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Microsoft’s top science exec is leaving to fulfill a childhood dream: Joining a Formula 1 team
Peter Lee, the longtime Microsoft Research leader, plans to join the Mercedes Formula 1 team in a newly created AI advisor role. He'll work on physics problems for the team's car, predictive models and how F1's regulators might govern AI.
Data center regulation on Inside West Virginia Politics
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WOWK) – On this week’s episode of Inside West Virginia Politics, our guests join Rick Johnson to discuss data center regulation, Parkinson’s advocacy and the Senate race. I…
Microsoft 365 just plummeted in value again — your family will lose a whopping 4TB of storage
Microsoft says the new storage model is more flexible, but families now get dramatically less OneDrive storage for the same price.
Microsoft is considering making Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, and even Minecraft Xbox console exclusive
Microsoft is actively asking Xbox users with multiple consoles how they'd react if big franchises went fully console exclusive. Is this a hint at things to come?
Big Tech’s enabling of the ballroom is the worst symbol of our times
The wealthiest companies since the robber baron days -- like Microsoft and Amazon -- greased the skids for an authoritarian vanity project the public doesn't want.
Microsoft Announces Per-Hour Cost for Xbox Cloud Gaming Service
You're on the clock, kids.
M5 Pro MacBook Pro vs Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra: Compared
The Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra uses Nvidia graphics in a bid to take over from the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M5 Pro as a productivity favorite. Here's how the two powerful notebooks compare.
Former Microsoft engineer left $200K job to build AI startup solo
Junead Khan left Microsoft after two years to pursue his AI startup. He explains why he quit his six-figure job without customers or VC funding.
Microsoft: FSR 4.1 Coming "Very Soon" to Xbox Game Developers for Series X, Series S
How will FSR 4.1 stack up against PS5's QSSR and Pro's PSSR 2?
Microsoft reportedly plans Xbox handheld in 2027, next-gen console in 2028
The next Xbox could cost between $1,200 and $1,800 if Microsoft doesn’t subsidize it.
Developer Who Cloned Photoshop With AI Just Did the Same to Microsoft Office
Developer Brandon Thomas used Anthropic's Claude to build free, open-source replicas of Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
Microsoft: Windows 11 24H2 Home and Pro reached end of support
Microsoft announced today that devices running Windows 11 24H2 Home and Pro editions have reached the end of support and will no longer receive monthly security and non-security preview updates.
Weekly Rundown: JAMA Network to add AI journal in 2027; UMass Memorial Health partners with Microsoft, Accenture
Stay up to date on the latest in health tech, digital health and health AI news with this weekly brief. Read below for news from the week of Oct. 12 to 16. | The latest news from UMass Memorial Health, Elation Health, HealthTap, JAMA and more.
I needed to see the new Windows 11 Photos app in action to fathom how fast it is — it's like switching from dial-up to broadband
Microsoft rebuilt key parts of Photos, and the result appears dramatically faster than the sluggish app Windows users know today.
Hackers Use Compromised ConnectWise Credential to Sign In to 173 Microsoft 365 Tenants
Attackers used a compromised ConnectWise Cloud Backup credential for unauthorized sign-ins across 173 Microsoft 365 tenants.
Microsoft tries to spark new life into Windows
Windows is slowly morphing into an agentic OS.
How Windows is being optimized for Nvidia’s RTX Spark laptops
Microsoft has focused on local AI models, gaming, and memory management.
CAS collaborates with Microsoft to enable faster innovation in pharmaceutical, life sciences, and chemical industries
/PRNewswire/ -- CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society, today announced the availability of CAS Connections in Microsoft Copilot. The connector gives...
Nvidia’s latest GPU driver brings a new way to speed up PC games
Microsoft’s new Advanced Shader Delivery technology is now part of Nvidia’s drivers.
Microsoft president pushes back against Trump's immigration crackdown
Brad Smith also defended Microsoft against JD Vance's claim that the company replaced laid-off Americans with foreign workers.
I've lived with Microsoft's $6,000 Surface Laptop Ultra, and it's so close to being the best MacBook Pro alternative you can buy
Microsoft's top of the line Windows 11 PC is finally here, and it's giving the MacBook Pro a real good run for its money.
Xbox mandates a four-day return to office
Xbox employees close to Microsoft’s Redmond headquarters will need to come into the office more starting in February.
Othello raises $8M to help sales reps improve pitches with AI
Othello, whose customers include Microsoft and Capital One, acts as a real-time coach on sales calls to help reps close deals.
Big Walk skipped Xbox to boycott Microsoft’s involvement with Israel
The omittance was intentional.
Update: Microsoft's Business Software Proposed to Receive Increased UK Regulatory Scrutiny
(Updates with Microsoft's response in the sixth paragraph.) Microsoft (MSFT) business software is
Microsoft is now scaling back Copilot in Windows 11 amid Microslop backlash, pulling 8 AI actions from File Explorer and calling it “simplifying”
Microsoft says it's retiring "Copilot actions" from the File Explorer context menu, which it recently began rolling out.
As Microsoft is cut from green card program, workers have questions
Once again, a Trump administration blow to the H-1B program is rattling the Seattle-area tech workforce. Vice President JD Vance announced Thursday that the Trump administration would suspend Microsoft from
Microsoft Is Taking AI Beyond the Data Center, But Its Surface Business Is Just a Small Piece of the Pie
The tech giant's latest Nvidia-powered Surface devices add another dimension to its growth strategy as shares trade near all-time highs.
Cardiology’s busy year: Compensation, productivity, imaging volumes and TAVR cases all on the rise for heart specialists
Cardiologists appear to be thriving in the face of adversity. Even as the specialty juggles an aging population, a workforce shortage and unfavorable reimbursement policies, compensation and productivity continue to climb.
As World Health Summit opens, IRC warns global health investment in fragile states is declining as disease outbreaks pose growing threat
As the World Health Summit begins, IRC warns that global health cuts are putting lives at risk in the world’s most fragile and conflict-affected states.
Redefining Workflows with Microsoft AI & Power Platform: Start with Business Goals, Not Technology
Microsoft executives Leon Welicki and Dona Sarkar joined Innovia Consulting’s Shawn Dorward to discuss practical AI adoption strategies, emphasizing leadership, clear business goals, and choosing the right technologies to improve enterprise workflows.
Satya Nadella: Companies should treat AI models like threats
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said companies should assume AI models are compromised and contain them from the start.
Microsoft’s Mustafa Suleyman says its AI outperforms doctors on hard cases as he chases ‘medical superintelligence’
Microsoft’s new AI diagnostic system beat generalist doctors on hard cases, according to a study in Science. But most of the improvement seems to come from the AI models underneath, not from Microsoft’s system itself.
Windows 11 Is Finally Becoming the OS It Should Have Been From the Start
Microsoft is completely redesigning parts of its OS so it doesn't hog all the resources of lower-end PCs with 8GB of RAM.
Microsoft Diagnostic AI Outperforms Generalist Physicians in Science Study
Microsoft's MAI-DxO diagnostic system outperformed participating generalist physicians on complex diagnostic cases in a peer-reviewed study published October 22, 2026 in Science, which reported 83.2% accuracy for the sys...
Microsoft is actively rebuilding Windows 11 Search. What does it mean? Our deep‑dive answers every major question.
Microsoft's new Windows 11 Search promises faster results, better query matching, and useful actions without requiring a Copilot+ PC.
Microsoft Patches Record 1,413 Flaws, Including Exploited Windows Shell Bug
Microsoft patched a record 1,413 flaws, including an exploited Windows Shell bug that can bypass Mark of the Web defenses.
Microsoft Says It Made Windows 11 Zippier, Especially On PCs With Less RAM
The whole RAM price thing is partly Microsoft's fault so it's the least it can do.
Xbox is struggling for stock so bad that it's encouraging lapsed users to trade-in their dormant consoles ahead of GTA 6
The console stock situation is so dire now that Microsoft is targeting lapsed users with second, dormant Xbox consoles to recommend trading-in. The RAM crisis continues.
Microsoft President says AI Needs Urgent Regulation
Brad Smith, President of Microsoft, calls for urgent AI regulation led by the UK as OpenAI, Anthropic and Google DeepMind back an industry slowdown
Earthshot and the science of positive tipping points: how environmental progress can become unstoppable
By Dr Steven R. Smith and Professor Tim Lenton It must be tough being a judge on the world’s most prestigious environmental prize: imagine having to choose between an ingenious machine that removes microplastics from
Microsoft updates Windows 11 Xbox mode with easier access to desktop and power controls
Microsoft is making it easier to return to Windows from Xbox mode. The latest Insider builds introduce a refreshed Gaming Task View with desktop and power shortcuts.
Give Your Business Microsoft Office for Life for Just $29.97
This one-time purchase installs the core Office apps on a work PC, with no yearly renewal.
The Surface Laptop Ultra delivers on most of Microsoft's promises
Microsoft promises one machine for dev, AI, and gaming, and mostly gets there.
'We're Victims of Xbox's Change in Strategy': Dishonored Dev Has Weeks to Save Itself
Blames Microsoft for "incoherent" decision making
I dumped Microsoft Phone Link for this free open source app that does everything better
It does everything I need and more
Trump awards science medals to Musk, Nadella and 4 other tech titans — 5 immigrants — hours after Vance targets them
Vance called foreign tech workers “indentured servants” and suspended Microsoft’s PERM program. Hours later, Trump gave its immigrant CEO a national medal.
Microsoft offers MacBook Pro owners up to $1,000 to switch to Surface Laptop Ultra
Microsoft is offering MacBook Pro owners up to $1,000 in extra cash back when they trade in their Apple laptop and preorder the new Surface Laptop Ultra. The bonus is paid in addition to the device’s normal trade-in value, as Microsoft tries to lure Apple users to its $2,599.99 RTX Spark-powered flagship.
Protiviti Achieves 2026-2027 Microsoft AI Business Solutions Inner Circle Award
/PRNewswire/ -- Protiviti, a global consulting firm, has been selected for the Microsoft AI Business Solutions 2026-2027 Inner Circle membership. This is...
Report: Microsoft's Project Helix planned for 2028 at $1,200 to $1,800 price
Xbox maker is also apparently planning its own gaming handheld for next year.
The next-gen Xbox won’t cost you $1,800. It can’t. Can it?
Didn’t Microsoft say the next Xbox needed to be affordable?
UMass Memorial Health Announces Unified Data Platform Multi-Year Initiative, Investments in AI-Powered Innovation in Partnership with Accenture and Microsoft
NEW YORK & WORCESTER, Mass., October 15, 2026--UMass Memorial Health today announced a multi-year initiative with Accenture and Microsoft to modernize its data platform.
Shrek 2 Remastered Microsoft Store page appears
A Microsoft Store page for the unannounced Shrek 2 Remastered developed by Aspyr has gone live.
Microsoft science chief Lee to advise Mercedes on AI
Departing Microsoft Science president Peter Lee plans to advise Mercedes on AI applications ranging from car physics to predictive modeling and regulation,...
Can AI solve our mental health access problem?
Last week I asked you what worries you most about AI in health. It was close, but your top answer was “AI giving bad health advice.” Last week’s poll results: You’re in good company. This concern was top of mind at a conference I joined at Stanford last week, where researchers, clinicians, and people who build AI systems spent a day debating trust and safety in health AI. Stepping back, I’m also hearing your emerging concerns about AI’s impact on our well-being generally. I see this as a matter of public health, and we’ll take it in pieces as we learn together. Today we’ll focus on AI chatbots used for therapy for mental health. Early this month, Governor Newsom vetoed Senate Bill 903, California’s most ambitious attempt to regulate AI use for mental health. It’s at the center of active debate, and raises the questions patients, family members, citizens, and voters will face as AI moves deeper into health care. Let’s work through it. What is “AI-based therapy”? It’s really two things: purpose-built mental health apps designed to deliver structured support, and general chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini that people increasingly use for emotional support—even if they weren’t built for it. Spoiler alert: I don’t know whether the shift toward AI therapy is good or bad. The evidence isn’t there yet. But I do know it’s already happening, and I have some ideas about how we can roll it out with safety in mind. The therapy dilemma, in a nutshell Mental health challenges are common, and strain health and well-being across populations. Therapy (interactive dialogue with a trained, empathetic practitioner) helps many people heal. The demand for licensed therapists far exceeds the supply in California, and AI-based therapy can narrow that gap. AI-based therapy remains novel, unproven, and not well tested. Right off the bat, we can see we’re dealing with trade-offs here. Since the main driver of demand for therapy from a robot is lack of access to therapy from a human, we’ll start there. It’s too hard to find and afford a human therapist California is short roughly 55,000 licensed, non-prescribing therapists and counselors, about 40% of what we need. Psychiatrists, who rely on talk therapy as a complement to prescribed medications, are even more scarce. Eight counties have none, and density ranges from 1.7 per 100,000 residents in San Benito County, to 68.1 in Marin County. My wife is a psychiatrist in Marin, and even here access is tight. If it’s hard in the best-supplied county, imagine rural Sierra County, or the San Joaquin Valley. In 2024, more than half of Californians who tried to make a mental health appointment struggled to find a provider who took their insurance, compared with 14% for physical health care. When Senate staff posed as “secret shopper” patients and called 120 mental health providers in Medicare Advantage networks, they landed an appointment less than once for every five tries. Insurers pay behavioral health clinicians about 22% less than medical and surgical clinicians for comparable office visits. On top of that, billing denials and prior authorizations hit hardest at the solo and small practices common in mental health. Psychiatrists opt out of Medicare at the highest rate of any specialty. In many places, a cash practice for therapy fills quickly with patients paying $250 or more an hour, with no insurance paperwork at all. Families who can pay cash find providers more easily. Those who rely on insurance, including Medi-Cal enrollees, older adults, rural residents, and non-English speakers, compete for what’s left. So we can’t pretend the human system works, and we can’t blame people for turning to AI for support when they’re in distress. AI is filling the gap It’s estimated that roughly a quarter of AI users use it for mental health support. If you have internet, it’s available 24/7, it’s cheap, and it speaks your language. Uninsured adults are about twice as likely as insured adults to do it (30% vs. 14%). It feels anonymous in ways that may enable people to ask things they’re unsure or embarrassed about. The largely hidden, personal use makes it hard to study whether it’s actually helping people with their mental health issues, but researchers are trying. Does AI therapy work? A 2026 analysis of nearly 40 randomized trials found chatbots showed a real but small reduction in depression symptoms. But most of these trials were compared to an alternative of no therapy, not a human therapist. So the benefit of AI therapy is probably real, but modest, and mostly untested against the alternative of human contact. We need more studies. Serious concerns OpenAI’s own estimate is that more than a million ChatGPT users each week show signs of suicidal planning or intent. These are high stakes encounters, and AI doesn’t always get it right. That’s partly because a chatbot can sound like a therapist, but it has no license, no duty of care, and it’s not clear who to hold accountable when it gets things wrong. AI is also designed to help users in whatever task they’re seeking to accomplish. People may feel like they’re getting therapy, but they’re mainly getting a convincing conversation. It’s easy for an AI companion to wander into gray areas, like playing along with “creative writing” that may be about the user’s own suicidal intent. Courts are driving safety conversations A wave of lawsuits have been filed on behalf of families claiming that chatbots pushed people they loved toward self-harm, including teens who died by suicide. The first settlements came this year. OpenAI is headquartered in San Francisco, and dozens of cases alleging that ChatGPT drove users to suicide or self-harm are now before a San Francisco judge. Character.ai has filed for bankruptcy after several states brought lawsuits accusing the chatbot of pushing dangerous content to kids. But the technology seems to be improving. Last month, an independent evaluation found that newer AI models “almost never endorse suicide.” That’s progress, but our societal appetite for even one preventable death is very low. So how do we move forward? Finding a middle ground Earlier this month the governor vetoed Senate Bill 903, a bill designed to place guardrails on the use of AI for therapy. The bill would have prohibited any AI-based platform from being advertised as psychotherapy, and would have required a licensed professional to review and approve each encounter where AI was used to support therapeutic decisions. Newsom called it overly broad, since even routine screening questions would have needed clinician sign-off. Knowing we’re already short on mental health providers, requiring human review of AI encounters may not relieve our access problems. Still, the answer isn’t no oversight. Here’s one feasible short term solution. Rather than reviewing each encounter, a licensed clinician can design the guardrails: what counts as a crisis, what triggers an immediate handoff to a human, and what gets sampled for audit each month. The AI runs inside that structure. Conversations get checked, failures get reported, and a real clinician owns the framework. Medicine already has models to learn from. The FDA process for rolling out newly approved medications is an example. After a product reaches patients, we keep watching for adverse events. Patient-facing AI needs the same “digital pharmacovigilance”: systematic tracking of harms, near misses, and the types of groups that get hurt and why. It’s also critical that users know that they can reach a human if they’re in crisis. Most chatbots now include messages like these: Bottom line The rush to use unproven AI tools for mental health support is mostly a workaround, a sign of a health system people can’t get into. We need better access to proven care from licensed clinicians. That takes reimbursement that makes accepting insurance viable, and a bigger workforce. But, built and tested well, AI could be part of the answer. It could be the 2 a.m. check-in when no one else is awake, or a way for patients to practice skills their therapist taught them. It could be the first step to get someone the right level of care, and take paperwork off clinicians’ plates so they spend more time with patients. None of this is simple. The SB 903 veto doesn’t end the debate, and the legislature will be back. In the meantime, those of us using these tools need to stay informed, ask hard questions, and hold the companies building them accountable. I’ll try to do my part, and we’ll keep learning together. Love,Matt P.S. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health challenges, emotional distress, substance use problems, or just needs to talk, call or text 988- you’ll reach a real person— or chat at 988lifeline.org 24/7. Dr. Matt Willis is the author of Your Local Epidemiologist in California. A California native, he’s served as a primary care physician, CDC epidemiologist, and public health officer for Marin County, where he guided the pandemic response. He lives in Marin with his family and their dogs, Teddy and Ramona. Thank you Cynthia He, MD, PhD, and Parnika Saxena, MD, for their guidance in preparing this article. Cynthia works in an outpatient mental health clinic, treating patients who have Medi-Cal or, sometimes, no insurance. Parnika works in an inpatient psychiatric unit, treating patients with public or private insurance or self-pay ability. All opinions are their own and do not represent their employers.
Microsoft, Health-ISAC dismantle phishing infrastructure targeting critical infrastructure, healthcare sector
Microsoft and Health-ISAC dismantle phishing infrastructure targeting critical infrastructure and healthcare organizations.
Microsoft October 2026 Patch Tuesday fixes 1,411 flaws, 3 zero-days
Today is Microsoft's October 2026 Patch Tuesday, with security updates addressing a record-breaking 1,411 flaws, including one actively exploited and two publicly disclosed zero-day vulnerabilities.
Microsoft's latest Windows 11 perk will give new PC buyers 25 free Xbox games worth over $500
Gears of War: Reloaded and more Xbox free games will be given to PC players as part of Windows 11's latest promotion.
Microsoft says its AI tool is better than doctors at diagnosing conditions
‘We’re gonna build something that is indistinguishable from human performance … in the next couple of years,’ Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman tells The Verge.
Adobe software dupe maker sets sights on Microsoft Office
AI vibecoded apps are challenging big legacy software.
The non-gamer CEO racing to save Microsoft’s Xbox
Asha Sharma has cut thousands of jobs, consolidated studios, and rewritten the playbook. Insiders wonder if she’s saving the brand or preparing it for a non-Microsoft future.
Windows and Xbox teams reportedly clashed over OS experience for gaming, as next-gen Xbox Helix console slips into 2028
A new report claims the Windows and Xbox teams have clashed over the direction of the OS for Microsoft's next-gen Xbox consoles.
Microsoft Says Its New AI Is More Than Twice as Good at Diagnosing Diseases as Doctors
Microsoft plans to start testing the tool in a Boston hospital soon.
Nvidia is no longer a PC gaming company. Get used to it
The disappearance of the GeForce RTX 5090 graphics card shouldn't come as a surprise, because PC game fans are no longer Nvidia's audience—AI companies are.
Forty new games are coming to Xbox consoles next week.
Microsoft's gaming platform ecosystem is gearing up for a major expansion of its catalog. Over the next seven days, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox...
Gears of War: E-Day sells 230K copies
Gears of War: E-Day has sold 230K copies since its advance-access launch on October 1 and full release on October 6. Steam accounts for 168K of those, with Xbox (console and PC) selling 62K. But there’s more to this story, as Xbox makes up the bulk of revenue. E-Day is the best-reviewed Gears game in nearly two decades (and the best one ever made, in my opinion). The Coalition has made a banger here (it’s currently in my top 10 of the year). Despite E-Day’s undeniable quality, this is a soft result. And it’s down to the business model, really. E-Day has made $37M so far, thanks to the Premium upgrade On Xbox, Game Pass is cannibalising much of the premium revenue. Our estimates show that 1.7M folks accessed E-Day via their subscription rather than a copy. But Xbox is having it both ways – or having it halfway, at least – via its Premium Edition Game Pass upgrade. Game Pass subscribers could pay $30 (or their local equivalent) for up to five days of early access starting October 1. Our estimates show that of the 1.7M who accessed E-Day through Game Pass, 722K paid for the upgrade. Between the review embargo lifting on October 1 and the full release, E-Day managed to shift another 250K early-access upgrades – no doubt helped by the campaign’s rave reviews. So despite selling far fewer copies on Steam, Xbox accounts for almost three-quarters of the revenue (roughly $26M of the $37M, versus about $11M on Steam). So “230K copies” undersells the paying audience. Including the 722K upgrades, nearly 950K people actually paid something for E-Day. The $30 upgrade is a halfstep from cannibalisation, but will Xbox go all the way? While E-Day is a sublime game, these are soft numbers for a flagship when Xbox badly needs revenue wins. E-Day sold 62K copies on Xbox against 722K Premium upgrades, so for every one copy sold on Xbox, nearly 12 Game Pass upgrades were sold. The $70 premium SKU is – functionally – dead on Xbox. Normally you can’t see what a Game Pass player would have paid, because the game’s just there in the subscription. But the $30 early-access upgrade estimate shows that 722K people demonstrated they’ll spend real money on this game. In a world without day-one Game Pass, many of these folks would have bought E-Day at $70. They paid $30 for five days early access to something they don’t own. Xbox is, in effect, charging its most valuable customers the least, based on a hangover from a tried-and-exhausted strategy from a previous administration. Those 722K willing-to-pay players generated about $21.7M via the upgrade. If three quarters of this group – mostly US and European audiences – bought E-Day outright, that’s nearly $40M. Of course, Game Pass does bring in meaningful recurring revenue, and E-Day is adding value for hundreds of thousands of subscribers. However, Game Pass is no longer growing, so Xbox is at a crossroads. Xbox is reportedly looking to do a Netflix and bolt on an ad-supported tier to pad it further. But that will just set a new floor, and leadership keeps telling us the priority now is revenue growth, which is subscriber-speak for ARPU. Xbox has already pulled Call of Duty from day-one Game Pass after day-one inclusion hammered its sales, with new CoD titles now arriving on the service around a year late. We know that some Microsoft executives believe the service devalues games outright, and rumours (which Microsoft has dismissed so far, to be fair) suggest that day-one releases could be taken off Game Pass. Want more free estimates and insights in your inbox twice a week? Subscribe below! Subscribe When a game this well-reviewed does this softly on its home platform, the model – not the game – gets brought into question. What else E-Day’s early adopters have played (including this month so far) Looking at E-Day‘s players on Xbox, most have played the franchise before (86% have played Gears 5, 76% Gears 4), and every game on the crossover list is either a shooter or a title from an Xbox-owned studio (though Game Pass is inflating those numbers, of course, more on that later): As for what else Xbox’s E-Day players have played this month, the top three are Fortnite (16%), Roblox (7%), and Call of Duty (6%). Another 5% played Minecraft Dungeons II, which is also on Game Pass and launched a couple of days before Gears‘ advance-access date. Many Game Pass players are happy to check out most big new additions. Want more free estimates and insights in your inbox twice a week? Subscribe below! Subscribe Over on Steam, the top crossover games are also mostly shooters (slightly more PC-coded ones), including Space Marine 2, which was itself heavily inspired by Gears: Looking at what E-Day‘s Steam players are into this month shows who they are – as subscriptions don’t skew the data. The top three are Wardogs (13%), Deadlock (12%), and CS2 (10%), so you’ve got the restless shooter crowd checking out the new hotness. A little further down are Helldivers 2 and Space Marine 2, your co-op PVE shooter players who’ll feel right at home in Horde mode. Game Pass is skewing the playtime distribution on Xbox Looking at the playtime distribution in our platform, E-Day players on Steam are – relatively speaking – playing for longer: 54% of E-Day players on Xbox have played for five hours or less (versus 32% on Steam) 19% of Xbox players played for over 15 hours (versus 33% on Steam) 14% of Xbox players played for over 20 hours (22% on Steam) The absolute number of people playing for over 15, 20, and 50 hours is, of course, bigger on Xbox, thanks to the sheer volume of folks who came in through Game Pass (upgraders included). None of that is cause for alarm. Game Pass is the reason Xbox playtime skews lower, as when a game is free to try, people try it and bounce without putting in even an hour (17% under an hour on Xbox versus 6% on Steam). Want more free estimates and insights in your inbox twice a week? Subscribe below! Subscribe The subscription brings in tourists alongside the committed, dragging down the average even when the game is excellent (but also perhaps winning over the uninitiated). It’s standard across every subscription-included title, on PS Plus too. Forza Horizon 6, for instance, had 11% of its Xbox players bounce under an hour, versus just 2% on Steam. So, Xbox’s crossroads So there we have it. Gears of War: E-Day is an incredible game whose revenues have been stifled by subscription inclusion and exclusivity. It’s the best-reviewed entry in the series in fifteen-odd years, but it still turned into one of the year’s softer flagship launches, not because players didn’t want it, but because Xbox’s own storefront gave its most willing buyers a reason not to pay. Which leaves Xbox at a crossroads. Will it keep making Gears games when the financial returns are this thin and the margins this low? And if it does, does the next one arrive off Game Pass at day one – the way CoD now does, or even on PlayStation? I think it should. Alright, back to E-Day for me! The last word Reply to this email – or reach out here – if you have any feedback for the newsletter – or want to request a game for us to cover. [Alinea Analytics boasts the most accurate PC and console estimates in the business. Game makers use our platform to understand their audience, keep an eye on the competition, monitor sales trends, and spot new opportunities. We equip game studios and financial institutions with accurate data and the confidence to make smarter, data-driven decisions. Want to talk about all things games market data? We’d love to chat!]
Microsoft MAI-DxO Diagnoses 83% of Hard Cases
Microsoft's MAI-DxO diagnosed 83% of complex NEJM cases in a Science study, versus 36% for generalist doctors with reference books.
The first thing I did on my new Windows PC was run this PowerShell command
This PowerShell script does a few things your PC manufacturer or Microsoft doesn't want to be done!
Microsoft’s new Photos app combines your PC, OneDrive, and iCloud galleries
Everything together in one place.
As Microsoft kills off Publisher, LibreOffice steps in with free support for your PUB files
No need to convert them.
Apple MacBook Pro 16 vs Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra: Poll shows clear winner
With the launch of the newest Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra, many people are comparing the laptop to the Apple MacBook Pro 16 with the M5 Pro. This comparison is quite apt, as both machines target the same audience. A poll run by Hardware Canucks has now revealed which laptop users prefer more.
Microsoft shuts down its beloved maker space
A key part of Microsoft’s hacker culture is going away
Ubisoft plans cuts at German studios, adding to wave of workforce reductions
Ubisoft is planning to reduce its workforce in Germany, where it operates a trio of studios, by about 100 workers, Game File has learned. The company wants to offer employees buyouts to, should enough people accept, avoid having to lay anyone off. “In Germany, we initiated discussions with the Works Council last week regarding a proposed voluntary departure plan across Ubisoft Dusseldorf, Ubisoft Berlin & Ubisoft Mainz,” a company rep told Game File. A “works council” is a union-like group representing employees. “The voluntary plan is the primary measure being proposed to support the intended organizational changes,” the Ubisoft rep added. The company declined to confirm the scale of the potential headcount cut. Of the impacted studios, Mainz might be the best known to the public. It leads development of the Anno series and shipped the well-reviewed strategy game Anno 117: Pax Romana in November 2025. Berlin and Dusseldorf operate as support studios within Ubisoft’s creative network. Berlin recently supported the development of Rainbow Six Siege and the Rayman Legends Retold remake. Dusseldorf also contributed to those projects, as well as The Settlers and Ubisoft-branded escape rooms. Dusseldorf is the biggest of the three studios, with some 400+ workers, compared to just over 100 at the other two, a source familiar with the reductions and the teams told Game File. More than half of these new reductions of about 100 people are expected to happen at Dusseldorf. The planned cuts were announced at a town hall for the German studios on Tuesday of last week. In an email follow-up, the studio group’s managing director, Benedikt Grindel, said the cuts were intended to “best position our German studios for the future... with a clearer focus on their role, capabilities and organizational setup needed for the work ahead.” The email was an echo of the past. In January 2025, Grindel had emailed the Ubisoft developers in his region (or studio “zone”) to explain that a round of 185 cuts at the time, including about 65 at Dusseldorf, were “essential to improve our operational efficiency and ensure the long-term sustainability of our studios, the zone and the company.” A half-decade of continued job cuts Ubisoft has been aggressively cutting its headcount for years. At the end of September 2022, it had 20,729 workers. By the end of March 2026, that total was down to 16,590. Studio management is trying to trim costs as it grapples with a changing industry and a drought of releases, let alone hits. The company announced earlier this year that it had reduced its costs since 2022 by “nearly €325 million” ($362m) and planned to lower them through 2028 by another €180 million ($200m). In June the company said it was closing down its Winnipeg and Belgrade studios and cutting roles in its Barcelona team. Even commercial and creative success hasn’t spared studios from this ongoing company-wide contraction. As Game File was nailing down details around the proposed cuts in Germany, Ubisoft management was informing workers of cuts in its Singapore studio, which shipped a hit remake of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag this past July. Some 70 positions in Singapore are being eliminated “to align the studio with upcoming production needs,” per a company rep’s statement to Game File. In early 2024, a large team in the Singapore studio launched the multiplayer pirate game Skull & Bones. It performed poorly but has been supported with regular content updates since. Many of Ubisoft’s studios around the world are heavily subsidized via regional grants and tax breaks. Singapore had been among them for years, but received no such local assistance in the 12 months ending this past March. News of the Singapore cuts broke today alongside word that Ubisoft is also proposing the closure of RedLynx, pending negotiations with officials. The Finnish studio behind the motorbike series Trials was founded in 2000 and sold to Ubisoft in 2011. As reported by VGC (and corroborated by Game File), Ubisoft management told employees it could not come up with a new, sustainable assignment for RedLynx. The 2025 workforce at Ubisoft Dusseldorf were straight-up cuts. This time, Ubisoft is hoping the reductions at its trio of German studios will largely come from workers taking a payout to leave. The company offered such voluntary dismissals at its Massive Entertainment studio (The Division) a year ago. For the German studios’ buyouts this time around, Ubisoft and the Works Council had discussed a formula that’d pay a worker’s monthly salary multiplied by 1.5 and by the number of years they’ve worked at the company, according to Game File sources. The formula is still subject to negotiations with the Works Council and has not yet been part of an official offer to workers. It could be adjusted up or down, and it could be supplemented with additional bonuses. Asked about the floated payout formula, a Ubisoft rep told Game File, “The terms of a potential voluntary departure program remain subject to negotiation with employee representatives. No final agreement has been reached, and we won’t comment on specific proposals while discussions are ongoing.” Game File is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe Item 2: Epic’s AI adventures Epic Games (Fortnite, the Unreal engine) is all-in on using AI to try to transform the way it makes video games and game-making tools. It’s leaders appear to be undeterred by any resistance among gamers and some game developers around generative AI—and instead emboldened by advances, particularly in AI-assisted programming. A recap of the last three days: On Monday, Bloomberg reported that Epic management told workers last week that development of an upcoming game combining Star Wars and Marvel characters would be “AI first.” Employees would be expected to use AI models such as Claude to code the game. A manager told Epic’s developers there would be “[n]o more hand-written code” and that art for the game would be “generated with full AI workflows,” per the outlet. Just ahead of that story running, Epic founder Tim Sweeney tweeted: “We have a huge pivot underway here at Epic, moving developers around to retool for maximum AI acceleration. The aim isn’t to do the same stuff with fewer people, but to enable everyone here to build MORE and BETTER stuff, and to bring the benefits to all teams using Unreal.” In a follow-up, Sweeney predicted that most game development processes would be at least three times faster a year from now than they were in January 2026, thanks to AI. To a person on X who told him he was failing to read the room, Sweeney said: “Much of the room wants it to be 2016 again, but it’s not. Our job, as the provider of tools and technology to much of the industry, is to design for the present that is and the future that will soon be.” On Wednesday, Epic announced it was releasing a faster launcher for its Epic Games Store marketplace. It did so by stating in a blog post as clear as could be that the launcher is an AI-enabled, vibe-coded project: Programming is hard. So, instead of doing that, we vibe coded a new Epic Games Launcher that’s way faster and more responsive than the current one, and has a new look. Programming is hard? That was unexpected phrasing from a company founded by a legendarily great programmer. Back in 2011, Sweeney told me that he’d picked up programming quickly as a kid and rejoiced at the power it gave him. “I could look at any program that anybody else had written and, with enough effort, build something cooler.” Item 3: The Xbox Labs experiment (and one of the people behind it) Microsoft’s Xbox division, which is flooding the zone with announcements lately, yesterday revealed a new internal tech-tinkering team called Xbox Labs. In the words of Xbox boss Asha Sharma Labs is “a small group of game makers, engineers and scientists whose job is to turn emerging ideas into things our players and developers can experience.” Conventional wisdom coming out of the announcement is that Labs is a team that’ll focus on ideas driven by generative AI. In her announcement, Sharma cited some of the dizzying achievements in tech and gaming over the past month as AI agents and other AI tools have been deployed to swiftly figure out how popular games work, then rebuild them and mix them up. She mentioned seeing ”games rapidly decompiled and rebuilt to run on hardware they were never originally designed to support” and said “[p]erhaps more surprisingly, we’ve seen many of the biggest games in the world have been remixed into the source code of another.” (Minecraft plus Elden Ring, for example, or Fortnite + Super Monkey Ball + Overwatch + Diablo + others.) Sharma also cited the work of Windows PC games being ported to run in browsers, a seeming reference to a recent AI-assisted fan port of Halo. Or perhaps Call of Duty or GTA. Sharma didn’t use the specific term “AI” in her memo, but she came close, citing AI “agents” and their potential for game-making tools that Labs could help craft: I think XBOX has an important role to play here. Coding became the first major workload for agents because they can write, run, and test software. Games share many of those same properties, and people spend more than 72 billion hours a year playing XBOX games, roughly five times the estimated time spent writing code worldwide. We’ve spent 25 years learning how to make great games, and I want our game makers to help shape what these new technologies make possible. As we learn, we’ll share the tools we build with developers across the industry, just as we always have. When I asked an Xbox rep if Labs was an AI-centric team, they said genAI was not the focus, describing it as having a broader mandate for using new tech in new ways in gaming. As an example, they pointed to Xbox’s recently launched disc-to-digital gaming usage rights program. Microsoft didn’t specifically name anyone involved full-time in Xbox Labs yesterday, but on social media and LinkedIn, I spotted Adrian Mato IDing himself as leading the creatio of tools at Labs and talking up the launch. Mato first caught my attention in late September, when he said on X that he was “starting to build a new team at Xbox focused on products and tools for how games get built and distributed as agentic tools become more capable.” At the time, he framed AI-based tools as a supplement to traditional game dev tools. “I don’t think we need to replace them,” he said. Since then, he’s publicly shown interest in AI and in games. He’s recently spent some of his X feed marveling at the power of AI agents and praising the lighting in the latest Gears of War. Following the Labs announcement yesterday, he enthused about the Xbox Labs’ stylish landing page. He wrote: “We built some fun tools to art-direct shaders in real time, experimented with interactive ASCII art, and sprinkled in lots of tiny details. “Move your mouse to leave a colorful trail that reveals the original footage, or interact with the video to trigger bursts of particles. “A lot of love went into making it all feel just right. “More to come”
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