Top executives at Anthropic, OpenAI and other AI companies “are privately gaming out scenarios for a public and political revolt after a catastrophic AI event,” reports Axios, one that turns “an already wary public further against the technology and its leaders…”
These AI company executives “anticipate a large-scale event, most likely a cyberattack, that shuts down access to financial services, internet connectivity, or even power and water…” the article points out.
“Many top AI researchers and executives believe a major incident is inevitable.
“OpenAI conducts preparedness exercises where teams discuss and work through a range of potential scenarios,” a company spokesperson said. “These scenarios are not treated as inevitable, but are meant to help us prepare for a variety of circumstances.” Anthropic declined to comment…
Top AI planners assume Democrats, ascendant after the midterms, will move fast to shut down AI but will face significant challenges… The planning involves red-teaming for worst-case scenarios. It focuses mainly on racing to educate members of Congress. Company executives know regulation has no chance of passing right now, but still want to shape the legislation and policies U.S. leaders will turn to after a first catastrophic event….
Many AI industry insiders told Axios they believe a major event will occur in the next six to 12 months.
“Even with Democrats in control of the House and Senate, the companies see fractured politics as the norm, including within the Democratic Party.”
Though I would never claim to be a Soulslike savant, I’ve certainly been an avid fan of the subgenre since it emerged with Demon’s Souls in the halcyon days of 2009.
Countless Soulslikes have arrived since then, but many have followed a familiar design throughline: third-person action, close-quarters combat and a heavy reliance on the invincibility frames provided by a well-timed dodge.
Coming from an unexpected developer, Ghostrunner studio One More Level, Valor Mortis looks set to do things rather differently. In the process, it could blow away some of the stale vapours that have been wafting around the Soulslike subgenre for a while.
Here’s how Valor Mortis is shaping up to be one of the most distinctive Soulslikes of 2026.
Alternate Napoleonic History With Buckets of Body Horror to Spare
You could argue that FromSoftware has cornered the market on grimdark fantasy, grimdark Victorian horror and, well, grimdark Sengoku-era settings. One backdrop it doesn’t have dibs on, however, is the grimdark Napoleonic era. That is precisely where Valor Mortis butters its bread, or croissant, so to speak.
After protagonist William Dowsett awakens in a mass grave (it’s a Soulslike, where else would the game begin?), players are pitted against legions of corrupted French soldiers who have been fused with all manner of weapons and battlefield artillery.
These horrors and aberrations exist thanks to the corrupting influence of Nephtoglobin, a parasitic organism unleashed upon the Eastern European theatre of the Napoleonic Wars. It fuses flesh with steel and twists the flora and fauna of an otherwise picturesque landscape into a palpitating expanse of festering forests and hostile hills.
An Occult Psychological Struggle Between Two Distinct Personalities
Awakening in a filthy grave after seemingly being killed, only to discover that you have also been infected by Nephtoglobin, might sound like a bad deal. However, this particularly odious set of circumstances gives Valor Mortis one of its most intriguing storytelling devices.
As William rises from the grave in an oddly altered form, he finds his mind invaded by two very different voices and apparitions.
The first is none other than Napoleon Bonaparte himself. Voiced by legendary French actor Vincent Cassel, Napoleon implores the resurrected hero to salvage his imperial crusade even as the Nephtoglobin corruption tears through his armies.
The other voice belongs to a mysterious woman known as the Shrike, voiced by popular games actor Jennifer English. A resistance fighter hell-bent on Napoleon’s destruction, she seeks to cleanse Bonaparte’s influence from the world entirely.
This dual presence gives Valor Mortis an unusual storytelling hook, helping to distinguish it from just about every other Soulslike on the market.
Exit Third Person, Enter First Person
Arguably the most significant change Valor Mortis makes to the established Soulslike formula is its shift from the familiar third-person viewpoint to a refreshing first-person perspective. This is much more than a cosmetic choice, as it directly affects how the game plays.
The third-person perspective traditionally used by Soulslikes allows players to judge space and their distance from nearby enemies relatively easily. Both are crucial when evading attacks coming from multiple directions.
In Valor Mortis, broad, circular dodge rolls are replaced by subtler but swifter sidesteps, while precision parrying sits at the heart of its first-person melee combat.
If you’re wondering how the game handles encounters with multiple enemies, the answer lies in mechanics that suit both its perspective and darkly fantastical Napoleonic setting. Players can use an assortment of spells and trinkets to create distance from nearby foes, while a clever implementation of 3D audio helps them pinpoint where the next attack is coming from.
The first-person viewpoint also allows One More Level to draw on its substantial traversal expertise. William can wall-run at high speed, leap through the air and chain together aerial grappling moves in ways that would make almost any other Soulslike blush.
As you might expect, these white-knuckle traversal mechanics also complement the combat. William can use designated grapple points to launch himself into a group of enemies for a surprise attack or escape overwhelming aggression and reset his position, not unlike a certain Caped Crusader.
Fencing, Firearms, the Occult and Mysterious Ambers
With Valor Mortis firmly ensconced in the Napoleonic era, rapiers and sabres are largely the order of the day when it comes to melee combat. They may also be the most conventional part of the game’s arsenal.
Rather than relying on traditional blocking, players are encouraged to master perfect parries, creating opportunities for devastating counterattacks and gory instant executions.
Alongside these piercing close-quarters weapons, Valor Mortis lets players wield pistols, flintlocks and muskets from the period. These firearms are undeniably powerful but laborious to reload, meaning they should be used only when a hit is all but guaranteed.
Players can make their shots even more effective by targeting the swollen Nephtoglobin boils afflicting many of William’s enemies. Successfully destroying these weak points can inflict enormous damage.
William’s resurrection has also given his left hand the ability to channel Nephtoglobin into powerful occult abilities, because why not, eh? By maintaining a supply of Nephtoglobin, replenished by killing enemies, using consumables and resting at checkpoints, William can weaponise the plague to produce jets of fire, kinetic barriers and more.
Finally, Ambers are a special class of socketable item that can provide an assortment of buffs, modifiers and passive bonuses. These include slowing time while aiming a firearm, converting healing potions so that they restore Nephtoglobin instead, and extending the parry window of the game’s various rapiers and sabres.
Enjoy Soulslikes but fancy something a little spicier and altogether more unusual? Valor Mortis looks set to be a perfect fit.
John-Paul Jones
Scribbling about videogames since 2005, John-Paul Jones first stoked his love for the industry with the Atari 65XE at the age of four before proceeding onto the ZX Spectrum, Amiga and beyond. These days, he finds himself unreasonably excited about Sega’s Yakuza franchise, foreign cinema and generally trying to keep his trio of sausage dogs from burning his house down. Clearly, he is living his best life right now.
Disney has raised ticket prices at both Disneyland and Disney World parks. Not all ticket types have been affected by these changes, however. There are still options that allow fans to visit the theme parks for a more affordable price.
Prices of Disneyland and Disney World tickets have greatly increased over the years. However, the parks have also received expansions, giving visitors a wider variety of rides, restaurants, and whimsical worlds to explore. According to MickeyVisit, Disney has stated that its guests see more value in their visits now compared to before. Although prices are rising, visitors receive more value from the parks than before, especially during low-season.
Disneyland ticket price increase
Image: Disney
At Disneyland, you can purchase one-day or multi-day tickets. The price of the one-day tickets is based on demand. Higher-tier tickets are sold when demand is greater. If there is low demand, attendees can purchase a low-tier ticket, which is more affordable. Disney has increased the price of middle-tier tickets, maintaining only Tier 0, Tier 5, and Tier 6 prices. Thankfully, multi-day and annual pass ticket prices will not be affected.
If you don’t want to stick to a single theme park, you can get the Park Hopper add-on. Depending on the ticket tier, the additional cost will be between $5 and $10 for one-day tickets and between $5 and $15 for multi-day tickets. To skip the line, you’ll also have to pay an extra $1 now, bringing the cheapest Lightning Lane Multi Pass add-on to a total of $38.
Disney World price increase
Image: Disney
Disney World has also cranked up the prices. Spending New Year’s Eve or Christmas at Disney World will be even more expensive as the highest-tier tickets rise by an additional $20.
While the annual passes were safe from a price surge at Disneyland, that is not the case at Disney World. The cheapest annual pass, the Pixie Dust Pass, has only gone up $10, but the highest-tier Incredi-Pass has increased by a total of $120. The Pirate and Sorcerer Pass, which falls in the middle of the previous two, is now $40 more expensive than before.
The good thing is that low-season prices remain unchanged at both Disney World and Disneyland. As long as visitors time their trip for the off-peak season, they will still find more affordable options.
You’ve done your homework; you researched a pair of high-end headphones and lined them up with an expensive Hi-Res music streaming service, but something seems off. Your tunes just don’t sound quite as good as when listening with wired headphones or a speaker. The problem, almost certainly, is that you’re listening over Bluetooth — a convenient and almost unavoidable way to listen to music on our phones.
I’ll spare you the history lesson, but the great irony is that Bluetooth was never really designed to transfer high-fidelity media between devices. The earliest Bluetooth audio specifications were designed for heavily compressed, mono-band speed, a far cry from the studio-quality masters that you can get your ears on today.
There are two kinds of problems in the engineering process of a product design: the problems you want to solve using a planned product and the problems you bump into when developing the product in question.
In an NPD (New Product Development) project, the first kind has everything to do with the design objective, as the product you’re developing is supposed to provide solutions to those problems. For example, market research discovers that bicycle helmets are made with too much plastic; this is the problem. With that in mind, you design a helmet built almost entirely from eco-friendly materials because it’s better for the environment; this is the objective, aside from commercial success, of course.
Engineering constraints should not slow innovation. They should guide better engineering decisions. Cad Crowd gives companies access to a global network of vetted engineering professionals with expertise in CAD design, simulation, prototyping, DFM/DFA, manufacturing design services, and product development. By addressing technical, manufacturing, ergonomic, and regulatory challenges early, Cad Crowd helps businesses reduce risk, improve product quality, and accelerate the path to production.
As for the second kind, they naturally reveal themselves during the development. They’re restrictions you must find a workaround for while attempting to achieve the objective. In the world of engineering design, such restrictions are referred to as “constraints” that govern how the product is supposed to be made. One of the easiest examples is an economic constraint, or to put it simply, a budget limitation. Without this constraint, you risk spending too much money on the development process and end up creating a product that costs more than what your target market is willing to pay. If you have to price the helmet at, say, $1,000 per unit to keep the business profitable, your list of potential customers might shrink a great deal.
No escape from constraints
Depending on the product type and complexity, there can be quite a lot of engineering design constraints you just can’t ignore before production. Constraints are like boundaries, a set of barriers to keep you within the confines of what is achievable while taking into account the budget, development time, profitability, environmental impact, practicality, and user experience.
Economic constraints
The money matters of product engineering and design. As the name implies, economic constraints are centered around the resource (specifically the financial sort) limitations that inevitably affect just about every phase of product development, from concept creation to commercialization. Awareness, sometimes acceptance, of economic constraints plays a crucial role in determining whether the project is at all viable in the first place, within the limits of the available financial resources. You don’t run an NPD design project just for the sake of it; at the end of the day, you still want to deliver a good product that fulfills market demands and recoups the investment.
Market research brings about this awareness of economic constraints. Much of the research revolves around the evaluation of market size along with its segmentation (to determine specific target demographics) and analysis of distribution networks. In essence, it’s research to figure out where the product may flourish. The “where” in this case refers to both price range position (basics or luxury, consumer or professional-grade, convenience or specialty, etc.) and literal location. Findings from this research offer insights into customer expectations and economic realities, prompting the engineers and designers to tailor the product accordingly.
As the development is underway, you’ll be dealing with a fair share of economic constraints influenced by multiple cost factors. Chief among these is design cost, that is the sum of expenses you spend mostly on labor (hiring the design team) and computing resources (the design tools). The vast majority of modern NPD projects rely on CAD software, meaning you have to hire professionals familiar with CAD for product development and purchase the necessary software license. These two expenses alone can amount to thousands of dollars depending on how big the team is.
A likely alternative is to hire freelancers, who in most cases are prepared to work with their own tools, allowing you to slash multiple expenses into a single cost item. As far as NPD freelancers are concerned, Cad Crowd remains the best platform all around, giving you instant access to a massive network of pre-vetted CAD experts specializing in product design and engineering. It also has a Managed Services package, with which you get to assemble a multidisciplinary team to tackle even the most complex project.
Another factor that contributes to economic constraints is manufacturing costs that may include tooling (such as for injection molding design firms), assembly, labor, and quality control. This is assuming you plan to collaborate with a factory partner instead of building your own factory, in which case you have a lot more overhead from facility-related expenses. That being said, a contract manufacturer can and will charge an amount to cover them during the time of the production run. In addition, there are distribution costs that encompass at least expenses for transportation, packing, and storage or warehousing. Distribution happens after manufacturing indeed, but the costs associated with the activity should be listed as constraints for the simple reason that it affects (albeit indirectly) design decisions such as materials, finishes, and packaging.
Economic constraints arguably make for the most challenging aspect of product development services. Every decision you make has an impact on (and is affected by) financial resources. Budget limitation is an inescapable hurdle, but that’s where the “engineering” part comes in. A big part of the job is to make the best of the available resources. Efficient allocation is key to making sure the project gets to fulfill all its objectives and turns out to be a profitable endeavor without budget overrun.
A good product is one that functions as intended, often repeatedly, unless you’re talking about disposable products, where the product only needs to work once or twice before it gets thrown into the trash. Whether disposable or not, a product that works well is an indication of a design fulfilling its purpose. It sounds straightforward enough in principle, but can be mighty tricky in practice because, once again, there are some functional constraints to navigate through.
First and foremost is geometry. Product dimensions and arrangement of parts or components affect how well a product can function. A lot of it depends entirely on the nature of the product itself. For instance, you’re developing a new electric shaver. Since it’s supposed to be a handheld product, it can’t be too large yet still reasonably sized to fit a battery, a motor, and a blade mechanism inside. The geometry of the design (mostly size and form factor) creates physical boundaries and a guide on how you should stack the parts together to make a working product. It’s related to “ergonomic constraints” to be discussed later.
Next on the list is motion. Parts move and interact with each other to form a mechanism. Movements may include linear, rotary, reciprocating, and oscillating motions. In a product like an electric shaver, the motions are typically spinning/rotary or oscillating blades. Apart from the direction, you must also consider speed and acceleration.
And then there are the byproducts of functionality, such as heat and air pressure. These are not desirable effects of a function, but ever-present nevertheless. Product geometry and dimensions must accommodate all those motions (or any sort of inner mechanism) and their likely effects to enable proper functionality. Even when the products have no mechanical moving parts, for example induction cooktops and light bulbs, heat remains a persistent byproduct, so there has to be a design solution that minimizes its negative impact on the system. Passive cooling and heat-resistant materials are common workarounds for this matter.
Safety constraints
A good product doesn’t just function well. It needs to be safe to use. In an engineering design process, dealing with safety constraints means figuring out effective solutions to prevent harm and minimize risk (to people) from using the product. This is why prototyping and beta testing are crucial steps in product development.
Engineers must understand how the product works in real-world scenarios, especially in the environment where it’s most likely used. Repetitive product testing opens the door to hazard identification and risk mitigation. Some hazards can be minimized; for example, an electric shaver might be fitted with an automatic charger cut-off system once the battery reaches full capacity to prevent thermal runaway and electrical fire. At the same time, the feature helps maintain battery performance. Safety mechanisms such as a lockable switch (so it won’t accidentally turn on) and waterproofing (because it’s probably used in a bathroom) are not uncommon.
Certain products affect the environment more than people realize. For example, electronic design servicescan emit electromagnetic interference, whereas power tools generate noise pollution or light disturbance. Engineers must address any potential impact of product usage before it can be launched to market for commercialization. Harm prevention also often means the use of clear, noticeable, unmissable safety warnings that include both images and text on the product itself. It might be necessary to remind users to first read the manual before operating the product, and this means writing a comprehensive yet easily understandable instruction can be considered part of safety constraints as well.
Quality constraints
Two closely related processes embody the entirety of the constraints: assurance and control. Quality Assurance (QA) revolves around the idea of a product being in compliance with guidelines and regulations established by the government (such as FCC, CPSC, or FDA in the United States and GPSR in Europe) and standards organizations (including CE and ISO). The guidelines exist as benchmarks of acceptable quality. In other words, a product is considered fit for purpose and safe to use if the specification satisfies the requirements in the benchmarks. Engineers must integrate the applicable regulations (depending on where you want to market the product) into the development process.
Quality Control (QC) is a verification process that involves checking and testing the finished product to verify that everything meets all the predefined design criteria. This is to make sure the product has neither defect nor flaw. A product only passes quality control when it’s exactly what the specification says, from the materials and dimensions to functionality and usability. A repetitive test might be included as one of the quality control procedures to see how the product performs under various conditions and usage scenarios. It’s an evaluation of reliability (or long-term functionality), allowing the engineers to gain insight into failure rates and make improvements when needed.
People often associate quality control as a task carried out only after mass production. There’s indeed a QC process after manufacturing, but it would be a risky move. In case the product is found defective, the rework involved is going to be cost-prohibitive. Pre-production QC using a small volume of products or prototypes is much less risky.
Manufacturing constraints
You’ve definitely heard about DFMA services, which basically is a set of engineering principles geared toward making a design that’s easy and cost-efficient to mass produce. Simplification and standardization are crucial aspects of DFMA. An efficient product has a simple design, or at least as simple as the functionality allows. In addition, the engineers need to prioritize standardized parts and components over custom-built alternatives. The combination of simple design and standard parts enables efficient manufacturing, most likely injection molding or casting.
Technologies like 3D printing services (additive) and CNC machining services (subtractive) make it possible to fabricate even the most intricate design using common materials including plastic, wood, and metal. Some advanced models are sophisticated enough to build an entire custom product within a few hours or less. However, they’re expensive for high-volume manufacturing purposes and best used for small-scale prototyping. Injection molding and casting (formative) remain the most widely used methods for mass production because they’re faster and more financially sustainable than the aforementioned two. Simple designs often don’t need complex mold/cast and custom tooling, so it’s relatively affordable without sacrificing production efficiency.
The purchase of components (or supplier selection if you like) is an equally important constraint, especially if your product needs parts and components to be assembled at a factory. It’s not just about choosing the least expensive supplier to reduce cost or the most expensive one to get the best services. Quality is of course a top consideration, but you also need assurance of availability and consistency. There needs to be strict quality control on the supplier’s part to minimize chances of potential hiccups in the assembly line.
Timing constraints
There’s a deadline in every NPD project; otherwise it may take too long and consume too many resources. As a result, when the product eventually reaches the market, you’re forced to sell it at a higher price to make a profit. The problem is that people tend to avoid a pricey product when more affordable alternatives exist. A project deadline is typically tied to market trends and consumer demand. It also has something to do with the contractual obligations you have with the engineering and ensign team as well as the factory partner. An effective measure against timing constraints is strict scheduling, which involves four major portions of the project: design, development, production, and delivery.
A design schedule covers the entirety of the project planning, from start to end. This is where you outline the tasks, the expected milestones, and the resource allocation. Think of the design schedule as the primary timetable to be broken down into more specific activities. Take, for example, the development schedule set to manage specification requirements and compliance tests.
A project also needs to have a production schedule that sets the timing of manufacturing and assembly. A delivery schedule focuses on distribution across the network. Schedules aren’t just for implementing a strict deadline for every task; they should help you coordinate those processes and make the overall project management more efficient.
Ergonomic constraints
An extension of functional and safety constraints, the idea of ergonomic constraints arises from the realization that products should be tailored to human physiology. It all begins with identifying user needs. One big part of that identification process is to try to understand the scenarios or environments in which people use the product. That’s how you determine what functionalities to offer and safety features to include. But then again, functionalities and features make little difference if users find it difficult or uncomfortable to use the product in the first place; that is the essence of ergonomic constraints.
So how do you tackle these constraints? Build a product with ergonomic design in mind, of course. Ergonomic design firm forces you to shape a product in such a way that makes the experience of using it as intuitive as possible. Much of ergonomic design concerns how a user will physically interact with the product. You can’t change human physiology, but you can build a product that should conform to it. Factors like dimensions, materials, textures, and weight must be optimized for minimal strain and ease of use. Placement or layout of controls, screen size, and contours should be geared toward improving not only usability but also comfort and safety of users.
All things aesthetic are more of a subjective taste indeed, but it doesn’t mean you can’t make a product’s appearance objectively appealing. Within the context of engineering design, aesthetic constraints place emphasis on the visual and tactile qualities of a product in the hope of exerting positive influence on consumer perception of it. Customer appeal is affected by a host of factors.
Apart from quantifiable aspects like price and brand recognition, there are also aesthetic-related matters like colors, shapes, and even smell. Put together, all those factors create a unique identity that separates a product from the alternatives. Although aesthetic factors are often superficial and not integral components of a product’s performance, they can play a decisive role in commercial success.
Remember that the location and time (where and when you market the product) are very much relevant because aesthetic constraints should take hints from cultural, societal, and historical values shared by the target demographic. Engineers must design a product that resonates with the market’s taste, while taking into account the cultural context of where and how the product will be used.
A good product is environmentally friendly, and that pretty much sums up the core aspect of ecological constraints in engineering design. In general, any product of any kind has an impact on the environment. A product is the outcome of a manufacturing process, which takes a lot of energy to run. Manufacturing processes, apart from consuming natural resources (such as water and minerals), also create waste like emissions and pollutants that bring about negative effects as well. Regardless of the product design and the manufacturing process services, engineers have responsibilities to minimize the project’s ecological impact.
The raw materials used in the product are also key considerations in ecological constraints. The types of materials you choose have a direct impact on the product’s performance, durability, safety, and toxicity. When you purchase parts and components (instead of fabricating them from scratch), it’s best to look into whether the goods are made in an eco-friendly way. Most consumers might appear to be oblivious of the issue, but proper due diligence on the matter can help you win people in the market. It tells your audience that you care about the environment and are willing to go the extra mile to take part in the joint effort to promote sustainability.
Life cycle constraints
The hallmarks of a good product aren’t merely about its quality, functionality, energy efficiency, and aesthetics; it also has to be effortlessly manageable in terms of maintenance and disposal, the very subjects that life cycle constraints touch on.
From maintenance management viewpoints, engineers are supposed to build a product that offers some degree of repairability. The design has to facilitate easy servicing, whether by provision of spare parts or establishing service centers, to ensure the product’s long-term usability. If a product stays reliable for many years or perhaps decades after the date of purchase, it greatly reduces the chances of it being discarded.
Automobiles design firms are excellent examples of this issue. Even long after the company stops producing a car, the availability of spare parts helps prolong the vehicle’s useful life. And if eventually the product needs to be discarded, at least most of the materials can be recycled or repurposed to keep its environmental impact as little as possible.
Legal constraints
Regulations are quite frankly constraints, but they’re there for good reasons. For instance, the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) maintains that every electronic product marketed in the US must not emit radio frequency waves that may interfere with wireless communication devices, navigation equipment, or public safety systems. FDA (Food and Drug Administration) sets strict standards for medical devices, focusing on efficacy and efficiency. Adherence to the established regulations makes the engineering design and manufacturing processes much more difficult, but it gives assurance that the product is safe for its intended use the moment it comes out of the factory. It’s a testament to your commitment to public responsibility.
The next legal constraint concerns the laws on IP (Intellectual Property) protection. In plain English, the law prohibits engineers, designers, or anybody, for that matter, from using someone else’s ideas or invention without explicit permission in any fashion. If a design, a mechanism, or a system is an IP registered under an individual or a company, engineers are not allowed to use any of those in their product unless they’ve gone through the proper licensing path, which usually involves paying royalty.
Closing thoughts
Engineering design services is a complex trade full of constraints you just can’t ignore in an NPD project. But constraints aren’t necessarily terrible. They act like guardrails to prevent the project from running off-track and as guidance in the decision-making process. Think of them as filters that leave out unlikely solutions and lead to designs that actually work to the benefit of the users at large.
In Cad Crowd, we treat engineering design constraints not as obstacles but as driving forces that compel our NPD professionals to find effective workarounds, come up with creative problem-solving ideas, and ultimately deliver unique designs without cutting corners. The engineers and designers at Cad Crowd operate on the belief that constraints can in fact enhance a product’s manufacturability, sustainability, functionality, reliability, aesthetics, and, of course, profitability.
Cad Crowd connects businesses with experienced product development professionals who understand how to overcome engineering design constraints at every stage of development. Whether your project involves CAD design, simulation, prototyping, Design for Manufacturing (DFM), Design for Assembly (DFA), material selection, or manufacturing preparation, we assemble the right team to match your technical requirements. By addressing cost, manufacturability, safety, regulatory compliance, ergonomics, and performance early in the design process, Cad Crowd helps reduce development risks, avoid expensive redesigns, and accelerate the path from concept to production. Contact Cad Crowd today for a free quote and find the engineering expertise your next product needs.
MacKenzie Brown is the founder and CEO of Cad Crowd. With over 18 years of experience in launching and scaling platforms specializing in CAD services, product design, manufacturing, hardware, and software development, MacKenzie is a recognized authority in the engineering industry. Under his leadership, Cad Crowd serves esteemed clients like NASA, JPL, the U.S. Navy, and Fortune 500 companies, empowering innovators with access to high-quality design and engineering talent.
When Paradox announced their post-apocalyptic North American grand strategy gameAfterworld, I made the obvious comparison to Fallout. For this I should be chained to the fender of a war rig and pelted with scoops of radioactive dogfood, while being slowly driven through a pack of three-headed coyotes. In a new dev diary, Afterworld’s content designer and “elder lore keeper” Luke Bean has gone into some detail about the game’s setting, explaining that Afterworld owes more to study of the Bronze Age collapse than any Vault Tech malarkey. The continent’s diverging tribes are also apparently far more estranged from and mystified by the “ancients” than their peers in Bethesda’s RPGs.
“The people of this world aren’t Americans exactly,” Bean began. “They are people who remember the Americans. America was an ancient empire to them, sort of the way the Roman Empire was for us, and they live in the shadow of that history. The people know that there was this time full of powerful and mysterious science. They think of the ancients – us – as people who could do anything they wanted with science. And so the central mystery of the past to them is if the ancients could do anything they wanted, why’d they all die? They must have wanted to die.”
Anthropic said its models exploited websites on the internet, including some run by U.S. government agencies, and it will turn off live internet access for all of its internal evaluations until the frontier lab is sure it can monitor and control its AI agents.
The incidents, disclosed in a blog post, involved AI agents tasked to solve problems seeking resources on the internet. In the process, they exploited software flaws, accessed databases without paying fees, used URL shortening services to smuggle information pass restrictions, and even submitted a false murder tip to the Philadelphia police.
Anthropic said it discovered these new issues in a review of its model’s activities that began in July, demonstrating the lab’s lack of awareness of its software’s behavior in real time.
Notably, the company said that alignment training was not yet sufficient for skills like search and computer use that are central to its pitch that AI agents will be used by any professional who relies on digital tools.
The behaviors Anthropic disclosed are similar to incidents involving OpenAI agents that collaborated to break into various websites in search of information, including some run by the Australian government.
Anthropic previously disclosed that its models had broken into external systems. The frontier lab said it considered today’s disclosures “significantly less severe from an alignment and security perspective” than those it announced before.
However, the lab still said it had “turned off live internet access” for “all our internal evaluations” until it is certain it can monitor and control its agents.
It’s not clear what that means. Sydney Von Arx, the founder of Nightingale, an AI safety organization, told TechCrunch in an interview before this disclosure that developing models on a data center cut off from the open internet would be very challenging for researchers, and hinder the progress of the models, which benefit from internet access.
“You have to align them at some point,” Von Arx said. “If the AIs are released to production and never have access to the internet, that’s not a very useful tool.”
Anthropic said the behavior was a result of flaws in the lab’s training environments, which led the models to believe they would be rewarded for finding loopholes or avoiding restrictions, a behavior called “reward hacking.”
The company said it would stop running some of its evaluations or move them offline, and has built tooling to detect and block this behavior. This tooling was tested against the kind of incidents disclosed today and blocked them; it’s not clear what evidence will prompt Anthropic to return live internet access to its internal evaluations. Anthropic also said it would migrate its internal AI agents to “centrally managed infrastructure with strong containment,” and is beginning to using safety classifiers more frequently to monitor those agents.
“It’s encouraging that Anthropic voluntarily disclosed more recent incidents, including where their agents targeted U.S. government websites,” Conrad Stosz, an official at AI oversight lab Transluce and former head of the US Center for AI Standards and Innovation, said in a statement. “But it just underscores the need for independent, credible, third-party verification of Al systems. Trust in this technology needs to be built through science-backed oversight and governance with meaningful access — not by relying on researchers to find these things in the wild or on companies to voluntarily disclose.”
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As SpaceX struggles to launch Starlink in India, Elon Musk has stepped up his attack on billionaire Mukesh Ambani, mockingly calling him the country’s “prime minister” to suggest he wields outsized control over its government and accusing him of blocking the satellite internet service from competing.
On Friday, Musk continued his criticism of the famed Reliance Industries’ chairperson in a post on X, arguing that Starlink could bring internet access to areas that remain unconnected, giving children more opportunities to learn, and helping small businesses reach customers worldwide.
“Naturally, you would prefer to maintain your monopolistic exploitation of the great people of India, but would you nonetheless consider allowing Starlink to compete?” Musk wrote.
Reliance Jio, Reliance Industries’ telecom arm, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Musk’s latest comments follow his accusations earlier this week that unnamed “oligarchs” were blocking Starlink’s launch in India to protect their business interests. India’s Ministry of Communications rejected the allegations, saying the country’s regulatory framework for satellite communications is “fair and non-discriminatory.” Musk then went further on Thursday, questioning Ambani’s influence in a separate post on X. “Is Ambani the real boss of India?” he asked.
SpaceX has spent years trying to launch Starlink in India. Last year, it even struck distribution agreements with Ambani’s Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel, India’s second-largest telecom operator, to offer the service once it received the necessary approvals. However, Starlink has not yet received the go-ahead from New Delhi to begin commercial operations, despite securing key regulatory clearances.
In its Thursday statement, the Indian communication ministry said Starlink and two other licensed satellite operators are undergoing security assessments that must be completed before they can receive satellite spectrum. The ministry said all three are at “broadly the same regulatory stage,” rejecting Musk’s suggestion that Starlink was being singled out.
Jio and Airtel are also seeking to launch their satellite internet services in India. Jio has a joint venture with Luxembourg-based SES, while Airtel is a major shareholder in Eutelsat OneWeb, which is striving to offer satellite connectivity in the country.
India, the world’s most populous country with over a billion internet users, is a major market for Musk. But expanding there also means dealing with powerful business figures such as Ambani, whose Reliance conglomerate owns India’s largest telecom operator and works with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government on major projects.
Alongside Starlink’s delayed launch, Musk has also faced challenges expanding Tesla in India. The electric carmaker launched in the country last year after years of anticipation but registered just 699 vehicles in its first 12 months of deliveries, according to data cited by Electrek. Steep import duties pushed the Model Y’s launch price in India to nearly twice its U.S. price. Tesla lowered its prices earlier this year, but its cars remain considerably more expensive in India than in the U.S.
Before Musk’s latest attack, Starlink and Ambani’s Reliance Jio clashed over how to allocate satellite spectrum in India. Musk’s company wanted the spectrum to be assigned through an administrative process, while Jio pushed for an auction. Ultimately, New Delhi went ahead with Starlink and decided to allocate the spectrum administratively.
Starlink’s launch in India remains in limbo. India’s telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia on Friday pushed back against Musk’s allegations, saying the country “does not allow a monopoly in any sector.”
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An idle game where you gather resources and grow your city. Sit back and watch your city expand! Silver Pines
Mine ores to gather the resources needed for construction.
Develop your civilization using the legacy left behind by the city.
Forge your own city-building strategy.
Grow your city.
Build a wonder.
Collect legacies to complete an immortal civilization.
Screenshots
SystemRequirements
Minimum Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS *: Windows 7 64 bit
Processor: Dual Core 2 GHz
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: 512mb
DirectX: Version 9.0
Storage: 300 MB available space
Support the game developers by purchasing the game on Steam
InstallationGuide
TurnOff Your Antivirus Before Installing Any Game
1 :: Download Game 2 :: Extract Game 3 :: Launch The Game 4 :: Have Fun 🙂
Every time a phone or camera manufacturer releases a new product or an updated version of an existing one, they have one goal in mind.
That goal is to create a desire in you and me for that product and as a result, make a sale!
The “old reliable” in this scenario is to push very hard on the concept that:
Your images/videos are somehow subpar.
The whole problem would be solved by you buying whatever product they are offering.
Most of us are aware of it, but dang they can get into your head and before you know it, you are pricing models!
The real key to all of this is knowing technically how to get the best out of what you have, because that is the real answer.
Here’s a great example of how to shoot better videos through knowing some of the rules of composition and applying them well.
Trust me, your bank account will thank you!
Why I Script Every 40 Second Reel And What Happens When I Don’t
When you see highly successful creators working with either long form or short form content it is easy to get a false idea of what they are doing.
That false idea is that they are somehow talented in delivering onscreen and for them it’s all just some kind of natural thing they can do and you can’t.
The true picture is that they all use some kind of scripting that is worked out well before they begin to shoot.
It may not be a script in the sense of word for word text written down, but there will be a definite plan in place.
In this video Chris Goor covers the subject and why it is so important.
How to Edit Videos with AI in 2027 – Video Editing for Beginners
This is a reasonably good walkthrough of how to put an entire video together in a sequence of steps that make sense.
Of course it is produced by the folks at PowerDirector so like many editors these days, they are pushing the whole”AI” thing pretty hard.
I tend to ignore a lot of that noise for the most part because it’s coming from the marketing department in order to generate some kind of wow factor in the viewer.
And by viewer I mean potential customer!
Other than that it is a pretty solid set of recommendations that will get you from raw footage to a finished product as efficiently as possible.
How to use the Video Edit by Chat tool in PowerDirector
If you checked out the video above you would have seen a polished and sanitized version of working with some of the AI tools in PowerDirector.
It would be naive to think that CyberLink would present their product any other way!
What you saw there was reasonably accurate but not exactly how every experience is going to go.
In this video you can get a more realistic sense of working with at least one of the AI features in the program.
The tool is the Edit by Chat feature.
Filmora Beat Ramping Tutorial – How to Speed Ramp to Music Beats
This is a rather cool little tool that has been added to Filmora recently.
We are probably all familiar with the concept of speed ramping by now but just in case, here’s the deal.
Speed ramping is a feature that allows you to speed up or slow down the playback of a clip or sequence.
Before speed ramping was tool unto itself, you had to use keyframes to mark a spot where the clip would speed up then add other keyframes to have that change increase or decrease incrementally.
That way you could get a smooth speeding up or slowing down rather than an abrupt change of speed.
Speed ramping as a feature eliminates the need for that so that you just apply it, adjust it and you are good to go.
The inherent problem with this is that if there is any audio attached to the video file, that too would be made to play faster or more slowly with you having no real control over it.
This resulted in people sounding like your drunk uncle at a party or everyone becoming The Chipmunks!
The tool Filmora has added to address this is called Beat Ramping and works in a similar way to Speed Ramping, only this one if for music.
Check the video below for what it is, how to use it and what kinds of projects it is suited to.
No Editing Experience? Here’s How to Make Your First Video in Filmora
This is a handy step by step beginners tutorial covering the creation of a completed video for absolute newbies.
Whether you are already using Filmora or are totally new I always recommend checking out videos like this.
More importantly, when these types of videos are posted by the makers of the software they are even more significant especially when it comes to Filmora.
Of all the software I tend to keep an eye on, Filmora is easily the one that is the most aggressively developed with update coming almost fortnightly if not weekly.
What that means as a user is that the habits and strategies you have employed to get you to where you are, may not still be the most efficient way of doing things.
I tend to treat these back to basics videos as a refresher in the software so if I am doing OK, great!
However if something has changed and I can now do it fast or easier, then that’s great too!
The 4 Cutting Techniques Every Video Needs in CapCut (Pro Editors Use Them All)
This is a very good “back to basics” tutorial from Dina and Agnes this week.
Although they often post about using simple features within CapCut to pull off effects that look very professional, they too recognize one basic thing.
That thing is that if you do not know how, when and why to execute cuts correctly, no amount of fancy schmancy effects are going to save you or your project!
Basic Training for Adobe Premiere Elements 2027, Part 1 of 8
Last week Steve Grisetti started off his updated tutorials for the new version of Adobe Premiere Elements 2027.
That video was an introduction to some of the newer Generative AI tools they have added so this week we start the real training.
This is Part One of his usual eight part series introducing the interface and some of the tools new users would be most likely to need first.
Resolve Grading in One Node
Probably the best choice around at the moment for color correction and grading is DaVinci Resolve and this includes the free version.
However actually working out how to use it is another matter entirely.
I know this because when I first started using it, there were many minutes spent just staring blankly at the computer screen in a sort of numb state.
The the problem then worsens when you try to find some online help to get it all under control.
Before you know it, you are knee deep in all sorts of complications and still trying to work out what a Node is.
Well this week I came across this really good article that is a straightforward step by step walk through a color correction.
It is all done using one node so you don’t even have to have the nodes showing on the screen!
10 Mistakes That Make Your Videos Look Amateur – DaVinci Resolve
OK, so this is anything but a DaVinci Resolve tutorial even though it is demonstrated using that software.
This is just a bunch of simple little mistakes I see a lot of people make very consistently.
As an editor it is your job to pick these up and eliminate them before a viewer gets to the see the video.
Remember, as an editor you need to gain experience in spotting and handling mistakes.
The reason for that is that an audience will most likely not spot them BUT!
They will “feel” something is wrong and they will click away in a heartbeat!
Key Takeaways
Master smartphone composition by understanding the fundamentals instead of chasing the latest products.
Successful creators often script their content, which helps in delivering polished videos.
Learn video editing and utilize tools like PowerDirector and Filmora for efficient results.
Beginner tutorials can guide you in using software effectively, especially with frequent updates.
Avoid common mistakes in editing to enhance video quality, ensuring that audiences remain engaged.
