Latest news with #Metroid
Time of India
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
NYT Mini Crossword, July 19: Hints and clues to decode the complete grid for Saturday #578
What Makes the NYT Mini Crossword a Weekend Staple? Across Clues: Building Up Your Answers Clue Number Clue Hint 1 Across 'See‑through' Ends with 'R' 6 Across 'Anybody home?' Ends with 'O' 7 Across Winged horse of Greek myth Starts with 'P' 9 Across Salamander famed for regeneration Starts with 'A' 10 Across Texting term for short Ends with 'S' 11 Across Birthplace of bossa nova Starts with 'R' 12 Across Even score Starts with 'T' 13 Across Insect in Dali's 'Persistence of Memory' Ends with 'T' 14 Across Directory abbreviation Starts with 'E' 15 Across Old Metroid game console Starts with 'N' Live Events Across Answers: The Full Set CLEAR – Makes sense as something see‑through. HELLO – Your classic 'anybody home?' opener. PEGASUS – That legendary winged steed of Greek tales. AXOLOTL – The adorable salamander that regrows limbs. SMS – The shorthand for text messages. RIO – The famed Brazilian city where bossa nova was born. TIE – An even game score. ANT – The insect famously 'melting' in Dali's canvas. EXT – Short for 'extension' in file directories. NES – Nintendo's original console for Metroid fans. Down Clues: Cross-Referencing Fun 1 Down: Party mix with cereal & pretzels (ends with X) 2 Down: Multi‑piece gift (starts with L) 3 Down: Airline named after a biblical king (starts with E) 4 Down: 'Election loser' (ends with N) 5 Down: Comedian's performance (starts with R) 7 Down: Keyboard command involving 'V' (starts with P) 8 Down: Casino pull-you-arms game (ends with S) Down Answers Uncovered Why These Clues Work — And How to Approach the Mini Premium points — Want to sharpen your game? Begin with reference material. Know your mythology (Pegasus), fauna (axolotl), and classic games (NES). Trust key letters. An answer like CLEAR is locked in once you've placed the C and L. Balance across and down. One answer often unlocks several others. From Across to Down: The Word Web Filling CLEAR (C‑L‑E‑A‑R) gives you C at 1 D start: CHEX MIX. That 'X' confirms the party mix, and the E from CLEAR helps pin down EL AL on 3 D. Similarly, the L in position two supports LEGO SET on 2 D. When PEGASUS crosses with SMS and clear vowels, the grid nearly writes itself. The Culture of the Mini Crossword Saturday's Standout: 'AXOLOTL' and 'PEGASUS' FAQs What is the NYT Mini Crossword and why is it popular on weekends? When is the Mini Crossword released? (You can now subscribe to our (You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channel Weekends are for winding down, but for many fans of The New York Times' free word games, puzzling never stops. Alongside Wordle, Connections, and Strands, the Mini Crossword remains a beloved fixture, releasing nightly at 12:30 PM ET. It's a compact mental workout that delivers big satisfaction. If Saturday's edition, Mini Crossword #578, left you stuck, worry no Mini Crossword stands out with its friendly size, typically 15 squares across and down, and its mix of trivia, pop culture, and wordplay. While the main Crossword caters to paid subscribers, the Mini is open to all. Its short length and sharp clues make it a quick yet stimulating stop on your daily to‑do list. Plus, failure to solve it doesn't ruin your evening; you can tackle it again or check the answers are enhanced hints for the across entries on Saturday, July 19, as mentioned in a report by Parade magazine:Think of basic, everyday words and pop culture references here — the simplicity is part of the for the complete list? Here are the answers that filled Saturday's grid:Here are the down clues with helpful hints:Notice how the tips like 'ends with X' or 'starts with L' can immediately rule in or out common words — critical for filling in the shared how the columns fell into place:1 Down. CHEX MIX – The classic snack.2 Down. LEGO SET – The interlocking‑piece gift.3 Down. EL AL – Israel's flag carrier, named after the biblical El Al (God of Gods).4 Down. ALSO RAN – The phrase for a candidate who didn't win.5 Down. ROUTINE – The structure of a stand‑up set.7 Down. PASTE – The command for Ctrl‑V.8 Down. SLOTS – The pull‑arm casino but clever — The Mini's charm lies in its brevity. Here, simplicity reigns: everyday words, familiar names, and common phrases fill the grid. The NYT design ensures there's no obscurity. And the concise hints (e.g., 'starts with P') steer you effectively without spoiling the walk through how across and down interlink:That interconnectedness is why the Mini can be fast-paced — solve a couple of key entries, and everything tradition: Unlike Wordle or Strands, the Mini is part of a nightly rhythm. Many players complete it before bedtime — a brainy capstone to the glue: Friends compare completion times and groan when the same clue trips everyone up. Platforms like Reddit are filled with lighthearted mini-meme culture around each edge: These bite-size puzzles provide vocabulary refreshers. Did you forget 'axolotl'? You'll remember leisure puzzles often introduce words like AXOLOTL, which challenge memory but enrich knowledge. The contrasting myth of PEGASUS and the sci-fi nostalgia of NES tie Saturday's grid into a fun pop-culture Saturday, July 19, the Mini Crossword delivered a pleasing collision of clear, convivial words — from CLEAR and HELLO to AXOLOTL and NES. The clues were accessible, the vibe weekend‑light, and the satisfaction high as solvers checked off each NYT Mini Crossword is a smaller, free version of the New York Times Crossword. It's just 5x5 squares and is known for quick, daily challenges that are fun and accessible. On weekends, it serves as a light mental exercise for puzzle released every night at 12:30 PM ET, including weekends. You can access it through the New York Times Games site or app.
Metro
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Metro
Shadow Labyrinth review - Pac-Man meets Metroid
The Pac-Man episode of Amazon Prime show Secret Level is the inspiration for this strange new Metroidvania and its peculiar mix of influences. 2025 has so far been a good year for weird games, with plenty of unlikely oddities, including one featuring a boy stuck in a permanent T-pose and whose best friend is a singing giraffe, and the latest from Hideo Kojima where you take orders from a talking shop mannequin and fight ghosts by flinging a boomerang soaked in your own blood at them. It may seem a cliché but most of the strangest video games are made in Japan; those two certainly and so is this: a grim and gritty 2D Metroidvania that's also a secret Pac-Man game. As bizarre as that idea is it's worryingly reminiscent of Bomberman: Act Zero on the original Xbox, which reimagined the colourful party game as a dystopian nightmare and became infamous as one of the worst video games ever made. Shadow Labyrinth is nowhere near that bad, but then it's not actually that gritty either. It's inspired by a 10 minute episode of Amazon Prime Video show Secret Level, which reimagined Pac-Man as a sci-fi story about a starfighter pilot crash landing on an alien world and being manipulated by a malign Pac-Man. We haven't seen it, but we hope it was better than the game tie-in. Before we learned of the Amazon connection, we assumed the game had been inspired by the famous The Madness of Mission 6 fan art for Pac-Man, which you've probably seen on a T-shirt or two, if you've ever been to any kind of video game convention or similar event. That almost certainly would've been a lot more interesting than the vapid, cliché ridden sci-fi tale that is Shadow Labyrinth's actual backstory. Right from the start, the plot is filled with nonsensical sounding names and jargon, but the short version is you're a nameless swordsman who's been revived by a floating yellow orb called Puck, that anyone else would recognise as Pac-Man. (The name is a reference to the fact that the original arcade game was originally meant to be called Puck Man, until someone realised how easily the first letter of the word could be defaced.) After the brief, and very confusing, introduction you're immediately knee deep in Metroid homages, whacking weird alien bugs with your sword and practicing your 2D platform jumping. All of this is fine, although the bland and clinical-looking art style is immediately unappealing and almost makes it look like an old Flash game. Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. The core gameplay is absolutely bog standard Metroidvania but the degree to which it copies the look and feel of Metroid, rather than Castlevania or anything more original, is strange and off-putting, given this is supposed to be a Pac-Man game. More importantly, Shadow Labyrinth is no Metroid Dread, and not only is it not as well designed or executed (the signposting is awful) but the only thing unique about it is the shoehorned in Pac-Man references. Like all Metroidvanias, there's a lot of exploration and backtracking in Shadow Labyrinth, as you pick up new abilities and weapons that then allow you to access areas you've previously seen, but which were inaccessible the first time round. That sense of slowly opening up the whole map, slowly peeling open its secrets, is the core appeal of the genre but this is a very uninspired implementation of the concept, with a hundred better example available elsewhere – especially from indie developers. You've probably already guessed, but one of the most important uses for Puck is taking over the morph ball role from Metroid, as you squeeze into places you can't usually fit. The Spider Ball upgrade, that allows you to stick to walls and tracks, is the real focus though, as you move along like the arcade game, eating little white dots along the way. There're more explicit recreations of the classic Pac-Man gameplay in a series of mini-games, which look and sound like the excellent Pac-Man Championship Edition games. They even use the same music, which only begs the question of why Bandai Namco didn't just make a new one of those, instead of wasting everyone's time with this Metroid nonsense. More Trending Having Puck combine with your character to become a sort of mechanical demon Pac-Man dragon sounds interestingly weird in theory but even that doesn't make the game any more fun to play. To add more salt to the wound, Puck is a very annoying character, and the whole game comes across as obnoxious and abrasive. When we say our favourite bit is the subtler references to other Namco classics, like Galaga and Xevious, it should give some indication of how much we enjoyed the majority of the game. Pac-Man has been around for 45 years and has aged better than most other golden age coin-ops, with the Pac-Man Championship Edition series keeping the core gameplay fresh and exciting even after all these decades. There's nothing fresh or exciting about Shadow Labyrinth though, the memory of which will linger for far less time. In Short: Mixing Pac-Man with Metroid seems like an enjoyably strange idea at first, until you realise just how bland and unimaginative the end result is. Pros: You have to get a long wrong to make a Metroidvania completely uninteresting and the sword-based combat is mildly engaging. The Pac-Man Championship Edition mini-games are fun. Cons: Once you dismiss the Pac-Man gimmicks the game has no notable ideas of its own and pales compared to better examples of the genre. Confusing and unengaging story, with ugly visuals. Score: 4/10 Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PCPrice: £24.99Publisher: Bandai NamcoDeveloper: Bandai Namco StudiosRelease Date: 18th July 2025 Age Rating: 12 Email gamecentral@ leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter. To submit Inbox letters and Reader's Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here. For more stories like this, check our Gaming page. MORE: Cyberpunk 2077 fans think new update secretly runs better on PS5 Pro MORE: The Drifter review – Australian adventure time MORE: RoboCop: Rogue City – Unfinished Business review – 20 seconds to comply
Hindustan Times
27-05-2025
- Hindustan Times
Nothing Phone 3 with flagship features launching this July: Here's what to expect
Nothing has announced the launch of its much-anticipated flagship smartphone, the Phone 3, scheduled for July 2025. The update came through the company's official X handle, which has now officially confirmed the release timeline. The upcoming device will mark a new phase for the brand, with CEO Carl Pei calling it the company's first true flagship offering. Though Nothing has not disclosed about any specifications or other details yet. However, multiple reports and certifications have provided early insights into the expected features. Let's take a look at what's coming. Also read: Nothing Phone 3 tipped to launch on July 25: Here's what to expect from the upcoming device The Nothing Phone 3 recently appeared on the GSM database and has been certified by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), Smartprix reported. Internally, the Phone 3 carries the codename 'Metroid' and the model number 'A024.' On the other hand, some leaks and rumours suggest that the smartphone could feature a 6.77-inch LTPO AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate and peak brightness of 3,000 nits. The device is expected to run on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. It may offer up to 12GB of RAM and 512GB of internal storage. The brand's familiar transparent rear design is likely to remain, possibly built using a glass back and metal frame. Also read: Oppo F29 Pro 5G vs Nothing Phone 3a Pro: Which latest mid-ranger is worth the hype? For optics, the Phone 3 could come with a triple-camera setup, including a 50MP primary sensor. The front-facing camera is expected to be 32MP for selfies and video calling. Industry reports indicate that the smartphone may house a 5,000mAh battery with support for 50W wired and 20W wireless charging. The new model may also integrate artificial intelligence at a deeper system level. Carl Pei has previously highlighted that future devices will focus on AI-driven interactions. These features are expected to debut with the Phone 3 and expand over time through Nothing OS. Also read: Alcatel V3 Ultra, V3 Pro and V3 Classic launched in India with NXTPAPER display tech - Details The Nothing Phone 3 will reportedly launch at around 800 euros, which is approximately Rs. 90,000. This marks a notable price jump compared to the Nothing Phone (2), which was launched in 2023 with a starting price of Rs. 44,999. Mobile finder: Nothing Phone 3a Pro LATEST price, specs and all details
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Business Standard
27-05-2025
- Business Standard
Nothing Phone 3 launching in July: Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, 50MP camera expected
Nothing is set to unveil its next premium smartphone, the Phone 3, in July. Its CEO Carl Pei referred to the Phone 3 as the company's 'first true flagship smartphone.' The smartphone, according to the company, is being built with 'premium materials' and is expected to deliver significant improvements in performance and software. While official specifications are yet to be confirmed, online rumours have provided early insights into the expected features. Nothing Phone 3: What to expect According to a report by Smartprix, the upcoming device has appeared on listings from both the GSM database and the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). Internally at Nothing, the handset is reportedly codenamed 'Metroid' and carries the model number 'A024'. As reported by Digit, the Nothing Phone 3 is likely to feature a 6.77-inch LTPO AMOLED display, offering a 120Hz refresh rate and peak brightness of up to 3,000 nits. The smartphone is expected to be powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and may be paired with up to 12GB of RAM and 512GB of internal storage. The device is also expected to retain the brand's signature transparent back panel while incorporating more premium materials, possibly including a metal frame and glass back. In terms of optics, the Phone 3 is likely to feature a triple-camera setup with a redesigned module. It is expected to include a 50MP primary camera and a 32MP front-facing camera for selfies and video calls. Powering the device could be a 5,000mAh battery, with support for 50W wired charging and 20W wireless charging. Pei has also confirmed that the Phone 3 will launch at approximately 800 pounds (around Rs 90,000). For context, the Nothing Phone (2), released in 2023, had a starting price of Rs 44,999.
Time of India
21-05-2025
- Time of India
Nothing Phone 3 launch timeline confirmed: Expected to make a debut with 5,000mAh, triple rear camera setup, AI updates, and more
Nothing Phone 3 launch timeline confirmed: The wait is almost over for Nothing's next big thing. Fans are looking forward to the upcoming release of the Phone 3. Nothing has amassed a devoted fanbase thanks to its distinctive style and cutting-edge features, and the Phone 3 is anticipated to carry on this tradition. You should keep an eye out if you enjoy modern style and cutting-edge technology. We'll provide you with all the most recent information on the Nothing Phone 3, including its anticipated features, pricing, and debut schedule. Discover what this fascinating new gadget has in store for us by reading on. Nothing Phone 3 launch timeline for India Phone (3). It's a magic number. Coming July 2025. According to a press release from the company, the Nothing Phone 3 will go on sale worldwide in July of this year globally. The forthcoming smartphone isn't being described as its "first true flagship smartphone." It is said that it includes "premium materials, major performance upgrades, and software that genuinely levels things up." In the weeks preceding the launch, we can anticipate the company revealing the handset's design or salient features. Nothing Phone 3 expected specifications Nothing's next smartphone, which is reportedly going by the internal codename "Metroid" and product number "A024," has been seen in the GSM database and the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) listings, according to Smartprix. Early information about the anticipated specifications of the item has been obtained from these sightings. There are rumours that the Phone 3 will introduce a revamped triple-camera setup. Its magnification capabilities are reportedly improved by a larger primary sensor and a more noticeable periscope-style telephoto lens. It is anticipated that battery capacity would increase as well, maybe beyond 5,000mAh, in keeping with current trends for Nothing and its sub-brand CMF. In terms of performance, the gadget can come with the top-tier Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 Elite CPU or Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8s Gen 4. Additionally, 512GB of UFS 4.0 internal storage and up to 12GB of LPDDR5X RAM are expected to be included. When switching to more expensive materials, such as a metal frame and glass back, nothing is likely to keep its recognizable transparent back panel. Deeper AI integration will also result in a major change to the software. A new layer of AI-driven "interactions" that will debut with the Phone 3 and keep developing has been alluded to by Carl Pei. Also Read: Nothing Phone 3 teased to launch soon: Expected to debut with 6.5-inch OLED display, 120Hz refresh rate, AI updates, and more Nothing Phone 3 expected price in India It should come as no surprise that Nothing Phone 3 will be the company's first real flagship phone, as co-founder Akis Evangelidis disclosed on X. The item will have a very high price tag, as the announcement itself reveals. Pei stated in a video posted by the YouTube channel Android that the Nothing Phone 3 will go on sale for "around EUR 800." After conversion, this is approximately Rs 90,500 in India and $1,063 in the US. Overall, these early reports indicate that the Phone 3 is poised to be a significant advancement in Nothing's smartphone portfolio, even though official specifications have not yet been confirmed. However, wait for the official information. For the latest and more interesting tech news, keep reading Indiatimes Tech.
