Seems the PR for Microsoft misstepped in their elucidation of the 12-month exclusivity deal struck with EA Sports and Konami for FIFA and Pro-Evolution Soccer, respectively. PES (also known as Winning Eleven) producer Shingo Takatsuka called Microsoft out, saying their "presentation was misleading... We never said exclusive for one year on the next-gen platforms. We said this year. We were agreed that it was this year." We all know repeating your point means you're either firm in your resolve or very angry about an agreement being misconstrued.

Microsoft's wicked claims have caused trouble for Konami and even Sony (confusion about the announcement, most likely). Takatsuka clarified that the 360 version of Winning Eleven is exclusive until the end of 2006 (a PS3 version is in the works for an estimated spring of 2007 release). FIFA may be in the same boat, although EA hasn't released any official announcements. Well Microsoft, you caused quite a ruckus, but your attempts to confuse and mislead consumers and developers were in vain! Although it was most certainly not intentional, it's still a pretty lame move. A tip of the hat, you do not get. ...

The good and knowledgeable SuicideNinja upped a very clever post and has given us the opportunity to write about it. Basically, the boomerang concept controller may have been a smarter angle to go for the PS3 than everyone gave it credit for. At the time of its unveiling, we weren't aware of the motion-sensor going into it and thought the rumble feature would still be intact. Things change with time. Now, waving the boomerang controller around would definitely make a more comfortable tilt-motion feature than the Dual Shock 2 design. As SuicideNinja says, for steering cars in the appropriate games, it would be a pretty good fit.

Sadly, this revelation can't save the dropped design now. Or can it? Petitioning for it to be released as a separate accessory may be within the realm of possibility. Aside from racing or driving games, would the boomerang design be worthwhile? The "steering wheel" likeness doesn't really make a big splash against any other type of game. It's most appropriate for racing games and quite possibly flight sims. Still, that was a fantastic epiphany on SuicideNinja's part and now, what do you all think? Did we bury the boomerang prematurely or did we save ourselves from a junky controller? ...

via Greenbay

Video game makers usually find themselves marketing to a young audience when they launch a new product. But with video games coming out that aim to help baby boomers with their aging brains, the marketing game plan may be changing.

Consider the introduction of Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day, ($20, all ages), released earlier this year for use with the hand-held Nintendo DS device.

Brain Age was the first of a planned series of brain games from Nintendo. It includes word and number puzzles, connect-the-dots exercises and other challenges. Most of the activities are timed. When the player is finished, the game issues a "brain age" that is tracked on a graph to show progress over the weeks and months the brain-exercise regimen is completed. The goal is for the brain age to be at least equal to or below the player's actual age.

The game taps into a growing body of medical research suggesting that brain teasers and problem-solving games can improve memory and brain function in older people, even those with dementia.

For Brain Age, Nintendo is shifting gears on its marketing and advertising strategy by contacting AARP, the nation's largest senior citizens advocacy organization, the Discovery Channel and magazines such as Health, Women's Health and Redbook.

Interest in brain exercise could revolutionize the video-game industry, says Nintendo of America's Perrin Kaplan. "It's kind of already starting," she said.

Other game makers have begun to cater to such interests with the popular Sudoku. Ubisoft recently released Go! Sudoku ($30) for the Sony PlayStation Portable game system, and Sudoku Fever (Global Star, $20) has more than 100,000 puzzles of varying difficulty to play on Nintendo's older game system, the Game Boy Advance. Also out is Ultra Sudoku & Ultra Kakuro (Abacus, for PCs, $30) and, Dr. Sudoku (Mastiff Games, for Game Boy Advance, $20).

Sudoku and a more far-reaching puzzler, Perplex City, a real-world treasure hunt that delivers clues through puzzle cards and Web sites, "are really getting some traction now," says John Davison, editorial director for Ziff Davis' video game magazines, including Electronic Gaming Monthly. "(Nintendo's) Brain Age, I'm sure, will be a huge phenomenon. The challenge is getting people to try it, because once they do, they'll be hooked. ... It taps in nicely to the emerging puzzle-culture thing that's gaining some momentum."

Meanwhile, researchers are attempting to quantify what effects games could have on aging. The Alzheimer's Association recommends puzzles as therapy because some studies have suggested they might improve memory, attention and problem-solving while staving off mental decline and, perhaps, reducing the risk of Alzheimer's disease.

The themes of "brain food" and periodic mental breaks are being emphasized as methods of stress relief to the female-skewed audience of MSN Games, which offers puzzle games such as Hexic, Bejeweled, Mozaki Blocks, Bespelled and Scrabble Blast!

Beyond stress reduction, these games amount to the type of "brain food" that can combat loss of memory and brain function, Hall says.

"Playing online games can be a new and effective approach for getting brain food," she says, "and this fits seamlessly into the digital lifestyle so many of us lead." ...

via Greenbay

Video game makers usually find themselves marketing to a young audience when they launch a new product. But with video games coming out that aim to help baby boomers with their aging brains, the marketing game plan may be changing.

Consider the introduction of Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day, ($20, all ages), released earlier this year for use with the hand-held Nintendo DS device.

Brain Age was the first of a planned series of brain games from Nintendo. It includes word and number puzzles, connect-the-dots exercises and other challenges. Most of the activities are timed. When the player is finished, the game issues a "brain age" that is tracked on a graph to show progress over the weeks and months the brain-exercise regimen is completed. The goal is for the brain age to be at least equal to or below the player's actual age.

The game taps into a growing body of medical research suggesting that brain teasers and problem-solving games can improve memory and brain function in older people, even those with dementia.

For Brain Age, Nintendo is shifting gears on its marketing and advertising strategy by contacting AARP, the nation's largest senior citizens advocacy organization, the Discovery Channel and magazines such as Health, Women's Health and Redbook.

Interest in brain exercise could revolutionize the video-game industry, says Nintendo of America's Perrin Kaplan. "It's kind of already starting," she said.

Other game makers have begun to cater to such interests with the popular Sudoku. Ubisoft recently released Go! Sudoku ($30) for the Sony PlayStation Portable game system, and Sudoku Fever (Global Star, $20) has more than 100,000 puzzles of varying difficulty to play on Nintendo's older game system, the Game Boy Advance. Also out is Ultra Sudoku & Ultra Kakuro (Abacus, for PCs, $30) and, Dr. Sudoku (Mastiff Games, for Game Boy Advance, $20).

Sudoku and a more far-reaching puzzler, Perplex City, a real-world treasure hunt that delivers clues through puzzle cards and Web sites, "are really getting some traction now," says John Davison, editorial director for Ziff Davis' video game magazines, including Electronic Gaming Monthly. "(Nintendo's) Brain Age, I'm sure, will be a huge phenomenon. The challenge is getting people to try it, because once they do, they'll be hooked. ... It taps in nicely to the emerging puzzle-culture thing that's gaining some momentum."

Meanwhile, researchers are attempting to quantify what effects games could have on aging. The Alzheimer's Association recommends puzzles as therapy because some studies have suggested they might improve memory, attention and problem-solving while staving off mental decline and, perhaps, reducing the risk of Alzheimer's disease.

The themes of "brain food" and periodic mental breaks are being emphasized as methods of stress relief to the female-skewed audience of MSN Games, which offers puzzle games such as Hexic, Bejeweled, Mozaki Blocks, Bespelled and Scrabble Blast!

Beyond stress reduction, these games amount to the type of "brain food" that can combat loss of memory and brain function, Hall says.

"Playing online games can be a new and effective approach for getting brain food," she says, "and this fits seamlessly into the digital lifestyle so many of us lead." ...

Moonlight has just released a new beta of Moonshell for the DS, Moonshell is a multmedia app that does just about everything for the DS.

Heres whats new:

MOD/MIDI/SPC/NSF/GBS plugin: Change sampling rate to 32768Hz. The over sampling was invalidated.
MIDI plugin: Linear interpolation when 16bitPCM sound font is used.
SPC plugin: The LPF characteristic was corrected.
Interpolation item was added to [ImagePlugin] section of global.ini. for the supplementation with the expansion reduction.
The bug that had failed in automatic detection of the enhancing memory built into M3CF/SD was corrected.

Download the beta here --> http://mdxonline.dyndns.org/archives/nds/ ...

Moonlight has just released a new beta of Moonshell for the DS, Moonshell is a multmedia app that does just about everything for the DS.

Heres whats new:

MOD/MIDI/SPC/NSF/GBS plugin: Change sampling rate to 32768Hz. The over sampling was invalidated.
MIDI plugin: Linear interpolation when 16bitPCM sound font is used.
SPC plugin: The LPF characteristic was corrected.
Interpolation item was added to [ImagePlugin] section of global.ini. for the supplementation with the expansion reduction.
The bug that had failed in automatic detection of the enhancing memory built into M3CF/SD was corrected.

Download the beta here --> http://mdxonline.dyndns.org/archives/nds/ ...

News from Dragonminded

DSOrganize is meant as a homebrew organizer application for the Nintendo DS that should have come built in in the first place. It is by no means comparible to a full-fledged organizer such as a palm, and it is not planned to become an operating system, video player, or anything similar. Many thanks go out to several dedicated members in the homebrew community for their help and libraries, without which, DSOrganize would not exist.

The latest version of DSOrganize, version 2.25, is available on this page. There are three versions: the gray version, the blue version and the green version, due to driver incompatibilities. Please be sure to only use the executable type for your particular card, and be sure to unzip the entire directory structure to your card properly, or certain pages will not save properly. As always, don't forget to back up before trying any homebrew!

Fixes found in 2.25

Fix for crash when nick is too long for server and you are autoconnecting.
Made DSOrganize IRC auto-pull nick from firmware if none is given.
Added alternate nick setting to DSO IRC.
Disabled the ability to type spaces in nickname entries on configuration.
Added check for bad server connections.
Changed scroll buffer on each page to only hold the last 100 lines.
Fixed ping command to not send until at least you are connected properly.
Made DSO check for valid path entry of HBDB download directory.
Fixed homebrew database to download into the dsorganize directory properly if it is /data/dsorganize/.
Added check for renaming to no file name to be more idiot-proof.
Took out MK2/MK3 and NinjaSD drivers for Green and Blue release to speed boot times (whiners).
Fixed the long hang time on hiding and unhiding files.
Added new supercard drivers to Blue release to hopefully fix scLite.
Reorganized configuration a little and added a few more options.
Added in option to change the default homebrew boot method.
Added in option to automatically insert bullets on the todo screen.
Added in option to swap the A and B button on all screens.
Fixed sluggishness on calculator buttons.
Fixed streams to use proxy if needed.
Made IRC advertise the /help command when starting up.
Changed L and R buttons on IRC to highlight the appropriate color if an offscreen window gets a message.
Added typed backbuffer on IRC. Hold Y and use the up or down buttons to scroll up to five lines back.
Added page-up and page-down to irc. Hold X and use the up and down buttons to scroll the view.
Changed /data/ directory detection method to only work if /DSOrganize/ directory is present inside.
Changed browser interface so that if there are multiple options for a file, A always views and Y always edits.
Added .hbdb and .pkg as editable file types.
Fixed some rendering errors in the simple html renderer.
Fixed weird error in syntax hilighting.
Fixed syntax hilighting logic for comments and html editor.
Fixed a bug where you were allowed to rename or delete the . and .. entries, thus destroying the file structure.
Fixed underlining error with links at the end of html files.
Added /away to IRC.
Added a failsafe in the FAT_rename code, hopefully this fixes dropped entries.

Download and Give Feedback Via Comments ...

GamersReports.com has posted an alleged internal GameStop memo, which documents 36 PlayStation 3 titles scheduled for release between launch (November 17) and May 1*, all listed at $59.99. While hardly official, these details will likely alleviate some of our fears that PS3 games will retail for more than $60.

According to the GameStop memo, the PlayStation launch lineup could include these 19 titles (exclusives in bold):

Bladestorm: Hundred Years War
Call of Duty 3
Fatal Inertia
Full Auto 2
Genji 2
Lair
Madden NFL 2007
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
MotorStorm
NBA Live 2007
NBA 07
Need for Speed: Carbon
Rainbow Six: Vegas
Resistance: Fall of Man
Sonic the Hedgehog
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2007
Tony Hawk's Project 8
Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom
Warhawk
*The memo suggests that some games could be released before the PS3 console. ...

Via Joystiq

Future Gamez has confirmed that Ubisoft is working on a new Prince of Persia title for the Nintendo DS, but it doesn't appear to be another card battler like last year's Battles of Prince of Persia.

Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification added the new game to their online database under the title, Prince of Persia: Rival Blades, for multiple platforms. However, an Ubisoft rep commented that Blades had been an alternate title for The Two Thrones, and the OFLC's listing is a placeholder for a new DS version of the prince's most recent console adventure. ...