An upcoming patch for Battlefield 2042 will introduce hundreds of bug fixes and quality of life improvements to the ailing multiplayer shooter and it's expected to roll out on April 18.
Dice community manager Kevin Johnson announced update 4.0 on Twitter , outlining several of the key changes we can expect (thanks, Eurogamer ). The patch will include over 400 bug fixes, which is a sizeable amount and not far off Battlefield 2042 ’s concurrent player count , which dropped to a paltry 832 on April 13.
Attachments are being overhauled to make them feel more unique, allowing them to better impact your loadout choice and gunplay. Playable Specialists Rao and Paik will also have their traits updated, and some fixes will be made to Sundance’s grenade belt to improve their close-quarters, anti-armor targeting.
XP rewards for support actions and squad-play will be rebalanced to encourage greater teamwork, and Ribbons – BF 2042’s in-match rewards – have been tweaked so they’re easier to unlock in some modes, such as Rush.
Balance tweaks are also being applied to Vehicular Warfare to improve the dynamics between infantry and vehicles. Aim bugs that occur when exiting a vehicle or reviving near obstacles will also be fixed.
Johnson says this “merely scratches the surface of Update 4.0 in Battlefield 2042” and the team appreciates “the patience afforded to us with getting this update out there”.
Damage control
For many Battlefield 2042 players, that patience looks to be wearing thin. The multiplayer shooter has seen an exodus of players since it launched late last year, as fans of the franchise remain disappointed by its persistent bugs and glitches. The slow rollout of additional content – such as voice chat and its delayed first season of DLC – has pushed more players from the game.
The updates that have been implemented so far haven’t been particularly well-received by the community. A batch of recent map tweaks were welcomed as a step in the right direction but weren't substantial enough to win over disappointed fans.
Battlefield 2042 recently dropped below 1,000 concurrent players on Steam , marking a new low for the multiplayer shooter.
Those who have stuck with the game will be eager to see whether the 400+ fixes in this upcoming update substantially improve it, or paper over the cracks.
These powerful MagSafe mounts help turn your iPhone into a GoPro
One of the big appeals of GoPros has always been the versatility of their mounting options, but some new iPhone MagSafe accessories have landed to bring some of that flexibility to your iOS smartphone.
The accessory maker Moment made some of the first MagSafe tripod mounts for the iPhone 12, back at the dawn of Apple's magnetic system. But now the company has made its most powerful add-ons yet, which include extra-strong magnets to keep your iPhone secure.
Like GoPro's Mod accessories, in particular its Media Mod, the Moment Mobile Filmmaker Cage ($99, or around £75 / AU$135) is designed to help you add various accessories – including microphones and lights – to your iPhone, while bringing extra stability to complement Apple's already impressive image stabilization.
It's the first video cage with MagSafe compatibility (which is built into the iPhone 12 and iPhone 13 series) and comes with a proprietary magnet array called (M)Force that's apparently significantly stronger than the standard MagSafe connection.
Alongside two cold-shoe mounts for your mics or lights, the Cage is studded with 1/4-inch mounts (28 of them in total), so you can mount it on mini tripods in various ways. There are also four 3/8-inch threads that are compatible with accessories like Arca Swiss tripod plates.
With the ability to stand flat on a surface without a tripod and built-in cable management, it looks like the ideal MagSafe accessory for vloggers and YouTubers – particularly if you already have some of Moment's lenses and filters, and don't have the budget for a dedicated setup from the likes of GoPro or Sony.
Joining the Filmmaker Cage are a couple of other new MagSafe mounts – the Strap Anywhere Mount ($39, around £30 / AU$55) and Stick-on Adapter ($9.99, around £8 / AU$13). The latter is a 3M sticker accessory that makes any iPhone compatible with Moment's (M)Force mounts, even if you don't get wireless MagSafe charging.
And the Strap Anywhere is much like GoPro's Tube Mount, letting you add a magnetic phone mount to fitness equipment like Peloton bikes, ellipticals or pretty much any tube-shaped surface. It looks particularly handy for more casual filmmaking or an easy way to FaceTime while you're mid-workout.
Analysis: The mobile filmmaking wars heat up
The latest iPhones are already powerful filmmaking tools, but MagSafe accessories like these from Moment are improving their versatility – even pushing them towards being a rival to GoPro, albeit with slightly more fragility.
The Filmmaker Cage in particular looks like a particularly useful accessory for capturing B-roll footage, or turning your iPhone into a main camera for vlogging or YouTubing. The MagSafe component is more about usability and convenience than improving your videos, but if it makes you take shoot more movies that that's a good thing. If you don't trust the magnets, it's also compatible with traditional phone clamps thanks to its 1/4-inch threads.
Moment's other MagSafe mounts also make it easier to attach your iPhone to objects for more interesting compositions and angles that you'd otherwise get from nervously holding a slippery rectangle.
So while iPhones have arguably slipped behind rivals like the Sony Xperia 1 III when it comes to pro-friendly filmmaking features, accessories like these do boost its appeal for videographers, particularly when you combine them with some of Moment's lenses.
With the iPhone 14 now strongly rumored to be arriving with a 48MP for 8K video later this year, it seems the smartphone battle against the b est vlogging cameras from the likes of GoPro, DJI and Sony is going to heat up later this year.
New Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 and 4090 leaks are bad news for our energy bills
New leaks for the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 and 4090, the next generation of GPUs from Team Green using the Lovelace architecture, have emerged, and suggest these high-end graphics cards could have some worrying power demands.
As Igor’s Lab reveals , a picture of the supposed PCB (Printed Circuit Board) of the AD102 GPU these cards will be using has emerged, and it looks like these new cards could have a TDP (Thermal Design Power) of up to 600W.
That’s a huge amount of power, and dwarfs the 350W maximum TDP the RTX 3090 – once considered a very power-hungry card itself – requires.
Analysis: High power consumption = bad news
The Nvidia RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 will be cards aimed at enthusiasts, where performance is the most important aspect and power consumption and price don’t matter as much. But if these upcoming GPUs really do require upwards of 600W to run, then that’s going to have big implications for many people.
The obvious issue is that the more power they need to run, the more expensive they could be in the long run. Not only will there likely be a high upfront cost, but with our ever-increasing energy bills, running a power-hungry PC could have a noticeable financial impact, and one that many people may have to consider when weighing up whether or not to upgrade.
Power-hungry components also traditionally get very hot when in use as well, and that means these new GPUs will need to have hefty cooling solutions to keep them from overheating. This means you’ll likely need a large PC case, as the coolers could take up a fair bit of room – and you’ll want to ensure there’s plenty of airflow.
This could also mean that PC gamers may need to replace their PSU (Power Supply Unit) as well, as anything under 1000W probably won’t be able to power these GPUs and the rest of the PC. Replacing a PSU is an expensive and time-consuming upgrade.
This all means that if this leak is correct, then the RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 will need to be seriously impressive upgrades to justify the price and inconvenience of upgrading. Worryingly, the new leak from Igor’s lab suggests that the 12 solder slots of GDDR6X memory will mean the RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 will have 12GB and 24GB configurations, the same as the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3090 .
While the amount of memory – and the type it is – isn’t the be-all and end-all when it comes to GPU performance, it certainly plays an important part. And again, if this is correct, it could mean people will be disappointed with the minimal upgrade in specs.
Via PC Gamer