Just one week after revealing the nominees of the E3 2010 Game Critics Awards, the numbers are in and the big winner is ... Nintendo's look-ma-no-glasses 3D handheld, the 3DS. But wait, the 3DS is just the Best of Show and Best Hardware winner! If you're looking for software, look no further than id Software's look-ma-crab-hands mutant-infested shooter, Rage, which took home the most awards in the show: Best Console Game, Best Action Game and Special Commendation for Graphics.

If you think it must've been frustrating to be either Sony or Microsoft, both of which were busy showing off their newest motion-sensitive gadgetry, you'd be mostly right. Microsoft did have one small consolation prize: Dance Central, Harmonix's look-ma-no-coordination dancing game for Kinect, took the well-deserved Best Original Game and Best Motion Simulation prizes. None of Microsoft's first-party Kinect efforts and no PlayStation Move games, first-party or otherwise, made the list.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/07/06/3d...ritics-awards/ ...

Hulu has confirmed that PS3 user will NOT need to be PlayStation Plus subscribers in order to get Hulu Plus on their console.

Techie investigators digging through the source code of the Hulu Plus page found instructions on how to get the service up and running on Sony's console. Within that tutorial it apparently specifically said: "Note: you must be a subscriber of the Playstation Plus Network."

Hulu and Sony were staying hush at the time, but Hulu has now come out to confirm: "The Playstation Plus service is only a requirement during the preview period."

Hulu is currently in its beta-style preview period, although as Joystiq reports, the Hulu App is not available to every PS Plus subscriber.

Hulu says: "Once the preview period ends you should be able to download the Hulu Plus app but that will still require the Hulu Plus subscription. Right now we are limiting the number of users but Hulu Plus will be launching to the public very soon so stay tuned."

Hulu is a US-only TV streaming service. It's expected to go live to the PS3 public some time this month.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com...VG-General-RSS ...

3D simulations of renowned Nintendo 64 games have appeared on YouTube. They offer non-E3 goers a glimpse of what the 3DS can do.

Games demoed include Mario Kart 64, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Excite Bike 64, Starfox 64 and Mario 64.

You'll need a pair of the old coloured 3D glasses to see what Nintendo is trying to create. You can change the 3D output of the video by clicking the "3D" button on the bar below the picture.

Note that the 3D glasses you stole from the cinema when you went to watch Up! or Avatar do not work. I've just tried.

Also remember that the 3DS offers a 3D picture without the need for glasses. That's one of the reasons Eurogamer was bowled over by Nintendo's new handheld at E3 last month.

Check-out our hands-on impressions of the 3DS for a detailed analysis.

The 3DS will be released in all major territories before April 2011.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/n6...ate-3ds-screen ...

Play.com's November 2010 release date for Dragon Ball (3DS), which had suggested the 3DS handheld would be out this year, is "estimated", the online retailer has told Eurogamer.

According to Play.com, Dragon Ball (3DS) is due out on 19th November 2010 in the UK, which suggests the 3DS console will be released on or before that date.

However, Play.com told Eurogamer the online retailer has only "heard that's the estimated release date".

Play.com wouldn't reveal what organisation it heard the estimated date from, be it Dragon Ball publisher Namco Bandai or 3DS manufacturer Nintendo.

Play.com also lists Gundam (3DS) with a 25th March 2011 release date.

Nintendo hasn't priced or dated the 3DS. Indeed Nintendo has repeatedly dismissed recent retailer 3DS pricing and release date listings as "pure speculation".

However, Nintendo of America's Reggie Fils-Aime has gone on the record to say the handheld will be out in all "major markets" by 1st April 2011.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/pl...te-an-estimate ...

tekgoblin sends news of the latest iPhone 4 glitch being reported in user forums and elsewhere: the phone's proximity sensor seems not to be detecting nearby faces, as it is designed to do, in order to deactivate the screen during a call. The result is often unintended input.
"On the iPhone 3GS, the proximity sensor was located to the left of the earpiece speaker. But that space on iPhone 4 is now occupied by the front-facing camera, and the proximity sensor is above the earpiece. What's not clear is whether the iPhone 4 screen's misbehavior is due to the new location of the sensor, or it's because Apple tweaked the sensor's responses in [some] way."

http://apple.slashdot.org/story/10/0...iPhone-4-Issue ...

quickOnTheUptake writes in to update the story of foul play in Apple's App Store, which we talked over yesterday. The Next Web, which broke the story, now provides evidence of rampant App Farms used for theft in the store. Here is a summary of the problems TNW has seen, which include large-scale breakins of the App Store accounts of users worldwide. Apple has responded to the initial reports, has disabled the account of the initially fingered rogue developer, and has called on those whose accounts were misused to change their password and credit card. Both TNW and Engadget, at least, believe the problems go far deeper than Apple is admitting.

http://apple.slashdot.org/story/10/0...ples-App-Store ...

Analyst Wedbush Securities has altered its predictions for the videogame industry over the next few years, following a fairly troubling set of figures from the most recent NPD results.

Michael Patchter's outfit had previously predicted 5 per cent growth for 2010, but Wedbush now claim sales will remain flat for the rest of this year.

However, its outlook for 2011 and beyond is more rosy. Patchter forecast 13 per cent growth next year, up from his original estimate of 7 per cent. 2012 and 2013 remain unchanged at 8 per cent and 6 per cent respectively.

"We adjusted our forecast downward for 2010 due to disappointing year-to-date results and our new belief that console price cuts later this year are highly unlikely," said Pachter.

"The primary driver for sales growth in 2011 – 2013 is the introduction of the Nintendo 3DS, which we expect to spur hardware and software sales dramatically for the next two years."

Wedbush expect DS sales to decline this year, but believe the release of the 3DS will push up DS range software prices to an average of $29.

The forecast also predicted price-cuts from all three current-generation home consoles, leading to sales increases of 15 per cent for the Xbox 360, 21 per cent for the PS3 and 5 per cent for the Wii.

Additionally, the release of highly-anticipated Blizzard products World of Warcraft: Cataclysm and Starcraft will push up PC sales by 11 per cent, claimed Wedbush.

Pachter and Wedbush "continue to believe that no new consoles (other than the Wii HD) will be introduced in the next four years." However, the report did not contain predictions for Microsoft's Kinect or Sony's PlayStation Move.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...t-says-wedbush ...

Mark Rein, vice-president of Unreal and Gears of War studio Epic Games, claims the industry should not "discount" Kinect and Move. Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz at last week's GameHorizon conference, he stressed that it was early days for Microsoft and Sony's motion controllers.

"Wait until you see what people are going to do with these things," he said. "We're involved tangentially in both technologies actually. The Kinect adventures game is Unreal Engine 3 and that sorcery game that Sony has, that's also Unreal Engine 3. So we have Sony and Microsoft, first-party, both doing cool things with our technology and I wouldn't discount anything."

However, he claimed that Kinect may be just the first move in a wider motion control gambit by Microsoft.

"There's no doubt in my mind that Kinect is very much an experiment to see where they should go with this stuff. I mean, this device [a prototype Android tablet] has a camera. If you had the rest of the Kinect sensors on here, this'd be great. You could prop this down on a little stand, and play Dance Central right here. What would be wrong with propping this on the table and standing here in an environment with friends and doing a dance?"

Having also spent much of the interview endorsing mobile devices such as the iPhone and iPad, he claimed the future of gaming was not heading down separate paths.

"I don't think you should draw the conclusion that these things mean you can't have Kinect or Move. It's nothing to do with that. You could have controllers for these. You could eventually have all kinds of experiences on portable environments. It's just a computer. This is just another kind of computer. Just like your Xbox is a computer, your PC is a computer...

"Who knows, maybe the future of Kinect is on your laptop? In fact I think that Microsoft already publicly said that they were going to do something with motion tech cameras on laptops. One of the things that they can do is recognise your face. There are other portions of Move and Kinect that I think have been a little bit overlooked right now, that will eventually come into play."

Having referred to Move's raygun-like Shooting Attachment as "absolutely brilliant", Rein was then coy as to his preferred favourite motion controller.

"Don't believe everybody's nonsense about what one thing can do versus the other," he said. "You can have that with Kinect, you can have a gun. If you had a gun with a distinct look to it, even a shape, or a light on the end or something, Kinect would recognise that device just as well as Move can. Maybe even better."

The outspoken VP also stressed that, though much of the industry was in a state of some alarm due to declining hardware and software sales, he was hugely optimistic about gaming's future.

New payment models and increasing mobile hardware power would soon lead to "$20 million iPhone games," he claimed. "I'm just generally excited about the industry as a whole, so many opportunities."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...-an-experiment ...

While Microsoft may be counting on Kinect appealing to the mass market crowd with its motion controls, family games and exercise apps, analyst firm DFC Intelligence says it feels the device "is somewhat limited" and will "struggle" to broaden 360's horizons beyond its hardcore following.

"The Xbox 360 clearly needs to diversify beyond the core first-person shooter audience. At E3 it was clear that Kinect is not designed for the hard-core game consumer. Microsoft is putting almost all its eggs into the Kinect as a way to appeal to the 'casual' consumer and expand its user base," says a DFC report.

"Unfortunately, based on what we have seen, DFC continues to feel that Microsoft is going to struggle to expand beyond its core audience," it adds. "The Kinect technology is cool, but in practical terms we feel it is somewhat limited. There are questions about how the technology captures non-lateral movement, and there is the lack of complex control options."

It notes that a lack of complex controls isn't a deal breaker for the line of simple games MS has shown for it, but there are other issues. "Almost every time Microsoft has tried to emulate successful entertainment products they have failed," says the report.

"Of course, the biggest exceptions have been some of their work in PC gaming prior to the Xbox and then the Xbox platform itself. However, in both these cases the appeal was to a fairly high-end niche of dedicated gamers."

It later goes on to add: "With MSN and casual games Microsoft was able to attract a fairly large and diverse audience, but these products were free. We don't know the price of the Kinect, but it is definitely not free. An Xbox 360 with a Kinect is likely to cost as much as an annual membership at the local YMCA." Or a fair amount more, we'd say.

Widespread speculation and various retailer postings put Kinect at between £100 and £130.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com...VG-General-RSS ...