Okay, we’ve seen a lot of mods that transform age-old controllers and make them compatible with PCs. Does that mean we are getting tired of spotting the same thing over and over again? Hell no! As a matter of fact, being clumsy with electronics as we are, we love to see the ancient controllers being made compatible with PCs and put up on online shelves. Etsy apparently knows our weakness and has put up two modded controllers for sale. Retro NES controller and Sega Genesis controller (both used) are up for grabs, hacked and endowed with USB compatibility. Compatible with Mac and PC, they’ve even been tested on Linux. Your preferences apart, NES controller seems better among the two as it comes with a handy trick. Press a series of buttons in a row and the controller readily becomes a mouse (or functions as such anyway). There are currently four of these retro devices on site – three Genesis and one NES. These are going for $35 each and $33 respectively. Jump to see the hacked Genesis controller.

Source: Ohgizmo

Game away till your thumbs become numb but you know that juice will eventually run out. And then it is back to hooking controllers to PS3 till you can game again. That demands a solution and Sony promptly delivers it by bringing AC charging for PS3 controllers. The latest peripherals announced by Sony Computer Entertainment Japan consist of a wireless keyboard (CECHZK1JP) for the PlayStation 3 and AC Adapter USB supported (CECHZA1 J). It is the latter, of course, that I’ve found most admirable. CECHZA 1J plugs into a regular AC socket and has two USB ports to feed power to DUALSHOCK and Sixaxis controller or even PS3’s wireless headset. This means one does not have to leave the console on for charging controllers. The device will hit stores at a price of ¥2,800 (£17), which is by no means prohibitive. CECHZA 1J is supposed to go on sale in Japan on 18 December and will hopefully move to the rest of the world thereafter.

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Source: techradar

Mobile gaming is getting bigger by the minute. And the quest to add phone-like utilities to a portable gaming device (or maybe even vice versa) is going full throttle. Mostly directed at PSP, we have seen several of these phone concepts over last year or so. Right on cue is this concept gaming-phone from Sony Ericsson. Tagged rather imaginatively as ‘Game Terminator’ the design follows your usual wide-screen trend. The phone-cum-console looks very sleek in its renderings and the touch-screen adds to its allure. The Game Terminator also brings home camera (hopefully a powerful one considering this one’s from SE) and game controls. I usually have my reservations about such bulky albeit combination-devices, but this is cool enough to consider shelling out for. Only question, when would it be realized, if indeed it would be realized at all?

Source: Cellphonebeat

Mods are always a great way to exhibit creativity and dexterity. Throw in wood into your mod-mix and you add a touch of distinctive class as well. ‘DuopV1‘ is one custom-made console that exudes brilliance. And bringing home NES and SNES in a portable avatar, DuopV1 is no slouch when it comes to gaming either. This hack began its journey as a 3D rendering and from there moved onto a brilliant creation. I mean, 4.5” LCD, 4.2 hours of battery life, stereo sound with a headphone jack and wooden buttons, come on! DuopV1 has the guts of RetroDuo and an exterior replete with wooden stuff. I can only fathom the amount of work that creation would have demanded of the creator. Time to jump to gallery and witness the wooden console in all its glory.

Source: Techeblog

If your parents constantly bug you for your gaming addiction then it is time they met one Mr. Bradster. Taking fanaticism for World of WarCraft to a whole new gaming level, this man has created not one nor two but 36 accounts. And that ain’t the surprising bit. What’s surprising is the fact that Bradster has a mind-blowing PC installation – with as many as 11 PCs – on which he plays with all his accounts simultaneously! And why is he obsessed with using so many accounts at one time? Well, simply because he would not like to depend on others to invade Stormwind and Ironforge. That his obsession with going alone costs him 5,711 bucks (on a 6 month pay schedule) every year is a different matter altogether. And the day of his lone raids is not that far into the future considering 32 of his shamans are level 61. To make sure Alliance is brought to its knees Bradster plans to buy 36 copies of Wrath of the Lich King – a question of mere $1,500 – as soon as it’s released. Now you might be astounded by the amount of time and (more importantly) money that this dude is putting into his crazy obsession but as he likes to put it:

…there are more expensive hobbies out there than World of Warcraft.

Dual-boxing :Source: Dvorak

Microsoft has announced at Tokya Game Show that they will be releasing a special Xbox 360 holiday bundle this month. The Xbox 360 Arcade holiday bundle will come with 6 free games, including SEGA Superstars Tennis and 5 Xbox LIVE Arcade games. Xbox 360 Pro and Xbox 360 Elite will come with New Xbox Experience and will feature two free games; LEGO Indiana Jones and Kung Fu Panda.

New Xbox Experience will be launched on 19th November and in addition to community and real-time chat features, it will also allow user to stream movies from Netflix. Microsoft will also be offering free Netflix trials as stated by xbox360fanboy. Xbox 360 Arcade, Xbox 360 Pro and Xbox 360 Elite will cost $199, $299 and $399 respectively.

Blizzard has officially announced that StartCraft II will be released as a Trilogy. Instead of being a single game with limited and small campaigns for each race, StarCraft II will be released in a way that each of three releases target one race at a time. Blizzard’s VP of Game Development, Rob Pardo says that this will allow for more elaborate campaigns for each race. There’s no word on release dates but three expansion packs will be following chronological order; Wings of Liberty (Terran), Heart of the Swarm (Zerg), and Legacy of the Void (Protoss).

This has surprised the gaming community across the globe and I bet that avid fans of StarCraft will be even more eager to get their hands on the first installment of the game. Blizzard has not revealed any info regarding the date of release, price and multiplayer capabilities of the game but we’ll keep you updated in case Blizzard plans to shell out anymore info about the trilogy.

Via: wired

It is time to update if you are one of the owners of Razer’s Lycosa gaming board. The company has worked on the device for over a year and has just announced a restructured Lycosa tagged “Lycosa Mirror Special Edition.”

The Lycosa Mirror SE is all set to look and act better than its predecessor. This it does so by incorporating some cool backlighting and high-gloss mirror finish on the keys. These changes have been made after considering gamers’ feedback on the precursor. The device is expected to retail starting December 2008.

The other device that Razer has announced is the Razer “Arctosa.” This one lessens the flash associated and keeps things rather simple. Again this one works on the lines of Razer Lycosa but does away with backlight. The Arctosa does, however, come with fully macro-programmable and media access keys. The Razor Arctosa comes in two editions – a silver-print edition and a black on black edition. Latter is exclusively aimed at those enlightened gamers who do not need a look at keys as they fire away merrily. The Arctosa hits shelves in November 2008.

Source: Engadget

Enough with lame PCs that stand no chance of competing with amazing gaming consoles of today. What we desperately need is a gaming-PC that can save the day for PC gamers. And an answer to our prayers is the “Solstice Spider Edition”. Clad in a crimson aluminum skin, Solstice Spider Edition optimizes gaming experience and is guaranteed to leave you “breathless.” Quad Core 9950 powers this machine and ATI Radeon HD 4850 (available Crossfire) graphics engine is incorporated to rival any console’s graphics’ prowess. Spider Edition has a 1 Terabyte RAID-0 array gaming drive and 4 GB of RAM up its sleeve to create an ecosystem that’s custom-made for gaming. To run all the gaming CDs/DVDs, Spider Edition has an optical drive dual layer CD/DVD burner. If you are still not impressed then maybe the fact that the PC comes with as many as 18 USB 2.0 ports, 4 FireWire Ports and a eSata Port (3GB/s), will change your mind. For LAN parties there’s 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet. Of course, sounds come crystal clear with 8 channel Realtek Audio. Ranging from $2799, Solstice Spider Edition is one machine that you must have to steer clear from the allure of consoles.

Source: Rainrecording

Gaming, especially of late, has been associated with a lot of bad traits. From attribution of laziness to social awkwardness and right down to shootouts, video games have been targeted with all and more. Several of the new games want to correct this situation. And one console that has done more to rectify the situation than any other is Wii. Its motion-controlled controller has spawned games that involve a lot more exercise and also improve interaction between family members by involving all in simple games. Building on this feature, the Wii Sauberman Controller is one concept that wants to sweep away all the negative imagery associated with gaming – quite practically too!

A result of designing workshop held in Zurich, the “Wiibrush” is the idea of Mario Weiss. Mario was given Wii and asked to develop a product for the brand. He conceptualized The Wii Sauberman Controller, which consists of a scoop and brush set. The designer wants to base a game around the clever controller that he’s thought out. The game called Sauberman will have a simple aim – brush all the unhealthy images of various games, of various genres. The Wii Sauberman Controller takes cleaning up to a whole new level (actually levels) and the player is asked to clean up all the messy situations created by unhealthy gaming actions. I say make this an actual product and you could do a lot to improve gaming’s image.

Source: Marioweiss