Sony Japan has released a news update concerning the PlayStation Network in Japan, but has still failed to provide any indication of when services might return.

According to Andriasang, the first news update in two weeks was sent to Japanese customers yesterday, apologising for the wait but revealing that more time was needed to make "adjustments with the various related parties".

No relaunch date was hinted at and there was no clarification as to who the "related parties" might be. However, this is almost certainly a reference to Japanese regulators, who have demanded additional security assurances before allowing the service to go back online.

Despite PlayStation Network services returning in North America, Europe and most of Asia the Japanese government has been much more demanding of Sony's new security measures.

In May the Media and Content Industry department at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry made specific demands of Sony in terms of preventive measures and consumer confidence.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...tation-network ...

A lawsuit filed this week suggests that Sony sacked a group of employees from its network security division just two weeks before the company's servers were hacked and its customers' credit card details were leaked. The suit, which seeks class action status, is being brought by victims of the massive data breach that took place in April.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/06/...re-Data-Breach ...

A device created by the University of Tokyo and Sony Laboratories called PossessedHand allows researchers to control a subject's hand via electrical stimulation. While currently being used to teach students to play the koto, a Japanese traditional stringed instruments, just imagine the possibilities! Twilight Zone anyone

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/1...Hack-Your-Hand ...

The majority of Valve president and co-founder Gabe Newell's keynote address yesterday at the Games for Change Festival was dedicated to his perception of games as educational tools. And that was fitting for the event, which is dedicated primarily to the educational and socially beneficial elements of gaming, and fitting for Valve Software, a company known most recently for releasing a game steeped in science.

Newell explained: "The interesting thing about Portal 2 is it doesn't sort of fit the traditional simplistic model of what a game is. It's not a collection of weapons. It's not a collection of monsters. It's really about science. It's about spatial reasoning, it's about learning physics, it's about problem solving. And often, during the course of the game, you're going to be solving problems with somebody else. The social model inside of it is collaborative and not competitive."

After rolling a short clip of the game for audience members, Newell went on to profess, "There seems to be this distinction between games that are educational, and games that are going to be commercially successful. I'm not really sure I buy into that." Citing sales of Portal 2 as proof, Newell pointed out that Valve has seen "$165 million dollars in gross revenue" from the game since April 18. "We can do this. We can make educational, commercially successful games, which are gonna help us both on the game side and on the educational side." He reaffirmed this to me in an interview after the speech, saying, "I just don't believe in this distinction between games and educational games. A lot of times [the label] 'educational games' is a way of being an excuse for bad game design or poor production values."

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/06/23/ne...ational-games/ ...

SCEE has confirmed an Uncharted collection, for those European PS3 owners looking for a fast-track method of catching up with the Uncharted series. The publisher told CVG that on July 22, it will release a collection containing Uncharted: Drake's Fortune and Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, along with a dynamic theme and an avatar.

The same day will see a European release of the Resistance bundle (coming to North America July 5), which packs the first two games in that series and a Resistance 3 skin. Also out on July 22 in Europe: a Ratchet & Clank bundle containing Tools of Destruction and A Crack in Time, with bonus avatars and a Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One dynamic theme.

No announcements were made about the Uncharted or Ratchet bundles in North America, but CVG's line of inquiry did begin with the discovery of the Uncharted collection on Best Buy's US website.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/06/23/un...out-in-europe/ ...

Irrational's creative director Ken Levine has expressed concern over integrating motion control into more traditional gameplay mechanics.

Following the E3 announcement that BioShock Infinite will support PlayStation Move, Levine spoke to OXM about ensuring the safety of tried and tested methods, even when adding new control schemes.

"Any experience that sits in the realm of motion play needs to be kept separate from the main experience," he explained. "It needs to be firewalled off so that if this experiment isn't for you, or doesn't turn out to be all that great, you just ignore it. Any new experience we add, we need to be able to protect this experience."

But he was also adamant about the need to evolve. "If we don't experiment, we don't progress."

Levine also spoke about Bioware's planned use of Kinect in it's epic space RPG. "I like the stuff they're doing with Mass Effect 3, in terms of making some of the interface aspects a little less thorny - more the squad commands than the conversation, as that's a bit of a challenge on the controller."

He did admit that, personally, he's a fan of more traditional methods. "I'm a hardcore gamer - I do most of my gaming on mouse and keyboard. I'm always open to new things, but I'm a really conservative guy at heart. I'll try it out slowly, but I'll be doing so very conservatively."

Bioshock Infinite is due for release in 2012.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...motion-control ...

For the first time in months the 3DS is the best-selling hardware format in Japan, with sales receiving a considerable boost from the release of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time 3D.

3DS sales for the week were up by more than a third to 40,649, well ahead of the PSP on 31,747 - despite an increase for Sony's portable this week as well.

There has been some controversy over the performance of Ocarina of Time 3D though, with website Andriasang reporting that it may have been supply constrained, with retailers reporting a low first shipment.

As a result sales of the game were almost identical to the other major release of the week: Level-5's Danbōru Senki on PSP - part of a cross-media franchise that includes toys and an anime.

Although independent chart compiler Media Create puts Ocarina of Time 3D in second place with 164,110 unit sales to 166,187, the chart from rival Enterbrain reverses the two positions.

In either case Nintendo will hope that this week sees a turning point for the 3DS's fortunes in Japan, with three titles in the top 10 and new releases generally now charting higher and for longer than during the post-launch period.

The other major new release this week is visual novel sequel Steins;Gate Hiyoku Renri no Darling on Xbox 360, from specialist publisher 5pb. A total of three new titles in the romance-themed franchise were released this week, with the sequel itself selling 31,666 units at number four.

A double pack containing the original game sold 11,041 units at number five and a budget-priced re-release of the first game sold 3,914 units at number 16.

Last Week This Week Title Format
New Entry 1 Danboru Senki PSP
New Entry 2 The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D 3DS
1 3 Yakuza Of The End PS3
New Entry 4 Steins;Gate: Hiyoku Renri no Darling 360
New Entry 5 Steins;Gate Double Pack 360
2 6 Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D 3DS
4 7 Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2 Professional DS
3 8 Battle & Get! Pokemon Typing DS DS
7 9 Wii Party Wii
5 10 One Piece Unlimited Cruise SP 3DS
Platform This Week Last Week
3DS 40,649 24,649
PSP 31,741 26,681
PlayStation 3 16,081 17,104
Wii 6,678 6,357
Nintendo DSi XL 5,464 5,283
Nintendo DSi 5,322 5,232
Xbox 360 2,875 2,370
PlayStation 2 1,346 1,291
Nintendo DS Lite 109 146
PSPgo 55 69

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...l-psp-in-japan ...

Dennis Durkin, COO and CFO of Microsoft's interactive entertainment business, has extended something of an olive branch to Sony over the issue of hacking, maintaining that he sees no advantage in crowing over his rival's security problems.

Although couched in terms of a larger statement on the security of Xbox LIVE as part of an interview with IndustryGamers, Durkin's comments seem to reflect a consolidated industry position on the threat posed by malicious hacking outfits.

"It's bad for the industry that this has happened to Sony," Durkin told our sister site. "It's very, very bad. It's very damaging. So we don't wish that upon anybody and you've seen we've been actually pretty quiet on the subject because we don't want to appear to even be looking to be taking advantage of somebody else's situation like that. That's just not in our DNA.

"Over time, all of the bets Microsoft is making are about cloud bets. We want customers to feel confident about the quality of service they're getting, the reliability they're getting, the security of the data that they have and the security of the private information that they have.

"As a company, you can look back 8, 9 years ago, when Bill Gates wrote his Trustworthy Computing Memo that basically said, 'We need to change the way we architect our products and it has to be designed into the way we architect our products and services.' So it's in our DNA, across the company. This is not just an IEB thing.

We don't want to appear to even be looking to be taking advantage of somebody else's situation like that. That's just not in our DNA.
Dennis Durkin, Microsoft.
"So this has really been a multi-year effort for us as a company and it'll continue to be one because this future, which we think is very much about services and very much cloud based - whether it be entertainment consumption or productivity - in order to do that, you have to have a secure environment. So we're going to continue to do that and we don't want to see any of our competitors hurt along the way. We think that's bad for consumers."

It's likely that benevolence was not the only reasoning behind Microsoft's placidity on the issue, as the two platform rivals have a long history of public sniping. By putting its head above the virtual parapets to deride Sony's security, for example, Microsoft would likely have become a target itself. In his closing comments to IndustryGamers, Durkin was keen to stress the importance which Microsoft places on the security of its customer data.

"[Xbox Live] is obviously very important to our consumers," Durkin argues. "It's part of the value proposition of why consumers buy our gaming consoles... So they want that to be on just like you want your phone to be on. And so we have that obligation and we've been diligently, not only in terms of our processes, which we leverage heavily from the company, but just in terms of our people resource and all that so we do everything we can to protect our consumers' data.

"Like in society, you can't always protect everything. There are people who are going to want to disrupt things and you can't always perfectly protect against every scenario, but we're going to make sure we do everything to we can to be sure we're as secure as we possibly can be. And thankfully - I'm grateful to be part of a company like Microsoft, who has such deep investments across its whole ecosystem that we leverage. Because it's an industry challenge and it's something that we all have to get better at."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...urity-breaches ...

PlayStation 3 owners will be able to download a Sonic Generations demo from tomorrow, Sonic's 20th Anniversary.

Sega's Sonic Anniversary bundle also gets a 20 per cent price cut - it contains Sonic, Sonic 2, Sonic 4 Episode 1, Sonic Adventure, the DX add-on and the Sonic 4 dynamic theme.

Also this week: Several big games get new DLC. L.A. Noire's Cole Phelps gets a new Arson Case, Nicholson Electroplating, to solve. Killzone 3's From the Ashes map pack adds four new locales - but no zombies. Mortal Kombat adds a "Klassic" skin pack, while LittleBigPlanet 2 gets Tron: Evolution gear.

If you haven't nabbed it already, last year's 9/10 scoring Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit is now available to download for a neat £23.99.

The full listing lies below, courtesy of the EU PlayStation blog:

PS3 Games

Akimi Village (£7.99/€9.99)
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (£23.99/€29.99)
Sonic the Hedgehog 20th Anniversary Bundle (£13.99/€17.99)
American McGee’s Alice (£7.99/€9.99)
Back to the Future: Episode 4 (free with Season Pass)
PS3 Demos

Dungeon Siege III Demo
Sonic Generations 20th Anniversary Demo (available from 23rd June)
Old Sonic vs New Sonic in Sonic Generations.
PS3 Add-Ons

Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers 2011 – Gold Deck Bundle (7.99/€9.99)
LA Noire – Nicolson Electroplating Arson Case (3.19/€3.99)
Marvel vs. Capcom 3 – Shadow Battle 10 (£0.79/€0.99)
EyePet Move – Lucky Dip Styling Pack: Animals 3 (free)
Operation Flashpoint: Red River – Valley of Death
RUSE – All in One Pack (£8.99/€11.25)
LittleBigPlanet 2 – Tron: Evolution Mini Pack (£2.39/€2.99)
Mortal Kombat - Klassic Skin Pack (£5.49/€6.99)
KillZone 3 - From the Ashes Map Pack (£3.99/€4.99), Map Pack Bundle (£7.99/€9.99)
No More Heroes: Heroes’ Paradise - Moto Geek 2 (£0.59/€0.79), TSUBAKI M-O-E (£0.59/€0.79), TSUBAKI + Moto Geek 2 Bundle (£0.95/€1.19)
Hyperdimension Neptunia - +300 Level Cap (£0.79/€0.99), World’s Labyrinth – A Tyrant who reigns over the Labyrinth (free), Devil (B) (£0.79/€0.99), Devil (C) (£0.79/€0.99), Devil (H) , (£0.79/€0.99), Devil (L) (£0.79/€0.99), Devil (S) (£0.79/€0.99), Devil (W) (£0.79/€0.99)
ModNation Racers - Prehistoric Props Pack (£3.99/€4.99)
MX vs ATV Alive - Answer Rockstar (£0.59/€0.75), Answer Skullcandy (£1.19/€1.49), Fox Racing 360 SE (£1.19/€1.49), KTM 350SXF MX (£1.99/€2.49), KTM 450SX ATV (£1.99/€2.49), One Industries Kombat (£0.59/€0.75), One Industries Rockstar (£0.59/€0.75), Quarry Nationals Events Pack (£3.19/€3.99), Thor Core (£1.19/€1.49), Yamaha YZ125 MX (£1.99/€2.49), Yamaha YZ250 F MX (£1.99/€2.49), Yamaha YZ450F MX (£1.99/€2.49), Unlock Pack – Performance Brakes, (£0.59/€0.75), Unlock Pack – Performance Suspension (£0.59/€0.75), Unlock Pack – Performance Tires (£0.59/€0.75)
PSP Games

LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (£23.99/€29.99)
PSP Add-Ons

Buzz: TUMQ – Prehistoric Quiz(£3.19/€3.99)
Rock Band & Yoostar

Rock Band Network - Veil of Illumination Part One – Andromeda (£0.99/€1.49), Veil of Illumination Part Two – Andromeda (£0.99/€1.49), Deception: Concealing Fate Part Two – TesseracT (£0.99/€1.49), Chameleon Carneval – Andromeda (£0.99/€1.49), Half Crazy – Jukebox the Ghost (£0.99/€1.49)
Rock Band 3 - Maroon 5 Pack 02 (£2.99/€3.59)(contains the following songs also available separately) Misery (£0.99/€1.49), This Love (£0.99/€1.49), Won’t Go Home Without You (£0.99/€1.49); Puddle of Mudd Pack 01 (£2.99/€3.59) (contains the following songs also available separately) Blurry (£0.99/€1.49), Control (£0.99/€1.49), She Hates Me (£0.99/€1.49)
Yoostar 2 - I Don’t like your Jerk-Off Face (£1.39/€1.75), I Want more Life (£1.39/€1.75), Sow Royal Oats (£1.39/€1.75), May I borrow your Towel? (£1.39/€1.75), The Shrieking Eels (£1.39/€1.75), True Love (£1.39/€1.75), Spock’s Brother from Another Mother (£1.39/€1.75), French Flag (free), Italian Flag (free), Spanish Flag (free), UK Flag (free), German Flag (free), American Flag (free)

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...date-22nd-june ...