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No, this is not a hellish sequel to Act Zero but instead a series of Bomberman games on their way this month. We already have Bomberman Land on the Wii gracing Japanese shelves, whilst this does retain the plucky and cute aesthetic style we are all used to the main game modes are much more generic action platformer fare (though thankfully the Battle Mode has stayed intact).

The other two Bomberman games scheduled for release are another Bomberman Land on the PSP, which is ironically the most faithful in terms of gameplay, and Bomberman Story on the DS. The latter has transgressed into action RPG territory, though there is already a proper Bomberman game on the DS. So at least we have that to be thankful for. ...

David Jaffe, the action-brain behind God of War, has spilt some enticing info-beans about the ill-fated PSP project he was working on last year, though as challenging and interesting as it sounds, it's now consigned to development purgatory.

"Heartland was the story of China invading America," David Jaffe explains in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, "where you played a soldier debating whether to stay and fight for America or go AWOL to meet up with your family".

"We were trying to put in a lot of gameplay that would evoke emotion," Jaffe continues, "[there were] sequences where you'd go into homes and your commanding officer would tell you to shoot innocent Chinese-Americans".

Sometime ago on his personal blog, Jaffe spoke of wanting "to make gamers cry" with his project, but he also had deeper hopes for Heartland - "It was very dark and was meant to cause players to consider what it's like to live in America and be an American today".

But it wasn't to be, and with Jaffe unwilling to desert his family for "90% of the time" in order to commit to developing the game, the project was dropped. Though Jaffe says that talking about Heartland makes him quite sad that it'll never see the light of day. Perhaps he'll rethink once God of War III has been polished off..

via gamesradar ...

via gamesradar

You could forgive us for speculating about a rise in Xbox Live Arcade pricing. Especially following the somewhat ambiguous proclamation made by Microsoft Casual Games manager Bryan Trussel, stating that we'd "see a correlation between some of the pricing" of games now that the maximum downloadable file size has increased from 50MB to 150MB.

Frugal gamers can put away their torches and pitchforks, because Microsoft shot back at us with a resounding "Nu-uh!" assuring us that a price increase will not be the case. Behold, the official statement from Trussel himself:

"There are currently no plans to offer Xbox Live Arcade games for more than 1200 points. My comments were meant to imply that a larger game may lead to a price that is at the high end of the current pricing range, not eclipse that range as suggested in the reporting."

That slight gust of wind you're feeling? The collective sigh of relief from all those who couldn't muster the balls to beg their boss for a raise just to play Root Beer Tapper. ...

via gamesradar

Despite garnering a ton of interest from fans when it hit in late 2006, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories didn't sell quite as well as other GTA titles. It could be that gamers are getting sick of the same recycled gameplay, but what's more likely is that they were just waiting for the game to arrive on PS2, instead of the notoriously hard-to-control PSP. If you're in that latter camp, then here's your chance to pick up the best GTA since San Andreas.

If you already caught it on the PSP, though, don't expect anything new. The multiplayer modes and custom-soundtrack feature have been stripped out and replaced by the smoother, rumble-enabled PS2 controls and a budgetastic price, but otherwise this is the same adventure that hit in October. Which, so long as you're not looking for multiplayer, isn't a bad thing at all.

Set in 1984 (two years before Vice City), Vice City Stories stars straight-laced Victor Vance, who - despite starting out as GTA's most boring protagonist - eventually becomes the series' most conflicted and most tragic anti-hero. He's also the big brother of Vice City sidekick Lance Vance, a walking disaster who shows up to comically ruin things and drag Vic deep into Florida's drug-smuggling underworld.

VCS is more than just a new story, however. Aside from serving up a sprawling, colorful, freely explorable city filled with jackable cars, boats, helicopters and even Jet Skis, it brings a few new features to the table. One of these is empire-building, which enables you to attack, take over and manage illegal rackets run by rival gangs, with the eventual goal of wiping your enemies off the map and owning Vice City's underworld. ...

via gamesradar

It's just two years since the UK was first touched by Nintendo's DS, but what a two years it's been. Okay, so its ugly, silver toy-like appearance might not have drawn anyone's adoration at first, but Nintendo's innovative handheld eventually won us over with its sublime gaming possibilities and a barrage of cheerful, colourful and compulsive games designed to use DS's touchscreen, microphone and dual-view to brilliant effect.

Since DS launched in the UK on 11 March 2005, we've had sell-outs, brain-taxing new genres, and that sleek redesign that added supermodel looks to DS's already impressive wealth of talents. With DS Lite, we fell in love all over again - and so did the rest of you, if the 200,000 sold in the first ten days across Europe are anything to go by.

DS has posted some mind-boggling landmarks - a record breaking 87,000 were shifted over the DS's first two days in the UK, 10m have already been sold across Europe, and last summer some bright spark calculated that Nintendo had sold one DS every two seconds across the globe since the first one was sold in Japan. And, if the meteoric rise shown in our snazzy graph suggests anything, it's that DS is destined to become one of the best selling platforms ever made. Long live DS! ...

Teachers have traditionally not been keen on students bringing handhelds or games into the classroom, but a new initiative supported by Sony aims to change that. At a "PSP in Education National Launch" event held today at its '3Rooms' brand space in London, Sony Computer Entertainment UK's managing director, Ray Maguire, introduced a project organised by ConnectED that sees the PlayStation Portable being used in schools as a learning tool.

Maguire explained that Sony has been linked with education for some time--in 2003, there was a trial of using the PlayStation 2 and EyeToy as a communication method between students in different schools. However, the development of 'connected' devices such as the PSP, and the increase in the availability of wireless broadband, has really opened up the opportunities for a link with education, Maguire said. While he commented that Sony was not aiming to be a leader in the education space, he pointed out that there were lots of opportunities for content providers to make use of the portable, connected nature of the PSP as a way to provide data and programs.

Richard Owen, from Maplesden Noakes school, which trialled using PSPs in several different classes, said the experiment had been very positive. Owen said that teachers found that students benefited from being able to work at their own pace--for example, being able to rewind an audio file and listen again to ensure they didn't miss anything, or to view a video several times. Another trial is set to start shortly in Newcastle, involving 10 schools.

Continuing the 'PlayStation in education' theme, Relentless Software also used the event to demonstrate its latest iteration of the Buzz! quiz series--a version of the game designed specifically for schools. The questions are all designed to cover the Key Stage 2 elements of the National Curriculum, and Jeff Gamon, executive producer at Relentless, said that classroom trials of the game had proved extremely successful.

via gamespot ...

Microsoft today announced the latest release in its Xbox Live Arcade Wednesdays program, the 1989 coin-op beat-'em-up Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Originally produced by Konami, the game is being offered on Live Arcade through an agreement with Ubisoft, the brand's current rights holder and publisher of its own line of movie-based TMNT games.

Developed by Digital Eclipse (the studio behind Live Arcade ports of Contra, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game will feature voice chat capability and online or offline cooperative multiplayer for up to four gamers.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is set to go live on XBLA this Wednesday at 2 a.m. PDT and will be available for 400 Microsoft Points ($5).

via gamespot ...

via eurogamer

Microsoft challenged four community developer teams to create four games in four days at this year's GDC, in an effort to show how simple it was to use the XNA Game Studio Express tool.

Well, they all rose to the challenge and produced a handful of gems for you to try out, providing you have a copy of the free XNA program for your PC installed, which you can grab from the official place (you'll need C# 2005 Express Edition installed to run it).

The line-up begins with DungeonQuest, created by German team Benjamin Nitschke and Cristoph Reinaecker; a 3D action RPG that lets you crawl through various dungeons in a two-player co-op team.

Then there's Simian Escape from American chaps Jonathon Stevens and Patrick Glanville, which is a 2D run-and-jump romp in a prehistoric setting. They've craftily utilised the help of the Torque X tools, available in the paid-for version of XNA.

The United Kingdom creation Damage Control came from Josh Butterworth and Maher Al-Samkari, and is a four-player siege game that challenges you with seeing off hordes of aliens that are advancing on your base.

Last but not least is AbduX from Brazillian Andre Furtado, which puts you in the space boots of a wide-eyed alien, and lets you plough through the counrtyside in your flying saucer whilst abducting scores of unsuspecting humanoids. Particularly impressive in this little chestnut is the voice recognition controls that let you command different functions of the spacecraft.

It's all part of promoting Microsoft's Dream-Build-Play competition, which is designed to create awareness of its XNA development tools. Simply make a great game using the software, win US$ 1000, and get your creation on Xbox Live Arcade.

XNA Game Studio Express is a free download that lets hobbyists, students, and independent developers create and share games for Windows. It was released last December along with the Creators Club, which is available for a yearly EUR 99 subscription and enables you to develop and play games on Xbox 360. ...

via eurogamer

Konami has moved to reassure European gamers that Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence servers will remain online for multiplay, despite the company's decision to switch off the American ones.

"The European MGS3 Subsistence Servers will stay online. Indeed, Konami recently announced a dedicated league system - http://www.mgs3league.com/ - which will continue to provide services for fans of the game," the publisher said on its website.

Presumably this is because MGS3: Subsistence only came out here recently, whereas it's been out in the US since March of last year. We thought it was pretty amazing, if you're wondering.

Mind you, keeping your servers online for one year seems a bit tight. Even EA does better than that. What do you reckon, chaps? Would this affect your decision to go with a Konami online game in the future? ...