Gaming News Round-Up: November 5th, 2004

Author: by Andrew Wilson, Simon Carless

Today's gunpowder, treason, and plot round-up sees Sony getting a second special custom car into Gran Turismo 4, a hint of disappointment to come for Konami of Japan, and some interesting Steam-related backup news from Valve Software. - Following the success of last year's event, Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) once hosted the second annual Gran Turismo 4 Awards at the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) auto show in Las Vegas. Giving the spotlight to the most distinguished entries from SEMA exhibitors, this year's event once again saw Gran Turismo 4 creator, Kazunori Yamauchi, presiding over the event and accompanying awards. Topping the awards was Marcel Horn, who won the Best In Show award for his one-of-kind HPA Volkswagen R32. Horn's vehicle will be featured in Gran Turismo 4 when released later this year. In addition to the grand prize, Best Truck/SUV was taken by Mark Mendoza for his Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII, the Best Domestic Automobile by Jeff Tetzlaff for his 1966 GT40, and Best Hot Rod by Craig Morrison for his 1955 Chevrolet 210 Sedan. - With its earnings report just a few days away, Konami Corporation of Japan has announced a revision to its consolidated earnings forecast for the fiscal year ending March 31st, 2005. Citing downward earnings forecasts relating to Konami affiliates Takara Co., Ltd. and Hudson Soft Co., Ltd., presumably implying disappointing sales or other development/publishing issues, Konami revised its net income from 15 billion yen ($142 million) down to 11 billion yen ($104 million), representing a drop of 26.7%. Konami will be reporting its fiscal year 2005 second quarter results on November 9th, 2004. - Digital distribution continues to be an important game development topic, and Valve Software's Steam 'content delivery system' is one of the more noted recent attempts to flow revenues directly to the developer, as opposed to through publishers. In relation to this, a post on the developer's official Steampowered.com forums reveals a possible solution to the thorny problem of no physical artifact with your digital download. According to posts by Doug Lombardi and Taylor Sherman of Valve, users of Steam content including the forthcoming Half-Life 2 will soon be able to create CD and DVD back-ups of the game content they've paid for online. However, this will likely come in the form of a self-extracting archive, broken up into the appropriate-size files, and even the offline content backed up this way will only be playable with an Internet connection and Steam installed.