Atlus U.S.A. announced Summon Night: Twin Age for Nintendo DS, a fully stylus-driven action RPG set in the Summon Night universe. The stylus is your key to the world of Clardona, whether as your swinging sword or your shimmering wall of fire. Summon Night: Twin Age is currently scheduled to bring its precise controls, beautifully animated graphics, and addictive action RPG gameplay to the Nintendo DS on May 20th.
From a very young age, the human girl Reiha displayed great aptitude for the magical art of Summoning. While still a child, her powers caused a terrible accident during a major Summoning experiment. It was reported that Reiha had died as result, but she survived, along with a young Summon Beast named Aldo that had been pulled into her world...
Following the accident, the two children grew up together as brother and sister on the tropical island of Jarazi, among a race of people with beast-like features. There they learned to commune with the Nature Spirits that surrounded them. One day, the Spirits began acting strangely, prompting Reiha and Aldo to investigate. Their quest to find out who or what is behind the corruption of the Spirits will lead them back to the human lands where the cataclysm first brought them together…
Immerse yourself in a lavish gaming experience that lets you do battle, collect items, craft weapons, earn and improve skills, conjure beasts, build relationships with party members, trade items via local wireless, and much more. With alternate story paths, loads of battle options, side quests, and multiple ending sequences, there is a wide variety of ways to play. Replay the game and challenge yourself with extra dungeons.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Atlus Conjures Summon Night: Twin Age for Nintendo DS
Asus P5KC, anything better for similar price?
I recently posted a thread relating to upgrading a processor on another PC. I've since sold that machine and now I'm PC-less.
I almost put this in the Motherboards section, but it's turned into more of a building thing...
I'm on a tight-ish budget of between $900 and $1200 and I'm building from the ground up. I have a screen, mouse and keys so I'll need everything from a motherboard and CPU to a case and a rodent to run on a wheen to power the thing.
I'm leaning towards this board because it supports DDR3 as well as our beloved DDR2, it sports a high stock FSB of 1333MHz and gives me the option to run two cards in SLI configuration, should I choose to do so (by that I mean I happen to be able to afford it later). Also, I've never had issues with Asus boards; thier build quality has always been fairly good and has been improving greatly over the last few years.
The other option was a Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3P. If I wanted to really push my machine to it's capilliary-breaking limits, this would be a no brainer. It's similarly priced but you can really squeeze some serious sizzling performance. I'll be overclocking eventually, but when I need to.
Just to give you an idea of where I'm at with my budget so far:
GeForce 8600GTS 256MB (purchased, $134.95)
Zalman 600W PSU (purchased, $160)
E8400 CPU ($255 avg. price, not purchased)
Asus P5KC ($165, not purchased)
Antec 300 Case ($90, not purchased)
2GB Generic DDR2 1066Mhz RAM ($80, not purchased)
80GB Samsung HDD ($40, not purchased)
250GB Samsung HDD ($70, not purchased)
Edit: Windows XP Pro $180
Total at $1175. I figure that when the budget permits, and by that I mean once I get my soul back from the Dark Lord that goes by the name or Hon. Master Card, I'll go get another 8600 of some kind and some scary fast RAM.
Sony Releases New PS3 TV Ad
Update: Just to clarify, this ad would be new if it came to the North America region. It has been circulating in Europe for a little while now.
Original Story:
We all know that Sony is the undisputed king of bizarre marketing campaigns in the video game realm, especially when it comes to television. The first set of TV ads they rolled out for the US launch in late 2006 boggled the mind with their vague yet quietly thought-provoking commercials. Well, you'll start seeing the latest this month, and we thought you'd want to take a look at it.
Here's the advertisement in question, and the theme this time around is "Technology that updates itself." Now, this could be interpreted in a variety of ways - which is exactly the point, we suppose - but all in all, it remains just as vague as ever. We see a robot become a human female, but how the PS3 "updates itself" is a little beyond our mortal comprehension. Heck, it can't even download the system updates by itself; we have to do it! Oh, we jest, of course (we understand the basic gist), but leave it to Sony to produce a commercial like this. Lately, the entire PlayStation business has been on the upswing, so perhaps these ads are designed to take advantage of this positive sales surge. After all, you gotta strike when the iron's hot, right?
We anticipate new PSP commercials, too (you know, "Get your own" and all that), but we haven't seen anything just yet. All we know is that many analysts are calling 2008 the "year of the PS3," and you can bet your bottom dollar that Sony will promote the snot out of their console to make that projection a reality.
Nokia India sales up by 36%
Global handset manufacturer, Nokia posted sales of 51 billion euros in 2007.
"Our significant market share gains in Asia-Pacific were primarily driven by our strong position in the fastest growing markets, such as
The over all sales for the company grew by 24.2 per cent as compared to total sales of 4.1 billion euros last year.
Nokia Launches Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte in India
Devinder Kishore, Director Marketing, Nokia India, said, "As part of its premium range, Nokia brings yet another iconic mobile phone. Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte sets the benchmark for quality and craftsmanship. The high-end materials and seamless surfaces celebrate the art of individuality, inspired by natural light with minimalistic design."
The company said the Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte combines an elegant appearance with uncompromised functionality. The handset has a high-end metal and glass composition. A smooth slide mechanism, comprised of ball bearings and a spring mechanism, ensures that the handset is a pleasure to use.
The Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte offers a sense of exclusivity by enhancing its polished steel case with a genuine sapphire gem stone and an accent of soft brown napa leather, which creates a rich, sensual feel.
The handset comes with unique tap-for-time and turn-to-mute features, while living wallpapers move organically throughout the day. By double-tapping the steel surface below the display, an analog clock appears to indicate the time. Incoming calls can be silenced on the phone by simply turning over the phone, screen-side down.
Nokia has created a unique and exclusive soundtrack for the new device composed by master producers Kruder & Dorfmeister with visuals by Fritz Fitzke, adding an extra touch of sophistication and individuality.
Nokia's new anti-fingerprint coating reduces smudges on metal and glass and unsightly outer seams are hidden with an all-in-one microUSB connector.
Key features of the Nokia Sapphire Arte:
- 2" QVGA, 240 x 320 pixel OLED display with up to 16 million colors
- 3.2 MP auto focus camera with 8x digital zoom
- 1 GB built in memory space
- Anti-fingerprint coating on metal and glass
- Ambient light sensor to adjust screen brightness automatically
http://www.itnewsonline.com/
Sony eyes big ad gains from IPL
| Come April 18 and the advertisers will have compelling reasons for diverting their advertising budget from other television channels to Set Max — the host broadcaster of the Indian Premier League (IPL) — for the Twenty20 format cricket tournament promoted by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). |
| But are the advertisers ready to take the IPL gamble as opposed to popular entertainment channels like Star Plus, Zee TV, Sony TV and others that give them both ratings and viewership? Media planners give a balanced view on this. |
| According to the IPL schedule, a bulk of the 59 matches will be played during the 7 pm-10 pm prime time television band that currently attracts advertising money worth over Rs 2,000 crore between Star Plus, Zee TV, Sony TV and other entertainment channels. |
| Additionally, the advertisers are banking on the captive reach of IPL through Set Max to about 80 per cent of the 76 million cable homes. |
| Together, the 59 IPL matches played for 44 consecutive days will generate over 177 hours of live cricket action. This, advertisers said, may give them a good reason to divert their ad-budget from the existing entertainment channels to Set Max. But media planners have a different take on the IPL. |
| Said Vikram Sakhuja, chief executive of GroupM India, the country’s largest media agency: “The whole power of IPL lies in the fact that it will differentiate vanilla advertising from brand sponsorship. It brings great sponsorship opportunities and as in the case of Olympics, all brands that feel that IPL is an extension of values, will want to pay the premium to be a part of the whole exercise.” |
| On Set Max, the advertisers will have about 35 hours of advertising spots (each ad-spot is for 10 seconds) for the first IPL tournament with fixed on-air sponsors. |
| Going by the industry buzz, Set Max has already finalised three more associate sponsors in Nokia, Hero Honda and Coca-Cola, apart from Vodafone (presenting sponsor) and Hyundai Motors (associate sponsor). |
| “Two more associate sponsors will come in shortly so that we will have six associate sponsors and one presenting sponsor,” a senior Sony TV executive said. |
| While Vodafone is said to have paid Rs 30-32 crore, the six associate sponsors will pay about Rs 22-24 crore each for being the exclusive advertisers for that category. |
| Explaining the benefits of being the on-air advertiser on Set Max, Vivek Srivastava, joint managing director, Innocean Worldwide India, the in-house advertising arm of Hyundai Motors, said: “With Hyundai as the associate sponsor, we will be ensured that no other four-wheeler brand will get to advertise during the IPL matches. All associate sponsors will get 200 seconds during each match and that will help us deliver focused messages to the viewers.” |
| Set Max has said it will pocket about Rs 300 crore from the IPL tournament. Going by the industry rates, the broadcaster will earn about Rs 180 crore from fixed on-air sponsors while the rest should come from spot sales. |
| But currently, the 10-second ad-spot rates for Set Max are in the range of Rs 2.5-2.9 lakh. At this rate, the broadcaster will be able to add another Rs 64 crore taking the tally to Rs 244 crore, Rs 56 crore short of its target. But a senior Sony TV executive is confident that as the tournament goes on, the ad-spot rates will shoot up to Rs 6-8 lakh, and thereby they will touch Rs 300 crore. |
| But media buyers are sceptical at such a huge escalation. According to senior media planners, each IPL match will offer about 200 ten seconds advertising spots on Set Max, of which about 160 such spots will go to the sponsors. |
| “Unless, a company buys 10-12 ad-spots on 20-25 IPL matches, the advertising message will not have its desired impact on the consumers. Will I advise my clients to stop advertising on Star Plus or Zee TV in favour of Set Max? Of course not! But I will tell them to buy spots if Set Max gets a consistent higher ratings,” said a senior media buyer. |
| The Sony Entertainment Television-World Sports Group (WSG) combine bagged the 10-year telecast rights for IPL at a whopping Rs 4,000 crore. And ad-revenue target of Rs 300 crore in the first year will mean a shortfall of about 33 per cent in the first year. |
| But Sony executives feel that as the IPL fever catches on, the advertisers will start spending big from second year onwards that will help the channel fill the gap in revenue. |
EMI interested in Nokia’s music service
Major record label, EMI has expressed interest in Nokia's 'comes with music' service. Nokia has already convinced Universal Music to make its content available for the service. The 'Comes with music' handsets have songs preloaded on them, and allow the user to download an unlimited amount of music for a year.
The service will launch in the UK this year, to compete with other unlimited music services, such as Omnifone's MusicStation, currently offered by Vodafone. LG announced last month it would be introducing a product, similar to Nokia's, which would give the user unlimited access to music.