Thanks to IGN Pocket for its discussion of a recent Famitsu-sourced Japanese magazine article quizzing readers and game creators about their impressions of the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP handheld consoles. In a reader survey, it's revealed that "14.8% checked that they'd like to purchase a PSP, compared to 11.8% who checked that they'd like to purchase DS... 7.1% stated that they think the PSP's design is cool while just 2.3% stated the same for the DS." It also polled developers and industry figures on questions such as "Which design do you like better?" ("PSP = 251, DS = 42"), and "Which do you want to be left standing in the end?" ("PSP = 84, DS = 156".) Which handheld do you want to be left standing?

Comte writes "About three hundred charter members, local sci-fi cognoscenti and assorted geeks got a sneak peek last night of Paul Allen's $22 mm Science Fiction Museum prior to its official grand opening this Friday." Comte peeked, and contributes his impressions of the museum -- read on below to see what it's like. If you're in Seattle with a few hours, he says it's worth dropping in. (The rest of the text is his.)

bluethundr writes "The Register has posted a story indicating that Sony will ship the new PSX models on July 1 (Japan first, Europe to follow, then - eventually released to us Yanks?) following the company's move to suspend production of the original model of PlayStation 2/digital video recorder hybrid, earlier this year. Apparently: 'The new models, the DESR-5100 and DESR-7100, offer the same storage capacity - 160GB and 250GB, respectively - as their predecessors, the DESR-5000 and DESR- 7000. What's changed is the introduction of a better graphical user interface and the ability to add DVD-style menus to content copied from the unit's hard drive to a DVD-R, DVD-RW or DVD+RW disc.' Sony also appears to have added a range of extra video recording modes to maximise the amount of programming that can be stored on the PSX's hard drive."

Moryath writes "The fine folks at Glide Underground look like they've started a new weekly column - and for their opening run, they tackled the question of whether movie-licensed games are in fact cursed or not. Apparently it was in honor of too many reviewers picking up the new Chronicles of Riddick title, and proclaiming boldly that the game broke some curse - 'movie video games suck, it doesn't suck but it's a movie game, ergo curse broken.' Quite an interesting read, going back all the way to the days of Atari 2600 to examine the history of movie-licensed games."

Thanks to Edge Magazine for confirmation, in its July issue, that the Eidos console FPS Snowblind, shown at E3, "was originally designed to be a spin-off from [Deus Ex], but has since gone its own way." The IGN PS2 product page for Snowblind also backs up this little-reported fact, following previous Slashdot Games news discussing the cyberpunk-influenced PS2/Xbox title, then called Deus Ex: Clan Wars. Additionally, the IGN PS2 E3 preview mentions "Crystal Dynamics looked to Warren Spector and Ion Storm for inspiration and advice on this game", further confirming info on the "Winter 2004"-due title whose E3-dated preview at 1UP explains: "The city environment was dark, neon-lit and vaguely Deus Ex-like, but the feel of the action was closer to something like Call of Duty."

Friedenfelds writes "Xbox Nation magazine asked a psychic to predict reviews of Doom 3, Halo 2, and a bunch of other big Xbox games - the results are pretty funny." Among the games rated by "a bona fide soothsayer" are Halo 2 ("I see a lot of partnerships in the cards... there's a third in the works, but no one knows this yet. You'll enjoy it, but it's not great for any relationships you're in") and Doom 3 ("The review of the game, by the people... it's not going to play out as well as people expected. Maybe there was too much expectation.")

Thanks to the Monterey Herald/AP for its news story regarding EA, Atari, and VU Games' lawsuit against the makers of the Games X Copy backup software. The article explains: "The federal lawsuit [PDF version], filed Tuesday in New York, alleges that Games X Copy software by 321 Studios Inc. of suburban St. Louis violates copyright laws by illegally cracking copy-protection systems used by [PC] game makers." Doug Lowenstein of the ESA trade body, also backing the lawsuits, explains: "I wouldn't get into speculating on dollar losses here. What's at stake here is a rather important legal principle - that products with no purpose other than to circumvent copyright protection are illegal under the DMCA." The piece also notes that "Federal judges in New York and California have barred 321 from marketing... [similar] DVD-cloning software - a victory for movie studios, which contended that such products violate the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act."

Thanks to GamesIndustry.biz for its article discussing significant PlayStation 2 sales increases following the price cut to $149 last month. The piece quantifies: "Data released this week by Sony Computer Entertainment America shows that the console's sales rose by some 216 per cent in the week immediately following the price cut, with an increase of 141 per cent over the full period since the cut", and this means: "The increase in sales will have propelled the PlayStation 2 well past its console rivals, after Sony's platform slipped behind the Xbox in monthly sales for the first time since the launch of the Microsoft console." It's also explained: "The increased sales noted since the price cut have actually pushed year on year sales of the PS2 upwards, with 26 per cent growth on the same period last year - and should hopefully help to slow the overall decline in hardware sales which has hit the USA so far this year."

IronicGrin writes "Just alerting you to a story I wrote for SFGate.com about the emergence of manga as a cultural and commercial force in the U.S.; in addition to discussing the fact that manga has begun to appear on national bestseller lists (volumes of Naruto and Rurouni Kenshin both cracked the USA Today Top 150), I also discuss scanlation communities--that is to say, distributed groups that use the Internet to translate and distribute as-yet unlicensed manga works--comparing this form of culture hacking to other open source development efforts. Do you think the comparison is apt? How many of you guys read manga (as opposed to watch anime), anyway?"

Thanks to GamersWithJobs for its review of digital subscriptions to notable videogame magazines such as EGM or CGW, running down the advantages ("No need to store it at home and you really can't lose it because you can download the magazine as necessary. Unless your wife manages to trash the entire Internet, digital magazines are pretty hard to throw away"), and disadvantages ("No CD/DVD that comes in many magazines these days... Some users will find the need to zoom and scroll as they read a hassle") of the Zinio Reader based digital formats, although for the Baghdad-based reviewer of these digital subscriptions, "getting content otherwise not available in Iraq is a big plus."

Thanks to GamerFeed for its news story discussing compatibility problems with some GameCube titles and the new Nintendo Memory Card 1019. The news story explains: "The [official Nintendo-produced] card has 17 times the memory capacity of the original Memory Card 59", and describes issues, some due to the card's four-digit block size, with a number of more minor third-party games, including Sonic Adventure 2 Battle ("If there are more than 999 free blocks on the Memory Card 1019, the game cannot display the amount of free blocks"), WTA Tour Tennis ("The game does not recognize the Memory Card 1019 properly, and should not be used"), and, disastrously problematic for many memory cards, Mary-Kate And Ashley: Sweet 16 ("Graphics sometimes will not display properly if a file is loaded and restarted after quitting the game.")

Thanks to Wired for its article discussing the rise of casual, Web-based online gaming from websites such as EA's Pogo.com and Microsoft's Zone.com. Particularly interesting is confirmation of post-Pandora's Box projects for an extremely famous game designer: "Today, Tetris is the model for how to reach the increasing number of middle-aged and elderly Americans online. The creator, Alexey Pajitnov, is a designer at Microsoft, where Gates & Co. are hoping he can repeat his magic." The piece names Zone.com games Mozaki Blocks and Hexic as Pajitnov creations, although they're not heavily promoted as such, and explains of Mozaki Blocks: "MSN's marketing team took Pajitnov's Atari 2600-style lo-res math game and sexed it up with an Eastern flair: smooth, rounded tiles, Chinese letters... [and] a gong-shaped progress bar."

Thanks to OgreCave for pointing to the debut freely downloadable PDF issue of Games Quarterly Magazine, an also-available-in-paper magazine "devoted to non-electronic games: board games, educational games, role playing games, card & collectable games, family and general interest games!" Among the articles in this first issue are "Educational Games That Play In Under One Hour, by David Niecikowski", "Remember The Alamo? How Hollywood Inspires Gaming, by Marcelo A. Figueroa", and "The Settlers Of Catan Phenomenon by William Niebling."

Thanks to GameSpy for its hands-on preview of Sony Online's forthcoming PC MMO EverQuest II, as the author discusses the graphics ("EverQuest II is one of the most beautiful games in development... Every square inch begs to be explored"), the play style ("EQ2 has a smaller, more intimate feel, more like tabletop roleplaying games centered on small parties"), and the complexity ("Everyone starts on the same island, then has to choose allegiance to one of two main cities (and belief systems!) From there, more and more options open up, sort of like an inverted gameplay pyramid.") Elsewhere, over at EQ2 Stratics there's further confirmation from devs that: "There are no plans for a PvP [Player vs. Player] server at release. There is no ETA on when or if we will ever have one."

kabrakan writes "Finding myself in an extremely boring tech job, I find the best way to pass the time is to listen to someone speak, specifically an interesting conversation about science, or a comedian. After exhausting NPR's database, could anyone recommend any online repositories of spoken word entertainment, especially talk in the technology world?"

kublai kahn writes "On the NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle segment this past weekend, Will Shortz mentioned the 2004 US Puzzle Championship, sponsored by Google. Registration closes on Thursday 17 June, and the competition is conducted online on Saturday 19 June. "The top two US contestants will be selected to join the US Team at the World Puzzle Championship in Opatija, Croatia. Prizes will be awards to the top US contestants." (This was mentioned on Slashdot last year as well.) I'll be away from my internet connection over the weekend, but perhaps others from the Slashdot crowd can compete. Check the practice test to see if it's your cup of tea."

Thanks to GameSpot for its article covering a panel discussing videogame graphics at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley. According to the article: "The panel of designers--The Sims and SimCity architect Will Wright; The Manhole, Myst, and Riven-creator Rand Miller... and Prince of Persia and Karateka designer Jordan Mechner--presented ideas which simultaneously praised the progress made in the past decade and cautioned against relying solely on the bells and whistles those faster GPUs provide." Interestingly, opinions on graphical fidelity differ, with Miller arguing: "We draw every little blade of grass, because we can", but Wright "reiterated his overall recipe to making great games--a less-is-more approach to leveraging and relying on graphics to drive the user experience."

Daniel Goldman writes "Today is the 53rd birthday of the UNIVAC I (UNIVersal Automatic Computer I). The UNIVAC I was delivered to the Census Bureau in 1951. It weighed some 16,000 pounds, used 5,000 vacuum tubes, and could perform about 1,000 calculations per second. It was the first American commercial computer, as well as the first computer designed for business use. The first few sales were to government agencies, the A.C. Nielsen Company, and the Prudential Insurance Company. It could retain a maximum of 1000 numbers and was able to add, subtract, multiply, divide, sort, collate and take square and cube roots. Its transfer write/read to and from magnetic tape was 10,000 characters per second."

Thanks to eToychest for its round-up of the favorite console strategy RPGs of all time. The piece argues: "a strategy RPG is (generally) a console game in which battles take place over a grid", and highlights include Vandal Hearts ("This is where everyone interested in the genre should start"), the Tactics Ogre series ("the replay value here is unmatched, due to multiple endings in each game"), and Disgaea/La Pucelle Tactics both on the top spot ("If you don't know why these two titles are sharing number 1, go play them.")

neura writes "In quite possibly the largest console auction ever, someone is selling just about every development kit and production game console ever made in Japan. They also have listed tons (almost literally) of software to go along with the systems. Anybody ever seen the original Super Famicom development system? The pictures alone are worth taking a gander. :)"