If you need proof that the video game industry’s current rerelease craze has started to lose the plot, look no further than Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered.

Like Sonic Generations of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Sony’s latest gives its debut Horizon game a major visual upgrade that’s far more polished compared to its predecessor. Unlike those games, though, Horizon Zero Dawn isn’t a release from two or three generations ago; it only launched in 2017. Seven years may sound like a lifetime for younger players, but it’s barely any time at all as far as console generations go. If Sony was going to convince players to double-dip, it would need to deliver one heck of a remaster.

I’ll give credit where it’s due: Guerilla Games and Nixxes have risen to that tall task. Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered pumps the PlayStation4 classic up with significantly improved lighting, more detailed faces, brighter colors, and more edits that genuinely do add up. Throw in some DualSense support and you’ve got a definitive edition that anyone coming to the series for the first time should start with. That all may be true, but the reality is that all the improvements in the world still can’t quite make sense of what’s undoubtedly the most needless remaster of this generation.

A big improvement

When Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered was first announced, I rolled my eyes. From a casual perspective, I could barely see a notable difference in its first trailer. After all, 2017 and 2024 aren’t all that far apart in terms of tech. Seven years used to signify an enormous hardware gap, but the differences between two PlayStations continues to shrink with each new machine.

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Now having spent significant time with the console version, I’m willing to eat some of my words. The remaster offers a significant improvement over its predecessor, but one that takes a bit to become apparent. The original game already put its best foot forward in its cinematic opening sequence that shows gorgeous glimpses at its landscapes. When I started a fresh save file and saw it again, I was momentarily stunned. When I pulled up a video of the PS4 opening and watched it side by side, I came back to Earth. Yes, the lighting was improved and infant Aloy looked much cleaner, but the changes didn’t feel too significant.

My tune quickly changed the deeper I got into its early hours. The first moment that caught my attention was actually a tiny detail. I was in a sequence where a young Aloy finds herself exploring a buried facility full of old computers. I marveled at the more detailed rocks and the streaks of light shining in, but I didn’t snap to attention until I walked into a room full of computers. Their bright purple screens cut through the darkness with a bold glow that drew me toward them. It’s an unassuming tweak over the original game’s flatter lighting, but one that builds more of a contrast between the electronic world and the natural one.

As it turns out, that would become a very functional change. When I’m hunting robots in the wild, their lights are brighter and more pronounced too. It makes it much easier to see my prey from a distance and track them without needing to swap my focus on. While fidelity and performance are always the selling points of projects like this, it’s those thoughtful changes that actually enhance Horizon’s gameplay and world.

There are a lot of obvious changes that one could point to that show off just how much better it all looks. Once I’m in basic conversations with NPCs as opposed to more directed, cinematic scenes, I can see noticeable improvements in faces. It’s obvious in small side characters like Olin, whose bald head gets the shine it deserves, with more detailed skin and smoother edges. When I’m sent into the mountains to complete The Proving ceremony, I see a snowstorm falling around me compared to the original’s much lighter weather conditions. Even little details in the world’s foliage are apparent, as I can see each reed of tall grass precisely bend as my body moves through them.

You might think that all of this pushes Horizon closer to hyperrealism, but I’d actually argue that it all works to make it more stylized. The original game had a somewhat flat aesthetic that was big on earthy tones. Its sequel, Horizon Forbidden West, would better define the series’ look by peppering in brighter colors that set the world apart from, say, Far Cry. This remaster follows in those footsteps to great effect. Erend’s scarf is a much sunnier shade of yellow. The blue ropes that dangle off of characters similarly pop, with an almost neon hue. Looking back at the PS4 version, and it now looks like raw film that’s yet to be color graded.

In those ways, Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered is a strong visual upgrade that doesn’t just turn the realism knob up and call it a day. It retroactively makes the original more consistent with what the series has evolved into since. That might annoy preservationists who see the color choices and lighting of the original as part of its language, but it’s all tastefully done as far as redos go.

Is that enough?

All of this looks great written out or in side-by-side comparison videos, but is any of it an actual good reason to replay a game that still feels brand new? This isn’t a case of Sony porting an inaccessible old game to PS Plus; Horizon Zero Dawn has always been readily available to buy and play on PS5. The same has been true for Until Dawn and both Part 1 and Part 2 of The Last of Us, three games that have gotten similarly needless double-dips during the PS5’s short lifetime. Of those four games, Horizon Zero Dawn’s update feels like the most superfluous.

I genuinely can’t imagine how many people on Earth are so eager to replay a fairly recent game where a visual touch-up that makes foliage look better will get them excited. I get the more aspirational pitch here. For those who have never played Horizon Zero Dawn, this is a great entry point that better connects it to Horizon Forbidden West. Even then, it’s a flawed execution. The Last of Us Part 1 worked as an upgrade because its release was timed alongside HBO’s very popular TV adaptation of it. It was a smart time to bring the PS3 game up to speed, giving it more accessibility features to account for a larger wave of potential players. Horizon’s rerelease isn’t pinned to any such cultural moment. The closest is the upcoming release of Lego Horizon Adventures, but that’s specifically built as an entry point for kids. If they were ready to graduate to the real series after playing it, they could have just done that and skipped the middleman altogether.

And when is enough enough when it comes to visual upgrades, anyways? Sure, the remaster looks excellent, but it’s still imperfect. Character models tend to unnaturally jerk into place from time to time. When Aloy touches her hair in a cutscene, her hand still goes right through it. I leap to a zipline at one point and Aloy momentarily glides just above it, clinging onto nothing until she’s snapped into place. What is the end goal of an upgrade like this? We don’t need to revisit and revise a game every single time the tech bar moves. Duller colors or less porous faces are not flaws that need to be fixed, just as Casablanca doesn’t need to be colorized.

It’s a bit of a tired cliché when writing about games to say “Who is this for?” Ultimately, every game has an audience, and there’s surely some hive of Horizon superfans out there who will happily take any excuse to replay what’s ultimately an excellent open-world game. But I sincerely find myself asking who projects like this are actually made for. Did we get 2023’s Dead Space remake because it was the right time to revisit a classic or because EA needed to keep a valuable IP relevant? Is there a good reason to replay Until Dawn in 2024, or is Sony Pictures worried that its upcoming film adaptation won’t make a splash if the 2015 game isn’t back in the public eye? Is Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered for me or is it built to be a line item on a fourth-quarter spreadsheet?

These are healthy questions to ask as video game publishers double down on remasters and remakes. It’s easy to get caught up in the kind of hype cycles that can so easily convince us that every game is a gift to players. The cold, hard reality of Sony’s recent remasters is that they are motivated by business more than art. Turning Horizon into a lifestyle brand that players engage with every year is a marketing tactic. That doesn’t mean these games can’t be great. Astro Bot’s collection of PlayStation cameos are built to sell a brand to you, but it doesn’t hurt what’s ultimately a joyful game full of meaningful nostalgia.

This is a long way of saying that it’s both possible and healthy to hold two thoughts at once: Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered is an unnecessary product that pads out PlayStation’s light holiday lineup, and it’s a gorgeous upgrade that brings new color to a generational classic. If you’ve never played the original, it’s a good excuse to finally jump on that. If you have, nothing about your life will change by upgrading and spending another 60 hours with it. Whether or not your time and money are worth it are up to you, but know that Nixxes and Guerrilla Games have put in the extra effort to make sure there’s a beautiful world waiting for you if you decide to dive in.

Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered is out now on PS5 and PC.

Gemini continues to receive new features in Google’s quest to make it the ultimate AI-powered assistant for mobile devices. Lately, the company has put a lot of focus on making the assistant more practical and convenient to use. For example, results no longer take you out of the current app but instead appear directly in the floating overlay. Now, Gemini is getting the shortcut to trigger split-screen mode on more foldables and tablets.

Gemini already supports split-screen mode on Android devices. However, there was no way to quickly enable it, which was impractical for an “assistant” app. You can enable the mode on the Recents/Multitasking screen, just like with any other app. Thankfully, Google is making things easier by having a shortcut built right into the app’s floating overlay.

Enabling Gemini’s split-screen will be easier on more Android foldables and tablets

In late September, some Galaxy foldable devices, like the Galaxy Z Fold 6, began to show a new bar at the top of Gemini’s floating overlay. Users can swipe up or down from the bar to turn the floating overlay into a movable floating window. Swiping left or right from the bar will quickly enable split screen mode. This is a quick and handy way to control how you want Gemini to display while you’re using other apps.

Now, Gemini’s shortcut for split-screen mode is coming to more Android foldables and tablets. 9to5Google spotted the feature’s availability on a Pixel Tablet and Pixel Fold. It’s possible that the option is arriving on Google Pixel devices first.

While large-screen devices seem ideal for enjoying the feature, it would be great if Android phones got it too. After all, many people tend to use split screen mode on their mobile devices as well. Fortunately, there are clues that suggest Google is working on it. A report from July found traces of an early version of the shortcut for Android smartphones, although no further news has emerged in this regard.

Canon has officially revealed its cheapest spatial and smallest VR lens yet, the $450 RF-S7.8mm F4 STM Dual. It’s the same size as a regular camera lens but is designed to let creators shoot 3D VR content for headsets like the Meta Quest 3 or Apple Vision Pro. In fact, it was first teased in June at WWDC 2024 alongside Apple’s latest Vision Pro OS.

There is one catch, in that the lens is designed for APS-C (not full-frame cameras) and only works with Canon’s 32.5-megapixel (MP) EOS R7 for now. That camera costs $1,300 for the body only, so a full shooting solution is around $1,750.

The company has dabbled with stereoscopic VR lenses before, most recently with the RF5.2mm F2.8 L Dual Fisheye. However, that product is bigger and more unwieldy, much more expensive at $2,000 and only supports manual focus. Its main benefit is the nearly 180 degree field of view that’s close to human vision and enhanced 3D thanks to the wide 2.36-inch gap between the elements.

In comparison, the new 7.8mm crop sensor lens has a much narrower 63-degree field of view. The fact that the the two elements are so close together (.46 inches) also reduces the 3D effect, particularly when you’re farther from the subject (for the best results, you need to be around 6 to 20 inches away, which isn’t ideal for content creators). Autofocus support is a big benefit, though, and it also comes with a button and control wheel that allows separate manual focus for the left and right sides.

Photos and video captured with the EOS R7 and new lens must be processed using Canon’s EOS VR Utility app or a plugin for Adobe’s Premiere Pro, both paid apps. After that, they can be viewed on the Meta Quest 3, Vision Pro and other headsets in a variety of formats including 180-degree 3D VR, 3D Theater and spatial video. The RF-S7.8mm F4 STM Dual lens is now on pre-order for $449 and will arrive sometime in November.

Advanced Micro Devices reported record revenue of $6.8 billion for the third fiscal quarter, up 18% from a year ago. But the shares fell due to a disappointing forecast for the fourth quarter.

AMD saw record data center segment revenue of $3.5 billion in the quarter, up 122% from a year ago. It was driven by record Epyc CPU and Instinct GPU revenues.

Client revenue in the quarter was $1.9 billion, up 29% from a year ago. That was driven by strong demand for Zen 5 Ryzen processors.

The weak part was the gaming segment, which saw revenue of $462 million, down 69% from a year ago due to lower semi-custom revenue. That revenue mainly comes from sales from game console revenues.

Embedded segment revenue of $927 million, down 25% from a year ago as customers continued to normalize inventory levels. Non-GAAP gross margins were 54%, up 3 percentage points from a year ago thanks to success in the data center. Net income was $1.5 billion, up 33%.

AMD estimated Q4 revenue will be $7.5 billion, plus or minus $300 million. It cited supply chain constraints hurting the overall ability to meet demand.

“We delivered strong third quarter financial results with record revenue led by higher sales of EPYC and Instinct data center products and robust demand for our Ryzen PC processors,” said AMD CEO Lisa Su, in a statement. “Looking forward, we see significant growth opportunities across our data center, client and embedded businesses driven by the insatiable demand for more compute.”

“We are pleased with our execution in the third quarter, delivering strong year-over-year expansion in gross margin and earnings per share,” said AMD CFO Jean Hu, in a statement. “We are on-track to deliver record annual revenue for 2024 based on significant growth in our Data Center and Client segments.”

If there’s anything to put AMD’s success in perspective, it’s only to look over at its rival Intel to see how tough a time it is having now.

Swiggy, one of India’s largest food delivery and quick commerce startups, is seeking a valuation of up to $11.3 billion in its initial public offering, marking a 57% discount to rival Zomato’s market cap.

The lossmaking Bengaluru-based company has set an IPO price band of ₹371 to ₹390 ($4.41-$4.64) per share for next month’s IPO. At the upper end, the valuation would represent only a modest premium to its $10.7 billion private market value from early 2022 — falling short of recent valuations by mutual fund investors Invesco and Baron.

Swiggy aims to raise $1.34 billion, with $535 million from fresh share issuance and the remainder through existing investor exits. Swiggy, which led India’s food delivery market four years ago and pioneered quick commerce, has since lost significant market share in both segments. In quick commerce, it now ranks third behind Zomato’s BlinkIt and Nexus-backed Zepto.

Zomato, which recently announced plans to raise up to $1 billion through a qualified institutional placement, currently commands a market cap of $26.2 billion.

Sennheiser has announced a new portable wireless microphone kit designed to be an affordable and flexible all-in-one solution for content creators and videographers. The Profile Wireless system features a wireless receiver that can be connected to various devices, a pair of compact clip-on transmitters with built-in microphones that can also be used as handheld or tabletop mics, and a mobile charger.

The Sennheiser Profile Wireless kit isn’t expected to start shipping until late 2024 or early 2025, but it’s available for preorder starting today for $299. That’s cheaper than both the popular $349 DJI Mic 2 kit, which includes similar hardware, and the Shure MoveMic system, which is $499 when bundled with a wireless receiver. Rode’s Wireless Go II kit is also $299, but it doesn’t include an on-the-go charging solution.

The Profile Wireless microphones are similar in size to the DJI Mic 2’s and can be attached to clothing using either a clip on the back or a magnet, which allows for more freedom with placement. If you want to use a higher-quality microphone or need a more discreet lav mic, the transmitter includes a lockable 3.5mm connector for attaching external mics.

The microphones come pre-paired to a two-channel receiver and communicate over a 2.4GHz wireless signal that has a range of just over 800 feet with a clear line of sight. If anybody gets in between the receiver and mic, the range drops to around 490 feet. Sennheiser says the battery life for the mics and wireless receiver is around seven hours, but all three can be recharged while away from a power outlet using the included charging bar that is equipped with a 2,000mAh battery.

Each microphone has 16GB of built-in storage with an optional “Backup Recording Mode” that will automatically start recording locally if the connection to the wireless receiver becomes unreliable. There’s also a “Safety Channel Mode” that will record a second copy of the audio at a lower level to help prevent louder sounds from being clipped or distorted.

Since the Profile Wireless system doesn’t use Bluetooth, capturing audio to another device requires the receiver to be connected using an included USB-C or Lightning adapter for mobile devices, a USB-C cable for computers, or an audio cable for cameras. The receiver itself includes an OLED screen that displays information like audio levels and the charge level of the mics; thanks to an included gyro sensor, the screen will automatically flip 180 degrees as needed.

Although wireless mic systems like this are becoming more popular because of their ease of use and convenient size, using a tiny clip-on mic in hand to conduct an impromptu interview can sometimes be challenging. Sennheiser’s solution to that problem has you attaching one of the microphones to the end of the included charging bar and then adding a foam windscreen.

This results in a larger microphone that’s easier to hold or use on a desk when connected to a microphone support or a tiny tripod. The larger microphone’s shape is a bit odd and may result in an extra question or two when sticking it in someone’s face, but it does bring some extra flexibility to an affordable microphone kit that already offers a lot of functionality.