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Gamer Wins Xbox 360 With Arcade Tickets
Posted by Matt Haselton Categories: Culture, Hot Deals, Xbox 360,
DCFC Fan, a member of xbox360fanboy.com, recently posted a picture of his new Xbox 360, still in packaging and with a Dave and Buster’s prize redemption receipt stuck to the outside.
That’s right: DCFC Fan won his new console through months of Slide Master, Throttle Up, and perhaps even Skee Ball, finally accumulating enough tickets to walk home with the first of the next-gen system and a place in geek history. Sharing the secrets of his success, DCFC Fan explains: “A tight grip over and under the knob, and keep your ball still. Oh, and use that strategy on the game Throttle Up.”
The folks over at Kotaku estimate that Dave and Buster’s 85,000 ticket price (heh!) for the item translates into roughly $850, but for DCFC “it was all about the experience and many nights there spent hanging out with friends.”
Anyway, follow the source link to the Xbox 360 Fanboy forums, and help DCFC decide what games to buy for his prize.
Read More 
| Xbox 360 Fanboy
Gallery: Gamer Wins Xbox 360 With Arcade Tickets
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Retailers Should Make Plans to Stave Off Decline
Posted by Thea Davis Categories: Culture, Editorial, Internet,
As digital distribution of video games takes off, video game retailers are finding themselves in the same spot that music retailers were just a few years ago. The question now is whether traditional brick-and-mortar video game retailers will embrace the upcoming digital revolution or end up scrambling to recover as traditional music retailers had to? Has anything been learned from the recent past? The ideas being touted by a few video game retailers in order to counter the move toward digital-only distribution seem uninspired. The time is coming when traditional video game retailers will need a better business model.
Read More | Ars Technica
Gallery: Retailers Should Make Plans to Stave Off Decline
The Birth Of Grand Theft Auto
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Action, Culture, PC, Retro, Simulation,
The original Grand Theft Auto has been credited for largely defining the “sandbox game.” Edge UK has a retrospective on its development, and it is interesting to note the combination of will and serendipity that enabled the game to come about.
The origins of the game tie to their attempts to build out a living city; originally this was to be represented in a 3D isometric view, similar to the concurrent game Syndicate Wars. However, performance problems would force the developers away from this view. The top-down view, interestingly, would be inspired by the side-scrolling Clockwork Knight from Sega.
Gamers can clearly see the core of the original game in the sequels. However, DMA wanted the original to be much more of a city simulation, with “buses following routes, people getting on and off, traffic lights working properly, a rail network.” While a number of the items made it into the game, others would have to wait for future technology, or would be dropped altogether. One of the dropped ideas was too make the game more horror themed, which would have truly changed the complexion of the series.
Other travails include rebuilding the game tiles for the Playstation version of the game, and convincing publishers to take a chance on its release. The article is an interesting rundown on one of the most influential game series of the past decade.
Read More | Edge Online
Gallery: The Birth Of Grand Theft Auto
Intelligence is the new black, and the video game industry hopes the suddenly popularity in intellectual challenges translates into increased sales for a number of newly released games in this category. Nintendo’s Brain Age is leading the challenge, but there are several other notables in the electronic “brain teaser” arena.
Big Brain Academy (DS) another Nintendo title, uses cartoons and a wider array of puzzles than its predecessor. (The reviewer gives it 3 of 4 stars.) Puzzle Challenge: Crosswords and More! (PSP) by Crave, fails by having such a horrible interface. (It gets only a half star.) And Magnetica (DS), another Nintendo title, is an update of the arcade game Puzz Loop. (The game is somewhat of a mixed bag, according to the reviewer who gave it 2 stars.) In order to be successful with a wide audience “brain” games need to have a component that cannot be found in their pen-and-paper equivalent. Not all titles are successful.
Read More | Casper Star Tribune
Gallery: Brain Teasers Win Popularity
Wes Craven, the man behind several very successful movie franchises, recently spoke at the MI6 Game Marketing conference. He had some interesting thoughts on the current and future state of the video game industry, saying that video games will become ever more prominent providing the target audience is not underestimated. “Young people are smart. They’re doing things…that show their creativity… (and) marketers and artists should respect the audience.”
In an interview after his speech, Craven commented that he thinks all the mass-criticism of video games and graphic horror movies is too far overboard, because games and movies are art forms. These disciplines serve as simulated tests of our ability to handle certain situations. Craven, who doesn’t want to be known as just “a scary movie maker,” also said he’s in talks to create a game. He ended by remarking that the video game market has a lot of subject areas yet to be explored.
Read More | Mercury News
Gallery: Craven Thinks Games Hold Promise
Shatner to Host Canadian Video Game Awards Show
Posted by Thea Davis Categories: Announcements, Culture,
William Shatner has agreed to host the first ever Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts (CAEAA) this year. Canadian achievements in talent development (New Media and Animation Art Schools), animation, and video game development will be honored at the program. CAEAA Producer Holly Carinci said, “We wanted Mr. Shatner as our host from the beginning and I cannot tell you how excited we are to learn today that he has accepted the role.” The awards show is scheduled for September 14, 2006 in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Read More | Canoe
Gallery: Shatner to Host Canadian Video Game Awards Show
New pricing has been announced for the latest edition of the Faith Explorer video game series. Cokesbury and Third Day Games would like for churches to be able to give copies of Faith Explorer to all children in their congregations, and have introduced a licensing program to facilitate such widespread adoption. The game uses a monthly video lesson to recreate prominent stories from the Bible. Parental response to the Faith Explorer video game has been very positive. And kids seem equally enthusiastic about the interactive learning experience the game provides. Bobby Wells, Third Day Games CEO, said that “extending Sunday’s learning to kids’ video game playtime is a powerful way for churches to expand their ministry into the home.”
Read More | Christian Newswire
Gallery: Kids’ Bible Story Games
Video games are increasingly popular with popular culture – rap acts want to do game soundtracks, movie stars want to voice characters—but the average American has yet to buy into the hype. Still the game industry pushes ahead, hoping to find a watershed moment where every home in America will own a game console and consider it the height family entertainment. It hasn’t reached such a point ...yet.
Mothers of young children rated the television higher than game consoles in providing worthwhile content for their children in a recent study. Part of the problem preventing widespread adoption of video games as family entertainment is the games themselves. Many people feel the scope of video games is too narrow. The video game industry is mainly marketed toward young, single fanboys – which doesn’t leave much room for a middle-America family with kids. The industry is working to widen its demographics but it has some way to go before families are gathering around a game console for a quality evening together.
Gallery: Game Developers Look for Main St.
The 2006 Hollywood & Games Summit opened today in Beverly Hills with a keynote address by director Paul W.S. Anderson. Anderson’s speech, entitled “Pressing the Right Buttons: How to Successfully Blend Game and Film,” discussed methodology to help ensure the success of a film franchise built from adapting a game. Simply because a game is successful does not mean it will be an equally successful film. In fact, Anderson stated that some games were not meant to be movies. Anderson also thinks that the relationship between the film industry and the video game industry is still growing, and that one day the relationship should bear fruit, with games and films stoking each other’s success.
Read More | Gamasutra
Gallery: Games Summit Keynote
Many parents are worrying about the exposure of their children to violent video games. Meanwhile a group of proactive game designers hope to counteract some of the negative attention heaped onto video games by creating games that aim to raise awareness of the world’s poverty stricken. Educational titles like “Darfur is Dying” and “PeaceMaker” show a different side of gaming, one on display at the third annual Games for Change conference held in New York recently. More than 200 people participated in this year’s conference, as industry interest has expanded. The campaign is showing a sign of success, as one of the free educational games has had more than 2 million downloads to date.
Read More | Reuters AlertNet
Gallery: Humanitarian Video Games
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