this is bbc news, the headlines: italy has now surpassed china as the country with the highest number of deaths from the coronavirus. 3,405 people have now died. for the second day running more than 400 people died in a single day. the nationwide lockdown will be extended beyond the end of next week the us has warned against all international travel and has urged its citizens who are abroad to return immediately. the state department said people who didn't come back must be prepared to stay overseas for an indefinite period. it's reported more than 12,500 cases of the infection. the olympic flame has landed injapan, amid grave doubts as to whether the 2020 games will be able to go ahead in tokyo. the elborate torch relay that had been planned has already been cut back drastically because of the coronavirus.

now on bbc news, a change of programme as we bring you click. this week, keeping our devices coronavirus free. the mobile phone app hoping to help more survive snakebites. and this eagerly anticipated video game is here — but don't expect to see it on an actual screen. in 1998, the release of first—person shooter half—life sent a seismic shock across the world

of video games. it featured cinematic storytelling, taut action sequences and some of the creepiest bad guys ever to grace a video game. well, let's just say your hour has come again. i remember when half—life came out — november, 1998 — a massive moment in pc gaming. before than it had been doom that defined shooter games. half life reset the bar. a sequel followed in 200a. fans patiently awaited new half—life content, but its makers, a company called valve, went very quiet on the half—life front. until now, that is. marks cieslak has been to valve's headquarters in the us, where he's got his hands on the latest addition

to the franchise, a game which has surprised many by embracing virtual reality. bellevue, washington is home to valve software, an award—winning games development company. it has plans to reinvigorate virtual reality with half—life's help — a title which changed games forever. hey, mr freeman, i had a bunch of messages for you, but we had a system crash... the first half—life i played was probably the second one, before going back to the first one. but both of them start with a train journey going on, and you are being introduced to the world as the train does, as you enter the game, you're seeing everything that's going on in the world. you're slowly being immersed in it. i played the first half—life not long after it came out. pa: current topside temperature is 93 degrees. there's something about having glimpses of set pieces that you never fully get up close to in games, that somehowjust accelerates the world

building by 1000%. the knowledge that you may not have even seen it, i think is brilliant. pa: sector c test labs and control facilities... like, the idea that on a second playthrough, or a third, you can see something you didn't the first time around, and even then, it'sjust by chance, it's going on outside a window, and if you looked to the right you would have seen a different set piece. morning, mr freeman. looks like you're running late. everyone has been fixated on the idea of a new half—life game for years. the a game, the second one, it handed us the gravity gun, we had much more puzzling, much more storytelling. my god, we made it! and it has almost become a kind ofjoke over the last 13 years of half—life 3 being announced, because valve has always teased that something would come. there were lots of rumours, everybody wanted something new, but finally being told that we have got something in that universe, it's a whole new full—length story, people are really, really excited. set before the events of half—life

2, the player assumes the role of alyx vance, a resistance fighter struggling to rescue herfather in city 17, the centre of an extra—dimensional invasion of the earth. all this is my fault! there has been a lot of hype and high hopes around the rebirth of virtual reality. vr headsets have arrived from a variety of different companies. but in recent years, interest in the technology has waned. virtual reality, it seems, is lacking a killer app. that, however, could be about to change. it's probably fair to say that a new half—life game will be one of the most keenly anticipated titles of the last decade. but is making it a virtual reality only title a way of shifting headsets? i mean, this is a way to sell the headsets. the minute you put a half—life game on vr it's going to make people buy something or potentially look buying

something they hadn't had before. but it's notjust available on valve's headsets, it's available everywhere. so what this all does is potentially reinvigorate and kick—start everybody‘s interest in the vr space. one of our goals here was to hopefully show a bunch of people who looked at vr and thought, that looks interesting, but it hadn't convinced them yet, to say, "oh, there's an experience over there i really want," and hopefully they will see this and say, "actually, i'll go check that out." this is the moment that i've been waiting for. it's been 16 years since half—life 2 was released, and 13 years since we've had any new half—life content. right now i'm going to try out the latest game in the series in virtual reality. i'm playing using valve's own vr hardware, called index. the controllers feature sensors which translate my hand and finger movements. this will allow me to interact with the game world in much the same way that i would in the real world.

here we've got an opportunity to try out some of the gameplay mechanics, so we have the gravity gloves, which should allow me to pull this. and grab it. and throw it towards one of those barnacles. let the barnacle eat it. when you see items you can grab them with the gravity gloves, catch them, store them in your backpack for later. the title has been designed to work with a wide variety of different vr headsets. but the game's demanding technical specifications means it will have to run on a pretty high—end pc. the full index vr set—up like this one isn't cheap either, costing nearly £1,000. can't open these doors, they're jammed. that will open it up for me. here we go. almost everything you interact with in the game works like it does

in the real world. everything apart from travel. getting around turns out to be one of the more interesting things in virtual reality. it's one of the trickier problems to solve. so many things that are local scale allow you to just use your body in a naturalway, like, i'm going to pick up a bucket to look at what's underneath it. traversing space doesn't quite yet allow you to use your body in that way, so solving that for players is one of reality. we've chosen to provide a variety of methods. there are a couple of different styles of teleportation and then a more traditional movement that we call continuous motion. and some people are more comfortable with one than another. a roomful of headcrabs here. looking for zombies. let's see if there's any extra ammo in here, because i have a feeling i'm going to need it pretty soon. this title is unusual for vr, because that's about 15—16 hours worth of gameplay, much longer than a lot of virtual reality titles.

let's get rid of this barricade, pull it out of the way. this is genuinely extremely tense. 0k, well, i need new underwear. this adds an entirely new dimension to video game combat. one of absolute pant—wetting fear. the big question is, will this can be the one that persuades more people to invest in virtual reality? there is a real chance that half—life: alyx is going to be a killer app for virtual reality in 2020. in part that's because it represents the return of one of the most acclaimed series in gaming, but it's also down to the fact that there are not a lot of developers making this kind of experience with vr with right now. half—life: alyx might not push virtual reality into the mainstream by itself, but it could persuade a lot of developers to start working on similar experiences in vr, and that could be huge. i think the only game that could potentially sway me and make me want to get vr and play it is a valve game.

the only downside is that i have to wander around my living room in fear of my wife walking in on me pretending to smash up some combine offices with a crowbar. i'm with you every step of the way. we'll find out what kind of impact half life: alyx has when it releases on march 23. hello, and welcome to the week in tech. it was a week that the british government ruled that chinese tech giant huawei would still be permitted to develop the country's 56 network after a rebellion from its own mps. finish satellite firm ice eye debuted images made with cutting—edge radar tech which can operate through clouds and at night. and a game—playing robot has been taught to admit its mistakes. i feel bad for letting you all down. yale university scientists said that by expressing vulnerability, the droid helps humans to communicate better.

as the coronavirus pandemic continues, one chinese firm says it has created facial recognition that can identify people while they're wearing protective masks. hanwang technology says it's 95% accurate in this scenario and can even connect to sensors to help china identify civilians suffering from high temperatures. we have seen drones carrying medical cargo before, but now autonomous ports can help load packages too. a drone station like this is opening at a swiss hospital where staff will use smartphones to log samples they can then scan and drop off for delivery to nearby labs. and finally, a digitalfood specialist injapan has been 3d printing sweet treats based on weather data. tokyo's 0pen meals has used algorithms to create flavoured designs, where wind speed alters shape, pressure levels dictate size and temperature determines colour. now, that's cooking up a storm.

we're all being told that the best way to combat the coronavirus is by washing our hands thoroughly with soap and water. but when we can't get to a basin, many of us are also using alcohol—based hand sanitiser. so much so that supplies have been running low. 0ne company we met in taiwan last year hopes to have found the solution. this is the eleclean, a device that is claimed to create your own disinfectant.

hopefully that will do the trick. the company does expect that this protects against the coronavirus. the issue is, they have actually sold out of them. but it's notjust about keeping our hands clean. how about our devices? this week apple issued new advice about how to keep our phones clean, but i would suggest that you don't do anything until you've heard what chris fox has to say. with the growing concern around coronavirus, i thought i'd be better safe than sorry and smothered my phone with antiviral gel. but it turns out that sanitisers and actually damage the oleophobic oil—repelling layer on your phone screen which is supposed to keep off fingerprints. so check this out. if i put my phone next one that has the layer intact, you can see that this one looks like i've been eating pizza off it. it's covered in fingerprint and oil. this one does have some prints on it

still, but not nearly as many, and then if i wipe down this phone with a microfibre cloth, the fingerprints come off super easy. if i try this one, some of the oil comes off but you can see it is still really smeary. and as a final test, if i pop my fingerprints on there, you can see that this is absolutely gross, and this one not nearly as dirty. so how can you clean your phone without damaging it? well, this week i met with microbiologist dr lena ciric and she told me how. you don't actually need to use antibacterial or antiseptic products on your phone. you can simply use soap and water. unplug your phone, turn it off and remove the case. dampen a microfibre cloth with water & household soap. gently rub the surfaces of the phone with the damp cloth. take care not to get moisture in any of the openings because even water—resistant phones lose their protection over time. finally, dry your phone with a clean microfibre cloth. we haven't used any anti—bacterial or antiviral gel on these phones

so how do we know they are clean? we can use these swabs and this device which tells us the level of microbial activity on the phone in relative light units, or rlus. so the higher number we get, the higher number of germs. the results are pretty good. so we would want a surgical surface to have a rating of 50 or less and all of the phones have readings of less than this, so that's pretty good. so they're significantly cleaner with just soap and water? yep, they are. how is that possible without using antiviral gel? what's going on here? the main ingredient in soap is a detergent, which is basically lifting off the grease and grime and the germs from the surface of the phone, which is then rinsed off with water, and that's what makes it clean. there are a few other ways you can clean your phone safely. this week, apple changed its guidance and that is if you have an iphone, you can safely wipe it with a 70% isopropyl alcohol wipe — the kind you can get from a computer shop or online, if they haven't sold out. there are also devices that can sterilise your phone using ultraviolet uvc radiation.