Star Wars: The Old Republic Gaming Stuff Launches

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Star Wars: The Old Republic is out and with it, there’s many fine accessories related to it that consumers can purchase. This includes a Dolby 7.1 surround-sound headset ($129.99) from Razer which can emit either green or red light, comes with retractable microphone and an interchangeable faction symbols.

There’s also an ergonomically-designed gaming mouse ($139.99) with 17 programmable buttons, complete with charging dock and interchangeable faction identifiers. There’s also an official mouse pad ($49.99) with non-reflective coating that can be flipped depending, once again, on faction choice.

Finally, there’s also a 160-page book called The Art and Making of Star Wars: The Old Republic ($40) where BioWare’s Daniel Erickson and Frank Parisi detail the game’s development with concept art and designs.

Source: USA Today

World Of Tanks Recruits 18 Million Worldwide

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Wargaming.net has announced that World of Tanks has exceeded 18 million players worldwide. The game launched in August 12, 2010 and currently holds the Guinness World Record for Most Players Online Simultaneously on One MMO Server.

“We want to thank our game community for their support,” said Victor Kislyi, CEO of Wargaming.net. “Having so many devoted players is extremely rewarding, and our company will provide them with tons of new game content to enjoy.”

To find out more about the game, visit worldoftanks.com.

Tetris Company Manager Calls Angry Birds A ‘Fad’

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Angry Birds has definitely been one of the most popular and influential casual games over the past year. Henk Rogers, manager of The Tetris Company, takes the long view and doesn’t think success for Angry Birds will last.

“Again I like to compare it to a sport, in the beginning it’s an activity, like golf was an activity, then it became a sport. I think once people have played it more than 20 or 25 years you can say it’s here to stay, it’s a sport, it’s no longer a fad. Angry Birds is cute and everybody plays it for a while but they get burned out and move on and they will play another game,” Rogers commented. “But Tetris is like ‘Happy Birthday,’ it keeps on going. Everybody else has games that come and go, they make the hit parade, but these are all temporary. You have to work really hard to get your unknown game to be #1, but when we re-released Tetris it became #1 even though we didn’t do any marketing. We have an unfair advantage, I gotta say. I’d rather have the goose that lays the golden egg.”

Source: IndustryGamers

Amazon Took Close Look At RIM

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Reports are that Research in Motion has turned down a takeover offer from Amazon.com. The troubled smartphone maker is up for sale, according to an insider, and Microsoft and Nokia are potential buyers.

“This story puts RIM in play, because shareholders are going to put it in play,” said an investor. “It’s over. This is now a company where the activists are in charge.”

RIM’s market value has dropped 77 percent in the past year to the point where it’s now below its “book value” of assets. This has followed a series of disappointing quarterly reports, delayed phone launches, weak sales of the PlayBook tablet, a nearly 48 hour outage of service around the globe and other missteps.

The shares took another hit after weaker-than-expected quarterly results, where profits were down 70 percent, followed by the announced delay in the launch of the new BlackBerry 10 phones until late 2012.

While partnerships with Nokia and Microsoft seems likely, an outright sale might not be a panacea. “They have had approaches from folks who have wanted to have discussions,” said one head of technology investment banking at a Wall Street bank. “The issue is it is hard to find a value that makes sense with a falling knife.”

After the bad financial announcement, reports are that the board instructed the co-CEOs to set aside any options for a sale, one person briefed on the situation said, “Selling the company or an economic joint venture is probably not in the cards right now,” the source said. “Until you stabilize the platform, people are going to be very nervous about spending $10bn or more.”

Additionally, it was reported that RIM approached Samsung and HTC about licensing its forthcoming handset operating system, due late in 2012. However, RIM is unlike to abandon its handset business.

Source: The Guardian

Sony, ‘We Can’t Find Any Evidence Of Widespread Glitches’ For Vita Launch

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There were several stories reporting that many PS Vitas during the Japanese launch were suffering from issues like malfunctioning power buttons or ineffective touchscreens. While there were subsequent reports of an apology from the company, David Wilson, head of UK PR at Sony Computer Entertainment denies that there ever was a widespread issue or an apology.

“The PS Vita has had a terrific launch and sold in large numbers. We’re annoyed with these stories, because we can’t find any evidence of widespread glitches,” said Wilson. “The stories even said that Sony has issued an apology for PS Vita glitches, which simply isn’t true – there’s an apology on our Japanese website for people who are having trouble getting through to our technical help line, but that’s it.

“And there’s a page showing standard procedures for powering the PS Vita on and off, which has been on our site since before the launch, which has been presented in some news stories as a means of solving the alleged glitches.”

Source: The Guardian

Hideo Kojima Going Open World For Next Game

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Metal Gear series creator Hideo Kojima has developed a reputation for making highly cinematic but rigidly paced games. In response to this, Kojima will be taking a different tack with his latest game, Project Ogre.

“The kind of game I’m making is some game that has a very wide entrance, a very open entrance,” said Kojima. “Rather than making something very cinematic, [I plan to] make something very free.”

Kojima says the game will have an open world players can explore, with well over 100 hours worth of content. He described the mood of Project Ogre as similar on the surface to Metal Gear, but “subdued” and essentially different from his other projects; no release date is given, and it might not come out until 2014.

Source: CNN

Android Activations Reach 700,000 Per Day

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Google senior vice president Andy Rubin has announced that over 700,000 Android devices are now activated every single day. This is a significant increase over the 300,000 Android devices last December and 550,000 activated a day in July.

“…and for those wondering, we count each device only once (i.e., we don’t count re-sold devices), and ‘activations’ means you go into a store, buy a device, put it on the network by subscribing to a wireless service,” clarified Rubin.

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