Guitar Hero IV is finally named, and gets a few pats in the back in the process

Up until now, all we knew about Guitar Hero IV was that it had designed it's own guitar controller and that it included a drum kit with cymbals. Not much, if you ask me.

But now, we know a lot more. We know for starters, it will be released by Fall 2008. We also know the official name, Guitar Hero: World Tour (snazzy!!)

The game will include songs by bands like Van Halen, The Eagles and Sublime. The game will offer significantly more localized downloadable music than ever before on all of the next-generation consoles. Budding rock stars will also be given creative license to fully customize everything from their characters' appearance and instruments to their band's logo and album covers.

There's also an 8 player "Battle of The Bands" for online and offline gaming

Citing literally the press release: In addition to a newly designed more responsive guitar controller and microphone, Guitar Hero World Tour will deliver the most realistic drum experience ever in a video game with an authentic electronic drum kit. Featuring three drum pads, two raised cymbals and a bass kick pedal, the drum controller combines larger and quieter, velocity-sensitive drum heads with soft rubber construction to deliver authentic bounce back and is easy to set up, move, break down and store.

Perhaps the most "promising" feature of GH:WT is it's Music Studio, with which a player can create a digital composition that can be played and shared with other players online with GHTunes.

The game is being developed by Neversoft Entertainment for Xbox 360 and Ps3, Vicarious Visions for Wii, and Budcat for PS2.

This looks like the cue for GH fans to start saving...



Guitar Hero: World Tour

Game Consoles Contain Harmful Materials, Greenpeace Finds

According to their lab findings, the PlayStation 3's AV cables contained phthalates up to 21.2 percent by weight, while the housing on the cooling fan had "the highest level of bromine found in all components tested from all three consoles," 13.8 percent by weight. The Xbox 360's power cable contained phthalates up to 27.5 percent by weight. Both console's controllers were noted for having low levels of bromine.

The Nintendo Wii, while having bromine up to 12.5 percent by weight in its internal housing, was praised for having no beryllium, which can cause lung disease. Check out the Greenpeace page for more information. (Via Joystiq)

Microsoft: 10m Xbox 360s sold in US!!!

Good news for Microsoft!! Although I'm sure they already know the news, since it was them who announced them. Anyway, Microsoft announced on Wednesday that its Xbox 360 gaming console has become "The first current-generation gaming console" to break the 10 million threshold for gaming units in the United States, while the Wii stands at 8.8 million and the PS3 at 4.1 million units sold (via Joystiq)

Now, breaking down the numbers, and assuming the Xbox 360 hit 10 million the midnight of May 14 2008, exactly 903 days after it's November 2005 launch, one would notice that:

• At a population of 301.4million, that's approximately 3.32% of all people in the US.
• Using the 903 metric, the Xbox 360 has therefore sold 11,074 per day, 461 per hour and 7.7 units per minute.

Microsoft also seized the opportunity to boast there's 12 million global members of Xbox Live (myself included) and 19 million Xbox 360 game consoles sold worldwide, which they claimed was more than any other current-generation console. Yet, GameDaily called the MS guys and reminded them the Wii has sold 25 million units worldwide, to which Microsoft said: "we apologize for any confusion. Xbox 360 has the largest global install base of any current gen, high definition gaming console" with added emphasis (take that, Mario!!)

Xbox 360