Threads was missing a lot of features users would expect from a service similar to Twitter's (now X's) when it launched. Over the past few months, however, it has been been rolling out more and more new features to give users a more robust experience, including polls, an easy way to post GIFs and the ability to quote posts on the web. Still, since it doesn't have an API, third-party developers can't conjure features specific to their services that would make the social network a more integral part of people's everyday lives. An example of that is local transportation agencies being able to automatically post service alerts when a train is delayed. According to Instagram chief Adam Mosseri, though, Threads is working on an API for developers — he just has concerns about how it's going to be used. 

As first reported by TechCrunch, Mosseri responded to a conversation on the platform about having a TweetDeck-like experience for Threads. In a response to a user saying that Threads has no API yet, the executive said: "We're working on it." He added that he's concerned that the API's launch could mean "a lot more publisher content and not much more creator content," but he's aware that it "seems like something [the company needs] to get done."

Mosseri previously said that Threads won't amplify news, which may have been disappointing to hear for publishers and readers looking to leave X. Instead, he said, Threads wants to "empower creators in general." More recently, in an AMA he posted on the platform, Mosseri said that that his team's long-term aspiration is for Threads to become "the de facto platform for public conversations online," which means being both culturally relevant and big in terms of user size. He said he believes Threads has a chance of surpassing X, but he knows that his service has a long way to go. For now, he keeps his team focused on making people's experience better week by week. 

Mark Zuckerberg recently announced that Threads has "just under" 100 million monthly active users. Like Mosseri, he is optimistic about its future and said that there's a "good chance" it could reach 1 billion users over the next couple of years.

Barbarian is one of the more memorable horror movies of the last few years. It tells a tale of a young woman who finds that someone is already staying at her rental home. She has little choice but to stay there since nearby hotels are all booked up. That alone is a nightmare scenario but the film goes into some truly wild directions from there. On the surface, it seems like an odd choice to turn into a video game, but that's exactly what's happening.

New Regency Pictures and Friday the 13th: The Game and Evil Dead: The Game developer Diversion3 Entertainment have teamed up to bring Barbarian to PC and consoles. Despite the multiplayer format of the studio's previous projects, this will be a single-player, narrative-focused title which will "expand on the settings, characters and creatures of Barbarian." There's no release timeframe as yet.

“We’re very excited to work with the team at New Regency to expand on the settings, characters and creatures of Barbarian,” Tim Hesse, an executive producer at Diversion3 Entertainment, told Variety in a statement. “The film did a magnificent job of not only scaring audiences with its unexpected and horrifying twists and turns, but also in establishing strong characters thrown into terrifying situations. We look forward to exploring these themes further in the game.”

A straight adaptation of the film's story probably wouldn't work as a game. But there's certainly potential for it to work as a tension-filled survival horror title given (mild spoilers) how much of the Barbarian takes place in terrifying underground tunnels.

For the uninitiated, here's the trailer for Barbarian. Happy Halloween.

It seems like just about every streaming service has raised their price this year – most recently, Apple TV+, Netflix and Disney+. In this episode, we chat with Janko Roettgers, author of the newsletter Lowpass, about the state of streaming media. Why are these companies pushing their prices up now, and what does that mean for you, the viewer? Does this mean the dream of cord cutting is over? (Spoiler: No, not really.)

Also, we chat about Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips, adult film star Riley Reid’s new AI chatbot, and why Super Mario Wonder is the best 2D Mario game since Super Mario World.

Listen below or subscribe on your podcast app of choice. If you've got suggestions or topics you'd like covered on the show, be sure to email us or drop a note in the comments! And be sure to check out our other podcast, Engadget News!

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Topics

• Reporter Janko Roettgers explains what’s going on with streaming price increases – 1:0

• Other News: 41 states use Meta over Instagram’s influence on kids – 23:15

• Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 brings more AI power to phones – 28:59

• Snapdragon X Elite takes aim at Apple’s M series chips – 33:26

• Working on – 42:30

• Pop culture picks – 46:12

Credits
Hosts: Devindra Hardawar and Ben Ellman
Guest: Janko Roettgers
Producer: Ben Ellman
Music: Dale North and Terrence O'Brien

The following article contains major spoilers for Season Four, Episode Nine

Star Trek: Lower Decks takes its name and premise from a late episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. “Lower Decks” pivots away from the show’s usual format to focus on four junior crew members and is told mostly from their perspective. One of them is Sito Jaxa (Shannon Fill) who had appeared two years earlier as a cadet in “The First Duty.” That episode focused on Wesley Crusher’s involvement in a conspiracy to cover up an accident that killed a fellow cadet. It also gave us our first look at Nicholas Locarno (Robert Duncan McNeill), the episode’s ostensible villain. Locarno was, at some point, intended to be the helm officer in Voyager and was named as such in an early draft of the series' bible. But, during pre-production, Locarno’s name was dropped and McNeill instead played Tom Paris, with the same backstory. Producers have, in various interviews, said the issue hinged on Locarno’s redeemability after his actions in “The First Duty.” But it’s equally plausible that the character was changed to avoid paying royalties to the character’s creators. But, even if you knew none of the above information, I don’t think you’d get any less out of this week’s episode of Lower Decks. Because while this series was conceived at the get-go to play to the crowd and bury itself in references, it rarely does so at the expense of telling a good story.

Mariner is once again throwing herself into harm’s way to save her friends without regard to her own safety. Her cavalier attitude to life, death, and her own career have threaded through much of this season to the point that now, even Captain Freeman is worried. She pulls the rest of Beta shift into a plan that’ll keep her daughter out of harm’s way on the next mission. Starfleet thinks the rogue ship destroying everything in its path might be targeting former officers. The list of at-risk individuals includes high-profile figures like Dr. Crusher but, this being Lower Decks, the Cerritos is sent off to find Nicholas Locarno. And while that’s going on, Freeman sends Mariner, Boimler, Tendi and T’Lyn on what she hopes will be a zero-stakes assignment to fix a weather buoy in orbit around Sherbal V. Except, of course, the crew’s shuttle is attacked by a Klingon Bird of Prey and the crew have to beam down to the hostile planet below.

Meanwhile, Freeman, Shaxs and Rutherford head to what can only be described as a Star Wars planet where Locarno is meant to be plying his trade. Despite its reputation as a wretched hive of scum and villainy, it’s got a muscular bureaucracy that the inhabitants use to frustrate Starfleet officers. The episode makes full use of that disconnect between the stuffed-shirt crew and the rougher corners of the universe. It was rare that we’d see the Next Generation crew really get their elbows dirty – the best I can call to mind is the awkward moments in “Gambit.” There’s just something inherently funny about the primary-colored space communist scouts encountering hairy-assed people who live in the “real world.” That’s before you get to Captain Freeman trying to beat up a Balok puppet that turns out to be a real alien. Of course, it’s a double bluff – at each turn, the villains put bureaucratic obstacles in Starfleet’s way but wave through a sinister bounty hunter type out of spite. Except the bounty hunter in question is Billups wearing a silly helmet, who got the necessary data to track down Locarno.

On the planet, the rest of Beta Shift is left fending for their lives as chaotic weather makes survival even harder. It doesn’t help that the victims of other attacks, explorers from several other alien races, are all fighting to the death for supremacy. Mariner, frustrated at the gang’s wise refusal to fight their way to safety, opts to go it alone and bumps into a Klingon. But their own fight to the death is interrupted by a rainstorm of glass shards and, while they shelter, Mariner finally reveals the source of her angst. She’s been sabotaging her career because she’s deeply resentful about Starfleet, and her role within it. When she signed up, she’d bought into the idea of exploring strange new worlds, but instead the Federation has been embroiled in an endless parade of galaxy-threatening wars. Her best friend was Sito Jaxa, from “Lower Decks,” who in that episode was sent to her death on a covert mission. Starfleet quite literally chewed up and spat out one of her friends, but as much as Mariner may hate what Starfleet is, she can’t quite just walk away because of what the Starfleet ideal represents. And you don’t need to be fluent with the events of a TV series from 31 years ago — Good God, I feel old — or the para-narrative around Voyager’s pre-production, to appreciate that dilemma. Of course, her Klingon opponent counters, saying that Mariner's angst dishonors Sito's sacrifice, and that she needs to get on with the job at hand. And, much as she agrees, she adds (just before hugging her former opponent) that she's still duty-bound to call out when Starfleet "can do better." 

Despite its love of self-referentiality, Star Trek has often struggled with any degree of on-screen self-interrogation. There are moments, best exemplified by the Root Beer scene in “The Way of the Warrior,” where the show touches on the values it espouses. The show’s numerous creative teams have often pushed the idea that Starfleet, and the Federation, aren’t as noble a force as the myth suggests. With Beyond, Simon Pegg wanted to focus on the nature of the Federation as a colonizing force, even if that concept is almost entirely erased from the finished film. I’ll leave it to better writers than I to explore this in depth, but it’s rare we get moments where Starfleet officers wonder, out loud or in private, if they aren’t the universally good force they’ve been led to believe they are. This thread is also paid off in the B-story as Freeman and Co. are told, more or less, that nobody in the real world likes having them around. Sure, it’s a gag in a sitcom, and our sympathies are almost universally with the Starfleet crew, but the fact it’s here at all isn’t to be sniffed at.

By the time we’ve reached the cliffhanger, Beta shift is trying to cajole the warring parties to work together. And, if we’re honest, the idea of disparate groups coming together to solve a problem as a whole is, surely, an idea worth upholding. But before we can see if they are able to be rescued, Mariner is beamed away to an ultra-minimalist starship. After forcing the door, she comes face-to-face with her rescuer / captor, and it’s… Nicholas Locarno.

Time comes for us all. There's no escape from getting older and the inevitability of our bodies and minds slowing down. For many of us, that might mean having to re-examine how we tackle games, especially those that demand quick reactions.

That thought has been at the forefront as I've been playing Ghostrunner 2. Like the original, it's a high-octane, first-person slasher with a big focus on traversal. It feels like a blend of Doom Eternal and a cyberpunk take on Mirror's Edge.

Ghostrunner 2 is an intense, often-tough game that's absolutely kicking my tail. This is a fragile world in which both you and most enemies die in one hit. You will perish often. In the third level, I died (without exaggeration) 164 times.

I don't tend to stick with overly challenging games. I'm sure I could beat the likes of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and Cuphead eventually, but there are too many games to play and not enough time for me to master the skills and knowledge needed to conquer some of the tougher titles out there.

That said, there are a few reasons I've kept with Ghostrunner 2, which arrives during an astonishingly busy spell for big game releases. Developer One More Level has generously dotted checkpoints around each stage, which makes the frequent deaths at the hands of enemies and environmental hazards easier to stomach. You can respawn instantly after dying or at any other time with the press of a button.

Most importantly, it's a blast to play. It's immensely satisfying to finally beat a section after dozens of failed attempts and to squeeze protagonist Jack's new motorbike through several narrow gaps. The propulsive, pounding soundtrack keeps driving me forward, even when I'm on the verge of tossing my controller on the couch and giving up for the night. One More Level has crafted a satisfying gameplay loop that's hard to walk away from.

One More Level/505 Games

I see Ghostrunner 2 mostly as a puzzle game. Sure, there are doors to unlock and objects to move around before you can access certain areas. But every enemy confrontation is a conundrum to overcome.

Whenever you respawn, enemies and obstacles reappear in the same place, so you can adjust your approach to tackling them as necessary. Rather than bolting headfirst into the middle of a combat area, using the mini map and Jack's strafing, wallrunning, air dashing and sliding abilities to get the lay of the land and enemy positions is a smart way to go. But even once I've figured out my plan of attack, it still typically takes me several attempts before I can wipe out all of my opponents and move onto the next area.

You'll need to be on your toes no matter what. Melee-focused enemies can quickly surround you and you'll need to be alert for incoming fire. You can't simply hold down the block button either, as that drains what's effectively a stamina meter. It's important to get used to the parry timing quickly, especially if you use an ability that redirects all deflected shots toward an attacker.

I was able to try Ghostrunner 2 on both PC and PS5. While I prefer the precision of a mouse for first-person games, this absolutely sings on a PS5 (especially compared with my three-year-old mid-range gaming laptop). The high framerate mode lets you play at 120 frames per second on PS5 if you have a compatible display. I felt like I needed every one of those frames to overcome some sections, and I was glad to have that advantage.

One More Level/505 Games

Trying to take things slow goes against the spirit of the game, but I'm finding it a more satisfying way to play Ghostrunner 2 for the most part. Taking a breather to explore the environment is also a good idea for all players, since it's worth searching for upgrades that can unlock powerful abilities.

Accessibility settings are important for many folks too, including those who are getting older. My reaction times aren't the same in my 30s as they were when I was a teenager, but I can hold my own for the most part. I'd like to keep playing games for as long as I can, though, and there will be a point in my life where I will need certain accessibility functions to navigate whatever challenges that developers throw at me.

One More Level added some useful accessibility features to the original game several months after its debut in late 2020. Those included the ability to slow down time, as well as being able to take an extra hit before perishing. I played much of Ghostrunner before those options arrived. I got stuck at a rotating tower that fires lasers in nearly every direction, with those beams killing me hundreds of times. It was only when One More Level introduced the Assist Mode that I was able to conquer it.

Unfortunately, One More Level hasn’t brought those Assist Mode options to Ghostrunner 2 yet. The only real gameplay modifier as things stand is an aim assist. But despite my many, many deaths as Jack, I haven't hit a true roadblock. So far, I've been able to slowly work my way through the levels. I may eventually need more help to navigate tougher sections, so here's hoping Assist Mode shows up in the sequel soon (and not just for my sake). One thing's for sure, at least: I won't be winning any prizes in the game's $10,000 speedrunning contest.

Ghostrunner 2 will hit PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S on October 26.

We knew Netflix had snagged the iconic roguelike/metroidvania Dead Cells for its ever-growing games library, and now we know when it’ll release. Dead Cells: Netflix Edition will be available on October 31. That’s Halloween, to those who don’t mess with the dark pagan arts. This is the full game, along with every paid DLC release, including the Castlevania crossover.

A standard Netflix subscription gives you access to the game on both iOS and Android devices, so you can finally see what all the Dead Cells fuss is about without spending any extra cash. As for that Halloween release date, this launch is part of the streamer’s “Netflix and Thrills” promotional event. Dead Cells isn’t a scary game, but it is steeped in a certain kind of classic gothic horror, like its forebear Castlevania.

Here’s a quick run down. You play as a headless blob/human hybrid, attempting to escape an island prison. It’s a sidescrolling action platformer. Every time you die, you start over and the world’s layout changes, which makes it a roguelike. However, you do get permanent upgrades that carry over from run to run and power ups that let you access new areas, which is where the Metroidvania part comes in. It’s extremely addictive, like calling in sick to work addictive.

In other words, there’s a reason Dead Cells has sold more than 10 million copies across numerous platforms and has even inspired a forthcoming animated series. If you’ve been on the fence for the, uh, past five years and have a Netflix account, this is a no brainer.

The streamer’s “Netflix and Thrills” event also sees the release of a brand-new sequel to the indie hit Slayaway Camp, which drops today. As for TV and movies, the company’s traditional bread and butter, “Netflix and Thrills” features the release of Mike Flanagan’s The Fall of the House of Usher, UFO docuseries Encounters and the survival thriller Nowhere, among many others.

TikTok has had a major impact on the music industry over the last few years, with many songs that have gone viral on the platform becoming major mainstream hits. The service is now making a bigger push into music by hosting its own festival.

Dubbed as the platform’s first “live global music event,” TikTok In The Mix will take place in Mesa, Arizona on December 10. The headliners are Cardi B, Niall Horan, Anitta and Charlie Puth, all of whom are popular figures on TikTok. The service says there will be surprise guests and performances by emerging artists, some of whom are involved in the TikTok Elevate program for up and coming musicians.

Followers of the four headliners will get presale codes to buy In The Mix tickets starting on October 27. The general sale will start on November 2.

Of course, TikTok will stream the event live on its app. The service also says it will bring the For You feed to life at In The Mix through “a range of activities inspired by our community's favorite trends." Some creators will be present too.

Similar platforms might be more inclined to sponsor an existing music festival than to go it alone. However, TikTok has carved out a space for itself as a destination for music discovery, so it makes sense for it to host its own event with a blend of established names and fairly fresh faces.

Adult film icon and media investor Riley Reid aims to bring the transformational capabilities of generative AI to adult entertainment with an online platform where users can chat with digital versions of content creators. But unlike other, scuzzier adult chatbots, Clona.AI’s avatars are trained with explicit consent of the models’ creators who have direct input in what the “AI companions” will, and won’t, talk about.

For $30 a month, fans and subscribers will be able to hold “intimate conversations” with digital versions of their favorite adult stars, content creators and influencers. The site’s roster currently includes Reid herself and Lena the Plug. A free tier is also available but offers just five chat messages per month. 

“The reality is, AI is coming, and if it's not Clona, it’s somebody else,” Reid told 404 Media. “When [other people] use deepfakes or whatever — if I'm not partnering up with it, then someone else is going to steal my likeness and do it without me. So being presented with this opportunity, I was so excited because I felt like I had a chance to be a part of society's technological advances.”

Clona uses Meta’s Llama 2 large language model as a base, then heavily refines and retrains it to reflect the personality of the person it’s based on. Reid explains that her model was first trained on a variety of her online media including interviews, podcast appearances and YouTube videos (in addition to some of her x-rated work) before further fine tuning its response by having the AI chat with Reid herself.

“I’ll be able to see how it responds to users, and edit it to be like ‘no, I would have said it more like this,’’’ Reid said. “But in the beginning my focus was on things like making sure it had my dogs’ names right, making sure I was fact-checking it.”

While the AI companion will be capable talking dirty, how dirty that gets depends on the actor’s preferences, not the user’s. Reid notes that her model, for example, will not discuss physically dangerous sex acts with users. "I don't know if the tech team thought about the sounding guys, but I was like, I thought about them,” she said.

Generative AI technology has shown tremendous potential in creating digital clones of deceased celebrities and recording artists. The process requires little more than the celeb’s permission (or that of their estate) and a sufficiently large corpus of their vocal or video recordings. However, we’ve already also seen that technology be misused in deepfake pornography and shady dental advertising. Unscrupulous data scraping practices on the public web (data which is then used to train LLMs) has also raised difficult questions regarding modern copyright laws, copyright infringement and Grammy award eligibility.

Still, Reid remains optimistic about the historically proven resilience of the sex industry. “I feel like we're gonna be a huge part of AI adapting into our society, because porn is always like that,” Reid said. “It’s what it did with the internet. And the porn world has seen so many advances in technology.”

Nightdive Studios has revealed when you'll be able to check out its remaster of Star Wars: Dark Forces. The latest version of the first-person shooter is scheduled to hit PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and PC on February 29, 2024.

The Nightdive team used its KEX engine to revitalize Star Wars: Dark Forces for modern gaming platforms, on which it will be able to run at up to 4K resolution at 120fps. The studio is promising updated lighting and atmospheric effects thanks to advanced 3D rendering. Controller users can take advantage of a weapon wheel and rumble features, along with gyro controls. Of course, you'll be able to earn trophies and achievements too.

LucasArts originally released the first FPS game in the Star Wars franchise in 1995. The game sees you take control of Kyle Katarn, a mercenary who joins the Rebel Alliance after defecting from the Galactic Empire. Katarn discovers that the Empire is developing the Dark Trooper Project, under which it's attempting to amass an army of battle droids and stormtroopers with power armor. As far as gameplay goes, it was one of many titles from around that time that took a page (or 12) out of Doom's playbook.

Nightdive is well known for modernizing old games for new consoles. The studio also has remasters of System Shock 2 and Turok 3 in the pipeline.

YouTube Music has two new features rolling out, and it should come as no surprise that one of them is all about AI. Instead of looking at a compilation of album covers or uploading your own image, you can now use AI to create custom playlist art right from the YouTube Music app. 

Whether or not you've ever thought about what's at the top of your playlist, designing and adding an image is pretty simple. All you need to do is click the playlist's edit button and then on the existing main image. YouTube Music will then bring you to a range of categories, such as nature, humor and animals. Each one will generate a random set of pictures upon selection, such as a dog in a specific art style, that you can change. Just toggle through the options, and when you find one you like, save it as your playlist's new cover photo. 

YouTube Music's other update set to roll out is a feature called speed dial that lets you jump right back into recent listens, like specific artists and playlists. The format is very reminiscent of the top of Spotify's homepage, but YouTube appears to show more options than its competitor. 

These features follow other recent attempts by YouTube Music to compete with more established services, such as adding a comments section and timed lyrics to follow along with songs. AI-powered custom playlist art is available now to English language accounts in the United States, with plans to roll out globally in the future, while speed dial will be available in the coming months.