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Web sites step up to connect Wii owners
Nintendo has made it pretty hard to connect with other Wii owners through the Wii itself, but this hasn't stopped some intrepid web users from creating online trading posts for Wii codes, messages, game saves and Miis.Here are a few of the better resources out there so far: MiiPages - A country-by-country list of Wii owners looking for other Wii owners to connect with. Users can search for fellow gamers with similar games and interests and put in a friend request -- your Wii code is hidden until you accept a request. With over 1000 users already, this is shaping up to be a premiere Wii sharing community. Wii-play - An extremely large Wii forum and chat community that supports easy Wii code sharing and a clever system to redirect private messages to your friends' Wii consoles. The site is a little overwhelming at first and requires a little work to figure out all its features, but its worth it to find fellow Wii owners to connect with. ConnectMii - Basically just a forum to broadcast your Wii code to hundreds of strangers who have done the same. If you're friend list goals involve quantity and not quality, this is the site for you. Wii Save - A growing community devoted to sharing Wii save files through SD cards, complete with step-by-step upload and download instructions. The site is mostly Zelda saves for now, but hopefully we'll see a wider range of saves soon. MiiPlaza - This site doesn't let you exchange Wii codes or data, but does let you share photos of your Mii Channel creations with the world. Kind of small at the moment, but sure to grow as more users try to give their Miis digital immortality. Stumble across any good Wii community sites we missed? Leave a comment and maybe we'll add it to the list.
Kludge alert: PS3 memory card adapter
Wired's Game|Life scored a rare PlayStation 3 memory card adapter (for PS1 and PS2 game saves) and found the subsequent transfer process to be "kludgy" -- the adapter gets the job done, but clumsily.Game|Life faults the device for its rather steep price ($14.99), given that the adapter could very well be used only once (if you possess just a single memory card). But even if you've amassed a collection of cards, you'll be frustrated by the adapter's insistence upon creating a new "Virtual Memory Card" directory on the PS3's hard drive for each card. That is, the system is not intuitive enough to combine and separate your PS1 and PS2 saves into two, easy to navigate categories. In addition, the entire contents of a card must first be copied to the HDD, and then users can single out specific game saves for permanent storage or deletion. Sounds like there's a new PS3 annoyance to add to the list...
Best time to buy a 360?
Is there ever a bad time? Well several pretty good deals expire this month, so it might pay to do your Christmas shopping earlier rather than later. Speaking of the Christmas rush, with all this focus on Microsoft's stated goal of 10 million consoles shipped by year end, shouldn't there be a special prize for the soul who takes home that shimmering 10 millionth Xbox 360 and makes Robbie Bach's holiday?
Buy 2 games, get 1 free at Toys R Us
Toys R Us is kicking off the Holiday Season with their annual buy 2 games, get 1 free sale. The selection isn't comprehensive, but you should be able to pick three games you can live with. Offer Expires October 28.[Thanks Fargo]
Double Agent plus 12 mos of XBL in Canada
Reader Forbiddon from Canada spotted a great deal for Sam Fisher fans in the Great White North. Buy a copy of Splinter Cell: Double Agent for $59.99 CA (already $10 off the regular Canadian price) and get 12 free months of Xbox Live. The Best Buy Canada site currently doesn't mention the XBL offer, so you'll have to take his word for it.
Save $50 on a 360 at CompUSA
CompUSA is selling 360 Platinum Packages for $349.99 after $50 mail-in rebate, plus free shipping, until September 16. This offer is online only. They're also having a fire sale on the older games.Can anybody who know tell me the percentage of people who actually mail in the rebates from these big box stores because I don't think I've ever remembered to send one in?[Thanks Muppet]
Last chance to get a 360 for $352
Overstock.com has 360s back in stock. Today is the last day you can take advantage of a 12% off coupon that lets you snag a Premium System for $80 off retail.[Thanks Fargo]
Saving yourself while killing zombies
While Dead Rising's non-stop zombie-killing action has led the game to robust sales, reviewers were lukewarm about the game's punishing save system. Wired's Clive Thompson has taken a bit of a philosophical look at the effect infrequent saves have on the experience of playing the game. On the one hand, having to backtrack twenty minutes after every death makes the player "constantly on the verge of mind-bending frustration." On the other hand, not having a save-anywhere safety net makes the game a "much more intense and authentic experience."How about this for a compromise: get rid of save systems altogether, forcing gamers to leave their system on for days to beat tougher games. It worked on the NES ...[Via GameSetWatch]
MS drops price of Core System in UK
Microsoft has repeatedly said that they won't be cutting the price of the 360, but then, reader Lorul2 never thought he'd have "three kids and dead end job." Things change, and they obviously have in the UK where GamesIndustry.biz confirms the Xbox 360 Core System is now selling for the official price of £199 off of £209. That's converts to a drop of about $19. No word on a similar price cut for other SKUs or markets. Will this invigorate interest in the lowly core system?[Thanks Lorul2]
Madden 07 for $47.99
CircuitCity.com is letting Madden 07 go for $47.99. If only they'd throw in a jockstrap.[Thanks Corey]
Rip, mix, save and convert YouTube videos for your iPod with TubeSock
If saving YouTube videos as favorites and making your own playlists online with their services isn't enough to quench your thirst for their literal flood of content, TubeSock lets you take things one step further by allowing you to save the videos and even convert them for your iPod. It's a small utility that allows you to enter a YouTube URL or simply a video ID, and it can show you a preview of the movie and offer a couple of saving and export options including H.264, PSP, audio-only and even a plain Flash FLV file. TubeSock can also install a bookmarklet in Safari for speedier delivery, and it can even send exported videos straight into iTunes to complete the ultimate YouTube-to-iPod workflow. After playing with the demo, I'm impressed. Compression is impressively speedy, and for bonus points it automatically cleans up the Flash file it dowloads once exporting is done. The demo is limited to exporting only the first 30 seconds of any video until you fork over the $15 registration fee. TubeSock is a Universal Binary and available from stinkbot.[via digg]
Get organized: a survey of digital junk drawer apps
A while ago I decided to bring some sanity to the way I do things and organize all my stuff. I'm working on a design thesis in my multimedia undergrad degree, I'm constantly doing research for my blogging work, and I have countless other projects and ideas that were growing in both size and disorganization in my Home folder. When I decided to finally start getting organized, I realized I might not be the only person in this position, and I figured I would turn my research and testing experiences into a post; a sort of survey of what some call 'digital junk drawer' applications.What follows is a pro and con summary of four of the most popular junk drawer apps I looked at, but read this post with a few of my criteria in mind: I like keyboard shortcuts. I like them a lot. Being able to highlight a chunk of text in a browser or a PDF I'm reading and hitting a couple of keys to send it to a junk drawer app is far more efficient and less workflow-intrusive than having to use a mouse to drag and drop it to some far corner of my display. I decided not to touch apps that employ entirely different paradigms such as the wiki-like VoodooPad; I'm not denying the usefulness of these other ways of working, but adding that entirely new level to this survey would've meant putting this post on the back-burner for longer than I would like. I'm using a MacBook Pro 2.0 Ghz with 1.5 GB RAM, and while I synced my notes library across these apps to gauge performance 'n all that jazz, my library is a mere 500 notes (URLs, PDFs, etc.) strong, so your mileage may vary. With that said, check out my survey of some Mac OS X apps that could help you bring order to your digital chaos, and feel free to post your thoughts or mention apps that should've made this list, and why.
Price drop blues: 360 Premium for $352.51
If you're still wallowing in self-pity because Microsoft shot down rumors of a 360 price drop, this deal might cheer your cheap ass up. Overstock.com is letting premium systems go for the low, low price of $352.51 after applying a 12% discount for first time customers (At least they were. See below). It looks like you can save another 5% by signing up for their affinity credit card. Now whip out the plastic like a real American and be glad you're not selling a kidney to afford a PS3.Update: Damn -- It sold out while I was typing this post. Maybe they'll re-overstock. In the mean time, anybody want to buy a kidney?[Thanks Clayton A.]
Buy 2 used games, get 1 free at Gamestop/EB
The July issue of Game Informer has a "Buy two used games, get one free" coupon for use at Gamestop/EB, pictured above in post rip-out condition. They discount the cheapest game so you need to buy three $55 games to get the full value out of it. There's also a $20 extra trade-in credit coupon for when you trade in that crusty old system.
MS first party titles for $29.99
According their latest Sunday circular (helpfully scanned by Xboxic) electronics retailer FYE is letting aging launch titles PGR3, PDZ and Kameo go for the low, low price of $29.99. The offer doesn't appear to be available on their website, so consider it an old-fashioned brick and mortar sale, complete with fine print (no rainchecks, two per customer). Circuit City will likely match the price if you bring in the ad.
Firefox extension: VideoDownloader does just what it says
VideoDownloader is a slick Firefox extension that allows you to save content from websites, including embedded videos at sites like YouTube. The extension adds a small icon to Firefox's status bar that, when clicked, offers a pop-up window with a download link of the actual file you want. Simple and painless. The one catch I've run into so far: the files from some Flash-embedded sites like YouTube are .FLV, and while I have the latest Flash player installed, I can't seem to find it, and not even Safari will open these with a File > Open command. Other than that, this extension has worked great for grabbing all sorts of media so far.The list of sites this extension works with is lengthy, but really it should allow you to grab embedded content from just about anywhere. Unless, of course, the site has already been turned on to haxies like this and they've already launched countermeasures. Until then, enjoy.
Access iPhoto and iTunes libraries with a simple Automator action
You could also file this under "fantastic Automator actions that Apple should've advertised when Tiger was being released."A post at macosxhints has discovered a simple Automator action you can use to open panel containing your entire iPhoto or iTunes library (pictured), complete with albums/playlists, DnD and even search abilities. This is for all those times you groan at having to start iPhoto just to grab an image or two. Bonus points for the iTunes library action: songs are playable from this panel.Check out the macosxhints post for the drop-dead simple 3-step process (it's really only two steps) for creating this handy panel.
