CrunchGear

CrunchGear

CrunchGear

Link to CrunchGear

One man against a Juggernaut

Posted: 22 Feb 2010 05:39 AM PST

Be brave, seller of iPod and iPod Touch accessories. Though you vend below the shadow of the Apple store in Soho, your work will not be forgotten when Apple’s goons come out to beat you into the gutter and steal your wares. You will return, more powerful and more magnificent, with cloth bags that people can put their iPads in and that cost $1 wholesale and that you will sell to tourists from Arkansas for $40, down from $60.

Remember the words of Obi Wan: “If you strike me down… I’ll be more powerful than you can imagine.”

Thanks, Steve

Video: Metal Gear Solid Arcade 3D in action

Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:20 AM PST

We’ve covered Metal Gear Solid 3D (whose first playable version was announced by Konami last week) twice so far, and now it’s time to look at the game in more detail. Konami is still in the middle of optimizing the gameplay (which is based on Metal Gear Online) and hasn’t fixed a release date yet.

In the video embedded below, you can see a model holding a gun in her hands and wearing the “VR” 3D goggles, the main selling point of the title. Your viewpoint in the game changes in line with the direction your head (in reality) is facing. There’s an analog stick on the gun, which allows you to move in the game independent of where you look in reality, too.

As we reported before, you need to cooperate and communicate with other players to advance in the game, which offers 5.1 sound to give you that extra-realistic feeling of being engaged in combat.

Here’s the video (courtesy of DigInfo in Tokyo)

CrunchGear Week in Review: Glowering Edition

Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:00 AM PST

Atari’s Missile Command (from 1980) to become live-action movie

Posted: 21 Feb 2010 11:01 PM PST

In case you needed another indicator Hollywood has run out of ideas, here is a new one for you: Atari is about to sell the movie rights to Missile Command, a shooting game that hit arcades back in 1980, to 20th Century Fox and another movie production company.

Selling the license doesn’t necessarily mean we ever get to see a Missile Command movie on the big screen, but a first step has been made. And in fact, Atari already managed to auction off the rights for Asteroids, another classic action game, to Universal Pictures last summer. Missile Command is supposed to be turned into a 3D movie.

The gameplay is based on a crosshair that players move around to fire off counter-missiles to protect their cities against incoming missiles. “Plot”-wise, players are supposed to protect a total of six cities on their home planet Zardon against invaders from Krytol – not exactly a very rich back story.

Missile command was later ported to a number of other platforms including the Atari 2600 (probably the most famous version), iPhone and Xbox Live Arcade for the Xbox 360.

Via The Los Angeles Times

Never fear, Innovationman is here!

Posted: 21 Feb 2010 02:52 PM PST

Innovationman has a gas-powered skateboard to sell you! He wants you to buy it! He has a family who are also interested in your trade! This thing is going for under $1000 but if you win, you have to offer a deposit of $1000! Don’t miss out!

What is this thing? Let Innovationman tell you!

GAS SKATEBOARD The New X-Game Sport Just do nothing only smart standing and use your Foot to control and you will get a better feeling from it. GAS Skateboard and MOTO RIZED SKATEBOARD was originally developed from skate board which has to use foot power to get it moving forward. Nowadays with new concept of balancing, new GAS Skateboard’s body can resist the forces that come from all directions when moving into sharp curve, which cause torsion from centrifugal force.

Oh my god! Sharp Curve! Slow down, Innovationman! You have a wife and child!

One more video after the jump! Go buy it on eBay!

Many, many cameras are being released at PMA

Posted: 21 Feb 2010 02:40 PM PST


It’s the supreme madness of the PMA 2010 season, and although we can’t make it there personally this year, that won’t stop all them camera companies from releasing stuff. You saw the sweet new Samsungs that dropped yesterday, but here are a few more interesting developments from the show.


These freaky Alpha concepts from Sony are something along the lines of the Micro Four Thirds and EVIL systems, but no one really knows for sure what existing lens system they’ll use, if any. Engadget saw one behind glass and it looks pretty rough.

Sigma has updated its DP series with the DP1x and DP2s. The original versions of these cameras received pretty poor reviews, the cameras coming off as sort of well-meaning but half-baked projects. With every successive revision, they get closer to being what we’d like them to be, but the proof of the pudding is in the taste, and we’ll have to really get hands-on if a verdict is to be reached. Photography Bay has the press releases for you (DP1x, DP2s)

The once-mysterious Samsung NX10 has gotten a few new lenses, including a 30mm f/2 that would probably be my walkaround. More info, again, at Photography Bay.

Ubisoft claims new DRM scheme was designed by ‘PC guys’ who are our ‘friends’

Posted: 21 Feb 2010 09:00 AM PST

Is it even worth getting upset over this Ubisoft nonsense? By now you’ve certainly heard about the company’s plans to implement a new form of DRM for its PC releases—I’ve only written about it 800 times in the past month! The DRM is bat-shit crazy, sure, but it’s the sentiment behind it that has me concerned this Sunday morning.

Ubisoft gave its side of the story to PC Gamer in a rather breezy interview. I encourage you to read the whole thing: it’s not too long, and it really does frame where Ubisoft is coming from.

I’ll isolate a few parts here.

So what’s in it for gamers?
Ubi say there are three advantages to their online services. The first: you don’t need a disc. The second: that you can install the game on as many PCs as you like, as many times as you like. And the third: the automatic uploading of savegames to Ubisoft’s servers.

I love the first two "advantages," like, wow, you mean we don’t need to keep the disc in the drive? That’s great. Incidentally, that’s how it should have been all along—what’s the point of installing a game to a hard drive if you’re going to insist that we keep the disc in there? And oh, I can install the game on as many PCs as I’d like? You’re too kind! The fact is, it’s really not too uncommon to own more than one PC these days. Maybe you have a custom-built PC in one room and a laptop in your bedroom. So there’s two installs right there. And maybe stupid Windows crashes, or your hard drive spontaneously explodes—who hasn’t had a hard drive on them? Bam, there’s a few more installs.

There aren’t "advantages" so much as what should be considered business as usual. (Steam is quickly making disc-based games seem old and silly.)

The last point, that your saves are automatically uploaded to Ubisift’s servers, sure, that’s nice, but it’s not exactly something that PC gamers have been clamoring for. Besides, is this merely syncing your local game saves with the Ubisoft cloud, or is the wholesale management of your saves for you? What happens if it’s the latter, and Ubisoft’s servers go down? Would you be able to access your game saves then?

My absolute favorite part of the interview is:

Ubisoft: The system is made by guys who love PC games. They play PC games, they are your friends.


Yes, and war is peace.

The smart reaction to these games—so far, the games afflicted with this DRM include Assassin’s Creed II, Settlers 7, and Splinter Cell: Conviction, among others—is simply not to buy them. Don’t buy the Steam version, don’t buy it from Amazon, and don’t buy it from your local GameStop. (Do GameStop even sell PC games anymore? No idea.) More importantly, don’t pirate it! Don’t grab the Torrent, don’t download it from Rapidshare, don’t drop the NZB into your watched folder. Just because you exist on planet Earth doesn’t give you the right to download the game because you’re upset at The Man. Besides, for every knucklehead seeding the game on BlackCats, Ubisoft can say, "See, piracy is a gigantic problem on the PC." I think it’s more accurate to say that piracy is a problem, end of.

So again, do not buy the games, and do not pirate it; pretend they don’t exist. Because if Ubisoft is even remotely successful with this new scheme, you can be sure other publishers will follow suit.


Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)