9th July 2010

Apparently Not All Turtles Are Ninjas

Hothead GamesHot Head Games‘ justice-seeking personality DeathSpank has officially celebrated the grand opening of his auspicious new fan club and “spanking” new website, and he’s inviting everyone to join. He promises lots of announcements and pretty well anything else you will need to know before he takes his fight against evil to the realms of PSN and XBL next week. DeathSpank has been rated T for Teen by the ESRB and will sell for 1200 MS Points on the Xbox Live MarketPlace or $14.99 on the PlayStation Network.

Alien Concepts‘ newest project, At Risk: The Turtle Survivor Challenge, commissioned by the Toronto Zoo’s Adopt-A-Pond Programme is now live. A downloadable free title, this flash game is aimed primarily at kids to teach them about turtles that live within city parks.At Risk

“It has lots of educational content about the threats that face turtles and turtle conservation efforts, but it’s fed to the player, we hope, in a way that’s not pedantic or intrusive upon the gameplay. The gameplay we tried very hard to make on par with other sidescroller-type games that kids and adults alike would be familiar with, and features high-end graphics,” said Alien Concepts Studio Director Jamie Richards. “All of the animations are pre-rendered frames from fully-3D scenes constructed in Maya, and there are even several short movie clips of the player’s turtle avatar performing various actions at different points in the game.”

The Adopt-A-Pond Wetland Conservation Programme provides teachers, students and community groups with information resources and educational opportunities to conserve, restore and create wetland habitats.

CorelCorel Software is celebrating its 25th anniversary with a contest. Enter your best illustration, painting or photo created with Corel software and you could win an Ultimate Design Studio or other great prizes – even those who vote on entries can win prizes. All entries must be submitted in the original Corel software format and must be received by August 31, 2010. There is a limit of one (1) entry per person, and the contest is open to residents of  Canada (excluding Quebec), the UK, USA and Germany only.

sysomosToronto social media analytics company and former MaRS client Sysomos has been acquired by Marketwire Inc. MaRS extends its congratulations to everyone at Sysomos, and is proud to have been a part of Sysomos’ success. MaRS’ influence on the “lab to market” success of the social media start-up is evidence of the centre’s ability to work with entrepreneurs to grow and scale their ventures into global market leaders.

Sysomos became a MaRS client in 2006, following its birth in 2005 as an advanced research project for content aggregation and analysis at University of Toronto’s Department of Computer Science. MaRSSpearheaded by then faculty member Nick Koudas and graduate student Nilesh Bansal, Sysomos took advantage of MaRS advisors and mentors to help with their business development and was introduced to other key Canada-based resources including Scott Vanderwel, Head of Monitor Canada’s Toronto office and volunteer advisor at MaRS; Vanderwel later joined the Sysomos board.

“We’re grateful for the work that MaRS did over the years to help us move the company forward,” said Koudas, President and Co-Founder of Sysomos. “We are also grateful for the counsel and high degree of engagement Scott demonstrated as a member of our board.”

The Sysomos platform brings business intelligence to social media by providing the ability to contextually analyze conversations across a variety of media channels. The Sysomos technology is an advanced social media monitoring and analytics platform, collecting and processing more than a billion new online conversations a month. This industry-leading platform allows major brands to quickly discover the tone of social media conversations and provides the ability to see what’s happening, why it’s happening, and who’s driving the conversations.

Sysomos, now profitable with 25 employees, has added an impressive set of organizations to its client list, which includes boutique and international agencies, mid-sized companies, and some of the world’s biggest brands such as Hill & Knowlton, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Disney and Shell; now becoming part of Marketwire, Sysomos has the opportunity to offer even more to its clients and to the 11,000 clients in Marketwire’s portfolio.

“The progress Sysomos has made in terms of refining its product and establishing a strong position in a highly competitive market since we first met Nick’s team is impressive,” said Dr. Ilse Treurnicht, CEO of MaRS. “This is a terrific example of a great technology transitioning from lab to market, and in being acquired by Marketwire, scaling internationally – with high value job creation in Ontario.”

EA SportsElectronic Arts Inc. would like its FIFA fans to know that the football engine which drives the award-winning EA Sports™ FIFA gameplay on the PlayStation®3 and Xbox 360® has arrived for FIFA 11 PC. Two years in development, the console game engine has been optimized for PC, delivering next generation console-quality gameplay, game modes and visuals to FIFA 11 PC.

“The EA SPORTS FIFA franchise is committed to investing and innovating for PC and this is a watershed FIFA 11moment,” said Executive Producer Kaz Makita. “We are delivering to FIFA 11 PC the high quality gameplay, innovative game modes and stunning graphics that have made FIFA the highest rated sports game on the PlayStation3 and Xbox 360 and winner of over 50 sports game of the year awards.”

The physics-based, data-driven technology behind the EA Sports football engine will deliver true freedom on the pitch with individuality of player control and movement, sophisticated ball touches, and physical interaction between players. FIFA 11 PC will feature the market-leading true 360° dribbling system that gives players precise control of the ball and next generation animation technology that delivers Skilled Dribbling, enabling skilled dribblers to face defenders and use highly responsive lateral dribbling to skip past them. Plus, Physical Play has been improved using collision sharing, creating a varied, less predictable, and extended fight for possession between players.

DreamCatcherCanadian publisher Dreamcatcher Games has released its latest Nintendo DS title. The Legend of Kay (previously released for the PS2) takes players to the mythical island of Yenchling, which is located in the Chinese Sea. For generations, this island was home to a variety of animal societies, all living in peace. Then one day Emporer Shun of the mighty gorillas attacked the rest of the island without provocation, destroying the peaceful existence of so many.

For the young cat Kay, an apprentice at the local Dojo, the attack caught him at practice and wiped out his entire town before he could respond. Travel across the vast island of Yenching as Kay on a quest to protect your fellow cats, and unravel the incredible secret that lies hidden in the volcano fortress of emperor Shun.

UbisoftUbisoft is very pleased that its stellar line-up of future titles which were showcased at this year’s E3 received multiple awards in diverse categories. Ubisoft was also named “Best Publisher” by Eurogamer.

Highlights of Ubisoft’s E3 showing were: Ubisoft’s core titles were among the most anticipated of the show with Assassin’s Creed® Brotherhood and Ghost Recon Future Soldier receiving numerous nods and Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood ranking first in a study of consumer purchase intent by Electronic Entertainment Design and Research (EEDAR)/Gamer Metrics.

Ubisoft again showed its leadership on new technologies with the quality of Your Shape™: Fitness Evolved for KinectT™ making a noted impact on participants thanks to Ubisoft’s patented Player Projection technology. Ubisoft reinforced its leader position in the casual segment, announcing Just Dance® 2 and revealing Michael Jackson: The Experience, a major announcement which garnered massive interest from mainstream media outlets. Setting itself out as one of the most creative developers in the industry, Ubisoft was praised for innovative projects such as Child of Eden, Project Dust and Mania Planet.

“It is a real satisfaction for the immense creative efforts of our development teams to have been recognized by critics and gamers,” said Yves Guillemot, chief executive officer at Ubisoft. “This year’s E3 was a stellar opportunity for Ubisoft to create excitement with our consumers about our upcoming line-up.”

Awards for Ubisoft’s line-up following E3 2010:

Assassin’s Creed® Brotherhood

Number 1 ranking in study of consumer purchase intent by Electronic Entertainment Design and Research (EEDAR)/Gamer Metrics, June 2010 Best Action Game – IGN Best Sequel – Game Chronicles Reason to Live – GamesRadar
Best Multiplayer Game – GameInformer
Yahoo! Best of E3 2010 – Yahoo! Games
Best Trailer of E3 – Kotaku
Best Online Multiplayer – Game Critics Awards
Best of E3 – The BitBag

Tom Clancy™’s Ghost Recon Future Soldier™

Reason to Live – GamesRadar
People’s Choice – Gamespot

Michael Jackson: The Experience

Best Game Announcement – Eurogamer

Your Shape™: Fitness Evolved

Best Kinect Game – OXCGN
Best of E3 – Gamepro

Mania Planet

Best Surprise – Big Download

Battle Tag™

Boldest Move Runner-up – Kotaku

Driver San Francisco

Best Gameplay Mechanic Runner-up – Kotaku

Shaun White Skateboarding

Family Friendly Seal of Approval – Family Friendly Video Game

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game

Best Downloadable Game – 1UP

Child Of Eden™

Best Motion-Control Game – IGN
Best Music/Rhythm Game – IGN
Best Visuals – VGChartz
Best Surprise – VGChartz
Best Rhythm Game – E3 Editors Choice- Gamespot
Best Motion Control Game – E3 Editors Choice- Gamespot
Game of the Show – Eurogamer
Best of E3 – Gamepro

Mobile HomeA recent release on the iTunes App Store reminds us all of how communication and social interaction is moving into the 21st century. Available as a free download from the iTunes app store today, the Mobile Home AppGotham Lofts MOBILE HOME™ app for the iPhone and iPod Touch platform marks a first for the Toronto area condominium community.

The app allows residents to view the current building notice, contact property management and building services, manage a list of neighbor contacts from their address book, and view the building’s location and track their own location with a fully functional Google map. The response from residents and management alike has been extremely positive, and versions of the app for the Android, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile platforms are in the works.

Additional members to the MOBILE HOME™ family are expected to be added rapidly within the remainder of 2010 and beyond.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 9th, 2010 at 11:25 am and is filed under Action Adventure, Awards, Business News, Contests, Digital Products, Educational, Everyone, New Releases, Social Media, Sports, Teen, Upcoming Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

You must be logged in to post a comment.

  • Archives

  • Subscribe to our Newsletter


  • Select a list:

  • GWEN Radio
  • Gamers Giving Back