Japanese tech giants Sony and Toshiba, along side computer wiz IBM have jointly announced that they will reveal details regarding their 64-bit 'Cell' microprocessor at the February 2005 International Solid State Circuits Conference. In addition, IBM and Sony are thought to be revealing the Cell workstation at the ISSCC, which would allow game developers to begin work on PS3 software. Given the current timeframe for development and production, Cell should be complete by the middle of the 1st Quarter 2005, and the PS3 should launch early to mid-2006.

While Sony seems to be rather on-the-ball with the PS3, they've been awfully mum in regards to the PSP; more specifically, just how many there'll be come launch day. Sony has already contacted smaller Japanese retailers and warning them that they might not receive any shipments, due to them being diverted towards major sellers. The source of this problem seems to be the rather small number of handhelds being produced for the initial launch (a paltry 200,000) shortage of PSPs; it doesn't take an Economy major to see that in this case, supply just won't be able to keep up with demand.

I got this from the Scobleizer Blog,:

"Ahh, Maryam and I found one of the last Nintendo DS systems in the Seattle area. I got the last one at Crazy Games in Redmond (one of their other stores still has some, but they are going fast). Two guys ahead of me bought all the remaining stock. Toys R Us: sold out. Best Buy: sold out. EB Games: sold out.

Nintendo has a hot one."

It appears that if you want a DS and are in Seattle you might be out of luck.

I'm sure this is only the first of many reports such as these that we will here in the coming weeks.

Nintendo Co. Ltd. reported a 39.1 percent rise in operating profit for the first half on Thursday and raised its sales target for the DS.

Kyoto-based Nintendo posted a group operating profit of $389 million in the six months to Sept. 30 versus a profit of about $250 billion yen a year earlier.

But Nintendo raised its recurring profit forecast by about 27%. It also said it expects to sell 5 million Nintendo DS portable game consoles in 2004/05 rather than its previous target of 3.5 million

Here is a nice little article from the BBC about Half-Life 2's new copy protection tool. Basically Valve makes you install a software called Steam on your PC. This software then goes out over the Net and creates an account for you on Valve's servers and then checks the legitamacy of your CD and serial number. Sounds fun huh? So far 20,000 people have been banned. Reminds me of the whole Windows XP Activation thing a couple of years back. Can't you imagine a system like this in the next Xbox or PS2? I sure can.....and what happens if you aren't online? Or your ISP is down that day? Can you mail something in? I doubt it.....

Hey everyone just wanted to let you know that after taking a nice little Holiday in a un-disclosed foreign nationality I am back to work here in the wearhouse. I will bring you all some new stories really soon. Also off the console variety here I just wondered has anyone been playing Half-Life 2? Drop us a line or comment away.....

As if the adulation of thousands of fanboys wasn't enough, the gaming industry's icons and visionaries are being memorialized in the form of 'The Walk of Game,' a forthcoming (think 2005) landmark inside Sony's Metreon entertainment complex.

Yeah, it came as a surprise to me too.

Anyway, the list of inductees has been recently released, and surprise surprise... the only two human inductees are none other than Atari founder Nolan Bushnell and Nintendo wunderkind Shigeru Miyamoto. Alongside them, Link, Mario, and Sonic the Hedgehog are also being honored. The final honoree is Halo, which is surprising, because I'm definitely not the only one who could come up with a game that better defined the industry.

Chrono Trigger, maybe. Or Radiant Silvergun.

Each inductee will be honored with a 2 foot by 2 foot brushed steel star installed in Metreon's floor. This is just a quibble, but shouldn't Ralph Baer be honored, considering he invented the first video game system ever back in 1966?

Another quibble: since gaming is their site's entire point, couldn't they at least be bothered to spell Shigeru Miyamoto's name right on their 'About' page?

I posted an article a few days ago about a new plug 'n' play console that allows you to simply hook a controller up to your TV and have instant access to many old titles previously available on the Intellivision.

More rencently Atari, a former powerhouse in gaming, has made an announcement that it's once popular Atari 7800 will be reborn in the Atari Flashback. This unit hits store shelves this week and packs along with it 20 classic Atari games including Centipede, breakout and asteroids to name just a few.

For you classic games this is the must have of the season. For you younger readers, take a look at what we "old timers" had to contend with :)

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Early reports suggest those that bought Halo 2 and attempt to log into Xbox live are getting the boot, and their live account cancelled, if their console has been modded in any way. This includes mod chips and/or bigger drives.

While it's too early to tell if a workaround will be found I am sure someone (maybe even you) will figure a way around M$'s new "security feature."

Nintendo decided to double the amount of DS handhelds.

They originally planned to have a million ready for the launch, but this has changed due to the unexpectedly very high amount of pre-orders for the console. In able to make this possible Nintendo brought a third factory online so there will be enough devices to sell for the coming period. This production boost is especially important for Nintendo in Japan. This because of the Sony PSP that will be launched only ten days after the Nintendo DS. This in comparison to the US launch, that will be next year.

A quick look at a non disclosure agreement was all that was needed to see what M$ plans for the Xbox in the coming years. The NDA shows that there are going to be three versions of the Xbox 2, one of which is a fully functioning PC in the coming couple of years.

The NDA plots a timeline for the introduction of the systems. Xbox Next and Xbox Next HD are planned for fall 2005, while the Xbox Next PC is scheduled for fall 2006.

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100 million in one day!?!?!?!

Guess we love our video games.

Nuff said....

K I'm going to date myself here, but I feel I must.

I was in Toys R Us yesterday (what can I say, I'm a big kid at heart) and I noticed that they have an Intellivision with 25 games for about $20. I couldn't believe it.

They also have atari and Activision flavors. The kicker is they are just controllers that you plug into the RCA ports of your TV.

I couldn't believe it - here is a gaming system that I grew up with (the Intellivision) in one small, inexpensive unit.

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Here on the United States' East Coast, things are getting especially nippy, and what better way to get pumped for the holiday season that to talk about the some of the season's most anticipated releases:

The Good:

Apparently, a few Meijer stores (can't say I've ever heard of the chain before) have gathered their collective chutzpah, and released Halo 2 well before its street date. According to various guys on the street, the store in question is reported to be at 1703 Haggerty Road in Toledo, Ohio. Rumors also exist stating that another Meijer store (this time somewhere in Michigan) is also being naughty.

I suppose I should go get a plane ticket to Toledo, huh?

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Sorry, but a thought has been bugging me so I had to get it out. And it makes it easier when you have a place to put it. Of course it does relate to gaming, but the handheld variety.

For some reason I have been hearing a lot about handheld/portable gaming these past few days. I don't know if it's becuase I'm more sensitive to it or becuase there really is something there. So I started thinking.

When will M$ move into the handheld market?

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Okay all you American Citizens, this is really way more important than Video Games or conspiracies (did I just say that?), get off your butts and go vote. No matter what state you are in, what race you are, what gender you are, or what political party you represent, we all need to go vote. So get to it. And let's get America headed towards a fresh start....

Gizmondo recently released it's flavor of handheld console in the UK. It looks pretty nice. It not only allows you to play games (and even play against others via a wireless connection) but it also has built in GPS. Future versions are purported to have built in cell phones as well.

This all sounds great, but recently I interviewed an insider at a company which develops components for this and other similar handhelds and what he told me kinda scares me.

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