Features

A beginner’s guide to Harry Potter: Wizards Unite

Wizards, unite!

Published

June 25, 2019

Niantic, Inc. has just rolled out its brand new game to over 150 countries worldwide over the weekend. Harry Potter: Wizards Unite is also a location-based game that uses augmented reality and builds on the current platform of the company’s games Pokémon Go and Ingress.

Quick disclosure: I’m far from being a Potterhead so I might not get the right terms related to the franchise in this article. Although, I’m a long-time and current player of Pokémon Go hence I checked out Wizards Unite.

Onto the game itself. If you’re like some players I know who would rather just get to the game right away and skip the numerous pages of introduction and dialogues, the main plot of the story is pretty simple. A mysterious event called Calamity has struck resulting in certain magical items and beings to scatter in the real world.

It is your job as part of the Statute of Secrecy Task Force to bring these items, people, and creatures back to the Wizarding World and complete your registry. This registry acts like your Pokédex and tells you what you have and things to look out for.

Throughout the game, you will come across different terms, items, and structures. Let’s take a quick look at the basic elements of the game:

Professions – Just like in the books and movies, you can choose from three types of professions once you reach level six. These are Auror, Magizoologist, and Professor.

Each has its own strengths and weaknesses and complements the other two during battles. It’s important to note that you can later on switch professions if you wish to but the upgrades already bought could no longer be reattributed.

Confoundables vs Foundables – In Wizards Unite, foundables are those you hunt down to bring back to their proper time and location. Meanwhile, you banish the confoundables that are responsible for getting the foundables stuck in our world.

Casting Spells – In order to banish confoundables, you need to cast spells by accurately tracing the pattern shown on your smartphones. There are about ten spells available as of the time of writing but the company says they will eventually be adding more. In addition to accuracy of tracing, speed also plays a big part to achieve a “Masterful” trace (there’s Fair, Good, Great, and Masterful).

Spell Energy – You’ll need to have spell energy to cast spells. Initially, you’re allotted up to 75 energy points and you use them whenever you try to cast spells on the confoundables. When it reaches zero, it’s basically the equivalent of running out of Pokéballs and you could no longer “catch” foundables.

Structures – Structures like Inns and Greenhouses are your way of getting more spell energy and ingredients to make useful potions. Inns will give out energy by dining in them, while Greenhouses churn out ingredients to make different potions. So playing in areas densely populated with Inns and Greenhouses will ensure you have the resources for a more efficient grinding session.

There’s a third kind of structure and it’s the Fortress. A fortress is a place where up to four friends can join forces and battle together different sets of magical creatures to further upgrade their abilities and come across rarer entries for the registry. Every tier gets tougher and tougher so it encourages players to team up with new players and overcome stronger foes.

Potions – As mentioned earlier, you can concoct your own potions by getting ingredients from Greenhouses. As per usual, these potions vary with different effects and can be used in battles either to heal yourself, make the spell more effective, or prevent the foundable from departing away and missing the chance to add it to your registry.

Portkeys – To get you moving while playing the game, you’ll be able to collect Portkeys that only open after walking certain distances in the real world. Right now there are 2KM/5KM/10KM variations of Portkeys and once it’s opened, it has the power to bring you to different locations so you can collect items and even XP.

Now that most of the basics have been covered, here are some tips to keep in mind while playing based on me and my wife’s experiences.

Download all assets as soon as you can. This will make loading times faster while performance will be more stable.
Turn on Trace Auto-Align to make encounters with AR slightly faster
An Inn with a green color serves up to 10 energy points, purple and blue give up to seven, brown up to six, and a pink one only dishes out a maximum of three energy points.
Master Notes are secret patterns that reduce brewing time of potions. Figure it out by checking the available patterns at the Potions Info page.
As the stages you battle in Fortresses level up, magical creatures grow stronger. Having a friend to fight alongside you will be needed even more so in the higher tiers of Fortress matches.
If you see a floating icon with a beam of light above it, it means it’s a high risk foundable with high rewards. Be sure to get it!

Use Dark Detectors for rarer foundables to appear, Exstimulo potions against higher risk foundables, and Baruffio’s Brain Elixir before claiming rewards like Portkeys to get double XP.
Flags and smoke from Greenhouses and Inns, respectively, signify they’re still on cooldown.
Be sure to have enough energy before battling at Fortresses. Quitting during an unfinished session will render the Runestone useless.
Turning off AR during encounters is easier for the phone and will save precious battery life.
Just keep on playing. Niantic’s games reward players who just keep on exploring new things (or simply staying) in the game.

If there’s anything we missed or if you want to add to these tips, be sure to leave a comment!

Features

This is the history of basketball videogames since the ’73 Knicks

Did you know that the first basketball videogame was invented in 1973?

Published

June 15, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

Knicks fans, rejoice; your long, long wait is finally over! The New York Knicks are once again the NBA Champions. As you’ve probably heard so many times by now, the last time that New York’s own was on top of the basketball pyramid was in 1973, 53 years ago.

Here’s a fun fact that you might not know, though: The last Knicks championship is tied to the history of the basketball in videogames. Did you know that the very first basketball video game was invented in 1973, the exact same year that the Knicks won their last championship?

But, of course, a lot of things have happened since then, and a lot of videogames have come and gone. Here are the most notable basketball games you might have played (or missed playing) in history:

NBA 2K

It would be pointless to start a list of basketball games without stating the obvious first. The NBA 2K series is the quintessential hooper sim today. When you think of the sport in videogames today, you can’t spend two seconds without thinking of the long-running franchise.

Now an annually releasing series, NBA 2K started in 1999 for the Sega Dreamcast. At the time, it was just another drop in a sea of ‘90s basketball games. Now, it’s an institution with constantly updating graphics and mechanics.

NBA Live

Around the time that NBA 2K first started, NBA Live was the king of the jungle. Up until 2018, it was another annually releasing series going alongside (and against) the behemoth known as 2K.

But it’s had a storied history as well. It started off as the NBA Playoffs series. The first one, 1989’s Lakers versus Celtics and the NBA Playoffs, featured eight teams who were part of that year’s playoffs. This went on until 1993 when it evolved into NBA Showdown, one of the first games to feature every NBA team. In 1994, Showdown reinvented itself once again into NBA Live and turned into an annual series before its unfortunate cancellation in 2018.

NBA Street

If sports simulators aren’t your thing, NBA Street is an arcade-style series that has ups the fun with trick shots and streetball rules. It features three-on-three hooping with 29 teams and 5 players from each. Whereas NBA 2K and NBA Live helped gamers live out their dreams to become an NBA superstar, NBA Street was one for the gamers who just wanted a fun time.

The series spawned a few sequels since 2001 but eventually met its end in 2007. Now, however, you can continue the legacy in the recently launched NBA the Run, a spiritual successor created by developers of the original NBA Street games.

NBA Jam

“Boomshakalaka! He’s on fire!”

Even if you’ve never played NBA Jam before, you’ve probably heard its most iconic catchphrase. NBA Jam was so influential that it’s considered one of the most important games of the SNES and the arcade cabinet generation.

Besides impressive graphics for its time, it was a spectacle. Because it had no fouling system, you can physically bully people out of your way. You can catch fire if you’re too good at shooting, hence the “he’s on fire” line. You can jump to gravity-defying heights to make a dunk. Plus, the game features so many fun Easter eggs, including one that turns you into a literal tank on the court.

Double Dribble

Technically a sequel to Konami’s Super Basketball, 1986’s Double Dribble was a fairly straightforward simulator that attempted to feature realistic gameplay in a very two-dimensional time. For its time, the game was remarkable because it featured highly detailed animations for fancy moves like slam dunks.

However, the game came out before the rise of the NBA’s massive popularity in media. It doesn’t have a license to feature actual teams or players. Then again, haven’t you heard of the Boston Frogs or the New York Eagles?

One on One: Dr. J vs. Larry Bird

Contrasted to the above’s five-versus-five or three-versus-three formats, 1983’s One on One featured, as the title says, a mano-a-mano duel between Julius Erving and Larry Bird. With an isometric half-court layout, either player takes turns dunking or shooting over the other.

While one-versus-one modes are available in today’s games, One on One let players live out their fantasies as two of the biggest basketball stars at the time. It even let you shatter the backboard Though the game isn’t much of a talking point nowadays, it was so popular for its time that it helped establish Electronic Arts as a household name in gaming.

Atari’s Basketball

As the father of modern basketball games, 1978’s Basketball, built for the Atari, was the first game to feature the full-court format so popular today. Like One on One, Basketball features only two players. The game was so rudimentary that the two hoops were represented with two sticks, and the two players were different colored blobs.

However, in 1979, Atari released an updated version with detailed graphics. It was also controlled with a trackball, the first of its kind to do so. Though it didn’t have named superstars or teams, it’s clearly the predecessor of the games we all know and love.

Basketball!

And now, we’ve come to the beginning. Released on 1973, Basketball! is officially the first basketball video game in history. Since it’s on the Magnavox Odyssey, the very first home gaming console, that comes as no surprise.

Like Pong, which also found a home in the Magnavox Odyssey, Basketball! features two square dots (the players) bouncing a smaller dot (the ball) into two “hoops” on both sides of a court. The game had a static image laid over the dots to simulate an ongoing basketball game. It was so basic that it didn’t even have a computing system for point. Players had to manually tally scores on their own based on where the small dot lands.

If it’s hard for you to imagine just how long today’s Knicks fans have waited for a championship, this was the state of gaming when they got their last ring.

Cameras

What HYROX Hong Kong looks like up close

Photographed on the Canon EOS R6 Mark III.

Published

June 11, 2026

MJ Jucutan

HYROX drew people from all over the world for a single purpose: finish the course. In Hong Kong, athletes showed up at AsiaWorld-Expo ready to run, row, and push through 8 stations of pure functional fitness.

So, we brought the Canon EOS R6 Mark III to capture one of the most demanding fitness races on the planet.

The Expo floor is a lighting nightmare, a mix of harsh overheads and deep shadows, but the 32.5MP sensor handled the contrast without breaking a sweat.

The 40fps electronic shutter and Pre-continuous shooting meant we were already capturing the moment half a second before we consciously decided to press the shutter.

Covering a race means staying mobile, and the 8.5-stop IBIS let us move freely alongside athletes without losing the shot. The Dual Pixel CMOS AF II stayed locked on athletes even when they were squinting through the final stretch.

What came out were stories of triumph and determination. Even when their bodies were screaming, they pushed through anyway.

This is what HYROX Hong Kong looked like from the inside.

Words by MJ Jucutan. Photos by Sky Rodillas.

Buyer's Guide

Buyer’s Guide: Xiaomi Pad 8 Series

Do you need the base or the Pro?

Published

June 8, 2026

MJ Jucutan

Choosing between the Xiaomi Pad 8 and the Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro feels like picking between a “sweet treat” and a “full-course meal.”

It’s deciding between a reliable travel companion and a specialized workstation. Both tablets rock a slim 5.8mm profile and a manageable 485-gram weight, and a 9200mAh battery.

However, under the hood, they are playing in different leagues. Especially since the “Pro” moniker adds serious muscle to the internals, and a solution for that glossy screen distraction.

Specs at a glance

Product	Xiaomi Pad 8	Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro
Processor	Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 (4nm)	Snapdragon 8 Elite (3nm)
Display	11.2″ 3.2K IPS LCD (144Hz)	11.2″ 3.2K IPS LCD (144Hz)
Surface	Ultra-Glossy Glass	Optional Matte Nano-Texture
Storage/RAM	Up to 12GB LPDDR5X / 256GB	Up to 16GB LPDDR5T / 512GB
Rear Camera	13MP	50MP
Front Camera	8MP	32MP
Charging	45W Turbo Charge	67W HyperCharge
Pricing	Starts at PhP 20,999	Starts at PhP 38,999

Why you should pick the Xiaomi Pad 8

The standard Pad 8 is that “Goldilocks” device, hitting that sweet spot between price and premium hardware.

It’s ideal if your tablet usage is centered on media consumption and light productivity. Since it shares the same 11.2-inch screen size as the Pro, it fits perfectly on an airplane tray table, making it a dream for frequent flyers.

The Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 is no slouch; it still runs titles like Racing Master at 60fps on Ultra-High settings. If you’re a fan of XG or KiiiKiii, you’ll appreciate the quad-speaker setup and Hi-Res Audio support without needing to pay the “Pro” tax.

It’s the smart choice for those who want a capable second screen to complement their main laptop.

Why you should level up to the Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro

The “Pro” is for those who found the standard model’s limitations — like the glossy screen reflections or the 128GB storage ceiling — to be a dealbreaker.

The biggest upgrade is the Snapdragon 8 Elite, a powerhouse chip that turns the tablet into a legitimate workstation for video editing in CapCut or heavy multitasking in HyperOS 3.0.

Beyond power, the Pro version offers a Matte Glass Edition, which completely solves the “reflection” issue that can ruin your movie sessions or drawing time under bright lights.

You also get significantly better cameras, such as a 32-megapixel front sensor for professional-looking video calls. There’s also a 50-megapixel rear camera for high-res document scanning.

Finally, the 67W HyperCharge means you spend less time tethered to a wall and more time being productive.

Which Xiaomi Pad is your GadgetMatch?

Swipe Right on the Xiaomi Pad 8 if you want the best value for your money.

It’s thin, light, and powerful enough for 90% of users. It handles gaming, writing, and music playback with ease, making it a worthy recipient of a seal of approval for anyone on a budget.

Just be sure to skip the 128GB entry model and go for the 256GB version to ensure you get those faster storage speeds.

Swipe Right on the Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro if you are a “power user” who hates screen glare. If you plan to use the Focus Pen Pro for serious creative work or need 512GB of space for a massive game library, the Pro is worth the extra investment.

It’s a high-speed machine that charges faster, captures better photos, and runs every app with flagship-level fluidness.

The Xiaomi Pad 8 starts at PhP 20,999 with Normal Keyboard while the Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro starts at PhP 38,999 with Touch Keyboard. Both tablets come with free Focus Pen Pro.