This week’s Week in Geek is all about looking ahead. We look forward to a new iPhone launch or gameplay footage from the latest Resident Evil.
It is also to talk about the future. This will be my final Week in Geek column as I leave the store to find out what’s next. We don’t talk much about departures at , and my colleague and certified Nicest Man in Tech, Alex Walker-Todd, also left to break new ground this week, but I wanted to take a quick look at the column dedicated to one of my favorite parts of the job, to mention the incredibly talented team of writers and editors I’m leaving behind.
Stay healthy, do a good job and keep in touch.
iSpy
Three things in life are certain: death, taxes, and the countdown to a new iPhone each year. This year is no different, and we now know when we’ll be peeking at the iPhone 11.
The splash tells consumers “only through innovation,” along with a rainbow-colored, older-style Apple logo. It has plenty of firsts: iOS 13 will run on iPhone 11 devices right away, bringing a host of new Apple services for those willing to splurge the cash. Consider the rumored triple camera setup on the back, another first for the Fruit phone.
What else? The biggest battery yet, the all-new A13 chipset, will power everything and, not for the first time, Apple probably won’t be releasing 5G with any of this year’s phones.
This year, Apple is taking a bigger risk than usual.
Smartphone sales, particularly for flagships like Apple’s iPhone, have slumped, and trade-offs between America’s Sentient Wotsit-in-Chief and the Chinese government could see Apple’s flagship priced up or even pulled from sales in the region altogether . It’s hard to say what impact this will have because it’s ongoing and it’s an unpredictable time for the industry since China is such a big part of the mobile phone industry.
To cover up the potential for weak sales on the device, Apple is hoping services like Apple TV Plus, Apple Arcade, and even the Apple Card can cheer things up a bit.
So there’s a reason to watch the September 10 live event for many reasons, as it could end up being a successful reinvention for Apple or another herald that even the coolest brands in tech can go through a rough patch .
residential
Capcom is bringing a new Resident Evil game to the masses and will be showing it off in September.
That’s great news, especially as it’s rumored to be a multiplayer-focused title that shares DNA with predating Resident Evil Outbreak, the multiplayer survival ’em-up that launched on PS2 in 2003 and suffered from that console shortage a large online player base.
The title, currently nicknamed Project Resistance, will be shown during Tokyo Games Week and will be broadcast live on September 9th at 3pm on Blighty.
A multiplayer iteration of Resident Evil could be great if it includes some of the tense moments that caused drama in Outbreak: While later Resident Evil titles featured fairly generic looting-and-shooting co-op play, Outbreak often had characters that their own survival adventures played and interacted with each other in odd ways as they stalked around, locking doors to give players time to escape, or sharing healing items.
The game created drama by forcing the players together. For every hard-working helper, there was a survivor who would betray you for their own reasons, or even for the basest reason of all, theirs
Expect this one to be huge on Twitch when similar horror multiplayer efforts like Dead By Daylight come around.
Get steamy
Back in April, the EU claimed it intended to target publishers for blocking download codes originating from non-native regions across Europe and named six publishers it would try to resolve issues with.
Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and Zenimax intend to settle, according to Reuters. Meanwhile, Steam owners Valve have announced plans to fight the charges head-on, and have requested a closed hearing to bring their case before the European Commission and national bodies.
That’s huge. Valve has yet to comment publicly outside of the Reuters report, but said in April that regional blocking in Europe was disabled back in 2015 and that only 3% of all games were affected by regional blocking.
It’s a complicated scenario. I remember using a VPN at university to set my region to Mexico so I could buy Titanfall for a few pounds instead of being £40 on EA’s Origin store. That was a bad move, and I’ve felt awful a few times since because, if you’ll excuse the language, I took the p**s.
Economic inequality around the world is often at the root of regional pricing, and it seems fair that companies should be able to take steps to prevent the wealthier regions of the world from benefiting. Finally, the alternative would be for the company to raise prices to something comparable to £40 everywhere, which will hit those hardest.
“In a true Digital Single Market, European consumers should have the right to buy and play the video games of their choice, regardless of where they live in the EU,” said EU Competition Policy Commissioner Margrethe Vestager in April this year.
“Consumers should not be prevented from browsing between Member States to find the best deal available.”
But when you consider that the average salary in the UK is £28,677 and in Poland at the much less affordable £8,500, a game that costs £40 anywhere is a completely different value proposition for a player from Poland than it is for someone from UK . Hence regional pricing – which is good.
Not that that matters. As we look to the future, it’s likely that our own silly political bobbleheads will see us out of the EU on October 31 – deal or no deal – so it’s unlikely to set a precedent like UK players in the new future interact with codes through the EU.