via Games Industry


A survey of 4000 parents across the UK, France, Germany and Italy has concluded that 75 per cent of respondents were concerned about the content in videogames that their children played.

Additionally 43 per cent claimed they were unaware of any ratings system in place, despite the PEGI system in place across Europe, and the BBFC in the UK, while 44 per cent believed that time spent playing should be limited to one hour per day.

The survey, carried out on behalf of Microsoft, is the latest research to highlight concerns over the use of videogames by children, despite the number of 18-rated titles available only making up a small percentage of games released.

It also went on to find that an average of 63 per cent of children played games on their own, without any kind of supervision, although most parents claimed that they identified and selected the most appropriate games for their children to play.

ELSPA set up the Askaboutgames web site to try and better inform parents about the content of videogames, and how to judge whether or not a game is suitable.

And in the UK Dr Tanya Byron is currently leading a government review into the subject of how children relate to videogames and the internet, the findings of which are due in the first half of 2008. ...

via Computer and Video Games


Well-known videogame analyst Michael Patcher says that it will take as long as three months for Wii stock to even out after the Christmas rush.

The Wii is already widely sold out around the world as Nintendo's motion control antics have become the most desired Chrimbo gadget for it's second year, and its unlikely that supplies will recover until April, according to Patcher.

He did, however, state that despite the lack of stock, Nintendo will top Christmas sales with Wii, predicting the company to sell 1.7 million consoles over the Christmas period, while he expects Microsoft to sell 1.5 million 360s and Sony to flog 800,000 PS3s.

Elsewhere in the report, Patcher points identifies a current sales spike for console overall, despite consoles of the current generation being generally more costly than the previous gen.

Patcher states; "While next generation hardware unit sales are more modest than they were in the analogous period of 2002 (when console prices averaged under $200), recent price cuts and new hardware (slim PSP and the 40Gb PS3) and the release of key games (Halo 3 and Guitar Hero III) triggered a spike in hardware sales over the last few months that we believe will continue over the remainder of the year," according to Gamasutra. ...

via Eurogamer


Microsoft has skirted around future plans to add television content to the European Video Marketplace.

We will be given new treats as time goes on, according to word-shaped noise from a spokesperson, but it was unwilling to comment specifically on series' from the telly.

However, the future looks bright; the US has had its Video Marketplace up and running for over a year, and offers all sorts of content including shows like Star Trek, South Park and CSI.

Earlier today Microsoft revealed that Europe would finally be granted the service next Tuesday, offering classics such as Demolition Man and The Matrix for download.

Today also hosts the bi-annual Live update, introducing new features such as downloadable Xbox titles to the online service. ...

via Games Industry


Don Mattrick, senior vp of Microsoft Interactive Entertainment, thinks the Xbox 360 is the best value for the money this holiday season.


Mattrick, who came to his current position at Microsoft in July just as the company admitted Xbox 360 hardware failures and launched a billion dollar warranty program, thinks that the company has definitely recovered.

"I think we're getting to the point of critical mass in terms of the number of hits. I think we have the highest rated content ever to exist on a gaming system," he said.

Although he noted that the system would have a collection of exclusive and third-party hits next year, he mentioned only Grand Theft Auto IV, which he felt had the potential to be the "Halo equivalent" in the calendar year 2008.

Mattrick also said that he thinks the Xbox 360 has the potential to have the same shelf life as the PlayStation 3, which Sony is predicting will last a decade. Considering the challenge of getting the original Xbox to market and making the transition to the Xbox 360, he was pleased with the company's progress.

"I think we've got great fundamentals, and we're going to continue to drive against those fundamentals to over-deliver value and satisfaction to consumers," Mattrick concluded. ...

via Games Industry


Koch Media has announced that it has received certification from Microsoft to publish titles on the Xbox 360 platform, and plans to release two games in Europe in the future.

Those titles will be Warhammer: Battle March and Sacred 2 - Fallen Angel, although no further details on game content or possible release schedule were announced.

Managing director of Koch, Dr Klemens Kundratitz, said of the move: "As one of the largest software publishers in the European region, we consider releases for Xbox 360 to be more and more important."

Koch Media will release the games via its Deep Silver label. The company recently announced the purchase of Rockstar's former studio in Vienna, Games That Matter. ...

via Games Industry


EA's Need for Speed ProStreet is on top of the German charts according to sales data released by Media-Control GfK International.

During the week ended November 25, the latest game in the Need for Speed franchise took first, second, and fifth place on Germany's charts, with the PS2 version beating out the PC and PS3 versions.

The PC version of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and the Wii's Super Mario Galaxy were also in the top five, at number three and four respectively.


The complete Top 10 list is as follows:

1. Need for Speed ProStreet (PS2)
2. Need for Speed ProStreet (PC)
3. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PC)
4. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii)
5. Need for Speed ProStreet (PS3)
6. Crysis (PC)
7. High School Musical - Sing It (PS2)
8. Dr. Kawashima's Gehirn-Jogging (DS)
9. Dr. Kawashima: Mehr Gehirn-Jogging (DS)
10. Die Siedler (DS) ...

via Zophar's Domain

NIN64 is a Nintendo 64 emulator for Windows. It can't run any commercial games, but it can run demos, such as the ones found here. It's currently at version 0.02.

Download and Give Feedback Via Comments ...

New from Pegasus2000:

A video that shows SIFT algorithm working under Playstation
Portable, is available here:

http://it.youtube.com/watch?v=3q8LfgApJ0A ...

Two weeks ago, Sony launched the PSP PC store with a whimper. It debuted just two days before Thanksgiving, offering PSP owners the chance to download some free themes and buy and download few old and new PSP games. I didn’t hear about any of it until the weekend when it got mentioned on the 1UpYours podcast.

Why the quiet launch? Was Sony embarrassed about it?

Late last week I interviewed Eric Lempel, the PlayStation director of network operations in charge of the store.

And we talked about everything.

Seriously. I don’t think we missed a thing. Want to know what the plans are for this store? The pricing strategy? Why it requires a PC? Whether it will support Macs? Which titles formerly on UMD will be coming to the store (he revealed that “SOCOM Fire Team Bravo” and “Twisted Metal: Head-On” will hit by year’s end)? Whether UMD titles will ever be released on the download store the same day as they are in game shops? Which PS3 games he’d like to see on the PSP store? The plans for import titles?

And more, more, more. Check out the chock-full interview below.

One excerpt to get you thinking:

Multiplayer: In general the store looks like it comes one step closer to fulfilling a lot of PSP owners’ fantasy of “I want to download everything. I don’t want that UMD thing.” A lot of people were thinking the PSP revision might even do away with the UMD and this whole thing is going to be like an iPod, it’s all going to be downloadable. In your mind, is this a step closer to that? Is this a way of acknowledging those people in any way? Is this the PSP showing that download is where the future is?

Lempel: I would say the industry is at an interesting point right now where we have the ability to quickly deliver content to people. So the retail business is still very important to us. And the UMD business is still doing very well for us and our retail partners. I don’t think we’re ready to look at that and say, “This is the way it should go right now.” But we’re at an interesting point in the industry where consumers know they can get things fast and they’re getting used to it with other devices from other companies. So it’s something we always wanted to do. Technically we didn’t have the ability in the past with some of our hardware. But now that we do we want to start opening up some of these channels and getting consumers used to that and experimenting with it.

I would say it’s a glimpse towards the future. Definitely just by releasing a UMD title in the store it definitely puts ideas in people’s heads, but no I wouldn’t categorize this as a shift in business model at this point.


Multiplayer: Can you describe the PSP store and what the goals are for it?

Eric Lempel, Director of PlayStation Network Operations, Sony Computer Entertainment of America: The key feature is to get content to the PSP in a way that we couldn’t do it before. You’re well aware that currently the only way to get games to a PSP is to have [PSP Onwers] either download demos which we offer on our PSP website or to have them go to the store to buy UMDs. That creates some challenges if you want to create some new and original type of games that may not necessarily be — I wouldn’t want to say worthy, but — up to the caliber of a UMD release and something that we can offer exclusively on the network. So we wanted to create a way to get those games out to consumers. That was one of the primary reasons for it. Examples of that on the PlayStation 3 are games like “flow” and “Calling All Cars” that we wouldn’t sell on Blu-Ray but are clearly very popular and we sell them over the network. We’ve got a lot of interest from the developer community and our internal teams about doing games for the PSP that wouldn’t be available on UMD so that’s one of the main reasons why we did it.

The other piece of it is to get those PSOne classic titles to PSP owners that don’t have a PS3 at this time. … Clearly we don’t want to ignore the giant base of PSP owners.

And the other thing was to really create a nice clean place where people can get a lot of content for their PSP that’s all formatted correctly, that all works well. It’s all something we’ve looked at and said, “This is something that should go on your PSP” [That includes] themes, wallpapers. We have the ability to do music. Longer term we’ll be looking at movies and TV shows.

Multiplayer: Who is this really for? Which PSP owners are you trying to reach?

Lempel: Short-term, right now, it’s for the more engaged PSP user, but longer term I think everybody is going to want to check it out. We made a little bit of noise around the launch, but there isn’t a whole lot of content that’s really new. But there will be. You’ll be seeing a lot more content coming on there in the near future that is made exclusively for the PSP and isn’t available anywhere else. The other side of it is PSP owners now that are getting into PSP for the first time may not find some of those older UMD titles that were really strong at retail. There’s only so much shelf space at retail. This allows us to open up the whole library of PSP titles.

Multiplayer: A bunch of questions come to mind about this. Many people are asking about the requirement ...