It's not actually called "Ladies of Ultima", as EA obviously own the rights to the brand. So it's called "Mystik" instead. But it does depict characters and events from the series, and even has the blessing of Ultima's creator, Richard Garriott.

We've posted a selection of shots here, but to see all of them, as well as read up on just who/what they're depicting, visit the calendar's site below.

Mystick [Enrico Ricciardi, via GameSetWatch]

The text heavy visual novel was developed by Japanese independent dev Naoki Sagawa and contains no actual sex scenes. It is not an adult game.

Sagawa was contacted by Microsoft Europe who stated that game contained three "visual reminders of sexual assault" — or basically innuendo. They are:

• One of the girl's hands is restrained. (The other is not.)
• The girl is being pushed down.
• The girl's underwear is visible.

In order to appease Microsoft Europe, Sagawa asked that his game be limited to Japan only distribution and even altered the scene to appease Microsoft Europe. However, Microsoft threatened to delete the game and suspend Sagawa's account if distribution did not cease. And like that, the 240 Microsoft Point game was still barred from Indie Games Marketplace.

The Xbox LIVE Indie Games developers are not beholden merely to the rules of their region, but those of regions far, far away. If Microsoft Europe finds it unacceptable, then the title should be banned in Europe — not everywhere. Ah, the joys of digital distribution!

What's more, if Microsoft Europe finds content like this unacceptable, it might want to review titles like Dead or Alive in which players can punch and kick scantily clad females. Ninjas or not, is Microsoft Europe okay with beating up women?

Picking and choosing is fun!

「それでも、私は愛している」配信停止の経緯 [Windows Live via Canned Dogs via Japanator] [GameSpot]

Here is a YouTube clip of its custom girl game, and here's an example of the software in action: customized characters from Namco's iDOLM@STER. Both NSFW.

Tech Arts 3D is bringing it customizing know-how to Xbox LIVE's Indie Games with an is a "housing action puzzle" called Madrism. In Madrism, players must create an interior design floor plan with all rooms accessible via door. No custom girls! Just rooms, kitchens and bathrooms.

That's right, Tech Arts 3D is apparently looking to go mainstream — 80 Microsoft Points at a time. Good luck with that.

Tech Arts 3D [Official Site NSFW] [Pic]

The stylist, whom she impersonated with a swishy, faux-frenchy accent, kept suggesting she try outfits that were plenty evocative of the oops-I-forgot-my-panties style of glamour photography. Then he reached into his costume trunk and pulled out the deal-breaker, a black fishnet number that was a swimsuit in name only. It left zilch to anyone's imagination, least of all what was in his.

She wasn't going there. "My vagina would have looked like a Honeybaked Ham," Munn said, sitting in a makeup chair and talking to Kotaku before Thursday's taping of G4's Attack of the Show, which she co-hosts. Despite the browbeating to Take! It! All! Off!! Munn's decision not to reveal her charms remained as final at the end of her shoot as it was when she rebuffed Playboy's original request.

Munn thinks she knows now why Playboy came back to say, no prob, a clothes-on pictorial was OK. "I'm convinced the photographer and the stylist were in cahoots to get me naked," Munn said. Hey, never let it be said Playboy doesn't have its readers' number one interest foremost in mind.

"They were showing me all these things to put on and saying, ‘And you can just see everything! And it's just gorge,' and I'm thinking, 'You guys are out of your mind," Munn said. "It ended with my publicist and the stylist screaming at each other."

Becoming one of the few women ever to do a Playboy cover and pictorial without nudity has certainly bolstered Munn's profile as the hottie with Geek Goddess approachability - the gamers' Athena, if you will, thanks largely to her three years with G4. But it's led to plenty of speculation that her choice of a fully functional wardrobe was only a business decision. That now isn't the right time for her to get naked, but one day that right time will come, and we'll both know it, and when it happens it will be tender and magical.

Yeah, forget it.

"It'll never happen," Munn said. "It would never happen. I think there's nothing wrong with Playboy - there's nothing wrong with women who want to be in the magazine, if they're comfortable being naked and showing everything. But I'm looking through it like, ‘Holy shit, that's a lot of vadge.' I mean, it's filled with that stuff. There's nothing wrong with it, it's just not something I'd do."

Not only did Munn turn away trained professionals with graduate degrees in coaxing hot women out of their clothes, she showed them less than she did to Complex back in April. "My underboob's in that shoot," she said. "You can't see anything like that in what I did for Playboy. I did the same amount of nudity, for them, that I did in a bathing suit for Surf magazine."

You can get a look at what she did show for Playboy in this online pictorial. "It's not like I'm the pizza guy in some porno," Munn said. But even though she'd never go half as far as that, Playboy or what it represents isn't intimidating to her. "It's just naked pictures, and they're all of hot girls," she said, "except there's one in there with big bush, that's not really good."

Munn's knows that part of why Playboy came calling, and was cool with her not doing nudity, is she has a fan base that's highly coveted by advertisers. Gamers are easily separated from their dough, after all. But the positive response she's gotten for not taking it off tells her that her fans do care. "They're not going to say, 'Oh, titty! Oh, that's Olivia's vagina, let's go buy it!'" she said. "They're supportive, not just because it gets them off."

But she doesn't worry about being typecast for the geek demographic. To the contrary, it gets her plenty of work. She's just finished up a role in Iron Man II, and got an offer for another from producers who said they wanted someone who isn't the kind of pedestalized-hot that Megan Fox represents.

"I love this world I am in," Munn said. "If I could stay in this world forever, the nerd world, I'd be happy. I've been here for three years, and I can confidently say this is a world I feel comfortable and welcomed in."

Unpublished picture courtesy Playboy.

Here's a video teasing the Attack of the Show host's shoot in the next edition, so, yeah, this is basically a big free ad for Playboy. And G4, I guess. And since she's not gonna be nekkid, this is also a tease of a tease, which makes it a hall of mirrors of frustration, like blue balls in infinite regression.

People are making a big deal about Olivia being one of the few to do a cover shoot without a nude layout, a list that also includes Steve Martin, thankfully. She's just showing solid business acumen - you can only take it off the first time, one time, after all. And she's also not being a skank.

Olivia Munn is Playboy's Next Cover Girl [thebbps, image from OliviaMunn.com

Bape DS [Yuuri's Blog, Kinda NSFW]

Hit the jump for TimeLeap dancing!

UPDATE - Courtesy of an anonymous tipster, we've got another pic after the jump. This one's rather unsuitable for work, though, so...bear that in mind.