News via Wololo

Two days ago Sony revealed the NGP, PSP’s successor. The NGP is an impressively powerful portable gaming device, that will be available at the end of the year. The device looks awesome, but after giving it some thought, I think I won’t be buying it. Here are a few reasons why:

The browser will suck
The browser on the PSP sucked. It had poor flash support, memory issues, close to no javascript support… All these problems were probably because of the hardware limitations of the PSP itself but…have you seen the internet browser on the ps3? Do you like it? Youtube half works on it, and when it does work, the interface is slow as hell. Sony showed lack of ability to adapt a browser to their devices twice, I don’t see why it would be different this time. Unless they migrate to a “better” browser, maybe using Webkit (Safari), or something based on Chrome.

God knows I hate Apple, but going from the browsing experience on an iPhone/iPad to that of the PSP/PS3 is always extremely painful.

Hopefully the gyroscope + the touch screen will allow for a good “vertical” browsing kind of stuff. Otherwise the wide screen will mean more wasted space on the screen, because most sites won’t provide a “NGP enhanced” version of their site.

It will suck as a Media Player
The PSP and PS3 were advertised as not only gaming devices, but Media Centers. A machine on which you could play your videos and music easily. They both dramatically fail at that.

The psp: proprietary video format (UMD) with region locking, blocking “high def” videos in mp4 format to artificially increase the sales of UMD videos, no DivX/Xvid/ogg/… support, crappy mp3 player (abysmal playlist support, no “random play all my files” support, some perfectly fine mp3 files just won’t play, no freedom to organize your folders as you want, lack of “good” visualization plugins, no ogg support, etc…). In all fairness, one HUGE good point of the PSP mp3 player was that it played mp3s without the need for additional crapware such as iTunes for the iPod. No ebook reader (all smartphones have at least 10 of those now)

The Ps3: region locking, no support for PAL DVDs if you live in a country where NTSC is the norm, no support for divx/xvid/mkv (seriously? At least for the PSP there was the excuse of CPU power and Ram limitations…), region locking, no possibility to skip ads on DVDs/Blu rays, insanely crappy music player (same issues as the psp, bad playlist support, no possibility to play my library randomly, give me winamp dammit), region locking (did I mention this one already?).

Overall, Sony cripples their perfectly good hardware with attempts at pimping their proprietary formats, and their own stores. They don’t provide you with a way to enjoy your media files, but with a way to buy media from them. I expect the NGP to provide “rental, will work for 48h” types of videos. Fine, but clearly not what I want from a “media player”. The offer will be limited to whatever contracts Sony is able to sign, and usually for me as a foreigner in Japan, this will mean I’ll have to deal with a massive amount of pain to get my French or American movies to work.

The NGP probably won’t have a convenient TV output, unless you pay for some super expensive hardware accessory that won’t even give you HD.

It will be expensive.
Sure, we’re all excited now, as this is clearly the most powerful portable device we’ve ever heard of. Except, it will be released in 10 months. In 10 months, will we accept to pay the same price as a smartphone for something that does less?Will you pay a 3G subscription for something that’s not a phone? Technically, the NGP will compete against the 3DS (which will be way cheaper and will have a larger library of games by the end of 2011), tablets (that will handle medias – ebooks, movies, music – way better), and smartphones (on which the GPS allows you to find where you are and where you want to go, rather than what games are being played in Shibuya…).

By the end of 2011, it will be easy to find a 3DS for 200$. Smartphones can go up to 600$ but the price go down when you take a carrier subscriptions. I believe that by the end of 2011, some tablets will have most of the technical specs of the PSP, for a similar price, and less crapware. Sony officials said the NGP would be sold at an “affordable price that’s appropriate for the handheld gaming space”, and my current guess is that it will be more than 400$.

The games will not be as good as you expect, because your expectations will change in 10 months.
Is that me, or does playing a high quality graphics hardcore game make no sense on a 5 inch screen? I’d rather play an awesome game on the PS3(PS4?), in my couch, on my 40 inches TV, than the same game in direct sunlight, in a crowded train, on a 5 inches screen. In general, People who play action games in public areas are disturbing other people, and not even playing in good conditions. Portable gaming for hardcore games is an ersatz ...

News via Wololo

Two days ago Sony revealed the NGP, PSP’s successor. The NGP is an impressively powerful portable gaming device, that will be available at the end of the year. The device looks awesome, but after giving it some thought, I think I won’t be buying it. Here are a few reasons why:

The browser will suck
The browser on the PSP sucked. It had poor flash support, memory issues, close to no javascript support… All these problems were probably because of the hardware limitations of the PSP itself but…have you seen the internet browser on the ps3? Do you like it? Youtube half works on it, and when it does work, the interface is slow as hell. Sony showed lack of ability to adapt a browser to their devices twice, I don’t see why it would be different this time. Unless they migrate to a “better” browser, maybe using Webkit (Safari), or something based on Chrome.

God knows I hate Apple, but going from the browsing experience on an iPhone/iPad to that of the PSP/PS3 is always extremely painful.

Hopefully the gyroscope + the touch screen will allow for a good “vertical” browsing kind of stuff. Otherwise the wide screen will mean more wasted space on the screen, because most sites won’t provide a “NGP enhanced” version of their site.

It will suck as a Media Player
The PSP and PS3 were advertised as not only gaming devices, but Media Centers. A machine on which you could play your videos and music easily. They both dramatically fail at that.

The psp: proprietary video format (UMD) with region locking, blocking “high def” videos in mp4 format to artificially increase the sales of UMD videos, no DivX/Xvid/ogg/… support, crappy mp3 player (abysmal playlist support, no “random play all my files” support, some perfectly fine mp3 files just won’t play, no freedom to organize your folders as you want, lack of “good” visualization plugins, no ogg support, etc…). In all fairness, one HUGE good point of the PSP mp3 player was that it played mp3s without the need for additional crapware such as iTunes for the iPod. No ebook reader (all smartphones have at least 10 of those now)

The Ps3: region locking, no support for PAL DVDs if you live in a country where NTSC is the norm, no support for divx/xvid/mkv (seriously? At least for the PSP there was the excuse of CPU power and Ram limitations…), region locking, no possibility to skip ads on DVDs/Blu rays, insanely crappy music player (same issues as the psp, bad playlist support, no possibility to play my library randomly, give me winamp dammit), region locking (did I mention this one already?).

Overall, Sony cripples their perfectly good hardware with attempts at pimping their proprietary formats, and their own stores. They don’t provide you with a way to enjoy your media files, but with a way to buy media from them. I expect the NGP to provide “rental, will work for 48h” types of videos. Fine, but clearly not what I want from a “media player”. The offer will be limited to whatever contracts Sony is able to sign, and usually for me as a foreigner in Japan, this will mean I’ll have to deal with a massive amount of pain to get my French or American movies to work.

The NGP probably won’t have a convenient TV output, unless you pay for some super expensive hardware accessory that won’t even give you HD.

It will be expensive.
Sure, we’re all excited now, as this is clearly the most powerful portable device we’ve ever heard of. Except, it will be released in 10 months. In 10 months, will we accept to pay the same price as a smartphone for something that does less?Will you pay a 3G subscription for something that’s not a phone? Technically, the NGP will compete against the 3DS (which will be way cheaper and will have a larger library of games by the end of 2011), tablets (that will handle medias – ebooks, movies, music – way better), and smartphones (on which the GPS allows you to find where you are and where you want to go, rather than what games are being played in Shibuya…).

By the end of 2011, it will be easy to find a 3DS for 200$. Smartphones can go up to 600$ but the price go down when you take a carrier subscriptions. I believe that by the end of 2011, some tablets will have most of the technical specs of the PSP, for a similar price, and less crapware. Sony officials said the NGP would be sold at an “affordable price that’s appropriate for the handheld gaming space”, and my current guess is that it will be more than 400$.

The games will not be as good as you expect, because your expectations will change in 10 months.
Is that me, or does playing a high quality graphics hardcore game make no sense on a 5 inch screen? I’d rather play an awesome game on the PS3(PS4?), in my couch, on my 40 inches TV, than the same game in direct sunlight, in a crowded train, on a 5 inches screen. In general, People who play action games in public areas are disturbing other people, and not even playing in good conditions. Portable gaming for hardcore games is an ersatz ...

News via http://www.nintendomax.com/viewtopic.php?t=12895&f=54

Titmouse offers version 0.34 of its Shoot 'em up space for the Wii, " Bolt Thrower ".

See 0:34 - GAME - 29/01/2011

* Added more sounds
* Added probe mines
* Added missile trails
* Added probe mine trails
* Added player ship thruster trail
* Added player collision
* Added blue (ok) to red (overloading) shields
* Added 'Well Done' message once everything (including satellites) are destroyed
* Added 'You are very Dead' message
* Added XML configuration, data used to store graphic positions,sizes, frames & other game data like 'AmountStars'
* Added more types of explosions

http://wiibrew.org/wiki/BoltThrower ...

News via http://www.nintendomax.com/viewtopic.php?t=12895&f=54

Titmouse offers version 0.34 of its Shoot 'em up space for the Wii, " Bolt Thrower ".

See 0:34 - GAME - 29/01/2011

* Added more sounds
* Added probe mines
* Added missile trails
* Added probe mine trails
* Added player ship thruster trail
* Added player collision
* Added blue (ok) to red (overloading) shields
* Added 'Well Done' message once everything (including satellites) are destroyed
* Added 'You are very Dead' message
* Added XML configuration, data used to store graphic positions,sizes, frames & other game data like 'AmountStars'
* Added more types of explosions

http://wiibrew.org/wiki/BoltThrower ...

News via Nmax

Tantric and rodri offering version 1.1.2 of " Wii ™ "media player for the Wii. Successor MPlayer EC, it is recommended to install the IOS 58 prior to use media that is on USB. The update is automatic from the Wii if you have a wireless connection.

Version 1.1.2 has been released along with an updated WiiMC Channel that has better USB compatibility. This release is primarily a patch release, but does have one notable new feature – ext2 support! Full changelog:

* Synced to MPlayer r32815
* Fixed broken audio/subtitle switching
* Fixed “Exception (Alignment)” crash
* Changed from mpg123 to ffmp3 (fixes some audio-related problems)
* Added ext 2/3/4 support
* USB compatibility improvements
* Improved performance (set L2 cache to 64bit)
* Large file (> 4GB) support
* Fixed relative playlist paths
* Paired-singles enhancements (thanks Extrems!)
* Added whitelist IOS - Warning from the Will now appear IF You are not using IOS58 or IOS61
* Disable dvdnav over SMB (it’s too slow!)
* Added Tamil translation (thanks dpandian!)
* Other minor optimizations and bug fixes

http://www.wiimc.org/2011/01/29/vers...1-1-2-released ...

News via Nmax

DrZoidBerg offers version 1.2 of its adaptation of the flash game " BASE jumping "for the Nintendo DS.

Change log (v1.2):

The first demo of playing against others! I have added them in at League 1, when you beat the exam.

Just so you know, you are always the one on the far left.

The CPU's seem perfect, I could only see one bug where if you don't jump or get a false start in League 1, you can still see thier parashoots but it's not that annoying and can be fixed later.

I have not yet added in eye animation for the CPU's but you bearly notice.

http://www.palib-dev.com/forum/index...ic,1098.0.html ...

News via Nmax

First version available for the GameCube's multimedia player " MPlayer EC ", a combination of MPlayer Team of Twiizers and Geexbox .







r648 - January 30, 2011

* Upstream sync. [FFmpeg d33ed7b]
* Enabled several Broadway-specific L2 cache features.
* Added paired single optimized H.264 plane prediction.
* Various minor optimizations.
* Initial GameCube port.

Previous

* Upstream sync. [MPlayer r32724 / FFmpeg r26068]
* Improved performance and quality.
* Added support for mono audio output.
* Added Dolby Surround mixing on any 4/5.1 channels sources.
* Added disc light VU meter.
* Any synchronized Wiimote or connected GameCube controller can now be used.
* Added support for USB keyboards.
* Added hardware analog volume control.
* Added blip.tv playlists.
* Added support for IOS58's USB 2.0 interface.
* Added direct DVD drive access with HW_AHBPROT.
* Extracted DVD encryption keys are now cached on the local storage device.
* Wiimote timeout now depends on the battery level.
* Improved resume accuracy.
* Improved video scaling.
* New VI initialization.
* Added support for the title element of some playlist formats.
* Added support for international text encodings on file systems.
* Cache and memory information have been moved to a new OSD level.
* MPlayer's messages are now available over USB Gecko.
* Removed Nintendo Channel content.
* Deprecated gx_zoom, hor_pos, vert_pos and horizontal_stretch.
* Fixed crash when stopping while using libdvdnav.
* Fixed crash when stopping while a scaled DVD subtitle is displayed.
* Fixed crash related to text subtitles.
* Fixed VP6 decoding.
* Many more bugs fixed.

http://code.google.com/p/mplayer-ce/ ...

News via Nmax

Daid directed " gb4gb "Game Boy Emulator / Game Boy Color / Super Game Boy for Nintendo Wii.



I know the name is very silly, and I should name it something like "gb4wii" or something.

But it's my gameboy emulator. Which has as main highlights:
-Supports Gameboy, Gameboy color and SuperGameboy games.
-Runs up to 4 gameboys side by side!
-Gameboy 1 and 2 are linked with a link cable, so are gameboy 3 and 4.
-This linking works for pokemon trading!

The UI is a bit tricky right now, the Wiimote that clicks on the "load ROM" button is the one associated with that ROM. So if you want to play pokemon red, and pokemon blue at the same time, linked. Then do the following:
-Have wiimote 1 click "load ROM" and select pokemon red.
-Have wiimote 2 click "load ROM" and select pokemon blue.
-Click on "run emulation" with any of the wiimotes.

Just a huge list of 'problems':
-Zelda: Link's awakening seems to be dog slow.
-Speed for other games is to high.
-Supergameboy support isn't perfect, but works ok for pokemon.
-Kirby's dreamland 2 doesn't do anything.
-Sound sometimes has a high pitch in it which should be there.
-Graphics in zelda intro and ninja gaiden shadow (AKA Shadow Warrior, AKA Ninja Ryuukenden) are messed up at a few places.
-No scaling options.
-No button config options.
-No other controller support then wiimote.
-Saves to the same location as the ROM is loaded from.

It isn't finished yet, but posting it here to catch the early bugs and get a few tips about what I should add.

http://forum.wiibrew.org/read.php?12,64060 ...

News via Nmax

Harpet pg- directed " Astronomy , "Information utility on astronomy by date (position of the planets, eclipses, etc ...) fully coded in Lua for Wii with LuaFWii .

This program calculates the position of the sun, planets and moon, eclipses and a starchart for a given date.
It is programmed in LUA and is totaly free.

http://www.harpet-pg.nl/ ...