DCEmu Homebrew Emulation & Theme Park News
wraggster
by Published on July 4th, 2012 01:03
Sony is to introduce a number of PS2 games for PS3 in Japan later this month.
The PlayStation 2 Archives service will arrive on PSN on July 25th. Its debut titles are Resident Evil: Code Veronica (Capcom), Kessen (Tecmo Koei), Siren (Sony), Dragon Force (Sega) and Shin Contra (Konami).
Prices range between ¥1,500 and ¥1,200, Andriasang reports.
Unlike other titles on the PSN Archive service – which currently offers PSOne, PC Engine and TurboGrafx games – the new PS2 selection will be playable only on PS3 and not PSP.
The roster will be updated monthly, with a number of upcoming additions having also been named – Gunstar Heroes (Sega), Dark Cloud (Sony), Castelvania (Konami) and Dead and Alive (Tecmo Koei).
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/ps2-g...s-month/098920 ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 01:01- Categories:
- DCEmu
Publisher’s hopes of illegalising the sale of pre-owned software have been dashed after the European Court of Justice ruled that the practice is legitimate.
It has also ruled that consumers have the right to re-sell their digital purchases,
The ruling is not binding but is designed to be used for reference when such matters arrive in the courts of EU countries. It dictates the direction of European law.
The Court’s decision was reached after it concluded that “the exclusive right of distribution of a copy of a computer program covered by a licence [that prohibits the resale of software] is exhausted on its first sale”.
“Under that directive, the first sale in the EU of a copy of a computer program by the copyright holder or with his consent exhausts the right of distribution of that copy in the EU,” it added.
“A rightholder who has marketed a copy in the territory of a Member State of the EU thus loses the right to rely on his monopoly of exploitation in order to oppose the resale of that copy.”
Perhaps more importantly for consumers, the decision also says consumers have the right to sell on software that they have downloaded, as well as those they have purchased on disc.
“The principle of exhaustion of the distribution right applies not only where the copyright holder markets copies of his software on a material medium (CD-ROM or DVD) but also where he distributes them by means of downloads from his website,” the ruling continues.
“Where the copyright holder makes available to his customer a copy – tangible or intangible – and at the same time concludes, in return form payment of a fee, a licence agreement granting the customer the right to use that copy for an unlimited period, that rightholder sells the copy to the customer and thus exhausts his exclusive distribution right.
“Such a transaction involves a transfer of the right of ownership of the copy. Therefore, even if the licence agreement prohibits a further transfer, the rightholder can no longer oppose the resale of that copy.”
The ruling comes as part of a dispute between Oracle and UsedSoft in the German courts.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/europ...ges-drm/098925 ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:56- Categories:
- Xbox 360 News
The first playable demo for Resident Evil 6 is now available on Xbox Live for Xbox 360 owners.
Of course, you’re only able to access it if you both purchased a copy of Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma AND haven’t lost the DLC code that came on a slip inside the case.
The demo will be released on the PlayStation Network, but not until September 5th thanks to a timed exclusivity agreement between Capcom and Microsoft.
Fortunately there’s not that long to wait until the arrival of the main game itself, which hits Xbox 360, PS3 and PC on October 2nd.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/resid...ox-live/098926
...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:54- Categories:
- DCEmu
EA Labels president Frank Gibeau has questioned the relevancy of market research group NPD, which publishes sales data and analysis on the game industry, while proposing a future in which the publisher will see most of its revenue come from digital sales.
NPD's monthly retail reports, much like weekly sales charts, still focus on physical sales data - a leaning Gibeau believes is outdated, especially as the reports tend to depict an ongoing decline in game sales.
“It's an irrelevant measure on the industry," he toldGamesindustry.biz. "It's totally irrelevant. We don't even really look at it internally anymore."
With digital distribution now such a large part of the industry, Gibeau's point is pertinent - sales reports and charts would be unrecognisable from their current state if the likes of Fez, Minecraftor even Jetpack Joyride were accounted for.
It's rather more complicated than that, of course, especially given the wildly varying price points of today's games and, of course, the distorting effect of free-to-play. But Gibeau believes that EA will see most of its revenue coming from digital sales in "the near future."
"I think one of the problems with this industry right now is that people tend to look at it like they're looking at an elephant through a straw," Gibeau continues. "They only see a little parts of it and they're not looking at the total picture, right?
"Between Facebook, social, mobile, free-to-play on PC, Asia, consoles... it's a vibrant, growing, huge market. An occasional bad report from NPD, which measures a sliver of what's actually happening in gaming gives people an erroneous impression."
EA's recent push into more digital territory paid off for the company, seeing it return to profit this year after a $276 million loss the year prior. Given that success, Gibeau's comments are hardly surprising, but they're also leant real weight.
Even with the clear seismic shift that's taking place, however, retail remains an important part of any company's overall strategy and damaging relationships with the highstreet is something EA will have to be wary of - a point not lost on Gibeau.
"Retail is a great channel for us," he qualifies. "We have great relationships with our partners there. At the same time, the ultimate relationship is the connection that we have with the gamer. If the gamer wants to get the game through a digital download and that's the best way for them to get it, that's what we're going to do."
NPD president David McQuillan countered Gibeau's criticisms, playing down the relevancy of digital to today's market, citing group research which shows new physical software represented 56 per cent of consumer spending on games in the US during 2011 - that percentage rises to 70 in the fourth quarter of the year as the christmas release schedule hits.
"While digital is a growing part of the industry and something that needs to be addressed for the future, the current games industry is still largely rooted in retail and any industry player involved with triple-A content simply can't take their eye away from the retail environment," he explained.
“Successful companies are looking at how their products are performing within all channels, particularly retail. For that reason, we were surprised to read the comments by Mr. Gibeau that EA does not look at NPD data internally at all.
“While we will not comment on the specifics on our long-standing relationship with EA, we can say with confidence that we have daily dealings with all of our major publisher clients. And we know for a fact they're using the data."
Irrespective of whether EA, or any publisher for that matter, uses NPD's data, the continued absence of digital sales from mainstream reporting is becoming harder to ignore.
http://www.edge-online.com/news/ea-p...npd-irrelevant
...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:51- Categories:
- Xbox 360 News
DICE general manager Karl Magnus Troedsson has criticised the lack of innovation present in many firstperson shooters today, believing that too few studios take the need for technical evolution seriously.
"The FPS is a very hardcore genre, and the hardcore crowd of the FPS is probably bigger than some other genres," he tells us. "And that crowd has extremely high demands on what the games are and how they develop.
"If they don't see some kind of new, if not revolutionary then at least evolutionary, step of rendering in every game they will start to lose interest. And I think that is what's happening. Because a lot of franchises out there don't take this seriously; to actually make sure that we don't just challenge ourselves on the gameplay aspect, or perhaps some other area like distribution method, but also how it [feels], how it looks and how it sounds.
"DICE has a strong history, for good and for bad, of doing this. We constantly bash ourselves and say, 'We could have done that better'. It might just be a rendering feature but in the end it adds up to the complete experience of what we're doing."
Troedsson points to the coming tech transition - both to new hardware and more powerful engines - and a move away from modern settings as temporary salves, but warns against using thematic switches in place of broader ambition.
"I think we're going to start seeing people moving away from the modern setting, because every now and again settings or themes start to get stale and then everyone jumps over," he continues. "Y'know, at some point dinosaurs are the hottest thing and everyone is making games with dinosaurs, but there are trends. It used to be WWII, and recently it's been the modern era and people are now moving towards near future.
"But it's a bit cheap to just say, 'Okay, we're going to switch and go back in time or into the future and that will be innovation'. It will definitely drive the franchise forward for whatever game, but it's not true innovation, it's more a thematic change that has a perceived value to the gamers out there. But as a developer you can only make so many games in one particular era, and then you personally start to get a bit bored with it."
That propensity toward trends at the mainstream end of the market, rather than a greater diversity of themes, is, of course, what many critics of the genre would point to as its major problem. But it's hard to begrudge big-budget teams' need to minimise risk in the face of a cripplingly conservative buying public. And while Troedsson acknowledges that more needs to be done, spectacle remains high on his list of priorites.
"I think it's our responsibility as game developers to always push ourselves when it comes to the experience of games," he concludes. "To always make sure that when we put games in the hands of consumers that we are proud of what we've done.
"I'm not saying we're going to build an FPS that will make you cry, or anything like that [laughs]. But we want people to be amazed when they look at our games. And I think this is more important than becoming number one in whatever way you look at it - though naturally part of that comes from a very high level of competitiveness here within DICE. We want to make the best game that we can, and we want that game to be the best one on the market. If gamers think that, then we've done our job. We're not there yet, but we're working on it."
http://www.edge-online.com/news/dice...genre-gameplay ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:50- Categories:
- PC News
walterbyrd writes with a story at The Inquirer outlining the latest volley in the patent wars surrounding mobile hardware, this timeaimed at the new Aus-built Nexus 7 tablet from Google by Nokia, in which the company's spokesman says, "Nokia has more than 40 licensees, mainly for its standards essential patent portfolio, including most of the mobile device manufacturers. Neither Google nor Asus is licensed under our patent portfolio. 'Companies who are not yet licensed under our standard essential patents should simply approach us and sign up for a license.
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/07/...es-our-patents ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:48- Categories:
- DCEmu
Research In Motion is in trouble. The BlackBerry maker has been suffering from an identity crisis for the last six months, which has resulted in mass layoffs, lots of job shuffling, dramatic drop-offs in market share and a quickly decaying portfolio for investors. But not according to Thorsten Heins! The newly-appointed CEO published an op-ed in the Toronto Globe and Mail on Tuesday, and also appeared on a radio program the same morning, to deliver one message: 'There's nothing wrong with the company as it exists right now.'"
http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/07...th-the-company ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:45- Categories:
- PC News
[Mike Field] was working on interfacing his TI Chronos eZ430 watch with the Raspberry Pi. As things were going pretty well, he took a side-trip from his intended hack and implemented watch-based control for an RPi audio player.
It really comes as no surprise that this is possible, and even easy. After all, the RPi board has native USB capability for hosting the watch‘s RF dongle, and it’s running Linux which we know already works well with the Chronos platform. But we still love the thought of having automation controls strapped to our wrist!
mpg321 is the audio playback program used for this hack. It plays MP3 files using ALSA for sound, which does have a few hiccups on the RPi. [Mike] found workarounds and included them in the C program he uses to gather everything into one nice code package. Control depends on keypresses sent from the watch (meant for use with PowerPoint) which are translated by his code and pushed to the audio/mp3 programs.
http://hackaday.com/2012/07/03/ti-ch...-raspberry-pi/ ...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:43- Categories:
- DCEmu
'There used to be so many kinds of games, but now all I see is the same kind of game, it's a little sad'
Too many games are the same and rely on violence, the creator of the Harvest Moon series has claimed.
Speaking to Gamasutra, Yasuhiro Wada said he was saddened by the lack of variety in games, and used the number of violent games on the market as an influence to make something different.
"Thinking differently from other people is one of the themes I have for my life,” he said.
"I wouldn't deny the violent games out there, but rather, I actually get influenced by them to create something very different.
"Because there are violent games with killing and war, that kind of shapes the identity for what I create. It's healthy to bring much variety to games. If the only things you see are violent games, then it won't be any fun," he says.
http://www.develop-online.net/news/4...same-says-Wada
...by Published on July 4th, 2012 00:41- Categories:
- PC News
Web giant to bring blockbuster franchise to China with Call of Duty Online
Activision has signed a new deal with social games titan Tencent to bring Call of Duty Online to China.
The upcoming free-to-play Call of Duty Online, which has been in development for more than two years, will be exclusively operated by the web giant in the region.
Activision states the new gaming model featured in the title has been designed specifically to the Chinese market, and will allow players will be able to personalise their characters, weapons and equipment.
There will also be an in-game store tailored for Chinese users.
"We are very excited about our relationship with Tencent and the opportunities for gaming in China," said Activision CEO Bobby Kotick.
http://www.develop-online.net/news/4...h-Tencent-deal
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