With more people stuck inside these days, gaming companies have been seeing large boosts in TV ad impressions just lately. In the US, Nintendo has been top dog in terms of ad impressions for a while now, as these latest statistics continue to prove.

New data from VentureBeat and iSpot.tv, covering 16th March to 15th April, shows that Nintendo took 55.4% of the gaming industry’s TV ad impressions in the country, comfortably topping second-place PlayStation which earned 13.3%. A large chunk of this, as you might expect, comes from advertising for Nintendo’s latest major release, Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

Nintendo saw 713 million TV ad impressions between those two dates, all generated by 20 spots that were aired 3,400 times. The most-seen ad was the one you’ll find below, which received 120 million impressions alone. Most of the impressions came from channels like Disney Channel, Nick, and Cartoon Network.

Following Nintendo and PlayStation – the latter of which earned 171.2 million impressions from ads focused solely on Final Fantasy VII Remake, Bethesda was third with 147.5 million impressions, Xbox was fourth with 120.8 million, and GameFly was fifth with 58.9 million.

Have you noticed many ads from Nintendo or other gaming companies recently? Do you find yourself instinctively looking up at the screen as soon as you hear that familiar Switch ‘click’? Let us know in the comments.

Launching later this week on Nintendo Switch is Mushroom Heroes, a puzzle-platformer inspired by the 16-bit classics of the genre.

The game stars three of these titular mushroom heroes in total and players can switch between each of them to make use of their different abilities. The unique techniques each one can pull off will get you through various obstacles within the game, and judging by the trailer above, you’ll be able to combine their skills to defeat tricky enemies:

Jumpi can jump higher and float in the air.
Yuppi can kill enemies with his bow. The bow can also be used to detonate some walls and bombs.
Dombi can block enemies projectiles with his shield, and he can push or pull some objects.

Intrigued? Here’s a feature list and a selection of screenshots:

Features:
• 38 Challenging Levels
• Dozens of Unique Puzzles to Solve
• EXTREMELY addicting
• The Ultimate Casual Brain Teaser

It’s launching on Switch this Thursday, 30th April and will be priced at £5.50. You can actually go ahead and pre-purchase it as we speak, however, and doing so will grant you a 20% discount.

Like the look of this one? We can’t stop humming that music from the trailer now…

There is a new Humble Bundle available today of interest to game developers, specifically C# programmers. It is the C# & .NET CORE Humble Bundle by Packt Press, a collection of e-books and training videos around the subjects of C#, .NET Core, Azure and more.

As with all Humble Bundles, this one is split into tiers:

1$ Tier

· Hands-On Mobile Development with .NET Core

· Modernize ASP.NET Web Apps with Azure App Services

· Hands-On Network Programming with C# and .NET Core

· C# 8 Programming in 4 Hours (VIDEO)

· C# 8 and .NET Core 3.0 New Features (VIDEO)

8$ Tier

· Beginning ASP.NET Core 3.0

· C# 8 and .NET Core 3.0 (VIDEO)

· Hands-On Object-Oriented Programming with C#

· Hands-On Design Patterns with C# and .NET Core

· Learn Modern App Development with C# 8 and .NET Core 3.0 (VIDEO)

· Programming in C#: Exam 70-483(MCSD) Guide

· Hands-On Software Architecture with C# 8 and .NET Core 3

· Hands-On Parallel Programming with C# 8 and .NET Core 3

15$ Tier

· ASP.NET Core 3 and React

· ASP.NET Core 3 and Angular 9

· Hands-On RESTful Web Services with ASP.NET Core 3

· C# 8 and .NET Core 3 Projects using Azure

· Hands-On Domain-Driven Design with .NET Core

· Build a Real-World App with ASP.NET Core MVC

· Hands-On Web Development with ASP.NET and Angular 7

· C# and .NET Core 3.0

Buying a higher dollar value tier gets you all of the items in the lower priced tiers. As with all Humble Bundles, you decide how your money is allocated, choosing between charity, the publisher, Humble or if you so choose (and thanks if you do!) to support GFS purchasing using this link. You can learn more about the bundle in the video below.

GameDev News Programming Sale Book C#

Almost overnight, video conferencing has become a big part of our daily life and work. A few weeks in, my team and I at Microsoft have adjusted to the new reality of seeing each other’s homes, complete with dogs, cats, and other family members. Everyone around the world is now working, learning, and connecting with colleagues, friends, and family through the power of technology. From kitchen tables to living room couches, and from home offices doubling as home schools—people are relying on Microsoft Teams to work and learn.

Businesses large and small are depending on Teams for mission-critical work. First responders are using Teams to communicate when lives depend on it. Governments are turning to Teams to move medical supplies to where they are needed most. Doctors and nurses are using it to consult with patients, and researchers are collaborating on it across continents to find a vaccine. And teachers are using Teams to teach students in entirely new ways. Important moments of human connection, achievement, and celebration have all moved online.

Now more than ever, people need to know that their virtual conversations are private and secure. At Microsoft, privacy and security are never an afterthought. It’s our commitment to you—not only during this challenging time, but always. Here’s how we’re working to earn your trust every day with Microsoft Teams.

We provide privacy and security controls for video conferences in Teams

We offer a variety of privacy and security controls to allow you to manage who participates in your meetings and who has access to meeting information.

For example, you decide who from outside your organization can join your meetings directly, and who should wait in the lobby for someone to let them in. You can also remove participants during a meeting, designate “presenters” and “attendees,” and control which meeting participants can present content. And with guest access, you can add people from outside your organization but still retain control over your data. Moderation allows you to control who is and isn’t allowed to post and share content. And advanced artificial intelligence (AI) monitors chats to help prevent negative behaviors like bullying and harassment.

When recording a meeting, all participants are notified when a recording starts, and online participants can access our privacy notice directly. Recordings are only available to the people on the call or people invited to the meeting. And recordings are stored in a controlled repository that is protected by permissions and encryption.

We safeguard your privacy by design

When you use Microsoft Teams, you are entrusting us with one of your most valuable assets—your data and personal information. Our approach to privacy is grounded in our commitment to giving you transparency over the collection, use, and distribution of your data. Far from an afterthought, privacy is deeply ingrained in our company philosophy and how we build products. Here are our privacy commitments to you.

• We never use your Teams data to serve you ads.
• We do not track participant attention or multi-tasking in Teams meetings.
• Your data is deleted after the termination or expiration of your subscription.
• We take strong measures to ensure access to your data is restricted and carefully define requirements for responding to government requests for data.
• You can access your own customer data at any time and for any reason.
• We offer regular transparency reports on the Transparency Hub, detailing how we have responded to third-party requests for data.

We protect your identity and account information

Multi-factor authentication (MFA), a feature turned on by your IT administrator, protects your username and password by requiring you to provide a second form of verification to prove your identity. This simple, two-step verification process is widely used in many consumer applications today, including banking, and protects you from attacks that take advantage of weak or stolen passwords.

We protect your data and defend against cybersecurity threats

As a leader in security, Microsoft processes more than 8 trillion security signals every day and uses them to proactively protect you from security threats. In Teams, we encrypt data in transit and at rest, storing your data in our secure network of datacenters and using Secure Real-time Transport Protocol (SRTP) for video, audio, and desktop sharing.

We meet more than 90 regulatory and industry standards

To comply with global, national, regional, and industry-specific regulations, Teams supports more than 90 regulatory standards and laws, including HIPAA, GDPR, FedRAMP, SOC, and Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) for the security of students and children.

For more information on the features we’ve built to deliver on these promises, see our detailed post on privacy and security in Microsoft Teams or refer to our Teams product documentation. And to learn more about our approach to security, compliance, and privacy across all our products, including Teams, visit the Microsoft Trust Center.

No matter how you’re using Teams at this extraordinary time to connect with the people that matter most to you for work and in life, we’re committed to continuing to learn and get better each day as we work to help you keep all your conversations private and secure.

If you’re particularly proud of your Animal Crossing: New Horizons island then you might want the opportunity to show it off – and we’re about to give you that chance.

Tomorrow (Tuesday 28th April) we’ll be running a livestream on our YouTube channel where the one and only Alex Olney will be visiting people’s islands for a mooch around. During his time on your island, Alex promises to behave himself, and may even leave you with a lasting memento – like signing the notice board, perhaps?

The stream will being at 3pm UK time (4pm CEST, 10am EDT, 7am PDT, 8pm AEST) and will last around two to three hours. To submit your island for Alex’s expert nosing around, you’ll have to use the chat window on here or YouTube and give us a Dodo Code when Alex asks for it. Each island we choose will be selected at random.

Naturally we can’t promise we’ll be able to visit every island in that time, but we’ll do our level best to make sure we show off as many of your lovely islands as possible.

Who knows – you could be hosting Alex very soon!

By Mike Peterson
Monday, April 27, 2020, 01:55 pm PT (04:55 pm ET)

Verizon and Comcast are both promising not to cancel service or charge late fees through June 30 as part of individual commitments to customers during the coronavirus pandemic.

Verizon, the largest U.S. wireless firm, said on Monday that it won’t terminate service or charge late fees due to coronavirus through June 30.

In March, the Federal Communications Commission said that several major internet service providers and telecom firms had pledged not to terminate service for 60 days, concessions made to help ease financial burdens exacerbated by the coronavirus.

With that deadline creeping up in May, Verizon and Comcast on Monday said that they will continue to avoid cutting service or charging late fees during the COVID-19 pandemic, Reuters reports.

In addition to its commitment, Comcast said it is opening Wi-Fi hotspots and plans to extend unlimited data to all customers at no additional charge.

Cox Communications is also extending previously announced concessions, which include a promise not to cancel service and to waive late fees through June 30. Like Comcast, Cox is providing free access to its network of Wi-Fi hotspots.

More than 700 companies have agreed to the voluntary measures, and more U.S. telecom and internet service providers are expected to announce extensions of their own commitments. Last week, a coalition of 24 state attorneys general asked carriers for extensions through Aug. 11.

It should be noted that some service providers require direct notification from customers before enacting the coronavirus exemptions.