Village Gamer

Frima Studios and Bolt Interactive have announced today that the Pygmies of Pocket God on Facebook have to worry not only about the gods smiting them, but now their fellow tribe members as well in Episode VIII: Hi-islanders. The latest expansion for the Pocket God world features a brand new item, a LARP rack, which enables Pygmies to duel one another using one of five fantastical weapons, introduces a new god challenge from new rival god Kali, and also expands the amount of in-game content by adding five new solo quests and a plethora of clothing options based on characters from the Pocket God comic book.

Since its debut in December 2010, the Facebook version of Pocket God has grown exponentially and is attracting more players every month. To date, there are more than 700,000 deities who have tortured Pygmies and more than 55 million loyal, unquestioning Pygmies have met their demise—that’s approximately the record-setting number for most votes cast in a single show on American Idol (okay, one more vote: Simon or Steven). Another two million sacrifices can be attributed to friends on Facebook sacrificing other friends in a host of brutal and irreverent ways, including electrocution, shark attack, venus fly traps, tornados, tar pits, and more!

The new updates for Hi-islanders include:

• There Can Only Be One Hi-islander: A mysterious LARP rack has appeared on the island and there’s only one thing to do now that it’s here: kill everyone. The new LARP item dons five video game-inspired weapons and swords, and when two Pygmies each get a hold of a weapon you’ll be witness to a fight to the death until only one Pygmy is left standing. Alternatively, if you dangle one of your hapless devotees in front of an armed Pygmy, your floating follower will be pummeled like a piñata (candy sold separately).

• Challenge Kali and Her Rack: New rival god Kali has showed up on the island, and she thinks that her rack is better than yours. Of course, you agree, and if you try to touch her rack then you best prepare for trouble as she won’t take your advances lightly. Successfully defeating Kali will earn you a weapon rack idol of your own, proving that your rack rules them all.

• Dress Up in Those Snazzy Comic Duds: Pocket God on Facebook is taking some fashion advice from its comic book counterpart and now offers fans the ability to customize their Pygmies with articles of clothing found in Pocket God Comics, as well as control the actual characters from the comic themselves! What’s that? You’ve always wanted to feed Ooga to a shark because he goes against everything the tribe says? Well then, your wish is our command.

• New Quests and UI Improvements Added: As always, we’re making sure to deliver new content for newbies and veterans alike with the latest update including five new solo quests for those deities who like to go it solo, as well as a slew of UI improvements in the Power and Clothing stores, along with some gameplay balances here and there.

The first of today’s Wild Games Studio video releases features the five minute E3 trailer for Dhaila’s Adventures, which focuses on the games’ three open worlds and the dungeons.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ph_jhLS8n18]

The second trailer, also from E3, introduces the studio’s new IP World Circus, an innovative and original game that allows players to build and manage their own circus. World Circus is scheduled for release in 2013 and offers 3 game modes – career, simulation and multi-player.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZxoU3-un1I]

The third and final E3 video presents Wild Games’ new iPhone game Kung Fu Lobster, a colourful undersea world where you control a well-armed lobster and take on other denizens of the deep to prove that only the strong survive.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spg71sOkYDM]

Calgary’s chapter of the Canadian Public Relations Society (CPRS) is hosting its annual summer social and networking event immediately following the organization’s annual general meeting at the Vue Café on Thursday, June 16, 2011. The meeting will run from 5:30pm – 6:00pm with a networking social immediately to follow. A new members’ reception will be held immediately before the meeting from 5:00pm – 5:30pm. The gallery closes at 8:00pm.

“This is a great opportunity and venue for Calgary’s PR community to connect again before dispersing for the summer,” says the Calgary chapter president, Dan Muys.

Chapter news and updates, as well as future organizational plans, will be discussed at the AGM, which is open to both members and non-members. Only members in good standing can vote. CPRS will host a summer social and networking event immediately following the meeting. The social is a chance for public relations professionals to meet and network while exchanging ideas and best practices. This event is free for CPRS-Calgary members, $25.00 for non-members. The Vue Café is located in the Virginia Christopher Fine Art Gallery on 11^th Ave SW.

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) warns all Canadians to beware of telephone calls, mail, or email that claim to be from the CRA but are not. These are phishing scams that could result in identity thefts.

Canadians should especially beware of phishing scams asking for their personal information, such as a social insurance, credit card, bank account, and passport numbers. Some of these scams ask for this personal information directly, and others refer the taxpayer to a Web site resembling the CRA’s where the person is asked to verify their identity by entering personal information.

An email scam that has been recently circulating notifies taxpayers that a complaint containing evidence of involvement in tax evasion has been filed against them and the company with which they are affiliated by using the Informant Leads Program. This email is not from the CRA. The CRA’s Informant Leads Program Web page warns taxpayers about this scam.

The CRA has well-established practices to protect the confidentiality of taxpayer information. For more information about security of taxpayer information and examples of fraudulent communications, go to the CRA’s Security Info Page.

Anyone who receives a suspicious communication should immediately report it to the Anti-Fraud Centre or to the institution that it appears to be from.

For information on scams, to report deceptive telemarketing, and if personal or financial information has been unwittingly provided, go to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Web page.

In its second news statement of the day, Spin Master Ltd., this time with Mind Candy, one of the world’s fastest growing social online gaming companies have announced the upcoming launch of an official toy line based on its safe online social networking platform for children, Moshi Monsters. The product assortment, which will be available across the U.S. exclusively at Toys”R”Us stores and online at Toysrus.com in late July, will feature six adorable plush Moshi Monsters characters, as well as 32 Moshling minifigures manufactured by Spin Master Ltd.

“We know that web-savvy kids want to enjoy tangible experiences with their favorite virtual properties, and the Moshi Monsters toy line delivers these experiences in a big way,” said Richard Barry, Vice President, General Merchandise Manager, Toys”R”Us, U.S. “We are thrilled to be the only U.S. retailer to provide kids the opportunity to bring Moshi Monsters into the physical world.”

Moshi Monsters is a new form of children’s entertainment, with its website forming the heart of the experience, combines adoptable pet monsters, safe social networking, stories, games, missions, virtual interaction and educational puzzles. The site has become hugely successful over the last year, growing at the rate of one new registration every second – with the fastest growth across North America. Recently, Moshi Monsters welcomed its 50 millionth registered user worldwide. Read the rest of this entry »

Canadian Satellite Radio Holdings Inc., the parent company of XM Canada, and Sirius Canada Inc. have released a statement that the final regulatory and government approvals related to the proposed merger announced in November, 2010 have been received.

The Merger is now currently scheduled to close on June 21, 2011 contemporaneously with the closing of CSR’s refinancing. CSR’s refinancing consists of an exchange offer and consent solicitation for its 12.75% Senior Notes due 2014 and a concurrent private placement offering of its 9.75% Senior Notes due 2018. The expiration date of the Exchange Offer is now set for June 16, 2011. The Exchange Offer and Concurrent Offering were undertaken in order to refinance certain debt of CSR in connection with the Merger. As of the date hereof, US$68.83 million aggregate principal amount of Existing Notes have been tendered in the Exchange Offer. The New Notes have not been, and will not be, qualified for distribution to the public under the securities laws of any province or territory of Canada or registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933.

On November 24, 2010, CSR and Sirius Canada entered into a securities purchase agreement to combine the companies in an all-stock merger.  On February 17, 2011, CSR received the support of its shareholders to approve the Merger.  On April 19, 2011, the Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission rendered its regulatory approval of the transaction.

Both Canadian Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. and Sirius Canada Inc. want readers to note that this statement does not constitute an offer to purchase or sell any securities. Any offer to purchase or sell securities will be made by means of an offering memorandum. No offer, solicitation, purchase or sale will be made in any jurisdiction in which such an offer, solicitation, purchase or sale would be unlawful.

Technoparc Montréal is thrilled by the City of Montreal’s 2011-2017 Economic Development Strategy, spearheaded by Mayor Gérald Tremblay and Executive Committee Vice President, Richard Deschamps, an initiative aimed at capitalizing on the knowledge and creativity already present in Montreal.

Technoparc Montréal is fully behind the City’s commitment to increase strategic partnerships and alliances with a view to building bridges between businesses and to increasing innovation and creativity in Montreal. The City’s ongoing PR@M Industry program and new PR@M Innovation are also excellent tools that will help support Montreal’s future development.

Today’s major international cities must offer nearby services and dynamic employment zones that serve multiple purposes and are readily accessible to workers. “The advantage of living in an urban environment is the ability to work, live and play in the same general area,” explains Mario Monette, President and CEO of Technoparc Montréal. “The City’s new strategy will keep Montreal young and relevant on the eve of its 375^th anniversary and will shore up its positioning as a premier city of creativity and innovation.”

Technoparc Montréal’s mission is to support the Island of Montreal’s economic development through the emergence of world-class innovation poles and research centres in the following sectors: aerospace, life sciences, information technology, clean technology, agri-food and renewable energy.

FreshBooks has come up with a unique solution to ensure the rotating postal strike does not affect small business owners in Toronto. Mail delivery has been drastically affected since the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) commenced a strike in Toronto on June 13th.

“We recognize that delivering invoices is a lifeline to independent business owners,” says FreshBooks CEO Mike McDerment. “We want to show our commitment to making billing activities as painless as possible. Our customers are looked after since FreshBooks allows anyone to send their invoices online. We thought this was an interesting way to help out other people who are affected and show them that we’re serious about our commitment to helping everyone get paid.”

FreshBooks is offering to pick up and hand-deliver invoices to anywhere in Metro Toronto area. The company has equipped a special vehicle to safely transport invoices today. This offer is available to any small business affected (not just FreshBooks customers) and exclusively for invoices.

A delivery day is scheduled for Wednesday June 15^th contingent on Toronto mail services remaining restricted and for people sending invoices within the Metro Toronto region. Delivery can be arranged by contacting freshbooks with pickup details.

“To us,” says McDerment, “painless billing means that you can rely on the systems supporting your business even during periods of uncertainty.”

Adlib Software has announced the general availability of the Adlib Content Transformation Platform, the industry’s first complete, automated transformation solution for the enterprise. The Adlib Platform is uniquely designed to streamline document-intensive business processes to improve efficiency, mitigate compliance-related risks and reduce costs. It is deployed as a shared service and can scale enterprise-wide, enabling centralized content-to-PDF transformation capabilities to multiple applications, departments and lines of business.

Today’s enterprises are challenged with increased content management demands, and struggle to find efficient ways to capture, manage, preserve and share content. Enterprise Content Management (ECM) systems including Microsoft® SharePoint® help ease these challenges. However, these solutions don’t always provide the necessary content transformation capabilities needed to enable the efficient automation of document-centric business processes that are important in removing time-consuming, error-prone and costly manual intervention.

Adlib turns volumes of content and intellectual property into digital assets that can be easily accessed, shared, leveraged and archived. For example, a leading international insurance company is using Adlib to increase sales by being faster than their competitors in delivering personalized customer quotes in PDF format. In addition, Pfizer, the world’s largest research-based pharmaceutical company, is turning patents into profits by speeding time-to-market for its drugs by streamlining and automating the creation of submission-quality PDFs and eliminating the need for time-consuming, costly and error-prone manual quality control reviews. Read the rest of this entry »

Summer 2011 will see two new titles on many platforms coming from the Ludia game studios. The first announcement comes from Ludia Inc. and FremantleMedia Enterprises, who announced today that Hole In The Wall will be available worldwide exclusively for Kinect™ on the Microsoft Xbox 360^® and will be available for purchase from Xbox LIVE Arcade. Based on the global television game show phenomenon, Hole In The Wall is one of the trickiest, fastest and funniest games on the planet where agility and a hearty sense of humor are essential tools to survive.

Players must contort their bodies to fit through bizarrely shaped holes in themed moving walls hurtling towards them. Competitors attempt to clear the walls in order to boost their scores, or risk being swept away into a pool of water. Hole In The Wall will also incorporate online play, single and multiplayer game modes, as well as image captures of the outlandish player movements performed within the game and hilarious bonus videos from the TV show.

“Ludia is thrilled to create an immersive, controller-free Hole In The Wall game play experience that is perfectly suited to leverage Microsoft Kinect technology,” said Alex Thabet, Founder and CEO of Ludia Inc. “This first title is just the beginning of Ludia games for Kinect on Xbox 360, and serves to further reinforce our multiplatform game strategy.”

“The Hole In The Wall television show has been highly successful in dozens of countries worldwide, so we are very pleased to work with Ludia to extend the franchise to Microsoft’s Xbox 360, said Olivier Delfosse, Director, Interactive, FremantleMedia Enterprises, licensor for Hole In The Wall. “We are sure that fans of the show and wider audiences alike will enjoy partaking in a fresh and exciting new Hole In The Wall experience.”

The second development announcement came from Ludia and Mark Burnett’s One Three Television LLC. The development studio will publish games based on the multiple-award winning Are You Smarter Than A 5^th Grader?® TV game show. The North America-wide, multi-year will result in games for Facebook and mobile platforms including iPhone™, iPod touch™ and iPad™.

“We are excited to have the opportunity to create Are You Smarter Than A 5^th Grader? games for the millions of people that play games on Facebook and mobile devices,” said Alex Thabet, Founder and CEO of Ludia Inc. “This new license helps amplify the Ludia portfolio of game show games, which has been a highly successful category for us and one we believe has strong on-going potential across platforms.”

The Are You Smarter Than A 5^th Grader? games will feature the favorite game play elements of the television show as contestants vie to earn money by answering trivia questions from a set of ten grade school subjects in a quest to earn the top prize. The games will also incorporate real-time multiplayer competition as well as other unique social features that will result in high dynamic and entertaining game play experiences.

“We are pleased to add Ludia as a licensee to our Are You Smarter Than A 5^th Grader? licensing program. We look forward to working with them on 5^th Grader games for social media and mobile platforms,” said Mark Burnett. “We are thrilled to see the franchise thrive so that fans of the show and wider audiences alike can enjoy their very own Are You Smarter Than A 5^th Grader? game experiences.”