Category Archives: Uncategorized
China Blocks Virtually All Of Google's Web Services As 18th Party Congress Gets Underway
According to multiple reports, China recently started blocking numerous Google services, including Gmail, Google Maps and others that usually pass through the country's so-called Great Firewall. Google's Transparency Report shows a significant drop in traffic from China that started around 12:30am GMT last night. According to a statement from Google, the company has checked and "there’s nothing wrong on our end."
Gameloft sales in Q3 grow 37% on freemium success
The mobile publisher is seeing 60% of revenues come from in-app purchases and advertising
Digital games publisher Gameloft has announced that its third-quarter sales grew 37 percent to €55.4 million, while sales for the company’s first nine months were up 28 percent to €150.6 million. While Gameloft publishes on digital platforms like Xbox Live, the majority of its growth is from smartphones and tablets, which combined saw growth of 124 percent for the company and accounted for 56 percent of total sales (compared to 34 percent a year ago).
Gameloft specifically cited its success with the freemium and paymium models, which it began using back in March 2011. In fact, 60 percent of of the company’s smartphone revenues came from in-app purchases and advertising. Gameloft’s monthly active users currently stands at 56 million.
With titles on the way like Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour, Zombiewood, Heroes of Order & Chaos, My Little Pony, Playmobil Pirates, and UNO & Friends, Gameloft expects more growth in the quarters ahead. The company is now expecting full-year sales to hit over €205 million, up 25 percent.
Lose Your Mind Over These TrackMania Videos
Utilizing the patented RPS Matter Relocation Device (note: it is actually a very big catapult), we recently flung Dan so high that he landed on Maniaplanet. There, he slowly but surely integrated with their society and partook of their most exotic cultural fineries. When he returned using the patented RPS Inertia Disruption Field (which may or may not bear striking resemblance to a trampoline), he was quite rightly confused as to what exactly both new TrackManias are bringing to the table. Now, though, you can get a glimpse of what he experienced – namely,TrackMania: Stadium and TrackMania: Valley – and puzzle over the pair yourself.
Dark Souls Artorias of the Abyss DLC Review (Xbox 360) | Kertechblog
Dark Souls has enough content to fill two very long games, but thanks to a fan petition From Software has released the Artorias of the Abyss DLC, adding several new areas, bosses, and lots of new loot to the game.
PlayStation 3: The Final Hack?
Sony is waking up to a new PlayStation 3 security nightmare after a day in which a brand new, PSN-enabled custom firmware was released for hacked consoles, swiftly followed up by publication of the console’s LV0 decryption keys – which some say blows the system wide open.
We’ve been here before of course. Over two years ago, the first piracy-enabling firmware and USB dongle combo - PSJailbreak was released, which exploited a weakness in the PS3′s USB protocols, allowing for the system software to be patched in order to run copied software running from hard disk. This was followed up some time later by the release of tools from hacker group fail0verflow, which allowed users to encrypt files for the system in the same way that Sony does, allowing for a new wave of piracy. Geohot’s public release of the “metldr” root key also added to the challenges facing Sony, resulting in a messy legal battle.
NVIDIA: Top end PC GPU 24 times faster than that in Xbox 360
Even next-gen consoles are unlikely to match that, says NVIDIA’s principal engineer.
The current top end graphics card on the market is approximately 24 times as powerful as the card inside the Xbox 360, according to Simon Green, principal engineer at NVIDIA.
Speaking to New Scientist, Green said that PC gaming visuals have already dramatically outpaced consoles. He also believes that next-gen consoles are unlikely to reach that level of raw horsepower.
This gap in graphical power was made obvious when Epic Games, makers of the Unreal graphics engine that powers many modern games, showed off the newest version of the engine on a top-of-the-range PC. Even the next generation of consoles is unlikely to match that.
The NVIDIA engineer also believes that the games console might one day be completely redundant: “One day, the whole idea of owning a separate piece of hardware to play games on might be completely redundant,” said Green.
VideoGamer.com Analysis
It’s no surprise that the current PC GPUs are significantly faster than what is inside our games consoles. The Xbox 360 is seven years old this year, and the PlayStation 3 is six. While we aren’t going to get console GPUs that match the raw power of top end PC equivalents, dedicated games consoles are always capable of doing more with the grunt they have.
Microsoft to bring interactive ads to Xbox Live
Microsoft has announced plans for interactive ads on Xbox Live.
The spots, dubbed NUads, will appear within Xbox apps that feature video content, much like the ads that appear on free mobile apps. These NUads are scheduled to start running in the autumn with three launch partners: Toyota, Unilever and Samsung Mobile USA.
Valve’s Source engine to be used in animated film
New feature film from Shane Acker will use Valve’s engine and may be distributed through Steam
Valve is collaborating with the director Shane Acker and the Irish production company Brown Bag Films on his new animated feature film.
According to a report in the Chicago Tribune, the film, Deep, will use technology based on Valve’s Source engine for rendering, editing, animation and lighting.
It will also allow Acker – whose previous film was the 2009 feature “9″ – and Brown Bag Films to produce a video game based on the film. Valve’s Steam platform is also being considered as a possible distribution platform.
Deep is currently in pre-production. It has a proposed budget of €15 million.
World population limits increased for GW2 beta weekend
ArenaNet has said it’s increasing the world population limits the Guild Wars 2 beta event which is going on this weekend. Therefore, worlds that were previously listed as full are now open to more characters. The purpose was to alleviate the rush of players, but if you find you are still have some issues with the game.
Incoming – June’s E3 Drought?
Welcome back to our feature where we aim to highlight the new releases that that our readers might be interested in!
With all the hype surrounding E3 this month, it’s unsurprising that there aren’t many new games to look forward to. What’s more, we’re entering that awkward Summer drought before the holiday season kicks off. Still, while late PC ports and other compilations make up most of the schedule, there’s light-hearted fun to be had with the next Lego Batman game (this time featuring heroes from the rest of the Justice League), and on the Marvel side of things we’ll find out if the reboot of The Amazing Spider-Man can take us back to the glory days of Spider-Man 2!
| Date | Game | Platforms |
| 8th June | Game of Thrones | PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 |
| Rayman Origins | Nintendo 3DS | |
| 14th June | Gravity Rush | PlayStation Vita |
| Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion | PC | |
| Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Future Soldier | PC | |
| 22nd June | Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes | Nintendo 3DS/DS, PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii |
| Steel Battalion: Heavy Armour | Xbox 360 | |
| 29th June | Harvest Moon: The Tale of Two Towns | Nintendo 3DS/DS |
| Metal Gear Solid HD Collection | PlayStation Vita | |
| The Amazing Spider-Man | Nintendo 3DS/DS, PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii |
