New York State is taking companies to task for flooding the FCC with bogus comments supporting the repeal of net neutrality. Attorney General Letitia James has obtained a total $615,000 from lead generating firms Ifficient, LCX and Lead ID for providing millions of fake comments in an attempt to skew the FCC's 2017 proceedings.

The broadband industry allegedly asked the trio to attract anti-neutrality input through ads and giveaways, but they instead manufactured fraudulent comments using real identities without permission. LCX and Lead ID directly faked responses for 1.5 million people, James says, while Ifficient served as a go-between that gathered 840,000 false comments from other lead generators. Several of the companies involved in the astroturfing (that is, fake grassroots) campaign had been involved in other attempts to influence regulators and politicians.

LCX and principals will pay $400,000 to New York and $100,000 to the San Diego District Attorney's Office. Lead ID and its principal will pay $30,000 to New York, while Ifficiient will pay $63,750 to New York and $21,250 to Colorado. This is the second batch of agreements New York has secured with companies sending fake comments to the FCC.

The fines come after a 2021 Attorney General report that found over 18 million of the 22 million comments on the net neutrality repeal were fake. While there were signs of trouble at the time, the FCC under then-Chairman Ajit Pai fought attempts to investigate and address the spam. Pai had long been an outspoken opponent of net neutrality and generally sided with telecoms on key issues.

The penalties are relatively tiny, and they won't undo the 2017 decision. Legislators haven't fared much better. A Senate bill that would have restored net neutrality hasn't gone anywhere, and California's neutrality law doesn't do much to help users in other states. The Attorney General's effort is more of a warning to would-be violators: don't expect to emerge completely unscathed.

Google Stadia may be gone for good, but one of the game streaming service's few exclusives will soon return from the ether. As promised, Gylt, the very first Stadia exclusive, is coming to Steam, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series and Xbox One. It'll hit those platforms on July 6th.

Gylt is a third-person survival horror game from Rime studio Tequila Works. You play as Sally, who has to sneak around her gloomy town and the dark corridors of her school while evading monsters and looking for her missing cousin. I played a few hours of Gylt on Stadia and enjoyed my time with it. Gylt might be a bit too scary for younger kids and it may not be a great fit for those looking for more depth in terms of gameplay mechanics. However, the solid blend of puzzle solving and spooky setting could make Gylt a decent entry point into horror titles for tweens.

Folks looking for more sci-fi to sink their teeth into on Apple TV+ after getting hooked on Silo won’t have too much longer to wait. The streaming service has revealed that the second season of Foundation will premiere on July 14th. The show, which is based on a series of Isaac Asimov novels, will return with one episode on that day, and more will follow on a weekly basis.

The season runs for 10 episodes and it's set over a century after the first season's finale. It features "a vengeful queen" who aims to destroy the Galactic Empire from within, Apple said. The Foundation, meanwhile, has moved into its religious phase. It's promoting the Church of Seldon throughout the Outer Reach and bringing about the second crisis — in other words, war with the Empire. Alongside the release date, Apple TV+ has released another visually dazzling trailer:

Cuphead isn't the only game banking on vintage animation to catch your eye. Fumi Games has unveiledMouse, a first-person shooter that mimics the "rubber hose" drawing style of 1930s cartoons from Disney and other studios. You play a private detective who has to blast his way through waves of mobster mice as he unravels a "web of deceit and murder." The result is equally charming and disturbing — crooks' heads pop like balloons, and explosions reduce your opponents to ash.

Fumi isn't leaning solely on nostalgia. Mouse will offer flexibility in how you play. You can charge in guns blazing, but you can also dodge around or meticulously plan your approach. A "Fantastic-o-Matic" upgrade system lets you boost preferred abilities and weapons through Bioshock-like vending machines. You can also expect activities like safecracking.

There's clearly a lot of work left. Fumi hasn't shared a release date, and the early footage shows barebones maps and gameplay mechanics. Still, Mouse shows some promise. Like Cuphead, the artwork is a refreshing break from what you're used to in its genre — it's neither striving for realism nor replicating the modern cartoon look of Fortnite or Valorant. It's just a question of whether or not the gameplay is strong enough to keep you invested after the novelty wears off.

New grads can easily find themselves overwhelmed by the responsibilities of post-college life, such as commuting to work, balancing the budget or staying fit. So, maybe skip the gift basket and give them a subscription that helps make adulthood more manageable. Here are the services we most recommend for grads who are just starting out, including a few that are free to try.

Commuting

Waze

Many navigation apps can help a grad find their way around an unfamiliar town, but Waze might offer the best way. The free service’s crowdsourced alerts can help drivers avoid construction or gridlock that isn’t always visible in competing apps, including Google Maps — its sibling. Tie-ins with streaming services like Spotify and TuneIn make it easier to soundtrack a lengthy trip without using separate apps. The ads that display while stopped aren’t ideal, but the sacrifice might be worthwhile if it helps a grad arrive on time for a new job.

Transit

If your grad relies on public transportation, Transit’s app is virtually a must-have. It provides detailed, real-time mass transit directions in hundreds of cities, letting riders know when to leave and which stops to take. More importantly, it’s integrated with alternative transportation options like shared bikes, scooters and Uber rides. The core app is free, but it’s worth paying $25 per year for a Royale subscription (if it isn’t offered for free by a local agency) to look up any transit line and future schedules.

Lyft Pink / Uber One

Ridesharing today is for more than just getting to parties or visiting family — for some, it may be the most effective way to get to work. In that light, a subscription to Lyft Pink or Uber One could easily be a welcome gift. Both $10-per-month services offer discounts on rides and food delivery as well as a handful of other perks, such as Lyft’s free priority pickups and Uber’s access to top-rated drivers. Either service is a good choice, although you’ll want to be sure there are plenty of drivers where your recipient lives.

Cloud storage and security

Apple One / Google One / Microsoft 365 Personal

Students can make do with a free cloud account or join a parent’s family plan, but there’s a good chance they’ll want a paid account of their own once they graduate. Thankfully, all the major platform creators have cloud service bundles that cover much of what they need. Apple One ($17 per month for Individual), Google One ($20 per year for Basic) and Microsoft 365 Personal ($70 per year) all deliver extra cloud storage as well as services you’re likely to use for entertainment, productivity and security.

The choice of service depends on what your grad is looking for. Apple One is, unsurprisingly, best for iPhone and Mac users — you get 50GB of iCloud storage, Apple Music, Apple TV+ and Apple Arcade. Google One, meanwhile, provides 100GB of shareable space, advanced Photos editing features and a VPN to secure your connection. Microsoft 365 Personal, meanwhile, is a big boost to productivity with Office apps, 1TB of storage and security tools like Windows Defender. While these bundles don’t cover every possible need, they can easily save money versus paying for each service on its own.

ExpressVPN

A VPN (virtual private network) can be extremely helpful for the security conscious. It can hide sensitive information from prying eyes and help access regional content that would normally be off-limits. There are many good VPNs, but our pick for a grad is ExpressVPN. While it’s not the cheapest at $100 per year, our security reporter Katie Malone says it’s extremely well-rounded. It’s easy to set up, works across many devices, includes a password manager, doesn’t log activity and is even gaming-friendly. Simply put, your ex-student is more likely to keep the VPN running regardless of what they’re doing.

1Password

Passwords are already a hassle in school, but they get worse once you leave — how is a grad supposed to remember all those new logins for utilities and other must-have services? That’s why we’re recommending 1Password. For $36 per year, it makes sign-ins easier on many of your devices. It can also store credit cards and other sensitive information. And importantly, 1Password is moving to passkeys to access its accounts. A grad won’t have to worry that someone will guess their master password and effectively have access to their entire digital life.

Productivity

Buddy Premium / YNAB

It’s important to learn budgeting skills as a graduate, but it can sometimes be a pain to find the right tool — many people even settle for a spreadsheet. But a budgeting app can often provide extra features that a simple spreadsheet cannot. Nattkod’s Buddy Premium ($35 per year for iOS) and YNAB’s namesake app ($99 per year for Android and iOS) make it much easier to track spending and plan for the future. Both visualize expenses in an easy-to-understand way, making it clear just how much you have to spend each month.

Buddy is particularly helpful for sharing expenses with a partner or roommate, and you can even use an Apple Watch to enter data when you’re settling the bill at a restaurant. YNAB, meanwhile, is a good choice for grads saving up for long-term goals like vacations or that first new car.

Todoist Pro

To-do lists can help anyone stay organized, but the free options (such as Google Keep) might not cut it for a grad who suddenly has to juggle more than just classes. If that’s the case, they may appreciate a Todoist Pro subscription as a gift. While the free version already includes advanced features like filtering and labels, the $48 per year for Pro adds genuinely useful extras like reminders, automatic backups, more filters and larger 100MB file uploads. Throw in access across many platforms and it’s an easy choice for someone figuring out how to manage their personal and professional lives.

Masterclass Individual

Graduates don’t have to stop learning just because they got their degrees. A subscription to Masterclass Individual may seem expensive at $180 per year, but it could easily help grads learn important personal and professional skills from (often famous) experts in different fields. They can perfect their cooking with Gordon Ramsay, or writing with Margaret Atwood. And importantly, this isn’t just about watching videos — pupils can follow a curriculum that involves finishing real projects. Skillshare ($168 per year) can be a better fit if a new grad primarily values creative skills, but Masterclass may be worth the outlay for honing life skills or simply indulging curiosity.

Fitness

Apple Fitness+

If you know a grad who has an iPhone and is eager to get fit, an Apple Fitness+ subscription is an easy gift. A relatively low $80 yearly outlay provides access to 12 workout types that cover a wide range of durations and skill levels that can fit into a busy schedule. There are even audio-only running and walking workouts for those who prefer to exercise outside. The service works best when paired with an Apple Watch, but that’s no longer necessary — an iPhone is all they need to participate.

Peloton

Peloton’s equipment isn’t always a viable gift for a grad, but a subscription to its app certainly can be. The $13-per-month membership gives Android and iOS users access to Peloton’s well-known trainers as they guide you through a variety of workouts that even include bootcamps. This is also an ideal gift if your recipient prefers structure — there’s a range of programs that help develop skills, such as running marathons. Add community elements (such as seeing who’s participating in the same workout) and it can help newcomers stay committed.

Entertainment

Apple Music / Spotify

There’s a good chance the grad in your life wants to soundtrack their commute or work day, and a subscription to Apple Music ($99 per year) or Spotify Premium ($10 per month) should provide exactly what they’re looking for. Both services offer ad-free streaming and offline access to large song selections and well-curated playlists on many devices — you can listen to Apple Music on an Android phone, or play Spotify on your favorite game console.

The choice depends on a grad’s tastes. Apple Music clearly has an advantage for users heavily invested in Apple’s ecosystem, but it’s also best if you want lossless or spatial audio. Spotify, meanwhile, has a strong social element, broader device support (particularly for smart speakers),exclusive podcasts and a hard-to-beat library of niche playlists.

Disney+

There’s a real possibility your giftee has already signed up for Amazon Prime Video or Netflix, but what if they want more? That’s where a Disney+ subscription might come in handy. The $110 per year no-ads plan ($8 per month with ads) provides access to a library that might not beat rivals in sheer quantity, but includes plenty of new and back-catalog material from Disney’s many huge franchises. Grads can see what The Mandalorian is all about, or catch up on the Marvel Cinematic Universe before the next big movie comes out.

YouTube TV

YouTube TV has been subject to price creeps, but it’s still the best live TV streaming service for most people, including new graduates. The core $73 monthly plan offers over 100 channels, including multiple 24-hour news networks and live sports from ESPN. Add-ons bring networks like HBO, too. There’s far-ranging device support, and unlimited cloud DVR storage means a grad won’t have to miss a favorite show.

The same noise-canceling ability and overall clarity that make AirPods a good match for iOS, also make the buds well-suited for video chats and casual listening while you work on your laptop. AirPods are designed to pair automatically with your iPhone, but pairing them with a MacBook usually requires a few extra steps. If you’ve already connected them to your iPhone and you’re using the same Apple ID on your MacBook, your buds may already show up in your laptop’s list of available Bluetooth devices. If so, you can skip down to “How to switch your AirPods.” If you don’t see them listed, follow these steps. 

How to connect AirPods to a MacBook

Apple renamed System Preferences to System Settings with macOS Ventura in 2022. That’s where you’ll head first to access your Bluetooth settings.

1. Click the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac’s screen and select System Settings. You can also click the System Settings icon in the dock or click on the Control Center icon in the upper right corner, and click on Bluetooth then Bluetooth settings. Once in System Settings, click on Bluetooth in the left panel.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

2. With your AirPods in the case and the lid open, bring them near your Mac and press and hold the button on the back of the case until the light on the front flashes white.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

3. Your AirPods should show up under My Devices in the Bluetooth window. Click the connect button to pair them. You may be prompted to enable Siri and select your voice assistant preferences.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

4. If your AirPods don’t show up in the Bluetooth dialog box, shut the AirPods case, wait 15 seconds and then open the case and press the back button again. You may have to try the pairing process a few times before your AirPods show up on the list. If you still have trouble, make sure the AirPods are fully charged and you have the latest OS version installed on your Mac. Restarting your computer might also help.

How to switch AirPods between devices

To manually switch your AirPods from another device to your Mac, follow these steps. Just keep in mind that these instructions only apply if you’ve already connected your AirPods to your Mac. If you haven’t done that, first follow the steps above.

You can go through the Systems Settings application, but I find it’s easiest to go through the through the Control Center:

1. Click on the Control Center icon in the upper left corner of your menu bar.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

2. Click on the text that says “Bluetooth” (not the Bluetooth icon, which toggles Bluetooth on and off).

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

3. Select your AirPods from the list of available devices.

Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget

The age of walking around a home goods store with your fiancé scanning items to upload to your registry has long come and gone. Digital wedding registries have sprung up in its place, with most large companies offering one. Now, Etsy has launched a site-wide wedding registry, joining the ranks of stores like Amazon, Macy's and Pottery Barn. It's a logical step for Etsy, home to seemingly endless products and a section devoted just to "Wedding & Party" filled with gifts and decorations.

Wedding registries are available to anyone with an Etsy account and are free to create. When you click the "Create a wedding registry" button, a pop-up asks if you've set a wedding date yet. From there, it opens a personal homepage where you can favorite or add gifts to your registry. It also suggests gifts below and tracks how many items have been added and purchased. You can view your registry or add more options at any time through the registry homepage or on your account dropdown menu.

Gift listings can get very specific, with options to include detailed personalization requests. Customization is a feature the makers-centric e-commerce company is known for and one that might set them apart from some of the other wedding registry sites. The company certainly hopes so: It attributes the introduction of its wedding registries to a growing desire for personalized gifts over more standard, mass-produced options. According to Etsy, users' searches for handmade gifts increased by 872 percent in the last three months compared to the same time last year. 

Guests looking to shop your registry will need to make an Etsy account to buy anything. On the registry homepage, they can click "Find a registry" and search your name to browse items. Once purchased, sellers will receive orders as usual with a note that it's from a registry.

Panasonic will not be able to start the volume production of its 4680 battery cells for Tesla before March 2024 like it had originally planned. According to Reuters, the company has delayed the battery's mass production and has decided to kick things off between April and September 2024 instead, so that it would have enough time to improve its performance. "Mass production rescheduled to begin during [the first half of the fiscal year ending in March 2025] to introduce performance improvement measures that will further enhance competitiveness," the company has revealed in its earnings report. 

The 4680 battery format has the potential to boost the range of electric vehicles by over 15 percent. Nikkei previously said that it could extend the range of the Model S from 404 miles on a single charge to around 465 miles. It's unclear what Panasonic means by introducing "performance improvement measures" and whether that would lead to even longer range capacities for electric cars. 

Tesla manufactures its own batteries in its Fremont, California facility and at the Gigafactory Texas, and it is expected to ramp up production in the latter. But the company still depends on its partner manufacturers, Panasonic being one of them, to be able to meet its battery needs. At the moment, Tesla is using the 4680-type cell for the base Model Y vehicles produced at Gigafactory Texas. The company plans to equip its other vehicles with it, though, including the Cybertruck, which will enter mass production in 2024. 

Games like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild don’t come along often. The 2017 title came 31 years into the franchise’s history and somehow felt familiar while simultaneously remixing or entirely removing core tenets of the series. To put it mildly, the changes worked. Breath of the Wild is the biggest-selling Zelda game of all time and was an unqualified success with critics and players alike.

What in the world do you do for an encore?

Internally, Nintendo decided to get right on that, announcing a direct sequel was in development only two years after Breath of the Wild arrived. The result is The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, a game that is not a complete reinvention. Instead, after successfully blowing up the Zelda format, Nintendo is giving players even more – more of Hyrule to explore, and more freedom to dream up how to tackle the many, many challenges the game throws at them.

Perhaps even more than its predecessor, though, Tears of the Kingdom demands patience. There’s an overwhelming amount of things to do, locations to see, puzzles to solve and enemies to defeat here. And as I tried to play through it as quickly as possible, to see as much of the world as I could for this review, I ended up more frustrated than satisfied. Fortunately, I then decided to slow down and indulge my curiosity, a decision that made the game far more rewarding and made me eager to explore at my own pace, without worrying about getting to the end.

Nintendo

Tears of the Kingdom kicks things off in a fashion that’ll be familiar to anyone who played Breath of the Wild. A quick prologue reveals the dark wizard Ganondorf and a calamity known as the Upheaval – events that leave Link grievously injured and Zelda missing (stop me if you’ve heard this one). The twist comes when Link awakes in a sky kingdom populated by ancient and powerful technology, courtesy of the Zonai clan. Lest you think, like me, that Nintendo just invented a new mysterious culture with a new set of powers to replace the Guardians from Breath of the Wild, the Zonai were actually briefly mentioned in the previous game.

The first few hours of the game take place entirely in the sky, a fascinating setting with a host of new challenges and enemies. But here the game retreads the prior entry here as you need to journey to a handful of shrines to get a new set of abilities, just like you did on the Hyrule plateau in Breath of the Wild. Once that’s done, you’re able to descend to Hyrule proper and get exploring.

Nintendo

Tears of the Kingdom gently guides you towards a few locations to get you started – but you can go anywhere you want, if you’re intrepid enough to try. The game definitely doesn’t hold your hand, and it took me a surprisingly long time to get my bearings and feel confident against the many monsters you’ll come across. At the start, Link is woefully underpowered, which makes finding the dozens of shrines dotting Hyrule crucial, as this is the quickest way to get more hearts, stamina and learn new fighting techniques.

I was also eager to find the numerous towers that dot the land, as those are how you reveal more of the Hyrule map. Six years later, Hyrule still feels positively massive, and navigating it without filling in the map is an exercise in frustration. In retrospect, though, I probably was too aggressive about journeying beyond the first few areas the game reveals to you, as I ran into numerous enemies I was simply not powerful enough to take on. My advice: stick to the game’s script and focus on the first few quests it gives you before going into full explorer mode.

In addition to the many shrines, the game will quickly implore you to search out four regions of Hyrule to investigate disturbances affecting the areas. (If you played Breath of the Wild, you can surely guess where those areas are.) This is where you’ll find the game’s four areas that harken back to the dungeons in Zelda games of yore. Just like before, you’ll need to help the citizens of each region before you can advance – but to keep things fresh, all the big dungeons are in the sky.

As much as I enjoyed revisiting the vast Hyrule overworld, the different gameplay elements and scenery of the sky areas made this feel novel. These main dungeons feel more similar to the Divine Beasts from Breath of the Wild than the levels found in Zelda games of old, but this time out they’re more visually distinct and connected to the region of Hyrule you’re visiting. The bosses of each are also a lot more creative and interesting than the variations of Calamity Ganon from last time out, too.

Nintendo

Another thing that will be familiar to Breath of the Wild players is the game’s presentation. As a direct sequel, there’s no noticeable change to how Hyrule and its inhabitants are rendered this time. Obviously, the sky islands and underground caverns were not present in BotW, so those areas gave the designers a chance to come up with impressive new visuals. The sky areas were particularly striking to me, though the underworld has a creepy, alien atmosphere that adds a whole new vibe to the game.

Nintendo’s art direction is impeccable, as usual, but six years on from Breath of the Wild it’s fair to say I sometimes wanted a bit more. I’ve been playing the Horizon Forbidden West expansion Burning Shores – that series has a similarly vast open world to these recent Zelda games, and having that in the back of my mind made me imagine what Hyrule could look like on more powerful hardware. I’m not saying I want a fully photorealistic Zelda game; the semi-cartoonish style has always been part of the charm. But it’s hard not to imagine just how spectacular this game could look on more powerful hardware. Of course, that’s not Nintendo’s strategy and it hasn’t been for years – but one can dream.

That said, the Switch hardware does show its age in one significant area. Frame rate drops are a bit more common in Tears of the Kingdom than I’d like. To be clear, this isn’t a major issue that renders the game unplayable by any stretch of the imagination. Generally, things run solidly at 30 fps, but the more advanced physics at play here occasionally causes some stutters. You’ll also get some dropped frames if too much is happening on screen, like big battles with multiple enemies in the rain. I never felt like these problems were enough to keep me from playing, but they are noticeable and show that Nintendo is pushing the Switch as hard as it can here.

Nintendo

You may be wondering what makes Tears of the Kingdom more than just a Breath of the Wild remix. There are two major components that make it stand out. First are the two new areas above and below Hyrule proper. Both the sky islands and underworld add completely new challenges and gameplay elements. For example, one set of sky islands has less gravity than everywhere else in the game, so jumps carry you further. It may sound like a little thing, but it actually changes the way you go about fighting enemies – for example, a jumping slash attack can deliver multiple blows as you slowly float back to the ground. But it also leaves you more vulnerable, since you can’t pull out your shield in the middle of this move. If you time it wrong, you can take serious damage in a counter-attack.

The underworld areas are perhaps the most treacherous you can visit in Hyrule. That’s thanks to the persistent gloom enveloping those regions, something that makes the monsters below even more powerful. If you get hit, not only do you lose hearts from your health bar, but those hearts actually “break” – they can’t be refilled unless you use a special elixir or visit particular waypoints scattered throughout the map. Naturally, since it’s pitch-black underground, navigating is a challenge as well. You’ll want to come well-stocked with brightbloom seeds, which can be found in caves throughout Hyrule. Dropping those illuminates the area, and you can also take special potions that make you glow on your own.

The underworld quest line provides a second set of tasks beyond the ones found in the Hyrule overworld. There aren’t any dungeons underground as there are up in the sky, but there are still significant quests and enemies to find below the surface. And from what I’ve played so far, these aren’t just side quests – they intersect with the main goal of finding Zelda. It’s easy to forget about the underworld while journeying through Hyrule proper, looking for shrines and helping residents in all corners of the map, but you’ll gain valuable skills and progress the story in major ways by diving underground as well. If you’re getting stuck or running out of steam, delving into the deeps is a good way to change things up.

Nintendo

But easily the most significant change is in the abilities Link has, thanks to his “Purah Pad” (a new name for the Sheikah Slate from BofW). Two of the abilities, Ascend and Recall, are useful but don’t fundamentally change the way the game is played. Ascend lets you dive straight upwards through roofs or rocks to reach new areas quickly, while Recall rewinds time on specific objects to move them backwards. They can be handy for sure, but you’ll need to master the other two powers to get anywhere in Tears of the Kingdom. One is called “Fuse,” which lets you stick objects you find around the world onto your weapons or arrows to enhance them. This is a requirement, because most of the weapons you find in the world have been decayed by Ganondorf’s emergence.

The good news is that you can stick all the monster parts you find around the world onto these weapons to greatly increase their power. For example, you can stick bokoblin horns on to your swords to make them stronger, but you can also fuse the tail of an ice lizard to a weapon and get its freezing power. However, these weapons still break far too often, so you’ll constantly want to be stocking up your inventory and investigating what combos of weapons and additional items work best. This goes for arrows, too: instead of being able to find or buy fire arrows, for example, you’ll need to attach a fire fruit to your arrow to set things aflame.

And then there’s Ultrahand. This takes the Magensis power from BotW, which let you move metallic objects around, and supercharges it. Now, you can pick up almost anything you see – and you can stick objects together to build basically anything you want. What really makes your creations useful are the Zonai tools you’ll find around the world, things like fans, wheels, flame-emitting objects and much more. If you have a board and a fan, you can fashion a makeshift hovercraft, for example. Or if you need to reach a far-off location, try building a bridge.

As the game goes on, it does a great job of nudging you towards building more complex and useful tools. The possibilities are near-limitless, and I’m really looking forward to seeing videos of all the ridiculous things that people try to build. (For example, the hilariously flammable war cart that my colleague Sam Rutherford built.) I was initially worried that I wouldn’t be quite creative enough to fully take advantage of the potential that Ultrahand provides, but totally wild creations are rarely required. Usually, it’s a matter of sticking two or three things together to achieve a goal, and the game makes it pretty clear what you need to do. The quick shrines, most of which you can get through in five or 10 minutes, also are good at showing you what kinds of things are useful to combine.

You can also use Fuse to combine Zonai objects together with your weapons and shields. One of my favorite combos is sticking a springboard to a shield – so when enemies hit it, they go flying, giving you a chance to counter-attack or run away. Attaching a fire device to your weapon, meanwhile, lets it spew flames as you swing it. Again, the possibilities are vast, and it’s going to be a lot of fun seeing what kinds of weapons and other contraptions people come up with to suit their own play styles.

Nintendo

This all adds up to a game that, despite significant shared DNA with Breath of the Wild, feels new and vital. I have fond memories of my time traversing Hyrule in BotW, and I was eager to jump back into the world again. The overworld map may be the same, but plenty of the locations have changed significantly, which provided a distinct feeling of time passing between the games as well as offering new puzzles and challenges. The frequent dips into the sky or underworld, meanwhile, provide plenty of fresh, all-new areas to explore and challenges to overcome.

All this said, I also would be remiss if I didn’t mention the difficult, sometimes unforgiving challenge this game can occasionally present. Since there’s minimal guidance as to where you can and should go, it’s easy to find yourself in enemy encounters where you’re totally overmatched. And while most of the shrines are well done, there are some that are absurdly difficult for no apparent reason.

My “favorite" so far is one where you lose all your items and armor and have to figure out how to defeat enemies with just the tools provided to you. In this case, there were about eight high-powered machines, and while there were some little war machines to create, there’s also no shield in the shrine. Even with 10 hearts, making two mistakes was enough that I would die and lose my progress. It was incredibly frustrating, and there was no reason for it to be so hard.

And the impact of Fuse and Ultrahand cannot be overstated. These new tools make experimentation a hallmark of Tears of the Kingdom in a way it hasn’t been before. Now, in addition to exploring every corner of Hyrule, you’ll also need to try lots of different combinations of tools, weapons, found objects and Zonai devices to find the solution a puzzle demands. Or you can fritter away hours making contraptions from whatever you find laying around. In a lot of ways, Breath of the Wild was already a creative sandbox that let gamers tackle the various adventures it offered in any order and any fashion they chose. In Tears of the Kingdom, that’s even more true.

If you want to spend all your time spelunking in the underworld, feel free. If you’d rather hunt down shrines at the expense of all else to maximize your stamina and hearts, that works too. If you only want to engage in building objects with Ultrahand when the game requires it, that’s fine – it makes it clear when you need to build various contraptions to advance. There’s enough guidance to set you on your path when you get started, but you can also ignore that and just roam the wilds. Do so at your own risk, though – it’s rough out there.

Tears of the Kingdom isn’t the series reinvention that we got in 2017, but that’s OK. There’s more than enough here to justify revisiting the Hyrule that we first saw with Breath of the Wild — I've "only" put in about 35 hours at this point, and there's no end in sight to my journey. If you’re one of the millions who delighted in that game’s freedom, chances are you’ll love Tears of the Kingdom too.

Teenage Engineering has launched a new field recorder called the TP-7 that was designed to record interviews, music and any kind of audio with, in the company's words, "zero friction in the highest possible quality." It's the latest entry to its "Field" series of interoperable products, which includes the OP-1 synthesizer and the TX-6 mixer released last year. Like the TX-6, the TP-7 is about as big as a deck of cards and can fit comfortably in your hand. It has a motorized "tape reel" at the center that you can use to easily scrub through or pause your recording and to navigate the menu. 

There's also a rocker on the left side of the recorder that you can also use to scrub through audio, along with a button right below it that quickly changes recording modes. While you can use its built-in microphone to record audio just fine, you can also plug in external mics through its three stereo two-way jacks. Take note that the jacks can accommodate other audio equipment, as well, such as Teenage Engineering's other Field devices. 

The TP-7 also has a USB-C port that you can use to transfer data or to charge it. If you use the device for interviews, you can connect it to an iPhone through that USB-C port or via Bluetooth and fire up the company's iOS app to get automatic transcriptions. The recorder can last up to seven hours between charges, has a built-in speaker in addition to the microphone and 128GB of internal storage.

Teenage Engineering calls the TP-7 "a device engineered in every detail to do only one thing and to do it well," one that's "perfect for... journalists, lawyers and medical professionals." But like most of the company's products, the TP-7 doesn't come cheap. It's listed for $1,499 on Teenage Engineering's website with a note that says it's coming sometime this summer.