Things re going well for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 on the European continent, in fact, Christmas 08 was the best ever, according to a statement from the company. Compared to last year, Xbox 360 sales were up 100%. In total, since launch, 8 millions consoles have been sold in Europe, well ahead of Nintendo’s Wii and Sony’s PS3.

Full press release after the jump. READ ON »

UK’s Times Online are reporting that Sony might be in bigger trouble than originally assumed. According to the news outlet, the company is “on the brink of upheaval”, which could cause massive layoffs and management restructuring. Last month, Sony cut 16,000 permanent and temporary jobs worldwide, simultaneously expecting profits to be down 50% compared to last year. In hopes of cutting costs. Analysts now predict even more job cuts to further cut costs.

Sony released a short statement saying “We do not plan to announce additional restructuring measures at this time. We don’t have any such plan”. Analysts are betting the other way, though.

Capcom has finally confirmed a release date for Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop, the Wii remake of the zombie-killing Xbox 360 title: February 27. It will hit both Europe and North America on the same day.

The publisher also offered release dates for other games, including Street Fighter IV on February 17 and Resident Evil 5 on March 13. PC releases of the latter two titles will arrive after their console versions, as the company aims to avoid piracy spoiling sales, among other things.

On Sandswept Studio’s website is the unveiling of its debut game Detour. While the initial revelation did not offer much in way of details, a subsequent update reveals the title to be a real-time strategy game based around road construction. Here’s a bit:

DETOUR is a road-oriented Real-Time Strategy game that takes a satirical twist on highway construction, environmental activist groups, and cartoon humor. Players compete against each other and/or AI opponents to outsmart and out-build them. The goal is to build a road to the opposite side of the board and successfully deploy a delivery truck, without being stopped, and at the same time, stop your opponents from doing the same. The means of which we will discuss in good time.

With DETOUR we’re putting a colorful twist on the RTS genre, creating a game that is both simple to learn, and complex to master — sort of like a chess game with bombs. While we’re not currently announcing the platform on which this game is launching; with an endless amounts of unique strategies, a built-in map editor, and online play, DETOUR is going to bring a great amount of replayability and a whole new kind of fun.

Target platforms and release date details weren’t provided, but they do offer the game’s theme music as an MP3; it is also, quite unusually, offered as sheet music.

Electronics giant Sony claims that it has no plans to announce any new restructuring plans that would see the closure of any of its divisions. This comes in response to a recent report by The Times Online, which said Sony was “on [the] brink of upheaval” and that its employees were preparing for a “series of ‘sacred cow-slaying’ measures” that would see major divisions and factories closed.

“We do not plan to announce additional restructuring measures at this time,” said Sony spokesman Atsuo Omagari. “We don’t have any such plan.”

The company announced back in December that it would cut 16,000 jobs and would reduce focus on “unprofitable or non-core businesses”.

With 2008 wrapped up, Microsoft has provided lists of the past year’s most popular Xbox 360, Xbox Live Arcade and original Xbox games. As Major Nelson points out, the original Xbox and Xbox 360 lists were compiled by calculating the amount of online Xbox Live users playing each game; the Xbox Live Arcade list was based off sales of the game’s download.

Quite unsurprisingly, the most popular Xbox 360 games are Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, GTA IV and Gears of War 2 – in that order. Halo 2 and Fable mark the most popular Xbox games list. Hit the jump for the lists.
READ ON »

Starting off the new year with bad news: Capcom has revealed that the PC edition of Bionic Commando will be released “shortly” after the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game.

“[Bionic Commando] will be initially available for gamers on Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and Sony Computer Entertainment’s PLAYSTATION 3 with the PC version following shortly afterwards,” the company simply stated.

It comes as no surprise, though, seeing as how the publisher has been delaying PC versions of its games due to piracy concerns and the need for more polish. The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions are expected this March.

It’s the start of the week, you know what that means, right? Updates to the Virtual Console and WiiWare services.

Apparantely a slow week as both services will only be recieiving one new title, both detailed below:

WiiWare

Sandy Beach (Konami, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone—Comic Mischief, 500 Wii Points): Enjoy a fun day at Sandy Beach as you build elaborate sand castles. You can work peacefully on your sand castle or enter into a battle with invading crabs in Crab Battle mode. Players will strategically build their sand castle and use cannons to defend it against an army of destructive crabs. After successfully defending your sand castle, discover beach treasures and additional cannons with your metal detector to customize your castle even more.

Virtual Console

Kirby’s Dream Land 3 (Super NES™, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone, 800 Wii Points): Kirby, Dream Land’s resident hero (and everyone’s favorite puffball), must once again save the day when the mischievous King Dedede starts causing trouble. Kirby must travel through an assortment of levels, battling an exotic array of enemies (both new and familiar) determined to stop him from completing his mission. Always armed with his trusty ability to swallow enemies and gain special attacks, Kirby can also unite with some of his animal friends and make use of their particular talents. Featuring detailed graphics, challenging boss battles and the distinct charm of a Kirby game, it’s no wonder this title is considered a classic.

I, for one, was a huge fan of the Kirby series and might actually be putting down the WiiPoints to purchase it. Sandy Beach, on the other hand, sounds a bit too ridiculous for me.

Read (Nintendo)

Despite all the worries about the economy and reports that holiday sales were down this year it seems that while big ticket items weren’t selling as well, Blu-ray was seeing quite an upswing. In December the citizens of the United Kingdom were quite big on the high-definition format, buying over a million and a half discs. That’s a big jump from last year, up four hundred percent than the previous holiday season.

Many are already predicting that Blu-ray will have a short life span in the face of digital downloads, but the size of high definition downloads (often several gigabytes) will probably keep physical mediums going for some time.  Especially when you factor in how long it takes non-technology loving people to switch over to the newest formats. I’m sure many of us still have parents who buy cassettes or watch movies on VHS. Until disgustingly high speed internet connections are cheap and readily available downloads won’t be taking over.

Before shopping malls, department stores were the be all and end all of shopping convenience. One stop got you everything from jewelry to sporting goods, kitchen utensils to shoes. Sadly many of these store chains have found they’ve run their course. Most recently English department store Woolworths announced that they’d be closing their stores. In fact the last stores will be shutting their doors tomorrow.

Although the company is going under and has probably been selling many of their goods at low prices in order to try and diminish their losses, there are still warehouses in their distribution arm which are full of products. Microsoft and other big name companies are preparing legal actions against the company’s administrators in order to try and reclaim some of their products. UK laws allow suppliers to reclaim stock that has not been paid for, or reclaim stock that has been paid for in lieu of collecting on debts.