Technologies

Madden NFL 26 Rushes to Xbox Game Pass in February

Play your own Big Game at home on your Xbox.

Super Bowl 2026 is over, and Xbox Game Pass subscribers can get started on a new season of football action with Madden NFL 26, which is now available on the service. Subscribers can see if the Seattle Seahawks will repeat as champions or if their favorite NFL team will make it to the Big Game in 2027.

Xbox Game Pass offers hundreds of games you can play on your Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, Amazon Fire TV, smart TV, PC or mobile device, with prices starting at $10 a month. While all Game Pass tiers offer you a library of games, Game Pass Ultimate ($30 a month) gives you access to the most games, as well as Day 1 games.

Here are all the latest games subscribers can play on Game Pass. You can also check out other games the company added to the service in February, including Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2.

Madden NFL 26

Available now for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

Madden NFL 26 is at its best when it captures the feel of a real NFL Sunday, from the grind in the trenches to the split-second decisions that can swing a game. With the next season now seven months away from starting, it’s an easy way to scratch the football itch.

Paw Patrol Rescue Wheels: Championship

Available now for Game Pass Ultimate, Game Pass Premium and PC Game Pass subscribers.

Little racers and PAW Patrol fans will love jumping behind the wheel in this colorful, family-friendly monster-truck racer across Adventure Bay and beyond. Choose your favorite pup, then pull off stunts, turbo boosts and power-ups, then drift and race your way toward the championship in solo or multiplayer mode. With signature characters and playful chaos on every track, it’s a joyful ride that brings the Rescue Wheels crew to life

Relooted

Available on Feb. 10 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

Relooted is a clever Africanfuturist heist game where you assemble a ragtag crew to sneak into museums and reclaim real African artifacts through planning, parkour and fast-paced escapes. You’ll scout layouts, solve puzzles and race against alarms in a stylish blend of action and strategy. With its unique premise and cultural heart, it’s a fresh twist on the heist genre gamers should keep an eye on.

BlazBlue Entropy Effect X

Available on Feb. 12 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

BlazBlue is a franchise that made its bones on fast-paced fighting games, but BlazBlue Entropy Effect X is something entirely different. This new game is a stylish, fast-paced roguelite action adventure with striking 2D visuals and responsive combat that takes place in the BlazBlue universe. Players dive into the mysterious Sea of Possibility, battling waves of foes and unlocking new builds with combos and upgrades along the way.

Roadside Research

Available on Feb. 12 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

There are games with unique premises, and then there’s Roadside Research. In this game, players control aliens who have landed on Earth and are running a gas station. Their goal is to research humans and to avoid being detected by their human customers.

Starsand Island

Available on Feb. 12 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

Starsand Island is a cozy life-simulation game that blends farming, exploration and friendship building on a tranquil, anime-inspired island paradise. Players can grow crops, make lasting bonds with colorful villagers and uncover hidden secrets across lush landscapes at their own pace. It’s a relaxing escape into pastoral bliss that invites you to shape your ideal island life.

High on Life 2

Available on Feb. 13 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

High on Life 2 is the sequel to the 2022 FPS game made by Squanch Games, which was founded by the co-creator of the Rick and Morty series. The sequel has players once again traveling across the galaxy with an arsenal of talking guns as companions.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora

Available on Feb. 17 for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora drops you into the lush, alien world of Pandora where you explore a vast open frontier as a Na’vi warrior, mastering traditional weapons, human tech and aerial combat on your own banshee. The game blends first-person action, exploration and story-driven encounters as you unite clans to push back the RDA and protect your homeland. With immersive settings and dynamic gameplay, it’s a must-try for fans of cinematic adventures in rich, living worlds.

Games leaving Game Pass in February

For February, Microsoft is being a little more charitable by only removing one game this month. It’s also a game not many people will miss since it’s an older sports title, but for those still playing it, now is a good time to finish up what you can before it’s gone for good on Feb. 28.

Madden NFL 24

For more on Xbox, discover other games available on Game Pass now, and check out our hands-on review of the gaming service. You can also learn about recent changes to the Game Pass service.

Technologies

‘Scream 7’ Got a Big Game Trailer, and You Can Stream All the Past Movies for Free

Do you like scary movies? The original Scream from 1996 is streaming for no cost with ads.

Do you like scary movies? A new Scream 7 Big Game trailer highlights Neve Campbell’s return as series heroine Sidney Prescott, battling a new Ghostface killer, and it could be the reason to revisit earlier spooky films in the franchise.

The upcoming Scream 7 revolves around Prescott facing a masked, knife-wielding murderer (yeah, you know what the mask looks like) who targets her family. It doesn’t hit theaters until Feb. 27, but if you’d like to get prepared and nab some scares, here’s how to stream Scream 1 to 6.

How to stream the Scream movies before Scream 7

Scream (1996) — Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream 2(1997) — Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream 3 (2003) — Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream 4 (2011) — Prime Video (free with ads), Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream(2022) — Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream VI (2023) — Pluto TV (free with ads), Paramount Plus
Scream 7 (2026) — Due out in theaters on Feb. 27, 2026

Technologies

ChatGPT Begins Showing Ads to US Users for the First Time

ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Business and Enterprise users will stay ad-free.

After weeks of teasing, OpenAI has begun testing advertisements inside ChatGPT in the US, marking a major evolution in the product’s business model and user experience. The rollout affects those with Free tier plans and the new lower-cost ChatGPT Go plan. People on paid tiers such as Plus, Pro, Business and Enterprise will remain free of ads.

The company says this early ad experiment is part of its effort to support broader access to powerful AI features while helping fund the infrastructure and development that keep ChatGPT running at scale.

The company says that ads will be clearly labeled as sponsored and visually separated from the chatbot’s answers.

(Disclosure: Ziff Davis, CNET’s parent company, in April filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.)

Controlled advertising and privacy

According to OpenAI, the ads will not influence the chatbot’s responses or compromise privacy. Conversations and personal chat data will not be shared with advertisers. You will also have control over your ad experience, including toggles for personalization or the option to opt out entirely in exchange for fewer free messages.

As part of the rollout, each ad is matched to the topic that a user is already discussing, though safeguards are in place to prevent ads from appearing in sensitive contexts, such as health or political discussions.

The company emphasizes that this initial phase is a test-and-learn opportunity. Feedback from early users will help shape how ads are refined and potentially expanded in the future. OpenAI says it will use insights from this pilot to better balance monetization with user experience.

The broader implications

The introduction of ads in ChatGPT comes amid growing competitive pressure in the AI industry and heightened expectations around sustainable revenue models for large AI platforms. While the move has drawn mixed reactions from users and industry observers, OpenAI maintains that the ads are meant to subsidize free and low-cost access.

As the testing continues, OpenAI’s approach will likely influence how other AI companies think about monetization and the role of advertising in conversational AI tools, though some platforms — like Anthropic — have «promised» to never incorporate ads. Anthropic even ran a series of Super Bowl commercials, making fun of the idea of ads showing up in AI discussions. In one of them, for instance, a young man asks AI for help getting six-pack abs, and the AI, in the form of a personal trainer, starts helping him, then begins hawking fictional insoles that will make him taller.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for Feb. 10, #505

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for Feb. 10, No. 505.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is all about the Winter Olympics. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Elegant ice sport.

Green group hint: Sports cinema.

Blue group hint: Five for fighting.

Purple group hint: Unusual Olympic sport.