If you happen to own a PS3 or Xbox 360 and are looking for great media-streaming software, then TVersity is a worthy option. It’s fast, stable and free, my three favorite words when it comes to media-streaming. While it doesn’t support as many formats as Java PS3 Media Server, it does benefit from having a simple design, making it more accessible for your average consumer.
TVersity has just been updated to a new beta version and with it comes some pretty cool new features.
Completely new off-screen browser, based on Google Chromium: runs out of process for increased stability and solves all the known issues with premium content (it used to occasionally fail to start on some systems).
Premium content site are now defined in an external file (osb.xml), advanced users can easily add their sites.
List of supported websites can now be updated without requiring a new release, so expect many new sites to be added and pushed to you from now on. (Advanced users should send us their additions since from time to time we overwrite your osb.xml automatically).
Update and expand YouTube support to include subscriptions, favorites and playlists by user (in addition to user video uploads which were previously supported). Also support adding YouTube content by search queries (replaces the “by tag” category which YouTube has obsoleted).
If you’re a fan of Doctor Who and have a soft spot in your heart for the writing of Neil Gaiman, then today is your lucky day as Mr. Gaiman has confirmed that he has indeed written a script for the popular British TV series.
The script is titled The House of Nothing and is slated to air in 2011.
During his acceptance speech for best comic at the SFX Awards, Gaiman said: “As anyone who’s read my blog knows, I’m a big fan of a certain long-running British TV series. One that I started watching – from behind the sofa – when I was three.
“And while I know it’s cruel to make you wait for things, in about 14 months from now – which is to say, not in the upcoming season but early in the one after that – it’s quite possible that I might have written an episode.
“And if I had, it would originally have been called ‘The House of Nothing’. But it definitely isn’t called that any more.”
A spokesman for Doctor Who would not confirm Gaiman’s announcement.
The next series of the show, starring Matt Smith as the 11th Time Lord, is due to air in the spring.
We get a lot of press releases sent to us. Myself, it’s not unusual to see near a hundred of them hit my inbox in a day. With that much competition, its hard to capture our attention. But when I glimpsed an email saying that development studio “Bloober Team” is announcing the first title being developed exclusively for the iPad, and their calling it “Gender Wars: The Battle”, I couldn’t help but sit up and take notice. When I then read that the lead designer described the game like this,
“In a way, and I understand that it’s bit bold to say, we would like to create something similar to Metal Gear Solid for iPad.”
I start to scratch my head and a confused look passes over my face. Gender Wars? Solid Snake?
But it doesn’t end there so I am posting the original press release in full (minus legally sensitive info, of course) after the break so you can read it for yourself. It’s one of the stranger ones we have ever come across and was either written by some kind of genius, or someone on acid. We’ve also posted the game’s sole screenshot to be released so far. (For those not sure about clicking through, the screenshot does not contain any images of Gender-specific anatomical parts battling it out.)
Here are both the screenshot and the press release:
Now that Avatar has shattered every record in the book and has become a global phenomena, the time has come for research and studies! Why is it people are feeling depressed and/or suicidal when leaving the theater? Actually, according to research about “Awe”, a movie like Avatar should find the majority of viewers feeling creatively juiced, socially connected and perhaps even a little spiritual.
Elicitors of awe include mountain ranges, cathedrals, powerful leaders, music, scientific theories, encounters with God, natural disasters, and James Cameron films. For me, Avatar induced awe in response to both the exhilarating fictional world but also the artistic and technical achievements I knew were required to create that world.
In a 2007 paper, Michelle Shiota, along with Keltner and Amanda Mossman, reported experimental findings on the effects of awe. In one study, people described recent experiences of either awe or happiness. Reliving an awe-inspiring event was more likely to make people to go outside for a hike after the experiment, or to do something creative like play an instrument or write. Further, subjects instructed to recall a recent encounter with beauty in nature said they felt the presence of something greater than themselves and felt connected with the world around them. Another group of subjects, after staring at a 25-foot Tyrannosaurus skeleton for one minute were more likely than people who stared at an empty hallway to use universal terms such as “a person” or “an inhabitant of the Earth” to describe themselves; they saw themselves as members of a larger group.
In regards to the sadness subjects reported in that study, the authors write, “It is not impossible that the discovery of the limits of the self during a self-transcendent emotional experience may produce some negative emotions.” Hence post-Avatar suicide-watch? If watching acrobatic cat people uplink their ponytails and fight giant exoskeletons in 3-D for two and a half hours doesn’t make you want to run outside and play or at least write some erotic Na’vi fan fic, I think you have bigger problems back here on Earth than just not having a tree house and a hot blue girlfriend.
You up for a little 3D Madden Football in the future? EA thinks you will be and is hoping the sports genre will usher in a new era of 3D gaming. EA seems to think sports games will be the key to early acceptance of 3D gaming technology, but I beg to differ: first-person shooters will be the big lure, not Madden. Here is EA Sports head-honcho Peter Moore:
“None of the games I’ve seen [so far] have been built that way – they’ve been regular games running in 3D. The real secret sauce will be when somebody says: ‘I’m going to build this game specifically for a 3D platform.’
“Absolutely. I’m not making any announcements, but it’s no coincidence that of the 3D [TV] broadcasts I’ve seen in the last two years, I can count the NBA All-Star event in Las Vegas, while ESPN has announced 3D programming – perhaps even a full channel. There have also been a number of announcements around the [football] World Cup, with some games broadcast in 3D.
“This is reminiscent of where we were with HD five or six years ago. It seems like a lifetime ago now, but you’d go to CES and be in awe of HD – and it was sports games that showed up the technology.
“I think there’s great opportunity for EA to bring sports to life in unbelievably imaginative ways, once we can grasp what 3D means to us.”
Well, not really, but I’ll play along with this beautifully accomplished hoax. A lot of work and coordination must have gone into producing this video, but the result speaks for itself. How many people will be suckered into believing this is real?
(Ratings Average: 4.00 out of 5)
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