And the technology wars begin. Just when you thought NVIDIA had the last say in the verbal bout of "who's processing power gargles nuts now?" Intel decided that it was time to take the graphics game to a higher level. Today, we're introduced to Intel's "Larrabee" - a much rumored CPU concept prototype designed to carry some form of graphics processing as well. Suddenly itching for more? Full story now, pardner.

Quite a number of announcements were made by Sony in this year's Game Developers Conference. While most are probably talking about the fact that there are 2.8 million PSN gamers, developers have been going crazy at the new PhyreEngine from Sony Computer Entertainment. For more on this, be sure to check out the full article.

 

Imagine being able to play high-end games you aren't normally able to run on your PC. Actually, this is quite possible now with a web-based service being offered by StreamMyGame through a games-sharing site and a software plug-in which can remotely play games left by posters who leave hypertext links of their software on the site.

This new service is currently available for games compatible with Windows XP, Vista and games based on DirectX8, DirectX9, DirectX10 and OpenGL formats. The company plans to extend the capabilities of the service to a Linux platform, enabling PC games to be played remotely on PS3 and other web-based devices such as DVD players, set top boxes, networked media devices and even mobile phones.

Richard Faria, CEO of StreamMyGame, had this to say about the new web service they are availing:

We are embarking on a new paradigm in the gaming industry fuelled by advances in computer hardware, network speeds and the want of gamers to have more freedom. We network the power of their main PC so it can be used to play high end games on other PCs and laptops around the home. I believe the demand for high resolutions will drive the sales of high end PC hardware

The Linux version will have an estimated release date by the fourth quarter of this year. Other practical applications of the web service include file sharing, as well as other practical streaming PC applications such as sharing live videos that are medical, geographical, architectural, automotive, scientific and multimedia in nature.

For those of you who want to look into this service provided by StreamMyGame, you can access the website through the read link below.

id Software bigwig John Carmack recently posted a message on the Splashdot forums reaffirming that his company's published games can run on Linux given the right amount of effort from the programming community.

"There is certainly no plans for a commercially supported linux version of Rage, but there will very likely be a linux executable made available," writes Carmack. "It isn't running at the moment, but we have had it compiled in the past."

Carmack stresses that "it really only takes one interested programmer to make it happen" as he explained that running on additional platforms usually provides some code quality advantages.

The id boss further elaborates that the PC version is still OpenGL, but it is possible that could change before release. "The actual API code is not very large, and the vertex / fragment code can be easily translated between cg/hlsl/glsl as necessary," he reveals.

"I am going to at least consider OpenGL 3.0 as a target, if Nvidia, ATI, and Intel all have decent support. there really won't be any performance difference between GL 2.0 / GL 3.0 / D3D, so the api decision will be based on secondary factors, of which inertia is one," concludes Carmack.

Just because global warming is an inconvenient truth doesn't mean learning about it has to be an inconvenient bore. French independent game and software developer Midori has just announced the release of its new game, titled Global Warming.

This game will put players behind the control of one of several characters, as a landfill is about to be set up beside their home.

Players must find a way to save their home from the dump by choosing an action card, which will affect their character's various stats (finances, morale, and health) in the next few rounds. These action cards will further have an effect on the character's surroundings (C02 emissions, waste, chemicals, etc). Further adding to unpredictability are the appearance of "accident cards,"  which randomly occur to add a degree of complexity to gameplay.

Global Warming runs under the Phelios game engine (PTK), and is compatible with both Mac OS X (10.3.9 or higher), and Windows (95/98/ME/2000/XP/Vista) OS. Here are the technical requirements:

• 512 MB of RAM
• 450 Mhz Processor
• 3D openGL video card

A free game demo should be available for download over at the Midori site (read link). Or if you're interested, the game's full version can also be purchased and downloaded for US$ 9.95.

PLAYXPERT announced in an official press release that their new line of in-game "widgets," uncannily named PLAYXPERT (oh the horror!), for the avid PC LAN and MMO gamer. These little management tools sit inside your game, offering a semi-transparent feature so that they don't obscure your field of view, but still allow you to view content streamed right through.

 

The universal instant messaging and chat system (with VoIP support) is compatible with Xfire, Yahoo!, AOL, ICQ, and MSN engines for IMing or chatting. But the PLAYXPERT platform is especially helpful for World of Warcraft players, since the initial release will come with special features for the successful Blizzard MMORPG. Future support for other popular games will soon be supported through add-on releases to the platform.

Other widgets include the Armory widget, Thottbot Widget, WoWWiki widget, and a WoWhead widget. A Google widget will also be provided so that any game can find key information online without having to ALT-TAB out of the game and launch a browser. Utilizing an in-game overlay technology, the widgets actually are rendered through DirectX (with OpenGL support coming soon) and not through the Windows GUI.

Aimed specifically for the techie, geeky and even hardware enthusiast gamers, other future widgets will include real-time hardware diagnostics. Game stat tracking, clan and team management, in-game music access along with other additional community features are also slated to come soon.

And of course, budding coders can even add their own widgets to the platform without having to tackle the difficulties in coding overlay engines. PLAYXPERT has already published a full application programming interface (API) for the platform so widget coders can get started on their own custom additions to their gameplay experiences.

The whole videogame industry is currently in the middle of the transition to high-definition next gen visuals with the introduction of DirectX 10, and to make the transition an easier process, here comes Nvidia with the "definitive" game development platform, Nvidia SDK 10.

The core of Nvidia's new platform is the new NVIDIA Developer Toolkit. It promises to "save developers time and money in creating games that deliver almost lifelike graphics and physics realism." The platform consists of Nvidia GeForce(R) 8 Series graphics cards, Nvidia nForce(R) 680 motherboards, and DirectX 10.

The new NVIDIA Developer Toolkit also includes instructive code samples, advanced shaders, performance tuning, and more, all in a bid to make the creation of Microsoft DirectX 10-compatible games easier.

The Nvidia Developer Toolkit also includes the following:

• SDK 10: all-new DirectX 10, OpenGL, and CUDA code samples for the latest GPUs
• Texture Tools: Powerful libraries and plug-ins for working with textures - now with DirectX 10 support and approximately 10x faster due to GPU acceleration via CUDA
• PerfKit 5: powerful tools for debugging and profiling GPU applications for Windows Vista and DirectX 10 -- now with shader edit-and-continue, render state modification, customizable graphs and counters, and more
• ShaderPerf 2: detailed shader performance information with support for new drivers
• FX Composer 2: a world-class development environment for cross-platform shader authoring; DirectX and OpenGL support with HLSL, Cg, and COLLADA FX
• Shader Library: the world's largest collection of GPU shaders featuring more than 100 different shader effects and support for external submissions

Nvidia is currently demonstrating the entire development platform and distributing some of its components free of charge at the Game Developers Conference (GDC).

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), one of the leading manufacturers of processors and graphics technology, has recently announced that it will be developing and licensing graphics core technology to semiconductor manufacturers in the handheld industry.

This decision is a major move in advancing the company's plans toward its goal of developing "the ultimate visual experience". AMD has been providing its technology to PCs and gaming consoles for years now, so it has a solid background in the field.

STMicroelectronics has already licensed AMD graphics technology. Included in the deal are the 2D and 3D vector graphics engine and software which are compliant with OpenGL ES 2.0 and OpenVG 1.0. OpenGL ES is used for creating user-interfaces while OpenVG is used for rendering graphics, both of which are geared toward mobile handheld devices and cellular phones. STMicroelectronics has decided to integrate AMD’s handheld unified shader architecture graphics technology with its Nomadik platform.

AMD has been working with different fields involved with developing handheld platforms such as semiconductor suppliers, OEM, and application developers. They are hoping to push for improved graphics on handhelds through the use of their technology in conjunction with the latest APIs.

Yeah, it's a LuaPlayer, and this one's from Shine at the PS2Dev forums. What's different about this one is that it's been re-written with the SCons build management and is based on OpenGL for all graphics output. Check Wiki, OpenGL "is a standard specification defining a cross-language cross-platform API" for computer graphics, which leads to the other thing that's different. It's been released for the PSP, the PS3 (Linux), and Windows.

We shall henceforth and heretofore call this the One LuaPlayer to Rule Them All/And In The Darkness Bind Them. Until Sauron Shine comes up with the next version, or someone else comes up with something else like it. Here are the details for each LuaPlayer platform:

• PSP: uses PSPGL (old hat, old friend), tested on 1.0 and 1.5, but doesn't run on kernel, so theoretically should work with other versions, too (that's unconfirmed, though). 3D rendering on the PSP is slow, though - Shine's hoping someone would step up with an idea to fix it.
• PS3: should work on every 64-bit PS3 Linux. Screenshot is from the PS3 version.
• Windows: compiled with VisualStudio.Net, so it won't need Cygwin or any other library apart from the system and OpenGL libs

Weirdly enough, there's a folder for "Mac OS X", but neither the forum post nor anything in the text files in the package indicate anything about Mac functionality. Looks like a work in progress since Shine and another member of the forum are talking about the Mac OS X "port." Anyway, the download link below contains both the application/s and the source codes for LuaPlayer OpenGL. Instructions are provided in build.txt, while actual apps are in the "release" folder.

Thank you, Bronx, for the tip!

Download: [LuaPlayer OpenGL]

Graphics cards help to make your gaming experiences so much better. You probably wouldn't be able to see the grandeur of Azeroth or the details on the pretty gun you're holding without a powerful card.

If you're a hardcore gamer who really wants to see everything a game has to offer, you may have picked up one of the GeForce 8800 series cards from NVIDIA to augment your gameplay. If that's the case, then this little bit of news is for you.

NVIDIA recently released the latest version of their ForceWare drivers for the GeForce 8800 types. ForceWare Release 95 v97.44 fixes some issues present in games like EverQuest II and Splinter Cell: Double Agent. This release also removes the option for temperature monitoring and overclocking of the GPU, placing it inside NVIDIA nTune 5.05 instead.

In any case, we've listed the highlights of their release below. GeForce 8800 GTX and GTS users should feel free to visit the sourced link to download the latest drivers for themselves, as well as grab a copy of the release notes and installation guide provided by their site. Enjoy!

Release Highlights:

• Supports GeForce 8800 GTX and GeForce 8800 GTS GPUs.
• Game and application compatibility fixes. For more information on this driver, please view the Release Notes.
• New PureVideo technology features allows GeForce 8800 GTX/GTS to achieve a score of 128 in the HQV video quality benchmark:
• Improved inverse telecine algorithms (2:2 and 3:2 Pull-down Correction) for standard and high definition content.
• Improved spatial-temporal de-interlacing algorithm (for standard and high definition content).
  

• Includes the new NVIDIA Control Panel. Please visit the NVIDIA Control Panel website for more information.
• Microsoft DirectX 9.0c and OpenGL 2.1 support.