Final Fantasy 7 Revelation is getting a physical edition, and it seems director Naoki Hamaguchi had to argue for it. He told Radio Times that he pushed Square Enix for a boxed release, while admitting the product lineup is the publishing team's call. On PS5 and Xbox Series X, the disc reportedly works as a key disc that holds the opening and downloads the rest, and the Switch 2 gets a game-key card. The game launches on April 8, 2027. Here's what Hamaguchi said:

In this day and age, as we've been talking about, there's a lot of pressure for disc-less editions, digital editions, and I used my position to put forth an argument for the physical version as much as possible. I completely understand there are those out there who may not really agree with that direction or approve of that direction. But I would just say that I hope you understand that I completely see where you're coming from, and that I did my best.

Take-Two has signed a new long-term Xbox Publisher License Agreement with Microsoft, according to an 8-K filing with the SEC. Signed on September 28 and effective from September 17, it gives Take-Two the right to develop, publish, manufacture, market, advertise, distribute, and sell Xbox-compatible products for "all Xbox devices." It also replaces all of the company's existing Xbox publisher agreements. The filing doesn't mention Project Helix by name, but it's probably covered under the "all devices" wording. On the commercial side, Microsoft pays Take-Two the wholesale price and/or an agreed revenue share on digital sales, and charges fees and royalties on physical media.

Microsoft keeps the right to approve each game concept, the final build, and any packaging or marketing that carries its marks. The full agreement will be attached to Take-Two's 10-Q for the quarter ending September 30. Interestingly, Take-Two's 2020 deal mentioned the Xbox One and Xbox Series X platforms specifically, while "all Xbox devices" is much broader. It looks like this is meant to cover whatever Xbox ships next, which would fit with Xbox CEO Asha Sharma saying the team is working on a "great family of devices" for Helix. Take-Two doesn't explain the change, and it could also be routine housekeeping. The first Take-Two game under this updated deal is GTA 6, which is still scheduled for November 19 on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.

An RTX 5090 Founders Edition owner says NVIDIA turned down a warranty claim because the serial number on the card's metal bracket had faded past the point of being readable. According to a Reddit post on r/NVIDIA from user Willing-Avocado-4830, the card began throwing black screen crashes under heavy load, so the owner returned it to NVIDIA for an RMA. After roughly a month of waiting, NVIDIA reportedly rejected the claim with little explanation, and a follow-up email revealed the reason. The printed serial number was apparently too faded to confirm.

The owner claims to have never removed the bracket, and still has the original box and matching invoice. That raises an obvious question, since the same serial number is printed on the card's modular PCIe connector too, and can reportedly be pulled from Windows using NVIDIA's SMI tool, at least while the GPU still boots. NVIDIA rejecting an RMA simply due to a faded serial number is questionable, to say the least, especially with RTX 5090 stock already scarce and prices well above MSRP. Here's what the faded serial number looks like, according to another Redditor who shared this image.

Earlier this week, Thai news outlets have reported a recent approval of a major THB2.3 billion (~$73.81 million USD) investment into Western Digital's local operations. The Southeast Asian nation's Board of Investment (BOI) gave the thumbs up to a new on-site HAMR HDD technology research and development project. Western Digital's central location has grown over the past couple of years—for example, around August 2024, Thailand's BOI gave a proposed HDD production hub enlargement the greenlight. Fresh news items outline an upcoming research and development project that will focus on HAMR (Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording) technology, with a view to enhance hard disk drive (HDD) manufacturing capabilities. Additional details mention an international collaboration; involving the North American and Japanese teams—the Thai unit seems to be tasked with devising key components and HAMR's crucial "laser-based data recording process." Earlier on in February, WD's Innovation Day 2026 roadmapped an extensive future HAMR release cadence. By the end of the decade, the data storage specialist projects the debut of 100+ TB drives.

As disclosed in a new press release—issued by the US Commerce Department—TSMC's North American operation has started another expansion. Last month, Taiwan's leading chip foundry committed a substantial $100 billion investment—eventually leading to a greater production footprint in Phoenix, Arizona. Reports suggest that ground has already been broken, in a low-key manner—as of yesterday (April 29)—at a planned third location, only hours after TSMC's receiving of permits—aka a "thumbs up" from the US government. According to local news outlets, key administrative representatives were in attendance to witness the initiation of construction work. TSMC's third plant is destined to pump out cutting-edge products via a 2 nm (N2) process technology, with Apple, NVIDIA and AMD confirmed as "front of the queue" customers. Despite recent fanfare and celebrations, industry analysts reckon that it will take up to a decade for the foundry's North American operation to solidify a dependable supply chain. In the interim, certain elements will require shipping to overseas locations—for packaging and finalization purposes.

AI agents are poised to transform productivity for the world's billion knowledge workers with "knowledge robots" that can accomplish a variety of tasks. To develop AI agents, enterprises need to address critical concerns like trust, safety, security and compliance. New NVIDIA NIM microservices for AI guardrails—part of the NVIDIA NeMo Guardrails collection of software tools—are portable, optimized inference microservices that help companies improve the safety, precision and scalability of their generative AI applications.

Central to the orchestration of the microservices is NeMo Guardrails, part of the NVIDIA NeMo platform for curating, customizing and guardrailing AI. NeMo Guardrails helps developers integrate and manage AI guardrails in large language model (LLM) applications. Industry leaders Amdocs, Cerence AI and Lowe's are among those using NeMo Guardrails to safeguard AI applications. Developers can use the NIM microservices to build more secure, trustworthy AI agents that provide safe, appropriate responses within context-specific guidelines and are bolstered against jailbreak attempts. Deployed in customer service across industries like automotive, finance, healthcare, manufacturing and retail, the agents can boost customer satisfaction and trust.

South Korean tech insiders believe that SK Hynix has sent "12-layer DRAM stacked HBM3E (5th generation HBM)" prototype samples to NVIDIA—according a ZDNET.co.kr article, initial examples were shipped out last month. Reports from mid-2023 suggested that Team Green had sampled 8-layer HBM3E (4th gen) units around summer time—with SK Hynix receiving approval notices soon after. Another South Korean media outlet, DealSite, reckons that NVIDIA's memory qualification process has exposed HBM yield problems across a number of manufacturers. SK Hynix, Samsung and Micron are competing fiercely on the HBM3E front—with hopes of getting their respective products attached to NVIDIA's H200 AI GPU. DigiTimes Asia proposed that SK Hynix is ready to "commence mass production of fifth-generation HBM3E" at some point this month.

SK Hynix is believed to be leading the pack—insiders believe that yield rates are good enough to pass early NVIDIA certification, and advanced 12-layer samples are expected to be approved in the near future. ZDNET reckons that SK Hynix's forward momentum has placed it an advantageous position: "(They) supplied 8-layer HBM3E samples in the second half of last year and passed recent testing. Although the official schedule has not been revealed, mass production is expected to begin as early as this month. Furthermore, SK Hynix supplied 12-layer HBM3E samples to NVIDIA last month. This sample is an extremely early version and is mainly used to establish standards and characteristics of new products. SK Hynix calls it UTV (Universal Test Vehicle)... Since Hynix has already completed the performance verification of the 8-layer HBM3E, it is expected that the 12-layer HBM3E test will not take much time." SK Hynix's Vice President recently revealed that his company's 2024 HBM production volumes for were already sold out, and leadership is already preparing innovations for 2025 and beyond.

The Council has today approved the regulation to strengthen Europe's semiconductor ecosystem, better known as the 'Chips Act'. This is the last step in the decision-making procedure. The Chips Act aims to create the conditions for the development of a European industrial base in the field of semiconductors, attract investment, promote research and innovation and prepare Europe for any future chip supply crisis. The programme should mobilise €43 billion in public and private investment (€3.3 billion from the EU budget), with the objective of doubling the EU's global market share in semiconductors, from 10% now to at least 20% by 2030.

With the Chips Act, Europe will be a frontrunner in the world semiconductors race. We can already see it in action: new production plants, new investments, new research projects. And in the long run, this will also contribute to the renaissance of our industry and the reduction of our foreign dependencies. - Héctor Gómez Hernández, Spanish Minister for Industry, Trade and Tourism

There were rumblings late last week about China's competition regulatory bodies giving Microsoft the go ahead for its proposed takeover of the Activision, Blizzard & King games publishing group. The crowd-sourced content site Seeking Alpha was the first online outlet to break the news last Friday - the author had learned from capital market firm - Dealreporter - that China's State Administration for Market Regulation had granted unconditional approval for the $68.7 billion bid, following the conclusion of a "Phase 3" investigation. The latest judgement arrived only a few days after the EU Commission's approval of the deal.

Microsoft has chosen to make an official announcement about this verdict - and has today released statements to several gaming news outlets, including GamesIndustry.biz and Eurogamer: "China's unconditional clearance of our acquisition of Activision Blizzard follows clearance decisions from jurisdictions such as the European Union and Japan, bringing the total to 37 countries representing more than two billion people. The acquisition combined with our recent commitments to the European Commission will empower consumers worldwide to play more games on more devices." Microsoft's next challenge sits with the US government's Federal Trade Commission (FTC) - a final deliberation is due this August.

Japan's competition regulator, Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC), yesterday issued a press release in which it announces an approval of Microsoft's proposed $69 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard. The JFTC's review has concluded and their members have: "reached the conclusion that the transaction is unlikely to result in substantially restraining competition in any particular fields of trade." This represents another regional victory for Microsoft, and follows last week's approval of the deal by the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). The JFTC has informed both Microsoft and Activision Blizzard that a cease and desist order will be not be issued, thus completing its investigation.

The timing of this new development is raising eyebrows - in last week's Senate Finance Committee, several US Members of Congress raised concerns about Sony's "monopoly" over the Japanese gaming market. The Japanese government was also accused of being complicit in its inaction and has: "allowed Sony to engage in blatant anti-competitive conduct through exclusive deals and payments to game publishers." Games industry watchdogs have questioned why another rival console and games company, Nintendo, was not brought up as subject matter in the debate. Microsoft has dedicated considerable resources into getting its proposed deal approved by international antitrust watchdogs, and has even offered to expand the Activision Blizzard games library onto Nintendo hardware platforms.

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) regulatory body has today delivered its provisional approval of Microsoft's proposed purchase of the Activision Blizzard group, but has added that it will conduct further reviews into the topic of whether the buyout will have any detrimental effect on competition in the area of cloud gaming services: "where the CMA is continuing to carefully consider the responses provided in relation to the original provisional findings. The CMA's merger investigation continues, and it remains due to issue its final report by 26 April 2023."

The antitrust watchdog's stance looks to have changed in a significant way since February, when it declared that Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard had the potential to "harm U.K. gamers". New evidence has been presented to the CMA in recent weeks, and its members have moved to provisionally conclude that: "overall, the transaction will not result in a substantial lessening of competition in relation to console gaming in the UK."