No more Folding@Home and Linux for PlayStation 3

PlayStation 3 firmware v3.21 to be released on April 1st 2010 will disable ‘Install Other OS’ functionality. Reason for removal was security concerns. Install Other OS functionality was recently removed from the newer and slimmer PS3 model. With this newer firmware all updated PS3 will not have Install Other OS functionality. This means no Folding@Home and Linux. The current SCE seems to be undoing all noble intents that the father of PlayStation Ken Kutaragi did for it. Sony seems to be crawling back to their proprietary root once again.

Nintendo 3DS Announced

From Kyoto Japan, Nintendo released a PR on the announcement of Nintendo 3DS, the successor of Nintendo DSi. It will feature glasses-free 3D solution and backward compatibility with Nintendo DS. It is currently unknown how well the 3D solution will be, but this is not Nintendo first 3D solution, their last one was the ill-fated Virtual Boy. Set for released before fiscal year ending March 2011 in Japan and the rest of the world will follow soon as soon. It is currently unknown what will be under the hood, but it was rumour that NVIDIA maybe providing their 3D expertise. Wether that's true or not remain to be seen. It is also rumoured that Sharp will be providing 3D screen for Nintendo 3DS. Apparently, Sharp demo the technology to Nintendo years ago and Nintendo were so impressed by it and thus Nintendo 3DS is born. Expect more news soon and additional details at E3 2010.

NVIDIA GTX480 Minimum 600W

The much anticipated and delayed NVIDIA DirectX 11 flagship Solution GTX480 will require greater than 600W PSU with minimum 12V current rating of 42A. For comparison EVGA Classified SR-2 1200W PSU announced recently, its 12V rails is rated at 38A. Gamers wanting to put one of this into their rig, should check the specs of their PSU. However getting GTX480 maybe more difficult compare to finding PSU that meets its minimum requirement. There have been reports that NVIDIA is having poor yield in producing this 3+ billions transistors chip. Still scheduled for release next week, every gamers will find out soon enough, if this is the card to have in your rig.

International Cricket 2010 Announced

Codemasters announced International Cricket 2010 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 to be released later this year. Developed by Australian developer Trickstar Games, International Cricket 2010 promises new Action Cam that will immerse players in all the on-pitch drama, intensity and excitement of cricket and Power Stick will give players ability to control batsmen via 360 degree analogue power and direction control while offering the widest selection of shots. International Cricket 2010 boasts official players roasters from 16 nations thanks to its official license. If players aren’t satisfied, there will be comprehensive players editor for customising the game. Players can select from 21 stadiums from around the world including the SCG and MCG.

Monster Hunter Portable 3rd

Capcom has officially announced Monster Hunter 3rd for PSP for released before the end of 2010. With each instalment moving at least a million units in Japan, Monster Hunter Portable is one of the only PSP series listed alone in the multi-million sellers list plaque and add to that the awards and accolades that it has won. The announcement of this third instalment is huge news across Japan for the ‘Monster Hunter craze crowd’. According to producer Ryozo Tsujimoto and director Yasunori Ichinose, Monster Hunter Portable 3rd is being developed from scratch. It is not a port nor based on the most recent Monster Hunter 3 for the Wii. It will offer improved monster graphics and animations, as well as refreshing new take on the Monster Hunter franchise.

Playing as a hunter, monsters tracking in the wild while cooperating with other hunters are still a big part of the game. Offering new village, new regions, new weapons, new armours and new monsters to slay, Monster Hunter Portable 3rd is hoping to satisfy old and new players alike.

Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown

Sega announced Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown at AOU2010. Virtua Fighter Official site has a preview video that gives glimpses of some of the changes in this final iteration of Virtua Fighter 5. It’s predecessor Virtua Fighter 5R introduced a new character Karateka Jean and reintroduced an old Sumo fan favourite Taka-Arashi. There doesn’t seems to be any new characters in Final Showdown, but it gives glimpses of many new animations as well as different moves and hit properties that makes the games new again and perhaps gives a preview of the direction in gameplay that Virtua Fighter 6 will take. From the short video characters don’t appears to float unnaturally anymore in like previous instalments but go into different staggers animations as they receives hits from the opponents. Maybe Taka-Arashi will be as difficult to knock down as he was in Virtua Fighter 3. He seems to be immune from knock down in the video, but this is early days, things will change as Sega-AM2 rebalances the games constantly.

Details are scarce now but with the expected arrival of around mid-year, they will trickle through sooner than later. It is safe to assume that Final Showdown will feature modified stages as well as many upon many new items. There is also a question mark on console ports, with arcade on life support in Japan and graveyard in developed countries, console ports are normally a given but Sega did not port VF5R as it remains arcade exclusive. More news on Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown as they come.

Resident Evil Shinji Mikami ‘Tango’ in Tokyo

Shinji Mikami opened his new games development studio, ‘Tango’ in Tokyo on March 1, 2010 with 13 employees comprised of former staffs from Grasshopper Manufacturer, Square Enix and Capcom. Mikami is currently working as freelance director with Platinum Games and Sega on Vanquish for PS3 and Xbox 360. He plans to grow his studio into 100 strong staffs within five to seven years. Down the road, he hopes to create a 3D horror game. That’s 3D horror that pops out of the screen 3D. Mikami wants to create one major brand where it will define its own genre. Currently his studio is working on small budget development where ideas are everything. In this economic climate starting, a new studio is highly risky business venture, but if there is one person that can withstand against the economic trend is this veteran Shinji Mikami, the best of luck, Mikami-san.

Square Enix Tetsuya Nomura on Progress

In the interview conducted earlier today on the Square Enix Members Twitter, Tetsuya Nomura mentioned Final Fantasy Versus XIII is progressing well and it is now possible to fly across the world map in an air ship. When quizzed about his other projects including Final Fantasy Agito XIII and Parasite Eve much-anticipated sequel, he has no comment. However, Nomura managed to mention about the possibility for a Dissidia Final Fantasy sequel in the future as highly likely. Nomura also mentioned that he’d like to release two new titles within the year. Nomura-san, Square Enix fans are looking forward to these games as well as the aforementioned games.

Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition Review

In Capcom tradition of releasing a super-version of their successful games to milk for all their worth, comes Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition. The Gold Edition contains everything the plain vanilla did plus these extras: Lost in Nightmares Episode, Desperate Escape Episode, Versus Mode, Mercenaries Reunion Mode, four new costumes and Extra figurines. These extras are also available from the PlayStation Network or Xbox Live. This Gold Edition is aimed at die hard Capcom or long time Resident Evil fans as well as those gamers who missed the original release for one reason or another. This edition is available for PlayStation 3 as well as Xbox 360. All the extra goodies of this edition are available on disc for PlayStation 3 while it is a 1GB download for Xbox 360. Player will get the same Resident Evil experience either way. Graphics are excellent, Zombies are grotesque, environments are complex and frame-rate is mostly stable. Sound not great but manages to create the atmosphere nevertheless.

For newcomers Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition is the latest entry of this long running survival horror franchise. Though this latest instalment is more action horror but all for the better. Biohazards and zombies are plentiful, all with their slimy tentacles and oozing eyeballs, ready for massacred into disturbing undead chunks covered in blood. Actions will unfold via over the shoulder third person camera. There are also cinematic camera angles when the game calls for them. On screen display and users interface are keep simple and effective. Finally, real-time inventory accesses to keep whatever suspense left in this game.

In typical Resident Evil, player will play as the starring character alone and unprepared. In Resident Evil 5, player plays as Chris Redfield but this time Chris is not alone. Joining him on his hopeless mission is Sheva Alomar, an African national and bioweapon expert. Both are members of the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance fighting against the evil mega corporation, typical Resident Evil story. Throughout the six chapters single player campaign Chris and Sheva will need to cover each other back and survive the ordeal, much easier said than done. The games will throw them into many situations where this opportunity arises.

The game will play into Chris brute strength and Sheva agile nature for player to co-opt their way to hard-to-reach areas. Sheva AI does a fair job as a partner but as with any AI, there are annoyances like being trigger happy with using that precious ammo or using the scarce herbs at the sign of a scratch. This is why Capcom encouraged player to play co-opt online with a friend controlling Sheva or if online is not accessible, second controller and a friend on a couch will suffice too. Co-opt combat is interesting with AI but takes on another level of awesome and satisfaction with an online friend.

The eerie and unsettling feels as player tiptoe their way through zombie-infested city is not in this Resident Evil game. In its place, as player progresses through the game, they will be involved in varieties of action sequences, involving vehicles and thrill ride. These action sequences will definitely pump that adrenaline out. Some long time fans voiced their critiques but this is a welcome change for a long running series. Regardless Resident Evil B-grade movie style storytelling is still present. Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition is Capcom’s way of redefining the franchise and genre it created. The eerie suspense is no more but replaced with over the top high intensity action sequences. Alone in the dark is no more but joined with a lovely partner. While offering top notch graphics and sound, the single player campaign will last for around ten hours but the game is designed to be replayed, with extra modes and episodes on offer, this is a worthy game to be added to any gamers’ library.

Intel Xeon 5600 Series

The new Intel Xeon ‘Westmere’ 5600 series is here. In the high-end segment of 5600 series, by using the smaller 32nm process Intel has increased the number of processor cores to six with 12MB of L3 cache, while maintaining TDP between 95W to 130W. Price starts at $996 for 2.66GHz Intel Xeon X5650 to $1663 for 3.3GHz Intel Xeon W5680. In this price segment, there is also 4-core Intel Xeon X5677 and X5567 but clocked at 3.46GHz and 3.06GHz respectively.

Disappointingly, Intel mid-range offering are all 4-cores, they are 2.66GHz E5640, 2.53GHz E5630 and 2.40GHz E5620 priced at $744, $551 and $387 respectively. Intel also has low TDP offering in 6-cores 2.26 GHz L5640 with TDP of 60W and 4-cores 2.13GHz L5630 and 1.86GHz L5620 with TDP of 40W priced at $996, $551 and $440 respectively. The L5620 has Hyper Threading disabled. Overall, Intel promises up to 40% better performance or up to 30% less power usage.

EVGA Classified SR-2 Motherboard

EVGA officially released the dual-socket 1366 based on Intel 5520 chipset, 4-way SLI and CrossFireX support, 48GB DDR3 RAM as well as USB 3.0 and SATA III dubbed the Classified SR-2. All fitted in new HPTX form factors that measures 15” x 13.6” that will only fit in wide ATX cases with nine or more expansions slots.

SR-2 can combine two suitable Intel Xeon processors such as Intel Xeon 5670 for up to 24 hyper-threads of compute power. Multi-tasking performance hungry applications will be a breeze.

To power them hungry components EVGA also introduced 1200W SR-2 Power Supply, capable of over 1500W peak power. EVGA SR-2 carries the $599 price tag proudly as it stands to rule them all. Enthusiasts who are looking to spend more than $5000 on their new rig should look at this contender seriously.