CrunchGear

Utherverse Takes Adult Video Games to the Next Level
PSA: DSiWare games don’t transfer to the DSi XL
Video: What does Modern Warfare 2 look like when played on six monitors?
Microsoft sued over Zune HD’s buy from radio function
Ask CG: New lens or new camera?
This is pretty much PAX East 2010
PAX East 2010: The oddest Street Fighter battle you’e ever seen
First round of iPads sold out, new pre-orders ship April 12th
A real Turing Machine

Utherverse Takes Adult Video Games to the Next Level

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 06:57 PM PDT

For most geeks, the only thing that can trump video games is, well, porn. Which is exactly why so many companies are exploring the world of sex based video games. For those old schoolers, you may remember games like Sierra’s Leisure Suit Larry Series, which was a computer adventure game about a guy trying to get lucky in any way possible. Of course we are talking about pixelated cartoonish sexual imagery but hey, back in the day this stuff was awesome! Certain game development companies continue to make straight out porn focused games, but there are also some ‘mainstream’ games including sex as part of a storyline like Heavy Rain, Mass Effect 2 (again), and the always controversial Grand Theft Auto series. With the advent of the video game rating system, it seems like mainstream games that really push the envelope are becoming less and less prevalent. Partly because any game slapped with an “AO” rating practically means suicide for the developer because no brick and mortar store will stock the game. With this move towards keeping our games clean, it seems almost counter intuitive to bring back sex video games a la Lesiure Suit Larry and Benny Hill. It’s a surprise to see new sex-based games hitting the market like Bonetown, Project X, and Digital Playground’s new 3D world, that bring players into a world where they can pretty much do whatever they want without judgement. All of these games feature well known porn stars (helllllooo, Ron Jeremy is in Bonetown), which is cool for fans because they can interact with them virtually like never before.

Unlike Bonetown and Project X, Digital Playground’s Utherverse focuses more on leisure and social networking rather than gaming. Users aren’t expected to complete missions or earn points, rather, they’re expected to roam around the world, have fun, and do all the things they can’t really do in real life (because unless you’re Tommy Lee, it’s doubtful you’re hooking up with porn stars). The Utherverse creates a place for fans to interact and play, making this new genre of sex games a rule free social networking experience. “We don’t refer to the virtual world as a game, but rather as the 3D Web, or the Virtual World Web. It’s really is less of a game and more of the Internet in 3D. It’s a place where users come to have social networking in real time, to watch movies together, to shop for real-world goods and services, as well as virtual goods and services – but there is no objective,” said Brian Shuster of Utherverse. Basically the goal is to have sex, hook up, and do all the naughty things you can’t do in real life without getting yourself in trouble.

While Bonetown and Project X both feature well-known porn stars, Digital Playground’s Utherverse is the first game to feature all Digital Playground branded pictures, videos, and characters, possibly marking a new frontier for porn. Aside from screenings of their DP porns, the game features the contract star, Raven Alexis, a self-professed geek and WoW gamer. For Raven, this new avenue is an obvious choice, “It's been so cool and exciting so far, getting to know the ins and outs of the game took a little while, and I've already met some amazing people. I don't think that Digital Playground could be teamed up with a better company to begin putting virtual characters of their contract girls into a game.”

The technology behind this emerging trend is what’s really interesting. Utherverse, the company that created Digital Playground’s 3D world explained that the creation of virtual worlds can take upwards of four years and cost up to 10 million dollars. Utherverse took the technology that goes into making these games and created a tool set and prop editor that allows companies to completely customized and create their own world without much coding or time. The way it works is that a company will choose from basic landscape and surroundings and then can further customize with a prop editor, cutting down on time and making the world of 3D games available to many companies. “The prop-editor also allows the user to pull images from the web, web pages, flash object, flash streams or any of the scripts that need to go onto objects. Scripts can include a wide range of tools, including the ability to inter-link objects, so that when a user clicks, they are transported from one are of the virtual world to another, or from one world to another.” For Digital Playground, this meant that they would import lots of fun things like videos, pictures, and toys.

Raven was also able to create her own character in the game, “I did make my own character, which took about a week in total – and she has all kinds of customized outfits that she can wear. For a gamer, it was completely fun for me, and I'm totally addicted to this game! I've already been told by many people in game that my character looks just like me!”

The world of online sex games marks a new chapter for the adult industry. Where previously adult stars were only able to interact with their friends through video and a hand full of in-person appearances, companies are now exploring different ways like online games. Are the family collations like MAVAV, Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and Violence that complain about games like Grand Theft Auto going to come after these truly hardcore sex focused video games? Only time will tell.

Guest columnist Lydia Leavitt writes about sex and, oddly enough, social media. For more information on the latest intimate technology, check out 69adget.com and Digital Playground’s Utherverse (NSFW)

PSA: DSiWare games don’t transfer to the DSi XL

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 06:30 PM PDT

Remember that DSi XL that’s coming out next week? Well, I hope you didn’t spend a bunch of money in the DSiWare store with your regular size DSi. Yep, turns out that you can’t transfer games to your new hand-held. That really sucks.

Nintendo did confirm that this is a known issue, and they are looking into the problem. At this time though, they don’t have an ETA on when exactly you’ll be able to transfer games. The issue lies in the way the store is set up, and the fact that purchases are tied to a hand-held device, instead of an account.

[via 1Up]

Video: What does Modern Warfare 2 look like when played on six monitors?

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 05:30 PM PDT

Man alive, how great would it be to be rich? You could afford crazy things like, I don’t know, new shoes, healthy food, and six 20-inch monitors to play Modern Warfare 2 with. That’s the dream.

So as you can see, the game scales quite well across all six screens—the only "glitch" occurs when text gets cut off at the bezel of the TV.

ATI’s Eyefinity technology makes this magic possible. The 5800 series of cards (and up, presumably) allow you to span compatible games across several screens. It’s not something you’re going to find at a Best Buy demo area or whatever, so people were freaking out while they passed by.

Pretty neat, I thought.

Microsoft sued over Zune HD’s buy from radio function

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 03:34 PM PDT

Patents, patents, everywhere! It seems you can’t swing a cat these days without infringing on someone’s patent. The latest victim/perp is Microsoft; an Illinois doctor is suing them because of a patent he was granted in 2002 which allegedly covers the Zune’s ability to tag a song directly from the radio and then download that song once an internet connection is established. Obviously it’s for the lawyers to work out the details, but it seems to me what he must have been granted was more a method of identifying and later purchasing a song, not the plain act of tagging and downloading later.

But all the Zune device does is copy the artist and song directly from the digital FM stream, and then search for it in the Zune store if an internet connection is available, right? This is an ability several devices have, including the iPod Nano, though certainly all their methods differ slightly.

But who knows? Maybe this guy has a point and his patent does include this stuff. If that’s the case, then may justice be done. I’m more skeptical of his claim that he pitched Microsoft with the idea in 2006; he claims to have emailed them, and includes some of the text — half of it is in ALL CAPS. I have a feeling Microsoft tends to ignore ALL CAPS emails.

What’s the likely outcome? Man, I don’t know! I’m not a lawyer!

Ask CG: New lens or new camera?

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 01:19 PM PDT

Reader Nate writes,

So here’s my problem. The kit lens for my Nikon D40 is busted –something’s rattling around inside — and I don’t know what to do. My options are either buy a new lens for about $200 or spend $600 on either a Nikon D5000 or the Olympus E-PL1.

On one hand, I would like to save some cake and $200 isn’t that bad for a camera that I don’t mind. I already have a 50mm f1.8 Nikon lens and Nikon SB-600 Speedlight anyway. But a new camera would be nice so I was thinking another entry level Nikon because it will work with my gear anyway.

Then there’s the Olympus E-PL1 that’s calling my name. It’s a lot more portable (read: wife-friendly) and Biggs says in his review that the picture quality is fine. It’s not like I even consider myself an armature photographer. I’m more like a weekend shutterbug so the I don’t need all the fancy manual controls found on DSLRs that I honestly don’t know how to use anyway.

So what do I do, CrunchGear?

Have a question you want to submit to the masses? Send it in to us at Tips@CrunchGear.com.

This is pretty much PAX East 2010

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 01:00 PM PDT

If one, and only one, photo could be said to represent PAX East 2010, I’m gonna said it’d be this one. Two gentleman in full-on cosplay mode (unless that’s just what they wear every day!), hunched over a computer monitor, playing to their hearts’ content. It almost brings a tear to your eye.

PAX East 2010: The oddest Street Fighter battle you’e ever seen

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 12:00 PM PDT

You’ll find no one here who’s not down for a round or two (or 10) of Street Fighter. No one! In fact, I’m half-convinced that that’s Greg under that helmet.

There’s a room set aside here at PAX for free play, where you can take a load off and try your hand at Heavy Rain, Bayonetta, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, and, of course, Street Fighter IV.

I can guarantee that even ol’ Blockhead here would destroy me in the game.

First round of iPads sold out, new pre-orders ship April 12th

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 07:36 AM PDT

Hope you got your iPad already pre-ordered because Apple has pushed back the shipping date for all new orders to April 12th. It’s really not that surprising seeing as there have been reports stating Apple may already have 500,000 iPads in the bag. It might be quicker at this point to start camping Apple Stores or Best Buy if you *must* have an iPad the moment it’s released. We know that retail outlets will at least have a small supply on April 3 to serve the Apple faithful.

This only applies to the WiFi iPad, actually. The 3G flavor doesn’t come out until later in April anyway and those haven’t seen shipping delays just yet. Although they could! So quick, Appletards, give Steve Jobs your credit card number and reserve your place in the lemmings line.

A real Turing Machine

Posted: 27 Mar 2010 05:35 AM PDT

We pay lots of lip service to Turing but has anyone actually seen or thought about what Turing did for computing? Aside from the Turing Test, Alan Turing invented his Machine, a “tape-based” system for digital computing. The machines have always been thought of as a “thought experiment” but on crazy man actually built one.

Although this Turing machine is controlled by a Parallax Propeller microcontroller, its operation while running is based only on a set of state transformations loaded from an SD card and what is written to and read from the tape. While it may seem as if the tape is merely the input and output of the machine, it is not! Nor is the tape just the memory of the machine. In a way the tape is the computer. As the symbols on the tape are manipulated by simple rules, the computing happens. The output is really more of an artifact of the machine using the tape as the computer.
The heart of the turing machine is the read-write head. The read-write head transports the tape and positions cells of the tape appropriately. It can read a cell determining what, if any, symbol is written there. The machine works on, and knows about, only one cell at a time. The tape in my machine is a 1000' roll of white 35mm film leader. The characters, ones and zeros, are written by the machine with a black dry erase marker.

This thing is so far over my head that it’s in the stratosphere, but it’s an amazing build.