AP - Video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc. has for a third time extended the deadline for its $2 billion tender offer to buy smaller rival Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., but it did not raise the price as many analysts had expected.
NewsFactor - Staying fit by playing a video game. That dream of humankind, possibly second only to losing weight by eating, is the object of Nintendo’s U.S. launch Monday of the Wii Fit exercise game.
Reuters - Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.OS) launched its “Wii Fit” exercise game in the United States on Monday, hoping to get gamers off the couch and appeal to new audiences such as women and older people.
Reuters - Electronic Arts Inc said on Monday it extended by one month its $2 billion hostile offer to acquire rival video game maker Take-Two Interactive Software Inc .
AP - One of the best features of Nintendo’s Wii is the Virtual Console, a downloadable library of more than 200 classic games. It’s a great resource for young gamers who want to see what they missed, and for geezers who wonder if old favorites were as great as they remember.
NewsFactor - How to lose that spare tire around your middle? A miracle pill won’t do it, and neither will eating to exhaustion. But Nintendo may have the answer with the Wii Fit video game that it introduced to the U.S. on Monday.
Reuters - Japanese videogame maker Square Enix Co Ltd (9684.T) said on Tuesday it is considering taking stakes in game developers to boost its competitiveness.
EA Mythic creative director, Paul Barnett, has said that he believes that Nintendo has the best chance of getting MMOs to take off on games consoles. Barnett said that to a successful console MMO you would have to \”build something very console centric from the get-go. I think probably the best chance of someone doing something like that is Nintendo - doingsomething crazy that no one expects.\”
According to the latest issue of NGamer, EA will be releasing a sequel to \’Boogie\’ this Autumn called \’Boogie Superstar\’. The game will use the balance board and is described as a \”board-based dance-a-thon\”.
This week SKYKID (NES, 1-2 players, 500 Wii Points) hits the Virtual Console. Red Baron, from the freedom- and peace-loving nation of birds, Bird Land, faces off in the skies with his rival Blue Max in this side-scrolling shooting game.
The producer of the Wii version of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, has said that the game is running at 640 x 480 and that it is pushing the Wii\’s hardware \”like no game before it\”. \”It looks really crisp, the aspect ratio, the textures scale appropriately, there\’s real time light from shadows.\” said the producer.
Nintendo has launched a French FanKit site that will feature wallpapers, emoticons, videos and other media for games. So far, only Mario Kart Wii and Ace Attorney feature on the site.
Kentaro Murayama, Hudson Entertainment’s Executive Vice President in Japan, has said that Tetris for WiiWare will feature a number of new rules and items. Murayam also said that they are \”tossing around the idea of using the Balance Board\” in the game and that it supports 6-Player Wi-Fi battles.
Free Radical’s creative lead, Derek Littlewood, has confirmed that Haze runs at 1024×576. \”We prioritise a nice smooth framerate over a different res. Personally, I don’t really buy the whole thing. People did the same with Call of Duty, they did the same with Halo, and they say with those games