move

Toy Story 3 game celebrates Pixar's spirit of play

EMERYVILLE, Calif.--Call it Toy Story 3.5.

That's what Pixar's Jason Katz, at least, called Toy Story 3: The Video Game, during a press event for the game at the famous animation studio's headquarters here Wednesday.

Katz, the story supervisor on the forthcoming "Toy Story 3," which will hit theaters on June 18, was explaining to a group of reporters that while the game version of the film is very true to its source material, it also stands on its own and extends the franchise. Someone who plays the game and then sees the … Read more

Activist groups launch new Facebook privacy offensive

Two nonprofit groups with a history of criticizing Facebook's privacy policies put out splashy messages on Friday to voice their opposition to the social network's latest changes: The Electronic Frontier Foundation published a timeline of Facebook's privacy policy modifications over the years, and liberal activist group MoveOn.org launched a Facebook group called "Facebook, respect my privacy!" in response to its new "Instant Personalization" option that shares a significant amount of profile data.

The two groups' tactics are somewhat different. But like a cadre of U.S. senators who have recently raised concerns … Read more

Partly cloudy

There's only so much you can expect from a screensaver. After all, its only real purpose is to be decorative; we're long past the days when screensavers were necessary to prevent phosphor burn-in on monitors. Moving Clouds Screensaver is one of the many thousands of screensavers available online, and we can't say it particularly impressed us with its graphics or other features. But the program is functional, and we suppose you could do worse.

We figured from the screensaver's name that it would feature a blue sky with some clouds placidly floating by. Maybe they could … Read more

preGAME 08: Nintendo DSi XL, Just Cause 2

This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea welcome special guest Russ Frushtick (MTV Multiplayer) as they take a first look at the Nintendo DSi XL! We have two units in the studio today and give a ton of comparisons, first impressions, and take live questions from our chat room. We'll also talk about the odd timing of Nintendo's 3DS announcement.

Also on today's show is a live demo of Just Cause 2, the open-world go-anywhere blow-up-anything action-adventure title. We'll chat with George Wright, the game's associate producer, about how the sequel … Read more

The 404 540: Where we find out if that's your REAL name (podcast)

Today's episode of The 404 Podcast starts off with a intimate glimpse into Justin's mind, so we recommend throwing on some goggles before watching. He reveals that his name was initially supposed to be Jonathan, but due to complications surrounding the pronunciation of his name, the doctor just shortened it to the simpler-sounding Justin. Jeff also has a funny story about his father's name, and it turns out it wasn't always Sweet Lou!

It's Thursday, so you know what that means: Natali Del Conte joins the fun and adds a valuable female perspective on our motley crew.

We've been talking about the Sony PlayStation Move since it debuted at last week's Game Developers Conference, and Sony just announced its first Move commercial, brought to you by...the future. The video features a very Colberian Kevin Butler, the PlayStation's VP of Realistic Movements, who takes sarcastic shots at Nintendo and Microsoft in the very distant future (November 2010).

We could spend an entire show on this next topic, a list of 10 things women do that turn men off. It's all in good fun and we're obviously generalizing, but we're finding it hard to dispute the irritations that writer Brendan Tapley brings up, including "assuming we know what you want us to do," "smothering instead of mothering," and "over-sharing." Thanks to NDC for sticking around to keep us in check!

Finally, a new study in the latest Retrevo Gadgetology Report (gadgetology?) anecdotally shows that one in 10 people under 25 would pause coitus to check their social networking updates, which begs the question: is Facebook better than sex?

Short answer: No, dude.

Long answer: Listen to the show!

EPISODE 540 Subscribe in iTunes audio | Suscribe to iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

preGAME 07: Metro 2033

This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea take a sneak peek at the action-thriller Metro 2033! Join us as we play it live on the show and talk to the game's executive producer, Luis Gigliotti live in the studio. We chat with Luis about how the title made the jump from novel to video game and how the PC version was built in 3D from the ground up. Make sure to watch the entire episode to find out how you can score a copy of the game for Xbox 360!

But before our live demo, Digital City's … Read more

Digital City 73: iPad pre-orders; foiling NYC taxi scams, and FFXIII vs. God of War III (podcast)

On this week's show, we find out how many people pre-ordered an Apple iPad (including someone you might not expect), then we check out a huge taxi scam in NYC, undone by the clever application of GPS technology.

Dan just got back from the annual Game Developers Conference, and he recounts his adventures there with indie games, FaceBook fans, and, of course, the PlayStation Move motion controller [see related video here].

Finally, Joey and Scott debate the merits of Final Fantasy XIII, and Dan jumps in to explain why God of War III owes much to Joseph Campbell and … Read more

Scenes from GDC 2010

With the 2010 edition of the Game Developers Conference winding down, we've put together a short photographic tour of our week, from Sony's PlayStation Move launch to the booth-filled expo hall. Though surprises were few and far between, we did pick up on some new lines of perceived wisdom from our fellow attendees in the form of trends and themes to watch out for.

Indie games looking for bigger audiencesOne highlight of the week was the Independent Games Festival Awards, which celebrated small, indie projects. Many of these games are or will be available as iPhone, Xbox Live, or PC downloadable games, and though we thought there were too many side-scrolling platform games, there were also many very creative ideas on display.

The move toward digital distribution is having the same effect on the video game industry as it did on the music industry several years ago. Small, independent developers, with tiny budgets and teams, can bypass publishing middlemen and sell directly to the consumer (or close to directly--the owners of much of this virtual retail shelf space, including Apple and Microsoft, still act as gatekeepers).

If you want to check out a few of these indie games, Monaco, a four-player co-op game, took top honors at the awards show. We also liked the photographic mystery game Trauma and the atmospheric side-scroller Limbo. (Disclosure: My spouse, AOL Games Editor in Chief Libe Goad, is a member of the IGF judges panel.) … Read more

Week in review: Game on for Sony

Sony is making a play for motion control dominance.

The entertainment and technology giant this week unveiled the Move, a small device that looks like a microphone and represents Sony's bid to gain control over the motion controller wars. Those wars are currently led by Nintendo, with its Wii controller, although many think they will be dominated by Microsoft and its Project Natal controller system.

To Sony, releasing the Move is an obvious move for the PlayStation, given it believes it started the motion controller era with its Eye Toy. Sony held its press conference during the Game Developers Conference … Read more