This is just a little bump up for a friend of mine who has opened his own Photo Studio in the Nottingham area of England. The Photo Studio will undercut other quotes on weddings, birthdays and any other special occasion that requires photos to be taken.

Check out the site hosted here at DCEmu

http://photo-studio.dcemu.co.uk/ ...

Paradox CEO Fredrik Wester has shared his doubts over the future of the console and boxed products.
"The next generation of console hardware will probably be the last," he told attendees to the Paradox annual showcase, reported StrategyInformer.
"I'd be surprised if we see another generation after that."
He explained that the future lay in digital products and open platforms like PC, mobile and social networks, while revenue from boxed products will continue to fall.
The comments were backed up by Paradox's own rise in digital revenue, from 1.5 per cent in 2006 to 97 per cent in 2011. They also reported a growth in revenue of 75 per cent for 2011, and a 250 per cent growth in profit.
Paradox Interactive is based in Sweden, and its games include Crusader Kings II, Victoria II: A House Divided and Pride Of Nations. In 2006 it launched digital distribution service GamersGate.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...bably-the-last ...

The pressure is on EA and Activision, as Ubisoft became the No.1 publisher over Christmas.
The firm sold more games than any other during the festive period (November 27th to December 31st). Just Dance 3 (no.3) and Assassin's Creed: Revelations (no.6) were the firm's top sellers for the month.
For the entire of 2011, Ubisoft was the No.2 publisher in terms of units, with Just Dance 3 shifting over 910,000 and Assassin's Creed: Revelations selling 814,000 copies.
Most games sold during December where sold on Xbox 360, followed by PS3 then Wii. However, both Xbox 360 and PS3 lost market share month-over-month, with all three Nintendo platforms (Wii, DS and 3DS) growing over November.
All data is courtesy of GfK Chart-Track.

Software Market Share By Publisher (Units)

1: Ubisoft (15.5%)
2: EA (15%)
3: Nintendo (12.3%)
4: Activision Blizzard (8.6%)
5: THQ (6.9%)
6: Microsoft (6.3%)
7: Sega (5.3%)
8: Bethesda (5.3%)
9: Warner Bros (3.9%)
10: Sony (3.6%)


Software Market Share By Publisher (Units)

1: Xbox 360 (36.6%)
2: PS3 (24%)
3: Wii (18.2%)
4: DS (8.7%)
5: 3DS (7.4%)
6: PC (4.3%)
7: PSP (0.6%)

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/ubiso...s-crown/090083 ...

SOPA has been sent back to the drawing board. 'The move came shortly after the Senate postponed a key vote on the companion PIPA bill scheduled for next week and amid calls for consensus before Congress moves forward on any legislation to address the problem of foreign piracy websites,' as written by the Los Angeles Times today. Hopefully the next draft of this bill will create a better foundation to stop piracy and not just assert control over the internet."Support for the bill eroded on Wednesday as several of its co-sponsors withdrew their support. The issue is not over, however; statements were issued by both Senator Patrick Leahy and Rep. Lamar Smith indicating that they still want to find solutions to online piracy, and Smith also wrote an editorial piece for CNN to explain why he thinks such legislation is necessary. The SOPA issue was raised at the recent GOP debate, and all four candidates spoke against it.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/01/...pipa-postponed ...

GAME CEO Ian Shepherd is hopeful that new console hardware will contribute to a recovery in the games market following disappointing Christmas sales.

"The weakness in the overall numbers was partly driven by the economy and consumer confidence issues," he told MCV. "It was also driven by where we are in the hardware cycle."The hardware market was much more negative than the software market. That tells you the industry and the consumer is ready for more innovation there.
"Whether it is in the handheld space with 3DS and Vita or in the home space with Wii U - all of that will excite the consumer in coming back to the games market again," Shepherd added.
Earlier this month, GAME Group reported a year-over-year sales decline of 14.7 percent for the eight week Christmas period ended January 7.
Group sales fell 11.9 percent in the 49 weeks to January 7, slightly ahead of the overall games market, which declined 13.1 percent during the same period.
The PS Vita release date is just over one short month away now. Cast your eyes over our PS Vita review, if you haven't already.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com...-new-consoles/ ...

Who could have predicted that 77 million PlayStation Network accounts would have been compromised last April? Who could have known that 3DS would at first struggle, then fly? Who could have guessed what the Wii U would be? Why, an analyst of course!
These future-gazing mystics are paid to try to discern the future from their money-shaped tea leaves. They weigh in on hot topics, declare the fate of companies; they watch, they listen, they never sleep. Who better to peer into the shrouded year ahead and tell Eurogamer what to expect?
Introducing: Jesse Divination! Michael Predicter! Peers Harding-Rolls! And Nicholas Lovesalloutcomes!
OK, back to reality. Michael Pachter analyses for investment firm Wedbush Morgan; Jesse Divnich analyses for research company EEDAR; Piers Harding-Rolls analyses for media research company Screen Digest; and Nicholas Lovell founded respected games business blog Gamesbrief.
Tell us of consoles in 2012
"The Wii U is the big story of the year," prophesied Pachter, "but without knowing specs, price-point and the level of software support, it's hard to predict how it will do. My bias is that it's not significantly more powerful than the current HD consoles, its price-point will not be significantly lower, and software support will be light.
"If I'm right, it will probably have a lukewarm reception at launch."

Michael Predicter.
Harding-Rolls' hunch read: "At this stage, and until we have concrete intelligence on pricing and content for the Wii U, we do not expect Nintendo's next generation console to generate as much interest as the ground-breaking Wii.
"My own view is that the Wii U's product message is more complex and, as a result, will not engage with as wide an audience as the Wii."
"I don't think we'll see anything from Microsoft other than a bigger hard-drive and a lower price-point," Pachter pursued, "and I don't think we'll see anything from Sony at all. The Apple console is probably a 2013 event, so nothing to look forward to this year other than price cuts.
"With that said, Microsoft has a lot of room to cut price (they could probably make money at $199 for a 250GB Xbox 360 with Kinect bundle), so that will be the biggest driver of console sales this year."
Divnich divined: "I wouldn't expect any new hardware announcements from Sony or Microsoft. Both the PS3 and Xbox 360 continue to drive substantial profits for the third parties, and given our industry's historical inability to transition between hardware cycles profitably, I don't think the third-parties are quite yet ready to face a new hardware cycle."
"I don't expect a new Xbox to be launched in 2012," Harding-Rolls ran on. "Our expectation remains 2013, but with information on a new Microsoft console hitting the market this year.
"We're currently forecasting 2012 declines in hardware sales for Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii on a global basis."
Tell us of portable gaming in 2012
"[PlayStation] Vita will struggle," reckoned Lovell. "The key question will not be whether it sells some initial units, but how it does for software tie-ins, and whether its appeal stretches beyond core Sony fans."
Presaged Pachter: "Sony's PS Vita appears aimed at the hardcore gamer, and will likely have limited success because of a relatively small addressable market.

Jesse Divination.
"The 3DS has broader appeal (both casual and hardcore), but the price-points for casual games are not particularly compelling when measured against $9.99, $4.99, $0.99 and free smartphone games. And the quality of games like Infinity Blade and Dead Space makes the smartphone competitive among even the hardcore.
"I see modest sales for 3DS, good enough to be profitable for Nintendo, but not good enough to offset the inevitable decline in DS hardware and software sales."
Recited Harding-Rolls: "Continued momentum of the 3DS in the first half of 2012 will help decide its future at least with regards to third-party support. If momentum stalls, I fear third-parties will continue to look elsewhere for investment opportunities.
"I expect Vita to get away relatively strongly at launch because of its strong content line-up but, like the 3DS, may suffer due to pricing after the initial rush has subsided. I expect Sony to be reluctant to make any significant pricing move, outside of value bundles, until at least 2013."
"It's true that the sandbox for dedicated portable gaming devices has shrunk as mobile and tablet technology increases its market penetration," Divnich divulged.
"But I believe the market for dedicated portable gaming devices is still large enough to support two competitors - 3DS and Vita. And it is certainly large enough to support healthy profits from the third-party publishers that support them."

Peers Harding-Rolls.
"Without question," pressed Pachter, "the biggest-selling portable gaming device will be the smartphone. The number of gaming apps for iOS and Android is increasing exponentially, and although many are free-to-play, the mobile games sector should still see greater revenue growth than any other."
"Tablets will fly and fly," Lovell harmonised, "although price-points need to fall. The Kindle Fire is interesting, but I am not yet ready to predict that it will be a success. ...

Renowned piracy advocate The Pirate Bay has issued a lengthy statement saying that the proposed SOPA legislation would do nothing to stop it operating.
“They want to make the internet into a one way pipe, with them at the top, shoving trash through the pipe down to the rest of us obedient consumers,” it reads.
“The public opinion on this matter is clear. SOPA can't do anything to stop TPB. Worst case we'll change top-level domain from our current .org to one of the hundreds of other names that we already also use. In countries where TPB is blocked, China and Saudi Arabia springs to mind, they block hundreds of our domain names. And did it work? Not really.”
The somewhat questionable finger of accusation then turns on the rights holders themselves.
“To fix the ‘problem of piracy’ one should go to the source of the problem. The entertainment industry say they're creating ‘culture’ but what they really do is stuff like selling overpriced plushy dolls and making 11 year old girls become anorexic. Either from working in the factories that creates the dolls for basically no salary or by watching movies and TV shows that make them think that they're fat.”
It even goes as far as to suggest that the movie industry is underpinned by an inherent hypocrisy as it, itself, was built on ‘piracy’.

“Over a century ago Thomas Edison got the patent for a device which would ‘do for the eye what the phonograph does for the ear’,” it explains. “He called it the Kinetoscope. Because of Edison’s patents for the motion pictures it was close to financially impossible to create motion pictures in the North American east coast.
“The movie studios therefor relocated to California, and founded what we today call Hollywood. So, the whole basis of this industry, that today is screaming about losing control over immaterial rights, is that they circumvented immaterial rights. They copied (or put in their terminology: ‘stole’) other people’s creative works, without paying.
“The reason they are always complaining about ‘pirates’ today is simple. We've done what they did. We circumvented the rules they created and created our own. We crushed their monopoly by giving people something more efficient. We allow people to have direct communication between each other, circumventing the profitable middle man, that in some cases take over 107% of the profits (yes, you pay to work for them).
“It's all based on the fact that we're competition. We've proven that their existence in their current form is no longer needed. We're just better than they are. And the funny part is that our rules are very similar to the founding ideas of the USA. We fight for freedom of speech.”

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/pirat...stop-us/090005 ...

Research from app analytics firm Localytics has shown that, rather than attempting to monetise freemium and free-to-play users as quickly as possible, developers are better off ensuring that the customer is fully engaged before offering any in-app purchases.
The study shows that a large proportion of users, 44 per cent, will use an app at least ten times before they're willing to invest in any microtransactions or in-app purchases, with just 22 per cent investing cash on the first play.
Furthermore, those players who do wait until they're fully engaged with a title tend to actually spend more on the game in the long run, whilst many of those who pay first time will move on without spending much, or even any, more. Customers who don't pay immediately spend, on average, around 25 per cent more over the course of their game playing.
Previous research by the firm also indicated that around a quarter of all apps are only used once after downloading, highlighting the problem of 'throwaway' culture which plagues many freemium and free-to-play titles.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...-app-purchases ...

A number of US politicians have retracted their support of the controversial SOPA and PIPA anti-piracy laws following a series of online protests from major web companies.
Senators Marco Rubio (Florida) and Roy Blunt (Missouri), who were initially co-sponsors of the Protect IP Act (PIPA), both issued statements on Facebook yesterday reversing their positions.
"I have a strong interest in stopping online piracy that costs Florida jobs," Rubio said. "However, we must do this while simultaneously promoting an open, dynamic internet environment that is ripe for innovation and promotes new technologies."
"Therefore, I have decided to withdraw my support for the Protect IP Act. Furthermore, I encourage Senator [Harry] Reid to abandon his plan to rush the bill to the floor."
Senator Blunt criticised PIPA as "deeply flawed" and in need of "much work" before it is acceptable. However, Blunt stressed that he still supported the issues raised by the legislation.
"The right to free speech is one of the most basic foundations that makes our nation great, and I strongly oppose sanctioning Americans' right to free speech in any medium - including over the internet," he said.
"I continue to believe that we can come to a solution that will cut off the revenue sources for foreign websites dedicated to counterfeiting and piracy that steal American jobs, hurt the economy, and harm consumers."
Utah senator Orrin Hatch also withdrew his co-sponsorship, calling PIPA "simply not ready for primetime" and confirming that he will vote against the legislation when it passes before the Senate next week.
"Given the legitimate vocal concerns, it is imperative that we take a step back to allow everyone to come together and find a reasonable solution," he said.
Rubio, Blunt and Hatch were among 13 members of the senate who altered their position on SOPA and PIPA yesterday - 11 Republicans and 2 Democrats.
SOPA and PIPA have been widely criticised by gaming and technology companies on the grounds that, should they be passed, their consequences could ultimately prove damaging to the very people they were designed to protect.
Yesterday, Reddit and Wikipedia were among a number of sites that went offline in protest. Google censored its homepage logo to raise awareness of the issue, and collected more than 4.5 million signatures on its anti-SOPA petition.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...thdraw-support ...