As much as we're going to miss covering the entertaining side show that has been the life of Bo Stefan Eriksson for the last nine months, we're relieved that the former Gizmondo Europe director has finally admitted some culpability in this strange saga -- and that he'll soon be forced to leave the country and become someone else's problem. After a Los Angeles jury failed to reach a unanimous verdict in Eriksson's grand theft auto case last week -- resulting in a mistrial -- the imaginary friend-loving Swede apparently decided that a retrial coupled with the separate weapons charges would be too much to bear, and ended up receiving a pretty sweet deal from prosecutors. In exchange for pleading guilty to two counts of embezzlement and one count of illegal gun possession, the one-time mobster weaseled his way out of an auto theft charge and ended up receiving a three-year sentence plus three years of probation -- but because of the time he's already served as well as "other allowances," he should be free in about a year. Once he gives up his orange jumpsuit, Eriksson faces immediate deportation from the US, although his lawyer has stated that the now house-less and car-less felon was planning to leave anyway (expect us to be liveblogging his bon voyage party). The only matter that has yet to be settled is how much loot will have to be paid to the British banks who repo'd Eriksson's Mercedes and non-crumpled Ferrari, so after December 7th, ol' Stefan will be lucky to have enough money in his commissary account to afford a package of Twinkies. ...

H3Enterprises, the "first publicly traded company dedicated to the Hip Hop culture and lifestyle" announced today that it will be launching the "H3TV," purportedly the first flat screen display specifically for "video gamers"-their quotes, not ours.

The press release revealed that the H3TV will "contain multiple Xbox 360s" as well as "GenAudio's 4D 'Astound Sound,' the finest sound system available." No other specs were revealed, other than the proclamation that the display will boast "the highest resolution in the industry" and was "designed to be the LCD flat screen of the 'hip-hop generation.'"

Adrian "Hollywood" Walton and a person named HarlemHoopHero will be holding a demonstration of the product in St. Petersburg, Florida on November 8. "Hollywood" Walton enthuses in the press release, "Everyone I know, particularly all the real Players, wants to load up with flat screens everywhere."

No doubt 'holmes. We're assuming the Players he refers to are the hip hop 'playas' and not the "video gamers" previously referenced, but that's okay since we like LCDs everywhere too. We contacted H3 PR representatives for further information, like size, price, pictures, and exactly what the apparently numerous built-in Xbox 360s will be used for, but have been told we'll have to wait until Monday for specific information of this sort. ...

Novadrome, developed by Stainless (the minds behind Carmageddon), is an arena-based battle game in which players control of "biggy-like" vehicles, armed to the teeth with various paticle, beam and physics weapons in huge sci-fi environments.

A total of 24 vehicles will be available, which can be thrashed around the selection of 15 arenas in the game.

Both online and offline modes will be included, with Career, Arcade and Freeplay modes available, as well as multiplayer which will allow players to do battle over Xbox Live in "highly-customisable" multiplayer bouts.

Novadrome will be available for download through Microsoft's Xbox Live Arcade service in December.

Screens Here ...

Nanostray 2 is looking real slick, and we've got the first shots to prove it

We're big fans of scrolling shoot-'em-ups, and although Nanostray on DS wasn't perfect, it's hard-as-nails bullet-dodging action was good enough to keep up hooked for a while.

Now the sequel is nearly here, and developer Shin'en has released this first batch of screenshots to show off just how nice it's looking. The good news is it seems the dev's got rid of the touch-screen operated weapon selection, which didn't work so well in the first game.

And it's looking like a top shooter to us. Giant, grab boss of death? Check. Fat lasers and nice explosions? Check. Vertically and horizontally scrolling levels? Yup. It even seems to improve on the already impressive backdrops of the original too.

With "exciting" Wi-Fi internet functions promised, (including a World Ranking system that can be accessed through the official website), we're looking forward to seeing what Nanostray 2 has up it's sleeve.

The game is still without a publisher or release date, but more info is due in coming weeks.

Screens & news at CVG ...

Next-gen shots of the mech action shooter for PS3 and Xbox 360

Check these screens out - if the game looks anything like this when it finally launches in spring next year, we'll be impressed.

Armored Core 4 (yes, Armored without the 'u') is the latest in the series of mech-based shooters developed by FromSoftware - the guys responsible for ChromeHounds on Xbox 360.

From the looks of it, the game will let players battle their spectacularly large fighting robots in an icy arctic-like setting, a futuristic city full of skyscrapers, and even over the open sea.

ChromeHounds looked nice, but its slow-moving robots lacked excitement. Hopefully, these jet-powered mechs in AC4 will provide more of a thrill.

Screens Here ...

Finally via YesAsia all those living in the UK and Europe can buy the game DJ Max Portable. Heres the info about the game:

features
English Version
Contains one new song "River Flow" (composed by Planetboom), not found in the original release

description
DJing and Bemani fans listen up!

From the Korean game maker Pentavision comes a special PSP™ version of the web-based and mobile music mixing game DJ Max. The game resembles Konami's popular beatmania series: You take the position as DJ and are challenged to hit the correct button(s) on your PSP™ handheld at the right time to complete the song.

The game is now completely in English and makes DJ Max easy to understand and to pick up for persons without any Korean knowledge. With more than 50 tracks to choose from (including K-Pop, Techno, Breakbeat, Hip Hop, Rock and other popular genres), every music game fan will find a tune of his taste. Lyrics of all songs are included in the game's manual as bonus.

Prior song selection, you will have several options available, such as speed & fader adjustment, mirror mode selection and more. After completion of a song, you will receive a summary of your performance, including a combo & break counter, rating and score.

Your achievements are saved into a Ranking Chart. Additionally, you can unlock new tracks and items in the Gallery Mode.

Depending on the difficulty level, DJ Max can be played in either 4 button (left, up, triangle, circle) or 6 button mode (left, up, right, square, triangle, circle). You can further manually increase the speed with the L/R buttons.

DJ Max contains a number of game modes and extras as listed up below. Be warned that rookies might have their difficulties in the beginning; DJ Max's difficulty level is adjusted to experienced gamers.

Portable Game Mode

Rookie DJing: Easy difficulty 4 button mode. 10 tracks are selectable from the start.

Pro DJing: Normal difficulty 6 button mode. 11 tracks are selectable from the start.

Club DJing: Expert difficulty 4/6 button mode. Select a music theme and unlock new genres.

Unlimited Mixing Stage: Choose from 40 tracks from the start in either 4 or 6 button mode.

Gallery: Shows your disc collection and a number of images and videos once you have completed parts of the game.

Ranking Chart: Your high scores are saved here.

Options: Adjust settings such as Gear Display (left/center/right), Sound (speaker/earphone), Control Settings & Save Settings

OST

All 58 tracks that are included on the Collector's Edition double disc soundtrack album are also stored on the UMD. The player includes useful functions, such as random and repeat play. Ideal to chill out and listen to DJ Max Portable's sound on the go.

M/V Clips

Select from 39 music videos to play back from the start. Here you can sit back and relax and watch DJ Max's music videos without being challenged as DJ at the same time.

DJ Max Portable (International Version) is completely in English and contains one new song.

YesAsia are selling it for US$52.99 [~£27.87] and with free worldwide shipping.

edit: Just in case anyone who is looking to buy it is a member of play-asia and not YesAsia, they are currently also selling it for the same price: Play-Asia ...

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