Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have discovered and identified a new gelatinous species of ctenophor deep in the sea. As reported by Science Alert, this discovery was the first of its kind as this new creature was found using only high-definition video footage captured at the bottom of the ocean. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="700"] Duobrachium sparksae. (NOAA)[/caption] The Duobrachium sparksae was found by the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) Deep Discoverer during a dive off the coast of Puerto Rico. It was first seen in 2015, but the team wanted to ensure this was a new species. This creature's body is less than a millimeter long, but these cameras allow for a high-level of detail that was previously not possible. "We don't have the same microscopes as we would in a lab, but the video can give us enough information to understand the morphology in detail, such as the location of their reproductive parts and other aspects," explains NOAA marine biologist Allen Collins. The D. Sparksae's features a bulbous, balloon-like body with two prominent tentacle arms, and three different individuals were filmed at depths of around 2,900 meters or 2.5 miles down. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-25-best-sci-fi-movies&captions=true"] "It was a beautiful and unique organism," says oceanographer Mike Ford. "It moved like a hot air balloon attached to the seafloor on two lines, maintaining a specific altitude above the seafloor. Whether it's attached to the seabed, we're not sure. We did not observe direct attachment during the dive, but it seems like the organism touches the seafloor." Ctenophores are also known by the name comb jellies, and have also been referred to as sea gooseberries, sea walnuts, and Venus's girdles. While they may resemble jellyfish, they are not too closely related, and Ctenophores tend to be carnivorous and "subsist on small arthropods and various kinds of larvae." Furthermore, since they live so deep in the ocean, they are "even worse than jellyfish" when it comes to bringing them up to sea level to research. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com. Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have discovered and identified a new gelatinous species of ctenophor deep in the sea. As reported by Science Alert, this discovery was the first of its kind as this new creature was found using only high-definition video footage captured at the bottom of the ocean. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="700"] Duobrachium sparksae. (NOAA)[/caption] The Duobrachium sparksae was found by the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) Deep Discoverer during a dive off the coast of Puerto Rico. It was first seen in 2015, but the team wanted to ensure this was a new species. This creature's body is less than a millimeter long, but these cameras allow for a high-level of detail that was previously not possible. "We don't have the same microscopes as we would in a lab, but the video can give us enough information to understand the morphology in detail, such as the location of their reproductive parts and other aspects," explains NOAA marine biologist Allen Collins. The D. Sparksae's features a bulbous, balloon-like body with two prominent tentacle arms, and three different individuals were filmed at depths of around 2,900 meters or 2.5 miles down. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-25-best-sci-fi-movies&captions=true"] "It was a beautiful and unique organism," says oceanographer Mike Ford. "It moved like a hot air balloon attached to the seafloor on two lines, maintaining a specific altitude above the seafloor. Whether it's attached to the seabed, we're not sure. We did not observe direct attachment during the dive, but it seems like the organism touches the seafloor." Ctenophores are also known by the name comb jellies, and have also been referred to as sea gooseberries, sea walnuts, and Venus's girdles. While they may resemble jellyfish, they are not too closely related, and Ctenophores tend to be carnivorous and "subsist on small arthropods and various kinds of larvae." Furthermore, since they live so deep in the ocean, they are "even worse than jellyfish" when it comes to bringing them up to sea level to research. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com. Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

Over 100 billion hours were spent watching gaming content on YouTube this year, with Minecraft leading as the most-watched game. YouTube Culture and Trends has released an annual gaming report, and the company revealed that viewers watched over 100 billion hours of gaming content on the site, which is the equivalent of traveling to Neptune and back 475,000 times. This makes 2020 YouTube Gaming's biggest year yet. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/2020-game-of-the-year-igns-nominees"] "YouTube Gaming has its biggest year, ever, in 2020 with 100B watch time hours and 40M+ active gaming channels," YouTube Head of Global Gaming, Ryan Watt, said. Of those 100 billion hours, Minecraft was the single most-watched game, with over 201 billion views. That's more than the double the amount of views the second most-watched game of 2020 received, which was Roblox at 75 billion views. Garena Free Fire, Grand Theft Auto V, and Fortnite came in third, fourth, and fifth place at 72, 70, and 67 billion respectively. YouTube also revealed the top ten creators in terms of gaming views for the year: FGTeeV, Jelly, Flamingo, Robin Hood Gamer, ItsFunnneh, LazarBeam, Slogo, Mikecrack, Arab Games Network, and Vegetta777. Over 80,000 content creators hit 100,000 subscribers, more than 1000 creators reached 5 million subscribers, and over 350 creators crossed the 10 million subscriber mark, according to YouTube. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=best-video-game-story-of-2020&captions=true"] "We've also seen gaming creators give back in incredible ways this year," Watt said. "The gaming community has always been willing to lend a helping hand when needed. This year, many of YouTube's gaming creators and partnership tournaments raised awareness and money for several causes." That includes Jacksepticeye raising over $660,000 in 12 hours for COVID-19 relief efforts, CouRage raising over $500,000 during a 12-hour charity stream for the CDC Foundation, and many tournaments hosted by YouTube Gaming to raise money for organizations like the Call of Duty Endowment, the World Health Organization, and the United Children's Fund. "And just last week, The Game Theorists' MatPat and Stephanie Patrick hosted a 10-hour charity live stream event to benefit St. Jude Children's Research Hospital," Watt said. "They tripled their goal and raised $3 million with the help from other large creators and gamers like Markiplier, The Game Grumps, Mr. Beast, and more." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/best-playstation-games-2020-igns-nominees"] You can read more about YouTube Gaming's 2020 in their blog post that breaks down things like most-liked and most-viewed videos. For more about this year in gaming, check out IGN's 2020 Game of the Year nominations for a look back at some of the year's best games and then check out some of the other categories like best PlayStation exclusive, best Xbox exclusive, and best Switch exclusive. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes. 

Over 100 billion hours were spent watching gaming content on YouTube this year, with Minecraft leading as the most-watched game. YouTube Culture and Trends has released an annual gaming report, and the company revealed that viewers watched over 100 billion hours of gaming content on the site, which is the equivalent of traveling to Neptune and back 475,000 times. This makes 2020 YouTube Gaming's biggest year yet. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/2020-game-of-the-year-igns-nominees"] "YouTube Gaming has its biggest year, ever, in 2020 with 100B watch time hours and 40M+ active gaming channels," YouTube Head of Global Gaming, Ryan Watt, said. Of those 100 billion hours, Minecraft was the single most-watched game, with over 201 billion views. That's more than the double the amount of views the second most-watched game of 2020 received, which was Roblox at 75 billion views. Garena Free Fire, Grand Theft Auto V, and Fortnite came in third, fourth, and fifth place at 72, 70, and 67 billion respectively. YouTube also revealed the top ten creators in terms of gaming views for the year: FGTeeV, Jelly, Flamingo, Robin Hood Gamer, ItsFunnneh, LazarBeam, Slogo, Mikecrack, Arab Games Network, and Vegetta777. Over 80,000 content creators hit 100,000 subscribers, more than 1000 creators reached 5 million subscribers, and over 350 creators crossed the 10 million subscriber mark, according to YouTube. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=best-video-game-story-of-2020&captions=true"] "We've also seen gaming creators give back in incredible ways this year," Watt said. "The gaming community has always been willing to lend a helping hand when needed. This year, many of YouTube's gaming creators and partnership tournaments raised awareness and money for several causes." That includes Jacksepticeye raising over $660,000 in 12 hours for COVID-19 relief efforts, CouRage raising over $500,000 during a 12-hour charity stream for the CDC Foundation, and many tournaments hosted by YouTube Gaming to raise money for organizations like the Call of Duty Endowment, the World Health Organization, and the United Children's Fund. "And just last week, The Game Theorists' MatPat and Stephanie Patrick hosted a 10-hour charity live stream event to benefit St. Jude Children's Research Hospital," Watt said. "They tripled their goal and raised $3 million with the help from other large creators and gamers like Markiplier, The Game Grumps, Mr. Beast, and more." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/best-playstation-games-2020-igns-nominees"] You can read more about YouTube Gaming's 2020 in their blog post that breaks down things like most-liked and most-viewed videos. For more about this year in gaming, check out IGN's 2020 Game of the Year nominations for a look back at some of the year's best games and then check out some of the other categories like best PlayStation exclusive, best Xbox exclusive, and best Switch exclusive. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes. 

This week, treasure chests have appeared on Cayo Perico, so claim them while on Scoping Missions, and get tons of login and Prime Gaming bonuses.

This week, treasure chests have appeared on Cayo Perico, so claim them while on Scoping Missions, and get tons of login and Prime Gaming bonuses.

The $2.3 trillion COVID-19 relief and government funding bill signed by United States President Donald Trump includes a 180-day countdown for the Pentagon and spy agencies to reveal what they know about UFOs. As reported by New York Post, this countdown was not part of the original 5,593-page legislation, but was a "committee comment" that was attached to the annual intelligence authorization act and then put into the COVID-19 bill. The Senate Intelligence Committee said in a comment that it “directs the [director of national intelligence], in consultation with the Secretary of Defense and the heads of such other agencies … to submit a report within 180 days of the date of enactment of the Act, to the congressional intelligence and armed services committees on unidentified aerial phenomena.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/04/27/pentagon-officially-declassifies-and-releases-3-navy-videos-purportedly-showing-ufos"] This report must address, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee, “observed airborne objects that have not been identified” and should include a “detailed analysis of unidentified phenomena data collected by: a. geospatial intelligence; b. signals intelligence; c. human intelligence; and d. measurement and signals intelligence." The requested report must also give a "detailed analysis of data of the FBI, which was derived from investigations of intrusions of unidentified aerial phenomena data over restricted United States airspace … and an assessment of whether this unidentified aerial phenomena activity may be attributed to one or more foreign adversaries.” This countdown follows the The Pentagon declassifying three U.S. Navy videos earlier this year that purportedly show Navy encounters with UFOs in November 2004 and January 2015. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-25-best-sci-fi-movies&captions=true"] Furthermore, this will hopefully help those scientists who have called for this potential classified information, emphasizing the need to study "unidentified aerial phenomena" to assemble "reliable evidence" of their existence. Who knows, these discoveries may in some way also shed more light on the alleged "Galactic Federation" of aliens that former Israel space security chief Haim Eshed claims is in contact with both the United States and Israeli governments. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/10/13/scientists-call-for-more-evidence-of-possible-ufouap-sightings"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com. Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

The $2.3 trillion COVID-19 relief and government funding bill signed by United States President Donald Trump includes a 180-day countdown for the Pentagon and spy agencies to reveal what they know about UFOs. As reported by New York Post, this countdown was not part of the original 5,593-page legislation, but was a "committee comment" that was attached to the annual intelligence authorization act and then put into the COVID-19 bill. The Senate Intelligence Committee said in a comment that it “directs the [director of national intelligence], in consultation with the Secretary of Defense and the heads of such other agencies … to submit a report within 180 days of the date of enactment of the Act, to the congressional intelligence and armed services committees on unidentified aerial phenomena.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/04/27/pentagon-officially-declassifies-and-releases-3-navy-videos-purportedly-showing-ufos"] This report must address, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee, “observed airborne objects that have not been identified” and should include a “detailed analysis of unidentified phenomena data collected by: a. geospatial intelligence; b. signals intelligence; c. human intelligence; and d. measurement and signals intelligence." The requested report must also give a "detailed analysis of data of the FBI, which was derived from investigations of intrusions of unidentified aerial phenomena data over restricted United States airspace … and an assessment of whether this unidentified aerial phenomena activity may be attributed to one or more foreign adversaries.” This countdown follows the The Pentagon declassifying three U.S. Navy videos earlier this year that purportedly show Navy encounters with UFOs in November 2004 and January 2015. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-25-best-sci-fi-movies&captions=true"] Furthermore, this will hopefully help those scientists who have called for this potential classified information, emphasizing the need to study "unidentified aerial phenomena" to assemble "reliable evidence" of their existence. Who knows, these discoveries may in some way also shed more light on the alleged "Galactic Federation" of aliens that former Israel space security chief Haim Eshed claims is in contact with both the United States and Israeli governments. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/10/13/scientists-call-for-more-evidence-of-possible-ufouap-sightings"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com. Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

BEYOND! On this week's episode of Podcast Beyond!... well, the cast took the holiday off, but as an end-of-year treat, we'd like to present the first (and currently only filmed) episode of our long-awaited Bloodborne let's play series. Watch the episode above or check it out on YouTube. Host Jonathon Dornbush had never attempted to really beat a Soulsborne before recording this, and his cohosts Brian Altano, Lucy O'Brien, and Max Scoville wouldn't stop talking about Bloodborne. So, the trio helps Jonathon begin his adventure into Yharnam in the first episode of our Bloodborne let's play. This was recorded way back in March before shelter-in-place protocols had been established and before we began working remotely. While we're working to continue the show in 2021, we wanted to put out the initial episode to thank all the Beyond! fans for your patience, and so you can enjoy watching as Jonathon either plays terribly or maybe does OK in his first journey into the beloved Soulsborne. Podcast Beyond! will be back next week with our regular episodes, but we hope you enjoy this in the meantime! [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-best-ps4-games-summer-2020-update&captions=true"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN's Senior News Editor, host of Podcast Beyond!, and PlayStation lead. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush or follow his streams on Twitch.

BEYOND! On this week's episode of Podcast Beyond!... well, the cast took the holiday off, but as an end-of-year treat, we'd like to present the first (and currently only filmed) episode of our long-awaited Bloodborne let's play series. Watch the episode above or check it out on YouTube. Host Jonathon Dornbush had never attempted to really beat a Soulsborne before recording this, and his cohosts Brian Altano, Lucy O'Brien, and Max Scoville wouldn't stop talking about Bloodborne. So, the trio helps Jonathon begin his adventure into Yharnam in the first episode of our Bloodborne let's play. This was recorded way back in March before shelter-in-place protocols had been established and before we began working remotely. While we're working to continue the show in 2021, we wanted to put out the initial episode to thank all the Beyond! fans for your patience, and so you can enjoy watching as Jonathon either plays terribly or maybe does OK in his first journey into the beloved Soulsborne. Podcast Beyond! will be back next week with our regular episodes, but we hope you enjoy this in the meantime! [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-best-ps4-games-summer-2020-update&captions=true"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN's Senior News Editor, host of Podcast Beyond!, and PlayStation lead. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush or follow his streams on Twitch.