The Norwegian Game Award – Gullstikka 2009 – was held in Oslo tonight. Under you will see all the nomenies, winners are marked in bold text.

The big winner was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 with five awards.

Best Racing game:

• Colin McRae Dirt 2
• Forza Motorsport 3
• Need For Speed Shift
• Need For Speed Nitro

Best Sports game:

• FIFA 10
• Football Manager 2010
• NHL 10
• Wii Sports Resort

Best Action game:

• Assassins Creed 2
• Batman: Arkham Asylum
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Best Adventure/RPG:

• Borderlands
• Dragon Age: Origins
• Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story
• Sherlock Holmes vs Jack The Ripper

Open Class:

• Guitar Hero: Metallica
• The Sims 3
• Street Fighter IV
• Tekken 6

Best Platformer:

• Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues
• Little Big Planet
• New Super Mario Bros. Wii
• Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time

Best Childrens game:

• Knerten Spillet
• Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues
• Mini Ninjas
• New Super Mario Bros Wii

Best game with Norwegian language:

• Buzz Norgesmester
• Little Big Planet PSP
• Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time
• The Sims 3

Critics Award:

• Batman Arkham Asylum
• Dragon Age Origins
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Best PC game:

• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• Dragon Age Origins
• Left 4 Dead 2
• Sims 3

Best Console game:

• Assassins Creed 2
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• New Super Mario Bros Wii
• Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Best Handheld game:

• Gran Turismo PSP
• GTA: Chinatown Wars
• Little Big Planet PSP
• The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

Game of the Year:

• Assassins Creed 2
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• Dragon Age Origins
• Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Best Online site:

• Gamer.no
• Gamereactor.no
• Spill.no
• Spillmagasinet.no

Årets Ildsjel:

• Bernt Erik Sandnes
• Kim «Iterium» Uri (MW2.no)
• Petter Røisland (FM Norge)
• Vegard Skjefstad (The Gathering)

Best Retailer:

• Gamestop Karl Johan
• Gamezone Kristiansand
• Spaceworld Megastore Oslo
• Spaceworld Strømmen

Best Downloable game:

• Battlefield 1943
• Shadow Complex
• Tales of Monkey Island
• Trials HD

Best Strategy:

• Anno 1404
• Empire Total War
• Halo Wars
• Warhammer 40 000: Dawn of War II

Best Multiplayer game:

• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• FIFA 10
• Left 4 Dead 2
• New Super Mario Bros wii

Best Cellphone game:

• Beneath A Steel Sky (iPhone)
• Flight Control (IPhone)
• Modern Combat: Sandstorm (iPhone)
• Secret of Monkey Island SE (iPhone)

Gullstikka translates to something like The Golden Stick.

The Olympics started tragically with the death of Nodar Kumaritashvili in luge training.

In the eyes of us Norwegians, it was a great Olympics. It started a bit slow, but in the end we got 9 gold medals, 8 silver and 6 bronze medals. That’s a total of 23 medals, only surpassed USA, Germany and Canada.

For everything Olympics, go to Vancouver2010.com.

Source: Gizmodo.com

I find curling very fascinating and I’m following the Norwegian team which do very well at the moment. They lost the opening match against Canada. But have since won against USA, Germany, Switzerland and China.

But what interessting, is all the buzz the Norwegian team have got over their crazy pants, also referred to as clown pants. The Facebook group The Norwegian Olympic Curling Team’s Pants have at the time of writting 182 000 followers. I quess Loudmouthgolf.com have had some extra hits this week. You can also buy similar pants on eBay.

It’s not only Norwegian press that have written about the curling pants. Msnbc.msn.com and usatoday.com are some of the international ones. The Today Show have also covered the new fashion, which you can watch bellow.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Small update: The Facebook group is past 254 000 followers (at 11:20 PM CET, February 21st)

Photo: NRK1

There is one gaming company that I do remember from the 80′ies, Epyx. They made a lot of good games. One, which I’m very fond of, is Winter Games on Commodore 64. The games was released on ‘all’ formats under the sun. And since it’s time for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada, I thought it was time to digg the game up and make a small review of it.

This is the emulated Commodore 64 version on Nintendo Wii’s Virtual Console (only available in Europe I think).

Winter Games have 7 eventens, detailed bellow. The games was released in 1985 and is 25 years old this year. Is the game still good? Yes, I think so. The graphics is quite blocky by todays standards. But all those 8-bit games have some sort of soul that many new games don’t have. Remember that these games ran on a 64 Kb computer. It’s amazing what they achieved with so little memory.

The characteristic C64 sound brings back good memories. The game emulates very well, it only lack a Tac 2 joystiq.

Under my YouTube-video, you will see a small description of each event.

Hot Dog

This is a freestyle event. Make your twist and turns and try to land stright.

Biathlon

Find a nice pace with the left button to get a good rythm of your skier. Watch your heart rythm since you will get tired and slow down uphills. It will also be harder to hit your target while shooting. This is one of my favourite events.

Speed Skating

This event is pretty easy. Find a good rythm with the left and right buttons, and you will win easy.

Figure Skating

You have 1 minute to do your jump and spins. Sounds easy, but you have to land stright to get good score from the judges.

Ski Jump

The key in Ski Jump is to time your jump right, have a nice flight down the hill and try to land standing. As you see in my video, this is something I’m not good at.

Free Skating

My only criticism to this game is that this event is the same as Figure Skating, except that you now have 2 minutes to do your athletic movements.

Bobsled

This is my other favourite event. Learn the curves and when to press the button, and you will do great.

In other words: Play some Winter Games. It’s still a great game after 25 years.

Alan Wake will be released in May. Can’t wait for the game to come out. Remedy Games have been working on it for years now, and it does look good. The trailer above and pictures bellow were released on Microsoft’s X10 press event this week. For more Alan Wake trailers and videoes, check out Remedy Games YouTube-channel.

 

Vancouver 2010 has startet, 16 days of Glory. I watched the opening ceremony last night (European time, Friday 12th Vancouver time). It was a nice ceremony, and there was also a 1 minute silence after the tradical death of Nodar Kumaritashvili.

I’ll be watching a lot of TV the next two weeks. I’m hoping for lots of medals the Norwegian participant.

Pictures are taken from NRK1 HD.

• Back to the Eighties – February 1988
• Back to the Nineties – August 1992
• The Ultimate Hero: The Complete History of Sabreman
• The Making of… Return Fire
• Import Only: La Abadia Del Crimen
• From the Arcihves: Durell Software
• The Making of… Simon
• The Classic Game – Uridium
• The Unconverted
• The Making of… Dan Dare
• Retroinspection: Colecovision
• The Making of… Return of the Jedi
• In the Chair with… Martyn Brown

You can by Retro Gamer from Imagineshop.co.uk.

Project Needlemouse is Sonic the Hedgehog 4. The new game will be released episodical on WiiWare, Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network. The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 will feature HD graphics, while the Nintendo Wii version will use some sort of motioncontroll. The best part is that Sonic 4 is back to it’s original 2D roots, where Sonic belongs. The first episode will be released Summer 2010.

Here is the full pressrelease from blogs.sega.com:

SEGA® Europe Ltd. and SEGA® of America, Inc. today announced the first game developed specifically for the download market from the world’s fastest hedgehog. Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I will be available via download on Microsoft XBLA, Sony PSN and Nintendo WiiWare, bringing with it the addictive classic 2D side scrolling action that Sonic fans have been waiting for.

Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I offers sublime 2D gameplay through beautifully rendered HD environments. Fans will be able to speed through each level with the classic Spin Dash move, and destroy enemies using the Homing Attack. Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I sees the return of the much-loved special stages and takes players through a variety of different Zones, all inspired by the Mega Drive era.

Each level from Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I is separately selectable from the main menu, making it easy for players to replay their favorite sections as they wish. Long time fans will not be disappointed as they rejoin the action and face all new intense boss battles against everyone’s favourite villain – the ever devious and evil – Dr. Eggman!

“Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I is a return to the classic game style of the original Sonic games” commented Gary Knight, European Marketing Director SEGA Europe Ltd. “It’s great to be able to offer fans of the Sonic series the type of game they have been asking for in a high definition experience.”

Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I will be available in Summer 2010 for XBLA, PSN, and WiiWare.

• Back to the Eighties – January 1988
• Back to the Nineties – July 1992
• Coin-op Capers: Nemesis
• The Making of… Frenzy
• The Classic Game – The Legend of the Mystical Ninja
• Retroinspection: Sinclair ZX80
• Why You Must Play: Flying Shark
• The Making of… Dungeons & Dragons: Tower of Doom og Shadow Over Mystara
• Import Only: Pulseman
• A decade of Fallout
• The Making of… Driver
• The Making of… Bubble Ghost
• In the Chair with… Stephen Crow

You can order Retro Gamer from ImagineShop.co.uk.

Here is the list of all the Golden Globe 2010 award winners, taken from GoldenGlobes.org:

Cecil B. DeMille Award
Martin Scorsese

Best Motion Picture – Drama
Avatar

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama
Sandra Bullock – The Blind Side

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama
Jeff Bridges – Crazy Heart

Best Motion Picture – Comedy Or Musical
The Hangover

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy Or Musical
Meryl Streep – Julie & Julia

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy Or Musical
Robert Downey Jr. – Sherlock Holmes

Best Performance by an Actress In A Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Mo’nique – Precious: Based On The Novel Push By Sapphire

Best Performance by an Actor In A Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Christoph Waltz – Inglourious Basterds

Best Animated Feature Film
Up

Best Foreign Language Film
The White Ribbon (Das Weisse Band – Eine Deutsche Kindergeschichte) (Germany)

Best Director – Motion Picture
James Cameron – Avatar

Best Screenplay – Motion Picture
Jason Reitman, Sheldon Turner – Up In The Air

Best Original Score – Motion Picture
Michael Giacchino – Up

Best Original Song – Motion Picture
“The Weary Kind (Theme From Crazy Heart)” – Crazy Heart

Best Television Series – Drama
Mad Men (AMC)

Best Performance by an Actress In A Television Series – Drama
Julianna Margulies – The Good Wife (CBS)

Best Performance by an Actor In A Television Series – Drama
Michael C. Hall – Dexter (SHOWTIME)

Best Television Series – Comedy Or Musical
Glee (FOX)

Best Performance by an Actress In A Television Series – Comedy Or Musical
Toni Collette – United States Of Tara (SHOWTIME)

Best Performance by an Actor In A Television Series – Comedy Or Musical
Alec Baldwin – 30 Rock (NBC)

Best Mini-Series Or Motion Picture Made for Television
Grey Gardens (HBO)

Best Performance by an Actress In A Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Drew Barrymore – Grey Gardens (HBO)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Kevin Bacon – Taking Chance (HBO)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Chloë Sevigny – Big Love (HBO)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
John Lithgow – Dexter (SHOWTIME)

CEO Steve Perlman held a presentation of OnLive at Columbia University. You can watch the video, which I found on Engadget.net, bellow.

Here’s a First Look video which I found on IGN.com. Enjoy!

Toy Story 3 at IGN.com

Even though the This Is It concerts never happened, the single was released this fall which you can see in the video bellow made by Spike Jones. A movie, also called This Is It, was realesed in cinemas worldwide in the fall. Sadly, I didn’t managed to go and see it. Luckily, the movie This Is It hits DVD and Blu-ray in the begining of 2010. This will be a must buy for me.

Enjoy the music video of Michael Jacksons This Is It by Spike Lee.

Michael Jackson – This Is It – Directed by Spike Lee from 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks on Vimeo.

In the first video under you can see Rob Oliveira going through character creation, while Mat Thomas shows you a racing walkthrough.

1. Susan Boyle – Britain’s Got Talent (120+ million views)
2. David After Dentist (37+ million views)
3. JK Wedding Entrance Dance (33+ million views)
4. New Moon Movie Trailer (31+ million views)
5. Evian Roller Babies (27+ million views)

Under you can see the Top 5 most viewed videos on YouTube in 2009.

1. Susan Boyle – Britain’s Got Talent

2. David After Dentist

3. JK Wedding Entrance Dance

4. New Moon Movie Trailer

5. Evian Roller Babies

1977-79

• Atari 2600

1980-89

• Intellivision
• Game & Watch
• Sinclair ZX81
• BBC Micro
• ZX Spectrum
• Dragon 32
• Commodore 64
• Vetrex
• MSX
• Famicom
• Amstrad CPC 464
• Commodore Amiga
• Atari ST
• Nintendo Entertainment System
• Sega Master System
• PC Engine
• Sega Mega Drive
• Konix Multi System
• Nintendo GameBoy
• Atari Lynx

1990-99

• Sega Game Gear
• Super NES
• Philips CD-i
• Sega Mega-CD
• 3DO
• Atari Jaguar
• Sega Saturn
• NEC PC-FX
• Nintendo 64
• Nintendo Virtual Boy
• Game Boy Color
• Sega Dreamcast
• Neo Geo Pocket
• Bandai Wonder Swan

• Back to the Eighties – November 1987
• Back to the Nineties – June 1992
• Coin-up Capers: After Burner
• DOS Gaming: A Bluffer’s Guide
• The SID Crowd
• The Making of Joe Jam and Earl
• Retroinspection: Playstation
• From the Archives – RamJam Corporation
• The Classic Game – Space Channel 5
• In the Chair with… Peter Molyneux

You can get Retro Gamer from Imagineshop.co.uk.

Here is a behind the scene featurette from the upcoming season 8 when Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) will be in New York, taken from IGN.com.

A short description of the the story:

When three East Great Falls High buddies accidentally discover the legendary “Book of Love,” penned by some of their school’s alumni, they embark on a hilariously outrageous quest to lose their virginity with the girls of their dreams. Join Jim’s Dad (Eugene Levy) and this lovable and outrageous group of guys in this raucous comedy full of shocking and heartwarming fun!

Watch the trailer and interviews with the cast in the videos bellow.

A lot of people watch the 7+ hours documentary of Bergensbanen on TV when it was aired on NRK2. It’s also available as a 22GB download in HD (direct-link to torrentfile). But for a lot of people, a 7 hour watch can be a bit too much.

Greatfully, NRK used a Creative Commons Share Alike lisence for this download. So I made this time laps video. It have the same CC-lisence. Original materials found at http://nrkbeta.no/bergensbanen. You can download my video as 300MB torrent-file at 720p.

The time laps is only 7 minutes and 14 second long (not counting the star- and end-credits). Enjoy!

How I made the video. The 22GB video-file played fine on all mediaplayers I’ve had installed on my computer. But for some reason when I used it in my video-editing software, all the tunnels went grey as seen in the picture on the right. I’m not sure, but I guess it have something to do with the keyframes when the picture goes from light to total dark. Nero Recode showed the file right. So I re-coded the whole 22GB file to a new editfriendly version. It took a night to do that.

The next step was to reduce the numbers of frames displayed. I used TMPGEnc 4.0 XPress to do that process. I chose the output to be singleframs (in BMP format) and 1 frames per second. The resault was 26 053 single frames and 67GB of data. I made the start- and endcredits in Edit Studio Pro (a great editor for DV-video). Then I made a project with TMPGEnc Xpress, adding the start and end-credits and the single frames. The single frames was set to show 60 fps, which then made Bergensbanen only 7 minutes and 14 seconds long. The whole project was encoded in 720p at 25 fps in MP4-format.

Next step was to add a soundtrack. I used the built-in scoregenerator (ScoreFitter) in Pinnacle Studio 14 HD to make the music. I ended up using the category Dreamscape and the tunes Sleepless Eve og Endless Fields. The sound was exported as MP3 and muxed with the video using YAMB. When everything was done, I’ve uploaded it to YouTube.

I can admit that this video was made in a rush to be the first to make a time laps video thanks to the CC-lincense NRK provited with their original video. I do se that the music stops a bit to early and that the last frame of the video should have stayed a couple of seconds and then faded out. But in all, I think the video works well. Hope you enjoy it too.

We meet Jack Sully who’s a former Marine confined to a wheelschair. He’s recruited to a outpost on Pandora which have a mineral that can solve the energy crises on Earth. They started the Avatar Program since the atmosphere on Pandora is toxic for humans. The avatars are geneticaly engeneered with DNA from human and natives from Pandora. The mission is to infilitrate the Na’vi and to get them to move, so the humans can mining the rare mineral.

I thing Avatar is a great movie. The story is OK, the action is good and the visuals are amazing. I watch Avatar in 3D and the effect is very good. It’s a lot of CGI in the movie, but it blends well with real life people and places.

Avatar is a long movie, around 160 minutes, but it doesn’t that long since the story, action and scenery keeps you watching and forgetting the time. Avatar is highly recommanded, and if you have the opertunity to watch it in 3D, do that.

Avatar trailer

Interview with James Cameron

Interview with avatar actors

Picture taken from IGN.com.

You can watch the demo of adhocParty from blog.eu.playstation.com bellow.

Sometimes you take the train to get from point A to point B. Sometimes you just sit watching it on TV for seven hours. It’s a mad idea, I know. But it’s a fascinating one.

On Friday November 27th NRK2 (Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation) broadcasted the seven hour trainride with Bergensbanen, from Bergen to Oslo. 1.2 million people watched part of this documentary, that’s 25% of the Norwegian population (we’re only 4.8 million inhabitants). The reason to broadcast this trip, was to celebrate Bergensbanen’s 100th anniversary.

I watched the last two hours of the documentary, and it was very fascinating. With all the people following #Bergensbanen on Twitter, it was a great social event. It may sound strange, but this is TV at its best.

The documentary have already had one rerun and a new is schedules during the Christmas holiday. That’ no all. You can download it from NRKbeta.no (or directly from this link). It’s a 22GB file in HD (720p) showing the front camera of the train. It also have a Share alike Creative Commons lisence.

It’s only one thing to say about this: It’s an amazing watch!

The clip under show Finse, where part of Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back where shot.

Link via @MajorNelson.

PS3 update 3.10 include:

• The Photo category on the XMB has been revamped to make it easier to see more of your photos stored on the PS3.
• The PSN Friends List has been modified based on feedback we received after update 3.00. Additionally, you can now choose a color for your PSN ID on the XMB.

PSP update 6.20:

• Digital Comics Reader – PlayStation Network Digital Comics is a new service launching in December. It will allow you to download hundreds of classic and new comics from the PlayStation Store and read them page by page or frame by frame on your PSP system. Firmware update (v6.20) includes the Digital Comics reader application, which you’ll find under a new section called “Extras” on the XMB. Please note, the comic reader is an additional download; once you’ve loaded (v6.20) onto your system, simply click on the comic reader icon under “Extras” to download it to your PSP. In addition, you’ll be able to try out a free digital comic sample from the service soon. Visit www.playstationcomics.com for more information.
• Export video/photo playlists – This is a new feature that allows you to export your video and photo playlists from your PC to your PSP system through Media Go. Download the latest version of Media Go (v1.3) for this and a few additional enhancements.

According to Joytstiq.com the Digital Comic Reader  will be available to Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States in December. France, Italy, Germany and Spain will get it early 2010. Japan will get a manga service slightly earlier.

Under is a video from the PS3 update.

Source: blog.us.playstation.com for PSP and PS3.

Today Nintendo in Europe released three WiiWare demos for download. You can download the demo of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord, BIT.TRIP Beat and NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits. they are only available for download until 31st January, 2010. You find the demos in Wii Shop Channel under Demo in Search by Genre in WiiWare.

So three demos isn’t much, but is a small start. I do hope Nintendo will release more demos. From my own experience on Xbox 360, some of my Xbox Live Arcade titles are bought after I’ve tested the demo.

I’ve recored some gameplay of all the three demos and took some screenshoot too, which you can see at the bottom of this post.

Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord

BIT.TRIP Beat

NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits

This blogpost is for everyone who lives in Europe, have a Nintendo Wii and haven’t connected it online you. In October Nintendo of Europe launched their Connection Ambassador Promotion. This is for helping all those of you who haven’t connected your Wii’s to Internet.

The benefit is for both of us. I give you my Nintendo Wii number which is 6418 – 9480 - 9127 – 7277, and you give your Wii number to me. You can post it in the comment or sendt it to me. Follow the instruction on Nintendo.co.uk on how to do it. When everything is done, we will each get 500 Nintendo Wii Points to spend on games from the Wii Shop Channel.

I help you, and you help me.

• Back to the Eighties – October 1987
• Back to the Nineties – May 1992
• Tales From Monkey Island
• The Making of… Jet Force Gemini
• The Classic Game – Gribbly’s Day Out
• Why You Must Play… Dragon Ninja
• The Top 25 Dreamcast Games
• The Making of… Switchblade
• Retroinspection: Neo Geo Aes
• The Making of… The Empire Strikes Back

Retro Gamer can be ordered from ImageShop.co.uk.

This is the English translation/rewrite of my original Norwegian blogpost.

I’ve been an a-ha fan since I could read and in the late 80ies I had a mixtape for a-ha songs only. When I found out this summer that a-ha was having a concert in Oslo, Norway, I thought that I had to go.

The ticket for this concert was suddenly more valuable, since a-ha decided that this is it. And before I knew it I had also purchased tickets to the farewell concert 4 December next year. So I got tickets for two shows before I even had been on an a-ha concert.

a-ha hold two concerts in Oslo on, respectively on Friday 6 and Saturday 7 November. I was on the last of these two. This concert is part of Foot Of The Mountain – Tour 2009. Both concerts were sold out and the atmosphere was good already when donkey boy warmed up.

a-ha started with The Sun Always Shines On TV. And we heard both Stay on These Roads, Hunting High And Low and Velvet. With a little help from Dagbladet, a-ha sung 21 songs (I do not count songs when I’m on a concert). And finally, we heard Take On Me, the song that gave the a-ha their great breakthrough in 1985.

I think it was a cracking good gig. Paul Savoy, Magne Furuholmen and Morten Harket did well on stage. The audience was so completely present and sang a long. When Morten Harket announced the last song, Foot Of The Mountain, the audience in Spektrum rose and clapped and joyed through the whole song. This was not the last tune from a-ha guys though. And ofcourse, there was also the encore which was completed with Take On Me. It was a great concert, too bad that the time flew away so fast.

Below you’ll see a short video clip I’ve put together from the concert recored with my cellphone.

Fortunately, it is not quite the end of a-ha yet. Next year starts the farewell tour. This will probably give them a boost in both career, record sales and media coverage. It will be exciting to see how many years it takes a-ha to get back together after the last concert in Oslo 4 December next year. I’m lookinng forward to this concert.

The pictures I posted with the Creative Commons license, and are taken with mobile camera in the dark from a distance.

In issue 69 of Retro Gamer, you can read about this (among other things):

• Back to the Eighties – August 1987
• Back to the Nineties – April 1992
• The Complete History of… Final Fantasy
• The Making of… Syndicate
• Why You Must Play… Cabal
• Retroinspection: Sega Nomad
• The Classic Game – Kung Fu Master
• From the Archives – First Star Software
• Coin-op Capers: Space Harrier
• The Making of… Die Hard Triology
• In the Chair with… Geoff Chammond

Retro Gamer can be ordered from ImagineShop.co.uk.

I assigned to the Xbox Live preview update for Xbox 360 and got into the first wave on October 22. Updated the Xbox with this falls big updates, which gives you Facebook, Twitter, Zune Video store and Last.FM (but only in US & UK) right on your Xbox 360. The update will go live for everyone sometimes in November. This is a preview release, so functions can changed or added I guess.

In the YouTube-video bellow, you can watch my recordings done with my Hauppauge HD-PVR. It was recorded at 1080i and downconverted to 720p before uploading it to YouTube.

Zune Video Store

Zune Video store is the greatest news for me. Up until now only US and 5-6 selected countries in Europe had the option to rent movies on Xbox 360. With this update, 18 countries (including Norway) have the advantage to rent online. And best of all, you can stream movies in 1080p (not every movie, but some).

As of now, 89 movies are available for streaming/downloading in Norway. Not a lot, but we had zero, so it’s a start. When this is update goes public, I guess we will have more movies. Of the 89 movies, 19 are in HD. SD movies are priced at 350 Microsoft points, and HD are 470. But this price will probably vary at bit if the movies are new or old. The 19 HD movies are: Absolute Power, Constantine, Eyes Wide Shut, The Fugitive, Full Metal Jacket, Harry Potter and Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Harry Potter and the Prisnoer of Azkaban, The Last Samurai, The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, Ocean’s Eleven (2001), Ocean’s Twelve, Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Three Kings, Training Day, Troy – Director’s Cut, V for Vandetta.

I have a 12Mbit connection had watched Three Kings in HD. The quality was very good. When started, it buffered for a few seconds and played fine without any hickups for the whole movie. It was a great experience. I will definitivly rent more movies. Very easy, and the price is OK too.

Facebook

You can do almost everything with Facebook on the 360 as on the PC, almost. You can read news feeds, update your status, watch your pictures and your friends pictures. You can check whick of your Facebook friends who are on Xbox Live and vica versa. But there is no inbox. So you can read messages sendt to you.

Twitter

With Twitter you can see the 50 last tweets from the people you’re following. You can write your own tweets, do search and see trending topics. I works well, but it will take ages to type in those tweets with your controller, even if it’s only 140 letters. Now is the time to get that Messanger kit/chatpad (check Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk or Play-Asia.com), it makes it much easier to type.

Last.FM

I haven’t tested Last.FM since that service is only available in US and UK. But it lets you stream music on the Xbox 360. I used my US account the get the picture.

Conclusion

I’ve only been testing it for a couple of days, and it looks promising. It’s cool to have Facebook and Twitter on Xbox 360, but I can’t see that I will use it on a regualar basis. Both Facebook, Twitter and Last.FM can be used when you’re in the Dashboard. It cannot be used ingame. And for now, Last.FM is for the US and UK only.

The feature I will be using most is the Zune video store. For the first time, people in Norway and 11 other countries (18 in total) can enjoy movie rental on Xbox 360. Streaming movies at 1080p work very well. I have a 12Mbit connection and would like to hear from you with lower bandwidth and how it worked for you.

All in all, a good upgrade to the Dashboard.

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If you use the screenshots, please link back to this post. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0.

If you’re lucky and live in Europe and have a lot of friends and family who have still not connected their Nintendo Wii to internet, you can now help them and earn Nintendo Wii points. The more you help, the more points you earn. Helping 10 persons gives you 5000 points, 20 person helped gives you 10 000 points and you can download every Virtual Console game for free.

The Nintendp Connection Ambassador Promotion was launched in Europe on Wednesday, October 21st, 2009.

Here is some of the pressrelease from Nintendo.co.uk:

By becoming a Connection Ambassador, players can gain up to 10,000 Wii Points by encouraging friends and family to get connected to the Internet with their Wii.  Each time a friend or family member connects for the first time to the Internet with the help of the Connection Ambassador, both the Connection Ambassador and the person they helped will receive 500 Wii Points.

If you help 10 people connect to the Internet, you reach Gold status and can download ALL Nintendo-published NES games for free on Virtual Console as well as receiving a total of 5,000 Wii Points. If you connect a maximum of 20 people to the Internet, not only will you attain Platinum status, you will also receive a total of 10,000 Wii Points to spend on WiiWare games and can download ALL NES, Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64 games on Virtual Console for FREE.

How do I become a Connection Ambassador?

• Enter the Wii Shop Channel
• There is an icon on the Wii Shop Channel entitled ‘Connection Ambassador Promotion’
• Select this icon and you will be prompted by two icons: one showing that you are the Connection Ambassador (or the Helper) and the other icon showing that you are the ‘Person Who Was Helped’
• Select the Connection Ambassador icon
• You will be prompted to enter the Wii Number of the person you have helped.
• You must do this within 30 days of when the person you have helped, has registered their connectivity using your Wii Number
• Once both parties have registered, you will have received 500 Wii Points on your  Wii Shop Channel Accounts to spend in the Wii Shop Channel

What do I do if a Connection Ambassador helps me connect to the Wii Shop Channel?

• Enter the Wii Shop Channel
• On the Wii Shop Channel welcome page there is an icon called ‘Connection Ambassador Promotion’
• Select this icon and you will be prompted by two icons: one showing that you are the Connection Ambassador (or the Helper) and the other icon showing that you are the ‘Person Who Was Helped’
• Select the ‘Person Who Was Helped’ icon
• You will be prompted to enter the Wii Number of the person who has helped you connect
• You must do this within 30 days of accessing the Wii Shop Channel
• You will be asked to fill in a short questionnaire
• Once both parties have registered, you will have received 500 Wii Points on your Wii Shop Channel Accounts to spend in the Wii Shop Channel

Source: GoNintendo

Source: buzzfeed.com via Twitter

It’s getting closer to the next Xbox 360 Dashboard update. The new firmware will bring you four new services to the Xbox. It will let you use Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm and Zune from the Xbox 360 Dashboard. According to Xbox UK the update will come on November 17. Also there will be a public beta end of this month. If you live in UK, you will also get the Sky Player sometime this fall, which will let you watch TV on the Xbox.

If you are a heavy user of Facebook and/or Twitter, now is the time to invest in Xbox 360 Messenger Kit for text typing. I’ve been using it close to a couple of years now and it’s way better to type text than useing the controller.

For an indepth preview of the new services, you can check out Joystiq.com or watch the video from Engadget.com below.

This years Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 goes to the president Barack Obama. It’s an interesting choice, since he haven’t been president for that long. But he do have visions, and that is probably the reason he got this years prize.

The comitee leader, Torbjørn Jagland read the following announcement:

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.

Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts. The vision of a world free from nuclear arms has powerfully stimulated disarmament and arms control negotiations. Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting. Democracy and human rights are to be strengthened.

Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future. His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population.

For 108 years, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has sought to stimulate precisely that international policy and those attitudes for which Obama is now the world’s leading spokesman. The Committee endorses Obama’s appeal that “Now is the time for all of us to take our share of responsibility for a global response to global challenges.”

When Cory Doctorow visited Norway in September for the release of Little Brother in Norwegian, he also taked about the importance of newspapers in the new media world where Internet is the big new thing.

(Videosource: bibpop.wordpress.com)

Forgot to blog about this when I received issue 68 of Retro Gamer weeks ago. But this is what it contained:

• Back to the Eighties – July 1987
• Back to the Nineties – March 1992
• The Making of… Asteroids
• Retroinspection: Tiger Game.com
• The Making of… Starblade
• The Comple History of Ultima
• The Making of… Super Sprint
• The Making of… Legend

Next issue, that should be number 69, is out on October 6.

In mid-September Cory Doctorow was in Oslo, Norway for the Norwegian release of his book Little Brother. In that context he also held a speech at Litteraturhuset where he among other things talked about DRM. Luckily, this speech was taped and you can watch it below. It runs for about 30 minutes.

Doctorow @ Litteraturhuset from Veslebror Serdeg on Vimeo.

There is a new CSI game in the horizon, CSI: Deadly Intent. And here is an interview with the  developers. Video taken from IGN.com.

I have a eBay auction going on witch ends on September 23rd. I have seven UMD movies for the European PSP (region 2), the movies will not work on PSP from the US or Japan, region 2 only.

The movies for sale are: Blade – Trinity, Blade 2, Austin Powers 2 – The Spy Who Shagged Me, Austin Powers 3: Goldmember, Daredevil, Cursed and Chain Reaction. It’s FREE SHIPPING to Europe.

September 19th is the International Talk Like a Pirate Day. And as it happens to be your lucky day. Telltalegames.com is giving away a free copy of chapter 1 of Tales of Monkey Island for PC. Download the game now, since it’s only free until midnight on September 19 PST (check this link for you local time around the world).

About chapter 1 – Launch of the Screaming Narwhal:

The saga begins with a heated battle involving the brave but often bumbling Mighty Pirate™ Guybrush, his beloved wife Elaine, and their nemesis, the demon pirate LeChuck. When the showdown goes up in flames, Guybrush finds himself marooned on a strange island with winds that always blow inward. How will our hero manage to escape this meteorological anomaly? What has become of LeChuck and Elaine? And what’s the story with the infectious voodoo pox that’s spreading across the Caribbean, causing Guybrush and other pirates to act like unruly hooligans? These are just some of the many questions posed in this first chapter of one of the most rollicking and rip-roaring entertainment experiences this summer.

Source: GoNintendo.com and wii.kombo.com

Under you can watch some Behind the scenes from the Seinfeld reunion (taken from IGN.com).

The new Zelda game for Nintendo DS – The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks - will be released in Europe on December 4th and in North America on December 7th. So it it’s not that many month to wait.

You can already pre-order the game from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and Play-Asia.com.

You can watch the trailer below.

(Source: G4TV.com via GoNintendo.com)

Fringe returns on September 17 in the US.

Today & Tomorrow Channel is the new free channel you can download from Wii Shop Channel on Nintendo Wii. To quote Nintendo.co.uk: “Check your daily fortune and get hints on relationships, activities and even the types of food that your horoscope recommends.”

This is not a usefull channel to have, but it’s free so at least you can download it an play around with it. If you have a brother or sister you can always make a competition out of it like to get highest total luck.

You can register up to six Mii’s and you can get todays and tomorrows fortune for all of them. The horoscope will tell you about Love, Work, Study, Communication and Money. You will also get the colour of the day.

The new channel will also give you food hints, fun hints and care hints. And if that wasn’t enough, you can check the compatibility check between Mii’s.

I won’t use this channel much, but it’s fun to play with for a while.

I recorded a YouTube- video of the Today & Tomorrow Channel, and below that, it’s a bunch of screenshots I made.

• Games can now be grouped and displayed in folders based on their expire date under [Game]
• Under [Settings], [Network Update] has been changed to [System Update]. Under [System Update], you can now choose how to update the system software.
• The numbers of colours that can be selected under [Settings] > [Theme Settings] has been increased
• Revisions to strenghtens security have been updated (Internet Browser)

The Dreamcast was Sega’s last console and was actually a short-lived one. It was discontinued after around 3 years in most part of the world, but it lived until 2006 in Japan.

I never owned and have hardly never played the Dreamcast, but I’ve many times thought of buying one. should be the place to start. I’ve also seen that Play-Asia.com, Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk have both old games and accessories. So it shouldin’t be that hard to get a console and some games.

You can read much more about Dreamcast on Wikipedia, blogs.sega.com have written a post with a lot of links to sites that write about the 10th anniversary of the Dreamcast, and IGN.com have an in-depth article about the history of Dreamcast. You can watch their video of it below.

There is also a new game coming in October for Dreamcast. Rush Rush Rally Racing is a new 2D top-down racing gam. It’s region free and will play on PAL, NTSC-US and NTSC-J Dreamcast. The game can be pre-ordered from the makers site at redspotgames.com, and they will ship worldwide. You can watch the trailer of the game below.

I’ve also found another History of Dreamcast video on YouTube which is also worth a look.

Watch the teaser below.

This Weekly Special at Play-Asia.com is Midnight Club: Los Angeles for Xbox 360 at US$ 18.90. The offer ends Tuesday Septermber 15, 2009 Hong Kong time. The game will work on Asian (NTSC-J) and European (PAL) Xbox 360 consoles.

About the game, taken from Play-Asia.com:

The best way to see Los Angeles is at 245mph.

Race at breakneck speeds through the streets of modern-day L.A. recreated in stunning detail. Drive the hottest range of real-world tuners, muscle cars, exotics and superbikes on the streets today. Customize your vehicle with the best after-market performance parts and custom kits. Illegal street racing with no track, no load times, no rules: Welcome to the Midnight Club.

You can read a review about the game on IGN.com or watch their vidoe-review below.

In August, Google changed their policy for AdSense and will ”allow multiple Google-certified ad networks to compete for display ad space on your site“. On adsense.blogspot.com it states that “This new capability will help you generate the most profit for every ad that appears on your site, whether the ads come from AdWords advertisers or Google-certified ad networks.” and:

We’ll slowly begin allowing ads from Google-certified ad networks to appear on AdSense pages over the coming months, so you won’t see an immediate impact on your ads or earnings. As new networks are certified, you’ll see them appear in your account. This feature will initially be available to publishers in North America and Europe, but we hope to roll it out to additional parts of the world in the future.

So this is good for all Google AdSense users. You can watch the promo video below.

Photo: Frank Eivind Rundholt, creative commons

Today is also a big Beatles day. Not only is The Beatles: Rock Band released for Nintendo Wii, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. But you can also buy The Beatles in to re-mastered editions, The Beatles In Stereo and The Beatles In Mono.

IGN.com’s review of The Beatles Rock Band

September 9th also marks the 10th anniversary for Sega Dreamcast in North-America. You can read a lenghty article at IGN.com or watch their YouTube-video of the history of Dreamcast.

You now have a chance to “Design a unique t-shirt and win the chance to show it off exclusively on your Avatar“. The competition is open to the following European countries: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.

The submited file to avatar@wearegt.com have to be in JPG or PDF format and not greater than 4MB, closing date is 17:00 CET on 21 September 2009. For more info, go to xbox.com/en-GB/live/myxboxmyway, Terms & Conditions.

In 1997 cyber dating or internet dating was the big new thing, and the video bellow cover that topic. Here’s the program discription:

One of the most popular early uses of the Internet was finding a date. This program looks at some of the first sites that offered to find that special someone. Sites demonstrated include match.com, americansingles.com, NetNoir, blinddate.com, and cupidnet.com. Guests include cyber dating counselor Dr. Judith Schwambach and netiquette advisor Larry Magid.

Watch and enjoy!

Creative Commons license: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs

You watch the weather report everyday. But have you seen it performed in a song? No, then you should watch the Norwegian weather lady Eli Kari Gjengedal perform the weather report on TV2, Thursday September 3, 2009. It’s amazing, it’s good.

The video is not uploaded by me.

Here is a teaser of season 2 of Fringe.

Here is a small interview with J.J Abrams on season 2.

(Video from blog.eu.playstation.com)

Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean”.

The Los Angeles County coroner rules Michael Jackson’s death a homicide. CNN’s Kara Finnstrom reports.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta reports on the results of the coroner’s report in Michael Jackson’s death and the drugs that killed him.

Play-Asia.com now have 20% discount on all in-stock items when using a Visa card. The deal runs until September 6, 2009.

Here his the press release (or some of it anyway):

Play-Asia’s summer deals are so sweet they even attract bees. Drop your ice-cream, we are opening up our flower gardens, with incredible bargains blossoming everywhere. No matter if you look for consoles, video games, CDs, DVDs or toys, surely you will feel like a bee in a flower field – hard to decide where to fly first.

In partnership with VISA, from now until September 6th, all in-stock items except those that have been released during the last 30 days, are discounted by 20%. Please be reminded that this is a VISA exclusive promotion, only valid for orders paid with your VISA card directly at Play-Asia.com. Make sure to watch out for the 20% off discount logo on the final payment page.

So go badger the bank or latch onto a friend who has a VISA card if you don’t have one already! All products eligible for the discount will be marked with a VISA icon. The icon will remain on the product page for as long as the item is in stock. Some products are restocked steadily so the icon comes back every once in a while, others have limited availability and might not get restocked.

Source: netbooknews.com via Engadget.com

Source: GoNintendo.com

Source: blog.us.playstation.com

Here are a video with reaction to Sony press conference.

Trailer of PlayStation Network Video Delivery Service.