The Activision blockbuster franchise, Call of Duty, has always focused bringing realistic warfare from the past and present into the hands of gamers. That may change, however, into a more Star Wars-like future.
Activision has secured the website domain names callofdutyfuturewarfare.com, callofdutyfuturewarfare2.com, callofdutyfuturewarfare3.comcallospacewarfare2.com, spacewarfare3.com, secretwarfare2.com, secretwarfare3.com, Advancedwarfare2.com, and Advancedwarfare3.com.
All these domain choices seem to point towards Call of Duty moving the battle into space.
The Sony Playstation 3 had a lot of loss ground to make up. After finally edging out its own system, the PS2, in annual sales, the PS3 still came in a distant third after the Xbox360 and the Nintendo Wii. The last 12 month annual sales period ended on March 31st, 2010, so where now does Sony stand in the console war?
Sony lost $435.6 million last year. As daunting of a figure as that may be, that is an improvement from the year prior that cost Sony a whopping $1.05 billion. PSP sales dropped from 14.1 million units sold to 9.9 million.
According to Sony,
“Game sales decreased due to unfavorable foreign currency exchange rates and decreases in unit sales of PSP hardware and of PS2 software, although unit sales of PS3 software increased……Despite PS3 hardware cost reductions and increased unit sales of PS3 software, profitability deteriorated primarily due to lower unit sales of PS2 software and of PSP hardware.”
There are promising signs for the PS3, however. Sony did meet their (what was once considered unlikely) goal of selling 13 million PS3 systems. Much of those sales came in the fourth quarter of the fiscal year, which very well may point towards 2010 being a good year for the PS3.
Nintendo Senior Managing Director and Mario Creator
There are few things that make gamers groan faster than a rumor about a company starting to charge for online access to their games, but, in Nintendo’s case, it may be more than merely a rumor.
According to Shigeru Miyamoto, the Senior Managing Director of Nintendo, during a recent interview with Edge online magazine, the tradition of free access may come to an end.
“Probably the other thing that we are desperate to realize is the core [online] business structure. Do we need to demand customers pay monthly fees to enjoy online activities? Or give an online subscription that is free of charge, but then offer something extra for people that pay, so that they get some extra value? With these core business strategies, I think we are less active than we should be.” -Shigeru Miyamoto
A lot has changed since Pac-Man ate his first blue ghost.
It is hard to believe that probably one of the most legendary video game characters in history has turned thirty years old. It is no secret that Pac-Man has not meshed well into later generations of video games, let alone the 3D graphics era led by the Nintendo Wii, Xbox 360, and the Playstation 3.
Is Pac-Man out for the count?
Namco, the makers of the Pac-Man franchise, is giving a resounding “No,” and they plan to issue the rebuttal officially during E3. Avi Arad, the once CEO of Marvel Comics and film producer, is geared to unveil this generation’s Pac-Man.
The fact that Hollywood is eager to make a movie adaption of the highly successful Uncharted franchise by Naughty Dog and Sony should come as no surprise. The game played like a movie and drew heavy influence from the action film genre, perhaps more so than it did from previous platform games.
Sony Pictures are starting to narrow down the possibilities as to who will be filling the director’s seat. David O’ Russell, who directed Three Kings, but may be better known for his dead-pan comedy efforts, Spanking the Monkey and I [Heart] Huckabees is at top of the list.
If the director choice is raising any red flags, the choice of screenwriters won’t help. According to the LA Times, the script has been penned by Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer. The pair of screenwriters didn’t gain a whole lot of attention with their previous efforts: Sahara and Sound of Thunder.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 is back. This time with improved Multiplayer features.
While the first Super Mario Galaxy was well received by fans and critics alike, it was criticized for having an unsatisfying multiplayer option. A second player had to be content with merely moving around a cursor and collecting fire bits while the first player had all the real fun.
Nintendo seems ready to answer that call of improvement with Super Mario Galaxy 2. Now, according to pre-released demo versions, the second player may still be in a supportive role, but he/she can have a significant impact on the game by collecting fire bits, attacking enemies, grabbing power-ups and extra lives, and even shake the remote to knock villains out of Mario’s path. The second player can also offer encouragement as a neat little bonus by means of cheering and coin collecting sound effects issued from the WiiMote at the second player’s cue.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 is due to hit the shelves May 23rd, 2010.
[Source: Gamespot.com]
