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by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:47- Categories:
- Nintendo 3DS News
Nintendo is not concerned by competition from cheap $1 smartphone games and has no plans to lower its software prices accordingly, so says the creator of the 3DS....
Hideki Konno explained to Gamasutra that rather than lower standards to allow it to sell games for less, Nintendo planned to pour more resources into making sure its titles competed at a quality level, rather than on price.
"We're not going to try to match that," he insisted, addressing the issue of rock-bottom priced smartphone titles.
"We're just going to continually strive to not just maintain, but increase, the quality of the entertainment that we're providing, and let it sort itself out. Again, we're not worried about competing at a price point level.
Konno then speculated that Microsoft and Sony held exactly the same opinion on the issue, adding that it wasn't possible to make an immersive, content-rich title for such a low price.
"Now of course as a customer, if somebody said to me, 'Hey, we've got Call of Duty on your portable device and it's only going to cost you 100 yen,' yeah, I'd be super stoked, really excited about that," he said.
"And I'd be really excited to see a great game at a really cheap price, but I just don't think that you could make a game that's immersive and as big as, let's say Call of Duty, or any other large title, and sell it at that price point; it's just not possible.
"The only way that you're going to get a game at that price point is if it's a limited version with limited levels or something. They're going to have to reduce it to sell at that price. So that other game - because the content is valuable - it's still going to be a viable product at a higher price point.
"If we went out and created one of our titles - a big title for Nintendo - and we decided to sell it at, like, say 100 yen," he continued, "how many do we have to sell to get back our investment? That number's insane. It's just incredible, right?
What's more, Konno argued, gamers don't mind paying extra if they know they're getting a quality product.
"As a game developer I've put my heart into what I create, and I'm hoping that what I'm putting out there is something that people will be engaged by and entertained by. And as a consumer, I want the same thing. If I go and I see a game that interests me and I think I want to play it, I don't mind the fact that I have to pay a reasonable price for it.
"I'm not trying to say that I think games on cell phones are a bad thing; I'm not trying to say that they're worthless, or have no value at all. I'm just saying that they're just different."
The 3DS launches this Friday, with full retail games currently priced at around £30. The eShop, which will offer cheaper downloadable titles, will be added in via a system update later this year.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...ith-USD1-gamesby Published on March 21st, 2011 18:43- Categories:
- PS3 News,
- PC News,
- Xbox 360 News
PCs aren't just a bit more powerful than PS3 and Xbox 360 - they're up to 10 times more powerful. So why aren't PC games 10 times their console equivalents? Because of Windows' meddling DirectX API (application programming interface), that's why....
"It's funny. We often have at least 10 times as much horsepower as an Xbox 360 or a PS3 in a high-end graphics card, yet it's very clear that the games don't look 10 times as good," scoffed AMD graphics card mouthpiece Richard Huddy to Bit-Tech.
"To a significant extent that's because, one way or another and for good reasons and bad - mostly good - DirectX is getting in the way."
Huddy added: "I certainly hear this ['make the API go away'] in my conversations with games developers."
DirectX is made by Microsoft. To run a game on Windows - the most popular PC operating system around - you need to use DirectX. In simple terms, it's DirectX that controls what your graphics card can do.
On console that's not the case: developers there can program "direct-to-metal", as Huddy calls it.
"By giving you access to the hardware at the very low level, you give games developers a chance to innovate, and that's going to put pressure on Microsoft – no doubt at all," Huddy went on to say.
"If we drop the API, then people really can render everything they can imagine, not what they can see – and we'll probably see more visual innovation in that kind of situation."
What sort of nut-case developer would want to program "direct-to-metal" on PC, you ask? Crysis maker Crytek; "Yes, that would appeal to us,' the developer said.
The Xbox 360 supports DirectX 9.0c. The PS3 doesn't use DirectX, what with it being a Microsoft technology. The most current version of DirectX is 11.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...horsepower-amdby Published on March 21st, 2011 18:40- Categories:
- Nintendo 3DS News
The battery in the Nintendo 3DS is as bad as we had feared, and it's a major impediment to enjoying the system. ... With the screen at a reasonable brightness, 3D and wireless turned off when the game allowed it, and no sound, we were about to get to a little over 4.5 hours of playtime. If you like a brighter screen, keep 3D turned on, or if you have that speaker going, that time is only going to go down. ... Using the cradle whenever the system isn't being played is a habit you're going to want to pick up, especially with a charging time of around three and a half hours.http://games.slashdot.org/story/11/0...Slow-To-Charge ...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:36- Categories:
- Nintendo DS News
Retail chain HMV has outlined its trade-in plans for the forthcoming Nintendo 3DS handheld, ahead of its launch later this week.
The company is offering an extra £20 discount to customers handing over a DS Lite, DSi XL or DSi in exchange if pre-ordering by March 24, bringing the ticket price down to £109.99 - while those doing so are also entitled to a £20 HMV gift card.
Meanwhile, customers exchanging those older consoles for a 3DS between March 25 and April 7 will still see an additional £10 discount on top of the trade-in price.
The retailer has also taken the unusual step of guaranteeing a trade-in price for the 3DS itself, to the tune of £200, if handed in by April 7.
"We want to help make this one of the biggest and most memorable games launches ever, so HMV's going full-out to offer 3DS customers the best deal anywhere on the high street," said the company's head of games, Tim Ellis.
HMV is Nintendo's official partner for the launch, and is opening 100 stores across the UK at midnight on Thursday, including regional flagship stores LiverpoolOne and 150 Oxford Street, London.
The first 500 customers to purchase a 3DS console at the London store will also receive a free 3DS game of their choice.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...gest-3ds-deals
...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:35- Categories:
- PSP News,
- PS3 News,
- PS2 News,
- Nintendo DS News,
- Nintendo Wii News,
- PC News,
- Xbox 360 News
THQ's first person shooter Homefront has defied a mixed critical response by debuting at number one in the UK sales chart.
The Xbox 360 version was by far the most popular of the three SKUs, accounting for 70 per cent of sales - compared to 26 per cent on the PlayStation 3 and 4 per cent on the PC. Homefront on Xbox 360 has already sold 82 per cent of the lifetime total of developer Kaos' last title, 2008's Frontlines: Fuel of War.
Officially Dragon Age II is the second-biggest seller of the week, with a fall in sales of 68 per cent. But if sales of Pokémon White and Black were combined they would have been enough to push Nintendo's portable release into second place.
PC exclusive Total War: Shogun 2 debuted at number four, although unlike the other new releases it was launched on the Tuesday rather than Friday. Nevertheless the game made almost 80 per cent of its retail boxed sales in the first 24 hours.
Outside the top 10, Take-Two's well-reviewed tennis title - Top Spin 4 - entered the charts at number 13. Here sales across the two HD console formats was much more even, at 51 per cent for the Xbox 360 and 45 per cent for the PlayStation 3 (plus 4 per cent for the Wii).
In what was a busy week for new releases there was no sign of Capcom's Okamiden in the all formats top 40. Even in the Nintendo DS top 40 the game only managed to debut at number 10.
Sega's Yakuza 4 did enter the all formats charts at number 25 though, and like Top Spin 4, just one place below that achieved but its previous iteration.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...t-in-uk-charts ...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:31- Categories:
- PC News
Blizzard co-founder and vice president of product development Frank Pearce has told press that he feels Diablo III is likely to cannibalise World of Warcraft's audience well before new MMO 'Titan' hits the scene.
Speaking in an interview with Gamasutra, Pearce spoke about the likelihood of WoW players leaving to play Diablo, but pointed out that if the game is going to lose players to anybody, it may as well be another Blizzard product.
"It's hard to say," said Pearce when asked about Titan and WoW running concurrently. "I think even a shorter-term concern is whether or not we might see cannibalization of WoW players from Diablo III when we launch it, because it's a similar type of experience. Not exactly similar, but it's that RPG feel.
"For us, I think it's really important that we recognise that somewhere, sometime it's likely that someone is going to cannibalise World of Warcraft players, so it's better we cannibalise them ourselves than let someone else do that, because if we cannibalise them ourselves, they're still a Blizzard customer."
However, Pearce doesn't see the current level of player engagement as a plateau - there is, he believes, still room for another big game or two in the market.
"Whether it's a Blizzard game or another great MMO, I think there's plenty of space in the market for great MMOs to share customers," Pearce claims.
"We have players that burn through content in weeks or months that takes us two years to create. There are so many people looking to play these experiences so passionately, so many hours a week, I think there's plenty of space for the industry to grow."
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...annibalise-wow
...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:30- Categories:
- PC News
Hardware manufacturer NVIDIA has told GamesIndustry.biz that it believes while the console platforms do have an advantage in terms of stability, the resulting disadvantage is that the hardware is static - and the gap to mobile and PC is closing.
That's according to the company's senior corporate and Tegra PR manager Bea Longworth, speaking in an interview published today.
"Already mobile gaming is hot on the heels of what you would expect from console-class gaming," she said. "We were demonstrating an Xbox 360 game running on our quad-core Project Kal-El technology demonstration at MWC.
"The gap is definitely closing, and that has always been the Achilles' heel of the console - its greatest strength is it's a stable platform, it's very much plug and play, you don't have to fiddle around with the hardware and have all the hassle that you might get from the PC.
"But that's also its biggest disadvantage, the fact that they are static from one generation to another, and also that the technology can't improve. Whereas with other platforms like the PC and now mobile gaming, they will be constantly moving ahead.
"So it will be really, really interesting to see what console technology has to do in order to differentiate itself and stay ahead when it has to compete with a very mass-market mobile format instead of digging in its heels."
The company has been working hard to establish its technology in the mobile space, and while Apple uses its own chipsets, NVIDIA's confident its supply to the Android market can help it compete in the future.
"It already is extremely important to us, but in terms of the proportion of the business dedicated to that particular sector, it's definitely going to become one of our most important businesses in the future," she explained.
"We've been pretty open, over the last two or three years, that we have that expectation. And obviously mobile is currently the fastest-growing and the most exciting area of computing and technology, so it makes a lot of sense for us to be there at the forefront.
"So yes, we're definitely extremely committed to our mobile business and we're really excited to be able to start introducing devices from major manufacturers like LG and Samsung and Motorola based on our technology."
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ble-but-static
...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:28- Categories:
- Apple iPad
Latest device will arrive on March 25th – but not till 5pm
The UK launch of Apple’s iPad 2 will be delayed on Friday due to an error in shipping the device to its UK stores.
Although Apple has denied rumours of a delay, insisting that “the website says 25 March and that’s when it’ll be”, it would seem that any Apple fans who queue up on Friday morning might be disappointed.
According to Robert Peckham, former executive director of the Mac Technology Association reseller group, a mistake in shipments means that UK Apple Stores will not receive stock in time for the anticipated launch time on Friday morning.
As a result, the US vendor has ordered its UK resellers – including PC World – to delay selling the devices until 5pm on Friday evening, forcing them to make a number of last minute changes to their preparations for the launch and in spite of the fact that many of them have already received their allocated shipments.
“It’s upset quite a few people,” Peckham told PCR. “They’ve now got to squeeze an entire day of sales in to one or two hours on a Friday evening.”
http://www.pcr-online.biz/news/36000...launch-delayed
...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:25- Categories:
- Xperia Play News
Sony Ericsson explains why it thinks it offers a viable alternative to iPhone
The marketing boss of Sony Ericsson UK has confirmed to MCV that downloadable games for the Xperia Play will be available for between £1 and £10.
David Hilton also explained why he thinks the device can successfully fight for market share against behemoths such as the iPhone.
"The main thing is to offer something different," he told MCV. "iPhone is a hugely popular product and Angry Birds on iPhone is a delight.
"But now the hardware allows you to play far more complex games. You don’t want to be playing these with your fingers all over the screen. You want full visibility and the ability to control the games with the sort of interfaces you have on your games console."
There was also some insight into how consumers will access the games.
"As soon as you slide open the phone, the screen will go into a game finder app that will show you all the games you own and all the games you can download," he added. "What we have heard about Android is that locating games in the marketplace is a struggle. So we have created this app to easily navigate through the games."
Six games will come pre-loaded onto the handset – FIFA 10, Crash bandicoot, The Sims 3, Tetris, Star Battalion and Bruce Lee Dragon Warriors.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/43586/Xper...t-between-1-10
...by Published on March 21st, 2011 18:20- Categories:
- Nintendo 64 News,
- Snes News
Mario Kart on the Snes is one of the all time great games despite getting around 82% in reviews at the time of release, the 2 player battle mode in my opinion has never been done has good as the first release of Mario kart on the Snes.
Today BFrancois has posted many videos and screenshots of his work on remoddiling the N64 version of Super Mario Kart to look more like the Snes Version.
The results so far are outstanding and worth a good look and makes my mouth water for the finished article.
Me personally i always wanted to hack the original Snes game and bring out a new version with different races and other features (anyone know of any decent modded versions of Snes Mario Kart?)
Anyway check out BFrancois`s work here --> on Emutalk ...- Search DCEmu
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