While us gamers wonder what the next generation of consoles can bring to the table, Epic Games is preparing the future's Unreal Engine. According to Epic CEO Tim Sweeney, Unreal Engine 4 will target the next generation of consoles, and he predicts that technology to put tens of cores on one processor may be available as soon as 2010. See the full article for more details.

Epic Games CEO and founder Tim Sweeney expressed his opinion on the flagging state of the PC gaming industry. In an interview conducted by TG Daily, he pointed out the different problems the PC marke t is facing as well as some possible solutions the industry can take if it wants to make some headway against its rivals. You can check out the rest of the interview by reading our full article, accessible through the "read more" link below.

At least one game industry analyst thinks so. While others may think that Sony's move to cut the price of the Japanese 20GB PS3 (and throw in an HDMI port) was in reaction to Microsoft's earlier announcements of Japan-targeted Xbox 360 package deals, iSuppli's Chris Crotty - we've met him before - thinks Sony's looking more in the direction of the Wii.

And nervously: "I am wondering if this announcement has more to do with Wii and how strong the console will be in Japan," Crotty says when asked by TG Daily. "It could be an indication that Sony feels less confident about its content."

But then Crotty hedges his bets, thinking that rather than being worried about competition from Nintendo (or Microsoft, for that matter), Sony might be thinking that the PS3 will do better, period, because of all its great games. "Whenever you lower the price of the console, you increase the burden to back the money through software. In this respect, you can argue that Sony could be feeling more confident that they will have great content (and can sell more games)." Some of that content was laid out and playable during TGS 2006, come to think of it.

(Well, at least we be proven right about one thing: Economists confuse us. Especially with this "on the one hand... on the other hand..." line.)

On the other side of the Pacific, Crotty thinks that even without a similar price cut, the US 20GB model will do "just fine." "There will be plenty of demand."

The biggest variable that could affect sales of Sony's PS3 may not be the technology it incorporates - from BluRay to the Cell to 1080p - or the lineup of games, game developers, and gamers just itching to get a crack at the system, at launch or otherwise.

To quote a former US President's campaign slogan (and according to Wikipedia, rather imprecisely), it's the economy.

Market analysts are generally bearish regarding the potential sales in the long-term for the PS3, given economists predicting dampening consumer confidence due to a rash of terror attacks, increasing oil prices, and declining disposable household income playing off against the PS3's US$500/600 pricing scheme.

Sony itself forecasts sales of two million units for the first month-and-a-half post-launch, and an additional six through 2007. The analysts surveyed by a TG Daily article agree that the first number is attainable, but remain uncertain about the second.

Just yesterday, we posted TG Daily's report about Hybrid Hard Drives (HHD) being a requirement for Windows Vista. Now, it seems  there's a misunderstanding regarding Microsoft's requirement. The Windows Logo Device Program Requirements document (v 3.01), which they referenced, did not indicate that HHDs are required, contrary to TG Daily's assertions.

What it says in the document is that if an OEM decides to use an HHD, these conditions should apply:

• A minimum of 50MB of non-volatile cache must be exposed to Windows.
• The cache must be able to perform sequential reads with a throughput of at least 16MB/sec, sequential writes at least 8MB/sec (16MB/sec is highly recommended for optimal performance for machine hibernation).
• The cache must be able to perform random reads and writes with a throughput of at least 4MB/sec.
  

So, if HHDs are not used, Vista would still work provided that the above conditions are met. It would be quite aggressive of Microsoft to require a new (and unproven) technology just so "Vista Premium" stickers can be slapped onto laptops.

It looks like the people at TG Daily, just made a minor boo-boo. Apparently, they recently reported about four new LCD TVs from Hitachi that integrate a new generation video processor which is capable of "advanced 1080p histogram processing" for about $2200 in a 32" package. In their site, this was written - "Turns out, the existence of a 1080p processor does not necessarily translate into a 1080p capable TV."...You may not realize it, but assumptions could really hurt people and businesses. But you gotta give 'em credit, at least they admitted their mistake.

They were corrected by Hitachi Senior Product Manager, Bill Whalen. According to him, "while the chip can create and convert the highest resolution, the TV itself cannot. In fact, the chip may take a 1080i (interlaced) or 1080p source, convert it to 1080p (in case of 1080i sources) - and then render it back down to a resolution the TV actually supports. In the case of the four new Hitachi LCD TVs, which will be introduced later this year for prices between $2200 and $3000, that would be 768p (1366x768 progressive)." Wohow...I got lost in there after the first sentence...with that, I couldn't really blame the guys who was responsible for the flaw.

TG Daily also apologized to those who read the flawed report, especially to those "put one of the Hitachi LCD TVs on their shopping list because of their article". They promised to look closely on future HDTV releases so that this mistake won't happen again. Oh well, there are a lot of cliches that will excuse what happened, such as everybody makes mistakes, nobody is perfect, you can't win 'em all, practice makes perfect, etcetera...Bottom line - it happens, just shake it off, and go on working.