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Online Gaming

Japanese Video Games That Made a Name in the World

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Everybody has played at least one game in their life. Card games, video games, sports, board games, and so much more. Games have been a constant presence in our lives, whether we actively play them or not. Some only played them during their childhood, while some continued to enjoy the entertainment games provide us to adulthood. Some are just casual players, while some do it for a living. Some are casual fans while some have a passion for it – like otakus.

It is no secret that the Japanese are known for their animations – whether it be in cartoons or games. Some have even become popular in other countries in Japan, and some have made such an impact to the world that they’re being remade and improved their graphics and features as our technology also continues to improve….

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How Do Gamers Find Love?

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Online gaming is hugely popular around the world. It’s no surprise that China tops out on the international gaming chart put together by newzoo.com. Of the approximately 1,383,837,000 people in the country, over 789 million of them have an online presence. This brings in a gaming revenue of over $24 billion dollars a year.

For a significantly smaller population, the United States isn’t far behind in revenue. There may only be about 324 million people in the U.S., but of that population, over 293 million are online. The ones playing games bring in only $825 thousand less dollars than the entire population of China.

couple gaming
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Playing Tetris Can Fix Eye Vision Woes

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Several studies have shown that playing video games has its benefits. One study has found that it helps relieve the pain suffered by children as it diverts their attention.

tetris

Another study has revealed that playing block-building games such as Tetris can help fix the lazy eye problem. Known as amblyopia, laze eye is a condition in which a person’s vision in one eye does not develop correctly. If not treated immediately, this can lead to sight problems as the brain will no longer correct the blurry images being experienced by that particular eye.

The traditional way of treating this vision issue is to cover the eye with the correct vision using an eye patch. This step will allow the weaker eye to exert more effort. The downside is that this type of treatment can take months to fix the condition. …

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Auti-Sim Video Game Helps Promote Awareness on Autism

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Autism is an issue faced by many parents worldwide. And it’s not a simple issue that can easily be solved because most often, it requires a lot of patience and understanding and the process of improvement on the part of the child can take some time.

autism_sim

In the video gaming world, a new game has been developed that lets people into the world of children with autism. Called Auti-Sim, the game was created by a team from the Vancouver Hacking Health hackathon whose goal is to increase awareness on this hypersensitivity disorder and help people understand that this issue can result in a child’s isolation.

According to one of the game’s programmers, Taylan Kay, the concept of Auti-Sim was inspired by a documentary entitled Inside Autism. One excerpt there, he said, simulated the behavior of a person with autism as he goes through the major department store chain Walmart. Kay further explained that seeing the video clip made a great impact on him particularly in terms of coping with the behavior and how people with this issue could be misunderstood and mislabeled.

The initial demo of Auti-Sim elicited positive feedback with people suffering from this problem thanking the developers for sharing their real world with gamers. On the other hand, there were others who felt the game does not fully represent their experience with autism.

Auti-Sim is now in the process of being expanded to become a full game. The developers are considering adding more interactivity and environments as they continue to work with therapists as well as professionals in education and those advocating the autism campaign.

Photo via abcnews.go.com

PC Games Ideal for the Oldies

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A lot of young people who are so into computer games normally don’t expect their dads, moms much more their grannies to play their games. If there are parents or grannies who may be interested, they’re very few and far between. Most of them would say it’s just for kids or they’re too violent.

Surprisingly, there are PC games that even the oldies can play. We share a number of them here which you can recommend to your dad, mom, grandpa or grandma.

Plants vs. Zombies

plants vs zombies
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24-Hour Ceasefire for Video Games a Success

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If only to show sympathy for the community in Newtown, Connecticut, a call was made this month for a one-day ceasefire of video games that involve first-person and online shooters. It was aimed at extending emotional support to the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootout and their families.
ceasefire
The call was spearheaded by a well known video game blog GamerFitNation. The site which promotes video games and health living was founded by Antwand Pearman.

The 24-hour ceasefire took place on December 21st and was a great success, according to the blog owner. His words were “You can’t be afraid, you know, to come out and speak against something in fear of what’s going to happen, you can’t let the media define who you are. You define who you are.”

Pearman earlier created a nine-minute video to appeal to gamers especially online shooters to take a one-day break from their usual routine. He said his goal is to pay respect to the victims of the tragedy that occurred on December 14. The video has close to 11,000 views already and 300 comments.
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Skylanders: Giants Expected to be a Big Hit

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There’s a new game foreseen to be a big hit among kids and adults this year. Skylanders: Giants is Activision’s game series that has become among the top 10 best-selling brands for kids in the U.S. today. It is also expected to be a hot item this Christmas season.

This new game released just recently features new character figures and a line of Giant Skylanders. According to Activision’s CEO, the story of the game is what attracts kids to play it particularly as they have a role in the story as the portal master.

Experts in the gaming field agree that Skylanders is more than just a video game. The game mainly relies on the Portal of Power which is a docking system that connects to a video game console. The goal here is to “port” Skylanders figurines into the game. Players should make sure that the figurine touches the Portal of Power so they can run amuck or shoot fireballs with Spyro.

In 2011, the starter pack came with three figurines for all platforms and 29 more characters were added for the duration of the year. Owing to its huge success as evident in the Q2 earnings of Activision, Skylanders was considered the best-selling console and handheld game.
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Blended Reality Gaming with Mechatars

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Christmas is less than 2 months away, which means that early shoppers will already be writing up their Christmas lists. One toy that will be making it on my list is iLoveRobots’ Mechatars, although I’m still not sure if it will be for my 6 year old or by husband.

The Mechatars is iLoveRobots’ latest line of toy robots designed to “unite the best of online games with robotic toys, for play that connects the physical and virtual worlds.” The gaming experience, which is dubbed by the company as “blended reality”, is quite unique in that each Mechatar robot can be played in the real world like you would any toy, except that as you play with it its skills and powers increase so that you can use your new moves and tricks against fellow Mechatar players once you go online at Mechatars.com.


The new Mechatar line features 3 robots called Wrexx “Frenzied Fighter”, Alpha “Tactical Leader”, and Kodar “Loyal Proctector”. Each of the 3 Mechatars have their own personalities, backgrounds, and specialties, but they all share the same cool features of having 3 modes of play, the ability to communicate wirelessly with other Mechatars, remote control action, and simply being an evolving cross-dimensional robot.

Each Mechatar is currently priced at $39.99, with shipping in the US free for all orders over $65, which I think is a pretty good excuse for ordering more than one toy. You can also buy additional power packs, which are detachable weapons that is designed to boost your Mechatar’s power (both in offline and offline game mode) for $9.99 each.

 

Exploring Mafia Wars 2: Initial Observations

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Zynga’s notification on the release of Mafia Wars 2 arrived in my inbox yesterday. I right away thought that it meant at least a few hours of my time “productively” spent doing research for this post. Unfortunately, less than an hour into the game and I found myself quitting, even way before I spent all of my allotted energy.

The gameplay is nothing new with nothing to distinguish it from Cityville, Farmville, Sims Social, or any of the other (beginning to be) countless social games you can play on Facebook (and Google+), except that everything looks and is named differently, from items and buildings to tasks. That does not mean though that Mafia Wars 2 is any less engaging than the above mentioned games. On the contrary, I’m sure Mafia Wars fans will end up inviting lots of friends to help them finish tasks and get more energy in the next few weeks as they build up their turfs and engage in fights.

What I did like about Mafia Wars 2 is that the artwork is truly cool; in fact I think I spent more time just looking at the task/tutorial notifications appreciating the coloring and effects than playing the game itself. The boss wars and the multi-player arena also adds another dimension to the game, especially since you can ask your friends during the fight to help you beat up a stronger character.

All in all though, this game will appeal to the same crowd its predecessor drew, and won’t grab the interest of those who’d rather not have the social aspect of gaming. Of course, you can always pay Zynga to get more energy and required items without waiting or adding friends.

Even Game-Addicts Need Sleep

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The thing about being too engaged in newly purchased game consoles such as the Playstation and Xbox consoles is that time flies when you are having fun. A game console aimed for all ages, people are too glued to their television playing their favorite games such as NBA Live, Tekken or even Gran Turismo that they end up lacking sleep from playing until the wee hours of the morning.

Sleep Disorder due to Gaming

Such produces a hypnotic type of a trance for gamers that simply want to complete a level or stage in storylines that these games have to offer. The game developers are not to be blamed since it is really their job to make the game as addicting as possible.

Self-discipline among the people who endorse and play this game should be done internally. It is their duty to ensure that they know when to stop even if they don’t want to. Besides, they can pull-it out anytime they wish to, when they have nothing else to do in real life.

[tags]playstation, xbox, games, sleep disorder[/tags]