Every day hundreds of new apps make their debut on the App Store, and hundreds more are updated or reduced in price. We have sifted through the noise and highlighted those select few that might be worth your attention.
E3-Week Highlights
Last week’s E3, while plenty of fun, left little time for keeping an eye on the App Store. But rest assured your resident mobile game expert is back, well-rested and once again ready to bring you the full scoop on all of the day’s App Store hotness. In the interest of starting fresh, today’s update will strictly focus on today’s news only. Anyone interested in what happened in iOS-land last week should check out highlights like Ichi, Catapult King,Uplink and Adventure Time.
Game Debuts
Euro Soccer – ($1.99)
First Touch Publishing is back with another serious soccer sim. The company seems determined to give bigger studios like EA and Gameloft a run for their money when it comes to full-featured soccer on-the-go.
Cardinal Quest – ($1.99)
Cardinal Quest is a classic dungeon crawler with a great old school style and difficulty. Roguelikes are making a big comeback in part thanks to polished indie efforts like this.
Probe the Humans – (Free)
Probe the Humans gives gamers the opportunity to abduct humans, animals, coins and whatever else they can grab. Unlockable space ships and plenty of other power-ups give this one plenty of replay value.
Price Drops
Cubis Creatures – (Free)
Two months after its App Store debut, the latest edition of the popular 3D puzzle Cubis franchise can now be nabbed for free for a limited time.
Boost 2 - (Free)
This popular 3D racer has once again gone free for a limited time. Don’t miss it.
Chuzzle – ($0.99)
Chuzzle, one of Popcap’s original hits, is now available for $0.99 for a limited time. This furry puzzler might not be a home run like some of the company’s later efforts, but it’s still a cute and enjoyable action puzzle game.

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2012/06/1...update-june-11 ...

New firmware is available for PlayStation Vita. Update 1.69 is entirely optional to download, and according to Sony’s Eric Lempel, it’s designed to “[improve] software stability.”
Update 1.69 is 97 MB in size and should download fairly quickly. Remember: if the update is going slowly, you can always attach your Vita to your PlayStation 3, which should let it download faster.
Other than improving “software stability,” does Update 1.69 also open the door for new additions promised soon, such as YouTube and PSone Classic support? Only time will tell!

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2012/06/1...-available-now ...

Sex and the City star Kim Cattrall is the latest celeb to star in Nintendo's TV ads.
Cattrall – who played the promiscuous Samantha Jones in the long-running US sictom – appears in a fresh ad for Super Mario 3D Land, which arrived on retail shelves last November.
The video's references to dressing up (Mario's power up suits) clearly reaches out to female gamers, while the sultry voice is no doubt meant to make men jealous of the virtual plumber.
"There are many in my life, but for a few minutes – or a few hours – I'll always find time for Mario," sighs Cattrall.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/ninte...ampaign/097748 ...

Yes, in terms of what was “in the box” the PS3 has always represented good value.
But Sony has at last conceded – albeit in a roundabout way – that the console’s £425/$600/¥60,000 launch RRP has played a part in its fall from the top of the console race to third place.
After enjoying a market-leading position with both PSOne and PS2, PS3 has been well and truly “beaten” by Wii this time around, and the ongoing strength of Xbox 360 in the US means that, in global sales terms, PS3 is the third most popular machine of this generation.
"It's a lot of factors," SCEA’s hardware marketing boss John Koller told Kotaku when asked why PS3 hadn’t “won” the current generation.
"We've been pleased with overall sales. And also very pleased with just how well then consumers who have purchased PS3s have attached and buy software. We have a very profitable consumer.
"Why we're in third... you know, there's a lot of things that happen in the market that cause sales to occur. I think we've been very staunch in our belief that there's a certain value behind the PS3 and there's certain kinds of games for the PS3 that have stood behind that.
“There's no secret that we opened behind a high price point. And certainly others got a relatively nice head start on us because of that. That's certainly been part of it.
"But we absolutely have no regrets. This has been a very good cycle for us, and I think if you ask any publisher they'd say the same thing. It's been good, and we think it does portend good things for the future for PlayStation."
When pressed further on whether PS3 would have sold better at a lower RRP at launch, Koller replied “potentially”.
It shouldn’t be forgotten, of course, that PS3 has still sold a whopping 63m units worldwide. It’s hard to categorise that as anything other than a success.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/sony-...-finish/097791
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US analyst Michael Pachter believes that Nintendo must price the Wii U below $300 – that translates to £190 – if it is to succeed at retail.
Ideally, he told CVG, he’d like to see it priced at $250 or less. That would mean a highly unlikely £161 in the UK.
MCV’s understanding is that it is the price of the Wii U GamePad that will prevent the machine selling for such a price. Indeed, the decision on whether or not to include two GamePads in the launch SKU – and how to price them separately on the High Street – is going to be pivotal.
Pachter also delivered a less than impressed assessment of Nintendo’s E3 presentation, though does speak positively of the Wii U hardware itself.
"Nintendo is intent upon repeating their success with the Wii," he said.
"While I agree that the Wii U controller is sufficiently novel and different from traditional controllers, I am not sure that there is a killer app that will drive Wii U adoption the way Wii Sports did for the Wii.
"At E3 I was not particularly impressed with many of the games, and in particular found Sing baffling. I don't understand why I need a tablet to read Karaoke words rather than reading the words on the TV screen instead."

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/wii-u...succeed/097795 ...

Apple has revealed a new MacBook Pro notebook, with a Retina display containing over three million more pixels than an HDTV.
With a 15 inch screen boasting pixel density of 2,880 x 1,800 - or 220 pixels per inch - Apple CEO Tim Cook claims the new MacBook Pro "pushes the limits of performance and portability like no other notebook… [It's] the most advanced Mac we have ever built."
That Retina display is, of course, great news for games. Diablo IIIwill be among the first to be updated to take full advantage of the machine's resolution, with senior vice president Phil Schiller promising the audience at Apple's WWDC 2012 event in San Francisco last night "a gaming experience with this resolution that you have never seen before."
The challenge now, of course, is for other developers to follow Blizzard's lead and update their games and apps to take advantage of the new resolution. VentureBeat reports that Apple has been working directly with developers to help them do so.
The machine is more than powerful enough to run games at Retina resolution, with Intel Ivy Bridge processors - which are 60 per cent more powerful than Intel's last-gen equivalents - plus Nvidia 650M graphics chips, up to 16GB of RAM, and SSD storage.
Not is this the most powerful Mac that Apple has ever built, it arguably sets a new standard for gaming - though with prices beginning at $2,199 it's clearly something of a niche proposition.
During the event, Apple also announced that its iOS gaming network Game Center will be added to Mac OS X when the latest version, Mountain Lion, launches next month.

http://www.edge-online.com/news/appl...na-macbook-pro ...

Nintendo is to cut its employees' summer bonuses by 20 per cent after poor performance this year, according to a report.
Japanese business outlet Nikkei claims that the console giant has taken the action after declining demand for Wii hardware and software.

The decision to make cuts comes despite the Nintendo 3DS reportedly shifting more than 13.5 million units worldwide.
Executives at the company are also set to have their bonuses slashed, although it is not clear by how much.
In April Nintendo reported its first annual loss since entering the console market, posting a net loss of £329 million for the 12 months ending March 31st.

http://www.develop-online.net/news/4...-bonuses-by-20 ...

For all of you that found yourselves wanting to use Kinect to control something but had no idea what to do with it, or how to get the data from it, you’re in luck. Kineticspace is a tool available for Linux/mac/windows that gives you the tools necessary to set up gesture controls quickly and easily. As you can see in the video below, it is fairly simple to set up. You do you action, set the amount of influence from each body part (basically telling it what to ignore), and save the gesture. This system has already been used for tons of projects and has now hit version 2.0.

http://hackaday.com/2012/06/11/kinet...nect-projects/ ...

For being more than 20 years old, [Max]‘s old brick-sized Game boy still has a lot of life left in it. Even though his Game Boy was still in good condition, there were a few vertical lines in the display, making it a perfect candidate for a restoration. While he had his DMG-01 open on his work bench, [Max] also decided to put in a back light.
After researching the blank vertical lines in his Game Boy’s display, [Max] learned the problem was probably a loose solder connection. [Max] whipped out his tri-wing screwdriver, disassembled his classic plastic friend, took a soldering iron to the LCD’s flex connector, and fixed the problem easily.
Since his Game Boy was already taken apart, he decided to add a 3rd party backlight. The installation was a snap – [Max] only removed the reflective LCD backing and shoved an edge-lit backlight panel into the Game Boy.
If you’re wondering why anyone would still be interested in a 20+ year-old Game Boy, the DMG-01 is highly regarded in the chiptune scene when paired with Little Sound DJ, in part because of the noisy amplifiers and unique sound. Anything that keeps these wonderful machines out of the garbage is alright in our book, so we’ve got to hand it to [Max] for putting together this wonderful tutorial.

http://hackaday.com/2012/06/11/addin...ame-boy-brick/ ...