Review: A Minecraft review isn’t really possible, but we’ll try anyway
How the hell do you write a review for a game that’s been out since 2009? A game that you’ve played across many changes, with additions and subtractions, a game without a box, a user manual, or, really, any sort of guiding pedagogy. I’ve personally spent at least 100 hours, probably more, playing this procedurally generated oddity of a video game across the beta and official versions, on servers, my own server, and in single … Continue Reading
RuneScape, the world’s most popular free-to-play MMO, gets a facelift
Jagex has today announced a brand new website and logo for its free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), Runescape. The browser-based game currently has over 175 million registered accounts, and is recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s most popular free-to-play MMORPG.
The makeover is about how to keep users coming back, which in turns leads to better monetization. Despite being free-to-play, RuneScape offers players the option of purchasing a monthly membership, which … Continue Reading
Free-to-play transition brings seven-fold revenue increase for DC Universe Online
The potentially risky move of taking DC Universe Online , the massively multiplayer online (MMO) game from Sony Online Entertainment, to a free-to-play model, seems to have paid off, with large increases in revenue being reported .
Earlier this month, we revealed that DC Universe Online had seen one million new players sign up following its transition to a free-to-play business model. What wasn’t clear was whether these new players would stick around, and whether … Continue Reading
DC Universe Online gains a million new players with free-to-play transition
A million new players have signed up for Sony Online Entertainment’s massively multiplayer online game DC Universe Online following its transition to a free-to-play business model last month, the company said.
DC Universe Online, for PC and PS3, originally required a paid monthly subscription when it launched in January this year. But Sony announced in September that the game was becoming free-to-play, with income being generated through micro-transactions and an optional subscription package. It was … Continue Reading
HP is not killing off its PC division
HP will be keeping its PC division after all, according to a press released put out by the company today.
“HP objectively evaluated the strategic, financial and operational impact of spinning off PSG. It’s clear after our analysis that keeping PSG [personal computing group] within HP is right for customers and partners, right for shareholders, and right for employees,” said chief executive Meg Whitman in a statement.
The company has changed its plans repeatedly since … Continue Reading
Intel describes the computers that people want to use
Intel executive Mooly Eden profiled a new kind of PC today while on stage at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco. You don’t expect to be wowed by PC advances in this age of smartphones and tablets, but Eden said new PCs — super-thin laptops nicknamed “Ultrabooks” — will combine functions that please both the left brain and the right brain.
“We’re putting the personal back into the PC,” Eden said.
Eden said the … Continue Reading
For sale: $40 billion PC business, only slightly used
Two weeks after announcing that it might be spinning off its PC business, HP is following through: It just put the business up for sale.
Well, sort of. In what may be a corporate first, the company announced the availability of its division through an advertising campaign and a blog post.
“The new organization would be a $40 billion business with the agility and freedom of a start-up. That’s an exciting prospect,” the post read.… Continue Reading
AMD regains microprocessor market share in Q2
Advanced Micro Devices regained some lost market share from Intel in the PC microprocessor market during the second quarter, according to market researcher IDC.
The results are interesting because the worldwide PC microprocessor market is a bellwether for the overall tech industry’s performance, and it reflects the competitive seesaw battle between Intel, the world’s biggest chip maker, and perennial underdog AMD.
AMD made gains in the quarter thanks to better uptake of its Fusion family … Continue Reading
Soluto raises $10.5 million for anti-frustration crusade
Soluto, winner of TechCrunch Disrupt New York 2010, has raised $10.5 million in a second round funding from Index Ventures. The company’s software specializes in the tangibly intangible: anti-frustration.
The free software detects the nerve pumping in your forehead by monitoring repeated actions or errors. Once it sees a pattern, it attacks the problem and prevents unnecessary coronaries.
Most interesting is what Soluto is doing with information received from user downloads. Data is collected anonymously … Continue Reading
After 15 years of development, Duke Nukem Forever sucks
Talk about a major bummer — Duke Nukem Forever, a highly anticipated title that has been in developmental hell for more than a decade, is shaping up to be one of the most mediocre games of the year, according to critic reviews.
The Duke’s latest adventure has earned a score of 50 out of 100 across 19 reviews on review aggregation site Metacritic for the Xbox 360 title. It has a score of 58 out … Continue Reading
Work hard, play hard: Students get a free Xbox 360 with Windows 7 PCs
Great news for college students (and perhaps not so great news for parents): Microsoft announced today that it will offer a free Xbox 360 with 4 gigabytes of storage (a $199 value) to any student who purchases a Windows 7 computer for $699 or more.
It’s a smooth move for Microsoft, since it gets Xbox 360s into even more dorm rooms, gives students one more reason to go with a Windows PC instead of a … Continue Reading
Acer stock plummets in midst of identity crisis
Taiwanese computer giant Acer wants to be like Apple with premium products and high margins. Now it thinks it has a more promising future in tablets, Bloomberg reports.
This is a big change in Acer’s strategy. The company has previously focused on the high-volume consumer PC business, trying and failing for a long time to overtake Hewlett-Packard as the number one PC manufacturer.
The CEO responsible for the previous strategy, Gianfranco Lanci, resigned yesterday after … Continue Reading
Forrester yawns at Amazon Cloud Player
The first critics were quick to arrive after Amazon launched the Cloud Player music service last night. Forrester’s analyst Mark Mulligan wrote on his blog that music locker services like Amazon’s “are not an innovation in the music product” and they “will not save music industry”.
Cloud Player allows users to upload their music and play it on a PC, Mac or any Android device. The music playback is not restricted to a single computer. … Continue Reading
Quirkat to develop games for the Middle East market
The Middle East has been pretty much off the map when it comes to making video games. But a small Dubai-based start-up called Quirkat would like to change that.
The company’s very existence is a nod to the globalization of the video game business. In a time when web technologies enable start-ups to create, publish and distribute their games anywhere, it’s a lot easier to create games anywhere in the world. So it’s only fitting … Continue Reading
Capping its best year ever, Intel reports record Q4 earnings
Intel reported record fourth quarter sales and earnings as it ramped up production for a new generation of microprocessors and saw strong demand during the holiday-selling season. That’s good news for the PC industry, since Intel is the world’s biggest chip maker and its earnings are a bellwether for the whole industry.
“2010 was the best year in Intel’s history,” said Paul Otellini, chief executive of Intel in Santa Clara, Calif. “We believe that 2011 … Continue Reading
Cloud music service mSpot heads to the iPhone
mSpot, the service that lets you upload music to the web from your computer and listen from Macs, PCs, and Android phones, has finally made its way to the iPhone today.
The company says its Android app has reached nearly 1 million users since it was launched in June. Now iPhone users will be able to join in on the fun and listen to their mSpot music library over 3G and WiFi connections.
The service … Continue Reading
Parallels bridges the PC-Mac gap
mSpot, the service that lets you upload music to the web from your computer and listen from Macs, PCs, and Android phones, has finally made its way to the iPhone today.
The company says its Android app has reached nearly 1 million users since it was launched in June. Now iPhone users will be able to join in on the fun and listen to their mSpot music library over 3G and WiFi connections.
The service … Continue Reading
