We say "Tetsuya Nomura", at least a million heads bolt up. We follow that with "talks to" and you know those heads are locked upright for the next thirty minutes. Then we say "Japanese GeMag magazine, as translated by the German Gamefront.de", and zomgz, we got more fun with weblation today. Add the attentive audience, and you know we're in for a roller-coaster ride of crossed "it-said-it-said" interpretations.

Anyway, deep breath, ready for the cold plunge... we may dub 2007 as the "Year of the Nomura" because of five titles Gamefront says GeMag says are on the way from the man: Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix , the PSP Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, the Blu-Ray Final Fantasy VII Advent Children Complete (hey, we said titles, not games), Subarashiki Kono Sekai: It's Wonderful World for the DS, and one other unmentioned title.

The "unmentioned" (or "unmentionable?") most certainly isn't either console Fabula Nova Crystallis title, Final Fantasy XIII or Versus XIII, Gam...

Filed under: Wireless
While we've got both GPS receivers and RFID tags handling very important duties around the world, Fujitsu has gone and unveiled a GPS unit with built-in RFID capabilities to provide the best of both worlds. The Tag Locator V2 sports the locating abilities we've come to know and love, promising accurate longitude / latitude measurements between "three and five meters, and bundles in an active RFID tag that operates on the 429MHz frequency band. Once the GPS receiver beams out the location data, the device then communicates the RFID information via "a unique ID," and can purportedly channel its data to any reader within 200 meters. Designed primarily to provide constant streams of precise data in airports, garages, and other locales that manage a plethora of equipment / vehicles (or lucrative PS3 boxes), the units should hit shipyards soon at ¥20,000 ($169) a pop.

[Via RFID in Japan] 
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BOLD MOVE...

Graphics power and gameplay aside, one point of comparison we've been hearing for the PS3 and Wii are their browsers. With that in mind, AZ central decided to run some tests on what features each browsers had/lacked. Here are the results:

Straight out for the box:The Wii's Opera Beta came out Friday last week, and while it's still going to need some tweaking, it's a good point of comparison to the PS3's relatively fresh browser.
Speed:
The Wii's browser was notedly fast, and allowed for updates like Ajax or Flash. For the net dudes, this means sites like YouTube and maps.google are accessible. The PS3 didn't fare so well in the comparison. They noted that the browser was constantly asking whether the user would like to open other apps (like Javascript).
Interface:
The Wiimote stood out in this test, as its motion controls gave the very familiar feel of a PC's mouse. And while trying to punch in characters with the Wiimote was still slow work, the SIXAXIS w...

Over at Destructoid, Nick Brutal recounts a very weird experience with a Sony representative at his local game store. We're pretty sure that someone's going to get fired very soon over consumer nuttiness like this one.

Here's your backstory: During the days before the PS3 launch, Nick noticed that the demo kiosk for the PS3 was closed in his local EB Games store. According to the clerk there, it was because the darned thing froze up five times in the course of a day, and this was the same day they got the demo unit. Wonderful, right?

Well, a few days back, he revisits that same store to find a Sony representative cleaning the kiosk he was talking about a month back (at least, we all assume it to be, but that's another point entirely). Here's the conversation Nick and Sony Rep had:

"So dude over there," I said pointing to the busy clerk, "says he keeps the kiosk off because it keeps freezing up."

"Nope. No it doesn't."

"Well, actually, yeah....

Apparently the Generation Dream Team (pronounce that with the nasal twang of francais, sil' vous plait) had enough of simply driving the Gran Turismo HD demo around. So they decided to pit it, or at least its visuals, against the real deal to see if the Real Driving Demo can keep up with the real. They took shots of an in-game Ferrari, then took shots of a real-life Ferrari, and...


The tongues of some of the staff have hit the floor, but that's because they're Italian car nuts. And since this writer's more of a Porsche fan himself, well, nuts to that. But the visuals certainly are impressive. It's the shot of the blue Italian horsey that's particularly unnerving - at HD standards, even the CGI people almost look like the real deal, too.

We wonder how much of the PS3's Cellular power the visual engine of the demo's eating.

SportsGamer.com had a chance to interview Jody Kelsey, producer for Sony's MLB Franchise. He talks about the improvements and basically what players can expect from this new installment.

They have made improvements in just about every aspect of the game since they had something better to work with - the PS3's processing power and larger memory. Graphics, animation, gameplay, and artificial intelligence were among the things that were improved.

Players would have the option of being "always online". They can access live data like scores of their fave teams, items, IM, Buddy invites, and game challenges. According to Mr. Kelsey, their "biggest feature this year, by far, is the Online League system". Online play is the front runner of this game, they are even working on a feature that involves the system sending text messages to the player. Players can enjoy head-to-head exhibition games and scheduled league games.

MLB 07 The Show would be released for three...

Tennis was never a QJ writer's strong suit, that's usually why I personally prefer ballroom dancing instead: no hassles with flying objects and the only people screaming are my partners, whose toes I step on repeatedly.

Of course, in this job, we don't always have that choice. We always have to watch our faces and keep training, because we never know when Maria Sharapova can slap us good with that mighty backhand of hers. Worse still, we never know when giant tennis balls are going to come racing down the halls, begging for someone to smite them with a racket.

Oh wait... did I say that out loud?

Anyway, here's the latest trailer for Sega's upcoming smash hit for the Xbox 360, PSP, PC, and PS3, Virtua Tennis 3. Enjoy the video, and be ready for its release in the Q2 of 2007.

Digitimes says Microsoft's plans for producing and upgraded CPU for the Xbox 360 have been pushed back until the middle of 2007. What does this mean to you?
Well, upgrading the CPU from 90nm to 65nm means the processor will run less hot, and will require less power and cooling. This means less fans, less noise, and less power consumption from the console as a whole.
Should you wait until '07 to buy your 360? Only if you're really picky about how much noise the 360 makes in comparison to the PS3 or the Wii. Most of the noise in the earlier units was due to the DVD drive, which was lessened when Microsoft switched manufacturers on those as well. Otherwise feel free to buy a 360 now. It won't be that huge a difference. – Jason Chen
65nm Xbox 360 CPUs delayed until mid-2007 [Digitimes]

Hero gives away PS3 - community gives it back. We got some good stories all the way form Manchester, New Hampshire. First up is Memorial High School senior Nathan Burditt. He camped out for 34 hours to buy a Sony PS3, then he gave the PS3 to be the prize in a fund-raising raffle for the Hudon family.

The Hudons have two kids going to Memorial High School; Stephanie Hudon, a freshman, has bone cancer in her right arm (it has spread to her lungs), and Kevin Hudon, a senior, has Hodgkin's lymphoma (a kind of cancer of the lymph nodes).

When the raffle took place, the winner was Nathan Burditt. Apparently, many people put Nathan Burditt's name on their raffle tickets, probably to reward the local hero for his effort.

You see, decent people still exist.

A group of seventh graders raised US 800. All told, US 21,000 have been raised for the family.

Adam Sandler also gave the family a PS3 (with games), signed DVDs, jerseys, and an autographed "Lon...

Some analysts are predicting the console shortage currently taking over the country may not be letting up anytime soon. Current speculation is suggesting that the lack of available Nintendo Wii and PlaysStation 3 consoles may last until March. It seems the PS3 is a little bit easier to acquire as folks are hitting up the Craigslist trying to swap their PS3s for the more desireable Wii consoles. People are even taking pretty big losses by not wanting any compensation in addition to the Wii for PS3 trade—just a straight up trade.
Regardless of your method of getting a next-gen console—whether it be begging, camping, selling yourself, or stuffing them down your pants—we wish you luck, you will need it for the next few months. – Travis Hudson
Video game console shortage could linger into 07 [Reuters]
PS3s Being Traded For Wiis [GigaGamez]