games

If you're the kind of person for whom every year is centered around Burning Man, then there's a certain problem you have with the calendar: you can't go to other Labor Day weekend events.

Not that I would know anything about this, of course, because I only go to Burning Man some years, and it's only coincidence that it's happened 10 years in a row.

But anyway, I noticed today that there's going to be a great Lego fan festival in Washington, D.C., next year, called BrickFair. "Fantastic," I thought, as … Read more

To the British, at least, video games are now officially acknowledged as an art form on par with movies and TV.

Well, maybe that's a stretch. But the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) has announced that it has added Sims creator Will Wright as a fellow, a prestigious honor that has previously gone to the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Steven Spielberg and Alfred Hitchcock, according to PC World (via Variety).

This is pretty cool. If you're not familiar with Wright, well, he's generally considered the reigning king of video games. In part that's … Read more

Mochi Media today is publicly launching a toolkit that serves ads in Flash games and also collects analytics. Since Flash games can spread across the Web rapidly and without the blessing of their designers, having some way to make the games phone home to developers, and send money back while they're at it, is a great idea and killer business model.

The big part of today's public release of the product is the ad network, MochiAds. Mochi Media sells image ads--splashy brand-building ads, not buy-me-now clickthrough drivers--to its own ad base at a $5.00 CPM (cost per … Read more

There's a new social network for gamers called GamerLibrary. The site takes the Delicious Library and Shelfari angle by letting users compile, and show off, their gaming collections, while at the same time adding a request feature to let members trade and borrow games among themselves. The idea is that you'll be able to join with your small collection of games and get others to loan you theirs, assuming they see something they like in your library. Together you build up a larger pool of shared games that can be borrowed or bought on the side.

Of course … Read more

This story has been updated from its original version.

In order to get back on top of the video games market, Electronic Arts is willing to pay a hefty price. Namely, $860 million.

The Redwood City, Calif.-based publisher announced on Thursday afternoon that it had agreed to acquire VG Holdings, the parent company of two game development companies, BioWare and Pandemic Studios, from private equity firm Elevation Partners.

This deal, expected to close in January and originally reported by the Wall Street Journal, is the largest in EA's 25-year history.

For more coverage from CNET News.com's … Read more

The New York Times on Monday ran a piece on the use of violent video games in Christian youth ministries. They get the kids into the parish hall by offering Halo 3 sessions, for example, for fun and community-building.

Following this revelation, anyone with an opinion on first-person shooters, God or teenagers took to the keyboard and beat the devil out of it. As a result, there's some pretty broad analysis out there. Whether churches should use violent video games as a recruiting or "outreach" tool is a topic that raises a number of questions.

Is it … Read more

If your child is spending so much time with games that you're concerned about ergonomics, perhaps posture isn't the first thing that needs to be corrected. But every parent has different priorities, so here's something for those who care more about orthopedics than their progeny's brains turning to mush.

The "Synergy Arcade Cabinet" supposedly keeps your child upright while playing on what looks like an updated version of the old Pac-Man tables found in fern bars of the '70s. We're not sure how it would truly improve posture when they're bent over … Read more

Now that the long-rumored "bargain" PS3 now a reality (in Europe, anyway), how will Microsoft respond? Over the past few months, the company has refreshed the bulk of the 360 line: the $450 Elite debuted in April with a large 120GB hard drive, HDMI port, and (finally!) black color scheme; the Pro (a.k.a. "Premium") 20GB model got a $50 price cut and HDMI upgrade; and there's even a limited-run $400 Halo Edition (basically, the Pro with a military camo paint job) for $400. But what of the lowly Xbox 360 Core System? The … Read more

Belkin has announced the successor to the n52 SpeedPad, the n52te. What does the "te" stand for, you ask? Tournament Edition. This professional-grade SpeedPad promises to improve your response time in PC games like first-person shooters, real-time strategy games, and MMORPGs.

Teaming up with elite gaming peripheral manufacturer Razer, the n52te carries with it a customizable software suite allowing players to completely modify their gaming experience. The device will support multiple player profiles in addition to Razer Synapse onboard memory, which allows for plug-and-play functionality without the need to install additional software wherever you take it. Also new … Read more