Syfy Joins Red Faction

BY

Syfy today announced their latest push into the gaming sphere with a Red Faction movie. The game series centers around miners on Mars fighting against an oppressive Earth government.

“It is the kind of content that fits our genre,” Alan Seiffert, senior VP of Syfy Ventures. “It is a great fit for a big Syfy Saturday movie, and if it really works, it is a great back-door pilot.”

This furthers the relationship between Syfy and THQ, with a kids series based upon de Blob already planned. THQ is also working on a game based upon the planned reality series Ghost Hunters Academy and the WWE’s Smackdown show (a licence THQ just happens to hold) is headed to Syfy.

“As long as we approach it as more than just a licensing proposition, there is a lot of value in taking some properties and just transferring them, if you will, to games,” Seiffert says.

Source: Broadcasting & Cable

Google Underestimated By Time Warner, Says Ted Turner

BY

Google has expanded in ways that could barely be anticipated at the beginning of the millennium, leading to billions in revenue and an established global brand. Ted Turner, while making a point about renewable energy at a conference, said that while he believed in Google, his partners at Time Warner didn’t.

“This is what I said at the Time Warner board room. I’m not on the board anymore because they didn’t get it. We have to stop doing the dumb things and start doing the smart things, said Turner. “We had five percent of Google in a music merger and I said to Dick Parsons, ‘Dick, I think we ought to hang onto that Google stock.’ That was 10 years ago. He said that company is a bunch of bulls**t.”

It seems like executives from established older media underestimated the advertising pull of one of the leaders of digital media. Turner made another television related example, comparing wind and solar energy to the revolution cable brought about TV programming.

“It’s just as big a win as cable TV was going to be,” said Turner. “People don’t want three channels, they wanted a hundred. I don’t know what the hell they do with them, but you like to have choice.”

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Nokia Announces Symbian Powered N8

BY

Nokia today confirmed that it has chosen the Symbian^3 platform to power the upcoming Nokia N8 device. This will give the mobile device various usability enhancements, like single tap and multi-touch gesture support, a zippier user interface,and faster multi-tasking.

“We are stoked that Nokia has chosen our fully open source S^3 for their latest device, the Nokia N8. S^3 enables an unparalleled set of options for device creators and app developers to extend the usefulness of Symbian products and services and, in turn, enhance the lives of mobile consumers,” said Lee Williams, Executive Director of Symbian. “This is an example of what is possible with the latest and greatest version of the Symbian platform.”

The N8 will feature a 12 megapixel camera, support HD video recording and has 16GB of storage space (with the ability to be upgraded to 48GB). The S^3 enabled phone will release in the third quarter.

Dark Knight Blu-Ray Sales Still Ahead Of Avatar

BY

20th Century Fox recently claimed Avatar as the top selling Blu-ray title of all time with 2.7 million in sales in four days. Warner Bros. has shot back, however, saying that The Dark Knight has in fact sold 2.9 million Blu-ray discs, increasing the previously known total (2.5 million) by 400,000.

Given the fact that Avatar reached its total in less than a week compared to 16 months for The Dark Knight, it seems surely inevitable that Avatar will soon take the number one slot. The lesson from all this is that while Blu-ray might not be the next DVD yet, it is certainly comparatively larger than Laser-disc was as an alternative to VHS back in the day. The PS3 has pushed the format into millions more homes worldwide and consumers still seem interested in owning physical copies of their high-def programming, at least for now.

Source: L.A. Times

PlayStation Move Developer Diary Tackles Bowling

BY

PlayStation Move opens up many new possibilities for gaming to the PS3 platform, some of the most intuitive of which are sports related. In this developer diary, Brunswick Pro Bowling lead designer Bobby King and lead programmer Jeff Rice of FarSight Studios discuss how Move lets the game mimic the technique of all types of throws, which they hope will make the title the definitive bowling game. Sony has been smartly using its PlayStation.blog to continually shine a spotlight on its games and products.

Iron Man vs. Hugh Grant

BY

Bridget Jones’s Diary was an acclaimed 2001 romantic comedy that became a favorite of many women in the Western world. One thing that the short clip below proves beyond a shadow of a doubt, however, is that the movie was missing Iron Man… until now. In all seriousness, it shows how viral stuff like this can pop up when people are really into a brand.

Iron Man 2 Comes Home

BY

In a collaboration with Audi, Paramount will be launching an Iron Man 2 themed mini-game in PlayStation Home. Users can compete to win one of ten Iron Man suits to wear in Home, or answer some trivia and receive a free Iron Man 2 movie t-shirt. Sadly, this promotion is limited to Europe for now.

{video link no longer active}

Source: Kotaku

Reach For New Arms In The Latest Halo

BY

Halo: Reach is a prequel to the original Halo: Combat Evolved game, but that doesn’t mean all of the weapons will be rehashes of what’s been in the previous titles. Check out new guns like the Needle Rifle, Plasma Launcher and the Covenant Focus Rifle. Reach will undoubtedly be a major entertainment event when it launches later this year, and Microsoft will put its full marketing muscle behind it.

Batman Stage Show Under Development

BY

The Spider-Man musical may be permanently grounded, but that will apparently not stop other similar productions. Right now Warner Bros. and DC Comics are working on the concepts for Batman Live, which is described as an arena production rather than a musical.

Nick Grace Management and Water Lane Prods., which worked on the Walking With Dinosaurs and Mamma Mia! touring shows, will collaborate on Batman Live. Alan Burnett, a veteran of the Batman and Superman animated series and DC Comics movies like Batman: Mask of the Phantasm and Green Lantern: First Flight will write the story and script, which is said to include multiple villains.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter