Posted on 02 December 2009 by
Need more evidence that physical media is inching towards the door? Enter this Reuters conversation with Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello. While the company — the largest publisher of “interactive entertainment” (AKA video games) — is hurting on sales during the awesome global recession currently underway, he thinks the future is digital. All digital. Riccitiello had this to say on the matter:
“When people think of games, they traditionally think, in the U.S., of what sells on the Xbox, the PlayStation, and the Wii, and they forget about all these online services that are out there… if you add all that stuff up, it’s almost half the industry now. It’s about 40 to 45 percent. Next year it’s likely to be the larger share of the total industry and it’ll be bigger than the console games all put together.”
He went on to say that if EA’s digital arm was a standalone company, “it would be like the darling of Wall Street.” Of course, he’s not just talking about XBLA and the App Store — this is an all-encompassing view of the digital market, including casual gaming, Facebook apps, and WoW transactions as well. It may not be the kind of all-encompassing push needed, but we are hoping this sort of noise rattles the industry enough to mobilize smarter, more centralized methods of online distribution.
EA CEO says digital gaming sales will overtake console numbers next year originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 17:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Joshua Topolsky
Posted on 29 November 2009 by
Whoever it was at Sony HQ that decided to pursue “military contracts” as a revenue source, kudos! Mere days after the US Air Force expressed interest in expanding its PS3 supercomputer, we’re hearing glorious Britannia’s Royal Navy has conscripted 230 PSPs into duty as revision aids for its trainee sailors. Loaded with maths and physics materials, the PSPs can be used in a bunk, have familiar controls for the young and mostly male recruits, and are considered pretty tough to break. The underlying reason for this move though is cost cutting: by making the training course more intensive, the Navy is saving on teaching time. Given that the UMD drive won’t come disabled — which is hoped to encourage the sailors to take better care of the device — the future this paints is of marines who’ve spent more time with a freebie handheld console than with a pro instructor. At least they’ll have a great stable of captured monsters to show for it.
[Thanks, pankomputerek]
Sony PSPs enlisted as study aids by the Royal Navy originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Nov 2009 21:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Vladislav Savov
Posted on 27 November 2009 by
Nintendo’s been doing a bit of digging and it turns out it’s already won the console wars. If we’re only talking about the ladies, that is. A whopping 80% of American female primary gamers (the person who primarily uses the console rather than the occasional dabblers) do their thing on the Wii, which we see as a clear indication to the graphics-obsessed Xbox 360 and PS3 developers that women prefer their games to be fun to play, rather than just look at. Maybe if we also stopped dressing female characters in swimsuits, they’d find non-Wii games relatable too — that’s just a guess though, probably wrong.
Nintendo Wii has lion’s share of female console gamers originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 27 Nov 2009 06:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Vladislav Savov
Posted on 26 November 2009 by
The elusive Pandora handheld and the Phantom gaming system have a lot in common. Thankfully, there’s one critical difference, and that’s the fact that the dutiful souls behind what’s sure to become the world’s next favorite pocket gizmo actually have some proof that mass production is tantalizingly near. The latest update has quite a few images of the final mold, and we’re also told that mass production has begun on the mainboards. All that’s left to do is add a touch of paint, snap a few things together and yell “Hello World!” for all the world to hear. Hit the read link if you’re badly in need of getting some drool out of your system.
[Thanks, Andrew]
Pandora cases start arriving, production enters ‘so close you can smell it’ stage originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 22:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Darren Murph
Posted on 25 November 2009 by
To think, it’s been over five years since we last tackled how to get music off your iPod, as opposed to the other way around. Back then, the classic model had only recently added the infamous click wheel (while still rocking the monochrome screen, mind you), iPod nano was still called the mini, and viewing photos was a brand new feature worthy of having its own line. It’s time to take another look at how to transfer media of all sorts — audio, video, and pictures — from a variety of iPods and iPhones back to your Windows or Mac OS X machine.
How-to: get music, videos, and photos off your iPod or iPhone originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Ross Miller
Posted on 25 November 2009 by
It may only produce enough power to heat an electric kettle at the moment, but Norway’s Statkraft says that its new, first-of-its-kind osmotic power plant could be producing as much energy as a small wind farm by 2015, and continue to grow from there on out. To do that, the company guides fresh water and salt water into separate chambers that are divided by an artificial membrane, and when the process of osmosis takes place — salt molecules pulling freshwater through the membrane — the pressure is increased on the sea water side. That, of course, doesn’t get you power on its own, but the pressure is apparently enough to drive a power generating turbine, and if you have enough of those you have a power plant. A bit of effort, to be sure, but the process doesn’t emit any greenhouse gases, is completely renewable, and it doesn’t depend on the wind or the sun being out.
Norway’s Statkraft kick-starts world’s first osmotic power plant originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Donald Melanson
Posted on 25 November 2009 by
If the
Pomera Digital Memo DM10 appeals to anyone (and we figure it must appeal to
someone), you can chalk it up to the device’s narrow scope: it’s for writin’ with, and for folding up and puttin’ in your pocket — and that’s it. The DM20, our friends at Engadget Japan tell us, expands the brief ever-so-slightly, bumping up storage to 89MB, upping the display to 5-inches, and adding USB cell phone tethering (for emailing documents). Seriously, though, in the end it’s really just a word processor. Is that how you want to take notes? We didn’t think so. Expect to see it hit the shelves in Japan on December 11 for ¥34,650 (just shy of $400).
Pomera DM20 Digital Memo puts your old Brother to shame originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Joseph L. Flatley
Posted on 25 November 2009 by
Welcome to the Engadget Holiday Gift Guide! The team here is well aware of the heartbreaking difficulties of the seasonal shopping experience, and we want to help you sort through the trash and come up with the treasures this year. Below is today’s bevy of hand curated picks, and you can head back to the Gift Guide hub to see the rest of the product guides as they’re added throughout the holiday season.
What luck. The Secret Santa recipient that you drew already has everything, so there’s little you can buy him / her that they’ll actually be impressed with. Thankfully, the peripheral market is here for you, and while some may considering these things “trinkets,” others will be downright giddy to unwrap ‘em. And whether you’d care to admit it or not, these are easily the most fun to shop for. Yeah, we said it — what of it? Hop on past the break for a few recommendations on knickknacks, or “accessories,” as it were.
Continue reading Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide: Accessories
Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide: Accessories originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Original post by Darren Murph
