By Alex Villafania
INQUIRER.net

IF there’s one thing that Xbox 360 owners don’t like to see on their beloved game consoles, it’s the dreaded 3RL, the three red lights that indicate there is a major hardware malfunction. The 3RL has been around since the first batch of the Xbox 360 came out. The most common thread with the 3RL is that the unit, particularly its graphics processing unit (GPU), overheats and would not work until repairs are made. The 3RL is such a big issue that it may be the main reason why wannabe buyers of Microsoft’s gaming machine are holding on to their money, perhaps until better manufacturing processes are put in place so that new batches of Xbox 360s are less prone to hardware failure.

In the Philippines, Xbox 360s outnumbered the PlayStation 3 and the Nintendo Wii but owners often complained about the 3RL. Some early users of the Xbox 360s experienced this mishap with a few sometimes buying a new Xbox 360 just to replace the dead one.

However, a few enterprising electricians have learned of a potentially huge market for Xbox 360 repairs and have taken it upon themselves learn the innards of the game console and see if they can resurrect a dead and expensive device. Ronald Caleb San Pedro is but one of them and so far, he’s making some positive rounds among the community of Xbox 360 owners, especially with members of the local forum PinoyXbox.com. San Pedro, who is just barely out of his teens, said the Xbox 360 repair business was huge enough to convince him to provide repair services — even if he has never opened any game console before.

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By Relly Carpio
INQUIRER.net

HUSBAND and wife gamers and bloggers Philip and Joanne Ortiz recently had their blog Third World Gamer added to the official communities recognized by Xbox.com.

Xbox Singapore held a promo last month looking for “Friends of Xbox,” bloggers who talk about the Xbox and their experiences with it. Philip Ortiz’s blog was one of those chosen by Xbox Singapore, and is now linked within the communities.

“I tried it, knowing that there are other blogs out there that are better than mine. So I was pleasantly surprised when mine was one of
those chosen,” he said.

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By Alex Villafania
INQUIRER.net

WHEN it comes to game complexity, developer Ubisoft almost always lands on top of the list. Nearly all its action-oriented games require a considerable learning curve just to get through the controls. This is common in its Splinter Cell and Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter series wherein every aspect of the Xbox 360 controller is used. Nonetheless, these controls become essential to the entire gameplay. The company’s latest game is Assassin’s Creed (designed by no other than my favorite game developer, Jade Raymond), which melds together a lot of gameplay elements from Splinter Cell, God of War, Elder Scrolls, and Prince of Persia.

Just as the gameplay is complex, so is the storyline; the plot is set somewhere near the future. Desmond Miles is a bartender but is a direct descendant of a long line of assassins from the days of the historic Crusades nearly 1,000 years ago. Miles is kidnapped and experimented upon by scientists of the Abstergo Industries, which has a machine called the Animus that pulls out memories of long-since dead people as long as their DNA structure remains intact with their descendants. Desmond holds the memories of Altair, one of the Assassins who knew the location of the “Piece of Eden,” which seems to be an artifact that can cause mass hypnosis. Abstergo scientists want this artifact. In between the plot, as they say, thickens and the player might get confused with the integrated story between Altair and Miles. The story, while linear, is so complex that players can start their adventures just about anywhere in the map and still be able to continue the story.

More than 90 percent of the action happens during Miles’ usage of the Animus. The player/Miles becomes the Assassin Altair upon entering into a dream-like state then the adventure begins. The world is set in the year 1191 during the Third Crusade that saw the war between the real-life King Richard the Lionheart and the Muslim warrior-king Saladin. While the two kings battle it out, the secret society of the Assassins are facing off against the Templar Knights. Altair, having failed to kill the Templar Knight Grand Master, is stripped of his weapons and skills by the Assassins’ leader Al Mualim. As such the player will have to complete tasks set upon Al Mualim to recover parts of his skills and weapons. Likewise, the missions will lead to the discovery of the “Piece of Eden” as well as a conspiracy set by Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. The plot can be likened to a video game version of a Tom Clancy novel and is surprisingly well implemented in a video game.

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By Alex Villafania, hackenslash Reporter
INQUIRER.net

YOUR Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wiis are environmentally poisonous. So says the latest review of electronic waste by environmental advocacy group Greenpeace.

The latest Guide to Greener Electronics by Greenpeace has rated console makers for the first time since the quarterly report started about a year ago. It also included LCD TVs, which are fast replacing old CRT monitors as the display panels of choice.

The game console business is also one of the reasons more consumers are buying LCD TVs.

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By Alex Villafania, hackenslash Reporter
INQUIRER.net

FILIPINO game development firm Anino Games said it has put on hold the development of what could have been its first console game called Project Phoenix.

Anino announced in January this year the development of Project Phoenix and showed an alpha version of the game to hackenslash. The game was originally intended for the Microsoft Xbox 360 but could eventually be ported to the Sony PlayStation 3.

In an e-mail response to hackenslash, Anino senior producer Paraluman Cruz stressed that Project Phoenix was put on hold as they “pursue other platforms.”

“Our end goal is to make next-generation games, but to get there we realized we need to build up our portfolio on current-generation platforms (PC and recently the Nintendo DS); these platforms will give us the experience and credibility we need to make our dream [of a] next-gen game,” Cruz said.

Project Phoenix is a third-person action-adventure shooter with a female character. The setting is a sort of cyber-punk megacity under threat from underground hackers.