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'Blade Runner 2099' Gets Official 2026 Window by Prime Video
Product Reviews

The Tesla ‘Blade Runner 2049’ AI Lawsuit Just Hit an Interesting Snag

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In April, movement on a 2024 lawsuit involving AI, Tesla, Warner Bros., and the production company behind Blade Runner 2049 caught the attention of sci-fi fans. Today, there’s an update that skews in favor of Warner Bros.

Alcon Entertainment, which produced the 2017 Denis Villeneuve film and has the Prime Video Blade Runner 2099 series on the way, alleged that promotional material used at an October 2024 Tesla event very closely resembled stills from that film.

Those concerns were further heightened by the fact that Alcon had asked Warner Bros., which distributes its films and was partnering with Tesla for a “robotaxi” or “Cybercab” unveiling, not to allow the use of Blade Runner 2049 imagery as part of the event.

The ensuing lawsuit alleges that Tesla circumvented that request by feeding Blade Runner 2049 stills into an AI image generator, and that’s what was eventually used to backdrop the Tesla presentation.

The lawsuit touches on several complicated issues, including, as the Hollywood Reporter points out, “whether the creation of a visual by an AI image generator by copying a portion of a copyrighted work without a license constitutes copyright infringement.” That’s one of the as-yet undecided issues in the ongoing proceedings.

As THR reports, now dismissed are “claims seeking to hold Warner Bros. Discovery responsible for Tesla’s use of the photos” as well as “another claim alleging that Warner Bros. Discovery had a duty to stop Tesla from infringing Alcon’s intellectual property.”

However, “Warner Bros. Discovery still faces a claim for contributory infringement, which accuses the studio of facilitating the alleged misconduct.”

You can read more about the lawsuit in THR; the complexities of this specific case, however, are coming at a time when Hollywood is facing issues centered on AI’s encroachment of intellectual property on an unprecedented scale.

Earlier this month, we learned that Warner Bros. joined Disney and Universal in filing a lawsuit against Midjourney; as Variety reported, the allegations accuse “the AI image-generating platform of blatant copyright violations” involving copyrighted WB characters.

We don’t know yet how Alcon, which (per THR) has one more try to “fix claims for direct and vicarious copyright infringement,” will ultimately fare in its legal fight. But even if Warner Bros. ends up overcoming the remaining claims in this case, it seems the studio has now taken new interest in protecting its library from copyright infringement with generative AI elsewhere.

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.



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How AI Is Upending Politics, Tech, the Media, and More
Product Reviews

How AI Is Upending Politics, Tech, the Media, and More

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In an increasingly divided world, one thing that everyone seems to agree on is that artificial intelligence is a hugely disruptive—and sometimes downright destructive—phenomenon.

At WIRED’s AI Power Summit in New York on Monday, leaders from the worlds of tech, politics, and the media came together to discuss how AI is transforming their intertwined worlds. The Summit included voices from the AI industry, a current US senator, a former Trump administration official, and publishers including WIRED’s parent company, Condé Nast. You can view a livestream of the event in full below.

Livestream: WIRED’s AI Power Summit

“In journalism, many of us have been excited and worried about AI in equal measure,” said Anna Wintour, Condé Nast’s chief content officer and the global editorial director of Vogue, in her opening remarks. “We worry about it replacing our work, and the work of those we write about.”

Leaders from the world of politics offered contrasting visions for ensuring AI has a positive impact overall. Richard Blumenthal, the Democratic senator from Connecticut, said policymakers should learn from social media and figure out suitable guardrails around copyright infringement and other key issues before AI causes too much damage. “We want to deal with the perfect storm that is engulfing journalism,” he said in conversation with WIRED global editorial director Katie Drummond.

In a separate conversation, Dean Ball, a senior fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation and one of the authors of the Trump administration’s AI Action Plan, defended that policy blueprint’s vision for AI regulation. He claimed that it introduced more rules around AI risks than any other government has produced.

Figures from within the AI industry painted a rosy picture of AI’s impact, too, arguing that it will be a boon for economic growth and would not be deployed unchecked.



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Product Reviews

Video of ‘Meta Ray-Ban Display’ glasses surfaces ahead of Connect

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Meta’s smart glasses plans were already one of the worst kept secrets, as there have been more than a year of leaks and reports about its work to add a heads-up display to the product. Now, just days before their unveiling at Connect, a promotional video of the new frames seems to have leaked.

The video, reported and reposted by UploadVR, shows the new “Meta Ray-Ban Display” frames as well as a new model of camera-enabled Oakley sunglasses. The clip mainly features the new Ray-Ban glasses, and shows a pair of black frames with clear lenses that look similar to the company’s previous Wayfarer frames. 

Meta is adding two new pairs of glasses to its lineup.

(Screenshot)

The glasses also include a small display that’s able to show info like a map preview, chats with friends and information related to what you’re looking at. As reported, it also shows a dedicated wristband for the device. The video briefly shows someone swiping with their fingers in order to type out a reply to a message in a chat app. 

The clip also shows a new pair of Oakley frames that don’t have a display. The sunglasses seem to be based on the company’s wraparound Sphaera frames and show a camera in the center directly over the nosepiece. That would line up with prior reporting about the glasses that suggested Meta planned to market the glasses to cyclists and other athletes.

The latest Oakley Meta glasses will have a different camera placement.

(Screenshot)

A separate promotional video of the Sphaera sunglasses also cropped up on Monday. That video more clearly shows the placement of the camera in the center of the glasses, but doesn’t reveal what, if any, new features might be arriving with the device.

UploadVR reports that both videos briefly appeared on Meta’s official YouTube channel as unlisted clips but were later removed. We’ve reached out to the company for comment.In the meantime, you can read more about the company’s new smart glasses lineup and what to expect at Connect here. Engadget will be reporting live from the event beginning September 17.

Update, September 15, 2025, 2:56PM PT: Added info about a second video showing the Oakley sunglasses.



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Best phone 2025: the top smartphones to buy right now
Product Reviews

Best phone 2025: the top smartphones to buy right now

by admin


Haven’t you heard? Phones are boring now. And that’s just fine! Most people buying a new phone just want something familiar that works better than the device they’re replacing. If that’s your MO, then you’re sure to find something reliable in my recommendations below.

But even if you’re looking for something a little more extra, you’ve got some great options. They’re going to be pretty iterative compared to whatever you’re using now — we’re in more of a software era than a hardware innovation cycle these days — but you can find a delightful new device. We finally have a folding phone that feels like the right size and shape, flip phones offer a lot more than just nostalgia, and you can still buy a phone with no fewer than four cameras on the back. Not bad for a boring season of phone hardware.

A lot of people in the US get their phones through carrier deals, and no judgment here if that’s the route you take — it’s how I bought mine. Just be sure you know what you’re getting into and how many years you’ll need to stay on that Super 5G Everything Unlimited Plus plan to keep the monthly device reimbursements coming.

What I’m looking for

How we test smartphones

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There’s no shortcut to properly testing a phone; I put my personal SIM card (physical or otherwise) in each phone I review and live with it for a minimum of one full week. I set up each phone from scratch, load it up with my apps, and go about living my life — stress testing the battery, using GPS navigation on my bike while streaming radio, taking rapid-fire portrait mode photos of my kid — everything I can throw at it. Starting over with a new phone every week either sounds like a dream or your personal hell, depending on how Into Phones you are. For me, switching has become so routine that it’s mostly painless.

Top-notch software support

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The phones listed here have powerful processors and enough RAM to keep up for years, so it’s fair to expect more than a handful of OS updates throughout the life of your phone. Four years of new OS versions and five years of security updates is a healthy benchmark for this class, and many of the phones here meet or exceed that standard.

A fantastic camera

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Most phone cameras can perform well in good lighting conditions, from the flagship class down to $300 budget phones. The devices listed here offer a little something extra, like a useful telephoto lens, a great portrait mode, or impressive low-light shooting — and many include all three. Stabilization for the main camera unit to help in low light is a must in this category.

Best-in-class build quality

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The very best devices come with robust IP68 ratings, durable glass on the front and back, and sturdy aluminum exterior frames.

Value

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In addition to the very best devices at any price, I look for phones that offer the best mix of must-have features for good prices. That might lead to a recommendation of a lower-tier model if it’s particularly feature-rich for its price or last year’s model if it’s still sold new and this year’s device doesn’t offer many upgrades.

If you’re looking to spend a little less and still get the best smartphone on a budget, you can find something really good for under $600. For those recommendations, check out our guide to budget smartphones.

The best iPhone for most people

$699

The Good

  • Reliable camera with versatile photographic styles
  • Handy new Action Button
  • More RAM and a current-gen chipset

The Bad

  • Standard refresh rate screen
  • Camera Control is a mixed bag

Screen: 6.1-inch, 2556 x 1179 OLED, 60Hz refresh rate / Processor: A18 Cameras: 48-megapixel f/1.6 main with sensor-shift IS; 12-megapixel ultrawide; 12-megapixel selfie / Battery: Not advertised / Charging: 27W wired, 25W wireless MagSafe, 15W Qi2, 7.5W Qi / Weather-resistance rating: IP68

From a hardware perspective, the iPhone 16 (or the 16 Plus) is an easy upgrade choice. If you’re switching from an iPhone 13, 12, or even older, those four or five years of incremental performance improvements add up. But there’s something entirely new this time around — well, two things: the Action Button and the Camera Control button.

The customizable Action Button, which replaces the mute switch on the left edge of the phone, is a hand-me-down from the 15 Pro series. You can set it to open a particular app, turn on the flashlight, or almost anything else you might want at the press of a button. On the other side of the phone is the Camera Control, which you can use to launch the camera app. With the camera open, it acts as a shutter button with a full press, and a light press brings up other exposure options you can adjust. Even if you only ever use it to launch the camera, it’s pretty handy, and it frees up the Action Button.

The iPhone 16 Plus (left) and its smaller sibling, the iPhone 16 (right). Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge

The iPhone 16 and its larger 16 Plus sibling use Apple’s A18 chipset, which is in the same family as the 16 Pro’s processor. That bodes well for the phones staying on the same software upgrade cycle. They both received Apple Intelligence last fall, which included AI-powered writing tools and notification summaries in its earliest iteration, and eventually grew to support ChatGPT and a new Visual Intelligence feature. But despite the similarities, the regular 16 models lag behind the Pros in two important departments: the screen and the camera.

The Pros come with dedicated 5x lenses and updated main cameras that do a little better in low light. And you’ll only get a ProMotion display on the Pro models; the regular 16 features a slower 60Hz screen. Basically every other high-end phone on the market offers a 120Hz display, so that’s a disappointment given the price. If those two drawbacks don’t bother you — and most people probably won’t mind them — then the iPhone 16 makes for a great upgrade.

Read our full iPhone 16 review.

The best Android phone for most people

$799

The Good

  • Qi2 wireless charging with magnets is great
  • AI is actually kind of useful, finally
  • Telephoto camera is a nice addition

The Bad

  • Main and ultrawide cameras aren’t quite as good as the Pro
  • Battery life is just okay

Screen: 6.3-inch, 1080p 120Hz OLED / Processor: Tensor G5 / Cameras: 48-megapixel f/1.7 main with OIS; 13-megapixel f/2.2 ultrawide; 10.8-megapixel 5x telephoto with OIS; 10.5-megapixel selfie / Battery: 4,970mAh / Charging: 30W wired, 15W wireless / Weather resistance: IP68

The Pixel 10 is an easygoing Android phone that offers some handy upgrades over its predecessor. The addition of Qi2 with built-in magnets is a delight, making it easier than ever to quickly charge up without plugging in. AI features like Magic Cue, which can proactively suggest information based on what you’re doing on your phone, are finally showing promise. And for the first time ever, the base model features a dedicated telephoto lens.

Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge

But, alas, there’s a catch: The Pixel 10 no longer features the same main and ultrawide camera hardware as the Pro. You’re essentially getting the two rear cameras found in the midrange Pixel 9A, plus a telephoto lens. Still, as a whole, the device’s triple camera system produces images that are totally fine. Beyond the cameras, the Pixel 10 features the same Tensor G5 chipset that’s found in the Pro phones — handy for those aforementioned AI features.

Overall, the Pixel 10 mostly improves upon what made last year’s Pixel 9 such a solid release. We’re not thrilled with the downgraded camera, but the addition of Qi2 and a telephoto lens helps to soften the blow. If you can live with the camera trade-offs, the Pixel 10 is still a smart pick for anyone who wants a flagship experience at a more approachable price.

Read our full Pixel 10 review.

The best high-end Android phone

$1048

The Good

  • Excellent screen
  • Improved ultrawide camera
  • Rounded corners are comfier

The Bad

  • Expensive
  • Bulky
  • AI is (still) hit or miss

Screen: 6.9-inch, 1440p, 120Hz OLED / Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite / Cameras: 200-megapixel main with OIS; 50-megapixel 5x telephoto with OIS; 10-megapixel 3x telephoto with OIS; 50-megapixel ultrawide; 12-megapixel selfie / Battery: 5,000mAh / Charging: 45W wired, 15W wireless, Qi2 ready / Weather resistance: IP68

Samsung’s “Ultra” S-series phone is still your best bet for a maximalist Android phone, even if ultra doesn’t quite mean what it once did. You still get four rear cameras — including a 3x and 5x telephoto — a massive screen, and a built-in S Pen stylus. The battery goes all day, the processor is top-notch, and there are AI features aplenty if you’re into that sort of thing. There’s just no other phone quite like it.

Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge

This year, Samsung removed the Bluetooth features from the stylus. That stings a little, especially considering that the company swapped a 10x zoom for the shorter 5x camera the year before. It still amounts to a great phone, but it’s one of the priciest slab-style phones you can buy, and Samsung seems to be cutting features without adding back any extra value. It’s still “ultra” alright, but it doesn’t feel quite as special as it used to.

Read my full Galaxy S25 Ultra review.

The best phone for around $500

$499

The Good

  • Robust IP68 rating
  • Seven years of software updates
  • Brighter, bigger screen

The Bad

  • Missing a couple of AI features
  • AI is occasionally handy, usually weird

Screen: 6.3-inch, 1080p OLED, 120Hz / Processor: Tensor G4 / Cameras: 48-megapixel f/1.7 with OIS, 13-megapixel ultrawide, 13-megapixel selfie / Battery: 5,100mAh / Charging: 23W wired, 7.5W wireless / Weather-resistance rating: IP68

Every year, we’re pleasantly surprised by how much Google packs into its midrange Pixel A-series devices. Last year, it was the Pixel 8A, and this year, it’s the even better Pixel 9A. For $500, the 9A offers Google’s fourth-gen custom Tensor G4 chipset (the very same chip that’s in the pricier Pixel 9 and Pixel 9 Pro), a brighter and larger 6.3-inch OLED display, and an IP68 rating for improved durability. Plus, you get the benefit of seven years of software updates and security support. What you end up with is a device that delivers fantastic value, especially compared to other inexpensive devices.

Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge

The Pixel 9A offers a handful of other features that put it above the pack, like a 120Hz refresh rate, wireless charging, and the largest battery across the Pixel line. It does fall short in a few areas, though — the camera’s low light performance and Portrait mode could be better. That said, the 9A’s camera is still great for everyday snaps, and for the price, the device is an easy recommendation as the best in this category.

Read my full Pixel 9A review.

$745

The Good

  • New tone control in camera lets you dial back HDR processing
  • Who doesn’t love a physical shutter button?
  • Your video director friends will spend hours gleefully taking 4K120 video portraits of people at street festivals

The Bad

  • Camera Control button is a little fiddly
  • Default photo processing is more aggressive than ever
  • The most incremental of incremental upgrades over the iPhone 15 Pro

Screen: 6.3-inch, 2622 x 1206 OLED, 120Hz refresh rate / Processor: A18 Pro Cameras: 48-megapixel f/1.8 with sensor-shift IS; 12-megapixel 5x telephoto with OIS; 48-megapixel ultrawide; 12-megapixel selfie / Battery: Not advertised / Charging: 27W wired, 25W MagSafe wireless, 15W Qi2, 7.5W Qi / Weather-resistance rating: IP68

Like all mainline iPhone 16 models, the 16 Pro gained the new Camera Control button, but it got another important update, too: a 5x telephoto lens. In the 15 series, that longer telephoto lens was reserved for the bigger Pro Max model. This time around, it’s on the smaller Pro, too, making it a great option for someone who wants to upgrade without upsizing their phone.

Like the Pro Max, the iPhone 16 Pro uses an A18 Pro chipset designed to support Apple Intelligence, which started rolling out in the fall of 2024. The first update included things like notification summaries and the new glowing-border Siri UI, which Apple centered its launch event on. Subsequent updates brought ChatGPT integration and Visual Intelligence. But don’t expect anything radical — at least at first.

The iPhone 16 Pro gets an upgrade to a 5x telephoto lens this time around. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Outside of AI, the 16 Pro is a fairly iterative update. The new Camera Control makes it easier to launch the camera and get right to taking photos, and it also frees up the Action Button if you were using it as a camera shortcut. The screen is a little bigger at 6.3 inches compared to 6.1 inches, even though the phone is basically the same size. You can record 4K video at 120fps now. And the new Photographic Styles, which are available on all iPhone 16 models, let you take more control over your photos than ever.

There’s nothing here that someone with an iPhone 15 Pro should upgrade for, but it’s an all-around solid device that will please Apple devotees, especially those who prefer a phone that isn’t too big.

Read our full iPhone 16 Pro review.

$950

The Good

  • Samsung finally adopted the big cover screen
  • All-day battery
  • Reliable camera

The Bad

  • More susceptible to dust than your average phone
  • Still too hard to run full apps on the cover screen

Screen: 6.9-inch, 1080p, 120Hz OLED inner screen; 4.1-inch, 948p, OLED cover screen / Processor: Samsung Exynos 2500 / Cameras: 50-megapixel f/1.8 main with OIS; 12-megapixel ultrawide; 10-megapixel selfie (inner screen) / Battery: 4,300mAh / Charging: 25W wired, 15W wireless, 4.5W reverse wireless / Weather resistance: IP48

Samsung finally got the memo with the Galaxy Z Flip 7’s cover screen. The company’s latest flip phone ditches the file folder-shaped look of its predecessor for a 4.1-inch, edge-to-edge display that wraps around the cameras. With more outer screen real estate, it’s easier to respond to texts and punch in a coffee order without flipping open the phone and getting sucked into a digital rabbit hole.

The Flip 7 still makes you jump through a few hoops if you want to run full apps on the cover screen, but once you’ve wrangled the settings, it unlocks a lot of convenience for everyday tasks. That said, the cover screen isn’t perfect for every app. Sometimes a button hides behind the camera cutout, forcing you to change the app’s window size. But most tasks are a breeze, and opening the phone is always an option.

Finally, Samsung went with an edge-to-edge cover screen. Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge

Under the hood, Samsung swapped out Qualcomm’s processor for an in-house Exynos chip, though we didn’t notice any hits to performance. The new 4,300mAh battery will last you all day with moderate use, but heavy gaming and hotspot use will significantly impact battery life. The camera system, meanwhile, remains unchanged from the Z Flip 6, which isn’t a bad thing. You still get a 50-megapixel main shooter and all the fun flex mode tricks, which are great for capturing candids.

Unfortunately, the Flip 7 still offers no protection against fine particles like dust or sand, which might work their way into the hinge and cause damage. This raises concerns about how the device hold up over time. But Samsung’s beefed-up warranty and repair program can provide extra peace of mind. Plus, with seven years of OS and security updates, the Flip 7 should prove reliable until you decide to upgrade.

Read our full Galaxy Z Flip 7 review.

$2000

The Good

  • Ridiculously slim and light for a foldable
  • All-day battery with moderate use
  • Outer screen finally feels normal

The Bad

  • It’s $2,000
  • Durability still a concern
  • Camera bump makes it wobble on a table

Screen: 8-inch, 1968p, 120Hz OLED inner screen; 6.5-inch, 1080p, 120Hz OLED cover screen / Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite / Cameras: 200-megapixel f/1.7 main with OIS; 10-megapixel 3x telephoto with OIS; 12-megapixel ultrawide; 10-megapixel selfie (cover screen); 10-megapixel inner selfie camera / Battery: 4,400mAh / Charging: 25W wired, 15W wireless, 4.5W reverse wireless / Weather resistance: IP48

One of our biggest criticisms of the Z Fold series has been that it feels too narrow and cramped when closed. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 fixes that. With a more familiar 21:9 aspect ratio, it no longer feels like you’re holding a TV remote control. The result is a book-style foldable that mostly feels like a regular slab-style phone. It’s nearly as slim, too, so it doesn’t feel as bulky in your pocket.

The large inner screen gives you ample room for multitasking. Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge

The Z Fold 7’s reworked proportions make it easier to wield when replying to texts and Slack messages. When you start craving more screen real estate, the device opens to reveal a spacious 8-inch inner display, giving you an entirely different experience that’s perfect for managing multiple tabs in Chrome and playing games like Diablo Immortal. It’s great for multitasking — being able to track your Uber driver’s arrival time on one half of the screen while replying to emails on the other half is incredibly useful.

The bad news? The Z Fold 7 costs $1,999, making the barrier of entry very high. It also has one of the largest camera bumps we’ve encountered in a phone and doesn’t carry a formal dust resistance rating, meaning even a small amount of dust has the potential to cause significant damage to the hinge. Despite these shortcomings, however, Samsung has created a luxurious foldable that’s thinner, lighter, and incredibly nice to use.

Read our full Galaxy Z Fold 7 review.
  • The Samsung Galaxy S25 is a very good device, and it’s basically the last small-ish Android phone you can buy in the US. I find the software to be fussier and more cluttered than the Pixel 9’s, so it’s not my overall pick, but it’s a reliable device — and your best bet for a phone that isn’t gigantic. Read our review.
  • The iPhone 16E is a great phone that makes a lot of interesting trade-offs. Apple’s latest entry-level phone starts at $599 and comes with the company’s latest A18 processor, USB-C and wireless charging, a 60Hz OLED display, and the customizable Action Button found on Apple’s more premium handsets. The 6.1-inch phone doesn’t have MagSafe support or a Camera Control button, though, and it’s limited to a single 48-megapixel Fusion camera (sorry, ultrawide stans). That makes it hard for us to recommend over the standard iPhone 16, even if it does start at $200 less. Read our review.
  • The Motorola Razr Ultra 2025 is an excellent foldable that exemplifies what makes the brand’s phones so unique. It’s one of the best-looking phones you can buy, thanks to its gold-bronze chassis and wooden back. Plus, it features a spacious cover screen that’s handy for quickly performing tasks without opening the device. However, as much as we enjoy the Razr Ultra, Motorola’s promise of three OS upgrades and four years of security updates is on the shorter side. Read our review.
  • The Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge is an ultra-thin alternative to the big, chunky flagships we’ve seen over the past year. At just 5.8mm thick, it packs a 6.7-inch 1440p OLED display with a refresh rate of up to 120Hz, a 3,900mAh battery, and a Snapdragon 8 Elite processor. Despite its thinner frame, battery life is surprisingly acceptable, though it won’t last as long as other flagship devices. The S25 Edge also lacks a telephoto camera, so it’s not the best phone for portrait photos. Read our review.
  • The OnePlus 13R stands out in two key ways: battery life and screen. The 6.78-inch OLED display has a variable refresh rate of up to 120Hz and a resolution of 1264 x 2780, both of which are great specs for a midrange phone. Meanwhile, its 6,000mAh battery can last for a long time — most people are likely to squeeze out two days before the device needs to be recharged. That said, the 13R lacks features like wireless charging and more robust water resistance, and OnePlus is only promising four major OS upgrades and six years of security updates, which is fewer than the seven years of OS upgrades on the Google Pixel 9A. Read our review.
  • The Nothing Phone 3 is the brand’s “first true flagship phone,” with a 6.67-inch OLED screen, a Snapdragon 8S Gen 4 chip, and a 5,150mAh battery. It also features four cameras — three on the back and one on the front — all of which are 50 megapixels. Additionally, the Phone 3 ditches Nothing’s signature light strips for a small dot-matrix LED display on the back, which can display images or emoji tied to specific apps and contacts. Read our review.
  • The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is an impressive sophomore effort from Google. Like the Z Fold 7, the outer screen matches the dimensions of a regular slab-style phone, while the inner screen is great for multitasking. The whole package is also light enough that it sometimes doesn’t feel like you’re holding a foldable, though it does suffer from a slightly downgraded camera system compared to other Pixel 9 devices. There’s also no formal dust resistance, so long-term durability remains a concern. Read our review.
  • The Pixel 10 Pro is Google’s most refined flagship yet, blending a premium design with meaningful hardware upgrades like the Tensor G5 chip and Pixelsnap wireless charging. Magic Cue delivers genuinely useful on-device AI that can surface helpful info in real-time, while the camera’s portrait mode is much improved over its predecessor. Battery life is just average, though, and some AI features still feel like they’re being shoved into corners of the device where it doesn’t really need to be. Most readers will be better served by the cheaper Pixel 10. Read our review.
  • Google’s Pixel 10 Pro Fold is the first foldable to earn an IP68 rating, meaning it offers robust water and dust resistance. The device also features Google’s new Tensor G5 chipset, improved inner and outer displays, and Pixelsnap wireless charging. We got a brief hands on with the 10 Pro Fold following its announcement, though we’re not ready to share a final verdict until we’ve performed more extensive real world testing. For now, you can preorder the base 256GB model at Amazon, Best Buy, or directly from Google starting at $1,799, with a release to come on Thursday, October 9th.
  • At its fall hardware keynote, Apple announced the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and the slimmed down iPhone Air. The Air is Apple’s thinnest device yet at 5.6mm, while the entry-level iPhone 17 got an upgraded 6.3-inch ProMotion display, making it a really great deal. Meanwhile, the Pro models boast a powerful A19 Pro chip and a three-camera system — all of which are 48-megapixels. The 17 Pro Max also features the biggest battery ever in an iPhone, promising up to 39 hours of video playback. The latest iPhones are available to preorder now, with a launch set for Friday, September 19th.

Update, September 15th: Adjusted pricing / availability, added the Google Pixel 10 as the “best Android phone for most people,” and added insights for the Pixel 10 Pro, Pixel 10 Pro Fold, and the 2025 iPhone lineup. Brandon Russell also contributed to this post.

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Donkey Kong looks at the camera.
Product Reviews

Donkey Kong Bananza: DK Island & Emerald Rush review: neat, but should’ve been free

by admin



Why you can trust TechRadar


We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.

Had Donkey Kong Bananza: DK Island & Emerald Rush been released as a free update, I would be singing its praises.

Review info

Platform reviewed: Nintendo Switch 2
Available on: Nintendo Switch 2
Release date: September 12, 2025

After all, if I had one complaint with Donkey Kong Bananza in the weeks since it launched, it’s that there’s no real reason to keep coming back for more after the credits roll, and this new downloadable content (DLC) expansion remedies that somewhat by bringing back the fan-favorite Donkey Kong Island and introducing a replayable side mode to dive into.

  • Donkey Kong Bananza (Nintendo Switch) (Switch) at Amazon for $84.99

It’s an enjoyable diversion for a couple of hours and gives you a delightful excuse to rediscover some of the best locations from the main game, but for $19.99 / £16.99, the content on offer is just too slim to fully recommend.

That’s the exact same price as the recently launched Drag X Drive and most Nintendo Switch 2 Edition upgrades, not to mention indie titans like Hollow Knight: Silksong if you venture outside the first-party catalog – all of which would be better value purchases.

Switching sides

(Image credit: Nintendo)

The entirety of DK Island & Emerald Rush takes place after the main game, with the new DK Island layer appearing the next time you visit the Eelevator. Situated on the surface, a short distance from Ingot Isle, the map is a novel interpretation of how the setting appeared in the original Donkey Kong Country. It’s a joy to explore for a little bit, with memorable landmarks like Donkey Kong’s little hit and the massive Kong head-shaped volcano sure to delight long-time fans.

There’s loads of gold to hoover up, particularly in the smattering of small challenge levels hidden in its various nooks and crannies, which makes it all feel like a fitting celebration now that you’ve finished the game.

Unfortunately, there’s very little to do beyond exploration. There are a few locations clearly designed for taking screenshots in the photo mode with the likes of Diddy Kong and Cranky Kong, but it’s hard to ignore the fact that there’s no real progression like a standard Bananza stage. There aren’t even any enemies to defeat, which leaves it all feeling rather empty.

Most of your time on DK Island is clearly meant to be spent in the Emerald Rush mode, accessed by visiting Void Kong on a wrecked piledriver adjacent to the island. There’s a sliver of story content, with Donkey Kong and Pauline unwillingly drafted into joining Void Company in order to collect a new emerald substance, and then you’re thrust straight into it.

(Image credit: Nintendo)

In the mode, you run around a past level in which all of the existing gold has been turned into bright green emerald. Your task is to smash through it quickly and hoover up as much as possible within ten timed rounds, meeting a certain threshold in each in order to continue into the next.

Void Kong feeds you objectives as you go, which usually boil down to defeating some special green enemies that have spawned on the map or completing a quick task like dipping yourself in water or using a nearby barrel launcher.

Completing objectives or collecting one of the now green Fossils or Banandium gems lets you choose a perk, mainly centered around increasing your rate of Emerald collection.

There are a decent number of them, and they stack in interesting ways, leading to some satisfying rogue-like progression. On one run, for example, each enemy I defeated at full health would result in a deluge of Emerald thanks to multiple similar bonuses, and on another, I earned hundreds of times the usual reward for each completed objective.

Climbing the corporate ladder

(Image credit: Nintendo)

Finishing Emerald Rush runs awards Banandium Chips that can be spent placing statues of characters on DK Island.

There’s no real way to interact with these statues beyond bashing or throwing them, so this whole addition feels completely superfluous unless your idea of enjoyment is tossing around an inanimate idol of Squarks the Parrot.

Best bit

(Image credit: Nintendo)

The new clothing items here are really strong. My favorite new addition equips Donkey Kong with a swinging Void Co employee badge – complete with an adorable picture of him and Pauline.

Thankfully, there is a much meatier progression system tied to your current employee rating, which increases with each successful run. Working your way up the ranks gives you the chance to return to other past maps (there are a total of six), puts new perks into rotation, and unlocks some cool Void Co outfits to wear.

Beyond messing around with the option to increase the difficulty of each Emerald Rush run, which raises the required quota to progress and removes some starting abilities, there’s really not much else to this DLC, and you’re going to have had your fill after just a few hours. The perks add plenty of variety, but many of the objectives in Emerald Rush are quite samey and mean that it gets stale before you’ve even managed to max out your employee level.

What’s here certainly isn’t terrible by any means and does successfully extend the game’s overall runtime, particularly if you want to unlock everything, but it’s not unreasonable to expect something more substantial at this price.

(Image credit: Nintendo)

Should I play Donkey Kong Bananza: DK Island & Emerald Rush?

Play it if…

Don’t play it if…

Accessibility

As an expansion, Donkey Kong Bananza: DK Island & Emerald Rush has the same suite of accessibility features as the base game. This means you can access an assist mode, which makes the game easier overall, in addition to the various difficulty options for each Emerald Rush run.

Camera controls can also be inverted, and your main actions can be customized using some presets. Subtitles are enabled by default.

How I reviewed Donkey Kong Bananza

I spent over three hours in the DK Island & Emerald Rush expansion using a Nintendo Switch 2 in handheld mode using the standard Joy-Con 2 controllers and the system’s built-in speakers.

Having written our Donkey Kong Bananza review, I compared my experience to that of the base game and carefully considered the value for money offered by this DLC compared to other Nintendo releases and various Nintendo Switch 2 games.

First reviewed September 2025

Donkey Kong Bananza (Nintendo Switch): Price Comparison



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Image for Mad-lad fans have revived The Crew after Ubisoft killed it: 'No one will ever be able to take this away from you now'
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Mad-lad fans have revived The Crew after Ubisoft killed it: ‘No one will ever be able to take this away from you now’

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I’ll be honest, I never really understood all the ardour for The Crew, but that’s no criticism. There are plenty of games (hello, Mafia 3) that I love to the absolute bafflement of my friends and loved ones, and I’d be very sad if they got taken away. So even if I don’t know what people see in The Crew, I certainly understand the upset at Ubisoft killing the servers and making the game unplayable last year.

One response to that bit of videogame vandalism was, of course, the Stop Killing Games campaign, but other fans took a different tack. The good folks at The Crew Unlimited have been beavering away at a fanmade revival of the game for over a year and a half: a server emulator with both offline and online modes—”Your local server, your local savegames, your game. No one will ever be able to take this away from you now.”

It’s out today, and will let you play the defunct CaRPG like Yves Guillemot never Old Yeller’d it. There is, of course, one issue: you need to already have a copy of The Crew for it to work. With the game scrubbed from history like Nikolai Yezhov, that’s easier said than done, though the project itself says on its Discord that “The truth is that, as long as you manage to run the game files, we have absolutely no way to tell a legit copy from a non-legit one, so we just have to let you in.” So whether you own The Crew legitimately or you’re some kind of criminal, it sounds like it’ll work.


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Don’t be a criminal though. I think I’m legally obligated to say you should not be a criminal. Not even if the crime is cool.

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Regardless, I suspect there aren’t many people out there who are A) desperate to play The Crew but B) don’t already have access to it. And if you do, running The Crew Unlimited is easy as pie. All you have to do is download the mod, run its launcher, point at your TheCrew.exe, then go hogwild living like it’s 2014 all over again. I hope publishers stop killing games some day, but for now, what is dead may never die.



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ASRock AI Quickset WSL
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ASRock’s revamped AI Quickset WSL virtualization tool makes it easy to run Linux AI apps on Windows

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ASRock released a special AI tool a few years back that gave users the ability to easily and quickly deploy AI applications on PCs with supported AMD or Intel GPUs. The board maker has announced its second iteration of the app, known as AI Quickset WSL, that further enhances the tool’s capabilities. Giving users an environment that can easily deploy AI apps made specifically for Linux on Windows machines without dealing with a complicated setup process.

The app takes advantage of Microsoft’s WSL virtual compatibility layer to achieve this. WSL is essentially a GUI-less virtual machine natively supported in the latest versions of Windows that allows users to run Linux apps in Windows through virtualization. AI Quickset WSL is built on AMD’s ROCm platform to provide all the necessary setup configuration to run Linux AI-based apps efficiently on AMD’s RX 7900 series GPUs or newer.


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'Trick 'r Treat' is Coming Back to Theaters Next Month
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‘Trick ‘r Treat’ is Coming Back to Theaters Next Month

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After finally hitting the big screen for everyone for the first time a few years ago, Trick r’ Treat will be back in theaters October 14 and 16.

According to a press release from Fathom Entertainment, the horror flick will get a 4K restoration and a little bonus in the form of a 4K restoration for director Mike Dougherty’s Season’s Greetings short. The 1996 video is an origin for the final film and will be part of a look back by Dougherty through several Halloween-specific memories that led to the creation of the film’s rule-breaking trick-or-treater, Sam.

“Horror fans have long been thirsting for Trick ‘r Treat to take its rightful place back on the big screen and in cinemas nationwide,” said Fathom’s Tom Lucas. “We’re thrilled to bring this classic horror film back in theaters in sparkling 4K with our partners just in time for Halloween. A stellar cast helps make Trick ‘r Treat a frightening cinematic experience fans will not want to miss!”

First shown at film festivals in 2007, Trick ‘r Treat has been a cult classic since it hit DVDs back in 2009. Its generally positive reception has led to some rumblings of Dougherty by a sequel, but the Hollywood strikes and his work on the Monsterverse movies have made progress on it slow. Until that day comes, rewatching the original is still a fine spooky season tradition—especially on the big screen.

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.



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USA Today Enters Its Gen AI Era With a Chatbot
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USA Today Enters Its Gen AI Era With a Chatbot

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The publishing company behind USA Today and 220 other publications is today rolling out a chatbot-like tool called DeeperDive that can converse with readers, summarize insights from its journalism, and suggest new content from across its sites.

“Visitors now have a trusted AI answer engine on our platform for anything they want to engage with, anything they want to ask,” Mike Reed, CEO of Gannett and the USA Today Network, said at the WIRED AI Power Summit in New York, an event that brought together voices from the tech industry, politics, and the world of media. “and it is performing really great.”

Most publishers have a fraught relationship with AI, as the chatbots that trained on their content are now summarizing it and eating the traffic that search engines used to send them.

Reed said that Google’s AI Overview feature has dramatically cut traffic to publishers across the industry. “We are watching the same movie as everyone else is watching,” Reed said ahead of today’s announcement. “We can see some risk in the future to any content distribution model that is based primarily on SEO optimization.”

Like other publishers, Gannett has signed some deals with AI companies, including Amazon and Perplexity, to license its content. The company actively blocks the web scrapers that crawl websites in order to steal content.

DeeperDive represents a bet that harnessing the same generative artificial intelligence technology could help publishers capture readers attention by engaging with them in new ways.

The tool replaces a conventional search box and automatically suggests questions that readers might want to ask. For example, today it offers as one prompt “How does Trump’s Fed policy affect the economy?”

DeeperDive generates a short answer to the query along with relevant stories from across the USA Today network. Reed says it is crucial that DeeperDive bases its output on factually correct information and does not draw from opinion pieces. “We only look at our real journalism,” he says.

The interface of DeeperDive on the homepage of USA Today

Photograph: USA Today

Reed adds that his company hopes that the tool will also reveal more about readers’ interests. “That can help us from a revenue standpoint,” he said.

DeeperDive was developed by the advertising company Taboola. Adam Singola, Taboola’s CEO, says his firm developed DeeperDive by fine-tuning several open source models.

Singola says DeeperDive benefits from data gathered from across its own network of more than 600 million daily readers across around 11,000 publishers. He says the tool “grounds every answer in articles retrieved from our publisher partners and requires sentence-level citations to those sources,” and will avoid generating an output if information from two sources seems to conflict.

Gannett’s CEO Reed said ahead of today’s event that, together with Taboola, his firm is interested in exploring agentic tools for readers’ shopping decisions. “Our audiences have a higher intent to purchase to begin with,” he says. “That’s really the next step here.”



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Product Reviews

Annual subscriptions are 50 percent off

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Sometimes, rising prices for streaming services feels as inevitable as death and taxes. So when a serious discount is available, we tend to sit up and take notice. For a few weeks, you can get a whopping half off an annual subscription to Paramount+. A year of the Paramount+ Essential plan, which is ad-supported, will cost $30 compared to the usual $60. Paramount+ Premium, which is ad-free except for live tv programming, will cost $60 for a year instead of $120.

Paramount+

Get half off plans for new and returning customers through September 18. 

$30 at Paramount+

This is a substantial deal that both new and returning subscribers can take advantage of; it’s not uncommon for this type of serious discount to only be offered to a first-timer. Anyone who signs up for a year-long subscription to Paramount+ from now through September 18 will be able to get this pricing. The only real caveat with this deal is that you have to pay for the full year in advance; month-to-month subscriptions will still cost the usual rate.

Paramount+ has some great programming options, particularly if you’re a fan of anything involving RuPaul. It’s also the home of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and Star Trek: Lower Decks, which are arguably the best modern additions to the sci-fi show’s canon, as well as the other past and present Star Trek series. The platform offers a solid lineup of sports as well. And if you opt to go for the Premium plan, you’ll also be granted access to Showtime titles such as Yellowjackets and the rebooted Dexter: Resurrection.

Check out our coverage of the best streaming deals for more discounts, and follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.





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