The single-player Squadron 42, set in the Star Citizen universe, has been delayed all the way to 2026. This is interesting because the developers said the game was “feature complete” last year. Squadron 42 was first announced in 2014 and has experienced throughout the .

The stated reason for the delay is to apply more polish. Cloud Imperium Games (CIG) boss Chris Roberts that he’s “confident” the title will make its 2026 release window. To sate eager fans, the developer dropped an hour-long gameplay video that chronicles the opening segments, seen below.

Roberts also told convention-goers that Squadron 42 would feature “30 to 40 hours of gameplay.” He went on to note that there’s still some work left to “bring the quality of the game up to” the level shown in the gameplay video.

Squadron 42 is a first-person action game that features on-foot exploration and combat, ship piloting and more. It has an absolutely stacked voice and mocap cast, many of whom are featured in the above gameplay video. The cast includes Gary Oldman, Henry Cavill, Mark Hamill, Gillian Anderson, Andy Serkis and Sophie Wu, among many others.

There’s also the matter of the parent game Star Citizen. It’s still not ready for a full release, after in 2012. However, the game has an active alpha community and is still racking up impressive crowdfunding numbers. All told, CIG has for the title in the past 12 years.

Indian stock trading and mutual fund startup Groww paid $159.4 million in taxes as it shifted its domicile from the U.S. back to India, the company said in a statement on Monday.

Nearly a dozen Indian startups are in the process of relocating their headquarters to India from the U.S. and Singapore to better comply with Indian laws and facilitate IPOs in the country. The shift in domicile creates a tax event for both investors and the startup.

While the IPO market remains subdued in the U.S. and many developed markets, India has emerged as a hotbed for public offerings this year. The first nine months of 2024 saw almost 70 IPOs in India, already the second-highest number of offerings in any calendar year on record.

One key reason for the influx of startups returning to India is the potential for better analyst coverage, even for companies valued below $2 billion. This coverage is crucial for attracting institutional investors. Hundreds of Indian startups — many of them backed by accelerator Y Combinator — chose to base their headquarters in the U.S. in the past decade.

The Combo 2 is now the most expensive option in iRobot’s Essential line and slightly pricier than the $400 DreameBot D10 Plus, our current choice for the best budget robot vacuum and mop. The Vac 2 is available via “select retailers” in North America (including Target and Best Buy, so far) and has the same features as the Combo except for the mopping capabilities, which contributes to its lower price.

Both vacuums have a self-emptying dock, up to 120 minutes of battery life, and the ability to perform cleaning routines that can run automatically or start manually from a button on the robot, in the mobile app, or by voice command to Alexa, Siri, or Google Assistant-capable smart device.

When a cleaning routine is complete (or when its battery is close to dying), the Combo 2 will automatically return to its included AutoEmpty dock, where the contents of its dust bin will be sucked into a bag that iRobot says is large enough to hold 60 days’ worth of dirt. The bag is also self-sealing, making the process of replacing and throwing it away a little cleaner.

The Combo 2’s mopping capabilities require a little more maintenance. The charging dock can’t automatically refill the tank used to moisten the robovac’s reusable microfiber mop pad, and rugs will need to be manually moved out of the way during a cleaning routine that involves water, as the Combo 2 can’t retract its mop pad when transitioning from hard floors to carpeting.

iRobot says the new Combo 2 features “100 percent stronger suction compared to the Roomba Combo Essential” while cleaning for up to 120 minutes on a single charge. But the company doesn’t specify which of the four levels of suction power will yield a two hour runtime. At maximum power, you can potentially expect a cleaning routine to last less than two hours.

Also, the Combo 2’s navigation isn’t as advanced as what you’ll find on more expensive Roomba models. This robovac relies on “specialized sensors” and an “enhanced bumper” to avoid obstacles as it simply crisscrosses a room. Although it can display a visual representation of where it’s traveled through the iRobot app, the Combo 2 can’t generate 3D maps of a room to know where it has and hasn’t cleaned.

De’Longhi has launched a new manual coffee machine that gives you full control over the coffee-making process, helping you make your drinks exactly the way you like them, and do so consistently.

The company is best known for its bean-to-cup coffee makers, but its new La Specialista Opera machine offers only a light guiding hand. It has a smart grinder that automatically adjusts the grinding duration and dose for a single or double espresso, and a smart tamping station that helps you apply even pressure (up to 20kg) for a well formed puck.

The US agency in charge of regulating road safety revealed Friday that they are probing Tesla’s self-driving software systems.

The evaluation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) covers 2.4 million Tesla vehicles across multiple models manufactured between 2016 and 2024.

NHTSA’s action is the first step toward any potential recall that the agency might seek against the company, which is run by tech billionaire Elon Musk.

Tesla did not immediately reply on Friday to a BBC inquiry about the investigation.

NHTSA’s preliminary evaluation follows four crash reports involving the use of Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving”, or FSD, software.

The agency said the crashes involved reduced roadway visibility, with fog or glares from the sun.

One of the incidents involved a Telsa fatally striking a pedestrian, and another involved someone being injured, NHTSA said.

The evaluation aims to determine if Tesla’s self-driving systems can detect and appropriately respond to reduced visibility conditions. It also will examine if other self-driving crashes have happened under similar conditions.

In its notice, the agency noted that despite the label, full self-driving is actually “a partial driving automation system”.

NHTSA’s announcement comes one week after Mr Musk’s glitzy rollout of the Cybercab at the Warner Bros. studio lot in Burbank, California.

At the event, Mr Musk said the fully autonomous robotaxi concept, which operates without pedals or a steering wheel, would be on the market by 2027.

But some analysts and investors were unimpressed.

The company’s stock is down 8% since the Cybercab rollout. Shares were mostly steady after the notice from NHTSA.

Unlike Waymo, the self-driving venture operated by Google-parent Alphabet, Tesla’s autonomous systems rely largely on cameras and artificial intelligence.

Mr Musk’s approach costs less than deploying high-tech sensors like Lidar and radar, which are critical to Waymo’s driverless car program.

Tesla’s recent We, Robot presentation has run into trouble, with one of the production companies behind Blade Runner 2049 suing Tesla and its CEO, Elon Musk, for copyright infringement.

Tesla used the glitzy October 10 event to unveil its Cybercab and Robovan, and also to showcase the latest version of its Optimus humanoid robot.

Hosted by Musk at Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) Studios in Hollywood, the presentation included imagery that Blade Runner 2049 production company Alcon Entertainment alleges Tesla created using generative-AI and stills from the seven-year-old sci-fi movie.

Alcon says in the lawsuit that just hours before the event kicked off on the evening of October 10, Tesla and WBD asked for permission to use “an iconic still image” from the movie. Alcon quickly rejected the request.

The company explained its decision in the suit, saying: “Any prudent brand considering any Tesla partnership has to take Musk’s massively amplified, highly politicized, capricious and arbitrary behavior, which sometimes veers into hate speech, into account,” adding that “Alcon did not want Blade Runner 2049 to be affiliated with Musk, Tesla, or any Musk company, for all of these reasons.”

Following the rejection, Tesla is accused of then feeding imagery from Blade Runner 2049 into an AI image generator to create a still image that appeared on screen for 10 seconds (see it in the video below) during the We, Robot live stream. With the image showing, Musk even referenced the movie franchise, adding that he’s hoping for a “fun, exciting” future rather than the dystopian one depicted in so many sci-fi films.

Alcon also said in its suit that it wasn’t surprising that Musk referenced Blade Runner 2049 during the We, Robot event, as the movie features a “strikingly designed, artificially intelligent, fully autonomous car.”

The accused parties have yet to comment publicly on Alcon’s lawsuit, and it’s not yet clear what level of damages the production company is seeking.