...Wow, it really is a NES game...

Source: GoNintendo, original here.

For today's North American WiiWare update we get... SPOGS Racing?

From the looks of it, it's a racing game where you're the equivelant of a 'POG' inside a wheel, racing. As you do.

Coming at you full throttle is SPOGS Racing, an all-new racer from D2C Games featuring classic arcade racing, pick-up-and-play controls, all-new racing vehicles and Crash N' Grab™ instant upgrades. Jump in, gear up and modify your ride on the fly as you compete head-to-head for a totally outrageous arcade racing experience on your Wii console. Whether you're a casual gamer or hardcore racer, SPOGS Racing features fun for all and is a must-have download for your WiiWare digital game library.

Certainly not the prettiest thing I've seen on WiiWare, that's for sure.

Check out more screenshots of SPOGS Racing here.

SPOGS Racing costs 1,000 Wii Points, has a 2 player mode, and is rating E for Everyone. Supposedly they intend on doing downloadable content too.

Also released this week is King Of The Monsters for the Neo Geo on Virtual Console. This'll cost you 900 Points. One of the best Godzilla-esque beat-em-ups around. Better than Primal Rage, at least.

Continue reading for the full press releases.

Initially slated for release on September, SOCOM Confrontation for PSN and retail has now been pushed back an extra month - to October 14th.

"Our top priority is delivering the best SOCOM online experience possible. Tough decisions had to be made and we've decided to push back the release date to October 14th, 2008. We just had to face the facts and do what is best for the title. Rather than sacrifice features, quality and stability, we had to do the right thing and re-adjust our schedule."

Alongside the announcement was the very first official 'trailer' for the game, watchable above or downloadable here.

Source: SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation Release Date

This week's ESRB updates brings us news of a whole bunch of titles for the Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, and for WiiWare.

First of all, on the XBLA front - it appears that a title based on the TV show Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? with the subtitle Make the Grade might be coming to the service. It will be released by ValuSoft - a subset of THQ. Their only other Xbox game is Rocket Riot, which is an Arcade title, so this may be one also.

If so, it's a good addition to the Xbox Live library. It will be interesting to see how far a release like this will go, if it will simply be stuck within English speaking countries or go for that worldwide audience that Wits & Wagers currently lacks. The picture above is from THQ's PC version... hopefully it'll look better than that.

Also rated was Sierra's Interpol title, announced just last month.

On the PlayStation Network - Jeopardy! The classic game show starring Alex Trebek has the player answering a whole slew of questions. It's definitely something that could do very well on the PlayStation Network. Hopefully they add a Celebrity Jeopardy add on.

Along with that was the rating for Ratchet & Clank: Quest For Booty, which we've talked about plenty recently, and Linger in Shadows - a bizarre, crazy visual experience akin to the European demo scene, apparently. Certainly sounds promising!

And for the Wii we have Big Kahuna Party. Unannounced as a WiiWare title, but certainly looks to be going in that direction. It's being made by Reflexive Entertainment, who have previously worked on Wik: Fable of Souls and the upcoming title Axiom Overdrive (which we haven't seen for some time) for Xbox Live Arcade.

Big Kahuna Party is one of their other games already released on the PC, but called 'Big Kahuna Reef'. A match-three tile game made on preset boards where you must remove all the wooden panels in order to move to the next level. There is a free version playable online here.

Along with Big Kahuna, we now know that Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millennium will be coming to the Virtual Console as well.

Source: ESRB, Thanks to Shard for reminding me!

The Splash pages have it - both Schizoid and Golf: Tee It Up are your game releases this week, XBLA fans!

Golf: Tee It Up!

Hit the sweet spot with Golf: Tee It Up! Pick up and play a few quick holes on your own or compete with friends in a full 18-hole multiplayer tournament. With zany customizable characters, both beginners and experienced golfers can easily join the fun on beautiful panoramic and challenging courses. Need that special touch for your hacked shot? With the unique Focus feature, read the green or control the ball's spin in flight to achieve amazing precision! A huge combination of game modes awaits including stroke, cup, or match play with local or multiplayer modes over Xbox LIVE®.

* Lush panoramic courses: Tee it up on 36 unique holes in stunning locations, such as the Caribbean course set against a beautifully landscaped beach resort, or the Parkland course that twists around the majestic Scottish highlands.
* Customizable golfers: Design your own zany character from an eclectic assortment of themed hair styles, clothing, footwear, and accessories.
* Special Focus feature: With the unique Focus feature, read the green or control the ball's spin in flight to achieve amazing precision.
* Multiplayer mode: Play with up to three other friends in local or Xbox LIVE versus and co-op multiplayer modes.
* Future downloadable content: Download additional courses, clothing, and accessories to extend your golfing experience.

Developed by Housemarque and published by Activision, “Golf: Tee It Up!” will be available worldwide for 800 Microsoft Points and is rated E for Everyone by the ESRB.

Click here for the Xbox.com splash page!

Click here for new screenshots of the game!

Schizoid

Cooperative gameplay is redefined in the fast-paced and unique Schizoid! Control red and blue ships, ramming them into enemies of the same color to destroy them. But be careful, because if you hit the opposite color, you will be destroyed. Quick thinking and quicker reflexes help you seize victory, but sharp teamwork provides the best chance of earning gold medals along the way. Schizoid offers more than 120 levels of challenge, playable in either single-player or co-op mode, plus the brain-melting Uberschizoid hardcore mode, in which one player controls both ships!

* Co-op gameplay to the max: No other multiplayer co-op game has such tight cooperative gameplay. The two players (or one player with a computer A.I. partner, or one player controlling both ships in Uberschizoid) must work together closely in order to defeat the hordes on each level.
* Uberschizoid mode: For perhaps the most challenging and "brain-melting" challenge yet, try Uberschizoid Mode. Control both red and blue ships, matching them to each enemy color in order to succeed.
* Tremendous graphics: The glowing, flashing, megabursting graphics add to the game's inherent chaos.
* Xbox LIVE® play: Play co-op over Xbox LIVE and team up with players worldwide to see how far you can advance!

Developed by Torpex Games, “Schizoid” will be available worldwide for 800 Microsoft Points and is rated E for Everyone by the ESRB.

Click here for the Xbox.com splash page!

Click here for screenshots of the game!

Click here and here for two additional videos of Schizoid!

Games Radar has gotten themselves an exclusive look at the next piece of downloadable content for the PSN game PAIN - The Amusement Park! A second level!

The level promises to have a ton of new ways to cause destruction, with all new additions such as vents that can relaunch you when you're nearly stopped, a ton of rides to mangle your body into, switches that can change the scenario around, a bunch of hidden bits and pieces, and more!

Source: GamesRadar: Exclusive reveal of PAIN amusement park!

It popped up on the ESRB website last week, but now it's official - Wild West Guns in coming to WiiWare, courtsey of Gameloft!

It's a gallery shooter like game which allows a "lone gunman" or up to 4 players to shoot their way out of the town in both cooperatively or against each other for points.

And it's coming out in two weeks! In Japan at least - July 23rd is the currently release date for it. It will cost 1,000 Wii Points.

Kind of reminds me of the old SEGA Master System game Wanted, which used the Light Phaser gun. Check out more images at the link below.

Source: Famitsu.com

The Fable II Pub Games, a collection of 3 minigames in which you can bet your money away, has now been slated for an August release for 800 Microsoft Points. However, you can get in free - if you preorder your own copy of Fable II at retailers!

Lionhead Studios and Microsoft Game Studios today announced that consumers who pre-order a copy of the Xbox 360™ exclusive, “Fable II,” at participating retailers worldwide, will be given free access to download the “Fable II” Pub Games when they are released this August. Available exclusively on Xbox LIVE Arcade, fans can transfer the gold earned in these casino-style mini-games to the world of “Fable II,” when the game is available later this year.

The final names of the Xbox LIVE Arcade “Fable II” Pub Games (which will be available as one download) are: “Keystone,” which is a combination of Craps and Roulette, “Spinnerbox,” which is an updated take on slot machines, and “Fortune’s Tower,” which is a press your luck style of game. The download will also include a Shell, which is a tutorial of all three games.

Now and for the first time ever, “Fable II” fans can get a head start on their virtual experience, starting their long awaited quest through this sequel with gold in the bank and the ability to purchase items right off the bat, such as weapons, clothing, houses, dog tricks and more - an experience that can only be found on Xbox LIVE Arcade. The “Fable II” Pub Games will also be available for purchase over Xbox LIVE in August for those that do not pre-order “Fable II” for 800MS points.

Lionhead and Microsoft Game Studios also announced details of a limited collector’s edition of “Fable II” available for pre-order at retailers worldwide, for a suggested price of $79.99 USD. The limited collector’s edition includes: a bonus disc with a new behind-the-scenes making of video, collectible Hobbe figure, a LIVE trial card and additional in-game content (an Xbox LIVE account is required to access the limited collector’s edition bonus in-game content). The “Fable II” standard addition is also available for pre-order at a suggested retail price of $59.99. “Keystone,” “Spinnerbox” and “Fortune’s Tower” will also be embedded as part of the full retail copy of “Fable II” (limited collector’s and standard editions).

Source: Gamerscore Blog.

Looks like we'll finally find out in a few days.

In the meantime.. look at all this bizarre promotional stuff!

Source: The Last Guy Splash Page

Joystiq have posted some shots of what appears to be Duke Nukem 3D for Xbox Live Arcade. Initially half-announced back in Feburary, this looks like the quite the real deal.

Source: Joystiq: Rumor: Leaked Pictures of Duke Nukem On XBLA?

GameInvest have announced a new game for the Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network - Sarah's Emergency Room.

Sarah’s Emergency Room casts players as Sarah, a young nurse who has recently graduated from college in California and is struggling to find a job. In a twist of fate, Sarah is hired for a nursing position at a small hospital in Arkansas, where she discovers that managing an emergency room is a bit harder than she expected. At the hospital, she tends to all patients who walk through the door, diagnosing, taking X-rays, filling prescriptions and assisting in the operating room. Play through the game’s narrative to the exciting conclusion - will Sarah’s career as a nurse be a success?

Sounds like a take on the popular Diner Dash style of game. Nice to see an independent releasing a game on both XBLA and PSN.

Source: Sarah's Emergency Room Announced

Top Arcade Titles (Full Versions)
1 SOULCALIBUR (NEW)
2 Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 (-1)
3 UNO (+1)
4 Ticket to Ride (-2)
5 Happy Tree Friends (-2)
6 DOOM (--)
7 N+ (+1)
8 Street Fighter II' Hyper Fighting (V)
9 Worms (V)
10 Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (V)

The release of Soulcalibur has been able to push Commando 3 off its 3 week high at being on the top of the weekly Top 10, pushing it down to second.

Ticket To Ride and Happy Tree Friends get knocked down two points but are continuing to hang in there. The rest is the usual - UNO is a monster.

Source: Major Nelson

Golf: Tee It Up!

Developer: Housemarque
Publisher: Activision
Genre: Sports Games
Price: 800 Microsoft Points
Availability: Worldwide

Click here for the Xbox.com splash page!

Click here for new screenshots of the game!

Click here for the official NeoGAF forum topic

Schizoid

Click here for the Xbox.com splash page!

Click here for screenshots of the game!

Click here for the official NeoGAF forum topic

Finnish websites Plaza.fi and V2.fi seems to know someone who likes to break Non Disclosure Agreements, with new phone images of Duke Nukem 3D sitting in the Xbox 360 marketplace.

Duke 3D costing 1,337 Microsoft Points? Oh those jokey chaps...

2-8 Player Multiplayer? sounds awesome.

Still, this may be a huge prank, but there is also a french image here which displays the same as the first image, but direct feed. They seemed to cut out the point cost though. According to these pages it's currently on Partnernet - Microsoft's self-contained testing service, but they were unable to play it.

This whole thing reminds me of Ikaruga way back in the beginning of 2007, when its existence was leaked, a year before its actual release! Same with Marathon Durandal - it seemed everyone knew it was coming before it was announced.

C'mooooon E3!

Source: Plaza.fi - Duke Nukem 3D - hän on melkein täällä and V2.fi - Todisteita Duke Nukemin XBLA-versiosta? (päivitetty) and thanks to chagrin for pointing it out!

Capcom have announced that their other Backbone recreation of a Capcom title - 1942: Joint Strike, will be released in just two weeks time!

In an e-mail sent to us, Capcom wrote that "The classically inspired vertical arcade shooter '1942: Joint Strike' arrives on PSN 7/24 and on XBLA on 7/23."

Along with the announcement are 5 brand new screenshots. Check them out here.

The website for the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade title 'The Maw' has popped up, with the first video! And it looks great!

Check it out above, as well as on their website, which has a ton of new screenshots!

'The Maw' will also be playable at Penny Arcade Expo, as it made it into the 'PAX 10' along with this weeks XBLA release 'Schizoid' as the best 10 "submissions in terms of gameplay and fun factor" Great for them!

Source: The Maw Website

IGN's new Xbox Live Arcade channel has gotten its hands on the first video of Puzzle Quest: Galactrix!

Check it out above, or download it via IGN.

If there's one thing Microsoft are good at, it's the 'montage' - a gathering of video clips for upcoming titles, polished off with some hip and trendy music and transitions.

Microsoft nailed it last year during E3, in my opinion, showing off a ton of games - most which got released that year. This year should hopefully include Bionic Commando, Braid, The Maw, as well as finally showing off some unannounced games like Duke Nukem 3D, Galaga Legions, Geometry Wars RE 2, and some other games that nobody else knows about!

So enjoy, the last few years of montages!

IGN have gotten their hands on the exclusive ENGLISH trailer for Mega Man 9. Looks great as always, but with an additional nugget of information at the end...

Told ya so!

Source: IGN - Mega Man 9 Trailer

This week, each of the territories got a different piece of PSN content.

In North America, players now can play the demo of the upcoming episodic title 'Siren: Blood Curse'. Looks like the first episode should be released soon! Also released is a new trailer for 'Elefunk'.

Speaking of 'Elefunk', the game got released this week in Japan! For ¥800, or roughly $8US. Hopefully the rest of the world might get prices like this for when it's released, like 'PixelJunk Monsters' initially did, which also got its soundtrack released in Japan's store too.

Japan also gets a ton of PSOne games, including Ehrgheiz and Raycrisis. We need more of this kind of thing in Europe and North America, Sony!

For Europe, they finally get 'echocrome', the bizarre M.C. Escher-like puzzle game - just a week before the year anniversary of its announcement! It'll cost €9,99 / £6.99 which is surprisingly pricey. The PSP version is also up, and only costs €7,99 / £4.99 despite technically being the same game.

Europe also gets the Amber Vorhees playable character for 'High Velocity Bowling' for €0,99 / £0.69.

Continue reading for the full list of downloads, thanks to tanod on NeoGAF.

Cub3d have just had a great interview with Hudson Entertainment about their huge line of upcoming WiiWare titles. One small tidbit of information did pop up during it:

"Please note only Bomberman for WiiWare version will be released in EU, not Wii version."

So Europe will not be getting the Wii release version of Bomberman for Wii - instead purely getting the Multiplayer only version on WiiWare. Fair enough. Strange, considering this is the opposite tactic used for the 'World Of Goo' game, which is only getting a retail release in Europe.

The German rating board also updated today with the final name for the game - 'Bomberman Blast'! Two other games have used a similar subtitle - Wario Blast back on the Gameboy, which was a strange collaboration between Bomberman and Nintendo, and Bomberman: Blast Squadron on PSP - a completely weird game that doesn't make a lick of sense. It was made near the same time where they thought Bomberman: Act Zero was a good idea too.

Source: USK - German Rating Board

D3 have released a ton of new assets for 'Puzzle Quest: Galactrix' for the Xbox Live Arcade. Included are screenshots, renders and artwork, and you can check them all out here.

Along with the media is a new video interview with Steve Fawkner, lead designer for the game over at GameSpot. Check it out!

Game Plasma has had an excellent interview with Australian developers Nnooo about their WiiWare game 'POP', what it's like to be a developer on the console, and what their thoughts are on other services.

It's quite fascinating. They go into detail about how they came about to be a developer on WiiWare, and how both Nintendo and Microsoft approach their service.

"We agreed that moving to Australia would be a great opportunity for both of us and so I invested my savings in setting up Nnooo. From there I started a dialogue with both Nintendo and Microsoft regarding making games for Xbox Live Arcade or WiiWare. At the time Nintendo had no formal plans in regards to WiiWare so we kind of got in early.

The dialogue with Microsoft became difficult for us as they require prototypes, full concept artwork and a full design document before they will green light anything (and you still need to fund the game yourself). For us this became a non starter as we cannot afford to make prototypes and then potentially have them canned.

Nintendo on the other hand was very refreshing. They basically asked me to pitch some ideas to them, with short descriptions (10 in all), we chatted about them and whittled them down to a smaller number which I then wrote some slightly more detailed outlines on. Nintendo then asked if I had signed an NDA, I said no, they passed one over, I signed it and the next day we were approved and in the WiiWare program (this was till before it had been officially announced or even named). It was all very refreshing."

They also discuss the current delisting program Microsoft intends to implement. Read the whole interview below.

Source: Game Plasma - Nnooo Answers Our Questions

Well I can't understand a word they're saying, but they're certainly enthused! And they have a goat!

SOLD!

Source: The Last Guy JPN Site

Looks like this might be one of the releases next week. Doesn't seem like surprise E3 fodder though - most likely releasing the week after.

But hey! It's 'Coffeetime Crosswords'! One of the many Konami games by Voltex that's in the pipeline and we know about, yet have never been announced publicly, much like 'Frogger 2', and unless there's some video during E3 - 'Beat'n Groovy'.

Source: Xbox.com Splash Page - Coffeetime Crosswords

Blitz Arcade Games - the guys behind 'Spongebob Squarepants Underpants Slam' and the Burger King XBLA-esque titles, have decided to move away from licensed properties and have announced five new titles for PC and "downloadable services".

The 5 titles - 'KrissX', 'Encleverment Experiment', 'Buccaneer – The Pursuit of Infamy', 'Droplitz' and 'CodaChain', cover a wide variety of different genres, from platforming to puzzlers.

Right now it looks like they intend to be Xbox Live Arcade titles, clearly 'Droplitz' and 'Encleverment Experiment' are since they have Xbox paraphernalia in the screenshots, but some of these may also be coming to the PlayStation Network and WiiWare. The resolutions for the screens are all over the shop, so it's difficult to tell.

Continue reading for the full lowdown on all five titles.

Remember 'Defend Your Castle' for WiiWare? That crazy title which came out at the launch of WiiWare? Oh wait, you're in Europe! You never got this game!

Well you're now in luck - the game has now been rated by both the European PEGI rating board and the Australian OFLC rating board! You'll be flinging stickmen to their deaths in no time!

Source: OFLC, PEGI