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UPDATE: Kotaku reports that Valve’s Doug Lombardi dismissed this as a rumor.

The Inquirer, reporting from the Austin Games Developers Conference, reports on heavy rumors that Google is looking to aquire Valve “any second now”. Google is said to be very interested in Steam, Valve’s digital distribution software. Call me crazy but while I can see Google running Steam, I cant imagine it doing games.

But who knows! At least Google releases software on time! We’ll keep you posted.

Thanks Sol!

[The Inquirer]

Well, that’s my interpretation of the story anyway. D+PAD picked up on this oh-so-exploitable offer: Gamescampus.com will supposedly pay $30.00 (US) to those who play their new free MMORPG Asda Story up to level 40 by September 4th and aren’t satisfied with their gaming experience.

Some small catches to this offer are: having to provide an address and phone number, and the fact that only the first 1,500 people who qualify will actually get the dough. Of course, cheaters will be disqualified.

I don’t know about you guys, but this is a risk I’m willing to take. I won’t have class for a few weeks and might as well try my luck with it. I’ve never been a fan of MMO’s, so I’m assuming I won’t like the game. Thus, it won’t be all fun and games (like grinding ever is).

In fact, I might even keep you posted on my progress in the game and let you know if I actually get the loot! So stay tuned for updates on this story.

[D+PAD / via N4G]

While some parents believe that video games are nothing more than time wasting money sinks, this interesting money sink from overseas just happens to be a video game. The BankQuest piggy bank allows Japanese children to go on an adventure using the money they save. Not a bad way to invest in new gear if I do say so myself.

The game consists of a 100 floor tower with over 180 different monsters inside of it. Needless to say you can’t get all that far without first investing a little money into your character. The game boasts over 160 items which total up to 10,000 yen. For 3,990 yen it’s a steep price for a piggy bank, but I can’t help wishing I had one of these when I was a kid. I’d even take one now to replace my Cup-O’-Change.

[Impress Watch via Wired]

If you thought we have it bad with  micro transactions, game cash shops and virtual economies in the western world you surely don’t know about the QQ coin. In China, a company called Tencent has a monopoly on virtual currencies, one so massive and shady that state regulators fear it may start to affect China’s own currency.

It all starts looking innocently enough. Tencent runs websites with all sorts of games where either subscriptions or items are bought with the QQ, Tencent’s virtual currency. Much like Second Life you can take your QQ and convert it back to cash, and this is where thing’s start getting shady.

Read more!

This painting above, made by Japanese artist Hisashi Tenmyouya, sold for over $615,000.00 USD at a Christie’s art auction in Hong Kong. The artist describes the painting as such:

I produced this painting for the exhibition, “GUNDAM: Generating Futures,” which was held at the Suntory Museum from July 15 to August 31, 2005. The work was later exhibited at the Ueno Royal Museum and other venues. In Japan there are many “Gundam-Otaku’s,” and their adoration of Gundam is intense. Therefore, I did not want to change their image of Gundam. By changing Gundam’s “mobile suit” to tattoos, I altered his body, and made him even more customized. I emphasized the very concept of the “mobile suit,” and by setting Gundam against a background of gold leaf from traditional Japanese painting, I emphasized Gundam’s samurai origins.

Tenmyouya has actually created more works in this vein combining Japanese pop culture to traditional Japanese art, you can see more of his work on his personal website.

Now if only I could convince someone that my notebook sketches of Princess Zelda eating a triforce sandwich are worth a tenth of what this went for…

[Bloomberg]

You might have heard about a minor scandal called Hot Coffee last year,  or probably you didn’t since it was so low key, yeah right! Well the big sex-minigame scandal finally comes to an end as Rockstar Games reached a settlement on the class action lawsuit and as a result you, the concerned and psychologically scarred citizen, are entitled to up to $35.00 USD in compensation.

Great that will cover about 15 minutes with any psychiatrist! The lawyers, blessed be their charitable and philanthropic hearts, will only get one million dollars for their services. Can you smell that? No its not the smell of hot coffee, that’s the smell of justice, being burned down to the ground.

[Gaming Steve]

If you are a fan Japanese fashion and have always dreamed of getting yourself dressed in the latest of J-fashion (and looking like a complete freak everywhere else in the world) you surely have found yourself facing the horrible prices the stuff runs overseas, the excessive cost of importing and the wait that comes with it (and fashion deprecates faster than hardware). Its always been a drag but Japanese businesses seem to be catching on. The see the money overseas and someone’s finally stood up and done something about it.

How FABULOUS are these?!

Maruione.jp is not the typical Japanese clothing outlet, its completely geared towards the international market, featuring the most prominent styles so you can bet you’ll find that gothic and lolita clothing you’d been craving for as well as everything else coming out of places like Harajuku. The prices are pretty fair and their inventory grows every other day.

Good news for the ladies, right now most of the merchandise is for you. As for us men, unless you are comfortable wearing a skirt (which you should if you like J-fashion) you will have to wait and see how things go.

There are also anime goodies such as animation cells, tshirts and a couple of cosplay outfits, all under the watchful eye of master-otaku Patrick Macias.  Go give it a browse!

[Maruione.jp]

A couple of months ago we posted about the Evangelion Longinus Spear replica which would be up for auction in Japan later that month. Well reports from ANN say that the thing sold for 13.7 million Yen, which is about $120,000 USD. That’s a lot of cash to blow on a replica, even if the scary lady holding it was included. To whoever bought that, I swear I’ve got a stain on my wall that kinda looks like Rei Ayanami if you look at it at an angle… while drunk, I’m willing to sell it for 10 grand, cheap!

[ANN]

60 year old Japanese house wife Yukiko Ikebe made 400 million yen (roughly ?1.7 million, $3.5 million) in trading in foreign exchange markets! (Wow!!) But recently she got got fined 34 million yen for evading tax. (Oh crap!) Ikebe-san used relatives’ names to make her gains look smaller and therefore avoid paying tax.

Yukiko Ikebe was reported as saying she spent the money on jewellery and kimono’s. With 400 million yen in her pocket you can bet she was dripping in enough ice to make her body freeze and that she was buying 100% silk kimono’s lined with Panda fur - all capped off with a pair of Gucci Geta sandals. What she did was illegal. But we all know we would’ve done the same damn thing if it meant we could pocket that kind of money over a period of time. Getting fined 34 million yen isn’t even a big deal, she’s still got over 300 million to mess around with!

[Yahoo! news]

So we’ve established you probably wouldn’t like to be a game tester anymore, it’s time to look for a new dream job. What else could you do? How about manga translator? Oh but that must be a lot of work huh? A day like that probably sucks as well. Let’s see, PingMag has an interview with Simona Pini, a manga and anime translator, where she shares  her experiences in the job, such as:

Let�s get a bit practical: What would be a typical day for a manga translator?

Well, usually I wake up at 4 in the afternoon, turn on my computer, read my mail - and get lost on the internet. I read the Panini forum because I like to read what our readers think, and I do Mixi. Eventually I start working until the morning�

Oh wow, sweet deal! Sound’s like we’ve got ourselves a new dream job candidate huh? Better bust out those Japanese flashcards!

[PingMag]

 Video Game testing, the holy grail of all dream jobs for many gamers. Just imagine, getting paid to play games all day, not like those suckers, the game programmers, spending their days slaving over petty problems. Or is it? This insider report from Journalist Karla Starr shows us a glimpse of the dark world that is game testing. A snip from the article:

“People were there because they thought it was going to be this great job,” says Sean Day, referring to his time as a tester, “but you were always threatened with the prospect of losing your job at any minute. There was a guy, we were testing and sitting there, it was 10:30 in the morning, and just out of nowhere, this security guard comes up, and a supervisor comes up after him and says, ‘Grab your things.’ I’ve seen that several times. At all three jobs,” says Day, who counts these inexplicable firings among the more unsavory aspects of his time in QA.

A bunch of people reduced to mere junkies, wasting away in front of screens just for a dose of the dream.

[Seattle Weekly]

Panasonic recently released a promo for GLOBALRANGE, their new line of IP phones, produced by Gonzo (Hellsing, Gankutsuou, Trinity Blood). You can watch it in english on Panasonic’s GLOBALRANGE website. Its filled with so much feel good that you will either be crying or laughing at the cliches. Im serious, it contains a baby having his first steps, a father-son bonding moment, grandparents hearing their grandchild for the first time, and even a man oogling babes in Brazil. Its like  GLOBALRANGE fixes all of your life’s problems! Very subtle, Gonzo, very subtle. From vampires and gothic neo-victorian kickass stories to selling phones to good ol’ mom and pop.

Go watch it now, if you dont suddenly get an epiphany about IP phones, then at least you are guaranteed a good laugh.

[Panasonic GLOBALRANGE / Via ANN]

Slightly over a week ago the tax office in Otaru, Hokkaido decided to subject a local Otaku to gruesome torture as they did one of the worst things you can do to an Otaku, they sold his figure collection.

You see, this poor soul committed a big no-no when he decided not to pay his taxes and when The Man came collecting his most valuable possessions were taken to settle his debt. Even though I imagine he would have rather given his kidney away, he got off easy. These figures where collectors edition from old dating sims like the classic game Sentimental Graffiti (pictured above) so they will probably sell for a very good price.

Otaku, the system has set its sights on you, there’s no faking it anymore. You cross the system and the system will hit you, hard.

[Japan Probe]

Yes, Nintendo is making money by the truckload; we all know that because we are anal about knowing everything there’s to know about the industry. Your average newspaper-reading small-time investor, however, might not. Reuters is making sure that changes, they have published an article on the shocking profit increase Nintendo is reporting, and not without mentioning the competition!

The Kyoto-based company said on Thursday in its fourth outlook hike this year that earnings would exceed its January forecast on stronger-than-expected revenue of about 966 billion yen ($8.1 billion), but it did not give specific profit numbers.

Nintendo, known for game characters like Mario and Pokemon, had forecast DS sales to reach 23 million units in the 2006/07 business year, more than double the expected shipments of Sony Corp.’s rival handheld PlayStation Portable for the same period.

So expect your market-tycoon wannabe uncle to be very, very interested in your Wii; expect it to be very disturbing.

[Reuters]

Everyone loves custom credit / debit card designs, but unless you like getting stuck with a stock photo of a puppy and a kitting playing nice, Japan is the place to go for your custom bank cards. Take for example the Super Mario Cash Card and now this, a Dead or Alive bank card. You know, so you can brag when you go and pay for your new Kasumi love doll.

[Kotaku]