Village Gamer

Vancouver – Rockstar Games, a publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., is proud to announce that Max Payne 3 is currently in development at Rockstar Vancouver and is scheduled for a winter 2009 release on the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system and PC. Developed by Rockstar Vancouver, Max Payne 3 tells the story of a retired police detective embroiled in a world of corruption, turmoil and intense violence.

The award-winning Max Payne franchise put players in the role of Max Payne, a hard-boiled New York City detective with a penchant for violence, out to avenge the death of his family. The latest installment delivers more of the classic elements and hyper-intense action that fans have come to love, while moving the story of Max in a new direction.
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Sci-fi collectible card game puts players in hero’s role for strategic play. Collect new characters, each illustrated by a talented artist in a unique style, and challenge your friends

Lasalle ON – In an age where game-playing can take place across the Internet against a virtual opponent, the concept of a card game presents a low-tech but more personal alternative. No batteries, electricity, or wireless connection required — just two or more people, in person, facing off against each other in a friendly game.

For Mike Wills, a lifelong sci-fi fan, this concept has launched not only his new business, but hopefully the careers of some up-and-coming artists as well. Wills and a group of dedicated gamer friends

Li Kui

created “Herobits“, a collectible card game that allows players to become heroes in powered armor fighting to save the planet.

Inspired by his daughters’ fascination with the extended worlds created for their toys, Wills wanted to create a game for youngsters and adults who enjoy sci-fi adventures. “I saw that the toys themselves were only part of the fun for my girls. They enjoyed building a world around the characters and giving them all a bit of personality,” says Wills. “It struck me that it would be fun to be able to collect and play with a totally new set of sci-fi heroes, to be able to build on their story, and add to their heroic powers.”

Complete decks eliminate booster pack purchasing
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Toronto – Today MySpace Canada announced “The Hollywood Minute,” the newest addition to the social portal, available exclusively in Canada. A source of candid celebrity shots, news and gossip straight from the streets, “The Hollywood Minute” will be a staple for entertainment news addicts across the country.

MySpace Canada encourages users to snap pictures or video of celebrities from around the world and upload them to “The Hollywood Minute” for a chance to be paid for the photo or video if it is syndicated through Central Image Agency, MySpace’s exclusive partner photo agency.

To introduce “The Hollywood Minute,” MySpace Canada will be hosting a suite in the Artist Sanctuary at the Loden Hotel in Vancouver during the 2009 Juno weekend. “The Hollywood Minute on MySpace Suite” will be a unique environment for artists to communicate with fans through MySpace, enjoy refreshments, and relax from the weekend’s events.

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Kelowna BC – Following its phenomenal success with millions of children and parents around the globe, the virtual world of Club Penguin has opened its igloo doors to the francophone community.

The new French language version of Club Penguin is supported by francophone staff in Europe and Canada who understand the unique cultural references of the French audience and can provide timely and responsive moderation and customer support.

“As a Canadian-based company, we’re particularly excited to be able to offer French-speaking children and families in this country the same opportunity to explore the fun and creativity of Club Penguin in their own language that so many other kids around the world already enjoy,” says Lane Merrifield, one of Club Penguin’s founders and executive vice president of Disney Online Studios.

Club Penguin, which launched in English in 2005, is one of the largest and fastest-growing virtual worlds for children where they can explore, play games and interact with friends. The virtual world enhances the Walt Disney Company’s legacy of rich and immersive entertainment that can be enjoyed by the whole family.

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Burnaby – Electronic Arts Inc. announced today that Need for Speed™ SHIFT, the all-new authentic racing game in the Need for Speed series, will hit stores in Europe on September 17 and North America on September 22, 2009. Need for Speed SHIFT brings a true driver’s experience to some of the world’s most iconic racing tracks, including the storied Brand’s Hatch in the UK. The game also features the largest roster of high-performance cars in Need for Speed history including race cars such as the Pagani Zonda F, Porsche 911 GT2 and Lotus Elise.

“With Need for Speed SHIFT, we set out to create a racing game that pushes the genre and delivers something never before seen in a Need for Speed title,” said Patrick Soderlund, Senior Vice President at EA Games Europe. “By focusing on the driver’s experience through the first-person view, we are able to capture the high-speed intensity and gripping emotions of racing.” Read the rest of this entry »

Burnaby/Kitchener-Waterloo – Desire2Learn Incorporated (Desire2Learn) a leading provider of mission-critical enterprise eLearning solutions, today announced that the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) has become one of the newest client partners to implement the Desire2Learn® enterprise eLearning solution as their Learning Management System (LMS).

Beginning with their “power users,” BCIT has rolled out the Desire2Learn platform for the Winter 2009 term using an escalated phase-in. Full, campus-wide implementation of the Desire2Learn eLearning environment will take place by the Fall 2009 term with the five main campuses and 18 ancillary campuses all coming onboard. More than 55,000 students, including both full-time and distance education learners, and all six Schools will use the system. BCIT expects to ramp up dramatically as they plan to implement the Desire2Learn system in numerous ways from distance education courses through to competency models across its Schools which span a diversity of curriculum from Health Care to Construction and the Environment.

“The Desire2Learn platform’s power, flexibility, reliability and efficiency are what has really impressed us. The system is extremely intuitive for both students and faculty,” said Bryan Fair, Educational Technical Advisor & Supervisor of BCIT’s Distributed Learning Services team. “We can’t say enough good things about the Desire2Learn team; they have partnered with us every step of the way to ensure a successful initial implementation. The pilot is advancing extremely well. We are able to move forward with confidence and assurance that we have a robust and leading-edge platform from a company willing to work with us as a partner on an ongoing basis.”
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Montreal – NDi Kids is proud to announce that its’ own property, Hans Hans the Biking Viking, has found a home with Nickelodeon Kids. Hans Hans was originally conceived by Meinert Hansen and developed further with the creative team at NDi.

Hans and friends will appear on Nick’s in a puzzle game called Leaving Loki’s Lockup. Hans Hans, Freya and Thor must coordinate their unique powers to solve Loki’s crazy conundrums.

Montreal – Audiokinetic Inc., the leading audio solution provider for the video game industry, announced today that its audio pipeline solution, Wwise®, will be used in the development of EVE Online, the critically-acclaimed massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) developed by the award-winning virtual world developer CCP.

EVE Online is a science fiction-based MMOG in which over a quarter of a million players inhabit a vast, persistent world as starship pilots in pursuit of fame, wealth and glory. First launched in 2003, the latest free expansion, EVE Online: Apocrypha, was released on March 10, 2009. Noted for its fervent use of cutting edge technology, CCP’s server architecture makes large-scale fleet battles a reality, with upwards of one thousand participants engaged in epic conflicts for control of resources and strategic regions of space.

Sound plays an important role in the immersion factor for these intergalactic gladiators. There were numerous advantages to having Wwise tools available to the CCP Audio team during the development phase for Apocrypha as described by Audio Director Baldur Baldursson.

“Ease of use was one of the key factors in our decision to choose Audiokinetic over other middleware solutions we tested,” said Baldursson. “Audiokinetic seems very serious in creating powerful tools that actually work for sound designers and musicians. We were able to focus on designing the sounds themselves instead of having to worry about technology issues – and integrating the actual sounds was fun.”
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Sault Ste. Marie – The Future Play 2009 conference on gaming and design is pleased to announce that seminar topics for this year’s conference have just been finalized.

Says Rick Mahoney of Cinetik, the Conference Co-Chair of Future Play: “I think we have been able to capture a very interesting spectrum of topics with the seminars we have selected. I feel that there is a good balance between technical ‘how-to’ seminars and presentations that will be more philosophical in nature.”

The full list of seminar topics is as follows:

Making Deep Games: presented by Doris Rusch

Game Audio Education – Adding Audio to your Games Courses and Games to your Audio Courses: presented by Karen Collins, Bill Kapralos, Leonard Paul and David Kerr

Designing Effective Exercise Video Games: presented by Nicholas Graham, Tadeusz Stach and Regan Mandryk

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Vancouver – A “voice powered virtual assistance company” Bvocalized Systems Inc. introduces the very first hands-free web information access and outsourced assistance entirely through voice. User can connect with the service by dialling a toll free number from any phone device within North America. The system will actually listen, understand and respond within minutes of service request by an automated phone call in spoken natural language.

The Bvocalized Voice Assistant™ provides more than just information and answers, it also handles secretarial tasks. Users can send email, dictate notes, get directions, find people, order goods, request reservations, set appointments or record transactions, to name a few – all without touching the keypad of their phone or having live agents online. It’s like having a two way conversation with the Web when there is no Internet.

While the system is highly automated, it fully utilizes valuable intelligent human resource. The caller’s voice is instantly transcribed into text (speech to text) for analysis by a Bvocalized specialist. The specialist then submits a text response to the system, which generates a spoken-word (text to speech) reply along with a corresponding email for the caller.
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