Microsoft News, Microsoft Features

Microsoft trademarks new name.

Those beady-eyed folks at Siliconera are reporting that Microsoft has registered a new trademark with the United States Patent & Trademark Office. The new mark that Microsoft wants to protect, is "Forzavista", according to a filing made on May 15th. Obviously, nothing more is known about this as yet, but could it...

Pre-E3, as usual.

Put it in the books, for Microsoft's E3 conference - where they've promised us a shedload of games - will take place on June 10th, the day before E3's doors officially open. Neowin reports that the company have booked the Galen Center in Los Angeles once again for the show, and after all the excitement of their next-generation...

Lara down to second place

Gears of War: Judgment has taken the top spot in the UK All Formats Chart, marking the end of Lara Croft's two-week reign at the top, and presenting Microsoft with their first top billing of the year. After a 44% drop in sales week-on-week, Tomb Raider slips to second position, ahead of another new entry in the form of...

Pulp leads the way for Microsoft's media strategy...

Xbox is following in the footsteps of Netflix by distributing exclusive content over Xbox Live. British independent film, Pulp, will make its debut on Microsoft’s platform, with a Microsoft spokesperson informing the BBC that the company plans to secure more deals of this nature in the future...

281k Units Shifted in January

Microsoft are celebrating the announcement of yesterday's US console sales numbers by NPD. Well, they're still celebrating, we should say. The numbers reveal that the Redmond-based giant shifted 281,000 Xbox 360 consoles in January in the States, which keeps them on top of the tree for the 25th consecutive month. The...

Spellbinding.

KINECTaku and Microsoft have teamed up to provide a boomer of a competition for you this holiday season. We're giving away an electric blue custom Fable: The Journey Xbox 360 console, complete with Kinect, Kinect Adventures!, a copy of Fable: The Journey, and a copy of Christie Golden's new novel - Fable: Edge of the World. Not only...

Seven year wait almost over.

Microsoft has announced that they'll be releasing the Xbox 360 in Isreal on the 21st of November. At the company's "Discovery" conference in Tel Aviv yesterday, Master Chief was on hand to confirm that the system will launch complete with Hebrew language support, local currency support, Xbox Live, and Kinect. The Kinect...

Oh, and it's got dancing

Kinect Star Wars is just a few weeks away — yes, really — and Microsoft is launching its final (rebel) assault on your senses to convince you to purchase its biggest Kinect title. What began life as an intriguing Jedi simulator has since grown to include pod-racing and, er, dancing, aiming to be all things to all Star...

Phil Harrison will lead the way

Microsoft has announced that former Sony man Phil Harrison has joined the company as corporate vice president, with the aim of growing the company's European business in the coming years. With Xbox 360 and Kinect, as well as a rumoured new console on the way, there's plenty of work for Harrison to do. The full press...

From Iron Galaxy

Wreckateer is a new Kinect-exclusive game heading to Xbox Live Arcade later this year. A physics-based score attack game, according to our friends at Eurogamer.net, the game is "highly reminiscent of Angry Birds" — players use a catapult to lob iron balls to destroy castles. The castles aren't occupied by green pigs —...

Xbox.com at work again

Oh, Xbox.com, you do make our job easier. Last year you leaked the entire of Microsoft's E3 line-up; this year you've leaked a release date for Fable: The Journey. According to the information you posted earlier — since removed, naturally — the Kinect-powered adventure will land on 4th September. Microsoft held an...

$4.24bn for the past quarter

Strong sales of the Xbox 360 helped Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices Division to record quarterly sales of $4.24 billion over the past quarter. The division made a profit of $530m, a drop of 28% over the previous year. Xbox shipments rose to 8.2m, up from 6.3m in the previous year. To date, Microsoft has sold 66m...

Is nothing sacred?

Kinect does some things very well — dancing, for instance. That's why there are 13 Kinect dancing games out now, but the genre's seeping into other games: games we thought were safe from move-busting. Games like Kinect Star Wars. The ESRB has rated the game and revealed it now includes dancing tournaments alongside the...

Can you hit the bullseye?

Microsoft is giving UK gamers the chance to put their darts skills on the line with a new Kinect Sports: Season Two competition. To enter, download the free Kinect Sports darts Gamerpic before Sunday 18th December and play a single-player darts match on Live between 1pm and 5pm on 7th or 8th January. Three players will be...

Interested? Read on

Microsoft's eagerness to spread The Kinect Effect continues apace with a brand new incentive for development studios. Called The Kinect Accelerator — exciting names obviously a key focus at Microsoft these days — the programme is offering $20,000 to "entrepreneurs, engineers and innovators" to help develop the next...

Another gadget revealed

Kinect Fun Labs has already offered some fun add-ons but not everyone's happy to pay for gadgets. That's why it's good news that Microsoft's going to give you another free activity soon with Battle Stuff on the way later this month. The add-on is released on 28th November and won't cost you a single penny. Interestingly the...

Who knew?

Want to know what good kids' games are available for Kinect? Other than the fact you've come to the right place, Microsoft has put out a video showing exactly how much fun child actors can have when playing on Kinect. The video below shows some of the available and upcoming games for Kinect that young ones of all ages should enjoy, from...

Let's find out

We're not far away from Kinect Sports: Season Two, and Microsoft is getting ready to compete for the family game top spot in the charts. Microsoft UK is about to embark on a high-profile advertising campaign for the game, highlighting its new sports not included in last year's original, as well as some of its new uses of Kinect...

Starts next week

If you haven't had chance to try out Kinect yet, or want to see some of the latest games on the way, Microsoft's UK division is bringing it to you with a new tour that kicks off on 29th September. The tour, named Your Kinect Experience, starts next week at the Metro Centre in Gateshead, before taking in London and Birmingham's...