sobeq.com - video games

Conscious computing vs Cow Clicker

2013-05-24T00:00:00.000+12:00

Conscious computing: how to take control of your life online | Technology | The Guardian: " . . . By far the funniest, or maybe the most horrifying, illustration of this situation is Cow Clicker, a Facebook game created in 2011 by the game designer Ian Bogost as a satire of undemanding "social games" such as FarmVille – in which, as Bogost put it, "you click on a cow, and that's it". In Cow

Gran Turismo 6 Holiday Release on PS3

2013-05-22T00:00:00.000+12:00

Gran Turismo 6 Set for Holiday Release on PS3 | News & Opinion | PCMag.com: "Gamers, start your engines: Gran Turismo 6 is heading to the PlayStation 3 this holiday season. Sony announced the news on Wednesday during a celebration of Gran Turismo's 15 years as a top-selling video game franchise." more news below Follow @sobeq

Facebook Game Revenue Up as Zynga Presence Wanes

2013-05-18T00:00:00.000+12:00

Facebook Game Revenue Up, Even as Zynga Presence Wanes - John Paczkowski - Social - AllThingsD: "“Q1 represented our largest three-month quarter of games revenue to date despite a 37 percent drop in year-over-year payments volume from our largest developer,” Facebook CFO David Ebersman said during the company’s earnings call. “Our other developers increased their payments volumes by almost 60

Electronic Arts - a Critical Quarter

2013-05-16T00:00:00.000+12:00

Why This Quarter Is Key for Electronic Arts (EA): The video game industry has struggled for a long time now, as console makers have been slow to produce new innovations and game producers have increasingly relied on sequels in established blockbuster series to produce sales . . . Still, Electronic Arts has had a particularly tough time even compared to its peers. The company was named

EA confirms 10 percent of staff laid off in major restructuring

2013-05-14T00:00:00.000+12:00

EA confirms 10 percent of staff laid off in major restructuring | The Verge: " . . . During the call, EA label president Frank Gibeau also spoke briefly on the company’sdisastrous launch of SimCity, in which network failures left millions of owners unable to play their new game. The franchise’s creator Will Wright might think that the launch was “inexcusable,” but Gibeau insists the company has

Microsoft IllumiRoom

2013-05-11T00:00:00.000+12:00

Microsoft IllumiRoom is a coffee table projector designed for the next-generation Xbox | The Verge: "When Microsoft first unveiled its IllumiRoom technology at CES, it did so in an unusual way. The software giant traditionally reveals its research projects in short, scrappy videos accompanied by research papers and a lot of technical jargon. IllumiRoom was different. The chief technology strategy

Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep

2013-05-09T00:00:00.000+12:00

That Tiny Tina Borderlands 2 DLC Will Release on June 25 - KotakuKotakuToday Gearbox acknowledged the next piece of downloadable content coming to Borderlands 2 is indeed named Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep. It's coming out on June 25, either for $9.99 (aka 800 Microsoft points) or for free as part of the Season Pass ...more news below Follow @sobeq

Mozilla releases Firefox UE3 demo

2013-05-07T00:00:00.000+12:00

Mozilla releases Firefox UE3 demoT3Mozilla has released a demo of Epic Citadel for its recently announced Unreal Engine 3 Firefox port. The game was ported to Javascript using the new browser-based engine. Significantly, it was the first game to make use of the engine on the iPhone after it ... more news below Follow @sobeq

Game Design merit badge

2013-05-02T00:00:00.000+12:00

Girl Scouts Chapter Introduces Game Design Merit Badge - Mashable Mashable The Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles have introduced a Game Design merit badge to help encourage its members to get interested in a variety of science and technology fields. The L.A. Girl Scouts chapter partnered with the Women in Games International ... more news below Follow @sobeq

Zynga Revenues Decline

2013-04-30T00:00:00.000+12:00

Amid A Challenging Mobile Transition, Zynga’s Revenues Decline 18% To $264M | TechCrunch: "Zynga’s revenues for the first quarter of 2013 declined 18% year-over-year to $264 million as the company is in the midst of doing a big pivot onto mobile platforms. The company swung to a profit from a year ago though, with net income of $4 million. Last year, during the same quarter, Zynga earned $321

Leviathan: Warships releases April 30 (video)

2013-04-27T00:00:00.000+12:00

Leviathan: Warships is a naval turn-based strategy game from Paradox Interactive, developed by Pieces Interactive and coming soon for PC, MAC, Android and iOS devices. Grab a blanket and curl up in front of the computer for the new official Leviathan: Warships Jazzy Pre-Order Trailer. "You've earned it." Afterwards, congratulate yourself on a job well done and head over to the game page.

Electronic Arts drops three Facebook game titles

2013-04-25T00:00:00.000+12:00

Electronic Arts drops three Facebook game titles - The Washington Post: "Electronic Arts said Monday that it will discontinue three Facebook game titles because player activity has taken a sharp dive. Three titles from EA developer Playfish — The Sims Social, SimCity Social and Pet Society — will be discontinued. EA will continue to support other, more popular titles, such as Bejeweled Blitz,

An Always-Online Xbox 720

2013-04-23T00:00:00.000+12:00

The Pros and Cons of an Always-Online Xbox 720 - IGN: "A popular rumor that refuses to die purports that Microsoft’s Xbox 360 successor – a machine which, I suspect, will simply be called “Xbox” and may be revealed on May 21 – will require an always-online Internet connection. Since we heard the first rumblings of this prospect, the gaming community’s incendiary outrage has lit up message boards,

EA Layoffs

2013-04-16T00:00:00.000+12:00

EA Layoffs | News & Opinion | PCMag.com: "Electronic Arts confirmed on Thursday that it has laid off an undisclosed number of employees from its Montreal-based mobile studio. Reports tipped 60 to 70 permanent employees, plus more than 100 contract workers, but EA declined to share an exact number. The cuts come in the wake of the company's SimCity debacle and the resignation of EA CEO John

Women in the Video Game Industry (video)

2013-04-13T00:00:00.000+12:00

Emily Chang explores the rising presence of women in the video game industry. She speaks on Bloomberg Television's "Bloomberg West." (Source: Bloomberg) more news below Follow @sobeq

Video Games Aid Children With Dyslexia

2013-04-09T00:00:00.000+12:00

Video Games May Aid Children With Dyslexia - NYTimes.com: "Playing action video games may improve reading in children with dyslexia, Italian researchers have found. The small study, published online last week in Current Biology, involved two groups of 10 dyslexic children. One group played action video games for nine sessions of 80 minutes each, while the other followed the same routine with

Blizzard freemium online trading card game

2013-04-06T00:00:00.000+12:00

Blizzard announces “freemium” online trading card game | Ars Technica: "Blizzard confirmed that it is working on a new small-scale game titled HearthStone: Heroes of Warcraft at a conference at PAX Friday. The game is a collectible-card-style game played online and will be Blizzard's "first free-to-play" title. The model is "something we've wanted to experiment with for a while... A lot of people

Journey sweeps Game Developers Choice Awards

2013-03-30T09:24:00.000+12:00

'Journey' sweeps Game Developers Choice AwardsIBNLiveSan Francisco: Journey arrived on top at the Game Developers Choice Awards. The artsy video game developed by thatgamecompany swept the 13th annual ceremony Wednesday with six wins, including game of the year and the innovation award. Journey ...IBNLive more news below Follow @sobeq

Not Many Developers Are Working On Wii U Games

2013-03-12T06:45:00.000+12:00

Not Many Developers Are Working On Wii U Games Surprisingly, the Wii U came in dead last with only 4.6 percent of developers saying they were working on a title for Nintendo's console. Other consoles didn't fare too well either as only 13.2 percent of developers are making a game for the Xbox 360 ... Donkey Kong to the Future: Divining What's NextNew York Times At 60 Mr. Miyamoto is still

Amazon suspends sales of SimCity video game

2013-03-09T07:59:00.004+12:00

BBC News - Amazon suspends sales of SimCity video game: "The web retailer stopped sales late on 7 March as players reported continued problems with the city building title. The latest version of SimCity was launched on 5 March and, like many current games, demand players stay online as they play. EA has also taken steps to fix login delays by turning off some features to lighten the load on game

Why the Nintendo Wii U version of Crysis 3 had to die

2013-03-06T09:00:00.001+12:00

Crytek says that its Nintendo Wii U version of Crysis 3 had to die | Digital Trends: "Electronic Arts has been selective about what it’s willing to put out for Nintendo’s Wii U. The twin titans of EA Sports - Madden NFL and FIFA Soccer - were a must, but little else form EA is guaranteed to be released on the new console. Mass Effect 3 was released as a launch title, but similarly adult-oriented

Electronic Arts and Zynga settle legal battle

2013-02-19T01:00:00.000+12:00

Electronic Arts, Zynga drop their legal battle before it begins - San Jose Mercury News: "Redwood City video game publisher Electronic Arts (ERTS) and San Francisco social gaming company Zynga have agreed to dismiss claims against each other in a case involving alleged copyright violations and employee poaching. Electronic Arts had accused Zynga of copying key elements of its game "The Sims

Faces Behind Successful Mobile Games

2013-02-16T01:00:00.000+12:00

The Faces Behind Successful Mobile GamesABC NewsWe spoke to 4 high-profile game developers who attended the 2013 D.I.C.E. Summit in Las Vegas last week and asked them the following: what makes their games special, how they made it in the gamingindustry and what excites them about the future of ...ABC NewsWhat Games Are: Why The Xbox's $5 Problem Is Great For OUYATechCrunchEditor's note: Tadhg

Electronic Arts Suffers $45 Million Loss

2013-02-14T01:00:00.000+12:00

The Escapist : News : Electronic Arts Suffers $45 Million Loss: ". . . analyst Michael Pachter said EA is being "overly conservative" in the wake of disappointing Medal of Honor: Warfighter sales, which were bad enough that the publisher revealed yesterday that plans for future games in the franchise have been shelved. "They were probably a little shell-shocked by how bad holiday demand was, and

Game developers gather at for Global Game Jam

2013-02-12T01:00:00.000+12:00

Game developers gather at Cogswell College for Global Game Jam - SiliconValley.com: ". . . ."To be a game developer, you have to love what you do," said Joshua McCoy, 19, a DeVry University junior. And it's more than knowing computer code. A good game designer must be a Renaissance man -- or for the few out there -- woman. "You need to know a little bit of everything -- what's happening in the