Light Start: Fall Guys Mobile, Blackberry is back, Moto Razr 5G leaks, and Microsoft backs Epic

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Fall Guys coming to mobile in China

The new game that’s taken the internet by storm, Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is currently only available on console and PC, but from the get-go, it has been clear that it might make a great mobile port. Until now, there hasn’t been much talk about adapting the game for mobile, until now. It looks like the game is coming to smartphones, but only in China. 

According to Gamespot, a Chinese company called Bilibili has licenced the rights to a mobile version of Fall Guys. This was revealed by Daniel Ahmad, an industry analyst on Twitter this weekend. “Chinese games and entertainment company Bilibili has secured the rights to publish a mobile version of Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout in China. The game released for PC and PS4 on August 4, 2020 and has become a viral hit,” Ahmad says on Twitter. It’s important to note that any results found on the Google Play Store or the iOS Store when searching for Fall Guys aren’t legit. The official Fall Guys Twitter account pointed this out last week, to make sure there isn’t any confusion. 

What about the rest of the world though? Well, this is just the first step in getting the game on mobile, and it could mean that Fall Guys will come to mobile devices across the world sometime in future. 

Source: Gamespot[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

BlackBerry is back, back again

It’s nice to reminisce about the good ole days when BlackBerries dominated the mobile market for a few years. Unfortunately, the iPhone 4 and all the touch display smartphones that followed, just put the final nail in the coffin for physical keyboards, but BlackBerry is still convinced the physical keyboard has a place in society. 

BlackBerry is making a comeback in 2021 (not that it ever left tbh), and this time it’s backing up the keyboard with 5G connectivity and Android. Interestingly, though, BlackBerry won’t’ be making the phones. “Instead the company has licensed the manufacturing rights to Texas-based OnwardMobility. The startup will also collaborate with Foxconn subsidiary FIH Mobile, which will help design and manufacture the device,” TNW reports. Other than that, we don’t know much about the devices, which specs to expect or even how much they may cost. But we’re keen to see how Blackberry reinvents itself again. This will be the… third or fourth time? We stopped counting somewhere when BlackBerry started using Android as an OS. 

But come 2021, and we’ll see whether BlackBerry and OnwardMobility can blow our socks off and bring a proper physical keyboard-donning device to users across the globe. We doubt it will, but we’re staying optimistic. 

Source: TNW[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

The next Motorola Razr has leaked

Flip-phone lovers around the world crawled out of their caves and lined up to see the reinvented Motorolla Razr last year. Nostalgia fuelled sales for this mediocre handset featuring a foldable display, priced way too high to justify it. But now it looks like Motorolla (or, well, Lenovo) has another Razr up its sleeves, and we’re keen to see it materialise. 

There hasn’t been an official announcement yet, though, but a few leaks later and we have a decent idea of what the new Razr will look like. This weekend, good old Evan Blass (the serial leaker of things) tweeted a gif featuring a clear 360-degree render of the unannounced Motorola Razr. The most noticeable feature is that it looks very similar to last year’s Razr — the only other defining feature being a 5G label on the device. That’s how we know it’s a new phone in 2020 or 2021 — it has 5G. How original. It features mostly the same form factor from the previous device, with a similar-looking hinge and size. We can just hope that this time, the hinge works better and that overall quality is on-par with the excessive price. 

The screen looks bigger, which is in line with a tweet by industry insider Ross Young, who said that Motorola is increasing screen size for its next Razr from 6.2in to 6.7in. This means it may look closer to the size of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip. We’ll have to wait and see when the device officially launches. 

Source: Gizmodo[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Microsoft backs Epic against Apple

The Apple vs Epic debacle is turning out to instigate a full-fledged cold war within the silicon valley society, with some corporates backing the Apple side, and some other corporates and small businesses backing the Epic army. If you’re not in-the-loop, Epic Games (the people behind Fortnite) is suing Apple for not allowing them to allow payments directly through its own system, bypassing the 30% ‘Apple Tax’ that goes towards the App Store/Apple. 

Now (probably the biggest corporate of ‘em all) Microsoft has filed a statement “in support of Epic’s request to keep access to the Apple SDK for its Unreal Engine.” According to Microsoft, it’s imperative that Epic and Unreal engine continues to have access to Apple developer tools as it is “the right thing for gamer developers & gamers”. The statement was made public after Phil Spencer, the Head of Xbox shared the filing on Twitter. It’s a document put together by which was a declaration by Kevin Gammill, the general manager of gaming developer experiences for Microsoft, where he details how harmful this potential move by Apple could be for Microsoft and the gaming industry as a whole. He continues by describing how Epic Games’ Unreal Engine is “critical technology for numerous game creators including Microsoft.” Which is a fair point. Unreal Engine is in the top two of most widely used game developing engines in the world, used not only by indie developers but even for large-scale AAA games. 

We’re not sure whether Apple really considered the implications for its own ecosystem, nevermind other developers. Apple is building out its Apple Arcade game subscription service, so continuing the ban could even minimise the number of games that can run on that system. This is a developing story, so stay tuned. 

Source: IGN[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]