After a rocky launch, which was the result of unrealistic expectations on all sides, the developers at Hello Games have continued to improve the game and have turned it into something more in line with what they had promised: a never ending exploration of space.

And now you can do that exploration in virtual reality.

Sean Murray, one of the founders of Hello Games, walked me through the demonstration and he explained that this is not just a port of the game, even though the entire game is playable in VR.

The “huge technical challenge” required a reinvention of the mechanics and the interface. And it is amazing.

The massive sandbox is mind blowing when you’re immersed in it. You raise your hands to interact with your controls, which appear above your wrists as holographic interfaces, and flying your spaceship requires you to control things with virtual flight sticks.

Murray said that he believes exploration is better in VR and it certainly was for me. i spent 20 minutes in the rig and it felt like

It is absolutely transformative.

Marvel’s Iron Man VR

Seattle-based Camouflaj was ahead of the curve with its adventure game, Republique, and they are on top of the world having been handed Marvel’s premiere Iron Man franchise.

The goal, studio founder Ryan Payton told me, was to get you in the suit, because that’s where the power fantasy lives.

Iron Man is made for VR, because Tony Stark is, in a sense, in a VR experience himself. And when you put on the VR rig, it’s akin to putting on the Iron Man helmet. You use the Move controllers for thrust and combat, in the same way Stark uses his hands.

Expect the game to last for 8 to 10 hours, alternating between set pieces where you are Iron Man, and cinematics featuring Tony Stark and other characters delivering story sequences.

Alexa speaks French. Canadian French

Amazon announced recently that its Echo smart speakers can now understand Quebecois. You can change the language settings of your Echo on your smartphone or tablet through the Alexa app. It is configured in the “settings” section.

Using the power of the internet, and distributed memory, to identify people who have died

The British Columbia Coroners Service is “responsible for investigating and determining the circumstances of all unnatural, sudden and unexpected, unexplained or unattended deaths in the province”. At the end of March, the service launched a new interactive map it hopes will help it solve some cold cases.

The Unidentified Human Remains Interactive Viewer was built using ArcGIS, a product of Esri, a global technology company.

The map includes coloured pins – red for female, blue for male, green for unknown – marking the locations in B.C. where human remains were found that have not been identified. Clicking on a pin gives you the case number and details about the remains, including the date the remains were discovered and any biographical details that were deduced, such as age, height, and eye and hair colour.

Some files include very specific information included to help with identification.

One of the single feet found in the coastal waters off Quadra Island, for example, includes this notation: “Left foot dressed in a wool sock and Size 8.5 white Reebok shoe. Reebok Canada shoe was in production after Jan 1993.”

Speaking for the Coroners Service in an interview with the Globe & Mail, Andy Watson said some 200 cases from as far back as 1953 are included.

“Typically speaking, these are unwitnessed deaths,” Watson explained to Ian Bailey. “They may be deaths where bodies may be found after some time so being able to identify them is a challenge.”

Brave is a new browser for a new world

If you’ve found yourself thinking about what you’re giving up when you use the internet these days, you might want to give a new web browser a spin.

Brave was built with privacy in mind. It has blockers in the browser, and it counts how many ads and trackers it blocks on your behalf.

And it provides true private browsing with Tor. It prevents your ISP from seeing what you’re browsing, and prevents sites you visit from seeing your IP address, which can be used to track you.

This all brings a faster browsing experience, too. Brave claims it can load some sites up to eight times faster than other browsers.

There are mobile versions for Android and iOS which will save you bandwidth by blocking ads and trackers. Which, ultimately, saves you money because you’re not having to pay to download the things companies are using to track and target you.

Now I just need 1Password to build a browser extension for it.

This week on The Shift with Drex, I talked about the announcements from Apple about Apple TV+, Apple News+, Apple Arcade, and Apple’s updates to iMac, iPad, and AirPod. Also, Facebook’s inability to keep your password safe and Tesla’s Model Y.

This week, Apple updates some hardware, Facebook seems not to understand security, and Tesla announced a new vehicle. But first, all the content that’s coming at you from Apple.

Everything you want to know about Apple TV+, Apple News+, and Apple Arcade

Oprah said it best when she explained why she’s signed a deal with Apple to create content for the new video service: “They’re in a billion pockets, y’all. A billion pockets. The whole world’s got them in their hands.”

Apple is leveraging the billion or so people it has connected to its devices. In a way, the content play the company announced on Monday began with Apple Music in 2015. Now, Apple wants to provide people with their video (Apple TV+) and print (Apple New+) content, too. And it’s finally giving gaming some recognition with Apple Arcade.

And while pricing for Apple TV+ and Apple Arcade haven’t been announced, all three of the new services are part of Apple’s Family Sharing program, so up to six people can share a single subscription.

Apple TV+

Coming this fall, Apple TV+ is a subscription service (pricing has not been announced) that will deliver original programming, ad-free and on demand, and all content can be downloaded for viewing offline.

At the press event in Cupertino, there were a bunch of celebrities who took to the stage to talk about what they’ve got in the works. Some of them, like Steven Spielberg’s Amazing Stories and Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon’s The Morning Show we already knew about.

Others, like See, the new action drama from Steven Knight, starring Jason Momoa and Alfre Woodard and filmed in Vancouver, were surprises.

Apple is also adding channels to Apple TV giving you a chance to subscribe to other streaming services through it. The company name checked HBO, Showtime, and Starz, but those are unlikely to be available in Canada, as Bell Media has rights to programs from those networks and they are in the Crave service.

Netflix was notably missing.

Apple News+

The print subscription service, Apple News+ is available now. For Cdn$13 a month you get access to all the reading you want.

Publications that have signed up include magazines such as the Atlantic, Chatelaine, National Geographic, Rolling Stone, Sports Illustrated, Wired, and the Hockey News. News organizations participating include the Wall Street Journal, the Toronto Star, Bell Media, and Global News.

Obvious missing entities include the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Globe & Mail.

Apple Arcade

While video games have been the biggest selling software in Apple’s App Store, the company has largely ignored the medium until now. Apple Arcade promises more than 100 games, ad-free and playable offline, when it launches this fall.

Your subscription will get you the games on all of your Apple devices, and you’ll be able to move from device to device and pick up where you left off. Apple made sure to point out that the games you play in the Apple Arcade will not be streamed, but will be full apps downloaded to your devices.

Pricing hasn’t been announced, but among the developers working on exclusive titles are Vancouver’s Klei Entertainment (Hot Lava), Toronto’s Snowman (Where Cards Fall), and ustwo, creators of Monument Valley. Bigger publishers including Konami and Sega are also listed as partners (Sonic the Hedgehog is visible in the Apple Arcade trailer).

Apple refreshes iMac, iPads, AirPods

In the weeks leading up to this week’s big press event at the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple Park in California, Apple announced that the technology in its iPad mini, iPad Air, and iMac computers was being updated, and revealed updated AirPods.

The new iMacs are faster, with 8th- and 9th-generation processors and Radeon Pro Vega graphics processors, and the new iPads get Apple Pencil support, the A12 Bionic chip, and Retina displays with Apple’s True Tone technology.

The iMac is priced starting at $1,399 for a 21.5-inch display, and $2,399 for a 27-inch display.

The new iPad mini is priced at $529 (Wi-Fi) and $699 (Wi-Fi and cellular) for the 64 GB version, and $729 and $899 for the 256 GB version.

The iPad Air is $649 and $819 for 64 GB of storage, and $849 and $1,019 for the 256 GB model.

The second generation AirPods, meanwhile, sport a new H1 chip designed for the earphones and promise better battery life and faster connections. And they come with a wireless charging case, which you can place on a Qi-compatible charging mat instead of plugging it in.

The new AirPods cost $219 with a standard case or $269 with a wireless charging case. They are available now.

Time to change your Facebook password

Oh, god. Can it get any worse for Facebook? Now the company has admitted that it stored “hundreds of millions” of user passwords without any encryption at all.

Facebook vice president Pedro Canahuati said in a statement that there is “no evidence to date that anyone internally abused or improperly accessed” the data.

Yeah, you should change your password anyway. Do it right now.

Tesla’s Model Y is the company’s new . . . car? SUV?

The Model Y, revealed by Elon Musk at an event last week (the video below is a supercut of the event from the Verge compressed into three minutes) is the auto manufacturer’s fifth production vehicle and the latest since the Model 3, which was designed for the average consumer.

The new vehicle is a crossover with seating for up to 7 in a cabin with fold flat back seats. It’s got the versatility and space of an SUV with the compact frame of a sedan.

There will be four trim packages, starting at Cdn$64,000 before incentives. The Long Range edition has a range of nearly 500 km, while the Dual-Motor All-Wheel-Drive and Performance packages get 450 km. These are all expected in fall 2020. A Standard edition, with a range of 370 km and a starting price of about $50,000 is planned for 2021.

It’s very pretty, and the 500 km range is solid. That’s pretty close to what I get with my Honda Pilot. And while the purchase price is at a premium for most, there are significant savings in gas and maintenance.

The company is still struggling to get up to pace building the Model 3 to meet demand.

This week on The Shift with Drex, I talked about the impact and effect of live streaming violence, how MySpace lost a decade of user’s data, Google’s new game service, Stadia, and Ubisoft’s The Division 2.

This week, Ubisoft’s new shooter The Division 2 shifts to D.C., how Google is approaching gamers, and MySpace manages to delete a decade of user files. But first, what responsibility do online platforms have over horrific, violent content?

Attack on New Zealand mosques was live streamed

The attack on the New Zealand mosques was horrific enough. Worse is that the alleged shooter published the live video of his actions on Facebook, where it was quickly copied to YouTube and other social media channels.

This was the intent, of course, and despite all of the automatic systems to remove the video, it’s still circulating.

The New Zealand Herald reports that a teenager has been charged with sharing the stream.

Facebook and YouTube insist they did the best they could.

It’s another incident that calls into question whether the platforms that allow such content to be published without first being screened should be allowed.

MySpace appears to have lost more than a decade of user music

MySpace hasn’t been relevant in the online world for years, but it was once an important social site, one that led to the discovery of musicians including the Arctic Monkeys, Calvin Harris, and Kate Nash, among others.

But sometime in 2018 during a migration to a new data server, the company claims it lost all music and videos. This was only revealed after about a year of users emailing MySpace support and asking what was going on (as documented on Reddit).

Archivist Jason Scott posted a screenshot of what appears to be a response from MySpace saying the data is lost.

https://t.co/m4itH5Hx1u Just in case you're wondering how it's going. pic.twitter.com/3O5l551F7e

— Jason Scott (@textfiles) March 17, 2019

Andy Baio, who helped build and was CTO of Kickstarter, wonders if perhaps it may have been more intentional than MySpace is letting on.

I'm deeply skeptical this was an accident. Flagrant incompetence may be bad PR, but it still sounds better than "we can't be bothered with the effort and cost of migrating and hosting 50 million old MP3s."

— Andy Baio (@waxpancake) March 18, 2019

Google wants you to play and watch more games, and Jade Raymond is going to help

Now we know what Jade Raymond is going to be doing at Google. Last week, the veteran of video game development announced she had accepted a vice president role at Google.

I’m excited to finally be able to share that I have joined Google as VP!

— Jade Raymond (@ibjade) March 12, 2019

At the time there was no revelation as to what she’d be doing. But at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco yesterday, Google laid out its plan for gaming and gamers, and Raymond is key to that plan.

Raymond started in the industry as a programmer for Sony. While working for Ubisoft in Montreal, she lead the team that created Assassin’s Creed, one of the most popular and lucrative game franchises. She later opened Ubisoft Toronto before moving back to Montreal to create Motive Studio for Electronic Arts.

Raymond is the head of Stadia Games and Entertainment, which is the creative wing of Google’s new gaming initiative. This will include working with existing game developers as well as building a network of development studios to create new game experiences.

Google says that its game platform, Stadia, will get games out of the box and onto whatever screen they want to play on. The company also wants to more closely connect game playing with game watching.

The concept relies on cloud-based processing, so while you might not need a console or gaming computer to play, your gaming experience does rely on the quality of your high-speed internet connection. But Google says that because it can create a nearly direct link between its data centres and the screen a player is using, the latency that can be so problematic when playing games over the internet isn’t an issue.

There is no connection to the “public” internet, claims Google, so security and privacy are also protected.

Last year, Google and Ubisoft showed that a graphically-intense game, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, could be played in a browser at a resolution of 1080p and at 60 frames per second. The goal is to deliver 4K, HDR video at 60 fps.

And Stadia wants to make it easy for you to start playing, so you can go from watching a trailer for a new game and playing it within seconds. On any screen you happen to be using: computers, tablets, smartphones, and TVs.

In the presentation on Tuesday, Google showed a player moving from Chromebook, to computer, to smartphone, to tablet, to television (through a Chromecast), and the game appeared to continue exactly from where the player left off.

There is a controller to support this play. The Stadia game controller looks like others, but connects through Wi-fi, and it identifies the screen you want to use, so you can use the same controller no matter what screen you use. It also includes a capture button so you can instantly share a video of your play, and a button to access Google Assistant, which can enable instant support, should developers choose to include that.

Stadia will be available this year in Canada, the U.S., the U.K., and parts of Europe. Pricing for the service has not been announced.

The Division 2 shifts action to Washington, D.C.

The Division 2, developed by Massive and published by Ubisoft, is a solid sequel to the first game. The franchise is set in America after a pandemic has led to the collapse of society as we know it. The first game was set in New York; this latest chapter moves to Washington.

It’s a crisp, fine-tuned experience, providing exhilarating cover-and-shoot gaming, punctuated by the collection of weapons and gear.

If there’s a knock on the game it’s that the developers and publisher insist this is not a political game, all while doing things like having a firefight set in the middle of a museum exhibit on the Vietnam War.

The Division 2 is available now for PS4, Windows, and Xbox One.