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Comment Re:It maybe that PC gaming is dying... (Score 1) 496

The problem with the Wii according to the game dev is that it costs a lot of money to license the games. And if the game doesn't sell well, they won't recoup their investment. In fact EA and Ubisoft have stated that their general revenues make up for the poor sales of their Wii games.

As for the PC side of things, faster and latest gen cards are not a bad thing, but it will take a good year or two before a worthwhile game comes out that can take advantage of the capabilities without it being some variant of a shooter. I love games like Half Life (and a few of the mods) but I would prefer to see more variety now a days and I hope to see novel games that use 3d in a fun way. Something like Trine.

Comment It maybe that PC gaming is dying... (Score 1, Interesting) 496

I have an acquaintance who works in the console gaming industry, and based on his look at his market data, he has mentioned these points:
- Microsoft laid off huge swaths of internal game studios/developers, so they're limiting their output to only surefire titles for the Xbox 360
- Many major publishers prefer to sell games on consoles, pirating on the PC and the difficulty and expense of supporting PC users makes it less desirable
- The Wii is not a good console to publish for due to low sales. The only games that sell well are made by Nintendo, and Nintendo offers little help to third parties; and they have unusual rules as well. Most third party games tend to be shovelware.
- Major publishers have announced many exclusive games to come out for console only. PCs are considered too expensive to support.
- Though nvidia and AMD make their video cards faster and better, only a few independent development houses are interested in taking advantage of faster cards, like Crytek. He feels Valve software still uses old technology for a lot of its games, so faster video cards are not worth the money. Developers hate Unreal Engine 3.0 so Epic games won't get too far trying to get new licenses with major publishers.
- There will probably be many exclusive games for the PS3 since there are no pirated games for it (yet) and support from Sony is a little better than Microsoft. Though Microsoft has better development tools.
~~~~
I don't agree with this guy on points but when I think about my own habits, I have bought more games for my console than my PC. The games I have bought for my PC have been mostly small games from indie publishers, the only excpetion being Fallout 3.
On the Wii and PS3 I have bought some of the downloadble games.
When I look at potential games for the PC to get, I look for RPGs or something unique that can't be done on console. But I don't see too many compelling games. And those that do look good often come to console first. PC games that are based on console games tend to be poorly programmed so I avoid those.
 

Security

Submission + - Former Antivirus Researcher Turns on Industry (washingtonpost.com)

tsu doh nimh writes: 18-year-old Peter Kleissner, a former anti-virus industry employee who was recently dismissed from his job for publishing a rootkit has lashed back, with a site called avtracker.info, which aims to keep tabs on the different automated analysis services used by the security industry, such as Virustotal, ThreatExpert, and Norman Sandbox, The Washington Post reports. "Armed with up-to-date information about these automated scanning services, malware writers could instruct their creations to quit loading or destroy themselves if they detect they are being downloaded by one of these services, the site's founder said." Antivirus vendor Kaspersky accused Kleissner of being a black hat who is in league with a notorious malware gang, and of threatening security vendors with distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Other security vendors are waiting to see whether malware writers pay the service any mind. Meanwhile, Kleissner remains defiant: "I won't make a difference between black hats and AV companies. To me it's not good or bad, it's just technology."
Microsoft

Submission + - Key open-sourcers back Oracle's takeover of MySQL (computerworld.com)

ericatcw writes: Influential members of the open-source community say that fears over Oracle's takeover of the open-source MySQL database are overblown, and that the EU's interference with Oracle's pending acquisition would set a very bad precedent, reports Computerworld. They reject claims by MySQL co-founder Monty Widenius and free software guru Richard Stallman that the GPL license (ironically, created by Stallman) fails to protect MySQL against potential bad behavior by Oracle. One even sees Microsoft's "shadow" behind the politicking to get the EU to force Oracle to sell off MySQL.
Games

Submission + - Capcom supports gaming marathon for charity (capcom-unity.com)

An anonymous reader writes: The well known video game publisher Capcom is officially supporting a gaming group called "TheSpeedGamers" (http://www.thespeedgamers.com) for a gaming marathon of the Resident Evil game series on October 30th at 6 P.M. CST for The Diabetes Research and Wellness Foundation, where all of the donations will be sent directly to. While such an event may have happened previously, it is quite uncommon for a publishing company to recognize such a group as this.
Technology

Submission + - Telco sues city for plan to roll out own broadband (maximumpc.com)

Syngularity writes: MaximumPC is featuring an article about one broadband provider's decision to sue the city of Monticello, Minnesota after residents passed a referendum to roll out their own fiber optic system. TDS Telecommunications had earlier denied the city's request for the company to provide fiber optic service. During the ensuring legal battle, which prevented the citizens from following through with their plans, TDS Telecommunications took the opportunity to roll out a fiber system.
Space

Submission + - Intergalactic Race Shows that Einstein Still Rules

Ponca City, We love you writes: "The NY Times reports that after a journey of 7.3 billion light-years, a race between gamma rays ranging from 31 billion electron volts to 10,000 electron volts, a factor of more than a million, in a burst from an exploding star have arrived within nine-tenths of a second of each other in a detector on NASA’s Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope confirming Einstein’s proclamation in his 1905 theory of relativity that the speed of light is constant and independent of its color, energy, direction or how you yourself are moving. Some theorists had suggested that space on very small scales has a granular structure that would speed some light waves faster than others — in short, that relativity could break down on the smallest scales. Until now such quantum gravity theories have been untestable because ordinarily you would have to see details as small as the so-called Planck length, which is vastly smaller than an atom — to test these theories in order to discern the bumpiness of space. The spread in travel time of 0.9 second, if attributed to quantum effects rather than the dynamics of the explosion itself, suggested that any quantum effects in which the slowing of light is proportional to its energy do not show up until you get down to sizes about eight-tenths of the Planck length. "This measurement eliminates any approach to a new theory of gravity that predicts a strong energy dependent change in the speed of light," says Peter Michelson of Stanford. “"To one part in 100 million billion, these two photons traveled at the same speed. Einstein still rules.""
Programming

Submission + - Speech-to-Speech Translator Developed for iPhone

Ponca City, We love you writes: "Dr. Dobbs reports that Alex Waibel, professor of computer science and language technologies at Carnegie Mellon University, has developed an iPhone application that turns the iPhone into a translator that converts English speech into Spanish, or vice versa. Users simply speak a sentence or two at a time into the iPhone and the iPhone will respond with an audible translation. "Jibbigo's software runs on the iPhone itself, so it doesn't need to be connected to the Web to access a distant server," says Waibel. Waibel is an leader in speech-to-speech translation and multimodal speech interfaces, creating the first real-time, speech-to-speech translator for English, German and Japanese. "Automated speech translation is an expensive proposition that has been supported primarily by large government grants," says Waibel. "But our sponsors are impatient to see this technology become more widely available and we, as researchers, are eager to find new revenues that will help us extend this technology to more of the 6,000 languages now spoken worldwide.""
Idle

Submission + - Family Guy proves too un-PC for Microsoft (thefirstpost.co.uk) 1

Barence writes: Two weeks after announcing its sponsorship of a special episode of Fox's edgy animated sitcom Family Guy, the computer giant has pulled out, saying the programme is "not a fit with the Windows brand". Quite why Microsoft thought Family Guy would complement their brand is anyone's guess — the Family Guy special that was to be sponsored by Microsoft was recorded on October 16 and reportedly features jokes about deaf people, the Holocaust, feminine hygiene and incest. Fox plans to air the show on November 8, as scheduled, partnered with a new, as-yet undisclosed, "integrated" sponsor.

Submission + - Polaroid deletes an important Photoshop plugin (alexsingleton.co.uk)

An anonymous reader writes: Photographer Alex Singleton says that Polaroid has deleted one of the most of the most useful Photoshop plug-ins — one that accurately removes dust and scratches from scanned photographs. He blames the removal of this tool on the bankruptcy process Polaroid suffered last year. He writes: 'The plugin was widely regarded on the net. I wonder if it really is gone forever. What a pity.'

Submission + - Laser 'tattoos' for labelling fruit (physorg.com) 3

arielCo writes: Those helpful-yet-annoying little stickers on fruits that tell the cashier the variety and brand may be replaced with a CO2 laser etching. Quoth the PhysOrg article: "the laser cauterizes the peel, much like when a laser is used on human skin. The cauterized area is impenetrable to pathogens and decay organisms and resists water loss". Demonstrated on a grapefruit, it is due for testing on "tomatoes, avocado and other citrus fruits". The original paper (abstract) requires a paid subscription.
Privacy

Submission + - Tennessee woman arrested for Facebook "poking" (go.com)

An anonymous reader writes: This story caught my attention and thought I would share it. From TFA; "According to an affidavit filed with the Sumner County General Sessions Court on Sept. 25, Shannon D. Jackson of Hendersonville, Tenn., allegedly violated a legal order of protection that had been previously filed against her when she sent a virtual "poke" to another woman on Facebook." Ms. Jackson's defense attorney Mr. Lassiter said "The only evidence that I'm aware of is a printout of a screen[.]" and later added "I'm trying to get my hands on some Facebook documentation so we can better assess the situation."

So is this the first time you have heard of someone being arrested for poking someone on Facebook? What do you think of this?

Submission + - Butterfly Wings Could Lead To Better Solar Cells (gizmag.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Researchers have developed a technique to replicate biological structures, such as butterfly wings, on a nano scale. They focused on the tiny nano-sized photonic structures that are found in the insects’ cuticle, and which give insects their iridescence — that slightly metallic sheen that also seems to shift in color depending on the viewing angle. By replicating the biotemplate of butterfly wings, the researchers hope to be able to make various optically-active structures, such as optical diffusers or coverings that maximize solar cell absorption.
Media (Apple)

Looming Royalty Decision Threatens iTunes Store, Apple Hints 279

eldavojohn writes "You may recall us discussing some legislation about online music. More decisions are being made that may affect how much money Apple must impart to labels and musicians. Right now, it's 9 cents a track — which adds up, when you sell 2.4 billion tracks each year. The Copyright Royalty Board is asking for 15 cents a track (66% increase) and Apple isn't going to agree." Reader scorp1us points out a similar article at CNN; both stories mention that Apple has intimated such a change might cause a complete shutdown of the iTunes Music Store. Update: 10/02 21:03 GMT by T : According to CNet, the rate has been officially frozen at 9.1 cents per track.
Image

Ultrasound Machine Ages Wine 448

Inventor Casey Jones says his creation uses ultrasound technology to recreate the effects of decades of aging by colliding alcohol molecules inside the bottle. Mr. Jones said, "This machine can take your run-of-the-mill £3.99 bottle of plonk and turn it into a finest bottle of vintage tasting like it costs hundreds. It works on any alcohol that tastes better aged, even a bottle of paintstripper whisky can taste like an 8-year-aged single malt." The Ultrasonic Wine Ager, which looks like a Dr. Who ice bucket, takes 30 minutes to work and has already been given the thumbs up by an English winemaker. I know a certain special lady who is about to have the best bottle of Boone's Farm in the world.

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