A VIP gaming service is provided through one or more servers providing games to players as members of the service, with one or more interactive interfaces executing on a web server, whereby players connected to the web server may select and configure games to play. Players connected to the server and logged in to the service are enabled by an interactive interface to purchase an ability to privatize an instance of playing a game, if a game developer has enabled the game to be hosted on a private server, and wherein privatizing the game selected as a VIP game enables the purchasing player to control entry of other players into the game in a specific instance of play, to alter circumstances and interactions in playing the game in the specific instance of play, and to lead the other players in the instance of playing the game.

An interactive mixed reality system for one or more users, in which both real-world entities and virtual world entities are capable of being interacted with by one or more users, or by objects (47, 91) for use by users, and the system arranged to computationally maintain game state and the evolution of events in the real-world and the virtual world, and the system arranged to generate a response (such as visual or tactile/haptic, or by way of cause and effect) which is experienced or perceived by the one or more users.

A method for gaming. The method including instantiating an instance of a video game at a local device of a spectator. Game state and user data of one or more players participating in a gaming session is received. Video frames are generated of live game play by the players using the game state and user data by executing the video game in the instance. Video frames are displayed for the live game play on a display of the spectator. A local game slice of the video game is generated for a sliced game play while executing the video game in the instance. The local game slice being responsive to inputs from a controller device of the spectator.

A computer-readable medium including a program which is executed by at least a first and second computer apparatus in a network to provide a video game that is progressed by at least first and second players using said first and second computer apparatus respectively controlling at least first and second player characters in a virtual multiplayer game world in which the difficulty of the game is defined by at least an enemy difficulty, wherein the virtual multiple player game world comprises at least one gaming arena and has at least one game level, the program causing the computer apparatus to function as: an enemy difficulty determining unit configured to detect a change in the number of player characters and to determine a new enemy difficulty in dependence on the change in the number of player characters; an enemy modulating unit configured to modulate the enemy difficulty to the determined new enemy difficulty; and an enemy generating unit configured to generate at least one enemy character at a rate, and/or having an enemy attribute, according to the determined new enemy difficulty.

Provided is an information processing system capable of, while avoiding running out of storage capacity, increasing the possibility that a program executed in the information processing system can use data according to a calculated position, even when the information processing system cannot receive data from a device. An item communication section (72) receives, from a server that stores data used in the program in association with a position, data associated with a position in a first-size area containing a position calculated by a positioning section (60). An item notification section (74) notifies to outside when a position associated with data received by the item communication section (72) is present in a second-size area, which contains a position calculated by the positioning section (60) and is smaller than the first-size area. An application executing section (66) executes a program using data received by the item communication section (72).

A system, computer-readable storage medium storing at least one program, and a computer-implemented method for generating game configurations are presented. For example, a system may receive a game configuration request message from a client device being operated by a player playing a virtual game. The game configuration request message may be sent, for example, in response to the player initiating a new game of the virtual game. The system may then select a game configuration based at least in part on historical performance data associated with the selected game configuration. The historical performance data may accumulate performance data from a group of players that previously played the virtual game using the selected game configuration. The system then communicates the selected game configuration to the client device. The player may play the virtual game using the selected game configuration as the initial game configuration for the virtual game.

Systems and methods for updating content of a mobile video game allow for mobile communication devices to receive updated content for video games that operate on the devices. The updates may be promotional in nature, and may be pre-selected based on the device type, service, or service provider. The game may contain instructions that cause the mobile communication device to contact an interface and/or server to receive updated content. After the updated content is received by the mobile communication device, the content may be displayed in-game. The user of the mobile communication device may be provided with one or more options that affect the frequency or ability to receive or display updated content. In addition, the server may track what content has already been received by the mobile communication device.

Useful work or services can be automated or otherwise facilitated or solutions to real world events developed by emulation of a real-world environment (which can contain objects representing virtual objects) with a virtual environment and generating a prioritized sequence of locations and associated tasks in accordance with resources related to the event in a virtual universe. Performance of the prioritized tasks at the prioritized locations is facilitated in the virtual universe by locally generating teleportation invitations corresponding to locations in the ordered sequence of locations.

Event synchronization in an online game is disclosed. A central computing device sends event information that identifies an event and an event depiction timestamp that identifies a future time at which to depict the event to a plurality of computing devices that are time synchronized with one another. The central computing device receives, from a first set of computing devices, a set of first messages, each first message including action information that identifies a user input received by a corresponding computing device and an action timestamp that identifies a time at which the user input was received by the corresponding computing device. Based on the action timestamps and the user inputs in the set of first messages, a next event to be depicted is determined, and next event information that identifies the next event is sent to the plurality of computing devices.

A network game system includes a server apparatus and a plurality of video game apparatuses connected to the server apparatus. A party includes player characters of a plurality of players. When the party battles with an opponent character, the server apparatus simultaneously transmits movie playback information to each video game apparatus for starting playback of a movie. Each of the players can skip the movie at a desired timing. A screen is displayed on each video game apparatus that has skipped the movie until the battle starts. When information is received from each video game apparatus that indicates playback of the movie has ended, the server apparatus simultaneously transmits battle start information to each video game apparatus.