Amazon UK are running a great promotion for an xbox 360 250GB with Kinect and more for £258 , heres the details:
You only have until Monday if interested, more details at Amazon UK
...

Makaron Coder Deunan speaks out:

One Graf Chokolo had his house raided by police, and now SONY is apparently seeking to sue him for 1 million Euros.

What exactly do they want from Graf is unclear - at least to me. I'm no lawyer and English is not my primary language so the legal speak confuses me somewhat. The way I understand the issue at hand is that SONY has yet to establish any proof of guilt, and the quoted 1 million is just their estimate of the damages incurred. I think it's been worded like that on purpose, to discourage anyone from helping Graf in any way. Whether or not he will have to pay anything and how much is yet to be seen.

I don't think it's smart of him to continue releasing stuff right now. Sure, most folks see this as the ultimate **** you directed at SONY, but that's not the real issue here. Problem is, the guy has apparently been court-ordered not to do anything of the sort until the matter is resolved properly. Going against court order is just plain stupid because it's punishable and SONY could even drop the case now and Graf would still have to face charges.

Obviously SONY has the upper hand here. They can hire lawyers and ask for court orders - and this will, in theory at least, shut people up. If the lawyers somehow find a way to sue hackers and win, it's good for SONY. If not, they'll just say "Oh, sorry mate, carry on." - and get away with that. You see, their tactics might simply be to stall, it would take years to clear things up and by that time PS3 will become obsolete. So it's a win for SONY as well, said hackers are unlikely to have the resources to properly fight back and, as I just said, going against a court order is a bit suicidal.

So, we determined that the court order might be just a gag and it's issue unjustified. Don't hate the judge though, he is just doing his job. Sure, these people have their own views as well, and that does affect their actions (even if it's not supposed to), but they are mostly bound by laws. It does take a good knowledge of the law to make a compelling argument and SONY can afford to hire entire teams. A "hacker" will seek the cheapest legal council Though, I must say that Geohot has a good lawyer on his side and can sleep better, but SONY is not yet done with him.

Anyway, I think it's now a bit more clear why I decided to stay off SONY's turf and not, for example, release VMU emulator for PS3 system. Call me a chicken, but do understand that it's not just about SONY and their precious "next-gen" console. I could as easily get sued by SEGA. While reverse engineering of owned hardware is legal, it's pretty much impossible without breaking some software anti-piracy laws. I wrote about that in detail some time ago so just to remind you - it's like with DVDs. You can make a backup copy of the media, in case it gets damaged or something. But to make a copy you have to overcome the copy-protection systems and that's illegal. So, in the end, your right to make a lawful copy is just plain dead.

By the way, I had a good laugh at people who got angry with SONY latest PSN licence/TOS. The wording isn't all that different now, you know, most of the nasty stuff has been there since day one. And you take offence now? Well, I suppose now you actually read the terms. Or at least it has been pointed out to you. Maybe this will improve the awerness in general populace that this stuff is legally binding agreement. Don't bitch about your rights being violated, you accepted this willingly. All your base are belong to us, sucka, mwahahaha.

http://dknute.livejournal.com/37458.html ...

Earlier today our friends at Crunch Gear ran with a story that, while based on a rumor, has sparked an interesting debate about the future of technology as it pertains to the intensifying crackdowns on hacking, jailbreaking, and the larger underlying issue of piracy. According to the report in question, Sony is said to be actively entertaining plans to introduce a so-called "hack-proof" PS3.

Could it be done? Probably. Will it? No clue. But it certainly would appear that hack-proof technology is poised to become a paramount aim of major mobile and gaming tech firms - like Apple. At a time when Sony is spending good money to bring down the man we know as Geohot through the legal system, it's safe to say that companies mean business - more so now than ever - when it comes to curbing piracy and software hacking/modding.


Quote:
Exactly how Sony would make this new PS3 “hack-proof” is anyone’s guess. The fact is there’s no such thing on this planet as “hack-proof,” but that’s not to say Sony couldn’t implement new security measures that would take a long time to circumvent. Let’s not forget that it took nearly four years for the PS3 to be cracked. At the same time, any new “hack-proof” PS3 would naturally attract plenty of attention, so who knows how long it would remain “hack-proof”?
Between the growing anti-piracy lobby attempting to sway the support of lawmakers around the world, to newer and harder to crack software and corresponding technologies, it's evident that life will not be made easy for hackers in the future, even those who don't engage in rampant piracy. While the extent to which companies may ultimately go this year to curb hacking is anyone's guess, the efforts by Sony - no matter the outcome - are clearly poised to set the stage for much bigger anti-hacking battles down the road.

http://modmyi.com/forums/mac-news/75...cy-debate.html ...

A runaway rumor being taken as reality by some today is that the iPad 2 will sport a carbon fiber body shell instead of an aluminum encasing in an effort by Apple to make the tablet lighter and sleeker. But as John Gruber of Daring Fireball cautions, there is no concrete evidence to chalk this feature up as a given in the same way we can assuredly expect a front-facing camera for FaceTime chats on the 2nd-gen iPad.

John Gruber only mentioned in a footnote - yes, in a footnote - that he is “half-sure” about the iPad 2 getting a carbon fiber shell, a persistent suspicion that has lingered practically since the iPad was released one year ago. The actual blog post that started the carbon fiber discussion wasn't even about the removal of the iPad's aluminum shell. Rather, Gruber was aiming to address Engadget's report about there being no retina display on the iPad 2.

In speaking one set of iPad 2 rumors, it appears that another sprouted new legs. But.

http://modmyi.com/forums/ipad-news/7...confirmed.html ...

News via http://www.aep-emu.de/

D2X-XL is an OpenGL-port of Descent II. Supported platforms are Linux, Mac OS X and Windows.


Quote:
v1.15.133
Fixed: The renderer was extremely slow when rendering transparency on low-end graphics hardware (like Intel IGPs) even when using pureD2 mode or turning off shader usage
Improved: Depth buffer reads will now be profiled and automatically disabled if they take too long
Improved: D2X-XL will fall back to alsa if pulse audio cannot be initialized ...

News via http://www.aep-emu.de/

Free Heroes2 Engine is a free implementation of Heroes of the Might and Magic II engine using SDL.


Quote:
SVN - up to r2268

Feb, 16, 2011

+ Added: game: transcribe scroll option
+ Fixed: game: load old format game
+ Fixed: game: hotseat select players

Feb, 10, 2011

+ Added: game: BattleOnly (experimental)

Jan, 22, 2011

+ Fixed: artifact: crystal ball level
+ Added: game: localized maps support, add iconv support
+ Update: Spell::RandAdventure
+ Fixed: game: update shipmaster cursor, upgrade monster button, dialog thievesguild reset cursor, hidden campaign button
+ Update: world: passable objects ...

News via http://www.aep-emu.de/

D2X-XL is an OpenGL-port of Descent II. Supported platforms are Linux, Mac OS X and Windows.


Quote:
v1.15.132
Fixed: The mission download didn´t work reliably and could even hang
v1.15.131
Fixed: Server address information got mixed up when the program queried several servers from a tracker
Improved: Mission download is now done via TCP which is much more reliable than UDP
v1.15.130
Fixed: The game host was flooding the other players with ping requests while waiting for them to join during level transition
Fixed: In multiplayer games, players often took a long time to connect or to enter the next level during level transition
v1.15.129
Fixed: Mines weren´t lit in nostalgia/pureD2 mode
Fixed: The textured automap was available in pureD2 mode
Fixed: Level songs from mods weren´t played when a global playlist was present
Fixed: No secret level songs from mods were played (these should have the name ´slevel##.ogg´, where ´##´ is a two digit, zero padded level number)
v1.15.128
Fixed: A few menu help messages were off, and others were too long w/o line breaks
Fixed: The HUD equipment icons were miscolored in levels that were using another than the default palette
Fixed: When changing the player profile, you could gain access to all the levels the previous player had reached even if you hadn´t reached them yourself
Fixed: Demo recordings taken in levels containing effect objects were broken (effects will intentionally not be displayed during demo playback though)
Fixed: Directed exits didn´t work in a mission´s last level
Fixed: Players were sent to the next level in the level sequence when dieing after destroying the reactor or last boss regardless of any directed exits in the level
Fixed: When a level couldn´t be entered while trying to enter a multiplayer game, the program could crash
Changed: Moved the mission download controls to the miscellaneous options menu
v1.15.127
Fixed: Due to a typo, the ´-enable_freecam´ switch didn´t work
Fixed: The advanced collision detection didn´t work reliably
Improved: You cannot drive parts of the player ship into objects by rotating it around an axis
v1.15.126
Fixed: Errors in robot info data (submodel joint and angle info) could cause program crashes (e.g. in ´Descent: The Enemy Within´)
v1.14.125
Fixed: The update function used an outdated URL to access and download program updates
Fixed: The built-in multiplayer tracker URL was outdated ...

News via http://www.aep-emu.de/

Commander Genius formally known as CloneKeen Plus is an interpreter for the Commander Keen 1-3 Series for Windows and Linux.
It has been released in a new test version.
Download it here.


Quote:
no changelog/notes ...

News via http://www.aep-emu.de/

AGD Interactive have released a remake of the classic game King´s Quest III. You can download the game for Windows and Mac OS. Unfortunately they have not (yet?) ported the game to Linux.


Quote:
King´s Quest III Redux Released
Following in the tradition of enhanced Sierra remakes, we´re proud to present King´s Quest III Redux: To Heir is Human. The game resumes where our previous remake, King´s Quest II: Romancing the Stones, ended. Featuring beautiful storybook artwork, an enchanting musical score, full voice acting, new scenes, quests, characters, and locations to explore, plus a royal serving of adventure, this is AGD Interactive´s most polished remake ever -- a must play! ...