Electronic Arts,  the behemoth console game developer has acquired PopCap for . You might wonder why this is a big deal. Simple. This is a sign of the change that is currently happening in the console gaming space.  Console gaming I believe will encompass handheld devices ( cell phones and tablets), which will compliment the current console gaming ecosystem. “EA and PopCap are a compelling combination,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello. “PopCap’s great studio talent and powerful IP add to EA’s momentum and accelerate our drive towards a $1 billion digital business. EA’s global studio and...

Sony has had a tough 3 weeks. It started with an outage to their PlayStation Network (PSN) which has escalated to one of the biggest network compromises in recent history.  I however believe that Sony should have done some things differently, but hindsight is an exact science which makes people seem smart: They should have played their cards more honestly with their users. The scale of the disaster was grossly understated, which is doing them no favors at the moment. Companies should have learnt by now that if you mess up, you come clean instead of telling a half true story. I get the idea that Sony...

Steve Ballmer unveiled a variety of new cell phones that will be using Windows Phone 7 yesterday. Unfortunately Ballmer’s presentation bombed. Which leads me to wonder whether this is Microsoft’s last chance with the mobile platform? With Microsoft’s share of the smart phone market accounting for just 5 percent of the worldwide smart phone market in the last quarter, there’s increasing pressure on Ballmer to kick-start what even he acknowledges has been a disappointing performance.  Symbian, on the other hand, had a 41 percent share, 18 percent went to Research in...

Los Angeles hosted the biggest video game conference last week. E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo) is the most important week for console game players as manufacturers preview the next 12 months in terms of new products and development of new technologies. If I can summarize the event in a sentence then it would be “the dawn of 3D and motion orientated accessories”. Microsoft unveiled Project Natal which was renamed to Kinect. Kinect is Microsoft’s direct competition to the Nintendo Wii nun chuck. The player does not use a control pad but rather replicate movement with his body. The...

One of the biggest complaints in the last 18 months in the console gaming industry in South Africa has been the cost of games and Consoles. Forums have been inundated with members saying that they will either stop playing or indicating that they might be focusing only on one particular console.  The major factors which have lead to this wave of unhappiness were the cost of the games and the consoles. That might be changing in the next few months. A new console is about to change all that. Sony has just released the Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3) Slim. It’s smaller and cheaper – two very...