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UK teen facing charges for hacking Black Ops servers
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Activision, Culture, First Person Shooters, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360,
Quitting games on Call of Duty: Black Ops can get you penalized, but forcing other people to quit games can get you locked up. A UK teen is now well aware of this as he sits behind bars for using a program called "Phenom Booter" to kick players from Call of Duty servers in September.
The Phenom Booter program attacks servers, denying specific users - or all users on the server - to be booted off the server. This hack was floating around on forums earlier in the year, and can be seen in demonstration with a quick YouTube search. E-cops eventually traced the attacks from the teen to the Greater Manchester area, charging the 17 year old with violating the U.K.'s Computer Misuse Act of 1990.
"Programs marketed in order to disrupt the online infrastructure not only affect individual players but have commercial and reputational consequences for the companies concerned," stated Detective Inspector Paul Hoare to BBC. "These games attract both children and young people to the online environment and this type of crime can often be the precursor to further offending in more traditional areas of online crime."
Read More 
| Gamasutra
Gallery: UK teen facing charges for hacking Black Ops servers
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Ms. Splosion Man reveal trailer
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Casual, Platformers, Trailers, Xbox 360, Xbox Live Arcade,
Splosion Man is one of our favorite Xbox Live Arcade games of all time, both for single and multiplayer, and we're glad there's more on the way with the announcement of Ms. Splosion Man. The game isn't set for release until Fall 2011, which is a year away, but hey, good things take time, right?
Gallery: Ms. Splosion Man reveal trailer
NES Super Mario Bros. played using Kinect
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Mods/Hacks, Nintendo, Retro, Xbox 360,
Since Kinect came out there have been some pretty interesting hacks of the technology. The latest one is a retro reprogramming that allows “Yankeyan” to control NES classic Super Mario Bros. using his body as the controller.
“I programmed it to recognize my motions and passed the virtual button presses to the NES emulator," says Yankeyan. "I could have placed a simulated keypad right in front of me that I can press with my hands, but I thought full body gestures were more in the spirit of Kinect. Of course, Mario isn't designed to be played like this, so this is really really hard."
If you listen closely you can hear the sound of Shigeru Miyamoto’s Wii controller hitting the floor.
Read More | Game Informer via Youtube
Gallery: NES Super Mario Bros. played using Kinect
Sonic 4 leaderboards get a full reset due to cheaters
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Platformers, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Network, SEGA, Xbox 360, Xbox Live Arcade,
I've never seen the point in getting to number one on a leaderboard with a cheated score - especially when the score is so ridiculous it is obviously fake. Really? You beat the level in 0 seconds?
Because of these attention seeking hackers the entire Sonic 4 leaderboards will reset (and I will have to once again get my Splash Hill Act 2 score charted, argh!). Though, you might want to wait a while to get your time back up, as apparently there is no permanent fix to stop the hackers from doing it again, which they surely will.
Read More | Sega Forums
Gallery: Sonic 4 leaderboards get a full reset due to cheaters
PlayStation Move engineer slams Kinect Star Wars
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Casual, Microsoft, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360,
One of the software engineers for Sony’s PlayStation Move, Anton Mikhailov, soke with EuroGamer on the topic of Kinect’s upcoming Star Wars game. "There's no way Kinect can do a good light saber game. Just never,” said Mikhailov.
Mikhailov then went on to brag about how a Move-compatible Star Wars game would be “damn better than Kinect’s,” even though no such game for Move has been announced.
“Technologically it's 100 per cent feasible,” continued Mikhailov on the subject of a Move Star Wars game. "We can overlay objects over the controller in AR. You've seen that in Start the Party, and swords are a really popular one. The fidelity is certainly there to do all sorts of Star Wars kid-style action. You can very well do the light saber."
As if comparing a game in development to a theoretical game wasn’t bold enough, Mikhailov then questioned the integrity of the Kinect Star Wars demo: "I've seen the demo but it's so scripted, and wasn't it like, faked?”
Kinect’s outspoken guru Kudo Tsunoda was reportedly last seen lobbying Nintendo for the right to make the Move-Kinect rivalry “on like Donkey Kong”.
Read More | Eurogamer
Gallery: PlayStation Move engineer slams Kinect Star Wars
Grab the DJ Hero 2 Tiesto Mix Pack for free
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Music, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, Xbox Live Marketplace,
All you DJ Hero 2 lovers out there, we've just come across a free mix pack that you can get right now for a limited time! Just click on the image above, or the link below, to head over to the My Coke Rewards page. Sign up, and you'll be able to choose the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, or Wii version of the Tiesto mix pack, which features three full tracks for you to jam to.
Read More | DJ Hero 2 Tiesto Mix Pack
Gallery: Grab the DJ Hero 2 Tiesto Mix Pack for free
Kinect for Xbox 360 Interactive Art Installation by Seeper
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Culture, Microsoft, Xbox 360,
Check out the video above which features further info on the Kinect Munich art installation used by a company called Seeper at the launch of the Xbox 360 motion sensor. Get a look at how Seeper put together the large-scale interactive motion control art at the Stachus gate. Nice tie-in to the Kinect product, for sure.
Gallery: Kinect for Xbox 360 Interactive Art Installation by Seeper
Gears of War on Kinect?
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Rumors, Third Person Shooters, Xbox 360,
A pretty decent sized portion (read "all") of the hardcore market has been hesitant to pick up a Kinect for their Xbox 360, worried that Kinect's main use is solely geared to the casual crowd. Y'know - workout games, shallow kiddie games, and, wait, the entire Kinect line-up is comprised of these types of games? Well, maybe they do have a point there, but perhaps not for long. Many Xbox gamers (yours truly included) have been searching for a real reason to purchase a Kinect aside from the voice recognition and hand gesturing menu fun. Well, Microsoft is apparently going to be using Spike TV's Video Game Awards to intro some big action games for Kinect, with Gears of War rumored to be headlining the bunch.
Now, mind you this is just a rumor, so don't go breaking your piggy banks just yet. Also, it is not clear whether or not (if there is even a GoW game) this Gears of War title will be the third in the series, a current GoW reworked with Kinect controls, or a special Kinect GoW version.
Still, it's hard not to get excited over the possibilities of a Kinect GoW, and speculate on just how it would work. Would you be willing to play GoW on Kinect? Do you even think it's possible to pull off well? Let us know!
Read More | IGN
Gallery: Gears of War on Kinect?
Ghost Recon and Driver delayed
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Action, Driving, PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360,
It seems like both Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Future Soldier and Driver: San Francisco have caught the same perpetually delaying bug that plagues Gran Turismo 5, as both titles have been pushed back to the 2011 fiscal year in April.
Both games were on track to ship in the fourth quarter of Ubisoft's 2010 fiscal year, which is between January and March.
No word on why the two anticipated games have been delayed, but if it keeps up then Ghost Recon Future Soldier will be able to live up to its title.
Read More | IGN
Gallery: Ghost Recon and Driver delayed
Microsoft sells a million Kinect units in ten days
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Microsoft, Xbox 360,
Microsoft's original lofty claim to sell five million Kinect systems before the year's end isn't looking so far fetched after just ten days. Since its release Kinect has found it's way into the homes of a million happy (and possibly not so happy) customers. As of now, the Playstation Move is somewhere around the 3 million mark worldwide. However, Move was released over a month before Kinect, and those figures represent units shipped, not sold.
We'll have to wait until the holidays are over to find out whose winning the motion control war. But with Kinect's insane amount of funding and mainstream infiltration, PS Move may just have to move (see what I did there?) out of the way. And let's not forget that there's still a little console called the Wii that we've forgotten in all the hype and hoopla. Hit the jump for Microsoft's obligatory braggadocios press release.
Click to continue reading Microsoft sells a million Kinect units in ten days
Gallery: Microsoft sells a million Kinect units in ten days
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