THQ Tames MX vs. ATV Untamed For The Xbox 360, PS3, Wii...

...And for three more platforms as well. In what is set to become one large cross-platform launch, THQ announced the continuation of Rainbow Studios' MX vs. ATV franchise with a new off-road racing game called MX vs. ATV Untamed, planned for release on six platforms: Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, DS, PS2 and PSP. Aside from the last two versions (apparently not dated yet), all the others should be unleashed in January 2008.

As with the previous recent instalments, the new MX vs. ATV will run on Rainbow's Rhythm Racing physics engine, but with added glitz in the next-gen versions, and "innovative gameplay" on Nintendo's equally innovative platforms. MX vs. ATV Untamed is set to feature bigger, more populated outdoor open-world environments, an X-cross career mode showcasing all eight vehicles and the all-new EnduroCross mode. If you're into off-road racing, the following extra details should prove useful:

"Rainbow's critically acclaimed physics have been supercharged with all-new improvements for next-gen action, featuring throttle based power-slides, near upside down whips and new scrubs at full speed, giving players more control than ever before while keeping the smooth, authentic feel not found in any other racing game. Players will compete in new event types, race with all-new vehicles and experience the ultimate X-Cross career mode, where they must master all eight vehicles, including the new ORV Sport. The largest, most detailed racing worlds to date will showcase all-new modes and event types, pitting racers against logs, rocks, mud pits and more in EnduroCross and letting players tear through treacherous trails with all the vehicles competing against each other in Opencross. Stadium-based Supercross racing will be returning, with all the top Motocross and ATV professional riders, and the entire game will be available online."

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DICE Reveals More About Its Next FPS, Mirror's Edge

If you think that the Swedes from EA's Digital Illusions (DICE) studio don't have anything other than Battlefield on their collective mind, you've got another thing coming! Another first-person shooter, naturally, but at least it will be a far departure from their great (albeit over-milked) Battlefield franchise. As it's been known for some time, DICE is currently working on two next-gen projects: one being Battlefield: Bad Company, and the other one will be called Mirror's Edge.

While the game has yet to be formally announced by Electronic Arts, the devs are already eager to talk about it, even though they still can't reveal too much. So far Mirror's Edge is planned for the PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and the way they put it, Mirror's Edge will revolutionize the FPS genre, by "changing the way that players are able to move in first person".

"No more restrictions, no more being blocked by simple barriers such as walls and fences. We want to enable the player to move like a real person, with the ability to run, jump, vault and slide in a way that has never been seen before in a first-person game", a representative for DICE told GI.biz.

Today, Eurogamer compiled a few more details about the game, based on a preview from the latest issue of UK magazine EDGE:

"The game's female lead, Faith, will sprint, climb and, of course, leap around a utopian metropolis where she's among a small faction of people who've rejected the corrupt, authoritarian methods of those in power.

(...) Many of Faith's moves have been inspired by parkour, and controls are being kept deliberately simple - with movement kept away from the face buttons in service to fluency - and a "Reaction Time" slow motion feature, as well as a system of timing button presses, that dictate your success on the run and in combat."

Less "shooting", more "first-person" immersion? Might not be a bad thing, for a change.

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NCsoft Announces E3 2007 Line-up, Auto Assault Shutdown

Shortly before announcing their E3 2007 line-up this week, MMO powerhouse NCsoft warned that the ingenious, original and utterly failing vehicular MMO game, Auto Assault, is to close down at the end of August. Despite it receiving several free content updates since its release in April 2006, and going through a servers-merger last summer, Auto Assault continued to lose players over the past months. So many, in fact, that ultimately NCsoft decided to discontinue it altogether.

The announcement from the official website retains from getting into any messy details, of course, simply stating:

"The service will close at midnight on August 31, 2007. As of today, any player currently in the service with an active billed account will not be billed again. If players have previously purchased time via multi-month billing or time cards that extends their service past July 31, NCsoft will reconcile these accounts appropriately."

More info on this topic will be announced at a later date, but for now let's see about that pseudo-E3 line-up... So, at the E3 Media & Business Summit 2007 that will take place next week (July 11-13) in Santa Monica, NCsoft will preview the following four MMO titles:

- Tabula Rasa

- Aion

- Guild Wars: Eye of the North

- Dungeon Runners

Tabula Rasa is set for release in autumn 2007, Aion was pushed back to 2008, and Guild Wars: Eye of the North will go live on August 31, as announced this week. What? What about Dungeon Runners? Who cares?!

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Dates & Delays: Crysis, Zelda DS, Metroid 3, Ace Combat 6 & more...

These last days brought quite a few release date announcements, some of which are actually more like corrections... or delays, in plain English. The games involved range from the DirectX 10 extravaganza Crysis, to the first Zelda game for the Nintendo DS, all the way to the defecting (though not at all defective) Xbox 360 flight-sim, Ace Combat 6... and everything in-between. So let's take them one at a time, shall we?

With the recent opening of the new Crysis website, Electronic Arts has confirmed that Crysis is set for release in autumn 2007, and further reports indicate an even more precise date. According to an Amazon listing, Crytek's latest tropical / Zero-G shooter is due for release on September 11, 2007.

Next up on the PC, NCsoft issued a salvo of statements this week, one of which predicts that the next chapter in ArenaNet's subscription-free MMORPG, Guild Wars: Eye of the North will be released on August 31. As for the other statements, they're not entirely pretty, but we'll get back to them shortly.

Moving on to Nintendo's consoles, it was announced that The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass should finally ship for the DS on October 1. At the same time, Nintendo briefly mentioned that Metroid Prime 3: Corruption is getting delayed once again - although only by a week this time. So instead of August 20, it's now set for August 27.

A rather good news was brought by Namco Bandai, whose Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation flight combat game will land in stores (only) for Xbox 360 on October 23, somewhat sooner than we had hoped for. Gamespot also has word that it's being launched in tandem with Hori's Ace-Edge Flightstick, the Xbox 360's first flight-sim accessory.

Last, and certainly least, Fatal Inertia is now scheduled to ship on September 11. Only for the Xbox 360, though, as Koei's communique has absolutely nothing to say about the game's PS3 version, which may as well be delayed till next year. If it ever makes it, at all...

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The pervs from Tecmo are planning to bring their decade-old (yet always juicy) Dead or Alive franchise to one more platform. After the arcades and various consoles, it's finally the PC's turn to bask in the hotness of a new DOA game, revealingly titled Dead or Alive Online. The project is the result of an agreement with Chinese online gaming giant Shanda, with development currently being handled by Tecmo's Lievo Studio. Unfortunately, Shanda will only operate the DOA Online game in mainland China, Hong Kong and Macao, where they hope to launch it before the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games (from August).

Even though the announcement doesn't mention any specific plans for bringing the game to the Western world, it does give us plenty of hope with the following bit:

"As the first PC online game adapted from DOA series, DOA Online will be globally published and initially released in China."

So yeah, it's quite safe to assume that Tecmo will eventually share all those virtual pantsu with the rest of the world, too. Further comments about this online edition of DOA follow...

"DOA Online will be developed on both PC and Shanda's EZ Platform. Its gamepad support will deliver to users a fantastic console gaming experience", said Tianqiao Chen, Chairman and CEO of Shanda.

"DOA Online is not a simple replant from the console platform to the PC platform. It is a completely new game featuring the characteristics of a PC online game. (...) Additionally, we have the technical capability and actual achievement to implement worldwide online fighting matches in our competitive fighting game for the console platform", said Yoshimi Yasuda, president and CEO of Tecmo.

This final statement basically tells us that Dead or Alive Online will not be a MMO, but a simple online fighting game. So, that's one less thing to be excited about.

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Geometry Wars: Galaxies Properly Announced For Wii, DS

Looks like the rumours from a while ago were right: Geometry Wars is indeed coming to Nintendo's Wii and DS platforms, as early as autumn 2007. Or "late", if you wish, considering that the original Geometry Wars minigame was part of Project Gotham Racing 2 back in 2003. Then of course came the best-known Xbox Live Arcade version, followed this year by a PC adaptation (also released on Steam last month). The latest addition to Bizarre Creations' franchise will be called Geometry Wars: Galaxies, but this time it's being developed by Kuju Entertainment for the Wii and DS.

As expected, they're optimizing the controls for Nintendo's playful little systems (Wiimote, Nunchuk, stylus, so on, so forth), "to execute hotshot moves as never before". Things should get even more exciting in multiplayer, as Geometry Wars: Galaxies will let players battle via hot-seat, co-op, simultaneous and versus modes. Aaand, players that own both a Nintendo DS and a Wii (and assumingly both versions of the game) can link the game together using Wi-Fi to unlock some sort of "bonus content". What kind?... Your guess is as good as ours.

As for the new content being added by Kuju, Galaxies will bring a new mission-based campaing, "where players blast-off on action-paced quests across the galaxy, defending solar systems one by one, defeating waves of alien enemies on new and classic Battle Grids". Plus, the full version of Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved will also be included in the package. Not bad, eh? Oh, and we also have some screenshots from the Wii version. Same old, same old...

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Wii Selling 6+ Times Better Than PlayStation 3 In Japan

Just as the PlayStation 3 was finally confirmed to be in "full production", reports are coming in from Japan that Sony's next-gen console is getting its ports kicked all over again by the Wii. Sixfold! For every PS3 sold in Japan throughout the month of June, Nintendo was selling more than 6 Wiis, as indicated by the latest data from magazine publisher Enterbrain (via Reuters). In fact, the Wii/PS3 sales ratio was just over 6.5 to 1 last month, in an accelerated rise from 4:1 in April, and 5:1 in May.

According to Enterbrain, Nintendo sold 270,974 Wii units in the four weeks ended June 24, while Sony only managed to push 41,628 PS3s off the selves. As usual, Microsoft lagged even further behind, with 17,616 Xbox 360s sold. Then again, considering that's nearly half of what Sony sold, it's not bad at all.

However, this "next-gen battle" still pales in comparison to the handheld market, as the Nintendo DS continues to hold its ground as the best selling games system in Japan, by far! During one week alone in late June, there were almost 164,000 DS units sold in the territory, which is more than all other consoles combined.

Apparently the only place in the world where the PlayStation 3 is actually doing better than the Wii and Xbox 360 at retail is Australia:

"In an interview with GameSpot AU, [managing director Michael Ephraim] quoted figures from data trackers GfK Australia, which show that the PS3 has sold more than 50,000 units since it was launched on March 23, 2007. In comparison, the Wii has sold 100,000 units since its launch on December 7, 2006. "Based on GfK since launch, PS3 has been the number one next-gen console, outselling Wii and Xbox 360 every week, except for last week," Ephraim said."

Now, I dare anyone to say that the Aussies don't have "issues"!

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Sherlock Holmes Faces Arsène Lupin In New Adventure

The fourth Sherlock Holmes adventure game bearing Frogwares' signature has already been announced by French publisher Focus Home Interactive for release in autumn 2007, after the previous chapter (The Awakened, based on Lovecraft's Cthulhu myth) appeared earlier this year. In the hope that this sudden development speed-up won't compromise the series' already-dubious quality, here are the first details revealed so far, along with the first batch of screenshots waiting to be investigated in our gallery.

The new game is titled Sherlock Holmes versus Arsène Lupin, and it will feature two of the greatest figures in detective literature: good ol' Sherlock, and Arsène Lupin, "the gentleman thief" imagined by French writer Maurice Leblanc, and later re-imagined in various movies and even an anime series. And, of course, video games. Elementary, my dear Watson.

"This new Sherlock Holmes game sends players to 19th Century London where Arsène Lupin, a young French burglar with an impressive track record, has just challenged Scotland Yard and the most famous of detectives - Sherlock Holmes. Lupin has announced that he plans to rob the capital of five objects of immense value over the course of five days. The objects are housed in highly prestigious locations such as the National Gallery, the British Museum, the Tower of London and even Buckingham Palace! Sherlock Holmes will have to muster all his courage and ingenuity to save England from terrible humiliation."

Aside from this scenario, there's not much to say about the gameplay that hasn't been said, seen or played before. It's a 3D adventure of sorts, taking you through famous places and prestigious landmarks full of "superb decors which have been faithfully reproduced", and "hundreds of works of art, all faithfully reproduced in their real locations". As faithfully reproduced from the announcement.

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