The actual lyrics for the "Eyes of a Panther" chorus are "She's got the eyes of a panther - She's got lips like Satan - She's got the eyes of a panther - And you'll soon be matin'." It loses something when you strip out Satan and matin', but I suppose there are rules you need to follow when making an official video game trailer.

The Microsoft chief of police Stephen Toulouse has said that his enforcement team is inspecting early play and applying permabans only to those with illegitimately obtained early copies of either game. Those who got their copy because a retailer broke street date are safe, Stepto says.

"Don't worry folks, anyone who bought a copy early is ok. In general, if you got a receipt, play away. These are illegit copies we're hitting," Toulouse tweeted around 4:15 pm. U.S. Pacific Time.

Reader SK sent us that screengrab and basically admitted he visited a bootlegger with a Forza 3 copy. After getting his 360 modded, he played it for 5 days before getting banz0red.

"I called another friend who went in on wednesday to pick up a copy and get his box done too, and he also received a ban for the same reason," says SK. However, SK says the permaban is account only, not console specific. "I made a new XBL account and was back up and running (minus playing f3, of course) within an hour."

The new model heralds a slew of changes for the PlayStation 3 brand, include a change in the official all-caps PLAYSTATION 3 brand to the PlayStation 3 everyone was using anyway, and a new PS3 logo, as seen etched on the side of the new console.

The new console will come standard with the recently announced firmware 3.0. A vertical stand will be made available for purchase to make the system vertical, and it will also house a Bravia Sync feature, allowing users to control the PS3 with their Bravia TV remote.

The final change is the removal of the Install Other OS feature, meaning no LINUX installs on the smaller unit. The release states that "The new PS3 system will focus on delivering games and other entertainment content, and users will not be able to install other Operating Systems to the new PS3 system."

In Gold Rush a team of players try to grab and move a treasure across the map without getting taken out. Looks kind of fun.

We actually did invite Gears developer Cliff Bleszinski, but his handlers said he was too busy. But Jaffe certainly wasn't some sort of alternate or sub, as the head of his relatively new studio, Eat, Sleep, Play and the lead designer of God of War for the Playstation 2, Jaffe knows his stuff. He also surprised quite a few people recently when he called Gears of War 2 not only the best game of the year, but the best looking console game he's ever played.

Jaffe solidifies his position as one of Kotaku's favorite developers in this podcast where he discusses what he likes about Gears, how God of War 3 will compare and his take on the Playstation 3's successes and failures in 2008.

Despite being exclusive to Sony, Jaffe even talked about his interest in developing a Wii title.

The famously outspoken developer also talks about the ups and downs of blogging on his own site and how he too missed prom. We almost even got him to spill some beans on his next big project for the Playstation 3, but it sounds like we're going to have to wait for an update on his blog for that.

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Don't forget to check out our other Holiday podcasts:
A Very Special Kotaku Holiday Podcast
Media Molecule Talks LittleBigPlanet Moderation, New Pitches and How The Found Out About That Recall
Resistance 2 Podcast: Multiplayer Tweaks Coming
Call of Duty: World at War: Balancing Historic Realism With Fun
Castle Crashers with Major Nelson
Chet Faliszek Talks Left 4 Dead's Future
Home Could Remain in Beta Indefinitely

The still-ubiquitously-named Prince of Persia features a new art style, combat system, open world gameplay, and spunky AI sidekick Elika, all built on the Assassin's Creed engine.

Full release and more marketable game descriptions on the jump.

UBISOFT ANNOUNCES RELEASE DATE FOR PRINCE OF PERSIA

The Prince will Reign December 2, 2008

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – September 18 2008 – Today Ubisoft announced that Prince of Persia will ship December 2, 2008 for the Xbox 360(TM) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, the PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system, and PC. Prince of Persia: The Fallen King will also ship simultaneously and exclusively for the Nintendo DS(TM) system.

Prince of Persia opens an entirely new chapter in the Prince of Persia universe in addition to introducing a fresh Illustrative art style, evolved combat system, open world structure and dynamic AI – most notably in the form of the Prince's powerful ally Elika.

About Prince of Persia
Set in a land rooted in ancient Persian mythology, the Prince finds himself caught in an epic battle between the primal forces of light and darkness: the God of Light, Ormazd versus his brother Ahriman, the destructive God of Darkness. The Prince arrives just in time to witness the destruction of the legendary Tree of Life – an act which threatens to plunge the entire world into eternal darkness. Manifested in the form of the Corruption, a dark substance that physically contaminates the land and the skies, the Prince must partner with Elika, a deadly companion, to heal the world from the evil Corruption.

About Prince of Persia: The Fallen King
Facing imminent danger, the Prince flees to a deserted kingdom that seemingly offers sanctuary. Already touched by the evil Corruption, a dark substance that physically contaminates the land and the skies, the kingdom is filled with adventure, challenge and intrigue. As the Prince seeks a way to fight the spreading Corruption destroying the land, he encounters a partially infected creature that promises salvation. But is the creature truly an ally or merely an enemy in disguise? It seems this perilous alliance may be the only way for the Prince to face the forces of darkness and save the Persian kingdom from the Corruption once and for all.

The latest debate concluded this morning. It's all about Grand Theft Auto IV. We talked about bringing our A game for this one. Or at least we would have if we spoke in sports metaphors. It's full of spoilers... about the game's moral quandaries, its ending and other stuff. So beware.

But if you're looking to see him have a go at me for preferring San Andreas to GTA IV and if you're interested in stuff like this...

N'Gai: I'm wondering whether the fault lies not with inconsistencies in the work of Rockstar's writing team, but with the credulity of all of us. Liberty City is filled with self-deluded characters like Playboy X, Manny and Brucie, who present themselves one way only to be exposed by their behavior. Why do we take Niko at face value? Is it just because he's our avatar? ... Maybe Niko is deceiving himself as much as do the rest of the lowlifes he runs with. Maybe as much as he believes he's fatigued with death and killing, he's actually drawn to it? Maybe we have all misunderstood Niko Bellic.

...then head to either of our sites and read the loooong debate. I'm linking to his version, because I'm classy.

Round One
Round Two
Final Round

The team just announced the release of a new downloadable map pack for SOCOM 3: U.S. Navy SEALs and SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Combined Assault. This third downloadable map pack includes SOCOM and SOCOM II maps Crossroads, Fishhook, Frostfire and Guidance.

Crossroads is a SOCOM II urban map based in North Africa. Crossroads consistently ranks as the most popular classic SOCOM map and a next generation version of Crossroads will be featured in SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation. It is playable in a day or night setting with up to 16 players in Suppression, Demolition and Control gametypes.

Fishhook is a SOCOM II map based on a seaside North African village. It is playable with up to 16 players in a day or night setting in Suppression, Extraction, Control and Breach gametypes.

Frostfire is a SOCOM map which features an oil drilling platform off of the coast of Alaska. It is playable in a day or night setting with up to 16 players in Suppression, Control and Demolition gametypes.

Guidance is a SOCOM II map which features an ex-soviet military base in Russia. It is playable in a day or night setting with up to 16 players in Suppression, Demolition and Control gametypes.

The best part, the new map pack is totally free. Sounds like just the thing to hold me over until SOCOM Confrontations hits in September.

NEW SOCOM 3 AND SOCOM CA MAP PACK RELEASED... FOR FREE! [SOCOM, thanks txshurricane]

Starting Thursday, gamers will be able to grab the Burnout Paradise demo on the Playstation Network and Xbox Live Marketplace, but why wait until then to start studying what you'll be playing with?

Criterion Games posted a "glance" at their demo map today, showing off a wedge of Paradise City and some of the routes taken along the coastline including Motor City, Big Surf Beach and Ocean View. The demo will also include three events.

I can't wait to see the plethora of "O faces" that flood the net once the game, and it's auto snapshot ability, hits stores on Jan. 22.

GRAB A SLICE OF PARADISE ON THE 13TH OF DECEMBER [Criterion Games]

One of the things I found amazingly odd was that the awards themselves really seemed to take a back seat to the musical performances, commercials, myriad non video game related guest stars, and occasional World Premier Trailers for games like Little Big Planet, Rainbow 6 Vegas 2, Borderlands, TNA Wrestling, Prototype and Gran Turismo 5. It was almost like the awards were an afterthought, tacked on to an evening of oohing and ahhing over the next big name to take the stage. But, they did eventually get around to the awards and while there were no huge surprises, in general the winners seemed pretty in line with most people's guesses.

*Caution: Spoilers ahead. If you don't want to know any of the winners until the show airs tonight, read no further!*

BioShock took home three awards including Best Original Score, Best Xbox 360 Game and the big daddy of them all, Game of the Year. Fan favorite Halo 3 had two wins with Best Multiplayer Game and the highly dubious Most Addictive game fueled by Dew. Seeing as Mountain Dew launched a full fledged advertising campaign that revolved around a new soft drink devoted to Halo 3 this was hardly a surprise even though this category was allegedly voted on by the fans.

Call of Duty 4 and The Orange Box were the other big winners with two awards each and Harmonix rocked the house by taking Studio of the Year as well as Best Rhythm Game and Best Soundtrack for Rock Band. Nintendo games in general were highly underrepresented although they did manage to net three awards: Best Handheld Game for The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass and Best Action Game and Best Wii Game for Super Mario Galaxy. The Best PS3 Game was given to Insomniac's Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction and a special award was given to Kristen Bell for Best Newcomer for her work on Assassin's Creed although there didn't really seem to be any other nominees in the category and if there were, they weren't mentioned.

The evening was also marked by celebrity appearances by the likes of show host and badass Samuel L. Jackson, freaky magician Criss Angel, "TNA" wrestling stars Kurt and Karen Angle, the still smokin' Tia Carrere, legendary Marvel comics god Stan Lee, the godfather of skateboarding Tony Hawk, Simpsons creator Matt Groening, flag toting boxing promoter Don King, much too pretty reality stars Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt, NFL quarterback Matt Leinart, complete douchebag Dave Navarro, diminutive bisexual Tila Tequila and comedians Patton Oswalt, Brian Posehn and Raphie May. Musical guest performers included multiple performances by the Foo Fighters, a song from southern fried rocker Kid Rock and a far too short old school game medley by Tommy Tallarico's Video Games Live Orchestra.

Some of the other hilights of the evening were great quotes by Samuel L. Jackson ("Mr. Miyamoto, lay off the weed!") and Matt Groening ("Thanks to the game industry for proving that game executives aren't nearly as big assholes as TV executives.") and a particularly funny video clip parodying anti-video game violence commercials. It showed Kim Jong Il, Stalin, Saddam Hussein and other dictators playing violent video games with the punchline "Paid for by the friends of Jack Thompson." Ah Jack, such an easy target...

All in all it was a pretty entertaining event (if not somewhat predictable) with the only real ants-at-the-picnic moment coming at the very end. I had seen the guys from Gamecock roaming about in the audience in costume all night and wondered if they were going to do some sort of performance of speech and as it turns out, they did although it wasn't really part of the scheduled show. Just as Ken Levine was taking the stage to accept the Game of the year award for BioShock, the feisty Gamecockers leapt on the stage, hijacked the mic with some of self promotional banter effectively taking up the time that had been alloted for Ken's acceptance speech. I have been a big proponent of Gamecock and what they are doing for independent titles, but this was seriously bad form on their part. Briefly hijacking the show to make a point is one thing, but stealing another man's hard earned thunder is quite another.

After it was all over, quite a few of us were milling about in the lobby area and I got a chance to see Ken and congratulate him. As usual he was gracious and didn't seem to be ruffled at all by what had happened to him on stage. His lovely wife whom I had met at the BioShock launch party was also present with her parents and they all seemed very proud and happy with the big win. The Insomniac boys rolled by, slightly tipsy and happy as two kids on Christmas morning with their award although they did express some disappointment in not being able to take the award with them (they mail it to you later) on their tour of the strip. Super foxy Helen McWilliams and her dapper cohort Daniel Sussman arrived and the cheerful mood of booze and camaraderie was high. Helen was quite the bombshell in her tight black dress and heels although once the crowds had passed, the shoes came off. When some fans asked to take a picture with her I graciously accepted the duty of holding the goddess of video game rock's shoes and having hit the bar a few times myself throughout the night, I just couldn't help taking a token lick. Tiff may lay claim to her famous PSP licking picture, but who else can say they licked Helen McWilliams' shoes?

Stay tuned later today when I bring you all the action from the red carpet where I spoke with some of the nominees and celebrities and took a ton of pictures. For the full list of all the nominees and winners, merely scroll down the page. The winners of each category are in bold.

Game of the Year
BioShock
Halo 3
Mass Effect
The Orange Box

Best Shooter
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
BioShock
Halo 3
The Orange Box

Best Action Game
Super Mario Galaxy
Assassin's Creed
God of War 2
Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction

Best Rhythm Game
Rock Band
Guitar Hero Encore: Rock the 80s
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Jam Sessions

Best RPG
Mass Effect
Eternal Sonata
Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3

Best Driving Game
Colin McRae: DiRT
Forza Motorsport 2
Need for Speed ProStreet
Project Gotham Racing 4

Best Military Game
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas
World in Conflict

Studio of the Year
Harmonix
Bungie Studios
Irrational Games
Valve

Best Graphics
Crysis
BioShock
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Mass Effect

Breakthrough Technology
Portal
Crysis
Halo 3
Rock Band

Best PS3 Game
Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction
Heavenly Sword
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
Warhawk

Best Wii Game
Super Mario Galaxy
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
Super Paper Mario

Best Xbox 360 Game
BioShock
Halo 3
Mass Effect
The Orange Box

Best PC Game
The Orange Box
BioShock
Crysis
World in Conflict

Best Individual Sports Game
Skate
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground
Virtua Tennis 3

Best Team Sports Game
Madden NFL 08
NBA 2K8
NHL 08
Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2007

Best Handheld Game
The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions
Syphon Filter: Logan's Shadow
Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords

Best Game Based on a Movie or TV Show
The Simpsons Game
Naruto: Rise of a Ninja
Stranglehold

Best Soundtrack
Rock Band
BioShock
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground

Best Original Score
BioShock
God of War 2
Halo 3
Mass Effect

Best Multiplayer Game
Halo 3
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Rock Band
The Orange Box

Most Addictive Game Fueled by Dew
Halo 3
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Team Fortress 2
Wii Sports

Halo 3 Advert - Consolevania [youtube]

That's still high compared to the Xbox 360's 32MB of system utility dedicated RAM, but a sizable improvement.

Inner Bits also reveals that developers now have access to built in utilities that will allow them to save screen shots to player's profiles, stream custom soundtracks, and also use the PlayStation Portable as a secondary display. All of these new features, should developers choose to use them, will require an additional memory hit, but seem to be steps in the right direction.

More detail on the news is available at Inner Bits in depth report.

PS3 1.80 SDK [Inner Bits]

A Toys R Us Canada employee and faithful Kotaku reader sends in word that the fabled Xbox 360 Pro Bundle has officially hit the toy store's inventory system. He even sent us this picture to prove it, along with a bunch of others, the tease.

The mole says that the system is listed at $499 and comes with an Xbox 360 premium console, copy of Project Gotham Racing 3, a 1,250 point cade and three months of Xbox Live Gold. While the price listed in the photo is Canadian, I'm guessing that the price in the U.S. will be same as the current premium console price, or $399.

Currently, the regular Premium bundle is listed at the same price, but the tipster believes that will change when the console bundle starts selling. No word yet on when the bundle will start officially selling, but we'll make sure to update you when we find out. Brian Crecente

While the new Playstation 3 controller isn't much to look at, watching this developer flail about in an attempt to convince us that playing Warhawk with the motion sensor is a jolly ol' time is definitely worth a gander, preferably whilst rubbing Icy/Hot on your joints in sympathy.