Invade and conquer: Space Invaders thirty years on

In 1977 Tomohiro Nishikado, a 33-year-old Japanese computer programmer, was a company employee, like millions of others. In his spare time he played video table-tennis, manoeuvring white paddles up and down a black-and-white TV screen to return a white blob of a ball to his opponent. In the amusement arcades, he had noticed a new game called Breakout, which involved moving a paddle from side to side to hit a ball, in order to destroy a series of blocks at the top of the screen.

At E3, video games shift their aim to casual players (USATODAY.com)

USATODAY.com - This year's downscaled E3 video game expo drew about 4,500 gamemakers, analysts, retailers and journalists to L.A. last week - less than a tenth of E3's size two years ago - even as the industry grew from $10.5 billion in 2005 to $18 billion in 2007.

Japan: PS3 Catches Up to Wii, Xbox 360 on Life Support

In Japan, the Wii's lead over the PS3 shrank from six-to-one in May to just one-point-seven-to-one in June, according to Japanese magazine publisher Enterbrain. According to the publisher, Nintendo sold 235,990 Wii in a five week period ending June...

NPD: Nintendo Wii the top-selling, current-gen console

The Nintendo Wii has secured its place above the Xbox 360 in total units sold in the US, and six of the top ten games in June were on Nintendo consoles. It's good to be the king. Read More...

Sony beefs up PS3 media ability (Reuters)

Reuters - Sony Corp (6758.T) said it would rent and sell movies and TV shows over the Internet for its PlayStation 3 video game console and double the hard drive capacity of its main PS3 model in a bid to better compete with Microsoft Corp and Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.OS).

Nintendo rolls out Wii games, Sony takes to video (Reuters)

Reuters - Riding the success of its popular Wii video game console, Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.OS) on Tuesday unveiled fresh titles for gamers to throw frisbees and rock on, while rival Sony Corp (6758.T) turned to Hollywood with a new video service.