Christmas Easter Egg on Google

If you go on Google and search for "Christmas", you'll notice a little banner of Christmas lights appear just below the top of the screen. So far we've determined you can search for other topics that contain "Christmas", but not all will work. For example, you'll see the banner if you search for "Christmas songs" or "12 days of Christmas" but you won't see the banner if you search for "Christmas google". If you know any other search terms that will work, please share with us in the comments below!

PlayStation Credit Card Out Now

PlayStation teamed up with CapitalOne to create an all new Visa card, the PlayStation Card. The PlayStation Card gives you 10x the points on items bought on the PSN Store, 3x on everything from Sony brick & mortar store and fast food/restaurants, and 1x the points on everything else.

On top of this, they are also offering the change to get a free $50 PSN Card upon your first purchase on your PlayStation Card.

You can apply here: http://www.sonyrewards.com/en/gateway/?offerlink=psm50cd1108&campaigncode=NI14IBA3

Possible Grand Theft Auto V Release Dates

Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto V, was announced earlier this week. Following the announcement Rockstar debuted the games first trailer. Now here at The Three States, we're completely stoked! So, since we can't wait, we thought we would guess some possible release dates.

We earlier suspected that it might be released on May 24th, since in the trailer, there was a “for sale sign” being hammered into the ground, directly above the house number 2405. But we later assumed this may also be a hint at Rockstar's CEO's birthday.

So we went on to guess sometime in October. We guessed this as it is when every other GTA game has been scheduled for release. Only thing, we can't wait that long!

Then there is Walmart. Walmart put GTAV up for pre-order today, and they say GTAV will ship on June 1st. Whether this is Walmart leaking the date by accident, or just sheer laziness, we don't know. We left an image below documenting the leak.

So in summary, it could be either, May 26th, sometime in October, or June 1st. We hope May 26th. What do you think? Tell is in the comments below!

Grand Theft Auto V Trailer

At first we weren't even going to cover this, but as it turns out, some people just don't know.

Rockstar Games debuted the announcement trailer earlier today. The trailer confirms earlier rumors that it will be taking place in San Andreas (or well kinda). The trailer does not show San Feirro, or Los Venturas.

What's amazing though, planes are back! That's right! Planes are back! The cars look better than both GT5 and Forza 4, the game looks like real life, and you can purchase property.

More interesting new features (or old features which died and came back) are, the ability to own a pet, the ability to hike, offroading, jet skiing, and even working out! This Grand Theft Auto appears like it will be the next “San Andreas”, and I say that not just because of the map, but the features as well! San Andreas, but modern, and very realistic and amped up! When can we pre-order?

Check out R* website for the trailer!

Grand Theft Auto V on its way!!

Today Rockstar Games released the following image in it website. Confirming a trailer for November 2nd!

Remembering Steve Jobs with 4001 Post-It Notes

A great man, Steve Jobs, died recently. Many memorial and tributes to Steve Jobs are being uploaded the Internet every second. Apple made a live feed dedicated to “messages” for Steve. These “messages” are the ones that were sent in by fans to rememberingsteve@apple.com. FYI You can still send in if wish. Anyways, back to the story, a great YouTuber, who's name I forgot, made a tribute of Steve Jobs on the side of an Apple Store using sticky notes. 4001 sticky notes to be precise. Amazing. Oh and they recorded it. Here's the video.

R.I.P. Steve Jobs!

Steve Jobs died just 20 minutes ago (as of writing). This is truly a sad day. You will forever be missed Jobs!

Google+ is Public

That's right everyone! Google+ went public yesterday! And if you're that kid on the block who pretends to know everything but just doesn't (kinda like me), Google+ is the new competitor to Facebook. It was in beta for quite a long time, but was finally released to the public yesterday. And guess what, it actually compares quite well to Facebook. In fact, it might completely replace Facebook for me!

If you want to sign up, just go to http://www.google.com/ and click on ‘+You’ on the top left.

Please feel free to leave feedback on this post and if you will switch to Google+!

Usage Based Billing (Canada)

Unfortunately, the CRTC has decided that large telecommunication companies in Canada should (and now are) charging for usage based billing, something that may hurt many Canadians and deem services like Netflix useless in Canada. Prior to this, unlimited data plans were available in Canada. So what can you do to change this? OpenMedia.ca has started a petition which is backed by the Liberal Party of Canada, all they (and we) ask is for you to sign this petition. As of writing, just over 493,000 people have signed the petition, we ask you make it 493,001 people. Below we have placed a counter and a form to sign the petition. We urge you, sign the petition!

Quick Question for Our Viewers

Have any of you noticed those Bell Canada vans doing maintenance everywhere? Does anyone know what they're doing? Setting up a new network? Please answer in the comments below! Honestly, I got no clue myself.

PSN Coming Live on May 3rd!

Okay, so after a few weeks of downtime on the PSN, rumors (semi-)confirmed by Sony are circulating. The PlayStation(R)Network will most likely go live (again) on May 3rd. Can't wait to see all of you gaming!

PSN Hackers are Identity Theft Hackers!

In case you didn't hear the news yet. PSN has been down for a few weeks (since Wed 20, when it got hacked). Sony only recently has confirmed the hacker(s) stole everyones personal information! While Sony is unsure whether or not credit card info was stolen, it is definitely may be a possibility. Sony is currently sending out mass emails regarding the issue to all PSN users.

PSN Still Down

That's correct folks, going into it's third day, PSN is still down. Although this time around, Sony has finally given us some insight into what's happening. Their help page now states;

"An external intrusion on our system has affected our PlayStation Network and Qriocity services. In order to conduct a thorough investigation and to verify the smooth and secure operation of our network services going forward, we turned off PlayStation Network & Qriocity services on the evening of Wednesday, April 20th. Providing quality entertainment services to our customers and partners is our utmost priority. We are doing all we can to resolve this situation quickly, and we once again thank you for your patience. We will continue to update you promptly as we have additional information to share.
Thank you very much for your patience while we work to resolve this matter.
During this time you may:

• Not be able to access the PlayStation®Store

• Have difficulty signing in to the PlayStation®Network

• Not be able to play online games

• See a maintenance page when attempting to access the PlayStation®Network  

Note: When you log into the PlayStation Network, a message may appear which states, "the PlayStation Network has been suspended".  This does not mean that your account has been suspended; it simply means the PlayStation Network has been taken offline.  Please wait until the maintenance window has passed before attempting to connect to the PlayStation Network again.  We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause."

So now all we have to do is interpret this, unfortunately that means most of us are going to misinterpret it. So let us give you some help with this "interpreting".

This could mean hacktivist group "Anonymous" is striking again, and Sony is trying to get it self back on it's feet, but "Anonymous" has already stated they're not the ones responsible.

So that leave us with other reasons, one's that weren't (completely) implied by Sony. Some of which are; "Portal 2" multiplayer left SNEA crippled. Obviously that's not it, Sony's not that dumb. Chances are, it has nothing to do with what they say it has to do with. As "satcimy" said, "someone at Sony just tripped over the power cord for the network and they didnt realize it yet."

PlayStation 3 Firmwares for Download

Whether you jailbreaking*, or just collecting for some other reason. A new blog, http://firmwaresource.blogspot.com/, has just been put up and is providing links to all older PS3 firmwares. The blog states they are working on iDevice firmwares as well, but were yet to see that happen.
*We do not encourage jailbreaking or modifying firmware of any kind, nor do we condone jailbreaking or modifying firmware.

Official PlayStation App Coming to US and Canada

Great news, well sort of. After a PSN member commented on a PlayStation.Blog post, a Sony employee later replied that they're working on the Official PlayStation App in NA. So at least now we know they remembered us.

Jeff Rubenstein (Sony Employee) confirms PlayStation App coming to North America.

For those of you who don't know what app I'm talking about; An iPhone/Android app was released by Sony in Europe. Sony just left us in North America, and Asia out. You may click on picture to enlarge.

Activision Reveals Beachead for CoD Online, and More

Activision has revealed Beachhead, their newest whole owned studio. This studio will create all of the company's new digital initiatives for the Call of Duty brand, including online community and service initiatives.

Activision has announced for the first time ever that the CoD series will soon support cross-platform gaming! This means PlayStation3 owners can now play CoD with their friends on Xbox360. How exactly this will work, we do not know.

Sorry...

Our feed messed up some of our posts. Seem like it posted old news as new. We will try to avoid this in the future. Only new news will be posted from now on (hopefully).

Is Our Twitter Feed Missing Any Updates?

Has our Twitter Feed(s) been neglecting any updates? Maybe from you favorite game publisher, or game system? If so, please tell us in the comments below! Here at The Three States, we're always striving to get you the fastest, most reliable updates about video-games!

The PSP2 (or NGP) + Specs

At PlayStation Meeting 2011 in Japan a yesterday, Kazuo Hirai, President and Group CEO, SCEI, introduced the world to the newest addition to the PlayStation product family and the future of portable gaming: currently codenamed NGP (Next Generation Portable).

Michelin Man is Racist?

I never noticed until now, but why is the Michelin Man white if tires are black? Is Michelin racist (did it used to be)? The balls in the court, tell us what you think!

PlayStation Phone Specs

While no official specs from Sony were announced about the Xperia Play, Chinese blog IT168 did give us an extensive overview of leaked information. After some translations, here is the overview;

• 1GHz Snapdragon processor
• Qualcomm Adreno 205 graphics processor
• 4-inch 854 x 480-pixel display
• 8-megapixel rear camera with LED flash
• 1,500 mAh battery
• microSDHC support
• 512 MB each of RAM and ROM

Canada's Getting There

A while ago, Canada's Federal Government passed a law banning incandescent light bulb. Of course, not taking effect until 2012, but who wants to wait? Definitely not IKEA!

 IKEA's retail stores are completely phasing out all incandescent light bulbs. This make IKEA the first in Canada!