online gaming

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Here's Why You Kept Losing at Online Poker

Stats guru Nate Silver made most of his money playing in the boom years

(Newser) - Nate Silver offers a lengthy primer on the online poker industry and its prospects for survival after the recent crackdown by the feds , with this interesting reveal from the stats whiz: "Between 2004 and 2006, I played a substantial amount of online poker, using it as my primary source...

New Facebook Game Highlights Human Rights

America 2049 set in paranoid future US

(Newser) - A new game out on Facebook focuses on human rights and social justice instead of virtual crops or online Mafias. America 2049, set in a future US obsessed by disease control and short on civil liberties, puts the player in the role of an agent for the "Council on...

How CityVille Sucked In a Hardcore Gamer

Online game's accessibility and simplicity turns busy man into addict

(Newser) - The online city-planning game CityVille is meant for “casual gamers,” and there are plenty of them: 92 million active monthly users, to be exact. But such simple gameplay and basic graphics would turn off any sophisticated player, right? Wrong—as JP Mangalindan, writing in Fortune , found out. A...

Urban Sprawl: CityVille Tops FarmVille

Zynga's monster logs 72.5M uniques in its first month

(Newser) - Zynga is officially taking over the planet, having converted millions of functioning human beings into game-playing zombies in the first month of its latest release alone, reports TechCrunch . CityVille, oddly reminiscent of the Sims, has logged a whopping 72.5 million monthly unique visitors since its launch Dec. 2—eclipsing...

Howdy, Crazy FarmVille Addicts: Here's a New Vice

It's called CityVille, and Zynga has high hopes for it

(Newser) - Maybe there are people out there who don't know someone who is batspit crazy about FarmVille, and those people should count their blessings. For the rest of us, Zynga is in the next few weeks rolling out its newest iteration of online game crack, ingeniously titled CityVille. You guessed it:...

Gamer Stabs Counter-Strike Foe—For Real

He plotted revenge after his character's killing

(Newser) - A Frenchman—possibly so divorced from reality that he failed to realize there's no respawn option in real life— hunted down a player who "fatally stabbed" his virtual character in online game Counter-Strike and plunged a real knife into the game rival's chest. The victim survived after the knife...

Want Hot Halo Opponent? Try Gamecrush

Site lets horndog gamers pay for sexy foe

(Newser) - Male online gamers surely fantasize that one of their opponents is a good-looking female, and one Web site is looking to capitalize, making it happen in exchange for dough. Gamecrush can set you up with a PlayDate whose profile you find sexy, er, interesting, and $10 gets you about 10...

Companies Using Ad Money to Buy Players Virtual Cash

Friend Bing, get a few Farmville bucks

(Newser) - Online advertisers are migrating ever more quickly toward a gold mine of eager, impressionable consumers: gamers on social networks. The preferred ad buy trades some sort of action—watching a video, becoming a fan of the company on Facebook—for a few units of the online currency used in those...

Web Game Turns Celeb Orphans Into Accessories

It's all in fun, says My Minx founder, but parents' groups disagree

(Newser) - An online fashion game is under fire for allowing players to buy a chic accessory for their avatars: the adopted children of celebrities. My Minx , a “dress-up game for style icons,” now includes an “adoption clinic” where players can acquire web versions of, say, Angelina Jolie’s...

Record $330K Paid for Virtual Space Station
 Record $330K Paid 
 for Virtual Space Station 
'REAL' ESTATE BOOM
Jan 5, 2010 2:34 PM CST

Record $330K Paid for Virtual Space Station

Online game player is confident his investment will pay off

(Newser) - The virtual Entropia Universe—Planet Calypso, in particular—might be entering a real estate boom with the recent purchase of the Crystal Palace space station for $330,000, a record for a virtual item. That’s right: A player who goes by Buzz “Erik” Lightyear paid the sum for...

Game Plays Out 2011 Obama Coup

Ron Paul fans behind scenario, which also finds Glenn Beck dead

(Newser) - For the burgeoning ranks of political paranoids, a scenario in which President Obama dissolves the Constitution, bans guns and drags the US into a union with Mexico and Canada seems not all that far-fetched. Now, thanks to some Ron Paul supporters, you can prepare for 2011 (yep, that soon!)...

Facebook Sees Big Bucks in Virtual Goods
 Facebook Sees Big 
 Bucks in Virtual Goods 
ONLINE GAMING
Oct 23, 2009 12:56 PM CDT

Facebook Sees Big Bucks in Virtual Goods

Social networking site wants a cut of gaming transactions

(Newser) - Gaming is blowing up on Facebook, and the social networking site hopes to take a cut of the very real revenue generated by virtual interactions. Analysts think credits and other services bought to enhance the likes of “Farmville” and “Mafia Wars” will be trading at a clip of...

Minn. Asks ISPs to Block Gambling Sites

(Newser) - Minnesota wants Internet providers who serve customers in the state to block access to Internet gambling sites, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports. Officials say the practice is illegal in the state, but how prevalent it is is unclear. “It's hard to know that," a gambling regulator said. “...

Real-World Lawyers Set Up Shop in Second Life

(Newser) - A bed designed for avatar sex? That's intellectual property. An agreement between virtual real estate developers? It's an oral contract. Or so say some lawyers, who are opening offices to handle disputes in the virtual, online world of Second Life, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. "It's an emerging area...

World of Warcraft: the 'Cocaine of Gaming'

Fantasy game involved in nearly every case of game addiction, foundation says

(Newser) - World of Warcraft is the most addictive video game on the market, the Local of Sweden reports. WoW is the most popular of the online multiplayer fantasy games—by far the most addicting game genre, according to a study by the Swedish Youth Care Foundation. The Blizzard title is "...

German Gamer Admits to Brutal Murder

Knifes UK man to death, was in love with victim's girlfriend

(Newser) - A German man has confessed to stabbing to death a Brit he met through an online war game, the Guardian reports. The 20-year-old victim ran a forum for fans of the game. Detectives had initially believed that the slaying stemmed from an online feud but it later emerged that the...

Put Your Virtual Tiger Up Against the Real Thing

Gamers get chance to face in-the-flesh stars in Xbox confrontation

(Newser) - Shaving giant Gillette has announced a partnership with Electronic Arts to sponsor an online gaming tournament where the prize will be competing against real-life sports stars, the Boston Globe reports. Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, and Derek Jeter are the celebrity champions, who will be challenged by players on the Xbox...

Study: Video Game Addicts Aren't Nerds

'Problem gamers' may be unhealthy, but they're not lonely geeks

(Newser) - The stereotype of the hard-core gamer as a friendless geek may be as outdated as Pac-Man, Reuters reports. An Australian study looked at "problem gamers" who spent more than 50 hours a week playing and discovered that less than 1% had poor social skills. The findings contradict statements from...

Sony Aims to Power Up Online Gaming
Sony Aims to Power Up Online Gaming
May 22, 2008 10:38 AM CDT

Sony Aims to Power Up Online Gaming

Games developer seeks to reach new markets with innovative scenarios

(Newser) - Sony is seeking to boost online gaming to the next level with a pair of new adventures in the pipeline. The company's 1999 EverQuest was the first massive online game to rocket to popularity, but rivals like World of Warcraft have since taken the lead. With spy shooter game The ...

Virtual Disney Closing its Doors

Company pulls plug tomorrow, and fans aren't happy

(Newser) - Diehard fans are outraged at plans to shut down a virtual version of Disneyland tomorrow, the Wall Street Journal reports. Players of Virtual Magic Kingdom, a free online game Disney started to celebrate the theme park’s 50th anniversary in 2005, are protesting throughout the blogosphere; some 20,000 have...

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