DIY developers to make Xbox games
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Microsoft officially launches a set of tools that it hopes will become a kind of YouTube for videogames.
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Microsoft has officially announced and released its Xbox 360 Arcade game console system.
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SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 18  - Video game developers,  eager to please all consumers, are increasingly including  features that let gamers play with or against their friends.
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Microsoft Corp.&#039;s Xbox 360 may exemplify the high-tech future of video game consoles, but the company is hoping some of its avid players still pine for the good old days of Pac-Man and Frogger.
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Ingenious hacks abound for the game console's input device. Plus: The
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Video game developer is moving in the right direction, despite an "unprofitable" image it needs to shake.
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You need more than an Xbox 360 and a plasma-screen TV to exploit the latest video games for their full entertainment value. These days, you also need a friend.
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Tantalizing new games for Nintendo Wii, Sony PS3, and Microsoft Xbox 360 are on the horizon.
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Tycho:  I should have all the science lined up by the end of the week, ready to stuff into the piano black lozenge I've obtained to celebrate my return to personal computing.  Wish me luck; I've never before had the opportunity to fry four processors at once.       I know things.  Specifically, things that may be of interest to you.  For example, I know if playing Eye of Judgment online is an onerous as it might seem.  It is not!  I cannot express my relief.    Well, let's try.  In my last, vast expose, I broke down a card's unique language and expressed some misgivings about online play - ultimately just accepting it, because what they're trying to do is so weird that there's no prior art.  Essentially, you "register" your thirty card deck with the system itself, where it is stored and named for future use.  This process is extremely straightforward:  it is simply a matter of you laying your cards anywhere on the mat, a few at a time.  It will probably take two minutes if you really keep on it.  Then, you jump online, choose what nation you want to play for, and track down a partner.  At this point, the game will "draw" you your five card hand by showing you the card art onscreen.  You get one Mulligan (or redraw), but if you like your hand you move into the game proper.  We laid out our deck by element, face up, and this smoothed the turn to turn process considerably.      In the build we have, and I hope this is changed for release, it shows you these cards in a single file line without their name or text - just the art.  Once you got familiar with these images, slightly modified from their card format, it's pretty quick - but the names should be displayed on this screen.  You can use the controller to pull up the names, but let's be serious - at no point should the player be forced to interact with a mundane controller once the game is underway.     You should know that the game really wants a well-lit environment.  You don't need a flare gun or anything, but we didn't have what we needed before and certain squares would slow down the game flow with partial reads that would only resolve after several attempts and minute card adjustments.  I should state that here in the office, we removed all the overhead lights, installing a single track of illumination that we point at the ceiling, where lights used to be.  We tend to transform any place we live into a cave.  So, our scenario might be somewhat atypical.    Also, I know if playing Rock Band with all the instruments off of a USB hub is onerous.  You will be happy to know that it is not - we played said instruments spread out on an actual stage, and found it more than satifactory.  The reality is that the drum kit already needs its own wire, so it isn't as though the future had actually arrived anyway.  Plus, the mic isn't wireless either. This makes the contrived brouhaha over wired guitars a fairly transparent traffic ploy.    This is a matter quite apart from Microsoft's reticence to play ball with unique, third party hardware.  And when I say "play ball," I'm taking about the shakedown operation they've got going licensing their wireless technology, which either makes products for their system more expensive or (in the salient case of Rock Band) results in them bundling a wired controller for the same price as a wireless one on a competitor's system.  This is the last holiday they can get away with this sort of thing...  right?
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(InfoWorld) - The OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) Project is asking software coders to develop free, open-source educational computer games for the XO laptop, continuing its push toward aÂ September launch date. OLPC offered a laptop prize on Thursday for software teams who create new games during a three-day "game jam" scheduled to begin June 8 on the campus of Olin College, an engineering school in Needham, Massachusetts. By increasing the software available for the XO, OLPC hopes to encourage governments of developing countries to order more laptops, pushing the group to its sales goal of 3 million units by May 30. OLPC had collected 2.5 million orders by late April but needed to boost sales enough to order bulk computer parts and stick to the manufacturing schedule. An OLPC spokesman was sanguine about the goal, calling the date an arbitrary deadline that could also be affected by software and hardware changes as developers put the finishing touches on the beta version of the XO laptop, according to an e-mail from OLPC's public relations agency. However, production has already slipped from an original date in July and could be set back further by spiraling prices. Last month, OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte said the price of the "hundred-dollar laptop"Â had risen to $175. Negroponte also says that his nonprofit effort is being hurt by well-funded competition from Intel's Classmate PC, also a low-budget, power-efficient PC designed as an educational tool for children in developing countries. The game-making contest marks a new effort by OLPC to increase momentum for the XO. "The purpose of the game jam is getting people together to hack for a couple of days. Hopefully this will be the first of many," said SJ Klein, OLPC's director of content. XO users already have their choice of certain games in a "Pygames" library of open-source applications written in the Python programming language, and the XO's eToys application that allows children to create their own basic media and games, he said. But in the game jam, developers could create new types of games that rely on features of the XO's design, such as mesh networking between nearby users, an integrated still or video camera, and a tablet mode for mobile gaming. "There aren't too many games right now that take advantage of mesh style networking," said Klein, referring to the XO's ability to use Wi-Fi to communicate with other users up to a kilometer away, and display them as icons on its Sugar interface. "There are networked games, sure, but they aren't sensitive to the ability to display the presence of other users depending on where they are in relation to you or to pop up on the screen when they are close enough." Beyond creating games that teach specific tasks like counting or reading, OLPC hopes the contest will produce templates that allow kids to build their own games, according to OLPC's development guidelines. In keeping with the group's decision to use an open-source Linux OS in the XO computer, OLPC will release all games created at the weekend-long event under the open-source GNU General Public License and post them on the SourceForge site.
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Archive your Zune-friendly movie downloads Microsoft has begun seeking manufacturing partners to make an internal HD DVD drive for a redesigned Xbox 360 console, whistle-blowers from among Taiwan's optical disk drive production community have claimed. And the software giant may be looking at incorporating disc-burning technology in the console.â¦
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Microsoft kicked off its 'Dream-Build-Play' contest at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, offering $10,000 and the opportunity to have their game published in the Xbox Live Arcade to one lucky developer.
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Gabe: Wired has a pretty big article about Penny Arcade in it's latest issue. We've done a lot of interviews but Wired actually sent a writer named Chris Baker out to spend a few days in our office. Sort of like a geek version of Jane Goodall, He hung out with us all day and took notes while we played games and made the comic. Chris interviewed everyone here and even found time to question our wives and friends. Living with us the way he did I think he managed to get some pretty candid stuff out of Tycho and I. Things we might never have divulged during a standard interview. By the end of the week I think we all considered Chris a friend and a valuable addition to any Halo 3 team. The resulting article is a pretty complete look at our little company here as well as the most honest interview I think anyone's ever managed to get out of us. If you're interested you can read it online right here.   -Gabe out
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Microsoft Corp.'s XBox video game system will team up with software maker Electronic Arts Inc. to stage an online Interactive World Cup tournament later this year, the companies announced Thursday.
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Microsoft has announced a new promotional program offering free access to some of its development, design and gaming software to students worldwide. The stated goals of the program are to help spark creativity and prepare the next generation for high-tech careers. In addition, the promotion may also help develop a preference for Microsoft  among a younger generation that often leans toward open source alternatives.
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With the release of MechAssault 2 looming for Xbox, Microsoft has kicked-off what could very well be the easiest competition you&#39;ll ever encounter.
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Microsoft has released a new SKU for its Xbox 360 console--but should you buy it?