Ahead of its official debut on April 19th, Mercedes-Benz has shared a first look at the interior of the 2023 EQS SUV. As you can see from the photos the automaker provided, Mercedes didn’t reinvent its interior design language. As before, the most eye-catching feature is the optional 56-inch MBUX Hyperscreen that spans across the entire front cabin of the car. It includes a 12.3-inch OLED display that allows the front passenger to watch video content while the car is moving. If an onboard camera detects the driver sneaking a glimpse of the display, the screen will automatically dim to refocus their eyes on the road.

Mercedes-Benz

The interior cabin incorporates both wood and leather to create a “lounge-like” ambiance. Mercedes will allow customers to customize the interior in seven different color combinations. It will also offer optional third-row seating and an electrically adjustable second row, allowing the EQS SUV to transport up to seven people. Other notable features include a Dolby Atmos sound system and an air filtration system that incorporates a HEPA filter to prevent pollen and dust from entering the cabin.

Mercedes also announced today it will manufacture batteries for the EQS SUV (and EQE SUV) at a newly opened battery plant in Bibb County, Alabama that will create up to 600 jobs. The company will assemble the vehicle at its long-standing plant in nearby Tuscaloosa, Alabama. 

Google will soon make it easier to see what Stadia has to offer. In the “coming weeks,” the company will introduce a new public-facing storefront that will be accessible without the need for a Google account. You also won’t need to sign in to the service to see its entire library. One of the ways you’ll be able to access the storefront is through Google Search, much like you can do for games on Steam and the PlayStation Store.

Alongside the new storefront, Google is expanding the availability of click-to-play trials to all developers. They’re limited-time demos that anyone can access, even if they haven’t signed up for Stadia. All a developer needs to do to offer one is set the amount of time someone can play their game without an account. One game that’s currently available to try in this way is Risk of Rain 2, with more to come throughout 2022.

Both initiatives broadly see Google removing barriers that in the past may have stopped some people from trying the service. Whether that ultimately changes the outlook of Stadia is hard to say, but at least anyone with a passing interest in the platform will find it easier to discover what it's all about. 

Tencent has added yet another studio to its stable of game developers. On Tuesday, the company announced it recently acquired a majority stake in Tequila Works, the Madrid-based studio best known for its work on Rime. Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but Tequila Works said the investment would help take its games “to the next level.” The studio is currently working with Riot Games on Song of Nunu: A League of Legends Story. Incidentally, Riot Games is also owned by Tencent.

“We are delighted to ally with a partner that allows us to make Tequila Works a stronger studio with access to all the resources required to produce titles of the highest quality, all made with the care and passion our beloved fans know us for as well as the opportunity of bringing these projects to a wider audience,” said Tequila Works chairwoman Luz Sancho.

While Microsoft has dominated headlines with its high-profile acquisitions of Activision-Blizzard and Bethesda parent company ZeniMax Media, Tencent has quietly amassed an empire of its own. In 2021, it invested in more than 100 gaming-related companies, including Back 4 Blood developer Turtle Rock and Sumo Group in a deal that saw Tencent acquire the LittleBigPlanet 3 studio for $1.26 billion.

Just days after introducing a feature that made an algorithmically-generated feed the default for iOS users, Twitter is changing things back to the way they were before. “We heard you,” the company said. “Some of you always want to see latest tweets first. We’ve switched the timeline back and removed the tabbed experience for now while we explore other options.”

If didn’t follow the controversy Twitter created for itself, it all started last year when the company began testing a new tabbed interface for switching between its algorithmically-generated “Home” feed and reverse-chronolgical “Latest” feed. On March 10th, the company began rolling out the feature to iOS, promising it would come to its Android app and web client soon after. But what many people found, and ended up complaining about, was that the feature would default their feed to the algorithmic one every time they opened the app.

This isn’t the first time an internet company has rolled back a feature, but it shows that many people still want a chronological feed and dislike it when companies try to take that functionality away from them. When it comes to Twitter, there’s a case to be made that many people come to the platform to get first-hand accounts and information when there’s breaking news. So making that version of the website difficult to access isn’t doing anyone any favors.

Move over, Spot, there’s a new quadruped robot in town. Meet Kawasaki’s Bex. Unveiled at last week’s International Robot Exhibition in Tokyo, Bex is a four-legged robot that’s inexplicably modeled after an Ibex, a species of wild goat that’s native to parts of Eurasia and Africa.

Bex came out of the company’s Kaleido program, which has seen it work on bipedal robots since 2015. Partway through that project, Kawasaki’s engineers decided to build a robot that could both move quickly across level ground and navigate tricky terrain. As you can see from the video spotted by Gizmodo, Bex features a set of wheels on its knees, allowing it to move faster on smooth surfaces than the glacial pace it plods along when walking. 

Bex can carry approximately 220 pounds of cargo. In addition to transporting construction materials and the like, Kawasaki envisions it carrying out remote industrial site inspections, much like Spot is already doing at Hyundai factories in Korea. To that end, the top half of Bex is fully modular, so it doesn’t have to look like a goat. But if you ask us, what kind of monster wouldn't want a goat protecting their factories? 

In February, Meta introduced a feature called Personal Boundary to Horizon Worlds and Venues to combat harassment. The company gave every avatar a bubble with a radius of two virtual feet, making it so that no one could come within four feet of your personal space. At the time, Meta made it so that users could not disable the feature. In response to community feedback, however, the company is now updating the tool to give people more control over it.

Meta

You now have three options that allow you to decide who can get close to your avatar. The app will default to the first one, “On for Non-Friends.” As you can probably guess, this one prevents people who aren’t on your friends list from getting close to your avatar. Then there’s “On for Everyone” and “Off.” The latter option effectively returns your avatar to the standard Meta enforced before introducing Personal Boundary. In some contexts, such as when two people first meet, the software will switch to a more restrictive setting to ensure everyone is safe.

As much as things like groping have become a significant issue in VR social spaces, today’s update would suggest that there’s no one-size-fits-all solution for helping people feel safe in virtual reality. Meta acknowledges as much in its latest blog post, noting these new options will make it easier for friends to high-five, first-bump and take selfies while in Horizon Worlds.

Apple has begun rolling out iOS 15.4. The highly anticipated update adds a handful of features many iPhone users have been waiting to try out since the company first began testing them back in January. Among the most notable is the option to unlock your device while wearing a mask, making it so that you don't need an Apple Watch to unlock your phone without removing a face covering or inputting your passcode. Once you've installed iOS 15.4, you'll need to activate it manually in the Face ID and Passcode section of the Settings menu. iOS 15.4 also comes with a new voice option for Siri.

Apple has also released iPadOS 15.4. It introduces another highly anticipated feature: Universal Control. First announced at WWDC in June and then delayed at the end of the year, it allows you control multiple Macs and iPads with a single keyboard and trackpad or mouse. The two updates also with the 37 new emoji characters introduced as part of Unicode 14.0. That means you can use characters like the "melting face" in your text conversations, and add skin tones to the handshake emoji.     

To download the new updates, launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad, then tap "General" followed by Software Update.  

Months after announcing their purposed $43 billion merger, WarnerMedia and Discovery have answered what will happen to HBO Max and Discovery Plus once they form the imaginatively named Warner Bros. Discovery. Per Variety, Discovery chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels said during a recent panel at the 30th Annual Media, Internet and Telecom Conference that the company plans to combine the two platforms into one unified streaming service.

“One of the most important items here is that we believe in a combined product as opposed to a bundle,” he said. “We believe that the breadth and depth of this content offering is going to be a phenomenal consumer value proposition.”

Merging the two platforms is something Wiedenfels said he expects will take a few months for Warner Bros. Discovery to “do it in a way that’s actually a great user experience for our subscribers.” In the meantime, HBO Max and Discovery Plus customers should expect at least some form of bundling. 

Wiedenfels suggested that could take the form of content sharing between the two platforms and the introduction of a single sign-on. One question the executive didn’t answer is how much it will cost to subscribe to the new combined service. Discovery Plus and HBO Max currently start at $5 and $10 per month, with both platforms offering more expensive ad-free tiers.

It’s not surprising to learn that Discovery and TimeWarner plan to unify their streaming platforms. When the merger was first announced last year, it was positioned as a move that would make the two companies better able to compete with Netflix, Disney+ and other rivals.

For nearly 30 years, Square Enix’s Chrono Trigger has stood tall as one of the defining releases of the SNES era and JRPG genre. In a medium that has dramatically evolved over the past three decades, it’s one of those rare games that still feels as fresh and vital today as it did in 1995. And now there’s even more of a reason to revisit this gem if you own an ultrawide monitor.

Earlier this week, Square Enix updated the Steam version of Chrono Trigger for the first time in four years. Spotted by Kotaku, the update adds support for 21:9 resolutions, “improved” d-pad controls, and a handful of user interface improvements among other quality of life changes. The addition of ultrawide screen support is particularly notable since it’s a feature that’s rare to find on retro ports and even some modern games – Elden Ring, for instance, doesn’t come with native 21:9 support.

The PC version of Chrono Trigger has come a long way since Square first released it in 2018. At the time, the company was rightfully criticized for releasing a lazy port. At launch, it included interface elements that were directly lifted from the Android and iOS releases. To its credit, however, Square spent the next year polishing the release, and following this week’s update, you can safely say the PC version is one of the definitive ways to play the classic.

With no end in sight to the global semiconductor shortage, Ford will temporarily offer some Explorer SUVs without the electronics necessary to access the car’s heating and air conditioning controls from the rear passenger seats. Following a report from Automotive News, a Ford spokesperson shared confirmation of the plan with The Verge on Sunday, telling the outlet the move is an effort on the automaker’s part to get those cars to customers faster.

They added Ford would offer those SUVs at a discount and noted they will still come with functioning front-seat climate controls. The automaker reportedly plans to ship the missing chips to dealers within a year, at which point owners of those models will need to bring their cars in for installation.

Ford won’t be the first automaker to ship a car without parts in response to the chip shortage. Last year, some Tesla Model 3 and Model Y buyers got cars with missing USB-C ports. BMW, meanwhile, removed touchscreen controls on some of its vehicles, including X5 and Z4 models, to cope with the shortages.