Archive for June 1st, 2006
$40 XBL Vision camera & UNO bundle detailed by MS source along with prices & dates for other 360 accessories
Filed under: Arcade, PC, Wireless, Microsoft Xbox 360, Driving, First Person Shooters, Online, Simulations, Strategy, Peripherals, Business
Our friendly anonymous source at Microsoft has provided us with a few more details concerning the 360 accessories announced back at E3.
Perhaps the most important involves the bundling of the Xbox Live Vision camera with a wired headset, the popular Live Arcade title UNO, and a month of Live Gold service for $39.99 when it releases in the States on September 19, 2006.
Granted, this is still an unofficial report (based on a leak of “official” info), so understand that you’re probably not gonna get much confirmation from MS until they’re good and ready to give it. If you’d like information on what other peripherals are coming out “Holiday 2006″ (so sometime in the 4th quarter) and at what price, read on for more.
- New faceplates featuring Halo, Forza 2, & Viva Pinata for $19.99 each
- Wireless headest with a 30-foot range for $59.99
- 256MB Memory Unit for $59.99
- Wireless gaming receiver for $19.99 (but it’ll go on sale in Winter 2007, unlike the others, probably around the month of February)
As stated before, the wireless gaming receiver will let you use wireless 360 peripherals — such as the wireless controller, wheel, and headset — on your PC. MS is apparently still considering the price point for the wireless racing wheel, as the $130 figure reported by us earlier has not been repeated in this round of releases (though it could still eventually be used). No official pricing has been given for the HD-DVD add-on, either.
Hopefully, Microsoft will provide some way of allowing those who have already purchased UNO on Live Marketplace to download a comparable title with the bundle (with or without camera functionality). Our source at Microsoft saw nothing that would indicate a unbundled SKU for the 360- and PC-compatible camera, so it looks like it’ll only be available at $40 for the foreseeable future. [Note that our earlier post on the pricing rumor contained a typo in the headline which might have led you to believe a second unbundled SKU for the camera would be available for $20; the figure was listed correctly in the body of the text, but the error in the title was ours and ours alone (our source had it right all along). Apologies to anyone who might have been misled -- the older post has been fixed.]
If these figures are what the peripherals in questions are eventually priced at, our hopes of a gradual easing of Memory Unit price points will have been thoroughly dashed (the better to service 360 Core owners in need of greater and/or cheaper storage options). Offering more value is good, but dropping the price of the 64MB MU to a proportional $14.99 would be an impressive show of good will to cost-conscious shoppers (however unlikely due to retail margin requirements). Not only that, those close to running out of, or who have already run out of, space on their 20GB hard drives are probably even more disappointed in the lack of hard-disk upgrades available in time for the two-tiered PS3 launch in November. Hopefully we’ll see more options (and price drops) next year.
[Image taken from the Best of E3 Gallery at Xbox.com]
See also:
- XBL Vision camera delayed to October 2nd in Europe and Asia outside of Japan; U.S. Sept. 19th release still on track
- Rumor: 360 wireless gaming receiver $20; wheel $130; headset $60; camera $40; Halo and Forza faceplates $20 [update 1]
- Xbox Live cam tester caught on camera
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Today in Joystiq: June 1, 2006
Joystiquery
Nintendo losing their Touch (Generations)?
News
Gaming products dominate top tech list
European game addiction clinic opens next month
WoW dominates MMO market share
Is your PC Vista-ready?
Xbox BC not a priority, says Moore
Wii takes “Best of Show” from E3 awards
10 new Dreamcast games on the way
Half-Life 2: Episode One now playable
Infinium’s name is now Phantom Entertainment
Dell drops two new XPS models; one big, one small
Read Joystiq from within Second Life
Half-Life 2: Episode Two trailer; Alyx is hurt!
XBL Vision camera release reshuffle
Gollum’s meatspace counterpart does PS3 title
Culture
NES pad + anything = art
Going to PAX? Try carpooling with strangers
Fox “investigates” PSP porn
Pac-Man: The Movie, not coming to any theaters near you
Nerd in a tux? Try Game Boy cufflinks
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Nintendo losing their Touch (Generations)?
Filed under: Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii
If Nintendo’s desires are realized, it won’t be too long before the image of Grandpa hunching furiously over his DS Lite and murderously screaming “Blue” joins that of the bespectacled nerd in the ranks of uninformed gamer stereotypes. In an effort to reach out to those who would normally shy away from electronic devices and their confusing beeps and boops, several forthcoming and readily available DS games have recently been shoved under the Touch Generations banner. The range highlights Nintendo’s popular “non-games”, titles that are meant to be approachable by any person, regardless of their previous gaming experience.
In North America, games like Nintendogs, Brain Age and Sudoku Gridmaster seem to gravitate towards the label quite naturally, but it seems that the selection differs significantly from that of other regions. Anthropomorphic neighbour sim, Animal Crossing: Wild World, slots right in with Electroplankton in Europe, but the choices of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney and Trauma Center: Under the Knife seem to fit in less comfortably. The latter two titles are far more traditional, with linear stories, clear conditions for success and failure and, in the case of Trauma Center especially, a more pronounced difficulty level that requires intricate stylus strokes–lest your patient’s internal organs become reduced to a bloody mush (technical term). In other words, all the stuff that the mythical casual gamer doesn’t want.
The Japanese selection is almost the exact opposite, filled with English trainers, dictionaries and travel guidebooks. If you looked up “game” in one of those dictionaries, you’d likely find a description far removed from most of these titles. It raises an interesting question, then: What constitutes a game that, according to Nintendo’s mantra, anyone can pick up and play? Is it a game that almost exclusively relies on intuitive touch screen controls? Or is it something with simplistic gameplay mechanics? Perhaps it’s not even a game at all. Nintendo’s pretty clear about the kind of people they’re chasing with the DS and the Wii, but things seem less vivid when it comes to matching specific games with specific audiences. With games being such unique and often personal experiences, it’s doubtful that the line between hardcore and casual will ever become especially obvious.
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Gollum’s meatspace counterpart does PS3 title
Filed under: Culture, Sony PlayStation 3
After groundbreaking roles playing digital counterparts Gollum and King Kong in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and King Kong respectively, Andy Serkis, the world’s most famous motion capture-actor, is giving video games a shot.He’ll be playing the role of the villainous King Botan in Ninja Theory’s upcoming PS3 action title, Heavenly Sword.
The BBC is running a short piece, with some gee-whiz tech jargon thrown in to wow the unwashed masses (”one of the processors inside the machine is solely devoted to recreating the movement of clothes and hair”) as well as some interesting details on Serkis’ specific involvement, noting that he’s “taking care of all the performance capture, the casting and is heavily involved in writing.”
Hollywood involvement in games is nothing new (remember Bruce Willis in Apocalypse?) but Serkis is the Marlon Brando of motion capture and, as such, might be able to bring some real talent into the acting backwater that is video games. Then there’s the whole question of whether or not that belongs in video games …
See also:
PS3 Impressions: Heavenly Sword
Major PS3 titles missing launch date
[Thanks, ben]
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XBL Vision camera delayed to October 2nd in Europe and Asia outside of Japan; U.S. Sept. 19th release still on track
Filed under: PC, Microsoft Xbox 360, Online, Peripherals, Business
Major Nelson has corrected an earlier report made during a recent Blogcast concerning the release date for the Xbox Live Vision camera: it will be out in Europe and Asia (outside of Japan) on October 2nd rather than the earlier September 19th date, which still applies for 360 owners in the U.S.
We suppose the short wait is better than the lack of any confirmed release dates for Japan, New Zealand, Australia, or any of the other countries in which the system has already been officially launched. At least Japanese gamers can still converse on their original Xboxes with the Xbox Video Chat camera that was released only in that fair land. They might not get to play UNO on the current generation of hardware, but it’s better than nothing.
[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]
See also:
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Half-Life 2: Episode Two trailer; Alyx is hurt!
Filed under: PC, First Person Shooters
- zOMG Alyx dies?!
- New baddie! An extemely potent looking and fast moving tripod.
- A voiceover by Dr. Eli Vance which goes as follows: “we’re done running. This is our chance to take back out world, we’re not going to lose it a second time.”
Episode Two should hopefully be out by the end of this year.
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Dark Messiah enemy profiles, new screens
Filed under: PC, Action, First Person Shooters, RPGs
Game Informer Online has 24 new screens from Ubisoft’s Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, which include profiles of a dozen enemies featured in the game. Arkane Studios has done some nice work in the modeling department, but that necromancer on the left bares a striking resemblance to a certain villain from a galaxy far, far away. Must be the turtleneck.
See also:
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Be a Xbox 360/Vista Beta Tester
Microsoft is putting out long, tentacle-like feelers for people who might be willing to submit their unknowning computers to the terrors of a beta operating system install. The Windows Vista team wants to beta test the Media Center Extender on the upcoming Vista operating system and the Xbox 360. If you’re a PC sadist and are interested check the requirements to see if you qualify:
Do you have an Xbox 360 console, and is it connected to the Internet?
Is your PC capable of running Vista Ultimate or Home Premium?
Are you over the age of 18?
Do you live in the United States?
And judging by the picture being hip might be a requirement too… make that edgy.. edgy and hip.
Be a Beta Tester [Xbox]
Show Notes for Play! Symphony
N-Sider, “The World’s Most In-Depth Nintendo Resource!”, has posted one of those extremely in-depth Nintendo resources that I keep hearing they are known for. In this case, it’s the detailed account of one gaming music lover’s experience attending the recent Play! Video Game Symphony. It sounds like a wonderful event, aurally radiating with a palpable geeky glow:
On the walk back to the hotel, I was pretty much still in awe at what a kick-ass show I had witnessed, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what the guy had said about this being not so “stuffy,” and, to be more specific, the crowd’s reaction to the Mario medley. It really does ring true, what Uematsu wrote in the program’s notes: music is the seeds, and video games are the soil. The Play! concert isn’t just about hearing music from video games, it’s about hearing music that everyone has heard before under a different set of circumstances. The Japanese family in front of me probably played Super Mario Bros. just like I did, albeit on a Famicom instead of an NES.
Well worth reading. Of course, if you’re a European, you have no chance of catching it unless you want to go up to the land of the midnight sun.
Play! Video Game Symphony Show Notes [N-Sider]
Nerd in a tux? Try Game Boy cufflinks
Filed under: Culture, Portable, Retro, Fashion
Unfortunately prom season is over, though we suspect anyone who’d be interested in wearing these Game Boy
[Via Engadget]
(Update: The myriad Game Boy models have proven too much for me to remember. These are indeed Game Boy Pocket cuff-links. Thanks Smith and deft!)
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OMG, Forty Minute Resident Evil Fan-Movie
If you have 42 minutes and 5 seconds of your life you are willing to part with, check out this fan-made Resident Evil parody. The movie was produced by a bunch of kids with loads of free time, and on some level, it is extremely impressive. I mean, it’s FORTY MINUTES long.
And I had thought this was long [Kotaku]
Snake Versus Link Brawl Screens
Forget all of the guffaws over intestinal fortitude, these are some amazing screens. Snake is going to hand Link his ass, HIS ASS!
Snake [Smash Bros]
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Related: Solid Snake Enters Dojo
Related: The Taiwanese Metal Gear Flick
Read Joystiq from within Second Life
Filed under: Hacks, Online, MMO
A recent update to Second Life that allows players to view the game’s online help pages using a custom Mozilla browser has been hacked so that you can view any webpage. Although there’s no way to type web addresses without some basic hacking knowledge, it’s quite simple to change the homepage to Google or any other website.
Of course you could always just tab-out and use Firefox, but this option has a much greater “geek cool” factor. Let’s just hope Fox News doesn’t cotton on to the possibility of people browsing “questionable” content from within SL. Anyway, the first commentator to post a screenshot of themselves commenting on this post from within Second Life bags themselves a star.
[Via Clickable Culture]
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Homebrewers Lament: PSP Firmware Updated to 2.71
If you, unlike Crecente, have restrained yourself from indulging the urge to dramatically hurl your PSP into the air and then shoot it like a clay pigeonwith a bazooka, this might interest you. Firmware 2.71 has been released and the main new feature it ads is Portable TV.
Of course, that makes it sound a bit cooler than it is: you won’t be picking up any local UHF anytime soon without a bulky contraption and a coat hanger attached to the back of your PSP. However, users in Japan can download video content from So-net. Some videos will be free; anything worth watching — and, of course, porn — will not. The service launches in Japan this month; we assume we’ll see it Stateside sometime shortly after.
Other features include the demos of Loco Roco and Kazuo which can be downloaded to the MemoryStick. There’s also a correction made to the video output to accomodate LocationFree.
Sony Releases TV PSP Firmware Update
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Related: LucasArts Picks Up Kuju Studios for “Traxion”
Related: How Sony’s Failure to Connect Doomed the PSP
Related: Playstation Pornable Plucking Hussies “Out of Thin Air”
Dell drops two new XPS models; one big, one small
Filed under: PC
Dell introduced two new XPS machines yesterday: one of them is the diminutive M1210, packing an (optional) 256MB NVIDIA GeForce Go 7400 TurboCache graphics solution into a 4-1/2 pound package. All right, not too shabby, but that’s not what the hardcore PC gamers are interested in, now is it? They want to hear about Dell’s new, enormous, XPS 700 desktop.
Dell’s XPS 700 desktops pack some serious power, but at what cost?
This thing sizes up to 21.86″ x 8.6″ x 24.25″ making it, volumetrically, 74707 cm^3. That’s about 8.5 times as large as a PS3! I checked the math … twice!Alright, so it’s not winning any performance per cubic centimeter contests anytime soon, but the XPS 700 isn’t supposed to be a pint-sized pixie. Think of it as the sort of computer that will not only run Doom III really well but look like it had a cameo in the game. Outfitted with a bunch of red LEDs and optional Quad-SLI, this thing is sure to melt your eyeballs, both literally and figuratively.
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E3’s Random Half-Naked Woman: The Video
Remember this Wonder Woman? She was tossed out of E3 for wearing bikini briefs. She claimed she was wearing proper shorts, and who’s to argue with Wonder Woman? Apparently, Staples Center security as the lass was promptly thrown out on her bottom.
At the time, we thought she was just some random crazy. She’s not, apparently. Crecente chatted her up the Sony party and got her side of the story. Then just out of the blue, we got an email from a friend of Wonder’s that points us to a video of the incident. Hit the jump for the email, along with the clip.
Her name is Kasey Poteet. She is a friend of mine. If you want the whole story on why she was dressed up like that, check out her myspace, http://www.myspace.com/kaseykicksass, or watch her show, geek rock on musicplustv.com at 10:00 pm mon-thurs. im sending you this because i cant comment and i wanted to lay to rest the people calling her an attention whore, etc3
Hmm…
Her MySpace page features posts on Mister T, Chuck Norris, Halo 2 and images of her tush. These are complemented with Kasey ranting on why people misjudge her and images of shirtless dudes posting comments on her site. Don’t be quick to judge. Like us, Kasey was at E3 to cover the event. (Our asses, of course, were covered, while Kasey’s wasn’t.) Here is her side of the story in movie pictures, complete with E3 security and the LAPD:
Look closely when watching the vid. You can see one of our E3 reporters in the background and what looks like Crecente rolling up at the very end.
Random Half-Naked Woman Getting Tossed Out of E3 [Kotaku]
Pac-Man: The Movie, not coming to any theaters near you
[Thanks, Justin]
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11 Strangest Moments in Gaming
The Onion’s latest AV Club Inventory feature lists the eleven strangest moments in video history. From Second Life’s cornfield of punishment to Jane Pinckard’s daring adventures with the trance vibrator, the list seems to touch on everything that matters. This reminds me, I totally need to get my hands on Smoke and Mirrors. I’m up for a full-day of virtual driving.
Is there anything they missed?
Inventory: 11 of Video Gaming’s Strangest Moments [The Onion]
Another Adorable Etsy Mario Bracelet
Alice’s weekly Etsy updates always turn up some just adorable little crafts. For example, the above bracelet, which I’d buy in a second if it didn’t so flagrantly clash with my various zodiac medallions or the battleship tattoo on my inflated Popeye forearm. Although I suppose I could wear it as an ankle bracelet — it would gel quite nicely with my moccasins.
Quick Etsy Rummage [Wonderland]
Fox “investigates” PSP porn [update 1]
Filed under: Culture, Sony PSP
Are you a parent concerned that your child may have easy access to communist and pornographic materials? If so, you may be shocked, devastated and appalled to learn that your innocent children “are using a gaming device to access porn out of thin air.” The PSP, which is a short for PlayStation “pornable”, is a portable game console that has the capability of “magically displaying images of naked women.” Yeah, that’s right. Fox 9, a local news affiliate of Fox News, the world standard for balanced and fair reporting, has revealed that the PSP is entirely capable of displaying images and therefore porn. As a result, Sony and the PSP are entirely to blame if your kid sticks pictures of naked ladies onto the device. Bleurgh.
This article has it all: a sensational headline, wildly outlandish claims and a healthy dose of out-of-context quotes from family institutes. What’s next? The Nintendo DS steals your precious bodily fluids? Xbox 360 responsible for failure to find WMDs? Playing too much Halo lowers exam results? Wait… that last one’s true.
[Via Game|Life]
[Update: Fox 9 is a local news affiliate of Fox News, not a purely investigative news channel.]
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