Microsoft CEO Candidate thinking of Selling Off Xbox, Axing Bing Search?

After guiding Nokia out of choppy waters and into a Microsoft acquisition of its smartphone business, potential CEO candidate Stephen Elop could be mulling some very big changes if he becomes Redmond’s top dog.

Bloomberg reported Friday that former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop may already have some big ideas for running Microsoft, despite the fact that Steve Ballmer is still very much in charge of the company right now.

Elop is widely rumored to be on a short list of potential candidates for Ballmer’s position, and sources “with knowledge of his thinking” claim that the former Nokia CEO could shake up Microsoft in a big way if hired.

For one thing, Elop apparently wants to ramp up Microsoft’s strategy for putting the company’s popular Office productivity suite “on a broad variety of smartphones and tablets,” including iOS and Android. Touch-friendly versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint are already in the works, but Ballmer has made it clear they won’t arrive until after first landing on the company’s Surface tablets.

Those closest to Elop claim that’s only the beginning, with the CEO    candidate considering the sale or shutdown of key Microsoft assets “to sharpen the company’s focus.” The costly Bing search engine is one such service that could get the axe, but Elop apparently feels selling off the company’s thriving Xbox game console business could be another area of interest.

As crazy as that might sound, there could be a method to Elop’s madness: After all, Microsoft clearly has its hands in too many pies at the moment, but that could prove to be a hard habit to break.

 

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How to Upgrade Select PS3 Games to Their PS4 Versions

As announced during PlayStation’s Gamescom press conference, there will be a simple way to upgrade to the PS4 digital version of four select games, for a low discounted price, when you buy the PS3 version of those games. Here are the full specifics so you’re set for November 15th.

Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag, Call of Duty: Ghosts, Watch_Dogs, and Battlefield 4 are the supported titles for this program. When you buy the Blu-ray Disc or digital version of these select PS3 games, for a limited time, you will receive an entitlement to download a PS4 digital copy of the same game from PlayStation Store when it becomes available, at the discounted price of $9.99.

Gamers who purchase a PS3 Blu-ray Disc of these four games will find a code packed into the PS3 version that they can redeem on PlayStation Store. To play the PS4 version of the game when it becomes available, you’ll need to insert the original PS3 disc in your PS4 to activate and play the PS4 version, so hang onto that PS3 disc!

Gamers who purchase the digital version of any of these four games will not need to redeem a code to receive their PS4 versions. When your PS4 arrives, just look for the PS4 version of the game on PlayStation Store – it will appear on PlayStation Store on your PS4 for the discounted price of $9.99. Just purchase it and start playing!

For those of you who purchase the PS3 disc version of the games, you do not need a PS4 system to redeem your code, so feel free to redeem it as soon as you pick up your PS3 copy — you can download your digital copy later when your PS4 arrives.

But don’t wait: This program lasts for a limited time. You’ll need to redeem your code and make the purchase before January 31st, 2014 (for Assassin’s Creed IV and Watch_Dogs), March 28th (for Battlefield 4), or March 31st (for Call of Duty: Ghosts) in order to participate.

 

Disc-Based Step by Step Overview:

Step 1: Disc Only:

• Step 1: Open an account on the PlayStation^®Network (or log in to PlayStation^®Network using your existing PlayStation^®Network ID account).
• Step 2: Select the PlayStation^®Store icon on the PS3™ system home screen.
• Step 3: On PlayStation^®Store, select ‘Redeem Codes’ at the bottom of the menu.
• Step 4: Enter the voucher code (“Code”) exactly as it appears on the voucher.
• Step 5: Once the Code has been entered correctly, select ‘Continue’ on the dialog box.
• Step 6: Select ‘Confirm’ to accept the Terms of Service.
• Step 7: Select ‘Continue’ to complete Code redemption.
• Step 8: The Code redemption is now complete. The Code cannot be used again or associated with a different SEN account. Once you have your PS4™ system, you can proceed with the next step.

Step 2: TO DOWNLOAD PS4™ VERSION OF GAME:

• Step 1: On your PS4™ system, register the PS4™ system with the SEN account through which you redeemed the Code.
• Step 2: Select the PlayStation^®Store icon on the PS4™ system home screen.
• Step 3: Search for the name of the game on PlayStation^®Store and select ‘Purchase’ to download digital version of the same game to your PS4™ system hard drive. The discounted price will be deducted from your network wallet according to the Terms of Service and User Agreement.
• Step 4: Insert the PS3™ game disc into your PS4™ system**.

**PS3™ game disc required to play digital version of the game on your PS4™ system.

See Promotion Restrictions for Each Game.

Digital-Based Step by Step Overview:

Digital Only:

• Step 1: Buy or pre-order* the PS3™ digital version of the game from PlayStation^®Store or Sony Entertainment Network Store.
• Step 2: In PlayStation^®Store or Sony Entertainment Network Store, find the PS4™ digital version of the game as soon as it becomes available. The special price will be available for accounts who purchased the PS3™ Digital version of the game from the PlayStation^®Store.
• Step 3: Buy or pre-order** the PS4™ digital version of the game at the special offer price. See Promotion Restrictions for Each Game.

*PS3™ games are available for purchase, and select PS3™ games are available for pre-order, from PlayStation^®Store on your PS3™ system and Sony Entertainment Network Store on the internet.

**Select PS4™ games will be available for pre-order from PlayStation^®Store on your PS3™ system and Sony Entertainment Network Store on the internet prior to the release of the PS4™ system. PS4™ games will be available for purchase from PlayStation^®Store on your PS4™ system and Sony Entertainment Network Store on the internet after the release of the PS4™ system.

 

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The Elder Scrolls Online “Was Never Planned to Come to Consoles”, Sony Convinced Bethesda to do it

Gamescom award winning The Elder Scrolls Online is set to come out next year on PS4, Xbox One, PC and Mac, but if it wasn’t for the efforts of Sony’s third party relations team, it would have been a PC/Mac exclusive.

Adam Boyes, VP, Publisher & Developer Relations at SCEA, told GameInformer:

Bethesda… cooking up the whole The Elder Scrolls Online deal – that game was never planned to come to consoles and we just kind of kept sitting with them and being like, ‘Why not? PS4′s…’

As we’re sort of disclosing the team and telling them more about the details, I’m like, ‘There’s no reason – I love MMOs and I love The Elder Scrolls.’ So I was like, ‘Why don’t you do this?’ They’re like, ‘We’re not planning it.’ I’m like, ‘Well, what if we built a plan that we could do that?’

Getting that, knowing that a game’s coming to console that was never going to come to consoles, that’s the kind of stuff that is like, “yes!”, you know, hugely awesome.

Of course, with TESO charging $14.99/€12.99/£8.99 a month, whether the game will be a success is up for debate, but at least we now have the choice.

Missing Rayman Legends PS Vita Invasion Mode Content “Will be Added Via a Free Patch, at a Later Date”

When the PlayStation Vita version of Rayman Legends launched it was discovered that there was some missing content when compared to Rayman Legends on consoles.

Addressing the situation, Gary Steinman, Communications Manager, took to the Ubi Blog and offered up the following explanation:

Due to a longer development time than expected, we couldn’t initially include the Invasion Mode – essentially, a second take on existing Rayman Legends maps — in the Vita version of the game. However, we can confirm that the Invasion Mode will be added via a free patch, at a later date.

With more than 100 levels, online Coop and challenges, Kung-Foot mini-game, 5 exclusive touch challenges developed specifically for the VITA and 2 exclusive costumes, Rayman Legends already includes a lot for customers to love, and features the same outstanding graphics and gameplay design as the home console versions.

 

 

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SimCity Mac launch runs into problems

Players complain of inability to install game from Origin, resolution issues, poor performance.

After a prolonged wait, the Mac version of SimCity launched this week only to run into problems reminiscent of those that plagued the PC edition’s launch in March.

EA has prepared an installation FAQ detailing half a dozen different problems that are preventing customers from playing. Some Mac users with an OS set for non-English languages have had problems launching the game, while others can’t install the game as Origin mistakenly believes it’s already installed. Still others are running versions of OSX that are advertised as being supported, but causing problems with the game’s launch. EA’s FAQ has workarounds for some of these issues, but not all.

Getting the game up and running isn’t the only problem Mac users are having. A number of players are also reporting issues with the Mac version’s resolution and performance, saying the game in its current state is unplayable. Others report that they have had better results by booting their machines into Windows and playing the PC version of SimCity.

As of press time, EA had not responded to a request for comment.

When the PC version of the always-online game launched in March, EA’s servers were unable to handle the number of players looking to log on. Unfortunately, without logging on, there was no way for people to actually play the game they had just purchased. The problems with the game lasted for weeks, but didn’t prevent SimCity from going on to sell more than 2 million units. When EA revealed The Sims 4 in May, the announcement specifically mentioned that there would be an offline single-player mode to the game.

 

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