Amazon’s giving Prime members stealthy game discounts
Amazon is now offering game discounts in yet another effort to call seduce you to a $99 Prime membership. If you’re thinking “what game discounts?”, that’s because the company rolled them out with little fanfare and is offering them in a rather sneaky fashion. When searching, all titles still show the regular prices for everybody. However, if Prime members carry a purchase through to the checkout page, they’ll finally see the discount. And it’s not just nickle and dime reductions on obscure games, as Destructoid discovered. You can find significant savings like $7 off the brand new Splatoon and a similar deal for Halo 5, which hasn’t even been released yet.
The only sign that the discount even exists is a note on qualifying titles saying “Members of Amazon Prime qualify for a lower price on this item when shipped and sold by Amazon.” We’re not sure why the retail giant is being so furtive about it, but you may want to jump on anything you like before it changes its mind.
Via: Destructoid
Source: Amazon
#ICYMI: Freezing lasers, tweeting video games and more
Today on In Case You Missed It: Microsoft debuts a Kinect-based room mapping system that understands furniture; we watch LEDs change color as they’re frozen in liquid nitrogen (because science!) and a programmer creates a game whose code fits into a single Tweet.
From the cutting room floor: Google rolls out 60 FPS video playback for its mobile app so now the walkthrough on your phone matches the gameplay on your console.
Let the team at Engadget know about any interesting stories or videos you stumble across by using the #ICYMI hashtag @engadget or @mskerryd.
Anki Overdrive blends robotic racing with video game hooks
Back in February, Anki gave us a sneak peek at Anki Overdrive, the second generation version of its robotic race cars. It’s introducing new toy vehicles, new gameplay mechanics, a new app and new modular race tracks that let players design their own custom race circuits. Today, Anki has announced that Overdrive will start shipping to retailers on September 20th in the US, UK, Germany and Canada. It also offered more details about the new cars and revealed two more game modes called Time Trial and King of the Hill. I had a chance to play around with Anki Overdrive at the company’s office in San Francisco, and while I can’t say it’s perfect, I was impressed at how much simple toy cars could give me the feeling of being in a video game.
And that’s no accident. For almost a year now, Anki has been hard at work at reimagining its robotic race cars as more of a video game. It hired Joby Otero, the former creative director for Skylanders, as its new chief creative officer. It also hired a slew of talent from gaming companies like EA and Activision to work on art, sound, writing, character development and mission design. “You can think of Anki as a game studio within the larger robotics company,” says Mark Palatucci, Anki’s co-founder and Chief Product Officer. “We wanted to bring the richness of the video game world to a physical place.”
It’s why the company introduced the idea of AI Commanders last year, which are essentially in-game characters that you assign to an opposing vehicle. You’re then supposed to challenge and defeat them in order to progress through the game. The characters all have different voices and personalities, which come through in the course of gameplay. Indeed, Palatucci tells me the company even hired voice actors for each of them, and they each have their own individual storylines. In Tournament mode, the commanders get progressively difficult after each challenge, just like a regular video game.
As for the game itself, well, much of the Overdrive gameplay is really unchanged from the original Anki Drive. As before, all you have to do to “drive” the cars is simply to put the Bluetooth-paired vehicles on the track and it’ll drive on its own. The corresponding app essentially lets you controls its speed, a bit of the steering (whether it veers left or right) and the firing of weapons. Everything else is handled by the car’s robotic smarts.
There are a few distinct changes from the original Drive, however. After you’ve assembled your custom race track from the modular pieces, you’ll have to place the cars on the course in order for them to “learn” the circuit. As the cars drive around the course, you can actually see the track being drawn on the app in real time. Also, as we mentioned, the app has been completely overhauled to mimic a video game experience. Speeding up the cars will trigger the sound of an engine revving; background music will get increasingly dramatic as the race ends; and the AI Commanders actually yell and whoop at you as they pass you by.
It all adds to excitement as I was playing the game — these were no longer just race cars; they were living, breathing characters. I found myself thinking, “Oh no way am I letting this asshole AI beat me” as I raced against it. At one point, I triggered a power boost as I was driving my little Thermo car around a corner, causing it spin out and jump off the track. Everyone in the room laughed, and despite myself I found myself having a pretty good time.
That said, I didn’t think the gameplay was perfect. I found it a little tricky trying to split my attention between the app and the race track, especially as I was waiting to make sure I was close enough to the rival vehicles before deploying my flame thrower weapon. The problem, of course, is using a touch screen for the controls — I had to look at the app to make sure I was doing the right thing. Anki tells me that there is some audio feedback and players do get used to this over time, but I couldn’t help but feel that physical controls would make it so much better. Palatucci did say to me, however, that the final version of the app will incorporate vibration feedback to make it easier to feel your way through the controls, or at least get a better sense of when you’ve been hit or maimed.
As for the new gameplay modes, well, they’re pretty self-explanatory. Time Trial is you racing to beat the clock, while King of the Hill encourages you to take down your opponents and see which one of you can be the leader once time runs out. There are also six new cars — Skull, Groundshock, Thermo, Nuke, Guardian and Big Bang — all of with unique weapons and characteristics. Skull and Groundshock are included in the Anki Overdrive Starter Kit, while the rest can be purchased for $50 each. Like we mentioned in February, the Overdrive Starter Kit will retail for $150 and also includes ten of the aforementioned modular track pieces. Additional track pieces can be purchased separately for anywhere from $10 to $30 depending on the pack. Oh, and don’t worry if you already have older Anki cars; they’ll be compatible with Overdrive after a software update.
What’s perhaps the most welcome news, however, is that Anki will finally have cross device play. Yes, that means both Android and iOS devices will finally be able to play together. Before, only iOS could play with iOS devices (and the same with Android) because Android didn’t have Bluetooth LE capability for phone-to-phone communications — Android users had to play with each other over WiFi instead. Now, that’s no longer an issue — both can play together over Bluetooth.
Anki also gave us a sneak peek into what it’s planning for the future: it wants to build a community of players. Not only to share tips and tricks, but also to share photos of that crazy custom track you just built and get instructions on how to recreate it.
“There’s a type of heightened emotional reaction that you can get with a physical object that’s smart and coming to life,” says Palatucci of the fusion of video games and physical toys. “When you do it well, when you get it right … there’s magic.”
Source: Anki
‘Forza Motorsport 6’ will let you drive every Formula E racecar
The first all-electric Formula E season may have just ended in real life, but the racers will keep going when Forza Motorsport 6 arrives. Microsoft announced today that after including a single car from the series as a DLC option for Forza 5, the sequel will include ten versions of the Renault Spark SRT_01E racecar representing each team. Other cars announced today include the 1988 Lamborghini Jalpa, 1965 Shelby Cobra 427 S/C and 1985 Toyota Sprinter Trueno GT Apex. The full list of cars announced so far (117 of 450 or so) is available on the official site, but we’ll have to get closer to its September 15th release to see the rest.
Filed under: Gaming, Microsoft
Source: ForzaMotorsport.net
The iPhone 6 Plus won’t fit Fallout 4’s Pip-Boy (and I’m sad)
Thanks a lot, Bethesda. After the outfit’s first E3 media briefing, I pre-ordered the Pip-Boy Edition of Fallout 4 because of course I want to put a real-life version of the game’s stat-tracker and menu system on my forearm. All good, right? Well, I’m also in the market for a new phone and was eyeing an iPhone 6 Plus because it has a better camera and battery life compared to its smaller sibling, the iPhone 6. That’s where the problems arise: Bethesda recently announced that the real-world Pip-Boy comes with foam inserts that fit the iPhone 4 and 4s, 5 and 5s and the 6 in addition to the Samsung Galaxy S4 and S5. The company also promises a customizable foam insert that’ll accommodate “most other popular” handsets.
You’ll notice that neither the iPhone 6 Plus or Galaxy S6 are listed there. Bethesda says that the reasoning behind the size restrictions is because it wanted to keep the dimensions of the real-life Pip-Boy faithful to those of the in-game model. However, this seems a bit short-sighted. The iPhone 6+ and the Galaxy S6 might be bigger, but they’re also pretty popular and represent the best handsets made by their respective manufacturers.
The fact is, this isn’t a life-or-death situation and I’ll survive either way. But I do have a conundrum on my hands. Do I go for a smaller phone that’ll work with the now sold-out Pip-Boy edition of the incredibly anticipated game, or do I stick with my original plan and buy Apple’s flagship device? I’m not the type to upgrade my phone that often, and with what a contract-free 6 Plus will run me I’m going to use it until its metaphorical wheels fall off (or it’s rendered obsolete via firmware update). I’m not a cosplayer either, so having a totally functioning Pip-Boy on my wrist isn’t a huge deal. If my handset won’t fit into the plastic sleeve, though, I’m not sure I need to drop $120 after all.
And just when I thought I’d had my new phone issues sorted, too…
Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD
Source: Bethblog
Swedish media house buys world’s largest eSports company
Professional gaming is a hot item in the investment world right now and even the largest eSports organizations are getting in on the action. On Wednesday, international entertainment company MTG purchased ESL, the largest eSports organization in the world. MTG spent 78 million euros ($86.4 million) for a majority stake — 74 percent — in ESL’s holding company, Turtle Entertainment GmbH. This deal marks the first acquisition of an eSports company by a traditional media organization.
ESL regularly hosts high-profile tournaments for professional players across games including Battlefield 4, Halo, Dota 2, Counter-Strike, StarCraft 2, Mortal Kombat and Hearthstone. Jens Hilgers founded the company in 2000 and he will remain on ESL’s management team, alongside both of the company’s managing directors and the inventor of the ESL Play platform, Jan Philipp Reining.
“ESports is fast becoming one of the most watched and passionately followed global sports categories amongst younger audiences,” MTG President and CEO Jørgen Madsen Lindemanns says. “There are now almost as many gamers in the world as traditional sports fans, and eSports is already bigger than ice hockey. However, the average revenue generated per eSports enthusiast in 2014 was just over $2, compared to $56 for traditional sports enthusiasts, so this global phenomenon has tremendous potential.”
[Image credit: ESL]
Watch the extended ‘Uncharted 4’ demo at 11am PT on Twitch
Fans of the Nathan Drake saga are going to want to tune in to Twitch at 11 am Pacific today. Naughty Dog has announced that it will stream the extended E3 press conference demo of Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End.
Filed under: Internet
Source: NaughtyDog (Twitch)
Disney Infinity might make its way to Microsoft’s HoloLens
It’s only natural for an entertainment corporation as massive as The Walt Disney Company, with IP holdings that span the likes of Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm, to be exploring the potential of virtual reality. It’s something John Vignocchi, VP of Production at Disney Interactive, the division behind toys-to-life platform Disney Infinity, confirmed when we chatted a few weeks back. But when it comes to Infinity, the future focus seems to be weighted more towards augmented reality. “We’ve had multiple meetings and discussions with Oculus; multiple meetings and discussions with Sony about Morpheus; multiple meetings and discussions with Microsoft about HoloLens. We’re very interested in that space,” Vignocchi said. “There’s the socialization problem right now with VR, but augmented reality is very exciting.”
The issue of isolation in VR isn’t new. It’s a hurdle Sony PlayStation addressed onstage during its E3 presentation last month and one Worldwide Studio head Shuhei Yoshida is determined to overcome with a range of new Morpheus demos (see: RIGS). But despite the inroads being made towards socializing VR gameplay, Disney Interactive head John Blackburn remains unconvinced it’s the way forward for the local co-op baked into the family-friendly Infinity.
“My own experience with these devices right now is that I feel like they almost cut directly against what we’re trying to do which is experiences that can involve you with somebody else,” Blackburn said. “…The idea of kind of creating that family memory and playing it together is really core to the experience we’re trying to build. And so when you put a lot of these headsets on, it’s almost isolating in a way. Until we can get over that piece of the technology, it’s not as interesting to me.”
Which is why Blackburn hinted that if infinity were to pick a side in the VR vs AR battle, it’d likely come out as a HoloLens project. And when you consider the parallels between the crafting of Infinity‘s Toy Box creation mode and Microsoft’s recently announced HoloLens Minecraft project, the prospect doesn’t seem too far-fetched. Though, that’s not to say Disney Interactive’s completely ruling out VR.
“You kind of look at Microsoft’s HoloLens stuff where you can kind of see through,” said Blackburn. “And that one’s kind of interesting from that perspective because I can see everybody else around me. But yes, we’re absolutely interested in that space because the toybox itself is kind of a very interesting concept of ‘I’m in the world I built.’
This video game is so small it fits inside a tweet
In the same way that people write words onto grains of rice, one programmer has managed to build a game with code that can fit into a single tweet. The 140-character opus is called Tiny Twitch and was created by Alex Yoder after responding to an open challenge by developer Ben Porter. Unsurprisingly, the game’s not going to rival the blockbuster hits of this world, since you’re simply asked to click an X as it bounces around your browser as many times as you can. If you’re interested in giving this a go, it’s available to play right now and let us know if you can get higher score than 17 before time runs out.
I challenge you to make a game whose source fits in a single tweet
– Ben Porter o.ᴗo. (@eigenbom) June 27, 2015
<body onload=d=Date.now,t=d(s=0)><p style=”float:left” onclick=”(e=d(++s)-t)<15e3?style.margin=e%300+’ 0 0 ‘+e*7%300:alert(s)”>X</p></body>
– Alex Yoder (@alex_yoder) June 30, 2015
[Image Credit: Getty]
Via: Rock, Paper, Shotgun
Source: GitHub, Tiny Twitch
Acer rolls out a curved, super-wide display with AMD’s gaming tech
You can get desktop PC displays that are curved, super-wide and gaming-friendly, but all three at once? That’s tricky. Thankfully, Acer thinks it has an answer. The company has just launched the 34-inch XR341CK in the US, giving you a curvy, 21:9 aspect ratio LCD with AMD’s anti-tearing FreeSync tech built-in. So long as you have a fast-enough gaming rig (including newer AMD graphics, if you want FreeSync), you’ll get an extra-immersive canvas for your first-person shooters and racing sims.
You won’t get 4K (this is “just” a 3,440 x 1,440 LCD), but you’ll still find DisplayPort input, Mini DisplayPort, HDMI 2.0 and a USB 3.0 hub. There’s also a 14W speaker system if the screen takes up the free space you’d normally use for audio gear. This monster monitor will cost $1,099 when it ships in July — no small potatoes, but potentially worth it if you’d otherwise get multiple displays to achieve the same all-encompassing effect.
Filed under: Displays, Gaming, AMD, Acer
Source: Acer (PRWeb)
AIVAnet 