Sizemodo: PlayStation 3 vs. ColecoVision

Released in 1982, the ColecoVision was infamous for advertising games using doctored or artist renditions of screenshots designed to look like a completed game. Various other advertised games were never even released.

Other problems: Coleco Industries tried to do too much and made a hardware expansion module (the Adam), turning the console into a full blown computer. Consumers balked at the $600 price tag, despite the Adam containing a new Digital Data Pack, which were higher capacity than older audio cassette drives. The failure weakened Coleco, which eventually filed for bankruptcy.

Gizmodo

EBGames Firing Employees for eBaying PS3/Wii?

It's just a rumor for now, but it seems like EBGames/GameStop wants to stop a repeat of last year's Xbox 360 eBay fiasco by cutting off employees who auction off their consoles.

This scheme is going to be hard to police, but retailers will probably scan employees' console serial numbers and compare it to serials listed on eBay—which if employees are smart, won't be. Unless EB/GameStop HQ buys up auctions and THEN compares the consoles to the listed serial numbers, it's unlikely that anybody will actually get caught.

Gizmodo

As close as you'll get to a Gears of War Demo

Around Nine Minutes of Amazing Gameplay seen and heard. Divx video download. 640X360

read more | digg story

Playstation 3 packaging unwrapped

Just over a week ago Sony brought a prototype PlayStation 3 by IGN UK's offices in London so we could drool over the machine and play around with the latest version of MotorStorm.

read more | digg story

TESTOSTERONE ALERT! Rainbow Six Vegas: Weapons

Ubisoft released these 36 artworks of Rainbow Six Vegas presenting all the weapons of the game. I guess this is what people call gun porn.

Xboxyde

Only 1000 PS3’s coming to Canada at launch?

Talked with an associate today at work, and I was told that a Sony representative stopped by the store over the weekend (Zellers, btw) to talk about PS3-related stuff. Apparently, the representative said that there were only going to be 1000 units available for all of Canada on launch day? Wow, that’s a lot thinner than I would have guessed. Of the 400,000 units coming on day one, I would have thought that at least 20,000 of those would be heading north, but I guess not. Slim pickings this holiday season, folks, very slim.

Oh, and before anyone contacts me, my location is only going to receive four units at launch and - you’ve guessed it - they’ve already been sold. Forgot to ask whether they were 20 or 60GB models.

The Advent

Lik-Sang.com Out of Business due to Multiple Sony Lawsuits

"Lik-Sang.com, the popular gaming retailer from Hong Kong, has today announced that it is forced to close down due to multiple legal actions brought against it by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Limited and Sony Computer Entertainment Inc."

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Xbox Live's Major Nelson : Show #199 (WMA) The one about Gears and the maintenance

This week’s show:
Special guest host: e
Interview: Cliffy B
Q&A With Mark and Jerry from Epic Studio about ‘Gears of War’
(recorded at the Canadian Community Party on 10/17 in Toronto)
Interview: e on the recent Xbox Live maintenance
Name the GameTM
…and much more!

Xbox Live's Major Nelson

Microsoft reaffirms commitment to Halo movie

Microsoft has confirmed that plans to produce a film based on hit Xbox title Halo are still going ahead, despite the decision of Universal and Fox to pull out of the project.

The movie studios were due to fund and distribute the Halo film, on the understanding that Microsoft Game Studios and developer Bungie would have almost complete creative control over the project.

But last week Fox and Universal demanded that their deals be improved - and when executive producers Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh refused, the studios pulled out."

GamesIndustry.biz

Rumor: Halo3 Demo Coming Early Next Year?

We're titling this as a rumor, but even so, sources have revealed to Game Informer Online that there will be a Halo 3 demo released over Xbox Live in the first half of 2007.

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Microsoft upgraded Xbox 360 for 1 billion dollars Gears of War

Epic games revealed how they convinced Microsoft to upgrade the Xbox 360 to run Gears of War by increasing the amount of RAM in the console from 256MB to 512MB.

Epic Games vice president, Mark Rein, told gamers in a Q&A session that, "What happened was, my partner Tim Sweeney, we kept arguing and we really wanted a hard drive in every single machine; that was something we really wanted but we realized that the 512 megs of RAM was way more important, cause otherwise you couldn't do this level of graphics if you had to both write your program and do your graphics in 256 megs. Nothing would really look that HD.”

"So the day they made the decision, we were apparently the first developer they called; we were at Game Developers Conference, was it two years ago, and then I got a call from the chief financial officer of MGS and he said 'I just want you to know you cost me a billion dollars' and I said, 'we did a favour for a billion gamers'."

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