Author: Admin

Playing Hogwarts Legacy instantly reminds me few fictional worlds are as bewitching as Harry Potter’s. In 1998, my mum handed me a copy of Philosopher’s Stone — published under the lesser name Sorcerer’s Stone in the US — and the mystery of that opening chapter awakened a sense of wonder. I was hooked for life.

Or so I thought. After the core book series wrapped up and there were no more movie adaptations coming, my emotional connection diminished. The overstuffed spinoffs, along with author J.K. Rowling’s inflammatory comments about transgender people, sucked the remaining fun out of the franchise, and I figured it was time to move on.

All that baggage fell away as soon as I started Hogwarts Legacy, which hit PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Series S and PC on Friday (it arrives on other consoles in the coming months). This open-world action RPG game, developed by Avalanche Software, is designed to let us live out our fantasies of enrolling at the iconic School of Witchcraft and Wizardry as a new student.

Having played the PS5 version for 12 hours, it captures the wonder of the early books, with an intriguing original narrative, engagingly varied gameplay and intricately designed world to explore.

Back to basics

The game sidesteps the narrative restrictions of Harry’s story by jumping way back in the timeline, to the 1890s. After creating your character, you’re whisked off on a brief opening adventure before reaching the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Even though you’re a new student, you’re starting your magical career a little late and enroll as a fifth year. That’s presumably because having a wide-eyed first year, just 11 years old, explore dangerous caves, learn dangerous spells and battle dark wizards would feel kinda weird.

The customization options are a key element in living out your wizarding world fantasy, and they’re a joy. You can choose your character’s gender and appearance. Then you’ll pick and alter your wand (don’t worry, the one you start the game with is a loaner) and broom.

You also get sorted into a Hogwarts house (Slytherin FTW), based on a series of questions you’ll answer shortly after arriving at the school, but you can have a do-over if the initial selection isn’t to your liking.

The house you end up in doesn’t seem to change much beyond the common room, your uniform and some throwaway lines. Though teachers mention house points in some classes, you won’t actually be competing for them in the game.

Your education is occasionally interrupted by the main story, which focuses on your connection to mysterious ancient magic and a sinister dark wizard in league with the intense leader of a goblin rebellion — these baddies sport the excellent names of Victor Rookwood and Ranrok, respectively. It’s an absorbing narrative that expands this universe’s lore nicely, especially when it hints at events further back in the timeline, but sometimes fades into the background amidst all the game’s other distractions.

Living in a wizarding world

The development team’s love for Harry Potter is apparent in every aspect of Hogwarts Legacy, but shines most brightly in the world and its characters. Every teacher, student and location feels distinct and real, with a peppering of familiar names like Weasley and Black to make fans feel comfortable.

Each character is richly written, cleverly voiced — Simon Pegg plays the unpleasant headmaster — and visually diverse, so talking to them and learning about their backgrounds is fascinating. (It’s frustrating that you can’t pause during cutscenes though.) This characterisation is woven through the main story and its side quests, which range from investigating one of the castle’s mysteries and sneakily grabbing potion ingredients to wandering into a dangerous cave.

These are varied and fun in terms of gameplay, exploration and puzzle-solving, but feel even more worthwhile since they present opportunities to learn more about the quest-givers and world. And teenage tomfoolery, like sneaking into the library in the dead of night with the help of an invisibility charm, just feels like vintage Harry Potter.

Your customized avatar’s voice acting is solid, but occasionally a bit flat — like you’re overly polite or reserved. That’s preferable to listening to a realistic teenager, though. The character models are convincing enough, but the eyes sometimes move unnaturally and feel unnerving.

The world is sumptuously designed too, particularly in the beautifully gothic Hogwarts, with its moving paintings, chatty gargoyles and fascinating student banter. Every inch is begging to be explored, with heaps of collectibles and Easter eggs to discover — you hear a satisfying hint of the John Williams theme when you pick up certain items. The nearby village of Hogsmeade isn’t quite as big, but it’s still full of fun diversions.

The colorful rolling hills, plains and hamlets that make up the rest of the world can feel a little bland by comparison, despite their Elder Scrolls vibes.

The game’s technical limitations are occasionally evident as you dash around the environment too; sometimes assets will pop up at the edge of your screen and doors will appear to be stuck as the area beyond loads. It never felt game-breaking, but might briefly shake your sense of immersion. I fell through the scenery and died while wandering outside the castle once too — luckily the game had autosaved seconds beforehand and the glitch didn’t repeat.

Tricks of the magical trade

The multifaceted nature of your wizarding unfolds gradually through Hogwarts Legacy’s early hours. Your character starts out with the most basic dueling skills and spells, but the way you flick out spells with your wand gives combat a unique, kinetic flow.

You block incoming attacks with a magical shield and dodge bigger ones. The combat is similar to that seen in the Batman: Arkham and Spider-Man games, but with a sorcery aesthetic. It’s immediately gratifying, to the point where you’ll be hankering for magical battles.

Once you get to Hogwarts, you’ll learn new spells and skills in classes like Defense Against the Dark Arts, Potions and Herbology. Crucially, the flow of quests gives you time to get comfortable with each new ability before introducing another — you’ll attend a class and then use what you’ve learnt in a few story missions or side quests.

The game encourages you to use every tool in your arsenal, instead getting comfortable with a few basic combos and relying on them to get through every battle. You’ll be playing for a few hours before the skill trees are unlocked, but you’ll likely have a sense of your preferred combat style by then. Pretty much everything you do gives you experience points too, so you’ll level up at a steady clip.

There’s also a constant flow of new gear that’ll enhance your attack and defense, in addition to changing your character’s look. You can also apply the appearance of any previous clothing to new ones, so you aren’t stuck looking ridiculous just because a certain item has higher stats.

Annoyingly, inventory limits add needless friction to exploration — you can find new gear but be unable to pick it up. It’s irritating to have to fast travel to Hogsmeade to sell off excess items while wandering around the castle. You can increase your inventory with certain side quests, at least.

A joyous school reunion

Thankfully, Hogwarts Legacy doesn’t lean too hard into its school setting — you won’t have to adhere to a rigid schedule. Instead, you attend class to advance the narrative and add new gameplay elements rather than going because you have to.

The world opens up in a big way once you finish your first flying lesson and get your own broom. There’s a bit of a learning curve to soaring above it all, but it’s exhilarating and highlights the scope of the playing area.

Hogwarts Legacy evokes the same magic as the first book’s opening chapter and simpler time for the franchise, letting you explore a beautifully realized world, meet a fascinating cast of characters and embark on your own wizarding career. It’s the Harry Potter game fans have been dreaming of for decades.

Netflix, for years, was notoriously tight-lipped about its viewership. But after a few years of dropping stats for some of its programming, Netflix launched a website in mid-November posting charts of its most popular shows and movies from the past week, as well as a global ranking of its all-time most watched titles.

The charts, which are updated every week and ranked by the total number of hours that subscribers spent watching them, represent an unprecedented trove of data about what’s popular on Netflix. The site details the most popular titles in the last week not only globally but also for more than 90 countries. And it’s meant to help subscribers like you get a better sense of the biggest hits on the world’s largest subscription streaming service, in the hopes you’ll discover something new to watch.

The company updates its weekly “Top 10 on Netflix” every Tuesday, based on hours viewed from Monday through Sunday the previous week for original and licensed titles. Netflix’s rankings are broken down into top 10 charts for films in English, TV in English, films in non-English languages and TV in non-English languages.

A ranking of all-time most watched titles also lives on the site, detailing shows that have the most viewing hours in their first 28 days of release. Netflix also has these split into films in English, TV in English, films in non-English languages and TV in non-English languages — but for our charts below, we don’t differentiate between language.

If a new season releases its episodes in two parts on different dates, Netflix counts the watch time of the first volume’s episodes for their first 28 days, then it counts the watch time of the second volume’s episodes for their first 28 days. These all-time rankings are also updated every Tuesday, whenever any programs make it into the charts during the week prior.

Why the all-time rankings don’t include You or You People (yet)

Shows and movies need sustained popularity in many countries to crack into the all-time most watched charts. That means you can see titles with “Top 10” badges in Netflix’s app for days, but they still may not be generating enough hours of viewing to make the all-time rankings.

For example, the first half of You‘s fourth season came out Thursday. Netflix’s popular psychological thriller about a serial killer has gained viewing hours with each subsequent season, but season four’s viewership stats won’t show up until next week’s report.

You People, a romantic-comedy movie, has generated 121.3 million hours of watch time in just its first 10 days. But TV shows need to eclipse half a billion hours to make it onto the all-time list, and films need more than 200 million.

Even the most popular shows and movies need multiple weeks and enduring attention to accumulate enough.

Netflix’s most watched TV shows, ranked

The following are Netflix’s most watched series, based on Netflix’s own reporting of total hours viewed in the first 28 days of each titles’ release. Again, if a new season releases its episodes in two volumes on different dates, Netflix counts the watch time of the first volume’s episodes for their first 28 days, then it counts the watch time of the second volume’s episodes for their first 28 days.

Any changes in the rankings from the previous week are in bold text.

1. Squid Game (season 1), a Korean survival thriller — 1.65 billion hours.

2. Stranger Things (season 4), a retro sci-fi series — 1.35 billion hours.
3. Wednesday, a coming-of-age supernatural dark comedy — 1.24 billion hours
4. Dahmer, a true-crime serial killer series — 856.2 million hours.

5. Money Heist (part 5), a Spanish-language thriller — 792.2 million hours.
6. Bridgerton (season 2), a period romance — 656.3 million hours.
7. Bridgerton (season 1) — 625.5 million hours.
8. Money Heist (part 4) — 619 million hours.
9. Stranger Things (season 3), a retro sci-fi series — 582.1 million hours.
10. Lucifer (season 5), a fantasy police procedural — 569.5 million hours.
11. All of Us Are Dead, a Korean zombie thriller taking place in a high school — 560.8 million hours.
12. The Witcher (season 1), a fantasy show — 541 million hours.
13. Inventing Anna, a true-crime limited series about a fake socialite — 511.9 million hours
14. Ginny & Georgia (season 2), a mother-daughter dramedy — 504.8 million hours.

Former top-ranking shows that have been bumped out of Netflix’s official all-time charts:

• 13 Reasons Why (season 2), a controversial teen drama — 496.1 million hours.
• Ozark (season 4), a crime drama series — 491.1 million hours.
• The Witcher (season 2) — 484.3 million hours.
• 13 Reasons Why (season 1) — 475.6 million hours
• Maid, a limited series about a young mother fleeing abuse — 469.1 million hours.
• You (season 3), a psychological thriller — 467.8 million hours.
• You (season 2) — 457.4 million hours.
• Stranger Things (season 2) — 427.4 million hours.
• Money Heist (part 3) — 426.4 million hours.
• Sex Education (season 3), a British teen dramedy — 419 million hours.
• Ginny & Georgia (season 1), a dramedy about a young mom and kids — 381 million hours.
• Extraordinary Attorney Woo (season 1), a South Korean legal drama — 402.5 million hours.

• Café con Aroma de Mujer (season 1), a Colombian telenovela — 326.9 million hours.

• Lupin (part 1), a French heist show — 316.8 million hours.
• Elite (season 3), a Spanish teen drama — 275.3 million hours.

• Who Killed Sara? (season 1), a Mexican mystery thriller — 266.4 million hours.
• Elite (season 4) — 257.1 million hours.
• The Queen of Flow (season 2), a musical Colombian telenovela — 230.3 million hours.

• Lupin (part 2) — 214.1 million hours.
• Dark Desire (season 1), a Mexican dramatic thriller — 213 million hours.

Netflix’s most watched movies, ranked

The following are Netflix’s most watched movies, based on Netflix’s own reporting of total hours viewed in the first 28 days of each titles’ release. Any changes are in bold text.

1. Red Notice, an action movie starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds — 364 million hours.
2. Don’t Look Up, a dark comedy with a star-packed cast — 359.8 million hours.
3. Bird Box, a post-apocalyptic movie starring Sandra Bullock — 282 million hours.
4. Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, a whodunit sequel — 279.7 million hours.
5. The Gray Man, a CIA action thriller — 253.9 million hours.
6. The Adam Project, a sci-fi adventure comedy — 233.2 million hours.

7. Extraction, an action movie starring Chris Hemsworth — 231.3 million hours.
8. Purple Hearts, a romantic drama about a musician marrying a Marine — 228.7 million hours.
9. The Unforgivable, a drama about a woman rebuilding her life after prison — 214.7 million hours.
10. The Irishman, a period Mafia epic directed by Martin Scorsese — 214.6 million hours.

Former top-ranking movies that have been bumped out of Netflix’s official all-time charts:

• The Kissing Booth 2, a teen rom-com sequel — 209.3 million hours.
• 6 Underground, a Michael Bay explosion-fest starring Ryan Reynolds — 205.5 million hours.
• Spenser Confidential, an action-comedy starring Mark Wahlberg — 197.3 million hours.

• Enola Holmes, a period detective film — 189.9 million hours.
• Army of the Dead, a heist set in a zombie apocalypse — 187 million hours.

• The Old Guard, an action-thriller starring Charlize Theron — 186 million hours.
• Murder Mystery, a comedy starring Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston — 170 million hours.

Netflix appears to have never released a non-English-language film that generated enough viewing hours to make it into an overall top-watched ranking. But additional widely watched non-English language movies on Netflix have included:

• Troll, a Norwegian monster movie — 155.6 million hours.
• Blood Red Sky, a German/British action horror film set during a plane hijacking — 110.5 million hours.
• The Platform, a Spanish social commentary wrapped in a horror film — 108.1 million hours.
• All Quiet on the Western Front, a German war drama — 101.4 million hours.
• Black Crab, a Swedish apocalyptic war thriller starring Noomi Rapace — 94.1 million hours.
• Through My Window, a Spanish teen romance — 92.4 million hours.
• The Takedown, a French cop comedy — 78.6 million hours.
• Below Zero, a Spanish action thriller about a breakout from a prison transport vehicle — 78.3 million hours.
• My Name is Vendetta, an Italian crime/action film — 68.7 million hours.
• Loving Adults, a Danish thriller about an extramarital affair — 67.3 million hours.

Former top-ranking non-English movies that have been bumped out of the non-English top 10 include:

• Rogue City, a French action thriller about an unorthodox team of cops — 66.6 million hours.
• Carter, a South Korean action thriller about a man who wakes up with no memories and a voice in his ear — 65.4 million hours

• The Forgotten Battle, a Dutch World War II film — 60.9 million hours.
• Restless, a French action thriller — 59.1 million hours.
• Lost Bullet, like a Fast & Furious movie but French — 58.3 million hours
• Spoiled Brats, a French comedy about rich siblings tricked into earning their own living — 56.9 million hours.
• #Alive, a South Korean movie about a gamer’s bid to survive the zombie apocalypse — 54.6 million hours.
• Space Sweepers, a South Korean space western with a weaponized child-android — 53.3 million hours
• The Last Mercenary, a French action movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme — 52.1 million hours.
• Just Another Christmas, a Brazilian Christmas comedy — 48 million hours.

I’ve been using a desktop computer for decades, and I’m still discovering new productivity tricks and hidden features. There are so many ways to save a keystroke here and a mouse click there. Those few milliseconds can actually add up to big time savings (or at least less annoyance) over the course of a week, especially if your job is primarily done online.

It’s not just your operating system’s infinite settings menus that can improve your workday, though both MacOS and Windows 11 have some great features to try. Your computer’s mouse and keyboard are also packed full of features that can help you perform tasks faster and easier. Whether it’s reopening a closed tab or permanently deleting a file without ever hitting the recycle bin, there are plenty of tricks to help you be a little more efficient on your computer.

But in my personal experience, the one computer trick people are most consistently surprised about is an action you can do with your scroll wheel.

The scroll wheel’s hidden function

The internet is a great place to collect random tidbits of information, but sometimes you see something you want to investigate later. You don’t want to click on the link and have to go back to the previous page, because it would interrupt your current read. But you want to keep the trail open for later.

What do you do? You have a variety of options here, but this is the slickest and most efficient: If you’re using a mouse, just use your scroll wheel to click on the link. It’s not the most intuitive motion, but if you push your scroll wheel down while hovering over the link, you’ll automatically open that link in a new tab.

This little trick is great for when you’re reading something that links out to other interesting stories — just scroll-wheel click to open new tabs and check them out after you finish reading the current story.

If you want other ways of opening new tabs, we’ll walk you through it. We also have tips on keyboard shortcuts, like Ctrl + Shift + T, and taking Windows screenshots (which you can open in new tabs with a scroll-wheel click).

How to open links in new tabs

Opening pages in new tabs is a convenient browsing technique, and there are a few different ways of doing it.

• Click with your scroll wheel to automatically open the link in a new tab.
• Or right-click a link and choose “open in new tab.”
• You can also hold down Ctrl (or command on Mac) when you click the link and it will open in a new tab.

Opening things in a new tab means you don’t have to interrupt your current read, and you don’t have to wait for pages to load as you bounce back and forth. I use it all the time for comparison shopping — just pull up the things I’m considering in a few different tabs and quickly compare by tabbing through my browser. It’s also good for when you’re reading a story that references another story that you want to check out without interrupting your current read. Just click the link with your scroll wheel and check it out when you’re done with this story.

Bonus tip: You can use Ctrl + Tab to move forward and Ctrl + Shift + Tab to move backward through your open tabs.

For more computer tips, check out how to factory reset a laptop before gifting it, and essential settings for your MacBook.

Google has some of the most popular digital services in Google Drive and Gmail. According to Axios, Google Drive had 2 billion active users as of 2020, and CNBC reported Gmail had 1.5 billion active users in 2019.

Google gives you a combined 15GB of storage space for free for all its services, which can fill up pretty fast. When you get close to that limit, Google will notify you and ask if you want to pay for more storage. But you don’t have to pay more. There are other, free ways to manage your digital space.

Here’s how to free up Google Drive and Gmail space on desktop and mobile so you don’t have to pay for storage. We recommend doing this on desktop, as you’ll have an easier time sorting through and managing files compared to doing it on your mobile device.

Delete large files first

If you only want to delete a few items from Google Drive and Gmail to free up space, you can sort each service by file size and delete one or two large files instead of a few dozen smaller items.

Here’s how to delete files by size in Google Drive on your desktop.

1. Log into your Google Drive account.

2. Once logged in, click Storage in the menu on the left side of the screen.

3. The Storage page should list your files from largest to smallest, but if not click Storage Used on the right side of the screen. The files should now be ordered from largest to smallest.

4. Click large files you want to delete to select them, then click either the trash bin in the top right of your screen or drag the large files to Trash on the left side of the screen.

5. Click Trash to go to the Trash menu.

6. Click Empty Trash in the top-right corner of your screen.

7. Click Delete forever and your files are gone.

You can do this in the Google Drive app, as well. Here’s how.

1. Open your Google Drive app and log into your account.

2. Tap Files in the bottom-right corner of the screen.

3. Tap Name underneath My Drive near the top of the screen.

4. Tap Storage Used. This will arrange your files from largest to smallest.

5. Tap the three dots (…) next to the item you want to delete.

6. Tap Remove.

7. Tap the hamburger icon in the top-left corner of the screen next to Search in Drive.

8. Tap Trash.

9. Tap the three dots (…) in the top-right corner of the screen.

10. Tap Empty trash.

You can also arrange and delete files by size in Gmail on the desktop. Here’s how.

1. Log into your Gmail account.

2. Type has:attachment larger:10MB into the search bar and hit Search. This will show you all emails that have attachments larger than 10 MB from largest to smallest. You can use this format to filter by other size files, not just 10 MBs.

3. Check the boxes to the left of each email you want to delete, then click the Trash icon in the top-right corner of the screen.

4. Click Trash on the left side of the screen to go to the Trash menu. If you don’t see Trash, click More and Trash should be in the expanded menu.

5. Once in Trash, click Empty trash now at the top of the screen.

Here’s how to arrange and delete files by size in the Gmail app.

1. Open your Gmail app and log into your account.

2. Type has:attachment larger:10MB into the search bar and hit Search. This will show you all emails that have attachments larger than 10MB, from largest to smallest. You can use this format to filter by other size files too, not just 10MBs.

3. Tap into the email you want to delete.

4. Tap the trash bin icon in the top-right corner of your screen.

5. Tap < in the top-left corner of your screen.

6. Tap the hamburger icon in the top-left corner of the screen next to Search in mail.

7. Tap Trash.

8. Tap Empty trash now.

Note that once a file goes to Trash, it will automatically delete after 30 days.

Empty your Gmail spam folder

It’s easy to forget about emptying your spam folder, and it can double the amount of data your Gmail account uses. Emptying your spam folder (or your social or promotions folders) is an easy way to make space.

Here’s how to empty your spam folder on your desktop.

1. Log into your Gmail account.

2. Once logged in, click Spam on the left side of the screen. If you don’t see Spam, click More, and Spam should be in the expanded menu.

3. In your Spam folder, click Delete all spam messages now.

Here’s how to empty your spam folder in the mobile app.

1. Open the Gmail app and log into your account.

2. Tap the hamburger icon in the top-left corner of the screen next to Search in mail.

3. Tap Spam.

4. Tap Delete all spam messages now or Empty spam now.

Clean up your Google Photos

Google also includes Google Photos in the 15GB of free storage it gives its users. Photos and videos can take up more space than text-based files so it’s a good idea to go through and delete old photos and videos to make room.

Unfortunately, there’s no option to arrange your photos and videos from largest to smallest like in Google Drive and Gmail, so you will have to go through and delete items manually.

Here’s how to delete photos and videos from Google Photo on your desktop.

1. Open and log into Google Photos.

2. Scroll your mouse over photos and videos you want to delete and click the gray check mark icon in the top left corner of the photo or video.

3. Click the trash icon in the top right corner of the screen.

4. Click Move to trash.

5. Click Trash on the left side of the screen.

6. Click Empty trash near the top-right corner of your screen.

7. Click Empty trash again, and you’re set.

Here’s how to delete photos and videos from the Google Photo mobile app.

1. Open and log into Google Photos.

2. Tap the photo or video you want to delete.

3. Tap the trash icon in the bottom-right corner of the screen.

4. Tap Delete.

5. Tap Library in the bottom-right corner of the screen.

6. Tap Trash.

7. Tap the three dots (…) in the top-right corner of the screen.

8. Tap Empty trash.

9. Tap Delete.

If you don’t click or tap Empty trash on either platform, the photos and videos you’ve deleted will automatically delete after 60 days.

When all else fails, download your files

If your storage is still almost full and you can’t part with any more items from your Google Drive, Gmail or Google Photos, you can download your items and store them directly on your computer.

Here’s how to download your Google Drive files for storage on another hard drive.

1. Open and log into your Google Drive account on your desktop.

2. Select the files you want to download.

3. Click the three stacked dots in the upper-right corner of your screen.

4. Click Download.

5. Once the items are downloaded, feel free to delete them from your Google Drive.

You can also download your emails from Gmail. Here’s how.

1. Open and log into your Gmail account on your desktop.

2. Click and open an email you want to download.

3. Click the three stacked dots next to the date of the email.

4. Click Download message.

5. Once the emails are downloaded, you can delete them from your Gmail.

Here’s how to download photos and videos from Google Photos.

1. Open and log into your Gmail account on your desktop.

2. Click and open a photo or video you want to download.

3. Click the three stacked dots in the top-right corner of the screen.

4. Click Download.

5. Once the items are downloaded, you’re free to delete them from your Google Photos.

For more, check out these 10 Gmail tips and tools, nine Google Drive features you might have missed and five Google Photos features to try now.

Shopping for a camera that can keep up with all of your travels and action shots? GoPro cameras have become favorites for content creators and are changing the face of videography. The latest GoPro sports video stabilization software has advanced with each model — and even won an Emmy. It’s a great camera choice for creatives and can be edited easily for popular social media platforms.

With newer models, you can get the quality of a high-definition video camera without the bulk or hassle of traditional DSLR cameras that aren’t waterproof or dustproof. GoPros are easy to carry around and are submersible, so you can shoot clear videos underwater. These cameras can be quite pricey for all their features, but there are lots of deals and discounts on a number of models.

At GoPro, you can save up to $200 when you also buy a $50 yearly GoPro subscription — which includes unlimited cloud backup — and get up to 50% off at GoPro.com. And if you don’t want to pony up for a subscription, check out some other great deals on GoPros below.

When the Dead Space remake was released last month, it exceeded expectations. It’s easily one of the best video game remakes. It not only stayed faithful to the original, it also added new content that seamlessly integrated itself into the sci-fi horror game.

One fun addition to the Dead Space remake are Easter eggs that unlock upgrade items or additional pieces to the game’s storyline. Placed throughout the USG Ishimura are red circles with symbols on them. Players who follow the steps laid out by the symbols will unlock the Easter eggs.

There are several Easter eggs, but one that’s grabbed players’ attention is the ability to unlock a sea shanty about the haunted ship.

How to find the sea shanty audio log

To find the sea shanty Easter egg, players will have to wait until they reach Chapter 4: Obliteration Imminent. This will give players access to the Bridge section of the Ishimura, where there are two elevators in the center of the Main Atrium.

After taking down the Brute, one of the larger monsters in the game, players can head into the elevator and proceed to Floor 1. On this first floor there’s a break room. Instead of having snacks and comfy chairs, it has a bloody shrine dedicated to the Marker, which is the artifact responsible for the horrors happening on the ship.

What’s important for this Easter egg is the bloody circle on the ground in front of the monitor showing the Marker. There are two symbols seen in the circle: a foot and a hand. The foot represents the stomp Issac can perform, and the hand is for a melee attack.

By going clockwise starting at the top of the circle and doing a combination of stomps and melee attacks, you’ll unlock a secret item. You can tell this has been accomplished, as there’s a quick glitch that appears on the monitor and a haunting sound effect plays.

For the sea shanty audio log, players will have to do the following while in the circle:

Melee – stomp – melee – melee – stomp – melee -stomp – melee – melee – melee – melee – stomp

The audio log will drop out of nowhere. Take a listen to the crew of the Ishimura singing a disturbing sea shanty.

Dead Space is out on PC for $60 and on the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S consoles for $70.

LastPass, one of the world’s most popular password managers, suffered a major data breach in December, putting customers’ online passwords at risk and endangering their personal data.

On Dec. 22, LastPass CEO Karim Toubba acknowledged in a blog post that a security incident the company first disclosed in August eventually led to an “unauthorized party” stealing customer account information and sensitive vault data. The breach is the latest in a lengthy and troubling string of security incidents involving LastPass that date back to 2011.

It’s also the most alarming.

An unauthorized party was able to gain access to unencrypted subscriber account information like LastPass usernames, company names, billing addresses, email addresses, phone numbers and IP addresses, according to Toubba. That same unauthorized party was also able to steal customer vault data, which includes unencrypted data like website URLs as well as encrypted data like the usernames and passwords for all of the sites customers have stored in their vaults.

If you’re a LastPass subscriber, the severity of this breach should have you looking for a different password manager, because your passwords and personal data are at serious risk of being exposed.

What should LastPass subscribers do?

The company didn’t specify how many users were affected by the breach, and LastPass didn’t respond to CNET’s request for additional comment on the breach. But if you’re a LastPass subscriber, you need to operate under the assumption that your user and vault data are in the hands of an unauthorized party with ill intentions. Though the most sensitive data is encrypted, the problem is that the threat actor can run “brute force” attacks on those stolen local files. LastPass estimates it would take “millions of years” to guess your master password — if you’ve followed its best practices.

If you haven’t — or if you just want total peace of mind — you’ll need to spend some serious time and effort changing your individual passwords. And while you’re doing that, you’ll probably want to transition away from LastPass, too.

With that in mind, here’s what you need to do right now if you’re a LastPass subscriber:

1. Find a new password manager. Given LastPass’ history with security incidents and considering the severity of this latest breach, now’s a better time than ever to seek an alternative.

2. Change your most important site-level passwords immediately. This includes passwords for anything like online banking, financial records, internal company logins and medical information. Make sure these new passwords are strong and unique.

3. Change every single one of your other online passwords. It’s a good idea to change your passwords in order of importance here too. Start with changing the passwords to accounts like email and social media profiles, then you can start moving backward to other accounts that may not be as critical.

4. Enable two-factor authentication wherever possible. Once you’ve changed your passwords, make sure to enable 2FA on any online account that offers it. This will give you an added layer of protection by alerting you and requiring you to authorize each login attempt. That means even if someone ends up obtaining your new password, they shouldn’t be able to gain access to a given site without your secondary authenticating device (typically your phone).

5. Change your master password. Though this doesn’t change the threat level to the stolen vaults, it’s still prudent to help mitigate the threats of any potential future attack — that is, if you decide you want to stay with LastPass.

LastPass alternatives to consider

• Bitwarden: CNET’s top password manager is a highly secure and open-source LastPass alternative. Bitwarden’s free tier allows you to use the password manager across an unlimited number of devices across device types. Read our Bitwarden review.
• 1Password: Another excellent password manager that works seamlessly across platforms. 1Password doesn’t offer a free tier, but you can try it for free for 14 days.
• iCloud Keychain: Apple’s built-in password manager for iOS, iPadOS and MacOS devices is an excellent LastPass alternative available to Apple users at no additional cost. iCloud Keychain is secure and easy to set up and use across all of your Apple devices. It even offers a Windows client, too, with support for Chrome and Edge browsers.

How did it come to this?

In August 2022, LastPass published a blog post written by Toubba saying that the company “determined that an unauthorized party gained access to portions of the LastPass development environment through a single compromised developer account and took portions of source code and some proprietary LastPass technical information.”

At the time, Toubba said that the threat was contained after LastPass “engaged a leading cybersecurity and forensics firm” and implemented “enhanced security measures.” But that blog post would be updated several times over the following months as the scope of the breach gradually widened.

On Sept. 15, Toubba updated the blog post to notify customers that the company’s investigation into the incident had concluded.

“Our investigation revealed that the threat actor’s activity was limited to a four-day period in August 2022. During this timeframe, the LastPass security team detected the threat actor’s activity and then contained the incident,” Toubba said. “There is no evidence of any threat actor activity beyond the established timeline. We can also confirm that there is no evidence that this incident involved any access to customer data or encrypted password vaults.”

Toubba assured customers at the time that their passwords and personal data were safe in LastPass’s care.

However, it turned out that the unauthorized party was indeed ultimately able to access customer data. On Nov. 30, Toubba updated the blog post once again to alert customers that the company “determined that an unauthorized party, using information obtained in the August 2022 incident, was able to gain access to certain elements of our customers’ information.”

Then, on Dec. 22, Toubba issued a lengthy update to the blog post outlining the unnerving details regarding precisely what customer data the hackers were able to access in the breach. It was then that the full severity of the situation finally came to light and the public found out that LastPass customers’ personal data was in the hands of a threat actor and all of their passwords were at serious risk of being exposed.

Still, Toubba assured customers who follow LastPass’s best practices for passwords and have the latest default settings enabled that no further action on their part is recommended at this time since their “sensitive vault data, such as usernames and passwords, secure notes, attachments, and form-fill fields, remain safely encrypted based on LastPass’ Zero Knowledge architecture.”

However, Toubba warned that those who don’t have LastPass’s default settings enabled and don’t follow the password manager’s best practices are at greater risk of having their master passwords cracked. Toubba suggested that those users should consider changing the passwords of the websites they have stored.

What does all of this mean for LastPass subscribers?

The initial breach ended up allowing the unauthorized party to access sensitive user account data as well as vault data, which means that LastPass subscribers should be extremely concerned for the integrity of the data they have stored in their vaults and should be questioning LastPass’s capacity to keep their data safe.

If you’re a LastPass subscriber, an unauthorized party may have access to personal information like your LastPass username, email address, phone number, name and billing address. IP addresses used when accessing LastPass were also exposed in the breach, which means that the unauthorized party could also see the locations from which you used your account. And because LastPass doesn’t encrypt users’ stored website URLs, the unauthorized party can see all of the websites for which you have login information saved with the password manager (even if the passwords themselves are encrypted).

Information like this gives a potential attacker plenty of ammunition for launching a phishing attack and socially engineering their way to your account passwords. And if you have any password reset links stored that may still be active, an attacker can easily go ahead and create a new password for themselves.

LastPass says that encrypted vault data like usernames and passwords, secure notes and form-filled data that was stolen remains secured. However, if an attacker were to crack your master password at the time of the breach, they would be able to access all of that information, including all the usernames and passwords to your online accounts. If your master password wasn’t strong enough at the time of the breach, your passwords are especially at risk of being exposed.

Changing your master password now will, unfortunately, not help solve the issue because the attackers already have a copy of your vault that was encrypted using the master password you had in place at the time of the breach. This means the attackers essentially have an unlimited amount of time to crack that master password. That’s why the safest course of action is a site-by-site password reset for all of your LastPass-stored accounts. Once changed at the site level, that would mean the attackers would be getting your old, outdated passwords if they managed to crack the stolen encrypted vaults.

For more on staying secure online, here are data privacy tips digital security experts wish you knew and browser settings to change to better guard your information.

Overwatch 2 kicked off its third competitive season on Tuesday. Season 3 is the first with no new hero for the online shooter, as we enter the phase of the game’s ongoing development in which it alternates between a new hero and a new map each season.

Instead, we got a new control map, Antarctic Peninsula, along with a new mythic skin in the battle pass. We also got some unexpected changes, like an upcoming collaboration and Overwatch’s first foray into text-based dating sims. Here’s everything to know about Season 3, including information from Blizzard’s blog post.

New map: Antarctic Peninsula

Control maps, aka king of the hill maps, are a community favorite in Overwatch, but we’ve gotten only two new ones since the game launched in 2016. The new Antarctic Peninsula map gives players a different feel than what they get from the game’s other control maps, which are typically set in more metropolitan areas. The three submaps in Antarctic Peninsula are an icebreaker ship, an underground drilling area, and Overwatch laboratories. Overwatch 2’s narrative lead has hinted that environments have some lore hidden away for sharp-eyed players to find. Also: penguins.

Crossover with One Punch Man

Perhaps the biggest surprise of all the season 3 news is the upcoming Fortnite-style collaboration with the anime One Punch Man. The only thing we know so far is that there will be a Saitama-themed skin for Doomfist, Overwatch’s own punching machine, but there may be other skins and cosmetics as well. The blog post says the team is looking for more potential collaborations in the future.

New mythic skin: Amaterasu Kiriko

In its first two seasons, Overwatch 2 offered a new type of hero skin called mythic skins, which come with hero customizations and different sound and visual effects. These skins are unlocked at level 80 of the battle pass. Season 1 brought us Cyberdemon Genji, while Season 2 added a Zeus-themed Junker Queen to the game. Season 3 continues the mythology trend by adding a mythic Amaterasu skin for support hero Kiriko. According to the season 3 blog post, the mythic skin is based on various deities in Japanese mythology and can be customized with moon, sea and storm themes. The shinto deity seems like a good fit for Overwatch’s newest support hero, whose healing abilities are already tied to a Japanese fox spirit.

Competitive and matchmaking changes

Matchmaking has been one of the community’s biggest complaints since Blizzard launched Overwatch 2, and the developers have planned changes for season 3 to address some of those concerns. In a developer blog about matchmaker goals, they said the matchmaker will start looking to balance teams within each role (tank, DPS and support) rather than just across the entire team. This should help avoid games where an entire role on one team outclasses the other, leading to a one-sided stomp.

The devs also introduced a couple of adjacent changes to improve the competitive experience. Previously, players would be able to see their updated rank only after they’d notched seven wins or 20 losses. Starting in season 3, those numbers have been lowered to five wins or 15 losses, allowing players to see their updated rank more often. It means you’re less likely to rank up on each update (because you’ll have played fewer games on average), but it also means you no longer have to win 21 games to update your rank across all three roles — a welcome change. The devs said, too, that the user interface will also get an update in the midseason patch, so you can always see how close you are to a competitive update (instead of only after a win or by doing math based on your current number of competitive wins for each role).

Your competitive rank will still decay at the start of season 3. But the developer blog said they’ll remove the seasonal rank resets that drop players roughly one full rank at the start of a season, starting in season 4.

More ways to earn credits

Since the launch of Overwatch 2, players have been asking for more ways to earn rewards that let them buy cosmetic enhancements for their characters. Previously, the only way to earn in-game currency was by completing weekly challenges, which awarded up to 60 credits per week. But a premium battle pass costs 1,000 credits, and legendary skins cost even more than that, which felt virtually impossible to save up for with weekly challenges.

But in season 3, players are able to earn legacy credits through the free and premium tiers of the battle pass. Legacy credits can’t be used to buy battle passes or cosmetics that are new to Overwatch 2, but they can be used on cosmetics from the original game. The free tier offers up to 1,500 credits — enough to get a legendary skin from Overwatch 1 — with another 500 credits available through the premium track.

Dating sim

Honestly, Overwatch dipping its toes in dating sims feels like an inevitability, but that doesn’t make it any less exciting. Your personal feelings about the heroes Genji and Mercy may make it more or less intriguing, though, as those are the two heroes you have the option of pursuing, with the aid of a cupid-themed Hanzo. You’ll be able to unlock a Play of the Game highlight with certain endings, so be sure to check it out between Feb. 13 and 28 at loverwatch.gg once the event is live.

Please, everyone play this and make it a huge success so we get more in the future. The game is filled with eligible candidates. The player base is thirsty. Baptiste already flirts with people in the game. I’m begging everyone to band together so we can flirt back.

Streamer mode

The game introduced a streamer mode in an attempt to cut down on stream sniping, where players queue up at the same time as streamers so they can watch the stream while playing, in order to outmaneuver the streamers. New streamer mode options include hiding your and other players’ Battletags, hiding chat and replay codes, and delaying and hiding queue times to make it harder for people to join the same match as the streamer.

Accessibility improvements

A few changes were made to aid in visibility across various parts of the game, including more subtitle options, mouse cursor size options and custom colors for groups and alerts, which players will now be able to preview before applying.

Video doorbells are a smart, low-cost way to add some security to your home. They can give you a real-time view of your entryway and alert you when visitors or packages arrive. Now through Feb. 16, you can get grade-A refurbished Ring video doorbells for as low as $20 while supplies last.

Our pick for the best budget-friendly Ring video doorbell available is the Ring Video Doorbell 2020. It has a 1080p video resolution, a 155-degree field-of-view, two-way audio and can be wired or run on the included built-in rechargeable battery. This model, when paired with the app, will deliver mobile notifications when the built-in motion-detection sensors are activated. And it’s available right now for $40.

And for the absolute lowest price in this sale, check out the wired Ring video doorbell. At just $20, it’s a cheap option that you won’t ever have to charge. It does, however, require existing doorbell wiring for its power supply. Be sure to shop the entire sale to check out all of the available models. Also note that if you want to record all your videos to review clips for up to 60 days or share videos and photos, you will need to pay for the optional Ring Protection Plan, with subscriptions starting at $3 per month, per device.

Grade-A refurbs are reconditioned to be as good as new. But your purchase is backed by a 90-day Woot limited warranty, just in case. And if you’re not a fan of refurbished devices, or these models aren’t the right fit for your home, be sure to check out Amazon’s one-day sale on new Ring doorbells, cameras and other products, which are up to 40% off today. (Ring and Woot are both owned by Amazon.)

Have you already set aside $60 for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom? You’ll have to cough up a bit more if you plan on buying it from Nintendo’s eShop.

Following Wednesday’s Nintendo Direct presentation, the eShop displayed a price of $70 for the upcoming blockbuster.

Stores like Best Buy and GameStop offered the option to preorder the game for $60 before halting preorders Tuesday, as documented by Twitter user @Wario64. As of Wednesday evening, preorders were back for $60 at GameStop and $70 at Best Buy. However, even the GameStop price had jumped to $70 on Thursday.

Tears of the Kingdom, the sequel to 2017’s acclaimed Breath of the Wild, is scheduled to launch on May 12. Nintendo revealed a new trailer for Tears of the Kingdom during Wednesday’s presentation as well as a collector’s edition that will release on launch day. That’ll come with the game, SteelBook case, a steel poster, a pin set and hardcover art book, and will set you back $130.

Nintendo also revealed a new Link amiibo — small plastic statues that unlock in-game extras — that’ll be released alongside the game.

Other notable announcements from Nintendo Direct include Pikmin 4’s July 21 release date, the surprise reveal of Metroid Prime Remastered, and the Nintendo Online service getting a slate of Game Boy and Game Boy Advance classics.