Ralph Lee writes "Is it time to enlist? Wired News is reporting that the US Army has set up a video game studio to model training and recruit soldiers on the heels of the successful America's Army title: 'The America's Army Government Applications office was quietly opened in January in Cary, North Carolina, with a team of 15 video-game creators, simulation specialists and ex-Army personnel. Many of the studio's employees come from local video-game companies like Interactive Magic, Timeline, Vertis, SouthPeak Interactive, Vicious Cycle Software and Red Storm Entertainment.'" It's also noted that "the office is working with a team of 24 video-game creators in Monterey, California, on the latest edition to its main franchise, America's Army: Overmatch, which will be released in March 2005."

Thanks to GameSpy for its 'Pixel' column discussing the problems inherent in translating classic remakes to modern consoles. The author argues plaintively: "For reasons both technical and probably cultural, most video game companies not giving their reissued classics the polished, flawless presentations that they deserve." He explains of Mega Man 2 from the forthcoming Mega Man Anniversary Collection for PlayStation 2: "The low-res, 256x224 graphics of the original NES game have been line-doubled for display on the PS2, are run in an interlaced (flickery) screen mode." He also laments: "Believe it or not, things were a good deal better back on the original PlayStation and Saturn... Looking back, the 32-bit era was a golden age of classic game reissues, with great products like Irem's R-Types, the Namco Museum line and the Capcom Generations series offering 99% accurate renditions of dozens upon dozens of classic video games", although it's suggested "the 32-bit renaissance was more likely due to technical limitations than actual care on the part of the developers."

Thanks to MSNBC for its fresh look at the problems of integrating the needs and tastes of the female into the male-dominated videogame industry. It's suggested by Microsoft's Laura Fryer: "Half of the population isn't having input into what's being created... And the one thing that I learned is that people make games they like to play. Having a diverse opinion helps games." Sheri Graner Ray of Sony also points out: "The purpose of recruiting women is not so they can make games about pink fluffy kitties... You can't say that women like this or Japanese gamers want this." Thus, it's argued: "The solution to this dearth of female fandom... lies in recruiting more women coders, artists and level designers, the type of positions that can shape a title's story, look and gameplay."

jasoncart writes "After the apparently poor uptake, and questionable design of the original N-Gage, have Nokia taken the hint when designing the next model - the N-Gage QD? Ferrago has a hands-on review."

An anonymous reader writes "The full download version of PC indie game Skools Out is now available from the official Mucky Baby site - there's also a bunch of new screenshots and a playable demo available." There's an interview with Mucky Baby's Simon Keating, himself an ex-Mucky Foot developer, over at DIY Games, describing the "PC action adventure title", influenced by classic Spectrum title Skool Daze. The article notes this as another example of "the world of independent game development... becoming populated with more and more developers that have left the business of big name game development and struck out on their own."

Thanks to The Next Level for its newly published interview with Sega's head of Sonic Team, Yuji Naka. Naka discusses the games that impressed him most in 2003 ("probably GTA3 in the West and Shin Sangoku Musou [Koei's Dynasty Warriors series] in Asia"), his programming of a not-intended-for-release NES emulator for the Genesis/Megadrive ("I did it primarily for [private] study purposes. It ran things like Dr. Mario, although it did not work perfectly, actually."), and the whereabouts of the Sonic-sponsored Williams Formula 1 racing car from the '90s ("It's supposed to be in our offices or warehouses somewhere. We just can't seem to locate it anymore; we don't know where we put it!")

Thanks to Video-fenky for its loving review of allegedly awful PC FMV graphic adventure Conspiracies, a game that some have compared to classic MST3K film Final Justice for its ability to "plumb the depths of lameness" in an intrigue-filled Mediterranean setting. Apparently, "Conspiracies is the story of Nick Delios, a balding Greek guy in a hoodie who has a living cactus with a face named 'Nionios' and solves crime... it's the year 206X, a world of flying cars and poor dubbing, and Nick... must solve... an alien plot to take over the World Government with android body doubles of top political leaders, starting with Greece first." The official Conspiracies site has more info on this soon-to-be-cult title, paradoxically well-received by JustAdventure, which includes gorgeously random puzzles such as "smuggling a crate full of plastic explosives from outer space so you can stick it inside a bra." Video-fenky happily concludes: "Overall, Conspiracies is a game no PC adventurer should be without, even if it's for all the wrong reasons."

Thanks to Game Science for its post discussing the Japanese announcement of the Xbox Video Chat hardware/software bundle, which includes "camera, 12 months of Xbox Live service, chat disc and Live Starter Kit." Although the product is "being developed mainly in Japan", a release date in the West is likely, if currently unknown. However, with features including "up to 5 people video conferencing simultaneously... participation can be restricted to invite only... send vibrations to participants' controllers", the staid Brits at Eurogamer are naturally horrified: "Given the remote-rumble function and the fact the Xbox audience is 'adult'; well, our minds are boggling, frankly."

Lewey Geselowitz writes "Freed Go is a new freely downloadable game for Windows and Mac OS X that extends the 'game of Go' on any arbitrary 3d graph. These include Mobius strips, spheres, tori, cubes and so forth, and even a few flat boards but with 3, 5 or 6 neighbored nodes. To anyone who has played the game, or is interested in this great game, I assure you that you will find this site interesting and it will help you expand your understanding of the game." There's also Freed Invasion - looks like these are both from the author of the similarly unconventional Quake II stereogram implementation, as previously mentioned on Slashdot Games.

Thanks to GameSpot for its feature discussing whether multiplayer mobile phone gaming is genuinely an emerging trend. According to the piece: "For every mobile maven that claims that networked multiplayer is where mobile gaming must direct its energies, there are another two that point to the prohibitive costs, technical barriers, and unacceptable risks that currently stand between wide-spectrum multiplayer and reality." Isaac Babbs of Atlas Mobile frames the problems as "...device limitations and high data costs to the consumer. On many of today's networks, even a simple chess game could hit you for half an hour of airtime--and that's if you manage to make it through without the other player getting fed up and dropping or going into a tunnel and losing reception." Will mobile phone gaming ever take off in the States?

Lemmus writes "A patch for the PC version of Thief: Deadly Shadows is now available. The patch fixes the AI skill level being reset whenever a level is reloaded, the major bug previously reported in a post at Slashdot Games. This is apparently the only thing that the patch fixes, so users with other problems have to wait for another patch. Although Ion Storm warns against installing the patch on installations with user-modified .ini files, most users don't seem to be having any trouble with it."

Ant writes "According to the story on Blue's News and Slitherine Software's related official statement, the gold master for Gates of Troy, their upcoming stand-alone PC strategy title, has been purloined, via a physical robbery of a UK Post Office carrier, rather than a computer break-in." It may well have just been "a piece of extreme bad luck", but kudos to Slitherine for trying to make the most of this incident, as they slather: "This attack comes hot on the heels of the theft of the Half Life 2 source code and shows how vulnerable games companies can be", and also fret: "It has been a wake up call to us and Slitherine will be reviewing its procedures in future to ensure the same type of thing cannot happen again." - perhaps a heavily armed guard is needed?

Game Boy writes "Brit games business site Gamesindustry.biz has posted a fascinating editorial asking whether Microsoft is about to shoot itself in the foot over Xbox 2 by rushing to launch the console years ahead of its rivals' next-generation platforms. It's a pretty good analysis of how Microsoft is thinking about this marketplace, and why they could be pretty drastically wrong - I work at a major games publisher, and a lot of people here are worried about exactly the same things, but it's rare to see anyone actually discussing them openly. Xbox has done pretty well so far, but Microsoft could be heading for a disaster that even Bill's billions won't dig them out of..."

An anonymous reader writes "According to a hands-on account of Success' Japanese PS2 title Yoshinoya over at GameSpot, the game, based on the popular Japanese/U.S. restaurant chain, 'is quite possibly one of the greatest beef-bowl simulators on the current generation of game consoles.' Sadly, the game probably won't make it out of Japan." Apparently filled with hectic multi-part gameplay: "You'll take the role of a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed trainee at a Yoshinoya store who must work his way up through the ranks of the apron-and-hat-wearing set to be the best employee to ever seat a customer, pour tea, prepare a bowl, and shout 'Arigato gozaimashita!'"

An anonymous reader writes "Since Commodore recently re-appeared selling a Commodore 64 joystick 'TV game', as previously mentioned on Slashdot Games (the company is now owned by Dutch computer builder Tulip), they're now expanding their efforts, and have set up a legal emulation site where you can buy classic Commodore 64 titles, initially including Epyx and Hewson titles. Apparently, in a later stage, Commodore will release a Gentoo Linux based set top box which plays MP3s and runs Commodore 64 games."

brainstyle writes "Space.com is reporting that John Carmack of Armadillo Aerospace (and who apparently has some game design hobby) has had a successful launch of the prototype of its entry in the X-Prize. From the article: 'I had tried several algorithms on the simulator before settling on this one, and it behaved exactly the same in reality, which is always a pleasant surprise.'"

Wraggster writes "Those who have never visited the DC Homebrew site, devoted to homebrew games and demos for the Sega Dreamcast, should be aware that it's just received an official relaunch, including over 230 pages of downloads of demos, games, ports, multimedia, and some great help pages too. New features for the site include a developer spotlight and homebrew spotlight - it's a resource well worth checking out." With titles like the great-looking Alice Dreams, there's some interesting material coming out of the unofficial Dreamcast coding scene of late.

Thanks to Stratics for its interview with the creators of indie PC MMO, A Tale In The Desert, discussing the 'rebooting'/upgrading of the game: "ATITD was never intended to be a single persistent world but a chapter like-story in the development of Egypt and the 'creation' of that perfect society. However, Tale 1 was a large undertaking and lasted longer than originally intended. ATITD2 will have a 6-month life-span before ATITD3 begins the cycle anew." Among topics discussed are better graphics ("We've had a new scaling graphics engine so, if you're using a newer card it will take advantage of fragment shaders for terrain, etc.") and dealing with griefing ("The community has tools to deal with griefers, including inventing laws to permanently exile those people from Egypt.")

darth_MALL writes "I've been looking high and low for the ultimate (could even be free!) single-player PC strategy game that offers detailed troop/battle management. I've met a few contenders that fit the bill: Medieval: Total War is a primo candidate, but Europe just ain't enough! I hate to say, the magic is gone - what I really want is to conquer the known universe from top to bottom. I checked out Ferion, as per another /.'ers suggestion, but it wasn't quite the same thrill as M:TW. What is a bloodthirsty, single player tyrant to do?"

to_kallon writes "As game devices, cellphones leave something to be desired. Most of the games found on them are rudimentary, with flat, cartoonish graphics and simple scenes. But that is going to change. Soon cellphone owners will be able to play games with realistic three-dimensional graphics rivaling those on PC's and game consoles."