The formula was pretty simple: Buy a game console at electronics retailer Best Buy, pick up the extended warranty, and when a new hardware revision was released, claim your console was broken and upgrade for free. Just ask all of those Xbox 360 Pro owners who upgraded to the Elite or 40gb PS3 owners who upgraded to the 80gb Metal Gear Solid edition. It worked.

In an attempt to cut back on losses stemming from an increasing amount of console exchanges, Best Buy is now trying to clamp down a bit more. Beginning next week, if you try to exchange a console at Best Buy, a Geek Squad agent will be required to test the console and verify that it's actually broken. No, they won't take your word for it and, yes, it will result in a longer wait on the customer service line. The good times had to end eventually, right?

Still haven't ever played Myst, despite the fact that it's been released across something like 10 different pieces of hardware? Then maybe you'll finally get around to it when it gets ported yet again, this time to the iPhone (via Game|Life).

The news comes by way of a very small announcement on the Myst Online forums. This latest port is being handled by Cyan, the original developers of Myst (although the post notes it's an "outside-funded project"), with a development team that is apparently comprised of only three people.

There are no other details at the moment, including any mention of a release date, but we do at least know one more thing -- according to Joystiq, which received a note from one of the developers of the game, the iPhone version of Myst will most likely not be called iMyst; "I'm pretty darn sure we're only calling it iMyst internally as a goofy moniker," the anonymous developer said. Thank the heavens.

News source: 1Up
View: Myst Online forum

Sony Computer Entertainment Japan has announced a partnership with the world's largest global WiFi community FON - to create a new service, PSP×FON.

Under the partnership the two companies plan to roll out FON access points in the region for a free internet browser via the Sony PlayStation Portable.

Starting today, there are approximately 44,000 FON spots across Japan and over 2,200 FON livedoor spots, which primarily cover central Tokyo. Through this service gamers can use their PSPs to download game demos, clips, wallpaper and the like.

News source: Gamesindustry.biz

Those of you who frequent the rumour mill will remember reports earlier in the year that PC hardware specialists Acer were going to release a console to compete with the likes of the Xbox 360 and PS3. Of course it all turned out to be a load of BS, but even this outlandish rumour had an element of truth to it: Acer was working on a game specific machine, although it is actually a highly specialized PC and it’s a sexy looking thing!

Link: Gadget Zone

Lynden Lab’s Second Life virtual world was so popular that people were investing in virtual real estate and making significant sums of money off their investments. This was in the glory days last year and in 2006. Now the virtual world is bleeding users fast, and there doesn’t seem to be a way to hemorrhage the problem.

February 2007, Reuters reported that real estate prices in Second Life had climbed to undesirably high levels and that land speculators could suffer when more is created. Lynden Lab’s virtual world was so popular that people were looking towards virtual real estate as a smart investment. In fact, Second Life was starting to imitate the real estate climate in Sydney, with high property prices and a fear that cheaper properties being developed on the outskirts in large quantities could significantly damage to the market rather than help struggling families.

Website Alexa, which monitors website traffic, shows a significant decline in visitors to Second Life over the past year. It’s now outside of the top 1,700 websites in Australia, the United States, Great Britain and Canada (outside of the top 2,000 in some), and over the past three months alone has dropped six percent in its global reach and 18 percent in its traffic rank. Having had an almost 0.08 percent reach this time last year, it’s now dropped down to under 0.03.

News source: gadget zone
View: Second life website

id Software's CEO Todd Hollenshead has stated that he believes PC manufacturers' acceptance of piracy and the sharing of content the user does not pay for is the PC hardware industry's "dirty little secret".

According to Hollenshead, manufacturers are secretly happy with levels of piracy in the industry as it helps to sell hardware.

"I think that there's been this dirty little secret among hardware manufacturers, which is that the perception of free content - even if you're supposed to pay for it on PCs - is some sort hidden benefit that you get when you buy a PC, like a right to download music for free or a right to download pirated movies and games," said Hollenshead in an exclusive interview published today.

"I think that if you went in and could see what's going on in their minds, though they may never say that stuff and I'm not saying there's some conspiracy or something like that - but I think the thing is they realise that trading content, copyrighted or not, is an expected benefit of owning a computer."

News source: Gamesindustry.biz

Impulse, Stardock's next-gen digital distribution platofrm is getting ready to move into the second phase, and there are some pretty significant changes upcoming.

Phase II of Impulse will include:

A new look. In the mid-term we plan to let people "skin" Impulse to make it look however they want. But for Phase 2, the green look will be gone.

New Community Features. Match-making will be in. The Political Machine v1.1 will be the first title to make use of it. You can use Impulse to find multiplayer games or do so from within The Political Machine which uses the new Common Virtual Platform library (CVP) a free library for developers to use to integrate multiplayer match making into their games.

FREEWARE. Impulse will support users installing and updating third-party freeware programs. What this means is that you'll be able to add free things to your Impulse account. Get a new machine? You can quickly install the latest/greatest freeware programs too.

MODS & GALLERIES. Click on a program and if we have a mod library or gallery available for it, the link will show up to take you there to get stuff within Impulse. This is only a start of course.

SMART QUEING. Lets users just click away and Impulse will handle the proper install order for you.

NEW CONTENT. There's going to be a lot more games and applications coming out this month for Impulse.

Screenshot: Impulse New Look
Download: Impulse

How far will you go for an MMORPG? A group of MMORPG gamers played for 18 hours straight just to try and kill one boss-mob. Tried, because they failed to do so -- an 18 hour, non-stop, effort gone to waste. Final Fantasy XI's Pandemonium Warden was the mob in question. The boss of this mob goes through some 20 different forms, some of which regen to 100% health, each of which spawns along with minion monsters.

"...After you kill all of the above [20 forms of the boss] he will pop with "hatched" lamps -- smaller chair dudes", posted Sylphet, chronicling their experience in frustration. "We killed all of the Lamps and at 75% he popped another 8 and regened to 100%. We attempted again but the lamps were faster this time and we wiped after killing just one." The group started playing at 3:30 pm EST, U.S, and finally ended at 9:00 AM the next morning: "People were passing out and getting physically ill," Sylphet continued. "We decided to end it before we risked turning into a horrible new story about how video games ruin people's lives."

Screenshot: Pandemonium
News source: Tech Tree

Sony does not plan to announce price cuts to its flagship PlayStation 3 games console at Europe's biggest video games fair in Leipzig, Germany next week, Sony Computer Entertainment spokesman Nick Caplin said on Friday. "It's not going to happen. If you're coming for that you'll be disappointed.".

In the 12 months ending March 31, Sony sold 9.24 million units, below its initial estimates of 11 million sales. But in an interview with Reuters on July 16, the company's video game chief said the firm was on track for the current year's target of 10 million sales. Cuts to the Playstation 3's original high price have helped boost its fortunes in Sony's three-way battle with Microsoft and Nintendo in the global video game industry.

View: Full Story at Reuters

Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification has passed the revised version of Fallout 3, giving the RPG a rating of MA 15+ and revealing the reasons behind its decision.

According to the censor board's report, acquired by IGN, the positive representation of drugs as power-ups in Fallout 3 was the main cause of concern. However, following the game's ban last month, Bethesda Softworks has toned down the depiction of drugs, earning the title an MA 15+ rating.

The report says the drugs themselves have all been given new names, while images of drug-taking have been removed and replaced by icons: "The drugs depicted are fictional; drugs are depicted as stylised icons on a menu with the drug use itself not depicted," read the report.

News source: Gamesindustry.biz
View: Fallout 3 website

Crytek has announced that Crysis Warhead, the follow up to last year's graphical stunner Crysis, is set for release in North America on September 16 and Europe on September 12. Moreover, if you're planning on purchasing Warhead, Electronic Arts (the game's publisher) has announced that you can pre-order it on their online store and pay $24.95, five bucks less than the normal price.

But that's not all -- also announced was Crysis Wars, a new multiplayer feature in Crysis Warhead that'll come with three modes of play: InstantAction and PowerStruggle from the original Crysis, and the new TeamInstantAction mode that, obviously, adds teams to the mix. Crysis Wars will include 21 maps in total, including six new maps for TeamInstantAction and InstantAction, and one new map for PowerStruggle.

News source: 1up
View: Crysis Warhead website

Microsoft has hit back at claims made by Nintendo that the Wii sells the most third party games, saying instead that it's Xbox 360 sells the most.

Last week, Nintendo of America's vice president of corporate affairs, Denise Kaigler, defended the Wii's third party sales saying, "We are selling third party games and they are doing very well, and better than our competitors."

But according to NPD information obtained from Microsoft by GamesIndustry.biz, that Nintendo claim appears to be wrong:

• Total third party sales for the Xbox 360 since launch is currently 67,929,999 units, followed by the Wii at 33,394,311 units and the PlayStation 3 at 19,976,325 units.
• Third party sales for the Xbox 360 since the launch of the Wii and PS3 is 54,065,728 units, still almost double the Wii's 33,394,311 units.
• If you take the total number of units sold and divide that by the number of titles released since November 2006, the Xbox 360 and the PS3 are selling more units per title on average than the Wii. This puts the Xbox 360 at 217,252 units per title, the PS3 at 156,065 units and the Wii at 132,517 units.

News source: Gamesindustry.biz

Continuing the recent trend of leaks, a new video showcasing the revised Xbox 360 dashboard and its game installation functionality has appeared on the internet.

In addition to game installs and Netflix streaming support, the new dashboard will pack customizable Avatars and the original blade interface when it arrives this fall.

News source: Shacknews

With Angelina Jolie tending to her ever-growing brood of children, a new woman has stepped into the role of Lara Croft - British gymnast Alison Carroll.

Earlier today (August 11), Alison appeared before the media for the first time during a press conference at Pineapple Studios in London, England.

For the new Tomb Raider game, slated for a November release, Carroll will be the face of Croft, joining the long list of ladies who have held the title, such as Karima Adebibe, Lucy Clarkson, Jill de Jong, Lara Weller, Nell McAndrew, Rhona Mitra, Ellen Rocche and Vanessa Demouy.

The 23-year-old brunette babe is definitely fit for the part, with a stunning combination of beauty and athletic ability. She’s won multiple first place trophies in regional and national competitions and, well, she’s hot!

News source: Celebrity-Gossip.net

OpenArena is a Free Open content package for the id tech3 GPL source code package. But why is it a game? Well you see one of the great side effects of making content for a bunch of source code out there is that it becomes a playable game itself. This opens more opportunity for FUN to the end user because they have another option to play a game that you couldn't play without the data because now there is data made for it. And since this data created is also FREE, it's very redistributable. Meaning more people can play it with little effort on obtaining it. This is A Good Thing.

The gameplay is identical to the game it's based on so fans of that other game should feel at home here. We do not intend to change the physics of the game. If you feel there is a change of physics of input smoothness, you can blame the ioquake3 team, not us; we just make MD3s and TGAs, compile the code and put it out there.

News source: OpenArena website
Screenshots: >> Click here <<
Download: OpenArena 0.8.0
View: Release notes