Tag Archives: video games

From NBA2K to eNASCAR, are e-sports the new sports?

Posted on by

“Gentlemen, start your engines,” rang the familiar refrain. And on cue, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Busch, and other drivers all got ready to race. Only instead of firing up their cars at the Dixie Vodka 400 in Miami, the NASCAR drivers practiced social distancing and were nowhere near one another—or their cars, for that matter.

Instead, the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Series, which aired live on Fox Sports 1 on March 22, was a multiplayer e-sports competition. The drivers, in essence, were playing a NASCAR video game (though one a bit more polished than home users play). No rubber? No road? No problem. More than 900,000 viewers tuned in to the televised races, regardless.

Read more at Fortune.com

EA CEO Andrew Wilson: Here’s How We Prepared for a Pandemic

Posted on by

Andrew Wilson used to be on the road almost every week. These days, he’s washing dishes, doing the laundry, and helping homeschool his children. But as CEO of Electronic Arts, he’s also overseeing the most massive and fast-paced overhaul of how the game publisher operates in the company’s history.

All of EA’s 9,700 employees are working from home right now — and Wilson tells Digital Trends that the company is in no rush to get them back to the office.

Read more at Digital Trends

Animal Crossing: New Horizons Has a Thriving Black Market

Posted on by

On the surface, you’d be hard-pressed to find a gentler video game than Animal Crossing: New Horizons. There’s no violence of any sort. The world is jam-packed with adorable creatures who are always happy to see you and lend a helping hand. Heck, even the music makes you smile.

Historically, the players who gravitate toward Animal Crossing titles have fit that same mold – helpful and friendly. But as the series has seen a rush of new players, forced to stay at home during the pandemic, a seedier world has started to emerge beneath the surface. And while most players still happily fish their days away, chase butterflies, or gather seashells, there are some whose interests have turned to stock market manipulation, fraudulent deals, and character trafficking.

Read more at Digital Trends

Streaming Could Change the Video Game Business Forever

Posted on by

In the beginning, there were video game stores. There were bricks, and there was mortar, and hours before the stroke of midnight of a highly anticipated release, there were snaking lines of customers outside GameStop or Toys “R” Us or Best Buy, waiting with excitement for the sale to begin. This was the first age of video games, and it was good.

Source: Streaming Could Change the Video Game Business Forever

The man who started a $100 billion industry dies

Posted on by

Ralph RalphBaerObitBaer never meant to start a multibillion-dollar industry. He was just trying to get an idea out of his head and into the real world.

That idea, which went on to become the Magnavox Odyssey, served as a launching pad for game-makers, though—and virtually every developer and publisher today points to it as the moment the industry was born. Today, that industry is mourning the passing of Baer, who died at his New Hampshire home Saturday night at the age of 92.

Read more at CNBC.com

Next generation video games start to shine in holiday 2014

Posted on by

While GameGiftWriteupthere’s an understandable excitement that surrounds the launch of new video game hardware, the real fun usually doesn’t start until a year or so after the systems hit store shelves.

Last year’s launch of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4, if we’re being honest with ourselves, didn’t have an especially stellar lineup of games. But the story’s much different as 2014’s holiday season gets underway—and that’s good news for players.

Read more at CNBC.com

Microsoft’s ‘Halo’ effect: Hunting for the next game hit

Posted on by

In MicrosoftNextHitthe Xbox universe, there’s “Halo” —and there’s everything else. The venerable franchise has sold more than 60 million copies to date and shows no signs of slowing down.

While the Master Chief and his crew cast a big shadow, Microsoft has actually put together a strong catalog of other go-to franchises along the way, including “Gears of War” and “Fable”. In late October, it published its latest effort to build another franchise: “Sunset Overdrive”.

Read more at CNBC.com

Gaming’s ESRB turns 20

Posted on by

For ESRB 20the past two decades, if you’ve wanted to get a video game into Wal-Mart, Target or any other brick and mortar retailer, you’ve had to go through the Entertainment Software Ratings Board first.

The ESRB isn’t just the gatekeeper of what can and can’t appear in a video game. It’s also proven to be a helpful tool for parents, a shield against those who wish to demonize an industry, and a thorn in the side of game makers hoping to reach the biggest audience possible.

It turns 20 on Tuesday, and while vidoe game ratings are now ubiquitous, that wasn’t always the case.

Read more at Yahoo! Games

Did a video game gun stop this home robbery?

Posted on by

Video light gungames are often accused of causing violence, but in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, they may have prevented it.

According to multiple reports, a 24-year old man in the city’s Oakland neighborhood used a fake gun to stop a burglar who sneaked into his house. The unnamed victim was playing video games in his bedroom on Sunday. He was wearing a headset and didn’t hear the robber enter the house — until his bedroom door opened and he was confronted by a stranger. And that person was pretty surprised to see him as well.

Read more at Yahoo! Games