All the millions who want the game, can get it. But still, low and behold, there were lines earlier this morning in Akihabara. Reader TitillatedOcelot has been in Tokyo on his honeymoon, and what's more romantic than taking pictures of people waiting in line? Nothing!

According to TitillatedOcelot, "Well, flying back to Canada today. I was in Japan for my honeymoon, and as it turns out, the last hotel we were staying at was one station away from the Electric City. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see the launch of a high-profile title up close. And no, I didn't snag a copy for myself. I'm gonna wait for the localized one as my Japanese is patchy at best."

Thanks Titillated! And congrats on the marriage dealio!

Rage won't be out until 2010, according to id's Tim Hollenshead, meaning this summertime preview of the game will still mean a substantial wait. Game Informer promises "tons of exclusive dirt on the post-apocalyptic title, including plenty of gameplay details and loads of screens," so I hope the magazine got my change of address all sorted out.

The shooter is likely to be the last title id Software releases with EA Partners, now that it's owned by ZeniMax Media.

August Cover Revealed [Game Informer]

Choose-your-own-adventure books were popular in the 1980s. Nowadays, I can only find them at garage sales with a lot of the stat pages missing. I didn't grow up with the Fighting Fantasy series, but it sounds like the character development was more detailed than my Master of Kung Fu book. Also, I'm told that while most choose-your-own-adventures had multiple endings, the branching paths in Fighting Fantasy typically led to death. Yikes.

What Is It?
Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is a first-person action RPG set in the same place as the novel with roughly the same plot. Players can choose from one of three different classes with modifiable stats and venture through the mountain and the town around it in search of the Warlock. There are side quests along the way and tons of non-playable characters to interact with. The 3D action takes p lace in the top screen while the bottom screen is home to the inventory and the map, which you can make notes on.

What We Saw
I spent about 30 minutes with the game in a dungeon halfway through the main quest. The primary objective was to find a secret entrance into the upper levels of the mountain, while the secondary quest involved a choice between helping skeletons by killing dwarves and helping dwarves by killing skeletons.

How Far Along Is It?
The game is due out in October.

What Needs Improvement?
What Do I Do With The Stylus? The control scheme in Fighting Fantasy allows players to use the face buttons or the stylus to look around; but other than that, it's not clear what you're supposed to do with the stylus. You can use it to make notes on the dungeon map or cast spells and select weapons if you don't feel like jabbing the lower screen with your fingertips. However, unless you're using the stylus to look, it's almost like you're just trying to keep it out of the way while you play.

What Should Stay The Same?
Rich Environments: From the exterior town around the mountain to the various caverns inside Firetop Mountain, the 3D environments in Fighting Fantasy just look so detailed. I'm not sure if it's the art style that gives colors and textures this really rich detail, or if somehow the developer has optimized the DS's rendering capabilities. But either way, visually, Fighting Fantasy is very entertaining.

Fast Combat: Whether you're a melee class or a ranged class, the combat in Fighting Fantasy is fast-paced. The shoulder buttons control melee combat – both quick attacks and slower, powerful strikes – and to cast a spell, you double-tap it on the lower screen (and make sure you're pointed in the right direction in the top screen). There's no targeting reticule, but from the few spells I cast, I get the feeling that the game is forgiving in ranged combat. Always a plus if you're going to be frantically casting spells.

Final Thoughts
I'm not sure how I feel about there being only one ending, but it's good to hear that even with a single critical path, there will still be 8-10 hours of solid adventuring. If nothing else, I'm always happy to have another adventure game on the DS, especially one that comes with a rich IP already attached to it.

Kodu Game Lab isn't a video game, per se, but a lot of the pre-packaged worlds that come with the Game Lab certainly count. There's a Frogger recreation, a bumper boat style game, and even an odd take on air hockey with really awesome controls. Also, since Kodu players can upload their own worlds, you're basically buying an eternal ticket to whatever games other users can come up with.

And if you don't like what they come up with, you can always make your own games.

Loved
Myriad Options: Kodu lets users change everything in the game world from the sky color to the topography of the terrain, as well as character behavior to game conditions for winning and losing. Far from being a simple exercise in matching colors and textures, or teaching a Kodu to move forward, the options lets users create a multitude of environments and game types. You could spend hours inventing your own environments—like the inside of a computer, a planet in deep space, etc.—or, like me, two hours trying to recreate the opening world from the original Super Mario Bros.

Cute Kodus: The default objects (apples, clouds, trees, etc.) and creatures (Kodus and Bots) are easily recognizable and very cute. The simplicity of the design makes it easier to come up with ideas for worlds. My first attempt was an adventure in which a motorcycle falls in love with a blimp on top of a castle and has to collect gold coins from a forest to enter the castle and reach the blimp. It was awesome—and by awesome, I mean ridiculously cute.

Hated
Lousy Interface: There are two primary interfaces users need to master to build words. The first is a drop-down listing of what the 360 controller buttons do that remains on screen whenever you go into Edit mode; the second is a side-scrolling menu where you can select all your world-editing tools. The two menus don't match up with each other stylistically and sometimes the side-scrolling menu will cover up the drop-down menu. This can make it especially tough for first-timers to figure out where to go in one menu and what to press once they get there to make the editing go. The interface can also make it hard for users to figure out what's breaking their world when they go to run it since there's no way to tell if it's the trees spitting coins or a mistake in the blimp's "express love" behavior programming that's ruining the frame rate.

Kodu Game Lab is a pretty spiffy tool for anyone with aspirations of game design. For anyone else, though, the myriad options and clunky interface might be overwhelming. Even if that's the case, I still think Kodu might be worth a look a week or two after its release, just to see what kind of games people have come up with.

Like I said, don't think of it as a one-time purchase kind of game – think of it as a ticket to the minds of fledgling game developers.

Kodu Game Lab was developed by Microsoft Research for Xbox Live Community Games on June 30. Retails for 400 Microsoft Points ($5). Played all tutorial and pre-packaged worlds and created one complete and one partial world of my own.

Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ.

Today Trish drove from somewhere in Tennessee to somewhere in Kansas, that's about 650 miles. What did I do? I sat in the middle row writing features, news and columns. What I didn't do was give away any schwag because no one asked for any. Hmmm, maybe I should have posted a pic of the van we were in. ;P

As much as I've enjoyed this three week or so cross-country trek with Trish and her parents, I can't wait to be home Saturday night.

How was your drive? Sorry I missed you when you passed through Denver. I'll make sure to blame anything wrong in my neighborhood on you when I get back.

What you missed:
[UPDATE] Eidos Once Again Attempting To Mess With Review Scores?
Hudson Soft Dials Up The Horror With Calling
Dante's Inferno Lust Level Could Have Been Packed With Sex
Forza 3 Will Deliver Nearly Limitless Online Multiplayer Variety
Guest Op/Ed: The Impact of Homophobia in Virtual Communities
The Saboteur Impressions: A New Way To Kill Nazis
One Weird Wii Control Scheme
Half-Minute Hero Preview: Don't Blink And Miss It
Valve Brings Left 4 Dead 2 To Comic-Con, Reveals "Swamp Fever"
Novel, Write Thyself

Confused about commenting on Kotaku? Read our FAQ and about our commenting system.

The day after Activision pushed back sci-fi first person shooter Singularity, Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia believes that the signs that StarCraft II will be ultimately be a 2010 title, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.

We've already braced ourselves for the bad news, considering Dustin Browder, the game's lead designer, told us the developer needs four to six months of public beta exposure to get the game in tip-top shape. Still a possibility, as Blizzard released StarCraft: Brood War at the end of November 1998, but looking less and less likely as the days progress.

Blizzard has never officially dated the game, only saying the highly anticipated StarCraft sequel would be released when the game "meets our standards and the expectations of our players." And those expectations are, well, kinda high.

Activision Seen Delaying Two Big Games [WSJ]

Shadow Complex's Apple Debut: On Tuesday, I met Donald and Laura Mustard, the developer and public relations rep couple who showed me the August-scheduled Xbox Live Arcade game Shadow Complex. A detail they told me that didn't make it into my coverage was that, before Epic purchased their home studio, Chair Entertainment, before Microsoft signed on to publish their game, they were meeting with people at Game Developers Conference 2008... showing a video of Shadow Complex running on one of their iPhones. That iPhone video was a hit, they remembered. Laura mentioned that Epic vice president Mark Rein proudly showed off the phone. He gets excited about what developers do with Unreal tech. But, no, the game never was programmed to actually be played on the iPhone.

Modern Warfare 2 Wii MIA: Call of Duty: World at War was a hit on the Wii last year, selling more than a million copies. At E3 last month I asked Nintendo president Reggie Fils-Aime whether the series was returning this year to the Wii, or if the then non-COD-named Modern Warfare 2 was going to have a Wii version. He said that that was a question for series publisher Activision. So this week, right as the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 naming news was breaking (not the best timing), I shot Kotaku's rep for all things Activision a note inquiring about whether COD or MW was going to have a Wii presence. The response was that Activision had no information to share. So... we wait.

Xcalibur Is Sleeping: At last night's XSeed event, where I played Half-Minute Hero, Sky Crawlers and demo versions of some other upcoming games, I noticed a guy sitting in a chair inputting a character name into part of the character customization screen of Wii role-playing game Valhalla Knights: Eldar Saga. I found this odd, because there doesn't seem to be a good reason to spend time inputting a name for your character in a copy of a game you can't take home. The name he was typing in was "Xcalibur." While he was doing this, Destructoid's Samit Sarkar was interviewing an XSeed official about the game. They were being serious, so I turned to Joystiq's Andrew Yoon to remark about the guy typing in the name. OK. Funny enough. We started to leave. Then I looked at the guy again. He was passed out. Wii in hand. Asleep. Samit's interview continued. I didn't play the game, but even the most amazing games don't exactly have the most rousing name-input screens. So don't blame Valhalla Knights for this one.

Horror Needs Quiet: Also at the XSeed event, I tried the Ju-On: The Grudge sort-of-game, which is labeled by its publisher as a "haunted house simulator." I used the Wii like a flashlight to slowly walk through a dark hospital corridor. I barely got a sense of how this game is supposed to feel, which is a problem for horror titles that might be better demoed in quiet places, not noisy second floors of Japanese restaurants. (Not that horror games are ever demoed in quiet places.) Excellent detail from the official fact sheet: "Unlike any other product on the Wii, this game forgoes slow-paced story elements to offer immediate gratification with scare after scare."

No Help To Nokia: I got a call from a guy from Nokia at some point this week to speak my mind about mobile games. Um, I'm no expert. People like iPhone games, I hear? Our readers are a little interested in mobile games but not hugely interested? I said that I needed to be convinced that there are games worth playing on today's phones in order to think people will be eager for more coverage. Maybe that's happening on the iPhone, but if it's happening on other phones, I'm unaware. It's a blind spot.

I think that's all that I didn't get to this week... other than the stuff I'm saving for next week. Have a good weekend, folks. Don't yell at Owen too much.

You'll be playing Twisted Pixel's swell-looking Splosion Man much earlier than previously planned, on July 22nd, according to the updated schedule from Xbox Live's Major Nelson.

Later, on August 5th, you'll get access to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles In Time Re-shelled on XBLA. Not a bad trade-off. If only we could do something about those prices, though...

The basic need-to-know info about this game is this: it's City of Heroes, only bigger and better. And, no, Marvel and/or DC Comics won't be suing anybody anytime soon over it because the developer is scrupulous about original intellectual property. Not to mention Cryptic has plenty to work with from the pen-and-paper game on which the game is based.

That just leaves these five things you might not know—and probably should—before diving into a superhero-centric world.

1) Player customization will consume you
The player customization system isn't based on classes and doesn't require you to adhere to any pre-set superpowers. In other words, if you wanted to a be a gadget-using, fire-and-ice based golem or a scantily-clad dark magic cowgirl elf, you could make it happen—and no armor pick-ups or costume limitations would mar your mental image of what your hero is supposed to look like. There are default superpower sets you can choose from and a randomization option for body type and costume that let you get your character going that much quicker. Even better, you can lock certain options while clicking random so that you can keep a color scheme you like but try different body types, etc. And if you decided you liked one but clicked "Random" too soon, you can click "Undo" and go back to it.

This will probably occupy my first three and a half hours of gameplay.

2) Yes, there is PvP
Player versus player belongs in a superhero game. What do superheroes do besides flying around clobbering people out to destroy a city? Sure, they have girlfriends, sidekicks and drama with alter-egos – but Champions Online is an MMO, not a dating sim. Ergo, we need PvP.

PvP in Champions takes place both in the world and in special maps. The incentive to PvP (aside from satisfying your inner jerk) comes from very rare item drops (which are not subtracted from the loser's inventory) and experience points awarded for victories.

We were shown the dueling system that you can activate in the world by selecting a hero and challenging them to a duel. Once the other player agrees, a force field goes up around both players, preventing all other characters from interfering in the fight. From there, fighting game rules apply: first one to lose all hit points or get knocked out of the ring loses.

The PvP-centric map we saw was a five on five "prison break" level where five heroes are on the red team (trying to bust out of prison) and five were on the blue team. Both teams had two leader characters – the goal of the other team was the kill those leaders and take over as many turrets and hack as many computers as possible to make things difficult for the other three players to cross the prison to find the leaders.

3) The Nemesis System is like the Buddy System, only evil
What would a superhero be without a nemesis? A spandex-wearing Good Samaritan maniac, that's what.

Cryptic works in every hero's own private nemesis by letting the player customize their own evil villain who will then constantly try to destroy the player. The nemesis' visual appearance is determined with the same menu as the hero's character creation screen – but there are four "Nemesis Details" the player has to fill out in addition to the crucial costume and gender choices. First you pick the fighting style, which determines if they're a cold-hearted mastermind or a crazy savage. Then you choose their superpowers, which are like yours, but they have to use one of the presets – also, unlike regular enemies, a nemesis can use all powers within a power set instead of only a few. Next, you choose their minions (robots, ninjas, etc.) and a smaller power set for the minions.

Once created, a nemesis will encounter the hero randomly in the world. Additionally, optional "popcorn" missions will appear where the hero takes on his or her nemesis in a special map. When a superhero encounters their nemesis in the world, other players can join up to defeat him or her (and they don't die – they just go to jail or whatever); but the popcorn missions are solo instanced. We only saw one of these and it was mostly about "go here, clobber this, go there, rescue that non-playable superhero so he can join your party, etc."

According to creative director Jack Emmert, there's more to most maps than this (like "how do I get out of here?" puzzles), especially when it comes to nemeses. Also, he says, at higher levels, you will get the opportunity to put your nemesis away for good and choose a new one.

4) It may be action-flavored, but it's still MMO combat
I hate to be cynical, but a lot of MMO developers claim that their combat is somehow different than the usual click-click-cool down-click-click. Cryptic is no different, claiming that the frenetic pace of combat is what makes their MMO more action-y than most, despite still having to click on attacks, charge up certain attacks and do the cool-down thing. However, in the lone five-on-five prison break map we were permitted to play, I'm not sure it felt all that different than, say, World of Warcraft. Also, it may have something to do with the powers your character has. The ranged lighting chick I played felt like WoW because I just clicked and sat still while she shocked the beejesus out of the targeted enemy; but the brawler kung-fu guy I tried probably would have felt different in up close and personal melee (if I was continually getting him killed by ranged characters, that is). Definitely something that warrants a more thorough study.

5) There are no limitations besides the level
To me, what makes a good comic book superhero is the drama that comes from superpower limitations. The best stories are not about what Superman or Spider-Man can do; it's about what they can't. Champions has no limitations like these. There are no two superpowers that won't go together and no vulnerabilities to anything that comes from items, enemies or powers. The only limit is the level – you gain more superpowers as you level up (capped at 40 for now), so at lower levels, there might be things you can't do… but there's never any drama to any of it.

I brought this up with Jack Emmert because he's a comic book fan who knows what I'm talking about. He seemed really intrigued and is already talking about plans for patches and expansions to build out the role of the nemesis. So there may be more to this idea yet to come – but for now, no drama. Only superpowers.

All in all, I really like what I saw with Champions Online. It looked great, played decently enough (although two PvP matches really isn't enough time to be completely sure) and it's about superheroes – one of my favorite things in the world next to unicorns. If my computer can stand it, I'll definitely have to give Champions a try when it launches seven weeks from now.

Here, have some screens:

Few though have had to tell a story in a universe almost completely controlled by the gamers themselves, the very people most likely to read those novels.

That's what confront the authors of Eve Online's novelized fiction. And the way the deal with it can have some surprising consequences.

The virtual universe of online computer game Eve Online is a thriving, thrilling place of starship fights, rampant piracy, militant corporations and financial espionage.

The game's hundreds of thousands of players assume the roles of characters who fill every need in the game, controlling miner, trader, pirate and CEO. More interesting, though, the players have almost total control over the lifeblood of the game: Its economy.

The result is a sometimes vicious environment of intrigue, racketeering and politics. And it's up to the developer's creative writing team to at times turn this unordered chaos into a living space opera. Two among the team have also used it to craft novels.

Tony Gonzales' Eve Online: The Empyrean Age was released in 2008 and Hjalti Danielsson's Eve Online: The Burning Life is due out this fall. And the authors took very different approaches to their work.

The Empyrean Age was used to tell the story of major events that took place in the game's universe as part of an update released for the game at the same time.

"My task was to tell the story about how this great war comes to pass-describing what was happening behind the scenes, and the choices that leaders of nations faced before committing to such a grave undertaking," Gonzales told Kotaku.

Gonzales said that early on publisher CCP Games decided not to include any of the many influential players or their character creations in the novel.

"Though tempting, the fact is that doing so would have been an unnecessary risky and thus inappropriate for the (game's) first foray beyond gaming into the greater science fiction community.," he said. "The main reason is because EVE Online has incredibly competitive gameplay. Player actions of a scale considered momentous enough to build a novel plot around tend to happen at a direct and often unpleasant cost to other players. "

And the history of conflict, in both the real world and the fictional, always has at least two sides: The victor's is the one most commonly told, he said.

So instead, The Empyrean Age took the "golden path."

"We can, for example, speak of aggregate player actions in broad strokes.," he said. "We just need to find a way to tell that story accurately and fairly, and more importantly establish that there's an audience eager to read about it."

Gonzeles' The Empyrean Age used broad strokes to tell a game-changing story that launched a war between the game's two main empires. But Danielsson's The Burning Life strives to convey a sense of what it's like to be a regular inhabitant in the universe of Eve Online

Danielsson said that to narrow the focus of the book he made lists of everything he wanted to use from the game and prioritized them.

"There was no way I could pick just one setting and one story to tell," he told Kotaku. "Instead, I had my characters go on a journey through the EVE cluster, encountering people with very different backgrounds and attitudes along the way, and chronicling the life in all those places."

And while Danielsson, like Gonzales, didn't overtly use any player history or actions in his book, he said it's hard to avoid.

"There is the lore that we create and the lore the players create, and a myriad of overlaps between the two," he said. "There is a feed there, back and forth, that the novel plugs into. "

Creating fiction in a fictional world not totally controlled by the author can have its challenges, Danielsson said.

"It's immensely challenging," he said. "A novel is static and can only reflect the game world at a certain specific point - and parts of EVE go through some pretty big changes at times, but it must nonetheless be timeless enough that it can be enjoyed a year later, three years later, and so on."

With the emergent storytelling that naturally sprouts from games like Eve Online it begs the question, when will game-based novels write themselves?

"Novelizing direct player actions would be almost exclusively historical and investigative reporting," Gonzales points out. "In fact, a novel probably isn't the best way to tell their story. But a dedicated history of player actions, especially if it included all the interesting externalities and accompanying social dynamics, might be a compelling tale on its own without any author-added role-playing elements to turn it into space opera. "

"If we can prove that the audience for this is there, we're definitely willing to pursue it."

Well Played is a weekly news and opinion column about the big stories of the week in the gaming industry and its bigger impact on things to come. Feel free to join in the discussion.

The "where" is the EA Gaming Lounge Presented by Xbox 360 at the Hilton San Diego Gaslamp Quarter Hotel. The "when" is 2-9 pm Thursday through Saturday, and 12-5 pm on Sunday, which means you'll need to miss out on valuable Con time—but will more than likely be worth it.

Should you not have the means to make it to Comic-Con this year, we'll be going hands-on with Left 4 Dead 2 on the Wednesday before Comic-Con kicks off officially. Valve promises to not only show off the second of five campaigns featured in L4D2, but also "a few more of the 20-plus new items" that will be included in the sequel.

Oh, that picture plumps when you click it, should you feel like squinting very hard for any details.

While I know Parry from his time with Nerf Herder, with songs like "New Jersey Girl" and "Van Halen" holding special places in my heart, the slightly younger generation knows him as the man behind countless ridiculously catchy YouTube jingles, from "Do You Life Waffles?" to my personal favorite, "Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom". In the video for "The Girl at the Video Game Store", Parry is joined by AotS female host Olivia Munn as the titular girl, with a rather impressive turn at the drums by the show's male host, Kevin Pereira. I am extremely glad they didn't mix those two up, though I am sure Kevin has a very attractive midriff.

The song itself? Despite some painfully forced lines ("At Tekken she'll kick your ass?" Thanks, Yoda), Gripp's signature infectious melodies are firmly in place, and I've been humming the damn thing all day. I hate you, Parry Gripp.

Video Game Girl: Nerf Herder's Parry Gripp Music Video [G4TV.com]

Half-Minute Hero is a PSP game that rested unattended at a New York City event for XSeed games that I attended last night. It was an assuming oddity in the corner, running on the console that doesn't have many games that people are talking about these days. In other words, it would have been easy to miss.

It's a game that just may be the most marvelous answer to the criticism that Japanese role-playing games are tediously-paced.

This game, at least its hero mode, plays a full RPG quest in 30 seconds, at a pace that makes WarioWare seem relaxed. And would you believe it's the first RPG I've played that had me hoping for more random encounters?

What Is It?

Half-Minute Hero is a PSP game developed by Marvelous Entertainment and Opus Studio with eight-bit graphics but a thoroughly modern send-up to top-down Japanese role-playing games.

What We Saw

The game is said to have four modes of play, including a magician mode and princess mode that play like riffs off of genres other than the JRPGs lampooned in the hero mode I tired. I got to play two missions. Each set my hero down on an old Final Fantasy SNES-era world map with a timer counting down 30 seconds until game-ending catastrophe. I had just a half-minute to save the world from some comically evil dark lords.

How Far Along Is It?

The game is slated for a Fall 2009 release. The two missions I played were fully localized and feature-complete. I don't know how far along the rest of the game is.

What Needs Improvement?

Not Much: The game hyper-accelerates the pace of the traditional role-playing game flawlessly. The demo missions were a little hard, but I didn't mind. It was confusing to figure out which health items on sale in the shops did what, but that wasn't a big problem either.

What Should Stay The Same?

Most of It: You control the hero with the d-pad and walk (or run) him around the map. You have just 30 seconds — sort of. Entering castles, towns or other locations represented by buildings pauses the game's countdown. In those locations, the game switches to 2D-side-scrolling and lets you talk or buy items such as better swords, shields or even a potion that refills the countdown clock. None of the talking was serious. And the spirit of the game compels the player to get on with it. Out in the overworld wilderness, I discovered that random encounters transition the game into battle mode. These battles are also rendered in 2D and are run automatically. Your hero dashes to the right, sword pointed at enemy. All I could do was wait for his repeated attacks to succeed. Or I could make him flee. All of this happens in Charlie-Chaplin-style high speed. A battle is over in two seconds. Experience points are tallied, gold is earned. Leveling up commences (I went up six levels in half a minute). Leveling is fun, but the goal is to rush to the boss — hoping that by the time you get near his lair you've been prompted with the "You > Evil." That alert indicates that victory is attainable. So you crush the boss. With hundredths of seconds to spare. Very vague echoes of Majora's Mask.

Respects For The Gamer: I am weary of JRPGs that waste players' time with cumbersome menus as well as inane and unessential dialogue. Half-Minute Hero seems to be designed by people who agree and have sped things along. Gameplay and fun appear to have been prioritized over tedious item management and maudlin narrative.

Final Thoughts

XSeed was showing only a tiny portion of the game. The official fact sheet for the title promises 15 hours of gameplay, spread across four modes of play that have 30 missions each. While missions can last more than 30-seconds if you make the necessary time-extension purchases in some missions, that still doesn't add up. But who's counting?

It may well be that the other modes of the game — conspicuously absent from the demo I was able to play — don't share the hero mode's ingenuity. That's a key thing to look for as the game's fall 2009 release approaches. Nevertheless, the game made the best first-impression of any new title I sampled this week.

Actually, it was a pretty good week for everyone, as hardware sales were up all over—with the exception of the PlayStation 3, which saw only a minor drop from last week. We'd expect the good news for Nintendo to continue next week, when Dragon Quest IX sales are reported. That special edition DQ IX-themed Nintendo DS is sure to do wonders for the platform's pie chart performance.

The hardware contest in Japan, as told by sales tracker Media Create for the week of June 29th to July 5th, panned out like so.

Nintendo DSi - 46,855
PSP - 32,849
Wii - 24,971
PlayStation 3 - 11,196
Nintendo DS Lite - 7,507
Xbox 360 - 5,876
PlayStation 2 - 3,734

Fur will fly, items will be stole, paws will...paw, and yes - there will be belly rubs if I have anything to say about it. A new downloadable quest for Capcom's Monster Hunter Freedom Unite sees players battling their way through a horde of Felynes and Melynx cat creatures.

To the one million Felyne fans out there: At long last we bring you our special challenge! Skillfully clear this and your reward will be a very special ticket!"

That special ticket allows you to create a new armor - the Hunter T-Shirt.

I haven't picked up Monster Hunter Freedom Unite yet, but I didn't know there were kitties in it before. Big fan of kitties. *twitches*

Monster Hunter Unite DLC: 2 Colors of Meow [Capcom Unity]

The LA Times' Ben Fritz (formerly blogging about games for Variety) recently visited San Francisco-based Addicting Games to learn about how and why the Viacom-owned site makes games about the news.

The site hosts — and sometimes develops — simple web games, sometimes based on current events.

While his story focuses on a new game made for the site about philandering politicians like disgraced South Carolina governor, Mark Sanford, the topic of making games about potentially darker moments also arose.

Would people want to play a game based on an event that was almost a horrific tragedy?

The answer has been yes. Since its launch more than five months ago, Hero on the Hudson has been played 4.6 million times, according to the company.

It helped that it's not very hard for players, who take on the role of the pilot, to nail a successful landing. After an initial design that had test players crashing 25 times before avoiding disaster, the AddictingGames staff lessened the difficulty level to keep the focus on the uplifting experience, not the challenge.

"We want these to be some of the easiest games we make," explains Breton.

You can play the Hero on the Hudson game here. More on what Addicting Games strives to do can be found in the LA Times article. These games may not be award-winners, but they are ripped from the headlines.

Web games, ripped from the headlines [LA Times]

Not only do we get the regular Friday update on what's new and forthcoming for the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Rock Band, we get the weekly Wii library catch up, and the latest additions to Rock Band Unplugged. Huzzah!

First out of the gate are new Rock Band and Rock Band 2 tracks, a triple shot of track packs from Judas Priest, Big Dipper and The Dead Weather. Sure, Jack White may find it "sad" that the kids are experiencing new music in music games, but apparently has no qualms about selling his band's music to Rock Band owners.

The Wii version of Rock Band 2 adds a slew of tracks from The Pixies, Spinal Tap, Foreigner and more. And Unplugged for the PSP gets a deuce from Radiohead and Killswitch Engage.

Platforms, release dates and prices are cataloged below.

Rock Band & Rock Band 2 (Xbox 360/PS3)
Available July 14/16 for $1.99 (160 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) per track or $5.49 (440 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) per track pack
Big Dipper "All Going Out Together"
Big Dipper "She's Fetching"
Big Dipper "Younger Bums"
Judas Priest "Dissident Aggressor (Live)"
Judas Priest "Eat Me Alive (Live)"
Judas Priest "Prophecy (Live)"
The Dead Weather "Hang You From the Heavens"
The Dead Weather "No Hassle Night"
The Dead Weather "Treat Me Like Your Mother"

Rock Band 2 (Wii)
Available July 14 for 200 Wii Points per track
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club "Weapon of Choice"
Dear and the Headlights "Sweet Talk"
The Devil Wears Prada "Hey John, What's Your Name Again?"
Evanescence "Bring Me to Life"
Evanescence "Call Me When You're Sober"
Foreigner "Blue Morning, Blue Day"
Foreigner "Feels Like the First Time"
Foreigner "Headknocker"
The Killers "Mr. Brightside"
The Killers "Smile Like You Mean It"
The Killers "Spaceman"
Maroon 5 "Little of Your Time"
Maroon 5 "Makes Me Wonder"
Maroon 5 "Wake Up Call"
The Pixies "Crackity Jones"
The Pixies "Dead"
The Pixies "Debaser"
The Pixies "Gouge Away"
The Pixies "Here Comes Your Man"
The Pixies "Hey"
The Pixies "I Bleed"
The Pixies "La La Love You"
The Pixies "Monkey Gone to Heaven"
The Pixies "Mr. Grieves"
The Pixies "No 13 Baby"
The Pixies "Silver"
The Pixies "Tame"
The Pixies "There Goes My Gun"
Spinal Tap "Back From the Dead"
Spinal Tap "Rock ‘n' Roll Nightmare"
Spinal Tap "Saucy Jack"
Spinal Tap "Warmer Than Hell"
Thrice "Image of the Invisible"

Rock Band Unplugged (PSP)
Available July 16 fpr $1.99 per track
Radiohead"My Iron Lung"
Killswitch Engage "My Curse"

The Louisiana Digital Media Act, sponsored by Senator Ann Duplessis, grants a 25% credit to game developers for digital interactive media expenditures, as well as a 10% credit on state payroll taxes. It's a very generous incentive that could see a growth in the number of development studios calling the state home. The Entertainment Software Association applauded the Governor's approval.

"We commend Governor Jindal for his strong leadership as well as that of Senator Duplessis for expanding the state's computer and video game development and production base, and helping lead the way in creating the next generation of entertainment innovation in Louisiana," said Michael D. Gallagher, president and CEO of the ESA, which represents U.S. computer and video game publishers. "Developers and publishers live and work for years in states where games are created, providing a higher return on investment than any form of entertainment."

Not too shabby for a state with baby bird vampires on its flag, right?

A growing number of states either have or are looking into implementing similar incentives, a reassuring sign that state governments are understand just how serious the video game business is.

To control an airplane in a Wii game, I have held the Wii Remote like a paper airplane.

I have held it like a flashlight, dipping and raising it to orient where my plane's nose is pointing.

These schemes failed me when, unsupervised by representatives in attendance at publisher XSeed's New York demo event last night, I took up Wii Remote and nunchuck and sent my World War II dogfighter into the drink.

The Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces, this flight combat game from the developers of Ace Combat, is controlled differently.

Read this next part slowly, lest you be as flummoxed as I was.

The nunchuck controls plane movement. Tilt, twist, turn it and the plane does the same.

The Z-button on the nunchuck shoots the plane's guns.

The C-button on the nunchuck switches weapons.

The Wii Remote controls the throttle, so it gets held vertically. Pulling it toward you speeds the plane up. Tilting it away slows the plane.

Tilting the nunchuck's control stick lets the player pick from a batch of stunt maneuvers. Pressing A on the remote activates them.

Flying the plane into yellow circles on the game's mini-map causes a meter to appear, a horizontal bar that slowly fills with color. Pressing A as the meter fills makes the plan maneuver into position behind an enemy plane. The more that meter is filled, the better the resulting position is.

Once I got it, the controls worked well. Here's to Project Aces for coming up with one of the stranger Wii control schemes yet.

A note about the story, which is its own brand of strange: I didn't play more than a quick skirmish in the air, but the fact sheet reveals that the plot of this game involves a peaceful world that is nostalgic for the constant wars that used to befall it. To remedy the social unease caused by a lack of war, governments hire private companies and fliers, like the ones controlled in this game, to fight battles. The game's hero is rookie pilot Lynx, who, according to the fact sheet, "becomes involved in a secret new military project with the goal of making pilots immortal." This is a "somber story of a world that needs war to survive."

The Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces is a single-player Wii exclusive set for holiday release, published by XSeed and developed by Namco Bandai Games and Project Aces.

I foolishly purchased a digital copy of the game via the Blizzard Online Store a few weeks back, thinking my Windows-only CD key wouldn't work. Oops! Hopefully, Blizzard will put my $15 to good use. I'll definitely put my Mac installs of StarCraft and StarCraft: Brood War to some sort of use this weekend, along with my still unreviewed copy of BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger. Yes, I'm getting to it!

Tell us about your gaming plans for the weekend in the comments.

It might not be the best adaptation of the classic fighting game, but it does the trick, allowing you to put your keyboard-controlled fighting skills to the test against twelve different Street Fighter mainstays. There's even a convenient link to purchase and download Street Fighter IV, along with a chat window where fellow players offer helpful hints and tips, like "Folk is a German word". How illuminating!

Street Fighter II CE Flash Game [Kongregate]

Novelty is not a predictor of quality. So, really, who knows how good EA's holiday game The Saboteur will be any good. I haven't played it.

But, until earlier this week, I didn't even understand what The Saboteur was supposed to be.

The game's lead designer from EA's Pandemic Studios, Tom French, remedied that by spending about 20 minutes demonstrating the game in a rented New York City nightclub earlier this week. And while I can't say whether the game will veer toward unusual-good or unusual-bad, I can at least report that The Saboteur is rightly described as not just another World War II game.

The game is open-world. It sits, in terms of graphical quality, somewhere between the GodfatherII/Prototypes of the world and the GTA IV/Infamouses. The hero is Sean Devlin, an Irish, inspired-from-real-life race car driver turned resistance fighter who winds up fighting Nazis throughout France in order to get revenge for a tragedy that befalls him early in the game.

The game isn't just in Paris, stretching its adventure from Germany to the countryside of France, with a good amount of time set up in what French described as a Disneyland-version of the famous city. It's Disney-fied in its scale. The city is shrunken from its real-life counterpart, except for its landmarks, like the Eiffel Tower, which is built to scale.

The game world and Devlin are rendered primarily in black, white and shades of gray, with splashes of red supplied by the Swastika armbands of Nazis. The drained color represents a low will of the locals to resist the Nazis. But some locations in those regions, like the aforementioned Parisian brothel, are rendered in color, a sign that it is there where resistance is brewing. As missions are completed, the game is designed to restore color to regions of Paris and the rest of the game world or to take that color away. When color is restored, the locals will help resist the Nazis, making a quick escape from a black-and-white area to a fully-colored one a dash toward friendly reinforcements.

In the midst of this game are some oddities. The Nazis, for example, aren't authentic Nazis. They are Nazis with bazookas and flamethrowers and anachronistically high-powered machine guns. Also unusual is the inclusion of some car races for Devlin to enter. French said one of these is aggravated by the Nazi's attempt to expose Devlin as a resistance fighter by messing with him while he competes.

Devlin's a good climber, can snap to cover, don disguises and wield lots of guns. So combat or stealth options are varied. He can also duck from his pursuers, French told me, by running to a urinal and using it while his enemies run by. Or.. he can do the same by grabbing a nearby lady and kissing her.

One other game design quirk worth noting: French promised a persistence to the player's interactions with the game's open-world that is still rare for this genre. Paris contains several sniper towers and anti-aircraft gun emplacements. These can be destroyed and treated as collectibles. But some are set up in locations where missions occur. Taking them out prior to those missions will register with the game and make those missions easier. I saw this in effect during a mission that tasked Devlin with destroying a big cannon that was set near the rooftops in one Parisian district. A sniper tower nearby was an aggravation that would have been absent had it been destroyed before the mission began. (One other Saboteur quirk: while that mission was timed as a race against the Nazis firing the cannon, the timer was eliminated when French sniped the scientist trying to fire the cannon. Then, he had all the time in the world to blow up the cannon and make his escape. That's an optional wrinkle, not a required way to play it).

The Saboteur is one of those games that is full of elements that make it different than the norm. As I wrote above, it's hard to say whether it will come together to be special in terms of quality. But what I saw looked enjoyable and imaginative, a game that deserves attention rather than eyerolls by those who are sick of killing virtual Nazis.

The Saboteur is slated for a PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 release this holiday season.

As I mentioned in my E3 impressions of ModNation Racers, you can see the game certainly doesn't skimp on charm, and the amount of options for customizing your racer, kart, and track is almost overwhelming. The frenetic action shown in the trailer does nothing, however, to assuage my fears that meat of the title will lie in the creation tools and the actual racing will fall flat. Of course, I say that with every intention of buying the game when it comes out just to spend countless hours making little tiny racing peoples.

When the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) sent a report through Facebook's built in reporting system and then urged its Facebook and Twitter followers to do the same, the user was suspended, and the group abandoned and commandeered by pro-gay users in the matter of hours.

It seems that real people in those virtual communities, as well as the massive companies that run the platforms, don't like when people form groups that advocate killing people or targeting groups.

Now what happens when you take that model and you turn it to online gaming virtual communities?

To illustrate my point, take a look at this video previously highlighted on Kotaku and GayGamer to get a sense of the problem just in online gaming communities.

Halo 3: Homophobia Evolved (NSFW)

This isn't to say that all gamers feel and think this way. As we know, there's a great diversity in who plays computer and video games and how they think. But similar to other forms of mass medium entertainment-like music, books, and movies-the new frontier created by advances in technology, especially Internet technology, has increased ability to transmit our voices, images, and ideas. But it has also come with a greater capacity to harass, bully, and spread prejudices - often times with little-to-no repercussions.  

The problem is widespread in these communities, with kids and adults alike throwing around virtual threats and threatening real world violence and death.

In 2006, a survey under supervision by the University of Illinois provided the first glimpse of "the social and behavioral demographics of gay video game players" as well as "the role of sexual orientation on gaming habits." Here are some highlights:

52.7% of those surveyed said the gaming community is "Somewhat Hostile" to gay and lesbian gamers, 14% said "Very Hostile."
When asked what forms of homophobia people have seen in the gaming community, here are some of what the surveyed said:

87.7% - Players use the phrase, "That's so gay."
83.4% - Players use the words "gay" or "queer" as derogatory names.
52.3% - Stereotypical representations of gay characters in games.
42.5% - Refusal of game designers to include well-developed gay characters.
49.4% - Invisibility of gaymers and/or the gaymer community.
When asked how frequently players experience homophobia, those surveyed who responded "Always" or "Frequently" equaled 42%. Add in "Sometimes" and it brings up that total to 74.5%.
When asked how often those players respond to the homophobia they witness – 50.9% total responded "Never" or "Rarely."

Keep in mind, that's a survey from 3 years ago. According to the Entertainment Software Association's 2009 Essential Facts, last year 68% of American households played video or computer games.  It's an industry that continues to grow - from 2.6 billion dollars in sales in 1996 to 11.7 billion last year.  And don't think it's child's play – the average player age is 35.

The problem is only getting worse and needs to be addressed with comprehensive and sustainable solutions. That's why GLAAD has announced an initiative to do just that – The Project on Homophobia & Virtual Communities – which kicks off with a groundbreaking panel discussion to be held on the Electronic Arts campus on July 18, 2009.

The panel discussion will include an assessment of the problem in these communities, policy solutions that have been developed to address homophobia – some that are working and those that are not - as well as looking to the future at the challenges and opportunities to combating homophobia in various sectors of the industry.

Confirmed panelists include representatives from XBox LIVE, Electronic Arts, Inc., Linden Lab, the Entertainment Software Association, and GayGamer.net.

There is no doubt that this is a complicated endeavor. While most companies do have some sort of policy in place that prohibits threats, advocating violence or death, and hate speech, there are major concerns with the effectiveness of those policies. Those concerns including the policies themselves, which in some cases ban self-identifying your orientation or using words like "gay" or "lesbian" altogether. They also include the mechanisms in place to report violations of the policies, many which don't allow you to submit evidence (i.e. recordings of in game audio/video). Then there is the lack of transparency once a user has been reported, leaving the harassed often feeling as if nothing has been done.

GLAAD's project has an established set of goals to address these concerns. To get companies to provide safe spaces for LGBT people in these virtual communities (which includes virtual worlds, online games, social networks, message boards, etc). To work with each of the companies to ensure they have solid policies in place that prevent anti-LGBT defamation where possible and mechanisms to report the defamation when it does occur. And what will be the most challenging in my eyes - to educate the user base about the real impact of their virtual homophobia.

However, what this comes down to is that this really is a company-by-company and a case-by-case project. For example, when a potentially anti-gay situation with the Old Republic message board arose, I reached out to Bioware about the situation and ended up getting a call back from a VP at Electronic Arts (EA), Bioware's parent company. After making sure the situation was corrected, he issued a statement through GLAAD, which we shared on our blog, and put me in touch with EA staff to continue conversations about the overall issue of homophobia in virtual communities.

Through ongoing conversations with EA, they have offered to host our upcoming panel on their private campus in Redwood City, CA, and have provided a panelist - a senior producer from the Maxis Studio. While I'm out in California I'll also be meeting with EA staff to discuss the issue of homophobia, their policies and begin working on a comprehensive plan to address it.

Microsoft has also had recent and ongoing dust-ups regarding their XBox LIVE policies being "anti-gay." After opening up a dialogue with them about the problems, they invited GLAAD out to their campus in Washington State for two days of meetings with XBox LIVE managers to review their systems, protocols and policies and provide recommendation on way to address the problem. We now have quarterly conference calls to continue working towards solutions.

These companies aren't monoliths and are very much committed to providing a safe and fun environment for all their players - they're just not all there yet.

We all know it's not going to happen overnight and it's not going to be easy. We have an uphill battle of policy issues, system improvements and campaigns to educate users on the real dangers of homophobia. In my job as GLAAD Director of Digital Media, I've also seen the real impact unchecked homophobia has on people's lives and how it leads to a climate of intolerance, to bullying and harassment, and can ultimately lead to violence and death, especially among children.

While the average player age may be 35, 25% of all game players are under 18. These are impressionable kids who are witnessing and then participating in anti-gay slurs, normalizing homophobia for them. They then take that behavior from their virtual worlds into their real world.

According to a 2007 report by GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, "86.2% of LGBT students reported being verbally harassed, 44.1% reported being physically harassed and 22.1% reported being physically assaulted at school in the past year because of their sexual orientation."

In February of 2008, a 14-year-old took out a gun during class and killed a 15-year-old classmate because of the student's sexual orientation and gender identity. This past April, an 11-year-old boy in Massachusetts who didn't identify as gay hanged himself because of anti-gay bullying, as did another 11-year-old boy in Georgia. These are but a few examples.

Some may argue that these examples don't directly support the argument that unchecked homophobia in virtual communities leads to real world violence amongst kids. However, we can all agree that children learn what's appropriate and acceptable and how to treat others from their friends, families and from their communities. And that includes their virtual communities.

This is a problem we cannot leave unchecked.

For those who say this is bigger than just being about homophobia – that there are also issues like racism and sexism to be addressed - you are right. But keep in mind; while the work being done here is focused around fighting homophobia its implications will affect many other groups. If we work to help implement better reporting mechanisms, it helps everyone. If we work to provide better policies and safe spaces for LGBT people, those policies and spaces can be replicated for other groups as well.

If we are moving in a direction where so much of our communications and interactions occur in virtual communities, then maybe its about time we start considering how we can make the spaces civilized and safe, inviting millions more into the communities, and paving the way for the expansion of this technology into other areas of our real world.

We have an opportunity to learn from the lessons of our real-life society, to not repeat the same mistakes in our virtual ones.

We at GLAAD hope you'll join us in this effort.

The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) is dedicated to promoting and ensuring fair, accurate and inclusive representation of people and events in the media as a means of eliminating homophobia and discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation. Justin J. Cole is GLAAD's Director of Digital Media

In an interview with Kombo, PopCap's senior director of public relations Garth Chouteau talks about migrating the company's more popular games to other platforms, and PC title Plants VS Zombies, which Luke absolutely adored, certainly seems to fit the bill.

Peggle for XBLA is a good example of a game that we took that was popular on the PC and we spent probably twice as long as anyone else would have figuring how to make that game really good for Xbox and Xbox Live Arcade, and I think you will see that with Plants Vs. Zombies—I don't know the exact order in which that game will make its way onto other platforms, but it's certainly been successful enough, quickly enough, that we're looking at other platforms and deciding where we'll take that game next...

Garth didn't elaborate on where the plant on zombie action would go next, but it's the kind of game that would fit well no matter what size of gaming platform you try to cram it on.

PopCap Games' Garth Chouteau Confirms Plants vs. Zombies to Other Platforms and Future Wii Support [Kombo]

When they first announced that The Old Republic would be fully-voiced during E3 2009, those of us involved in the more massively-multiplayer side of gaming collectively gasped. The average MMO title has players interacting with hundreds of different characters over the course of the game. Providing real voices for each of those characters as well as the player characters themselves is a monumental task.

As I said, The Old Republic is the size of at least 10 KOTORs recorded back to back. Basically, it takes a very large team all focused on the same outcome - producing the most VO assets ever produced at the highest quality possible. There are dedicated internal teams at both LucasArts and BioWare, and externally, there are also multiple studio audio engineers and post production teams. On any given day, there can be over a dozen people working specifically on The Old Republic voice-over and that doesn't include any actors!

And there are hundreds of actors working on the project, with recording spanning four cities - Los Angeles , London, New York, San Francisco, and Toronto. The most staggering statistic? When last we checked, the game had surpassed the amount of dialog in the entire run of The Sopranos. According to Perry, the script for the game as it now stands contains enough material for more than 40 Star Wars novels. That's completely insane.

Check out the full blog post to get an idea of how much work poor Shauna is being put through in order to make Star Wars: The Old Republic the most talkative MMO ever created.

Developer Blog #10 [Star Wars: The Old Republic]

As racing franchises continue down a diminishing road of more, with detailed engine tuning, real world physics, realistic damage modeling and road wear, they often leave all but the most devoted fans of their games and autophiles in the dust.

But not increasing the realism, not giving what car fanatics need to get the full experience of driving and driving fast, often leads to bland diversions stripped of any right to be considered a simulation.

With Forza 3, developers Turn 10 Studios hope to make something for everyone. Instead of trying to blend the best of both worlds, the game makers have added so many options, so many helping hands that a gamer can create their own experience.

But how can that translate to the diverse world of online gaming? How can Mario Kart fans play Forza 3 in a way that requires little more than gas and steering online with those who expect an intimate knowledge of gear ratios and part selections from their drivers?

The issue of balancing the experience for hardcore and casual gamers in the same environment is solving a problem created by the developers themselves, said Korey Krauskopf, producer for Forza 3.

That long-tail of niche game development is more about trying to differentiate yourself in a crowded genre, than trying to satisfy gamers, Krauskopf said.

"I think that's more about developers trying to be different, not an indictment of the user," he said. "I think it's that game companies are making their games more specialized.

"We want to serve those who already enjoy our games and invite more in."

The problem, he says, is that people hear that a game like Forza is a "hardcore game" and to many that simply means hard to play.

That's why in Forza 3 the developers layered on assists, like auto-braking and one-button driving, he said. And why the game includes plenty of help for auto-tuning a car, if a player doesn't want to do it themselves.

For online gaming, tells Kotaku, Forza 3 features an incredibly elaborate race rules editor.

While the game will ship with a dozen or so pre-created race modes, everything about them, from the number of laps to start delays and what sort of assists a player can be using, can be changed.

"We have a whole bunch of options that just cascade," Krauskopf said. "There are pages and pages of options they can set to make the race exactly how you want it to be."

Krauskopf likens it to the ability first-person shooter fans have to manipulate the online game rules for Halo 3, but with much more control.

For example, most racing games allow players to choose a track, the car classes and the number of laps. In Forza 3, a gamer can take that basic race and choose to change the rules of how a winner is determined.

Krauskopf explains:
*First they could section everyone into two teams, one team will win.

*They could then decide that a specific person from each team must cross the finish line to determine who wins (we'll call this person the "mouse"), the rest of the players are just there to provide interference to the other team, or protection for their own team (we'll call them "cats").

*Then they could create still deeper challenges by limiting teams to specific car classes, tunings, assists, or upgrades.

*If they want to make things more interesting they can stagger the roll-off times from the start line giving some a head start.

*If the players want to be super specific about their race, they can limit the mice to D-class, front wheel drive European hatchbacks and the cats to all wheel drive turbocharged V10s.

"This results in players running in packs on a track, trying to protect their team's "mouse" and see it safely across the finish line first while trying keep the other team's mouse away from the finish line," Krauskopf said. "A very different type of race!"

The game's online modes have more than 100 rule types to tweak giving players an almost limitless ability to customize the way they want to play, he said.

Krauskopf says that the team expects once the game ships and gets into the hands of enthusiastic gamers they will begin to see far more creative combinations of the rules used to create modes they've never imagined.

Since these personalized race modes can only be saved locally, Krauskopf expects that some gamers will make a name for themselves as popular hosts for their custom races. He added that they are considering one day perhaps allowing gamers to save modes online, but right now have no plans to include that option.

Forza 3 will still include all of the Live support Forza 2 had as well. Other new additions to online play include a new party system that allows gamers to hop into one room and then jump from race to race together.

The team has also worked to blur the line between the game's offline and online modes when it comes to a player's career.

"As people are playing online they are still earning experience points and getting rewarded for in-game credit," he said.

Finally, the game will feature a robust set of leaderboards that will take into account how assisted a driver is when racing, so those hardcore fans can steal easily identify "clean" and skilled drivers from those who win with the help of the game.

"We are going to certify score boards, showing you who use assists, and which are totally clean times," Krauskopf said. "Thats how we serve the people who are our real loyal fan base."

And what about all of those casual racers who might flood into Forza's online racing world when Forza 3 hits?

"If you have someone who really wants to race as realistic as you can get he is going to set up a lobby with restrictions, saying we're going to outlaw one button driving and stock car and only allow cars that have been tuned. "

The challenge, he says, is that the team wants to make sure that the detail and depth is there for those who want to dig into it, but obscured from those who may be put off by it.

"We face challenges," he said. "Educating users who think that Mario Kart is quick to use and fun to play and Forza is for hardcore people, so no you can't have a good time playing it."

Krauskopf respects what Nintendo is doing with demo mode, a mode Shigeru Miyamoto first confirmed to Kotaku at E3 was coming to New Super Mario Bros. Wii, which allows a game to essentially play itself.

"What Nintendo is doing with Demo Mode is interesting," he said. "You are building a feature that allows anyone to play the game, but you don't get that badge of honor if you use it."

It's, essentially, a more extreme version of what Turn 10 is doing with Forza 3 online play.

"We are giving everyone the ability to enjoy the game," he said. "But not taking anything away from our fan base."

Media Molecule and Sony have been teasing the Ghostbusters downloadable content for LittleBigPlanet for a good week now. While we're still waiting for the big reveal as of this writing, visitors to the Japanese LBP site already know which costumes will be available for purchase next week.

Lucky Japanese people. I sure hope they reveal the outfits in North America soon, so I can be all excited too.

Squiggly Lines I Cannot Understand [Japanese LittleBigPlanet Website - Thanks TheAlp]

This teaser image popped up on the DC Universe Online MySpace page yesterday, along with a bit of overly-obvious teaser text: "I just saw the poster that we're giving out at San Diego Comic-Con and people will be "clawing" to get it." Subtle.

I'll be sure to have McWhertor add this poster to the annual list of Comic-Con exclusive merchandise he forgets to pick up for me.

DC Universe Online [MySpace via MMORPG.com]

Now about those Doggy-Style enemy creatures.

The Calling plays on classic Japanese horror films like Ringu, with a mysterious website called the Page of Black. A simple black page with a counter in the center, rumor says that those who gain access to the linked chat room soon die after the onset of a mysterious, unexplained coma. The player wakes up in a strange room and receives a phone call from a ghostly voice. Soon they find themselves drifting in and out of a state of limbo known as The Border, where lost spirits roam, some communicating with the player, and others taking violent exception to their presence.

It sounds to me an awful lot like a Silent Hill title, with a mix of puzzles and exploration in a nightmarish world, but with Konami Digital Entertainment distributing the title in Europe next year, I doubt it's all that derivative. If anything it looks slightly scary, but we'll have to see more before we decided whether or not to run screaming.

The Legendary Starfy for the Nintendo DS might have been released in North America early last month, but it's never too late to raise brand awareness. From 1pm to 3pm this Saturday, July 11th, Starfy himself will be on hand at the Nintendo World Store in Rockefeller Plaza, posing for photos in a special underwater-themed area. There'll be prizes to be won, demos to be played, and yes - face painting.

We've been trying desperately to get Totilo to show up and get his face painted, and shall continue to do so long after this event has come and gone.

Yes, this is the same Eidos behind the Kane & Lynch fiasco with GameSpot. Behind voting for their own games in a game of the year poll. Behind attempts to fix Tomb Raider review scores.

Sure, they're far from the only company to be accused of this sort of thing with magazines (businesses gotta make money, yo), but it seems they could be far and away the worst at covering their tracks.

According to The RAM Raider, the company's latest misstep the following absurd policy:

Several mags have their review code already, but have to sit on their reviews until a hateful embargo expires at the end of the month. But Eidos, ever the helpful fellows that they are, have been offering a way around this embargo. If you dedicate the cover of your mag to Arkham Asylum and guarantee a score of at least 90%, Eidos will allow you to run the review early.

TRR says that while "one editor has already valiantly told Eidos to fuck off", others have been less resolute. "This means", they say, "that if you see a mag turn up within the next few weeks (ding!) that features Arkham Asylum on its cover (ding!) and gives it at least 90% (ding ding ding!), you have a winner."

With the publishing arm of Eidos soon to be rebranded as part of the Square Enix empire, it's a shame that, if true, this is probably the last thing they're going to be remembered for.

We've contacted Eidos for comment, and will update if we hear back from them.

UPDATE: Eidos, for their part, outright deny the allegations telling Kotaku:

"With regards an article posted on RamRaider alleging that Eidos has fixed review scores for Batman: Arkham Asylum, we want to state that no discussions have been held about review scores with any magazines. In short there is simply not one shred of truth in this article, except for the title of the game." Jon Brooke, Head of UK Marketing, Eidos.

Eidos Seek 90% Score & Cover For Arkham Asylum In Exchange For Early Review [The RAM Raider]

Game Daily points out 20 words that show up way too often attached to the name of a game. The list includes everything from the innocuous (age, legend) to adjectives (darkness, eternal) to a simple name (Mario).

The real trick would be piling up as many of these as you can into a single game title. Who wouldn't want to play World War Dawn of the Dead: Red Blade of Eternal Super Star Mario?

20 Totally Overused Words in Game Names [Game Daily]

We're still working out the kinks of the new comments system (we know there are bugs, bear with us). But here are the key ways that I believe TAY conversation will be affected:

-The new thread order is in reverse-chronological order, so those of you who were used to just following the first threads started on the old first pages of TAY will now see those threads move to the back. Page 1 of the TAY comments will always show you the newest threads.

-As Crecente explained yesterday, the comments you will see by default on a given page are those made by starred commenters as well as any non-starred comments that have been promoted by us editors or those of you readers who are starred commenters. We all have two ways of promoting comments: by manually promoting them or simply by replying to said comments. What that means, starred commenters, is that we are looking to you to help craft the conversation appearing in TAY and all other posts. If you see a good comment that deserves promotion, give it a boost by promoting it or replying to it. (Bolded, because that's extra-important.)

-For anyone who wants to see every comment on the page, starred and unstarred alike, you can click the "show all comments" option at the bottom of any comments page. They're all in there.

-If you have any questions about this or see bugs, let me know. And again, please be patient as our tech team works out the kinks. The result, we hope, will be an even more exciting, lively, and quality-rich array of comments, something that will take time to achieve as we all get familiar with this system and dole out some more stars.

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For the French version of Arcade Mania, we had to switch out a couple of the purikura (sticker pics) photos. So in their place, we needed pictures of girls posing in print club photos, and we needed them pronto.

Mrs. Bashcraft (above) graciously agreed to stand-in and she roped in her buddy for the photo below. Many thanks for that, Mrs. Bashcraft and Mrs. Bashcraft's Friend! We appreciate your help!

What you missed last night
When Polls Go Wrong: The Most Popular Monster Is...
Dragon Quest IX Already Being Hacked
Pay Nothing, Get Mechwarrior 4
Scribblenauts, As Hilariously Explained By The ESRB
First Look At Dragon Quest IX's Co-Op Game Play
Battlefield 1943 A Hit, Server Problems Be Damned

Confused about commenting on Kotaku? Read our FAQ and about our commenting system.

The LittleBigPlanet "Game of the Year" edition will see the original game packaged alongside "much" of the downloadable content that's been released in the months since the game first went on sale.

No idea just which DLC that would entail, but so long as it's got the 2000AD and Team ICO stuff in it, that's a good deal.

New LittleBigPlanet coming to PS3 [MCV]

Each game is priced at 200 Points. Titles and Japan release dates as follows:

• Ball
July 15

• Flagman
July 15

• Vermin
July 15

• Judge
July 15

• Helmet
July 29

• Chef
July 29

• Donkey Kong JR.
August

• Mario's Cement Factory
August

• Manhole
August

All of these, save for one ~ two player title Judge, are single player only titles.

From 1980 to 1991, Nintendo made way more Game & Watch titles than these nine games, so we can probably expect just that: more. Be patient! We imagine games like Fire and Octopus are inevitable additions to this already solid line up.

If busting ghosts or tropical bloodbaths aren't your thing, you could always try some of DLC available this week, which includes add-ons for Skate 2, MotorStorm 2, Dynasty Warriors 6 and Rock Band.

And if they don't interest you? Then perhaps the addition of one of this generation's worst games, Little Britain, to the PSP store might be more your style.

Downloadable Games

Battlefield 1943 (Trial free, unlock key £9.99/€12.99)
Ghostbusters – The Video Game
Fuel

Add-On Game Content

MotorStorm: Pacific Rift – Expansion Adrenaline (£4.79/€5.99)
Skate 2 – Maloof Money Cup Pack (£1.59/€1.99)
High Velocity Bowling – Route 66 Americana Ball Pack & 4th July Americana Ball Pack (£0.79/€0.99 each)
Dynasty Warriors 6 Empires – Additional Music Set

Rock Band

* 21 Guns by Green Day (£0.99/€1.49)
* East Jesus Nowhere by Green Day (£0.99/€1.49)
* Know Your Enemy by Green Day (£0.99/€1.49)
* Green Day Pack 01(this combines all the above tracks in one pack) (£2.49/€3.99)
* Black Magic by Slayer (£0.99/€1.49)
* Conquer All by Behemoth (£0.99/€1.49)
* Disposable Teens by Marilyn Manson (£0.99/€1.49)
* Embedded by Job for a Cowboy (£0.99/€1.49)
* Empire of the Gun by God Forbid (£0.99/€1.49)
* Hammer Smashed Face by Cannibal Corpse (£0.99/€1.49)
* This Is Exile by Whitechapel (£0.99/€1.49)
* What a Horrible Night to Have a Curse by Black Dahlia Murder (£0.99/€1.49)
* Ten Bonus Pack by Pearl Jam (£2.49/€3.99)

Guitar Hero: World Tour

Bomb the World by The Sleeping (£1.59/€1.99)
I Am the Arsonist by Silverstein (£1.59/€1.99)
NJ Legion Iced Tea by A Day To Remember (£1.59/€1.99)
Victory Records Track Pack (This pack contains all three tracks listed above) (£4.39/€5.99)

Videos

inFamous Duality Trailer

Themes

Overlord II Minions Theme

Downloadable Games (also available via the PS3 store)

Archer Maclean's Mercury (£4.79/€5.99)
Final Armada (£7.99/€9.99)
King of Pool (£7.99/€9.99)
Little Britain (£11.99/€14.99)
Championship Manager 2006 (£3.99/€4.99)

Add-On Game Content (also available via the PS3 store)

Rock Band Unplugged

Here Comes Your Man by The Pixies (£0.99/€1.49)
Pride and Joy by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble (£0.99/€1.49)