‘Elden Ring’ update fixes bug that could put players in an endless death loop

You may want to update your copy of Elden Ring on PC to make sure that you don’t end up losing hours of gameplay to the endless death loop exploit. Bandai Namco has rolled out a patch for the game, which fixes a bug in multiplayer that “allowed players to teleport others to incorrect map coordinates.” A few days ago, reports surfaced about bad actors exploiting a bug that gives them a way to crash your game and teleport your character off the map. Upon reloading, you’ll just find yourself falling to your death and seeing the reviving/loading screen again and again. 

Here’s the infinite death loop in action:

As The Verge notes, some players were able to save their game by quickly teleporting elsewhere, but others reported losing as much as 100 hours of gameplay to the death loop. In addition to fixing this particular bug, the update also patches other issues, including ones that will prevent you from advancing certain quests. 

Elden Ring has been out for less than a month, but it has become huge very, very quickly. It sold 12 million units worldwide merely 18 days after its release, smashing the records of other Souls-type titles — Dark Souls 3, the best-selling game in the franchise, only reached 10 million units sold four years after it became available. When Bandai Namco and Elden Ring developer FromSoftware announced the milestone, they also said that the IP could be expanded “beyond the realm of games.” 

Twitter DM search now works the way you’d expect

Twitter is expanding DM searches to help you find the exact conversation you’re looking for. The social media app now lets you use the search bar in the DM inbox to find specific messages. Type in a keyword or name, pick the “Messages” tab and you’ll see any relevant messages, including older ones.

The company didn’t mention which platforms supported the feature (we’ve asked for comment). As of this writing, we could only search for people or groups on the web.

Twitter introduced DM searches in 2019, when they became available to iOS app users. The feature didn’t come to Android until 2021, but Twitter delivered an upgraded version that allowed searches of your full history rather than just recent threads. The firm teased the ability to search message content later that year, but it clearly took longer to deliver the upgrade than anticipated. Still, this might be appreciated if you’re trying to unearth a must-have restaurant or revisit a favorite discussion.

An NFL football game is coming to Meta Quest and PlayStation VR

The NFL is making its first-ever VR game. And rather than work with longtime partner Electronic Arts on the project, the league is partnering with StatusPro, a startup that uses real-time player data to “create authentic extended reality experiences.&q…

YouTube makes thousands of TV show episodes available to stream for free

For the first time, YouTube is letting users in the US stream thousands of free, ad-supported TV shows like Hell’s Kitchen, Heartland and Unsolved Mysteries, it announced. That will put it into competition with OTA (over-the-air) TV and streaming services with ad tiers including Peacock, the Roku Channel, Tubi and others. 

YouTube will offer around 4,000 free TV episodes on top of the 1,500 movies already available. This month, it added a raft of new movie titles including Gone in Sixty Seconds, Runaway Bride and Legally Blonde, now available to stream for free (in the USA only) with ads.

With the new TV offerings, YouTube is no doubt hoping to keep American users glued to its platform. Having dozens of episodes from multiple series will allow users to binge like they do on Netflix and other platforms, though most of the content on offer is not what you’d call prestige TV. One of its biggest rivals in that regard is Roku TV, which had a very public dispute with YouTube that was only recently resolved.

Until last year, YouTube had been trying to fill content holes with its own programming via YouTube Originals. Earlier in 2022, however, it announced that it was largely abandoning those ambitions and would focus strictly on its Black Voices and YouTube Kids Funds. The program had some success with shows like Cobra Kai, but didn’t pose much of a threat to services like Amazon Prime Video and Netflix. 

Netflix’s latest mobile game raises awareness for drinking water scarcity

Netflix is now using its growing mobile game collection to support a good cause. The streaming service has launched three Android and iOS games headlined by This Is A True Story, a game meant to raise awareness about the lack of safe drinking water. The team-up between Frosty Pop and Charity:Water is an educational RPG that challenges you walk miles in sub-Saharan Africa to find water while dealing with poachers, windstorms and other hazards. It’s a frank commentary on a dire state of affairs (771 million people don’t have access to clean water), although the hand-painted backdrops might keep you coming back after you understand the message.

The other games are less poignant, but may still be worth a try. Pik Pok has unveiled both Into the Dead 2: Unleashed, a sequel to its endless runner/shooter hybrid, as well as Shatter Remastered, a modernization of its brick-breaker/shoot-em-up crossover for the PS3.

All three games should be available on Android and iOS today (March 22nd) at 1PM Eastern. As with other Netflix games, the latest selection is ‘free’ once you’ve signed in with your account. These releases probably won’t convince you to sign up for Netflix. However, This Is A True Story might just use Netflix’s size to reach a large audience.

Shazam’s new feature makes it easy to find and buy tickets for nearby concerts

Now that pandemic restrictions have started lifting, people are eager to go back to the activities they used to do, such as seeing live music performances. Shazam has launched a new feature meant to make it easier to find shows nearby, so music lovers don’t miss events they can easily go to. Starting today, when users Shazam a song or search for it in the app or on the website, they’ll also see relevant concert information and tickets on sale for upcoming shows near their location.

If they have a specific artist in mind, though, they can simply launch the new Shazam Artist page on the platform and see the dates, times and locations of upcoming performances. Tapping on any of them will show additional tour or show information, along with the ability to add any event to their calendar. Shazam uses information from concert discovery app Bandsintown for this feature, and musicians who want the service to display their event details will have to make the information available via Bandsintown For Artists.

Shazam’s new concert feature is now available on iOS and Android. “Shazam has a long history of innovation in music discovery and connecting artists and fans,” Apple VP for Apple Music and Beats Oliver Schusser said. “With the reemergence of live music, we’re excited to give Shazam users access to concerts and bring even more discoverability to artists.” Apple, which purchased Shazam back in 2018, said last year that the app IDs over a billion songs per month. With this feature, Shazam has taken its music discovery service to another level. 

Netflix will release a Tekken animated series later this year

Having helped bring properties like DotA 2 and Castlevania to TV, Netflix is once again turning to a historic gaming franchise to add to its content library. On Saturday, the streamer announced it would release Tekken: Bloodline, an animated adaption of Bandai Namco’s popular fighting game series, in 2022.

In the trailer Netflix shared alongside the announcement, we’re introduced to protagonist Jin Kazama, who joined the franchise as a playable character in 1996’s Tekken 3. In the show, Kazama embarks on a quest for revenge when his mother Jun falls to what she calls a demon. Kazama subsequently turns to his grandfather, Heihachi Mishima, for help. If old man Mishima gives off a sinister vibe, it’s because he’s the main villain of the Tekken franchise. Kazama’s quest eventually leads him to The King of Iron Fist Tournament where we see some familiar faces.

Outside of knowing it will come out later this year, we don’t have an exact release date for Tekken: Bloodline. Netflix’s track record with video game adaptations has mostly depended on the companies it has partnered with to work on those projects. Productions like Arcane and The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf have been a success for the company thanks to the involvement of studios like Fortiche and Studio Mir.

The ‘Overwatch 2’ PvP beta starts on April 26th

Blizzard Entertainment has finally announced a specific launch date for the Overwatch 2 PvP beta on PC: April 26th. The gaming company previously revealed that the beta for the sequel’s 5-on-5 PvP mode will go live in late April. Now, you can mark the 26th on your calendars and block out that weekend to play matches. In addition to 5-on-5 battles — the Overwatch PvP is 6-on-6 — the beta also comes with four fresh maps, the new Push mode and redesigned heroes. In fact, one of those heroes is getting more than just a stats/abilities upgrade or a model makeover.

A few days ago, Blizzard posted a screenshot of the game showing Doomfist as a tank. While the image has since been deleted, the company has eventually confirmed that the character is changing roles to tank from damage hero. 

Blizzard has been testing the role change for Doomfist since last year, hero lead designer Geoff Goodman revealed on Reddit in October. Back then, Goodman explained that the character’s kit is “full of crowd control effects and mobility” and that makes him difficult to tune and balance as a damage hero for Overwatch 2. He’ll be able to keep those properties as a tank, though he’ll obviously lose some damage and gain some defense points. In Overwatch 2, teams can only have one tank, so the player’s choice could be they key to their victory. 

Players can now sign up to get access to Overwatch 2’s PvP beta on the game’s official website.

Humble Bundle unveils Stand with Ukraine charity game bundle

Humble Bundle has put together a charity game bundle with all proceeds going to humanitarian crisis relief efforts in Ukraine. For a minimum donation of $40, you can pick up more than 120 games, books, apps, game asset packs and other goodies worth a total of over $2,500 through the Stand with Ukraine bundle.

The bundle includes Back 4 Blood, Metro Exodus, Spyro Reignited Trilogy, Max Payne 3, Sunset Overdrive, PGA Tour 2K21, Brothers – A Tale of Two Sons and Superhot. You’ll also get rulebooks for Pathfinder and Warhammer, one year of access to GameMaker Studio 2 Creator and a volume of the first six issues of graphic novel series The Boys (which Amazon turned into a Prime Video show).

Creators on Itch.io also rallied to put together a bundle of almost 1,000 games, books, magazines, comics and game dev tools. The Bundle for Ukraine raised $6.3 million from almost 450,000 contributors.

Humble Bundle last week stopped sales in Belarus and Russia, which invaded Ukraine last month. Other notable companies in the gaming space have stopped selling games or shut down services in Russia (and in many cases Belarus). Those include Niantic with Pokémon Go, Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, Bungie, Ubisoft, Take-Two, CD Projekt Red, EA, Activision Blizzard and Epic.

Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members can claim 30 days of free access to Paramount+

Nine years after it first emerged a live-action Halo TV series was in the works, the show is only a few days away from premiering on Paramount+. To celebrate its debut, Microsoft is giving Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers a free 30-day trial to the streaming service via Perks.

The offer will be available on March 23rd, the day before Halo arrives. There’s a catch, though. Given that only one installment of the nine-episode season is scheduled to drop each week, you might need to subscribe to Paramount+ to watch the entire season (unless you activate the offer a bit later). Paramount+ costs $5 per month with ads or $10 per month to go commercial free and gain access to a feed from your local live CBS station.

Earlier this week, Paramount+ released the final trailer for the show, which has a separate plot from the games and is already renewed for a second season. Along with some story beats, the two-minute clip shows an Elite with an Energy Sword and several shots of Master Chief in action.