Mom's Minute

Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier

The delays for Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier are coming to an end.  Ubisoft has released the trailer for this video game, which will be playable on the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC.

Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier is a squad based shooter game with many advanced weapons for gameplay.

Scene from Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier trailer

The tagline of this game is "Only the dead fight fair."

Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier

In addition to advanced weapons, the game includes air and ground drones as well as radar grenades that let players see enemies behind hidden objects.

The release date for Ghost Recon:  Future Soldier is May 22, 2012.

Kingdoms of Amalur:  Reckoning  Release Date is February 6, 2012

Developer 38 Studios of Providence will be releasing its first video game, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning on February 6, 2012.  Electronic Arts is publishing the game and the company is owned by former Red Sox baseball player Curt Schilling.

The video game is a Role Playing Game (RPG), which will be competing against such heavy hitter games as World of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.  World of Warcraft is played by approximately 10 million people worldwide and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim sold 3.5 million copies during its first 3 days of release.

Cover art for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning

The game play involves video game players creating characters and sending them on a quest to find treasure.

Regarding the challenge of competing against World of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls V:  Skyrim, Curt Shilling stated he hopes these games continue to do well.  In his words, "You can't be successful, preying on other people's failure or loss."

Curt Schilling plans to be at the midnight launch of the game at a GameStop in  Bellingham, Massachusetts.

Rock Band Video Game

Due to a charge against the Rock Band video game, Viacom, one of the largest companies in the entertainment venue took a 65% drop in its first quarter earnings. 

Specifically, Viacom took a charge of $379 million as a result of an arbitration award won by the original shareholders of Rock Band, Harmonix Music Systems which created the game.

Rock Band allows the video game player to mimic the performance of rock stars by playing with controllers modeled after musical insruments.  Video game players can also try to match the singer's pitch by following scrolling musical notes.

The game was popular when it was first released in 2007; however, its popularity has faded.

Scene from Rock Band 3

Viacom bought Rock Band from Harmonix Music Systems in 2006, then sold it back to the founders in 2010.

Harmonix  Music Systems then sued Viacom for the extra earnings the video game experienced during its heyday.  In December, Harmonix Music Systems won an arbitration award which is being contested by Viacom. The money has been set aside by Viacom, and is reflected in their drop in earnings.  

Here is cover art for Rock Band 3.

But not to worry about Viacom's total overall earnings.  With its other media financial holdings, The President and CEO of Viacom, Phillippe Dauman, states the company is showing a healthy bottom line.  

Paul McCartney will compose video game music.

According to reports, Paul McCartney of the Beatles is writing music for a video game.  Previously, he has loaned his likeness to the video game, the Beatles: The Rock Band, but this is the first time he is actually writing music for a video game.

Paul McCartney states the video game market is the way he can easily make money and have his music readily available to video game players.

By marketing his music to video game players, Paul McCartney plans to have his music listened to by a target group who may have never heard his music before.

Beatles legend, Paul McCartney pictured on left during the Beatlemania era.

Paul McCartney states a video game sells so much better than a CD nowadays and that he can make money by selling to gamers.

Paul McCartney is excited to be working on the yet unnamed video game and is eager to introduce his music to the fascinating market of video games.

Flight to Freedom Video Game

Flight to Freedom video game is an educational game that was launched on January 24, 2012 and timed to support and extend curriculum activities connected with the start of Black History Month which began on February 1, 2012.

The video game is produced by a company named Thirteen in association with WNET, New York,  and funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) with additional support by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The game is designed by Electric Funstuff, an innovative software development firm.

The video game can be accessed by teachers and students by streaming and download via www.mission-us.org.

Here is a graphic for Black History Month

Flight to Freedom is a role playing game where players take on the role of Lucy King, a fictious 14 year old enslaved girl in 1848.  She meets a diverse group of people and how she reacts or the decisions she make affect the outcome of the game.

This game is geared to middle school students and helps them to learn not only about Black history, but they also widen their vocabulary and their historical literary skills by using the embedded "smart words"  in the game.

The President and CEO of CPB  Patricial Harrison states, "Now, through our support of Mission US, we are focused on providing that same high-quality content to students, using one of the most popular media in their lives today - interactive, online games - to engage and educate them in American history and civics."