NVIDIA has recently introduced a pair of special edition graphics cards of its fastest consumer GPU available at the moment: the GeForce GTX Titan Xp. The new cards, as you all know, have a Star Wars theme, ahead of the franchise's Episode VIII: The Last Jedi premiere in December. It would appear that these new designs - the Jedi Order and Galactic Empire editions - are simply re-skins of the already existing Titan Xp product, with added Red or Green LED colors according to your particular lean when it comes to The Force.

While these graphics cards certainly look the part - I'd say that the Galactic Empire edition is the better looking of the two, but that's neither here nor there - they likely signal the beginning of a trend. A trend where special edition graphics cards may move in to fill the void left by the absence of new products, while also allowing companies to re-purpose hitherto unsold inventory of a given graphics card.

NVIDIA has announced two new collector's edition NVIDIA TITAN Xp GPUs created for the ultimate Star Wars fan. The new Jedi Order and Galactic Empire editions of the NVIDIA TITAN Xp have been crafted to reflect the look and feel of the Star Wars galaxy.
These new Star Wars collector's edition GPUs pay homage to the light side/dark side dichotomy, and contain hints of the Star Wars galaxy, such as the hilt of Luke Skywalker's lightsaber and light panels reminiscent of the Death Star.

The Jedi Order GPU simulates the wear and tear and battle-worn finish of many items used by the Rebel Alliance, resulting from its diecast aluminum cover being subjected to an extensive, corrosive salt spray. Conversely, the Galactic Empire GPU's finish features simple, clean lines, emulating the high-end, orderly nature of the resource-rich Empire. Both versions have multiple windowed areas to showcase internals and lighting, evoking each faction's lightsabers, green and red, respectively. The finishes of both versions took over a year to perfect.

We went into Star Wars Battlefront II with a goal to make the deepest, biggest Star Wars game you've ever played. That meant transporting you to all three eras and handing you a huge assortment of heroes, classes, and vehicles - as well as bringing tons of free post-launch content to all Star Wars Battlefront II players.

The Beta gave us a welcome chance to test all of our systems in action and tune things up for better balance. A few weeks back, we mentioned we were going to take another look at how the progression system works. After incorporating feedback from the Beta, we're happy to share our plans for launch.

The death knell is sounding in Visceral Games (creators of the Dead Space series), courtesy of EA. The publishing company has shuttered another one of its studios, and is looking to move employees from Visceral to what others remain. Apparently, the Star Wars game, which had a tentative release date for 2019, was shaping up as a "story-based, linear adventure game": not that much of a surprise, considering it was being helmed by Uncharted series veteran Amy Hennig. A development team from across EA Worldwide Studios will take over development, led by a team from EA Vancouver that was already working on the project.

Apparently, EA wasn't much enjoying the way the game was developing; usually, linear, story-based games don't lend themselves much for microtransactions or loot boxes, now do they? Citing "shifts in the marketplace", EA says that "It has become clear that to deliver an experience that players will want to come back to and enjoy for a long time to come, we needed to pivot the design," so that it "allows for more variety and player agency." All in all, this sounds much like Destiny, or upcoming Bioware game Anthem. But it will also certainly lend itself better to further monetization, considering how it's one of the industry's most important sources of revenue.

Another day, another set of Vega results see the light of it. It would seem like this saga has been going on for ages, ever since we've seen AMD showcase its prototype Vega cards running Star Wars Battlefront (4K, Ultra settings at over 60 FPS) and Doom (4K, Vulcan render path at over 60 FPS on pre-production hardware). But with the lack of official information coming from AMD (let's hope this changes on May 16th), it would seem the company is content to see us hardware news sites jumping at every detail and offering free publicity.

This is known to be Vega because the device ID, 687F:C1, was spotted on AMD's own hands while running that Doom demo in 4K. The device clocks seem to be in line with previous leaks: a 1200 MHz core clock and 8GB of video memory running at 700 MHz memory clocks. With these clocks (which are expected to be extremely conservative when we take into account what we know of Vega), the Vega video card manages to deliver a 17,801 points graphics score, approximately 1,400 points more than your average Fury X, but some hundreds less than your average, current-generation GTX 1070. Remember: AMD's MI25 is expected to come in at 1,500 MHz core clocks, and this is a professional, passively-cooled graphics card. This means that unless AMD greatly overestimated the clock capability of its Vega cards, the consumer version of Vega will have necessarily higher clocks. But we'll stay here, waiting for some more details to pour our way, as always.

At CES 2017, AMD set-up a demo room in which it showcased a PC powered by a Ryzen CPU and a Vega GPU playing Star Wars Battlefront at 60 FPS, reportedly at Ultra HD, with confirmed Ultra quality settings. Some sources do report that the frame rate at 4K Ultra settings occasionally dropped to 57 or 58 fps, but it still remains a strong showing from the company's upcoming Vega graphics architecture, as well as the prowess of its Ryzen CPUs.

AMD released the WHQL-signed version of Radeon Software Crimson Edition 15.11.1 as the new 15.12 WHQL. It addresses a variety of game-specific issues, including rendering errors on Star Wars: Battlefront; bugs on Fallout 4; texture-compression issues with Just Cause 3; poor CrossFire performance with Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. It also addresses a critical issue in which the driver would either spool fan-speeds all the way up to 100% on load, or lock them down at 30%, causing certain GPUs to overheat. A variety of bugs specific to the Radeon Settings app were also addressed.

DOWNLOAD: AMD Radeon Software Crimson Edition 15.12 WHQL for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 8.1 64-bit | Windows 8.1 32-bit | Windows 7 64-bit | Windows 7 32-bit

This week on TechPowerUp News: Intel's next-generation "Kaby Lake" and previous-generation "Broadwell-E" being slated for 2016; AMD Radeon "Star Wars: Battlefront" bundle with Radeon R9 Fury; and Rocksteady's guarded "no" for multi-GPU support on "Batman Arkham Knight" PC.

AMD has a knack of pulling off some of the season's biggest game bundles, with its Never Settle Bundle legacy. The company is preparing to give away one of the season's biggest games, Star Wars Battlefront, with its Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards. Given away by participating retailers, purchases of the three cards will come with a voucher that can be redeemed on AMD website for an Origin key to the game. R9 Fury X and Nano are not included in this promotion.

AMD released its latest Catalyst 15.11.1 Beta drivers in the run up to its major Radeon Software Crimson Edition launch. One of the last drivers to bear the name "Catalyst," these drivers come with performance optimization for all of the season's biggest releases - Star Wars Battlefront, Call of Duty: Black Ops III, Fallout 4, and Assassins Creed: Syndicate. These optimizations could include CrossFire profiles on games that support it. Grab them from the links below.DOWNLOAD: AMD Catalyst 15.11.1 Beta 32-bit | AMD Catalyst 15.11.1 Beta 64-bit

NVIDIA released its second "Game Ready" GeForce drivers in a span of a week, with version 358.91 WHQL. These drivers are "game-ready" for Fallout 4, Star Wars: Battlefront, and StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void. This means game optimizations, SLI profiles, and GeForce Experience optimal settings for the three games. This closely follows last week's GeForce 358.87 WHQL release, which was game-ready for Call of Duty: Black Ops III.DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 358.91 Game Ready Drivers Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 8.1/7/Vista 64-bit

AMD released Catalyst 15.10 Beta drivers. These drivers address issues with Star Wars: Battlefront Beta, and comes with quality and performance optimization for Ashes of the Singularity in DirectX 12 mode. It also addresses a rare crash that occurs when maximizing a minimized web-browser window with a YouTube 4K video playback in it. Issues with Cyberlink PowerDVD playback on 3D displays connected via HDMI are also addressed.DOWNLOAD: AMD Catalyst 15.10 Beta for Windows 10/8.1/7 64-bit | Windows 10/8.1/7 32-bit

NVIDIA released the GeForce 358.50 WHQL drivers, which are "Game Ready" for Star Wars: Battlefront Open Beta. Open for pre-loading now on Origin for free, the game goes life in a day. In addition to this, it includes an updated driver support for GameWorks VR SDK; and OpenGL ARB 2015 extensions. This includes support for OpenGL ES 3.2 on the desktop. Grab the driver from the links below.DOWNLOAD: GeForce 358.50 WHQL for Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 32-bit | Windows 7/8 64-bit | Windows 7/8 32-bit

At CES 2014, SMS Audio, LLC (www.SMSAudio.com), a premier audio headphone and accessories brand from Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, debuts a line of limited edition Star Wars STREET by 50 On-Ear Wired receiver. Branded with font and themes from Lucasfilm's Star Wars rυn, the four new models contain Stormtrooper, Rebel Alliance, Boba Fett and Imperial. 50 Cent is instructive the new harvest for the first time, as well as showcasing the void SMS Audio line of harvest, at booth #21313 in South Hall 1.

"I've been a fan of Star Wars since I was a kid, so working with Lucasfilm to ѕtаrt this line of receiver was a really сοοƖ experience," ѕаіԁ 50 Cent, CEO of SMS Audio. "Star Wars has a hυɡе following of dyed-іn-thе-wool fans and I'm excited to salutation them into the SMS Audio family tree."

BioWare, a studio of Electronic Arts Inc., and LucasArts announced today that the new, Free-to-Play option for the critically-acclaimed, massively multiplayer online game Star Wars: The Old Republic is now live. Players can experience the complete storylines of all eight, iconic Star Wars classes, all the way to level 50 for free. This new option complements the existing subscription offering, providing players with maximum flexibility in how they choose to experience Star Wars: The Old Republic.

"We want to give our players the freedom to enjoy Star Wars: The Old Republic when and how they want," said Matthew Bromberg, General Manager of BioWare Austin. "There has never been a better time to start playing with us."

Razer, the world leader in high-performance gaming hardware, has announced a sweepstakes promising one winner a custom-designed Star Wars: The Old Republic Razer Blade gaming laptop. Valued at over $15,000, the Star Wars inspired Razer Blade is unique: Only one of its kind exists in the known universe, from this galaxy to those far, far away.

"Star Wars provides the benchmark by which all entertainment media is measured, and the Razer Blade is the standard for true portability, power and innovation in PC gaming," says Robert 'RazerGuy' Krakoff, president of Razer USA. "The opportunity to work with LucasArts and BioWare on this fun project is a testament to our common love of great entertainment and ensuring the best possible experience for fans."