Daily Archives: April 9, 2022

SEOUL, South Korea--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Gravity Co., Ltd. (NASDAQ: GRVY), a global game company, will start the second CBT for a new 3D MMORPG, Ragnarok V: Returns, in Oceania on April 6.

Ragnarok V: Returns, a multi-platform MMORPG, is the sequel to Ragnarok: Valkyrie Uprising, which has been played by more than five million global users. In addition to the attractive aesthetics unique to Ragnarok, this game will feature a high level of freedom for players.

After the first CBT held over one week from February 16, users expressed satisfaction with the game by commenting, This game is the closest to Ragnarok Online, It brought back old memories throughout the CBT, and I enjoyed this game because it had many cute and adorable costumes.

The second CBT of Ragnarok V: Returns will target Oceania users and be held from 1:00 p.m. on April 6 to 1:00 p.m. on April 12 (Australian Eastern Standard Time). Unlike the first CBT held for mobile users only, the second CBT can be enjoyed on not only a mobile version for Android and iPhone devices, but also on a PC version. During the CBT period, a variety of benefits will be provided to users during two events. The first event, Show off Your Character, will invite users to take screenshots of their characters and post them on social media. The second event, Second CBT Questionnaire Survey, is a survey to gather feedback from the users.

For the second CBT, the game has been updated through balance adjustment, playtime improvement, debugging, trial content improvement, and more based on user feedback from the first CBT. Being the last CBT, users participating in the CBT will be able to enjoy playing the game even more prior to its official launch.

A Gravity official said, We prepared the 2nd CBT for users to enjoy the game even longer before the games official launch in April. As this is the last CBT before the launch, we ask for users to participate, as we are committed to updating the game until the very last minute based on users opinions from the second CBT.

Detailed information about the Ragnarok V: Returns CBT, including version, download and schedule, is available on the Ragnarok V: Returns Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/ROValkyrieUprising/).

Since March 16, Gravity has been receiving pre-registrations for Ragnarok V: Returns from the Ragnarok V: Returns pre-registration page (https://go.ragnarokv.com) as well as from Google Play and Apple App Store.

[Official Website of Gravity] http://www.gravity.co.kr

[Ragnarok V: Returns Facebook Page] https://www.facebook.com/ROValkyrieUprising/

[Ragnarok V: Returns Pre-registration Page] https://go.ragnarokv.com

[Ragnarok V: Returns Steam Page] https://store.steampowered.com/app/1865770/Ragnarok_V_Returns/

About Gravity

Established in Korea in April 2000, Gravity is a global game company that is directly listed on the NASDAQ. As of June 30, 2021, the cumulative global accounts of the Ragnarok IP, Gravitys representative IP, exceeded approximately 120 million. In addition, Ragnarok has been selected as the "second most loved Korean game overseas" consecutively over the last three years (Global Hallyu Trends 2021).

Gravity has established a powerful global network comprising of Gravity Neocyon (Korea), a subsidiary, as well as Gravity Communications (Taiwan), Gravity Game Link (Indonesia), Gravity Interactive (U.S.), Gravity Game Arise (Japan), Gravity Game Tech (Thailand), Gravity Game Hub (Singapore), and Gravity Game Vision (Hong Kong), the overseas branches. Together with its branches, Gravity is broadening its recognition and influence across the world by promoting global publishing businesses to discover and distribute a range of platforms and genre games in addition to games using the Ragnarok IP. The company is also accelerating not only the Ragnarok merchandise business, but also the content business, such as animation, IPTV, and webcomics, by collaborating with a number of brands.

- Key Titles

"Ragnarok Online (launched in 2002)," a PC MMORPG, and "Ragnarok M," "Ragnarok Origin," "Ragnarok X: Next Generation," "Ragnarok: Labyrinth," and "Ragnarok: Poring Merge," the mobile MMORPGs

Continued here:

Gravity Launches 2nd CBT of Ragnarok V: Returns, New 3D MMORPG, in Oceania - Business Wire

Oceania includes 14 countries each of which is ecologically, socially, and culturally rich. It offers a varied amalgamation of cultures and economies that operate through peculiar standards, notions, beliefs, and practices. Some countries rank among the highly advanced in the world, and some are less developed. For a great part of its history, Oceania remained in oblivion and it was only upon the arrival of the European settlers that gradual changes to the local life were introduced and the world got to know about its many offerings. Today, Oceania is of high strategic importance in an array of areas including politics, environment, and higher education.Higher Education has become a pillar of repute and prestige to the Oceanic region. This is evident from the fact that millions of students from all corners of the world migrate to many countries to pursue education. Australia and New Zealand, particularly, are known for their student-friendly, high-yielding, and world-class education system and have quite a few of their universities ranked among the global best. This fact also underlines the competition that applicants face when they apply to these universities. Still, you should actively pursue your application in these universities, as these are the gateways to a bright and lucrative future.

In case you want some help as to where to apply, here is a list with the top 4 in the region:

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Top 4 Universities In Oceania You Should Know - CEOWORLD magazine

In a major announcement, i-PRO APAC Oceania has recently announced a separation from Panasonic i-PRO in the Oceania region and will now trade as an independent entity.

As a new entity, the company looks to accelerate the development of high technology cameras with advanced capabilities built on a platform powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) on the edge.

They say they will move forward with a more agile, start-up mentality and bring a wider, more diverse range of products to the Oceania market.

Panasonic NZ will continue to be the leading NZ distributor for i-PRO technology and aims to provide continuity for existing customers and resellers with no significant changes.

Marius Van Der Merwe will step into the role of director for the Oceania region, building on his experience as national security solutions manager for Panasonic i-PRO. The move will also see more investment in the Oceania regions with increased reserve in all states.

This is an exciting time for i-PRO in our region. It is essentially a fresh start, and an opportunity to look objectively at the business and create a more effective model, says Van Der Merwe.

The goal is to provide high-level, reliable cameras for a wide array of scenarios at a competitive price and deliver them to the market quickly and effectively.

He also says that the move will create better opportunities for customer engagement and spread company resources around Oceania in a more efficient and effective way.

The new i-PRO APAC Oceania operation will also put more resources in place to better service customers, with pre-and-post sales engineers being added across all territories.

The new entity will also look to increase the number of key integrator partners operating and expand its presence in the channel.

Van Der Merwe also acknowledged the supply chain and customer service struggles relating to past business models and noted that the change will help streamline and simplify a variety of processes with new initiatives and innovations.

We acknowledge that the previous business model was sometimes cumbersome, and as such we are putting pieces in place that allow us to answer questions and deliver solutions in a timely manner, with local support, he says.

The planned opening of our own experience centre will add a lot of resources to our operations also. Customers will get the best of both worlds - the strength and reliability of our high-end cameras, now coupled with an agile local team that is responsive and flexible.

Panasonic NZ senior product sales manager for security Paul Grey says the companys role as NZ distributor will continue to help provide better solutions to customers.

Panasonic NZ Ltd is very excited to be announced as the New Zealand distributor for the i-PRO Brand. We believe that our in-house capabilities in CCTV, software development and network technologies complement the very exciting roadmap of products that I-PRO is producing, he says.

i-PRO will allow Panasonic NZ to provide a wider range of solutions to our customers leveraging best of breed technologies while maintaining the reliability that the Panasonic Security products were renowned for.

He says the i-Pro has plans to triple the number of camera releases in the current range over the next 6-12 months, and they are committed to assisting with the transformation.

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Panasonic i-PRO rebrands in the Oceania region - ChannelLife Australia

After a rough couple of years due to COVID-19, the cruise industry has recently started bouncing back. Earlier this month, the Center for Disease Control eliminated its pandemic-related Cruise Travel Health Notices, and also eliminated all risk warnings.

So if things arent fully back to normal for the industry, theyre at least heading in that direction.

As a sign that cruise fans are back on board in the new normal, Cruiseline.com has just released the results of its 2022 Member Choice Awards.

The awards come from review rankings submitted by more than 4,000 members of theCruiseline.com community who took a trip between June of 2021, when ships could cautiously restart, through the end of last year, which means theyre from the diehards that couldnt wait to get back on the water.

The ratings reflect the safety and health procedures that were set in place before cruises could resume. And now that the results are in, Royal Caribbean International (RCL) - Get Royal Caribbean Group Reporthas a lot to brag about.

Carnival Cruise Line (CCL) - Get Carnival Corporation Report, Princess Cruises, Oceania Cruises, Disney Cruise Line (DIS) - Get Walt Disney Company Reportand Norwegian (NCLH) - Get Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd. Reportalso all made strong showings. But you could, of course, argue that the real winners were cruise fans who were just happy to be reunited with their buffets, sea breeze and gigantic on-board swimming pools.

The categories that cruise fans were asked to vote on include the overall mainstream cruise line, top premium cruise line, best river/luxury line, highest-ranked cruise line for first-timers, top cruise line for couples, and best line for families.

Image source: Carnival Cruise Lines.

Heres where all the cruises placed, in terms of the overall experiences, as well as their member ranking.

Best Mainstream Cruise Line

Royal Caribbean (4.471)

Disney Cruise Line (4.482)

Norwegian (4.431)

Carnival (4.388)

MSC (4.356)

Best Cruise Line for First-Timers

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Royal Caribbean (4.563)

Carnival Cruise Lines (4.374)

Norwegian Cruise Line (4.274)

MSC Cruises (3.871)

Celebrity Cruises (3.740)

Best Cruise Line for Couples

Royal Caribbean (4.568)

Celebrity Cruises (4.558)

Holland America Line (4.520)

P&O Cruises (4.489)

Disney Cruise Line (4.485)

Best Cruise Line for Families

Royal Caribbean (4.448)

Carnival Cruise Lines (4.413)

Princess Cruises (4.376)

Silversea Cruises (4.350)

Disney Cruise Line (4.339)

Image source: Carnival.

Getting a little more granular and specific, cruise fans also voted on which ships had the best dining, onboard activities and service and staff. Heres who won in those.

Best Cruise Line - Food & Dining

Celebrity Cruises (4.622)

Royal Caribbean (4.519)

Disney Cruise Line (4.468)

Regent Seven Seas Cruises (4.465)

AmaWaterways (4.451)

Best Cruise Line for Onboard Activities

Royal Caribbean (4.346)

Celebrity Cruises (4.284)

Princess Cruises (4.023)

Oceania Cruises (4.021)

Carnival Cruise Lines (4.019)

Best Cruise Line for Service & Staff

Princess Cruises (4.832)

Royal Caribbean (4.797)

Celebrity Cruises (4.778)

Oceania Cruises (4.760)

Silversea Cruises (4.751)

Overall, Royal Caribbean clearly dominated proceedings and have a hold on the hearts of cruise fans.

But its a new era now that things have fully opened back up, and theres plenty of opportunity this summer for Carnival, Disney and everyone else to step it up and claim the title of the King of the Seas.

See the article here:

Royal Caribbean Beats Carnival, Norwegian in This Key Vote - TheStreet

The number of Swiss nationals living abroad increased in 2021 by 1.5 per cent compared to the previous year, recent figures unveiled by Switzerlands Federal Department of Foreign Affairs show.

In a press release issued on Thursday, April 7, the Department announced that about 788,000 Swiss citizens were registered with a Swiss diplomatic representation outside the country, the majority of them in Europe.

Regardless of the continent in which they lived, the majority were aged between 18 and 64. Reflecting Switzerlands multicultural nature, many of them also had more than one nationality, according to the results of the statistics on the Swiss abroad from the Federal Statistical Office (FSO), the press release reveals.

It also points out that the year-on-year increase recorded from 2020 to 2021 was similar to the increase marked from 2019 to 2020, which was 1.4 per cent. In 2021, the highest increase of Swiss citizens living abroad was marked in Europe by 2.2 per cent, followed by Asia with 0.7 per cent, Oceania with 0.6 per cent, and the Americas with 0.2 per cent.

The number of Swiss nationals living in Africa dropped by 0.6 per cent.

Whereas the number of citizens living in the continent of Europe was distributed as follows:

In spite of marking a low increase from 2020 to 2021, the Americas lead the remaining continents when it comes to the number of Swiss citizens living in their territory.

Data show that out of the remaining 286,300 Swiss citizens living abroad, 23 per cent lived in the Americas, 6.8 per cent in Asia, 4,2 per cent in Oceania and another 2.4 per cent in Asia.

The largest communities outside Europe were in the United States, which registered 81,800 people, ahead of Canada (40,800), Australia (25,800) and Israel (22,100). An increase was seen in all of these countries, but the greatest was observed in Israel with three per cent more than in 2020, the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs reveals.

>> Switzerland Among Best European Countries for Its Living Conditions

Since 2017, the number of Swiss citizens holding more than one nationality has increased by 5.3 per cent, with the highest growth recorded in Asia, 6.7 per cent, followed by Europe with 6.5 per cent.

In 2021 alone, 590,500 Swiss citizens living outside the country had at least one other nationality, which accounts for 75 per cent of the total number of Swiss nationals living abroad.

The highest percentage of Swiss citizens with more than one nationality was found on the American continent (80 per cent). In over half of the American countries in which they lived, the percentage was 75 per cent or more. The highest percentages were seen in South America, particularly in Chile and Argentina, where they were 91.3 per cent and 94.2 per cent respectively, the Department note, adding that on the contrary, the lowest share of Swiss citizens abroad with more than one nationality was recorded in Asia.

The Department further notes that in 2021, 28,700 persons left Switzerland, and 22,300 arrived, which means that net migration was 6,431 persons.

According to the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, Switzerland has a permanent resident population of 8,670,300.

>> Switzerland to Facilitate Residence & Work Permits Issuance for Skilled Workers From Third Countries

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1 in 10 Swiss Citizens Live Abroad, 75% of Them Have Dual Nationality - SchengenVisaInfo.com - SchengenVisaInfo.com

The World Press Photo Foundation has announced the 2022 global contest winners that it has recognized as the best photojournalism and documentary photography taken in the last year.

This year, the World Press Photo competition took on a new format that is broken into regions. As explained along with those regional winners in March, the organization found that there was an imbalance in representation among entrants, stories, and winners with the previous contest system. In 2021, only 7% of entrants came from South America, 5% from Southeast Asia and Oceania, and 3% from Africa. The organization felt that this was not representative of the photojournalistic talent around the world, and sought to change its methods to reflect that.

The system was changed to a six-region format Africa, Asia, Europe, North and Central America, South America, and Southeast Asia and Oceania and of the winners from each division, the jury selected on the 24 overall regional winners and from there, selected its four global winners: World Press Photo of the Year, World Press Photo Story of the Year, World Press Photo Long-Term Project Award, and World Press Photo Open Format Award.

These four global winners were chosen from a total of 64,823 photographs and open format entries from 130 countries. Every regional winner of the Contest received a monetary prize of 1,000, inclusion in the annual worldwide exhibition, inclusion in the annual yearbook, publication and a personal profile on the World Press Photo website, promotion on World Press Photo platforms, an invitation to the Winners Program, and a physical award. In addition to their regional prizes, global winners will also receive an additional monetary prize of 5,000 and an additional physical award.

Kamloops Residential School, by Amber Bracken, Canada, for The New York Times

Red dresses hung on crosses along a roadside commemorate children who died at the Kamloops Indian Residential School, an institution created to assimilate Indigenous children, following the detection of as many as 215 unmarked graves, Kamloops, British Columbia, 19 June 2021.

Saving Forests with Fire, Matthew Abbott, Australia, for National Geographic/Panos Pictures

Indigenous Australians strategically burn land in a practice known as cool burning, in which fires move slowly, burn only the undergrowth, and remove the build-up of fuel that feeds bigger blazes. The Nawarddeken people of West Arnhem Land, Australia, have been practicing controlled cool burns for tens of thousands of years and see fire as a tool to manage their 1.39 million hectare homeland. Warddeken rangers combine traditional knowledge with contemporary technologies to prevent wildfires, thereby decreasing climate-heating CO2.

Amazonian Dystopia, Lalo de Almeida, Brazil, for Folha de So Paulo/Panos Pictures

The Amazon rainforest is under great threat, as deforestation, mining, infrastructural development and exploitation of other natural resources gain momentum under President Jair Bolsonaros environmentally regressive policies. Since 2019, devastation of the Brazilian Amazon has been running at its fastest pace in a decade. An area of extraordinary biodiversity, the Amazon is also home to more than 350 different Indigenous groups. The exploitation of the Amazon has a number of social impacts, particularly on Indigenous communities who are forced to deal with significant degradation of their environment, as well as their way of life.

Blood is a Seed, Isadora Romero, Ecuador

Through personal stories, Blood is a Seed (La Sangre Es Una Semilla) questions the disappearance of seeds, forced migration, colonization, and the subsequent loss of ancestral knowledge. The video is composed of digital and film photographs, some of which were taken on expired 35mm film and later drawn on by Romeros father. In a journey to their ancestral village of Une, Cundinamarca, Colombia, Romero explores forgotten memories of the land and crops and learns about her grandfather and great-grandmother who were seed guardians and cultivated several potato varieties, only two of which still mainly exist.

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The Global Winners of the 2022 World Press Photo Competition - PetaPixel