There’s a rumor making it’s way around the internet this morning, it seems that Microsoft may be launching an updated Xbox 360 controller this coming holiday season. Again, this isn’t official, however Joystiq seems to think that their source is pretty reliable. What are they updating? Well, apparently the D-Pad needs some refreshing. The plan is apparently to rotate the D-Pad by 90 degrees, thus raising it up about a quarter of an inch. The change is apparently intended for fighting game fans in particular, but I’m not sure that I see the point. At any rate, when/if this rumor becomes official we’ll let you know. Update: It’s official, and it’s shiny – as in silver covered shiny. And the D-Pad converts from the old style flat version, to the taller new version just by twisting it. The bad news, it’s part of a $65 play-and-charge bundle that’s coming out Nov. 9th. Watch the video update from Major Nelson after the jump: → Read More
Google, Apple, Microsoft, Netflix, Amazon — when you hear these names, you usually think about how these tech giants all compete with one another. But what if they all teamed up for one cause? They’d be unstoppable, right? We’re about to find out.
All of these companies are currently sitting in the same boat about to storm the beaches. Which beaches? Those belonging to the the cable television providers in the U.S. It has only just begun, but the assault is underway.
Let me start by saying that of course the cable companies aren’t about to go away. Even if the mega assault by the tech juggernauts is successful, it will be many years before everyone’s addiction to cable gives way to something else. But it will. And that something else will be content served over the Internet. → Read More
China is, shall we say, fairly lax when it comes to intellectual property laws. Therefore, game manufacturers are afraid to drop their consoles into that roiling pit of counterfeiting and have only once launched a console in China, the Nintendo 64 clone called the iQue.
Now Microsoft is considering jumping into a market that even Sony fears to tread. Why? Presumably to sell millions of consoles in one fell swoop and let piracy do what piracy must. → Read More
Oh, it’s been about a month or so since Red Dead Redemption has spun around inside my Xbox 360, but Rockstar’s new DLC, the Legends and Killers Pack, may convince me to give it another go. → Read More
Best Buy is reducing the price on old-model Xbox 360 bundles. They need to be cleared out to make space for the new slim design. Packaged with the console will be either Final Fantasy XIII or Splinter Cell Conviction, depending on your choice. No custom art on the console, though. Both consoles will come with the 250GB hard drive, two wireless controllers and the game. Price is expected to be $299, a savings of $50 off MSRP. [via Joystiq] → Read More
If you’re a Halo fan and haven’t bought the new 360 yet, you’re in luck. This September 15, Halo: Reach will be launching alongside a sweet new Xbox with Halo detailing. It comes with two Halo-style controllers and costs $400 — a $100 premium over the vanilla 360 S and $200 over the stripped-down Arcade model. They say it’s a limited edition, but “limited” in this case probably means limited to like a million. The console will actually make a cameo in the game, which seems a little weird to me. But I’m probably never going to play Reach, so I’ll never know how it is. → Read More
Microsoft, perhaps sensing that it was losing control of the story, has gone on record as saying, essentially, yes, the Kinect will initially be aimed at a “casual” gaming audience, but after launch we will re-confirm our support for you “hardcores.” It will take around 18 months for more hardcore-friendly—think Halo and the like—to show up. → Read More
Strap yourself in for new Xbox 360 SKUs and prices. The hard drive-less Xbox 360 Arcade will be replaced with a $199 SKU that comes with 4GB of flash storage. That comes out on August 3. Meanwhile, as for a Kinect-only deal (i.e. with no bundled 360), that comes out in November. → Read More
In a lateral move that is akin to a car company selling buggy whips, MovieTickets.com will start selling movie tickets through an Xbox 360 interface, thereby allowing players to experience a thing called “real life” and perhaps take part in a common courtship ritual known as a “date.”
As you see from the description, you don’t actually buy the movie tickets via the interface but instead are connected to a “Microsoft tag” that brings you to a payment system for tickets using a mobile phone. → Read More
Apparently changing the look of the Xbox 360 was the thing to do for Microsoft; they saw a huge jump in sales or the month of June, surpassing even the Wii by about 30,000 units. → Read More
It’s no secret that retailers love them some gaming system bundles. Easy money. Traditionally they include a random 3rd-party accessory pack along with a sub-par game. However, Walmart’s Kinect bundle is a bit different. For $50 over the $149 MSRP, it includes one of the for launch games that retail for $60 ($60! That’s insane btw. Solid work, Microsoft) and a $30 Walmart eGift card. That’s actually a smart buy. → Read More
Whatever you say, Microsoft. The House that Gates built believes that “hardcore gamers” will be the first to buy the Kinect, which comes out in November. Or, in the exact words of one of their marketing managers: “I think we know that hardcore gamers will be the first to go out and buy it, as they are with any product.” That’s interesting, seeing as though a recent survey suggests that only 8 percent of 360 owners intended to buy Kinect (or Natal, as it was known at the time). → Read More
It’s fairly hard to review the latest crop of consoles. Nintendo, for example, just released a black Wii – it’s the same Wii, but black – and, not to be outdone, Microsoft just sent out their Xbox 360 S, a full-bore replacement for the space heaters known as the Xbox 360. Do you buy a Slim? Do you replace your old 360? Or do you sit tight until the next generation? Questions, questions, questions. An exhaustive review is a bit of overkill for this update, so let’s just talk about what’s different. First, and most important, the processor (codenamed Valhalla ), eDRAM, and GPU are now on one 40nm die, which means that the problems associated with failing heatsinks should be negligible. → Read More
Inside sources close to the matter have said that the build costs of Kinect are near $150. When you add up all the time to write the software and the costs of the hardware, it gets expensive. This has many people at Microsoft concerned. → Read More
Rejoice user! Devin won’t be keeling over from auto-erotic asphyxiation after all. The TRON controllers that he saw at E3 and threatened to hold his breath over? Well, they are going to be for sale. To be honest, I haven’t considered replacing my stock Xbox 360 controllers until this point, but now I’m afraid I have no choice. → Read More
At a Microsoft internal marketing Q&A session, representatives proffer more details about the new slim Xbox. Announced last week at E3, the new slim design Xbox, comes with both WiFi and a 250 GB hard drive all for $299. Right now Microsoft has reduced their price of the elite and arcade models to $249 and $149 respectively. As far as a new lower priced slim model similar to the arcade, Microsoft simply commented, “We will offer a $199 Xbox 360 this fall.” → Read More
A NEOGaf forum user discovered over the weekend that while the new Xbox 360 slim (note to self: we have got to come up with a better name) is unlikely to fry itself and die in any permanent way, the threat of overheating is still a real one. The red bit isn’t as striking as the original, though. One might go so far as to call it… yellow. → Read More
Word on the street (Wall Street, that is) is that UFC Undisputed 2010 didn’t sell nearly as well as the previous game. There could be a few reasons for that, chief among them that people already had their UFC thirst quenched, so to speak. It was genuinely exciting to play a game with the modern roster (the last game before UFC Undisputed 2009 came out in 2004). The question now becomes, is the world ready for yet another MMA game? I speak not of EA Sports MMA but of Supremacy MMA, a game being developed for the Xbox 360 and PS3 by Kung Fu Factory, published by 505 Games. → Read More
Wondering what’s in the new Xbox Slim? No? Well tough, it’s a slow news day, and I’m writing about it, so you’re just going to have to read it. Microsoft has been hard at work on the the 360 Slim for a while and it’s only fair that you pay attention and see what’s they’ve done to improve the original hardware and make the new system run cooler, quieter, and more efficiently. → Read More
If you’re like me, you use your Xbox 360 to watch Netflix and other movies. It’s relatively painless, but the controller doesn’t exactly make the best remote for watching tv. Enter the X-Link, a universal remote control designed to work with the Xbox 360, as well as hundreds of other devices (since it is a universal remote control after all). → Read More
