microsoft

It’s no secret that 4J Studios’ XBLA port of developer Mojang’s Minecraft has been a runaway success. First it sold 1 million copies in less than a week, …
Read More

The news that a Microsoft employee had publicly referenced the existence of a “new Xbox” spread rapidly across video game media outlets and blogs this past Monday. Microsoft Windows Live General Manager Brian Hall’s perceived reference to a next-gen home gaming platform to succeed the Xbox 360, released in November 2005, in the same breath as talk about Windows 8 would have marked the first time anyone working for the console holder acknowledged its existence. However, the publisher has since spoken with IGN about what most believed was an accidental slip of the tongue by Hall and said his words had been misunderstood by the media.

“The comments to The Verge were not understood in their intended context,” reads the statement Microsoft issued. “When Brian [Hall] mentioned a ‘new wave of products,’ he was referring to the full lineup of products coming later this year from Microsoft, including Windows 8, Office, Windows Phone and of course our fall Xbox update which will bring a host of new consumer experiences like Xbox Music, Videos, Games on Windows 8 and Xbox SmartGlass.”

That’s it then, right? Case closed. There is no new Xbox. Never was, never will be. Except for that there is. Proving as much isn’t really possible, but, in addition to the fact that there must be one simply because creating new consoles every several years is just what’s done in this industry, there are a number of reasons to believe the follow-up to the 360 is a thing. Epic has released sizzle footage of its next middleware engine, Unreal 4, in action. Ubisoft and LucasArts showed off games this past E3 that are all but confirmed to be coming to the PS4 and Xbox 720 (Watch Dogs and Star Wars 1313, respectively). A little while back, Kotaku‘s Stepen Totilo even went ahead and said, “people are making video games for the next PlayStation and the next Xbox.”

Read More

The staff has been pretty divisive on Spelunky. If you’ve listen to the podcast, we’re all huge fans of the game and the game has some super charming characters and music. Do you want to own a little shopkeeper or set of frogs on your desk? Of course you do. Attract Mode is a collective of video game journalists and artists putting out some pretty unique and creative stuff. Derek Yu, creator of Spelunky is part of the collective and the long awaited Spelunky Minis figurines are now available! You can pay $5 for a random one or $40 for the entire set. Having the golden idol will not cause a gigantic rock to plow through your place and doesn’t the Tunnel Man bare a resemblance to our Guide Co-ordinator?

Read More

As far as surprises go, Microsoft Windows Live General Manager Brian Hall’s frank admittance that there will be a successor to the Xbox 360 fell somewhere between Michael Phelps’ recent dominance of a multitude of swimming events at the London Games and NASA successfully concluding the 352-mile journey of its 2,000-pound rover Curiosity on Mars last night. To narrow that down a bit, that Microsoft is working on the follow-up to the nearly seven-year-old home of XBLA is about as (un)surprising to most gamers as that guy who swims really well swimming really well.

Despite the best wishes of the Big Three first parties of gaming that cyclically dump enormous sums of money into developing, launching and marketing home video game platforms, the life-cycles of their systems are always finite. The trio has managed to stretch the elastic holding this console generation together further than most industry vets and gamers would have thought possible only a few years ago, yet they have been unable to magic up the secret to console immortality. And so there was Hall letting the X out of the Box last week just over a minute into The Verge’s podcast. What’s more, the general manager mentioned Windows 8 — the software developer’s next operating system, coming to retail October 26 — in the same sentence as the next-gen Xbox.

“We’ve had Hotmail and operated Hotmail for about sixteen years. We obviously have Exchange, and Outlook, that people use at work,” he told The Verge before continuing on to mention Windows 8 and the 360’s eventual replacement. “We just decided it was time to do something new and bring the best from each of those and put them together and release it right in time for the new wave of products that we could have coming out with Windows 8 with the new version of Office with the New Windows phone and the new Xbox.”

Read More

 Fez developer Polytron recently made a public statement saying they are not fixing the game’s broken patch due to the cost of certification. While gamers may not agree with leaving …
Read More

Microsoft announced today that revenue for the fiscal 2012 fourth quarter ending June 30 reached $18.6 billion. That figure, which Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft Steve Ballmer identified …
Read More

Microsoft’s Xbox Live security team has spent the last several months introducing new safeguards to the service in response to a bevy of user feedback, Xbox Live General Manager Alex Garden said in a blog post today. Garden released a statement about buffing up account security earlier in the year and reported that the Xbox community responded by sending him “hundreds of emails and the responses ranged from frustration to support, as well as suggestions for making Xbox Live the best service it can be.”

The team in charge of protecting users is said to now be better positioned to do so thanks to increased notifications being sent to accounts with suspect activity. Holders of such accounts are encouraged to take self-protecting measures such as changing passwords, tapping Microsoft’s customer support and proving that they are indeed the owner of the account in question.

Read More

One of the most anticipated XBLA of the titles of the summer – and the official kick-off to Microsoft’s annual Summer of Arcade – hits this week in Activision and Robomodo‘s Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD, a hi-def rerelease featuring classic levels from the long-running skate series’ earliest entries. With that in mind, there’s little surprise Activision have released a launch trailer that highlights the game’s classic feel.

Read More

This Sunday night our guide coordinator will be back at it again, this time streaming Minecraft. We could’ve had some glorious world for you to see, or some cool game …
Read More

Microsoft has released a software development kit (SDK) for SmartGlass just a few weeks after announcing it at E3. The system allows various portable electronics devices – like, say, tablet computers or smartphones – to synch-up with an Xbox to display information based on what’s going on in-game: Showing a world map, for example, or allowing the player to create plays in Madden on your device for in-game use.

Read More