Village Gamer

Vancouver – Last evening our local ACM SIGGRAPH chapter presented a post-mortem panel for the movie Watchmen, featuring four of the development team from MPC Vancouver.

Watchmen was the first project for the brand new west coast studio, which completed a total of 300 shots for 24 sequences with 50 team members in only nine months. The team wanted to accurately recreate iconic moments from the original graphic novel, which at times proved to be a big challenge, but they rose to the challenge and succeeded. Archie, the owl ship was by far the heaviest asset in the show and played a major part a pivotal part in the show, during the sequence known as Call to Account.

The panel members – Ben Cole, Landon Bootsma, Harry Mukhopadhyay and Tim Mulvihill led the audience through the processes used in building the major shots from reference photos to 3d builds to finished product. Mixed with bits of humour the session was very educational and offered some very good insight into the amount of time and work which goes into the making of a movie such as Watchmen.

Watchmen Revealed was sponsored by: BCIC, 3vis, VanArts, Sophia Books, AnnexPro, Stash Digital Media, VEAbc and Society of Graphic Designers Canada, Vancouver Chapter.

Toronto – Stealth.com Inc. (Stealth Computer) a leading ISO 9001 manufacturer of industrial rugged computers and peripherals has released the new Model WPC-500F, a waterproof rugged, small footprint, fanless computer for environments where ordinary computer hardware won’t survive.

WPC-500F

The new Stealth WPC-500F is a rugged PC that is completely water-tight, surviving liquids, chemicals, dust and dirt intrusion, meeting IP67/NEMA 6 environmental specifications. Designed without cooling fans the internal CPU is cooled through advanced heat pipe technology. The rugged aluminum chassis also acts as a heat sink to dissipate internal heat and provide noise free operation.

Stealth’s WPC-500F extreme environment PC offers tremendous power in a tiny package that measures only; 7.51″(W) x 11.37″(D) x 2.97″(H) or (191 x 298 x 75.5 mm) yet surpasses the performance of most industrial and embedded PCs available today. Systems utilize Intel’s latest Atom processor technology for maximum performance and power efficiency.
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Vancouver – Renowned for connecting people and systems to global mobile broadband networks, Sierra Wireless was named Company of the Year at the 2009 Technology Impact Awards (TIAs) hosted by the BC Technology Industry Association (BCTIA). The award formally recognized Sierra Wireless’ phenomenal year that included developing the world’s first data devices for the HSPA+ standard, further penetrating the M2M market with the acquisition of Wavecom S.A., increasing their BC-based employees to 250 and, for the first time in company history, surpassing half a billion dollars in annual revenues.

Earning the Leadership in Social Responsibility Award was TELUS and its ‘Give Where You Live’ philosophy. Since 2000, TELUS, team members and retirees have contributed $137 million and more than 2.6 million hours of community service. Having also contributed over 2000 computers and laptops during the 2008 calendar year, TELUS was further recognized with an appreciation award by Computers for Schools – an organization that provides increased access to computer technology for students and learners of all ages.

James Topham, retired partner of KPMG, was awarded the prestigious Bill Thompson Award for career achievement. James enriched BC’s technology industry for over 30 years. During that time, he advised more than 100 technology companies and spent countless hours contributing to technology?related associations and philanthropic efforts. This includes being a founding member of the BCTIA. James is currently involved with three small technology firms as a financial advisor and director.
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Longueuil – D-BOX Technologies Inc., a leader in innovative motion technology for the entertainment industry, announces that it has entered into an agreement with Cineplex Entertainment LP, the largest motion picture exhibitor in Canada, to equip a section in one of its auditoriums at the Cineplex Odeon Queensway Cinemas located in Etobicoke, Ontario with a D-BOX Motion system.

The Canadian premiere will allow moviegoers to feel the motion and on-screen action right from their very own seat. This unmatched, realistic and immersive experience is created with breakthrough D-BOX Motion Code technology in which the movie is coded, frame-by-frame, to create customized motion effects resulting in subtle, refined movements that work in perfect sync with the action taking place on screen.

“Supported by an overwhelming level of satisfaction from moviegoers, D-BOX has partnered with Canada’s largest motion picture exhibitor to equip one of its flagship locations in the Greater Toronto Area. We are pleased to work with Cineplex Entertainment and look forward to an ongoing relationship with them,” stated Claude Mc Master, President and Chief Executive Officer of D-BOX Technologies Inc.
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Ottawa – Corel Corporation today announced Corel® Home Office, a new office suite designed specifically to address the needs of consumers and home-based businesses. With its low memory requirements and small footprint, Corel Home Office is also ideally suited for netbooks – portable, mini notebook computers that comprise the fastest growing PC segment. Corel Home Office includes Corel® Write for word processing, Corel® Calculate for spreadsheets, and Corel® Show for presentations.

Corel Home Office Simplifies Tasks for Consumers and Home-Based Businesses

* Sleek and simple interface: Easily access the tools and features you use most
* File compatibility and document sharing: With extensive file format support (including Microsoft Office) and the ability to create PDFs in all three applications, it’s easier than ever to communicate and share materials with others.
* Multi language support: Quickly toggle between 13 available languages to work in the language of your choice
* Portability: Delivery on a USB stick makes Corel Home Office easy to install on the go – even on netbooks without an optical (e.g. CD, DVD) drive
* Customization: Netbook owners can use manual or auto configuration options to easily adjust their settings and maximize screen real estate
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Ottawa – The game reviewers are calling “by far the best skating game on a mobile device” (GamePro) has recently gone live with its latest update, which includes, among other features, full compatibility with Apple’s newest iPhone and iPod Touch OS 3.0.

The latest update to the official Vans iPhone game adds the additional functionality of allowing players to skate to their own playlists, pulling music from their iPods.

Developed by Fuel Games, Vans SK8: Pool Service allows players to step into the shoes of pro riders Bucky Lasek or Omar Hassan, choose their board and wheels, and session an abandoned pool in one of ten unique events.

Vans Sk8: pool Service is currently available for $2.99 on the App Store, or as a free Lite version, giving iPhone and iPod touch users an excellent opportunity to check out one of the season’s most addictive titles.

Montreal – Meridian4 is thrilled to announce that they have signed an agreement with independent developer 2DEngine.com to digitally distribute their challenging and addictive puzzle game Chains.

“Working with Meridian4 is an excellent opportunity to gain the right exposure for our game which would not be possible otherwise. Most conservative casual portals would not appreciate how Chains is so expressive and different from other puzzle titles.” Said Ivan Traykov, Lead Designer and Programmer at 2DEngine.com.

“We were instantly addicted to Chains the moment we played it and instead of getting no work done, we decided to sign the game so we had a legitimate reason for playing it. We also saw a great, challenging independently-developed game that needed to get exposure to a wide audience. This is one of those ‘just-one-more-level’ games that will have you playing for hours.” said Andy Sher, CEO at Meridian4.

Chains will be available in the coming weeks on most digital distribution channels. Village Gamer has reviewed this game – and recommends it for some challenging fun.

This Gaming Life: Travels in Three Cities
Author: Jim Rossignol
May 2008
224 Pages

There is much about this book which I liked, particularly the fairly in-depth look at the Korean gaming culture and how it differs from that in the west. It was also interesting to read about the political movements within games and how they have been used as protest platforms. I feel that as a person who is both a gamer and a person who works in the gaming industry, This Gaming Life brings to light many of the reasons why people play video games – for the challenges, social experiences or to simply escape the stresses of every day life. One of the other reasons given by the author is that gamers game to stave off boredom.

Jim Rossignol raises some very valid points on how the activity of playing video games has grown to become a central part of today’s culture, such as the social components in today’s games and the scientific studies being conducted to better understand the effect of video games on the human countenance. He examines at length the pros and cons of becoming engrossed in games, as well as some of the educational aspects. Topics also covered are the varying levels of importance some game development studios put on gamer interaction with development through gamer-made mods or playing the game in ways not expected by the developers. This is something which I have heard discussed at many game development conferences – that gamers will always find some way to play the game that was outside of the project vision.
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Vancouver – AnnexPro is pleased to be presenting two educational events this summer. First up is the Matrox MAXimum Roadshow on June 23 at the VFS Cafe. The seminar will be showcasing Matrox MAX technology for faster than realtime H.264 encoding for Blu-ray, the web, and mobile devices. Matrox MAX is available in the Matrox CompressHD accelerator card and in the Matrox MXO2 series of I/O devices for the Mac.

The second seminar is the AJA Ki Pro Worldwide Roadshow: From Lens to Post. You are invited to join AJA on July 14 at the Vancouver Film School for a demonstration of their latest innovation in workflow enhancing technology – the Ki Pro. Finally, shoot on the same codec as you edit with, full raster 10 bit Apple ProRes 422, built natively into Ki Pro’s stand-alone, portable hardware. You’ll get a high level overview of AJA and see a live demo of Ki Pro. Ask questions and get answers from AJA executives, and leading industry experts.

Vancouver – Fresh from E3 and Apple’s WWDC, IUGO Mobile Entertainment is proud to announce that its free and paid iPhone apps download total has reached 2 million units! IUGO’s first breakout hit on the iPhone, Toy Bot Diaries Entry 1, was released back in August 2008. Since then IUGO has released 5 other original titles made exclusively for the iPhone. “ IUGO has proven itself to be a major player and contributor in iPhone gaming”, states Sarah Thomson, Director of Business Development for IUGO. “ We are very proud of our 2 million downloads and counting and expect this number to soar past our latest milestone with A.D.D. and Starhogs’ approaching releases.”

IUGO plans to continue blasting out premium content for the iPhone and sees 3.0 features coming to its latest games soon. Keep an eye out for Starhogs and A.D.D., IUGO’s upcoming killer games to hit the App Store! You can check out our review of IUGO’s game FreeBallin’ in the  Game Reviews section.