Monster Hunter Communal Gaming Space Opens

The game latest game in the franchise, Monster Hunter: Freedom Unite, is number 25 in the sales charts this week, and the organisers of the event hope it will kick-start the game’s popularity in the UK. The Monster Hunter series is huge in Japan, outselling all other titles by hundreds of thousands of copies. It has a similar premise to Pokemon, with players completing quests to achieve glory, and fashioning armour and weapons from the remains of slain monsters. Gamers play co-operatively on their PSPs, lending the title a social element, and Japanese fans often play together on their morning commute. The event’s organisers are hoping that by opening up a communal gaming space in central London, they’ll foster a similar trend. The Monster Hunter Gathering Hall, which is taking place at the former site of the Lazarides gallery on Charing Cross Road, runs until September 1, and organisers expect hundreds of fans to gather at the gallery each day to play the game. Admission is free to PSP owners who have a copy of the Monster Hunter game. Capcom, the game’s publisher, said: “What makes Monster Hunter unique in that it is best played cooperatively. Players have to be physically close to play together, meaning that there’s a real social element to the game. Players in Japan congregate everywhere, from parks to cafés to amusement arcades to on public transport. It’s not unusual to see large huddles of kids in parks, all sitting together playing the game.”

( www.telegraph.co.uk )

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Videogame Sales Hit Record High Thanks To Nintendo Wii

According to research from Deloitte, the consultancy firm, a quarter of households owned the market-leading Nintendo Wii console. People spent an average 6.6 hours a week playing games on a computer, phone or a console. A further 24 per cent intended to buy a Wii in the next year. Jolyon Barker, head of technology at Deloitte said: "Gaming has been traditionally frowned upon by parents. However it is now considered "family time" for many people aged between 26 and 42. Although interest declines after the age of 40 this could change as a generation of gamers grows up." The research, which surveyed 2,023 people online, highlighted that 39 per cent of that age group had played on a games console in the past six months, compared with 51 per cent of 14-to-25-year-olds.

More than half said their preferred method of gaming was a console, over a computer or mobile device. Separate sales figures from the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA) said the fastest-growing sector in 2008 was computer games, which saw unit sales grow 17 per cent to 82.8m units spearheaded by the popularity of console games (up 28 per cent to 74.3m units) which the body attributed to the success of Nintendo's Wii platform. Elspa, the games publishers' association, says the UK gaming market, including hardware and accessories, is now worth £4.03bn. Michael Rawlinson, managing director of Elspa, said: "In the past people played board games and now you have families sitting around their console, creating a community feel. People with no previous experience are playing games like Wii Fit as if were the most natural thing.

"Playing video games is no longer a solitary thing. The percentage of games that you play on your own is in decline. Nintendo Wii, PS3, XBox360 all have interconnectivity with the internet so people have the opportunity of playing games with people all over the world," he added. Games sales for the Nintendo Wii sold 20.1m units in 2008, up 153 per cent on 2007. Wii software revenues increased 112 per cent to £481m, while Microsoft's Xbox 360 earned £443m, up 38 per cent. Sony's PlayStation 3 generated £334m in software sales, an increase of 115 per cent, in its first full year on the market, according to Elspa. ( www.telegraph.co.uk )

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PlayStation 3 Console Sales Lag Behind The Competition

It looks like the third wheel this time around is Sony. Going back several console generations, there have always been one or two successful systems, and then one or more also-rans. When the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo were battling for supremacy in the early 1990s, the TurboGrafx-16 settled for table scraps. In the next generation, Sony's original PlayStation and the Nintendo 64 took first and second place, while Sega's Saturn barely even made it out of the starting gate. Sega again took it on the chin when its initially promising Dreamcast was trounced by the PS2, and Microsoft's Xbox and Nintendo's GameCube dueled for second. Now the Nintendo Wii is lapping the field, while the Xbox 360 has carved out a solid following that's growing again with the recent price cuts. But the PS3 is turning into a punching bag. In November, sales of Sony's console actually fell from a year ago, while the Wii and Xbox 360 numbers grew. What's the problem? Price.

While the PS3 has a handful of good exclusive games, there's enough overlap between the games on the PS3 and the Xbox 360 that the average gamer is going to decide which system to get based largely on the price. And the PS3 sells for $399, while the cheapest Xbox 360 model goes for $199. That decision basically makes itself for most gamers. ( www.tmcnet.com )

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Wii Outsells Xbox Three To One

Nintendo's Wii outsold the Xbox 360 by nearly three to one last month. While Microsoft managed to shift a fair few of the boxes it was just not enough to stop punters taking the Wii. According to research outfit NPD, Nintendo shipped 2.04 million Wii's in comparison to the Xbox's 836,000. Sony's PS3 shipped 378,000 units, better than a poke in the eye with a short stick, but jolly disappointing. A breathless Vole told us last week that sales of the Xbox had increased by 25 per cent in comparison to last year and it was pretty sure it had beaten the Paystation 3 by three to one. Its sales, it said were spurred by the recent release of hot-selling games like Gears Of War 2, Fable II, and Lips. The small matter of the fact it slashed its console by nearly a third and enabled it to start streaming HD movies might have helped a bit too.
( www.theinquirer.net )

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Sony PSP-4000 Releasing In 2009

Hot on the heals of the recent PSP 3000 launch, Sony plans to refresh the PlayStation Portable yet again in 2009 with the planned release of (yep, you guessed it) the PSP-4000 model. The news comes courtesy of unnamed games publishing sources talking to Eurogamer.net, who suggest that Sony will follow the PSP-3000 next year with another 'iterative approach'. If so, this means that the recently rumoured PSP mark 2 might not be seen by gamers until 2010 at the very earliest.

( www.techradar.com )

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PlayStation Home Hacked

Developers have found a way to exploit vulnerabilities within the software's code to allow them to customise their PlayStation Home experience beyond the options provided by Sony. PlayStation Home, a Second Life-like virtual world that providea PS3 users with a three-dimensional social gaming space in which to interact and communicate with other players, was launched on Dec 11. One hack uses a combination of the Apache web server and DNS re-direction to allow users of PlayStation Home to watch their own movies on display screens within the game, and change text and music to whatever they choose. A second hack enables players to download any file they want from PlayStation Home's servers, such as a fellow user's profile or avatar, the cartoon-like representation of themselves they create to appear in the virtual world. But the most worrying vulnerability found in the Home software is the security loophole that allows tech-savvy users to upload any file to the Home server, or delete any file from the Home server. It raises the spectre of malicious hackers spreading viruses and malware across the PlayStation Home platform, or even launching sustained attacks on the virtual world's servers to force it offline. ( www.telegraph.co.uk )

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Nintendo Sued Over 'Dangerous' Wii Controllers

The class-action lawsuit, filed by Molly Elvig, a mother from Littleton, Colarado in the United States, claims that the wrist strap attached to the controller is "ineffective". Mrs Elvig decided to file the $5 million (£3 million) claim after alleging that her 52in Samsung television was damaged by a Wii controller that flew out of her son's hand as he played a game of virtual bowling. It's not the first time Nintendo has been criticised for the safety of its Wii controllers. Since the launch of the Wii in 2006, Nintendo has released three different versions of the strap used to attach the controller -- which players gesticulate with while playing games -- to the gamer's wrist, following a spate of injuries and breakages. The first strap, which was little more than a cable hung around the wrist, was replaced by a second strap with a slider mechanism to tighten the loop more securely. The most recent strap features a 'lock' for the slider, to keep the tightened loop in place. In 2006, Nintendo and the US consumer safety product commission warned that the strap may break if "excessive force" was used. But according to the documents filed on behalf of Molly Elvig by her legal team, the "defective nature" of the Wii remote wrist strap was never disclosed by Nintendo. ( www.telegraph.co.uk )

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Nintendo Turns DS Into E-Book Contender

After Amazon's Kindle and Sony's Reader, the latest entry to the electronic book market is surprising in that it isn't actually new – in fact, it's the Nintendo DS. Boxing Day will see the release of a £20 DS cartridge called 100 Classic Book Collection, which contains – you guessed it – 100 classic books. Working with publisher HarperCollins and developer Genius Sonority, Nintendo has developed an interface that allows readers to turn the electronic pages by brushing a finger or the stylus from right to left on the touchscreen while holding the DS vertically like a real book. The titles in the first release include Treasure Island, A Tale of Two Cities and Pride and Prejudice, while more offerings are due to be made available to download.

( www.techradar.com )

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Nintendo Wii Still Tops The Gaming Charts

The Nintendo Wii has not yet lost its unprecedented popularity as it is yet again set to top the charts for most popular gaming console at Christmas time for the third year in a row. Despite claims that the gaming sector - although usually doing alright in poor economic times - is crashing, Nintendo Wii sales seem to be actually improving. The apparent reasons for the immense popularity of this console are not only its unique motion detecting technology and innovative game playing experience, but also its welcome from non-gamers. Whilst in previous years the Wii has been hard to find during the festive season as it has flown off the shelves from the month of November onwards, this year Nintendo has announced that it has increased production of the Wii by 50 percent over last year. The NPD Group reported yesterday that Nintendo sold 2 million Wiis last month, which is shocking since not only is this a non-December sales figure but also because the Wii was released way back in November 2006.
( www.theinquirer.net )

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Meta Data: Xbox's New Clothes

With Sony's social networking platform, Home, set to launch in beta Thursday, Microsoft has displayed impeccable timing in reminding everyone that it already has a robust 14 million-member online community on its Xbox 360 console. It is no surprise that a cleaner, friendlier and better organized marketplace has spurred the sale of downloadable content. Greenberg says it's a sign that the NXE's new social features (avatars and a "party mode" that keeps players together as they move from game to game) appeal to mainstream consumers. On average, movie downloads increased by 49% and television show downloads increased by 30% the week after the launch of the NXE. The sale of Xbox Live Arcade games tripled. And sales of "UNO"--a game released in 2006 and recently retrofitted to include Xbox's new avatars--jumped by 650% the day after the NXE launch. ( www.forbes.com )

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Sony: PS Home Launch Has Technical Problems

Posting over on the PlayStation Home forum, a Home community manager by the name TedTheDog has announced that the roll out of the Open Beta has run into technical problems.
( www.videogamer.com )

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Full Game Downloads Coming To Xbox 360

Full videogame downloads may soon become a reality for Xbox 360 users, according to Fable creator Peter Molyneux. In an interview with Gamesindustry.biz, Molyneux hinted at full game downloads, saying: "I think it would be a great thing for this studio to work on. I can't say anything else on it – I would be killed to death."

( www.techradar.com )

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Wii Begins To Speak

Nintendo launched today a new communications tool – Wii Speak which is an accessory to the Wii Speak Channel. This launch will aid Nintendo in creating a new social gaming experience. Also today comes the launch of new Wii game, Animal Crossing: Let’s Go to the City which will be one of the games which will highlight the full potential of Wii Speak – this comes bundled with the game. This new service will enable users to speak directly through their Wii console to other users using the free-to-use Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. The Wii Speak device can be placed either on top of the TV set or in the middle of the room – this means that you can converse will a whole room of people at once, should you wish to of course. Launching simultaneously with the Wii Speak application is the Wii Speak Channel which will act as a portal to allow up to four different locations to connect, chat and share images and texts anywhere in the world at no extra cost. ( www.theinquirer.net )

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Piracy: Nintendo's New DSi Already Hacked

One major aspect of Nintendo's latest handheld refresh, the beauty that is the Nintendo DSi, was the attempt to crack down on software piracy. It seems that enterprising hackers have already destroyed Nintendo's best laid plans, having already cracked the new DSi with an R4DS-like device doing the rounds in Japan. ( www.techradar.com )

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New Xbox Arcade With 256MB Memory

Gamers were mildly concerned last month that the Xbox Arcade model, with no internal memory, would not be able to run Microsoft's shiny new Xbox Live Experience. Microsoft originally hit on the idea of offering free memory cards, but even that seemed a bit of a clumsy workaround. Microsoft is now planning on releasing Xbox Arcade units with 256MB of internal memory.

( www.techradar.com )

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Xbox 360 Jasper Mobo Out In Wild

Code-named 'Jasper', it comes with a 65nm GPU, which Microsoft hopes will further alleviate some of the infamous Xbox 360 RROD problems. Xbox-scene's forum members have once again come up with the scoop and low-down. Multiple Arcade Xbox 360 SKUs have been spotted with the new motherboard. The new power supply is now rated at 150W (25W less than those used with previous Falcon boards) and the plug format has changed so you can't accidentally poke this PSU into an older Xbox 360. It's reported the system is quieter than original 360s, but the DVD-drive is the same, meaning you'll have to install your games to a separate HDD if you want to get the most out of your quieter console. ( www.atomicmpc.com.au )

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Nintendo Wii Sales Slowing Down

Sales of the Nintendo Wii have slowed considerably in Japan in the last month – although the popular family console has moved past the 7 million mark in its birthplace. The Wii has been a roaring success for Nintendo but Enterbrain statistics point to a 24 per cent drop in sales as it enters its second year. That is based on figures that show that 5 million consoles had sold by January of this year or around 386,000 average monthly units, but only 2 million since (or 292k a month). ( www.techradar.com )

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Xbox 360 Is 3 Years Old, First Warranties Expire

Microsoft's Xbox 360 hit three years of age this last weekend, following its original release in the US and Canada on 22 November 2005. European gamers were treated to our new toy a couple of weeks later on 2 December 2005 (and our Japanese cousins collectively shrugged when it was launched over there on 10 December 2005). Despite its much-reported problems with overheating (the dreaded 'Red Ring of Death') the machine is still the under-TV box of choice for the hardcore console gamer. TechRadar fondly remembers the Xbox 360's UK launch party in London nearly three years ago, when we were treated to what, at the time, was a massive leap forward in videogames (as well as some lovely free massages and gallons of killer cocktails that took us out of action for around 48-72 hours following the event!). ( www.techradar.com )

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Who Will Win This HD Console Generation?

We all hear this question around the web and we can not seem to avoid it no matter how hard we try. There are always fanboys out there saying anything possible to back their system up and prove why their console will win and why it is the best. I am going to give you guys a very in-depth view on who I think will win this console generation and why. What will each company have to do to convince customers to buy their console over the other? This is the true non-fanboyish view on who will win this console generation. ( www.thegameraccess.com )

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Tectoy Announces New Videogame 100% Brazilian

The Tectoy announced in this the fourth (12) launching of a videogame 100% Brazilian, who must arrive officially at the market in July of 2009. The Zeebo will be manufactured in Manaus, has forecast of price of R$ 599, will come folloied of a control and six games in the memory: “Fifa”, “Brain challenge”, Super action hero”, “evil Prey”, “Need will be speed” and “Quake”. The videogame goes gratuitously to connect to a proper net (ZeeboNet) through connections 3G or Edge (of cellular telephony), and from now on the player will be able to buy the games, that will be transferred by download. Before, however, she is necessary if to register in cadastre and to buy the virtual currency (Z-Credits) - either for banking billet, credit card, banking debit or daily pay-paid cards. The credits will be deducted of it register in cadastre as the user to buy the games.
( br.babelfish.yahoo.com )

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