Topic: WildTangent Orb

[idolminds]

What the hell?

Game Developer Conference - WildTangent, Inc., the fastest growing online game property in the world, today announced The WildTangent Orb(TM), the industry's first application to transform the PC into a console for enthusiast gamers. The company also announced that Sierra Online, a division of Vivendi Games, THQ and other leading game publishers will release their AAA titles for the WildTangent Orb when it launches on www.wildtangent.com in April. To support the launch of Orb, Sprint will be the first advertiser to sponsor free premium game play to millions of enthusiast gamers.

The WildTangent Orb will feature the same full-screen user interface and game pad-enabled experience that other leading game consoles offer. Additionally, it will leverage the superior hardware performance and connectivity of the PC, the world's most popular and pervasive online gaming platform.

"The WildTangent Orb turns any modern PC into a full-featured game console more powerful than any next generation game console including the Microsoft XBOX 360, Sony PS3 or Nintendo Wii," said Alex St. John, CEO of WildTangent. "Now enthusiast gamers can download and play popular console games they love on the most ubiquitous gaming device available today: the PC."

St. John today encouraged the nearly 20,000 attendees at the annual Game Developer Conference in San Francisco to follow the lead of THQ and Sierra Online into online game distribution of their AAA console titles.

"Enthusiast gamers are spending a tremendous amount of time playing games on their PCs," said Michael Pachter, managing director of research at Wedbush Morgan Securities. "While traditional consoles will continue to have their place for the foreseeable future, the market has become highly fragmented and modern PCs have the media capabilities and market share to represent the largest contiguous enthusiast gaming audience console publishers can reach."

Starting in April, 12 million WildTangent gamers will be offered a free upgrade to the WildTangent Orb game console, when it will be released publicly for the first time on www.wildtangent.com. In the second half of 2008, WildTangent Orb will come pre-installed on every major-brand consumer PC in the U.S., including HP, Gateway and Toshiba.

"Sierra Online is continuously looking for opportunities to offer its popular and award-winning titles to game enthusiasts in the format they prefer to play them," said Ed Zobrist, president of Sierra Online. "Those who enjoyed playing our AAA tiles on console, as well as PC gamers will be eager to get their hands on some of our most desirable console titles on the PC."

The WildTangent Orb will launch with popular AAA titles from Sierra Online including 3D Ultra(TM) Mini Golf, Assault Heroes(TM), Battlestar Gallactica(TM) and Switchball(TM) as well as popular PC titles from Sierra Entertainment. THQ titles will include Juiced(TM) 2 Hot Import Nights(TM), Company of Heroes®, Company of Heroes® Opposing Fronts(TM), Red Faction®, Red Faction® II, Full Spectrum Warrior®, MX vs. ATV Unleashed(TM), Full Spectrum Warrior Ten Hammers®, Titan Quest(TM), Warhammer® 40,000 Dawn of War Gold and Warhammer® 40,000 Dawn of War Dark Crusade(TM). Also included in Orb will be more than 55 enthusiast titles from THQs Valusoft.

"THQ is committed to making its games available to gamers in the most convenient ways possible including online distribution," said Adrienne Lauer, national sales director of Market Development in the Americas, THQ. "We are excited to make our games available for the WildTangent Orb and offer our AAA games to enthusiast gamers online."

Game developers and publishers interested in making their enthusiast titles available for the April launch of the WildTangent enthusiast game console should e-mail enthusiast@wildtangent.com.

[Pugnate]

WTF?

Why will Company of Heroes be on this??

[scottws]

Yeah I don't get it?  Is it like an emulator?  Is it just a download service?

Several of those games already have PC releases.

I tried to search for more info, but it looks like it was just a press release that almost everyone was posting.  I couldn't really find much out about what it really is.

Edit:  All I found out is that you can pay for the games or instead opt-in to advertising prior to playing the games.

[Pugnate]

Well I think it is basically a competitor for STEAM and Amazon's upcoming gaming service.

[scottws]

I found this.  It seems they are speculating that it's basically a competitor to Gametap.

[scottws]

I think it's funny that they are saying "play it like you play a console" with a gamepad and everything.  Have fun with that gamepad when playing Company of Heroes and Dawn of War.

[Pugnate]

And it isn't like you need this software to use a 360 controller on the PC.

[Cobra951]

That is a company-line press release, meaning it's advertising, meaning there's enough spin there to power everyone's PC for the rest of the century. 

[Pugnate]

 

[Pugnate]

PCGP Episode #121: Over The Line

http://www.pcgamerpodcast.com/

Some of you found the GFW podcast I posted fascinating. Well I think you will find this quite interesting as well. And there is no annoying guest, so I think Que can listen as well. This is basically about the shape PC gaming is taking, and they make a lot of the points that Idol did in another thread.

What I found really interesting, was the whole explanation of the Wild Tangent system that Idol posted about earlier.

Basically you can play a lot of the new games for free after watching a mandatory advertisement, or you can pay  30 cents a gaming session, which isn't bad. If you play it enough times, and the money builds up to retail value, then you own the game and don't have to pay anymore.

Oh and they mail you the DVD of any game you buy, so that's not bad either.

[idolminds]

Hooray, im at the library so i can download this fast. Ill have to give a listen.

[Quemaqua]

Huh... that actually sounds interesting.  I don't know that I'd use it all the time or anything, but it's worth hearing more about, at least.

[MysterD]

Oh and they mail you the DVD of any game you buy, so that's not bad either.

That's awesome.

Valve, take notes please...

[idolminds]

Pug, if you're looking for a good listen, hit up the 1UP Yours GDC podcast with Lorne Lanning. Very interesting stuff (and Lorne seems like a very cool guy).

[Ghandi]

That's an interesting concept. So does watching the advertisement count the same as paying the 30 cents? In other words, do your "free" sessions after watching the advertisement go towards the total of the game or do only your 30 cent purchases go towards the total?

[scottws]

I don't know.  The way it's made to sound: you can either pay to play ad-free or you can watch the ads.

[Pugnate]

What Scottws said.