Monkey Island Comes to the App Store

Posted by Brandon Gribin Categories: Games, New Apps, $7.99

The Secret of Monkey Island is now on the App Store! The classic point-and-click adventure game was originally released in 1990 on the Atari ST, Macintosh and PC systems. The Special Edition version released on the iPhone/iPod touch is also available on PC and Xbox 360.

The Special Edition features updated graphics, music, and voice recordings. You can switch between the new and old versions simply by swiping your fingers across the screen.

The game seems to be an excellent update although there have been mixed reactions to the controls. You move the cursor around by sliding your finger on the screen and using it like a track-pad. The game does not allow you to simply tap on a part of the screen to interact with it but hopefully LucasArts will adjust that in a future update.

All in all, Monkey Island coming to the iPhone is only a sign of more good things to come. From LucasArts, hopefully other classics will be revitalized soon - like Sam and Max and Day of the Tentacle.

This big App Store release clearly shows how much of a player the iPhone is becoming in the gaming world - even if not all hardcore gamers want to admit it.

Read More | Monkey Island: Special Edition

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Warner Bros. Archive DVD on Demand

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Corporate News, Home Entertainment, Movies

Good news for fans of classic movies and TV. Warner Brothers will release some of them on DVD for the first time. The online service is known as the Warner Archive Collection and will create each one on demand when ordered for $19.95 apiece. The site includes titles such as “Al Capone,” “I Was a Communist for the FBI” and “Edison the Man.” Right now there are about 150 films, but more will be offered in the future including more recent films.

Read More | WB Archive Shop

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Sony Adds 500,000 Books for Reader

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Corporate News, Google, Internet, Misc. Tech

Sony is offereing its Reader users half a million public domain books. The Google optimized books are added to the 100,000 already available for the e-book. Included are such titles as “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,”  “The Awakening” and “The Letters of Jane Austen.” Google has been encoding books in the open electronic format ePub to make such titles more available to Sony and other e-book distributors.

Read More | NY Times

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iArthouse Launches Streaming Video

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Hot Deals, Internet, Movies, Software

Now that Netflix has cut back on Indy cinema, this might be a good time to check out iArthouse. They have over 800 international and arthouse films and plan thousands by the end of the year. They offer ad-supported free streaming video, subscription, and download-to-burn options. Download their free StreamBurner software and start shopping from film companies such as Vanguard Cinema and Arts Alliance America. We really dig that they offer online free screenings of such classics as “M,” Hitchcock’s “39 Steps,” and “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.”

(Thanks, Kristin)

Read More | iArthouse

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Fictionwise Offers Free eBooks

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Handhelds, Hot Deals, Internet, Misc. Tech

After reading that Fictionwise is releasing 3 free Stephen King ebook novels for free with rebate if you pay with credit card or Paypal, we went more in depth and found that they are also offering others at no cost. Selections include the classic “Around the World in 80 Days” by Jules Verne, “Ghost Rider: Stories” by Jonathan Lowe, and a sample of the Oxford Paperback Thesaurus ( 348 pages.) Join their club and there are more hot deals. Most books come in eReader, Mobipocket, and Microsoft Reader.

Read More | Fictionwise

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Virtual Console to Release C64 Games for Wii

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Corporate News, Video Games

If you are old enough to remember the Commodore 64, you are old enough to remember how good those games were compared to Pong. While they are simplified compared to most of those released today, they continue to have their own following, evidenced by the fact that you can still play them online. Virtual Console is adding these games to allow Wii owners to play them as well. International Karate and Uridium will be the first two titles offered and VC will add to their line from time to time. While they will first become available on the European Wii Shop Channel, we suspect it will not be long before they move globally.

Read More | Nintendo News

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Select Xbox Live Arcade Titles Get Price Reductions

Posted by Paul Hamilton Categories: Downloadable Content, Xbox 360, Xbox Live Arcade

Starting on midnight Sunday four Xbox Live Arcade titles will be getting a brief 50% price cut. Small Arms and Zuma Deluxe, normally 800 Microsoft Points, are getting reduced to 400 and coin-op classics Dig Dug and Gauntlet are going down from 400 to 200.

The price reduction will last through Monday.

Microsoft has had price reductions and these kind of limited-time sales before, but usually they have been reserved for game-specific downloadable content. This is the first time they’ve extended price fluctuations to full XBLA titles, although the announcement does vaguely hint that this may be a semi-regular occurrence.

Read More | Major Nelson's Blog

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Discover Bollywood With iTalkies

Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Home Entertainment, Internet, Movies, Music

iTalkies has adopted Netflix’s idea and the company, which is based in Seattle, has been delivering Bollywood titles since 2004. Now they have expanded and are available to residents of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Shaiwal Singh, the company’s founder and CEO, says that there are over 5,000 titles of Indian films in seven languages and features both popular films and award-winners. We like this idea and wonder if it could be the beginning of a trend that will include such individualized online services as iChickFlick and iFreddyKruger.

Read More | Hindustan Times

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WiiWare – Nintendo’s New Downloadable Game Service

Posted by Chris Pereira Categories: Nintendo, Virtual Console, Wii

Sure, the Wii already has the Virtual Console, but all we get there are straight ports of classic games. Great for those of us who may have missed games or want to play them again for nostalgia’s sake, and Nintendo & co. can make a ridiculous profit. Xbox Live Arcade, and PlayStation Network, to an extent, on the other hand, are home to original titles and encourage independent developers to create titles for the platforms.

WiiWare is Nintendo’s answer. We don’t have many details yet, but we know the first content for the platform should be appearing in early 2008. Pricing has not yet been announced.

Read More | Red Herring via Gear Live

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Ocarina Of Time Now On Virtual Console

Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Nintendo, Retro, Virtual Console, Wii

Highlighting this week’s Virtual Console releases is Nintendo’s classic The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Ocarina, of course, dealt with some controversy during its release due to the number of perfect scores the game received, and the game is still the highest ranked entry on Gamerankings.com. While gamers might dispute the “perfect” score, this entry of the franchise brought Zelda into full 3D for the first time, and is one of the best entries in the series. At 1000 Wii Points, this release is a bargain; the Wii-compatible Gamecube Ocarina releases are selling for above $30 on eBay. Two other titles hit the Virtual Console this week as well, Bio-Hazard Battle for the Genesis at 800 points, a decent side-scrolling shooter, and Chew-Man-Fu the Turbografx-16 a bizarre arcade action game with Pengo style gameplay at 600 points.

Read More | Nintendo

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