October, 2014 - Softonic English

Watch the launch trailer for Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor

Out now on PC, Xbox One and PS 4, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor is a new open world adventure set in J.R.R Tolkien’s fantasy world, between the stories of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

In terms of gameplay, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor is clearly influenced by Ubisoft’s massive Assassin’s Creed games, featuring fast flowing movement around environments, and fluid but brutal swordplay. The game’s defining feature is called the Nemesis System, which is an enemy artificial intelligence that responds to player actions, creating ‘personalized’ enemies that remember you and adapt to your style of play.

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The story is new, about a ranger called Talion who is brought back to life by a ‘spirit of vengeance’ after being slain with his family. Journeying through Mordor, you’ll discover the nature of the spirit that resurrected you and the origins of ‘the Rings of Power’.

Buy Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor on PC via Steam.

Security company finds many popular Android flashlight apps could compromise your data

Security company Snoopwall has published a report on the top ten Android Flashlight apps, and found that all of them require and obtain permissions giving them much greater access to your data and phone settings than necessary. The company warns that using your device for anything sensitive like mobile banking, could put you at serious risk if you have one of these Flashlight apps installed.

Here’s the list of the ten Flashlight apps and developers in question:

– Super-Bright LED Flashlight, Surpax Technology Inc.

– Brightest Flashlight Free, GoldenShores Technologies

– Tiny Flashlight + LED, Tiny Flashlight + LED

– Flashlight, Mobile Apps Inc

– Flashlight, Crazy Softech

– Brightest LED Flashlight, Intellectual Flame Co.

– Color Flashlight, Notes

– High-Powered Flashlight, iHandy Inc.

– Flashlight HD LED, smallte.ch

– Flashlight: LED Torch Light, Mobile Apps Inc

Last December, GoldenShores Technology, the developer of a popular flashlight app, Brightest Flashlight, was found guilty of collecting user data and selling it to third parties without consent. But the app is still available in the Google Play store, and while Goldenshores may no longer sell your data, the app still requests far too much access to your device. Installing Brightest Flashlight allows the app to:

– Check your approximate (network based) and precise (GPS) location data

– modify or delete stored data

– test access to protected storage

– take pictures or video

– view Wi-Fi connections

– check phone status and identity

– disable or modify status bar

– read Home settings and shortcuts

– control flashlight

– prevent device from sleeping

– view network connections

– full network access

– install shortcuts

– uninstall shortcuts

As you can see, this is an extensive list of permissions for an app that really just needs to control your flashlight. The other apps in the list are similarly asking for extensive permissions. Mentioning these apps on iOS or Windows Phone, Snoopwall say those operating systems are less at risk due to the ‘hardened (security) OS features of Windows 8.1 and Apple iOS 7 & 8.’

The company has developed its own simple Flashlight app which only has access to your camera flash and screen. You can get that here for Android and Windows Phone.

Read the full report here.

Assassin’s Creed: Identity coming to iOS and Android next year

With Assassin’s Creed: Unity, Assassin’s Creed: Rogue, Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, and the compendium Assassin’s Creed: Birth of a New World – The American Saga, you might be forgiven for thinking there are enough Assassin’s Creed games on the horizon. But Ubisoft would beg to differ, and have soft-launched Assassin’s Creed: Identity for iOS in New Zealand and Australia.

Assassin’s Creed: Identity is a free to play 3D adventure game, developed by Ubisoft Blue Byte, known for their work on strategy titles Settlers Online and Anno.

The game is set in Renaissance Italy, and you choose from one of four types of assassins to complete each mission. There’s the Beserker, Shadowblade, Trickster and Thief, each with differing abilities. Your assassin can be upgraded by earning skill points and taking time to train – the time needed can be reduced by paying for in game coins, which vary from NZ$4.99 for 50 coins, to 1350 coins for NZ$99.99.

The game is not set for worldwide release until 2015, on iOS and Android. This early soft-launch is probably to help Ubisoft balance the free-to-play elements with making Assassin’s Creed: Identity playable and fun. Watch a gameplay video below.

Watch the full Microsoft Windows 10 presentation video

Microsoft has published the full video presentation of Windows 10, its upcoming operating system that aims to unify all Microsoft devices under one system, and you can watch it below. It clocks in at almost 40 minutes, but you get to see a lot of how the new Windows will work.

See the new hybrid Start Menu in action, how it’s Continuum feature will detect whether you’re using a keyboard or touchscreen, multiple desktops and more.

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As we reported, Microsoft conspicuously avoided any mention of price, but there will be a free preview available for you to test today if you sign up for its ‘Windows Insider Program’. Windows 10 won’t get a full public release until late 2015.

If a 40 minute video is too long, check out our comprehensive guide to whats new in Windows 10 here.

Path Talk can be your human-powered assistant

Social network Path updated its Path Talk app today with the ability to text businesses. Powered by TalkTo, a company Path bought back in June, the service lets you ask businesses questions via text and you’ll receive an answer within ten minutes. It’s like having a personal assistant.

The way Path Talk connects you to businesses is delightfully old school. You look up a business under the Places tab in the app and type in your question. A human will then look up the information for you by calling or searching the internet and return the answer to you within five to ten minutes.

Path Talk features its own database of businesses but also leverages Foursquare to look up places and phone numbers. This makes looking up basic information like phone number or store hours quite simple. But then so is searching the internet for the answer.

What makes Path Talk’s business integration useful is for acheiving tedious tasks you wouldn’t want to do yourself. Ellis Hamburger of The Verge asked how long the line was at a Chipotle restaurant. A Path agent confirmed the question and alerted Hamburger that he or she tried twice but received no response. If he had called himself, he would have wasted those precious minutes himself.

While this feature is certainly interesting, it may not be enough to make users jump to Path Talk as a messaging app. Many simple questions can already be answered quickly by using Siri, Google Now or looking it up on the internet. Path Talk faces an uphill battle trying to differentiate itself from popular messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and Google Hangouts. It’ll be interesting to see whether users actually find Path Talk’s new business messaging feature useful or if they’ll forget about it once the novelty wears off.

Download Path Talk for Android and iOS

Month: October 2014

Watch the launch trailer for Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor

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