As promised here is the professional version of the CK3 Probe 3. Speaks for itself. The easiest, safest, most flexible “PMT” no-cut/no-solder probe for Liteon drives.
No capacitors, no discharging, no power clips, enhanced extraction code built into X360USB and Jungle Flasher to give instant key extraction with no need for prolonged probing of the PCB or timing your power cycles or any other waiting around or messing about.
Also tested working with the Samsung Bad Flash Recovery Method (mostly not required with X360USB Pro as it will recover 99% of Samsung recovery / Bad Flash situations – but its a working backup all the same)
We have also designed the CK3 Power Cable so that it can be used to convert any CK3 probe (v1 / v2 / v2.1 / Mini probe) to a fully functional PMT capable probe. Naturally the cable is a lot cheap than buying a Probe 3 so YOU save money !
It’s this simple (Connect using X360USB PRO & Jungle Flasher of course):
1. Press the PhatKey button, then click Yes
2. Hold Probe 3 Button down (LED OFF), connect probe to MPX01, release Probe 3 Button (LED ON)
3. Extract Complete will be instantaneous when using X360USB PRO, now remove probe from MPx01
4. Press and release the Probe 3 button again then click OK
5. Done!

http://team-xecuter.com/ck3-probe-3-images-info/ ...

The Microsoft Kinect is one of the hottest gaming peripherals we've seen in years, and that's because it can do a lot more than control games.

Within weeks after the Kinect hit stores, scientists, programmers and researchers hacked away at the device. It turns out that the Kinect, which consists of cameras and an infrared-light sensor to track and follow your body movement, has applications for medical purposes, language learning and even partying outdoors. Those applications are enabled by a relatively open programming interface which lets people quickly hack together their own custom software to interface with the Kinect hardware.

None of these hacks are officially supported by Microsoft, but they demonstrate the amazing potential of turning the human body into an interface controller. Who'da thunk a gaming gadget would be so powerful?

What follows are some examples of the coolest Kinect hacks we've seen..

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/03/kinect-hacks/ ...

[Adrian] has a friend that, due to an accident, can no longer play Xbox games in the standard fashion. His friend is unfortunately unable to hold the game pad properly, and no longer has the manual dexterity to reach the shoulder buttons and triggers on the top side of his Xbox 360 controller. Being the good guy that he is, he set out to see what he could do in order to bring the joy of playing Xbox back into his friend’s life.
Inspired by the many different gaming mods he has seen [Ben Heck] construct, he pulled apart an Xbox 360 wireless controller and began to investigate how the four top buttons were activated. In no time, he had four large buttons wired to the PCB where the triggers and shoulder buttons once connected.
[Adrian] mentions that his modification isn’t quite complete, as he is going to mount the buttons into a board which can easily be laid on his friend’s lap or a table. The only thing we are left wondering is whether or not he was able to replicate the analog functionality of the triggers, or if they are treated as simple on/off switches. Either way, we are sure his friend will be thrilled!

http://hackaday.com/2011/03/03/xbox-...riend-in-need/ ...

Before the Super Turbo Hyper BBQ HD Ultra Mega Remixes there was just plain ol' Street Fighter 2, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this month. Capcom posted a birthday reminder for its classic fighter, which was born two decades ago in the arcades (remember those?).

Since 1991, Street Fighter 2 has seen six arcade iterations and near countless ports across consoles, PCs and handhelds (Tiger even!). Chances are you've played the game a time or two ... and had your pixelated butt unceremoniously handed to you.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/03/03/st...er-2-turns-20/ ...

Twisted Metal creator David Jaffe believes that home consoles are pushing away users through bad, restrictive design choices that delay the game-playing experience.
Checking for new downloadable content, updating software, cut scenes and the time between turning a console on and actually playing the game are just some of the problems that turn customers to more immediate portable experiences and social networks, said the outspoken designer.
"Portable game time is going way up, but why? Those of us in the console space are actually making choices that push our customers away. The time it takes to power on your console and be in the game playing takes too damn long. The gap of time from pressing 'on' to actually beginning to play is getting longer and it's annoying customers," he told an audience at GDC.
"Cut scenes, installs, updates, load times, system boot-up times - a lot of the stuff can be designed around. For me there are times I've wanted to play a new console game but I just don't because I don't want to deal with all the ramp-up time. Maybe that makes me lazy but look at all the other stuff that's competing right now for my leisure time.
"The one thing that they all have in common, the best thing, is that all of these pretty much have instant payoff. Literally seconds after thinking about doing these activities I can be doing this activities. Why would I put up with 3-15 minute wait times when I can be entertained otherwise, instantly?" he said.
These delays were tolerated in the past, said Jaffe, because console gaming was the better experience, but the evolution of portable, mobile and social gaming now rivals a traditional home console.
"If we're talking sheer fun factor, for the first time handheld, mobile phones, internet games, they're just as good, in some cases better - and in all cases cheaper - than the console options," he said.
"If I've got 5-30 minutes to kill and I want to do something it makes total sense that I'm going to reach for instant gratification. The gameplay on my DS, PSP and iPad is just as good as it is on my console."
Jaffe reeled off a list of possible solutions to some barriers, using tech and design choices to avoid annoying the player and turning them off from the experience.
"Can anything be done? What about if you have a disc in the system and there's a save file on the hard-drive for that disc, the instant I power up it shows me a prompt and says 'do I want to go to my latest save?' If I say 'yes' it bypasses everything - hardware logo, dashboard, XMB, game logos - all of it, and I'm in the game much faster.
"Another thing is, why can't - if it's technically possible - I have a sleep mode on my consoles like I do on my Mac and I do on my game devices. All I have to do is hit a switch and within seconds I'm back in the game."
To applause from the crowd he also called for a limit to the number of updates a game should have over the internet, forcing better design and completion of a game before it's released.
"Hardware manufacturers, I feel, should only allow 1-4 updates to the software per game every year. And none of them should come in the first one or two months of the game shipping. When I first started in the business the games we shipped was our last chance off the bat.
"If game developers could make it work then, we can at least make sure games don't have to be updated the same f**king week they hit shelves, thus causing more wait times for the consumer."
Discussing game length, he called for shorter games - not titles that are artificially lengthened to justify a high price point.
"Some of these games on console are just too long. They run out of gas in the first four hours and they should - I want them to. I want to finish stuff and feel a sense of accomplishment. I want to go from start to end of a story in a weekend.
"Ultimately what happens is these console, story-based games putter on for 3-12 hours just because the business model demands it. With portable, most of them focus on the purity of play and not story, it's less of an issue. And a fluid pricing system is acceptable for portable and phone games and story-based games on those platforms are shorter and can be priced accordingly."
And he saved his final criticism for multiplayer gaming on console, that according to Jaffe, has upped the number of players online purely for the sake of it.
"Competition I feel is best when it's one-on-one, and worst case when it's small teams versus small teams. Console multiplayer has lost sight of this just because technically speaking they've been able to. Just because you can do something doesn't mean that you should do something.
"The spectacle of a massively multiplayer war will never get old, but the experience of the game in such a battle usually just feels like just chaos to the player. But console games rarely stop to think about this. Instead they just throw more virtual bodies at the issue and the result is often mind-numbing and empty.
"I still love console games," he concluded. ...

New 3DS titles have made a significant impact on the Japanese sales charts, but the number one selling game of the week is Sega's Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinity for the PSP - a new iteration in the popular Monster Hunter-esque series that sold 206,654 on its debut.
The second highest new entry, at number two, is Namco Bandai's SD Gundam G Generation World on the PSP with 192,981 sales. The Wii version charted at number 12 with 28,119 units sold.
As a result the highest-selling 3DS title was Level-5's Professor Layton and the Mask of Miracle at number three, with 119,591 units sales. An impressive figure considering the charts only take into account the first two days that it, and the 3DS itself, went on sale.
The second biggest seller was nintendogs + cats at number five with 64,213 sales, followed by Samurai Warriors: Chronicles at number six, (49,327) Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition at number seven (44,649), Ridge Racer 3D at number eight (38,226), and Pro Evolution Soccer 2011 3D at number 15 (26,345). Pilotwings Resort was not part of the Japanese launch line-up.
With the weekend total for the 3DS hardware put at 374,764 the total of all software sales for the format suggests an overall attach rate of almost exactly 1:1.
It has been a generally busy week by any standard, with Nippon Ichi's Disgea 4 also debuting at number four with 79,425 sales and THE iDOLM@STER 2 on Xbox 360 squeezing into the top 10 with a creditable 34,621 unit sales.
As a result there is only title from the previous week in the top 10 (Monster Hunter Freedom 3 at number nine, and only four overall in the top 20.


http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...3ds-debut-week ...

It's official: a Battle: Los Angeles game is on the way to release a month after the motion picture of the same name, confirms publisher Konami.




The Battle: Los Angeles movie - yet another alien invasion plot - hits US cinema screens on March 11, while the game's due to arrive "next month" for Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network and PC via Steam and "select distribution channels", confirming rumours last week sparked by leaky rating boards.

You will "assume the role of Corporal Lee Imlay and fight alongside characters from the film and defend the city of Los Angeles from attacks from unknown forces," says the blurb.

Developed by TimeShift developer Saber Interactive, BLA is an first-person shooter with a single-player campaign the follows the events of the film. "Players will battle unique and varied enemies, using an arsenal of weapons throughout the game like an assault rifle, sniper rifle, rocket launcher, frag grenades, and a turret gun as they navigate the streets of Los Angeles avoiding fierce and relentless attacks," says Konami, who's publishing the title.

"Aside from high-caliber fire fighting combat, destructible environments have been included using the Havok Destruction Module, which will allow players to destroy scaffolding structures, vehicles and overpasses to eliminate enemy forces."

No screens yet.

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

There never seems to be a lull in the stream of new and novel hacks that people create around Microsoft’s Kinect. One of the more recent uses for the device comes from [Interactive Fabrication] and allows you to fabricate yourself, in a manner of speaking.
The process uses the Kinect to create a 3D model of a person, which is then displayed on a computer monitor. Once you have selected your preferred pose, a model of the image is rendered by a 3D plastic printer. Each scan results in a 3cm x 3cm plastic model complete with snap together dovetail joints allowing the models to be combined together. A full body scan can be constructed with three of these tiles, resulting in a neat “Han Solo trapped in Carbonite” effect.
Currently only about 1/3 of Kinect’s full resolution is being used to create these models, which is pretty promising news to those who would try this at home. Theoretically, you should be able to create larger, more detailed images of yourself provided you have a 3D printer at your disposal.
Keep reading for a quick video presentation of the fabrication process.

http://hackaday.com/2011/02/28/encas...e-with-kinect/ ...

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