Hasta La Gadget!

Today was the day that the Wikipad Android gaming tablet was scheduled to launch. Sadly, October 31 is almost gone and there’s still no sign of the rather interesting looking tablet. As it turns out, the Wikipad has been delayed, with the device’s developers issuing a statement to announce that it has been pushed back. Bad news if you were looking forward to it too, as the developers didn’t give a new release date for the Wikipad.

Judging from the statement, it appears that the device itself is mostly ready to go, but the developers want to make some last minute changes to the bundle that will be offered at launch. “The Wikipad team has been relentlessly working with our manufacturers and partners to perfect the Wikipad bundle to ensure our first product is the best tablet and entertainment experience at launch,” the developers said. “There is a last minute opportunity to enhance the Wikipad bundle as well as a minor refinement needed to ensure our first customers are completely satisfied with the Wikipad.”

The Wikipad team says that its retailers have been notified of this delay, and those who pre-ordered will be getting the “refined and updated bundles” that are the cause of the delay. If you pre-ordered the Wikipad, you’ll also be getting a “special bonus gift” for your trouble, but of course the statement doesn’t spill the beans on what that gift is. As stated above, there isn’t a new release date for the Wikipad yet, but the developers say that they’re in the final stretch and will announce a new date soon.

The Wikipad features a NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor running at 1.4GHz, 1GB of RAM, and a 10.1-inch 1280×800 display. It’s being marketed as an Android tablet for gamers, but can it win the gaming masses over? We’ll find out soon enough. Did you pre-order a Wikipad, or do you use another tablet to satisfy your Android gaming itch?

Wikipad hit with a delay on launch day is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Earlier today, we heard that Zynga had laid off a number of workers and had shut down its Boston studio. At the time, those were only reports, but this afternoon Zynga CEO Mark Pincus confirmed the layoffs and the studio closure to employees in an internal letter posted by Joystiq. In the letter, Pincus explains that not only will Zynga be closing its studio in Boston, but also reducing the workforce at its Austin branch.

In all, Zynga will have to layoff 5% of its full time employees. More layoffs may come later on down the road, as Pincus says that executives are proposing the shut down of studios in Japan and the UK. Not only that, but Zynga will be retiring 13 games and “significantly reducing” its investment in The Ville, a game which Electronic Arts is currently suing the company over.

Those 13 games aren’t named in the letter, so it could be any combination of social and mobile games. The fact that Zynga will stop supporting 13 different games and could potentially close down three studios entirely signifies that the company is in a heap of financial trouble, which won’t come as a surprise to a lot of folks.

After all, Zynga has been struggling financially for a while now as its customers move from Facebook to mobile gaming, and tomorrow’s financial report probably isn’t going to bring any good news. Pincus says in his letter that “These reductions, along with our ongoing efforts to implement more stringent budget and resource allocation around new games and partner projects, will improve our profitability and allow us to reinvest in great games and our Zynga network on web and mobile.” Here’s hoping that’s the case, because it’s never good to hear to that people will be losing their jobs.

Zynga confirms layoffs, Boston studio shut down is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Rovio teased a certain film-inspired Angry Birds picture a long, long last week, and as expected, it’s another new game — Angry Birds Star Wars. Our furious feathered friends are assuming the likenesses of characters from the epic saga, with the trusty Red Bird taking on Luke Skywalker’s role. It wouldn’t be the Rebel Alliance without a dark side to fight, which is where the Pigs fit into the storyline; even the music and levels for gravity-based play will hark back to the film franchise. In addition to the software, details of related merchandise have also been uncovered, including table games, toys and costumes. The game is out on November 8th for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Kindle Fire and computers, and if it follows the original storyline, we wonder how Red Bird’s going to feel about his porcine family history.

Continue reading Feel the Force: Angry Birds Star Wars coming November 8th to iOS, Android, WP, Kindle Fire and computers

Filed under: Gaming, Mobile

Feel the Force: Angry Birds Star Wars coming November 8th to iOS, Android, WP, Kindle Fire and computers originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 08 Oct 2012 06:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Joystiq  |  USA Today, Idle Hands blog  | Email this | Comments

Gameloft is certainly no stranger to the high-end mobile gaming scene. They’ve been releasing some of the top games for Android and iOS for a long time and today they’ve just issued a teaser for what could be their best game yet. The popular Modern Combat series is getting its 4th iteration, and the graphics look so good we’re amazed this is for a mobile device. Lets take a peek!

Gameloft has seen huge success on both iOS and Android with Modern Combat, as well as other games such as their acclaimed Asphalt racing series. They recently announced their new Unreal Graphics Engine powered Wild Blood, but this latest game looks even better. All those iPhone 5 owners can get excited knowing this game will look amazing on that 4-inch Retina display.

Impressive right? It certainly leaves you wanting more, that is for sure. I couldn’t help but feel a certain Call of Duty or Black Ops feeling while enjoying the trailer, but either way we still completely enjoyed it. Gameloft has continued to push the edge for mobile games and this looks to be no different.

Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour looks to set the bar for first person shooter games on both iOS and Android if you ask us. Those graphics look impressive for a mobile device, or any device for that matter. While we don’t have any additional details from Gameloft the video does unveil that we can expect to see this epic new FPS hit the iPhone, iPad, and Android this fall.

[via Modern-Combat]

Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour trailer revealed for iPhone, iPad and Android is written by Cory Gunther & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Allow us to introduce you to the JXD S602. It’s a new Android gaming device that comes running Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box, and it’s pretty inexpensive too. It also sports a look that’s quite similar to the PlayStation Portable, which is nothing new – we’ve seen plenty of devices that attempt to “recreate” the look and feel of Sony‘s last-generation handheld, so it isn’t surprising to see another one arrive on the scene

The device comes with a price tag of $66, which signals that there probably isn’t much going on under the hood. Indeed, you’ve got 1 GHz ARM Cortex-A8 processor running the show, working with a PowerVR SGX531 GPU and 512MB of RAM. There’s a 0.3-megapixel camera on board, and 4.3-inch two-point resistive touch screen that displays 480 x 272 resolution. If that resolution isn’t quite your liking, it also comes with an HDMI port so you can play your games on a bigger screen.

Given the set of actual buttons present on the face of this device, you can tell that it’s geared toward Android gaming. The JXD S602 supports button mapping for Android titles, so if you’re looking for a cheap way to play Android games with actual controls instead of touch screen controls, this may not be such a bad choice. Have a look at the video demo below for a better idea of how the JXD S602 plays.

It isn’t a bad looking device, but then again we have Sony to thank for that more than anyone else. At the very least, it should satisfy your gaming needs, but don’t expect to get too much more out of it. The fact that it’s running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich will definitely be appreciated, and when coupled with the low price tag, that might just net JXD some significant sales.

[via Obscure Handhelds]

JXD S602 Android gaming device looks awfully familiar is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.