Author: Trent Meikle

You'll often catch me dreaming of a Wind Waker remake. Or sleeping. One of the two.

Anyone who’s played The Witness has probably cheated their way through a section or two. We won’t judge — anything coming out of Jonathan Blow’s mind automatically gets a pass. But if you’re using a PlayStation 5, there’s a simpler way: Game Help. It’s a collection of tips and tricks baked right into the console. It’s being expanded (and renamed) to ‘Community Game Help’ where it will crowdsource gamers’ gameplay. Would your ancestors be proud? Don’t fret, PlayStation won’t get hold of your abysmal Rocket League gameplay without your OK first. Community Game Help is an opt-in experience that will automatically record…

Read More

Dread it. Run from it. Google’s AI will arrive all the same. And now it’s here. The search giant has, perhaps unsurprisingly, retrofitted Google Search with artificially intelligent results, generating a summary of your search and essentially bypassing the traditional trove of links you’d normally find up top. Ads on the other hand… This isn’t exactly new. Google first announced what it calls the Search Generative Experience (SGE) in 2023 offering exactly what we’re describing — AI-powered Search results. The only difference? SGE is no longer an opt-in-only sort of deal. It’s more of a ‘if you want to keep…

Read More

Are you tired of companies stuffing AI into their products wherever possible? Well, would you mind suspending that weariness until the end of this article, please? We only ask because WhatsApp is doing exactly that: stuffing more AI into its messenger. That’s according to WABetaInfo, who reckons the beta for Android 2.24.7.13 update will come stocked with a new AI-powered image editor, allowing users to zhuzh up their images before sending them on their way. That’s quite a large addition — unless you’re already wielding something from Samsung’s 2024 AI-touting catalogue. And in less interesting news, WABetaInfo also made note of another feature…

Read More

Snapdragon in my pocket If you aren’t punting AI at every turn, can you even call yourself a successful company in 2024? We’re being hyperbolic, but we’re also… not. Artificial intelligence is turning up everywhere and Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 7+ Gen 3 SoC is living proof, with plans to infect the next wave of mid-rangers with 2023’s favourite buzzword. Following the flagship Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 revealed last year, the SD 7+ Gen 3 focuses on enhanced photography abilities, improved gaming and a wider net for AI model support. With onboard AI processing, it allows for speedier and more sophisticated…

Read More

Ever wondered why WhatsApp only lets users pin a single message per chat? Us too. Fortunately, it doesn’t matter much now. The Meta-owned messenger announced yesterday that it was refreshing the feature, finally allowing for more pins in a single chat. Three is the new magic number, according to Mark Zuckerberg and WhatsApp’s official Channels. If you’re still new to the idea of pinning messages, a feature that dropped near the end of 2023, it’s simple. Users can pin any message — regular text, images, polls — and have it appear at the top of the chat so that it…

Read More

If you haven’t heard the news, there’s a ‘new’ PS5 in town. The “Slim” as it’s known to everyone but Sony is landing on South Africa’s shelves in April — and the country’s local distributor is looking to shift some of the old stock to make room, ironically, for the slimmer console. It hasn’t said as much, but Koodoo’s mega PS5 sale, launched at midnight, was all the confirmation we needed. It’s worth remembering that the PS5 Slim doesn’t offer any sort of technical upgrade to the original PS5’s hardware. It’s purely a cosmetic upgrade — meaning if you can stomach…

Read More

It’s rare to be on the receiving end of a South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) headline without groaning out loud. This is one of those golden moments. It’s finally booting out some of the older content (or shuffling it around, at least) to make room for a new two-hour content slot on SABC 3 and filling it with shows from BBC Studios. That isn’t some eTV after-hours showing you might remember from your youth. We’re talking about real television from the UK’s own British Broadcasting Commission — you know, the folks that got the original The Office greenlit along with the…

Read More

When Elon Musk let his five-year-old design a real-life car, he made it bulletproof. We all laughed as it barely managed to stop a steel ball from cracking a window. It would hardly be any use against Mike three-quarters of a kilometre away holding an M40A1 sniper rifle. But the idea was sound, especially in places where crime is rampant. We may not have a Cybertruck to look foolish in, but we do have Armoured Mobility. Armoured Mobility is a South African outlet “specialising in the production, retail, and leasing of bulletproof vehicles.” It’s essentially made a name for itself…

Read More

Someone at Defy had to throw away one too many steaks when their freezer defrosted, or maybe it’s just a coincidence that the company recently launched a series of ‘Solar Off-Grid’ fridges and chest freezers which it hopes will alleviate some of the pressures of load shedding – and keep those steaks in the freezer safe. The idea is a simple one, strap a couple of solar panels to a new fridge/freezer, hook up a battery and boom: it’s off the grid. As convenient as that sounds, customers looking to pick up one of the new units are only paying…

Read More

Picking up a new smartphone is easy. There are the obvious hits from Samsung or Apple, but look deeper, and you’ll find a sea of Asian brands all vying for your attention. Oppo is one of those brands, whose Reno series you might remember passing through Stuff’s offices a while back. They aren’t all R20,000 or more, though. Occasionally, it’ll dip its toes into the realm of ‘mid-range’, producing something spectacular for R12,000 (or less if you know what you’re doing) — like the Oppo A79 5G. Is this iPhone? Uh, no. The A79 might have the conventional good looks…

Read More