A huge roundup of some critical news. These include OUYA, the new console whose dev units are finally shipping, Playstation 2 finally being discontinued in Japan after 12 years of sale and Minecraft had a really Merry Christmas where the franchise sold over 453k units. Wow!
OUYA dev consoles shipping
After a humongous success at Kickstarter, Android running upcoming gaming console OUYA (Oh Yeah!) which is slated to release sometime late in 1H 2013 has finally started shipping it's first wave of development units. These developer units will be used by game developers to test their games out with the system and for debugging and further development. Alongwith, a developer portal has also been launched which will enable other developers who weren't lucky enough to receive the console to also kick-start their development. There is a complete guide on how the game model should be as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psCoR4zmIpE
OUYA has shipped off 1,200 of these dev units.
Some of the salient features are:
OUYA DEVELOPER PORTAL
Head over to the developer portal to download the ODK or the OUYA Development Kit.
The OUYA console will have a standard issue controller for all games. Every game in the market will be free to play. Nobody has to buy anything to play a game. Game developers can only charge for in game items or ask for a fee after the first few levels are free. This is pretty cool huh?
OUYA will be the weakest console in the market, but with proper optimization and good titles this console can do some damage indeed, especially with it's $99 price tag.
Source - OUYA, Tech2.in
PlayStation 2 discontinued in Japan
The legendary and super popular (in households even today) PlayStation 2 has finally been laid to rest in Japan. This comes after 13 years of service. That, is a long time in the video game console scene.
The Playstation 2 was originally introduced on March 4th, 2000. It's competitor was Microsoft's Xbox console. However, the Playstation 2 enjoyed a far greater commercial success and developer support despite it being hard to code for (complicated chipset).
Today, after 13 years and around 150 million units sold (the original PlayStation sold 100 million units), the PS2 (fondly) has finally been laid to rest. A huge salute to the highest and best-selling video game console ever.
Source
Minecraft franchise sells 453k on Christmas
It seems Minecraft had an especially good sales on Christmas as the franchise sold about 453k units on Christmas alone. That's a huge number for a single day. Minecraft which became viral after a blog post made by Valve's Team Fortress 2 team never stopped selling. The number of sales went up up away and Marcus Notch became one filthy rich man.
Mojang is now working on their next game, Scrolls. It will follow a similar sales model as Minecraft did, i.e. Alpha, Beta and Final with each having different price tags.
Notch 1 & Notch 2
OUYA dev consoles shipping
After a humongous success at Kickstarter, Android running upcoming gaming console OUYA (Oh Yeah!) which is slated to release sometime late in 1H 2013 has finally started shipping it's first wave of development units. These developer units will be used by game developers to test their games out with the system and for debugging and further development. Alongwith, a developer portal has also been launched which will enable other developers who weren't lucky enough to receive the console to also kick-start their development. There is a complete guide on how the game model should be as well.
OUYA Dev Console UNBOXING
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psCoR4zmIpE
OUYA has shipped off 1,200 of these dev units.
Some of the salient features are:
- quad core nVidia Tegra 3 chipset
- Android 4.1 Jelly Bean
- Standard Gamepad/Controller
- All games based on the Free 2 Play model onlS
- $99 price tag
OUYA DEVELOPER PORTAL
Head over to the developer portal to download the ODK or the OUYA Development Kit.
In the Developer Portal you will find these resources to help you get started:
The OUYA console will have a standard issue controller for all games. Every game in the market will be free to play. Nobody has to buy anything to play a game. Game developers can only charge for in game items or ask for a fee after the first few levels are free. This is pretty cool huh?
OUYA will be the weakest console in the market, but with proper optimization and good titles this console can do some damage indeed, especially with it's $99 price tag.
Source - OUYA, Tech2.in
PlayStation 2 discontinued in Japan
The legendary and super popular (in households even today) PlayStation 2 has finally been laid to rest in Japan. This comes after 13 years of service. That, is a long time in the video game console scene. The Playstation 2 was originally introduced on March 4th, 2000. It's competitor was Microsoft's Xbox console. However, the Playstation 2 enjoyed a far greater commercial success and developer support despite it being hard to code for (complicated chipset).
Here's a video of the top 25 PS2 games of all time
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VL2bhcIPiXg
Today, after 13 years and around 150 million units sold (the original PlayStation sold 100 million units), the PS2 (fondly) has finally been laid to rest. A huge salute to the highest and best-selling video game console ever.
Source
Minecraft franchise sells 453k on Christmas
It seems Minecraft had an especially good sales on Christmas as the franchise sold about 453k units on Christmas alone. That's a huge number for a single day. Minecraft which became viral after a blog post made by Valve's Team Fortress 2 team never stopped selling. The number of sales went up up away and Marcus Notch became one filthy rich man.
Mojang is now working on their next game, Scrolls. It will follow a similar sales model as Minecraft did, i.e. Alpha, Beta and Final with each having different price tags.
Notch 1 & Notch 2