ICYMI: the week's 7 biggest tech stories from LG's excellent new OLED TV to our Assassin's Creed Shadow review

Date:
Sat, 22 Mar 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Description:
The week's 7 biggest tech stories from Lego, Ubisoft, Pebble, Google, LG and more for March 22, 2025.

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This week was full of major announcements. Google showcased the (potentially) iPhone 16e beating Google Pixel 9a, we reviewed Assassin's Creed Shadow and loved it, and Nvidia showcased an actual Star Wars droid in real life.

To catch up on all that and more you can scroll down to see the week's seven biggest tech news stories that you don't want to have missed.

Once you're all up to speed check out our picks for the 7 new movies and TV shows to stream this weekend (March 22) . 1. The Google Pixel 9a broke cover (Image credit: Google)

Google took the covers off the Pixel 9a this week , finally giving us an official look at its latest budget phone. At a quick glance, youll probably not notice a huge amount of difference from the Pixel 8a, but look closer,
and there are some neat changes.

For starters, the phones design has changed with flatter sides and a larger display - which is also brighter - along with a rear camera setup that
eschews the pill-shaped design of the Pixel 9 and goes for modules that sit flusher with the phones rear.

Under the hood, youll find the Google-designed Tensor G4 chip ready to power many Google Gemini activities and generative AI tools. Theres a bigger
battery as well. This all comes at the same price as the Pixel 9as predecessor, but theres a slight caveat in that Google has delayed the
release of the phone until sometime in April due to a mystery component quality issue . Read more: Google just launched the Pixel 9a and I reckon it embarrasses the iPhone 16e 2. We found the droid we've been looking for

Star Wars droids just got one step closer to reality at Nvidia's GTC 2025 keynote as Blue joined Jenson Huang on stage to show off the companys new Newton engine. The robot bounded onto the stage after attendees watched a simulated version of the droid digitally explore the surface of a sandy
planet far, far away.

This virtual landscape is what Newton is all about. Rather than needing to actually build a robot and real environments with a wide range of surface designs and materials to train your robot, with Newton, you can instead construct everything digitally, run the simulation, and the AI will gradually learn how to navigate. Once youve trained the model virtually, you can upload that data to a real version of the robot, and like Neo training in The Matrix Blue, other bots instantly become experts.

During the keynote, Huang also showcased a bunch of new hardware for developing AI, more humanoid robots, and autonomous vehicle tech. Read more: Nvidia GTC 2025 - all the news you might have missed 3. Pebble returned with two new smartwatches (Image credit: Core Devices)

Its a big week for retro gadget fans, as Pebble founder Eric Migicovskys new Core Devices company unveiled two new smartwatches running the now
open-source Pebble OS. The Core 2 Duo is a low-power smartwatch with four buttons, some basic functionalities, an MIP black-and-white screen, and
access to Pebbles suite of 10,000 third-party apps.

The second watch, the Core Time 2, is an upgraded larger version with a color touchscreen and a heart rate monitor. Crucially, both watches last up to 30 days, an impressive 40 times the battery life of your average Apple Watch.

While both are limited runs, Migicovsky said hell make more if they do well. Available to pre-order now, both devices will be released in July. Read more: Pebble founder announces two new smartwatches, and they're basically the opposite of an Apple Watch in every way 4. We reviewed the LG C5 OLED TV The LG C5 delivers bold, vibrant and dynamic colors, as shown on Disney's Elemental . (Image credit: Future)

We got our hands on one of 2025s most anticipated TVs, the LG C5 OLED TV. The latest iteration in the ever-popular LG C-series, we spent a week with the
C5, and spoiler alert; its fantastic.

Earning a full five out of five stars in our review, we loved the LG C5s stunning picture quality, superb gaming performance, full suite of gaming features, and intuitive smart TV platform with some useful new AI tools. Even its built-in sound was solid!

To address the elephant in the room, no, its not that different from its predecessor, the LG C4, and while thats around, the C5 looks overpriced. But, when the C4s time is up, the C5 is a fantastic replacement and is already set to be one of the best TVs of 2025. Read more: I reviewed the LG C5 OLED TV
for over a week, and it's one of the best TVs of the year 5. Deep Research went free to use (Image credit: Google)

Deep Research is Google Geminis AI-powered research assistant. Rather than
the usual search and response of the standard chatbot model, using Deep Research, Gemini puts together a full report on whatever youve asked it, including citations from sources that it analyzes.

It works best if you throw really meaty questions that need it to consult multiple sources, like What percentage of dogs in the US are puppies?, for example. It comes up with a plan for what research its going to undertake, which you can edit, and then produces its report. It can take a few minutes for Gemini to assemble a Deep Research report, but when it does, you get a document you can open in Google Docs that covers the subject conclusively.

Best of all, Deep Research is now free to all Gemini users. Read more: Gemini Deep Research is now free - here are 4 ways to get the most out of Googles awesome AI tool 6. Assassin's Creed came out from the Shadows (Image credit: Ubisoft)

Assassins Creed Shadows is out now and is immediately one of our favorites in the entire series. Offering the best open-world role-playing game in that
line of Creed games, Shadows gets an awful lot right and not wrong. And I should know, having spent more than 40 hours in the game now.

A major part of the games success is the implementation and execution of some of the best combat in the series. Both protagonists, Naoe and Yasuke, offer distinct styles of combat and a unique range of weapons they can use - but each can engage in seriously fluid, chunky, and hard-hitting combat. Whether youre slashing at enemies with small blades as Naoe, or smashing them about the place with a Kanobo as Yusuke, the combat is Shadows is superb.

Ubisoft Quebec has also rethought world exploration and discovery with
Shadows and implemented a much more rewarding and satisfying method of doing so. Instead of viewpoints revealing a sea of known entities in the landscape for you, Shadows only gives you a few points of interest and locations - unmarked, so you have to go and find out what they are. What results is a method of exploring the world that feels rewarding to explore and pulls you
on from location to location, landscape to landscape, and region to region.

And while the main story wanes a little, and the Hideout mode that offers
cozy base builders a little something can be a drain, theres just so much to do in Shadows Feudal Japan setting that Im going to be spending dozens more hours in it collecting tea sets, painting wildlife, meditating, learning new combos, carrying out contracts, and assassinating baddies. Read more: Ive played Assassins Creed Shadows for more than 40 hours and cant stop
collecting tea sets, painting birds, and assassinating evil schemers 7. Lego and Pokmon broke the internet (Image credit: Lego / Pokemon)

Lego and Pokmon broke the internet this week when everybodys favorite plastic bricks announced a partnership with the worlds most valuable media franchise. For years, weve hoped for a Pikachu collaboration with Lego, and now our dreams look set to become a reality.

Coming in 2026, perfectly timed with the 30th anniversary of Pokmon, youll be able to go on a real LEGO Pokmon adventure." While we dont know what LEGO
sets will be made available, the teaser trailer showcased Pikachus tail, so Pokmons mascot is almost a certainty.

We wouldnt be surprised to see regular releases celebrating the extensive library of Pokmon; after all, there are now over 1,000 species dating back to 1996. With Generation 10 on the horizon and new Nintendo Switch video games set for release this year, its definitely an exciting time to be a Pokmon
fan. Read more: Pokemon and Lego announce the most electrifying collaboration of all time



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/tech/icymi-the-weeks-7-biggest-tech-stories-from-lgs -excellent-new-oled-tv-to-our-assassins-creed-shadow-review


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