Microsoft has revealed the first screen and art for Forza Horizon, the first Forza spin-off for Xbox 360.

Forza Horizon has been revealed with a first screen on the Forza website. Playground Games’s collaboration with Turn 10 Studios is expected to launch on Xbox 360 in the Autumn.

Playground Games includes a number of former Codemasters racing devs, with experience on games such as TOCA, Colin McRae, GRID and DiRT – no details have been revealed for Forza Horizon, but the game is thought to be a cross-country racer in the vein of the last couple of Need For Speed games.

More Forza on NowGamer:

• Forza 4: Top Gear Car Pack DLC Hitting Xbox 360 Next Week
• X12: Halo 4, Forza Horizon, Fable, CS: GO, Minecraft Round-Up
• Forza Horizon: A New Alternate Franchise To Motorsport

Microsoft studio Lionhead is developing a new IP for a future-gen console.

Lionhead is making a single and four-player co-op MMO-style game for “next generation consoles,” according to a agency recruitment post on LinkedIn (via Superannuation).

Described as an “opportunity to work on an MMO like title for next generation consoles. AAA game and budget” the post refers to a “a major developer in the South East UK,” which is looking to “add a number of key team members to a very large scale game development group in this studio.”

The studio is developing a “major brand new IP that is being targeted for the future generation of platforms and will be an RPG based game with a radical new take on how co-operative and multiplayer gameplay feeds into the experience, while blending online and single player into one complete experience,” according to the recruiter.

Other things mentioned about the game include:

- a complex progression system
- multiple routes through the campaign
- an MMO like multiplayer experience that will affect the outcome of the player experience
- many other attributes surrounding their profile (such as the environment and the outcome of certain actions).
- 4 player co-op
- A development team with over 150 members

Lionhead didn’t deny the report, saying in a statement that it is “in the business of making great games,” and regularly looks “to hire great individuals to help in this cause.”

Lionhead were previously rumoured to be developing an MMO back in December.

More Lionhead on NowGamer:

• Fable Studio Lionhead Developing MMO?
• Fable Creator Peter Molyneux Quits Lionhead, Microsoft – Forms 22 Cans
• Fable Heroes Review
  

For whatever reason, many Amazon authors seem to be under the impression that you can only create a proper table of contents for Kindle Direct Publishing on Windows, not the Mac.

Having just uploaded our newest book (Getting Ready for Mountain Lion) to Amazon, Steve Sande and I have invested a lot of time learning the quirks of KDP and its tools, as well as those for iBooks (but more about that in another post). For any of our readers who are also budding authors or publishers, we’ll be sharing what we’ve learned in a TUAW series called “iBook Lessons.”

We thought we’d share our KDP Table of Contents strategy with you to help reduce the hair-pulling and frustration associated with document preparation. Here are the steps we use in Microsoft Word 2008 and 2011 to create our TOC.

1. Create a fresh page and add Table of Contents text line, formatted with your favorite header style.
2. Move your cursor just to the left of “Table”. Choose Insert > Bookmark. Call the bookmark toc and click Add. This creates a bookmark before the title, named in such a way that KDP’s automatic conversion tools will recognize it as the start of your Table of Contents. All the Kindle hardware and apps will be able to use it as well.
3. Generate a temporary TOC, so you have an outline to start working with. Move to under your Table of Contents header to a new line. Choose Insert > Index and Tables > Table of Contents. Uncheck “Show Page Numbers”.
4. Click Options. Choose which heading styles you wish to include. If you use custom styles (e.g. H1 instead of Header 1) make sure to add a level for those as well. Typically, most ebook TOCs use either just H1 or H1 and H2. Your call. Click OK to finish options. Click OK again to generate the contents.
5. Select the entire TOC, cut it, and paste it into TextEdit to be your guide to the next step.
6. For each entry in the TOC, locate the start of that section in your manuscript. Set your cursor to the left of each section title. Again, use Insert > Bookmark to create a bookmark at that position. Name each item with a meaningful (and easy-to-recognize) tag.
7. After bookmarking your entire document, return to the initial Table of Contents section. Paste the text from TextEdit back into your document as simple, unlinked text.
8. For each item on your list, select the entire line: i.e. every word, not just clicking to the left of the name as you did to set bookmarks. Then choose Insert > Hyperlink (Command-K). Choose the Document tab, and click the Locate button to the right of the Anchor text field. Choose the bookmark you wish to link to, and click OK.
9. Repeat for the remaining TOC entries.

Once you’ve finished adding bookmarks and hyperlinks, save your work. Go to KDP and upload the file (you may want to create a testbed skeleton book entry just for this purpose). Download the .mobi file it generates and try it out on the Kindle Mac app and/or any Kindles or iPads/iPhones you have on-hand. Amazon’s Kindle Previewer app is also available for download from KDP, and provides simulated views of your ebook on iPhone, iPad, Kindle, Kindle DX, and Kindle Fire.

Always make sure you test each link to ensure that the bookmarks are placed properly. Also test the Table of Contents button in-app and check that it jumps you to the TOC correctly.

Best of luck in your ebook / iBook publishing efforts, and look forward to more tips about publishing here on TUAW.

iBook Lessons: Creating Amazon KDP tables of contents on MS Word for Macintosh originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 05 May 2012 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Source | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Minecraft XBLA studio wants to see a new Xbox community grow around the game.

The Xbox 360 version of Minecraft is due for launch next week, but after that the direction it takes could end up drastically different, according to Minecraft Xbox 360 developer 4J Studios.

“Mojang and Microsoft are keen for us to add new content to the game specifically for Xbox,” Paddy Burns, chief technical officer at 4J told NowGamer, “and while we are working on updating the game version in the short term, we will be looking at specific Xbox content in the longer term.”

As with the PC version, however, this content will be based on the desires of the community of Minecraft Xbox 360 players.

“We would love to see a community growing around the Xbox version of the game,” said Paddy, “and it is something we are all very keen to enable as we continue developing the game.”

There’s exclusive features to Xbox 360 already, such as the ability “to take screenshots of your Minecraft levels, and share on Facebook”.

And since forums are already being established for the Xbox version of Minecraft, Paddy promises that 4J Studios “will be following and interacting with these as we continue the development.”

Will you be getting Minecraft on Xbox 360 and, if so, what features would you most like to see added? Let us know in the comments below.

More Minecraft on NowGamer:

• Minecraft Xbox 360 Trailer Details Splitscreen Co-Op, New Controls
• 0×10c: Notch Enhancing Minecraft’s Visuals For Space Sim – Screens
• Notch Reveals 0×10c Details: Graphics, Gameplay & Multiplayer

Next-gen console release dates likely unknown says veteran analyst Michael Pachter.

Xbox 720 and PlayStation 4 release dates are probably unknown by any developers with knowledge of the next-gen consoles according to Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter despite rumours to the contrary which suggest a 2013 launch for both.

“I suppose that there are dev kits out there, but nobody has firm knowledge about launch dates,” he told NowGamer.

“I love that the Xbox 720 has gone from no disc drive to a Blu-ray drive in the span of a week, and love that there is no mention about the PS4 blocking used games,” Pachter said of the latest reports. “If there are disparate rumors about the Xbox 720 and PS4, one of them must be wrong.”

The rumoured specs for both consoles are believable as “dev kits would have the correct configuration,” the analyst reasoned, adding that while features such as a perpetual internet connection or built-in Kinect may be true, are not essential information for developers at this stage.

“The noise about who will launch first is just noise. Neither Sony nor Microsoft knows what the other is doing, so it’s not particularly important which one launches first. They may both go at holiday 2013, although spring 2014 makes more sense so that they can keep up with demand,” Pachter concluded.

More Next-Gen on NowGamer:

• Sony Wants PS4 To Beat Microsoft’s Xbox 720 To Launch – Report
• Durango: Next-Gen Xbox Has 2013 Release Date, Blu-ray – Rumour

See XBLA’s fiendish bike-’em-up Trials Evolution in all its glory.

Trials Evolution is headed to XBLA on 18 April for 1200 Microsoft points, and brings more of the type of mayhem experienced in RedLynx’s first Trials game as well as on and offline multiplayer and loads more.

Get a good look at some of the game’s 60 tracks, skiing, the multiple customisations, four-way multiplayer and loads more in the clip above.

More Trials Evolution on NowGamer:

• Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition Gets May Release Date, High Price
• Trials Evolution: RedLynx Bringing Bikes Back To XBLA Next Month?
  
• Trials HD: Big Thrills DLC Out Next Month

MW3’s first standalone content pack hits Xbox 360 this week.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 will get the first paid-for content pack which doesn’t require a Call of Duty: Elite subscription.

MW3’s Content Collection 1 hits Xbox Live on Tuesday 20 March and includes all the previously released content drops: Maps Liberation, Piazza, Overwatch and Black Box as well as Spec Ops missions Black Ice and Negotiator.

The pack will cost 1200 Microsoft points – expect it for PS3 and PC a month from tomorrow.

Check out the Content Collection trailer below:

If you haven’t noticed, Apple’s stock was soaring today. It closed at US$589.58, another all-time high, and is up +21.48 for the day. As financial analysts pour over these numbers, they are discovering some amazing trivia about this off-the-charts growth.

• Morgan Stanley’s Katy Huberty may have kicked off this climb when, as Philip Elmer-DeWitt of Apple 2.0 notes, she revised her previous 12-month price target from $515 to $720 (base case) and to a mind-boggling $960 on the bullish side.
• Apple’s stock has gone up 40 percent since last October 14 ($422) when the iPhone 4S launched. Up 68 percent this year alone.
• Tyler Durden of ZeroHedge points out Apple’s market value is almost equal to the market value of the entire US retail sector combined.
• Asymco also chimed in and noted that “Apple’s market value today increased by more than one Nokia, nearly three $RIMM’s or a bit less than one Sony.”
• MacDailyNews also points out that Apple’s market value ($548.95 B) is now double that of Microsoft ($274.42 B).
• To see how far Apple has come, Apple went public on December 12, 1980 at $22.00 per share. It’s lowest market value was $630.9 million (stock price of $1.375) on July 8 1982.

With the new iPad launch only two days away, I have a feeling this is only the beginning of a momentous climb for Apple.

Apple stock soars, market value close to entire retail sector originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Wed, 14 Mar 2012 19:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Source | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Major Nelson reveals first images of Xbox Live application running in Wndows 8.

Xbox Live looks much the same in Windows 8 as it does normally, judging by new images posted by Major Nelson.

“The Windows 8 Consumer Preview is available starting today,” wrote the Xbox Live boss.

“Xbox Live in the Windows 8 Consumer Preview includes games, video, music and Xbox companion applications. In the preview, these apps are just a taste of the features that we’ll be delivering at launch.  We will share more information later this year as we get closer to launch,” added the Major.

Some games such as Microsoft’s own XBLA title Pinball FX 2 will also be available for Windows 8 according to the images – check out our gallery, left.

Hit the link to check out the Windows 8 consumer preview, and look out for more from Microsoft’s current X12 event over the coming days.

Quake, Rage and Doom developer wants pixel-perfect visuals on next-gen hardware

id Software programming genius John Carmack has revealed a preference for ‘pixel-precision’ graphics on the next generation of consoles, citing uncertainty with 720p resolutions on various displays.

“Targeting 1080P for next gen consoles brings pixel precision back to relevance. Almost every display screws with 720P,” Carmack tweeted.

Most HD console games aim for a 720p resolution, although this is often upscaled via 1080p TVs or the console itself.

Battlefield 3 actually ran at 704p on consoles.

Rage pushed hardware capabilities almsot beyond their limit with 720p, 60fps visuals on consoles, but despite a heavily recommended installation still suffered from texture issues on PS3 and Xbox 360.

id is currently working on Doom 4 but, so far, little is known of the project.

The latest speculation on next-gen consoles suggests the launch of the next Xbox will come in 2013.