Former id Software designer American McGee, best known for the mind-blowing action-adventure game American McGee's Alice (and worst for attaching his name to the recent Bad Day L.A. political manifesto / gaming disaster), is hard at work on a new project called Grimm. Mostly revealed through a series of concept artworks posted on McGee's Flickr page, Grimm looks like it might be another deranged intrusion into the world of fairy tales - such as Pinocchio, Little Red Riding Hood or Three Little Pigs.

Exactly what kind of game it will be... we honesly have no idea. But if said arworks - drawn by one Lin Ran - are anything to go by, it should hopefully be more like Alice, than Bad Day L.A. Here's what McGee had to say about the artist last month, on his blog:

"Our latest addition to the Spicy Horse team, Lin Ran, is an amazing concept artist with an immense range of ability and styles. The stuff he's been doing for our latest project is stunning."

You can also see just how stunning Lin's drawings are in our new Grimm gallery. "Weird" is just one of many words that come to mind.

Aside from working at id Software once upon a time, American McGee was also a creative director at Electronic Arts. More recently, he founded a new game development studio in Shanghai, China, called Spicy Horse (erroneously reported as "Spicy House" by some websites), where he acts as creative director yet again. And they also have a sister game art-outsourcing company called Vykarian. Looks like they're gearing up for some big future plans.

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Activision Gets Unreal Engine 3 For New Action Game

In a somewhat surprising (as in surprisingly late) announcement, publisher Activision revealed over the weekend that they have entered an agreement with Epic Games, to license their Unreal Engine 3 technology. The main reason behind the deal is an upcoming - and unannounced - action game, developed under Activision's supervision. And that's about all they had to reveal at this time, save for the following PR statements given by one of the publisher's officials, and by Epic's Mark Rein:

"The Unreal Engine is one of the most technically advanced engines on the market and is a perfect fit for our upcoming action game," said Laird Malamed, head of production for Activision. "The engine's robust suite of programming tools will enable our development team to deliver what is sure to be an amazing game experience."

"We're extremely excited to be working with Activision" said Mark Rein, vice president of Epic Games, Inc. "We've admired them for a long time and we're pleased that they've chosen to use Unreal Engine 3 and we're confident they're going to make a great game with it."

As I'm sure many have pointed out by now, at this rate it's becoming increasingly easier to keep track of the companies that haven't licensed Unreal Engine 3. Good thing we have Wiki keeping count of the games using Epic's latest technology, although that list still doesn't include all the companies.

Looks like id Software's technology wasn't good enough for Activision. Either that or id's looking for a new publisher. Or... bah, I could go on forever with the speculation.

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While waiting for the 2007 edition of the Games Developer Conference to begin next week in San Francisco, ze Germans send word that their increasingly popular Leipzig GC Developers Conference will take place between August 20-22, 2007, at the Leipzig Exhibition Centre. This is in a slight disaccordance with GI.biz' report from last autumn (story), when this year's event was said to be "confirmed" for August 22-26.

As the event's new GCDC.eu website reveals, the German conference also bares a new motto - "Upgrade the Future" - and for those looking to keep themselves up to date with the 2007 Leipzig GC, the website will feature "a news section providing up-to-date information about developments in the video game industry, as well as video interviews with the most important experts in the industry available for download. In addition, a new matchmaking feature helps participants in planning their appointments for GCDC with other attendees and speakers".

The are no specific speakers announced so far, but the organizers revealed that the three-day event will be focused on three main topics - Game Development, Business, and Science - while offering participants numerous networking opportunities. Other focal points will include Mobile Gaming, Server Technology, Experts meet Students, Made in Europe, and the premiere of Games meet Movies.

"'Upgrade the Future' expresses the fact that we offer developers insight into the future, new technologies and business ideas. This is only possible thanks to the outstanding support of the industry itself and we are proud of the trust placed in us over the past five years. With the GCDC as the most significant European platform for developers we aim to continue to bring together and strengthen the European branch of the industry", said Frank Sliwka, project director of GC Developers Conference.

Last year's Leipzig GC included such prominent speakers as Peter Molyneux (Lionhead, ex-Bullfrog) and Bill Roper (Flagship, ex-Blizzard), so expect some heavyweights to take the stage once again in August.

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PS3 Oblivion Lacks Downloads, Elder Scrolls MMO Possible

Just a few days after Pete Hines told IGN that the PlayStation 3 SIXAXIS controller's tilt function is completely useless for Oblivion (though they could've used some rumble), Bethesda's VP of public relations and marketing had even more disappointing comments in store for the game's upcoming PS3 version. As I'm sure you know by now, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion already has plenty of downloadable content on the Xbox 360 and PC, including that famed horse armor pack, or additional dungeons and quests. We may not like having to pay for them, but there's no denying that they help prolongue the game's life - and enjoyability - on these platforms.

"Thankfully", we won't have to worry about any of that on the PlayStation 3, because Bethesda hasn't figured out a way to deliver extra downloadable content on Sony's next-gen console. Speaking to MCV, Pete Hines said they weren't given enough information about the PS3's online service, so Oblivion will launch without any extra content on the PS3 next month.

"We plan to support downloadable content on PS3, but we couldn't tell you how or when it will be out, because it's not clear how we're going to do that yet." He added, "You could point to any number of factors for why that is. Although it's impossible to say which is the better between [Xbox Live and PS3 Online], Xbox Live is easier to implement because we've had a much better sense of it at an earlier stage than with PS3."

Oh well, here, have some new screenshots from the PS3 version to ease your suffering.

In a more refreshing Elder Scrolls story that we skipped over last week, Pro-G also conducted an interview with Pete Hines, hinting at an inevitable The Elder Scrolls V sequel, and also at the possibility of a future MMORPG placed in the Elder Scrolls universe. For now, however, it's just that - a vague possibility - because Fallout 3 and (then) TES V come first.

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Sony Europe just keeps sending in more and more press releases, dealing with the upcoming PlayStation 3 launch in PAL territories on March 23. But unlike last week's despicable announcement that the PS3 would be less compatible with PS2 games in Europe, today we finally have a good news speculation for those of you planning to buy the console, and living in Europe, Australia or other PAL territories.

The first of today's communiques deals with the pricing of the first-party games available at launch, either as full disc-based titles (namely Resistance: Fall of Man, Motorstorm, Formula One Championship Edition, Ridge Racer 7 and Genji: Days Of The Blade), or gamelings downloadable via the PlayStation Network (such as BlastFactor, flOw and Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection). The recommended retail price for each of Sony's five disc-based launch games will be €59.99 (£39.99, AUD 99.95, NZ 109.95), while the downloadable games will cost between €2.99 to €9.99, depending on the specific title (and apparently only "for an introductory period").

  But moving on to their second press release, this is where the fun begins. While announcing that Gran Turismo HD Concept will be freely downloadable from day one via the PlayStation Network, Sony also slipped a hint that even more Gran Turismo goodness would follow later this year. As far as we're concerned, that means Gran Turismo 5 (which was previously thought to come out in 2008). But feel free to judge for yourself from these two quotes:

"A big year for Gran Turismo starts with a free download for PS3 owners"

"We can't say too much right now, but it's going to be a big year for this title; Gran Turismo HD Concept is just the beginning."

For now, however, here are some sure things about Gran Turismo HD Concept as provided by Sony, who point out a couple of "firsts" for the series in this version:

"Players start with one car on the Eiger Nordwand track in the Swiss Alps. When the track is completed within the time limit, another car is unlocked. There are nine further cars to unlock in this way, including a Ferrari 599 - the first time a Ferrari has appeared in Gran Turismo. In another first, Gran Turismo HD Concept's Time Trial will bring into effect the first Gran Turismo online rankings system. For the first time, players will be able to track who the best Gran Turismo driver is - and we expect a lot of dedication to be put in."

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Over the weekend, Vivendi's Sierra division officially announced the latest instalment in the Empire Earth series, currently in development at Mad Doc Software - as previously revealed one week ago in a PC Gamer preview. At that time, the British magazine already offered (via CVG) some consistent details about the third iteration's gameplay features, such as the "new" strategic component at the global level, opening up the possibility of keeping the surviving units from one battle to the next. Something similar would stay true for constructed buildings and researched technologies, and sub-missions were also mentioned as part of PC Gamer's article.

In light of that, what did Sierra's announcement have to say about Empire Earth III that we didn't already know? Absolutely nothing! Well, except for a vague release date, which they say is planned for fall 2007. They also urge us to visit the Empire Earth website to get more information about it, but ironically there's not a single trace of "III" there, at this time. So we'll have to suffice with the following description from the announcement:

"Empire Earth is the only RTS series that allows players to build and rule an empire from the ancient world to the distant future, battling it out across the globe through the eons in a bid for worldwide control. Unlike other RTS games that take away the spoils of victory, Empire Earth III will offer continuous free-form gameplay that will allow players to keep units from one battle to the next."

Ultimately, the only good thing out of that press release are the attached screenshots, that we added in our Empire Earth III gallery for your viewing... *cough* pleasure. Once again, I feel compelled to point out the sheer cheesyness of the graphics, at least from a personal point of view.

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PlayStation 3 Not So Backwards-Compatible In Europe

There hasn't been any great news concerning the upcoming launch of the PlayStation 3 in Europe for as long as I can remember, and this one is no different. As if the late launch and high price point weren't bad enough, Sony's latest press release brings even more bad news! Today, while announcing the PS3's hardware specification for Europe, they subtly hinted that the PlayStation 3 will only be compatible with a "limited range" of PlayStation 2 titles:

"The European PS3 will feature the Cell Broadband Engine, 60 GB hard disc drive, Blu-ray Disc player, built-in Wi-Fi connectivity, SIXAXIS wireless controller. It also embodies a new combination of hardware and software emulation which will enable PS3 to be compatible with a broad range of original PlayStation (PS) titles and a limited range of PlayStation 2 (PS2) titles."

Just how limited are we talking about? Well, a Sony spokesperson was already quoted by Reuters as saying that "the backwards compatibility is not going to be as good as in the US and Japanese models", so prepare for the worst. SCE Europe president, David Reeves basically says so himself, as well, in the communique:

"Rather than concentrate on PS2 backwards compatibility, in the future, company resources will be increasingly focused on developing new games and entertainment features exclusively for PS3, truly taking advantage of this exciting technology."

As a "brilliant" measure to cut production costs, it appears that Sony is removing the Emotion Engine (PS2) chip from the European units. So, instead of using hardware emulation for running PS2 games, the European PS3 will use software emulation - hence the lower compatibility rate (PCSX2 comes to mind...).

This also means that additional PS2 titles will only become compatible on the PS3 system through future firmware updates, the first of which will be made available on day one of the console's PAL launch. Also on March 23, users will be able to check whether their favorite titles are compatible with PS3 at faq.eu.playstation.com/bc.

Even the look of the PAL console could be less impressive, as suggested by analyst Datamonitor, who believes that Sony will launch the PS3 in Europe with a "new chassis", designed to bring down manufacturing costs. What's next? Throwing out the Blu-Ray drive?

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Prince of Persia Movie Should Be Disney's 2008 Hit

Not a year went by after Ubisoft resurrected Jordan Mechner's classic Prince of Persia franchise, and someone in Hollywood already jumped on the prospect of making a film based on the Sands of Time game. This was back in 2004, and that "someone" was - and still is - Jerry Bruckheimer, whose credentials as film producer are impressive to say the least. Not much has been heard about the "Prince of Persia" movie since then, other than it would be released by Disney, and that last year Jeffrey Nachmanoff ("The Day After Tomorrow") was hired to write the script (story).

Fast forward to present day, and we finally have anoter tiny bit of news about the Prince's upcoming cinematographical debut. The buzz was started yesterday by the Jim Hill Media blog, whose story "The Walt Disney Company embraces the "F" Word" (as in "franchise") bears a striking mention of the PoP movie:

"Walt Disney Pictures - in conjunction with Jerry Bruckheimer Films - is now gearing up to put a "Prince of Persia" movie into production. Because it's thought that a film based on this hugely popular series of Ubisoft Entertainment games (Which - in theory - will be Disney's big action-adventure release for the Summer of 2008) could then lead to a new hit series of movies for the studio."

Sounds to me like someone is trying to find a long-term cash-printing replacement to the Pirates of the Carribean "trilogy" that ends this summer. Not that I have a problem with this, no sir! They could even re-cast Johnny Depp as the Prince, for all I care. That should be... interesting.

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Nintendo Pulls The Plug On GameCube // UPDATE - Not!

As it stands now, the PlayStation 2 is the only "last-gen" console still left alive - and going strong. As you may remember, Microsoft pulled the plug on the Xbox production a long, long time ago (in July 2005), and now Nintendo acknowledges that they are no longer making GameCubes either. If you were still planning to buy one, though, there's no need to despair, because Nintendo still has plenty of units stocked up, and the price can only go down from now on. Well, at least until it becomes a classic rarity of sorts.

The nostalgic news (I wouldn't call it outright sad) was given by Perrin Kaplan, vice president of Nintendo America, in an interview conducted by GameDaily BIZ:

PK: Are we producing any more GameCubes? No. But do we have the inventory there for people to still purchase? Yes.

BIZ: But do you have the software support? (...) My point is that from a first-party perspective, just like Microsoft doesn't put out new original Xbox games, Nintendo is no longer supporting GameCube. Can you confirm that?

PK: Right, that's correct.

So there you have it, Nintendo's playful purble box that launched in 2001, and unfortunately ended on the third place of its generation of consoles, has now officially come to the end of its life cycle. It may still linger on for a while, with third-party games, but Nintendo won't be releasing any more GameCube titles. *sigh*

By the way, GameDaily's interview is actually about upcoming Wii features, so you might want to check it out in full.

And to think that Sony abandoned the PSOne production just last year...

UPDATE: Oh-oh, looks like mister Perrin Kaplan buried the GameCube alive! According to Nintendo UK, speaking to Eurogamer today, "Nintendo is still continuing production of GameCube hardware and GameCube software", and globally it still supports the console. Pff, classic example of communication breakdown.

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With no ending in sight to Microsoft's denials of any future Xbox 360 price cut, retailers from the United Kingdom decided to take matters into their own hands and offer their customers what Microsoft wouldn't: cheaper Xbox 360s. Way cheaper! As reported by several websites over the last couple of days, including Gamasutra, some UK retailers have initiated an unexpected, unseasonal, and unofficial series of price cuts for the Xbox 360, as well as for the old PlayStation 2.

In particular, the "Core" package of Microsoft's next-gen console is currently enjoying the most consistent promotions, with price cuts of up to £50 (€75 / $98). So instead of the suggested retail price of £199.99 ($390), the Core Xbox 360 is now being sold for £149.99 ($292) in some places. As a side-effect, this means that Microsoft's console is now actually cheaper than Nintendo's Wii, priced at £179.99 ($351), despite it packing way more computing power.

The "Premium" bundle, however, remains at pretty much the same price point, with negligible reductions observed so far. The reason for these marketing manoeuvres is not yet clear, but there are some speculations floating around already, involving the previously-rumoured hardware upgrade for the Xbox 360 (with a larger hard drive and HDMI port). But until Microsoft responds to any of these issues, speculation is all we have.

At the same time, Gamasutra reports on another major price cut for the PlayStation 2, ahead of the European release of Square's Final Fantasy XII today:

"At the same time as the Xbox 360 price cut, Wal-Mart owned supermarket chain Asda, the second largest in the UK, has cut the price of the PlayStation 2 from £69.99 ($136) to just £50 ($98) for a limited period. As with the Xbox 360, the price cut is not official, the only apparent reason for the move being the recent release of prominent exclusives Okami and Final Fantasy XII in the UK."

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