Latest news with #Xbox360
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Former GTA Lead Designer Hopes You'll Build The Content For His New Game For Free
MindsEye looks like a flashy but somewhat genericthird-person shooter techno thriller from the Xbox 360 era that recently escaped containment and is now coming out in just a few weeks. Two of the most notable things about it are its director, longtime Rockstar Games producer and Grand Theft Auto 5 lead designer Leslie Benzies, and just how exceptionally little fanfare there's been around its impending launch. A third is that MindsEye will feature its own spin on Roblox-style user-generated content, which Benzies hopes will be a big part of the game's decade-spanning growth plan. '[The studio] will support the game through with continuous new content,' he told referring to the space where a stream of studio-made add-ons for the game will be hosted, not to be confused with the toolset with which players will make their own new worlds and experiences. This big interview comes less than two weeks out from MindsEye's June 10 release on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. 'Some of the content, like races, are made just for fun. But [with] most of the content, we'll try and incorporate it into the story. So once you've played the big overarching ten-year plan, you'll have a very good idea of what this universe looks like.' MindsEye was originally revealed as a spin-off to Everywhere, a mysterious MMO that aimed to be its own open-world metaverse of sorts with multiple biomes and multiplayer modes. That pitch helped Benzies' Build A Rocket Boy studio raise nearly $40 million in funding but has since faded to the background as the team pivots to launching MindsEye as a conventional single-player $60 game in partnership with publisher IO Interactive, best known for the Hitman series. But while the upcoming shooter about an ex-soldier suffering from memory loss in a fictional version of Las Vegas begins as a 20-hour linear campaign, post-launch updates and user-generated content are supposed to extend its life well into the future. It's not clear how exactly, and Benzies is cagey about the details in his interview, but it sounds an awful lot like Roblox-style exploitation is part of the model. 'We have plans to add multiplayer, [and] we have plans to make a full open world,' he said. 'And of course, we've also got to look at what players are creating, and incorporate that into our plans. Given the ease of the tools, we think there's going to be a high percentage of players who will jump in and give it a pop, see how it feels. Hopefully some will create compelling content we can then promote and make that part of our plans to push to other players.' I, too, hope 'some will create compelling content,' and by 'some' I mean the team at Build A Rocket Boy, which is selling a $60 game and a paid premium pass required to access some of the additional post-launch content. Elsewhere in the interview, Benzies talks about the spectrum of crafting in games, saying he hopes the building tools will be somewhere in the middle between Roblox (hard but expansive) and Minecraft (easy but simple). Epic recently announced it's paid out over $300 million to people making stuff in Fortnite. 'The dream from the building side is to allow players the opportunity to create their own multiplayer open world games with ease,' Benzies told 'So anyone could pick up the game, jump in, drive around, stop at a point where they see something of interest, build a little mission, jump back in the car, drive again, build another mission. Once you've built a couple of hundred of these, you've built your own open world game. So, that's the build side.' Those are lofty goals for a brand-new game from a first-time studio. If the underlying game can deliver something solid, maybe there's a chance, but if not, I don't think the promise of user-generated content will be enough to bail MindsEye out. . For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
India Today
a day ago
- Business
- India Today
Amazon hires Xbox co-founder to lead ZeroOne team that will create breakthrough products
Amazon has a new team under its devices unit called the ZeroOne team, which will be led by the co-founder of Xbox and former Microsoft executive, J Allard, according to a report by CNBC. The team has been tasked with creating 'breakthrough' products. Allard, who worked with Microsoft for 19 years, co-founded Xbox. He was one of the prominent members at the time of the Xbox and Xbox 360 console launches. In 2010, Allard stepped down from his role as the technology chief of consumer products at Microsoft, and then worked at GoFundMe as their chief technology and product officer for a year. According to his LinkedIn profile, he then worked on his own company, Project 529 (which he founded in 2007), worked as a board member, and got his fellowship, until he joined Amazon in September 2024. At the time of writing the story, his current role at Amazon was listed as the vice president of ZeroOne. advertisementReportedly, the ZeroOne team will have people across Seattle, San Francisco and Sunnyvale, California. ZeroOne members will reportedly be working on both hardware and software projects. The name ZeroOne apparently signifies that the team will be working on the entire cycle of the product, from the concept to its launch. The Verge notes that a job listing for the new team reveals that one of these breakthrough products could be a smart home device. Reportedly, the ZeroOne team has job listings for senior roles in applied science, product marketing, and customer insights. The description for the role in applied science reveals that the person will be working on 'a new smart-home product', The Verge report reveals. Amazon already has a series of smart home devices under the Echo range of products that are powered by its AI software Amazon has reportedly also brought together people from across its various divisions, drawing on expertise from teams behind Alexa, the Luna cloud gaming platform, and the Halo sleep-tracking device, according to LinkedIn profiles of those now working on the ZeroOne initiative. One of the group's leaders is the former head of Lightform, a projection mapping startup previously acquired by Amazon is setting up a new team, the company is also cutting some corners at the same time. Earlier this year, Amazon laid off 100 employees from its Devices and Services unit, which oversees products like Echo speakers, Alexa, Kindle, and Zoox self-driving cars. According to the company, these layoffs were needed to align better with its product roadmap and streamline operations. Was it preparing to set up the ZeroOne team? Maybe. At the time, the company had said that the layoffs will help the company move faster.
The Courier
a day ago
- Entertainment
- The Courier
Dundee games boss Chris van der Kuyl investing millions in new technology
Chris van der Kuyl spent more than a decade helping Minecraft become a global phenomenon – but believes his new game could keep his Dundee company busy for the next 20 years. Chris has several surprises in store for his appearance at The Courier Business Conference next month. These include a demonstration of what a new 'world-class' Dundee virtual production studio is capable of. And Chris, who co-owns 4J Studios with Paddy Burns, will give a sneak peek of its new game which is the culmination of more than five years of work and millions of pounds of investment. The conference will take place at the new events space, The Real Deal, within the Water's Edge building he and Paddy own at the City Quay. The Courier Business Conference, held on June 24 in partnership with Henderson Loggie, has the theme of Powering Scotland's Creative Economy. 4J Studios will celebrate its 20th anniversary this year. It started off as – in Chris' words – a 'scrappy, work-for-hire games developer' with dreams of building a game based on its own intellectual property. After a series of successful projects, the company was recommended to Swedish games developer Mojang as a good option for creating a console version of Minecraft – now the best-selling video game of all time. The 4J team spent a year creating Minecraft for Xbox 360, which was released in 2012. 'We always knew that the game was quite special but we had absolutely no idea what it was to become,' Chris said. 'By the time it was getting close to launch, you could feel there was a different kind of anticipation for it compared to anything else. 'I think we hit a break-even point in the first five minutes of launching it. 'Then it went on to become the biggest ever selling Xbox 360 title. 'Our console versions sold almost 70 million copies. It was an incredible period.' 4J created seven console editions of the game, the last being for the Nintendo Switch in 2017, and it continues to provide updates for its existing versions. For more than five years, 4J has developed its own games engine – software from which games can be developed. This multi-million-pound investment on its Elements engine has been the basis of 4J developing its own original game, Reforj, which has reached the testing phase. Chris continued: 'If you told me we'd have had even three or four years of involvement with Minecraft I would have gone, 'wow, that's such a long time, that's mad'. 'To still be involved 13 years later blows my mind. 'But there was definitely a point where 4J had a real desire to reach out and start to develop our own games. 'We released Manic Mechanics a couple of years ago. That was us just really exercising our creative muscles again. 'The Elements engine is about five years of work from our top technical team. 'It's the core technology that allows us to build out new game Reforj, which will be 100 times higher performance than Minecraft.' Like Minecraft, Reforj is a 'sandbox' game which allows players to create and modify the game's world. It has recently been released to a few hundred fans to test and give feedback. Its full launch will likely be next year. 'The worlds in the game are generated faster than anybody's ever seen before,' Chris said. 'You can traverse our worlds at the speed of a jet plane and nothing pops up. 'The reaction's been incredible. Within minutes people had spun up YouTube channels about Reforj. Within days somebody had written a fan-based soundtrack. It's amazing. 'One of the key features of Reforj, is it's beyond blocks. You can shape and sculpt the blocks so people are able to create amazing structures. 'It's been millions of pounds of investment, but we're only at the beginning. 'We wholly expect Reforj to be something we work on for the next 20 years. 'And it's all ours, so we're very excited about where we can take it.' The other major project Chris has been working on is the next stage of the Water's Edge office development. It has won numerous awards since opening in 2019 and houses several of the city's most entrepreneurial firms, including 4J. These include some of the local businesses that have received financial investment from Chris and Paddy – Broker Insights and Ace Aquatec. The final part of the development is a new events space, The Big Real, which contains one of Dundee's most exciting developments, a virtual production studio. Abertay University's CoSTAR Realtime Lab specialises in the use of computer-generated imagery (CGI), augmented reality, and motion capture to create immersive virtual film, game and performance sets. Its vast screen will be the backdrop for this year's Courier Business Conference. Partnership working was key to securing funding for this facility to come to Dundee. Chris explained: 'Professor Gregor White from Abertay approached me about the project. The funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council relied on partnerships with existing creative studios,' Chris said. 'Water's Edge is a perfect home for it – we believe it's the beginning of something very special. There's nothing else like it in Scotland. 'It's phenomenal that the first major event we're hosting is the Courier Business Conference, and it'll be a showcase for the potential for this technology in this space. 'I think once they see what it's capable of, people's imaginations will run riot. 'It's a world-class facility. It's perfect for film and television units to do music videos, advertising or small parts of much larger productions. 'It can act as a catalyst for businesses to come to Dundee and we want local companies to use it. 'At the Courier Business Conference I'll also talk about how the games industry's next chapter is going to stretch way beyond what people think of as games today.' This year's conference will feature a keynote speech from Geoff Ellis, the chief executive of DF Concerts, which is behind the T in the Park and TRNSMT music festivals. There will also be a panel discussion featuring local business success stories on the theme of monetising creativity. The conference will run from 8.15am to 1pm followed by lunch and networking. Tickets are available at
Digital Trends
2 days ago
- Business
- Digital Trends
5 years in, the PS5 proves that the PS6 can't just be a more powerful box
The leap from one console to the next used to be so pronounced that it was impossible to ignore. It only took a glance to see the world (or dimension) of difference between SNES games and Nintendo 64 games, and understand exactly what the new system was offering. I'm cherry-picking that specific generation as the greatest gap in power we will likely ever experience, but I believe that the leaps in power throughout the entire video game console generation timeline spoke for themselves right up until the Xbox 360 and PS3 era. It isn't that technical advancements have leveled off after that, but the edges are blending together more with each generation. As we approach our fifth year with the PS5, and rumors continue to swirl about the PS6, I don't believe Sony can rely on a marginally more powerful box being enough to justify whatever price it demands next time around. Recommended Videos Diminishing returns It's no surprise that the main selling point for new hardware is its technical capabilities. It is easy to show off shinier graphics, bigger worlds, and more realistic physics to a mass audience. We all knew we had to get that PS1 or N64 to experience that level of 3D graphics, or get a PS3 or Xbox 360 to experience full HD games. I'd argue that the last time the general consumer saw a noticeable gap between one generation and the next was going from the PS3 to PS4. I'm not embarrassed to admit that even I could be fooled if someone told me some PS4 games were actually on PS5 or vice versa. Check out this screenshot of Uncharted 4 — a game released almost 10 years ago — and tell me this couldn't pass for a PS5 game. If you were to analyze and pick apart this game compared to a PS5 game, yes, I'm certain the PS5 game would come out on top. But more detailed shadows or faster rendering times don't necessarily make a game more fun to play. I'm also confident that every boost in power is a godsend to developers working to squeeze every bit of juice out of the hardware. Even in this regard we are starting to see developers praising the efficiency of new hardware above any graphical leap. Kojima Productions' chief technical officer Akio Sakamoto commented on the transition from PS4 to PS5 for Death Stranding 2 to Edge Magazine saying, 'The most obvious improvement from a technological point of view is the reduction in loading times, but to be honest, the difference between the two hardware systems isn't so great,' he says. 'It's more a case that on PS5 there are more efficient ways of arriving at similar goals.' I won't deny how important it is to make the creation of games as frictionless as possible for the developers, but the fact is that those are diminishing returns for a large group of players. All we care about is whether or not we feel justified investing in the box we spend our hard-earned cash on. The trend of introducing Pro models doesn't help the issue as they further blur the lines between proper generations. The PS5 Pro reveal is a prime example, where the differences had to be zoomed in on to be conveyed. We're breaching the level of what the average consumer can even understand as an improvement. Ray-tracing isn't exactly common parlance, and I doubt most people could tell you what a teraflop is. Compounding it all is the fact that many, if not most, people don't own the types of displays that can even show it off to experience that difference. I'm not saying that we should be content with where graphics are today. Someone at every stage of gaming has proclaimed that 'graphics can never get any better than this,' and has been proven wrong each time. PlayStation absolutely needs to make the PS6 as powerful as it can, but it can't rely on that as its main selling point like past generations. Sony could get away with it with the PS5 Pro, but the general public isn't going to be impressed if they can't see a difference between a PS5 and PS6 game side-by-side without a magnifying glass. To be fair, the PS5's SSD was another touted upgrade over the PS4. Outside of Marvel's Spider-Man 2, however, this hasn't amounted to doing much that couldn't be done previously except for loading games a little faster. So, where does that leave the PS6 and other future consoles? Convenience has to be where PlayStation pivots next now that any technical advancement will only appeal to developers and the most hardcore fans. It has already started this process with a tempered PC release cadence that doesn't infringe on the core console sales, as well as by adding cloud functionality to the PS Portal without the need for a PS5. The rumors of a dedicated handheld is another necessary gamble to meet players where they are. Like it or not, we're living in a world of instant gratification and PlayStation has to remove as many barriers as possible between its players and its games. Whatever the PS6 ends up looking like, it's the games that have to be at the heart of it. Introducing new experiences, new ways to play, and the freedom to play however we want will matter far more than throwing around terms like PSSR, terraflops, and CPU clock speeds. Most of all, I want the PS6 to give me what I don't know I want yet.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
As calls for Star Wars Battlefront 3 grow stronger, an ex-Pandemic dev explains why the original games never got a third entry: "We started working on it and then negotiations just didn't take off"
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Star Wars Battlefront 2 is having a resurgence in popularity at the moment, with calls for a sequel to the 2017 DICE-developed title to come out being so strong that even former devs are getting in on it. But it wouldn't be the first Star Wars Battlefront 2 to not get a sequel, as the mid-2000s version of the series also never made it past the number 2 (and no, I'm not counting the squadron games on handhelds). A Pandemic Studios follow-up never surfaced, and Free Radical Design's take on it never came out despite being allegedly very close to completion. Battlefront 2 designer Dan Nanni claims that Pandemic did in fact start working on a third game, but a breakdown in communication with LucasArts is what caused it to never happen. "We started working on it and then negotiations just didn't take off," Nanni told VideoGamer, adding that the one-year development time of the previous two games wouldn't fly a third time due to the transition to Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. "When you're moving to a new console it's not as easy as saying, 'let me just make a game for it like we did for the old console'. New consoles have new hardware and new hardware comes with new limitations and you don't know exactly what you're working with until you've got it." Nanni added, "I think, negotiations stalled out because I think we wanted more time to work on it. But obviously, Lucas was also trying to align it with their own marketing beats." One of the big elements found in the leaked Battlefront 3 from Free Radical was the inclusion of missions that took place in both flight and ground sections. Nanni told Videogamer that this was actually in the cards for Pandemic's version too, "We had some tech on it that was pretty fun. And was working really well," adding "in Battlefront II we had space missions and we were like, 'well, what's the evolution of that' and everyone was like 'well, it's ground to space'. A big battlefield that is Star Wars all the time." Nanni said that if the team had been "given the time, we'd have made something really special." Pandemic would move on from Star Wars, with the closest thing to a sequel from the studio being The Lord of the Rings: Conquest, which adapted the gameplay of Battlefront into a better property. After that, it was the underrated WW2 game The Saboteur before EA threw the studio into its big landfill of shuttered studios. "We cough up a chunk of our soul": 32 game devs, from Doom's John Romero to Helldivers 2 and Palworld leads, explain what people get wrong about games.
