John Carmack's rocket company, Armadillo Aerospace, succeeded in its September 12 attempt to achieve level two in the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge 2009.
The challenge awards US$1 million to the team that can lift off and then land a rocket-propelled craft twice for at least 180 seconds within a total time period of 135 minutes and record the most accurate landings. Two further attempts by competing teams are to take place before the challenge ends on October 31.
Sony has revealed that PSP Minis won’t support wireless multiplayer functionality, downloadable content or software updates.
SCEA senior account manager Justin Cooney said that the decisions had been made in a bid to "accelerate the approval process" of games for the company’s handheld.
Valve’s Left 4 Dead 2 has been banned from sale in Australia after being refused classification by the country’s ratings body.
Over five million unique users have registered for Sony Online Entertainment’s free-to-play MMO Free Realms, SOE president John Smedley said at GDC Austin.
Smedley also said that the family-friendly title, which has been live since April 28, will release for PlayStation 3 "in the “next year some time, toward the middle of the year." He went on to reveal that the PS3 version will likely support PlayStation Eye functionality.
Speaking at the DICE Summit Asia in Singapore on Thursday, Sony Computer Entertainment’s senior vice president of Japan Studio offered his views on how a developer must be global to succeed.
Using a translator, Yasuhide Kobayashi told the audience of developers and professionals that many issues face his group. “The Japanese market is really shrinking,” he said. Looking to the US and European markets, he asked, “How are we going to gain success in these markets?
Congratulations to @UpperEchilon, who wins with the right answer of Mad Dog!
For those that have so far held back from buying Batman: Arkham Asylum, you could be in luck. We're giving away a copy of the 360 version of the Collector's Edition to the first Edge reader to demonstrate a little knowledge of Batman lore.
Microsoft will release a 250GB Xbox 360 bundled with Forza Motorsport 3 on October 23.
The console will ship with a 250GB hard drive, two wireless controllers, a headset and a standard edition of 360 exclusive racer Forza 3 for an estimated retail price of £249.99.
The announcement follows the unveiling of a 250GB Modern Warfare 2 Xbox 360 earlier this week.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot expects a number of titles pushed to the first quarter of 2010 to face fresh release delays.
"Well, now we have a situation where there are a lot of good games due for release in the first half of next year, but I think some publishers will move again,” he told MCV.
Nintendo is to restructure its Japanese quality assurance division by turning it into a new subsidiary called Mario Club.
Nintendo's QA division currently employs 250 staff working to improve game quality through debugging and test play. Following the launch of the new subsidiary, existing part time employees will become contract employees and current contract employees will become full time employees, reports Inside Games (via Andriasang).
Microsoft Game Studios is in the process of “building a new team” to create franchises using its Natal motion sensning technology.
Seeking candidates with “a wide array of specialties,” the company has posted 18 Natal positions on its job board since the end of August. It’s currently looking for producers, developers, engineers, artists and audio staff to be based at MGS in Redmond, Washington.
Firebrand Games has announced the expansion of its operations and relocation of its European HQ.
The handheld development specialist has made “significant investment” in its Florida and Glasgow studios, noting that its Glasgow team has moved into a new office space to accommodate its growth.
The year was 1967, and the house band of the London underground was Pink Floyd. They were progenitors of space rock, headlining shows that were as much psychedelic spectacle as rock show. In his prog rock study The Music’s All That Matters, Paul Stump describes a gig at the Queen Elizabeth Hall: “[Roger] Waters hurled potatoes at a gong, [Nick] Mason sawed wood, eggs were fried onstage.” They grew into a globe-straddling rock dinosaur, but it all began with four guys with the guts to start a food fight.
The following look at Wolfenstein's multiplayer is supplemental to our review, which didn't take the mode into account because its servers were not populated at the time.
Format: 360 (version tested), PC, PS3
Release: Out now
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Raven Software/Endrant Studios
Leading Dutch retailer Nedgame has announced that it won’t be selling PSPgo when the new handheld launches on October 1.
While the company will continue to support existing PSP models, it says that the drawbacks of the UMD-free PSPgo include its €249 price point, as well as its inability to support physical media and hence game trade-ins and second hand sales.
Sony has released PS3 firmware update 3.01, which will rectify problems some users have been experiencing while playing Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune.
In SCEA’s official announcement the firmware was billed by Eric Lempel, director of PlayStation Network operations, as an “optional update that improves system stability during use of some PlayStation 3 format software”.
Microsoft and Activision have revealed plans to release a limited edition Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 themed Xbox 360 alongside the multiplatform game's launch on November 10.
US publisher Majesco has posted a loss for its fiscal third quarter ended July 31, 2009.
While quarterly revenues rose by 18.9 per cent year-on-year to $17.2 million (£10.4m / €11.7m), driven by “the continued strength of our Cooking Mama franchise”, a “soft retail performance” from the firm’s Go Play line and Night At The Museum: Battle Of The Smithsonian saw it post a net loss of $5.2 million (£3.2m / €3.5m), compared to a profit of $0.5 million a year earlier.
The newest DS Pokémon instalments, Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, have sold over 1.4 million copies within two days of releasing in Japan.
Having launched on September 12, the titles have already sold out across various retailers, moving 1,408,980 units, according to Famitsu (via Kotaku).
Atari has announced the appointment of Philip Veneziano as its chief financial officer, effective immediately.
Most recently, Veneziano served as VP of finance at online career services management company TheLadders.com. Prior to that, he held numerous financial management roles at international media firm News Corporation.
In his new role as CFO, Veneziano will be responsible for finance, accounting, IT and various administrative functions at Atari.
Toby Gard, the designer of Lara Croft and the original Tomb Raider game in 1995, has left California, US-based Crystal Dynamics, the most recent developer of the series.
VidZone has apologised to users of its PS3 music on demand service after a bug led to “an increasingly frequent and increasingly annoying” amount of adverts being shown in between videos.
“This was due to a bug and was certainly not intentional and we have been working like dogs to fix it,” said Ben Creasey, VidZone’s head of production. “We would never overload you with adverts like this and we apologise for any annoyance and also ask you to keep using the service as this has now been fixed.”
Microsoft has confirmed that its new Zune HD handheld will feature gaming functionality.
The company said in a press release that the touch-screen media player, which released in the US today, will support “fun 3D games” such as Project Gotham Racing: Ferrari Edition, Vans Sk8: Pool Service and Audiosurf Tilt.
Games can be added to Zune HD via Zune Marketplace over the Wi-Fi connection or when connected to Zune PC software.
Japanese PS3 sales fell by over 90,000 units during the PS3 Slim's second week of availability, according to data from Famitsu publisher Enterbrain.
While Sony’s console recorded its biggest weekly sales total in Japan following the September 3 launch of the PS3 Slim, with the new console moving 150,252 units, there was a sharp drop in demand for the system during the week ended September 13, with advance figures from Enterbrain showing PS3 sales of 57,056 units.
Activision will look to grow its business by making “many” of its products playable on televisions independent of consoles.
Company CEO Bobby Kotick made the revelation at the Deutsche Bank Securities Technology Conference in San Francisco, where he was delivering a speech about the future outlook and potential growth of the games industry.
How ought we to respond to fulminations against videogames by people who don’t play them?
