The makers of MapleStory invest $400 million in a Russo brothers-founded company to expand to film and TV

Nexon wants to expand its game franchises to film and TV. | Image: Nexon

Nexon, which develops the popular MMORPG MapleStory, wants to bring its gaming franchises to film and TV, and it’s investing nearly half a billion dollars — and the potential for more — to do so. The company announced Wednesday that it’s making a minority investment of $400 million in AGBO, a company founded by Avengers co-directors Anthony and Joe Russo and producer Mike Larocca, and says it will invest up to an additional $100 million in the first half of this year “if requested by AGBO.”

According to a press release, “the agreement is intended to accelerate the global expansion of Nexon’s existing and new franchise intellectual property (IP) in film and television and to further support AGBO’s development, production, and ownership of...

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HTC is launching a VR wrist tracker for its Vive Focus 3 headset

HTC

HTC is announcing a new wrist-based controller for its Vive Focus 3 virtual reality headset. The wireless Vive Wrist Tracker fits like a watch around a user’s arm, tracking the orientation and position from hand to elbow. It’s designed to complement the business-focused headset’s existing controllers, particularly for simulation and training experiences where body position is important. It’s also part of a larger suite of new features HTC revealed at CES, including a 5G-powered VR experience.

The Wrist Tracker looks a lot like a small, light, and specialized version of the Vive Tracker device HTC debuted in 2017. It includes a strap and a toggle indicating whether the tracker should be on a left or right arm, but unlike the...

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General Motors announces electric versions of the Chevy Equinox and Blazer SUVs

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

General Motors CEO Mary Barra announced electric versions of the automaker’s Chevy Equinox and Blazer SUVs, both of which will be available in 2023. The electric Chevy Equinox will retail for a suggested price of $30,000, which could help drive broader adoption of electric vehicles in the US.

The announcement came during Barra’s keynote address for the 2022 Consumer Electronics Show, at which the company also revealed its electric Chevy Silverado pickup truck.

Most EVs on the market today are more expensive than their gas equivalents

Most EVs on the market today are more expensive than their gas equivalents, though EV sales numbers are still ticking up as more models become available. GM is hoping that a more affordable EV with a...

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Chevy Silverado EV revealed: GM’s best-selling truck goes electric

Up to 400 miles of range and a price that starts at $39,900 for some buyers

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Cadillac’s autonomous future looks too rich for my blood

Cadillac announced a pair of autonomous vehicle concepts that are a definite improvement over last year’s toaster-shaped thingamajig, but also seem designed to appeal to the 1 percent of the 1 percent of the 1 percent. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Rich people like cars and robots.)

The Cadillac InnerSpace (shout out, Dennis Quaid) is a fully autonomous luxury coupe with an electric drivetrain and vibes to spare. The concept will join others in the automaker’s Halo Concept Portfolio, which includes the aforementioned toaster-shaped vehicle and a single-seater electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft.

shout out Dennis Quaid

Here are some more pictures of this slice of deadliness. Also, the roof opens up? I...

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Walmart and FedEx ordering thousands of electric delivery vans from GM’s BrightDrop

Walmart struck a deal with General Motors-backed BrightDrop to reserve 5,000 of the company’s electric delivery vans, the companies announced today. The retail giant says it will integrate the EVs into its fleet in the coming years.

BrightDrop, which is GM’s dedicated electric delivery spinoff, will sell to Walmart both of its vehicles: the EV600 and the EV410. The EV600, which went into production last fall, has 600 cubic feet of cargo space, can travel up to 250 miles on a full battery, and has a gross vehicle weight of less than 10,000 pounds. The smaller EV410 features 400 cubic feet of cargo space and can cover 250 miles on a single charge.

FedEx is expanding its order with BrightDrop

Meanwhile, FedEx is expanding its order with...

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General Motors claims it will sell autonomous vehicles to consumers by ‘middle of decade’

Image: GM

General Motors is going to sell fully autonomous vehicles to regular people by the middle of the decade, the company’s CEO Mary Barra declared during her speech at the 2022 Consumer Electronics Show. It was a bold claim that is sure to cause waves in the auto industry, especially as it continues to grapple with its own over-inflated expectations about the future of driverless cars.

Barra didn’t offer further details about the kind of vehicle it will sell, which markets it will target, how it will address liability in the event of a crash, and most importantly, whether owners will be able to sleep in their autonomous vehicles.

To date, there are no self-driving cars for sale to consumers as personally owned vehicles. Autonomous vehicles,...

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Google is buying a company for half a billion dollars to boost cloud security

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Google’s $500 million acquisition of Israel-based startup Siemplify is supposed to help the company bolster its own cloud security initiative, Chronicle, according to a report from Reuters. In a blog post announcing the deal, Google describes Siemplify as a security orchestration, automation, and response (SOAR) organization and plans to integrate its capabilities into Chronicle.

“Siemplify allows Security Operation Center analysts to manage their operations from end-to-end”

“Siemplify is an intuitive workbench that enables security teams to both manage risk better and reduce the cost of addressing threats,” Sunil Potti, the vice president of Google Cloud Security, states in the blog post. “Siemplify allows Security Operation Center...

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Samsung’s CES 2022 showcase includes a metaverse experience we didn’t ask for

Get ice cream, talk to other booth goers, and barely interact with anything in Samsung’s “My House” CES experience. | Screenshot: Umar Shakir / The Verge

On the first day of CES 2022, Samsung opened up the virtual doors to its My House metaverse experience. The company built a customizable digital home accessible through the Zepeto app — a metaverse platform. With the number of COVID-19 infections reaching new highs, many companies pulled out or downsized their physical presence for CES this year — making virtual options like livestreaming a booth from a phone or, in this case, a metaverse booth, alternative ways to share products.

Image: Samsung

Don’t get too excited...

The problem is, no one asked Samsung for this metaverse experience. Especially not the target audience the company’s press release stated this is for — millennials and zoomers. Just take a look...

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Turning Point is quietly building the next generation of conservative influencers

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Influencer first, conservative second

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The PS5 is available right now at Best Buy

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

If you’re currently shopping for a PlayStation 5 console, you have another chance right now at Best Buy. The electronics retailer just opened up a fresh batch of PlayStation 5 consoles for $499.99.

Be sure to log in and queue up on Best Buy’s site, with your billing and shipping info saved. Click the “Add to Cart” button on the right to jump into the waiting line, and stay calm. You don’t need to refresh the automated system, though, you may be prompted to verify your account when it’s your turn. Best Buy’s recently-updated queue system may not work well if you try to open multiple tabs, but keep your phone handy — if you have trouble verifying your account you may be able to do it in the mobile app and check out once the PlayStation 5...

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Tile is working with Lenovo to help you find your lost laptop

This is Tile’s second embedded PC partnership. | Image: Tile, Lenovo

No one likes misplacing expensive gadgets, but especially not a laptop. If you were thinking about copping one of Lenovo’s newly announced ThinkPad X1s, good news. Tile and Lenovo are teaming up to make the computers findable via the Tile app, even when the laptops are offline.

This is Tile’s second embedded PC collaboration — the first was with HP. As for which Lenovo laptops are compatible, the list includes the X1 Carbon 10th gen, X1 Yoga 7th gen, and the X1 Nano 2nd gen. To enable the feature, download and install the Tile Windows app from the Microsoft Store. From there, activate the ThinkPad as if it were a Tile tracker. Once that’s done, should you misplace your shiny new laptop, you can find it using the Tile app for iOS or...

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Lenovo’s new Yoga 9i embraces hardware shortcut buttons

Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge

Lenovo’s newest Yoga 9i convertible laptop is embracing one of the more fun trends of ‘90s and early ‘00s computer design: shortcut keys. While plenty of laptops have added handy shortcuts to the Function row on the keyboard, few are making keys that have one express purpose. Now Lenovo is planning to release a laptop in 2022 with five of them.

The 1-Click Function keys all sit to the right of the keyboard. There’s a key for switching between performance mode and a battery-sipping Smart Power mode that sacrifices a little power to boost battery life. Another key lets you toggle between light and dark mode in Windows 10 (or 11? does this laptop ship with 10 on it?), and the Vibe Check (lol) key toggles between the various built-in audio...

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Lenovo’s new ThinkBook Plus Gen 3 has an eight-inch secondary screen

Here’s the ThinkBook Plus Gen 3.

Lenovo has announced the new ThinkBook Plus Gen 3, which has two (two!) screens. There’s one 17.3-inch primary screen (like, the regular one), and there’s another eight-inch screen on the keyboard deck. Various other models that have tried this form factor (namely, Asus’gaggle ofDuo products) have put the secondary screen in the back of the deck and pushed the keyboard to the front. But Lenovo has instead put the keyboard on the right side of the chassis, smushing the keyboard to the left.

While the ThinkBook Plus Gen 3’s look takes a bit of getting used to, I definitely prefer this layout to those of the Duos. You don’t have to buy a separate palm rest, and you don’t look and feel like a T. rex when you’re typing. (I know that...

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Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 Carbon and X1 Nano get better webcams and OLED displays

Here’s the new ThinkPad X1 Nano, which looks a lot like the old ThinkPad X1 Nano.

At CES 2022, Lenovo announced updates to three of its most premium laptops on the market: the ThinkPad X1 Carbon 10th-gen (that’s right, this is the tenth one), the ThinkPad X1 Yoga seventh-gen, and the ThinkPad X1 Nano second-gen. The Carbon and the Yoga will be available in March (starting at $1,639 and $1,749, respectively), and the Nano is coming in April (starting at $1,659).

These are some heavy hitters. The X1 Carbon and the X1 Yoga are two of the most established and beloved laptops in the business sphere. The X1 Nano is newer to the scene but was one of our favorite laptops that we reviewed last year — it’s the lightest ThinkPad ever made, and it packs impressive power into that chassis.

The X1 Nano was one of our favorite...

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Fossil activates gamer mode with a Razer smartwatch

The Razer X Fossil Gen 6 might not have RGB but it can still match your keyboard. | Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge

Fossil usually shows up to CES with a hoard of smartwatches, but last year was a weird one for Wear OS. Google and Samsung announced a new unified version of Wear OS, but the catch was that non-Samsung watches — including Fossil’s — won’t be eligible for an upgrade until mid to late 2022. Given the circumstances, this year, Fossil is keeping it relatively simple with a limited-edition Razer smartwatch and an updated version of the Skagen Falster.

Before you ask, no, the Razer X Fossil Gen 6 smartwatch does not come with RGB lighting. It does, however, come with three Razer-branded watch faces — including a “Chroma” face that you can customize to match Razer’s other Chroma products. It’s technically not RGB, but you can enable “breathe”...

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Lenovo’s 16-inch Legion 5 Pro is about to get even better

Lenovo

Lenovo impressed us in 2021 with its Legion 5 Pro, a 16-inch QHD+ laptop that delivered excellent gaming performance at a price that undercut many of its key competitors, like Razer and Asus. It also got bonus points for being powerful without being too thick or heavy.

Like many companies during CES 2022, Lenovo is upgrading the specs of its Legion 5 Pro for this year, and despite my never-dying thirst for new chassis design, it seems like Lenovo may have another hit on its hands without having to change all that much (here’s to hoping Lenovo stocks it at more retailers than just Walmart). Though, according to the company, the chassis is thinner than the previous generation.

The new Legion 5 Pro will be available in the standard storm...

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PG&E found responsible for yet another devastating fire

CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES - 2021/08/16: Flames from the Dixie fire approach powerlines. | Photo by Ty O’Neil/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

California utility company PG&E was found at fault for sparking another massive inferno. This time it was the Dixie wildfire, the second largest in state history. Electrical distribution lines sparked the blaze after coming in contact with a tree, according to the results of an investigation completed by state firefighting agency Cal Fire yesterday.

The Dixie Fire raged for more than three months last year, burning over 1,300 structures and killing one person. In perhaps its most traumatic episode, the blaze tore through the town of Greenville one August evening — growing explosively overnight. By morning, it had decimated most of the historic Gold Rush town. “We lost Greenville tonight,” local Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-CA) said as he held...

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Meta reportedly canceled a 300-person VR / AR operating system project

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Meta reportedly pulled the plug on a custom operating system that was supposed to power upcoming virtual and augmented reality headsets, although its full reasoning and future plans still aren’t clear. The Information reported the news today, saying the company formerly named Facebook suspended development of a project called XROS — named after XR, an umbrella term for AR / VR — in November. That leaves Meta with the Android-based operating system used in Quest (previously Oculus) VR devices, something that offers convenience but also makes Meta dependent on another company’s OS.

The Information article reports that XROS development began in 2017 and had more than 300 people working on it. It’s apparently synonymous with the “reality...

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That Walmart VR shopping video is old news — but so is the metaverse

There’s a video doing the rounds on Twitter today that supposedly shows “how Walmart envisions Shopping in the #Metaverse.” In it, a virtual avatar browses shelves of virtual groceries, picking and tossing items into a shopping cart with all the grace of stop motion skeleton in a ’50s adventure film. Responses to the clip have been suitably mocking, criticizing the VR experience for its pointless skeuomorphism and outdated visuals.

This is appropriate, given that the video is actually four years old.

Current metaverse demos still look like this sloppy ad from 2017

A quick Google reveals that the clip was made for Walmart by a digital agency in 2017 to “impress influencers at SXSW” (an example of an obscure capitalist ritual known as a...

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Amazon makes a deal with Stellantis to buy electric Ram ProMaster delivery vans in 2023

Amazon announced that it will buy an undisclosed number of electric delivery vans from Stellantis in 2023. The automaker has said that it will roll out an all-electric version of its Ram ProMaster commercial van that year.

Stellantis, which is the company that formed last year from the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and the French PSA Group, has not officially revealed the electric vans. But Amazon says it will be the first commercial customer when they eventually enter production, with the two companies working together to put “thousands” of electric vans on the road.

Amazon has been working with Rivian, the buzzy electric vehicle company that went public last year in one of the biggest IPOs ever, on a fleet of electric delivery...

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Amazon makes a deal with Stellantis to buy electric Dodge ProMaster delivery vans in 2023

Amazon announced that it will buy an undisclosed number of electric delivery vans from Stellantis in 2023. The automaker has said that it will roll out an all-electric version of its Dodge ProMaster commercial van that year.

Stellantis, which is the company that formed last year from the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and the French PSA Group, has not officially revealed the electric vans. But Amazon says it will be the first commercial customer when they eventually enter production, with the two companies working together to put “thousands” of electric vans on the road.

Amazon has been working with Rivian, the buzzy electric vehicle company that went public last year in one of the biggest IPOs ever, on a fleet of electric delivery...

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HMD has five new sub-$250 Nokia phones coming to the US soon

From left to right, the Nokia 2760 Flip, C100, G400, C200, G100. | Image: HMD

HMD, the company behind modern Nokia-branded phones, has announced five new “US exclusive” phones coming in the first half of this year. None of these are flagships: there’s only one 5G device, and all five are set to retail for under $250. HMD has also revived a classic Nokia design as a modern feature phone — the Nokia 2760 — a flip phone that inherits its name from the original 2007 handset.

The company isn’t fully detailing the specs of the five phones today and says it plans to release this information closer to each handset’s launch. Instead, it’s emphasizing that the phones will be available across a wider range of US wireless providers, which now include Dish Wireless and Consumer Cellular in addition to T-Mobile and TracFone.

T...

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Elizabeth Holmes’ verdict won’t change Silicon Valley

Photo by Yichuan Cao/NurPhoto via Getty Images

The market’s only gotten weirder since Theranos

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Amazon’s Alexa and Cisco’s Webex are heading to deep space on NASA’s upcoming Moon mission

An artistic rendering of the Callisto system inside the Orion crew capsule for Artemis I | Image: Lockheed Martin

When NASA debuts its new massive deep-space rocket for the first time in the coming months, a familiar voice assistant and video teleconferencing tool will be going along for the ride. A version of Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant and Cisco’s Webex videoconferencing platformwill be included on the flight to space, part of a technology demonstration to see if these tools might benefit future astronauts flying to distant destinations like the Moon and Mars.

The upcoming flight is known as Artemis I, and it’s the first test mission in a series of flights planned for NASA’s Artemis program — an initiative to send the first woman and the first person of color to the surface of the Moon. Tentatively set for March, Artemis I will mark the...

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Asus says this is world’s first quad-band Wi-Fi 6E gaming router

The Asus ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000. | Image: Asus

Asus’ latest router is the ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000, and it says it’s the “world’s first quad-band Wi-Fi 6E gaming router.” That doesn’t quite make it the world’s first quad-band Wi-Fi 6E router overall (Netgear announced a quad-band Orbi system last October which you can already buy), but this is the first such system to specifically target gamers, and as a standalone router its starting price is cheaper than comparable mesh systems.

Quad-band routers, as their name suggests, broadcast a total of four wireless bands for connectivity. Asus’ latest router has a 2.4GHz band, two 5GHz bands, and a fancy new 6GHz band. The three highest frequency bands each offer a theoretical maximum speed of 4,804Mbps, which drops to 1,148Mbps for the...

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Vivo launches ‘color-changing’ V23 Pro with dual-camera notch

Vivo has announced the V23 and V23 Pro, the latest phones in the company’s mainstream V series that sells a ton in India and other Asian countries.

The most unusual feature is the Sunshine Gold model’s ‘color-changing’ exterior that apparently shifts colors completely when exposed to sunlight. Vivo says the material took two years to research and develop; if you leave it in the sun for about thirty seconds, the phone will turn to blue-green before gradually returning back to the original gold.

Plot twist: these phones are both gold.

The other standout feature is the display’s notch that houses two selfie cameras, a 50-megapixel main unit and an 8-megapixel ultrawide on both phones. The selfie camera system also...

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Chrysler previews its all-electric future with Airflow concept SUV

Stellantis

The iconic American brand will only sell electric vehicles by 2028

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Belkin’s Soundform Immerse noise-canceling earbuds are designed with music lovers in mind

Image by Belkin

Belkin is adding the Immerse earbuds to its existing Soundform true wireless lineup. The earbuds come with hybrid active noise cancellation (ANC) technology, which should deliver audio free of background noise.

Image by Belkin

In case you haven’t heard of the “hybrid” form of ANC, SoundGuys describes it as two microphones located on the inside and outside of each earbud, which detect and cancel out sound coming from your environment. The other forms of ANC put the mic on the inside or outside of the earbud, which isn’t always as efficient for filtering out noise.

The Immerse earbuds have a pretty long battery life as well. Each earbud is supposed to get eight hours of play time on a single charge, and when combined...

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The Samsung Odyssey Ark is its largest curved monitor yet — and you can turn it on its side

Samsung now makes the biggest, curviest, you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it PC monitors out there; two _Verge_editors recently replaced their multi-monitor setups with a single 49-inch Samsung Odyssey G9 when it went on sale for $999 the other week. But the company’s not satisfied simply filling your horizontal field of view with 49 inches of real estate — today at CES, it’s revealing an even bigger 55-inch curved screen with a special stand that lets you flip the gigantic monitor vertically, so the screen curves right over your head.

It’s called the Samsung Odyssey Ark, and the company is pitching it as a real product that it’s planning to bring to the United States in the second half of the year. We don’t have a price, release date, or...

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