Month: September 2026

Foundation: Galactic Frontier, FunPlus’s free-to-play mobile sci-fi 4X strategy RPG, got a new update this week: Season 2, The Usurper. And if that title caught your eye over the last few days, don’t confuse it with a new season of Apple TV+‘s Foundation.

The mix-up makes some sense. Season 2, The Usurper first showed up in a sponsored YouTube preview from Mirandus Plays before it went live in the game, so plenty of people saw the name floating around without much context and assumed it was TV news.

The game itself is officially licensed by Apple TV and Skydance, and Foundation: Galactic Frontier builds on the TV version of Foundation, not just Isaac Asimov’s original books.

Story-wise, Season 2, The Usurper takes place after the war in Kirrel. The fighting moves to the resource-rich Siwenna Province, now under the Ascendancy Court, and your role is to dig into the lies surrounding the Ascendancy Throne and figure out who the mysterious Usurper really is.

The update also brings in Electromagnetic Storms, Electromagnetic Shield Towers, an Ore Refinery, the Ascendancy Hall, the Aromabloom War, plus faction events centered on the Progressive Front and the Ascendancy Court, along with seasonal rewards.

If you’re already playing Foundation: Galactic Frontier, or you just want another excuse to spend more time in this universe, this looks like a solid update to check out. Just don’t read that season title and assume Apple TV+ quietly announced something.

You can download Foundation: Galactic Frontier now as a free-to-play mobile game.

Leaked code in iOS 27 beta 8 suggests Apple is trying out more advanced camera controls in its Camera app. If they make it to users, they may show up first on the iPhone 18 Pro rather than rolling out across older iPhones.

What turns up in the code is a lot more than basic camera tweaks. There are exposure tools like waveform and histogram scopes, along with RGB Composite, RGB Parade, and Luminance presets. That would move Apple’s default Camera app a lot closer to what people currently use Halide, Blackmagic Camera, or Filmic-style apps for. The same code also references focus peaking, highlight clipping warnings, and a repeat self-timer mode for taking multiple shots.

There’s also what looks like a manual focus slider. The catch is that it may depend on hardware that debuts with the first phones built for iOS 27, most likely the iPhone 18 Pro. That fits with the broader rumor cycle around variable aperture hardware and aperture-based lens correction blending, both aimed at improving light distribution and overall image quality as the lens changes.

If you shoot photo or video on your iPhone a lot, this is one to keep an eye on. Casual users might not notice much, though, and Apple could still hold these tools back, keep them exclusive to Pro models, or drop some of them before release.

You can install iOS 27 beta 8 through Apple’s beta program on iPhone, but at this point leaked code comes from leaked code, not from any official feature announcement.

Actor Gary Oldman says the James Bond franchise has already settled on the person it wants to replace Daniel Craig as Agent 007, even if it still hasn’t made that public, and he’s hoping that person is Jack Lowden.

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We’ve never had to wait this long for a new James Bond. Ever since Sean Connery, the role has usually changed hands without too much delay, but after Daniel Craig’s sudden exit, the whole thing started to feel strangely directionless.

Even Amazon MGM Studios, which now has control of the franchise, didn’t seem fully sure who should be the next Agent 007. Maybe that’s changed.

My name is Man. Old Man

The person who may have let slip more than he meant to wasn’t Denis Villeneuve, the new director of the James Bond franchise, or Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. It was Gary Oldman, which honestly wasn’t on anyone’s bingo card. Not because the 68-year-old actor is about to suit up as the new Bond, of course, but because he says he knows something the rest of us don’t: “There have been rumors that Jack Lowden is on the list. We’ll know very soon, won’t we? Because they’ve chosen. They’ve chosen their top choice, but they haven’t announced it yet. So I’m keeping my fingers crossed for Jack.”

That makes a certain amount of sense. Jack Lowden has been acting opposite Gary Oldman on Apple TV+’s Slow Horses since 2022, and they’ve already done 6 seasons together, so of course Oldman would be pulling for his co-star. Lowden is also the name that’s come up most often in the rumor mill, on a list that has also included Callum Turner, Jacob Elordi, Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Harris Dickinson. At this stage, I could see any one of them working. Now they just need to make it official.

Earlier this year, Saoirse Ronan, Jack Lowden’s wife, had already said she’d love to show up in the next 007 movie as a young villain. “It would be really interesting, especially for women and girls, to see someone who can take all that rage and channel it somewhere else.” And honestly, imagine the free publicity if Saoirse Ronan ended up playing her husband’s nemesis too. Come on, Amazon. You’ve basically got this one lined up.

Amazon Prime Video has officially pulled the plug on Spider-Noir, its Nicolas Cage-fronted Spider-Man series, after only one season. And none of the obvious arguments in its favor seem to have helped: Spider-Man is still wildly popular, the show kept racking up awards, and plenty of people looked more than willing to stick around for another season.

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Prime Video really did try to give Spider-Noir every possible push. It even released the series in two versions, one in color and one in black and white. Didn’t matter. Spider-Noir still won’t get the chance to settle in and grow over a few more seasons. Cage, for his part, doesn’t sound especially shaken by it.

Spider-Nah

Cage is already busy with other projects, which is about as surprising as the sun coming up. The man never stops. He’s also been pretty direct about how he feels, saying, “One season is perfect for me, I’ve said what I wanted to say with this dangerous, innovative, pop-art Spider-Man. Forward, upward, inward.” And this won’t be the last time he plays the character, either, since there’s still one more Miles Morales multiverse movie on the way, which, I’ll admit, is basically my North Star in the current movie landscape.

What makes this cancellation especially strange is the timing. The call was made the week before the series picked up 5 Emmys, at least so far. But film and television can be brutally unsentimental. Prime Video’s explanation was that Spider-Noir just didn’t have enough staying power, even after crossing 2.6 billion minutes watched in its first month and a half.

So, could Spider-Noir, that black-and-white wall-crawler, ever find its way back to TV or maybe the big screen? Well… the multiverse is still sitting right there. But as a standalone series, if 5 Emmys still can’t save it, this may be the end of the road. Ouch.

Warner Bros. is still keeping its mouth shut about Wonder Woman, but right now all signs point to Adria Arjona stepping in as the heroine of the new DC Universe.

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The secondhand embarrassment around Gal Gadot and her Wonder Woman future has been something to behold. The actress at one point said that DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn had assured her she’d star in a third installment, but after a very long wait, it all led nowhere.

In the end, the only thing left was to admit what was right there in front of everyone: Warner Bros. and DC Studios never had any intention of bringing Gal Gadot into the new DC Universe, and she had built up a whole story in her own head. In her own head, anyway.

A New Wonder Woman

Warner Bros. still doesn’t want to show its hand, but all the pieces seem to be falling into place for a new actress to take over Wonder Woman’s mantle in Man of Tomorrow. It all lines up, from Gal Gadot’s kind words to the attention now swirling around Adria Arjona and her (ahem, ahem) mysterious character. So mysterious that the only thing missing is a W in the middle of her chest.

The actress in question is Adria Arjona, who’s dodging the questions as best she can because, officially, she’s only supposed to be playing Maxima, saying: “Yes, it’s an iconic character. I love my suit. Really. Both. Both characters, Wonder Woman and Maxima, if you’re a comic-book fan, have incredible costumes”.

We’ve still got more than a year of this cat-and-mouse game ahead of us. Or, better yet, super-cat and super-mouse.

Arjona also said, “I’ve sworn to secrecy, and I don’t like secrets. I hate secrets. I’m very bad at keeping them.” That’s an awful lot of secrecy for Maxima, isn’t it?

“When I meet with DC Studios co-chiefs James Gunn and Peter Safran, I want to be on the safe side—especially when you’re playing such an iconic character—you want that security blanket”. Sure, of course. As iconic as, ahem, Maxima. With those two Ms you could flip around and turn into two Ws.

Xiaomi has launched the Xiaomi 18 Fold in China, and the foldable is already on sale there. The company is pitching it as its first mid-size foldable: a passport-style wide-fold phone with a 3nm XRING O3 chip, a 6,000mAh battery, Leica-branded cameras, and a starting price of CNY 10,999, which works out to about $1,600.

Xiaomi says the 18 Fold is meant to land somewhere between flip phones and the bigger book-style foldables. It has a 5.38-inch outer display and an inner screen of about 7.6 inches, both using an A4-like aspect ratio so the jump from one screen to the other feels more natural.

It also doesn’t weigh much for this category. At 219g, Xiaomi says the 18 Fold is its lightest foldable so far, and both HyperRGB LTPO panels use full RGB subpixels, support refresh rates from 1Hz to 120Hz, and hit 4,000 nits of peak brightness. The company also says the phone uses an aluminum alloy frame, Shield Glass 3.0, and a new three-link hinge.

Inside, Xiaomi is packing in a 10-core CPU, a 16-core GPU, LPDDR6 support, and what it claims is a 45% jump in NPU decoding performance. Charging is rated at 67W wired and 50W wireless. Camera hardware includes a Leica triple-camera setup with a 200MP main sensor, a 50MP periscope, and a 50MP ultra-wide, which Xiaomi says helps it sidestep the usual trade-offs that come with foldables.

If you’ve been waiting for a wider foldable and you’re in China, the Xiaomi 18 Fold has a lot going for it, especially with Apple’s foldable rumored to be on the way and Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 8 already adding more pressure in a market that’s getting crowded fast.

The Xiaomi 18 Fold starts at CNY 10,999, or roughly $1,600, and it’s available in China now. Xiaomi hasn’t said anything yet about an international release.

Nintendo is airing a 30-minute Zelda Direct today, September 8, to celebrate 40 years of The Legend of Zelda. It starts at 7:00 a.m. PT / 10:00 a.m. ET, and it arrives one day before the broader September Nintendo Direct on September 9.

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The main focus should be Zelda’s 40th anniversary. The biggest update will probably be a much fuller look at the already announced The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake for Nintendo Switch 2, along with pre-order details, a solid chunk of gameplay, and a firm release date. Recent reports have pointed to a possible November 2026 launch, with Nintendo potentially using it as a holiday-season draw. Fans are also waiting to see how closely the remake sticks to the original, or whether Nintendo uses it to pull the series back toward a more traditional structure after The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

Nintendo has also left the door open for news outside the games themselves. That means there’s a chance of a Zelda movie teaser for the April 30, 2027 film starring Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Bo Bragason, and Uli Latukefu. You could also see the still-unconfirmed Zelda-themed Nintendo Switch 2 hardware, new amiibo, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD or The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD making a return, or even a few early hints about games planned for 2027. The Legend of Zelda series has now passed 195 million sales, so if you follow Zelda at all, this showcase is probably worth watching.

You can catch the stream on Nintendo’s official channels.

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Firaxis Games is celebrating the 35th anniversary of Sid Meier’s Civilization. An important date for a franchise that has defined 4X strategy by shaping it while remaining the saga that, even today, is still the most important and beloved in its genre. That’s why it shouldn’t surprise us that they’ve decided to start the celebrations by pampering their latest title, the seventh, with new paid content. Its first major expansion.

An update worthy of the stars

Called Earthrise, it will be released in 2027 and will focus on the space race. To do this we’ll have to go from exploring the night sky and learning about the space around us to launching the first orbital missions, to exploring the depths of space and discovering ways to address some of the major problems of our time, such as climate change or increasingly frequent natural disasters. Something essential if we want to settle on other planets, given the hostile environment they present.

Before this new expansion, there will be two free updates that will serve as a preview of what’s to come. At the end of September, update 1.5.0 will arrive, which will introduce the True Start Location map, Earth, in addition to various updates that will polish some aspects of the game. Then, in 2027, Arc of Tomorrow will launch, a major update that will introduce a new age: the Atomic Age, which will span from 1950 to the near future. It will include new technology trees, the return of Gandhi as a leader, as well as new empire management tools.

With that, Civilization VII is shaping up as a very well-defined entry in the series after a fairly rough start. But to see how it all fits together we’ll still have to wait until 2027. And see what else the 35th-anniversary celebrations have in store for us.

Nintendo doesn’t usually give advance notice of its Directs, but this time it has made an exception. Maybe because we’re getting not one, but two, and one of them will be very special. Because they’ve announced that on Tuesday, September 8, and Wednesday, September 9, we’ll be getting a Nintendo Direct on each day, the first dedicated to the 40th anniversary of The Legend of Zelda and the second a general one featuring both first- and third-party announcements.

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A remake we’re eager to see

As for the first one, we can expect, first of all, something very obvious: the first real look at the Ocarina of Time remake. While we already got to see a very brief teaser, we still haven’t seen any of its gameplay and this is where we expect to see it. Also to be expected is that we’ll see new details about the film, which premieres on April 30, 2027, and it wouldn’t be surprising if we saw some kind of new announcement about the franchise. Probably some kind of game collection that we can buy for a limited time, like they did for Super Mario’s anniversary.

On the other hand, for the general Nintendo Direct we know nothing. There haven’t been any leaks, beyond Brazil’s age ratings board leaking a remake of Romancing SaGa 3, Romancing SaGa 3: Destinies United, which wouldn’t be surprising to see in this Direct. But otherwise, we only know one important detail: it will be focused exclusively on Nintendo Switch 2 games.

In any case, we won’t have to wait long to find out, considering that they’ll be held on September 8 and 9 at 4:00 PM CEST, with runtimes of about 30 and 45 minutes, respectively. So get ready, because Nintendo seems to have more than one surprise up its sleeve.