Xbox has teamed up with a startup called Inworld AI to create a generative AI toolset that developers can use to create games. It's a multi-year collaboration, which the Microsoft-owned brand says can "assist and empower creators in dialogue, story and quest design." Specifically, the partners are looking to develop an "AI design copilot" that can turn prompts into detailed scripts, dialogue trees, quests and other game elements in the same way people can type ideas into generative AI chatbots and get detailed scripts in return. They're also going to work on an "AI character runtime engine" that developers can plug into their actual games, allowing players to generate new stories, quests and dialogues as they go. 

On Inworld's website, it says its technology can "craft characters with distinct personalities and contextual awareness that stay in-world." Apparently, it can provide developers with a "fully integrated character engine for AI NPCs that goes beyond large language models (LLMs)." The image above was from the Droid Maker tool it developed in collaboration with Lucasfilm's storytelling studio ILM Immersive when it was accepted into the Disney Accelerator program. As Kotaku notes, though, the company's tech has yet to ship with a major game release, and it has mostly been used for mods. 

Developers are understandably wary about these upcoming tools. There are growing concerns among creatives about companies using their work to train generative AI without permission — a group of authors, including John Grisham and George R.R. Martin, even sued OpenAI, accusing the company of infringing on their copyright. And then, of course, there's the ever-present worry that developers could decide to lay off writers and designers to cut costs. 

Xbox believes, however, that these tools can "help make it easier for developers to realize their visions, try new things, push the boundaries of gaming today and experiment to improve gameplay, player connection and more." In the brand's announcement, Haiyan Zhang, General Manager of Gaming AI, said: "We will collaborate and innovate with game creators inside Xbox studios as well as third-party studios as we develop the tools that meet their needs and inspire new possibilities for future games."

Black Friday is still a couple of weeks away, but the sales are already starting. Take Logitech, which has markdowns on lots of its best devices on Amazon, including the G733 Lightspeed Wireless Gaming Headset. The well-made and stylish headphones (we named them one of the cutest gaming accessories) are currently $120, down from $150 — a 20 percent discount. 

Logitech's G733 headset backs up its good looks with powerful sound, a 20-meter range and up to 29 hours of battery life. Plus, its stretchy band and interchangeable earbud tips give you a comfortable, easy fit. 

Among the many other Logitech mice, keyboards and headphones currently for sale, there are a few other stand outs to look into. The G Fits True Wireless Gaming Earbuds are down to $150 from $230 — a 35 percent discount. These are a great option if you just can't get earbuds to stay in your ear, with Logitech's Lightform technology molding the device to your ear in just one minute upon first use. They also come with 10mm drivers, dual built-in beamforming microphones and passive noise canceling. 

OK, enough about listening — let's talk about the tools you need for gameplay. The G Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse is currently marked down 38 percent, dropping to $80 from $130. Logitech built the mouse with input from professional esports gamers, and it shows, touting features like a 1-millisecond report rate connection and up to 25,600 DPI. Looking for a cheap entry point into Logitech's devices? Try the G203 Wired Gaming Mouse, down to $20 from $40 — a 50 percent discount. 

Logitech's G915 Lightspeed RGB Mechanical Gaming Keyboard rounds out some of our favorites on sale with a 36 percent price cut, making the device available for $160 instead of $250. The wireless keyboard provides 30 hours of gameplay and 16.8 million color options. Plus, you can choose between three distinct sounds for your perfect level of clacking. 

Your Black Friday Shopping Guide: See all of Yahoo’s Black Friday coverage, here. Follow Engadget for Black Friday tech deals. Learn about Black Friday trends on In The Know. Hear from Autoblog’s experts on the best Black Friday deals for your car, garage, and home, and find Black Friday sales to shop on AOL, handpicked just for you.

Last week, a number of Apple Watch owners noticed that their batteries were draining much quicker than normal after they installed the latest watchOS version 10.1. Now, Apple has acknowledged the issue in an internal memo seen by MacRumors, and promised that a fix will arrive in an upcoming update. 

The issue is affecting multiple models including older ones like Watch SE and Watch Series 5, up to brand new versions like Apple Watch Ultra 2, according to Reddit, Apple's Support Community, X and other sources. The issue appears to be fairly serious, with one user noting that "watchOS 10.1 is killing the battery on my Apple Watch," draining it from 100 to 50 percent in less than 60 minutes. 

Apple appeared to address the issue partly with its iOS 17.1 update, noting that it resolved a problem involving "increased power consumption" when a Watch running watchOS 10.1 is paired with an iPhone using iOS 17, as MacRumors noted. That doesn't seem to have fully resolved the issue, though.

Apple said in the memo that the issue will be fixed in a watchOS update "coming soon," without providing a more specific date, specific models affected and reason for the problem. Given the nature of it, however, we'd hope it's a high-priority item. Apple is reportedly set to release iOS 17.1.1 for iPhone, and will hopefully also release watchOS 10.1.1 with a fix.

Even though its latest microcomputer bears its own chip designs, Raspberry Pi has been using Arm CPUs since its inception in 2008. The two companies have now formed tighter bonds as Arm has picked up a minority stake in Raspberry Pi. The terms of the deal have not been disclosed. However, the companies say it's a "strategic investment" on Arm's part.

It seems that Arm wants to gain more of a foothold in the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. "With the rapid growth of edge and endpoint AI applications, platforms like those from Raspberry Pi, built on Arm, are critical to driving the adoption of high-performance IoT devices globally by enabling developers to innovate faster and more easily," Paul Williamson, senior vice-president and general manager of Arm's IoT division, said in a statement.

Many IoT developers have long been using Raspberry Pi's low-cost, capable computers for a wide range of purposes. The Register reports that, since 2020, more than half of all Raspberry Pi devices are being used for industrial and commercial purposes. However, Raspberry Pi is said to have prioritized those partners, perhaps making it more difficult for students and enthusiasts to get their hands on its computers at retail price.

There's another reason why Arm and Raspberry Pi might want to be closer bedfellows. RISC-V is an open-source processor design that could make it easier for companies to build their own chips or lower manufacturing costs. Qualcomm and Google are working on a RISC-V platform to power Wear OS devices, for instance. In addition, several companies are also using RISC-V CPUs in would-be Raspberry Pi competitors.

As The Register notes, Arm has pointed out the potential threat of RISC-V to its business. The company mentioned in a pre-IPO filing that if market support for RISC-V rises, "our customers may choose to utilize this free, open source architecture instead of our products." To that end, the investment could help to bolster Raspberry Pi's position in the single-board computer market and perhaps ward off competition.

Apple's latest earnings report paints a picture of software wins amid a hardware slump. In a statement announcing the financial results for its fiscal fourth quarter, the company called out a new all-time high for revenue from its Services products. It also highlighted iPhone revenue as having set a September quarter record. However, this marks the fourth consecutive quarter of overall revenue decline, with its earnings of $89.5 billion representing a 1 percent drop year over year. This also means the record-breaking performances of the iPhone and Services divisions did little to offset weakness elsewhere. 

The lackluster performance is somewhat understandable, though. The company just had a launch event for its new M3 chips, MacBooks and an iMac this week, none of which can be bought yet. And though the new iPhone 15 lineup and Apple Watches were introduced in September, sales of those devices likely did not account for much of this fiscal quarter’s results. We're also anticipating a November release for new iPads this year, which could further fuel hardware revenue. 

Correspondingly, the Mac, iPad and wearables divisions were down this quarter, with the first two taking noticeable hits. Though Apple drummed up significant interest with the Vision Pro headset earlier this year, that device is far from ready to be sold to the public and is unlikely to hit the market until 2024 at the earliest. With holiday shopping about to ramp up, as well as more product releases on the horizon, it’s much more likely that the company’s hardware products will have a greater impact on its bottom line next quarter.

It looks like Meta may be pumping the brakes on one of its more aggressive, and unpopular, growth-hacking tactics for Threads. The company appears to be working on a new privacy setting so Threads users can opt-out of having their posts cross-posted to Facebook and Instagram feeds.

The unreleased feature was spotted by reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi, who often uncovers early versions of social media features before they officially launch. Paluzzi shared screenshots of a new “suggesting posts on other apps” toggle in Threads’ privacy settings.

The feature comes barely a week after the company acknowledged that it was promoting users’ Threads posts in Facebook feeds in an effort to boost Threads. While Meta has used similar tactics to promote its other apps in the past, the move has been widely unpopular among Threads users, many of whom are not active on Facebook and see the promotions as an intrusive overreach. Meta said last week it was “listening to feedback” in response to user complaints about not being able to opt out.

Notably, it appears as if Meta still intends to automatically enable cross-posting as a default setting. “If your profile is public, your posts may be suggested on other apps so people can discover and follow you,” the opt-out screen states.

The back and forth over the feature comes as Meta has steadily ramped up its efforts to boost Threads growth. The Twitter clone has been growing again in recent weeks, and currently has about 100 million monthly users. Mark Zuckerberg recently said he sees a path for the app to become Meta’s next billion-user service. But in order to reach that many people, the company will need to lean hard on its other apps to attract new sign-ups.

Apple appears to have killed off its lowest-cost Apple Music subscription. The Apple Music Voice Plan allowed folks to access the streaming service for $5 per month, as long as they were willing to use it only via Siri voice control. However, as of Wednesday, the plan is no longer listed as an option on the Apple Music webpage, as first spotted by MacMagazine.

It's no longer possible to sign up for the Apple Music Voice Plan, 9to5Mac notes. It's unclear if current users will be grandfathered into their current subscription or why Apple seems to have ditched the offering. Engadget has contacted Apple for comment.

The voice plan was largely aimed at those who listen to Apple Music via HomePods, AirPods or Apple Watch and may be more likely to use a voice assistant than go through the Music app on their phone, tablet or computer. There were other significant tradeoffs. It wasn't possible for users on this plan to add songs to their library, create playlists, use the service on non-Apple devices or listen to lossless or Dolby Atmos audio. The voice plan, which debuted in 2021, was also only available in a limited number of markets, including the US, UK and Canada.

As it stands, the cheapest standalone Apple Music option is now the student plan, which costs $6 per month and includes Apple TV+ at no extra cost. Alternatively, you can opt for the $11 per month individual subscription or split the cost of a $17 family plan with relatives. Otherwise, you can join Apple One, which now starts at $19.95 per month, and gain access to multiple Apple services.

Arturia just released a free-to-use version of its popular Analog Lab software, called Analog Lab Play. This is a pared-down software suite with 100 presets culled from the original Analog Lab and from VSTs like the well-reviewed Pigments soft synth. There’s also a simplified interface for new users called Play View that streamlines visual cues and speeds up the preset selection process, in addition to allowing the purchase of standalone instruments. 

The available 100 presets with Analog Lab Play is much lower than the 2,000+ found with the original software, but, hey, free is free. Arturia’s new software is a good way to familiarize yourself with the company’s sound engines, just in time for those likely Black Friday discounts.

To that end, the original paid Analog Lab software is also getting a refresh. It’s now called Analog Lab Pro. It still allows access to thousands of presets captured from the renowned Arturia V Collection, Pigments and related soft synths. It costs $200 and remains mostly unchanged, but will receive the same UI refresh included with Analog Lab Play. When we reviewed the original Analog Lab, we found it to be the perfect software suite for those who like to tweak presets over creating sounds from scratch.

This isn’t the first time Arturia has thrust a free version of its software on the world. Analog Lab Intro is a similar product to Play that was offered as a free download with the purchase of select MIDI controllers and occasionally as a standalone software suite. The company also drops free instruments and effects once in a while, like 2021’s lo-fi tape plugin based on its Mellotron emulation.

Analog Lab Play is available for download right now, so hop to it. The UI refresh for Analog Lab Pro is coming at a later date. In recent months, Arturia has released an effect based on the iconic Leslie rotary speaker and an emulation of the acid house classic Roland TB-303, among other products.

Today Microsoft has begun rolling out its Windows 11 2023 update (also know as version 23H2), which adds some minor features on top of Copilot and its other AI-powered apps announced in September. Now, you may be asking yourself, "Didn't Microsoft just release a major Windows 11 update?" And you would be correct. But it turns out that release, which launched on September 26th, was basically just an AI preview meant for last year's Windows 11 22H2 update. Consequently, Copilot didn't actually reach most Windows users over the past few weeks (I eventually got it in a test laptop, but my home desktop is still Copilot-less).

It's fair to be confused, because Microsoft's handling of Copilot has been baffling from the start. We first heard it was arriving as "Windows Copilot" back in May, where it essentially put the AI features we saw on the Edge Copilot and similar tools right into the heart of Windows. Copilot ended up being the star of Microsoft's most recent Surface event, where the actual hardware took second place to the company's AI ambitions.

So if you've been dying to get your hands on Copilot, be sure to start refreshing Windows Update. Additionally, the Windows 11 2023 update transforms the built-in Chat app into Microsoft Teams, which will sit in your task bar by default. You'll also be able to find Windows 11 components under a new "System" label in the Start menu's "All apps" section (something I rarely visit these days). Those System Components will also be under a new page in the Settings app under the System section.

It’s perhaps The Addams Family’s favorite time of year, but Apple’s pre-Halloween “Scary Fast” event was neither mysterious nor spooky. Thanks to M3 chip leaks and rumors, all of the company’s announcements were largely expected. And though the showcase inexplicably took place in the evening, it’s hard to imagine Tim Cook ever cutting a ghostly figure.

Anyway, Apple had a bunch of product refreshes to discuss, namely in the new MacBook Pro and iMac lineups. The event anchored around a trio of new chipsets that, unsurprisingly, Apple is touting as its most powerful yet.

M3 chipsets

Apple

Apple unveiled a trio of M3 chips at Scary Fast: the M3, M3 Pro and M3 Max. While they're certainly going to be faster than the previous M2 chipsets, the company not-so-subtly hammered home the notion that they're far more powerful than their M1 equivalents, just in case folks who are using devices with first-generation Apple silicon chips are starting to yearn for an upgrade.

Notably, these are the first three-nanometer chips for PCs. On the GPU side, Apple has factored in hardware-accelerated ray-tracing and mesh shading to offer more realistic lighting and better geometry handling.

The base M3 has an eight-core CPU (four performance cores and a quartet of efficiency cores) and a 10-core GPU, with support for up to 24GB of unified memory. The M3 Pro has six performance and six efficiency cores for a 12-core CPU, along with an 18-core GPU. The mid-range chipset can support up to 36GB of RAM.

As for the M3 Max, that's up to 80 percent faster than the M1 Max, according to Apple. The company's current most powerful chipset features a 16-core GPU (with 12 performance and four efficiency cores), a 40-core GPU and support for a whopping 128GB of RAM, in case you're feeling flush or need a lot of memory.

The chips should be major upgrades for anyone making the switch from an M1-powered device or an Intel-powered Mac. That means better performance for productivity, creativity and even gaming as high-profile titles such as Death Stranding Director's Cut make their way to Apple's ecosystem.

M3 MacBook Pro

Apple

Of course, those fancy chips aren't going to be very useful unless they're plugged into some capable hardware. As such, Apple showed off some upgraded MacBooks of the Pro variety that run on M3 chips.

There are new 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros for you to get your hands on. The 14-inch variant starts at $1,599 for a model with a base M3 chip. That's the lowest ever price for a new 14-inch MacBook Pro. There wasn't a version with a base M2 chip. Instead, you would have had to shell out $1,999 for an M2 Pro-powered unit if you wanted to go with that form factor. You can now opt for a 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M3 Pro, which will likewise run you $1,999.

On a similar note, the 16-inch MBP starts at $2,499 for a model with an M3 Pro. An M2 Pro-powered model started at $2,499 as well.

Don't expect major hardware changes elsewhere on the latest models. This is by and large a spec bump. One notable tweak, however, means that the laptops' Liquid Retina XDR displays are now able to display SDR content with 20 percent more brightness, up to 600 nits.

Perhaps the best thing about the new MBPs is that Space Black chassis. I'm more tempted than ever to make the switch from Windows to Mac for that colorway alone. The extra power that the M3 chips offer seems like a bonus — though the Space Black option isn't available for the base 14-inch MacBook Pro, unfortunately.

However, not everything about the refreshed MacBook Pros is a Halloween treat. The base 14-inch model has a paltry 8GB of RAM, which maybe doesn't quite align with Apple's promise of significantly better performance in the new MBPs.

Pre-orders for the new MacBook Pro models are now open. Apple will start shipping them on November 7.

M3 iMac

Apple

The new 24-inch iMac is pretty much the same as the last 24-inch iMac, save for a new chipset and a few other tweaks. Apple says the M3-powered system is up to twice as fast as the previous version, which ran on the M1 chipset.

The company claims that Safari and productivity apps like Microsoft Excel will run up to 30 percent faster than on the M1 iMac. There will be support for up to 12 video streams in 4K resolution, three times as many as on the last iMac. Image processing and video-editing apps will be up to twice as fast too, according to Apple.

There are some minor upgrades on the connectivity front too. The M3 iMac supports Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3, which improve on the previous model's Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0.

The M3 iMac starts at $1,299 for a model with an eight-core GPU and eight-core CPU. Unfortunately, Apple's only offering 8GB of RAM and 256GB of SSD storage with that configuration, so you may want to bump those up a bit. Pre-orders for the M3 iMac are open now and the revamped desktop will arrive next week.

Everything else

Other than the M3 chips, new MacBook Pros and refreshed iMac, Scary Fast was notable for what Apple didn't talk about. First, you had to read between the lines to realize that the company has ditched the 13-inch MacBook Pro. That means we're waving farewell to the much-loved and much-loathed Touch Bar, at least for the time being.

It was widely expected that Apple would update several of its accessories to include USB-C ports as it shifts away from Lightning to a common charger. That wasn't the case at Scary Fast. For the time being, you'll still need a Lightning cable on hand at least for your Magic Keyboard and Magic Mouse.

Although we couldn't really shake the notion that Apple would reveal an M3-powered iPad or two, the company declined to do so on Monday. As such, you'll need to wait a while longer for tablets with its new chips.

Follow all of the news from Apple’s "Scary Fast" October event right here.