|
Week of May 25, 2008
XBMC Dev Con 2008 Hosted By Boxee
>> From xbmc.org:
[QUOTE]
XBMC DEV CON 2008 will be the first event in which the XBMC developers get a chance to get together face-to-face, meet and greet, discuss XBMC, and maybe get a little coding done as well. After 6 years and with so many users, it is time for the XBMC programmers to get out of the IRC chat-room and meet up in person to talk about the past, present, and future, set priorities and make plans (and yeah, play a few games), and who knows, this may even lead to a XBMC fan convention in the not too distant future.
When and where?
June the 13th, 14th, and 15th in Amsterdam.
Who is boxee?
boxee is a NYC-based start-up company that will soon be offering a social networking multimedia-platform built on-top of XBMC. Much as Red Hat and Firefox are specific businesses that have products built on open source code and open technologies as their framework, boxee's aim is to bring the core XBMC platform to the mainstream consumer. boxee is fully committed to the growth and success of XBMC and will continue to contribute back upstream to the XBMC code base under the GPL license. boxee is hosting the 2008 DEV CON, and will be going into public alpha testing of their product beginning on the 15th of June 2008. Team-XBMC is very excited to have our code base used in boxee's product, and we look forward to more people discovering XBMC through boxee. This initiative will hopefully lead others to use XBMC in a similar fashion.
How to get involved:
* Propose ideas for stuff that you would like Team-XBMC to discuss: XBMC Community Forum Discussion
* Meet Team-XBMC for drinks on the evening of June the 14th (details will be posted on the boxee blog)
* Sign up for boxee alpha testing: www.boxee.tv
* Follow boxee progress on the boxee blog: blog.boxee.tv
* Send boxee a Twitter with a comment or question: http://twitter.com/boxee
[/QUOTE]
Official Site: http://xbmc.org
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Itagaki: Xbox 360 is the Most Powerful Hardware
>> From an interview with Team Ninja (Ninja Gaiden II) developer Tomonubu Itagaki on mcvuk.com:
[QUOTE]
* MCV: "Ninja Gaiden II has got some great previews from the press - how proud of it are you?"
* Itagaki: "I'm very happy with it. It's not 100 per cent as I think that's not possible to do, but I think that I was successful in making a game that no one else could. This is a game that only my team and I would be able to make."
* MCV: "Do you prefer to develop on the Xbox 360, rather than the other consoles?"
* Itagaki: "Yes. In my opinion it is the most powerful hardware. I have a lot of friends that develop on it so in some ways I regard it like being at home when I'm working on it. There's no reason for me to go to a strangers house to make games."
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: mcvuk.com (via n4g.com)
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Michael Pachter: Xbox360 Next for Netflix
>> From businessweek.com:
[QUOTE]
Following a Netflix analyst event in San Francisco, Wedbush Morgan Securities' Michael Pachter has reiterated his belief that the popular rental company will partner with Microsoft to offer a new streaming service over Xbox Live.
"The company is investing heavily in building its online streaming capability, to the point where it is a market leader, and a desirable partner for consumer electronics companies that hope to participate in digital media convergence in the near term. As we have speculated in the past, we believe that one of Netflix's partners is Microsoft. We arrive at this conclusion based upon Netflix management repeatedly mentioning 'Internet enabled video game consoles.' While there are three such consoles, only one (Microsoft's Xbox 360) has a sufficiently large installed base to make sense from a streaming partnership with Netflix," Pachter stated in his latest research note.
"It strikes me that the right business model for Microsoft and Netflix is that they both participate for free, and I think the idea is that Netflix has 8 million subs in the U.S. and Microsoft has probably pretty close to that many Xbox Live members in the U.S., and there's probably not 100 percent overlap - my guess is there's a couple million of overlap, but there's 5-6 million Xbox Live subscribers that Netflix would love to have join Netflix service and there's probably 5-6 million Netflix subscribers that Microsoft would love to sell an Xbox 360 to," Pachter told us.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: businessweek.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Opinion: Where Microsoft Is Going Wrong With Xbox Live
>> From gamasutra.com:
[QUOTE]
Conclusion
As you can see, Microsoft have effectively hoisted themselves by their own petard when it comes to XBLA. In trying to manage consumers and overcome what they believed was an image issue, they have created a network that organisationally can't actually sell a lot of games. Their solution is to reduce the catalogue, but this is essentially an admission of failure on their part.
With the 360 probably having peaked in terms of overall appeal and other console providers and technology companies now delivering credible alternatives, it is up to Microsoft to rethink their whole strategy and decide whether this is a sector of the business that they really want to be in any more.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamasutra.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
UK: 360 consoles outselling PS3 since GTA IV launch
>> From gamesindustry.biz:
[QUOTE]
Sales of Xbox 360 consoles are 18 per cent ahead of the PlayStation 3 in the UK since the launch of Grand Theft Auto IV, Chart-Track told Eurogamer.
Official GTA IV sales figures for the first four weeks also reveal that the Xbox 360 is the format of choice for UK gamers, with 57 per cent of the total sales of the game on 360, compared to 43 per cent on PS3.
However, taking all 21 weeks of 2008 into account, sales of PlayStation 3 in the UK are 10 per cent ahead of Xbox 360. Prior to the launch of GTA IV, the PS3 boasted a 20 per cent lead on 360.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamesindustry.biz
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
VGChartz: Wii Passes 360 in America
>> From vgchartz.com:
[QUOTE]
With the release of the latest figures from VGChartz, Wii has officially passed 360 in the Americas in lifetime sales as of the week ending May 24th, 2008, despite the 360 having an extra year on the market. Wii has reached 11.7M sales in America in its 79th week available; whereas, 360 reached 11.5M in American sales in its 131st week. PS3 is currently at 4.9M lifetime sales in the Americas after it's 80th week on the market. (For reference, the "America" region tracked by VGChartz includes all of North, Central, and South America.)
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: vgchartz.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
EU is now Second Largest Videogaming Territory
>> From gamesindustry.biz:
[QUOTE]
According to research compiled by Nielsen Games, the European Union is the second-largest videogaming territory in the world.
Gaming generated EUR 7.3 billion (USD 11.4 billion) in the European Union during 2007, compared with EUR 7.4 billion (USD 11.5 billion) in Asia and EUR 6.9 billion (USD 10.7 billion) in the United States.
The average age of a gamer in the UK is 33 - the highest out of the territories surveyed - and 42 per cent of UK game players have children.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamesindustry.biz
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Spread News: PermaLink
| Add us on: Twitter - Facebook - RSS
(Wednesday 28 May 2008 23:34 EST) - (Category: GamingGeneral) - (Posted by::
)
Nyko Ships Charge Base For the Xbox 360
>> From the press release:
[QUOTE]
Nyko Technologies®, the premier gaming peripherals manufacturer, today announced that their Charge Base 360 has shipped to stores. This new charging solution for the Xbox 360 provides a drop-in charging and storage solution for up to two wireless controllers. Nyko is the first to offer such a charging solution for the millions of Xbox 360 owners looking for a faster and more efficient way to store and charge their controllers. The Charge Base 360 offers an alternative to USB charging or wasteful and expensive disposable batteries.
Nyko's Charge Base 360 comes with two custom NiMH rechargeable batteries that feature special contact points, allowing the controllers to be easily dropped into the Charge Base 360 without removing the battery packs. Two ports allow up to two controllers to charge simultaneously, with a single charge providing up to 25 hours of play time for each controller. The device is AC powered and plugs into any standard outlet for a charge time of less than 2 hours for one controller, and less than 4 hours for two controllers. The Charge Base 360 also includes two LED lights which change color to indicate the charge status of each controller.
"Nyko has identified a need among Xbox 360 owners looking for a more convenient way to store and charge their controllers, said Chris Arbogast, Director of Marketing at Nyko Technologies. "The Charge Base 360 eliminates the use of wasteful and expensive disposable batteries and keeps your controllers charged while you store them, so that they are ready to go for an extended gaming session every time you pick them up."
Nyko's Charge Base for the Xbox 360 is available for the suggested retail price of $34.99. Please visit www.nyko.com for more information.
A limited edition run of 200 units in a Black & Gold color scheme will go on sale June 2nd, exclusively on the Nyko store website at http://www.nyko.com/chargebase360/ for the standard MSRP of $34.99.
[/QUOTE]
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Seattle's new MLS team Sponsored by Xbox Live
>> From AP via biz.yahoo.com:
[QUOTE]
Microsoft will sponsor the new MLS team in Seattle.
The Seattle Sounders FC will be sponsored by Microsoft and Xbox Live 360, the team announced Wednesday. Microsoft will pay a reported $20 million over five years.
Microsoft executive Robbie Bach said the growth and global scope of soccer enticed the company to get involved with sponsoring a sports franchise.
The team will begin play in the 2009 season.
[/QUOTE]
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Interview: XNA's Boyd Multerer Talks Xbox 360 Community Games
>> From gamasutra.com:
[QUOTE]
XNA game platform general manager Boyd Multerer sat down with Gamasutra to discuss the specifics of the complex system, how it's intended to work, and some of the possible issues and solutions inherent in the new system.
* OK. You're still going to have Xbox Live Arcade, correct? And so Community Games will be differentiated, right?
* BM: That is right. Well, the first differentiator to think about, right now - that's a different differentiator - there's a differentiator of professional content versus community content. That one I can talk better about.
In the professional world - and when you think about XBLA in particular - that is content that has had serious budgets put into it. I mean, to make those games, and to make a high quality game that's worthy of getting big marketing money behind it, and all that, it costs money. Budgets for those games, with multiple people involved, about three hundred thousand dollars, half-million dollars, even a million dollars these days is not unheard of to develop these kinds of games.
The people I'm targeting with the community side of XNA, their budget is... can they eat? Right? Some of these people are in college, some of these people are not even in the software industry, this is what they do for hobby, and it's about giving them a channel where they can still be creative.
No one's expecting that - and of course there will be exceptions to this, but overall - no one's expecting that their games are going to compete with the professional titles, simply because they don't have the art budget for it. There will occasionally be someone who's really, really good at it, and is going to stand out, but for the vast majority of the content, you'll be able to tell the difference as soon as you see it, simply because it just takes a lot to make a professional game.
* You mean if it's over an M rating [then it's not going to make it through the system]?
* BM: If it's over an M rating, then it wouldn't make it through the system anyway. Beyond that, any of this content, when we launch, is going to be officially 'unrated', which is the highest restriction level, so if you set any parental controls on your box whatsoever, then this stuff won't play.
The third piece is, you know, our job is just to make sure that it's a decision the parent gets to make. We're trying to be better than anyone else at explaining, 'this is what you're going to get into if you download this' and you can see those ratings, and you can say, "OK, this doesn't have a lot of language, it's got a whole lot of violence," and blah-blah-blah, and let the parent make their own choices.
* You mentioned that the $99 a year is not going to cover the cost by a long shot; do you have a plan to eventually bring this to profitability, or is this mostly a community-building kind of thing?
* BM: There are different aspects to the program that need to be considered, and we get different things out of them. One of the fundamental things we've always been trying to do with it is to teach people how to make games. And this is an easily-overlooked goal on our part, but it's actually really serious.
One of the problems we've got, and in fact every technical company has got, and the game companies have got, is that we can't hire enough people who know how to write games. There just aren't enough of them out there.
So one of the biggest drivers of the whole program is getting into universities, get people being taught how to write games, get Xboxes in there, and actually get more people into CompSci. Period. So I'm really happy, we're in over four hundred universities right now - which just kind of blows me away.
* Do you have any kind of mechanism through which these XNA Creator creative people can seek out jobs, or anything like that? I don't know if that's too high level integration, but -
* BM: No, that's a great question. One of the dreams that we have for the Creator Club website is to have a place where people in it can advertise their services, get hooked up with other people who are maybe looking for a programmer, or an artist - and I don't care if it's small teams coming together, or people trying to get into the professional companies - that is totally a goal that we have.
Every once in a while we just troll around on the internet and just look to see if anyone's posted jobs where they're looking for someone who has XNA experience, and that's like totally a validation that we're doing something interesting.
* Will people be able to publish globally? Can you say that, or no?
* BM: Um, that would be one of those ones where you say "yes" with an asterisk on it. It's most likely going to be a regional roll-out, and we don't know the full set that we'll be supporting when we start, but it'll be an expanding list as we go.
It turns out that there are all kinds of regulatory and legal issues involved, and it just takes time to sort through those things. Long term, the goal is, yeah, we want to be able to provide developers as large an audience as we possibly can.
[/QUOTE]
Full Interview: gamasutra.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
G4 Shows Coming to Xbox Live
>> From gamedaily.com:
[QUOTE]
G4 today announced that it is making some of its TV series available on Xbox Live Video Store. Available now are the animated series Code Monkeys (along with a free sneak preview of season 2), the "snowboarder reality series" The Block, and the "live trip to the digital water cooler," Attack of the Show. This will be the first time G4's content has been offered on a gaming console.
"G4 is a natural fit to be part of the Xbox LIVE community. Our young male audience spends more time interfacing with technology than any other network," said Neal Tiles, President, G4. "This partnership underscores G4's commitment to bringing relevant and authentic content to young guys in more ways than ever before."
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamedaily.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
GameSpot's 360 vs PS3 Graphics Comparison Part3
>> From gamespot.com:
[QUOTE]
A solid year's gone by since we ran our last Xbox 360 vs. PlayStation 3 graphics comparison. The differences between the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3 have diminished with every passing batch of games, but some variation still exists between the two machines. Our first graphics comparison between the two consoles showed that the Xbox 360 looked better on most of the games, oftentimes drastically so. The second graphics comparison showed that the PlayStation 3 looked nearly as good as the Xbox 360 in some games, and actually looked better in a few as well. Now with both consoles well into their respective life cycles, developers have had plenty of time to figure out the nuances required to code beautiful games. With our third batch of games[Assassin's Creed, Orange Box, GTA 4, COD 4, Burnout Paradise, Rainbow Six Vegas 2, NFS Pro Street, Madden 08], the two machines seem evenly matched. The two trade blows on various games, each with its own set of advantages.
Conclusion
After going through another eight games, we've found a few trends that follow both of these consoles around. Outside of Rainbow Six Vegas 2, our findings didn't show any drastic differences in image quality between the two consoles--nothing compared to what we found when we compared first-generation games in our original comparison feature. The PlayStation 3 generally lags behind the Xbox 360 in high-quality textures and the depth/normal maps that go with them. However, in the same games, the PlayStation 3 sometimes comes ahead with better shadowing and antialiasing. Games on the PS3 do tend to be blurrier than their Xbox 360 counterparts, but the PlayStation 3 games can look just as good as the Xbox 360 games when developers put some effort into it, as is evident with both Grand Theft Auto IV and Burnout Paradise. Overall, the PlayStation 3 outputs visuals that are either on par with the Xbox 360 or only slightly behind.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamespot.com (8 pages)
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
How many FLOPS are in game consoles?
>> From tgdaily.com:
[QUOTE]
Recently I was asked how many TFLOPS are in all the game consoles shipped to date.
If you count central processor FLOPS then you have one answer and if you count the FLOPS potential of the GPU and add it to the CPU's FLOPS, then you have the second answer. This second version is controversial since the FLOPS of the GPU aren't used in computations and some therefore claim that the GPU should not be counted as it simply represents a theoretical number. Others argue that GPUs are used in computation - the computation of shader operations. Both sides, however, agree that there isn't yet a benchmark that can measure this discipline. And therefore I conclude that we shouldn't use them in evaluating the CPU FLOPS of game consoles.
Xbox | CPU: 1.5 GFLOPS | GPU: 5.8 GFLOPS | Combined: 7.3 GFLOPS
Xbox360 | CPU: 115 GFLOPS | GPU: 240 GFLOPS | Combined: 355 GFLOPS
Dreamcast | CPU: 1.4 GFLOPS | GPU: 0.1 GFLOPS | Combined: 1.5 GFLOPS
Wii | CPU: 60 GFLOPS | GPU: 1 GFLOPS | Combined: 61 GFLOPS
PS2 | CPU: 6 GFLOPS | GPU: 0 GFLOPS | Combined: 6 GFLOPS
PS3 | CPU: 218 GFLOPS | (GPU: 1800 GFLOPS) | (Combined: 2018 GFLOPS)
* Update: We have received numerous emails and comments voicing doubt over the floating point capability of the RSX GPU in the PS3. While original specs put the GPU at an official 1.8 TFLOPS spec, this number in fact appears to be inflated. Once we have verified the performance with the manufacturer as well as the developer, we will update this article.
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: tgdaily.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Spread News: PermaLink
| Add us on: Twitter - Facebook - RSS
(Monday 26 May 2008 21:33 EST) - (Category: Xbox_Xbox360) - (Posted by::
)
List of potentially de-listed Arcade titles
>> From xbox360fanboy.com:
[QUOTE]
Since the news that the Live Arcade would be having its under-performing titles de-listed, the tubes have discussed at length many of the implications. In a response that seems absolutely inevitable with hindsight, someone has put together a list of XBLA titles that conform to two of the three criteria outlined by MS for a de-listing (Metacritic score of less than 65% and at least six months old).
The third criteria isn't accessible outside of Microsoft, and is the conversion rate, i.e. the percentage of demo downloaders who end up buying the full game. As we don't know what games have good conversion rates, the games on the list are therefore not absolutely guaranteed to be in danger. But if there are any on the list that tickle your fancy, now is the time to try them, as they're the most likely ones to leave the Marketplace.
[/QUOTE]
Check out the full list on xbox360fanboy.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
Greenberg: Live dwls hit 1 million per day, Sony is Under-Delivering
>> From videogaming247.com:
[QUOTE]
Aaron Greenberg, Xbox's director of product management, has confirmed that Live users are now downloading in the region of 1 million pieces of content daily.
"People are now downloading about a million things every day from the service," he said. "When we first launched 360, it took us four months - 120 days, more or less - to get 10 million downloads. And now we're doing 10 million downloads in ten days."
"We're at 17,000: the PlayStation Network is just around 600 items," he said. "This is like comparing a Wal-Mart superstore or a Cost-Co to your local Quickie Mart, right? It's at extreme ends... In the first year we had more than 600 items. We were way ahead of that."
"I think Sony has had a history of over-promising and under-delivering. [I was] just using actual facts of all the things that they had promised. I think I talked to some folks about this afterwards, but I think as an industry, we owe it to our customers to be straight with them. I think that some of the stuff we've talked about, while the reaction may not always be positive, we're going to tell you... People just want you to be straight with them. We know titles slip, we know things happen, and there's little we can do to control that, but if we promise something - I think as an industry - we need to start living up to our promises. As an organisation, i think Xbox has a pretty good track record of doing that."
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: videogaming247.com(1) | videogaming247.com(2) | videogaming247.com(3) | majornelson.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
PS3 vs Xbox 360: Who's Really Winning Europe?
>> From gamedaily.com:
[QUOTE]
Earlier this month Sony Computer Entertainment Europe chief David Reeves happily announced that over five million units of PS3 hardware have been sold across Europe, allowing the console to surge past Microsoft's Xbox 360 despite the 360's 16-month head start in the region. In an interview with Wired, however, Microsoft Game Studios' Shane Kim seemed to dispute those numbers.
So Microsoft continues to claim a "comfortable lead" and yet when we reached out to Sony, the company maintained that the PS3 was winning. Perhaps what it really comes down to is the definition of Europe?
Here's what a Sony rep told us, "The statement was based on the fact that cumulative sales of PS3 in Europe since its launch now exceed the cumulative sales of Xbox 360 in Europe since their launch, despite Xbox 360 having had a 16 month lead on PS3. Europe means the whole of Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Russia. SCEE sources its market data from official sources such as ChartTrack and Gfk, from their retailers and from a variety of additional sources. SCEE has been using the same methodology for the last 10 years or so."
[/QUOTE]
Full Story: gamedaily.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
