tekgoblin writes "Cryptic Studios, the developer of the Star Trek Online MMO, announced that they are switching to a Free-to-Play model on January 17th. Free subscribers to the game will be able to play, but will not get the same benefits as paying subscribers still get. Free accounts will be Silver, while paid accounts will be called Gold. Silver accounts will be able to pay for features that Gold members will get as part of their paid subscription. These features include but are not limited to respecs and extra character slots." EverQuest II is jumping on the free-to-play bandwagon as well.

Today marks the release of Skyrim, the fifth installment of Bethesda's The Elder Scrolls series. The game is set about 200 years after the events of Oblivion, at which point the province of Skyrim is embroiled in a civil war, and dragons roam the skies. Early reviews for the game have been largely complimentary — one at Rock, Paper, Shotgun artfully details all the things the reviewer hasn't yet done, despite playing the game for over 30 hours. Quoting: "I seriously worried Skyrim would, for all its talk of lavishness, depth and dragons, continue the transformation into a trudging, consolified action game filled with clunky acting. It does not. It slams on the brakes then reverses at dangerous speed back into Morrowind territory. Some things are lost (e.g. Persuasion is a sadly watered-down, irregular affair now mostly to do with shopping), many things are changed (e.g. recharging magic items can be done anywhere) and it’s certainly not as weird (no flying or Siltstriders), but it truly reclaims that sense of being in another world, rather than a generic soft-focus, over-familiar fantasyscape." An addendum goes into more detail on the specifics. If you're curious how the game looks in action, Giant Bomb has posted a ~52-minute quick-look video with commentary.

CmdrStone writes "The Universe is ending in the eyes of LEGO. (Cheap pun, I know.) From the announcement: 'We are very sad to announce that LEGO Universe will be closing on January 31, 2012. This was a very difficult decision to make, but unfortunately LEGO Universe has not been able to attract the number of members needed to keep the game open.' It's too bad; I enjoyed playing this game with my kids. Open sourcing the game would be nice."

SKYMTL writes "Valve has revealed that hackers have gained access to the Steam database and have pulled a variety of information. A statement from Gabe Newell reads in part: 'Dear Steam Users and Steam Forum Users, Our Steam forums were defaced on the evening of Sunday, November 6. We began investigating and found that the intrusion goes beyond the Steam forums. We learned that intruders obtained access to a Steam database in addition to the forums. This database contained information including user names, hashed and salted passwords, game purchases, email addresses, billing addresses and encrypted credit card information. We do not have evidence that encrypted credit card numbers or personally identifying information were taken by the intruders, or that the protection on credit card numbers or passwords was cracked. We are still investigating. We don’t have evidence of credit card misuse at this time. Nonetheless you should watch your credit card activity and statements closely."

Hugh Pickens writes "The 50 million individuals who have downloaded 'Angry Birds' play roughly 200 million minutes of the game a day, which translates into 1.2 billion hours a year, more than ten times the 100 million hours spent creating Wikipedia over the entire life span of the online encyclopedia. Why is this seemly simple game so massively compelling? Charles L. Mauro performs a cognitive teardown of the user experience of Angry Birds and concludes that the game is engaging, in fact addictive, due to the carefully scripted expansion of the user's mental model of the strategy component and incremental increases in problem/solution methodology. The birds are packed with clever behaviors that expand the user's mental model at just the point when game-level complexity is increased ... For example, why are tiny bananas suddenly strewn about in some play sequences and not in others? Why do the houses containing pigs shake ever so slightly at the beginning of each game play sequence? Why is the game's play space showing a cross section of underground rocks and dirt? One can spend a lot of time processing these little clues, consciously or subconsciously. 'Creating truly engaging software experiences is far more complex than one might assume, even in the simplest of computer games,' writes Mauro. 'You go Birds! Your success certainly makes others Angry and envious.'"

Activision released the latest iteration of their blockbuster first-person shooter franchise yesterday, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, narrowly avoiding a whole year-long gap between this one and the last Call of Duty game. Still, analysts estimated pre-orders at 9 million worldwide, and expect the game to generate another billion dollars in sales, give or take. Reviews for the game range from "amazing" to "slightly less than amazing." Eurogamer sums it up simply: "Modern Warfare 3 is exactly the game you expect. It's conservative in every sense of the word, a paean to military superiority which never ventures far beyond gameplay parameters that were set in stone in 2007. ... With such a well-rehearsed recipe to follow, there's more room here for innovation than there is for improvement. There are plenty who would love to see Call of Duty dragged through the mud for its lack of new ideas, but the game itself is too confidently constructed, too generous with its pleasures, to deserve any lasting vitriol. This is a ferocious and satisfying game that knows exactly what players expect, and delivers on that promise with bullish confidence."

esocid writes with this excerpt from TorrentFreak: "Despite having booked and paid for their booth at Gamex, Sweden's largest gaming exhibition, the Pirate Party have been excluded from the action this week. The party, who say they were nagged for 2 to 3 months to book for the event, were this week informed they were too controversial and no longer welcome. ... [Pirate Party leader Anna Troberg] says that after the sales people from the exhibition pursued the party for months to participate, they decided to book and pay for a booth. ... 'I thought it was a bit strange, but in the afternoon, the pieces fell into place when the fair manager, Bear Wengse, phoned me and kindly, but firmly, announced that the Pirate Party was no longer welcome at the fair.' Wengse informed Troberg that the exhibition is a meeting place and not a venue for political conflict and the party's presence could cause problems, particularly since some of their work "could be perceived as criminal."'"

dotarray writes "Despite stories suggesting that a change to the Australian ratings system may be as far as two years away, the Federal Minister for Home Affairs has announced that each Australian state and territory has signed off on the final guidelines required for the introduction of an adult R18+ classification Down Under."

wjousts writes "A interesting take on the birth of the Xbox from Technology Review: 'When the original Xbox video-game console went on sale in 2001, it wasn't clear why Microsoft, known for staid workplace software, was branching out into fast-paced action games. But Microsoft decided that capitalizing on the popularity of gaming could help the company position itself for the coming wave of home digital entertainment. "Microsoft saw the writing on the wall," says David Dennis, a spokesman for Xbox. "It wanted to have a beachhead in the living room." ... Now Microsoft is linking Xbox 360, its most successful consumer-focused brand, with others that have not been as well received. It is integrating Bing, its search engine, into Xbox and Xbox Live to enable people to search for multimedia content. By the end of the year, Microsoft is expected to unveil an updated Xbox Live design that is more in line with the look of Windows phones and the forthcoming Windows 8.'"

jonklinger writes "An Israeli Court rejected the appeal of a prisoner who requested to have an Playstation 3 or Xbox 360 because there is no possibility to remove the internet connectivity apparatus from the device without harming its functionality. Therefore, prisoners cannot engage in gaming and will have to result to other kinds of violence."

bdking writes "The most popular mobile game in history now has been downloaded more than 500,000,000 times, according to maker Rovio Mobile. Good thing the 300 million minutes of Angry Birds daily playing time around the world aren't being wasted or anything. Rovio chief executive Mikael Hed says: 'This is a fantastic landmark achievement for us, and we’re extremely delighted to see such an incredible amount of people enjoying our games. We remain committed to creating more fun experiences and bringing exceptional quality to Angry Birds Fans everywhere.'"

An anonymous reader writes "Why are there so many free games listed in the top 10 grossing games over in Apple's App Store? Because some feature exorbitant in-app purchase fees for virtual items. Quoting ZDNet: 'Developing "free" games aimed specifically at children, and then bundling ridiculously priced in-app purchases inside those "free" games feels scammy to me. Sure, it's not illegal, and it's not against Apple's developer terms and conditions, but Apple is a company that prides itself in protecting users from harm. Most of the game developers do make an attempt to warn users that the game "changes real money for additional in-app content" but it's a lame attempt. It's easily missed, and kids aren't going to read it anyway.'"

An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has announced that its Kinect motion-control system will be available for PCs in early 2012, and that they're planning to take it into the business world as well. 'Microsoft plans to launch a commercial program for the peripheral early next year, giving businesses the tools to develop customized applications for their companies and industries. The pilot program already includes such familiar names as Toyota, book publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and design firm Razorfish. All totaled, over 200 "marquis brand" companies in 25 countries have signed up for the program... And while the majority of those companies have opted to keep their names hidden for now for competitive reasons, Microsoft is working with them to get the applications up and running, so they can debut as soon as possible. Just don't expect the Redmond-based company to do any first party apps for this program.'"

An anonymous reader writes "The BBC reports that Minecraft has won a new arts award for games, beating the likes of Portal 2 and Ilomilo. The prize was announced at the finale of the GameCity videogame culture festival in Nottingham. From the article: 'Minecraft does involve traditional staples of gaming, including night-roaming monsters and the chance to fight multiplayer battles online. However, it was ultimately selected on the basis of its mood and ability to encourage gamers to become creative. "It's the broadest definition of art that you can have," said Mr. Hall.'"

New submitter wesbascas writes "Have you ever wanted to play a new PC game, but weren't sure where your PC falls between the minimum and recommended system requirements? I don't have a whole lot of time to game these days and with new hardware perpetually coming out and component vendors often tweaking their model numbering schemes, knowing exactly what kind of experience I'm buying for $60 can be difficult. Luckily, somebody benchmarked Battlefield 3's campaign on a wide range of hardware configurations and detail settings. If you've purchased a system in the past few years you should be in luck. The video cards tested start with the AMD Radeon HD 4670 and Nvidia GeForce 8500 GT, and go up to the brand new Radeon HD 6990 and GeForce GTX 590. I hate it that my aging Radeon HD 4870 isn't going to cut it at 1080p, but am glad that I found out before buying the game." If you're curious about the game itself, here's a detailed review from Eurogamer and a briefer one from Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

dotarray writes "An American aquarium supplier obviously has a gamer on the payroll, after naming two new forms of Acanthastrea coral after Activision's shooter Call of Duty: Black Ops. From the article: 'The Facebook post announcing the two new forms openly admits to the video gaming influence – and it’s not the first time a video game has inspired the Quality Marine coral namer – One of Swords points out that earlier this month, The Master Chief made its glorious pink-and-purple debut.'"

theodp writes "On Tuesday, Amazon received a patent on 'Customizing Gift Instrument Experiences for Recipients', which allows a gift card giver to not only recommend items via the gift card but also to restrict the types of things the card can be used to buy — and to get a report back on what the recipient purchases. From the patent: 'The rules could also specify that the available media be constrained by a rating, such as a parental rating (e.g. G, PG, PG-13, R, etc.) or media that excludes explicit lyrics or language. In other examples, the gift instrument purchaser directs that the gift instrument can only be redeemed for books (e.g., not video games), books of a selected genre (e.g., romance, action, historical, etc.), books having a selected author, etc.'"

jfruhlinger writes "Gamers who have grown bored with the current generation of game hardware will have to sit tight a bit longer. Word on the street has it that the next PlayStation won't be ready until 2014, and the next Xbox won't appear until Christmas 2013 at the earliest."

Bob the Super Hamste writes "The St. Paul Pioneer Press is reporting on an analysis by lawyer Justin Kwong in the William Mitchell Law Review about virtual property and ownership. Justin Kwong asserts that virtual items are not real items (PDF) and that you do not own them but only have a license. The analysis stems from a 2008 case of a Blaine, MN man who filed a police report for the online theft of approximately $3800 of virtual goods. Justin Kwong compares virtual items to a mug club at a bar where patrons purchase rights to a specific numbered mug but cannot remove the mug from the premises. He does note that if in game items are purchased there needs to be clear language stating: 'the transaction is a license, not a sale, and that traditional consumer protections afforded by sales of goods do not necessarily apply.'" Justin Kwong also made a weblog entry responding to misconceptions expressed in comments on the St. Paul Pioneer Press article.

Valve Software is working on a second helping of downloadable content for Portal 2, and they've revealed that it will include an in-game map editor. It's planned for early next year, and it will allow players to create both single-player and co-op maps. The maps can be shared with others, and there will be a system to view and vote on other people's maps. In other Portal-related news, a reader sent in a video of his efforts to get GLaDOS running on his home computer. He writes, "I used Microsoft's Kinect technology as the platform and sound files from my copy of Portal 2 to create my own GLaDOS. My plan is to make the source code (but not the audio files) open source once it gets farther along. The technology has already been useful to my parents in helping them more easily navigate a computer."