Chinese site DigiTimes reports that Microsoft won’t be releasing the Xbox360 HD-DVD add-on in Asia. According to Microsoft Taiwan, there is no market for the HD-DVD player in the Asian region,

This is because the external HD-DVD drive is designed to play back movies pre-recorded on HD-DVD blue-laser discs, and the supply of HD-DVD movies in Asia is not sufficient to support the sale of such hardware, for the time being at least.

The HD-DVD add-on will launch later this year in North America and Europe, rumored to cost around $200.

Read (DigiTimes, via Kotaku)

Last Friday a group of protesters gathered around Take-Two’s office to show they anger against Bully, the yet to be released and still highly controversial game.

The protesters, from the group Peaceaholics, yelled, “This game is bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!”. Take-Two and developer Rockstar Games previously received complains about GTA: San Andreas, for its violence and the whole Hot Coffee controversy.

This time, the critics claim that Bully will result into more school violence, because the main character is supposed to retaliate against kids and teachers who are bulling him.

Nevertheless, a group called “Peaceaholics” protesting against a videogame. Shouldn’t they be protesting in Washington D.C. anyway? And leave this matter to Jack Thompson, who is already suing Take-Two over Bully?

Update: Check out a video of the protest, and hear a guy saying “violent videogames are worse than terrorists”.

Aeropause features a walkthrough on what to do if your Xbox360 goes dead and has to be replaced. How do you transfer your content, downloads, videos, games, on to a new hard drive safely?

Usually people resort to use the “Recover Xbox Live Gamertag” option, but as they report, it might not be the best thing to do.

Last round of screenshots and videos from the Games Convention in Leipzig, plus a few newly released screenshots of various games. The concention was very popular among fans, as we reported earlier today.

New Screenshots:
Elveon, Xbox360 (TeamXbox)
Splinter Cell: Double Agent (TeamXbox)
WoW: The Burning Crusade (3DGamers)
Hot Shots Golf, PS3 (TheMagicbox)
Halo 2 Vista (DigitalBattle)
Red Steel (VoodooExtreme)
Zelda Twilight Princes (DigitalBattle)
Mario Hoops 3on3 (BritishGamingBlog)

New Videos:
Battalion Wars 2, Wii (Videogamesblogger)
UT2007 (DigitalBattle)

Lonely Planet, publishers of countless video and book travel guides, have teamed up with Sony and will be releasing their books in form of interactive guides on the PSP. The guides will be delivered via a download service and stored on the Memory Stick.

The new service, called “Passport to…

Nintendo has announced that over 2 million players have connected their DS online using the Nintendo WiFi Connection. The most popular games are Mario kart DS and Metroid Prime Hunters. The 2 million number represents unique players that have connected online, player #2.000.000 connected last Thursday for the first time.

Nintendo’s newest DS title, Star Fox Command, will also include full online multiplayer features, where up to four players will be able to play together.

I love TheInquirer, they always have the latest insider news surrounding Sony’s PlayStation 3. This time, they report that the graphics chip, the Nvidia RSX, has once again been downgraded, from a 700 MHz memory clock, to a 650 MHz memory clock speed.

Previously the GPU was also downgraded from 550 MHz to 500 MHz. It appears that Nvidia has some problems producing enough quality chips for Sony, so clock speeds must be lowered. None of this is official though, Sony still specifies the RSX at 550 MHz on the official product page.

There wasn’t much news from Nintendo at the Leipzig Games Convention, only two new Wii games announced. Price and launch date was never talked about, besides eager journalists, bloggers, and common gamers.

However, Nintendo has announced a Wii media event held in New York on September 14. Reggie Fils-Aime will be there, hopefully announcing Wii pricing and launch date(s). Or announce when they will announce a price and launch date. One of those two has to happen, or we’ll loose our minds soon.

BFG (Big Force Gun), the most powerful gun in Doom and Quake, famously know as the “Big F***ing Gun” for its mass devastation. And for being a pain in the ass if you’re in its sight (kind of like the modern AWP/AWM sniper in Counter-Strike).

You can now, for only $79.95, own your own replica of the gun. But be prepared to wait a while, they’re already sold out.

BFG Replica $79.95 (via coolestgadgets)

Video of The Rock using the BFG in Doom (the movie).

Leipzig Games Convention is over and attracted a record number of visitors; more than 183,000 visited the show, with some 2,600 journalists from 38 countries covering the event. Last year, “only” 138,000 visitors stopped by, while 2000 journalists covered the event. CEO of Leipzig GC, Josef Rahmen said,

“Success on this scale is unique ever since the Leipzig Fair’s new exhibition centre was opened ten years ago. GC has clearly demonstrated that it’s the European number one not just among the general public but also in the media and business sector – making it one of the leading events in the industry anywhere in the world.