Bytes of News

-September 21st, will be a double whammy day for Star Wars fans. Fans will be treated to the first ever release of the Star Wars Trilogy on DVD. Yeap, that’s right folks, the man who said he would never release the first three Star Wars films to DVD has finally broken down. I guess that means George is finally giving the DVD format the nod of approval.

Also on the Star Wars front, the highly anticipated release of Star Wars Battlefront comes to gaming stores on the same day. This newest addition to the plethora of Star Wars games on the market is the first time gamers will be able to experience the battles from any of the five films from the perspective of the troops. Choose from one of 20 soldier types from four factions (Rebel Alliance, Imperial Army, Clone Army or the Droid Army) in the game, as you battle in 15 environments on 10 different planets. 15 vehicles, of both the ground and air variety, will be included as well. Online games will support up to 16 players on the Internet or 32 via a LAN for console owners, and 32 on the Internet or 64 on a LAN for PC owners. A single player campaign will be featured in the game as well.


-Entering the MMORPG arena is Star Trek. Perpetual Entertainment, a San Francisco based company has announced they’ve acquired the license for an online multiplayer game set in the Star Trek universe. Tentatively, the company has said a launch is set for early 2007. For fans of the Trek universe, don’t get your hopes up to high. With the recent slew of online games that have stalled, entered development hell or been canceled it difficult to be sure this title will ever see the light of day.

-Making a long boring story short, Intel has announced its release schedule for the next generation Centrino brand technologies, including chip, battery, and display developments. What does this mean for the consumer? By the end of the decade, Intel hopes to have small portable devices like laptops capable of doing everything the user requires for at least eight hours. This will be quite an achievement, and a long time coming. The usefulness of a portable laptop diminishes quickly if two hours into use you’re running around looking for an outlet to plug into. Unlike the battle over media entertainment centers, this is one development that consumers will actually look forward to.