The recent release of Rei Cho Aniki—a remake of the original homoerotic side-scrolling shooter for the PSP—wasn't cheap. But thanks to the PlayStation Store, cash-strapped importers can have it for a song.

As Siliconera points out today, the digital download of Rei Cho Aniki, via the Hong Kong version of the PlayStation Store, is selling the PSP game for $220 HKD (less than $30 USD). That's about half of what the retail version goes for at 6,040 yen plus import mark ups. Not a bad deal for such a niche shooter.

Setting up a new account for the Hong Kong PlayStation Store is a breeze. While I've personally done that portion of the process, I've yet to actually drop the cash. Siliconera says it can be done with any credit card—no PlayStation Store Ticket required.

This could be a good step in the right direction, bringing import-only titles that are likely never to see the light of day outside of Japan or the rest of Asia to a global audience. More digital downloads, please!

http://kotaku.com/5194312/playstatio...half-the-price ...

Know what little kids love more than playing the Nintendo DS Lite? Playing the DS Lite for long periods of time and holding it close to their face.

To prevent that, there this: the Health Control Game Timer. The ¥3,990 (US$40) doohickey has a timer with settings for 30 minutes, 60 minutes, 90 minutes and 120 minutes. If a player goes over the allotted time, the DS switches off automatically.

There's also a sensor that can gauge how close the player. If the player gets too close, an LED light illuminates, the DS Lite vibrates and makes a beeping noise.

The Health Control Game Timer fits directly in the DS Lite's Game Boy Advance slot. Shame the DSi doesn't have a GBA slot.

http://kotaku.com/5194746/ds-lite-ti...screen-staring ...

Microsoft has announced the upcoming release of Alpine Legend for the Xbox 360. Building upon the established titles of the music game genre, Alpine Legend takes you to the Swiss mountaintops, where you and your friends play up to three Alpenhorns at a time while a fourth yodels along. When you're done playing, you can disassemble the 8-foot horns for easy storage. "Jam with alpine legends like Franz 'The Manz' Lang and Johann Hornbostel. Shake the mountain tops with 100 classic Alphorn tracks including, 'Whose spit is in my horn?' and 'More goat bell (It needs).'"

http://games.slashdot.org/games/09/04/01/1612209.shtml ...

DS Month: As part of the ongoing DS Month on CasualGaming.biz, we’ve spoken to some of the key figures in the UK games industry about their thoughts on Nintendo’s device ahead of its arrival in the UK on April 3rd.
Here, CG.biz talks to Zushi Games’ marketing manager Chris Brown.
CG.biz: Why do you feel the DS has such mass-market appeal, and what has been key to its ability in expanding the industry's customer base?

CB: There are a number of factors involved, such as the Touch-screen & Stylus interface, which makes the console more accessible to a new audience who would maybe feel alienated in the past by an abstract input such as a Joystick and a multitude of buttons.

This coupled with the fact that the initial software line-up and TV advertising strategy had games such as Nintendogs and Brain Training that would appeal to a wider female audience and an older demographic that would not have played games in the past.
This broke down previous perceptions of videogames being a younger male dominated market and opened up the door for your younger sister, mum, dad and even grandparents to take the plunge and have a go.
Since its launch back in 2006, the phenomenal success of the Nintendo DS Lite® worldwide has allowed publishers to create dynamic and creative games reaching much wider target audiences and establishing themselves what is now becoming known as the emerging casual games market!
Nintendo’s foresight, dedication to its brand and strategic positioning of both the DS and Wii consoles, has allowed publishers like ZOO to become more innovative and focused on their business and product development strategies.
At Zoo we continue to look into our New Product Development Strategy and adopting licenses that will attract the mass-market buyers out there for the DS and now DSi platforms.
This year we’ve self funded a number of games, making sure we drive our product development programmes, both in the UK and overseas to target the individuals and families that enjoy gaming In all its varied genres.

For example, take our upcoming licenses; Love Is…, SmileyWorld® and Jelly Belly®, all of which have mass-market appeal across a wide variety of target audiences. From parents, kids to teenagers, there is something for everyone in the ZOO DS and DSi line up this year!
Zoo have the following games based on their new licenses ready for release in the upcoming months.
Love Is…® in bloom – Take control of the popular Love Is…® characters in their first ever videogame outing as they plant, grow and collect flowers to make beautiful bouquets to sell in their flower shop.. Full of the same endearing charm as the original cartoons you get to work on a blossoming relationship as well as growing a thriving business. There are 12 varied and unique arcade-style games to choose from with user-friendly controls using the DS stylus!
SmileyWorld® Island Challenge - Join Smiley and friends in this exciting adventure game. Marooned on a desert island the only way to escape is by completing each of its challenges while avoiding the perils and dangers ahead, and collecting rewards and treasures along the way. With 14 actioned packed games, trophy rewards for replay value and head-to-head 2 player duel mode using the Nintendo DS Wi-Fi technology to keep players of all ages entertained for hours on end!
Jelly Belly®: Ballistic Beans – Now lovers of the Jelly Belly beans brand can indulge themselves in this official licensed video game with 8 thrilling themes and 5 maniacal modes of bean blasting fun and dazzling power-ups aplenty!
Is it pinball? Is it breakout? No! It’s Jelly Belly Ballistic Beans for the Nintendo DS!
Enrichment and diverse game play entertainment is what we are striving for within our products this year and these all hit the nail on the head when it comes to bringing gaming to life on the DS platform.
All 3 licenses combine vibrant visuals with a real sense of fun and entertainment value, to provide a feel-good factor to the individual and family audiences - the whole essence of what casual games should be about!
CG.biz: What is next for the DS? What can the DSi bring to the table that's not currently there?
CB: As a UK publisher the DSi has made the DS more personal and wants to let avid gamers and people into social networking, keep, swap and edit music and photos wherever possible. It also gives publishers the added security from piracy because of the removal of the physical media cart and GBA slots. We’ve welcomed the transitional move to paid-for downloads of demos, entire games and other content, which we’ll also be focusing a great deal in the upcoming year! There is enough onboard memory and a SD card slot to let enthusiasts take full advantage of sharing content too.
The 0.3 megapixel camera is sufficient although we would have liked to have seen this added feature fully integrated with the device for gamers to use and promote their own bespoke ‘user generated’ ...

Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime covered a broad range of topics withe me during our interview at GDC last week. In the first of a series of posts, check out our conversation about all things DS, including his hands-on impressions of the new “Zelda” and his expectations for the DSi gaming market.
***
I conducted the following interview with Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime in his hotel suite in San Francisco last week. I’ve interviewed Fils-Aime several times, which allowed the mood to be light, the banter to be quick and for a lot of ground to be covered.
First, here’s the DS-centric part of our interview:
MTV Multiplayer: What’s the DSi software landscape going to be like once the system is out? Will there be DSi-exclusive games? Will there be DS games that have DSi-exclusive features?
Reggie Fils-Aime, president, Nintendo of America: The short answer is “Yes.” There’s going to be both. Our expectation is that most of the content will be, call it, DSi-enhanced vs. DSi-exclusive. Why? One hundred-million installed base of DS. Developers are going to want to leverage that installed base and yet they’ll want to provide extra content via the features of the DSi, like the camera. That’s my expectation as to how it will play out.
MTV Multiplayer: You guys didn’t announce any hybrid games like that.
Fils-Aime: Correct.
MTV Multiplayer: When could we hear about that?
Fils-Aime: It would be reasonable to talk about that after we’ve launched. Part of it is, we want to make sure people understand some of the core functionality. Down the road is when we’ll start talking about DSi-enhanced or DSi-exclusive content.
MTV Multiplayer: “Zelda”? DSi-enhanced?
Fils-Aime: Wouldn’t that be nice?

MTV Multiplayer: Yeah. Now, when you guys were thinking of the subtitle for the new “Zelda” ["The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks"], did you start with my initials and go from there?
Fils-Aime: That was not the driver.
MTV Multiplayer: Ok. Because the “Halo 3” spin-off was originally “Halo 3: Recon.” They changed it to “Halo 3: ODST. And you guys? “The Legend of Zelda: ST”!
Fils-Aime: I have to say that, as we were doing all the naming, and working with NCL [Nintendo's Japanese main office], we were not in the background saying, “It’s gotta be Stephen Totilo somehow!”
MTV Multiplayer: It should be. But that’s a tentative title, right? So people shouldn’t get too attached to it?
Fils-Aime: Correct.
MTV Multiplayer: Can people assume that this game puts a new 2009 “Zelda” game on or off the table, because maybe there can’t be more than on new “Zelda” for the year?
Fils-Aime: What we’ve done is we’ve announced a great “Zelda” game for the DS — one I’m looking forward to. But reading anything more into that would be a mistake.
MTV Multiplayer: Have you had a chance to play it yet?
Fils-Aime: I did play a little bit of “Spirit Tracks.”
MTV Multiplayer: How is it?
Fils-Aime: I love it.
MTV Multiplayer: How does it compare to you as a player?
Fils-Aime: I’ll tell you what I love about it. It takes some of the things I liked about “Phantom Hourglass” to the next level. Example: I thought tracking the path of the boomerang was nice in “Phantom Hourglass.” But the way you use [the stylus] to solve puzzles with “Spirit Tracks” is really provocative. I think the “Zelda” fan will really enjoy it… You do more in tracking and outlining. We showed it in the trailer. You move [an extra] character to a spot in order to unlock puzzles. I really like that. I think it adds a level of gameplay which, for me, hearkens back to some of the classic “Zelda” puzzles.
MTV Multiplayer: If you can have trains in the “Zelda” universe, can you have planes in the “Zelda” universe? How advanced is this universe?
Fils-Aime: ["Zelda franchise director] Mr. Aonuma must answer those questions. I cannot answer those questions.
MTV Multiplayer: Another DS question: “Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars” — there was a lot of skepticism about the M-rated market for the DS. What have you been able to determine about whether the market is there for that game?
Fils-Aime: The market is absolutely there. Look at it from a US perspective. Here’s a fun ST-factoid. Fifty-two weeks into the marketplace, the installed base in the U.S. for the DS is larger than the installed base for the PS2 at the same time. And yet there was no concern or disagreement that PS2 had an M-rated consumer they could sell to.
MTV Multiplayer: Well, they launched with fighting games. You guys had a dog game.
Fils-Aime: We didn’t launch with a dog game. [laughs]
MTV Multiplayer: No, you launched with “Mario 64″…
Fils-Aime: Which is still selling exceptionally well.
MTV Multiplayer: Have you seen what the ordering pattern has been?
Fils-Aime: I have not talked to the folks from ["GTA" publisher] Take-Two. We certainly believe that there’s an 18-and-above consumer opportunity with DS, just as we believe ...

I should warn fans of the Japanese Game Boy Advance game “Mother 3” that this post may make you sad, but, still, the Nintendo of America president had something to say about the much-heralded role-playing game.
***
The following is an excerpt from my interview with Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime. The first part of our interview ran earlier today, covering the Nintendo DSi, the new “Zelda” and some other stuff.
And then, this came up:
MTV Multiplayer: We used to talk about “Mother 3” [the highly-regarded 2006 Japanese role-playing game that has never been released in America, despite a fervent Internet fan movement]. And then I stopped asking you about it after a while.
Fils-Aime: I’m a big “Mother” fan. I have to set the record straight on this topic, because I have seen all of the hate comments. I’m a big “Mother” fan. Huge “Mother” fan. I would love to see “Mother” localized in our market. In fact, I’ve talked to [Nintendo president] Mr. Iwata about it because this is a game he has some history with. [pauses] But it is not on our announcement schedule. [laughs]
MTV Multiplayer: How can that be? [laughs]
Fils-Aime: I am a fan of a lot of different products that aren’t on our announcement schedule.
MTV Multiplayer: How could there be something you like, but it’s not on the announcement schedule? Take me into the psychology of that.
Fils-Aime: Maybe I’m going to burst some people’s bubbles, but just because I’m the president of NOA doesn’t mean that every game that I love gets published in our territory. We run a business. And so, in order for a title to be published, the development, localization, launch, volume, all needs to make economic sense.
MTV Multiplayer: Does DSiWare [the downloadable gaming service for the DSi] open you guys up to being able to release, for example, a much-anticipated, much-desired Game Boy Advance game — that’s pretty small — digitally, where you wouldn’t have to market the same way?
Fils-Aime: Let me answer the question a different way. We have seen effective sales taking content that only launched in Japan and launching it on WiiWare.
MTV Multiplayer: “Sin and Punishment.”
Fils-Aime: Exactly. So it’s certainly something we look at and, for the right titles, we’ll bring to bear.
MTV Multiplayer: What did Mr. Iwata say when you started badgering him about “Mother 3″?
Fils-Aime: [laughs] It was a fun conversation.

http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2009/...bout-mother-3/ ...

Two million players have joined the LittleBigPlanet community since its launch in November 2008, creating 725,000 unique levels.

Media Molecule's title has been played more than 125 million times, while players have posted more than four million comments on user-generated levels.

"LittleBigPlanet is giving people from every walk of life the opportunity to express themselves creatively. The game is just the start. This is creative gaming; never ending experiences that take on lives of their own through their players," said Mark Hardy, MD of content and platforms at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe.

"LittleBigPlanet appeals to a generation shaped by their networks and thirsty for great experiences to share with friends. Where LittleBigPlanet goes from here is up to its community; it is theirs to shape however they like. This makes it much more inclusive than gaming has ever been before."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...-levelscreated ...

2,000,000,000. That's how many movies Netflix has shipped out since coming on the scene in 1999. Lucky number two billion -- Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist on Blu-ray) snagged Clay Shannon a complimentary lifetime subscription (guess he's not too concerned about the new, higher Blu-ray rates.) It took the company eight years to cross the one billion milestone, and only two for the next billion. While there's little indication of a slowdown in the two million movies shipped out every day from 58 distribution centers, we wouldn't be surprised if number 3 billion were just as likely to come as a download than anything else.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/02/n...-blu-ray-disc/ ...

No, this isn't an April Fool's joke. President Obama met today at Buckingham Palace with the Queen, and our forward thinking commander-in-chief brought along a little tech for gifting purposes. Obama presented Elizabeth II with an iPod containing video from her 2007 visit to the States. In return, the first family received what is apparently a standard present for visiting dignitaries to the Palace -- a silver-framed photo of the Queen and her husband. At a glance, it seems like Obama has a thing for gadgets (and related media); he recently handed off a set of DVDs featuring classic American films to Prime Minister Gordon Brown... who was unable to play them due to incorrect region encoding. Regardless, the Queen appears pleased with the music player, telling the President during their 25 minute tea that she "Finally has something to listen to [her] Pantera records on."

http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/01/p...en-of-england/ ...