Devs Problems: Lack of memory on Sony PS3 and storage on Xbox 360
>> From product-reviews.net: [QUOTE] That will possibly be the only major problem for devs for both consoles in the near future. 1). Lack of memory on the PS3. 2). Lack of storage space on the Xbox 360. Watch out for that one. It will be here sooner than you think, if not already.
But everyone, just bear this in mind. The Xbox 360, for all the bagging it gets, is really quite a powerfull piece of kit. It has 3 seperate PPC cpus, which basically equates to 6 hardware threads. It has more memory to play with, a superior GPU, and superfast bus rate.
All the BS talked about GOW pushing the 360 is almost toss. Sorry. It was only running on two thread system. And even that engine was very buggy and "heavy" at the time. If not totally overated in its own right as well.
Honestly, if MS decided to put some form of a HD disc in it, Blu Ray or HD-DVD, the damn thing would be almost future proof, with the exception of the over heating, ofcourse. Because, as it stands, the PS3 only has the storage space over the 360. Its not anymore "advanced" at all, and in many ways, slightly less. [/QUOTE]
Microsoft Exec Says Company Isn't Trying to Fuel HD Format War
>> From homemediamagazine.com: [QUOTE] In response to this week's Blu-ray Disc Festival in Los Angeles, Kevin Collins, director in the Microsoft Consumer Media Technology Group, defended the company's backing of the next-generation HD DVD format. "The [Blu-ray] camp's claims about Microsoft's desire to have a format war are baseless," Collins said. "Microsoft has over 100 people working on HD DVD interactivity and we believe that HD DVD is the next-generation optical format."
During a presentation to journalists and home theater enthusiasts at the Blu-ray Festival earlier in the week, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment worldwide president Mike Dunn intimated that the format war is being perpetuated by Microsoft in the hopes of confusing consumers so much they don't support either format and ultimately buy their entertainment online. He didn't mention the computer giant by name, but blasted "the orchestrated campaigns of confusion and anti-consumerism fueled by an 800-pound gorilla that would prefer to force us all into the practice of paying tolls for the right to exchange information and enjoy entertainment."
Collins said Microsoft did not and will not bundle the HD DVD drive in Xbox 360 because the company believes that gamers are first and foremost gamers. "If you look historically at the attach rates (i.e. the number of DVDs purchased per DVD player) you will see that game consoles have a single-digit attach rate, while dedicated DVD players have an attach rate in the mid-20s," said Collins. "Microsoft knew if we put in an HD DVD drive that we would have to raise costs and disenfranchise our customers (that are primarily gamers) as the unit would become too expensive." [/QUOTE]
Gamers, Our Brains Are Limited To Tracking 8 Objects At Once
>> From kotaku.com: [QUOTE] Researchers long believed that human perception was limited to tracking four moving objects at one time. But a new study, challenging participants to follow 16 dots moving at a very slow pace on a computer screen, found that participants were able to track up to eight objects at once (or double what we previously thought possible).
The major downfall of our ability to track objects is speed. Because once these dots hit the on-screen speed of 0.15 metres per second, subjects were only able to track one dot at a time. [/QUOTE]
Subsidies for Videogame Developers is Not the Answer
>> From gamesindustry.biz: [QUOTE] Subsidies, sponsorships and other forms of public funding for videogames developers is not a good solution to increasing development costs, according to Dr Klemens Kundratitz, managing director of Koch Media.
Speaking exclusively to GamesIndustry.biz he is worried about the uneven playing field that countries such as Canada create, but believes that public funding would lead to games for the sake of culture, rather than for the sake of the customer.
"I don't believe in sponsorship, public funding and subsidies at all, because I think that those systems will lead to games being produced for reasons that are not what the consumer demands, but because people think they should be for cultural reasons." "It takes the attention away from what the customer wants, and if we create great entertainment then the customer will buy it and I'd rather not have everybody focused on how to get subsidies from various places." [/QUOTE]
Best Buy and Wal-Mart Offer Toshiba HD-A2 for Less Than 100usd
>> From engadget.com: [QUOTE] Wal-Mart may have been the first to tempt HD-fence-sitters with a $100 HD-A2 player (however limited) [$98.87 to be exact only this friday], but it looks like it's not the only one, with Best Buy now also listing the very same player for the impulse buy-inducing price of $99.99. Of course, it's sold out online, so you may be better off trying your luck at your local store. [/QUOTE]
Note: yes, Toshiba still gives you 5 free HD DVD movies with any HD DVD player you buy, including the A2 (FYI: max resolution of this player is 1080i, not 1080p). Full Story: engadget.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com
>> From eXOBeX on forums.xbox-scene.com: [QUOTE] This is a collection of batch files which allow you to "manage" flashing of BenQ firmwares in the same way that the batch files for X360SAM(info) operate. In other words, the batch files are the same as the ones for X360SAM and Samsung drives, except:- 1) they use FIRMTOOL instead of X360SAM 2) they use DOSFLASH instead of MTKFLASH 3) they're for BenQ drives instead of Samsungs!
The X360SAM batch files store firmwares in folders named after the 360s' serial numbers, these batch files do the same and are called in the same way.
* BENREAD.BAT, BENREADF.BAT, BENREADQ.BAT This will create a folder especially for that Xbox, read the firmware from the drive, storing it in the folder as BORIG.BIN. It will then use FIRMTOOL.EXE to create a hacked version (called BHACKED.BIN), storing it in the same folder. BENREADF.BAT will use BENQ-IXA.BIN (the "Fast" firmware) BENREADQ.BAT will use BENQ-IXB.BIN (the "Quiet" firmware) BENREAD.BAT just calls SAMREADF.BAT anyway, unless you change it.
* BENHACK.BAT This flashes the BHACKED.BIN file (created by BENREAD.BAT) onto the drive.
* BENREMOD.BAT, BENREMOF.BAT, BENREMOQ.BAT This does the same as BENREAD.BAT but without re-reading BORIG.BIN from the 360. Useful if you've used read the drive in the past, but now you want to flash a newer firmware to the same drive. BENREMOF.BAT will use BENQ-IXA.BIN (the "Fast" firmware) BENREMOQ.BAT will use BENQ-IXB.BIN (the "Quiet" firmware) BENREMOD.BAT just calls SAMREMOF.BAT anyway, unless you change it.
* BENORIG.BAT This flashes the BORIG.BIN file (created by SAMREAD.BAT) back onto the drive.
* MAKEFOLD.BAT This is a "bonus" batch file, I use it to create folders within the existing "BACKUPS\yyyyy\xxxxxxx" structure, I use these folders when flashing Hitachi 007x drives with Firmware Toolbox. For earlier Hitachis I use customised versions of GaryOPA's batch files, they're not included here.
* WIPEFIRM.BAT This is another "bonus" batch file. If for any reason you need to delete a firmware folder altogether, that's what it does (after asking for confirmation!) [/QUOTE]
Vgchartz Interviews Siren on life at Microsoft from 00'-05'
>> From vgchartz.com: [QUOTE] Over the past few months Siren, who currently works at www.emaglive.com, has been speaking to Vgchartz about the industry in general, and how it is progressing. Earlier, I interviewed him about his time with Microsoft from 2000 to 2005.
* thesource (8:02:55 PM): How was the knowledge of the Xbox project received by your co-workers in the division? What was the company assessment of Sega, Sony and Nintendo in those days...and how did it evolve during your tenure? * siren (8:03:42 PM): That's a fun one (and a few questions there). Let's see if I can cover it all. For starters, a lot of people did not have confidence in the project as presented. Being in Windows it felt a lot like they were taking a path that was not the same as how Microsoft approaches business relating to software. A lot of people thought they should make a software platform for games and then pitch that and get the other companies to adopt it. Little did people know at the time that this was exactly what the team had originally tried before being rejected by just about everyone but Sega (including Intel, Dell, HP, and others not normally associated with gaming). Beyond that, when we did learn what they were doing, a lot of people in the Digital Media Organization had a certain level of animosity for the Xbox org, this was in part due to Xbox not using a lot of DX technologies like DShow, even though the product code name was "DirectX Box" Around the time of CES 2001, Microsoft held an internal only show to announce the Xbox to employees over in Building 33, their conference center. So many people on campus attended the event that they had to open up over 50% of the entire conference center and live-rebroadcast the show into other rooms on the projectors. It was an amazing site to see (and I had the pleasure of winning a Japanese Xbox branded backpack there as an added bonus). That changed a lot of opinions about the team. Suddenly people everyone in Microsoft were excited about Xbox and believed in the team and their vision
* thesource (8:27:22 PM): Did Microsoft feel like it met its goals with the original Xbox? If not, what was the goal of Xbox 360 in terms of market share (i.e. finding a niche in Japan, passing say N64/Genesis sales of ~30 million) * siren (8:28:10 PM): Well, the first goal failed miserably. Make money. While losses people discuss in forums are greatly inflated (Xbox wasn't the only one losing Billions in the Home and Entertainment division), they lost a lot. They wanted to at a minimum break even. As far as market share, they got to about where they wanted to be in the US. A little low in Europe and definitely off in Japan. Japan was a disaster to say the least They were really hoping to get about Gamecube level of success in Japan, but were hampered by a whole slew of critical errors. With the 360, one of the main goals is to get Japan up to a couple million sold over the life and Europe up around original Xbox sales. They also want to grow the US sales to be #1 in the territory.
* thesource (8:31:51 PM): Well that sounds reasonable, but given the pricing it seems money was more of a concern this generation... * siren (8:32:08 PM): Early on I heard numbers like 60 Million 360's sold over life being a target. Definitely money is a concern. They want to make back pretty much everything they lost last generation and then some if possible They realize that even with 60 Million systems, they would stand to make a good $1 Billion a quarter off the market late in its life if the business is built correctly [/QUOTE]
>> From next-gen.biz: [QUOTE] Floor space for gaming exhibitors [at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show] will jump 65 percent on last year's available space, but to date the only companies to have confirmed a presence are Commodore Gaming, Entropia Universe, Red Lion Interactive, Shuttle Computers, War Machine, LumiSource, Red Beard and InterAction Laboratories.
However, Microsoft and Sony will both be in attendance on a wider scale, and gaming features are expected to form part of their respective booths. [/QUOTE]
360 sells nearly 2X as many games per console as Wii, PS3
>> From xbox360fanboy.com: [QUOTE] Joystiq got their greasy manhooks on some interesting market data from NPD. Savvy Xbox 360 fans know that the Xbox 360 sells quite a few games, but according to this data, the Xbox 360 sells nearly twice as many games per console as the PS3 and Wii.
* Xbox 360: hardware to software ratio: 6.59 (hardware total sold = 6.8 million; software total sold = 44.8 million) * PlayStation 3: hardware to software ratio: 3.58 (hardware total sold = 1.9 million; software total sold = 6.8 million) * Wii: hardware to software ratio: 3.44 (hardware total sold = 4.5 million; software total sold = 15.5 million) [/QUOTE]
>> From next-gen.biz: [QUOTE] Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello suggests that publishers will soon have to "deal with" the $59 price point for next-gen videogames.
With the US videogame industry on track for its biggest year ever at $17-$18 billion in 2007 revenues, it would seem that consumers are just peachy with the current price of next-generation games.
"In the next five years, we're all going to have to deal with [the current pricing model]. In China, they're giving games away for free," he said in a Fortune blog report. "People who benefit from the current model will need to embrace a new revenue model, or wait for others to disrupt." [/QUOTE]
>> From betanews.com: [QUOTE] Kmart has decided not to carry Blu-ray players due to their high prices, instead focusing solely on HD DVD this holiday. While it may no longer be the bastion of discount stores it once was, Kmart's move highlights the problems facing Sony's format as HD DVD continues to get cheaper.
The HD DVD Promotions Group said that Kmart's decision to go exclusive wasn't related to an end-cap purchase (where vendors can buy specific shelf space and lock out competitors), but rather because the cost of Blu-ray players are more tailored to home theater enthusiasts. HD DVD meanwhile, will have players under $200, with even deeper discounts after Thanksgiving. [/QUOTE]
*Update* From gadgetell.com: [QUOTE] Kmart has responded to the recent reports of dropping Blu-ray from their stores. Initially it was reported that they were dropping Blu-ray due to "high cost", however Kmart is now stating that those reports are not true.
"There have been numerous statements in the media (Wednesday), attributed to Toshiba, indicating exclusive support for the HD-DVD format in Kmart stores. These statements are false. Kmart intends to support both the HD-DVD and Blu-ray platforms, and has no plans to support either platform exclusively." [/QUOTE]
Analyst: Hardware Supply Constraints To Hit Holidays?
>> From gamasutra.com: [QUOTE] Analyst Colin Sebastian of Lazard Capital Markets recently released his comments on current industry sales trends leading up to the closely-watched holiday season, stating in particular that hardware supply constraints and lower pricing for PS2 and Wii software may pose health risks for the industry's sales numbers.
"Holiday hardware demand may outstrip supplies," Sebastian said. "We believe one of the themes from the upcoming holiday period could be hardware supply constraints, driven by ongoing strong demand for Nintendo's Wii and a shift in Xbox 360 unit sales from 4Q into the September quarter, while Sony's PS3 and PSP may benefit from lower price points." [/QUOTE]
>> From gamesindustry.biz: [QUOTE] Microsoft has announced Xtival 07, a European-only online event taking place next month.
From November 23 to 26, Gold memberships will be free to everyone with a broadband connection who connects to Xbox Live and signs in. Microsoft promises a line-up of events, competitions, and exclusive downloads to be announced soon on Xbox.com. The company is also promising "headline acts" for existing Xbox Live Gold members. [/QUOTE]
>> From gamepro.com: [QUOTE] We're well into the new generation of game consoles, yet a slew of key flaws go unaddressed. Here are 27 things Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony need to fix immediately.
Xbox360: * The D-pad sucks * The continued hardware failures * No Wi-fi on the Elite * Enough with the double-A batteries * Overpriced hard drives * Subscription fees: lose 'em! [/QUOTE]
Major Nelson: Xbox LIVE account sharing and Gamesave tampering
>> From majornelson.com: [QUOTE] I have mentioned this a couple of times on my podcasts, but I want to make sure those that don't listen to the show get the message. Specifically, don't share your account information. If you run into that person in Halo 3 who claims if they could have your LIVE ID name and password to recover your Xbox LIVE account to their Xbox and they'll rank you up or find you all the hidden skulls in Halo 3, I urge you not to fall to temptation. While it may be appealing, in addition to violating the Xbox LIVE Terms of Use it can also result in you permanently losing your account. If that 'friend' of yours decides not return your account and buys a bunch of Arcade titles and movies on your account, there is nothing we can do except cancel the account since you willingly shared your information.
Cancelled. As in you can never get it back. In addition to losing your Gamertag, you'll also lose your Gamerscore, saved games and any points you have on the account.
While I am on the subject of things you should not do, I strongly urge you not to tamper with your Gamerscore and Achievements. If you decide to employ some nefarious techniques to artificially increase your Gamerscore or obtain achievements by manipulating the Xbox software without playing the game, bad things will happen. What type of bad things? For one thing we may remove the entire Gamerscore for an account that contains manipulated gamerscore. Let me be more clear: If you use tampered gamesaves to boost your Achievements and Gamerscore, you may sign in to Xbox LIVE one day and discover that we have removed your Gamerscore. Once we do that, you will never be able to re-earn those achievements on that account. Even worse, you might have your account and/or console banned from Xbox Live.
As you can imagine, we know how to find out if you do this and we do take action. And we'll continue to do so. [/QUOTE]
>> From cdrinfo.com: [QUOTE] Slysoft Inc released a new version of its AnyDVD software, which is claimed to bypass the 4th generation HD DVD and Blu-Ray copy protection (MKB v4), found in latest high-def movie releases.
The latest build is capable to process the Blu-Ray movies which include the 4th generation media key block (MKB), according to Slysoft. The MKB v4 was recently released by the AACS LA and it is an updated version of the special code placed on the Blu-ray media that is essential for the authentication and thus the reproduction of Blu-ray movies on updated Blu-Ray players. Movies that feature the new MKB keys include the U.S. versions of the "Transformers" HD DVD, and "Spiderman 1-3" Blu-ray. Slysoft said that it would support all MKBv4 discs in a future release of the software.
"SlySoft was recently honored by AACS-LA, being declared as public enemy number one in the ongoing battle for copyright protection. To prove them right and to take on the challenge, SlySoft has just released the latest AnyDVD version which beats the latest 4th generation HD-DVD and Blu-Ray copy protection MKBv4, which was expected to be unbreakable," the company said in a statement.
Slysoft also said that it is ready to defeat the upcoming BD+ feature of the Blu-ray titles. "All that AACS-LA has to offer now is BD+, but even that is on the verge of being circumvented and a release is expected by the end of this year," said Slysoft. [/QUOTE]
Microsoft: IPTV not a part of Xbox Live Fall Update
>> From joystiq.com: [QUOTE] Turns out those images of an Xbox 360 with IPTV were legit. In a statement issued by Microsoft, the Redmond-based company acknowledged that the IPTV features "were inadvertently exposed while the customer's console was being serviced and is unrelated to the Fall Update."
The IPTV features, according to the statement, are part of the Microsoft Mediaroom services and will be made available to service providers by the end of this year, adding that it will be up to them to decide when the service is deployed. [/QUOTE]
Lobbying group believes gamers need exceptions to DMCA
>> From arstechnica.com: [QUOTE] Are gamers affected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act? The Entertainment Consumers Association argues that they are. The group has just announced its support for the FAIR USE Act in an attempt to make the world safe for democracy backing up game discs.
The ECA is a relative newcomer to the political scene. Founded in 2006, it's a nonprofit that wants to represent gamers in a way that the Entertainment Software Association can't. The ESA, despite having the resources to battle bad video game legislation across the country, looks out for the interests of the game developers and publishers.
The Act is a watered-down version of the Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act, which Boucher and Doolittle have been pushing for years without success. The idea was that circumvention of copy controls would be legal so long as the intended use of the material was legal. In the FAIR USE Act, though, the actual exceptions proved much more narrow and did not include this broad immunity. The upshot is that the FAIR USE Act is good for hardware manufacturers, but only moderately good for consumers. [/QUOTE]
AMD's Feldstein: Future Game Hardware To Combine CPU, GPU
>> From gamasutra.com: [QUOTE] Both the Xbox 360 and the Wii have graphics processing units designed by AMD, and speaking in a Gamasutra-exclusive interview, the company's VP of strategic development, Bob Feldstein, provided some insight on the future of console gaming chips, speculating that GPUs and CPUs may someday be a single entity:
"I'll say that what I see the future as is a combined CPU/GPU, where the delineations are not there anymore. You combine them into a chip; you have compute elements of both, and jobs get kind of -- threads get kind of put on the resources that are best suited for them. GPU-like resources, vector engines for problems that simulate the real world, graphics, and physics. And for sequential problems, about other parts of this, you know, you've got your typical sequential processor." [/QUOTE]
>> T3CH released a new SVN compile (rev10638) of XboxMediaCenter(info) for Xbox1. This T3CH-compile is a complete snapshot of what is in SVN at the time the build was compiled, with just a few small additions.
Special Notes and Added/Noteworthy/XML/Script changes: * Apple Movie Trailers (AMT) script updated to pre0.99.2 rev1611. * Plugin added, worldpremiere for the new AOL Videos Plugin by Nuka1195 & Dataratt. AOL Videos Plugin 1.0 can access 1000+ musicvideos on AOL in quality ranging from 640x480.mov to 400x300.flv, it has a settings.xml that you should check before transferring XBMC over. More Plugin instructions in 'AN INTRODUCTION TO PLUGINS'. * added: cachelevel for paplayer for codecs that implement caching. * added: Player.CacheLevel infolabel which returns the cache fill percentage if the player supports it. * added: Container.Row(number), Container.Column(number), and Container.Position(number) conditionals. Useful for differing focus anims in panels depending on location. * added: UPnP client now shows device icons changed: xbmc now shows standard icons while loading remote thumbs * added: support for local season thumbs. only supports <showpath>/season[ ._-]0?<seasonnumber>.tbn * added: partial workaround for Nero MediaHome broken behavior when xbmc's UPnP Renderer is enabled. it should now atleast provide data for mp3's and mpeg video's. for anything else disable xbmc's UPnP Renderer and remove that device from Nero MediaHome's devices screen.
Keep in mind this is a SVN snapshot of the current development tree. It's not an official (stable) point release. Use only if you know what you are doing.
Team Underdog Introduces new DVD FW PatchMod: NME-360 v2.0
>> Team Underdog released a new DVD FW Patch Mod, called NME-360 v2.0, that will work with all current Xbox360 DVD drives: [QUOTE] Welcome back everybody. We are proud to announce the release of NME-360 v2.0!
We have been silent for the last few months in order to continue our developments to meet the new market needs. The result of our long and hard work is the birth of NME-360 v2.0 which is a fully upgradable DVD-drive mod for the Xbox360. It supports all Samsung MS25 + MS28 drives, all Hitachi 46 - 79 drives (FL and FK) and all BenQ drives. Once a new Xbox360 DVD-drive hits the market it will be an ease for the customer or wholesaler to upgrade the chip to make it compatible to that new drive too. Besides the cool upgrade feature we have added another security feature which is the optional ability to either disable the back USB port or the internal network adapter of the XBox360. This way you can install the NME-360 depending on how you are going online, wlan or lan, and use the network off feature anyway. Using the Actel A3P060 technology we are meeting the highest standard in the industry which automatically results in a very stable working chip with no dre's whatsoever. Final samples have already reached a few resellers who are pretty amazed of the stable booting especially in BenQ drives. The first sales batch will hit the market in the first or 2nd week of November.
Features of the NME v2: - one chip for all drives: Samsung ms25 and ms28, Hitachi/LG 46,47,58,59, 78 FL/FK, 79 FL/FK, all BenQ drives!!! - Added logic to support possible future Hitachi/LG versions as well - 100% Auto detection of Backup or Original on Samsung and Hitachi drives (BenQ requires manual switching) - boots stealth and non-stealth backups - optional: Power Led will turn off when a Backup is detected - optional: disables the network when playing backups - optional: disables the rear USB connection when playing backups (for disabling USB Wlan) - no DVD writer model issues. Works with all DVD writers - now working with pioneer 111d and Pioneer based burners as well as all LG burners. - 100% Firmware Stealth, when MS tries to read the Firmware then it replies as 100% original unmodified. No error code E66. - optional: 100% Live secure when playing Backups - teh result of 1000s of hours of research and programming - based on Actel Logic for most possibly stability - Manufactured with highest quality Logic, PCB and components. Made in Europe. - Complies with RoHS directive (lead free). Gold plated solder pads, for easy soldering. [/QUOTE]
Ex Microsoft China Employee Talks about Xbox360 Piracy
>> From playnoevil.com: [QUOTE] Frank Yu answered my call with a note on the state of next generation piracy in China (slightly edited): Yes, the Xbox 360 hardware is totally broken for pirated games...however, if you leave your mod chip active MS will detect it and shut you out of Xbox Live. I have heard rumours of mod chips that can be switched off so that it toggle between a modded Xbox and an unmodded one to go on Live. I have brought many MS Xbox people to the shops here in China that do the modding (its not illegal to install the chip as far as I know but it is illegal to technically sell the console) (Editor's Note: Frank used to work for Microsoft in China). Folks at MS are always impressed by the speed and workaround that hackers and modders do to the motherboard. Of course we don' t tell them we're MS...there are a lot of foreigners who go to these shops too. [/QUOTE]
