Players who discover the Playboy magazine in the game will receive a unique and special upgrade for Chuck Greene, the main character in Dead Rising 2. Furthermore, players will come across Playboy ads and billboards that will feature specially selected issues from the magazine’s 57-year history.

The new magazine system for Dead Rising 2, which will feature Playboy along with various other publications, is an evolution of the popular book system from the original Dead Rising game. Along with the special Playboy issue, there will be a variety of different themed magazines that Chuck will be able to pick up for bonuses to use to help fend off the zombie hordes along the way.

“The Sin City-type environment in Dead Rising 2, Fortune City, is a natural playground for the Playboy Bunnies,” said Seon King, Senior Director of Licensing for Capcom Entertainment, Inc. “We have integrated the Playboy brand throughout the game in ways that bring even more life to Fortune City and add to the user experience.”

For those unfamiliar with the premise of Dead Rising 2, former motocross champion Chuck Greene arrives at Fortune City, America’s latest adult playground, to participate in the zombie game show Terror is Reality, a gruesome test of strength and agility through excessive and imaginative  elimination of hundreds and hundreds of zombies. While in Fortune City, a zombie outbreak occurs and Chuck must survive the onslaught of the undead for 72 hours. Pitted against bosses and psychos – tens of thousands of zombies and the constant countdown of the clock – while potentially rescuing other survivors of the zombie apocalypse, players must also unravel the greater conspiracy behind the outbreak.

The Dead Rising® series is renowned for letting players pick up and use everyday items to fend off hordes of the undead, but Dead Rising 2 adds a new twist with combination weapons. Take two objects, add a roll of tape plus the inventiveness and skilled hands of Chuck Greene and an innocent water gun and a can of gasoline become a deadly flamethrower, while a garden rake and car battery combine to create an electrified zombie prod. Using combination weapons to fend off hordes of the undead in fun and grotesque ways is only just the beginning as the more combo weapons a player uses, the more Prestige Points (PPs) they will rack up. Earn enough PPs and Chuck levels up which will helps him along the way.

Equally important is Chuck’s need to to find Zombrex, a drug that stops his infected daughter Katey from turning into a zombie. Players will decimate thousands and thousands of zombies in an increasingly outrageous manner in order to beat the clock and survive 72 hours in the darkly comedic, no-holds-barred confines of Fortune City.

June is also the month when we 360 players are supposed to get a prologue look at Dead Rising 2 with the availability of Case Zero, which was announced in February as being in the XBL Marketplace on June 30th (I am awaiting confirmation on the release date). Dead Rising 2: Case Zero, will introduce gamers to Chuck Greene and provide a link between the original game and the events that await players in the gambling paradise of Fortune City.

June has been an incredible month thus far for Quebec’s Frima Studio. On June 1, Mr. Jean Charest, Premier of Quebec, Mr. Sam Hamad, Minister of Employment and Social Solidarity, Minister of Labour and Minister responsible for the Capitale-Nationale region, and Mr. Steve Couture, CEO of Frima Studio, have announced an investment of  two million dollars in the training of the Québec-based studio’s personnel, specialized in the development of video games. Half of this sum will be invested by the Government of Quebec via Emploi-Quebec and its envelope destined to large-scale economic projects.

“Quebec has become a destination of choice for many multinationals in the interactive
entertainment industry. We are known around the world for our creativity and dynamism in that field. This fairly recent reality is owed to people of vision and passion; to people who get involved, and who dare take the necessary risks to build the companies that will, over the years, become symbols of pride for us all,” declared Mr. Charest.

The development of a video game requires the participation of experts in various fields. To ensure coherence and cohesion within the teams of artists, game designers, interface designers, animators, programmers and testers, each employee must develop a certain level of versatility within the framework continuum, which this training plan will enable.

“The interactive entertainment technology industry plays an important role in establishing the Capitale-Nationale’s unique signature of learning and creativity. The video game industry is one of the region’s fields of excellence, and contributes to its positioning on the international scene. Our government is proud to endorse Frima’s training plan, which will allow the creation of 147 jobs over three years and consolidate its 201 production-oriented workforce,” stated Mr. Hamad.

“Frima’s success rests first and foremost on its employees’ know-how. Investing in training allows us to increase our level of expertise, to stand out from the crowd, and, mostly, to attract and keep new promising talents. In addition to ensuring the upkeep and creation of new jobs, and the consolidation our position as an economic lever in the region, this investment will fuel our growth and contribute to making Quebec into a world leader in video games and interactive entertainment,” declared Mr. Couture.

Frima is also the fastest growing game development house in Canada. The studio placed 14th in Profit Magazine’s 2010 Top 100 Fastest Growing Companies list, and it placed 1st for the second year in a row on L’Actualité’s annual list of the fastest-growing companies in Quebec, with a growth of 3,002% between 2004 and 2009. This prestigious lineup lists the 20 companies that experienced the greatest increase in sales figures.

“Frima is the first company to sit at the top of that list two years in a row! We are very proud of this accomplishment, and we wish to thanks all our employees,” declared Frima’s CEO Steve Couture.

Frima also announced today that its soon-to-be-launched PlayStation® mini title, Young Thor, will be prominently featured in Sony Computer Entertainment Europe’s booth at E3. Young Thor is one of the first mini titles – playable on the PlayStation®3 and PSP® systems – to be developed from the ground up exclusively for the platform, rather than ported over from a previous game.

As young Thor, you’ll have to travel to both Midgard and Asgard, battling hordes of mythical monsters as you strive to put an end to Hel’s evil designs. The three Norns – Urd, Skuld and Verdandi – have gone missing, leaving no one to tend to Yggdrasil, the World Tree. Can you save the day and restore balance? Do you have what it takes to be the mighty god of thunder?

Frima Studio has already established itself as a leader within the PlayStation mini space with 2009’s Zombie Tycoon. The strategy game allowed players to take command of three squads of the undead to conquer cities and enslave humanity and is a top-selling mini.

Wait, we’re not done yet! Frima has also announced the launch of its first Facebook title, Rock Paper Sumo. Ridiculously simple to play and cleverly addictive, Rock Paper Sumo lets Facebook gamers don the sumo wrestler’s mawashi and fight to be the top contender in the world arena of ‘rock-paper-scissors’!

“Rock Paper Sumo is a brilliant twist on the classic hand game ‘rock-paper-scissors’ and a great way to challenge and taunt your friends for ultimate dojo supremacy,” said Steve Couture, CEO of Frima Studio. “The game has a fun and unique art style and tons of customizable options for your sumo wrestler…plus who doesn’t like laying the smack down on friends with one of the most simple yet tried-and-true games of all time?”

In a quest to become the ultimate rikishi, wrestlers must live by the ancient ways of sumo: train hard, eat lots of calorie-rich bento to pack on the pounds, engage in sparring sessions against a deadly dummy and fulfill dojo duties with honor! Spend hard-won Bento Bucks and Dojo Dollars on hysterical makeovers with over 200 accessories to choose from, like cowboy hats, pink Mohawk, fu manchu, assorted tattoos, or even a chest fro! Each player must challenge his Facebook friends to fight in order to win battles and unlock achievements, brawling his way up the global leaderboard to ultimately be hailed as the best rock-paper-scissors player in the world!

Untold Entertainment has released new artwork for its upcoming word puzzler title Spellirium. Today we are introduced to two of Spellirium’s primary characters: Brother Todd, a young Runeskeeper and his blue tunk sidekick Lorm. The pair must set out on a quest to find other Runeskeepers in the post-apocalyptic era known as The Now, a time when modern civilization has become buried beneath a mile of earth, and it is your job to help them overcome challenges and hurdles with your word skills.

I have been playing Spellirium’s various iterations thus far and have enjoyed it immensely. Watching the backstory and characters coming to life had definitely added another level of anticipation for the next test round, and of course, to see the game completed. I bet that if you were to sign up for the development diary newsletters, you too might have the chance to play Spellirium sooner than its release.

Hot on the heels of the launch success of ModNation Racers, United Front Games has released a little intel about their newest title in development, True Crime®: Hong Kong, which will be handled by game publisher Activision.

Inspired by classic Hollywood and Asian cinema style thrillers, fans can dive deep into Hong Kong’s Triad criminal underbelly and gain access to the latest True Crime news, assets, promotions, and more! The new web site also reveals the first details on some of the project’s Hong Kong Cinema and Hollywood talent, further underscoring United Front Games’ commitment to delivering a game experience that looks, feels and plays like a true Hong Kong action flick.

As a newly hired thug within the Triad organization, undercover detective Wei Shen must do whatever it takes to stay undetected and survive, balancing his moral duty as a cop with the objectives of the assignment. In order to ascend the ranks of the underworld, gamers will engage in visceral, fast-paced martial arts combat and explosive gunfights, along with high-octane driving sequences and acrobatic free-running chases as they go deeper and deeper undercover.

True Crime’s story takes players on a roller coaster ride through the game’s vast, action-packed open-world Hong Kong setting, introducing handfuls of intriguing characters in a truly unique and dangerous city. Lending more authenticity to the game’s narrative and further bringing True Crime’s characters to life, Activision and UFG have enlisted the voice over skills of top Hong Kong cinema and Hollywood talent, including Tom Wilkinson, James Hong, James Liao, Byron Mann, Dustin Nguyen, George Cheung and Sammo Hung to name but a few.

Bill Hutchison, Chair of the i-Canada program, which is supported by the Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance, seeks to spread ultra-broadband communications among all Canadian communities, has been awarded the prestigious REALCOMM Digital Impact Award. The REALCOMM award is given to the person who has best advanced the development of the “net generation building”.

Mr. Hutchison is the inspiration and creator of the Information Technology component of the massive Toronto Waterfront Revitalization project. One of the largest development projects in the world, the Waterfront project will include to-home or to-office information transmission speeds of 1 gigabit per second — 100 times faster than most home broadband connections.

“Our vision with this ultra-broadband Waterfront project is to provide a quantum leap in connectivity,” said Mr. Hutchison. “We will use it as the core infrastructure that sparks innovation for businesses and home-owners alike. The ultra-broadband capability will allow intelligent buildings to be remotely controlled to manage heating, lighting and cooling systems. People using ultra-broadband will not have to commute to work or in some cases even to the doctor’s office; communication will allow high-capacity engagement.

Mr. Hutchinson went on to say that “we see i-Canada as a nation of Intelligent Communities large and small, central and remote, all enjoying the economic development, job growth and social prosperity now available in the world’s leading Intelligent Communities or Smart Cities. We want to expand upon Canada’s “Islands of Excellence” like Moncton, Fredericton and Waterloo who have all been recognized for excellence by the Global Intelligent Community Forum. We are a living laboratory for creative opportunities.”

Though the i-Canada program has not been officially launched, it already has some 300 signatories, including a Provincial Premier, Municipal leaders, business executives and leading academics.

The Honourable Tony Clement, Minister of Industry, today announced the launch of a public consultation on foreign investment restrictions in the telecommunications sector.

“Our goal is to encourage investment, innovation and competition in the telecommunications sector for the benefit of both businesses and consumers,” said Minister Clement. “We look forward to receiving Canadians’ views on this important issue.”

In the Speech from the Throne and Budget 2010: Leading the Way on Jobs and Growth, the Government of Canada committed to opening Canada’s doors further to venture capital and to foreign investment in key sectors, including telecommunications, in order to attract new capital and to encourage innovation and competition.

The consultation will run until July 30, 2010. The consultation paper outlines the current restrictions, describes how Canada compares with other countries and presents the following three options for consideration:

* Increase the limit for direct foreign investment in broadcasting and telecommunications common carriers to 49 percent
* Lift restrictions on telecommunications common carriers with a 10-percent market share or less, by revenue
* Remove telecommunications restrictions completely

Reviewing restrictions on foreign investment is consistent with the government’s approach to rely more on market forces and less on regulation in the telecommunications industry. Telecommunications is a critical part of the digital economy — a key government priority.

Congratulations to CityMax.com, who has been named Company of the Year by Small Business BC’s Successful You Business Awards. This citation, which is sponsored by WorkSafeBC, concludes a year in which the website builder company earned multiple industry accolades, recognition in the House of Commons for holding Canada’s first Entrepreneur Spirit Day, and was featured in the Wall Street Journal and Entrepreneur Magazine for its efforts in supporting small business owners.

“This award is an exciting achievement for our team and our site builder,” said Dean Gagnon, Chief Evangelist and President at CityMax.com. “Every facet of our company is based on helping entrepreneurs make money online, so to be recognized by our peers is truly humbling. This has been a collaborative effort from our support staff, to our expert programmers, to our 30,000 small business customers – and we hope to ride this momentum towards achieving our goal of helping 1 million entrepreneurs with our website software.”

In the past year, CityMax.com has been recognized as the #2 Best Company to Work for in BC (BCBusiness Magazine), received its second WebAward for Outstanding Achievement in Website Development (Web Marketing Association), and was listed in PROFIT Magazine’s NEXT 100 Emerging Business in Canada.

Joe Deobald, Brand Manager and 5-year employee, commented on the award: “It has been an incredible journey, going from a tiny start-up to a company supporting thousands of entrepreneurs around the world. We continue to add the right pieces to grow, and I am very excited to see what the future holds.”

The Company of the Year Award is presented to the nominee who has demonstrated an outstanding, growing business; innovative product(s), increasing jobs, increasing sales, overcoming adversity, and community contributions.

Fair Copyright for Canada (administered by Michael Geist) also has an active Facebook group which carries updates and opinions relevant to Bill C-32. One point which seems to be an area of contention is the Digital Lock, and CBC News has written a very comprehensive look at what it could entail. I freely admit that I have not had time to read and process all of the information about C-32, and while I will endeavour to do so, I would like to invite someone more expert in the ramifications of C-32 to write a guest editorial explaining the good and the bad of our copyright bill. While many of what we could deem as special interest groups are voicing their opinions about Bill C-32, the most relevant to both us and our readers is what those in interactive media are saying. All of the sites and Twitter accounts above contain links to opinions and press releases from groups such as ACTRA, AFM and the Documentary Organization of Canada, and I invite you to check them out. Here is what ESAC has to say about the reforms:

The Entertainment Software Association of Canada has released a statement about Bill C-32, congratulating the Government of Canada on its introduction of copyright reform legislation which will help protect Canadian content creators and digital media companies. ESAC believes that protecting the intellectual property of industries that contribute to Canada’s prosperity is not only good public policy, but is essential as our economy transitions to more knowledge-based jobs.

“We applaud the government for showing leadership on this complex issue and we look forward to studying the bill more closely,” said Danielle Parr, Executive Director of ESAC. “Without strong protection for our intellectual property, we’re basically operating in a digital Wild West. Promoting piracy under the guise of ‘user rights’ does nothing to defend the livelihood of thousands of Canadians who rely on turning great ideas into world class entertainment,” she added.

“Piracy fundamentally undermines the integrity of the marketplace. It forces creators to compete against black market versions of their own products, affecting their ability to recover the considerable investments associated with digital media production. A strong bill – one which prohibits hacking of digital works, trafficking in hacking tools and that makes those who facilitate digital piracy clearly liable for their activities – is critical to the success of Canada’s digital economy,” says Parr.

In the industry’s view, a bill with clear protection for intellectual property will enable creators to decide how and at what cost their products can be accessed and in turn allow consumers to decide which products succeed and fail by voting with their pocketbook. Further, by supporting a diverse range of business models, strong copyright will facilitate increased competition, which ultimately leads to greater consumer choice and lower prices.

In related news, the Pew Internet and American Life Project has released a report about The State of Online Video. While this study was conducted in the USA, the information can be useful to those Canadian companies and individuals who produce web-distributed products. The study is available as a downloadable PDF, or it can be read online.

And now back to our regularly scheduled Canadian game industry news and updates:

THQ has confirmed in an official press release that Relic Entertainment’s Company of Heroes Online will indeed be released to the North American market this fall. Building on the frenetic Real-Time-Strategy action of the original Company of Heroes, Company of Heroes Online is free to play and offers army specialization, commander customization, and persistent progression, allowing players to strategize on and off the battlefield. Players will also have the opportunity to earn or purchase special units and upgrades and improve their army with each and every multiplayer victory.

Vice President of Global Brand Management Travis Plane commented that, “We are delighted to bring this award-winning franchise to gamers in a whole new way with the online version of the Company of Heroes experience. Players will benefit from the persistent upgrades and the ability to tailor their armies to really suit their play style making this a unique experience for everyone.”

Capcom® Mobile and Classic Media, whose portfolio includes of some of the world’s leading kids, family and pop-culture brands such as Where’s Waldo?®, Casper the Friendly Ghost® and Lassie®, have announced the release of Where’s Waldo?® In Hollywood, the sequel to last year’s top-selling mobile phone game.

“The first Where’s Waldo? game was a run-away mobile hit with its addictive mini games and classic search and find puzzles,” said Midori Yuasa, President, Capcom Interactive, Inc. “For the sequel we’ve built on the winning mix with a whole new crop of puzzles, achievements and even more Waldo fun.”

“Capcom Mobile has done a terrific job translating the search and find experience of Where’s Waldo? for mobile and we are excited to partner with their team on the second game,” said Nicole Blake, Senior Vice President, Marketing & Consumer Products, Classic Media. “With its crowds of celebrities and celebrity-spotters, Hollywood is an exciting place for fans to take up their search for Waldo.”

Based on the international publishing phenomenon, Where’s Waldo? in Hollywood, developed by Capcom Interactive Canada, chronicles the world-famous traveler through a series of tinsel-town themed adventures. Players can join the search with multiple search and find games that are based on classic scenes from the book series, as well as five mini games, including Tic-Whack-Wizard, Odd One Out, and Slide Puzzles. As players progress, they will be able to unlock bonus content and earn in-game achievements. Where’s Waldo? In Hollywood is currently available for download on most North American carriers.

EA has released a new Dev Diary for the upcoming Need For Speed World. Check out what they have to say about the game in this new video.

Meanwhile, over at EA Sports, it seems that the developers have gone out on a limb and predicted that Spain will take home the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™. Using the market-leading EA Sports™ football engine that drives 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™ on the PS3 iand Xbox 360, EA Sports was able to simulate the 2010 FIFA World Cup and test all 32 teams under the same conditions they will face in the weeks ahead. It was determined that Spain will defeat Brazil 3-1 at Soccer City on July 11 to win its first World Cup. The testers holding the controllers – and thus the “players” free will, determined the following from their simulation:

* World Champion: Spain
* World Cup Final: Spain 3 Brazil 1
* 1st team to be eliminated: South Africa
* Golden Boot winner: David Villa (Spain), 7 goals
* Golden Ball winner: Kaka (Brazil)

EA Sports is also predicting that soccer fans around the globe will compare these astonishing results to the real-world tournament as it unfolds beginning June 11. The Final itself was an epic battle as Brazil put on a dazzling display of free-flowing samba style football early on against the Spaniards, taking a 1-0 lead in the 30th minute with a Felipe Melo strike from just inside the box. It didn’t take long for Spain to level the score after a goalie error that left striker David Villa in the clear. He tapped in his 6th goal of the tournament in the 42nd minute. The second half saw fortunes turn in favour of Spain, as their disciplined build up play and domination of possession paid off with a goal in the 61st minute when Villa connected for his second goal of the match, off of Andres Iniesta’s driven cross. Brazil had several efforts on goal in the final third of the match but couldn’t capitalize on its chances as they pushed all players forward in an attempt to draw even, eventually conceding a splendid counter attack goal in the 88th minute from Cesc Fabregas, which delivered Spain the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Spain’s path to FIFA World Cup glory included a quarterfinal 5-4 penalty shootout victory over Italy after an absorbing 1-1 draw, and a 2-1 win over Argentina in the semi final. Brazil’s journey to the Final included a 3-2 win over the Netherlands in the quarter final and a 5-4 shootout victory over England after the two teams played out a 2-2 draw in the semi.

Music makers who play games will soon be able to play, record, edit, save and playback their own song creations on their Xbox 360 drum kit peripherals in the form of Vancouver’s All Seeing Eye Games‘ debut title Drum Studio. Drum Studio utilizes the full potential of the drum kit to put the power of music creation in the players’ hands.

No longer will players merely play along to pre-determined drum lines. Instead, they will create their own jams on drums they’ve customized from a library of over 320 sounds. A simple & elegant recording interface allows players to layer in multiple tracks and hone their songs to perfection before they save the song, kick back, and watch an animated drummer play back their creation.

The past few years have seen the music game genre explode into a cultural phenomenon only to fizzle out in its own stagnation & over saturation. Drum Studio aims to push the genre forward in meaningful ways with its robust customization & creation tools and re-ignite some of the passion players felt that first time they sat down at a plastic instrument peripheral.

Drum Studio is the inaugural product of All Seeing Eye Games, a Vancouver-based independent game development studio founded in November 2009. It is dedicated to making accessible games that push the boundaries of innovation. Drum Studio is releasing in June 2010 exclusively on the Xbox LIVE Indie Games channel of Xbox LIVE Marketplace for 80 Microsoft Points.

Twenty-five Boys and Girls Clubs youth from across Canada will get the opportunity to pursue their careers and life goals through higher education as recipients of a $4,000 Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarship.

“I am extremely honoured to be selected as a recipient of the 2010 Future Leaders Scholarship,” said Scott McKinnon, a longtime member of Boys and Girls Club of Saint John. “Without this award, I may not have been financially able to attend university next year and continue towards the completion of my degree. This scholarship will allow me to better focus on the requirements of my courses without worrying about the stress incurred by having to find a way to cover the costs associated with a year at university. I am very thankful that Future Shop has partnered with Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada to provide this opportunity.”

Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada, through the generous support of Future Shop, has been supporting the education dreams of youth for ten years through the Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarships program. The program provides vital financial support at a time when tuition costs continue to rise. Since the program was created, more than 550 young people have received scholarships totaling more than $1.5 million. Each student receives a $3,500 or $3,000 cash award along with a $500 or $1,000 Future Shop gift card to provide needed technology and school equipment.

“I am the first person in my family to go to university. My parents couldn’t afford to go and I feel really blessed to have come to Canada and been given all these opportunities,” said Majda Miljkovic, a past Future Shop Future Leader Scholarship recipient who is currently studying Education at the University of Manitoba. “The Future Leaders Scholarship has helped me keep up with paying for school on my own, stay out of debt in doing so, and also look around me and realize just how lucky I am to be here today.”

Building on the ten year success of the Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarships, Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada and Future Shop have developed a new program, Future Generation, which will launch later in 2010. An evolution of the Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarships, Future Generation will aim to provide young people in Grade 10 with the financial resources to achieve their long term education goals and the skills and technology needed to be truly successful.

“Future Shop is committed to investing in creating positive opportunities for young people and together with Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada we have helped hundreds of young people over the past ten years realize their dream of post-secondary education,” said Cheryl Grant, Community Relations Manager, Future Shop. “Through the Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarships we have improved the lives of youth and families across the country, and we will continue to make a difference through the upcoming Future Generation program.”

Recipients of the Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarships are selected based on their outstanding contribution to their Boys and Girls Club and local community, good academic standing and financial need.

2010 Future Shop Future Leaders Scholarship Recipients

Alberta

Amaira Hanson, Boys and Girls Clubs of Calgary
Erin Hutchinson, Boys and Girls Clubs of Calgary
Tammy Morgan, Stettler and District Boys and Girls Club
Courtney Johnson, Boys and Girls Club of Brooks and District

British Columbia

Reid Neilson, Boys and Girls Club Community Services of Delta/Richmond
Janette Wheeler, Okanagan Boys and Girls Clubs
Eileen Zheng, Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Vancouver

Manitoba

Sabreen Shahin, Boys and Girls Clubs of Winnipeg
Hope Akello, Boys and Girls Clubs of Winnipeg

New Brunswick

Sarah Stewart, Miramichi Boys and Girls Club
Scott McKinnon, Boys and Girls Club of Saint John

Newfoundland and Labrador

Alexandria Hemeon, Botwood Boys and Girls Club Inc.

Nova Scotia

Carlos Beals, Boys and Girls Club of Dartmouth

Ontario

Kaitland Thompson, Toronto Kiwanis Boys and Girls Clubs
Mike Ali, Boys and Girls Clubs of Peel
Osman Omar, Boys and Girls Club of London
Mahdi Hussein, Eastview (Toronto) Boys and Girls Club
Meagan La Plante, Boys and Girls Clubs of Kawartha Lakes
Prince Sunama, Boys and Girls Club of Kingston and Area Inc.
David Francis, Boys and Girls Club of East Scarborough
Ismail Abdulle, Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa
Richard Lorde, Braeburn Boys and Girls Club

Prince Edward Island

Donald Gallant, Wellington and Area Boys and Girls Club

Quebec

Lois Boateng, Boys and Girls Club of LaSalle / Club Garcons et Filles de LaSalle

Saskatchewan

Kayla Krawetz, Battlefords Boys and Girls Club

Quick Play is exactly what it says – you are tossed into a randomly chosen match and expected to hold your own. Exhibition Mode will let you chose your teams, but don’t expect the game to be an easy trouncing of your opponent. Meanwhile, over in Campaign Mode, you can customize your pixelated self to your heart’s desire before heading off for a play-through of 18 tournament matches with varying challenges which you must successfully complete if you want to take part in the ultimate tournament and become the Pur Futbol champion. Take a look at the European launch trailer for the game to check out how it’s done.

Pur Futbol is not meant to be a technical round of sanctioned world cup soccer. It’s meant to be fun, challenging and rewarding in that there is somewhat less structure than the more rigid, rule-following soccer titles out in the game market. You will be granted special team management privileges by completing the challenges set out for you; this means you can upgrade your character, trade or steal other players, building your team up to the ultimate playing machine required to dominate the world on the soccer pitch.

Pur Futbol offers 230 players, 17 of the top teams from the international leagues, as well as 3 legend-status teams. The Hometown Champions feature on the Pur Futbol site lets other players view local and global leaderboards as well as search for future opponents. With Xbox Live or PlayStation Network accounts, players will be able to challenge friends, families and foes to some fierce online play, further extending Pur Futbol’s replay attraction.

As we saw with Ubisoft Vancouver’s first title Academy of Champions, the game’s environment is full of rich graphics with recognizable locations and fantastical backgrounds. Pur Futbol also ties in with Ubisoft’s Uplay system, where you can get bonus actions and rewards as you earn Uplay points. As shown here, you can get a special Ubisoft team uniform set with 30 Uplay points. Pur Futbol is rated E for Everyone and is available for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Pur Futbol is listed at GameStop Canada for $39.99.

Tickets for SIGGRAPH Vancouver’s next event are now on sale. The Making of ModNation Racers, which will feature presentations by Clint Hanson, Lucas Granito and James Grieve from United Front Games, this panel presentation will take place on June 29th at the VanCity Theatre. Tickets will be available to members for $10.00 and $20.00 for non-members.

Chapters will be hosting two book signing sessions with author Neil Pasricha for his  newly published work “The Book of Awesome“, which was inspired by the Webby Award winning blog 1000 Awesome Things, where he posted one awesome thing in life each day. The Book of Awesome reminds readers of little things that make everyone smile. You are invited to join Pasricha as he signs copies of this universal high five for humanity at these Chapter’s outlets:

Chapters Macleod Trail – 9631 MacLeod Trail S.W., Calgary on Thursday June 10th at 5:00 pm
Chapters Robson – 788 Robson Street, Vancouver on Saturday June 12th at 2:00 pm

Crank Storyboard Suite 1.1 is now available from Crank Software Inc., an innovator in embedded user interface (UI) solutions. Compared to older, traditional electronic design automation tools, Storyboard enables R&D teams to quickly and collaboratively develop rich and dynamic graphical user interfaces while optimizing hardware performance.

* Enhancements available in Crank Storyboard Suite 1.1 provide functionality that enables R&D teams to accelerate the design cycle resulting in faster times to commercialization.
* Storyboard 1.1 gives teams extended platform support for new operating systems and architectures
* Storyboard 1.1 delivers unparalleled performance though the use of industry standard graphics API’s

“Crank Storyboard Suite 1.1 is a result of listening to our customers and delivering the new functionality that they require to perform their jobs more efficiently. Storyboard is enabling R&D teams to more quickly prototype and simulate user interfaces to streamline the development cycle and release products with richer, more complete experiences for their users.” said Jason Clarke, Crank Software’s Vice President of Sales & Marketing. Storyboard 1.1 includes the following enhancements over the previous version:

* Extended platform support for Storyboard Engine

- Linux support increased to include Renesas MPU SH4A
– QNX 6 support increased to include PPC and Renesas MPU SH4A
– Windows CE 6.0 support for ARM platforms

* Linux hosted development for Storyboard Suite
* Lua debugger integrated into Storyboard Designer
* Performance optimizations by leveraging graphics acceleration though industry standard API’s including DirectFB and OpenVG

Toshiba and PHAX Gaming have joined forces to produce the first organized Canadian Online Gaming League. Over the next eleven months of online battle, over $30,000 in cash and prizes will be awarded to Canadian players who display the top notch skills and the dedication it takes to become Canada’s Best. Toshiba and Taco Bell have supplied great prizing like Nokia Surge phones, Gunnar Optik e-SPORT Collection glasses and Taco Bell gift cards.

Not only will gamers have a shot at winning placement prizes, all tournament registrants are also automatically entered into a draw for a Toshiba Qosmio X500 Gaming Laptop or one 46″ UX600U REGZA LCD TV, both valued at $1999.99. The 2010 Toshiba PHAX Canadian Open line-up features the hottest titles in both XBOX360, Wii, and PC Gaming, with the inaugural 2010 tournament lineup to include the following:

HALO 3 4v4 (Xbox 360)
Counter Strike 1.6 5v5 (PC)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 4v4 (Xbox 360)
Super Smash Brothers Brawl 1v1 (Wii)
NHL 2010/11 1v1 (Xbox 360)

Over the next twelve months, registration for the Toshiba PHAX Canadian Open will be wide open and free of charge to Canadian players. For your convenience, the structure of the league schedule caters to both short term (4 week) tournaments, but also offers longer term ladder (8 week) competitions. If you play more than one game, points earned in each game will be added to your Player Total and jump your name to the top of the individual player leader boards. The PHAX Gaming crew will be broadcasting live tournament matches, conducting player/team interviews, and keeping up with all of the Toshiba Phax Canadian Open News online throughout the entire season.

AfterCAD is pleased to announce that San Francisco-based start-up Nukotoys has selected Aftercad’s Immersion 3D technology to power its cloud Gaming-as-a-Service (GaaS) offerings.

“We want our online 3D multiplayer games to be playable by as many kids as possible. After reviewing various technology options, we found Aftercad Immersion to be the best fit for streaming our highly immersive games to browsers on even lower-end machines,” said Rodger Raderman, Co-CEO of Nukotoys. “In addition, due to a rich informational environment that allows us to utilize both server and client optimally, Immersion gives us UI flexibility that is absent in other solutions.”

Aftercad has recently expanded its 3D web publishing efforts to include the new Immersion 3D application porting service for Game and 3D application developers looking to migrate their titles and apps to the cloud. As cloud computing begins to weaken the console makers’ grip on gaming, developers are looking to cash in on the new cloud gaming methods being touted by services like Onlive, Otoy, Gaikai and others. Aftercad Immersion delivers the technology to maximize this new cloud delivery method while giving developers the the ability to leverage the full power of HTML5 on the clients’ computer or mobile device.

“Other methods out there rely on just the video stream and an sometimes even a plugin to bring the remote game play to the user in time to react and send those commands back again. This method is called ‘Soft PC-Over-IP’ will always be lag sensitive and function as a closed loop. Immersion does a much better job by opening up the loop, allowing game developers to utilize the power at both ends of the wire thus greatly reducing the dependence on bandwidth alone,” said Chris Boothroyd, CEO of Aftercad. “We are pleased with Nukotoys’ selection of our Immersion technology, it is yet another validation of the superiority of our patent pending approach and we are looking for more game developers to join us in the cloud.”

According to Statistics Canada, only one third of small businesses survive over five years, and Cognition LLP is shaking up the legal market again by offering free legal consultations to entrepreneurs.

“Start-up companies typically can’t afford their own in-house counsel, nor can they spend a lot on outside legal services, with the result that they try to handle this work themselves. That’s when they get into trouble and miss valuable opportunities in their contracts and structuring,” notes Cognition partner Rubsun Ho.

“So we thought we’d help them out,” adds co-founder Joe Milstone. “If we get them as clients later, that’s a bonus. But for now, we’re just happy if we can improve their odds.”

What are some of the worst legal mistakes that start-ups and growth companies make? Through its network of 20 lawyers, Cognition has rescued clients from some really bad blunders. The top five are:

- Doling out equity without documentation or proper thought
– Not having a solid shareholders’ agreement, leading to messy conflicts down the road
– Hiring employees and contractors on a handshake, exposing the company to unnecessary termination risk and disputes over intellectual property
– Entering into major agreements with suppliers, customers and distribution partners without thinking through the terms or implications, including what’s not in the agreements but should be
– Blindly adopting others’ precedents and policies for their own use, assuming that “one size fits all” businesses and situations

To be closer and more accessible to entrepreneurs, Cognition has taken up residence at MaRS, a Toronto-based innovation centre, in association with Ogilvy Renault. Entrepreneurs can drop in or make an appointment for no-cost legal consultations during the hours of 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. every Tuesday at Cognition’s MaRS office at 101 College Street, Suite 140.

Cognition is no newcomer to doing things differently. As an entrepreneurial venture in itself, its lawyers work largely from their own homes or onsite with clients. This ‘virtual’ approach has allowed the firm to dramatically trim costs and thereby hold its fees to about half of what the traditional legal establishments charge. The firm also pioneered the alternative legal services model of providing start-up and growth businesses with their own dedicated in-house counsel on an outsourced basis.

“We do a lot of work for smaller, younger companies, so we’re familiar with their issues. We help them avoid the pitfalls, and often we can provide other value-added services for which we charge nothing,” says Ho.

For example, because of its network of contacts and experience, Cognition has been known to help start-up companies find venture capital and even new customers.

“It doesn’t surprise me that Cognition is offering free legal advice,” says Nussar Ahmed, President of AddictiveMobility, a client of the firm and of MaRS. “That’s just who they are. They got us over the early legal hurdles, and because they really wanted us to succeed, they leveraged other business opportunities for us as well.”

The amount of development that went into Assassin’s Creed II is mind-boggling. With over 230 features and a dev team of over 300, just the massive amounts of data to keep a rein on would bury the uninitiated. Patrick stated that through the entire development process, the most important things to pay attention to are your game play pillars and the need to keep an honest perspective. He said that your game play pillars are used to create the challenge, while your supporting features give meaning and depth to the core, while exotic features are used to change the pace of the game.

Patrick also drew attention to the importance of play tests and making the most of the test feedback in the development of your title. Using a two-fold process of Qualitative and Quantitative Reporting will give developers a very good perspective of what gamers like or do not like, as well as how they are playing your game. The Quantitative portion focuses on data tracking and usability reports, which provide concrete information to orient discussion on data instead of personal opinions. Meanwhile, the appreciative, or Qualitative reports, give context to the data you’ve collected, and you can see what is working, what isn’t, and what changes need to be made so that the gamer can more fully experience (and enjoy) the mechanics of the game.

Patrick also touched briefly on the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood and how everything learned in the two previous Assassin’s Creed development processes helped the team work quickly through a very short ten month production window. A big part of this was the strength, scope and depth of the team’s design documents. He stated that it is very important to keep your documentation up-to-date right through until the end of the project. Paying attention to your development documentation will cut down on needless questions and distractions, as well as force you to think and keep track of the vision for your title. As has been stated in many, many game dev seminars – it is cheaper to fail on paper than in production – and Patrick reiterated this by saying how important it is to challenge every feature you want in your game on paper first. This is not a perfect process, but it will reduce risk to your bottom line. In reply to a question asked from the audience, Patrick noted that features drove a large part of the story, and have a big part in the future of where the Assassin’s Creed franchise is heading in the future. Too bad he wouldn’t expand on that future…just where is Assassin’s Creed III going to take us? Curious gamers want to know.

SIGGRAPH Vancouver has two more upcoming events which may interest you. The first is Alice in Wonderland – Creating Underland on May 25th at the Empire Theatre on Granville. This session features two presentations, the first with animation director David Schaub (Sony Pictures Imageworks), who will give you a look behind the talent and tools that were used to create Alice In Wonderland. Mr. Schaub will focus primarily on the standard creative elements of the show, but he will also provide insight into the surprising challenges and innovative technical solutions that were used to breathe digital life into over 30 inhabitants of Underland including the Mad Hatter, the Red Queen and the Cheshire Cat.

The second Creating Underland session will be presented by freelance Visual Effects Supervisor Carey Villegas, who will focus on the process of photographing the “live-action” component of the film, as well as the many challenges that he and Senior Visual Effects Supervisor, Ken Ralston faced in post production while creating the visual and stereo 3D effects. A screening of Alice in Wonderland will follow the technical presentations. Tickets for this event are $20.00 for non-members and $15.00 for members.

The other upcoming SIGGRAPH Vancouver event, just announced last night, will focus on The Making of ModNation Racers. Featuring Clint Hanson, Lucas Granito and James Grieve from United Front Games, this panel presentation will take place on June 29th at the VanCity Theatre. Tickets will be available to members for $10.00 and $20.00 for non-members. As of press time, this event had not yet been added to the SIGGRAPH Vancouver web site, so you’ll have to check the association’s site later for ticket availability.

Interactive entertainment company Ludia and FremantleMedia Enterprises (FME) have announced the availability of The Price Is Right game ($9.99) for the Sony PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system on the PlayStation®Network. Players can now “COME ON DOWN” for their shot in Contestant’s Row, bid on items in 19 different pricing games, test their luck with spinning The Big Wheel, and experience the winner-takes-all tension of the Showcase.

“We are pleased to extend our tremendously successful The Price Is Right game to PlayStation 3 systems via the PlayStation Network,” said Alex Thabet, Founder and CEO of Ludia Inc. “This first game release is just the beginning for Ludia games on PS3™, and further reinforces our multiplatform game strategy.”

The Price Is Right for PS3™ features:

* 19 favorite pricing games to play including Plinko, Cliff Hangers, Punch-a-Bunch & many more.
* Rich graphics, including stages, The Big Wheel, and other game elements combined with all the familiar music and sound effects to create a true-to-show game experience.
* Original, fully customizable 3D player avatars: choose hairstyles, clothing, accessories and more.
* Two game modes: single player and multiplayer.
* Unlock bonus items as a reward for progress in the game.

“The Emmy Award-winning The Price Is Right is the #1 daytime game show on television, and one that holds a consistently solid fan base” added Olivier Delfosse, Director of Interactive for program licensor FME. “We are delighted to continue to work with Ludia to bring an authentic brand experience to an even broader public of PlayStation 3 systems owners.”

Mobile Game Studio invites you to travel The High Seas on your iPhone. This new action packed game will put you in the boots of a treasure hunter. Fighting against the mighty pirates, lethal castles and deadly whirlpools you sail the seas in search of treasure chests. Pass through the Caribbean and Arctic on your quest for the title of a first class treasure hunter.

The High Seas brings you into a whole new world, full of action, danger and mystery. Each level will present you with a new challenge; a number of gold. You are to collect the set amount of gold, but the mighty pirates will do everything in their power to protect their loot. Take a stand against your enemies with your cannons, which follow your command at the touch of a button along with a steering wheel you rotate to guide your ship across the seven seas. The sea is also against you on your quest as they put deadly towers, castles, icebergs and whirlpools in your path. The Ghost Armanda will bring your skills into question along with the mystical ghost towers. The title of treasure hunter never looked so far away.

At an official ribbon cutting ceremony at ParetoLogic’s Victoria head office, company executives unveiled PC Health Advisor to the public. The new software packs a huge number of features and tools to optimize, secure, and maintain Windows PCs. With ParetoLogic’s successful track record, indications are that PC Health Advisor will help millions of customers and their computers.

“We are absolutely ecstatic about PC Health Advisor and the ways it can help people,” said Elton Pereira, ParetoLogic’s President, CEO and Co-Founder, at the program launch celebration. “This is the software that our users have been asking for.”

PC Health Advisor raises the bar for system utility and optimization software. Included in the digital multi-tool are a registry cleaner, privacy scanner, and malware process detector. The registry cleaner detects and removes problems in the Windows registry to improve performance, speed and system stability. The privacy scanner locates personal information and then permanently erases it. Computers continually record a user’s actions, the files accessed, and websites visited. PC Health Advisor removes this privacy and security risk. The malware process detector, as the name implies, searches for active malware on the system. This ensures that malware does not annoy users with pop-ups, or endanger them with keyloggers or Trojans.

“We’ve integrated truly essential functions,” said Ted Deng, Senior Project Manager at ParetoLogic, “not only are vital optimization features included but we’ve also added completely new tools and controls.”

These tools include direct access to Windows customization options, a process manager, duplicate file finder, Startup Manager, and BHO Manager. The software pairs ParetoLogic’s user-friendly interface with an array of technologies that have traditionally been the exclusive domain of highly trained technicians. All told, the toolkit gives Windows users unrestricted control over their computers, and instant power to clean, tweak, and fine-tune them.

“The software is so powerful, but the interface so easy-to-use,” said Pereira with a smile, “PC Health Advisor might end up giving some users a reputation as a computer whiz.”

With a new management team firmly in place, Vancouver’s Rainmaker Entertainment continues to evolve as a multifaceted animation studio with its focus on creating, developing and producing its own animation projects. To that end, the company has unveiled its first slate of proprietary projects, it was announced today by Catherine Winder, President and Executive Producer of the company.

“Rainmaker is fully utilizing its resources – creative talent, storytelling and technical and artistic skills – to bring an exciting and entertaining array of ideas to the global animation film, television and home entertainment markets,” said Winder. “We have over 200 talented artists who are eager to set the company on a new course, leveraging our expertise in CG animation and our breakthrough animation techniques. Our team is also comprised of top notch development veterans and, with our production acumen, we’re now ready to take Rainmaker to the next level in realizing our goals as a full fledged animation studio.”

Rainmaker Entertainment, which purchased Mainframe Entertainment and its mainstay and groundbreaking TV property ReBoot, the first ever CG animated series, have released the following details about its new slate and updates on the creative staff working on the projects:

Ogo, in development as a theatrical animation movie, is based on Canada’s famous water monster, believed to reside in Lake Okanagan in the South Central interior of British Columbia. The movie is a comedy that pokes fun at all idiocracies of the monster’s lore and its impact on modern life. The story is about a little girl who reveals the monster’s existence to the world and then must do everything in her power to protect it. Ogo is written by Jacob Medjuck, formerly an animator at DreamWorks Animation, Walt Disney Interactive, Sony, Warner Bros and Fox and currently an independent filmmaker. Rainmaker is actively seeking distribution partners for Ting & Juma as well as Ogo and Country Bunny and the Little Gold Shoes.

Country Bunny and the Little Gold Shoes, being developed as a series of animated holiday specials for the television and home entertainment/DVD marketplace, is based on the 1939 children’s classic written by American author DuBose Heyward. Rainmaker has acquired the rights to the book, in which Heyward tells the story of a country bunny who always dreams of being one of the five Easter bunnies chosen by the old, kind and wise Grandfather Bunny. Bernice Vanderlaan (Disney’s “Life With Derek”) has been signed as the writer on the project. Vanderlaan has also written over 30 episodes for PBS Sprout’s preschool blocks, including its holiday special “Preschool Musical on a Stick”. She has also co-created and produced several imaginative children’s programs including Disney’s “Flash Forward”, Family Channel’s ” Hello, Mrs. Cherrywinkle” and GMTV’s “Rockabye Bubble”. David Snowden and Alison Fine, who won the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film for “Bob’s Birthday”, are also on board as Consulting Directors.

Ting & Juma: The Movie rounds out the initial Rainmaker development slate. Ting is a tiny frisky alien with an attitude, while Juma is a forest dweller with a thirst for creativity and adventure. Rainmaker’s artists created the characters and have already produced several short films of their exploits together. In the movie, Ting and Juma team up on a journey story to find Ting’s home. Rainmaker is currently taking pitches from writers for the project.

Open Text Corporation has been awarded a 2010 SAP® Pinnacle Award in the category Global Software Solutions Partner of the Year. Pinnacle Awards are granted to leading SAP partners that have excelled in enhancing the customer experience, addressing critical issues such as accelerating co-innovation and improving return on investment. Winners were selected based on over 230 nominations in 27 categories received from partners and SAP employees. Open Text received the award at a special awards ceremony held on the eve of SAPPHIRE® NOW, SAP’s international customer conference currently underway in Orlando, Florida.

“The SAP Pinnacle Awards reflect the strong success we are seeing globally in helping customers in a wide range of sectors from energy to financial services to government agencies connect their content with SAP solutions,” said Patrick Barnert, Vice President, SAP Solutions at Open Text. “The fact that we’ve now won an SAP Pinnacle Award three years running underscores that this is a highly effective partnership and that Open Text is committed to bringing real business results to customers. We look forward to even greater success in the coming year.”

Nova Scotia’s Innovacorp has won one of the highest international honours for its work in helping new businesses. Stephen Hartlen, Innovacorp’s interim president and CEO, accepted the National Business Incubation Association’s international award for its work in the business incubation industry on May 18, at the association’s annual international conference, also taking place in Orlando, Florida.

“This award represents the hard work of our dedicated and professional staff, and our partners and clients,” said Mr. Hartlen. “Combined with our compelling economic, client satisfaction, and leading indicator measurements, this award tells us that our High Performance Incubation business model is globally competitive.”

Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal Minister Bill Estabrooks, acting on behalf of Economic and Rural Development Minister Percy Paris, congratulated the corporation on receiving this distinction.

“Innovacorp plays an important role in business growth in our province,” said Mr. Estabrooks. “It helps Nova Scotia-based knowledge companies sell their technologies and succeed in the global marketplace. This helps create good jobs and grow our economy.”

Innovacorp helps Nova Scotia entrepreneurs prosper in the global marketplace through its High Performance Incubation business model, which is based on a unique approach of incubation infrastructure, business mentoring, and seed and venture capital investment. Its key industries include information technology, life sciences, and clean technology.

“We continuously refine our business model and assess ourselves against other models around the globe,” said Dr. Jacquelyn Thayer Scott, chair of Innovacorp’s board of directors. “It’s very gratifying when the premier international organization in our sector recognizes what we do as being best in class.”

Absolute® Software Corporation, the leading provider of firmware-based, patented, computer theft recovery, data protection and secure computer lifecycle management solutions announced today that it has partnered with Trend Micro™ to include Computrace® LoJack® for Laptops in select bundles to be offered by Trend Micro. Offerings will be available for the back-to-school shopping season.

The combination of LoJack for Laptops and Trend Micro Internet Security offers joint customers a more comprehensive computer security package. With Trend Micro, computers are protected against online theft and viruses. With LoJack for Laptops in place, customers can be assured that if their computer is stolen, the Absolute Theft Recovery Team can gather evidence and work with local law enforcement to get their computer back.

“Computers have become the blue-prints to our lives. We do our banking there, store our passwords, and record our lives in pictures and video – everything to do with who we are. If your computer is stolen, it can be a scary occurrence, but it doesn’t have to be,” said Mark Grace, vice president of consumer business at Absolute Software. “With Absolute on your side, you have your own investigative team standing by to take action. We can delete your sensitive data, render the computer useless, send messages to the thief, conduct a full investigation and physically recover your computer – all while working with local police to help catch the thief. Without Absolute, you’d have little chance of seeing your computer again. Absolute greatly increases your chances of recovering your stolen device.”

“For Trend Micro, our customer’s personal online freedom directs how we design our products and solutions,” said Tobias Lee, vice president of consumer marketing, Trend Micro. “We’re pleased to partner with Absolute Software and offer our mutual customers an extra layer of mobile and laptop security.”

Multiplied Media Corporation has announced the availability of an enterprise build of their award-winning Poynt application. BlackBerry smartphone users on a BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) will have full access to the benefits and features of the Poynt application.

Poynt is a convenient and timesaving GPS-enabled application that connects users to local businesses, people, restaurants and movie theaters at the moment they want to find or acquire products or services. Poynt gives consumers the ability to move beyond discovery of their local area to view movie trailers and show times, book dining reservations, compare local gas prices, view directions on a map, click-to-call a business or view a website.

“Poynt is an effective tool in reducing business costs and enhancing workforce productivity through fewer directory assistance calls and the ability to quickly set up business lunches or find meeting locations,” said Andrew Osis, CEO of Multiplied Media. “The new BES build allows BlackBerry enterprise administrators to easily manage distribution and updates of Poynt to their colleagues, connecting them with the local area to get quick search results, turn-by-turn directions and mapping, or detailed location information.”

“Poynt is a very useful application and we are pleased to now be able to give our organization access to it,” said Gavin Wilson, Senior Support Analyst at Oxford University Press. “We appreciate that Multiplied Media delivered a well-packaged BES build of the app that is easy to deliver to Oxford University Press’ Blackberry users.”

Multiplied Media has turned off update notifications in this enhanced enterprise build to ensure BES users do not need to download the app directly when an update becomes available. Poynt offers two versions of its Enterprise build to ensure BES users can fully utilize the application whether it’s through a desktop manager or BES connection only. Poynt is currently available for BlackBerry® smartphones in Canada, the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, France and Spain.

The Honourable James Moore, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, has announced the appointment of Ram Krishna Raju as a member of Telefilm Canada.

“I am delighted that Mr. Raju has accepted this appointment,” said Minister Moore. “Telefilm Canada will undoubtedly benefit from his strong leadership, dynamism, extensive knowledge, and experience in the digital and information technology industry.”

As founder of e-academy Inc., Mr. Raju has built and led, since 1997, one of the world’s leading providers of hosted electronic software delivery solutions and software licence compliance for the education market. This company is recognized by leading software companies such as Microsoft, Adobe Systems, and several other major software developers.

Prior to that, Mr. Raju worked at Dalhousie University as a Professor of Information Systems and as a Manager of the Computing and Information Systems Department, where he established a university computer store that has remained profitable since 1984. His work in this field was recognized in 1995, when he was elected Vice-President of the Canadian Association of Campus Computer Stores to represent more than $125 million in purchasing power in negotiations with hardware and software companies. Mr. Raju holds three degrees from Dalhousie University: a Bachelor of Arts, a Bachelor of Science, and a Master of Business Administration.

Yahoo! Canada continues its vision of becoming the centre of peoples’ online lives by delivering customized content across multiple platforms and innovative new products to Canada’s World Cup 2010 fans. As Canadians prepare to join hundreds of millions of soccer fans from around the world this June and July to celebrate the world’s biggest sporting event, Yahoo! Canada is creating an online home for Canadian soccer fans who want to access all the action from their desktop or web-enabled device.

“It’s a big year for sports in Canada, and Yahoo! Canada is excited to continue providing original content and real-time coverage and insights for Canadians around the events that matter most to them. Whether it’s the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, and now the World Cup, Yahoo! Canada is as passionate about providing leading online sports coverage as Canadians are about cheering for their favourite teams and home town athletes,” says Max Tremblay, Director of Marketing, Yahoo! Canada.

Yahoo! will provide sports fans with customized online and mobile experiences during World Cup 2010. Canadians can follow all the World Cup action online. Later this month, Yahoo! will also launch a comprehensive mobile site for Canadian soccer fans.

Yahoo!’s reign as a technology leader continues by kicking up the science for this year’s World Cup and offering the following innovations for fans:

* New Shortcuts in Yahoo! Search results that will launch in more than 25 markets throughout the summer. These Shortcuts will provide rich information such as photos, videos, schedules, live scores, stats, team information and news, right on the Search results page.
* Real-time scores, schedules and breaking news, all of which fans can have at their fingertips by downloading the Yahoo! Toolbar with World Cup coverage. The toolbar can be customized with a country-themed skin to support any competing team.
* Yahoo! Sports World Soccer 2010, a pick’em style fantasy soccer game available to Canadians that allows fans to select winners for each match of the World Cup.
* Yahoo!’s first global online penalty shootout contest — Yahoo! Penalty Shootout is set to launch at the end of May. Soccer fans will be able to compete with friends, other fans, and sworn soccer rivals from around the world for a chance to win the Yahoo! Sports Pass, tickets to any four premier sporting events in the world over the next four years.
* Predictalot from Yahoo! Labs is a fun experiment that puts the “wisdom of the crowd” about the World Cup to the test. Predictalot allows fans in every country to make millions of interesting predictions, like “How many teams from Europe will advance to the quarterfinals?” or “Will a country that has never won before win it all this year?”

Both Yahoo!’s PC and mobile platforms will allow fans to get breaking news and analysis, scores, player stats, live commentary and video from Yahoo! Canada Sports and will include:

* On-the-ground reporting from South Africa by award-winning sports writers Martin Rogers, who spent seven years as a soccer writer for the London Daily Mirror, covering the English Premier League, UEFA Champions League, UEFA Cup and international soccer; and Yahoo! Sports editorial team members Dan Wetzel and Les Carpenter.
* “World Soccer Roundup”, a daily video news show that will recap top stories and give information on upcoming World Cup events.
* Dirty Tackle, a leading soccer blog from editor Brooks Pecks and contributors Richard Whittall and Ryan Bailey.

And in very late-breaking news from the INplay 2010 conference happening right now in Toronto, Shaw Communications has announced that they will be adding a new digital media programme to their Rocket Fund. Further details will be available via the Rocket Fund’s web site this coming Monday, May 24th.

This year’s list of Canada’s Greenest Employers was announced this morning by the editors of the Canada’s Top 100 Employers project. Fifty organizations across Canada were recognized on this year’s list.

There’s another fun gaming-related mixer coming up in Vancouver – check out the Olympic Gaming Mixer, which will be taking place on the evening of Friday, May 7, 2010 at the Century Restaurant and Bar on Richards. Check out the event’s FaceBook page for the list of challenges to be had at the Olympic Gaming Mixer.

Don’t forget to buy your tickets for the ACM SIGGRAPH Vancouver presentation of Designing Assassin’s Creed II featuring Lead Game Designer Patrick Plourde from Ubisoft Montreal, which is generously sponsored in part by AnnexPro and 3vis. He will discuss the challenges faced by the dev team: an enormous scope, one of the biggest development teams ever assembled and a limited time frame. This talk is about sharing our best practices to ship high quality games through a focused and rigorous Design Process while maximizing the output of production. Tickets for this May 18th event at the VanCity Theatre are only $15.00 for SIGGRAPH members and $20.00 for non-members. Annual SIGGRAPH membership is only 35.00 – and gets you special pricing at all of our great chapter events. You should join today.

DigiBC has put out a call for speakers for its Vancouver Digital Week 2010 event which takes place May 25-28 at the Vancouver Convention Centre. Please see their site for more details.

Interactive Ontario is pleased to welcome back Alexander Manu to give a keynote presentation at INPlay 2010. Manu, who delivered a keynote address at Interactive Ontario’s iSummit in 2006, is a strategic innovation practitioner, international lecturer and author. For over 20 years Alexander has enabled global companies as diverse as Motorola, LEGO, Whirlpool, Nokia, Navteq and Unilever, to develop policies and strategies that address emerging issues through strategic foresight and pre-competitive business models.

Goldtooth Creative has once again shown their video magic – check out the Cover Reveal trailer for EA Sports’ Madden NFL 11, developed by Florida’s Tiburon Studio. Goldtooth’s incredibly talented teams have produced trailers and cinematics for many of today’s top titles. Need a production team for your project? We recommend them.

BC indie developer Krabbitsoft Studio has released new features and specs for their RPG Krabbit World Origins. Featuring some very unique creatures, Krabbit World Origins has a very strong player community, and allows for single or multi-player modes. This is a game we’re going to be taking a look at in the coming weeks – look for it to be featured in our review section later in May 2010.

Banff World Television Festival has just released a call for entrants for the nextMEDIA Digital Hot List. This is a competition open to developers, content producers, and digital superstars. This is your chance to showcase your new, innovative digital property and grab the attention of advertisers who are looking for exciting brand integration opportunities. There are four available categories for entry:

*  Media (Does your website stand out amongst the rest?)
* Talent (Are you a proven online superstar with millions of followers?)
* Content Proposal (Got the best new idea for online content and branded entertainment?)
* Technologies (Are you creating the coolest apps, games and digital ad solutions?)

This contest closes on May 3rd, so if you’re interested in entering, you’d better get a move on!

New children’s mobile application studio Googly was delighted to find its first app, Alphabets in the Zoo featured yesterday in iTunes’ New and Noteworthy section, and amazed to see it reach number one on the education list.

Alphabets in The Zoo features a charming new animated alphabet song and story to help children learn their letters as they look, listen, and sing-a-long. Children’s understanding of the alphabet is taught and reinforced as they enjoy Saad Rashid’s colorful animation, listen to the Fauzia Abbasi’s delightful lyrics, and enjoy Dave Klotz’s catchy tune. Googly plans to release an iPad version of Alphabets in The Zoo shortly, and three more original children’s apps in the next 30 days.

Montreal publisher Strategy First has announced the release of Two Time Aggie award winner Dark Fall: Lost Souls and World Basketball Manager 2010 on Steam. The world’s leading platform for the digital distribution of PC games with over 25 million users world wide will offer a 10% discount on both games from April 21 – 28, 2010.

“We are excited to bring these two great titles to 25 million Steam users” says Strategy First Director Emanuel Wall, “We are proud to offer a two time Aggie Award winner, and the first PC Game from Greece to be published on Steam.”

Dark Fall: Lost Souls is the Aggie Award winner for Best First-Person PC Adventure game, and winner of Best Sound Design. Dark Fall: Lost Souls is a horror adventure game penned by the ‘Lost Crown’ author Jonathan Boakes. The new game engine allows full exploration and movement, letting the player physically interact with the eerie setting and really ‘feel’ the place while using light as your weapon and ally to fight the darkness.

Localized in several languages, World Basketball Manager 2010 allows gamers to take charge and manage basketball teams from all around the world. Gamers have access to over 11,000 basketball players on over 900 teams, and 1,300 managers from nearly 200 countries. Easy to learn and play, WBM 2010 has 95 tournaments to enter with Real Time Matches wth pre-season training centres and Manager Actions which allow for such activities as team promotions to player transfers.

Toronto – Tungle has introduced its Tungle.me software for IBM’s Lotus Notes at the Lotusphere Comes to You conference in Toronto. The application will be introduced and demonstrated on stage today by Tungle CEO Marc Gingras and IBM Software Group Director of Messaging, Ed Brill.

“Tungle for Lotus Notes helped me streamline the maintenance of free time across multiple calendars inside and outside of my company. It helped reduce emails and scheduling conflicts,” said Chris Miller, Director, Connectria, a provider of customized IT services to name brand clients globally. Miller was part of a group who tested a beta version of the software.

Tungle.me makes it easy for people to schedule meetings across organizations, calendar systems and time zones by eliminating costly double bookings and the endless back and forth of finding a time to meet. The addition of Lotus Notes means that Tungle now works with all major business- and consumer-oriented electronic calendar environments, including Lotus Notes, Microsoft Outlook, Google Calendar, Apple iCal, Entourage, and is also available on the iPhone and Blackberry.

“With the introduction of Tungle.me for Lotus Notes, many millions of additional business people around the world can spend more time being productive and less time playing scheduling ping-pong,” said Tungle CEO Marc Gingras.

IBM Lotus Notes collaboration software is available for the full spectrum of proliferating mobile and Web-connected devices such as the Apple iPhone, BlackBerry and Nokia Symbian smartphones, thin clients, laptops and desktops used to access corporate applications and business processes. Lotus Notes is available in a cloud-based version, and also comes bundled with hardware and other offerings via its Lotus Foundations line for mid-sized businesses.

Toronto – WinMagic® Inc. has opened an eStore so that customers can instantly purchase and download standalone SecureDoc products for Microsoft Windows or Mac OS X for $99, a 10 Pack for $945 or a 25 Pack for $2320 as well as a one, two or three year maintenance service packs.

SecureDoc also supports and manages hardware-encrypted disk drives including self-encrypting drives conforming to the Opal standard put forward by the Trusted Computing Group in January 2009, in addition to Seagate® Momentus® FDE drives and encrypted thumb drives from vendors like Ironkey, Sandisk, Kingston, MXI, etc. This provides the flexibility to deploy any combination of hardware and software-based encryption – or transition between the two – with full transparency for users and a consistent management interface for administrators.

Additionally, SecureDoc now supports Intel® Anti-Theft Technology, which is available in select systems with the new 2010 Intel® Core™ processor family. Intel AT acts as a laptop theft deterrence mechanism – enabling organizations to issue a “poison pill” to stolen laptops whether or not they are connected to the internet. When a protected notebook is reported as lost or stolen, Intel AT can remotely disable the computing platform and perform a data-disable function. SecureDoc seamlessly adds full-disk encryption and encryption management to Intel® AT – ensuring data cannot be accessed in the time it takes to report the loss and disable the laptop even if the hard drive is removed and installed on another computer.

Vancouver – Telefilm Canada is pleased to announce that it will present the Show Canada 2010 Closing Gala this evening. This year’s edition of the largest film industry convention in Canada is currently under way in Vancouver. Telefilm Canada, a partner in the success of Canadian cinema, is presenting the Closing Gala to celebrate the country’s film industry and its creators. Well-known Canadian comedian Brent Butt will be host for the evening.

“Show Canada is an important gathering for the Canadian film industry and Telefilm Canada is proud to support this event by presenting the Closing Gala,” said Sheila de La Varende, Director of National and International Business Development, Telefilm Canada. “On top of keeping participants busy with plenty of film screenings, seminars and an awards ceremony, the convention, organized by the Show Canada Committee, provides participants with a venue to discuss major industry issues like social marketing and multi-platform distribution. The Show Canada programme, designed to meet the needs of the Canadian film industry, attracted between 400 and 450 professionals, including studio heads, distributors and movie theatre operators from across the country. The closing ceremony will be the perfect ending to this exceptional event,” she concluded.

Those attending the Closing Gala presented by Telefilm Canada will have the opportunity to preview films scheduled for release this year. Successful 2009 productions, including a number of films that benefited from Telefilm Canada’s support, will be highlighted during the evening.

Quickly emerging as one of Canada’s newest technology companies to watch, Blitware Technologies Inc., is pleased to announce the achievement of a milestone for its popular driver update software, Driver Fetch. In March 2010, over 2 million computer users installed the utility software program, setting a new record for the company, and forging the course for future Blitware products.

Incorporated in late 2008, Blitware is a young software company that has produced four utility software applications since its inception. It’s flagship product, PC Medkit, was launched in the consumer market to help computer users clean, repair, and optimize their PCs while their File Helper software application enables computer users to find and open previously inaccessible files that they had downloaded. Though the company’s other software applications enjoyed strong consumer uptake, Driver Fetch is gaining the attention of the general computing population and experts alike. Designed to assist users in identifying and installing the drivers necessary to run hardware and peripheral devices, Driver Fetch is popular amongst those who expect the best in computer performance as well as those who install new hardware and peripherals. The program’s ability to detect and access drivers even when a computer is not online or cannot access the Internet is unique in the industry and has gained the program significant praise from technology experts.

Riding the success of the Driver Fetch milestone achievement, Blitware is now taking the time to build its online community. Appointing an Online Community Liaison, Blitware is reaching out to its current and future customers through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Flickr in an effort to make their corporate presence known and reach out to those computer users who need assistance with updating drivers, opening files, and optimizing their PCs. Blitware is hard at work on their newest product that promises to be another winner in the utility software sphere and is expected to be released in Summer 2010.

Presagis™ has announced the availability of Terra Vista 6.1.1 with support for OneSAF Terrain Format version 8.0 (OTF-8). This new release provides users with the ability to generate highly detailed and correlated OTF-compliant databases for OneSAF Objective System (OOS) version 4.0 runtime environments.

“With this release of Terra Vista, Presagis continues to deliver on its commitment of supporting key industry standards and to provide our customers with the features and functions they require to create correlated semi-automated forces databases,” said Chris Henderson, Vice President and Product Segment Lead for Visualization & Content Creation Products at Presagis. “Our customers can now create OTF-8 compliant databases using a product that provides the highest level of correlation in more formats than any other terrain generation tool in the industry”.

New to the OTF-8 format is the ability to build OTF databases that are smaller than a GeoTile and contain non-contiguous areas. Terra Vista users will benefit from increased flexibility and time-savings with the new OTF-8 format which enable users to create detailed terrain databases in all pages of a GeoTile when building an OTF database.

Terra Vista also offers users a wide range of methods for implementing Ultra High Resolution Buildings (UHRB) into their OTF-8 database. Users can import geospecific UHRBs modeled from the Creator Building Interior Wizard, or use models generated from other applications, to accurately construct and populate OTF databases with realistic, complex, and accurate Ultra High Resolution Buildings in the OneSAF Objective System.

eBay is celebrating the 10th anniversary of the launch of eBay.ca and a decade of connecting millions of buyers and sellers across the country, helping them to explore opportunities in the world of online commerce. eBay Canada marks the milestone with the induction of Canadians into the eBay Canada Hall of Fame, the launch of a charity auction to benefit Free The Children and awarding prizing worth $5,000 to contest winners. These celebration activities will recognize and reward the more than 11-million Canadians who have benefited from eBay in special and often unique ways over the last 10 years, during which time Canadians have bought more than $7-billion on eBay.ca, leading to a decade of success that would not have been possible without its millions of passionate community members.

“In just 10 years eBay.ca has become an important enabler of small businesses in Canada and the premier online shopping destination for Canadian consumers,” said Andrea Stairs, country manager of eBay Canada. “From a modest start in 2000, eBay.ca has grown tremendously and now helps millions of Canadians to buy and sell online with ease.”

Over the last decade eBay Canada has supported numerous causes and Canadian charities. For its tenth anniversary celebration, eBay.ca will auction off a number of high-profile items where members will have a chance to bid on once-in-a-lifetime experiences benefiting Free The Children. To date, Free The Children has built more than 500 schools, bringing the fundamental right of education to over 50,000 children every day. The auction is live, with a large array of notable experiences up for grabs.

And in the totally cool robots department, The Aeryon Scout, a small man-packable flying robotic system, manufactured by Aeryon Labs of Waterloo, gave law enforcement officers the break they needed in a recent drug bust in Central America. This small, lightweight mini-helicopter that is remote-controlled from the ground by computer was able to provide visual surveillance of a suspected narcotic trafficker’s compound deep in the jungle. The Scout provides the features of larger unmanned aerial systems (UASs) in a small package, at a fraction of the cost.

“This might sound like a plot from a TV show like CSI or 24, but it’s a real-life application of our robotic technology,” said Dave Kroetsch, President of Aeryon Labs. “This is what the Scout was designed for: providing aerial intelligence in settings too challenging or dangerous for humans to venture into.”

Kroetsch said the law enforcement officers took the Aeryon Scout into the jungle, in hostile territory, under the cover of darkness. At first light they cleared a small launch area, took the Scout out of its suitcase-sized case, and snapped it together. Measuring only 80 cm by 80 cm when assembled and weighing just over a kilogram, the Scout was easy to transport. They then set the robot’s target by selecting the location of the drug compound using a touch-screen satellite-map interface on a portable computer tablet. The target location was approximately 1 km from the operator. For security reasons the actual date and location of the operation cannot be publicized.

The Scout, which can quietly travel as far as three kilometres from the operator’s location and up to 500 metres off the ground, is ideal for this type of beyond line-of-sight surveillance as the officers did not need to see the unit to control it. Once at the target location, the Scout’s motion-compensated camera took digital still images and streamed encrypted digital video in real-time to the operator’s computer, with no risk to the investigating officers.

The images enabled the enforcement team to determine the interior layout of the compound, establish what vehicles were inside, identify possible escape routes, and assess what security measures were in place. Most importantly they were able to see a gap in the wire surrounding the compound that was then used as the entry point for the raid. The successful bust resulted in the arrest of the drug gang members. Before the use of the Aeryon Scout, law enforcement officers would typically drive an armoured vehicle through the wall of the compound and face unknown circumstances on the other side.

The drug bust is just one of the scenarios where the Aeryon Scout is useful to police and similar agencies. Easily carried in a backpack, the Aeryon Scout assists with documenting accident scenes, following fleeing suspects, and aiding in search and rescue operations in day or night, especially beyond line-of-sight of the operator. Military units can use it to scope out areas with dangerous or rugged terrain. There are also industrial applications such as inspecting the exterior of buildings or gathering air samples from exhausts and smokestacks.

“The Scout’s low noise, radar, visual and heat signatures make it an ideal platform for covert tactical imagery collection. You can set it up in a couple of minutes out of its case, fly the mission, and be gone without ever alerting the target. And if you can play a simple video game, you can fly the Scout,” said Charles Barlow, President Zariba Security Corporation and former Canadian intelligence officer.

Aeryon Labs designed the Scout system to be easy enough for even non-technical people to use with minimal training. Its on-board computer system supervises all aspects of the mission, allowing the operator to focus on completing a task.

“We’re excited to have developed robotic technology which is practical and affordable for law enforcement, military and security forces, and can save lives. And that’s priceless,” said Kroetsch.

Vancouver

The second event is a virtual event directly from Autodesk. ‘Seize the Opportunity at the Autodesk Virtual Event” is comprised of 3 sessions for Digital Entertainment Creation software including Smoke for Mac OS X along with sessions for building, engineering and more. Please see the event listing at Autodesk for details and registration. This virtual event will run on April 19th from 7am – 2pm Pacific Time.

Toronto – TransGaming, Inc. and Ubisoft®  have collaborated with TransGaming to bring The Settlers 7: Paths to a Kingdom™ video game to Mac® via TransGaming’s Cider Portability Engine. TransGaming, a leading developer of portability technologies for the electronic entertainment industry, brings the Mac version of The Settlers 7 Paths to a Kingdom simultaneously with the PC release to both traditional retailers and online merchants including, GameTreeOnline.com. This new global release extends TransGaming’s partnership with Ubisoft, that includes Prince of Persia® and Shaun White titles, and continues the collaboration of bringing great video game content to the Mac community.

The long-awaited sequel to the award-winning strategy game, The Settlers®: Rise of an Empire, The Settlers 7: Paths to a Kingdom will also offer an exclusive Gold/Collector edition of the game available for purchase via download only. The standard and Gold/Collector editions are available immediately for consumers to purchase and download.

“We are pleased to bring another great Ubisoft game to the Mac, and the simultaneous deployment could only be made possible through our Cider engine,” commented Vikas Gupta, President & CEO of TransGaming, Inc. “Settlers is an award winning franchise, and I’m sure the Mac community will be thrilled to have access to this great new release through both retail channels and GameTreeOnline.com.”

“Ubisoft is excited about the simultaneous multiplatform release of The Settlers 7: Paths to a Kingdom™,” said Carrie Tice, Senior Director of Strategic Sales & Partnerships at Ubisoft. “The partnership with TransGaming to bring our titles to the Mac allows us to expand our business and serve the growing Mac gaming community with new and exciting game releases.”

The standard edition is priced at $49.99 and is available via digital download and at retailers, with the exclusive Gold/Collector edition only available via digital download for $59.99. In addition to the standard edition game play, the Gold/Collector edition provides exclusive unlockable content for consumers, including: one exclusive map, the original soundtrack of the game and additional castle forge elements – including a gate, balcony, bay, gargoyle and two windows – allowing players to customize their castles and make their cities unique

Gormley – Digital Leisure has announced their latest title, Chess Challenge! for the Wii. According to the title’s info page, patience will be key going up against the best players from around the world with Chess Challenge! Perfect your chess skills by playing against the computer in multiple difficulty modes or using the Nintendo ® Wi-Fi Connection service to start climbing the worldwide rankings. Win online matches and even see how your chess rating stacks up against the world by viewing the online Leaderboard.

If you don’t have time to play your friends in a live chess game, Chess Challenge! also lets you play up to five different Wii Friends using WiiConnect24. With full Mii support you can really bring your games to life! Start off practicing on some casual games, and work your way up to fully ELO rated matches. With all of these gameplay options you have some serious chess action awaiting you!

Kitchener – IGLOO Software has announced the availability of free online communities with business-ready solution templates. IGLOO’s free offering is ideal for project teams, SMB’s, not-for-profits and associations.

IGLOO’s online communities offer powerful content management, collaboration and knowledge sharing tools, within one secure, cloud-based social solution. In the free edition, users can experience the benefits of an intuitive, drag-and-drop interface for web publishing and information sharing; Web 2.0 technologies such as wikis, blogs, messaging and forums for collaboration; and personal profiles for social interaction and professional networking.

“Our free version is truly game-changing”, said Dan Latendre, CEO of IGLOO Software. “In this new world of Web 2.0, offering a free version of your software has become a normal course of business,” he added. “But, unlike other free social offerings, our community solutions are focused on the needs of the business user – helping them to identify, connect and leverage the talent, knowledge and relationships that reside in their organization.”

Online communities, powered by IGLOO Software can be up and running in less than 60 seconds. Start from scratch or choose from a collection of preconfigured solution templates:

* Corporate Website
* Intranet/Team Space
* Partner Portal
* Customer Support Site
* Classroom & eLearning

Additional business templates will be available soon, including Project Team, Research Community, Sales & Marketing Community and an Event Site template.

“As with the introduction of any new technology, the smart organization starts small. [Make sure to] carefully define the business issue you want to address and work closely with business leaders in a controlled pilot to ensure that your organization will embrace social technologies,” said Rob Koplowitz, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research.

IGLOO Software also offers a variety of value-added services, optional modules and upgrade features such as: BlackBerry® client to connect a mobile workforce; e-commerce integration to process paid memberships, donations or shopping cart transactions; desktop client integration to improve productivity; custom domain creation to reinforce branding; real-time communications integration with Skype™, Windows Live™ Messenger, Google Talk™ and Yahoo!® Messenger; Salesforce.com integration to improve visibility into sales and marketing metrics for Social CRM; and Microsoft® SharePoint integration to leverage existing infrastructure to access and share existing corporate information.

IGLOO’s free online community edition is available immediately. The free edition is available for the first 25 members with unlimited anonymous users. To upgrade to IGLOO’s Basic Edition for more than 25 members, pricing begins at less than $4/user. There is Enterprise Edition pricing available for large corporations, where entry level support begins at $2,000. There is also a collection of professional services packages to meet the needs of any budget.

Montreal – Ubisoft has unveiled the Assassin’s Creed Personal Space for the PlayStation Network. Available today for $4.99, the Personal Space includes a multi-player tower defense-style game where Assassins will battle Templars along with concept art, the Animus 2.0 database, the full Lineage live action short film and dev blogs.

Ubisoft has also confirmed that Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Conviction™ is on schedule and will be in stores next month. They’ve also released the latest Dev Video, which you can watch below:

Toronto – Leading independent studio E1 Entertainment has signed a long-term distribution agreement with kids production company Amberwood Entertainment. Through the deal, E1 will handle worldwide distribution rights for Amberwood first-run and selected kids catalogue programming, act as the global sales agent for its animated “Rob the Robot” series and secures first-look at all future projects.

Specializing in but not limited to animation, Amberwood creates, develops, finances and produces its properties which are then licensed throughout the world. Amberwood’s portfolio of titles now handled by E1 consists of more than 240 half hours of programming including well-known children’s brands such as “The Secret World of Benjamin Bear” (39 x 30) which is licensed to over 120 territories and currently in production on season 4 (13 x 30); “Rob the Robot” (26 x 30) currently in production, as well as popular library titles including “Zeroman” (13 x 30), “Hoze Houndz” (78 x 30) and “Katie and Orbie” (78 x 30).

“Amberwood is one of Canada’s most prestigious producers of high-quality children and family programming,” said Peter Emerson, President, E1 Television. “This distribution agreement and first look arrangement compliments our overall strategy to grow our global kids business.”

“Amberwood has distributed its productions to over 120 territories worldwide and we are confident that E1 can further this success” stated Jonathan Wiseman, Senior Vice President at Amberwood.

E1 Entertainment has been growing its E1 Kids division by partnering with acclaimed creative talent worldwide to bring award-winning content to life. The deal with Amberwood is in keeping with the company’s strategy to aggressively grow E1 Kids, which has seen tremendous success to-date with properties such as “Peppa Pig” and “Ben and Holly’s Little Kingdom” in the UK and “Majority Rules” in North America. The deal also comes on the heels of an announcement of a kids’ television development deal with legendary rockers KISS.

“Backed by the success of our properties such as Peppa Pig and Ben and Holly, E1 Entertainment is rapidly becoming recognized as a leader in the production and distribution of quality kids programming around the globe,” said Patrice Theroux, President, E1 Filmed Entertainment division. “This deal fulfills several key priorities for our E1 Kids business – it gives us a stronger presence in the Canadian market, creates opportunities for future Canada-UK co-productions, it brings further diversity to our kids programming library and it provides us with an ongoing relationship with an established producer of quality kids programs.”

Montreal – iCongo Inc., a leading provider of e-commerce, multi-channel, order management and marketing systems, announced today the release of M-Commerce as part of its industry renowned E-Commerce Platform. iCongo customers can immediately take advantage of their existing platform to explore the mobile channel.

The addition of mobile technology in the iCongo E-Commerce Platform is a natural next step for a marketplace that is ready to use M-Commerce. “Our customers count on us to help grow their businesses through iCongo’s growing suite of solutions, services and consultative approach to maximizing online revenue. M-Commerce is a growth channel and we want our customers to tap into the benefits early. Consumers expect to buy any product from anywhere and have it fulfilled from any store location, something mobile marketing and a mobile storefront powered by iCongo’s Cross-Channel systems provides. It brings our endless aisle literally to the palms of the consumer.” Stated Steven Kramer, President for iCongo.

Retailers looking to launch mobile storefronts can protect their existing investment, using iCongo’s mobile offering which leverages existing CMS (Content Management System) and marketing tools to push content to a mobile-optimized storefront. In addition, retailers can maintain their PCI compliance across all channels through iCongo’s PCI Compliant multi-channel E-Commerce Platform.

“iCongo’s approach to M-Commerce has been developed in conjunction with our clients feedback and needs in mind,” added Steven Kramer, President for iCongo “As a provider with cross-channel capabilities, the iCongo E-Commerce Platform can take all the benefits already achieved through cross-channel and in-store integration strategies and transfer those same benefits to the mobile channel.”

With iCongo’s E-Commerce Platform including M-Commerce and Cross-Channel, retailers are well positioned to maximize each channel’s potential, meet every customer’s request, in any channel – anywhere and offer all the functionality that will set them apart including anywhere-to-anywhere fulfillment, find it in store, and return/pick-up in store.

Vancouver via GDC

This video supports its showing at this year’s Game Developer Conference in San Francisco, Calif. March 11-13, 2010. As one of the 2010 Independent Game Festival (IGF) finalists (and recognized for its excellence in “Visual Art”), Shank will be on display at the IGF Pavilion during regular Expo Hall hours.

Montreal – Ubisoft has released a new game play trailer for Prince of Persia: Forgotten Sands. In Forgotten Sands, the developers are using the setting to take the Prince back to the roots which were a big part of Sands of Time. Our hero will travel to his older brother Malik’s kingdom, which is under attack by the Sand Army. Those gamers who played Sands of Time will be able to make use of the Prince’s signature moves and acrobatics in The Forgotten Sands. Using the same Anvil Engine which was built for Assassin’s Creed, The Forgotten Sands will feature a rich environment with massive battle scenes. Just from watching the trailer, I know that my Prince character will be facing certain death a good amount of the time, however – The Forgotten Sands looks to me like another beautifully crafted historic time piece with lots of room to explore and details to take in.

Burnaby – Electronic Arts Inc. has announced the all-new Exotic Racing Series pack for Need for Speed SHIFT. On March 18th, gamers will have access to seven phenomenal new cars and an amazing new track in the game. Highlighting this exclusive pack of cars are the McLaren MP4-12C and the legendary BMW M1. Players won’t find more brilliance, innovation, or drama than in these magnificent machines, where each is a potent mix of race car and road car. The Exotic Racing Series pack will be available worldwide on the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system for $10.00 or the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system for $10.00 or 800 Microsoft Points ^{(Xbox LIVE® or PlayStation Network account required)}.

Over 50 exciting new events have also been created specifically for these cars including time challenges, endurance and sprint races. The challenging and spectacular new Riviera track boasts four unique layouts, each with daring corners, multiple blazing straight-aways and a few hairpins that will push these cars to the limit. Players that complete the package will receive an additional 125 Microsoft gamerpoints or 5 PlayStation Trophies as a reward for undertaking various exciting challenges.

The Exotic Racing Series pack cars include:

1. Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione
2. BMW M1 Procar
3. GUMPERT apollo
4. Honda NSX
5. McLaren MP4-12C
6. Maserati GranTurismo S
7. Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Stirling Moss

Need for Speed SHIFT features an intense first-person crash dynamic and a signature cockpit view that delivers a true driver’s experience. The game further personalizes the experience through the all-new driver profile — a unique persona based on the driving skill and style of each player. Need for Speed SHIFT is now available on the PlayStation®3, Xbox 360, PC, PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, mobile and the iPhone™.

Canada – Best Buy will launch the highly anticipated God of War III on Tuesday, March 16, 2010 at midnight openings (12:01 a.m.) at select Best Buy Canada stores nationwide. The first 100 people who purchase God of War III at each of the participating stores hosting a midnight opening will receive a free God of War t-shirt. You can also trade in 2 select games and get God of War III for free from March 16-18, plus you will bet triple Reward Zone points if you purchase the game between March 16-18.

The following locations will be hosting midnight openings for the God of War III release:

1. Cambie – 2220 Cambie Street, Vancouver B.C.
2. Coquitlam – 1135 Pinetree Way, Coquitlam, B.C.
3. South Edmonton – 9931-19 Avenue NW, Edmonton, AB
4. Deerfoot Meadows – Unit 300-8180 11 St. SE, Calgary, AB
5. St. James Street – A-810 St. James Street, Winnipeg, MB
6. Bay and Dundas – 65 Dundas Street West, Toronto, ON
7. Heartland Town Centre – 1-6075 Mavis Road, Mississauga, ON

Edmonton – PureInbox Inc. has released a software suite called Syncamatic™, which is able to sync your contacts, calendar, memopad, tasks and files over the air to your BlackBerry®, Mac or PC.  BlackBerry® users can now synchronize, protect and easily transfer data with their mobile devices without the need for a third party server and the new software interfaces enables users to continue to use applications that they already know such as  Outlook and the BlackBerry® MemoPad and its native address book.

Users can now have their BlackBerry® smartphones’ contacts, calendar, tasks and memo’s in continuous sync. with your office, wirelessly. PureInBox is offering a free 30 day trial for the premium version of Syncamatic, and as an additional bonus, Syncamatic will include a new feature which automatically synchronizes Files. This new feature will enable users to download files to their BlackBerry® smartphones, edit the files and attach these files to emails. If you require your data to be current and in constant synch, Syncamatic is for you! Your data is encrypted and should you lose your smartphone we can reinstall your data on a new phone.

Vancouver -  HootSuite has added Foursquare and MySpace functionality to their social media dashboard. The release comes just in time for SXSW – the massive interactive media, film and music conference in Austin, Texas.

Mayor of the Nest

Foursquare combines way-finding, social marketing and gaming in an addictive mobile app which encourages everyday socialites to “check in” at cafes, bars, conferences, and other locations to alert their friends, share tips and even become “mayor” of a location. Additionally, using HootSuite, travelers can easily follow recommendation from locals when visiting other cities. This location-based tool also creates a unique marketing opportunity for businesses who seek valuable word-of-mouth advertising and endorsements from regular customers.

Bands, Meet Fans

MySpace is the first stop for fans and artists to discover, connect and communicate. Consistently in the top dozen websites, MySpace is home to an abundance of creatives – from bands to filmmakers. With HootSuite, the hundreds of bands playing at SXSW can easily outreach to fans about gig locations, surprise shows and new song releases. Likewise filmmakers can quickly rally attention across networks for screenings and release dates. Fans can also spread the word about noteworthy bands or movies to build buzz – or to just make their friends jealous – all from the HootSuite web dashboard.

Tools for Marketers

Today’s release includes a powerful addition of default settings to custom URL parameters which were added in HootSuite’s “Barn Owl” release (Feb. 15, 2010). This feature helps marketing and customer service teams track campaign results by adding unique referral identifiers. The release also includes a variety of bug fixes and performance enhancements.

Bar-B-Q and Apps in Austin

Following the Android and iPhone App launch on March 2, HootSuite coordinated this release with the 23rd annual SXSW conference – a massive gathering of web tech, media and artists in Austin, TX which frequently acts as a launch pad and test bed for new media products and services. The HootSuite team will be on-the-ground keeping an eye out for users updating Foursquare and MySpace with HootSuite and sharing swag specifically designed for the culture of the conference.

GDC – Palm, Inc. has announced that a public beta version of the Palm® webOS™ Plug-in Development Kit (PDK) is now available at the Palm Developer Center. Palm is demonstrating new games from early PDK developers in its booth at GDC (No. 2016).

The PDK complements the Palm webOS Software Development Kit (SDK), letting developers use C and C++ alongside the web technologies that power the SDK and mix them seamlessly within a single app. The PDK enables new functionality, including immersive 3D graphics, and gives developers who have built games for other platforms an easy way to bring their titles to the webOS platform. Developers can download the beta PDK and start developing today, but distribution of games built with the beta PDK will require functionality provided in an upcoming Palm webOS update.

“Palm webOS is the go-to platform for great games on two of the three leading carrier networks,” said Katie Mitic, senior vice president, Product Marketing, Palm, Inc. “We have both the developer tools and the hardware necessary for a world-class gaming experience, and an impressive portfolio of webOS game titles from top-notch developers to show for it.”

“The Palm webOS PDK is extremely powerful and far-reaching, as evidenced by the number of titles we’ve been able to bring to the webOS platform in a very short time,” said Baudouin Corman, vice president of publishing, Americas, Gameloft. “It’s quite difficult to make a great phone that’s also an outstanding gaming platform; Palm has been successful delivering both.”

Vancouver and New York – 2K Sports announced today they have signed Ryan Kesler, star two-way forward for the Vancouver Canucks® and 2010 Winter Olympics Team USA member, to be featured as the cover athlete and spokesman for their upcoming video game, NHL® 2K11.

“Having the opportunity to participate in the Olympics and play in front of my home crowd was one of the best experiences of my life. To now be chosen as the next cover athlete for NHL 2K11 is another dream come true,” said Kesler, alternate captain for the Vancouver Canucks. “It was awesome to work with 2K Sports last year on the NHL 2K10 commercial shoot and the outdoor motion capture session on the Las Vegas strip was incredible to be a part of. I’m looking forward to having just as much fun again, and helping them make another great hockey game this year.”

Drafted by the Vancouver Canucks in 2003 as the 23rd overall pick in the first round, Kesler has spent his entire five-year NHL career with the Canucks. As a 2009 Selke Trophy finalist, awarded annually to the top defensive player in the league, Kesler has blossomed into one of the most feared and relentless players on the ice. Best known as a two-way forward, Kesler also set personal statistical records last season with 26 goals and 33 assists. He was honored with the Cyclone Taylor award last year as team MVP and has helped to lead the Canucks this year to the top of the Northwest division.

“Ryan is one of the most talented and exciting players to watch in the NHL today and his popularity has grown exponentially since the recent success of Team USA at the Winter Olympics,” said Greg Thomas, senior vice president of sports development for 2K. “We’re thrilled to have him represent NHL 2K11 and wish him the best of luck through the rest of this season.”

Being developed by Visual Concepts, a 2K Sports studio, NHL 2K11 is not yet rated by the ESRB and is scheduled to be available for Wii™ in fall 2010.

Toronto - As part of its ongoing commitment to be the centre of people’s online lives, Yahoo! Canada today announced its partnership with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) to provide hockey fans with live streaming video of the network’s popular CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada broadcasts starting Saturday, March 13 until the 2010 Stanley Cup champions are crowned in June.

For the first time ever, the more than 16 million Canadians who visit Yahoo! Canada every month can access the new CBC & Yahoo! Canada site and catch their favourite hockey teams on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada each week. CBC will be responsible for all sales and marketing initiatives on the new site.

“It’s no secret Canadians love hockey, and as part of the company’s focus on delivering ‘wow’ consumer experiences, Yahoo! Canada wanted to make the experience of watching games even better,” says Gina Cothey, director, audience, Yahoo! Canada. “Hockey fans can watch their favourite teams in action and catch up on all the news and analysis from the hockey world just by visiting Yahoo! Canada. CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada is an important part of Canadian culture, and Yahoo! Canada is excited to partner with the CBC to offer NHL fans this unique online viewing experience.”

“CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada is pleased to be working with Yahoo! Canada on this initiative,” says Scott Moore, executive director, CBC Sports. “Yahoo! Canada provides a unique platform for CBC to extend the best in CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada programming to Canadians. In addition to our complete line-up at CBCSports.ca, we’re ensuring that Canadians can experience Canada’s number one weekly sports program whenever and wherever they choose.”

CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada content featured at Yahoo.cbc.ca will include:

• CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada broadcasts live and on demand
• Hot Stove – Ron MacLean’s second intermission feature focusing on the latest news and developments from around the hockey world
• Coast to Coast – CBC’s expert analysts break down the evening’s action
• Top 5’s – A list of all the top hockey events of the night
• Peter Puck – A 26-part animated series featuring the legendary Peter Puck, focusing on interesting and unique stories of players and remarkable moments in hockey
• The Opens – Popular show openings from CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada broadcasts
• Game In An Hour – Games condensed into an hour-long format
• Player stats and profiles and game highlights

Today’s announcement further reflects Yahoo! Canada’s commitment to bring all the latest sporting news and information to Canadians. During last month’s Games in Vancouver, Yahoo! experts and athletes Elvis Stojko (figure skating), Jennifer Jones (curling) and Ken Daneyko (men’s hockey) provided popular insights and analysis around the competitions and competitors.

Canadians came to Yahoo! Canada Sports in record numbers during the Games in Vancouver, with more than 1.7 million unique visitors during the week of February 15^th to the 21^st alone (comScore Media Metrics), making Yahoo! Canada Sports one of the most visited online destinations during the Games. This represents almost a doubling of the number of unique visitors to Yahoo! Canada Sports in the earlier weeks of February 1^st to the 14^th.

To support the company’s continued focus on hockey, Yahoo! Canada recently hired Sam McCaig, formerly with The Hockey News, into the role as hockey editor where he is responsible for delivering the best hockey content to users for all of North America. Yahoo! Canada Sports will continue to invest in and increase its hockey coverage with a junior hockey site launching in April.

All awards are for work completed in Canada by December 31st 2009. This includes products that were certified gold during the 2009 calendar year. Please note: videogame upgrades, expansions and mission packs are not eligible.

Vancouver – We’d also like to remind  you that the Technology Impact Awards also has a nomination deadline of March 17th. The BCTIA Technology Impact Awards celebrate the successes of our industry and the companies, people and innovation that continue to put British Columbia on the map and who serve as role models for others in our province. The Technology Impact Awards will be presented at the BCTIA dinner on June 8th. The dinner will be held at the Vancouver Convention Centre beginning at 530pm.

Vancouver – Last evening we stopped in at the Masters of Digital Media portfolio presentations, as always we were very impressed with all of the projects going on. The instructors, mentors and administrators at the campus have much to be proud of, and we foresee a very bright future for all of the innovative students in the current class. We invite you to check out the industry projects which we got a look at last night. We were particularly impressed with the innovative eLearning application Wound Care as well as with the Rainforest Project and the Bateman Centre Visualization Project.

Vancouver – Following the portfolio presentation we went over to the Pacific Space Centre to attend the VANarts graduation ceremony. VANarts also has many students to be proud of, as witnessed in the many student reels which were presented for 2D and 3D animation, Visual Effects, Game Art and Design and Digital Photography. We wish the graduating class all the best as they venture out into the wonderful world of digital media.

British Columbia – Are you a BC innovator and/or entrepreneur? Don’t forget to register for New Ventures BC. If you wish to take part in the competition and vie for some pretty hefty prizing, the first deadline is April 19th. There is also a 10-week seminar & networking series which starts on April 6th. These business education seminars are open to anyone, with a registration fee of $20.00 per seminar.

Burnaby – EA has announced that there will be an English-language beta event this weekend for Need For Speed World. The dev team will be playing with their first group of play testers, looking for feedback on player experience as well as important information regarding stability and scalability. According to Senior Producer John Doyle, this beta weekend is the first of many planned events which will involve more teams of (invited) play testers as the dev team looks at more aspects, options and areas of NFS World.

In his community announcement, Doyle also stated that the NFS community is invited “to model a car for launch. We’ve seen some of the amazing work you’ve done with our PC games once they’ve shipped and we’d like to showcase some of that work in World. Our good friends at Porsche have agreed to give players the chance to model the 959 for inclusion in the game and get credit for their creation.” EA will be announcing further details about this model activity at a later date.

Calgary – Ph03nix New Media today announced the availability of a new developer video for their recent addition to the App Store, Hottie Hookups. This humorous, behind the scenes video features Big Stack Studio’s Daniel Kratt and Craig Rushforth, along with the rest of the team, giving insight on their latest project as well as exposing a few their own geeky tendencies.

Along with the developer interview comes gameplay footage of this comical and irreverent title. Viewer beware, there is no shortage of geezers, nerds, and cougars.

Xbox Live has made a change to its Terms of Use and Code of Conduct which effects GamerTag names. According to Marc Whitten, General Manager at Xbox LIVE, these changes “will allow our members to more freely express their race, nationality, religion and sexual orientation in Gamertags and profiles. Under our previous policy, some of these expressions of self-identification were not allowed in Gamertags or profiles to prevent the use of these terms as insults or slurs. However we have since heard feedback from our customers that while the spirit of this approach was genuine, it inadvertently excluded a part of our Xbox LIVE community. This update also comes hand-in-hand with increased stringency and enforcement to prevent the misuse of these terms.” While I personally feel that the gaming community is maturing somewhat in terms of behaviour, there will sadly be those who still feel the need to behave badly in mixed company, and while I feel that these changes are a positive move forward for the XBL community, I hope that those small-minded gamers find it within themselves to overcome their nastiness and evolve into a positive force in the Xbox community.

Quebec – Meridian4 has announce that they have signed a digital publishing agreement with Headup Games to publish their future titles for three years, starting with the turn-based strategy title Future Wars.

“Expanding our well-working and established partnership with Meridian4 to a full portfolio scenario is the next strategic and logical step towards our aim to reach gamers on a worldwide level throughout all retail and media channels. We started strong with the first two titles and are very much looking forward to bringing and creating new franchises together with their very experienced team” said Dieter Schoeller, Managing Director of Headup Games.

“Our initial agreement with them for Greed and Gear Grinder was very successful and we are delighted that we are able to continue to work with Headup Games. Their original and unique titles, such as Future Wars are a great match with our audience. We know that this title will do well and will have a wide appeal to all types of gamers.” said Andy Sher, CEO at Meridian4.

Similar to classic titles such as Advance Wars and Battle Isle, the game takes turn-based strategy gaming away from the micro-management overkill that it has become and using simple, proven rock-paper-scissors principles, reopens the genre to a wider audience.

With a modern 3D engine providing the graphics, a proven, easy to learn, but difficult to master set of rules surrounded by an engaging plot and challenging gameplay, the game will appeal to newcomers and hard-core gamers alike.

Also available is unlimited access and infinite possibilities to mod the game through open data structure, open scripts and an easy-to-use editor.

• Modern 3D graphics & proven gameplay embedded in an engaging and sometimes, humorous plot
• Infinite modding possibilities through open data structure, open scripts and editor
• Novel and unique game modes such as AI vs. AI or play-by-email
• Rock-paper-scissors principle makes Future Wars easy to learn but difficult to master
• In-game achievements encourages replay to acquire top honors

Vancouver

“We’re very delighted to have partnered with Metaboli and to be helping them expand their subscriber base across the globe, especially with their many telecom partners in Europe and GameTap’s service in the United States. There is a strong fit between both companies regarding our culture and goals. Core to both of our company’s philosophies is creating the best experience possible for users playing games online,” says Nick Mellios, CEO of Yummy Interactive.

By integrating the Yummy Games delivery platform and associated APIs into its on demand service platform Metaboli has increased compatibility, download speeds and added more games to deliver exceptional value and ease of use for their customers such as British Telecom and France Telecom, along with their 50+ other white-label services.

Metaboli now offers support for games on 64-bit processors along with Microsoft Windows®7 compatibility. A variety of games will also support mods, patches, and custom maps adding even more value to Metaboli’s services.

“By partnering with Yummy we have been able to make a leap forward in our Games on Demand services. Because Yummy’s solution is so easy to integrate and feature-rich, we have been able to innovate for the next generation of online PC gaming, and we are now even better positioned to take advantage of the paradigm shift to downloadable game content,” said Olivier Decrock, CEO of Metaboli.

Edmonton – Bioware has updated the Dragon Age wiki with new information about Dragon Age: Awakening. Players can get more advance information about the enhancements coming when Awakening is released in two weeks for Mages and Rogues. It appears that there will also be new information coming soon for Warriors, Armour and Weapons, but those pages have not yet been added to the Wiki. In the meantime, here is the latest trailer which introduces Mhairi, one of the newest Grey Warden recruits.

Dragon Age: Awakening, rated M by the ESRB, is scheduled to hit store shelves on March 16th. I have my pre-order in place, have you got yours?

Montreal – The achievements list for Splinter Cell: Conviction has been released on the Xbox360 Achievements site. There will be 45 initial achievements worth a total of 1000 gamer points, with 18 of those achievements listed as Secret. Secret Achievements drive me crazy, because I’m always afraid that I will miss some little clue or pick-up that will unlock the secrets of the Secret Achievements. For the named achievements, it looks like there is a good mix of single player and co-op tasks to complete, so I hope that some of my regular Xbox 360 co-op partners are picking up this title. Part 3 of the Multiplayer video series for Conviction was posted last week on You Tube, so in case any of you missed it, you can watch it here:

Splinter Cell: Conviction is being developed by Ubisoft Montreal and scheduled for release on April 13. This title is rated M by the ESRB.

Toronto – Registration is now open for Canada 3.0 2010, which is taking place in Stratford, ON this coming May 10th & 11th. Early Bird pricing closes on March 19th – attendees can register now for $495.00 + taxes and service charge. After March 19th, registration goes up to $595.00 + taxes and service charge. The Student Rate is $95.00 between now and May 10th.

Vancouver - If you’re like me and couldn’t attend the VX2010 speaker events which were held during the Olympics, you can now listen to the audio recordings on the Vancouver Experience web site. If you haven’t yet had an opportunity to visit the VX2010 showcase, again, the same as me, you’ll be happy to know that the showcase is still open. For more information about visiting the showcase, please check the Showcase Information page.

Vancouver – SoundOfMotion has officially launched AlpineSport – a mobile application for alpine sports: mountain bicycling, snowboarding alpine and cross-country skiing. AlphineSport debuted at the British Columbia Sport Technology and Innovation Show in Vancouver, which was hosted by the Government of British Columbia and the BC Innovation Council. The BC Sport Technology & Innovation Show highlighted home-grown BC sport technologies and innovation to international and domestic business visitors in Vancouver for 2010 Winter Olympic Games Winter Olympic Games.

Alpine sport athletes strive to know their speed or pace, altitude, climb or drop, time and distance and many other performance data to excel in their sports. Recreational alpine enthusiasts are also interested in performance data as well as mapping and sharing routes. Available now on Android Market, AlpineSport users can upload their data to the web portal and share with their friends via Twitter.

The AlpineSport application utilizes the power of smartphones with GPS and accelerometer. It provides sports performance monitoring, tracking, mapping and navigation for alpine sports. The application uses accelerometer to measure cadence in rotations per minute (RPM) for cyclists and strides per minute for cross-country skiers. It calculates G-forces (force of gravity) and air time (zero gravity) for skiers and snowboarders taking a jump.

All performance data, including speed, time, distance, GPS route, cadence, air time, G-force, strides per minute is recorded on the phone’s memory card in a simple CSV file and can be viewed on Google Earth in 3D.

Since the phone’s display is not easily accessible during the ride AplineSport application uses audible feedback for monitoring speed and pace, cadence, strides or air time. Users can record their own sounds and customize application when certain sounds should be played on external speakers or via a headset. By using audible feedback user can know important performance data without looking at the display.

Toronto – Conalgo, the folks who brought Tun3r to the world, have unveiled “Milk Crater” the world’s first real-time audio iPod browser. Unlike other iPod applications (including Apple’s own iPod application), Milk Crater allows the listener to browse an expansive tiled grid of their iTunes cover art. As the listener glides over a particular square, the audio switches in real time to the corresponding audio track. If the user returns to the same spot, she will hear the same track from where she left off.

Because the transitions between songs are seamless and uninterrupted, listeners are able to enter a mental state of “flow” when browsing music. It is this deeper level of immersion while browsing that becomes a new experience unto itself – not unlike creating music.

In order to assist users, Milk Crater also includes search functionality consistent with its ultra-fast interface. It is also simple and fast for the user to add tracks to playlists as they browse. Playlists can be saved for later or even exported.

“I’ve been bringing Milk Crater to parties and get-togethers and am always surprised by the reaction and how quickly people ‘get it.’ It’s been a great icebreaker,” said Neil Hepburn, GM of marketing.

Milk Crater has been translated into eight major languages: English, Chinese, Spanish, Russian, French, Japanese, German, Italian. The is currently on sale in the iTunes App Store for $2.99

Toronto

“It is an honour to receive accolades from such an esteemed group of industry peers,” said Tom McGillis, President, Fresh TV Inc. “I would like to especially thank our amazing team at Fresh TV as these awards embody the team’s continued dedication to creating quality, engaging shows.”

Stoked is an animated situational comedy about teens who come together one summer to work at world renowned Surfer’s Paradise Resort, home of the best surfing in the country. For twelve weeks they will spend their first summer away from home, work hard, and most importantly, have the opportunity to surf on their days off.

The series (26 x 30’) broadcasts Monday-Friday on Cartoon Network in the US and on TELETOON in Canada.

Edmonton – Bioware has released several new screenshots for the upcoming Dragon Age: Origins expansion chapter Awakening. These new images focus on Vigil’s Keep in Amaranthine, which had previously served as the base of operations for the Howe family and their troops. .

Amaranthine was the first of the Fereldan arlings to fall to the Orlesian occupation. As the port city burned, its ruling family, the Howes, fled to the countryside to wage a guerrilla war against the invaders that lasted for generations. No matter how enormous of a bounty the Orlesians promised, they could not rid themselves of the wily Howes and their ever-growing number of sympathizers.

The Howes chose the ancient fortress of Vigil’s Keep as their primary base of operations, hiding the entire rebellion within the vast complex of storage rooms and caves beneath “The Vigil” — right underneath the noses of their oppressors. When the Orlesians were finally ousted, it was at Vigil’s Keep that the flag of Amaranthine was first raised again, amidst cheers of victory. Vigil’s Keep became the new home of the Howes. Following the downfall of the Howes in Origins, Vigil’s Keep and arling of Amaranthine came under the control of the Grey Wardens. If you want to learn more about the rise and fall of the Howes, you’ll have to pick up a copy of Dragon Age: Origins, because I’m not saying anything about how they betrayed their allies and friends.

Bioware has also released a short trailer to introduce of one of the new party NPCs you will meet when you play Dragon Age Awakening, Anders. According to the video’s description, many mages chafe under the Chantrys control, and Anders is no exception. Its a lucky thing that Anders despises blood mages as much as the Chantry does, else he might have been executed as a suspected maleficaru.

Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening will be available for the Xbox 360® videogame and entertainment system, the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system and PC on March 16, 2010. And yes – I have already placed my pre-order. Dragons, magic, spies, blood and gore – too much goodness to miss.

Ottawa – W!LDBRAIN, the award-winning entertainment company and one of the world’s foremost producers of animation, has entered into a partnership with Fuel Industries, the Ottawa-based digital agency and producer of popular interactive brands, including AllGirlArcade.com, to develop television, motion picture, direct-to-consumer platforms and consumer products utilizing the existing popularity of Fuel Industries’ entertainment properties.

“Fuel has a great body of characters and stories with limitless creative possibilities,” said Michael Polis, CEO, Wildbrain. “As a company, we will strategically integrate the proven Fuel Industries branded properties and characters into our studio’s content and distribution businesses. Under this agreement, we are looking at a number of properties that have the potential to become sustainable franchises and growth drivers on a number of media platforms,” he continued.

“Our development deal with W!LDBRAIN, combined with their successful portfolio of world-class animation and family entertainment, is a major step in our company’s efforts to realize the full potential of our

interactive properties,” said Mike Burns, CEO of Fuel Industries. “As a digital agency expanding into an original content creator, we are confident that our expertise in building audiences for brands will continue to generate success for our own IP.”

Current Fuel Entertainment properties in development and/or production at Wildbrain include:

AllGirlArcade.com – A rapidly-expanding tween girl gaming portal and virtual world (Spark City) based on Fuel’s ‘Clik Stars’ property. The property is currently one of the web’s fastest growing girl’s portals, and includes a vibrant social network and a host of original web and mobile games based on the colorful characters.

Fairies and Dragons – A property for kids 6-10 that appeals to both girls and boys through the unique combination of four fairies and their elemental dragon friends into a magical storyline that has already captured hearts across Europe as the world’s first Digital McDonald’s Happy MealTM.

Sideway – A property for teenage boys that captures the art, passion and individuality of the underground graffiti culture that lives within today’s urban youth. Sideway follows the adventures of Noz, a rebellious New York youth, and his mysterious journey through the wacked out realm of Sideway, a two-dimensional world that exists solely on the city’s walls.

Tetsurai – Set in an alternate industrial future of hissing steam and clanking iron, Tetsurai is an engrossing property for teen boys that combines television, an MMO, an arcade fighter and a role-playing game in a dark, sci-fi package.