Ed Hewitt

E3 2008 is now over. I was planning to do a day-by-day summary of all the news from E3, but hey, there is always next year! Instead, I will give you a quick round up off all the news from E3.

The Press Conferences

Microsoft

• Revamp of Xbox dashboard, as well as Xbox live which now has avatars (copy off Wii)
• Netflicks partnered with Live to add more movies to the store.
• Lips, new karaoke game (again, another copy, off PS3 this time)
• Final Fantasy XIII announced for Xbox 360
• Fallout 3 gameplay footage
• Gears of War 2 dated, 7 November 2008
• Resident Evil 5 dated, 13 March 2009
• Fable II dated, October 2008
• Also announced, Guitar Hero: World Tour, Rock Band 2, Viva Pinata 2, Portal 2 and Geometry Wars 2

Sony

• New Bundles - PS2 with  Lego Batman including DC New Frontier DVD announced for $149 and Silver PSP, Ratchet & Clank - Size Matters, National Treasure 2 UMD, 1 GB Memory Stick and a voucher for Encochrome for $199.
• PS3 80GB Core Model for $399
• 130 PS2 titles announced for 2008
• New PSN games, Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty, Siren, Eden and Fat Princess. $14.99 each.
• Gran Turismo TV announced
• New footage of Resistance 2
• Resistance Retribution announced for PSP
• More footage of Home
• Also, Infamous, Valkyria Chronicles, DC Universe Online, Patapon 2, LocoRoco 2 and God of War 3 announced!
• The biggest title of the whole of E3 has to be Sony’s exclusive title. MAG (Massive Action Game), is a new FPS which is very similar to Battlefield, however the online battles can have up to 256 players! The 128 players on each side are broken up into 8 player squads. There is no other game like this. On PC the biggest online match you can have is 64 players, on Xbox 360 it is 16.
• Movies & TV Shows can now be bought from PS Store.

Nintendo

• Animal Crossing: City Folks annoucned which will use the new Wii Speak feature.
• Wii Motion Plus announced
• Pokemon Ranger and GTA: Chinatown Wars announced for DS
• Wii Sports Resort and Wii Music announced

Game Highlights

• Halo Wars
• Socom: US Navy Seals Confrontation
• Motor Storm: Pacific Rift
• Far Cry 2
• Left 4 Dead
• Lord of the Rings Conquest
• Gears of War 2
• MAG (Massive Action Game)
• Resistance 2
• Resistance Retribution
• Ratchet & Clank: Quest for Booty
• Fallout 3
• Prince of Persia
• Killzone 2
• Little Big Planet
• Tom Clancy End War
• Crysis Warhead
• Fable 2
• Resident Evil 5

E3 2008 has been great for Sony, excellent titles announced and Resistence 2 and MAG look great! Microsoft & Nintendo have had a poor showing, even GameSpot UK have said about how poor Microsoft was. Personally, I looking forward to seeing more of Killzone 2, Resistence 2, Gears 2, Crysis Warhead, Ressitance Retribution, SOCOM and Lord of the Rings.

Tags: Gaming, News by Ed
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Linux Wednesday is back! Just a quick post this week for Windows and maybe useful for Linux users.

If you are a Windows user and would like to try out Linux, it is possible to run Linux while you are on Windows. The program is called Qmeu, it allows you to run a Linux distro on Windows. This version has been setup to run DSL, Damn Small Linux. DSL is a very lightweight version of Linux, which has a many applications and games. Download this 50mb file, unzip it and then click on dsl-base.bat. DSL will begin to boot-up in command prompt. After about 30seconds you will be able to use DSL.

Few important commands:

* ctrl + alt - switchs your from DSL back to linux
* ctrl + F - puts DSL in full screen

This program maybe also useful for Linux users to be able to use Linux while they are on a Windows PC. Put DSL on a flash drive (at least 64mb) and you can take Linux anyway you go!

Download it here!

Tags: News by Ed
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Some of you may have heard about Windows 7 (code named, Vienna), its the next Windows operating system to follow after Vista. Today, Bill Gates has announced that Windows 7 may be shipping as early as 2009. Many Windows users may see this as great news, since Vista is in a bad state. However, I believe Microsoft needs to fix problems which they are currently having with Vista. Many users have bought Vista and are having issues. It would be far better if Microsoft released more service packs first before releasing a new version of Windows, instead they are covering up their mistakes with Vista. Vista has great features and still could be a great operating system if they fixed the issues first.

I believe its far too early to be releasing a new version of Windows very soon after they have released Vista, but Microsoft have done it in the past with Windows 95, 98, 2000 and XP. But all those were great stable operating systems, Vista is currently not stable. Another problem Microsoft could end up with, is that they would be supporting four operating systems. Windows 2000, XP and Vista will still all be supported by Microsoft, when Windows 7 is out. It would be far better if Microsoft only supported two operating systems, not four. When Windows Vista came out, they should have stopped support of Windows 2000.

If I was Microsoft, I would first end support of Windows 2000. I would put Windows 7 on hold and make Windows Vista a stable operating system. Once Vista is stable, then I would release Windows 7.

What do you think, should Windows 7 be released in 2009?

Tags: News, Windows by Ed
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Mass Effect, one of the biggest Xbox 360 titles of last year, has now got downloadable content from Xbox Live. For 400 points, you can download Bring Down the Sky. It includes a new uncharted world introducing the Batarians, described as a ‘notorious and feared alien race’.

The plot follows a Batarian extremist group who have hijacked a mobile asteroid station in the Asgard system, setting it on a collision course with the nearby colony world of Terra Nova.

The new pack claims to content 90 minutes of content. It is the first in a planned series of Xbox Live downloadable content.

Tags: Gaming, News by Ed
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Finally, a Xbox 360 price drop confirmed!

the Arcade is now £159 (down from £199.99), the Premium is now £199 (down from £259.99), and the Elite £259(down from £299.99).

This now makes the 360 the cheapest current gen console, currently the Nintendo Wii is £180 and the PS3 40GB is £300.

Tags: Gaming, News by Ed
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Last week, Apple launched the SDK for the iPhone. This allows third-party groups to create applications for the iPhone. Today, we finally see the importance of the SDK.

Its called G-Fi it is a GPS receiver which can also work on your PC, but the main use is for the iPhone. G-Fi will wireless communicate with the iPhone and work with the G-Fi software to allow the iPhone to be used as Satellite Navigation.

This shows a great example of the importance of the SDK, allowing companies to do things which were thought not possible with the current iPhone. We are still waiting for the iPhone gen2 to be released which hopefully will come with 3G and GPS.

Tags: Apple, News by Ed
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