Google searches of 2023: 'Barbie,' Israel-Hamas war are among the year's top internet searches

2023 was a huge year for PlayStation 5, with Sony finally able to cut loose and produce consoles without any of the constraints of the last few years. There’s now over 50 million PS5 consoles out in the wild, as they’ve taken a firm grasp of this generation, and then there’s the launch of the PlayStation VR 2 to hopefully rekindle their ambitions for virtual reality.

Reliance Industries Chairman and MD, Mukesh Ambani has urged the employees of his company to accelerate artificial intelligence (AI) transformation across all businesses in 2024 to stay ahead of rivals in deploying advanced technologies. In this year-end address to Reliance employees on Thursday, at an event marking the 91st birth anniversary of the company's late founder Dhirubhai Ambani, Mukesh outlined his ambitions.

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As big as online gaming has become, 2023 has shown that single player games are absolutely thriving. Whether it’s a sequel that takes what its forebears did and refines or expands the experience further, a game that takes a genre and wrings every ounce of creativity and ingenuity out of it with new ideas, this year has been absolutely fantastic for gamers that like to be left alone in front of the screen.

If you’re still exploring the vast reaches of Starfield and are somehow hungry for more, you’re in luck. An “End of the Year Update” dropped by Bethesda outlined some of what’s to come in 2024. 

 Google has been trying its best to up its security game. Speaking of the latest development, the company's Safety Check feature for Chrome, which, among other things, checks the internet to see if any of your saved passwords have been compromised, will now "run automatically in the background" on desktop.

Gareth Edwards’ latest movie The Creator has set its streaming release date. 

We gave everyone a gentle nudge at the start of December to remind them that the clock on the Bluetooth upgrade option for the Stadia controller was ticking down: Google had given Stadia owners until the end of 2023 to convert their controllers to wireless functionality, or be stuck with wires forever. But someone, somewhere, decided the deadline was too tight, because now that deadline has been pushed to the end of 2024.

Despite the history-changing implications of battles on Endor and Yavin, the nature of war, especially within the Star Wars universe, is one of countless skirmishes across the furthest reaches of the galaxy. Unlikely heroes and allies come together to fight on land and in space, accruing small advantages along the way to inch toward their versions of victory. The same will be true for Star Wars: Unlimited, the newest entry into the hotly contested battle for players in the world of trading card games.

Voting for the PS Blog Game of the Year Awards 2023 is now open. All 18 categories reflect the best of PlayStation through this past year, which not only celebrate captivating new characters, sublime soundtracks, fantastic art direction, and much more, but also allow us a chance to acknowledge and thank creatives worldwide whose exceptional craft and hard work has brought us 12 months of extraordinary gaming experiences.  

Game developers have a problem with this year’s Game Awards.

What a year it’s been. We’ve seen a host of terrific games come out (and some not-so-terrific ones), with ups and downs across the board. But what’s interesting is seeing which specific games people were searching for in 2023.