14w ago - Sony Director of Emerging Platforms Chris Mahoney has announced that Beats Trellis is free this week on PlayStation Mobile with details below.

To quote: Years ago, making music required you to have a band, actual instruments, and use of your parent's garage or basement. Now, all you need is a PlayStation Certified device and Beats Trellis.

With this app, you can create your own beats on the go, fitted with drum kits, funky sounds, breaking beats, and other instruments. Beats Trellis is perfect for the person that wants to try making their own beats for fun, or add beats that they have created to a video montage for show online.

Find out for yourself starting today - and at no cost! PS Vita owners will be able to download Beats Trellis for free on the PS Mobile section of PlayStation Store.

Owners of PlayStation-certified devices can obtain it through PlayStation Mobile Store - click here for full instructions.

Check back next Wednesday to see which free game you'll get next!

17w ago - Sony Director of Emerging Platforms Chris Mahoney has confirmed that Beats Slider is free this week on PlayStation Mobile.

Below are the details, as follows: Last week saw the launch of a PlayStation Mobile promotion that will offer six free games over six weeks, starting with Samurai Beatdown.

This week, the free PlayStation Mobile game is Beats Slider. Master the puzzle gameplay by sliding different note blocks into sequences to create catchy electro tunes and compete for the best times online!

Recently, we invited FuturLab's Managing Director James Marsden to explain the ins and outs of the game on PlayStation.Blog. Here's what separates Beats Slider from its contemporaries:

Each block of the sliding puzzle represents MIDI data, which is basically musical notation that computers can read. MIDI data can be used to play back any instrument, synthesizer, drum loop or whatever you throw at it, just by changing the instruments or samples that are triggered by it.

So what we've done is allow the player to push a drum loop MIDI pattern into a synthesizer slot, or a melody pattern into a bass line track, and every combination you could think...

33w ago - FuturLab Managing Director James Marsden has detailed Beats Slider and Fuel Tiracas for Sony's new PlayStation Mobile service today.

To quote: Hello folks! Earlier this year we were shouting about shouting about Velocity, and now we've got some new things to be excited about. We've been hard at work coming up with more simple, elegant and clever ideas, and crafting them into fun and addictive games.

The first of these games is called Beats Slider, and it's called that because you slide beats around. It's simple, rather elegant, and pretty clever too...

Beats Slider - Conquer Those Blasted Slider Puzzles!

Each block of the sliding puzzle represents MIDI data, which is basically musical notation that computers can read. MIDI data can be used to play back any instrument, synthesizer, drum loop or whatever you throw at it, just by changing the instruments or samples that are triggered by it.

So what we've done is allow the player to push a drum loop MIDI pattern into a synthesizer slot, or a melody pattern into a bass line track, and every combination you could think of within the limits of each level. It was quite the brain teaser to write music that can be rearranged in this way whilst still sounding good, but we managed it.

What we're also...

201w ago - Has Microsoft's Xbox 360 finally cemented itself as the 'it' console for this generation? You know, the most talked about, played, respected and in the forefront of peoples minds?

If listening to the words of US President Obama are to be taken at face value then perhaps so.

To quote: You can't just contract out parenting. For our kids to excel, we have to accept our responsibility to help them learn. That means putting away the Xbox -- putting our kids to bed at a reasonable hour. It means attending those parent-teacher conferences and reading to our children and helping them with their homework."





With his recent public comment about 'putting away the Xbox' it makes you wonder why his words focused on the Microsoft brand name. If we're to go by sales then surely the most sold is the Nintendo Wii, yet there was no mention of 'putting away the Wii'.

Maybe Obama's speech writers felt it didn't roll off the tongue as smoothly as Xbox, but at least it proves that the masses understand and recognize the Xbox branding, which last generation would have certainly been PlayStation.

Microsoft has seen some great growth with...

226w ago - Yeah, I said it. The Windows 7 taskbar is the most important Windows UI change since Windows 95, and it will dramatically change the way you use Windows. And it's better than the Mac's Dock.

That's because the "superbar" -as the taskbar is known by developers- jerks taskbar functionality in a new direction. It's no longer merely a window manager.. just a place to manage open windows and by proxy, open applications. It's now a bona fide application launcher.

More than that, it blends the two in ways that will remind many of the OS X Dock-apps that are running and those that aren't can live together. True, you've been able to launch apps from the Windows taskbar's Quick Launch ghetto for ages, but that's been demolished so that Microsoft could completely and seamlessly integrate the launching of new apps and the managing of running ones.

Managing Apps and Open Windows
The OS X Dock operates from a similar standpoint, but Windows 7 takes this (not to mention the translucency gambit) a step further: The visual signification of a running application (versus one that's not and merely "pinned" to the taskbar) is exceptionally subtle- a kind of "glare" appears on the top left corner of the icon and it's faintly outlined. It borders on actively encouraging you to forget the distinction,...