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Death Stranding Director’s Cut for iPhone delayed, after Apple shoutout

Death Stranding Director’s Cut was one of the games highlighted by Apple during the iPhone 15 launch, noting that it would take advantage of the hardware-accelerated ray tracing of the two Pro models.

That was due to be released before the end of the year, but the developer has now said that it needs “just a little more time” …

Hardware-accelerated ray tracing

Ray tracing is an approach first developed for CGI work in movies, and later borrowed for gaming. The name derives from the fact that it aims to simulate the path of every ray of light present in a scene, and the way that light would interact with the objects it hits.

By doing this, you get incredibly realistic lighting, reflections, and shadows – which is the key to generating photo-realistic graphics.

The problem with ray tracing is that it takes huge amounts of processing power, making it tough to do on a phone while still delivering high frame-rates.

Hardware-accelerated ray tracing means providing circuits specifically dedicated to carrying out the complex calculations needed. Because part of the hardware – part of the A17 Pro chip, in this case – is specifically designed for ray tracing, it can do this at a much faster speed, hence hardware-accelerated.

Death Stranding Director’s Cut and more

Apple cited four games as taking advantage of the hardware-accelerated ray tracing capabilities of the A17 Pro chip in the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max.

Now with hardware-accelerated ray tracing — which is 4x faster than software-based ray tracing — iPhone 15 Pro offers smoother graphics, as well as more immersive AR applications and gaming experiences. iPhone 15 Pro brings true-to-life gaming to the palm of users’ hands with console titles never before seen on a smartphone, like Resident Evil Village, Resident Evil 4, Death Stranding Director’s Cut, and Assassin’s Creed Mirage.

The company said that this made the iPhone a true games console.

In a new interview with Taylor Lyles at IGN, a trio of Apple executives offer more details on the company’s plans to turn the iPhone 15 into the world’s “best game console” […]

Sandmel notes the old saying that “the best game console is the one you have with you.” But that’s not what Apple’s targeting this time around. Instead, Sandmel believes that the iPhone is “going to be the best game console,” with no exceptions.

A little more time needed, says developer

Engadget spotted that Death Stranding Director’s Cut developer, 505 Games, revealed the delay to the launch of the game on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

If you were hoping to play Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding: Director’s Cut on a Mac, iPhone or iPad before the year ends, I’m afraid you’ll now have to wait a bit longer. 505 Games, the publisher behind this port, announced on X that it needs “a little more time,” and that it will have “a new release date in early 2024” […]

Much like the PlayStation versions, this Apple flavor will also feature cross-over content from Cyberpunk 2077 and Half-Life.

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Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Ben Lovejoy

Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer and EU Editor for 9to5Mac. He’s known for his op-eds and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review. He also writes fiction, with two technothriller novels, a couple of SF shorts and a rom-com!


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