Sony’s ‘Let’s Play’ Trademark Application Denied
Sony Computer Entertainment has been denied the right to trademark "Let's Play" by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Though the application was filed in late October, the filing only surfaced last week after being discovered on Justia by a NeoGAF user.
USPTO refused the application on grounds of "likelihood of confusion," as there is a similar mark already trademarked. The official notice of rejection outlines the similarities between the already trademarked service—LP Let'z Play—and Sony's proposed trademark.
Daily Deals: The Best Xbox One Hard Drive, $20 VR Headset, BB-8 is Back
Our Favorite Xbox One External Hard Drive is $22 a Terabyte Right Now
The Western Digital MyBook is the best Xbox One hard drive you can get. It'll give you a ton of space, and actually speed up the load times of your games. You can snag a 5TB model for $110 right now. It's normally $145.
USA’s Colony is This Week’s TV Highlight
Midseason premieres and returns continue this week as Freeform (formerly ABC Family) debuts Shadowhunters, Showtime goes big with Billions, TV Land premieres Teachers, TBS dips into the Naked Gun well with Angie Tribeca, and iZombie returns.
The TV highlight his week however goes to USA's Colony - a new sci-fi show from The Strain/Lost's Cartlon Cuse that's lighter on "sci-fi" and higher on paranoia and relevant, real world themes of politics and occupying colonial forces. Lost's Josh Holloway and The Walking Dead's Sarah Wayne Callies play a young couple whose lives and family, like so many others, have been ripped apart after a mysterious alien force conquers and divides Los Angeles, separating many from their loved ones.
iOS 9.3 Wants to Improve Your Sleep Patterns With ‘Night Shift’
Apple has promised a new feature for iOS 9.3, called "Night Shift," with the intention to make its devices easier on your sleep cycle.
When activated, Night Shift "automatically shifts the colors in your display to the warmer end of the spectrum" at nighttime. This is in response to several studies which indicate that cooler colors like blue can adversely affect a person's sleep cycle.
The feature will then adjust the colors back to normal in the morning. Both functions will require access to your device's clock and geolocation to function properly. The latter of which should, ideally, account for those that frequently travel between time zones.
CES 2016: Expectations vs Reality
There was a lot of hype for the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show and now that it's over, we can take a look back and see what predictions we got right and wrong. With a show so vast, it’s hard to really see technology trends on the show floor until you take a step back. Let’s get right into it.
I expected there to be a lot of VR at the show and indeed there was. Just about every company was trying to dip their toes into the hot new entertainment and computing platform. Big players like Oculus and HTC were there showing off their best games and technology demos. Oculus is the first company to name a release date and price for its high-end virtual reality headset, the Oculus Rift.
New Witcher 3 Patch Fixes Tons of Issues
Patch 1.12 for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is now available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. This latest update provides fixes for numerous issues related to the Hearts of Stone expansion, gameplay, UI, quests, and more.
A handful of notable changes can be seen below, while the full list can be found here, courtesy of CD Projekt Red.
- Introduces a number of improvements to general game performance.
- Introduces a series of minor difficulty balance tweaks at all difficulty levels in Hearts of Stone expansion.
A Virus is the Monster in The CW’s Containment
The CW's intense new series, Containment - premiering midseason (TBA) - takes a hard look at what would happen if a viral outbreak occurred in a major U.S. city. How families, friends, loved ones, separated inside and outside the quarantine, would all deal, how their lives how everyone’s lives would change after what feels like a potentially very real catastrophe.
Created by Vampire Diaries and Originals EP Julie Plec, and based on the Belgian series Cordon, Containment is designed to be a a horror show "where the monster is a virus," Plec said when she, along with the cast and executive producers Matt Corman and Chris Ord, appeared at the TCA Winter Press Tour to chat about the show with TV critics. And to discuss the legitimacy of the procedures depicted in this nail-biter of a series.
Netflix Has Codes To Find Specific Genres
The Internet has recently re-discovered that Netflix has a series of special codes that are synced to super-specific entertainment categories in the streaming service's interface.
Netflix is already pretty good at gauging what you might like, but if you share an account, the results aren't always perfect. So for all you sci-fi, fantasy, and comic book lovers out there, GeekTyrant have compiled a list of codes for you to take back your main page.
The list follows:
- Martial Arts Movies: 8985
- Comic Book and Superhero Movies: 10118
Arrow and The Flash Are All About Their Big Bads When They Return
After Arrow and The Flash helped launch the new CW series DC's Legends of Tomorrow during the first half of each show's seasons, both series will refocus their storylines on their respective central villains once Legends premieres on January 21st.
For Arrow, that means the series is going to double down on Oliver Queen's (Stephen Amell) quest to take down Damien Darhk (Neal McDonough). Showrunner Marc Guggenheim said fans can expect to be surprised by a twist coming up with the season's Big Bad.
"The back half of the season, we're pretty much following the same structure that we have in seasons past where obviously the Big Bad gears up. That said, we're going to throw a hard six in episode 15 that I think will surprise people," he told IGN while promoting Legends of Tomorrow at the Television Critics Association winter press tour. "We're going to do something that's never been done before on Arrow with the Big Bad. 15 is a real game-changer episode for us."
Oxenfree Partners with Walking Dead Creator for Film, More
Night School Studio, the developer of upcoming indie thriller Oxenfree, announced a partnership with Robert Kirkman's Skybound Entertainment today.
Skybound will be partnering with the studio to bring Oxenfree to new mediums, including film, a web-based documentary series and merchandise.
In addition to that, Skybound has also produced a making-of web series called "The Story of Oxenfree." The first episode, covering the story of the game, is live today on Skybound's channel, with the rest publishing once a day leading up to Oxenfree's release on Jan. 15.
Skybound has worked on several projects in the past for indie games, including a making-of series for VR game Gone and several videos for card game Superfight.