Fully Charged: Skype adding real-time translation, Battlefield Hardline pits cops against robbers, and the 3D house printer
Tech, games, and more — all the news you need to kickstart the day
Police-themed Battlefield Hardline announced
Following a series of leaks via Electronic Arts’ own website over the last day, the publisher confirmed the existence of Battlefield Hardline, a new entry in the long-running first-person shooter series that’s due out this autumn.
Rather than soldiers, Hardline spotlights police and their criminal counterparts in urban environments, with the leaks suggesting that multiplayer takes a SWAT vs. Thieves approach. The character classes will reportedly include Enforcer, Mechanic, Operator, and Professional, with game modes like Bomb Squad, Blood Money, and Carrier Assault in the mix.
Battlefield Hardline is the first entry not developed by series creator DICE, as it’s being handled by Visceral Games (Dead Space). It’s expected out on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3, and EA says we’ll get our first look at its E3 press conference on 9 June.
READ MORE: E3 2014 — the biggest video game news so far
Official Skype Translator bridges language gaps
At the Code Conference yesterday, Microsoft demonstrated a fascinating upcoming feature for Skype: real-time translation during spoken conversation. Skype Translator translates speech from one language to another on the fly, with the results both spoken and displayed as subtitles on the screen.
Microsoft isn’t the first to dabble in such translation efforts, but Skype Translator will be unleashed upon a huge potential audience fairly soon: it’s expected to be available before the end of 2014 in beta on Windows 8 devices, but Engadget notes that it’s slated to reach all platforms that Skype operates on in time. No word yet on which languages will be supported from the start, but we’re sure to hear more on that front in the coming months.
[Sources: Microsoft, Engadget]
READ MORE: Microsoft Surface Pro 3 vs Apple iPad Air: the weigh-in
Want to 3D print your next home?
Consumer-level 3D printers are designed to fit nicely into an average home—but now there’s one large enough to print actual houses. Which is curiously its intent! Slovenian company BetAbram is due to release its P3 house printer this summer for approximately €12,000, reports 3DPrint.com. It’ll print houses at 4 meters x 3 meters, which the above teaser trailer begins to demonstrate.
Larger models are due out in September: the P2 (€20,000) can print houses at 12 meters x 6 meters, while the P1 (€32,000) is planned to pump out homes at 16 meters by 9 meters. While 3D-printed homes might struggle to gain traction in developed countries, the report posits that such structures could provide serious benefits elsewhere in the world.
[Source: 3DPrint.com]
READ MORE: Doodle your own drone with a 3D printing pen
Lego Batman 3 expands into space this autumn
What, three Lego-branded multiplatform games in the last several months wasn’t good enough for you? Naturally, Warner Bros. and TT Games have another kid-friendly game to fire off in the near future, with Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham announced for a slew of platforms come autumn.
Unexpectedly, the subtitle refers to outer space action, along with familiar locales like the Hall of Justice and Justice League Watchtower, and the game will boast more than 150 playable characters. It’s coming out for essentially every current platform: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii U, Nintendo 3DS, and PlayStation Vita.
The series has been wearing out its welcome of late with the barrage of licensed releases (Lego Marvel Super Heroes, The Lego Movie Videogame, and Lego The Hobbit), but younger players will surely eat up its new race events and myriad challenges.
READ MORE: The 10 best Lego minifigures ever
Andrew Hayward
Freelance Writer 
