Archive for August 11th, 2006
Best Korean Movie This Year Getting PSP Game
For many, director Joon-ho Bong is about as big as Korean blockbuster filmmakers come. His latest flick, The Host, got critical acclaim at Cannes—even though it wasn’t entered in competition!
Besides an upcoming cartoon and theme park based on The Host, a cell phone and a PSP role-playing-game version of movie have been announced. For the video game, players get to choose to be one of the family members and each has a unique weapon. For example a bottle of alcohol (light it and throw), a bow and arrow (the aunt character in the movie wants to enter the Olympics), a baseball bat, etc.
While trying to rescue your daughter (cousin or grand daughter… depending on who you are), players must overcome antagonistic characters. Director Bong even appears in-game, providing advice and giving tips.
More Here [Naver] Thanks, Torokun!
The Original Jack Thompson
This “Livewire” program from Nickelodeon dates from the early 1980s and was hosted by Fred Newman. PTA Council President Ronnie Lamm talks about “proliferation” of arcade cabinets turning up in the pizza parlors, the bowling alleys, and *gasp* the stationary stores. Her demands? Keep children from being bombarded by this form of entertainment. And she’s dead serious. Just check out that flannel-shirt kid’s expression when she talks of owning store owners forty bucks at the end of the month!
Thanks, Batmundo!
Capcom Responds to Tinytext Dead Rising Whining
Those without HD have found themselves squinting and scrabbling at their blue-glowy screens in an attempt to interpret the mission objectives and other assorted text in Dead Rising. The furor on the Internet is rising to an irritating pitch, much like a near-ear mosquito.
But according to a post on the official Capcom boards, Capcom hears all and wants to make it better.
Dear Everyone, I have heard your concerns and passed them to every source within Capcom possible. I feel your pain as I, myself, have a large SDTV and am having trouble reading the mission objectives, item names, etc.
I’d like you all to know we have heard your concerns and take them seriously. I have been seeing campaigns on other forums to send hundreds of emails to our support email. Unfortunately this doesn’t expedite or increase the importance of the concern in any way, but it does take time and resources from other fans’ equally deserving concerns. All concerns are always important to us and we do what we can.
We also would like you to know that we appreciate your feedback as the game was just released and it’s feedback from our fans and gamers that make our games great. We appreciate your continued support of Capcom products!
The above was posted by Capcom board administrator “WickedKitty”, who lists her location as Capcom, USA. I assume she actually has contact with the company itself, but it’s impossible to tell. Eliza Gauger
Text Too Small [Capcom Forums (thanks Adam)]
Kotaku Originals
This week’s Kotaku originals include a bit of a Dead Rising Rant, plenty of Pac-Man food, DS Crack and Strokes and an interview with the chief UK Anti-Bully.
Why I Love and Hate Dead Rising
This Day in Gaming
Hey UK, Rent 360 Games for Your Original Xbox
Another Food Post But This One Has a Story
Feature: Talking With the AntiBullies
New Horrible DS Lite Crack
Tetris DS: Just Like a Stroke
PlayStation 3, No Dummy It’s PLAYSTATION 3
Crazy Taxi Cruises the Streets of London
Freedom to Sonic Don’t Buy New Hedgehog Game
KotakuStalku: Met the Dead Rising Dude
Toyota Is Run By Nintendo Fanboys
Life-like Pikachu Cars for Japanese Children
Aeropause says Phil Harrison is a Stupidhead
Phil Harrison says the darnedest things.
Let’s stop talking about Sony’s fuckups for a moment here and address the specfic insanity of their most vocal yokel. Aeropause is on the job.
In a post that reads like the greatest hits of Sony PR blunders, blogger Richard names Harrison the Gilligan of Gaming:
Phil reminds me of Gilligan because he is the comedic relief that gets us through the day. He is the scapegoat for the rest of the cast (Sony) and everything seems to be his fault, even though the blame lies with many. Phil has what I deem the worst job at Sony, the fall man.
The PS3 will be a good machine, even though it may be overpriced, but every time Phil speaks we have to hear comments like “The HD era doesn’t begin until we say so” or “High definition as far as the consumer is concerned means high definition movies, which means Blu-ray disc.” These statements are so far from reality that I can’t imagine anyone even saying them.
No need for imagination, of course, as Harrison has repeatedly made an ass of himself and his company, responding to criticism by just digging himself deeper. Please, please shut up. Eliza Gauger
Phil Harrison, the Gilligan of Gaming [Aeropause]
Today in Joystiq: August 11, 2006
Joystiquery
Rockstar’s Soft Serve tour in Philly tonight
Joystiq invades “a very special” CAGcast
Exclusive: Joystiq interviews WoW’s Jeff Kaplan
WoW’s Burning Crusade: What’s new
News
EA says the PSP is no fun
Bizarre tries to stop Geometry Wars clone
The Xbox arson: A lesson in sharing
BioWare defines mass effect
Industry needs new business model, says LucasArts prez
Bully controversy gets thoughtful consideration
GameStop sued by Louisiana store managers
Stubbs developer conducts a postmortem
Report: US July sales up 22%, DS and EA top sellers
PAX Omegathon prize revealed: A NEW CAR!
Eidos and Ford making promotional racing game for PS2, Xbox
Dark Messiah of Might and Magic intro vid
Japanese hardware sales, 31 July - 6 August: heavy meta
Rumors & Speculation
PSP price to drop to $149 this holiday season?
Culture
Current top 10 Xbox 360 game rankings
The ultimate Mac spoof: PS3 vs Wii
360 D-pad sucking? Use a Saturn gamepad
Pour out some Saint’s Row liquor for the homies
Happy Zelda music day
Wal-Mart bargain bin update
Sub $50 Xbox 360 games announced, get ‘em on the cheap
The history of video game music
Dead Rising humor: I hate you, Otis
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Win a Car? Truck? Vehicle at Penny Arcade Expo
Penny Arcade Expo, already basking in the glow of E3’s wreckage, announced today that they will be giving a brand new 2006 Scion xB (Tha’ts a car, btw.) to the winner of the Omegathon III. The boxy car will include a flipdown 15-inch widescreen monitor, Xbox 360 Premium System, 6-speaker sound system with CD/MP3 player, custom taillights and wheels with low-profile tires. It sounds like the perfect road-trip vehicle for next year’s PAX.
The Omegathon III is a three-day gaming tournament, the gaming tournament actually, where contestants have to duel in a range of mystery games. I think next year they’re going to be giving away Tycho’s immortal soul… and a twinkie.
Penny Arcade [PAX]
Oz Paper Looks at Sex in Gaming
The Sydney Morning Herald (where’ I’d love to work one day), has an interesting story up about the first ever Sex in Video Games Conference that was recently held in San Francisco. The Australian paper talks about the odd paradox that has left the gaming industry and those who watch it OK with violence but totally freaked out about sex.
Organiser Brenda Brathwaite said opposition to sexual content in games was inevitable, with critics typically using the argument of protecting children “as if all gamers are kids and all media should be reduced to a form that kids can consume”.
She challenged the audience to imagine a world of books, art, music and film with no sexual references, adding: “If Brokeback (Mountain) was a game that just had two guys on a bench talking” someone would still try to ban it.
Flesh for Fantasy [SMH]
WoW’s Burning Crusade: What’s new
Filed under: Culture, Mac, PC, Online, RPGs, Interviews, Competitive Gaming, MMO, Business
In an interview with World of Warcraft’s Jeff Kaplan, Joystiq was able to gain some exclusive knowledge of what will be coming out for WoW’s first expansion, The Burning Crusade. Check out these excerpts from the piece of just some of the new things players will be able to experience:
- The PvP system is the first big change that our players have been waiting to hear about for a long time. … The first is the arena combat system. You’ll be able to join a team: 2v2, 3v3, or 5v5. There are two different modes you can play: One is called practice mode to hone your skills and the other is competitive mode, which is level 70 only.
- We also want to get world PvP flowing again in WoW. A lot of players missed it, so every Outlands zone was designed with a major PvP objective in mind, so that’s the second of the big PvP announcements.
- The third thing is a revamp of the honor system. We’re not going to do away with the honor system, but we’re going to fix many of the flaws with it. The first thing players will really care about is that your honor points will no longer decay. Honor points will now become the like the PvP equivalent of a PvE experience. Honor points are just something you accumulate and then we’ll introduce gear to the game so you can purchase that by spending your honor points.
- We are actually lowering the raid cap which is now at 40. All the expansion raids will be 25 or less. The reason we are doing this is that we can still make the raids feel epic and difficult, but we just wanted to take some of the logistical headaches out of it. We’re also introducing a 10-man raid, as well.
For more in-depth discussion on these topics and others, including Panderans and voice chat, read our full exclusive interview here.
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When Game Theorists Duel
Fight, fight! I love when academics dust it up over publications, its so mentally invigorating… and subtlety catty.
Big brain gamer Henry Jenkins of MIT fame takes to task, quite politely, Ian Bogost of Watercooler Games fame about Bogost’s review of his new book: Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Collide.
The critique critique looks at Bogost’s take on Reality and Fiction, Affective Economics and, God help us, Bogost’s use of the word “buttery” to describe the book. The longish, intellectually stimulating counter-point is just part one of what appears to be the makings of another book.
A Response to Ian Bogost (Part One) [Henry Jenkins]
Exclusive: Joystiq interviews WoW’s Jeff Kaplan
Filed under: Culture, Features, Mac, PC, Adventure, Online, RPGs, Interviews, Competitive Gaming, MMO, Business
Earlier this week, I sat down with Jeff Kaplan, lead designer for World of Warcraft, to chat about the state of the highly successful MMO and what was in store with the coming expansion, The Burning Crusade.
Jeff had some great things to say, and gave really good insight on what is going on behind the scenes at WoW. Take a look after the break at the full interview which includes some exclusives never known before about what’s coming up.
Tell us why some new races were added to World of Warcraft in the upcoming Burning Crusade expansion?
One reason for the Blood Elves choice was obviously looks. You’d be amazed how many people will not play the Horde based purely on the fact that they’re monstrous. So by giving an attractive race to the Horde, we feel like we’re opening a whole new part of the game to the people who wouldn’t experience that half of the game.
What went into the decision to adding a Paladin choice for the Horde (Blood Elves) and a Shaman choice for the Alliance (Draenei)?
Our reasoning behind that is we had a conflicting design vision going on with World of Warcraft. Our class design goal was that every class had to be completely unique — really unique mechanics per class. And, we felt like our Shaman and Paladin were pretty unique, but as time progressed in the game, players would become outraged anytime you gave something to the Paladin and didn’t compensate the Shaman.
The classes had a totally different vision behind them, but we tried to balance them out all the time and make them equal. It’s not fair to the classes, they were becoming homogeneous. We really wrestled with the idea internally and we finally decided that the lore could justify with Blood Elves and Draenei putting the Paladin and Shaman on each side for the first time. We feel like because we made this decision, we’re finally free to make the classes be what they were originally supposed to be. We wanted the Paladin to be more tank oriented, that holy tank that heals. And, we can focus the Shaman more on his DPS and utility roles.
Tell me something that hasn’t already been announced that is planned for the expansion?
The PvP system is the first big change that our players have been waiting to hear about for a long time. Basically, we recognized the flaws with the existing honor system. Our goal was not to create a system that involved a massive amount of time investment, it’s counter to all of WoW’s designer philosophy. We’ve never been focused on trying to be a time sink. Our PvP system in its current incarnation is very much like that, so what we’ve done is design a new PvP system that will go live with The Burning Crusade. It has three core components to it.
The first is the arena combat system. You’ll be able to join a team: 2v2, 3v3, or 5v5. There are two different modes you can play: One is called practice mode to hone your skills and the other is competitive mode, which is level 70 only.
Can other players watch?
We’re still debating that. There’s some technical issues with it because we want to allow for cross-server arena battles as well.
So, tell me how the teams will work?
So, say you have a partner that you want to team up with. You can make a team with someone not in your guild and name it and give yourselves team colors and because you’re on a 2-on-2 team you can have a four-man roster. For 3-on-3 we allow six people on the roster and for 5-on-5 we allow ten.
What’s the incentive for taking part in competitive mode?
You can get the best rewards in the game on par with the raid game. So, wherever the raid game loot is currently at, the PvP arena system will match those rewards. And, the arena system is a seasonal system that will last three months then reset with a new set of rewards each season. It’s a competitive-based ladder that uses a rating system similar to the chess ELO rating. One of the key differences is that we require a minimum number of games that you have to play. Unlike in the chess system where if you’re on top, you can just sit there, we wanted to ensure that the No. 1 guy can be knocked off his top spot. But, we don’t require too many games. We’ll require something around ten games.
Also, it can be Horde vs. Alliance or Horde vs. Horde or Alliance vs. Alliance and cross-server. With that, we anticipate there will be little, to no queues for this.
Are there going to be specific places you have to go to access the arenas?
Well, we’ll probably make it accessible from all over the world. But, in order to make it feel like it’s not a tacked on system there will be a few specific locations — sort of like our PvP Battlegrounds system. We want it to feel like an integrated, natural part of the game. We also want to get world PvP flowing again in WoW. A lot of players missed it, so every Outlands zone was designed with a major PvP objective in mind, so that’s the second of the big PvP announcements.
What’s the third?
The third thing is a revamp of the honor system. We’re not going to do away with the honor system, but we’re going to fix many of the flaws with it. The first thing players will really care about is that your honor points will no longer decay. Honor points will now become the like the PvP equivalent of a PvE experience. Honor points are just something you accumulate and then we’ll introduce gear to the game so you can purchase that by spending your honor points.
What are you guys doing to try and prevent ganking or griefing in the game?
I think the best we can do with ganking is put things in place to mitigate it and to not encourage it. There are a few things in place to discourage it already: There are contested territories where true newbs really have to go out of their way to get flagged for PvP and we also make sure not to award you for PvP with players much lower than you. We really explored a lot of PvP solutions and focus on punishing players for killing below their levels but there’s also a lot of reverse griefing that can take place in those scenarios.
So, we wanted to make sure to have a system that felt natural, that didn’t encourage ganking but didn’t force so many rules on players that they could no longer understand what was happening. In fact, when you put so many heavy-handed rules in a game, you’re going to encourage reverse forms of griefing.
So basically nothing is going to change?
For the most part, yes. Obviously, the best way to progress is through the honor system or arena system. Both, don’t really involve ganking at all. And, when cross-server Battlegrounds go live in the next patch, we can start to look at ways we can do matchmaking differently. So, we hope in the future we can matchmake on gear and organizational composition. So, if you’re a pre-made group, we know that and we can matchmake based on that.
Is cross-server implementation the way you’re going to lessen Battleground queues then?
Yes, cross-server Battlegrounds in patch 1.12 will help alleviate queue times on a lot of servers. It’s amazing how many PvE players want to play PvP, and because they’re on that server it’s harder for them to find PvP players to battle with. Our arena system, I think, will also really alleviate queue times because not only is it cross-server but also not side specific.
Is there any talk of implementing integrated voice chat within WoW?
We’ve been discussing it. There are a lot of technical challenges to go with that and some legal issues as well because of the different ways you can set up voice chat — either on a person’s IP or we provide the bandwith. We’ve been looking at voice chat options, but we’re probably not going to have anything for The Burning Crusade, but it’s definitely something that we recognize as an enhancement to the game that we’d like to add at some time.
What is the plan for expansions as far as time frames between releases?
There is a time table, but our goal is a little bit more ambitious than one every two years. We have to weigh that against the quality of the product and how much content we want to put into it. We won’t put something out until the quality level is there. So, our goal though is to provide content quicker than we have been up until now. We’ve really beefed our team up — we have about 100 now and when we started we had around 50.
What are you guys doing to prevent disconnects in high-population areas like Ironforge?
We are addressing those issues and in a number of different ways. In a previous patch we did an optimization code that dynamically spawns the NPCs based on priority and location. In the old way, it was just spawning in NPCs randomly. You might have seen some improvements from that latest patch. But, then we’re also doing some design things in the expansion where we design the new cities with that Ironforge crunch in mind. In Silvermoon, for example, there are two areas that each have their own bank, auction house and inn in separate areas of the city. We tend to find that most players congregate in those areas. So, there are some technical solutions and design solutions there.
So, what other new ideas are coming down the line?
We will have a dungeon difficulty level setting. Party leaders for groups will have the ability to set the level with two different settings — normal and hard. For example, a 60 to 62 dungeon on hard will turn into a level 70 dungeon with level 70 rewards in it. In a level 70 dungeon on hard, the enemies will be extremely dangerous but you will definitely be rewarded better for doing the harder difficulty mode.
Has there been a separate team working on the expansion?
No, and in fact that’s something we’re very proud of. The same WoW team that started has been working on both the patches and expansion. We wanted to make sure we had the same core people there working on it.
Tell me what went in to picking the new races for the expansion. Why did you pick these two versus other races like Panderens?
At our core, the development team of WoW are a bunch of geeks and we wanted pandas too, and goblins, and we just debated it. It was a hot and heavy debate as to what our favorite race was. Everybody was throwing their hat in the ring. But, as we developed the expansion more, we knew we were going to open up Outlands. And as we honed in on Outlands, Blood Elves and Draenei were the most logical. When you start to talk about Outlands and the lore, it just made sense and everything just clicked. Also, we wanted to have a pretty race on the Horde and that just fit with the Blood Elves. And, also we wanted a new profile for the Alliance and when you look at the Draenei they really kind of click.
Are you looking to add more races in the future and if so, how many could you possibly go to? Is there a limit?
I definitely think there is a limit, but we haven’t hit it yet. So, we don’t anticipate that with every new expansion we will introduce new races. Perhaps we’ll introduce a new class instead of a new race. We’re kind of open with that. But, there is a finite limit with the races. You have too look at when it starts to be too much. But, we still feel like there is room to add more races and we still debate it.
What other major new gameplay changes are coming with the expansion?
We are actually lowering the raid cap which is now at 40. All the expansion raids will be 25 or less. The reason we are doing this is that we can still make the raids feel epic and difficult, but we just wanted to take some of the logistical headaches out of it. We’re also introducing a 10-man raid, as well.
What are you guys doing to counteract people from dropping their WoW accounts?
I think it’s a multi-tiered approach. The problem is that everyone has a different play style and WoW is such a big game and so diverse, that there’s not that one thing that people want. I think the revamp of PvP will be huge. I think a lot of people bowed out because of the PvP system. I think we will show people that we care about the PvP system and we want to make it how you want it to be. I think because we are doing this in such a big way it will be huge. I also think that the fact we are changing the raid cap and dungeon difficulty, will also add to gamers wanting to stay or come back.
And then there’s the guys who just like to solo. They don’t like to group or PvP or quest and for them it’s all about raising their level cap. They just love showing off their character and gaining abilities. For those people the expansion itself is the big win because it’s level 70 with massive Outlands zones and quests.
Why do you think World of Warcraft has been such a success when compared to other MMOs?
I think it has to do with the focus of fun in WoW. The game is much less of a social experiment at times and focuses more on core gaming mechanics that are just fun. When people sit down to play World of Warcraft we are providing them with a night of entertainment. We’re not there to punish them or make them feel like they’re working. They’re there because they’ve chosen us as their venue to entertain them. We feel lucky that they chose to spend a night with WoW. We focus heavily on making the game fun.
We also have a split approach to development that goes for all our games. Some people say we’re a casual MMO, but if you look at the depth of the game from our PvP honor system to our difficult zones, the game cuts through a solid slice of all the demographics. Yes, we did focus on making it accessible to casual gamers, but we did provide a lot of hard core content. It all goes back to the Blizzard philosophy of easy to learn, hard to master. If you don’t have the hard core content there, you’re not going to keep the casual player.
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The history of video game music
Wikipedia has a nice write-up on the history of computer and video game music, from 8-bit machines and early sampling to pre-recorded and streaming music. From the article: “The decision to include any music into a video game meant that at some point it would have to be transcribed into computer code by a programmer, whether or not the programmer had musical experience… Composers who made a name for themselves with their software include Koji Kondo (Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda), Koichi Sugiyama (Dragon Quest), Rob Hubbard (Monty On the Run), Hirokazu Tanaka (Metroid and Kid Icarus), Martin Galway (Times of Lore), Hiroshi Miyauchi (Out Run), Nobuo Uematsu (Final Fantasy), and Yuzo Koshiro (Ys).”
How important is music to the video game experience, and what are some of the most memorable game soundtracks that come to your mind?
See also: Gamespot: A brief timeline of video game music
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Why I Love and Hate Dead Rising
Dead Rising is just nutso fun. It’s like I feel about Table Tennis, but with buckets of blood and the occasional garden sheer decapitation. But all is not right in the Garden of the Dead. Here’s two things I love about the game, and two things I hate about it.
Hate:
Otis: If that fucking security guard chastises me one more time for having the effrontery to cut him off in one of his rambly non sequiturs on the two-way merely because a horde of the undead are about to eat my kidneys, I will go all chainsaw and shovel on his ass. Let’s put this shit in perspective Otis, you’re a god damn security guard hiding out behind a door that you decided to weld shut. I’m a guy using a fucking Frisbee to beat back the undead. I know it must get lonely, but deal!
Saves: I’m sorry, but sometimes I’m too busy biking around the mall de-heading zombies with a Nine Iron to stop and use the bathroom, even if that is the only reasonable way for me to save the game. And I’m sorry, visiting Otis in the security room just isn’t going to happen. He’s too damn clingy.
Love:
Art: Spending way too much time trying to pop children’s masks over the rotting heads of the undead without losing my fingers. Then standing back and taking pictures of the slow and the dead as they fall over each other because they can’t see anymore.
Play: Dressing up in a Mega Man helmet and grabbing a Mega Man Power Gun toy and then jumping in front of a bazillion zombies and unloading nerf balls into their corpsey faces. DIE!
Illinois Ordered to Pay Half a Mill to ESA
This one got me belly laughing: The State of Illinois has been told that they have to pay the video game industry more than half a million dollars for being chowderheads. Technically, “chowderhead” doesn’t enter into the ruling handed down by Judge Matthew F. Kennelly, but you know he was thinking it.
Kennelly, United States District Judge for the Northern District of Illinois, handed down a permanent injunction halting the implementation of the new anti-video game law and ordered the state to pay the ESA their attorney fees.
If controlling access to allegedly ‘dangerous’ speech is important in promoting the positive psychological development of children, in our society that role is properly accorded to parents and families, not the State.”
And their was much rejoicing in the ESA:
“Judge Kennelly’s rulings send two irrefutable messages - not only are efforts to ban the sale of violent video games clearly unconstitutional, they are a waste of taxpayer dollars,” said Douglas Lowenstein, president of the ESA, the trade group representing U.S. computer and video game publishers. “The sad fact is that the State of Illinois knew this law was unconstitutional from the beginning. Taxpayers have a right to know that over half a million of their dollars and countless government hours were thrown away in this fruitless effort.”
Hit the jump for the full press release, but be prepared to set aside at least one minute and twenty seconds for belly laughing. You might want to warn your pod mates.
Washington, D.C. (August 10, 2006) - The State of Illinois must pay the video game industry $510,528.64 in attorney’s fees for its unconstitutional effort to enact a law banning the sale of violent video games, Judge Matthew F. Kennelly, United States District Judge, Northern District of Illinois, ruled yesterday.
“Judge Kennelly’s rulings send two irrefutable messages - not only are efforts to ban the sale of violent video games clearly unconstitutional, they are a waste of taxpayer dollars,” said Douglas Lowenstein, president of the ESA, the trade group representing U.S. computer and video game publishers. “The sad fact is that the State of Illinois knew this law was unconstitutional from the beginning. Taxpayers have a right to know that over half a million of their dollars and countless government hours were thrown away in this fruitless effort.”
“I am very disappointed that the state of Illinois has to pay these fees for what was such a clearly unconstitutional law from the start,” said Senator Cullerton, Illinois 6th District State Senator. “When I spoke against the law in Springfield, I predicted we would have to pay legal fees. The amount ordered paid to the plaintiffs by Judge Kennelly doesn’t even count the substantial fees the STATE will have to pay its own lawyers.”
The fees will be paid to the Entertainment Software Association, Video Software Dealers Association and Illinois Retail Merchants Association, plaintiffs in the lawsuit. In December, 2005, the United States District Judge for the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois handed down a permanent injunction halting the implementation of the new state law that would restrict video game sales. In his decision declaring the law unconstitutional, Judge Matthew S. Kennelly forcefully sided with the ESA, writing, “If controlling access to allegedly ‘dangerous’ speech is important in promoting the positive psychological development of children, in our society that role is properly accorded to parents and families, not the State.”
“As we said from the outset of this debacle and repeatedly since then, instead of squandering taxpayers’ money on frivolous lawsuits and attempting to enact clearly unconstitutional laws, we encourage policymakers to focus their resources on a cooperative effort with industry, retailers, parent groups and health groups to work together to educate parents about the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) ratings and content descriptors, and the parental controls available in all next generation consoles to help parents make sound choices about the games their kids play,” said Lowenstein.
The ESA is the U.S. association dedicated to serving the business and public affairs needs of the companies publishing interactive games for video game consoles, handheld devices, personal computers, and the Internet. ESA members collectively account for more than 90 percent of the $7 billion in entertainment software sales in the U.S. in 2005, and billions more in export sales of entertainment software. For more information about the ESA, please visit www.theESA.com.
PSP price to drop to $149 this holiday season?
Filed under: Sony PSP, Strategy, Business
Chris Morris from CNN/Money explores the possibility of a PSP price drop this holiday season. Recent PSP stockpilings suggest that gamers could see a $50 reduction in price later this year bringing Sony’s first portable game machine down to a cool $149.
While the PSP has shipped 20 million units in comparison to Nintendo’s selling of 21 million, Morris believes the real issue is as follows: “While the DS has been on the upswing, thanks to commercially and critically successful games such as Brain Age (which has sold more than 4 million copies worldwide), Nintendogs and New Super Mario Brothers, the PSP has not had a game truly capture the gaming world’s attention since the release of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories last October.”
Though we loves us some price drops, if Sony wants to move PSP units (and I don’t mean just shipping them), better to develop unique content in the form of must-have games than merely drop prices. I’ve heard the N-Gage is dang cheap right now.
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What Are You Playing This Weekend?
It’s Friday. Time to slough off the crackling dead skin of the corporate drone and be reborn as a nascent gamer, dripping with the fluid of enthusiasm.
Usually, I sort of do this post and ramble on about what games I’ll be playing. But I doubt I’ll be playing any this weekend: I’m galavanting off to the Netherlands early next week, and there’s fungus in the apartment that needs scraping, lest it overtake my house while I’m gone.
The extent of my gaming may very well be practicing my more bitching licks on Guitar Hero. I’m bringing it as a host gift to my friend in Rotterdam, and I have visions of impressing my friend’s constabulary of attractive female drop-bys by an impromptu, bad-ass acing of “Take It Off” on Expert.
You?
Dead Rising humor: I hate you, Otis
Filed under: Culture, Microsoft Xbox 360, Action, Online
Here’s a little bit of comedy for Friday, courtesy of Something Awful. For those of you who have played the game, you know of the security guard Otis. He’s the guy who gives you a transmitter — quite possibly the biggest mistake you can make. Otis will provide you with “scoops,” which are essentialy the side missions of the game.
However, it seems that Otis only calls you when you being swarmed by a group of zombies, and when he calls you cannot attack (as you are holding the phone while the text is displayed on the screen below). Doing so will hang up on Otis, but no worries — he’ll call back. “Don’t hang up on me,” he says, “it’s rude.” Way to be understanding there, Otis, you fu …
… you know, we’ll save the rant for Something Awful. It’s pretty funny, so click on the link and enjoy.
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May The Mass Effect Be With You
Bioware’s Mass Effect really looks like something to get excited about. I checked out the game behind closed doors. The game is talky, but boasts this really inventive system that lets players choose what they are going to say and keep a naturally flowing conversation at the same time.
1Up’s Luke Smith caught up with BioWare and pinned Project Manager Casey Hudson until he cried “uncle.” Luke then forced some intriguing details about the upcoming space title, including what the heck Mass Effect means.
Inside the game universe, mass effect is a newly-discovered (for humans anyway) physics phenomenon that has properties along the lines of other physics forces such as gravity and electromagnetism…
In the game, similar to the way some creatures in the real world can sense or apply electromagnetism (like sharks and electric eels), some people have a natural ability to sense and control the ‘mass effect’ field.
Luke correctly compares this to the Force speech Alec Guinness gives in Star Wars. Jedi mumbo jumbo or not, this game still looks promising.
More Here [1Up]
CES Getting Back into Gaming?
It looks like CES is the latest expo hoping to profit off of the demise of E3 as we know it. the Consumer Electronics Association, which runs the show, are forming an advisory committee to “solicit gaming industry feedback and explore the viability of a West Coast event in late spring 2007 focused on the gaming and entertainment marketplace.
“Since ESA decided to eliminate the E3 event in its known format, we have been deluged with inquiries on whether we could fill the tradeshow needs of smaller video entertainment companies,” said Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of CEA. “Our executive board met yesterday and unanimously asked staff to explore ways that we can help the gaming community.”
Added Shapiro, “The Consumer Electronics Association believes that tradeshows are the most viable means for reaching a market as they serve smaller companies and entrepreneurs who need access to media, buyers and investors. Our board, association and events are committed to growing the industry - in fact nearly 80 percent of our members are companies with annual sales of under $10 million.”
I wonder if the ESA is starting the realize the magnitude of their mistake yet?
GDC Needs Some Mobile Geniuses
The GDC Mobile Conference is looking for people to present lectures, roundtables and panel sessions at next year’s mobile dealymabob.
The two-day event kicks off on March 5 at San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center North, during the week of the Game Developers Conference, or as I like to call it: E3.
The theme for the Mobile convention is “Take Control” so if you’re interesting on getting all yappy in front of a bunch of people make sure you stick to the subject. Hit the jump for the tracks they are looking to fill.
They are seeking submissions for the following tracks:
3D & Programming
Audio
Deals & Distribution
Game Design
Planning Ahead
Production
World Tour of Mobile Innovations 2007
