Reporting its financial results for its first fiscal quarter of 2007, Microsoft stated that it has shipped six million units of its Xbox 360 gaming console and, in an audio webcast, Microsoft senior VP Chris Liddell said the company is still “confident” it can meet its earlier goal to ship 10 million Xbox 360 systems by the end of the 2006 calendar year.
The entire gaming industry anticipates a surge in sales leading up to the end-of-year holidays; Microsoft’s Xbox 360 system has the cache of having been the only “next-generation” video game console on the market through 2006; however, it will be joined this November by both Sony’s PlayStation 3 and Nintendo’s Wii.
Microsoft’s financials also revealed the company is gradually curtailing the losses incurred in Xbox 360 manufacturing: the company’s entertainment and devices division (which includes the Xbox 360 as well as the forthcoming Zune handheld media player) lost $96 million during the first fiscal quarter, down from $173 million a year ago. Liddell noted that the company continues to reduce the manufacturing cost of the Xbox 360 console, so Microsoft’s loss on each unit sold is getting smaller as shipping volume and manufacturing experience both increase.
Video game console makers often take a loss on the manufacture and sale of new gaming systems, hoping to earn money back (and turn a profit) on game sales and, eventually, on sales of the consoles themselves as manufacturing costs fall.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.