In episode two of our Five Senses of Gaming miniseries, David Pierce dives into the world of hearing with audio-only video games with Paul Bennun, who has been in this space longer than most. Years ago, Bennun and his team at Somethin’ Else made a series of games called Papa Sangre that were among the most innovative and most popular games of their kind. He explains what makes an audio game work, why the iPhone 4 was such a crucial technological achievement for these games, and more.

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The rise of the audio-only video game

The Vergecast is the flagship podcast from The Verge about small gadgets, Big Tech, and everything in between. Every Friday, hosts Nilay Patel, David Pierce, and Alex Cranz hang out and make sense of the week’s most important technology news. And every Tuesday, David leads a selection of The Verge’s expert staffers in an exploration of how gadgets and software affect our lives – and which ones you should bring into yours.

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The Verge's Nilay Patel, Alex Cranz, and David Pierce discuss Google's algorithm leak, OpenAI content deals, and more tech news from this week.
Further reading:

Google won’t comment on a potentially massive leak of its search algorithm documentation

Google confirms the leaked Search documents are real

An Anonymous Source Shared Thousands of Leaked Google Search API Documents with Me; Everyone in SEO Should See Them

Secrets from the Algorithm: Google Search’s Internal Engineering Documentation Has Leaked

Unpacking Google's massive Search documentation leak

How SEO moves forward with the Google Content Warehouse API leak

Google responds to leak: Documentation lacks context

Vox Media and The Atlantic sign content deals with OpenAI

Google scrambles to manually remove weird AI answers in search 

Apple’s WWDC may include AI-generated emoji and an OpenAI partnership

OpenAI CEO Cements Control as He Secures Apple Deal

Custom GPTs open for free ChatGPT users

OpenAI has a new safety team — it’s run by Sam Altman

Why the OpenAI board fired Sam Altman 

Elon Musk’s xAI raises $6 billion to fund its race against ChatGPT and all the rest

New Galaxy Z Flip 6 and Galaxy Ring details have leaked, courtesy of the FCC


The Fitbit Ace LTE is like a Nintendo smartwatch for kids 

Discord’s turning the focus back to games with a new redesign

The business behind Unnecessary Inventions’ millions of followers

Welcome to Notepad, a newsletter on Microsoft’s era-defining bets by Tom Warren


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Inside the Google algorithm

Today on the flagship podcast of open smart home standards: 

03:25 - Microsoft’s Pavan Davuluri, leader for Windows and Devices, joins the show to discuss the future of the AI PC and what’s next for Microsoft’s hardware

Microsoft’s new Windows chief on the future of the OS, Surface, and those annoying ads

Microsoft’s big bet on building a new type of AI computer 

Microsoft Build 2024: everything announced


30:25 - The Verge’s Jen Tuohy and David Pierce discuss the latest updates in the smart home world in a segment called “Does Matter matter yet?”

The Dyson WashG1 is the company’s first dedicated mop

Amazon’s Matter Casting is shaping up so nicely, I want to use it everywhere

Matter 1.3 arrives with new device type and features

Smart lighting company Brilliant is looking for a buyer

Google launches new Home APIs and turns Google TVs into smart home hubs 


01:13:20 - David answers a question from the Vergecast Hotline about AI-powered search engines. 


Google is redesigning its search engine — and it's AI all the way down 

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on AI-powered search and the future of the web


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Why Microsoft bet on Surface

On this episode of The Vergecast, the fourth and final installment of our series on the five senses of video games, we asked Polygon’s Charlie Hall to help us make sense of the current state of the art in flight simulation. Hall, who once spent more than four months in VR mapping the edge of the Milky Way galaxy in Elite: Dangerous, has more experience in a virtual cockpit than most. We wanted to know how the pros set up their simulators to get the most realistic experience and why it’s so complicated to make a virtual world look like the real one.
Further reading:

It’s time to build the cockpit of your dreams

Microsoft Flight Simulator’s most-needed feature is co-op

My first kill as a Star Citizen

If Microsoft Flight Simulator has you craving air combat, try this flight sim next


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Seeing the real world inside a virtual one

The Verge's Nilay Patel, Alex Cranz, and David Pierce discuss announcements from Microsoft Build, the OpenAI's trouble with Scarlett Johansson, new Sonos headphones, and more.
Further reading:

Microsoft’s big bet on building a new type of AI computer 

Recall is Microsoft’s key to unlocking the future of PCs 

https://www.theverge.com › microsoft-surface-pro-pric...

Here’s the eight-inch Snapdragon PC for your Windows on Arm experiments 


How does the Microsoft Surface Laptop stack up to the MacBook Air? 

Microsoft Build 2024: everything announced

Windows now has AI-powered copy and paste

Microsoft is making File Explorer more powerful with version control and 7z compression

Here’s the eight-inch Snapdragon PC for your Windows on Arm experiments

Microsoft Edge will translate and dub YouTube videos as you’re watching them

Microsoft brings out a small language model that can look at pictures 

Microsoft’s new Copilot AI agents act like virtual employees to automate tasks 

Microsoft outage took down Copilot, DuckDuckGo, and ChatGPT search features

OpenAI is ‘in conversations’ with Scarlett Johansson over the ChatGPT voice that sounds just like her

OpenAI pulls its Scarlett Johansson-like voice for ChatGPT

Lawyers say OpenAI could be in real trouble with Scarlett Johansson

Scarlett Johansson told OpenAI not to use her voice — and she’s not happy they might have anyway

OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

OpenAI Just Gave Away the Entire Game

OpenAI’s News Corp deal licenses content from WSJ, New York Post, and more

OpenAI strikes Reddit deal to train its AI on your posts

The US government is trying to break up Live Nation-Ticketmaster

The Sonos Ace headphones are here, and they’re damn impressive

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence addresses the company’s divisive app redesign

here’s an electric salt spoon that adds umami flavor 

Apple needs to explain that bug that resurfaced deleted photos 

Humane is looking for a buyer after the AI Pin’s underwhelming debut 


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ChatGPT has a Scarlett Johansson problem

Today on the flagship podcast of Arm-based chipsets:
03:08 - The Verge’s Tom Warren and David Pierce discuss the announcements from Microsoft’s Surface event, including the new Arm-powered Surface Laptop, and Copilot Plus PCs.

Microsoft’s Surface AI event: news, rumors, and lots of Qualcomm laptops 

Microsoft announces an Arm-powered Surface Laptop

Microsoft’s new Surface Pro gets an OLED display for the first time

Microsoft announces Copilot Plus PCs with built-in AI hardware


The new, faster Surface Pro is Microsoft's all-purpose AI PC 

Recall is Microsoft’s key to unlocking the future of PCs


27:29 -Verge senior AI reporter Kylie Robison joins the show to chat about OpenAI’s GPT-4o demo and where we’re headed in the next few years of AI. 

ChatGPT is getting a Mac app

OpenAI’s custom GPT Store is now open to all for free

OpenAI releases GPT-4o, a faster model that’s free for all ChatGPT users 

ChatGPT will be able to talk to you like Scarlett Johansson in Her 

OpenAI pulls its Scarlett Johansson-like voice for ChatGPT 

OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever is officially leaving

OpenAI researcher resigns, claiming safety has taken ‘a backseat to shiny products’


We tried out the Project Astra demo at Google I/O which worked well un... | tech | TikTok 


57:40 - Nilay Patel answers a question about iPads for this week’s Vergecast Hotline.
Apple iPad Pro (2024) review: the best tablet money can buy

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The rise of the audio-only video game

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