E3 2009 previews: Activision, Capcom, EA, Ubisoft

We've now reached the heavy hitters in Game Hunters publisher previews ahead of the Electronic Entertainment Expo. The following four are responsible for a few of the big titles arriving this year and beyond. With that in mind, let's get right to the tales of the tape.

ALSO: Previews of Bethesda, Namco Bandai, Sega, Square Enix
ALSO: Previews of 2K, Disney, Konami, Warner Bros.
ALSO: Previews of Eidos, LucasArts, MTV Games

Publisher: Activision

Best known for:Call of Duty, Guitar Hero

Two games to watch:
Modern Warfare 2: No surprise here. Expectations are riding high for Infinity Ward's follow up to arguably the best first-person shooter of this console generation. Modern Warfare 2 also marks the debut of cooperative play in the form of Special Forces mode.

Tony Hawk: Ride: The long-running skateboarding series -- now competing with Electronic Arts series Skate -- returns with a brand new peripheral. Wonder how much that will cost consumers.

Wild card:
Guitar Hero is everywhere, between Aerosmith, Metallica, World Tour and the upcoming Guitar Hero 5 and separate Van Halen game. Will consumers reach Hero overload?

Publisher: Capcom

Best known for: Resident Evil, Street Fighter

Two games to watch:
Dark Void: Sci-fi action game features a jet-packing, futuristic version of The Rocketeer. Beyond standard run-and-gun style action, players engage in vertical combat, including the ablility to hijack flying ships.

Lost Planet 2: Third-person shooter pits a group of heroes against aliens called the Akrid. The highlight of its predecessor was punishing enemies with mechanized assault vehicles called Vital Suits. Hopefully, combat outside the Vital Suit is more engaging.

Wild card:
Capcom has had an impressive year thus far with follow-ups for known commodities such as Resident Evil and Street Fighter. Will brand new franchise Dark Void exhibit enough personality to break through as their next big series?

Publisher: Electronic Arts

Best known for: Madden NFL, Burnout, Battlefield

Two games to watch:
Brutal Legend: Tim Schafer, the man behind Grim Fandango and Psychonauts, returns with the tale of a heavy metal roadie sucked into an alternate universe. Hero Eddie Riggs, voiced by actor Jack Black, uses guitar riffs to thrash enemies and command a growing army.

Mass Effect 2: The role-playing game known for its robust story and players' ability to dictate the dialogue returned with an incredible teaser in February. The big question will be whether studio BioWare has fixed the combat for the sequel.

Wild card:
Players have seen games based on movies and television shows. But how about one inspired by literature from the 14th century? That’s what EA has created in Dante's Inferno, a game based on the Divine Comedy. So just how does a game like this play?

Publisher: Ubisoft

Best known for: Tom Clancy franchise (Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, Splinter Cell)

Two games to watch:
Assassin's Creed II: The third-person action game shifts gears from Jerusalem during the era of the Crusades to the Italian Renaissance. Leonardo Da Vinci's flying machine is among many of the new items at the disposal of assassin Ezio.

Red Steel 2: Some critics slammed the first Red Steel, a Nintendo Wii launch title, for rough motion controls. But that may improve for the sequel with the introduction of Wii MotionPlus.

Wild card:
It's been a while since we've heard from one of the flagship Tom Clancy franchises, particularly Splinter Cell. Ubisoft's CEO recently hinted the stealth series would return this holiday. Will Sam Fisher make a comeback at E3?

Readers, what games off this list are you most excited for?

By Brett Molina
Photos (from top): Tony Hawk: Ride (Activsion); Dark Void (Capcom); Brutal Legend (EA); Assassin's Creed II (Ubisoft)

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RIM Launches BlackBerry App World

Its over-the-air store for Blackberry applications puts Research In Motion on par with Apple's App Store and Google's Android Market.

By Marin Perez

BlackBerry users now have an app store of their own, as Research In Motion has launched its BlackBerry App World for discovering and buying new mobile programs.
App World offers an over-the-air way for BlackBerry users to find, download, purchase, and install applications. RIM said it has lined up thousands of developers to contribute content, and has organized the store by categories that include entertainment, news, music and video, and travel. App World launched with programs from the likes of The New York Times, Facebook, MySpace, Bloomberg, Major League Baseball, and more.

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Melkote also explores how its approaching 802.11n, and why the controllers are the key
Developers get to keep 80% of the revenue from any sold app, which is 10% more than they get from Apple's App Store for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Content creators have to pay $200 a year to put up to 10 apps in the virtual store, which is a bit more than developers pay to enter Apple's store or Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT)'s upcoming app store.

While there are multiple free apps in the store, users can purchase apps using a PayPal account. By clicking on the "purchase" button, a secure login page for PayPal pops up to complete the transaction. Unlike the iPhone, where 99 cents is a popular price point, the minimum price for App World apps is $2.99. It's unclear how this higher price point will affect adoption, or if the use of PayPal will be a hindrance.

Organizations that have deployed BlackBerry Enterprise Server or BlackBerry Professional Software will retain control of which applications can be downloaded to BlackBerry smartphones within their corporate deployments.

The move shows the growing importance of apps for smartphones; soon every major platform will have a way for users to download apps over the air to their handsets.

iPhone OS 3.0 beta 2 now available

by Jason D. O'Grady

Apple has posted iPhone OS 3.0 beta 2 (build 7A259g) in the iPhone Dev Center. The download is only available to registered iPhone developers and weighs in at 2.13GB.

According to Ars Technica the second public developer build of iPhone 3.0 contains minor updates, bug fixes and no new functionality. Sources tell Ars that Apple is warning developers to avoid its tethering and MMS features because they “are not supported, and should not be used.”

As with the the previous developer build (7A238j) Apple warns:

Devices updated to iPhone 3.0 beta can not be restored to earlier versions of iPhone OS. Devices will be able to upgrade to future beta releases and the final iPhone OS 3.0 software.

Also it’s wise to avoid the temptation to install an unlicensed version of iPhone 3.0 as it has been known to turn your iPhone into an iBrick.

Conficker worm is no April Fool's joke

I have an apple and I don't know if it will be affected like most PCs will be. I don't think I have anything to worry about since their security is much better than PCs. I do have a lot of friends though who are freaking out about the Conficker worm and will not even be getting online tomorrow.

By McNelly Torres | South Florida Sun-sentinel

Cyber security experts are warning that a new variation of Conficker, a fast-spreading computer worm also known as Downadup, could attack millions of computers on Wednesday -- April Fool's Day.

Personal computers and laptops already infected with Conficker could automatically be linked to the servers operated by the hackers.

Esteban O. Farao, a consultant with Enterprise Risk Management, a Miami security consulting company, said the worm is not destroying files or stealing data, but it has the capability to do so.

"The main concern about this worm is that it is capable of downloading additional code from the hacker's Web site or through a peer-to-peer connection," Farao said. "Consequently it can bring more functionalities or receive instructions."

Experts say it's unknown whether the worm will cause havoc or merely turn out to be an April's Fool prank. But people can protect their computers by using security software.

Howard Schmidt, a former White House cyber security adviser, said computer users need to download an application of Microsoft software to detect and disable the worm.

Experts also advise keeping your security applications and operating systems updated.

"The most interesting thing about this worm is that every time someone finds out a way to get rid of the worm, it reinvents itself with more rigor and better technology," Schmidt said.

Authorities have not identified the culprits behind the worm or their intentions. Microsoft has offered a $250,000 reward to bring the Conficker creator to justice.

The Conficker worm, which has infected 10 million computers outside the United States, is a program that exploits weaknesses in Microsoft's Windows operating system including Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.

The worm surfaced last November in computers on weak networks such as those in coffee shops, airport or offices. The second variation can spread via shared networks, including removable drives such as USB devices.

This worm also blocks infected systems from downloading new security software or receiving updates for security software. After attacking, it connects to a server where it receives instructions to propagate and gather personal information. Conficker creates a back door in the system where the worm can download and install additional programs.

Albert Whale, owner of ABS Computer Technology Inc., a Pittsburgh company that offers computer consulting services, said experts think the hackers are making money by getting information to send spam or attack people they don't like.

"Hackers spend 24 hours a day perfecting their craft," Whale said. "People don't even spend an hour a week securing their computers."

Staff researcher Barbara Hijek contributed to this report.

Conficker worm come April 1

In an event that hits the computer world only once every few years, security experts are racing against time to mitigate the impact of a bit of malware which is set to wreak havoc on a hard-coded date. As is often the case, that date is April 1.

Malware creators love to target April Fool's Day with their wares, and the latest worm, called Conficker C, could be one of the most damaging attacks we've seen in years.

Conficker first bubbled up in late 2008 and began making headlines in January as known infections topped 9 million computers. Now in its third variant, Conficker C, the worm has grown incredibly complicated, powerful, and virulent... though no one is quite sure exactly what it will do when D-Day arrives.

Thanks in part to a quarter-million-dollar bounty on the head of the writer of the worm, offered by Microsoft, security researchers are aggressively digging into the worm's code as they attempt to engineer a cure or find the writer before the deadline. What's known so far is that on April 1, all infected computers will come under the control of a master machine located somewhere across the web, at which point anything's possible. Will the zombie machines become denial of service attack pawns, steal personal information, wipe hard drives, or simply manifest more traditional malware pop-ups and extortion-like come-ons designed to sell you phony security software? No one knows.

Conficker is clever in the way it hides its tracks because it uses an enormous number of URLs to communicate with HQ. The first version of Conficker used just 250 addresses each day -- which security researchers and ICANN simply bought and/or disabled -- but Conficker C will up the ante to 50,000 addresses a day when it goes active, a number which simply can't be tracked and disabled by hand.

At this point, you should be extra vigilant about protecting your PC: Patch Windows completely through Windows Update and update your anti-malware software as well. Make sure your antivirus software is actually running too, as Conficker may have disabled it.

Microsoft also offers a free online safety scan here, which should be able to detect all Conficker versions.

Sony Bravia LCD HDTV, Logitech Harmony Advanced Universal Remote, Lenovo IdeaPad laptop

A Sony 32-inch Class BRAVIA KDL-32M4000 LCD HDTV, a Logitech Harmony 510 Advanced Universal Remote Control, and a Lenovo IdeaPad laptop. Here are Gadget Gal’s daily deals for Wednesday, March 25:

1. Woot is offering a great deal today on the Sony 32-inch Class BRAVIA KDL-32M4000 LCD HDTV. Normally $749.99, Woot is dropping the price down to $479.99. The deal is for today only, so hurry.

[read the review] [find the deal]

2. Get the Logitech Harmony 510 Advanced Universal Remote Control from Amazon.com today for only $47.99. The remote normally costs $99.99, saving you a whole 52 percent off of the original price.

[read the review] [find the deal]

3. You’ve got some time on this one, but you can get the Lenovo IdeaPad S10e 4187 - Atom N270 1.6 GHz - 10.1-inch TFT for $299.99 after mail-in rebate from OnSale.com until April 30, 2009. The laptop includes features such as 1GB memory, 160GB SATA HDD + 4GB SSD, QuickStart technology, 10.1 LED, camera, and Windows XP Home. Find it a few dollars cheaper at CostCentral.com for $297.40.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs Takes Medical Leave of Absence

Well this doesn't sound good at all for Apple. I know that Apple Stock has dropped almost 10 % in after hours trading which is to be expected right after news like this. It will be interesting how Apple moves foreward from this. They should have some new gizmo in their back pocket that they can unveil while Jobs is out so it will show more confidence that Apple can survive without Jobs in the Long run. And who knows maybe Apple has that up their sleeve. It will also be interesting to see if Apple now goes through Layoffs or if Jobs even comes back at all. It doesn't sound good for the future of the company. But Jobs should of made a strong foundation that should have Apple running lightyears after he passes anyways.

By Mike Musgrove and Peter Whoriskey

Washington Post Staff Writers

Apple chief executive Steve Jobs today announced that he will take a leave of absence as a result of health concerns.

"During the past week I have learned that my health-related issues are more complex than I originally thought," Jobs wrote in an e-mail sent to all Apple employees.

He said he intends to return to the company at the end of June.

Speculation about Jobs's health has swayed the company's share prices during the past year as his increasingly gaunt appearance left some investors worried. The iconic tech leader, who is often viewed as the main driving force for his company's recent successes, was treated for pancreatic cancer several years ago.

Jobs did not deliver a keynote at the recent Mac-centric trade show this year, citing a hormone imbalance. The company's share price rose 4 percent on the news, a result of investor relief that Jobs was not suffering a recurrence of cancer.

Apple products, particularly the iPod and iPhone, have gained a rare kind of loyalty from customers, and much of the credit is given to Jobs's demanding leadership. He is reputedly relentless in his demands that Apple engineers make products that simplify technology, an approach that often gives the company's products a minimalist chic.

In 2004, Jobs received a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and had surgery, which apparently was successful. Last June, however, Jobs appeared gaunt and the uncertainty over his health created new worries for investors. Stock prices suffered as a result.

Concern about Jobs's health heightened Dec. 16, when the company announced that he would not attend Macworld, a conference that he has addressed in his trademark black turtleneck for several years. Instead, the company sent marketing chief Philip Schiller to make a presentation.

Apple's stock fell as much as 10 percent after the company made that announcement.

Jobs was forced to address the rumors last week. In recent months, Jobs and the Apple board had declined to provide more information about the chief executive's health.

"Unfortunately, my decision to have Phil deliver the Macworld keynote set off another flurry of rumors about my health, with some even publishing stories of me on my deathbed," he wrote on Jan. 5. "I've decided to share something very personal with the Apple community so that we can all relax and enjoy the show tomorrow.

"As many of you know, I have been losing weight throughout 2008," his note said. "The reason has been a mystery to me and my doctors."

Jobs said that the cause of his troubles was a "hormone imbalance."

But many health professionals said then that hormone imbalance is not a specific medical diagnosis

While Jobs is away from the company he founded, Apple will be steered by chief operating officer Tim Cook.

As Mac launches products, hacker reports that Steve Jobs has died

Wow I wonder who is behind this. Can somebody tell me where Bill Gates was at this time. I wonder if this was just another hacker trying to be funny, corporate espionage, or somebody who was trying to short on Apple stock and found a way to try and make some big money. Anyway you slice it, it is pretty bad that you are trying to tell the world that the person who brought us the ipod is dead. Steve Jobs is alilve of course.

by Mitch Marconi

Surfacing rumors of Steve Jobs death have been going around the internet as of late. MacRumors, one of many cover sites for Apple's annual Macworld prodcut launches, was apparently hacked.

The people who hacked MacRumors made false news of Steve Jobs' death. Valleywag.com had posted an image of what the hacked page looked like. Steve Jobs is still alive, despite is weight loss he is working on himself currently according to reports.

Could the hackers been trying to spook people? Many fix the stocks? Who knows, but hopefully the criminals are caught.

Samsung unveils world's slimmest TV

I can't wait to see this TV in action. Hopefully one day I will have one. Even though I don't really need a new TV. I like my LCD right now just fine. I wonder if this is going to start a new wave of TV that are going to start being made. I also wonder how heavy the new Samsung TV weighs.

SEOUL (AFP) - South Korea's Samsung Electronics on Monday unveiled what it says is the world's slimmest LCD (liquid crystal display) TV.

The new product, measuring only 6.5 millimetres (0.26 inch) thick, is thinner than any other existing TV set, and even slimmer than most mobile handsets, Samsung said in a statement.

Its thickness is one seventh of Samsung's "Bordeaux 850" LCD TVs, which is currently the thinnest on the market, the company said.

The new product, which adopts an LED (light emitting diode) backlighting system, will be on display at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas from January 8 to 11, Samsung added.

Macworld 2009 rumors

This will be Apple's last Macworld for now. So hopefully they will have some very interesting things to come out with. Go out with a bang as they say. But then again many people might not be expecting much since Steve Jobs won't be delivering the keynote.

Apple’s (AAPL) last Macworld Conference and Expo opens Monday at San Francisco’s Moscone Center, but the real action starts Tuesday at 9 a.m. PT (12 noon ET) with senior vice president Phil Schiller’s opening remarks — the first Macworld keynote not delivered by Steve Jobs since 1997.

Nobody’s expecting breakthrough products that rise to the level of the iMac (Macworld 1998), the iBook (1999), iTunes (2001) or the iPhone (2007), but this Expo is not without its drama, speculation and hype.

Our top 10 favorite Macworld rumors:

10. Snow Leopard release date. We know a lot about Mac OS X 10.6, thanks to Jobs’ June 2008 announcement that it was coming, Apple’s official description of the product and a steady stream of leaks from the developer community. What we don’t know is when it will ship.

9. Unibody 17-inch MacBook Pro. By several accounts, this machine was supposed to be released in October, along with the new unibody 13-inch MacBook and 15-inch MacBook Pro. But display issues and problems with the optical drive reportedly pushed its release back “several months” — which brings us to next week’s Expo. UPDATE: Seth Weintraub at 9to5Mac adds this twist: the new 17-inch Pro will sport a superslim longer-lasting nonremovable battery pack.

8. Revamped iWork. The big news on New Year’s Eve was the “truckload” of information dumped on various rumor sites about iWork — Apple’s homegrown answer to Microsoft (MSFT) Office. The thrust of it was that what’s now a suite of desktop applications — Pages, Numbers and Keynote — is about to be transformed into a collection of Web-based apps like the .Mac Web Gallery, suitable for cloud computing.

7. 32 GB iPhone. Whispers that Apple was set to double the memory of the top-end iPhone have been floating around since September, but AT&T’s (T) post-Christmas $99 iPhone sale and word that Apple had sewed up the lion’s share Samsung’s flash memory production all point to a January release.

6. 64 GB iPod touch. Rumors of this memory upgrade go back even further. It was supposed to happen in August, then in September, and then before Christmas. With memory prices falling, time is more than ripe.

5. New Mac mini. Rumors of the most affordable Mac’s imminent demise have given way to a flood of new specs, among them 2.0 or 2.3 GHz Core 2 Duo processors, NVIDIA graphics platform, dual display outputs and dual drives that can be configured every which way.

4. New iMac. Some inspired sleuthing in the extension files that shipped with the new MacBooks found references to NVIDIA chipsets for both a Mac mini and a new iMac — along with hints that the reconfigured all-in-one desktop was supposed to ship in November but got pushed into 2009 by unexpected delays. DigiTimes now reports that Apple has ordered shipments of 800,000 per month.

3. New iPod shuffle. FBR Capital Markets’ Craig Berger, whose track record AppleInsider describes as “questionable,” expects Apple to release a new and smaller version of the iPod shuffle sometime in the first calendar quarter — which started on Thursday. AppleInsider adds that it has picked up chatter of a new shuffle that would be flat as a credit card but thick enough at one end to fit a headphone jack.

2. New Apple TV/Time Capsule. This one also comes from an analyst. Shaw Wu, a veteran Apple watcher newly ensconsed at Kaufman Bros., wrote last week about the possibility that Apple will introduce a new consumer device — “an enhanced version of Apple TV and/or Time Capsule” — that would give users access to their media content, SlingBox style, from anywhere on the Internet.

1. Steve Jobs. Show or no-show, Apple’s CEO is both Macworld 2009’s No. 1 rumor and No. 1 source of rumors — whether it be that he’s stepping down, that his health is failing, that he doesn’t feel there’s enough news in Nos. 1-9 to justify a Steve Jobs keynote, or that he just doesn’t feel like playing in Macworld’s sandbox anymore. We favor the theory that he’s set the stage brilliantly for a surprise cameo appearance.

Below the line:

• iPhone nano. Despite all the chatter — and spy photos — not this Macworld. Maybe later this year.
• iPod tablet. Maybe later this year. Maybe never.

Is there truth to any of this? We’ll be flying to San Francisco Monday to find out. Tune in to this space early Tuesday for our Macworld 2009 live blog.

[Photo courtesy of setteB.IT.]

Below the fold: How Phil Schiller could hit a home run next Tuesday, as imagined on The Mac Observer’s Apple Finance Board by one of the regulars, retired Air Force pilot Pat Smellie.

From AFB:

Mr Schiller will do great. He is being coached by one of the best presenters in the business and whether SJ shows or not he will have been over every inch of the presentation.

Start with Itunes Over 6B songs sold., 400M Applications, 300M TV shows WOW. Bring up the Music execs and announce release of Itunes Plus for all tracks same great price.

Back to Schiller Mac sales growth over 10M new MACs in 2008. Demo new IMac, MAC Mini, Mac Pro in Feb with Intel I7 and Mac Book Pro 17’ Quad Core.

Switch to Snow Leopard speed comparison of the new hardware on Leopard vs Snow Leopard. Wow! Free upgrade to Snow Leopard with new Mac purchase. Available in June

Software demo of new ILife/Iwork Suite on mobile me. Free to all Mobile Me subscribers.

On to Iphone 20M sold to date. Joined on stage by China Mobile CEO. Announce new Iphone for China/Korea GSM/TD-SCDMA $99 price also available US non 3G via Walmart. Demo couple new software features.

One More Thing
Finally lights dim and SJ appears on stage with a NetBook and Tablet. He says he can’t decide which to build so he will let America decide. Call in numbers or text Netbook/Tablet. Voting will continue until end of Mac World

Lights come up curtain opens SJ on stage with Sir Paul singing Let It Be announcing the release of the Beatles catalog

It great to dream big. Reality is its a show as much as anything. Apple will deliver many great things this year but probably a lot of them will not be announced at Mac World. — pats