Monthly Archives: May 2005

The Wizard’s Toys

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Screenshot from Wizard of Funk

To be honest, I don’t pay as much attention to Sony’s Eyetoy as I probably should. Not that new interfaces aren’t interesting. They certainly are. It’s just that I’ve been waiting for that Power Glove-VR Goggle style 3D interface the title character from the movie Johnny Mnemonic whips out to retrieve data from a hotel fax machine(!) in Beijing. Guess I’ve been blinded, so to speak. Anyway, although it’s not a major product hit afaik (edit – at over 5 million sold according to reports, I guess it’s doing pretty good), it does seem like the Eyetoy is carving a nice niche for itself. Case in point is this entry over on Gamesblog:

Despite the proliferation of rap, guns and cars there were a few examples of gaming innovation tucked away in the darker corners of the E3 show-floor. One of these was Wizard of Funk, the world’s first, get this, EyeToy RPG.

Maybe I need to go back and listen to Eyetoy creator Richard Mark’s 2004 talk at Accelerating Change. The SLFuture Salon has a blog entry with links, so if you want to catch it, here’s that entry.

Billions and Billions…

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… of dollars.

From this Yahoo/AP press release:

Game publishers have to recognize that there are millions, if not billions, of dollars in advertising money coming their way in the next few years,” said Justin Townsend, chief executive of IGA Partners Europe, an agency that places in-game ads for clients.

…

Until very recently, advertisers weren’t rushing to place products in video games. They spent only $34 million in 2004 on in-game ads – a far cry from the billions spent on television advertising.

But that amount is expected to explode to $562 million by 2009, according to The Yankee Group research firm. Including “advergames” – games built solely to promote a product – game advertising will approach $1 billion by the end of the decade, the firm predicts.

which is essentially the same thing written in today’s Wired online article. Maybe it’s not “Want a Coke With That Railgun?”. Maybe instead it’s “You Need a Coke to Power That Railgun”.

Both stories via Blue’s News.

Thiel On Virtual Money

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Via Jerry Paffendorf’s SL Future Salon blog entry, comes word that IT Conversations has a 2004 talk posted on their site by PayPal co-founder and former CEO Peter Thiel. The topic: Virtual Money.

Since the bridge between design, virtual product, and personal manufacturing will be largely built as a result of some kind of monetary incentive, it’s perhaps appropriate to begin considering the different avenues by which this incentive will arrive. It’s an issue that’s currently near and dear to me. Even though I’m not particularly interested in money, one still has to pay for this stuff, so I’ll be giving it a listen soon.

InterMedia Dating

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HL2 + real world

Last year, in anticipation of Doom3 and Half-Life 2 – and all their machinima potential – I posted a kind of “how-to” page for some indy filmmakers; showing them how a game character might be composited into a low-budget film. Well, it appears a group of Half-Life 2 fans are doing the deed (although their technique seems different) and the Deathfall website has an interview with the 17-year-old behind the project, Australian Nick Bertke. I’m not actually expecting it to be completed (HDRI is a relatively slow rendering process, all things considered), but I certainly hope and believe we’ll see something. Looks like the meet-up between traditional film and machinima is in the dating stage. Having watched some of the Playstation 3 gameplay footage, I’d venture there’s a marriage in their future.

(See also: G4 TV’s coverage – Link)