Increasing its HPL score from 1.02 Eflop/s in November 2022 to an impressive 1.194 Eflop/s on this list, Frontier was able to improve upon its score after a stagnation between June 2022 and November 2022. Considering exascale was only a goal to aspire to just a few years ago, a roughly 17% increase here is an enormous success. Additionally, Frontier earned a score of 9.95 Eflop/s on the HLP-MxP benchmark, which measures performance for mixed-precision calculation. This is also an increase over the 7.94 EFlop/s that the system achieved on the previous list and nearly 10 times more powerful than the machine's HPL score. Frontier is based on the HPE Cray EX235a architecture and utilizes AMD EPYC 64C 2 GHz processors. It also has 8,699,904 cores and an incredible energy efficiency rating of 52.59 Gflops/watt. It also relies on gigabit ethernet for data transfer.

Micron Technology, Inc. announced today it will be introducing extreme ultraviolet (EUV) technology to Japan, tapping this sophisticated patterning technology to manufacture its next generation of DRAM, the 1-gamma (1γ) node. Micron will be the first semiconductor company to bring EUV technology to Japan for production, with its Hiroshima fab playing a critical role in the company's development of the 1-gamma node. Micron expects to invest up to 500 billion yen in 1-gamma process technology over the next few years, with close support from the Japanese government, to enable the next wave of end-to-end technology innovation such as rapidly emerging generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications.

With each successive advancement in process technology to scale memory cells and advance performance, Micron enables increased memory density, improvement in power efficiency and lower cost per bit, helping to unlock new opportunities for digitization, sustainability and green transformation, and automation. The introduction of 1-gamma follows the development of Micron's 1-beta (1β), the industry's most advanced DRAM node today, which Micron mass produces in its Hiroshima fab. Micron continues to make progress on its EUV integration plans and expects to ramp EUV into production on the 1-gamma node in Taiwan and Japan from 2025 onwards.

Sega Sammy Holdings CEO Haruki Satomi and CFO Koichi Fukazawa were took part in a Q&A session last month, as a follow-on to the company releasing its financial reports for the past fiscal year. An English translation of the event's notes has only just become available this week, with news outlets picking up on a key item - computer game pricing. General life costs have been climbing in recent times, and games publishers have been adjusting MSRPs due to the rising expense of developing new content, especially in the AAA sector.

The Sega executive team has noticed this industry trend and is pondering over the options - the session notes state: "In the global marketplace, AAA game titles for console have been sold at $59.99 for many years, but titles sold at $69.99 have appeared in the last year...We would like to review the prices of titles that we believe are commensurate with price increases, while also keeping an eye on market conditions." Nintendo has recently joined the likes of Sony, Activision, 2K and Ubisoft in bumping up MSRP to $70, but this pricing decision has only affected the latest Legend of Zelda title - Tears of the Kingdom. Nintendo of America's CEO Doug Bowser defended the move (prior to the game's release) - he argued that the direct sequel to Breath of the Wild would offer fantastic value for money.

A recent Bandai Namco investor report has indicated that FromSoftware's hugely popular action action role-player has sold a total of 20.5 million units, which is highly impressive when you consider that the game launched last February. The publisher and developer's preceding Dark Souls series, as a whole, was reported to have sold 27 million copies in total by mid-2020. Bandai Namco states that uptake of its recently released games titles have not met company expectations, but FromSoftware's smash hit seems to be picking up the slack: "Repeat sales of existing titles such as Elden Ring were strong, especially overseas, worldwide sales reaching 20.5 million. New worldwide titles got off to slow starts, but smaller more medium-sized products moved steadily."

The report suggests that interest in Elden Ring is expected to dip: "We expect a pullback in repeat Elden Ring sales, which made a particularly large contribution to this previous year." The Elden Ring twitter account boasted about hitting the 20 million sales mark back in February 2023, so it can be assumed that a mere 500,000 units have been sold in the interim period between then and this month's investor report. Bandai Namco's document states that an Elden Ring DLC/expansion is in the works, but no further details are provided about the content or release time frame.

The NVIDIA RTX 4000 SFF Ada Generation graphics card was released to the public in late April, but very few reviews and benchmarks have emerged since then. Jisaku Hibi, a Japanese hardware site, has published an in-depth evaluation that focuses mostly on gaming performance. The RTX 4000 Ada SFF has been designed as a compact workstation graphics card, but its usage of an AD104 die makes it a sibling of NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4070 and 4070 Ti gaming-oriented cards. Several PC hardware sites have posited that the 70 W RTX 4000 Ada SFF would "offer GeForce RTX 3070-like performance," but Jisaku Hibi's investigation points to the RTX 3060 Ti being the closest equivalent card (in terms of benchmark results).

According to the TPU GPU database: "NVIDIA has disabled some shading units on the RTX 4000 SFF Ada Generation to reach the product's target shader count. It features 6144 shading units, 192 texture mapping units, and 80 ROPs. Also included are 192 tensor cores which help improve the speed of machine learning applications. The card also has 48 ray tracing acceleration cores. NVIDIA has paired 20 GB GDDR6 memory with the RTX 4000 SFF Ada Generation, which are connected using a 160-bit memory interface. The GPU is operating at a frequency of 1290 MHz, which can be boosted up to 1565 MHz, memory is running at 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective)." The SKU's 70 W TGP and limited memory interface are seen as the card's main weak points, resulting in average clock speeds and a maximum memory bandwidth of only 280 GB/s.

In a rather unexpected move, Samsung will reportedly open a chip development facility in Yokohama, Japan. According to the Nikkei, Samsung is readying a 30 billion yen or US$222 million investment near its current R&D institute in Japan. Samsung is hoping to be able to leverage a combination of Japanese and Korean expertise at the site, although exactly what kind of chip development that will take place at the site is currently unknown, beyond it being focused on the back-end processor of chip manufacturing. This generally involves the wafer packaging process or chip stacking, processes that have evolved a lot of the past few years.

The facility is said to be employing hundreds of people once it starts operating sometime in 2025. The Nikkei is also reporting that Samsung is hoping to take advantage of subsidies offered by the Japanese government, which might also be one of the reasons for opening the development unit in Japan. The subsidies are said to be in excess of 10 billion yen. Considering that Japan and Korea aren't on the best terms at the moment, for many reasons and most of them irrelevant to this news post, it's surprising to see Samsung making this move, as although it might be a fairly minor investment for the company, it's doing so on what could only be referred to as hostile soil.

Nintendo has released another of its "Ask the Developer" discussions, the first segment of this week's edition is obviously part of a marketing drive to drum up even more interest in the Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (scheduled to launch this Friday). Included in the roundtable conversation is Eiji Aonuma, project manager of the The Legend of Zelda series, who has RPG development experience dating back to the SNES and N64 days at Nintendo. The veteran developer confirms that the follow-up to 2017's Breath of the Wild functions as a direct sequel - the fanbase has long suspected that this was always the case - in his introduction he gets down to the facts sharply: "Once again, it takes place in the vast land of Hyrule after the conclusion of the previous game."

Aonuma reiterates the chosen setting: "Yes, this title is set in Hyrule shortly after the end of the previous game. There are many reasons why we chose this setting. After finishing development on the previous title, we wondered if we could make it possible for players to continue exploring the world after they've reached the game's ending." Given the previous entry's massive success in terms of sales - Breath of the Wild is approaching 30 million units sold - and critical reception, it would be natural for Nintendo to build on that foundation. A section of the fanbase has been critical of Nintendo's decision to not produce an unconnected sequel - Aonuma addresses this matter when he is asked whether an entirely new setting/visual style was in the cards: "No, not really. Although The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, has its own conclusion, we started to come up with new ideas that we wanted to bring to life in this already realized version of Hyrule, so our direction in making a sequel did not change."

Nextorage Japan is preparing its NE5N range of PCIe Gen 5 NVMe SSDs for launch in early June - listings have emerged on Newegg for 2 TB and 1 TB models - with a product page appearing recently on the company's (Japanese language) website. These units boast read and write speeds rated for operation up to 10 GB/s, and are based on Phison's E26 PCIe Gen 5 controller. Nextorage started off as a provider of PlayStation 5-oriented PCIe Gen 4 SSD products, due to company ties to Sony Corporation, but its upcoming NE5N range indicates that it intends to target buyers within the enthusiast PC market.

The initial batch of cutting edge SSDs are unlikely to end up in any PS5 consoles, thanks to a sizable dual formation heatsink - the Japanese company has filed a patent for the bulky two-level structure and heatpipe combination design. Gen 5 SSDs are said to be difficult to tame in terms of heat output, and manufacturers are going to great lengths (and sizes) to provide adequate cooling solutions in advance. Future versions of Nextorage Japan's NE5N NVMe M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 5 SSDs are being refined for compact PCs and laptops, so it will be interesting to find out about the intended thermal tempering for more cramped environments.

Customers from Japan to Ecuador and Sweden are using NVIDIA DGX H100 systems like AI factories to manufacture intelligence. They're creating services that offer AI-driven insights in finance, healthcare, law, IT and telecom—and working to transform their industries in the process. Among the dozens of use cases, one aims to predict how factory equipment will age, so tomorrow's plants can be more efficient.

Called Green Physics AI, it adds information like an object's CO2 footprint, age and energy consumption to SORDI.ai, which claims to be the largest synthetic dataset in manufacturing.

Sony PlayStation and Square Enix are engaged in the process of hyping up blockbuster action role-player Final Fantasy XVI, set for a worldwide release on June 22, and have recently announced some visually striking accessories and interesting hardware bundles - as part of the promotional cycle and eventual release of the sixteenth (mainline) Final Fantasy game installment. Their Japanese marketing teams are collaborating on a custom design PlayStation 5 DualSense controller and console faceplate/cover bearing Final Fantasy XVI-based artwork. The controller's Midnight Black + gold accenting combo creates a very macho aesthetic, which stands in sharp contrast to some of the recent special edition Xbox controllers in terms of color and finish.

The special edition controller and console plate will be sold separately and are scheduled to launch alongside the game and related console bundles on June 22. These Final Fantasy XVI-themed accessories could be exclusive to the Japanese domestic market - Sony and Square Enix have issued information related to pricing in Yen (¥8980 & ¥7980 respectively), and their North American and European sites only make mention of the standard white PS5 console FFXVI bundle being available on the game's launch day.

Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon, the latest high-octane action game by FromSoftware, Inc. and Bandai Namco Europe S.A.S. will release globally on August 25. Combining the 25 years of experience developing the ARMORED CORE franchise and action games in the Elden Ring, and Dark Souls franchise, Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon is full of mech action, including fast-paced battles, in-depth customization, and thrilling boss fights. The game is coming to PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC via Steam, and is now available to pre-order at participating retailers and on Bandai Namco Store.

A mysterious new substance called "Coral" was discovered on the remote planet, Rubicon 3. As an energy source, this substance was expected to dramatically advance humanity's technological and communications capabilities. Instead, it caused a catastrophe that engulfed the planet and the surrounding stars in flames and storms, forming a Burning Star System. Almost half a century later, Coral has resurfaced on Rubicon 3, a planet now contaminated and sealed off by the catastrophe. Extra-terrestrial corporations and resistance groups fight over control of the substance. The player infiltrates Rubicon as an independent mercenary and finds themselves in a struggle over the substance with the corporations and other factions.

Future Japanese chipmaker Rapidus has announced that their first fab will be located in Chitose, Hokkaido, located in northern Japan. The planned 2 nm fab will be one of the most advanced fabs in the world once it's ready and construction is said to be starting in September, thanks to approval by the related Japanese government agencies. So far, the Japanese government has approved 330 billion yen for Rapidus, with the most recent investment being 260 billion yen or the equivalent of US$1.94 billion.

However, the total investment into the 2 nm fab is expected to end up somewhere around 5 trillion yen (~US$37.5 billion) in total investments before the fab is ready for mass production. Rapidus is collaborating with IBM and has already sent a group of researchers to its Albany Nanotech facility in upstate New York, which is one of the world's most advanced semiconductor research facilities. At the same time, Japan is working on building a local talent pool of researchers and semiconductor plant workers, by spearheading specialised training for select university students from Japan's top universities. Time will tell if this gamble pays off for Japan, as it's going to be a huge investment before the new fab stands ready in early 2025.

The official NieR Series Twitter account declared a sales milestone this week, and showed a great appreciation for its fanbase: "You'll be delighted to hear more than 7.5 million copies of NieR: Automata have been sold or shipped to date. Thank you for your love and support!" PlatinumGames' action role-playing game has accumulated very decent numbers over a six year period - NieR: Automata first arrived on PlayStation 4 and PC back in March of 2017. Thanks to highly favorable reviews from the computer game press, and word of mouth spread throughout the gaming community, the unlikely spin-off (from the Drakengard series) has become an enduring classic. It also helps that NieR: Automata broke free from being a PS4 and PC timed exclusive, and later on found its way onto the Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.

It is probably safe to assume that NieR: Automata has made a return on its production budget, so talk naturally turns to the prospects of a hypothetical third entry in the series. PlatinumGames and the game's creator, Yoko Taro, have remained very tight-lipped about a possible continuation. The normally eccentric video game director took a more straightforward approach when sharing good news about his game's healthy sales figures: "It seems that 7.5 million copies have been sold. It's so awesome that it makes me dizzy. I can't exceed this number for the rest of my life…I can only thank everyone who supported me!" Taro has taken a more evasive stance when dealing with questions regarding a third Nier title.

At the turn of the 1980s, most PC adventure games were played using only the keyboard. In those days, adventure games didn't use action menus like more modern games, but simply presented the player with a command line where they could freely input text to decide the actions that characters would take and proceed through the story. Free text input systems like these allowed players to feel a great deal of freedom. However, they did come with one common source of frustration: players knowing what action they wanted to perform but being unable to do so because they could not find the right wording. This problem was caused by the limitations of PC performance and NLP technology of the time.

40 years have passed since then, and PC performance has drastically improved, as have the capabilities of NLP technology. Using "The Portopia Serial Murder Case" as a test case, we'd like to show you the capabilities of modern NLP and the impact it can have on adventure games, as well as deepen your understanding of NLP technologies.

NTT-X, a retailer in Japan is advertising a strange promotion to its moneyed customers - a free Intel Arc A750 Limited Edition GPU with every purchase of an ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 4090 24 GB OC Edition graphics card. You would normally expect a couple of extra digital download codes for video games as some sort of bonus incentive, but NTT-X has chosen a non-traditional approach to getting fancy silicon into clients' hands. The shop is selling the high-end ASUS card for just over $2300 (converted from the value in Japanese Yen), and mid-range Intel board will set you back roughly $350 (when sold separately). It seems that PC hardware prices in Japan tend to be higher when compared to USA market trends.

It is not really clear if this particular hardware outlet is experiencing slow sales for top-end RTX GeForce 40 series cards simply because of high asking prices, or it is having difficulty in shifting the Alchemist card due to wavering hardware buyer perception. Super enthusiasts with plenty of cash to spare on cutting edge tech will tend to purchase the best stuff available - perhaps NTT-X are offering their target audience a chance to construct a secondary or tertiary computer. These additional PCs could host the promotional Intel Arc A750 graphics card, with the retailer gaining further sales via customers buying more components for another build, be it for a compact computer or home theater/media center PC.

EdgeCortix Inc., the innovative Edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) Platform company, focused on delivering class-leading compute efficiency and ultra-low latency for AI inference; announced, it is shipping its industry leading, energy-efficient, turn-key, AI co-processor, branded as the EdgeCortix SAKURA-I, to its global Early Access Program members.

"We are very pleased to be announcing the fulfillment of our first-generation semiconductor solution, the EdgeCortix SAKURA-I AI co-processor. Designed and engineered in Japan, SAKURA-I features up to 40 trillion operations per second (TOPs) of dedicated AI performance at sub-10 watts of power consumption.", said Sakyasingha Dasgupta, CEO and Founder of EdgeCortix, "We are delivering a complete Edge AI platform to our Early Access Program members, comprising both software and hardware solutions, which includes our recently updated MERA software suite. Program members include numerous global industry leading enterprise customers across both the commercial and defense sectors. We developed the EdgeCortix Early Access Program (EAP) with a focus on offering customers the opportunity to assess EdgeCortix's products and services at scale, by deploying them within their own complex, heterogeneous environments. The goal of the EAP offering is three-fold: showcasing the ease of integration into customer's existing heterogeneous systems, enabling customers to prove-out the effectiveness and efficiency of EdgeCortix solutions versus competing products and facilitating a direct dialog with EdgeCortix product management, enabling tailor-made fit in certain cases."

The final DLC in the Xenoblade Chronicles 3 Expansion Pass launches for the Nintendo Switch system on April 25. The trailer gives viewers a glimpse into the scenario of Xenoblade Chronicles 3 Expansion Pass Vol. 4 - Future Redeemed. Set before the events of the Xenoblade Chronicles 3 game, players join a cast of new and familiar characters in an original story scenario that connects all three installments in the Xenoblade Chronicles series. Future Redeemed also features new battle mechanics, such as Unity Combo, where two characters can attack in unison.

In Xenoblade Chronicles 3, Aionios is the backdrop to an endless conflict between two opposing nations: Keves and Agnus. Through a chance encounter, a group of six soldiers hailing from both rival nations resolve to put aside their differences and work together to expose a new threat - far greater than that of their ceaseless battle. Players can join Noah, Mio and their friends as they traverse epic landscapes, battle ferocious creatures and fight to break the never-ending cycle of violence that binds their homelands.

TrendForce reports that the US Department of Commerce recently released details regarding its CHIPS and Science Act, which stipulates that beneficiaries of the act will be restricted in their investment activities—for more advanced and mature processes—in China, North Korea, Iran, and Russia for the next ten years. The scope of restrictions in this updated legislation will be far more extensive than the previous export ban, further reducing the willingness of multinational semiconductor companies to invest in China for the next decade.

CHIPS Act will mainly impact TSMC; and as the decoupling of the supply chain continues, VIS and PSMC capture orders rerouted from Chinese foundries
In recent years, the US has banned semiconductor exports and passed the CHIPS Act, all to ensure supply chains decoupling from China. Initially, bans on exports were primarily focused on non-planar transistor architecture (16/14 nm and more advanced processes). However, Japan and the Netherlands have also announced that they intend to join the sanctions, which means key DUV immersion systems, used for producing both sub-16 nm and 40/28 nm mature processes, are likely to be included within the scope of the ban as well. These developments, in conjunction with the CHIPS Act, mean that the expansion of both Chinese foundries and multinational foundries in China will be suppressed to varying degrees—regardless of whether they are advanced or mature processes.

Explore a city turned supernatural in this free update including a new rogue-lite "The Spider's Thread" game mode, more side missions, new enemies, new skills, Photo Mode enhancements and more. Plus, Ghostwire: Tokyo is available now on Xbox Series X|S and Microsoft PC Store. Paranormal forces have taken over Tokyo, with nearly all the human populace vanishing in an instant.

The city's denizens have been replaced by beings from another world - yōkai, evil spirits, myths and urban legends brought to life. But now isn't the time to fear the unknown…face it in Ghostwire: Tokyo, now featuring the all-new Spider's Thread update! The Spider's Thread update, available now for all Ghostwire: Tokyo players, adds a new rogue-lite mode to the game on top of other additions to the base campaign, including new enemies, new skills, new areas to explore, new side missions, extended story cinematics, Photo Mode enhancements and more!

Sony is not happy about the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) recent provisional approval of Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard, and has highlighted the apparent removal of a Microsoft-owned game from being developed on the PlayStation 5. According to legal documents submitted to the UK government, Sony has taken issue with the watchdog's sudden change in opinion - the CMA's position was highly critical at the start of the year - and suspects that Microsoft's expensive PR campaign and submitting of "new evidence" to international competition regulators have influenced a change in direction of rulings. Sony's statement bears down on the unfair nature of the bid's approval: "The CMA's reversal of its position on its consoles theory of harm is surprising, unprecedented, and irrational."

Japan's Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) was the latest anti-trust governing body to give the takeover a thumbs-up, almost two weeks ago - a dramatic turn of events given that it happened on Sony's home turf. The embattled electronics corporation has taken notice of fresh developments in the press, and proceeded to mention controversy surrounding the Redfall platform war. Harvey Smith, the game's creative director, let slip too many details during a promotion tour and seemingly admitted that the higher-ups at Microsoft's Xbox division had decided to can the PlayStation 5 version of Redfall in favor of keeping it exclusive to Xbox, Game Pass and PC. Arkane Studios, as part of the ZeniMax Media Group, was acquired by Microsoft in 2021 - and certain games, already in development, were later released on the PlayStation 5 as timed exclusives, Deathloop being a prime example of this.

The Japanese government, on Friday March 31, announced that it plans to place restrictions on its export of 23 types of semiconductor manufacturing equipment. This follows similar efforts announced by other nations, including the USA and the Netherlands. In a news conference, the Minister for Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Yasutoshi Nishimura stated: "We are fulfilling our responsibility as a technological nation to contribute to international peace and stability." The press release makes no mention of a trade battle between the USA or China, but the implication is that METI is limiting the latter's access to Japan's most advanced chip making equipment.

Nishimura-san continues: "If our exports are not being re-appropriated for military use, we will continue exporting. We believe the impact on companies will be limited." The U.S. government has called on its allies to prevent China's access to semiconductor manufacturing technology in order to slowdown domestic technological and military advancement. Japan and the Netherlands have previously agreed, back in January of this year, to restrict exports to China of equipment that could be used to churn out sub-14 nm chips.

According to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Enterprise Infrastructure Tracker: Buyer and Cloud Deployment, spending on compute and storage infrastructure products for cloud deployments, including dedicated and shared IT environments, increased 16.3% year over year in the fourth quarter of 2022 (4Q22) to $24.1 billion. Spending on cloud infrastructure continues to outgrow the non-cloud segment although the latter had strong growth in 4Q22 as well, increasing 9.4% year over year to $18.7 billion. For the full year, cloud infrastructure grew 19.4% to $87.7 billion, while non-cloud grew 13.6% to $66.7 billion. The market continues to benefit from high demand, large backlogs, rising prices, and an improving infrastructure supply chain.

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.

Japanese OLED display manufacturer JOLED has decided to throw in the towel, as the company board has filed for bankruptcy protection at the Tokyo District Court. JOLED has some 33.7 billion yen (US$257 million) in liabilities and is hoping to cover some of these by selling off assets. The Innovation Network Corporation of Japan (INCJ), which is the largest shareholder of JOLED, will be taking over its R&D department, along with around 100 employees as well as its intellectual property. However, it will not take over either of JOLEDs two fabs, located in Nomi and Chiba, Japan. The two fabs employ around 280 staff and currently the two fabs building displays using JOLED's innovative printing technology for OLED displays are expected to be closed.

However, as JOLED still has supply contracts with the likes of Apple, ASUS, Eizo, LG and Sony, INCJ will continue to operate the fabs for now, to fulfil the contracts for the time being. INCJ is apparently accepting responsibility to cover JOLED's liabilities, sheltering the other shareholders of JOLED, which includes Japanese Denso and Chinese CSOT/TCL. JOLED has struggled for most of its existence, being late to market with its OLED displays and haven't been able to compete with the likes of LG and Samsung in Korea and BOE Display and CSOT in China. Hopefully INCJ will be able to take advantage of the intellectual property from JOLED, as the company is focusing on making its own line of OLED displays in the future.

Nintendo is ramping up publicity efforts for its upcoming sequel to Breath of the Wild, which was a ratings and sales smash upon launching in Spring 2017 for the Japanese company. Tears of the Kingdom is the latest addition in the long running Legend of Zelda series and is set for release on May 12. In a newly released video that clocks in at a generous 13 and a bit minutes in length, the game's producer Eiji Aonuma demonstrates multiple aspects of gameplay - including Link's new abilities, refined combat systems, weapon crafting, vehicle building via puzzle mechanics and the transition from sky to land areas.

Aonuma-san starts off the video presentation by announcing that the development cycle for Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has been completed (reached gold status in industry terms). The game is due to launch internationally in mid-May, so it is encouraging that the development team is, allegedly, not tinkering under the hood until the very last minute. Tears of the Kingdom has been delayed since it was first teased at E3 2019 - development began in 2017 following the completion of its predecessor, Breath of the Wild. Nintendo initially announced an estimated release window in 2022, but presumably due to world changing events, the game was pushed back to Q2 2023.