Month: March 2020

March is officially underway, and there are a ton of events lined up for Pokemon Go this month, including the debut of the Legendary Thundurus. A new month also means a new set of Field Research tasks, and if you can complete enough of them, you’ll earn an encounter with another new Gen 5 Pokemon.

As usual, Field Research tasks are distributed via Poke Stops. You’ll receive a task when you spin the Photo Disc, and each one you complete will net you rewards, which can range from helpful items like Poke Balls and berries to encounters with certain Pokemon.

On top of that, the first Field Research task you complete each day will net you a stamp. If you amass seven stamps, you’ll achieve a Research Breakthrough, which will net you additional rewards, including an encounter with a special Pokemon. This month’s Research Breakthrough reward is Ferroseed, a Steel/Grass type originally introduced in Pokemon Black and White. Ferroseed’s evolved form, Ferrothorn, is a great Pokemon to have for PvP battles, so you’ll want to catch as many as you can this month.

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The auto-battler revolution of 2019 saw a flurry of activity from publishers as they tried to take advantage of the latest craze: Dota 2 Auto Chess. A custom game mod built using Dota 2 itself, Auto Chess was another product of the endless iteration found in the custom map modding scene–Dota was born out of a Warcraft 3 custom map, which iterated on a StarCraft custom map, and Auto Chess itself iterated on a separate Warcraft 3 map, and so on. A year later, Valve’s free-to-play interpretation of Auto Chess is one of the few left standing, and for good reason: Dota Underlords is a thrilling game that promotes layered strategy, mental acuity, and the rush that comes with beating overwhelming odds, making it a continually diverse and compelling experience.

Unlike Dota 2, Dota Underlords is a straightforward game. You can easily think of it like a deck builder or drafting game with multiple economies–Dominion, Ascension, or the Legendary series are some good touchstones. Facing off against seven other people, you have to build a team from a selection of heroes presented to you, and that team will then fight in head-to-head battles with others over a series of rounds until only one player remains.

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Microsoft keeps expanding the already large collection of Xbox One controllers available to purchase, and today it announced additions to two of its most popular lines: the Phantom and Camo special-edition controllers. The new Xbox One controller colors include Phantom Magenta and Arctic Camo, and they’ll be up for pre-order starting today. These controllers will also be compatible with Xbox Series X when it launches this holiday season thanks to backward-compatibility.

Joining the two controllers are their respective Controller Gear Xbox Pro Charging Stands, which match the new designs perfectly while being a convenient way to both charge and display your new controllers. Both will retail for $50 each.

The Phantom Magenta Special Edition is the third in the Phantom line, which features a gradient starting with a solid color and slowly tapering off into translucent plastic. The Magenta version is arguably the most striking in the Phantom line yet, joining the previous white and black variants. It will be available for purchase on March 17 for $70, and you can pre-order today on the Microsoft Store and most other retailers. The matching charging stand releases the same day.

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Scientists have discovered organic material within 75-million year old dinosaur fossils, including cartilage cells, proteins, chromosomes, and DNA.

Paleontologist researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and North Carolina University published a paper on National Science Review detailing the discovery, which was found within skull fragments from a Hypacrosaurus. This duck-billed herbivore lived during the Cretaceous period and was a ‘nestling’, meaning it was still very young when it died.

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The fragments contain some preserved cartilage cells, which are host to structures that appear to be chromosomes. After detailed tests and comparing the results against samples from modern emu skulls, it appears that antibodies from a protein commonly found in animal cartilage can be detected in the fossils.

Tests were also run for DNA. A staining substance that binds to DNA was applied to the Hypacrosaurus cells, and the result was similar to what would be expected of modern cells. This is surprising as modern day thinking suggests that DNA will only survive for about a million years, but the fossils date back 75 million years.

“These new exciting results add to growing evidence that cells and some of their biomolecules can persist in deep-time,” says Alida Bailleul, who is one of the lead authors of the paper. “They suggest DNA can preserve for tens of millions of years, and we hope that this study will encourage scientists working on ancient DNA to push current limits and to use new methodology in order to reveal all the unknown molecular secrets that ancient tissues have.”

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This isn’t the first time scientists have discovered elements like this in ancient fossils. A few years ago scientists at Imperial College London found blood cells in a fossilized dinosaur claw. In other discoveries, the oldest meat-eating dinosaur was recently discovered in Brazil.

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Matt Purslow is IGN’s UK News and Entertainment Writer. You can follow him on Twitter.