Ubisoft launches Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Commander game on Facebook

0

Today, Ubisoft announced that Tom Clancy’s Ghost ReconCommander, an isometric tactical combat game, is now available to play on Facebook.

equip ghost

Brenda Garno Brathwaite, Loot Drop’s cofounder and lead game designer, has created features that both hard-core and social game players can enjoy. Hard-core gamers will appreciate the beautiful graphics, tactical gameplay and faithful translation of the Ghost Recon franchise to the Facebook platform. Facebook and other casual game players will like the approachable dynamic combat system and the ability to start and stop the game at their convenience without penalty.  Ghost Recon Commander also features 10 replayable missions, three difficulty levels and dozens of weapons for players to choose from to help them win their missions.  These features help make Ghost Recon Commander fun for all types of gamers.

“We are taking the popular Ghost Recon franchise and bringing it to platforms that allow players of all skill levels to enjoy at their leisure, on the platform of their choosing,” said Chris Early, vice president of digital publishing at Ubisoft. “This is the basis of our companion gaming strategy that Ghost Recon Commander exemplifies so well.”

“As a longtime fan of the Ghost Recon franchise, I wanted to make a game that would appeal to me both as a fan and a gamer,” said Brenda Garno Brathwaite, lead game designer and cofounder of Loot Drop. “Ghost Recon Commander highlights the tactical gameplay that fans of the series will enjoy in a social environment that’s accessible to all types of gamers.”

aim grenade base

In Ghost Recon Commander, players will be able to develop their own “Ghost,” an elite Special Forces operator utilizing stealth, firepower and exciting near-future technology to take command of the battlefield against impossible odds.

Other features in Ghost Recon Commander include:

· Gamer-on-the-Go: Players have the ability to pick up where they left off in Ghost Recon Commander; it doesn’t matter if they’ve been away from the game for a day or for an hour, time is not a constraint.

· Customization: Ghosts can be upgraded and customized with state-of-the-art weaponry, armor and near-future gadgets.

· Asynchronous Co-op: Players will be able to have friends join them on missions or offer themselves up as a mercenary for hire.

double kill prison market

Ghost Recon Commander can be played as a stand-alone game or played to tie into the overall Ghost Recon universe. Following Ubisoft’s companion gaming strategy, players are encouraged to play the game alongside Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Future Soldier™, available on consoles May 25th, and Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon® Online, available later this year. By playing Ghost Recon Commander, players will be able to unlock exclusive weapons, weapon skins and bonuses to use while playing Ghost Recon: Future Soldier and Ghost Recon Online. Ghost Recon Commander players can also gain benefits, such as exclusive characters, by playing Ghost Recon: Future Soldier.

prison guard prison save the hostage

Ghost Recon Commander is available to play for free worldwide on Facebook at: apps.facebook.com/GhostReconCommander/

rodgers field rodgers killstat card Store - scarfs

Have you played it yet?

Microsoft Research Launches Experimental Social Networking Site

0

Microsoft Research has launched SO.CL, a new social networking site.  We have details!

socl

Microsoft Research launched a new social networking site called SO.Cl recently.  What is it, you ask?  Well, it centered on Bing searches and allows you to share your searches with friends, get their comments, conduct video chats and otherwise collaborate in ways familiar to users of Facebook, PinInterest and Google +.  Here is a video from Microsoft that shows the main points.

Microsoft Research has a webpage up that talks about the service.  Here how they describe it.

Share Your Search

With So.cl you can share your search and help others discover what they might be looking for. Fun commentary & discussions usually follow.

Discover New Interests

What are you interested in? At So.cl you can find new interests and connect with like-minded people. The topics you care about are waiting for you.

Start a Video Party

Doing things with others is a fun part of So.cl. Start a video party on any topic and chat with your friends.

You need to apply for the service, and I did that…once I have access, I’ll bring you more details.  In the meantime, head on over to the website and sign up for notifications.

SO.CL Website

Waterstones Book Shop to sell the Amazon Kindle

It was announced today that Waterstones, a large book retailer here in the UK will start selling the Amazon Kindle.

Kindle

Waterstones said:

The agreement with Amazon will enable Waterstones to extend first class digital reading to its customers in-store. This will complement and strengthen the traditional attributes of the bookshops to which the company remains fundamentally committed.

The digital initiatives will build on the UK group’s on-going investment plan to upgrade its 30-year-old retail chain. This incorporates a major refurbishment programme and other innovations including dedicated digital areas, free wi-fi access and new coffee shops, all planned for 2012.

Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com Founder and CEO, said: “Waterstones is the premier high street bookseller and is passionate about books and readers – a dedication that we share deeply. We could never hope for a better partner to bring together digital reading and the physical bookstore.”

Further details will be announced in the Autumn. Commercial terms of the partnership have not been disclosed.

Official teaser trailer for new James Bond film Skyfall released

If you are a James Bond fan you will probably be looking forward to the new movie Skyfall. Today saw the first official teaser trailer released!

Skyfall

Skyfall will be released in UK cinemas on 26 October and in November in the US. Daniel Craig returns as 007 and this one is directed by Sam Mendes.

Here is the trailer:

AWIECO Ivy Bridge Sever Pre-order Special

If you pre-order an AWIECO Ivy Bridge Server today you can get a discount of 50 Euro!

UWHS-Review---AWIECO-Windows-Home-Se[2]

This is what AWIECO told us:

We updated our server models. Powered by the latest 3rd generation Intel Ivy Bridge processors, they are more powerful with less power consumption. The Ivy servers will be available in June. If you pre-order one of our Ivy models: HS-Pro, BS-Pro or PowerServer in May, you will get 50,- Euro off!

Just enter the coupon code: IVY2012 in the shopping cart!

Check out our Exclusive Review of the AWIECO Windows Home Server Visit the AWIECO shop today

Microsofts talks about multiple monitors in Windows 8

In the next of their Windows 8 articles, Microsoft talks about the use of multiple monitors to enhance the user experience.

monitors

This is how the next article starts:

Connecting multiple monitors to a PC is one of the easiest ways to enhance your Windows experience. Plug in a second monitor and you instantly double your working surface. I’ve had a multi-monitor setup for the past 10 years; once you start using multiple monitors, you’ll never want to go back to your old setup. A multi-monitor setup allows you to be more productive by having more windows across multiple screens. We’re very excited about the ease at which tablets in Windows 8 will be able to support large screen and high resolution monitors (often through HDMI connectors), as this opens up a broad range of exciting new scenarios.

When we embarked on planning Windows 8, enhancing multi-monitor functionality was an important area to improve. A multiple monitor setup is certainly more common today than they used to be, and many technical professionals (developers, graphics professionals, architects, etc.) have started using it. Today, support for multiple monitors is standard on virtually all PC hardware, and monitor prices are at an all-time low (as of writing this post, you can purchase a 21” LED display in the $140 USD range). As a result, we continue to see increased adoption of multi-monitor configurations, both by enthusiasts and technical professionals.

Data collected through the Windows Feedback Program indicates that approximately 14% of desktop PCs and approximately 5% of laptop PCs have run with multiple monitors. It is important to note that this particular opt-in data set is enthusiast-leaning so represents the high end of usage (relative to previously shared measures that look at the entire universe of PCs), but we thought we would share this data set to reinforce another data source.

To continue reading, click here.

Microsoft launches Kinect for Windows SDK version 1.5

A couple of months ago we told you about Kinect for Windows version 1.5, and today Microsoft have released it.

kinect

This is part of what Microsoft posted today:

I am pleased to announce that today we have released version 1.5 of the Kinect for Windows runtime and SDK.  Additionally, Kinect for Windows hardware is now available in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan. Starting next month, Kinect for Windows hardware will be available in 15 additional countries: Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, India, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates. When this wave of expansion is complete, Kinect for Windows will be available in 31 countries around the world.  Go to our Kinect for Windows website to find a reseller in your region.

We have added more capabilities to help developers build amazing applications, including:

  • Kinect Studio, our new tool which allows developers to record and play back Kinect data, dramatically shortening and simplifying the development lifecycle of a Kinect application. Now a developer writing a Kinect for Windows application can record clips of users in the application’s target environment and then replay those clips at a later time for testing and further development.
  • A set of Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) to guide developers on best practices for the creation of Natural User Interfaces using Kinect.
  • The Face Tracking SDK, which provides a real-time 3D mesh of facial features—tracking the head position, location of eyebrows, shape of the mouth, etc.
  • Significant sample code additions and improvements.  There are many new samples in both C++ and C#, plus a “Basics” series of samples with language coverage in C++, C#, and Visual Basic.
  • SDK documentation improvements, including new resources as well as migration of documentation to MSDN for easier discoverability and real-time updates.

To read the rest, click here.

Skype for iPhone and iPad Updated to version 4.0.1325

0

The Skype app for the iPhone and iPad has been updated to version 4.0.1325.

skype-for-iphone-hero-2_thumb1_thumb[1]

What’s New in Version 4.0.1325

– Improved stability.
– Fix for sign in error.

Download now from the Apple App Store

BYOB Podcast Episode 86 Out Now

0

The guys over at the BYOB podcast, including our very own Tim Daleo have just released episode 86.

BYOB300_thumb_thumb_thumb

Here is what is included in this weeks show:

[box style=”rounded” border=”full”]Short show this week, but we pack it full of hardware info. PCs on a Stick, AMD Trinity update, nVidia releases the GTX 670 Kepler GPU, Dirt cheap hi-res monitors? Server issues all around, Mike & Mike talk about their hard drive server issues on this weeks BYOB Podcast.[/box]

As usual you can listen to the show from here.

Eben Upton talks about Raspberry Pi

Over the last couple of months we have had the pleasure of seeing and talking to Eben and Liz Upton about Raspberry Pi. Here are the videos we shot of Eben talking about the Pi at some recent events.

CDW---The-Beeb--30-Event-037_thumb1_

The first video was taken at the Beeb @ 30 Event:

This second video was taken at the Sci Fi London Horizons Event:

Have you ordered one? Let us know if you get yours before us, or even after us.

Mine has finally been ordered and should be here in a few weeks time!

ZOTAC announces ZOTAC GeForce GT 630, GT 620 and GT 610 series graphics cards

0

ZOTAC this week expanded the successful ZOTAC GeForce 600 series with new value offerings. The ZOTAC GeForce GT 630, GT 620 and GT 610 series deliver a savoury taste of Microsoft DirectX 11 technologies for an outstanding visual computing experience.

ZT-60405-10L_image1

“ZOTAC is pleased to bring the GeForce 600 series to value shoppers seeking a superior visual experience discrete graphics brings to computing,” said Carsten Berger, marketing director, ZOTAC International. “By installing one of our ZOTAC GeForce GT 630, GT 620 or GT 610 series graphics cards, users can experience faster video and image processing and perfect high-definition video playback with a simple upgrade.”

The ZOTAC GeForce GT 630, GT 620 and GT 610 series are available in a variety configurations with 512MB, 1GB, 2GB and 4GB memory options in PCI Express 2.0 x16, PCI Express x1 or PCI interfaces, and active or passive cooling configurations to cater exclusively to all user computing needs.

General details

· ZOTAC Expands successful GeForce 600 series

· ZOTAC GeForce®GT 630 series

o 96 processor cores

o 1GB, 2GB and 4GB memory configurations

o 128-bit memory interface

· ZOTAC GeForce GT 620 series

o 96 processor cores

o 1GB & 2GB memory configurations

o 64-bit memory interface

· ZOTAC GeForce GT 610 series

o 48 processor cores

o 512MB, 1GB & 2GB memory configurations

o 64-bit memory interface

· NVIDIA 3D Vision capable

· NVIDIA Adaptive Vertical Sync

· DirectX11 technology & Shader Model 5.0

· OpenGL 4.2 compatible

· Hardware-accelerated Full HD video playback

· Blu-ray 3D ready

· Loss-less audio bitstream capable

ZT-60405-10L_image3ZT-60405-10L_image4

Learn more from the Zotac website

New Sony VAIO S Series notebooks pictures and hands-on

2

Earlier this week we told you that Sony had announced it’s new S Series range. Well we got to see them up close and personal and get some hands-on time with it.

CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 6

The new Sony VAIO S Series of notebooks is designed for both power and portability

It has a backlit keyboard which makes it easier to use in low-light situations.

All of the new Sony VAIO range has hibernation features, and the S series can maintain hibernation for up to 90 days!

CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 4 CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 7CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 8 CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 9CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 11 CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 12CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 13 CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 14CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 3 CDW Sony VAIO S Series notebook - 5

All S series VAIO’s come with a full copy of Adobe Acrobat X, plus a 1 year anti-theft service.

There is even a dock for the S series that has a built in hard drive so that all your important data is automatically backed up whenever you dock it.

Considering there is a 17” version of the S series notebook it is still quite portable!

The screen is excellent and you even get a Blu-Ray drive.

Price wise, the S Series starts from around £654 for the base model and there are a lot of different configurations to choose from!

Learn more about the Sony VAIO S Series notebook range from here Check out our pictures and hands-on with the VAIO T13 Ultrabook

New Sony VAIO E Series notebooks pictures and hands-on

0

Earlier this week we told you that Sony was expanding it’s E Series range. Well we got to see them up close and personal and get some hands-on time with it.

CDW Sony VAIO E Series notebook - 5

The VAIO E Series 15 teams fresh, individual looks with everything you need for everyday tasks. With Intel processors, generous storage, smooth graphics and clear, high-contrast 15.5” VAIO Display, there’s all the power you need to breeze through the day.

Boasting a 17.3” VAIO Display Plus Full HD on selected models, the VAIO E Series 17 gives you extra screen space to enjoy movies on Blu-ray Disc (on selected models), edit photos or play games.

The E Series is Sony’s most popular range and comes in either 14, 15 or 17” variants and a wide variety of colours.

The E14 comes with a full version of Adobe Photoshop Elements where as the E17 comes with Sony Vegas.

The E series has a wrap-around look to it and felt very natural to use and the 17” screen was very bright and clear with it’s 1600 x 900 ratio.

CDW Sony VAIO E Series notebook - 1 CDW Sony VAIO E Series notebook - 2CDW Sony VAIO E Series notebook - 3 CDW Sony VAIO E Series notebook - 6

Price wise, the E Series starts from around £409 for the base model and there are a lot of different configurations to choose from!

Learn more about the VAIO E Series from here Check out our pictures and hands-on with the VAIO T13 Ultrabook