Game Tech News

Pulling out a board game is always a great way to bring loved ones together, especially if you have kids who are often glued to their devices. And playing games in real life doesn't have to be boring. Over the last decade, board games have evolved beyond Monopoly and Clue. The best board games offer something for everyone in the family, including games with epic fantasy scenarios.

A few of these qualify as "high fantasy," with knights and wizards and the like, but we've picked a variety of subgenres of the best fantasy board games, as well as different styles of gameplay. Some even work well for a solo game night. If you're in need of some analog entertainment, gather around the table and dive into one of these fantastical worlds.

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We are still a couple of months away from Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference where the next major version of the iPhone's software, likely called iOS 18, will debut. We have a few ideas for features and fixes that Apple should include in its next major update to the iPhone.
For seven months, most of us have lived with iOS 17. There have been high points like the introduction of StandBy Mode, Check-In and iMessage stickers. There have also been low points like the overheating software bug that hit iPhones running iOS 17, which has since been resolved. For months we've Journaled, NameDropped and casually sworn in Messages without the fear of being Autocorrected.

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To kick off Summer Game Fest, the ringleader of the successor to E3, Geoff Keighley, showcased a set of game trailers for games we've heard of and others debuting for the first time.
While Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo have trended toward their own showcases, with E3 gone, Summer Game Fest has become the big mid-year multi-platform release show. And this year, we saw a huge selection of games big and small in the two-hour showcase.



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NASA's Curiosity rover has been exploring the Gale Crater on Mars since 2012. That's a long time to weather dust storms, drive along the base of a mountain and crawl over endless pointy rocks. The rover's aluminum wheels have taken a beating. New images show some dramatic gaping holes, but don't be alarmed. NASA has it under control.
The photos are eye-opening. Curiosity has six wheels and some are worse off than others. The right-middle wheel looks rough, but "is still holding up well despite taking some of the worst abuse from Mars," wrote rover engineer Ashley Stroupe in a mission update on Sept. 24. The wheel sports a gaping hole where you can see down into the mechanisms inside.



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If you could have a robot at home, what would it do?
In the case of the 1985 sitcom Small Wonder, it would be a member of the family named Vicki. But pop culture has more frequently envisioned robots as highly competent helpers, such as Rosey the housekeeper in the Jetsons and the super-savvy AI assistant Jarvis in the Iron Man and Avengers movies.
Science fiction writer Joanna Maciejewska captured that sensibility in a pithy post on X (formerly Twitter) earlier this year: "I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes."

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