That’s right, everyone. The wait is nearly over. BioWare has announced today that its highly anticipated sequel sequel, Mass Effect 3, has finally gone gold.

Casey Hudson revealed on Twitter, “After an awesome effort by our team, I’m proud to announce Mass Effect is officially gold.” Hudson also went on to tease fans by saying, “Many surprises await you–this week and beyond.”

The demo officially releases tomorrow for Xbox 360, PC, and PlayStation 3. Mass Effect 3 hits stores this March.

BioWare is a big name in the gaming industry with heavy hitting titles like Mass Effect. Another popular franchise being developed by the studio is none other than Dragon Age. Currently, EA and BioWare are prepping to launch Dragon Age II and have just recently announced that the game has gone gold. In other words, Dragon Age II has been finished and is being sent to the printing press.

While Dragon Age II won’t officially be out for the Xbox 360, PS3, PC and Mac on March 8th, you will be able to check the game out in depth on February 22nd when a demo is made available.

via rockpapershotgun

Video game consoles give consumers the ability to participate in one of the most loved forms of entertainment; gaming. However, while most games feature expansive offline gameplay, that’s only have the fun. With the introduction of high speed broadband Internet came the phenomenon of online gaming with services like Xbox Live and the Playstation Network taking center stage.

While the Playstation Network is offered free of charge, Xbox Live is more popular with online numbers breaking records on the regular. Today, Microsoft has come forth to show off those numbers by saying about half of their 25 million Xbox Live members are Gold subscribers that pay $60 a year for the service. The company then elaborated by saying Gold members spend about 40% of their Xbox Live time on services like Netflix, Last.fm, and Zune making the platform a very valuable asset.

Are you an Xbox Live Gold subscrbier? If so, what do you live most about the service?

via thatvideogameblog

After numerous delays, Ubisoft has just announced that Splinter Cell: Conviction has finally gone gold. For those who don’t know, this means the game is completely done being developed and produced and will soon be sent to retailers nation wide.

If, however, you can’t wait until Conviction‘s April 13th release date you can always hop on Xbox Live and download the demo.

Those hoping that God of War III will see no delays before its March 16th release can now rest easy, some what. Thanks to Christer Ericson’s Twitter, who just so happens to be Director of Technology over at Sony Santa Monica, we now know that the game has gone gold and is entering the manufacturing stage.

Of course, some unforeseen error like the destruction of the manufacturing facility could give us a delay, but that’s doesn’t seem very likely.

We’ve seen some pretty ridiculously pimped out consoles in the past but a $490,000 Wii? That’s a first.

What you see above is just that, a half million dollar Nintendo Wii made out of over 2,500 grams of solid gold. If that wasn’t crazy enough, the front buttons have 78 diamonds which clock in at 0.25 carats a peice.

If you’re looking to purchase one of these, you better do it fast as only 3 of these are being made.

via stuarthughes

SEGA and High Voltage have just announced that their much anticipated Wii FPS The Conduit has gone gold and is ready to hit store shelves on June 23rd.

Below is the official announcement from the companies giving a short insight into the game:

SEGA and High Voltage Software are proud to announce that The Conduit has gone gold, and will ship to North America on June 23rd, 2009. A unique first-person shooter, The Conduit is an original IP featuring an intense conspiracy-laden single-player campaign that brings an unparalleled shooter experience exclusively to the Nintendo Wii™. Soon you will be able to arm yourself with an arsenal of sci-fi gadgets and high-powered weapons as you fight against aliens, rogue agents and other enemy forces. Additionally, be ready to dominate your friends from around the globe in up-to-12-person online multiplayer battles!

Web 2.0 has officially hit the gaming industry, as Sucker Punch announced through Twitter that inFamous, its upcoming super-powered open-world game, has gone gold.

Meanwhile, producer Brian Flemming revealed how the studio will be celebrating the end of over three years of development work, writing and creating new code and assets.

It’s a tradition here to bust out old builds and videos of the game and laugh at ourselves for how *crappy* the game was 2 years ago. It’s a strange combination of humiliation at how we ever showed those builds to people, appreciation to Sony for believing in us even when the game was so provably terrible, and sense of accomplishment at how far we were able to come, especially in the last 6-12 months. Plus it’s just plain hilarious to see some of our really BAD ideas on-screen.

inFamous is due out exclusively on the PS3 on May 26. A demo is due out on PSN on May 21, though those who pre-order the game will get access faster.

In case you don’t actually have an Xbox Live Gold already, you should definitely get an upgrade right now. Or think about it for a couple of days, but do know that January 5th is the last day to decide for the Gold account.

And here’s some incentive for your thinking. The upgrade will get you a free gift from Microsoft. You will have access to free downloadable content from Xbox.

In order to get the gift you will have to sign up for a 12 month Xbox Live Gold membership. But you were going to do that anyway.

Here are the available downloadable gifts. Just go ahead and pick one!
Hexic 2: Spin trios of hexes to create groups of matching colors in this puzzle favorite.

Hardwood Spades: Play the classic party card game with friends over Xbox LIVE.

Poker Smash: Make vertical and horizontal matches by forming poker hands in this puzzle game.

N+: Become a daring ninja with unique, physics-based controls, and stylish animated graphics.

EVERY EXTEND EXTRA EXTREME: Unique, fun gameplay mixes with hip and cool original music.

Crackdown Getting Busy Bonus Pack: New vehicles, weapons, game modes, equipment, and achievements.

Halo 3 Legendary Map Pack: Grab these three new maps for the ultimate multiplayer experience.

via Xbox