Awesome Techs

According to what Video game industry analyst Michael Pachter said, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 to receive price cuts again this year.

He said,

“The Wii enjoyed a $350 price advantage over the PS3 at launch, and a $150 advantage until September. Now, the gap has narrowed to $100, with the feature-laden PS3 a tempting purchase for prospective console households,” says Pachter.

“The holiday Wii sales boost was primarily attributable to a $50 gift card promotion offered by Wal-Mart; while we expect similar promotions at holiday next year, we expect the other consoles to be lower-priced by then, further eroding the Wii’s competitive price advantage.”

“It appears that piracy in Europe and some substitution of iPod Touch games has impacted DS software sales more than we expected, and we have adjusted our estimates for FY:11 to account for further pressure.”

The Xbox Live is recently added with  Twitter, Facebook and Last.fm. And microsoft is saying this proves to be a major hit. And all are welcoming this feature.

According to Microsoft spokesman David Dennis, the first-week figures show that at least 2 million Xbox Live users have logged into Facebook, and that half a million Last.fm accounts were created in the first 24 hours of availability.

But in fact the users atleast some of them are underwhelmed. Also some of them thinks this implementation, how it is implemented is not the way they expected.

Some users have posted status updates as “First and last post from the xbox”. Well this explains what microsoft says, is actually not happening. This may not be a smashing hit at all. This is a new feature, so everyone will be waiting for trying it. So these numbers are quite normal for the first few weeks, What counts is the users who regularly login to facebook and all using XBOX, but for this we have to wait.

One users comment for the reported news at Downloadsquad.com,

Great features in writing, but very poorly executed.

Until I can access Twitter and Facebook through the Guide button, I have no need for either one on the 360.

And Last.FM? What’s the point of turning on the jet engines and leaving your TV on the whole time, just to get an ad-filled music experience with a poor resolution slideshow going on in the background? No thanks. Again, give me music streaming through the Guide button that can be played while gaming, and I’ll actually use it.

Not hard to believe the stats for the week one, but let’s have a look at week 2 stats.

Last week microsoft banned lots of users who modded their XBOX for playing pirated games, which is said to be affected between 600,000 and one million members of the online service.

Well now it seems like they are fighting back. The odd thing is ( Or you can call it even ) these people are trying to unban these XBOX s by modding again.

This trick/modding includes some software and hardware modding. This process is somewhat complex for a new user. But the website which published this mod says it worth doing since this mod will unban the XBOX for sure.

But for this, one should need another XBOX which has not been banned.

To be exact these are the tools and software you should need if you want to do this.

your 8955 live console + cpu key
a 2nd unbanned console
nandpro b + flash cable
xell loader
degraded
1888 fs
robinsod’s flashtool

And the Process is,

“use nandpro and dump nand from unbanned console.
flash xell and use jtag hack to obtain cpu key.
use flashtool to extract file system.

dump nand from 8955 console.
use flashtool to patch nand dump with kv.bin from unbanned console.
save patched file (patched_kv.bin).

open degraded + 1888 fs.
create 1888 downgrader image (downgrader.bin) from your patched_kv.bin file.

flash downgrader.bin to 8955 console.
attach hdd + ethernet cable and boot console.

connect to live and update to 8955 dashboard.

console is now fully working and unbanned!”

You can read more on how to do this Here.

Yesterday MCVUK posted a news about the launch of Microsfot Natal.

According to MCVUK “The Natal will be releasing on November 2010 and almost 5million units are to be shipped globally. There will be 14 games, on the first launch of Natal.

The details are said to be from a closed and secret tour, Microsoft has been having with UK publishers and studios showing off the technology in an effort to increase development.

As per the post, The device will be available by itself for under £50 ($80 USD).

If you dont have any idea about, “WHAT NATAL IS“, read this.

Wedbush Morgan videogame industry analyst Michael Pachter has made some more interesting comments this week on GameTrailer’s Bonus Round, stating that Microsoft is ready to move on from PC gaming, and that the company will eventually raise the price of Xbox Live Gold subscriptions.

“Microsoft wants you to never play a game again on your PC and play everything on your 360,” says Pachter. “You give a PC gamer an incentive to buy a 360 if you put something that he really wants only on the 360.”

Why would Microsoft want to kill off its still popular PC platform?

“You can’t hook a guy into Xbox Live Gold if he’s playing on PC. So, I mean, that’s the other problem is you really wanna hook every gamer who has a 360, you want them to buy all their games on 360, play everything multiplayer, pay you 50 bucks a year so that in a couple years, it’s 100 bucks a year. And that’s going up — we all know that,” Pachter declares, via 1up.

Another great news for gaming world. XBox is expecting to launch XBox 360 with natal support in 2010 Q3.

For all who are not familiar with the name NATAL.

Natal is a technology in which camera sensors are used for detecting movements made by users( game players in this case ). Then this is turned to video game play back.So the thing we dont need a controller for controlling the game.

Project Natal according to Microsoft:

Introducing Project Natal, a revolutionary new way to play: no controller required.  See a ball? Kick it, hit it, trap it or catch it.  If you know how to move your hands, shake your hips or speak you and your friends can jump into the fun — the only experience needed is life experience.

Now if that comes to XBox thats good news right?.

Digitimes Report about this:

Aptina Imaging has been selected as the exclusive supplier for CMOS sensors to be used in Microsoft’s Project Natal motion sensor system that will be bundled with Xbox 360 consoles.

Electronista adds that

“to meet demand for the Xbox 360 game controller, Aptina plans on upping capacity at its fabrication facility in Italy that makes 8-inch wafers and look for a partner in another foundry.”

Read More about Project Natal