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Google Maps 4.0 with Buzz support now available in Android Market
Looks like Android's getting in on the new Google Buzz party in more ways than one today -- in addition to support in the browser, Maps 4.0 is now in the Android Market and it's all Buzz-ed up and ready to go. We've heard from both Droid and G1 owners that it works on their devices, so we're guessing every other Android set out there running 1.6 or higher will work as well -- let us know if you find anything else cool, won't you? Same goes for you S60 and WinMo kids out there. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Google Buzz takes mobile location services to the next level
Google just announced that it's bringing some serious location-based integration to its services, all centered around the new Buzz social networking tool built into Gmail. Google's going to do location better than the usual latitude / longitude coordinates -- it's able to snap those to actual place names and then take context-aware actions depending on where you are. The new location services is integrated into the main mobile Google.com search page and the new buzz.google.com page for the iPhone and Android, and into maps for Android, S60, and Windows Mobile. Buzz is rolling out starting today, and it should hit everyone within "the next few days."
An app with everything but sales
TriplePoint PR's site has a post on their blog about Orbital [iTunes Link], an iPhone game released a while back that I presume is one of their clients. Obviously, they've done their job: we're talking about the game, which is $.99US or available in a lite free version [iTunes Link]. But they've also provided us with a little insight into just how things are going in the app's release, and the picture they paint says "not well." Oh, sure, it's been reviewed well, there's a little bit of buzz about it, and the game itself, says the firm, is good (trust them at your own risk, but they sound like they really do enjoy it). So what's the problem? It's not selling. To be fair, it is selling. They've sold less than 100,000 units, they say, and even half of that is a nice chunk of sales. But apparently that's not a success, and they're wondering why. Piracy is their first guess -- we've heard before that piracy can be a huge issue, even on cheap apps. They say the game had an 80% piracy rate in the first week, which has since dropped down to 24%. I'm not convinced piracy can be blamed completely -- there's no guaranteeing that all pirates would have bought a real copy anyway. But certainly there's something going on here -- you can have a terrific app that's well-reviewed and buzzworthy, and if it doesn't end up in the right place at the right time, it still won't be successful (or at least as successful as you want). Everyone is still working to unlock success in the App Store, but with over 100,000 products on the shelves, it has become increasingly more difficult for the good apps to stand apart.
HTC's 2010 roadmap goes on display?
Those among us with minds like steel traps might recall that HTC's 2009 was leaked with shocking accuracy way back in January of this year, which lends some credibility to this already-believable series of slides we have seemingly showing off most of the good stuff we can expect out of the company in the coming months. The stuff we're privy to here was allegedly presented at a meeting in Vienna back in October, with both Windows Mobile and Android designs broken up into four target demo categories: Design / Lifestyle, Social, Performance (we like the sound of that), and Productivity -- but don't take our word for it. Follow the break for everything you need to know about this very real-sounding downpour of specs and renders. %Gallery-79710%
Scandalous! Buzz and Sackboy romantic rendezvous in Vienna!
It looks like some romance may be happening at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe. Two popular PlayStation mascots were seen on a date in Vienna. In this shocking video (after the break), you'll see Sackboy and Buzz shamelessly holding hands, eating lunch together, and riding the wiener risenrad. We're disgusted by Buzz's actions here. Yes, Sackboy is adorable -- but he's only one year old. Just because you're a video game celebrity doesn't mean you can get away with this kind of sickening pedophilia. [Via @Media_Molecule; design inspired by TMZ.com]
Buzz! developer says PlayStation Home is starting to realize its potential
Andrew Eades, executive director of Buzz! developer Relentless Software, recently had a few nonplussed things to say to VideoGamer.com about Sony's virtual social hub, PlayStation Home. Specifically, he remarked, "Home doesn't appeal to me personally that much," adding that he doesn't know why the experience appeals to people. Though he might not be its biggest fan, Eades later added that Home still has room to grow, and that only now is it "realizing its potential." Eades suggested that Sony focus on "[building] the tools to allow people to create content for it," mentioning that his studio has plans for "a game we're considering doing which only could work in Home." It's just a wild guess, but we're picturing a multiplayer trivia title with heavy crossdressing elements.
PSN Thursday: Begun, the Mushroom Wars have
The PSN update returns this week with another game that looks adorable and safe, yet conceals some disturbing ideas. Mushroom Wars looks beautiful and innocent, but like any good RTS, it's all about exterminating the competition. Genocide isn't supposed to be cute. This comes following Capybara's Critter Crunch, last week's "cute, yet disturbing game," and remember Fat Princess? That wasn't all that long ago either. We're sensing a theme ... a theme we can't help but put money down on. Check out the full PSN update after the break. Choose your platform to view the corresponding release list: (Note: Continue past the break to view both release lists.)
First Look: ZenNews brings the news cloud to your iPhone
Zensify announced its latest app, ZenNews [iTunes link], this morning. It's basically an intelligent news aggregator, using algorithms to find "what's hot" from a variety of sources including the New York Times, the Washington Post, Al Jazeera, the Guardian and more. It parses Twitter and other social mediums to figure out who's talking about what, and then creates a tag cloud of hot topics. There's an aggregated view combining all sources, or you can view a tag cloud for each source. You can toggle sources and/or categories on and off in the preferences. If a keyword in the tag cloud reveals more than 5 articles, tapping it will drill down into another tag cloud, repeated until the keyword returns a list of 5 or fewer articles. View articles within ZenNews using the built-in webkit browser, or open them in Safari. You can always switch from the tag cloud to a list view for any page, and there's a default view titled "All News" which lists all the aggregated news (in list format) at once. You can drill down to specific topics in the Categories view, and see what's new/hot from all enabled sources for a single category. As you read, you can mark any article as a favorite, and view a list of your marked articles in the Favorites view. You can quickly share articles via Twitter or email, as well. It's all quite slick, and pretty solid for a first release. I did run into a bug which would bring up blank tag cloud pages if a specific combination of being on a certain view and losing a network connection at the right time occurred. I spoke with the developers yesterday, and I'm confident they'll smooth out any wrinkles quickly. Zensify is offering ZenNews for free. Their plan is to demonstrate the buzz-detecting algorithms, and then offer white-label versions -- using a subscription model -- to companies with a need for up-to-the-minute buzz tracking. For the rest of us, this is a good-looking and, as far as I've been able to tell, accurate way to see what's happening in the world at any given moment. Check out the gallery below for a preview, and grab a copy on the App Store. %Gallery-75650%
Test your friendship with Buzz! on Facebook
Are you really friends with your Facebook friends? It's time to find out with the new Buzz! application. The "Friend Quiz" lets you and your invited friends to partake in a trivia contest about your mutual buddies. The quiz will draw information from mutual friends' status updates, comments, interests and photos.Buzz will be narrating the entire game, so expect some snide remarks from the short British host. Each question, in typical Buzz! style, is timed: make sure you answer quickly to get the most points. At the end of the game, you'll be able to post your total score to your Wall, as you wait for your invited friends to beat you. It's a terrific twist on classic Buzz! gameplay, and best of all -- it's free.[Via PlayStation.Blog Europe]
Scene It? *will* use BUZZ! controllers (on PS3™)
The battle of the console-exclusive peripheral-wielding weirdly-punctuated trivia games has come to an end ... with PlayStation the victor. WBIE is bringing Scene It?, the former 360-exclusive trivia game, to PS3 and Wii. While the 360 version was bundled with a set of special Scene It? controllers, the PS3 and Wii versions of the game will let you simply use your ol' fashioned DualShocks and Wii Remotes.But what if you want to use a wacky peripheral? Don't fret, as you'll be able to use your BUZZ! controllers with Scene It?. Considering many of the modes of Scene It? require buzzing in, the translation is incredibly faithful.
Swiss gamer comes out on top as Buzz! World Champion
Earlier this week, Armin Diethelm of Switzerland was crowned Buzz! World Champion in the town of Buñol, Spain, during a massive international competition. Armed with a Buzz! controller and a quick trigger finger, Diethelm walked away from the contest with his new title and a MINI Clubman.If playing the popular trivia game for high stakes wasn't enough excitement for the 32 national champions flown in from around the world, the competition's conclusion marked the start of Buñol's annual tomato fight, La Tomatina. We don't know the history behind the event, but we do know what kind of soup the people in Valencia will be enjoying for the next six weeks.
Buzz now host to over 1.7 million user generated questions
Over 1.7 million questions have now been created by users using the MyBuzzQuiz website. That's 218,750 8-question quizzes, which is the equivalent to almost 11 thousand Amateur Quizwriter trophies. Considering it's only been a year since Buzz! Quiz TV was first released (September in the US), this is an impressive number -- enough to fill 350 Buzz retail discs -- and works out to over 18 thousand quizzes being made per month.These quizzes can all be played and enjoyed by anyone, regardless of whether you own the game or not, thanks to the MyBuzzQuiz website. Alternatively, you can check out the Buzz! Home space which is set to launch this week, where these questions will be pumped in and answered collectively by the Home community.
Ultimate Buzz Lightyear robot to the rescue, on video
Step aside, Wall-E: Buzz Lightyear, courtesy of Thinkway Toys, has arrived to claim his rightful place at the top of the robot-based-on-Disney-character heap. Maybe that's a bit of a stretch, but Buzz's facial animation, sexy moves and trademark catch-phrases have all been wrapped up into a nice little bow here to rake in the cash when Toy Story and Toy Story 2 hit theaters this October as a 3D glasses double feature. Buzz responds to a few voice commands, can play a laser tag with the included remote, has a "Puppeteering Programming" mode to pose him for your own animations, and can even suffer an identity crisis when you tell him that he's just a toy. He'll be available this fall for $130-ish, check out a video after the break.
ESRB: Buzz Jr. RoboJam, SingStar Sampler Pack coming to the US
A few more discoveries were made today off the ESRB website. Looks like American PS3 owners will be able to download Buzz Jr. RoboJam off the PSN some time soon. The family friendly PSN game is a port of a PS2 game with the same name and has some of the easiest Trophies around. It'll require the Buzz! buzzers though, so many trophy hunters will be out of luck.A new SingStar game has also been discovered on the ESRB. The SingStar Sampler Pack looks to be yet another expansion to the franchise, this time featuring David Bowie, Fergie, Amy Winehouse, Rockwell, and the Smashing Pumpkins.Finally, long-lost PSN game topatoi looks like it may actually be coming out. You can watch the bizarre promo trailer here and check out our gallery.%Gallery-66362%
BUZZ! Quiz World is ... more Buzz
Unsurprisingly, Sony showed off more BUZZ! games for PS3 and PSP. Quiz World will be available on both PS3 and PSP. For the most part, Quiz World provides an experience that players should be already familiar with. The PS3 game will add 5,000 new questions and will provide an "enhanced" online mode with new game modes. One mode we saw had question answers hidden, with letters slowly appearing. You'll have to be patient, but you'll also have to be quicker than your opponents. The PSP game will feature 3,000 new questions and introduces online infrastructure mode. Like the PS3 game, players will be able to access user-generated MyBUZZ! content and will offer downloadable quiz packs as DLC.It's hard to say much more about the game, as we're sure most of you are quite familiar with it. Looks like BUZZ! is taking a Madden-esque approach, with minor updates improving the franchise annually. We're not sure if it'll garner the same following as EA Sports' series, though.%Gallery-65170%
E3 2009: Sony says Playstation Home holds 6.5 million accounts
In addition to all of the games Sony has been showing at their press conference today, Sony released some impressive numbers for their Playstation Home service, revealing they now hold 6.5 million accounts and the Home service sports an 85% return rate for users. The 6.5 million accounts is impressive, but the 85% return rate is a vague, empty number that we're not quite sure what it means.To further expand their plans for Home, Sony will be introducing over 100 new virtual items each month, as over 100,000 items related to Capcom and Resident Evil were sold two months after their introduction. Future game spaces will include areas for inFAMOUS, Buzz! and Socom, with EA, Ubisoft, Activision, Namco, and Eidos jumping on the game space bandwagon with their support.
Buzz! space coming to Home 'very soon'
Buzz! is coming Home "very soon," according to both the US and EU PlayStation Blogs. The new space will feature a 64-player quiz game, which requires you to stand on the correct answer on the giant Buzz! controller as user-generated questions are pumped in from MyBuzz!. Exclusive prizes will be available for those who consistently find themselves at the top of the leaderboard. Check out the video after the break to see the Home space in action or visit the European PlayStation Flickr set for a selection of screenshots.
Trophies: BUZZ! Junior: RoboJam
0 Platinum1 Gold5 Silver5 Bronze Difficulty: Very Easy Online Trophies? No Time to Completion: 1 hourDLC Trophies? No View Trophy List Read More About the Game %Gallery-77339%
Buzz! World Championship competition begins this month
Europeans will have the opportunity to represent their country in an international quiz contest, courtesy of SCEE. The Buzz! World Championship will begin on April 22 in the UK, Germany and France -- May 6 elsewhere. For a month after that, owners of Buzz! Brain of the UK (or any of its regional equivalents) will be able to upload their best scores to the leaderboard. The top 32 will go on to the national final, with the winner in each country finally being flown off to a secret location to play for their entire country.The prize? That would be the Mini Clubman that you can see above. An intrinsically British prize, even though the contest is Europe-wide. Nevertheless, it could be yours if you demonstrate your patriotic knowledge later this month.
Buzz! Quiz TV getting 'Prehistoric Thumb' pack, Buzz PSN game coming tomorrow
Quiz show fans get some downloadable goodness tomorrow, as PSN will feature two specific items pertaining to Buzz!. First up, Buzz! Quiz TV is getting some DLC in the 'Prehistoric Thumb' pack, which will add 500 new questions that test your knowledge on things such as the formation of the Earth and the fossils of its early inhabitants.Also arriving on PSN tomorrow is Buzz! Junior: Jungle Party, a title made up of 5 fast-paced mini-games. Available for $4.99, Buzz! Junior: Jungle Party is a title geared towards the younger crowd and allows you to use your Buzz! controller to play through the variety of local multiplayer modes on offer.
