Technologies

Pokemon Legends: Z-A Hands-On: Trying Out Real-Time and Mega-Evolution Fights

A 20-minute peek at the highly-anticipated sequel to Pokemon Legends: Arceus.

I wandered the halls of the Anaheim Convention Center days before it would be flooded with tens of thousands of fans for the 2025 Pokemon World Championships, looking for a tucked-away room to get a taste of a game diehard Poke-nerds would give anything to see. For a brief 20 minutes, I got to play Pokemon Legends: Z-A.

Let’s be clear: My time with the upcoming game — split into two 10-minute sessions — was hardly enough to reveal every way Z-A will build on its predecessor. The groundbreaking 2022 title Pokemon Legends: Arceus brought the storied monster-training franchise into an open world set in its distant past — a wilder, less civilized era when Pokemon roamed the land largely unchecked.

Instead, Pokemon Legends: Z-A brings the series into the present — a shift that’s stirred mixed feelings among fans. In my brief hands-on, though, I spotted some promising tweaks to the Arceus formula, especially on the Switch 2 (docked mode, to be exact), where I saw no performance hiccups.

The first 10-minute slice of Pokemon Legends: Z-A focused on trainer battles in a sprawling city. I started with a four-monster team which included familiar faces like Chikorita, Mareep and Weedle, and entered the Battle Zone. There, I could challenge (and be challenged by) other trainers. All of it was part of the mysterious, eponymous Z-A Royale, a competitive league where I began at the very bottom: Z grade, naturally.

The twisting alleys of the Battle Zone hid trainers ready to pounce, but unlike in Arceus, battles here start instantly in the field and play out in real time — enemy Pokemon will chip away at your HP if you don’t send one of your own to fight. Holding L2 targets an opponent, and each of your monster’s moves is mapped to the face buttons (A, B, X, Y), each with its own cooldown. That let me slip in stat-affecting moves like Growl between damage-dealing Tackles — almost like injecting some fast-paced Pokemon Unite DNA into the open-world formula. Swapping Pokemon is simple: Use the directional pad to pick a benched monster, then press up to switch it in.

Like any Pokemon game, trainers can catch you off guard, letting their Pokemon sneak in a few attacks before you send out your own. You can turn the tables by locking on with L2 and choosing an attack from your active Pokemon, making the Battle Zones feel almost like PvP areas. Unlike in Arceus, you can use potions and other healing items between or during battles — just watch out, as real-time attacks don’t pause while you’re in menus.

With my party of level-seven and -eight monsters and just a trio of trainers to beat, this Battle Zone felt like an early section designed to help players get acclimated. There’s no telling how complex future Battle Zones might get — or what other environments might allow battles between trainers (or even wild Pokemon). These areas seem tuned to the Z-A Royale competition, with beaten trainers awarding not just rank-improving tickets but also prize medals (earned for wins and forfeited for losses). Battle Zones take place at night, and at daybreak you’ll receive prize money based on how many medals you’ve won or found lying around.

Pokemon Legends: Z-A’s Mega-Evolution battles

The second 10-minute demo, short as it was, held the flashier attraction: a Mega-Evolution battle that served as a hefty, story-driven boss encounter. While Arceus had plenty of big, strong Pokemon to encounter in the wild, Z-A’s addition of Mega Evolution lets players face beefed-up versions of regular monsters in longer, more challenging fights.

I started the demo chasing a legendary Zygarde in its dog-like 10% form, which led me to a city rooftop and an Absol radiating Mega Power. It’s not the first time Pokemon have bristled with unstable energy — a mysterious, professorly figure named AZ caught up to us, calling it another Rogue Mega Evolution. Just as the creature evolved into Mega Absol, AZ lent us his Lucario to battle the frenzied Pokemon.

This boss battle took the lion’s share of the second demo to beat, building on the real-time combat I’d experienced with trainers and adding its own unique mechanic: When I’d dealt enough damage to the Mega Absol, it would drop colorful Mega Power orbs I could collect. While dangerous to collect — the Mega-Evolved Pokemon hurled attacks my trainer had to dodge or risk losing health — filling the bar let me Mega-Evolve my Lucario to carve off even bigger chunks of the boss’s HP.

What followed was a fun romp and a promising glimpse at the game’s boss battles, with me (the trainer) darting around the small arena to dodge lunges and ranged attacks while managing Lucario’s move cooldowns to chip away at Mega Absol’s health. Some of those moves were damaging, while at least one other — Protect — nullified enemy attacks, a very neat application of an otherwise passive, classic Pokemon move.

After a close shave with my health in the red, I defeated Mega Absol and won an Absolite for my trouble — a stone that would let me attach it to my own Absol to Mega-Evolve it in a future battle.

My 20 minutes with Pokemon Legends: Z-A left a lot of questions unanswered about the upcoming game, which comes out Oct. 16. Would it have the Breath of the Wild-style open-world exploration that made Pokemon Legends: Arceus such a success? What other changes are in store for the switch to a modern-day setting? But at least I can satisfy fan curiosity about the real-time combat: It’s engaging, fast and rewards quick thinking to maximize type advantages. Still, plenty of stones remain unturned for Pokemon Legends: Z-A.

Technologies

Google races to put Gemini at the center of Android before Apple’s AI reboot

Google is using its latest Android rollout to position Gemini as the AI layer across phones, Chrome, laptops and cars.

Google is using its latest Android rollout to make Gemini less of a chatbot and more of an operating layer across the phone, browser, car and laptop, just weeks before Apple is expected to show its own Gemini-powered Apple Intelligence reboot at WWDC.
Ahead of its Google I/O developer conference next week, the company previewed a number of Android updates, including AI-powered app automation, a smarter version of Chrome on Android, new tools for creators, a redesigned Android Auto experience, and a sweeping set of new security features.
Alphabet is counting on Gemini to help Google compete directly with OpenAI and Anthropic in the market for artificial intelligence models and services, while also serving as the AI backbone across its expansive portfolio of products, including Android. Meanwhile, Gemini is powering part of Apple’s new AI strategy, giving Google a role in the iPhone maker’s reset even as it races to prove its own version of personal AI on the phone is further along.
Sameer Samat, who oversees Google’s Android ecosystem, told CNBC that Google is rebuilding parts of Android around Gemini Intelligence to help users complete everyday tasks more easily.
“We’re transitioning from an operating system to an intelligence system,” he said.
As part of Tuesday’s announcements. Google said Gemini Intelligence will be able to move across apps, understand what’s on the screen and complete tasks that would normally require a user to jump between multiple services. That means Android is moving beyond the traditional assistant model, where users ask a question and get an answer, and acting more like an agent.
For instance, Google says Gemini can pull relevant information from Gmail, build shopping carts and book reservations. Samat gave the example of asking Gemini to look at the guest list for a barbecue, build a menu, add ingredients to an Instacart list and return for approval before checkout.
A big concern surrounding agentic AI involves software taking action on a user’s behalf without permissions. Samat said Gemini will come back to the user before completing a transaction, adding, “the human is always in the loop.”
Four months after announcing its Gemini deal with Google, Apple is under pressure to show a more capable version of Apple Intelligence, which has been a relative laggard on the market. Apple has long framed privacy, hardware integration and control of the user experience as its advantages.
Google’s Android push is designed to show it can bring AI deeper into the device experience while still giving users control over what Gemini can see, where it can act and when it needs confirmation.
The app automation features will roll out in waves, starting with the latest Samsung Galaxy and Google Pixel phones this summer, before expanding across more Android devices, including watches, cars, glasses and laptops later this year.
The company is also redesigning Android Auto around Gemini, turning the car into another major surface for its assistant. Android Auto is in more than 250 million cars, and Google says the new release includes its biggest maps update in a decade and Gemini-powered help with tasks like ordering dinner while driving.
Alphabet’s AI strategy has been embraced by Wall Street, which has pushed the company’s stock price up more than 140% in the past year, compared to Apple’s roughly 40% gain. Investors now want to see how Gemini can become more central to the products people use every day.
WATCH: Alphabet briefly tops Nvidia after report of $200 billion Anthropic cloud deal

Technologies

Waymo recalls 3,800 robotaxis after glitch allowed some vehicles to ‘drive into standing water’

Waymo issued a voluntary recall of about 3,800 of its robotaxis to fix software issues that could allow them to drive into flooded roadways.

Waymo is recalling about 3,800 robotaxis in the U.S. to fix software issues that could allow them to “drive onto a flooded roadway,” according to a letter on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s website.
The voluntary recall is for Waymo vehicles that use the company’s fifth and sixth generation automated driving systems (or ADS), the U.S. auto safety regulator said in the letter posted Tuesday.
Waymo autonomous vehicles in Austin, Texas, were seen on camera driving onto a flooded street and stalling, requiring other drivers to navigate around them. It’s the latest example of a safety-related issue for the Alphabet-owned AV unit that’s rapidly bolstering its fleet of vehicles and entering new U.S. markets.
Waymo has drawn criticism for its vehicles failing to yield to school buses in Austin, and for the performance of its vehicles during widespread power outages in San Francisco in December, when robotaxis halted in traffic, causing gridlock.
The company said in a statement on Tuesday that it’s “identified an area of improvement regarding untraversable flooded lanes specific to higher-speed roadways,” and opted to file a “voluntary software recall” with the NHTSA.
“Waymo provides over half a million trips every week in some of the most challenging driving environments across the U.S., and safety is our primary priority,” the company said.
Waymo added that it’s working on “additional software safeguards” and has put “mitigations” in place, limiting where its robotaxis operate during extreme weather, so that they avoid “areas where flash flooding might occur” in periods of intense rain.
WATCH: Waymo launches new autonomous system in Chinese-made vehicle

Technologies

Qualcomm tumbles 13% as semiconductor stocks retreat from historic AI-fueled surge

Semiconductor equities reversed sharply after a broad AI-driven advance, with Qualcomm suffering its worst day since 2020 amid inflation concerns and rising oil prices.

Semiconductor stocks fell sharply on Tuesday, reversing course after an extensive rally that had expanded the artificial intelligence investment theme well past Nvidia and driven the industry to unprecedented levels.

Qualcomm plunged 13% and was on track for its steepest single-day decline since 2020. Intel shed 8%, while On Semiconductor and Skyworks Solutions each lost more than 6%. The iShares Semiconductor ETF, which benchmarks the overall sector, fell 5%.

The sell-off came after a key gauge of consumer prices came in above forecasts, and as conflict in Iran pushed crude oil higher—prompting investors to shift away from riskier assets.

The preceding advance had widened the AI opportunity set beyond longtime industry leader Nvidia, which for much of the past several years had largely carried the market to new peaks on its own.

Explosive appetite for central processing units, along with the graphics processing units that power large language models, has sent chipmakers to all-time highs.

Market participants are wagering that the shift from AI model training to autonomous agents will lift demand for additional AI hardware. Among the beneficiaries are memory chip producers, which are raising prices as supply remains tight.

Micron Technology slid 6%, and Sandisk cratered 8%. Sandisk’s stock has surged more than six times over since January.