Evga Superclocked GTX 670 Possible Recall?

We mentioned earlier that we were getting word that EVGA was pulling back some GTX 670 products for the channel and that is specifically the case. Here is exactly what EVGA had to say:

EVGA has isolated this problem to an early batch of GTX 670 Superclock cards (P/N: 02G-P3-2672-KR) that were not properly screened during QA/QC procedure. We have already been working with our partners to retest this particular batch. In the meantime, our R&D has also done numerous tests, burn in and component quality verification to confirm that the EVGA GTX 670 Superclock is a well designed product.source hardocp

If any of your users are experiencing issues with their EVGA GTX 670 Superclock boards, please ask them to email Jacob Freeman, and he will assist in getting them setup with an RMA cross shipment along with EVGA upgrading them to the GTX 670 FTW version (P/N: 02G-P3-2685-KR) for the inconvenience of this.

So, "EVGA has not recalled its 670 product line," as Joe Darwin with EVGA put it, but EVGA has identified some bad product in the field which it is bringing back in from etailers. EVGA was not forthcoming with what exactly "this problem" with its products is or how it is identified.

Max Payne 3 Various Reviews

OPM UK : 8/10 - A dark, cinematic single-player campaign lasting around ten hours coupled with a compelling multiplayer offering make this a worthy addition to the genre, even if it can't quite compete in the very top tier. But for legacy's sake, we hope that this time Max's retirement is permanent.

• GamesRadar: 10 - Between its pacing, its presentation, and its excellent gunplay, Max Payne 3 has raised the bar for other action games to follow. Welcome back.

• G4: 5/5 - Max Payne 3 is a technological tour de force that will have you screaming "Dear lord!" more times than midnight mass. The performances are top notch, the action plays out with unrivaled fluidity, and the multiplayer is deep and rewarding. Silly distractions aside, Max Payne 3 is an action lover's wet dream that also happens to employ some of the slickest direction and transitional trickery this side of a David Fincher box set. Lock and load. It's bullet time...time.

• X360A: 93 - A true cinematic gaming masterpiece, Max Payne 3 is not just another triumph for Rockstar, but it's also testament to what the developer can do when it turns its hand to linear storytelling. Max Payne 3 might be a stylistic shift for the series, but it's also a raw and brutal portrait of a man pushed to the edge that deserves a place alongside Rockstar's superlative open-world efforts. Get ready to enter a world of Payne.

• IncGamers: 9/10 - An expert blend of cinematic storytelling and flamboyant action, weaved together by a team with a clear passion for the genre and the content. Payne never felt so good

• StrategyInformer: 9.0 - As with Rockstar's other franchises, Max Payne 3 is enveloped in love and a huge amount of dedication. This is a consistently thrilling and explosive tale that states its case as one of 2012's best. I'd be hard pushed to find a game that has made me scream with excitement on such a regular basis, as the compelling narrative and rewarding gunplay conglomerate into a truly spectacular product. Max Payne 3 lets you star in your favourite action movies, minus the Wahlberg.

• IGN: 9/10 - There are plenty of games which are celebrated for their gameplay but lack anything in way of story or character. Max Payne 3 is a different type of proposition. The gameplay is simple yet satisfying, but it's entirely in the service of a strongly-authored narrative. Players aren't at the liberty to roam, to explore, or to shake things up. Some might find this too controlling, but in return for your freedom, you're rewarded with a mature genre piece which is also a finely-realised character study. Action games continue to inch the dial towards 11, sometimes at the expense of their narrative integrity. Max Payne 3, however, has the conviction to reign in the action, imbue it with purpose - the spectacle still sparkles but it also makes sense.

• 1UP: A- - Although the gunplay may still have its roots planted firmly in the past, the way Max Payne 3 showcases its world is undeniably forward thinking. It's a bit strange to gain so much pleasure from Max's suffering, but I guess that's the true essence behind Rockstar's magic.

• GameReactor: 9/10 - Max Payne 3 is an accomplishment any way you look at it. The story may perhaps get a bit murky towards the end, but other than that it fires on all cylinders from beginning to end. The action will make your nose bleed, it's well directed, and refreshingly free of the conventions that often plague this genre. This is, simply put, the best shooter I've played in a long time. Don't let Payne's beer belly fool you, he's in the best shape of his career.

• VideoGamer: 8/10 - In Max Payne 3 the risk of death and restart is often too great. Why do something that makes you look and feel like an action hero, when holding back behind cover means you're more likely to survive? The shame, then, is that the difficulty encourages over-cautious play.

• GamesTM: 8/10 - Ultimately, none of the story beats or polish mask the fact that Max Payne 3 is very much a refinement of an old formula, and if you're looking for something brand new or revelatory it just isn't here. However, what is amazing is how Rockstar has fallen back on its trademark production values and sublime attention to detail to update the franchise in a compelling way. Factor in some impressive multiplayer offerings and it's still head-and-shoulders above most of its trigger-happy ilk. Which perhaps says as much about the state of the genre as it does Rockstar's obvious skill.

• The Guardian: 5/5 - Max Payne 3, then, is another stylish, self-conscious and enthrallingly full-bloodied title from the Rockstar hivemind. If it is at all possible to distil every great Hollywood action flick into one interactive experience - with all the wise-cracking thuggery and anti-hero angst that would entail - this is it.

• GameInformer: 9.25 - No matter what gameplay mode I chose, I had a great time playing Max Payne 3. The gameplay doesn't explore new territory, but delivers a retro charm that fans of the series should appreciate. It's a new day for Max Payne, and at the same time, a return to his glorious past.

• GameSpot: 9.0 - With savage gunplay and an absorbing personal story, Max Payne 3 is an exhilarating shooter that grabs hold of you and doesn't let go.

• Destructoid: 9.0 - Max Payne 3 is a fantastic package, with a top-notch presentation and plenty of content to keep players busy and happy. It may have been a long time in coming, but there's no arguing with results, and Max is the kind of guy who gets them. Fans and newcomers alike are going to find plenty to enjoy in this exceptional title.

• Joystiq: 4.5 - Max Payne 3, a game built out of remarkably implemented, masterfully presented parts. Video games live or die by the mechanisms that lie underneath. That's why the graveyards are always full.

• Polygon: 9/10 - This is the first time Rockstar has made a game that excels best as just that, supported and expertly augmented by the production values and attention to small details that its games have always been known for. It is uncompromisingly excellent, with a sense of focus that has secured Max Payne's legacy once again.

• The Telegraph: 4.5 - It may not have the scope of Rockstar's most famous oeuvre, but it more than makes up for that in focus, detail and raw thrills.

• OXM UK: 8/10 - Like its hero, Max Payne 3 has its flaws. The repetitive action might be reminiscent of the original games, but it's still repetition, and ultimately that causes things to drag. Fortunately just like Max himself it's also difficult to dislike - the plot isn't something you'll be able to leave alone for long, bullet time still has the capacity to thrill and the multiplayer provides the variety and unpredictability required for genuine longevity. This new spin on familiar action is proof, if proof were needed, that there's life in the old dog yet.

• GiantBomb: 4/5 - Rockstar Games modernizes and makes Max Payne its own, creating something grittier and more grounded in reality, if not quite as singular.

• Eurogamer: 7/10 - What it has in abundance, though, is expensive-looking environments for Max to dive around in and then talk to himself, and that's just about enough to keep you going for as long as it takes to settle the score. All the same, you can't escape the feeling that Rockstar just isn't as good at a pure third-person shooter as it is with the open worlds of Grand Theft Auto or Red Dead Redemption, and in this linear context it's much harder to put up with its usual missteps in mechanics and difficulty.

• Edge: 7 - This is a game about a world-weary killer doing the only thing he knows how to, and for all its spectacular action beats there's something apt about Max's fatigue.By Tamoor Hussain

Nvidia Says Gaming Consoles On The Decline?

Nvidia Chief Executive Jen-Hsun Huang gave an audience at his company’s annual GPU Technology Conference a peek at what could be the next generation of gaming hardware Tuesday.It’s nothing more than a cord linking a video game controller to a LG Cinema 3D Smart TV television set

While Nvidia rival Advanced Micro Devices has cornered the market for the graphics processors that will power the next generation of gaming consoles, Huang has a bold plan that could — over the long term — hollow gaming consoles out and place the powerful graphics processors used to power immersive digital experiences in the cloud.

On Tuesday, Huang introduced a new technology, dubbed GeForce GRID, that will be anchored by the company’s latest generation of graphics processors, dubbed ‘Kepler.’ Gaming services Gaikai, G-Cluster, OnLive, Playcast, and Ubitus are all using, or testing, Nvidia’s new technology.

While hosted gaming services such as currently rely on Nvidia’s graphics processors, GRID will use Nvidia’s Kepler-based processors to perform several clever tricks that will allow gaming services to support more gamers using less hardware.

While Nvidia’s older ‘Fermi’ graphics processors, for example, could only handle one workload at a time, it’s new Kepler chips can work on 32 concurrent work queues, a feature Nvidia calls ‘Hyper-Q.’ Another trick, which Nvidia calls ‘dynamic parallelism,’ allows the GPU to allocate resources to the most challenging parts of its workload on its own.

The plan: drive down the cost of online gaming services able to stream games to television sets, tablets, ultrabooks, and smartphones. “Our vision is that one of these days any device will be able to host a fantastic video game, that this video game experience would no longer reside just on the device in the room, but that it would fall away and effectively become a supercomputer in the cloud,” Huang said.

It’s a radical vision that has a number of advantages. For starters, videogame piracy will be almost impossible in a world where digital experiences are streamed, rather than generated by hardware running software that lives under a user’s television set. Placing videogame hardware in Internet-connected server rooms also promises to accelerate the metabolism of the gaming business. The last generation of videogame consoles appeared in 2006. Updating a server room full of graphics processors to support the latest games, by contrast, is a much easier prospect.

To be sure, the gaming console won’t vanish anytime soon. Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo are all busily preparing new game consoles that  have only become more important after Microsoft’s XBox Live service has shown can anchor a rich suite of online services. But as those services proliferate, it’s only becoming harder to imagine them being confined to consoles — and kept off smartphones and tablets — and even harder to imagine a twice a decade hardware refresh keeping pace.by brian caulfield forbes

U.S. game retail could hit six-year low in 2012

["Should the contraction from 2011 continue at this pace, annual U.S. retail video game revenue in 2012 could fall below the $12.6 billion figure from 2006," says Gamasutra analyst Matt Matthews in his latest Behind the Numbers column.] It is getting more difficult to have any optimism about the U.S. retail video game market in the near term. Prior to last Thursday, when the NPD Group announced its retail video game sales estimates for April 2012, the analyst consensus had console and handheld software sales down 26%. Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter had expected software down 19% at U.S. retail, and Michael Olson of Piper Jaffray and Company had foreseen a 25% decline. Doug Creutz of Cowen and Company was more pessimistic than the consensus, with a 27% decline. According to the NPD Group's retail sales estimates, the actual decline was a shocking 42%. Console and handheld software sales fell from $503 million last April to a mere $292 million for the same period this year. I can slice the market however you wish – console and handheld, high def and standard def, hardware and software – but practically everyone took a hit at U.S. game retail. The only segment that did not suffer was the accessories segment, where the NPD Group records sales of controllers, cases, and points cards. Accessories inched up from $147.8 million last year to $148.6 million this year, a mere 0.5% increase. That's hardly a win in my book. Before we look separately at the hardware and software segments of the retail market, I want to show just how dire the situation is right now. As the following graph shows, the total amount of revenue generated by the retail video game market in the U.S. is now back below 2007 levels. Should the contraction from 2011 continue at this pace, annual U.S. retail video game revenue in 2012 could fall below the $12.6 billion figure from 2006, the first full year of Xbox 360 sales and the launch year for the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation 3. Given how loaded the latter half of the year is, with both software launches and a new console launch, I still consider that event unlikely, but it does give some perspective on where things could go without a turnaround. Console Blues The high definition segment of the market had the best hardware news for the month, if I can call it that. According to several analyst comments, it appears that combined sales of Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 consoles down 18% year-over-year. Microsoft hasn't seen hardware sales that low (on a weekly average basis) since May 2010, nearly two years ago, right before the launch of the current Xbox 360 S model at E3. You have to go back to July 2011, right before Sony cut the entry-level PS3 price from $300 to $250, to find a month in which PS3 sales were as low as they were in April 2012. As a result of the weakness in hardware, every major console is down this year compared to last year. The figure below demonstrates this for the Xbox 360, PS3, and Wii. In the face of the persistent declines, Microsoft has signaled its intentions: a $100 Xbox 360 and Kinect system with a two-year Xbox Live Gold service plan. While this deal is currently restricted to fewer than 20 Microsoft Stores in the U.S., I expect this to be just the test phase, with a formal roll out in other retailers later this year. In a conversation about April sales, Wedbush's Pachter called the $100 deal "Microsoft's price cut" and said he didn't anticipate any other price adjustments for Microsoft's systems until closer to the holiday season. After a disastrous end to its fiscal year, Sony has restated its intentions to strengthen its video game segment and I don't see any way to make progress in that area without increasing its hardware base and driving demand for software and services. Moreover, Sony has estimated it will increase its hardware sales over last fiscal year, and that certainly will not happen without a price cut or some other dramatic change. Two months ago, I predicted that Sony would move to cut its price in April and that Microsoft would cut its prices shortly thereafter. Clearly I was wrong, and the new pricing plan by Microsoft is one that I did not expect. However, I still think that Sony needs bold moves to grab as much marketshare as it can, and would prefer to it announce a price cut in June at E3. The ongoing discounts and gift card bundles at retailers suggest a cut from $250 to $200, whenever it happens. Pachter disagrees, and says that the PS3 will get its price cut by September. Certainly history is on his side, as Sony has announced a price cuts in August 2009 and August 2011. Moreover, Sony has shown immense patience all generation while cutting its hardware prices. On the issue of pricing, I would note that the average price of the Xbox 360 had been declining from about $300 in January to just below $260 in March. In April, with the introduction of the $450 Kinect Star Wars hardware bundle, the average price jumped up to $325, according to data provided to me by the NPD Group. Based on last month's average price, it seems likely to me that 70,000 to 80,000 units of the Kinect Star Wars bundle were sold during April. The average price of the PS3 in April dropped again, this time to $262, which I believe should be a record low. Without the addition of the Kinect Star Wars sales, I think that the Xbox 360 and PS3 could nearly have been tied for hardware sales in April. Handheld Weakness Handheld software also demonstrated significant weakness during April, both for Nintendo and Sony. Of particular concern is Sony's PlayStation Vita (PSV), whose sales fell below 100,000 units for the month. In terms of units per week, I estimate that PSV hardware sold at approximately half the rate it did in March, probably below 20,000 units per week. (Specific PSV sales information is not available for April, from Sony, the NPD Group, nor from analysts.) When examining the PSV launch sales data, I expressed a great deal of skepticism about Sony's handheld. Two months on, I have not changed my mind. It is my estimation that consumers of all stripes now expect handheld devices to have a great selection of software available at launch. The PSV could have been such a device, with the full PSP software catalog available to consumers, but only half of all full-sized U.S. PSP games are available online and not all of them are compatible with the PSV. Even if the entire PSP catalog were open to PSV owners, the legacy pricing structure for that software on the PlayStation Store is out of step with the pricing of software in the distribution channels serving iOS and Android devices. The inexpensive software line that Sony launched specifically to appeal to this cost-conscious segment of the market, PSP minis, is still not completely compatible with the PSV in the U.S. On top of that, the PSV still won't run the PlayStation 1 software available on Sony's PlayStation Store, even though the device is clearly powerful enough to do so. To make matters worse, new titles designed specifically for the PSV are still trickling into retail and the online store. These titles are priced between $20 and $50, with the majority falling in the $30-$40 range. Truly, Sony is on the right track, building a truly modern software distribution system with what I hope will be a progressive pricing structure. However, just as quickly as they are moving on their own, the rest of the market is advancing independently and Sony could still be left behind, another casualty of the ongoing disruption fostered by insurgents like Apple and Google. Personally, I'm still trying to make the case for dropping $250 on the PSV for myself, and I'm hard-pressed to make it for anyone else. Just ask Activision Blizzard what it's doing with its money. The system has been out for three months already, and it has not published a single title for it (though it announced Call of Duty for Vita last year at E3). I'd like to make a very brief comment about the state of Nintendo's older DS line of hardware. At the end of this week the Nintendo DSi and the Nintendo DSi XL will receive price cuts to $100 and $130, respectively. (Presumably there is practically no further Nintendo DS Lite hardware stocked anywhere.) This situation reminds me of the spring 2009 price cut that Sony's PlayStation 2 received from $130 to $100. That price cut helped prop up sales for the aging console through one more Christmas season, and 12 months later the system's sales essentially fell off a cliff. The DS price cuts are the final send-off for the record-setting handheld, and I expect by this time next year its contributions to the market will be minuscule. After Christmas, Nintendo will effectively be a single-handheld system company, putting all of portable software efforts into the Nintendo 3DS. The figure below shows a brief recap of the growth of the Nintendo DS base in the United States, with some notable milestones along the way.by matt matthews By the end, I expect that the three Nintendo DS models will account for over 53 million units of hardware in the United States. Later this week, I want to take a closer look at the software market and then – separately – the market outside retail. At retail, I will show data that demonstrates that the U.S. is not alone in seeing breathtaking contraction in software sales and that publishers are themselves partly responsible for the contraction. Outside of retail, I think the latest figures from the NPD Group actually carry some hidden bad news: the digital market may be contracting too.

Next PlayStation Called Orbis?

While the official reveal of Sony's next home console could still be months away, if not longer, Kotaku has today learned some important details concerning the PlayStation 3's successor.
For one, the console's name—or at least its codename/working title—is apparently Orbis. And it's being planned for release in time for the 2013 holiday season.

The details in this story come from a reliable source who is not authorized to talk publicly about next-gen hardware but has shared correct information with us before. What they're telling us in specifics matches much of what we've heard and reported in generalities in recent weeks.
A Sony spokesperson declined to comment about these details, citing the company's policy not to comment on "rumors or speculation."

Orbis. Say it out loud. Sounds a little like the word "four", doesn't it? Only it doesn't make the next PlayStation sound like a bad horror movie sequel.
It's also a name loaded with meaning. The word "Orbis" itself, from Latin, means circle, or ring, or even orbit. Not terribly helpful. Combine it with the name of Sony's new handheld system, though, and you have the common term Orbis Vita (or, in strict Latin, Orbis Vitae). Which means "The circle of life". Could the Vita be playing a very important role in the development and use of the next PlayStation home console?

Such symbolism also suggests that rather than being a codename, like most companies employ when still developing a console,this might actually be the machine's final name. We don't know that, though, so keep an open mind about things.by luke plunkett

As It Awards a Million-Dollar Prize, 2K Sports

Last week, Kotaku reported strong evidence that at least one of the eight finalists in the million-dollar MLB 2K12 Perfect Game Challenge had used an exploit to substitute weaker batters into the opposing team's lineup and have an easier time tossing a perfect game during the contest's qualifying round.

If the allegations are true, the contest is tainted. The alleged cheater himself cast doubt on the legitimacy of other finalists' qualifying performances.
But the people who run this contest won't say a thing. When I spoke to Jason Argent, the 2K Sports vice president of marketing, at the contest's final round pairing in New York this afternoon, he refused to answer questions about the allegations.
He wouldn't deny them. He wouldn't confirm them. But he wouldn't even voice his side of the story, either.
"All I will comment on is that the contest was run fairly and consistently with the rules," he told me.
Technically, this is true. The substitution exploit was not specifically prohibited in the official rules thanks to a loophole, but other communications from 2K Sports to gamers said that they could not make any substitutions to any lineup, either CPU or user-controlled teams.
And what of the allegations? What of the MLB 2K12 fans who may have missed a shot at winning $1 million because they chose to play fair? More than 900,000 perfect games were attempted and more than 900 were thrown in a month.
"If you look around today, upstairs, everyone here is really happy and there's excitement in the air," Argent said.
As I continued to press him, the PR representative sitting with us interjected.
"I think if you keep asking the same question I think your answer is going to be the same," she said.
In other words, they have no interest in defending the integrity of the million-dollar contest they run. Maybe their silence speaks for itself.

Nvidia Gtx 690 Is Here

Debut of Nvidia’s $999 Dual-GPU Video Card

Nvidia president and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang took this stage this weekend at the GeForce LAN Shanghai to introduce the GeForce GTX 690, a dual-GPU monster designed from the ground up to be the most powerful video card in history. Are your nipples hard too?
What, it's a ridiculously powerful graphics card. When the news first dropped this weekend, Nvidia compared the power of the GTX 690 to that of two GTX 680s slung together in SLI. If we read between the lines we can assume they mean the performance Nvidia likes to think that configuration has and not the actual performance of SLI'd cards, which isn't nearly as impressive. If this one card can delivery that sort of dreamy power, than I'd like two of them please. And a new motherboard. And a case.
Tell you what, I'll unplug my speakers, and you can just slip an entirely new machine in.
I like how Huang says that no design was included unless it enhanced the performance of the GPU, and then points out that this is the first graphics card with its name imprinted on the card itself. How does that aid performance? Shut up, it's cool.by mike fahey