Nintendo has made it official, Wii U games will be on a proprietary disc that is not Blu-ray or DVD.
The confirmation comes via Nintendo president Satoru Iwata following a week of confusion and speculation as to exactly what Wii U games would be published on.
In explaining the move, Iwata says:
We feel that enough people already have devices that are capable of playing DVDs and Blu-ray, such that it didn’t warrant the cost involved to build that functionality into the Wii U console because of the patents related to those technologies.
Furthermore, the Wii U will go “social,” says Iwata (via TR):
After examining the penetration and adoption rate of social networking services like Facebook, etc, we’ve come to the conclusion that we are no longer in a period where we cannot have any connection at all with social networking services.
Rather, I think we’ve come to an era where it’s important to consider how the social graph of the social networking services can work in conjunction with something like a video game platform.
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Sony has given a revised forecast for their fiscal year today, adding a large loss resulting from the earthquake and tsunami tragedy in Japan and the security breach of the PlayStation Network.
The company says the PSN breach will cost Sony $171.1 million and the earthquake will cost them a devastating $1.8 billion.
PSN costs were mainly attributed to the cost of the free 1-year of ID theft protection the company is offering all affected, as well as the free games/PlayStation Plus and customer support costs.
Adds Sony (via Gamasutra):
So far, we have not received any confirmed reports of customer identity theft issues, nor confirmed any misuse of credit cards from the cyber-attack. Those are key variables, and if that changes, the costs could change.
In addition, in connection with the data breach, class action lawsuits have been filed against Sony and certain of its subsidiaries and regulatory inquiries have begun; however, those are all at a preliminary stage, so we are not able to include the possible outcome of any of them in our results forecast for the fiscal year ending March 2012 at this moment.
Overall, thanks to the earthquake and the PSN issues, Sony says its fiscal year, ended in March 2011, will be revised down to a $3.2 billion loss from an $858.5 million profit.
Sony did say, however, that the earthquake will not affect the release of the NGP (PSP 2) and that the PlayStation Store would be available again this week.
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Rovio and Google are offering Angry Birds HD for free for Chrome browser users.
Head over to the webstore here: Angry Birds HD for Chrome to install the game.
Reads the game’s description:
**** Surprise! New exclusive Chrome levels ****
The survival of the Angry Birds is at stake. Dish out revenge on the green pigs who stole the Birds’ eggs. Use the unique destructive powers of the Angry Birds to lay waste to the pigs’ fortified castles. Angry Birds features hours of gameplay, challenging physics-based castle demolition, and lots of replay value. Each of the 70 levels requires logic, skill, and brute force to crush the enemy.
“Lemme tell ya, these ain’t no ordinary finches we’re talkin’ about. These here are the Angry Birds, the ones that’s gonna kick you in the ‘nads. And they’re the ones on your side. They must be from Galapadapados, or sumptin’.” – Col. Angus, Bird Expert.
Protect wildlife or play Angry Birds!
