Right in time for the Game Developers Conference, News.com is excerpting another TechRepublic feature in which they dive into the guts of a popular piece of equipment. With a $6000 price tag, the Blackbird might not be ubiquitous, but it's certainly an object of intense lust for many gamers.
Don't think any PC's worth that investment? Check out the full gallery at News.com: "Cracking open the HP Blackbird gaming PC"
SAN FRANCISCO--On a regular basis, two of the things I most like to write about are Lego and virtual worlds. So when I first heard about Lego Universe, a Lego-themed virtual world, well, I was more than a little interested.
Lego Universe, which, sadly, is still about two years from public release, will be a full-scale MMO (massively multiplayer online game) aimed at Lego's core audience, kids ages 8 to 12. But in keeping with the company's awareness of the millions of adults who are utterly devoted to the iconic toys, there is expected to be something for … Read more
Microsoft's announcement at today's Game Developer's Conference made some waves in the gaming community, but for the growing faction of Zuneowners, it felt like an exciting glimpse into the product's future.
While Microsoft hasn't made any formal announcements regarding games coming to the Zune, they dropped a big hint today when they demonstrated a game developed using XNA Studio running on a Zune 80. Its a move that makes plenty of sense, considering that Apple has been slowly and steadily releasing games for the Zune's competitor, the iPod. Gaming on the Zune also capitalizes on a theme Microsoft already has some credibility with, by way of XBox 360.
We might not know when Microsoft will start releasing games for the Zune, or how much they will cost, but we have some idea of what types of games will be released. The following list of XNA games and descriptions is quoted from Microsoft's XBox 360 site (videos via YouTube):… Read more
SAN FRANCISCO--In a frenetic keynote address at the Game Developers Conference here, Microsoft showed off the next phase of a strategy it claims will "democratize" game development and distribution.
For several years, Microsoft has been working on its XNA Studio, a platform that allows anyone to create games for the Xbox and for Windows.
But now, the company is expanding the XNA offering to allow the best community-created games to be uploaded to and distributed from Xbox Live.
Microsoft is calling the new offering its "Creators Club," and the idea is to present the Xbox Live … Read more
Yesterday I opened my Wall Street Journal and was struck by the advertisement staring back at me from the front page. Roughly two years ago the Journal started inserting one ad per day on its front page, talking it up as a prime advertising vehicle:
"The Wall Street Journal will provide the most valuable opportunity anywhere in any medium for advertisers who want to reach a large, affluent and influential audience," [said] L. Gordon Crovitz, the publisher of The Journal and executive vice president of Dow Jones & Company.So who is this "large, affluent, and influential audience"? Gamers, as the inclusion of the $75,000 to $100,000+ advertisement suggests:… Read more
This morning at the Game Developer's Conference here in San Francisco, Alex St. John, the CEO of WildTangent, will announce a new version of the company's gaming software that he hopes will make people think twice about buying a video game console.
Taking a cue from the growing number of casual gamers buying consoles, St. John, who is most famous for helping create Direct X specification for Microsoft, figures that people are itching to get their hands on video games, but that they shouldn't have to buy a proprietary piece of hardware and pricey software titles, or … Read more
I've just made a small orange cube disappear with my mind. No hands necessary.
I'm testing out the San Francisco company's so-called brain control interface, the latest iteration of technology it first showed off a year ago, but which, unlike last year, is now almost ready for prime time.
The idea is a blending of hardware and software: A headset that seems a little like the one from the James Cameron-written 1995 film, Strange Days, complete with a set of sensors that are built to read your brain waves.
The software then is designed to interpret those … Read more
Jack Thompson, one of the best-known and most controversial foes of video games and the culture surrounding them, might be in need of a few extra grains of salt.
On Monday, satirical news site News Groper posted an expletive-filled rant in the guise of its "Fake Samuel L. Jackson" blogger about the tragic Northern Illinois University shootings and Thompson's willingness to connect it to violent video games. Most of the News Groper post by the faux-Snakes on a Plane star is far too foul to post here, but basically, it described Thompson's reaction to the … Read more
Adobe next month will release Director 11, an update to its graphics assembly, that it hopes will lure game developers with its better 3D imaging.
Adobe is expected to detail the latest features of Director at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday.
Director 11 is used to build games, as well as graphics-rich presentations, and learning applications. It uses the Shockwave plug-in to render 3D graphics.
The latest version includes physics, or movement between images, using the Ageia PhysX engine and support for DirectX 9, which can take advantage of recent graphics cards.
It will make it … Read more
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Christina Milian and the gadgets she loves
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