Ars Technica - Opposable Thumbs

This site posted every face from Parler’s Capitol Hill insurrection videos

Sat, 23 Jan 2021 11:40:51 GMT

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Wired)

When hackers exploited a bug in Parler to download all of the right-wing social media platform's contents last week, they were surprised to find that many of the pictures and videos contained geolocation metadata revealing exactly how many of the site's users had taken part in the invasion of the US Capitol building just days before. But the videos uploaded to Parler also contain an equally sensitive bounty of data sitting in plain sight: thousands of images of unmasked faces, many of whom participated in the Capitol riot. Now one website has done the work of cataloging and publishing every one of those faces in a single, easy-to-browse lineup.

Late last week, a website called Faces of the Riot appeared online, showing nothing but a vast grid of more than 6,000 images of faces, each one tagged only with a string of characters associated with the Parler video in which it appeared. The site's creator tells WIRED that he used simple open source machine learning and facial recognition software to detect, extract, and deduplicate every face from the 827 videos that were posted to Parler from inside and outside the Capitol building on January 6, the day when radicalized Trump supporters stormed the building in a riot that resulted in five people's deaths. The creator of Faces of the Riot says his goal is to allow anyone to easily sort through the faces pulled from those videos to identify someone they may know or recognize who took part in the mob, or even to reference the collected faces against FBI wanted posters and send a tip to law enforcement if they spot someone.

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Blizzard absorbs acclaimed Activision studio as a dedicated "support” team [Updated]

Fri, 22 Jan 2021 21:33:04 GMT

Enlarge (credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

The corporate behemoth organism that is Blizzard Entertainment, which exists in a symbiotic state next to megaton game publisher Activision, became bigger on Friday with a surprise announcement: It has absorbed a game studio within the Activision family, effective immediately.

Vicarious Visions, a longtime game studio that was acquired by Activision in 2005, has been shuffled out of the Activision ecosystem and pumped directly into Blizzard's veins. In a statement offered to GamesIndustry.biz, Blizzard confirmed that the 200+ staff at Vicarious Vision has been shifted to a "long-term support" team focused entirely on "existing Blizzard games and initiatives." The news also includes a mild shuffle of leadership, sending current Vicarious studio head Jen Oneal to the Blizzard leadership board as executive vice president of development.

The statement did not clarify exactly when this arrangement began, nor which of Blizzard's "existing" projects would receive Vicarious staff support in particular. (Blizzard representatives did not immediately respond to Ars Technica's questions about the deal.) As of press time, neither Blizzard nor Vicarious have published details or terms about the deal on their respective blogs or social media channels. In fact, Vicarious Visions' website is currently offline altogether.

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Xbox Live price increase sets a new $10/month floor for online access

Fri, 22 Jan 2021 16:39:04 GMT

Xbox users will soon have to pay at least $10/month for the baseline Xbox Live Gold subscription needed for online play on Xbox consoles. That's a significant increase from the recent floor of $5/month for an annual subscription.

The new pricing, as Microsoft unveiled this morning is as follows (or a "local market equivalent" outside the US):

One month: $11/month (previously $10/month)
Three months: $30, $10/month (Previously $25, $8.33/month)
Six months: $60, $10/month (Previously $40, $6.67/month)

A 12-month, $60 subscription plan was officially removed from Microsoft's online store last July, but annual digital subscriptions at that $5/month rate are still currently available from a variety of retail partners. It's unclear if those offerings will continue, but a new annual subscription option was not mentioned in Microsoft's announcement this morning. Microsoft does note that current 6-month and 12-month subscribers will be able to "renew at the current price" for the time being, though (current members will receive email notices about the new prices, and the new rates won't apply to them for at least 45 days).

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Resident Evil VIII gets May release date, massive preview, playable demo

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 23:11:30 GMT

We're suckers for classic leading women in giant hats. Unclear amounts of evil are just a bonus. Welcome to the new face of fear in Resident Evil VIII, coming May 7 to PC and consoles. [credit: Capcom ]

After receiving vague teases through last year, Resident Evil VIII: Village has finally emerged looking like a real game, thanks to a sweeping new gameplay reveal video that went live on Thursday. Its immediate resemblance to Resident Evil VII, which we granted a rare Ars Approved award to in 2017, has us quite excited—though things have clearly advanced for the series in four years.

First off, we now have confirmation that this sequel once again puts RE players into a first-person perspective and that it follows the direct chronology of RE7. The footage we've seen puts players in the shoes of Ethan Winters, RE7's protagonist, who is forced, once again, to find and explore a creepy mansion—though this one is far more palatial than the bayou-adjacent dump he previously explored. While searching for a missing family member, Ethan must contend with a new "family" of sorts: a mysterious, tall, and gorgeously attired matriarch, and her shapeshifting accomplices who seem to turn into waves of locusts and bleed through walls.

Though RE8's YouTube reveal is capped at 30 fps as of press time, Capcom sent us footage of the game running at 60 fps—presumably on PlayStation 5, the console that was shouted most loudly through the gameplay reveal presentation. RE8 will launch on May 7 on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC. All platforms will eventually receive a free-download version of its playable demo, named "Maiden," but only PlayStation 5 owners have gotten a release date for said demo: Today.

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GamersNexus’ Steve Burke overclocks his YouTube channel’s best comments

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 16:15:04 GMT

Produced by Adam Lance Garcia, edited by Richard Trammell. Click here for transcript. (video link)

GamersNexus has been a staple of our RSS feeds for more than a decade. The site has quickly become a must-read for anyone looking to build a PC, especially a gaming PC. And in addition to running that enterprise, Editor-in-Chief Steve Burke has more recently become a staple of our weekly viewing, too, as he helms GamersNexus' equally popular YouTube channel.

It doesn't take a lot of time to realize thatGamersNexus clearly shares a lot of DNA with the Orbital HQ. In every video, Burke and his team both inform and entertain, skimping neither on technical jargon nor opportunities to create useful Reddit memes. By now, GamersNexus videos have focused on everything from putting PCs from Walmart through genuine technical paces to emptying (literally, emptying) a tube of thermal paste on a poor CPU. You'll learn useful info every time, even if it's what new parts not to covet.

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QAnon in crisis as day of reckoning fails to materialize

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 15:12:59 GMT

Enlarge / A demonstrator holds a "Q" sign outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. (credit: Bloomberg | Getty Images)

QAnon adherents called it “the storm.” At midday on Wednesday, there were supposed to be blackouts across the US, military tribunals led by Donald Trump, and the mass execution of Democrats in the streets.

It did not happen. Instead, Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th US president and the day of reckoning anticipated by the pro-Trump conspiracy cult failed to materialize, dismaying the faithful.

“QAnon believers invested all their remaining hopes in false beliefs that Trump would take action validating their theories before or during inauguration,” said Jared Holt, a research fellow focused on extremism at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab. “For some followers, watching Biden and [Vice President Kamala] Harris sworn into office was a breaking point in their beliefs.”

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Report: Apple’s VR headset will be a pricey, high-end niche standalone

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 15:08:47 GMT

Any excuse to show former Ars UK reporter Seb Anthony excited about a VR headset is a good one. (credit: Sebastian Anthony)

The last time we heard any details about Apple's long-rumored plans in the virtual/augmented reality space, the company was implementing a two-year internal delay from a previously planned 2020 launch. Today, Bloomberg cites "people with knowledge of the matter" in reporting some new supposed details for the standalone Apple VR headset, which Bloomberg suggests could launch in 2022 as a precursor to a more mass-market AR headset.

From a tech design perspective, the most notable detail in the report is that Apple's latest VR prototypes have "removed the space VR gadgets usually reserve for users who need to wear eyeglasses." That could help avoid some of the "ski goggle" bulk usually associated with the "eyebox" on most current headsets. For users with poor eyesight, the prototype apparently utilizes "custom prescription lenses" in the headset itself, according to Bloomberg's unnamed sources.

Bloomberg also reports that the Apple headset prototype currently sports a fabric exterior to reduce weight (shades of Google's defunct Daydream VR there) and a fan to help cool internal processors that reportedly "beat the performance of Apple’s M1 Mac processors." Some prototypes also reportedly including built-in hand-tracking and the ability to type on a virtual keyboard through a custom-built OS.

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Twitch’s Trump ban sustained after leaving office

Wed, 20 Jan 2021 22:10:04 GMT

Enlarge / Photo illustration of the Twitch logo on a smartphone. (credit: Getty Images | Thomas Trutschel)

On Wednesday, an automated alert about Twitch account bans included a somewhat surprising account name: "@DonaldTrump." The surprise came because Twitch had already "indefinitely suspended" the former president's official Twitch channel on January 7 in the wake of his January 6 speech inciting a seditious riot at the US Capitol.

Following this Wednesday alert, Twitch confirmed to Ars Technica that this was no accident: Trump's account is indeed outright banned. Twitch continues to call the ban an "indefinite suspension," but it has not offered any timeline for its return or steps that its account holders (either Trump himself or any representatives) may take to reverse the decision. Wednesday's news lines up with a Tuesday claim by DW News reporter Dana Regev, who had hinted at Twitch waiting until after President Joe Biden's inauguration to make a firmer ruling on the previous ban.

The service took the rare step of outlining the exact reason for the ban, a courtesy generally not reserved to those affected. This lack of clarity emerged in particular when Twitch offered no explanation for banning Guy "DrDisrespect" Beahm in the wake of spreading COVID-19 misinformation.

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PC fan port of early Sonic games lets you zoom the camera way, way back

Wed, 20 Jan 2021 20:49:21 GMT

The intertwining paths of Chemical Plant Zone are a thing of beauty at this scale.

A group of coders has decompiled the source code for Sonic the Hedgehog and its 1992 sequel from their well-regarded 2013 smartphone ports. That means these heavily enhanced versions of the early '90s Genesis games—developed by Christian Whitehead using the same revamped Retro/Star Engine that powers Sonic Mania—can now be easily recompiled for play on new platforms including the PlayStation Vita, the Nintendo Switch, and Windows/Mac computers.

That's an interesting enough hacking/coding achievement on its own. But with a little tinkering, the PC versions also let players scale the game window to any arbitrary resolution, expanding the visible playfield without scaling up the games' core pixel graphics. As you can see in the pictures and videos included in this article, this tweak effectively zooms out the standard in-game camera to show huge chunks of a stage at once, giving players an exciting new perspective on these classic titles.

But how?

Scaled up to 4096x2160, you can see a lot more of Sonic 2 at once. Be sure to extend to full screen for maximum impact.

Filling your PC screen with a playable Sonic map isn't exactly as simple as dragging the corner of the gameplay window. First, you have to take a legally obtained copy of one of the 2013 Sonic games (which are still available on Google Play and the iOS App Store) and extract the "RSDK" file to your computer (this handy video tutorial can be of assistance there). From there, you can run the pre-compiled Windows release and edit the settings file to extend the playfield horizontally with relative ease (you can also edit the pixel scale if you want to effectively zoom the game's camera back in on a large monitor)

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What psychology of mass mobilization can tell us about the Capitol riot

Tue, 19 Jan 2021 19:04:27 GMT

Enlarge / Trump supporters near the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. The rioters stormed the historic building, breaking windows and clashing with police. (Photo by Shay Horse/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

It's a dark moment in American history that will not be soon forgotten. On January 6, thousands of supporters of soon-to-be-former President Donald Trump gathered for a "Stop the Steal" rally in Washington, DC, to protest the certification of the 2020 election results by Congress. Speaker after speaker pumped up the angry crowd by repeating false claims of widespread election fraud, culminating with an address by Trump himself, in which he called on his followers to "fight like hell" and march on the US Capitol. The result: frenzied rioters overran Capitol Police, smashing windows and triumphantly posing for selfies as they roamed through the evacuated building. By the time the National Guard regained control, five people were dead, including a Capitol Police officer.

As people struggled to process the horror in the immediate aftermath, Michael Bang Petersen, a Danish political scientist at Aarhus University, weighed in on Twitter with some counter-intuitive commentary. While the predominant theme among many pundits centered on the role of Trump and his enablers spreading lies about widespread voter fraud and then whipping the crowd into a frenzy during that morning's rally, Petersen suggested that perhaps they had it backward. "Did protestors storm Congress because they followed Trump and believed his misinformation about the US election? No," he tweeted. "They followed Trump and believed in misinformation because they wanted to storm Congress."

Petersen's background is in evolutionary psychology, and his research focuses on how the adaptive challenges of human evolutionary history shape the way modern citizens think about mass politics. Back in October, Petersen published a review paper in the journal Current Opinion in Psychology, making the case for his thesis that "mass mobilization"—like we saw with the Trumpian insurrectionists storming the nation's Capitol—is not the direct result of manipulation by misinformation/wild conspiracy theories spread by a dominant leader. Rather, the paper said, those factors are vital tools for coordinating individuals who are already predisposed to conflict.

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Gaming the system: How GameStop stock surged 1,500% in nine months

Tue, 19 Jan 2021 18:04:06 GMT

Enlarge / When will this stock [game]stop rising? (credit: Aurich Lawson)

Nine months ago, GameStop stock bottomed out at $2.80 a share, a reflection of the myriad problems facing the retailer specifically and brick-and-mortar game retail as a whole. As of Tuesday morning, though, that stock price is hovering around $40 a share (peaking at $44.74 as of this writing), with the vast majority of those gains coming in the last couple of weeks.

Is GameStop really worth up to 16 times as much as it was back in April? Is the company's ambitious turnaround plan finally (and suddenly) turning things around? Is GameStop roaring its way back to the nearly $10 billion market cap it enjoyed at the height of the Wii phenomenon?

Probably not. Analysts suggest the recent surge in GameStop's stock price is the result of a massive short squeeze bubble that will pop eventually. But beyond the sky-high valuations of recent weeks, analysts also suggest there's some reason to believe GameStop's long-term health is more robust than last year's stock doldrums suggest.

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How one musician took on the world’s biggest TV network over copyright—and won

Tue, 19 Jan 2021 14:00:53 GMT

A dramatic moment from Glee maybe isn't the first thing you expect to see in an Ars story, but promise there's a point here.

You’ve heard Kerry Muzzey’s work (Bandcamp, Spotify), even if you haven’t heard of him. The 50-year-old classical music composer from Joliet, Illinois, who now lives in Los Angeles, produces haunting orchestral scores that soundtrack some of the most poignant moments in film and television. When Finn Hudson kissed Rachel Berry for the first time on TV’s Glee, it was Muzzey’s stripped-back piano playing in the background. Some of his works have been choreographed and performed on So You Think You Can Dance?, too.

The use of Muzzey’s music across pop culture has no doubt brought the veteran composer some success and acclaim. And around 2012, he decided to see for himself, searching for his name on YouTube. Muzzey recalls the site’s algorithm surfaced 20 or 40 videos. The majority were fan compilations that teenagers obsessed with Glee had painstakingly put together to memorialize their two favorite characters' love story—and they were all soundtracked to the full version of Muzzey’s music.

“It was really kind of cool and validating, especially for someone who was a complete independent, to have a kid finding a piece of instrumental music, which is the most uncool kind of music for a kid to find, and to make a tribute montage using it,” he explains. “It was stuff nobody would have a problem with.”

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Hitman III review: Let’s call it Hitman 2.5 and be fine with it

Tue, 19 Jan 2021 13:00:48 GMT

How many people can we assassinate from the very top of a Dubai skyscraper? Agent 47 seems poised to find out in the opening mission of Hitman III. [credit: IO Interactive ]

The Hitman game series reached a zenith in 2018 with Hitman 2, technically the seventh in the series—but, hey, the seventh time can be the charm. Everything that we enjoyed in the 2016 series comeback was even better in this sequel, and IO Interactive nailed its "murder puzzle box" concept with sprawling, macabre playgrounds, all built to encourage a kill-multiple-ways core.

Three years ago, IO Interactive still had compelling directions to take its level design and plot composition, and the resulting sequel doubled down on dark humor and inherent video game silliness—while also getting a better handle on how to compose its levels. Walking through crowded scenes as a slow, blend-in-the-scenes assassin, looking for clues and opportunities, simply felt better in Hitman 2.

This week, Hitman III arrives on consoles, PCs, and streaming platforms with five new arenas of mayhem—the fewest yet in a numbered entry—and a pesky list of new tweaks. It feels very, very familiar—even more than the leap from 2016's Hitman to 2018's Hitman 2. It lands in a nearly identical interface as the last game, with the same XP progression meters, the same objective-based system, the same one-off "escalation" missions, and the same "custom contracts" sandbox. And its graphics engine revolves around a seemingly identical core, with one admittedly handsome tweak.

A sequel or an episode?

The worst part about Hitman III, then, is the number in the title. It betrays the game's true nature as an expansion pack instead of a standalone game that can easily be enjoyed in isolation. That's not a bad thing! If all you want are "more Hitman reboot levels that are up to the series' par of excellence" (and that was the game's original "episodic" plan), then III will neatly lodge into your brain. IO Interactive has concluded the "World of Assassination" trilogy in mostly fine fashion, although its inability to live up to the heights of Hitman 2 led me to immediately wish this were a more ambitious sequel.

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Lunar war brews and NASA gets militarized in For All Mankind S2 trailer

Mon, 18 Jan 2021 01:23:46 GMT

The space race in an alternate timeline continues in the second season of For All Mankind, returning to Apple TV+ in February.

Apple TV+ has dropped the trailer for the second season of For All Mankind, its science fiction drama about an alternate history where the space race never ended. The series was the linchpin of the Apple TV+ launch in 2019, and proved popular enough with viewers to warrant a second season.

(Some spoilers for the first season below.)

Series creator Ronald D. Moore (Battlestar Galactica) has made a point of trying to keep the show reasonably close to reality, despite the science fiction concept, often consulting the original NASA plans for guidance, and incorporating archival footage throughout the season. Moore said the following during a 2019 panel Q&A after an IMAX screening of the first two S1 episodes at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC:

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Review: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina ends run with disappointing finale

Sun, 17 Jan 2021 20:01:31 GMT

Sabrina Spellman (Kiernan Shipka) is a half-human, half-witch teenager facing the coming of the Eldritch Terrors. [credit: Netflix ]

Our favorite half-human/half witch teenager took on eight timeless menacing entities to avert the apocalypse (again) in the final season of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. I've championed this weirdly captivating supernatural horror show from the beginning, and for three seasons the strengths have always outshone the occasional weakness. Unfortunately, S4 turned out to be the weakest of all, despite including one of the best episodes of the entire Netflix series, and what should have been a strong unifying narrative arc. It's still pretty entertaining, but there was just a little too much pointless fan service and sloppy plotting this time around for S4 to really work.

(Spoilers for prior seasons below. Major spoilers for the series finale are below the second gallery. We'll give you a heads up before we get there.)

As we've reported previously, the show was originally intended as a companion series to the CW's Riverdale—a gleefully Gothic take on the original Archie comic books—but Sabrina ended up on Netflix instead. The show retains some of the primetime soap opera elements of Riverdale, but it incorporates more full-blown horror without bowing to the niceties imposed by network television. As I wrote last year, "Ultimately, the best thing about The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina is how gleefully and unapologetically the show leans into its melting pot of the macabre. It's quite the high-wire act, exploring serious themes while never, ever taking itself too seriously—and never descending into outright camp."

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The local politics of AirBNB’s ban on DC rentals

Sat, 16 Jan 2021 11:50:10 GMT

Enlarge / Airbnb said it will refund guests who had booked stays in Washington next week and reimburse hosts for lost income. (credit: Bonnie Jo Mount | Washington Post | Getty Images)

On January 9—three days after supporters of President Trump started a riot at the US Capitol—Sean Evans decided it was time for action. Evans had seen a post on Nextdoor about neighbors running into hostile Trump supporters the night of the riot, leading to a verbal altercation that had left residents of his corner of Northwest DC on edge. Now, rumors flew online that the upcoming inauguration of president-elect Joe Biden would bring more protesters and more armed violence to the streets of his city. “I don’t want them in my neighborhood,” Evans thought to himself. In fact, he didn't want insurrectionists in the city at all.

So on Nextdoor, Evans asked his neighbors to stop renting out their properties via Airbnband VRBO. A few hours later, another neighbor devised a hashtag: #DontRentDC.

Separately, a group called ShutDownDC gathered 500 volunteers to message DC area Airbnb hosts. The group sent messages to the managers of 3,400 properties in the region—polite ones, according to ShutDownDC organizer Alex Dodd. The messages alerted the Airbnb hosts to an upcoming threat and asked them to please refrain from booking anyone in their homes in the days surrounding the inauguration.

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Wandavision premieres in ways that would never work on ABC—and that’s great

Fri, 15 Jan 2021 22:00:18 GMT

Enlarge / The black-and-white world of Wandavision, as occasionally interrupted by color in its first two episodes on Disney+ as of today. (credit: Disney)

The modern era of Marvel Comics television has been a jumpy one, with ABC and Netflix dividing-and-conquering based on available comic series, exclusivity deals, and otherwise trying not to step on Marvel Studios' gargantuan toes. Fans got some fascinating television out of the process, but those network deals eventually fizzled—perhaps not coincidentally, right around the time that the Disney corporate umbrella began plotting its own content-filled streaming service.

As a result, today's premiere of Wandavision on Disney+ is far from the first TV series with clear links to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But it's definitely the clearest one yet. Take two major actors from repeat MCU films, slap them into the first-ever TV series that opens with a Marvel Studios logo, and you've got yourself one massive statement of intent.

As if that weren't gutsy enough, Wandavision goes further in terms of ambition with a two-part series premiere that will befuddle fans and outsiders alike. After over a year of squint-worthy reveals, with hints of black-and-white TV throwbacks and superhero-filled intrigue, we have 65 minutes of goofiness, dread, and a sense that this weird series is only going to get weirder.

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Report: Xbox’s "instant on” feature could consume 4 billion kWh by 2025

Fri, 15 Jan 2021 21:00:07 GMT

Enlarge / A lot of neon green power potentially (credit: Aurich Lawson / Getty Images)

The "instant on" feature that's activated by default on new Xbox Series S/X consoles could suck up a total of 4 billion kWh—the equivalent of a year's operation for a large power plant—from US owners alone through 2025. That's according to a preliminary report released this week from the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmentally focused nonprofit advocacy group.

As the name implies, the "instant on" feature of the Series S/X (and the Xbox One before it) lets users skip the usual startup time when turning the console back on. That saves about 10 to 15 seconds of waiting per power cycle on the Series S/X, down from about 45 seconds on the Xbox One. (This is separate from the Xbox Series S/X's heavily promoted "quick resume" feature that loads the game state for recent titles directly from the system's fast SSD storage and works in either mode)

"Instant on" standby also lets the system check periodically for system updates in order to download and install them in between play sessions. But leaving the "instant on" feature active means the Xbox Series S/X draws nine to 10 watts of power 24 hours a day—even when it's not being actively used—compared to less than 1W if the standby settings are switched to "energy saving" mode.

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Nintendo uses copyright claims to take down Game & Watch hacking videos

Thu, 14 Jan 2021 16:36:57 GMT

While two videos have been taken down, this stacksmashing video on loading Doom onto the Game & Watch unit remains up.

Nintendo is using copyright strikes to take down YouTube videos that detail how to hack the recently released Game & Watch: Super Mario Bros. color handheld.

A hacker going by the handle stacksmashing managed to hack the portable unit a day before its official November 13 release, thanks to an early retail delivery. But a YouTube video detailing that hacking method, originally posted on November 14, was taken down by a targeted copyright claim from Nintendo earlier this week. Another stacksmashing video, entitled "Bringing homebrew to the Nintendo Game & Watch," has also been taken down by an apparent copyright claim.

Two other stacksmashing videos on Game & Watch hacking remain up as of press time: one detailing how to load a Doom port onto the unit, and one discussing how to dump the firmware. Neither of these extant videos features footage of Nintendo's own games shown running on the Game & Watch; such footage is specifically blurred out in one of the videos, in fact.

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CDPR CEO blames "in-game streaming” for Cyberpunk’s console problems

Wed, 13 Jan 2021 22:45:03 GMT

Enlarge / The end of glitches is near, CDPR promises... (credit: Aurich Lawson)

CD Projekt Red is still trying to contain the damage from widespread reports of major technical problems in the versions of Cyberpunk 2077 released for the PS4 and Xbox One last month. To that end, studio co-founder and CEO Marcin Iwinski today tweeted a video message seeking to explain the internal situation leading up to the problematic launch.

"Despite good reviews on PC, the console version of Cyberpunk 2077 did not meet the quality standard we wanted it to meet," Iwinski said in the message. "I, and the entire leadership team, are deeply sorry for this, and this video is me publicly owning up to that."

Sifting through the stream

The core of the problem, Iwinski said, was the "in-game streaming system" that Cyberpunk 2077 used to "feed" content and game mechanics to the engine without frequent breaks for loading. That system had to be "constantly improved" for last-gen consoles during development, Iwinski said, in order to keep up with the "epic" look of the PC version (which saw its graphics and other assets scaled down to work on more limited, older console hardware).

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