Some 67 per cent of American households own a gaming console or PC, according to a new survey by the Entertainment Software Association.

While the definition of a "PC used to run entertainment software" is perhaps broad enough to cast some doubt on that 67 per cent figure's relevance to retail, it remains a positive endorsement of games' place in contemporary America.

"Computer and video games are now available to consumers on every screen from smart phones to computers to flat screen televisions. This enables millions of Americans enjoy the immersive storytelling, incredible graphics, and compelling plot lines," said Michael D. Gallagher, president and CEO of the ESA.

"These works of art are a fun and engaging way to bring people together, especially families who are playing video games together now more than ever."

The ESA's report also posited the average gamer as 34 (but games purchasers as 40) and male, although some 40 per cent of players are female.

In terms of games themselves, the study reveals that 2009's best-sellers chart was dominated by Nintendo's Wii and DS, despite the 360 version of Modern Warfare 2 taking the top spot.

The most popular genre, in terms of sales, was 'action', at 19.5 per cent, closely followed by sports at 19 per cent. Action does not incorporate shooters, which constituted 12 per cent themselves.

The report also suggests parents are coming around to games. 64 percent of them believe games are a positive part of their children’s lives, and 76 per cent have faith in in-game parental controls.

The study also claims that 64 per cent of gamers play with others and that 48 per cent of parents play games with their children regularly, reinforcing the medium as a social one. Further details and statistics are available in the ESA's PDF of its Essential Facts About the Computer and Video Game Industry report.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...lds-play-games ...

Market analyst firm Lazard Capital Markets has predicted a late 2010 launch for the Nintendo 3DS portable in Japan, followed by a North American launch in March at $249-$299.

"We have little doubt that the 3DS will prove successful for Nintendo and quite possibly third-party software publishers, as the 3D effects will give reason for consumers to upgrade from their current devices, as well as potentially reduce the cannibalistic impact from smartphones and tablets," said analyst Colin Sebastian in comments provided to website Gamasutra.

Nintendo's only comment on the launch date of the 3DS has been that it will be released before the end of its financial year in March 2011, although this may refer only to Japan. New hardware is often released in Japan in December, ahead of the New Year gift-giving season, with some iterations of the DS released first in Japan and others debuting in the West.

No indication on the price of the device has ever been given, but the current RRP of the Nintendo DSi XL in the U.S., the most expensive DS variant so far, is $189.99.

Sebastian also commented on the other major hardware platforms at E3, suggesting that the Wii could see its market share eroded by Kinect and Move. However, he felt high costs for the HD peripherals and a strong software line-up for the Wii, "should keep core fans engaged with the platform until there is a platform refresh, as early as 2011, in our view."

A price point of $100 to $150 was predicted for Kinect, which yesterday Sebastian forecast would ship 3 million units worldwide. Both GameStop and Amazon are currently listing the device with a $150 price tag. Microsoft is set to reveal the official price at the gamescom event next month.

Sebastian also commented on Sony's E3 performance, saying: "While initially marketing the PS3 as a core game platform, we believe that Sony has turned a new page and now is developing a broader digital entertainment platform."

In terms of third party publishers Sebastian felt that Activision came out ahead at E3, referencing a "robust Blizzard pipeline, new online business models, and growth in Asia" and concluding that "We believe that Activision is well positioned to maintain its industry-leading margin profile with multiple opportunities for growth in coming years."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...-price-for-3ds ...

Is lag a problem for Kinect? Not according to Rare, the studio tasked with producing one of its flagship launch titles, Kinect Sports.

Speaking to Eurogamer in LA this week, Nick Burton, exec producer of technology and communications for the Britsoft veteran, claimed earlier problems had been overcome. "Lag is not an issue," he said. "As with any prototype stuff, of course it was in the past. That's to be expected.

"Where we're at now, not at all. Yes, we've done a lot work to make sure it wasn't a problem, but when you've got something that's copying what you're doing you can't have a lot of lag."

Burton said lag for Kinetic Sports is set at 150ms which, as Digital Foundry smarty-pants Richard Leadbetter pointed out, does not include TV lag.

Lag is more evident in some titles than others at E3 this week and, since some degree of it is unavoidable, the onus will be on developers to work around it to ensure acceptable response times.

Meanwhile, the studio was also keen to dispel the belief - amplified by the recent rebranding - it was now focusing exclusively on casual games.

"It's been the focus for the past couple of years, but we're going to do all kinds of stuff," Burton said. "Obviously the rebrand for us was more about we wanted to freshen up the image - it was just time for a chance. We've done it before, we'll probably do it again.

"We are continually looking at what the next thing's going to be. It might be casual, it might be core, we've had such an eclectic mix over the years and we'll continue to do that."

He added: "It's not always going to be as casual as [Kinect Sports]; this is just something we got really excited about."

Burton refused, however, to be drawn on the studio's other projects, stating: "This is the only Rare game you're seeing at the moment."

While Kinect Sports can be seen as filling the 'Wii Sports' role in the initial Kinect line-up, Burton said the experience on offer is far more advanced.

"There's so much more data, so much more fidelity, so many more things you can do," he said. "Kinect's not just about tracking - there's voice recognition, identity, so many things. It's more than the sum of its parts. I've been involved for a couple of years and even now we're like, "Wow, there's all these things we could do!"

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/ra...g-not-an-issue ...

David Reeves, 14-year veteran of Sony and now chief operating officer of Capcom Europe, has told our sister site GamesIndustry.biz that Sony needs to release a true sequel to the PSP quickly if it expects to compete in the handheld market.

Rival Nintendo has this week revealed the 3DS in detail, wowing the masses at the annual E3 conference with hands-on demonstrations of a 3D console, its software and potential to reinvigorate the handheld market.

"It's an exciting time and you could possibly have two handhelds coming out within months or a year of each other," Reeves told GamesIndustry.biz.

Asked whether he expects a PSP2 to be released in the next 12 months, he said: "I'd like to the think it would be for the publishers and developers and consumers.

"Sony tried to make the transition with PSPgo, I think that changed some consumers' attitudes, but they need to come back with something on PSP pretty quickly to stay in the game because Nintendo are s*** hot at getting these things right. And they always get these things right."

Reeves has always been frank about the PSP platform, and last year admitted there were problems with the system - while he was still at Sony he suggested Capcom was one of the publisher's that could help lift the flagging format.

The PSP2 has not been officially acknowledged by Sony, but reports are suggesting the system will be a "technological monster", with one of the main features of the system a touch-screen interface.

The PSPgo, released only last year, has been a flop at retail, with Sony recently offering new users a massive 10 free games for the download-only machine. As well as issues with the software delivery, the high price also hindered sales.

"It was hard and it was very, very expensive," said Reeves. "Now they're offering 10 games and they have to try and revive it."

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/re...-release-psp-2 ...

Anyone can take a hammer and rib-spreader to a new piece of hardware. But it takes someone like Anand Shimpi, the man behind Anandtech who has personally suffered through four out-of-warranty Xbox 360 failures, to bring sage analysis to a teardown of the new Xbox 360. His reluctant sixth Xbox 360 is the new slimster (codename Valhalla) which, for the first time, combines the CPU, GPU, and eDRAM onto a single chip -- previous Xbox 360 motherboards featured two discrete packages that split the CPU from the ATI designed Xenos GPU and eDRAM. The design allows for a single heatsink to be cooled by a single, larger fan making the new Xbox "noticeably quieter," measured at 45dB when idle or 51dB with the 1.5Gbps SATA Hitachi HTS545025B9SA00 with 8MB buffer spinning at 5400RPM -- that's down from 50dB and 54dB, respectively, as measured on late 2008 through 2010 Jasper-class 360s. Regarding power consumption, Anand measured a 50% reduction from the original 2005 Xbox 360 (25% less than Jasper-class rigs at idle, or 20% to 17% less under load) and pulled just 0.6W when "totally off" compared to the 2W of vampire power pulled by older 360s. Anand speculates that Microsoft might finally be using cheaper 40nm components. However, we shouldn't expect to see a price cut anytime soon as it will take Microsoft awhile to ramp up the material and manfucaturing cost savings. Regardless, with Kinect and several new game titles on the horizon, Anand concludes that there's still pleny of life left in the old Xbox 360 platform for those looking to make the jump.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/18/n...-and-noise-re/ ...

Razer's meteoric rise from second-tier mouse maker to top-shelf peripheral guru has been nothing short of incredible, and its success has enabled it to start to focus a little more on the niche groups. Such is its latest addition: a keyboard, mouse, and headset designed just for RTS gamers, and specifically for Starcraft II. We spent some time sampling their APM-enhancing abilities, and checked out the latest revision of the company's upcoming Xbox 360 Onza controller too.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/18/r...rals-hands-on/ ...

Stoobalou writes with a story that got started earlier this month when iPhone users in the US and the UK noticed that their phones seemed to be sending large data bursts via 3G overnight. (Providers are ending unlimited contracts, so iPhone users are paying more attention to how much data they are using.) The discussions began on MacOSRumors and an Apple discussion forum. Thinq.co.uk makes this guess as to what is going on, but doesn't offer much in the way of substantiation:
"The simple fact of the matter is — as far as we can tell — that the iPhone's push notifications and other small transfers of data are totted up throughout the day and the total for all of those notifications is added up after dark and sent to your airtime provider while your phone is sleeping. If these tiny amounts of data were individually listed your bill would probably be the size of a telephone directory. The reason it is using the 3G network rather than Wi-Fi is that all iPhones up to and including the 3Gs turn off Wi-Fi push functionality while the phone is in sleep mode, in order to preserve battery life. The iPhone 4, incidentally, has better power management so will not need to do this."

http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/10/...d-Phantom-Data ...

Having bossed the karaoke market for the last decade, Sony’s SingStar series is turning its hand to something new – dancing and instruments.
Singstar Dance will allow up to two players to move along to the music using PlayStation Move controllers. Users are required to mimic the actions of the on-screen avatar. Rather than watching the music videos players will instead watch themselves via the video captured by the PlayStation Eye.
SingStar Guitar, on the other hand, will allow those who own either a Guitar Hero or Rock Band instrument to strum along as their friends sing.
“The key thing for us is to give people new features while retaining that classic SingStar look and feel,” SingStar director Dave Ranyard stated. “For me, SingStar is all about family parties and these new features encourage more people to get involved.”
“With SingStar Dance we’re able to augment the PlayStation Move motion controller so that you see sparkles and ribbons flowing from it. We already have the Video Editor and things like this will allow our community to be even more creative.”

“SingStar Guitar songs are quite simply those that are most fun to play on guitar. On some tracks we’ve taken the bass line. With SingStar Dance songs it’s very much about the tempo.
“Slower tracks aren’t so good to dance to, generally speaking, but maybe we’ll find an exception to that rule. In terms of genres we have a broad range, from salsa to country to pop.”
Sony has warned that Dance and Guitar support will not be applied to the entire SingStar catalogue, though both will see post-release DLC releases.
SingStar Dance and SingStar Guitar are due for a Blu-ray boxed release some time later this year.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/39668/E3-2...r-branches-out ...

Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime has said that the 3DS has "no health issues" - except maybe for kids under seven.

"We will recommend that very young children not look at 3D images," Fils-Aime said at E3 yesterday.

"That's because, [in] young children, the muscles for the eyes are not fully formed."

"This is the same messaging that the industry is putting out with 3D movies, so it is a standard protocol. We have the same type of messaging for the [1990s Nintendo virtual reality machine] Virtual Boy, as an example."

With much of Nintendo's portfolio being very kid friendly, this could come as a surprise to some.

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