Xbox 360 failure rate at 16 percent?

http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/14/xbox-360-failure-rate-at-16/

• Warranty seller SquareTrade, sampling from a pool of over 1,000 claims, says that it's seeing an Xbox 360 failure rate at around 16 percent. Most Xbox 360 owners -- at least the early adopters -- don't just fear the RRoD(the red dot flashing indicatoing something is wrong), they've come to expect it


• compared to projected failure rates of 3% for the Wii and PS3 it's obvious that this continues to be a spendy problem for Microsoft and a headache for its customers.


• with the release of more and more games,the XBOX 360 will be used more,with games such as CoD4 on ther market the consoles will be played until they melt!

Sky News report on Second LIfe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN_jr6xjs90

• Problems with the restricted areas and sex industry on the online world is big as we are never sure the true age of people entering it
• A virtual playgroup has been discovered.a sort of "peadophile ring" in which avatar children are available to perform sexual pleasures for Linden dollars.
• This transfers to real life as we are never sure of the age of these people,and they can fuel each others sick feelings,then later elading onto sending and sharing real child porn images
• as it is user created content it cannot yet be stopped,if it were a console game it would be taken right off ther shelves

Playing the future – the rise and rise of online gaming

http://www.mediamagazine.org.uk/

• Internet cafes have changed from places that allowed us to read,send emaisl and get on with work to gaming stations and areas of social connection.
• Sonys PS2 and Microsofts XBOX are not jus the biggest rivals and contenders in the gaming business but are infact 2 of the largest companies in the world.
• The thrill of online gaming is big,"taking out a sniper,never knowing if it could be britnet spears behind them,or Prince Harry!"
• Sony and Microsoft have both limited their online gaming services to those who have broadband. But once the momentum starts building, fewer and fewer people are going to be satisfied with simply playing video games ‘alone’.
• the easy creation of online avatars

From Pong to PS2 – how games became big business

http://www.mediamagazine.org.uk/

• People didnt realise how the simple game of a simulation tennis match, will elad to the biggest entertainment industry in the history of entertainment industries,ever!
• In 2000, the UK computer and video games market alone was worth a mind-blowing £1.3 billion. In comparison, movie ticket sales totalled a comparatively measly £570.5 million and record sales £1.1 billion.
• Sony-with approximately 100 million sold – has become the most successful home console ever made, the ‘VCR of video gaming’: the PlayStation.
• Now a new machine, the X-Box, has arrived, and is produced by the company that made Bill Gates the richest man in the world. The gloves are off for a ruthless fight, less ‘International Karate’ than ‘Mortal Kombat’: stealthy Sony vs mighty Microsoft.
• the early 1990s, the competition between Sega and Nintendo was given a cute face when Sega created Sonic the Hedgehog (developed from a designer’s notebook doodle) as an answer to Nintendo’s incredibly successful Mario family (which had sold at least one copy for every man, woman and child in the UK).

Games in the classroom – whatever next?

http://www.mediamagazine.org.uk/

• The idea oif when teaching about the games industry in media, they will have to compare two differetnet games,thus meaning they will have to play them in order to analyse them.
• This causes controversy because people play the games they want to play there games,gaming is so open these days people will have different views of the game to how thery treat and use the game.
• The ‘end-game’ will be that in January or June you can write for roughly three quarters of an hour about how conflict and competition is represented/facilitated in two computer games of your choice
• Here is an example of how to get started, using two new games reviewed in the September edition of Games magazine. A nice angle would be to compare a game which very explicitly deals with ‘out and out’ military conflict between human beings with a game that sets up conflict between the human race and a non-human enemy.
• some games arew so diverese there is no way in which replresentation can be compared completely.
• So, to get started you need: two well chosen games, the chance to play them (preferably in lessons if you can persuade your teachers to use the department budget to buy consoles!), and the skill you always need in Media Studies – the ability to take something from the realms of popular entertainment and think seriously about its social importance and its existence as a commercial product.

Gaming's future 'on the network'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7258120.stm

• The future of the games industry lies with the internet and content delivered from central servers, a panel of game luminaries has predicted. "Everything is moving towards the network," said Neil Young, general manager of EA Los Angeles.


• This is the idea that you will no longer need a games console in your house,instead pick up from a central server from google in Oregon. played thrugh a tv screen.

The power of play on the internet

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7361924.stm

• Sites such as Facebook and Myspace are becomiong more interactive and similar aspects including gaming whilst socialising on this network,For example MySpace has just announced the public launch of its "applications gallery" at Web 2.0. Central to those applications will be games.
• Recent figures by research firm Park Associates estimates that 34% of US adult internet users play online games weekly.
• One hardcore gamer said the shift to social gaming was inevitable as Web 2.0 flourished.
• "Logging in and playing with strangers was exciting when the internet was new but the modern web is personal and social and it is clear that the internet is being used for social purposes to connect people rather than isolate them."
• The Ben-Artzi's are a brother and sister behind a start up called Mytopia, which they describe as a social gaming community where everyone can play together.

SpongeBob is the real threat to our kids online

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/apr/10/games.news

• Virtual worlds are the new battlegrounds for toy manufacturers, kids TV channels and software companies with an eye on the youth market. It is the classic no-brainer. These days, kids are so into social networking sites that their parents have to get Bebo accounts just to call them down to dinner.
• Barbie Girls, an online community based around the popular dolls, which attracted 3 million users within 60 days of its launch. It's on more than 10 million now - impressive, but dwarfed by the massively multiplayer animal-rearing community Neopets and its 45 million pet owners.
• Real life companies are becoming to advertise in both the real word and in all these teen virtual worlds to gain the attention of all people no matter what format or system they are on
• The imaginative and social universes children used to create for themselves have now been populated by toymakers and TV networks. Virtual space, head space and ad space are the new holy trinity of corporate manipulation and indoctrination.
• 
  

Get ready for sports to turn Unreal

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/apr/03/games.news

• despite being a huge sports arena,somewhere in the stadium suite 200 gamers have gathered to play Unreal Tournament 3, a hardcore first-person shooter where players run around huge arenas, picking up weapons and blasting each other to bloody pulp.
• They are fighting it out for an overall prize pot of £50,000: £20,000 for the winner of the one v one tournament, and £30,000 to the victors of the five v five team event. It's the biggest prize ever offered on the UK pro-gaming scene, and Europe's best gamers are here.
• This shows how serious gaming has become,a sporting event in itself,it not just a console by your living room TV set,its a socializing and competing event where you can meet people with similar interests,like that of a sporting event.
• Over in the US, pro-gaming is huge and steadily growing. Here you'll find the Championship Gaming Series, an international gaming league created by Fox Sports with a $500,000 top prize and dozens of the world's best players, most of whom are on exclusive contracts to this competition.

deny children access to all computer games

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/10/games.childprotection

• Corruption how games are wanted to be banned in the US due to violence and danger to childrens health yet scary films and films features torturing porn are still allowed and not even dreamt of to be banned
• Dr Tanya Byron's eminently sensible report last month on children and new technology emphasized the many opportunities for fun and learning that games provide. But the media coverage focused on the usual fears and worries. Byron said that we need to move away from talking about computer games "causing harm"; in response, TV and newspapers showed stills from games with titles like Manhunt and God of War.
• As a gamer, I can't think of anything more annoying for everyone concerned than playing games in a shared living room. Games make noise: they're surely going to irritate other family members who aren't playing or watching. Not to mention the supreme aggravation, as the player, of having someone interrupt you while you're at a crucial stage, just before a save-point, when you want to devote all your attention to the story.
• there are so many beautiful, moving, inspiring games - many free online - that I really cannot understand the insistence on portraying all games as psychotic killing sprees.
• The makers of the GTA series, like the makers of any movie about gangland, can stand squarely behind the art they have created and say: this represents reality. If it offends you, don't criticise the art, but take action to improve the world around you.

Microsoft cuts europes Xbox price INDUSTRY

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7288024.stm

• Microsoft has cut the price of its Xbox 360 video game console in Europe.From 14th March, the 20 gigabyte hard drive model will cost 270 euros, a drop in price of 80 euros.In the UK, the entry level machine, which does not come with any hard drive, will cost £159.99, £40 less than the current price.
• This means it is now cheaper than both 7th gen competitors, the Wii and ps3

• Sony's 40GB console currently retails for £299.99 compared to £259.99 for Microsoft's top level machine - the Xbox 360 Elite, which has a 120GB drive.The Nintendo Wii currently retails for £180 in the UK.

• Microsoft said that the price of the entry level machine had been chosen because historically it was "the price point where a console's audience begins to expand".The Xbox 360 has been losing ground to both of its competitors recently, despite having launched earlier.

'No plans' for Xbox 360 Blu-ray TECHNOLOGY

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7334152.stm

• Microsoft has no plans to release a Blu-ray add-on for the Xbox 360 and is instead backing digital delivery, the head of Xbox in the UK has said.Microsoft stopped production of its HD-DVD player following the decision by Toshiba, the format's creator, to concede victory to rival Blu-ray.

• Microsoft's Neil Thompson said physical media would give way to downloads in the next two to three years."We have always said online is the way to go," he said.

• He said Microsoft had always planned to shift its focus to digital distribution of content."Our belief was that in the lifetime of the Xbox 360 we were going to move to this online world and online distribution for content outside gaming.

• Microsoft has been criticised for the variety of downloads on its online video service in the UK.Mr Thompson said the firm would be adding more content and announcing new partners throughout the year.

Video games immune to US slowdown_INDUSTRY

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7353841.stm

• US sales of video game consoles and software have grown 57% over the past year, defying the economic downturn.

• Consumers snapped up consoles, games and accessories worth $1.7bn during March, according to research firm NPD.Nintendo's Wii came top with 720,000 units. Microsoft sold 262,000 Xbox 360 consoles, ahead of Sony's PlayStation 3 which found 257,000 customers."You'd never know the US economy was under distress by looking at the sales figures," said NPD's Anita Frazer.

• Microsoft also celebrated overtaking arch rival Sony in the console wars. Sales of its Xbox 360 had been lagging during the past two months, mainly due to a "supply issue".
• NIntendo say there winning was due to Super Smash Bros Brawl, which was the best-selling game in the US in March with 2.7 million copies sold.x-box said how it was there new Tom Clancy Rainbow 6 game but SOny are saying how 2 new games ,GT5 and Metal Gear SOlid 4 will soon boost sales.
  

Xbox 360 Wiimote Rumoured-TECHNOLOGY

http://news.spong.com/article/15162/Xbox_360_Wiimote_Rumoured?cb=197

• This article discusses how Microsoft are looking into developing a controller similar to that of the Wii,a sensor controlled handset. This is in order to compete with the other 7th generation consoles
• A key difference between the Wii remote and the prototype is the lack of a companion controller to be placed in the other hand, like Wii's Nunchuck."
• The controller has not been instigated by deeply thought out design innovation, however, with MTV reporting a candid response from its source, "The whole thing is a colossal marketing ploy because MIcrosoft just want it so they can match the Wii point for point.
• Frankly, the image(http://news.spong.com/asset/269983/11/15162/entity) is just too close to the existing Wii Remote for Nintendo not to take some kind of action in terms of protecting patents. While the MTV report is packed with anonymous sources and appears to stack up, it would surely be simpler for Microsoft simply to adapt its existing controller design to cope with motion sensing.

"New Wii craze is opening up"

New Wii craze is opening up

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7264353.stm

• The new Wii craze has allowed anyone to game,not just your stereotypical teenager. a more of a family console.Like other games systems the Wii is as far from an open platform as you can imagine.
• Games cost a lot of money to develop, and Nintendo has worked hard to make it difficult to get inside the Wii for fear that easy access would allow games to be copied and distributed.
• Although Nintendo thought you could only run legal and specific games,specialist engineers have been able to crack the Wii.They have allowed the control to now control vacuum cleaners and even Mac computers. this was totally against what the producers of the Wii have allowed.
• According to the technology site Slashdot there is now an MP3 player, a way to convert and play GameCube game files and even a port of GNU/Linux that runs on the Wii.
• Surely it makes sense to combine different consoles and converge them to save having a pile of consoles by the TV. but companies just want to keep bringing out new consoles, to keep people buying and interested.

Gaming Stuff that will be useful

1.EDi – Electronic Distribution initiative – distribution of games online


Sony’s Game 3.0 philosophy

comaparison of 3rd gen such as xbox360, ps3 and the Nintendo Wii


Is the PS3 really THAT much better than the PS2?


Democratisation Or exploitation?


Research technique: reading reviews is
Very useful as they often summarise the
Pros and cons of a new technology,
However you must recognise them
as opinions.


How does this make gaming more sociable?


How has web 2.0 applications played a part in the way audiences use gaming applications?

MY NMT AREA

I have chosen to do "Gaming" as my area of studies for NMT.i have chosen this as i am a keen gamer myself and have personal interest in the area so i feel this will be relevent in order to obtain my best mark.

Areas of Study include:

• Technology-How it is marketed,which companies provide etc...
• Institutions-How media is being converged,market campaigns etc..
• Audience-How is the technology consumed,by whom,advantages etc...
• Issues-Does it encourage illegal activity,"moral panics" etc...
• Future-what will the future hold,based on current progress etc...