New bundle deals and one of its strongest Q4 line-ups will make Xbox 360 the best selling console in Europe, Microsoft told MCV.
The firm has dismissed the need to follow Nintendo and Sony by reducing Xbox 360’s price or developing new-look hardware. The platform holder says its line-up of games – including Gears of War 3, Forza 4 and Halo: Anniversary – will realise its dream of being No.1 across Europe
“We certainly think the line-up is strong, and we will continue to partner and work with key retailers across Europe to drive the right value for the right package for the right time,” Robin Burrowes, Xbox LIVE marketing manager for EMEA, told MCV.
“We have done that historically, where we do a number of bundles and deals. Those sort of bundles and deals will be part of how we get to that No.1 position.
“We are also pretty bullish about getting to that No.1 position on the strength of our blockbuster games, with things we are launching like Gears and Forza.“
And we are working really closely with a number of third-party publishers on games such as Modern Warfare 3, FIFA 12 and Battlefield 3. These big, big titles are coming in the next few months. There’s certainly going to be a lot of attention in that traditional space.
“Then we look at the second wave of Kinect titles, like Kinect Sports 2 and Dance Central 2.
“Selfishly from an Xbox Live point of view, a lot of those Kinect games have far better Xbox Live capabilities. It all gives us a strong sense of confidence that we can get to that No.1 position.”

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/block...to-no-1/083807
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Sony's Jack Buser believes the redesign of PlayStation Home will kick-start the growth of free-to-play business models on consoles.
In an interview with IndustryGamers, the PlayStation Home director explained that many of the games planned for therevamped service will use the sort of monetisation methods commonly found on the web and social networks.
"Many of the games are free-to-play or freemium," he said. "You can beat the whole game if you want and never spend a dime, but we will sell weapon upgrades, armour upgrades, enhancements, etc., as a series of micro-transactions."
The advantage of Home is that it can also leverage the power of the PlayStation 3 hardware to offer more complex and immersive games than those normally associated with free-to-play.
"It's using the most cutting edge and creative business models that so many sessions at GDC are all about, while also giving a gameplay experience that's very much PlayStation - high definition, 3D, online multiplayer, action packed."
So far, Microsoft and Nintendo have failed to show enthusiasm for bringing free-to-play games to their consoles, and Buser sees Home as an opportunity for Sony to break new ground.
"I believe it's going to be viewed as a turning point in the industry where we finally started to see these business models from the web actually take hold on consoles," he said.
"It's a huge differentiator for the PlayStation 3. You could not build these types of games on other consoles because they don't have a platform like Home."
Home also offers a solution to the rising cost of development on console platforms. Buser claims that a team of 6 to 10 people can build a "full-on game that looks like a console game" using Lua programming language in around 6 months.
"And it's monetizing immediately," he adds.
"I'm a big games historian and read lots of books on game history. If you fast forward 10 years, it is my personal belief that games will look a lot more like what's going on in PlayStation Home than what they typically look like today."
Home currently has 23 million registered users. The redesign will launch this autumn.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ay-on-consoles
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Steve Jobs has stepped down from the position of CEO of Apple.
The decision was announced yesterday in an open letter released to the "Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community."
"I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's CEO, I would be the first to let you know," Jobs writes. "Unfortunately, that day has come."
Jobs named current COO Tim Cook as his successor, and requested that he be allowed to remain, "Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee."
Cook joined Apple in 1998, and was appointed to COO in 2005. He has been influential in streamlining the company's production processes and supply chain, closing factories and warehouses worldwide to significantly increase its profit margins.
"I believe Apple's brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role," Jobs continues.
"I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you."
Since Jobs' return to Apple in 1998 he has been instrumental in its rapid growth, presiding over innovations like the iPod, the iPhone and the App Store, and kick-starting the burgeoning tablet market with the iPad.
Earlier this month, Apple briefly overtook Exxon as the most valuable company in the world. In May, it was named the world's biggest brand.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...s-ceo-of-apple
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Valve boss Gabe Newell wants Steamworks integration built into the Xbox version of Counter Strike: Global Offensive, but has said that Microsoft must relax its restrictions on the service first.
Steamworks integration, including PC/PS3 cross-platform play, was included in the PS3 version of Valve's last game, Portal 2, but was absent from the Xbox version. Newell believes that Microsoft's acceptance of Steamworks is vital to achieve platform parity with future valve games.
"We certainly can deliver a lot of value to customers to the degree to which we have those capabilities," Newell told Eurogamer.
"The PS3, obviously we made a lot more progress with that. The PS3 customers of Portal 2 are going to start to see the benefits of that with Portal 2 DLC coming out in September. So we'd really like to be able to do that for Xbox customers as well."
Whilst the initial debut of Steamworks on console was marred by the hacking scandal which brought the PlayStation Network to its knees on the day of Portal 2's release, Newell is confident that it improves customer experience.
"The main thing is having Microsoft get comfortable with it and let us do it," Newell explained.
"Right now, there's a huge amount of updates and free content we've been able to deliver to people who have The Orange Box that we haven't been able to deliver to the Xbox because of the restrictions that have been placed on us on Xbox Live.
"We'd love to see those relaxed. Other developers on the PS3 are starting to benefit from Sony's more open approach. Hopefully that will help Microsoft see that's a good strategy for making customers happy, that the barbarians won't tear down the walls of Xbox and turn it into some chaotic wasteland."
One possible motivation for Valve is trying to engage customers with its fledgling microtransaction store, powered by the proprietary Steam Wallet. It is this system which Valve has been using to monetise the now free-to-play Team Fortress 2 on PC, allowing player trading and store-bought purchases. Whether the company has a similar model in mind for Counter Strike is unclear, but Sony has already set a precedent for free-to-play titles with its exclusive EVE Online tie-in from CCP, Dust 514.
"Let's just say that with Sony at least they have policies that allow us to build the game the way we want," CCP CTO Halldor Fannar told E3 in June. "That is one of the reasons why we've gone with PSN.
"Sony allows us to use our systems. Microsoft has Xbox Live. They're very strict on that. There are a lot of issues we run into. It may be a basic thing people don't realise, but with Dust and Eve on Sony's network, we can allow them to chat together. Voice chat, text chat, that's all one world.
"One of the reasons for the partnership with Sony is because they're opening up new ways to do these things. We're going to be managing most of it. We're using PlayStation just for credentials, stuff like that. Then it's all our stuff.
"With our agreement with Sony they seem to be fine with our three month expansion cycle. They've been looking at the MMO space for a while, trying to understand why something like that hasn't still happened on the console. They're coming to terms with it. There are certain things they have to relax just to allow these things to function."
Counter Strike: Global Offensive will be playable to the public for the first time in Europe at theEurogamer Expo at Earls Court in London, 22-25 September, 2011.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...gration-on-xbl
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The 3DS sold 105,639 units in the week following its price cut, Andriasang reports.
In the week running from August 15 to August 21, Nintendo's handheld outsold every other hardware format combined.
However, this still marks a significant drop in performance from the previous week's total of 196,077 units.
The PlayStation 3's ¥5,000 price cut also took effect last week, but the system experienced a relatively small increase in sales, from 20,239 units to 29,666 units.
Earlier this week, Nintendo confirmed that it would hold a conference for media, investors and analysts on September 13, just before the start of the consumer-focused Tokyo Game Show.
Rumours surrounding the announcement indicated that the focus of the conference will be a redesign of the 3DS hardware.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...wing-price-cut
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Mobile gaming network OpenFeint is launching a single sign-on system for social developers on iOS.
OpenFeint's OFUID is intended to replace Apple's UDID, which the company intends to phase out with the introduction of iOS5.
UDID afforded developers a range of benefits, like accessing a user's history, tracking their behaviour, and offering cross promotions. OFUID will carry similar benefits, and remove the need to create proprietary solutions.
"With the deprecation of UDID, social game developers need access to a universal method for identifying and delivering services to their users," said OpenFeint founder and CEO Jason Citron.
"Available to 115 million gamers at launch, OFUID will offer that reach and improve on it by giving users a way to share information with game developers, if they so choose."
OpenFeint will also introduce a supplementary programme that guarantees participating developers 1.5 new installs for every install of Game Channel - an app required for users who wish to enjoy the benefits of the single sign-on.
"Sign-on with OFUID is incredibly flexible and has been designed to reduce sign up friction for games," said added senior vice president of product Ethan Fassett.
"Developers will be able to make sign-on optional at first launch and can display it later if they choose. Game developers will also be able to incentivise the sign-on process, offering users rewards for signing in or setting up accounts."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ign-on-for-ios
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News via http://mobiles.gx-mod.com/modules/ne...p?storyid=9668

wintermute has emerged from these boxes the port of Doom for Nintendo DS and a string of updates to perfect the result. This new version fixes a problem mainly freeze (which occurs when the volume of sound effects SFX was modified) and adds a keyboard when editing the name of backups.


Obviously you will need the original WAD files episodes of Doom (Doom, Doom II, Plutonia, TNT, etc.). Which you want to play, to be placed in the directory of homebrew.

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XePatch is a full patch editor that allows you to edit and compile-compile patches with ease. XePatch Eaton Work is a free and open source. Features Navigation-Simple GUI. A-compiled full patch editor. It allows you to edit the existing patches, add new patches and fixes to remove existing ones. Dashlaunch. Supports Patch-v1 and v2 -Support FreeBoot patches and all patch locations. - Validation characteristics of all text fields to make sure you do not enter data or invalid addresses. Distributed with a Compiler-xenon PPC assembly. Requires: The FULL version of. NET Framework v4.0.

http://x360.gx-mod.com/modules/news/...p?storyid=3497 ...

An entry into this years Neoflash Coding Contest, heres the full details:

Nickname: ds
Project Name: Flyin'
From: Germany
Division: RETRO GAME
Platform: NDS
Original Enter: YES
Support Motion: NO
In last NEO Compo this project have won in the top 10: NO
Download: Attatchment or http://rapidshare.com/files/479426960/flyin1.0.zip

After many issues (downtime) with this website, it seems to work now...

Project description:
A multi-language (currently English and German, depending on User's preferences) 3D game with little in-game manual...
Control a fly, discover the levels, find the green sphere. But make sure you don't collide with walls, objects, etc, as that wouldn't be healthy for the fly... and you would need to start the level again.
Use the touchscreen to rotate the fly (touch, drag into a direction and hold touchpen on the screen), it accelerates by itself. Red spheres will brake the fly on collision, in most levels you migt also use the L and/or R Key to reduce speed, but only for a limited time (see bar at the bottom of the topscreen).
If you want to pause the game, restart the level or return to menu, press START.

Feel free to contact me if you're willing to design some levels (my current tools convert Wavefront OBJ with BMP UV-Mapped textures, so for example with the free Blender), I'm thinking about implementing a load level from file possibility

How to use:
Download...Unzip...Copy...Play...

In theory Flyin' will create the needed folder "/data/flyin", if saving game progress won't work, try to create it manually (tested on R4).

Enjoy!





http://www.neoflash.com/forum/index....ic,7132.0.html

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