We just learned earlier today that EA would be releasing a prequel to their popular survival-horror, Dead Space for the Wii entitled Dead Space Extraction.

Well it seems EA wasn’t satisfied with just an announcement and decided to throw in a trailer, shown above, for the game.

Dead Space Extraction is currently under development by EA Redwood Shores and is slated for a Fall 2009 release.

Well it was only a matter of time, Halo Wars has been unofficially leaked and spread across the legion of BitTorrent websites.

If you really feel the need to break just about every copyright law there is you could head over to your favorite BitTorrent tracker and snag the ~7GB file which was apparently released by a group called ‘GLoBAL’.

Of course, we don’t recommend or endorse this practice. This is too bad for the late Ensemble Studios, hopefully it won’t hinder sales and Halo Wars recieves the acclaim it deserves.

Read (XboxInsider)

Criterion has recently uploaded videos to YouTube that showcase each car from the upcoming Legendary Cars pack, for Burnout Paradise, in all of their individual glory.

These videos give you a really look at just how true to the originals these remakes stay. My favorite? The Jansen 88 Special based on the DeLorean DMC-12 time machine from Back to the Future. It even floats and leaves flaming skid marks.

Check out the others after the break. READ ON »

Blizzard has recently updated their website giving a breakdown of the newest raids that are to be added to the game via the forthcoming 3.1 patch.

Entitled Ulduar, the raid predominantly feature vehicle combat. Players will be pitted against the Iron Army with various siege vehicles at their disposal which will all grant riders special abilities. 

A major boss battle will be against the Flame Leviathan, an enormous tank that requires a player to be catapulted onto it’s back from one of the siege vehicles in order to complete the treacherous battle.

Sounds pretty damn epic to me.

Read (World of Warcraft)

It’s a new and interesting game that’s made its way to us from Johnny K this time around, folks—isn’t it great how we can get all these new and interesting games gratis?  Sometimes I wonder if there’s another shoe waiting to drop—ah well.  Today’s game of choice is called Roly Poly Cannon, a fairly simple game that’ll take only seconds to learn, but mastering it might well take days.

Insidious Roly Poly Bugs have taken up residence throughout your little world, and it’s up to you, armed only with a cannon and time-delay explosive projectiles, to blast, burn, drown or impale these smug little squatters.  Some might say it’s wrong to kill tiny adorable insects with high explosives…but if this is wrong, well, I don’t want to be right.

Granted, this is just another variant on the “ragdoll-cannon” theme, but it’s a fun variant nonetheless.  And the price is definitely right on a game that’ll let you kill some time for a few minutes of fun.  Add in a quick mental exercise figuring out all those angles and force quantities to blast those bugs away and you’ll have a pleasant time on the super cheap.

There are games that visibly, awesomely, catch your imagination and pull you into the experience with a force and grandeur all their own. I admit that this was the case with me playing the first stage of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. Sadly, this wonderful beginning couldn’t last, and from there, the game throttled back its spectacular fun factor. The upshot is that the collapse was not complete. Let’s go ahead and take a look at this game that could so deeply hook me at first, but lose most of that hook after only minutes in.

You play as Darth Vader’s secret apprentice, somewhere between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope in the chronology, that vast chunk of time where Vader was just getting started. Longtime fans of the series will be interested to note your character is named Starkiller, or the original name of Luke Skywalker. But anyway—Starkiller is dispatched by Vader to complete the work he began, the destruction of the Jedi throughout the universe. As you progress, you’ll have the opportunity to follow your master into the Dark Side, or separate into the Light Side, and thus have access to two different endings based on your choices.

Now, like I said earlier, the first few minutes were what had me so very hooked. This was because, for the first few minutes, you don’t play as Starkiller at all.

You play as Darth Vader.

Playing quite possibly the greatest Sith who ever lived—let’s remember that the guy’s going to hand it to Palpatine down the line—is like controlling a black-cloaked tornado. You’re dropped onto Kashyyyk, otherwise known as Wookiee Planet, and sent to take down a legion of walking furballs with blasters. This should make just about anyone’s blood run cold–Wookiees are badasses of the first order when sufficiently provoked—but not you. You are Darth-and-don’t-you-forget-it-Vader. You don’t run. You just stride in this coolly controlled fashion, striking down whatever walks in front of you with a flurry of lightsaber swings or various Force powers. It’s like controlling Jason Voorhees; a towering, hulking juggernaut that seemingly can’t be brought down no matter how many Wookiees take potshots at him. It’s a real jaw-dropper of a sequence.

It’s only too bad that the rest of the game can’t live up to this amazing opening, or to the hype it generated. Oh, sure, it’s FUN enough—Starkiller is a pretty entertaining sort and there are legions of enemies to strike down. But compared to that sweet taste I got in the beginning, the whole rest of the game just feels like a letdown.

The interesting part is, the PS3, Wii, PS2, Nintendo DS, N-Gage and PSP versions of the game are all different from the Xbox 360 version. Some have small differences, others have massive differences. For those who wonder, I’m handling the 360 version, so I’ll caution you all that your mileage may vary.

In summary, the plot is solid, and the first five minutes will grab your attention in a pure-on Force grip, but the rest of the game will not be so compelling. If you’re okay with a small disappointment in an otherwise fair-quality game, then your time spent playing Star Wars: The Force Unleashed will not be ill-spent.

In a documentary included with the recent release of the Mass Effect Platinum Hits edition, BioWare revealed the combat-centric theme of the upcoming DLC pack for the game.

“We had something in Mass Effect 1 which we didn’t have the time and we didn’t think we would do well enough, which is a fight club arena,” said principal lead designer Preston Watamaniuk in the video.

Added comments by project director Casey Hudson note that the pack will be light on story but heavy on combat. “You’re going to go to kind of a casino, gaming, fight club space station.”

BioWare also dropped an interesting tidbit about the highly anticipated sequel: “Any save game that you make from Mass Effect 1, you should be able to carry that same character into Mass Effect 2,” said Hudson.

Hudson also noted that the second game will be a “much darker experience” and that there will be lots of twists and turns.

From Nintendo comes word today that Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai, founder of Nintendo first-party developer Sora Ltd., has formed a new company called Project Sora.

Sakurai will head the company in developing an original project for Nintendo, which holds a controlling interest. The project is said to be unrelated to the Smash Bros. franchise, going by comments made by Sakurai in an interview with Nintendo head honcho Satoru Iwata.

“I can promise an experience that’s different from anything [you've played] up until now,” he added.

No information on the project itself was given though.

Critically acclaimed platformer Braid will be released on PC next month, according to Stardock. The game, originally released on Xbox Live Arcade, was hailed for its innovative ideas and the great use of physics.

Stardock has already opened up their pre-orders page on Impulse for the title. It will cost $19.95, a $5 premium over its Xbox Live release that arrived last year.

The game might come to other distribution platforms, including Steam, going by past comments made by creator Jonathan Blow.

“They are interested in putting the game up,” said Blow of Valve in a recent interview. “So it’s just a matter of me having a PC version ready that I feel is good to go with.”

Nihilistic Software, responsible for last year’s beat ‘em up Conan is reportedly working on a downloadable zombie-themed game, according to Destructoid, who cites sources and resumes.

The site states that it will be an “arcade-style” game and will be imaginatively titled Zombie Apocalypse. It is said to be in development for PlayStation Network and Xbox Live and will feature some type of online support.

The game will have players fighting to save survivors from zombie hordes over the course of several in-game days. Weapons include the infamous chainsaw, and there will be “deadly environmental hazards”.