Technology

Legendary video game designer Vince Zampella, who co-created the Call of Duty series, was killed Sunday in a car crash in southern California.

Zampella, 55, most recently led the Battlefield shooter series at EA Games, but also had his hand in many successful franchises, including Medal of Honor, Titanfall, and Apex Legends.

Along with Grant Collier and Jason West, Zampella co-founded the Infinity Ward studio in 2002, which led to the creation of the iconic first-person shooter Call of Duty in 2003. After Infinity Ward was fully acquired by Activision, Zampella was later dismissed and went on to successfully sue the company for tens of millions of dollars in unpaid royalties and bonuses.

SEE ALSO: Electronic Arts nears $50 billion buyout by Saudi Arabia and Jared Kushner's firm

Zampella was integral in some of Call of Duty's most acclaimed entries, according to the Guardian, including 2007’s Modern Warfare and 2009’s Modern Warfare 2. The Call of Duty series now encompasses nearly two dozen games and has sold half a billion units.

Zampella co-founded the Respawn studio with Jason West in 2010, which released two Titanfall games under Zampella's leadership before the company was acquired by EA in 2017. While under EA, Respawn released not only Apex Legends, but also Star Wars games, including Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

SEE ALSO: Where to pre-order 'Call of Duty: Black Ops 7' — Standard and Vault editions explained

Zampella, along with another person in his car, died on the Angeles Crest Highway north of Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon in a single-vehicle crash.

EA released the following statement to TMZ on Zampella's death:

"This is an unimaginable loss, and our hearts are with Vince’s family, his loved ones, and all those touched by his work. Vince’s influence on the video game industry was profound and far-reaching. A friend, colleague, leader and visionary creator, his work helped shape modern interactive entertainment and inspired millions of players and developers around the world. His legacy will continue to shape how games are made and how players connect for generations to come."

Dolphin Progress Report, Release 2512, comes with substantial updates that focus on lowering frame latency. This improves performance in troublesome games and finally brings RetroAchievements support to Android users. This release also changes how the emulator handles frame pacing and input timing.

I’ll tell you what—you can keep that celebratory spirit going right through the New Year on HBO Max. The streamer has just released their January lineup, and it features several big reasons to keep the party going, which is good news for you.

Amazon has finally started rolling out the updated Alexa Home Theater feature. This lets you use the latest Echo speakers as a full, multi-channel surround sound system for your Fire TV. This update is coming after the debut of the new Echo Studio and Echo Dot Max earlier this year.

“The action can’t be completed because the file is open in another program” might be one of the least helpful messages Windows has ever shipped. It's been this way for as long as I can remember. So, I can't eject a drive, move a file, delete a file, or modify a file because a program is using it. Fine, which program? Why won't you tell me?!

Linux, macOS, FreeBSD, Android, and other operating systems can trace their lineage back to the early commercial versions of Unix. One of the missing links in that chain, UNIX Fourth Edition, is now publicly available after being lost for decades.

This is a pretty sad time to be a PC gamer, or any kind of gamer really. Games are getting more expensive, more space-hungry, and the price of storage is going up and up.

Windows includes several built-in security features designed to protect your data and system. But some of them—like UAC prompts—can feel intrusive. That’s why you need to tune them down so they stay protective without becoming a nuisance. Here are some features that frustrate me the most.

If you've ever seen NVMe SSD reviews online, you've probably noticed that some reviews mention these drives as having DRAM inside. And you've probably wondered—why would an SSD have RAM?

The Linux gaming tool CtrlAssist, which lets multiple physical gamepads act as a single virtual device for cooperative play, just dropped a rumble update. This utility also lets you customize your input setups so you can use multiple controllers to do different things in-game.

I recently saw a coworker type out a SUM formula in Excel to get a quick total, only to delete it a second later. When I showed him a pro shortcut hidden in plain sight, he realized he'd been wasting time on "disposable" formulas for years.

The highly anticipated holiday season is here, with festive cheer filling the air. If you're looking to bring some of that cheer to your screen, Netflix has you and your family covered with its romcoms, thrillers, and comedies.

It's been a tough few years for iRobot, maker of the popular robot vacuum cleaner Roomba. 

After a deal to sell the company to Amazon fell through the year before, iRobot has had trouble finding a buyer amid financial difficulties and mounting debts. Last week, iRobot announced it was filing for bankruptcy. As part of the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process, the company said it was being taken over by iRobot's primary contract manufacturer, the China-based robotics company Picea.

But, most importantly, what does all of this mean for you, the consumer? 

Roombas are an extremely popular brand of robot vacuum cleaners. iRobot holds a commanding 42 percent market share in the U.S. for robotic vacuums. On top of that, the timing of the bankruptcy means that there's likely many brand-new Roomba owners who bought deals for themselves and gifts for others just weeks earlier on Black Friday.

According to iRobot, there's nothing for consumers to worry about. 

TechRadar's Ruth Hamilton spoke with iRobot CEO Gary Cohen who assured the tech outlet that "it's business as usual" at the robot vacuum cleaner company. 

"The app is working, the warranties are going to be honored," Cohen said.

TechRadar also pressed Hamilton on the bankruptcy announcement, which shared that there would be no immediate disruption. Did this mean consumers should be worried down the road?

According to Cohen, no, there's no need for concern and Roombas were "never" going to just stop working due to the company's financial troubles.

"Now that we have a path forward, the app will continue, the products will continue...We'll have firmware updates on the products, which is one of the benefits of this category – we're constantly putting software updates in the marketplace. So those will continue," Cohen said.

Cohen also told the outlet that iRobot and Picea are already working on new products for the new year and that the transition has been smooth because the two companies were already working together.

So, Roomba fans, it seems like there's no need to worry just yet. Your robot vacuum should be good to go – at least for now.

SAVE 25%: As of Dec. 22, you can get the Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 1) Smart AI Glasses for $246.75, down from $329, at Amazon. That's a 25% discount or a $82.25 price cut. It's also a new record-low price, according to our trusty price tracker CamelCamelCamel.

Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 1) Smart AI Glasses $0 at Amazon
  Get Deal at Amazon Get Deal at Best Buy

If you’ve been interested in smart glasses but haven't moved forward because they seem a little too "techy" or intimidating to wear, the Ray-Ban Meta glasses are probably the easiest way in. They look just like classic Wayfarers, so you don't feel like you're wearing a computer on your face.

SEE ALSO: Despite awkward demos, Meta Ray-Ban Display early testers say it's the real deal

Right now, you can get the Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 1) Wayfarer Smart AI Glasses for $246.75 at Amazon. That’s 25% off the $329 list price. It's also a new all-time low, according to CamelCamelCamel.

Kimberly Gedeon, a tech expert and former Mashable editor, says these smart glasses are a "useful extension of your phone." She was particularly impressed by the sound quality, noting that music sounds "rich, full, and smooth" through the discreet open-ear speakers.

They also have Meta AI built in, which can answer questions or provide real-time translation between Spanish, French, and Italian without WiFi. Plus, they feature an ultra-wide 12 MP camera for photos and 1080p videos, along with a five-mic system so you can take calls or livestream directly to Facebook and Instagram.

Just a heads up: Gedeon's "golden rule" is to keep a close eye on the charging case — if you lose that, you're pretty much screwed since it's the only way to power them up.

Spotify's library was scraped and released by pirate activists Anna's Archive just two weeks after the streaming giant released its "largest Wrapped ever."

The unprecedented data grab of nearly 300 terabytes was announced by the website in a Dec. 20 blog post. The archive says it obtained metadata for 99.9 percent of Spotify's 256 million tracks and audio files for 86 million pieces of music, or a library that represents about 99.6 percent of listens on the platform.

SEE ALSO: Barack Obama just dropped his 2025 'Best Of' list. The internet has thoughts.

"It’s the world’s first 'preservation archive' for music which is fully open (meaning it can easily be mirrored by anyone with enough disk space)," said Anna's Archive. "With your help, humanity’s musical heritage will be forever protected from destruction by natural disasters, wars, budget cuts, and other catastrophes."

Anna's Archive made the metadata library immediately available for public download, and says it will release the rest of the scrape in stages, including music files and album artwork. It also released an expansive breakdown of the metadata including stream count, genre, and popularity analysis.

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"An investigation into unauthorized access identified that a third party scraped public metadata and used illicit tactics to circumvent DRM to access some of the platform’s audio files. We are actively investigating the incident," Spotify wrote in an initial statement to Android Authority. As of Dec. 22, Spotify said it has "identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping." The streaming platform also said it is implementing new safeguards against further copyright attacks to combat piracy.

Anna's Archive, an open source search engine that directs users to pirated, paid, or paywalled content like books and articles, has become a bane of copyright holders across the internet. Last month, Google removed more than 749 million search result links that directed to Anna's Archive, a vast majority of the 784 million link removal requests the company received. According to reporting by TorrentFreak, Anna's Archive URLs (annas-archive.se, annas-archive.org, and annas-archive.li) face the highest amount of Google takedown requests.

Amiga computers may have been popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially in media production, but their filesystems are not directly compatible with modern computers. The new 'amifuse' project aims to fix that with a new filesystem driver built around an invisible m68k CPU emulator.

SAVE $60: The Kindle Colorsoft is on sale at Amazon for $189.99, down from the standard price of $249.99. That's a 24% discount.

Opens in a new window Credit: Amazon Amazon Kindle Colorsoft $190 at Amazon
$249.99 Save $59.99   Get Deal

If we think about the best tech gifts of 2025, some are geared toward gamers while others are perfect for kids. But if you're searching for an item that's likely to thrill almost anyone on your Christmas shopping list, it's an e-reader. Almost everyone is either constantly diving into new titles or has the best intentions to stop scrolling and read more. If you're looking for an e-reader, check out this Amazon deal.

As of Dec. 22, the Kindle Colorsoft is on sale for $189.99 at Amazon, marked down from the usual price of $249.99. That's a 24% discount.

A Kindle is the perfect device for anyone looking to cut down on doom scrolling. The doom will still be there tomorrow so why not head into the wonderful world of a book instead? The Kindle Colorsoft is a great version if you like manga, studying maps at the beginning of books, or reading graphic novels. It's Mashable's top pick for the best Kindle if you want a color version.

SEE ALSO: The Kindle Scribe is at its lowest-ever price ahead of Christmas — save $140 right now

Like most Kindles, you'll be in line for excellent battery life. We're talking about up to eight weeks of battery before you'll need to recharge. An iPad could never. The seven-inch display size on the Kindle Colorsoft is a great middle ground, offering enough space to not need to turn the page after two sentences but still small enough to be travel-friendly.

Mashable Shopping Reporter and e-reader expert Samantha Mangino noted the Kindle Colorsoft is just as quick and efficient as the popular Kindle Paperwhite, but she wasn't convinced it was worth the $250 price. However, thanks to today's sale price at Amazon, we're getting way more bang for the buck.

If you're still not thrilled about the price of the Kindle Colorsoft even with the sale, consider the Kobo Clara Colour which is on sale for $139.99 at Amazon. It's one of Mashable's favorite e-readers and comes in at a more affordable price. In either case, your reading wishes for 2026 will be off to a great start with a fresh e-reader.

There are plenty of ways to prolong your device's battery life, but some battery-saving tricks don't actually help. In some cases, following certain battery-saving advice can actually consume more battery life rather than conserve it.

Save $151.99: The Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones are back down to their Black Friday pricing of $248 at Amazon and Best Buy. Originally $399.99, you'll score a 38% discount on this deal.

Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones $248 at Amazon
$399.99 Save $151.99   Get Deal at Amazon Get Deal at Amazon Get Deal at Amazon

A foolproof way to save on headphones this holiday season is by checking out deals on older models.

As of Dec. 22, there's one worth checking out: a $152 markdown on the Sony WH-1000XM5, which brings them down to just $248 at Amazon and Best Buy. Considering most new flagship models are $450 and up at full price, this is an especially worthwhile deal.

I had the chance to test the Sony XM5 headphones directly against the XM6 headphones, and though I appreciated the return of the folding ear cups to the XM6 headphones (from the XM4 model), I was also surprised by the minimal difference between the two. The noise-cancelling ability isn't all that different and though the sound quality was better in the newer model, it was a jump only noticeable as I tested the headphones on the same songs back to back.

SEE ALSO: The 60+ best Christmas gifts for 2025: Find unique gift ideas you'd never think of on your own

Mashable editor Timothy Beck Werth also noted in his XM6 review that between the XM5 and XM6 headphones, the changes were "more iterative than innovative." The inputs, 30 hour battery life, and connectivity support remain the same between generations.

Though the XM6 headphones are also on sale as of Dec. 22, they're still $150 more than the XM5 headphones, making the latter a better buy from a pure value perspective (and the superior choice for anyone who doesn't need the latest and greatest tech from Sony). The XM5s still hold their own, and with this deal, you can also take your choice of colorway between the four available options.

SAVE $30: As of Dec. 22, the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Select is still on sale for just $9.99 with the on-page coupon code HOL4KFTV. That's $30 or 75% off its list price and its best price ever.

Opens in a new window Credit: Amazon Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Select $9.99 at Amazon
$39.99 Save $30 with on-page coupon code HOLFTV4K Get Deal

Amazon really wants you to grab its newest Fire TV Stick this season — so much so that it's practically giving them away.

As of Dec. 22, the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Select is still on sale for just $9.99 with the on-page coupon code HOL4KFTV (make sure to hit "redeem" next to the code). That's a massive $30 price drop from its usual $39.99 tag and 75% in savings. We first saw this deal pop up ahead of Black Friday (it quickly became one of Mashable readers' top buys), then it disappeared and reappeared a few times throughout the month of December. There's really no telling how long it will stick around this time, so we suggest grabbing it ASAP if you have a streaming stick on your shopping list.

The latest Fire TV Stick in Amazon's lineup, the 4K Select is the most affordable option to deliver vibrant 4K quality with HDR10+ support. It also features an ultra-responsive and quick new operating system called Vega. We haven't had a chance to test it for ourselves, but we're glad Amazon is switching things up. The previous operating system was a bit laggy in our tests — an upgrade was in order. Its plug-and-play design is the same as other streaming sticks in the Fire TV lineup and instantly brings all of your favorite streaming apps into one convenient location. Press and ask Alexa to open Peacock or Prime Video or even pick up an episode where you left off.

The new streaming stick offers support for Xbox Game Pass, Amazon Luna, NordVPN, and IPVanish, and will soon also offer Alexa+ and Amazon Kids+. It may not feature Dolby Atmos or Vision, but it's a pretty advanced streaming device nonetheless. Plus, at just 10 bucks, it's much more than you'd expect.