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Austin Independent School District makes deal to buy more video games for classrooms originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 07 Jan 2010 03:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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And here we thought Tetris DS was the best blend of the Russian puzzler and Nintendo’s classic platforming game Super Mario Bros., but Tuper Tario Tros. is a quite imaginative combination of the two. In fact, we haven’t seen Tetris go so well with something since we were introduced to the conflict resolution capabilities of Tresling.

Already the culprit behind a sharp downturn in Joystiq productivity today, we now offer it to you. Just, uh, don’t play it as much as we did. We can get away with it since, y’know, it’s kinda our job.

[Via digg]

Mario plus Tetris equals one fun game originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 07 Jan 2010 00:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer gave the keynote address at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Wednesday night, speaking a bit about the future of the Xbox 360.

As anyone with a single functioning brain cell could have already told you, Project Natal, Microsoft’s new camera-based motion controller, will be released during the 2010 holiday season.

During the keynote, another one of those funny little sentences popped up again: Engadget reported that executive Robbie Bach said that Natal will “work with your existing console.” We heard the same weird phrasing at E3, and that was quickly followed up with a story from 1up that spelled out their take on why Microsoft would be saying such strange things: A new Xbox may be in the works.

Game Room for the Xbox 360 will let you build your own virtual arcade by buying classic games like Atari’s Tempest.
Image courtesy Microsoft

One more big announcement: Microsoft will debut a new service called Game Room. Like Nintendo’s Virtual Console for Wii and Sony’s PlayStation Archives, it’ll let you download classic games. Unlike those services, you can access those games through a 3-D virtual world interface, using your Xbox 360 Avatar.

You can buy games for $5 each, which will let you play them on your Xbox 360 and Windows PC. Or you can pay $3 to play the game on a single platform. $3 per game, every game? That’s a pretty awesome deal, considering that classic arcade games on Wii cost anywhere from $5 to $10.

There’s also a pay-per-play option in which you can pay 50 cents to demo a game once. Microsoft says you can invite your Xbox friends over to check out the games in your Game Room, although the press release doesn’t quite make it clear exactly how much access they’ll have to your virtual goods.

Here’s the best part. Although the service will launch this spring with 30 games from the arcade, Atari 2600, and Intellivision, Microsoft says that within three years the number of games will be up to 1,000. That’s thousand. That’s awesome.

On the heels of its CES 2010 keynote speech, Sony released a chest-pounding press release declaring worldwide sales “exceeding 3.8 million” of the PlayStation 3 during the 2009 holiday season. According to the company, “during the five weeks following the last week of November 2009″ (ending on January 3, 2010), the console sold more than during any previous holiday season — a 76 percent increase over last year’s numbers.

Alas, the PSP and the PSP Go were neglected a mention in the presser, though Sony did reiterate the 38 million PSN user number we’d heard a bit earlier. We’ll have a clearer picture of what exactly the sales shook out to for North America when the latest NPD numbers arrive next week.

Sony PlayStation 3 sales ‘exceed 3.8 million’ worldwide over the holidays originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 23:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remedy’s Xbox 360-exclusive Alan Wake, described as “the TV show Lost, as written by Stephen King, and filmed by David Lynch,” by Microsoft Entertainment & Devices head Robbie Bach will — much like Fable II — be expanded upon via additional downloadable episodes. Bach made the announcement concerning the long-in-development title during the company’s CES 2010 keynote this evening, saying, “story-driven like a TV series, Alan Wake will be told in episodes with even more episodes available on Xbox Live after its launch this year.”

Let’s just hope Remedy isn’t taking cues from The Sopranos when deciding how long it will be between the release of the game’s episodes.

Alan Wake will stay up late with post-launch DLC ‘episodes’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 23:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Just like Sony earlier this evening, we’re not going to be detailing all of Steve Ballmer’s 2010 CES press conference, that’s really Engadget’s thang. Instead, we’ll be bringing more details on all things gaming (think: leaked Xbox Game Room and Project Natal deets, anyone?) right back here. If you want the total experience, including lots of non-gaming stuff, venture forth, dear reader.

Microsoft 2010 CES press conference, live at Engadget originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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David Perry’s “It’s not OnLive” service, Gaikai, recently gained $5 million in venture capital, a Security and Exchanges Commission filing shows. For the uninitiated, basically Perry wants to beam games directly into your house. We imagine the tech behind it is kinda like that crazy set-up the Riddler had running all over Gotham, hence the need for such a large sum of money.

All kidding aside, Perry’s been very tight-lipped about Gaikai, offering up little via his Twitter account and the usual channels. However, back in July, he did offer the first sneak peek at the game streaming service, which looks like it’s coming along nicely.

[Via Big Download and Venture Beat]

Score $5 million in funding for Gaikai originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Chances are you represent one (or 12) members of the 38 million-strong PlayStation Network community. At CES in Las Vegas, Kaz Hirai confirmed Sony’s intention to expand the PSN well beyond the PS3 and PSP. As the above slide shows, Sony’s premium video offerings will expand to some of Sony’s other products, including Bravia televisions and VAIO laptops. Taking a page from Microsoft’s Live Anywhere philosophy, a single user ID and password will work across all Sony products and services. Going a step further, the PSN virtual wallet can be used universally across Sony’s services.

To help facilitate the cross-proliferation of content across Sony’s multiple devices, Hirai also announced the creation of a new division within Sony: the not-very-creatively named Sony Network Entertainment, Inc. With this new initiative, expect the PSN logo to be far more ubiquitous than ever before.

Sony confirms expansion of PlayStation Network ID, wallet to other Sony devices originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Last week, PSN users found that the DLC for Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 — items that included new characters such as Carnage, Psylocke and Cable — went missing from the PSN Store. Well, after navigating the intricate web of Activision PR, Joystiq can now confirm the DLC simply expired at the end of last year. An Activision rep told us: “The Marvel: Ultimate Alliance Downloadable Content was a limited time offer, expiring on December 31, 2009.”

Sorry, PSN users — if you managed to snag the content already, have fun. For the rest of you would-be heroes and villains, looks like you’re out of luck, because the DLC isn’t coming back.

Activision: Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2 DLC on PSN was a ‘limited time offer’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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