On the one hand, she really is doing amazing things to that tight shorts and tiny jacket ensemble, and the gun adds a certain something. She is rather pretty and well-spoken for someone who beats up other people for a living.

On the other hand, she beats up other people for a living and could probably kill me with an errant thought, or hell, even on accident, like some terrifying all grown-up Elmira from Tiny Toons, hugging and squeezing me until I die.

Phew, nevermind. Invoking Tiny Toons always cancels out any excitement...well, unless we're talking mink.

ELITEXC FIGHTER AND AMERICAN GLADIATOR GINA CARANO TO APPEAR IN COMMAND & CONQUER RED ALERT 3

She has left opponents lying defeated in the cages of EliteXC mixed martial arts competitions and would-be contenders gasping for air throughout Gladiator Arena in American Gladiators. And now America’s “Crush” is ready to lay waste to the battlefields in Command & Conquer Red Alert 3.

Electronic Arts announced today that rising star and undefeated EliteXC MMA fighter Gina Carano will be starring as Natasha, a deadly Soviet commando, in Red Alert 3, one of the most anticipated strategy games of the year coming to the PC and Xbox 360 this holiday season. Carano will not only appear in person and in high-definition as Natasha as part of Red Alert 3’s live-action movies, but will also be featured digitally as a playable unit in the game.

“The last year has been such a whirlwind for me, from everything that’s happening with EliteXC this weekend to American Gladiators and now with EA and Red Alert 3,” said Carano. “Natasha is such a cool, powerful character, her actions definitely speak louder than her words which is something I definitely identify with. I can’t wait to see how everything turns out and I hope all of the gamers out there have a great time wreaking havoc as me.”

Carano can be seen tomorrow night headlining the undercard on CBS during EliteXC’s “Saturday Night Fights”, the first MMA card to air on broadcast network television and every Monday night on NBC slamming would-be contenders as “Crush” on NBC’s popular American Gladiators series. Carano joins a prestigious list of stars that have crossed over to appear in the Command & Conquer franchise’s trademark live-action video movies, including: James Earl Jones (Star Wars), Josh Holloway (Lost), Billy Dee Williams (Star Wars), Michael Biehn (The Terminator, Aliens), Natasha Henstridge (Species), Tricia Helfer (Battlestar Galactica), Jennifer Morrison (House), and Michael Ironside (Top Gun).

Hear more from Carano on her upcoming fight and her first foray into the world of video games in Red Alert 3 in this month’s episode of BattleCast PrimeTime on Command & Conquer TV, debuting today at noon PDT at www.commandandconquer.com, the home of everything C&C. And stay tuned for more announcements surrounding the star-studded cast of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 this summer.

Not a 1920-ish Alone in the Dark adventure, but an adventure game nonetheless. Check out the gallery below and see if the picture of Edward hanging halfway off a building ledge is as unintentionally hilarious to you as it was to me.

Mike Fahey of Kotaku explains that "for some reason the little bastard (Abomination) scares the living piss out of me." We will be sending Mike some adult diapers so he can have a urine free couch and play the game too.

Kotaku thinks Project Origin is Scary [Project Origin Community]

Make the jump to experience the horror at full size.

[4chan - via Ectoplasmosis - via GayGamer]

Move over Alien, there's a new scary... alien in space. GameTrailers managed to nab a world exclusive trailer for EA's upcoming space horror game, Dead Space. I'm a big fan of the survival horror genre but usually my tastes tend towards the Silent Hill, Resident Evil end of things. I have yet, to my memory (which is admittedly poor) played a horror game in outer space much less zero gravity, so I'll be anxious to check this out when it hits next year. Definitely one for lights out...

"Tunnel Rats is a first-person shooter set during the Vietnam War that tells the story of a young G.I. who escapes from a POW camp and journeys through a heavily fortified valley in the Cu Chi province," said Marc Moehring Managing Director and Co-Founder, Replay Studios. "It not only depicts his actual physical path through the merciless jungle and claustrophobic, trap-ridden tunnels, but also his emotional and psychological journey as the horrors he witnesses—and participates in—slowly deprive him of his ideals, morals and sanity."

If the laws of irony are still firmly in place, it will end up being the best video game of all time. I sincerely hope not, however, especially considering the closing quote of Game Daily's article on the game.

"If this game does well then we'll keep going with other game ideas," said Boll, who's currently wrapping principal photography on Far Cry. In addition to the original Tunnel Rats film, Boll also completed Seed, a horror movie he wrote starring Pare.

Boll 'Tunnels' Into Game Business [GameDaily.BIZ]

For some reason, the DS has been pigeonholed as "bad for horror games." That's a bit short-sighted! Developer Renegade Kid's upcoming Dementium: The Ward is a straight up scare title in which players wonder around a creepy hospital. Says Renegade Kid's Jools Watsham:

Does the fact that the majority of DS games are geared towards a young audience alienate potential owners who are looking for mature content? The Nintendo DS is not just a kids' console.

DS Can Do Horror [Eurogamer]

"I'm staying in Beijing , if I'm also staying in our Shenzhen office , I should also had been abducted, and then all of us should had been KILLED quietly then they can take all our fortune away freely without anyone else dare to SUE them!"

Those are the words of Anndy Wang, an employee of Firstsing. Firstsing is a Chinese trade company that handles mostly game peripherals. The Chinese government apparently barreled into Firstsing's Shenzhen offices, seized all the computer towers and took in all employees. According to an email sent to Insert Credit, almost all of the employees were released within thirty hours — Save for the company's top three ranking people: Anndy's younger brother, older brother and 24 year-old cousin. They've been held for over 100 hours. Anndy says the government is trying to strong arm an admission of doing something illegal so that it can seize the company's funds under law. None of Anndy's family have been allowed to visit the prisoners, who are even being charged for their meals while being held. Over at Insert Credit, here's Brandon Sheffield's take on the situation:

While I don't know for a fact that Firstsing is totally innocent, this does sound like a rather distressing situation. The tone of the mails he's sending indicated that the motivation for this was all financial — according to Anndy, the company had been doing well in a poor area, and the local government wanted in on the action. He's so upset that he's actively wishing he weren't Chinese — the only 'crime' he claims to be guilty of.

But, why was this company targeted? That's what I don't get. Sure, this is one side of the story, but lots of companies are making money in China. Why this one? Brian Ashcraft

Government Takes Action [Insert Credit]

Some holiday. It's late Thursday morning, between 10am and noon, I forget. With the country shut done for the Golden Week holidays, families board trains, load up cars and head to the seashore, the mountains or the Monster Hunter Festa. Trying to find the damn thing, walking through an underground shopping area out by Osaka Castle. I pass more and more people with PSPs, so I know: I'm close.

Getting into the main exhibit hall requires waiting in line in one room to get into another room. Fortunately no one is in this room. Well, not "no one," but "no one."

The other room, however, is packed. We're herded through a zig-zag line, and a woman in a Monster Hunter shirt talks into a bullhorn, apologizing for the wait. The exhibit hall, it seems, is crowded, and Capcom is only letting people in as people come out.

Forty minutes pass, seconds punctuated by PSP button clicking. Everyone has one of Sony's portables, and they're all playing MH Portable 2nd. The game's a smash in Japan, moving something like half a million copies on drop day alone. It's the biggest hit for the PSP, and the game is nothing short of a cultural phenomenon. The guy with chapped skin in front of me is talking about it, the short woman with too much make-up behind me is talking about it, and the gaggle of lanky teens next to me are talking about it. Everyone, and I mean everyone, is breathing Monster Hunter Portable 2nd and the Sony PlayStation Portable. Well, except for this guy.

And an old DS at that. Total punk. Yah, I know it's blurry. I got excited.

We're finally ushered in the exhibition hall. Going in, I knew this was a MHP 2nd rally. There will be players competing in Monster Hunter, footage shown from the game and MH goods like stuffed animals. In short, it's Monster Hunter and that's it.

There's a stage with people sitting on the floor. Families, friends, all of them have PSPs. Multiple PSPs. And they're all playing Monster Hunter Portable 2nd, I imagine. An inventory of my surroundings:

A large sword.

Figurines. Behind glass. (There is glass.)

Dudes with hair-dos and PSPs.

Monster Hunter art.

Fake meat with fake fire.

A sign that tells me to turn my PSP's LAN function off, not to take pictures and not to eat large pieces of meat in the event hall. The Nintendo DS is in the fine print.

In the back, there's a "Goods Corner." Over the mob, I can make out various Monster Hunter plush toys. An event staffer tells me that it's not possible to go look at the goods. Too many people.

Near the exit, there's a display for a MH card game coming out this summer. Looks somewhat complex as it involves a mat. Child sit on the floor next to me, playing it. They've already figured it out. Combine this with the upcoming MMO Monster Hunter: Frontier, and Capcom seems dead set on capitalizing on the series full tilt throttle.

I kinda linger for a moment. Yup, it's Monster Hunter, it's portable, it's the sequel, and I hear it's popular in Japan. Like I said, some holiday. Brian Ashcraft

Already the venue is filled with Fallout fans offering Bethesda in-depth tips on how to make a Fallout game for the fans instead of for the general public at large, which is something a developer should never do. Who wants to sell millions of copies and generate a new fan base anyway?

In an extremely long post entitled "The Fallout Fanbase and You, We aren't all rabid deathclaws...", poster Frank Horrigan explains the feelings of the fans.

And no, we are not pessimistic, we are apprehensive. We are worried this game won't be a Fallout game for the fans. We don't have any solid evidence to prove the game will not be a worthy Fallout game, but we've got plenty of circumstantial evidence that allows us to build an ominous case. It may be weak, but there is no evidence at all, yet, that this game will be a Fallout game for the fans.

Fallout 3 Forums [Bethesda via CVG]

Midway's Kickman is an odd one in the video game world as it was one of the first arcade games to feature Pac-man as a guest star outside of an actual Pac Man related game.

In Kickman, you control a clown on a unicycle with a track ball and a "KICK" button. Placed on a "3D" cityscape (read: perspective) where happy people throw balloons at you off of the balconies. You try and catch as many as you could on top of your head and if you missed one, you could try and kick it back up on to your little clown hat. Different colored balloons gave you different amounts of points if you catch them and eventually you would pop them with a pin. But watch out, amongst the happy balloon throwers are nasty monsters who will try to confuse you by throwing bombs. Avoid the bombs and try to catch the special guest star of the game, Pac-Man, for super extra points.

Unlike some of the flyers we've seen past Arcade Flyer Art Saturdays, this one does not use sex to sell it. Instead, they've gone for the complete opposite and decided to use a terrifying, sexually ambiguous clown. I'm always suspicious of anything advertised by clowns, which is the reason I don't eat at McDonald's, disgusting food aside. Although, I guess it would have been rather hard to sell a game that's all about clowns and balloons any other way. At least they didn't try to do something really creepy like a sexy lady clown. Ugh... just the thought of that makes my flesh crawl. Flynn De Marco

This October, I hope I will spend the vast majority of my days sitting in a rapidly expanding pool of hysterically evacuated urine. And I need your help to do it.

Let's face it: despite the fact that almost every game has monsters in it, there aren't many truly scary games. Games that have scared me, off the top of my head, include Silent Hill, System Shock 2 and, ironically, quite a few adventure games, like Gabriel Knight and I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream. Most of these games are frightening not because of monsters or mere spooky moments, but because there's something deeply unsettling philosophically behind them.

I want to spell all of October playing some truly scary games. The thing is, I don't really know of many that don't merely fall into the FPS with monsters mold. I'm looking for games with less monsters jumping out of closets to blaze down with a shotgun than I am looking for games that disturb on a deeper level. For example, I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is terrifying because of the reality-shifting cruelty of an insane, malicious god willing to torture for infinity. System Shock 2 is unsettling because of the horrors of losing your humanity in infinite space, all alone. Silent Hill's dreamlike psychological symbolism touches something raw.

So help me, guys. Help me find some good horror games, fitting the above criteria. Any suggestions you have, no matter how old, would be welcome. Remember anyone can comment now: just enter your comment, a username and a password and you're on your way to becoming a Kotakuite! Florian Eckhardt

Destructoid's readers (and contributors) are a tawdry, villainous bunch. As are scoundrels over at The Age blogs, where Destructoid got the idea for compiling a list of gaming sins in the first place.

For my own part, I despise the tendency of gamers to regard the personal tastes of themselves or others as wrong. Liking or not liking something is not immoral, because it has no effect on others. It's not a sin that you didn't finish Halo. It's not a sin that you dig Parappa. And it's most certainly not a sin to hate Sierra adventure games (it's common bloody sense).

Be absolved.

The most sinful confessions from both Destructoid and the Age's threads were often the ones not regarded so sinfully by onlookers, such as the Age's 'Bluie's precocious chirp, "My favourite game is Unreal Tournament (and I'm a girl)and the newer versions just can't beat it." Note here the absence of awareness of the morally repugnant nature of braying about your vagina every time you get a chance to relate it to gaming.

Hit the jump for my favorite sin from the 'Toid, plus personal confessions from myself and Stickypig (who is tired of being called Sizzlepig).

Being a fanboy is also, most certainly, a sin. If I see one more totally console-free comment thread get turned into a ps3 vs. wii pissing match, I'm calling the Pope to come and take you all to hell. And I'm not talking about John-Paul, either.

But my all-time favorite was from Destructoid, and has nothing to do with pontiffs or pussies:

# Xbudz says: September 19th, 2006 at 9:42 am

You guys call those gaming sins? Try this:

I sold my birthday presents for a Sega Saturn during its suprise launch in 1995.
# Chris Taran

For Stickypig's part, during Sega's promotion for Truxton, he missed the deadline by which he had to purchase another Sega game and send in the receipt to get a free copy of the former. But through the intervention of some dark god, S-Pig was struck with the inspiration to manually transfigure the date on a diferent receipt, thus receiving his ill-gotten game in a timely manner.

For my own part, I discovered that the secondary controller would steer the duck in Duck Hunt. I did not tell my friend who was actually manning the light gun, and who suddenly seemed to become far less proficient at the game. Eliza Gauger

Confess Your Gaming Sins [Destructoid]
Gaming Confessions [The Age Blogs]

We got a tip from some joker calling himself Skylab about this here indie game, KUDOS, which touts itself as a "turn-based life simulator".

Gaming is all about simulating life, really. But it's all about simulating a life you want to lead, if only for the short time that you're in the game. When I'm headshotting filthy Russian mobsters as Gabe Logan, international man of mystery, that's a life I can get into! Complicated algorithms about when I need to feed the cat, or what TV channel I should be watching, or how that date went with the whitecollar guy who lives in the next suburb... these things are infuriating.

Cliff's notes: Saving the world? Fuck yeah. Feeding the cat? Fuck you.

Even in the Sims, the level of fantasy was fairly high. High enough that once every few years I can stand to play it for a week or so, make some skins for some truly disfunctional homunculi, try and summon that horrible Social Bunny and get some hilarious screenshots.

But Kudos just seems to make you work, and work, and work, with no reward but your hideous and poorly-dressed denizen of the Uncanny Valley staring straight back at you from behind your myriad mundane menus, boring into your soul. And I do mean boring.

There's a free demo on the site, so go ahead and give it a try and report back. I'm on my Mac today so I wasn't able to run it. Eliza Gauger

From here [BunchofNerds]

Pokemon is touring the nation, color me scared. I'm not sure where all they will be going, but I know that on May 5 the furry little rodents will be landing in Denver.

The event will include a chance to get your pic taken with Pikachu, download some new pokemon to your game pack and even check out that Pokemon puzzle game for the DS.

I can't believe that Pokemon is still so tremendously popular.

Pokemon Invades Southwest Mall in May [Rocky Mountain News]