Brand: MacNews

Aspyr Media and Pangea Software are offering the opportunity for the first 200 schools that purchase a copy of its new 3D action game, Otto Matic, to receive a full site license for the game free of charge. Schools can then use a single copy of the game (US$42.90) to make it available on all of the computers at the school site.

Motorola, which develops and manufactures the processors used in Apple’s Power Mac G4 systems, has announced an additional 9,400 layoffs this week, bringing the total number of layoffs during the past year to 42,900—more than a quarter of its workforce. Company spokesperson Margot Brown attributed the new layoffs in part to a “recession like we’ve never seen before” in the semiconductor industry.

The Omni Group has released a Mac OS X version of Oni (Cocoa), the third-person 3D action game developed by Bungie Studios. The futuristic game stars Konoko, a lead female character that mixes gunplay with hand-to-hand martial arts combat for a unique twist on traditional action shooters. Oni for Mac OS X requires OS X 10.1 or later and a copy of Oni for OS 9. Omni notes that the introduction and final cinematic movies have sound skipping issues on faster and dual-processor machines.

A ZDNet article explains that while Linux has been widely touted as having an integral role in the production of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, digital effects studio Weta Digital discovered that a high-end Power Mac G4 was the ideal solution for delivering hi-definition uncompressed frames in the production of the film.

Opera has released Opera 5.0b5 for Mac OS 7.5.3-9.2.2 and Opera 5.0b3 for Mac OS X, new betas of its alternative Web browser. The browser now offers a 30-day banner-free period, after which users must pay to use a banner-free version, as well as other improvements and changes.