The cheaper and 'more immersive' alternative to Google Glass

November 29th, 2013, 21:07 Posted By: wraggster

LaForge Optical, the creators behind the Smartspecks unveiled their answer to Google Glass to VentureBeat, claiming, “you don’t have to look like a nerd to be the most tech savvy person in the room.”
The device from the Massachusetts startup does what its mainstream counterpart does, including offering directions, take pictures, record videos, display Facebook, Instagram updates plus much more.
It even connects to the cloud via the phone it is connected to. The main difference is that all its intelligence is stored safely away in an app, on that phone.
Corey Mack, CEO at LaForge Optical, told VentureBeat: “We designed the simplest most minimalist device we could. Anyone who wants Google Glass, in a more conventional form factor can have it.
Additionally our lens technology allows for people who need prescription lenses to be able to use our glasses.”
Rochester Optical recently announced that it was soon to be launching prescription lenses for Google Glass, but will most likely cost on top of the price of the gadget.
Pre-orders for the device will be opening sometime next week on the company’s website for select customers, priced at $200, however will also launch on Kickstarter for $400 to gain more interest, gain more customers, and get the finding they need to go mainstream.

http://www.mobile-ent.biz/news/read/...e-glass/022956

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BestBuy Black Friday Doorbuster Deals LIVE Online, Including Xbox 360 250GB Conole

November 29th, 2013, 02:30 Posted By: wraggster


BestBuy Black Friday 2013 LIVE!
BestBuy has upgraded some of their Black Friday 2013 Doorbusters!
Highlights include:

• Xbox 360 Holiday Console with 4 Games - $189!
  • Includes console, wireless controller, headset, Halo 4 and Darksiders II games, and downloads for Tomb Raider and Batman: Arkham City. Plus free shipping.
• Save $20 on 3DS Handheld - $149!
• Save $50 on Wii U Console Bundle - $189!
• XBuy 2 Skylanders SWAP Force Characters, Get 1 Free
• Plus MORE!
  Check it out:

• BestBuy Black Friday Doorbusters
  • BestBuy Black Friday Video Game Doorbust
  • http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Misc/Bla...25600050002ers

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Google Chromecast Black Friday Deal: $30 with free shipping

November 29th, 2013, 01:26 Posted By: wraggster


Google Chromecast Black Friday Deal!
The Google Chromecast HDMI Streaming Media Player is discounted today for $30 with free shipping at Amazon!

Grab one now if available...
Check it out: Amazon - Google Chromecast HDMI Streaming Media Player

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Walmart Black Friday deals: Cheap 2DS, consoles, starter packs, games

November 29th, 2013, 00:42 Posted By: wraggster

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Target Black Friday preview: Hardware, headsets and games, oh my

November 29th, 2013, 00:40 Posted By: wraggster

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Console bundles, Battlefield 4 highlight GameStop's Black Friday preview

November 29th, 2013, 00:38 Posted By: wraggster

<center style='font: 14px/22.39px "Open Sans", Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-transform: none; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; word-spacing: 0px; white-space: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;'></center>GameStop isn't quite ready to reveal its full swath of Black Friday deals, but the company has offered a preview including discounted consoles, cheap recent hits, and a sale on all used games.

On Black Friday, if you walk into a GameStop (and aren't crushed by an unruly mob), you'll find a 250GB Xbox 360 with Halo 4 and Tomb Raider priced at $200. Sharing that price tag is a PlayStation 3 bundle which includes a 250GB console as well as copies of Batman: Arkham Origins and The Last of Us.

If you already have one of these consoles, GameStop is also offering big discounts on two recent games: Just Dance 4 will be available for $15, while Battlefield 4 will feature a $25 price tag. If you'd prefer something a bit more dated, however, GameStop is also planning a "buy two, get one free" deal on all used games in the store.

The discounts listed above are only the highlights of GameStop's Black Friday deals. The retailer has yet to publicly release its ad, though the store does offer a site where interested consumers can sign up to receive the ad just as soon as it's ready to debut.

While GameStop will be closed on Thanksgiving Day, the store will reopen on 12:01AM, Black Friday. Most likely this means that you'll need to visit your local store as early as possible to ensure savings, but those who'd rather sleep in can instead sign up to be notified when GameStop issues its forthcoming Cyber Monday ad.

http://www.gamestop.com/blackfriday

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Japanese sales point to serious declines for Final Fantasy and 3D Mario

November 29th, 2013, 00:33 Posted By: wraggster

It’s not often that a pair of games topping the charts brings bad news for their respective publishers.
PS3 title Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII and Wii U platformer Super Mario 3D World entered the weekly Japanese charts in first and second spots today, but both point to serious declines for their brands.
Gematsu points out that FF XIII enjoyed week one unit sales of 1.5m units. FF XIII-2 debuted with 605k. Lightning Returns managed just 277k.
Super Mario 3D World, which is adored by critics, managed just 99,588 units in its debut week – the lowest week one sales for a 3D Mario title ever on any platform.
Mario’s latest outing did little to help Wii U sales, either, which climbed just 5k week-on-week to 21k and were 42 units short of Vita.
The news is a blow to those who thought that the arrival of Nintendo’s powerhouse IPs would provide a much-needed boost for the struggling machine. It will be interesting to see if the European release this Friday has a more positive effect.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/japan...-mario/0125039

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UK games retailers gear up for Black Friday

November 29th, 2013, 00:30 Posted By: wraggster

GAME and Green Man Gaming are joining Amazon in a bid to make Black Friday a UK event.
Black Friday is a US sales holiday to coincide with Thanksgiving.
Amazon has run Black Friday sales over the last few years, and this year's event – which lasts all week and not just Friday – has seen 3DS XL with Mario Kart sold for £130 and Battlefield 4 available for under £25.
GAME have been running a week of sales, too, with today's deals including Batman: Arkham Origin for £22.49 and GTA V for under £30. The firm is planning special hourly deals tomorrow.
Meanwhile, Green Man Gaming is getting in on the act with its 4-Play promotion. The firm is running four deals every four hours across four days, beginning right now. (see what they did there).
The first deals includes BioShock Infinite and Chivalry
Every customer will also be entered in a competition to win four sets of four games: Call of Duty Ghosts, Injustice, LEGO Marvel Super Heroes and Batman: Arkham Origins.
“At Green Man Gaming we’re bringing you more action and going much deeper in our 4-Play sale,” said Darren Cairns, EVP Marketing at Green Man Gaming.
“The key to this sale is staying frisky and primed, remember things will change every 4 hours.”
Could Black Friday establish itself this year as a UK event, too? Discuss below.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/uk-ga...friday/0125094

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72-year-old app developer fights violence against women

November 28th, 2013, 23:38 Posted By: wraggster

His app captures evidence of crimes witnessed and instantaneously sends them out to trusted sources.
GotU – an iPhone app created by semi-retired Australian, Keith Jolly – came about after he witnessed an assault on a train and realised he needed a way to capture and share evidence of the crime before he became a target and had his phone destroyed.
With just one touch the app captures what is needed and sends the information off within seconds to the user’s trusted recipients.
The messages sent include tamperproof images of the situation, a map and GPS co-ordinates, date, time plus other relevant data.
Since the assault that he witnessed, the IT professional did not do anything with his idea. However as the news began reporting more and more horrifying attacks on women especially in Australia and India, plus the increasing campus rapes in the US – he knew he had to act.
Jolly said: “I wish I had developed GotU earlier. Perhaps some lives could have been saved. It is my objective with GotU to help people who find themselves at risk, or those who witness crimes as I did.”
Evidence can be sent to private inboxes of up to eight user-selected recipients. It is also intended to record, and hopefully deter other incidents including alcohol induced violence, campus rape, bullying, sexual harassment, workplace harassment, assault, taxi violence, racial crime, stalking, abduction and elderly attacks.
Jolly continued: “GotU is essential for those times in life when you can find yourself in the frightening ‘wrong-place-wrong-time.”
GotU is available now from the App Store for $1.99, with a percentage of the proceeds going to anti-violence organisations.

http://www.mobile-ent.biz/news/read/...t-women/022949

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Newegg Black Friday 2013 Deals LIVE!

November 28th, 2013, 01:28 Posted By: wraggster


Newegg Black Friday 2013!
Newegg's Black Friday 2013 Sale is LIVE!
This year, they are featuring over 4,000 products at deep discounts!
Check it out: Newegg.com - Black Friday Sale

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BestBuy Black Friday Early Access Sale LIVE: 11 Exclusive Deals Online Now!

November 28th, 2013, 01:26 Posted By: wraggster


The BestBuy Early Access Sale is still going on and features these 11 Deals:

• Insignia 46" 1080p 60Hz LED HDTV - $330
• Nintendo 3DS w/ Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon - $150
• Apple iPod Touch 32GB MP3 Player - $250
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (AT&T / Sprint / Verizon) - Free w/ 2-Year Service Agreement
• Apple iMac Desktop w/ 8GB DDR3, 1TB HDD and 21.5" Display - $1100
• •enovo G500 15.6" Laptop w/ 4GB DDR3 and 1TB HDD - $400
• Nikon Coolpix 16MP Digital Camera - $130
• LifeProof Case for iPhone 4/4s/5/5s - $50
• LG Smart WiFi Blu-ray Player - $55
• Jawbone Jambox Wireless Bluetooth Speaker - $100

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Google Glass could have iPhone-like impact on gaming

November 27th, 2013, 23:28 Posted By: wraggster

Glu Mobile CEO sees potential for a wearable computing revolution as mobile's big players only get bigger



Google Glass is giving Glu Mobile CEO Niccolo de Masi visions of the future. Speaking with Venture Beat, the executive said that the software giant's latest gadget could be incredibly disruptive.
"Every five or 10 years, something more revolutionary than evolutionary comes along," de Masi said. "It's been six or seven years since the first iPhone. This could be one of those moments. The next seven years could well be a wearable wave. It could happen as fast or even faster than the smartphone, this PC in your pocket."
Glu Mobile isn't waiting to find out if that will be the case. The company has already created one game, Spellista, for the Google Glass GDK beta program, a move de Masi said will give Glu a technological edge if the platform actually does take off.
"If you think about how quickly hardware and software progress these days, this thing-I'm sure you've heard that the prototypes now are not even two years old," de Masi said. "They were the size of a laptop. Look at it now. Imagine where it'll be in two more years or four more years. There's a miniaturization opportunity where that could get small enough so that I could go to Lenscrafters and install it as an option on my glasses. That day will come. The question is when."
As for the smartphone market where Glu currently makes its money, de Masi said the big players in the space are increasing their share of the pie faster than the market is growing.
"The market is doubling every year, but the top 10 games are getting bigger at an even faster rate," de Masi said. "We went from 2010, where a $10 million new game like Gun Bros was a big game, to today, where it's a $50 million game if you're in the same grossing position."
While he acknowledged there are opportunities for smaller players to emerge and succeed, much as Supercell did, de Masi predicts that by 2015, "every company of any significance will be public."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...pact-on-gaming

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Windows CE On A Raspberry Pi

November 27th, 2013, 23:26 Posted By: wraggster


From all the BSDs and Linuxes to extraordinarily odd operating systems, it seems just about every OS has been ported to the Raspberry Pi. All except Windows, that is, but a few people are working on it.
This build comes to us from [ideeman] who wanted to show off his Raspi running Windows Compact Embedded. It technically works, but there are still a few problems. In his own words:

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Japanese sales point to serious declines for Final Fantasy and 3D Mario

November 27th, 2013, 23:11 Posted By: wraggster

It’s not often that a pair of games topping the charts brings bad news for their respective publishers.
PS3 title Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII and Wii U platformer Super Mario 3D World entered the weekly Japanese charts in first and second spots today, but both point to serious declines for their brands.
Gematsu points out that FF XIII enjoyed week one unit sales of 1.5m units. FF XIII-2 debuted with 605k. Lightning Returns managed just 277k.
Super Mario 3D World, which is adored by critics, managed just 99,588 units in its debut week – the lowest week one sales for a 3D Mario title ever on any platform.
Mario’s latest outing did little to help Wii U sales, either, which climbed just 5k week-on-week to 21k and were 42 units short of Vita.
The news is a blow to those who thought that the arrival of Nintendo’s powerhouse IPs would provide a much-needed boost for the struggling machine. It will be interesting to see if the European release this Friday has a more positive effect.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/japan...-mario/0125039

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Are Xbox One and PS4 being held back by concessions to old hardware?

November 27th, 2013, 22:59 Posted By: wraggster

The next generation doesn’t start when Microsoft, Sony or any other platform holder says so. It starts with the players who decide which console to buy, cascades down to the developers who decide which platform to develop on, and hits its stride when everyone is finally brave enough to write off 360 and PS3 altogether. Yes, hardware is hitting shelves this November, but the lengthy boot-up process for next-gen gaming is just beginning. Soaring development costs, a global recession, the reliable installed base of 360 and PS3, and systems still capable of fulfilling developers’ visions means there’s no sudden end point for the outbound seventh generation of game consoles.“You can never forget that this is a business like any other business, and the goal is to make money,” says Sylvain Trottier, associate producer of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, explaining why the game’s publisher, Ubisoft, found 360 and PS3’s gigantic userbases hard to resist. “Dropping the current gen – with however many million consoles there are out there – is a key strategic decision. It depends on how much the executives are relying on your project for income on their yearly budget. We have lots of fans, but we also like lots of revenue. The company is counting on us.”It’s all happened before, of course. But while 2005 and ’06 saw the likes of Gun, Hitman: Blood Money and Tomb Raider: Legend ported to new hardware from Xbox and PlayStation 2, there was always The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Call Of Duty 2 to mark out what PS3 and Xbox 360 were capable of. In 2013, the ongoing survival of the boxes sitting beneath millions of TVs threatens the viability of games that demand top-of-the-line systems to power forward-looking features.There are three kinds of next-gen game. Some are designed exclusively for new hardware; they’re usually platform exclusives – Killzone: Shadow Fall, Forza 5, Ryse: Son Of Rome – but there are a few thirdparty titles built exclusively for the next generation or high-end PCs, including The Crew and Tom Clancy’s The Division. Then there are games such as Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, Watch Dogs, Destiny and Need For Speed: Rivals, which are being built to run at a current-gen spec then ‘forward ported’ to Xbox One and PS4, meaning they have the same core mechanics plus a few cosmetic upgrades. Finally, there are games built for the eighth generation then ‘back ported’ to the seventh, dropping features to run on lower-spec machines. Titanfall and Battlefield 4 are notable early back ports, with the former being produced for 360 by an external studio.

http://www.edge-online.com/features/...-old-hardware/

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Violent video games can make children smarter, says study

November 27th, 2013, 21:12 Posted By: wraggster

Playing video games may increase children’s “learning, health and social skills”, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.
The report stated that the study included observation of the effects of “violent shooter games”, and opposes many commonly held beliefs about how video games can affect the behaviour of children.
"Important research has already been conducted for decades on the negative effects of gaming, including addiction, depression and aggression, and we are certainly not suggesting that this should be ignored," said lead author Isabela Granic PhD of Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands.
"However, to understand the impact of video games on children's and adolescents' development, a more balanced perspective is needed."
The report explained: “While one widely held view maintains playing video games is intellectually lazy, such play actually may strengthen a range of cognitive skills such as spatial navigation, reasoning, memory and perception."
"This is particularly true for shooter video games that are often violent.”
Interestingly, puzzle and role-playing games – including self-proclaimed ‘brain training’ games – were not found to provide the same level of “enhanced thinking”.
Strategy-based games such as StarCraft had previously been found to offer considerable cognitive benefits by a separate study.
While not all games will provide an improvement in cognitive ability, most will offer the simple benefit of happiness.
“Simple games that are easy to access and can be played quickly, such as ‘Angry Birds,’ can improve players' moods, promote relaxation and ward off anxiety,” the study said.
"If playing video games simply makes people happier, this seems to be a fundamental emotional benefit to consider," added Granic.
Another stereotypical assumption about video games challenged by the study was the view of the socially inept ‘lone bedroom gamer’.
“More than 70 per cent of gamers play with a friend and millions of people worldwide participate in massive virtual worlds through video games such as ‘Farmville’ and ‘World of Warcraft,” the report detailed.
“Multiplayer games become virtual social communities, where decisions need to be made quickly about whom to trust or reject and how to lead a group.”
The video game developer Spilgames recently released statistics claiming that the total number of gamers worldwide will reach over 1.2 billion by the end of 2013.
A previous study from 2011 had found that “people who play video games, even if they are violent, that encourage cooperation are more likely to be helpful to others while gaming than those who play the same games competitively.”

http://www.pcr-online.biz/news/read/...s-study/032590

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Raspberry Pi Emulates an Amiga 500 Floppy Drive

November 27th, 2013, 01:23 Posted By: wraggster


[Maurizio] loves using his Amiga 500. His classic piece of hardware has been serving him well for years, except for the floppy drive, which recently gave out on him. No problem for [Maurizio], he just cracked his case open and added a Raspberry Pi as a real-time floppy emulator. [Maurizio] didn’t want to make any permanent changes to his A500 case, and more importantly he wanted to use the Amiga’s original floppy drive interface. The latter placed some rather stringent timing requirements on his design.
The interface hardware is relatively simple. Most of the circuit is dedicated to level shifting from the 5v Amiga 500 to the 3.3V Raspberry Pi. A 74LS06 Hex inverter converts the signals to the open collector outputs the A500 requires. [Maurizio] powered his Raspberry Pi from the floppy power connector of the Amiga. His model A Raspberry Pi works fine, but a model B would pull a bit more power (700ma) than the Amiga floppy power supply is capable of providing (550ma). The user interface side of the equation is simple: Two buttons, one used to switch disks, and one to “Write to SD”. Live disk images are stored in the Raspberry Pi’s ram, so the user needs to hit the “Write to SD” button to store any changes to disk before swapping floppies.
The software is perhaps the most interesting portion of this build. [Maurizio] is emulating a floppy drive in real-time – this means emulating MFM encoding in real time. Calls have to be made with a timing accuracy of 2 microseconds. The Pi’s stock Linux Operating system was just not going to cut it. [Maurizio] coded his drive emulator “bare metal”, directly accessing the Arm Processor on the Raspberry Pi. This gave him access to the entire processor, and allowed him to meet the hard timing requirements of the floppy interface.

http://hackaday.com/2013/11/26/raspb...-floppy-drive/

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Google puts Glass Explorer Edition up for sale

November 27th, 2013, 00:34 Posted By: wraggster

Google has put the Glass Explorer Edition up for sale, following the recent release of the Glass Development Kit.
The hardware, which has been made available for purchase by developers via a code in an email, follows the release of the GDK, which allows developers to further control aspects of the smart eyewear.
The Explorer Edition of the Glass uses a high resolution display placed just above the right eye to give the impression of viewing a 25-inch high definition screen eight feet away.
The Glass also includes a five-megapixel camera with 720P video recording, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and 12GB of storage for apps and media.
A consumer version of the Glass is predicted for released next year.

http://www.pcr-online.biz/news/read/...or-sale/032578

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Can an Oculus Rift game treat crossed/lazy eye?

November 27th, 2013, 00:01 Posted By: wraggster

Can Oculus Rift retrain your brain and eyes to see in three dimensions again? Can it treat conditions such as Strabismus (crossed eye) Diplopia (double vision) and Amblyopia (lazy eye)?A Rift game called Diplopia claims it can. "Measurable improvements" can be achieved in a month, and it's effective on adults as well as children.The game itself is like a 3D Breakout. The clever part comes from Oculus Rift being able to display a different image for each eye. It sends incomplete images that force both eyes to work together, and having them work together is, after all, the ultimate goal.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...ossed-lazy-eye

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Mathematica and Wolfram On The Raspberry Pi

November 26th, 2013, 00:38 Posted By: wraggster


[Stephen Wolfram], possibly the only person on Earth who wants a second element named after him, is giving away Mathematica for the Raspberry Pi.
For those of you unfamiliar with Mathematica, it’s a piece of software that allows you to compute anything. Combined with the educational pedigree of the Raspberry Pi, [Wolfram] and the Pi foundation believe the use of computer-based math will change the way students are taught math.
Besides bringing a free version of Mathematica to the Raspberry Pi, [Wolfram] also announced the Wolfram language. It’s a programming language that keeps most of its libraries – for everything from audio processing, high level math, strings, graphs, networks, and even linguistic data – on the Internet. It sounds absurdly cool, and you can check out a preliminary version of the language over on the official site.
While a free version of Mathematica is awesome, we’re really excited about the new Wolfram language. If it were only an interactive version of Wolfram Alpha, we’d be interested, but the ability to use this tool as a real programming language shows a lot of promise for some interesting applications.

http://hackaday.com/2013/11/24/mathe...-raspberry-pi/

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