It’s been a long time coming, but the final Harry Potter films are coming to theaters. Unlike some other books split into two pieces of the final film entry, this one appears entirely worth it.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=_EC2tmFVNNE%26amp
Honda has taken a different approach towards promoting itself on the Internet. Instead of having something directly promotional, they’ve launched a series of short documentaries in a series called Dream the Impossible including this neat look into the company’s little known robotics division.
Seth Green will appear in ads for the upcoming DS game Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies. He will appear in two spots for the game, touching on the outfit customization of the game, with the first ad airing on television and screening in theaters with The Twilight Saga: Eclipse.
Green helped create and produce the ongoing Robot Chicken series, and is also consulting on the planned Star Wars sitcom. Green has also appeared in movies like Old Dogs and the Austin Powers trilogy.
GameHouse and Summit Entertainment announced the release of The Twilight Saga: Memory Quest and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse Movie Game. The two games join GameHouse’s Twilight: The Movie Game and The Twilight Saga: New Moon Game, which have been downloaded over two million times.
The Twilight Saga has captivated a massive worldwide audience, and now fans of all ages can enjoy one of the most popular entertainment franchises of all time on their mobile phones as they look forward to the next installment of this phenomenally successful series of films, said Matt Hulett, chief revenue officer of GameHouse. This is another top-quality license that we re proud to feature in our broad portfolio of award-winning games, and we look forward to continuing the Twilight Saga journey along with all of the film series fans.
To find out more, visit www.twilight-mobilegame.com.
There are many types of games available on the iPhone right now, though original FPS titles on the system aren’t plentiful. Developer MunkyFun and publisher Villian are looking to change that with what they describe as a full-featured online FPS in Archetype. We talked with Villian founder Dane Baker about marketing a FPS on iPhone as compared to consoles and the balance between cost and “freemium.”
Dane Baker: Early buzz for Archetype is, truth be told, a happy accident. We rolled out the game in several European countries to make sure our servers can handle the launch onslaught, only to discover users uploading wonderful YouTube clips of the game’s intro sequence, gameplay, and more. So for us, early buzz was not manufactured; it’s the iPhone/iPod touch community telling us that Archetype fills a need in a big way.
As for capitalizing on the buzz, we have a sort of “facilitator” role in engaging the community of mobile gamers while providing a stage for fans to play on. Discussing feedback with fans, keeping them informed of our plans (particularly the hardcore fans) — in short, addressing their needs. For Villain, the customer is king.
Dane Baker: The old saying is true: you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression in the App Store. So we start by managing early expectations while timing our launch to strike all at once. Supply/demand metrics don’t apply in a digital market, so you can’t drive impulse buying by making the game scarce. Apple’s approach is useful to us too, in that the product is the marketing. If the game sucks, or is inadequate in some major way, all the planning in the world isn’t going to make gamers impulsively purchase it.
Watch out for DukeKiller!
Dane Baker: Absolutely. Archetype has no “offline” features aside from a training level, so for us the online multiplayer aspect is everything. On a mobile platform like iPhone, this is ideal as people want to be connected to other people with similar interests, even through their phone.
Dane Baker: In this day and age it’s hard to find a truly new philosophy, even in the mobile space. So it really boils down to believing in what works — having a customer-centric marketing and business model isn’t about paying lip service to some cranky customer. It’s about infusing every crevice of your product with care — again, the Apple approach. I hear they’re doing okay . . .
Dane Baker: Good question. In the console space we’re seeing astronomical development budgets during this generation, and many think it’s going to just get worse. This means not only fewer games but safer games — you can’t blame the publishers, though. If you’re spending $20 million on a single PlayStation 3 title, you’d better be sure it’s going to sell. This is an entirely different universe from the mobile games market. Both have so-called walled gardens, but Apple is perhaps less strict and less hands-on than traditional publishers. So anyone with programming knowledge can play. Developing for Apple devices amplifies the risks and rewards.
As for similarities, the one common thread regardless of platform is the goal of creating high quality experiences. That said, our development process relies heavily on having strong creative, vision and disciplined processes that ultimately deliver on that promise. Today’s market leaders are the developers that build exceptional quality into every nook and cranny of their games, particularly in the mobile space. Consumer feedback and opinion is key, so similar to traditional development, the average gamer is central to everything we do. Typically this involves testing and rigorous QA along with post-ship initiatives.
Dane Baker: This is something we feel pretty strongly about at Villain. Freemium can work, I just don’t think it is working in the App Store so far. Looking at the ongoing top 10, one can’t help but notice few freemium titles, and customers are pretty vocal about the reasons. Freemium can sometimes mean that customers don’t get the deal they thought they were getting. This may not be done on purpose but there’s an understandable backlash that leads to some pretty heavy skepticism about the entire model. I think there are solutions but they aren’t being implemented (yet).
In contrast we prefer to be extremely upfront with our customers. $2.99 (‚¬ 2,39 in Europe) is the cost for our first game, Archetype, and that’s it. No fine print, ever. Gamers decide whether we get to keep coming into work in the morning.
Wonder Woman is seeing her biggest redesign perhaps ever. Designed by Jim Lee, the new costume has a blue jacket, red top with a golden “WW” logo at the top, and actual pants.
The New Wonder Woman
“The bracelets are still there, but made more colorful, tied on the inside and over the hand, with a script W on each of them that form WW when she holds them side by side . . . and if you get hit by one of them, it leaves a W mark,” said DC Comics’s Alex Segura. “This is a Wonder Woman who signs her work.”
The new outfit will debut in issue No. 600 of Wonder Woman, which will also see a new origin story, where she’s sent off of Themyscira as a child and her fellow Amazons are massacred. J. Michael Straczynski (Changeling, Babylon 5) is taking over as the head writer.
“She’s been locked into pretty much the exact same outfit since her debut in 1941,” Straczynski said. “If you’re going to make a statement about bringing Wonder Woman into the 21st century, you need to be bold and you need to make it visual. I wanted to toughen her up, and give her a modern sensibility. What woman only wears only one outfit for 60-plus years ”
Source: CNN
Fable III is one of the big titles in Microsoft’s lineup that isn’t a shooter of some sort. While the series has traditionally been regarded as an RPG, it’s been set up as an action/adventure to appeal to a larger audience.
“We are driving to sell more than five million units and to make a profit in excess of $150 million,” said Lionhead’s Peter Molyneux. “We have to do that because if a franchise doesn’t reach that level it will inevitably wither.”
Downloadable episodes will be part of this strategy. “Soon after the retail launch we’re doing episodic. We break it down in chapters,” describes Molyneux. “We give away the first chapter entirely free, the first hour. When you reach a certain point in the game it says ‘thank you for playing the pilot of Fable 3, do you want to spend an extra 2-5 or whatever dollars to buy the next episode, or buy the whole lot ‘ Press ‘yes’ and you will immediately continue playing.”
The concept of DLC episodes was tried with Fable II; Molyneux says the first episode was downloaded 1.6 million times and earned $15 million. Molyneux is adamant that the system of trials is better than demos. “It supports this freemium idea. It gets around this horrible concept of demos. Anyone out there who thinks a demo is a good idea is crazy. It’s never a good idea, because demos are usually done at the end of a game and they require an enormous amount of design talent to make a demo. The other thing is you’re more likely to satisfying the curiosity of a user rather than entice them to play more.”
Part of making Fable III more accessible comes from the study that says that over 60 percent of Fable II players used and understood less than 50 percent of the game’s features. Casual gamers and females are being targeted as well.
“About 30 per cent of people that played Fable II were women,” revealed Molyneux. “The reason we’re doing this is really trying to bring a wider audience into the Fable franchise, because my suspicion is there are a lot of people who are the partners of core games who probably want to get involved as well.”
Source: GamesIndustry.biz
Flying cars have been the dream of science-fiction and normal people since the 1950s. Terrafugia is taking a step towards realizing this dream with the production a light aircraft that is also a road-legal car called the Transition.
The U.S. Federal Air Authority has granted a special weight exemption which will allow users to fly the craft after only 20 hours of logged flying time. The Terrafugia is expected to be available in the last quarter of 2011.
Source: Daily Mail
The iPhone 4 has become widely known for two things at this point: huge sales and reception problems. Regarding the latter, a document of internal procedures for AppleCare is very telling.
Reps are told to say that the reception for the iPhone 4 is the best of any iPhone model and that gripping certain sections affects reception of all mobile phones. For the iPhone 3GS, it is recommended to avoid covering the bottom-right side with your hand, while on the iPhone 4, it is advised to avoid covering the black strip in the lower-left corner of the metal band.
The use of a case or Bumper that is made out of rubber or plastic may improve wireless performance by keeping your hand from directly covering these areas, reads the document. We ARE NOT appeasing customers with free bumpers DON’T promise a free bumper to customers.
Source: Boy Genius Report
The capabilities of Kinect were somewhat enigmatic until E3, where more details finally came out. However, a hardware spec sheet gives a very revealing look as to the Kinect’s true capabilities.
The most interesting revelation deals with the Skeletal Tracking System, which as specified before, tracks 20 joints on the human body and can map active players to Xbox Live Avatars. However, the revealing bit is that it Tracks up to 6 people, including 2 active players, implying that only two people can be playing a Kinect game at a time.
Source: Play.com
