Virtual avatars affect mood of people controlling them

A study at the University of Texas has shown that dependent on the virtual avatar the user is using, moods and teamwork are affected. When users take control of a negative figure, in this case, a character wearing black cloaks or a member of the KKK, the users were seen to exhibit more agressive behaviors towards teammates in team excerises as well as the unwillingness to cooperate. Users in white cloaks or physicians were shown to show teamwork and the ability to complete the team exercises given. In order to have a control group, some users were given transparent characters. People using the negative avatars were later asked to create a scenario based on information they were given. All scenarios created by these people involved murder or other scandals whereas the positive groups created scenarios with relationships involved. This was definitely an interesting article to read and is some insight as to moods caused by video games.
link to original image

Sony's goal for profitability by march 2013

Sony, one of the largest electronic manufacturers in the world, hopes to reach its goal profit margin of 5% by March 2013. They hope to achieve this by being the main distributer of 3D televisions and ithium-ion batteries. By doing this, they are hoping they can turn their televison and video game departments out of debt. Sony total loss of last year was around £664,000,000 and they expect to loose a similar amount this year. This is due to a decline in sale because of the current economic market. The have let off around 12% of their employees this year and are continueing to reduce the amount of plants they have until they reach 47 which is 10 less factories they had at the beginning of the years which will continue to produce job loss. They also hope to control 20% of the flat screen television market by around the same time.

The PlayStation 3 has seen an up in sales since the release of Sony's cheaper, power saving PlayStation 3 console in September. The cut in price created enough sales in the release month to outsell both the Nintendo Wii and Microsoft's Xbox 360. This is a first since the original console's release in 2006. Sony are also planning on launching a variety of 3D devices in 2011 including BluRay players, TVs and game consoles to further boost sales.
link to original image

Playstation 2 launches in Brazil for just $462

The PlayStation 2, a last generation console and predecessor to the PlayStation 3, has officially launched in Brazil. The console available since 2000, costs roughly 799 Brazilian Real or about 462 US dollars. I find these quite ridiculous seeing as the PlayStation 3, a far more supieor console costs less (about $399) in the United States. I don't think sony manages to make much money off of this because anyone who would want the console, would of gotten it through other means, more likely for a cheaper price, quite a ways back. PlayStation 2's selling point is also at $100 in the US. This go's to show how companies like sony aren't reaching far enough on a global perspectrum and focusing on European, Asian, and North American Countries.
link to original image

Toyota planning to put robots on the moon

Toyota's Partner robots are set to be placed on the moon by 2020. The upgrades involved would include the ability to withsatand lunar temperature drops, jumping mechanisms, and solar panels mounted on the back of the robots in order to maintain a charge. This is one step closer to colonization on the moon and/or other planets. Although this was only introduced in a press conference, if this was to happen, which most likely it would, we would be able to gather much more information on planets like mars which are somewhat mysterious at this point in time. Toyota also stated they would release a rover type robot some what similar to ones used by NASA.
link to original image

Mordern Warfare 2 Sells big

Activision, Publisher of higlhly acclaimed game, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 has announced Day 1 sales for the game. The game sold over 4.7 million units on the first day of release in just the US and UK. This is not only record breaking in the video game industry, but for entertainment in general. The money from the sales for both nations is said to be over 300 million dollars which breaks the record for highest revenue on release day for any source of media. Publishers Infinity Ward were most likely not so surprised to hear this seeing as Amazon and Gamestop had already both announced that they game was each of their most pre-ordered items in the history of the companies. People speculate but it is looking possible that the game will become one of the most sold of all time and will continue to generate millions of dollars.
link to original image

EA restructuring

The widely video game publisher, EA, is laying off 1,500 employees in order to restructure the company. This is due to poor third quarter earnings as well as the recent purchase of casual game developer Playfish. Playfish focuses mainly on games for social networking sites like Facebook. EA made the purchase for 250,000,000 dollars because they believe the gaming community is growing largely around simple, social, flash games. EA had a similar incident last year where the let go of over 1,000 employees by closing down their branch, Black Box studios.
link to original picture

Touch screen iMacs

Troll Touch have announced touch screen kits for the iMac 21.5 inch and 27 inch computers. The kits and the machines with pr installed screens will ship december 1st of this year and will cost $1099 for the kit and $2299 pre installed. This just shows how if third party deveolpers can create touch screen computers, it is more than likely that apple are in the process of doing this and the tablet rumors will prove to be true.

iPhone Hackers Targeting Jailbroken Phones

Over the past week a hacker in the Netherlands released a hack to hack all existing jailbroken iPhones connected to Tmoblie in the Netherlands. The hacker displayed a message on the iPhone slide screen stating that the iPhone is not safe and to fix this issue, you must go to a certain website and download a patch. This patch would cost people 5 euros. The method used to gain control of the iPhones was not to complex. The hacker only had to search for devices with SSH active and use the default password. This did not effect users of jailbroken iPhones that had switch the password away from the default. This goes to show that by jailbreaking your iPhone, you are taking any safety features that were pre installed on it off. Later this past week the hacker issued an apology letter and made the patch free to the public. He also stated he would give back any money recieved through the scandal. A similar incident has happened in Australia recently as well. This hacker did not ask for money to get rid of the hack and still give full functionality of the phone. The hack smply replaces the background of users iPhone with a picture of Rick Astley. Although this is somewhat amusing and does not seem to be doing any harm, it will make it easier for hackers to, in the future, use the same method but with more severe consequences.
link to original image

New approach to rhythm based games

Many of you have most likely played a rhythm based video game likely guitar hero, but none of you can say you have used footballs being hit against pads on a wall on a controller. In order to promote kasabian's new single, technicians created a mod for the freeware game, similar to guitar hero, Frets on Fire. The technicians made it possible to create pads that when hit, mimicked hitting a key on the keyboard of a computer which in turn hit a button in game. The pads had motion sensors in the back that were all connected to the computer with a projector showing the onscreen displays. It's a bit hard to explain so here is a video:

N Gage service being shut Down

Nokia's handheld gaming service, N Gage, has officially been announced as being shut down. The service was originally launched back in 2003 in hopes to compete with Nintendo, whom, at the time, dominated the market. The first device was launched October 7th, 2003. It was not successful from the start due to its clunky design as well as the poor library of games. The design actually developed a nickname for the phone which was the "taco phone". The cell phone gaming service will no release any more games but will continue to run nokia's ovi store up through september of next year. Users will be able to buy currently released games up until that point. Games will also still work on devices after the service has been closed which may be good news for the few that use it. The downside to that is that all the community support will be gone. This isno suprise for Nokia or the public because the device and service have had poor sales as well as softwrae issues in the past.
link to image