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Sony Online Entertainment has announced the first online only PlayStation 2 game, scheduled for release in the States at least in spring 2003, and it's EverQuest - what else? EverQuest Online Adventures is a completely new title developed from the ground up, and it will require the Network Adapter to run (although there is no word on whether the hard disk will also be required, our guess is not). Players will be separated from their classic EQ brethren in an adventure set in the land of Norrath 500 years before the PC game, and the developer is promising "millions" of possible character combinations, nine playable races and thirteen classes amongst 'em, not to mention customisable genders [surely that one's a pretty simple choice - Ed] and facial features. Furthermore, the game will not just feature realistic day / night cycles, but an actual weekly cycle of light covering 360 square miles of play area, which in turn is made up of eight terrain types and nine cities. There will be no such thing as load times, and no modem support if Sony is to be believed. We've been scratching our heads for weeks over how Sony might convert the masses to its networked way of thinking, but if ever there were a way of doing it, it's EverQuest. Related Feature - EverQuest : Ruins of Kunark review

THQ have announced a licensing deal with Marvel Enterprises which will see them gaining exclusive rights to develop and publish games for the PC and next generation consoles based on a selection of Marvel's top comic book series. The deal takes them all the way through to 2007, but you won't have to wait that long to see the first fruits of the agreement - The Punisher is due out for Christmas 2003. Other titles coming under THQ's wing include Nick Fury and Captain America, as well as The Call, a new property about "the adventures of real-life heroes in New York City" [pass me the sick bag - Ed] which is being co-developed by THQ and Marvel. "Working with Marvel not only on rich properties like The Punisher but in jointly creating a brand-new property like The Call is a huge win for THQ as we continue to execute on our strategy of bringing the best gaming content to market", THQ's vice president of licensing Germaine Gioia beamed. "THQ looks forward to tapping into the essence of these characters from their comic book roots and creating true digital experiences that reflect Marvel's future plans for the franchises." Related Feature - THQ snags Warhammer 40k license

Being an Imperial Storm Trooper is a hazardous occupation at the best of times, what with the constant threat of Rebel attack and meddling Jedi knights. Statistically though, your average grunt should be more worried about the risk of accidents in the workplace than being killed by marauding revolutionaries. After receiving an anonymous tip-off from a union rep, we called in the Health & Safety Executive to examine a random sampling of Imperial facilities. What we discovered was truly shocking...

After Xbox disappointment in Europe and Japan, Microsoft have found reason to celebrate again with the announcement that Halo has now sold over a million copies in the US and Canada. As their press release helpfully points out, this equates to a copy being sold every ten seconds (give or take) since the console's launch last November. European sales of the game are still unknown though, and it is widely expected to tank in Japan when it's released there later this month. What we do know is that so far about 80% of British gamers who bought an Xbox have also bought a copy of Halo - an impressive statistic. "The demand for Halo : Combat Evolved has been incredible from the very beginning", over-enthusiastic Electronics Boutique bigwig Pete Roithmayr is quoted as saying. "It's not only the reason people should own Xbox, it's the reason people should play video games. Halo: Combat Evolved is that good." Microsoft are also celebrating the success of the Xbox itself, which has apparently been selling 25% faster in America than the Playstation 2 did during its first four months on the market. Xbox games have been flying off the shelves in the US as well, with the company claiming a higher attach rate (the ratio of software vs hardware sales) than for any other next-gen console. Of course, the bad news is that the PS2 is currently outselling the Xbox by a significant margin even in the USA, so although Microsoft have got off to a quicker start there than Sony did, they are still firmly in second place in the console war at this stage and falling further behind every week. The real question is if / when the Xbox's weekly sales will overtake the PS2. Related Feature - Xbox is a flop in Europe too

SCE President Ken Kutaragi has told the Japanese Microdevice publication that combining the PlayStation 2's Emotion Engine and graphics processor into a single microchip may now be possible. If Kutaragi-san is correct, the company's Nagasaki production facility may be able to triple its output, even reducing fail rates. Kutaragi-san didn't go into specifics about revised pricing but the implication is that this change may make an American price cut (already a fairly safe bet for E3 next month) an even more likely scenario. Although it probably stands to reason, these changes are unlikely to benefit developers in any way, as any architectural change would break all the existing software. Related Feature - PS3 to use distributed computing

Sports Interactive's Championship Manager: Season 01/02 will make its console debut on 26th April, published by Eidos Interactive. Unsurprisingly the game is a big hit with the CM-loving games press, and is expected to sell in ridiculous quantities when it finally makes it to market in just over a fortnight. Struggling Eidos will no doubt be thankful for that. Sports Interactive MD Miles Jacobson commented, "The team at SI has been waiting years for a console with a hard drive that could handle Championship Manager, so we're very pleased to see Championship Manager: Season 01/02 on Xbox. We're hoping that this launch will make Champ Man available and affordable to a whole new consumer base. Who knows? Some customers may even buy an Xbox specifically to play Champ Man: it's much more affordable than buying a PC." Not an unusual claim for a chap in Miles' position, but given CM's dependable popularity perhaps he has a point. The Xbox version has been restyled to quicken navigation. A full list of changes can be found at the end of today's press release. Related Feature - CM Xbox due next month

BT Retail is to provide a no frills ADSL option from the summer, The Register is reporting. The service currently on trial will end up a few bob cheaper than regular ADSL, but lacks the value-added clutter and services usually associated with such products. The fodder-free service, described as "unique" by BT and "overdue" by virtually everybody else, is part of the company's campaign to increase broadband uptake, something which it claims is at the heart of BT strategy. Whether the service will be cheaper than rival cable modem technologies from NTL and Telewest is still unclear. BT's competitors will doubtless be pleased to learn that the company has found new ways to undercut them. In other ADSL news, BT has also announced that it is upgrading 100 more exchanges in the UK with 500 more under review to be upgraded. The extra 100 is expected to mean more than two thirds of the UK can receive the service by the end of May.

French developer 4X Studios has announced its plans to release Times of Trouble on PlayStation 2, GameCube and Xbox later this year. The game centres around a resourceful young oil worker named Zak and his path through a world where the entire economic system has collapsed. Players will come face to face with a myriad of different groups from the political to the extremist, and the quest will bring Zak closer to his ancestors than ever before. Related Feature - Times of Trouble screenshots

Terra Mobile - iobox is teaming up with Midway Games to reproduce Paperboy and Rampage, two of its most popular arcade successes, on PocketPC devices from early summer. Both games offer a wealth of gameplay according to Midway, but are unlikely to give anything on the GameBoy Advance a run for its money. Speaking of which, pricing and specific release information remains elusive.

Eidos have announced that they will be auctioning off the original Lara Croft outfit, as worn by Nell McAndrew way back in 1998, with all proceeds going to the children's charity UNICEF. For your money you'll get a ridiculously tight green rubber vest, a pair of equally tight khaki shorts, white wool calf-length socks (hopefully they've been washed since Nell last wore them), open-backed leather gloves, backpack, sunglasses and twin Smith & Wesson replica pistols with a belt and leather holsters. And of course the glowing feeling that comes from knowing you've just helped some poor deprived kids in the back of beyond. All of this will be guaranteed by an authenticity certificate signed by Nell herself as well as Eidos chairman Ian Livingstone, Core boss Jeremy Heath-Smith and UNICEF's Rose Nelson. The auction should kick off on eBay UK at noon GMT on April 26th, with the bidding war lasting ten days. For more details, check the auction page on Eidos' website.

Bringing one of the finest tactical action games ever to grace the PC - Tom Clancy's Rogue Spear - to the GameBoy Advance may seem a frankly ridiculous idea. However, the new handheld incarnation of this apparently unstoppable franchise is far better than you might imagine. Ubi Studios have obviously gone to a lot of effort to cram everything they possibly could from the original game onto the cart, right down to the familiar Rogue Spear theme tune which greets you in all its orchestral glory when you first load up the game. Naturally a change of vantage point was necessary, but this has been worked around with a carefully considered top-down view. You can see a fair distance around your team, and a manual-aiming mode enables your viewing radius to increase, as if peering through a rifle scope. It was hard to get used to the cartoonish style of the graphics at first, but the variety of textures across the environments coupled with the wonderfully detailed animations soon help any misgivings to disappear. And while the visuals might not be as realistic as in its PC forefather, Rogue Spear is still very much alive. Both ambient and functional sound effects (such as shouts from team-mates and enemies) convey the tense atmosphere of the original admirably, and the music is nothing short of excellent. It's likely that you will hear an enemy before you see him, whether he's yelling at a hostage to shut up or actually shooting at you. Should the latter be the case, a visual aid in the form of small red arrows indicating the direction of your assailant will appear, and if you're particularly slow to react your AI team mates will kill him for you.

Korea is a nation obsessed with computer games. Top Starcraft players earn hefty salaries and star in TV commercials, addicts spend days on end at LAN gaming centers, and rival gangs get into fights over in-game incidents. And yet to date very few homespun Korean games have had any success overseas. Phantagram are hoping to change that with Shining Lore, which is quite possibly the most completely off-the-wall massively multiplayer role-playing game we have ever seen.

One of the most unusual games we've come across on the PC in recent years was Sheep, a bright cartoonish game which involved herding the eponymous dumb ovines around a series of themed mazes strewn with lethal obstacles just waiting to reduce your flock to mincemeat. Now the novel puzzle game is on its way to the GameBoy Advance, with a few cosmetic changes. For example, whereas in the original PC and PlayStation versions you picked a suitably odd shepherd to chase the sheep around themselves, on the GBA you have a selection of sheepdogs at your disposal to do the herding. Sheep was an amusing and at times surreal game, and although some of that edge appears to have been lost in the rather cutesy looking translation to the GameBoy, if the actual gameplay is still intact this could prove perfect for wasting half an hour on the bus on the way to work. Expect to be counting Sheep some time next month. Related Feature - Sheep GBA screenshots

Welsh schoolboy Chaz Davies today became the youngest British rider ever to take part in the Moto Grand Prix motorbike racing championship, at the tender age of 15. And apparently he's been using video games to practice. "I spend hours playing the bike games on my PlayStation because you can learn all the tracks", Chaz told BBC Sport. "I have only been to five of the tracks on the circuit, so the games help me get the experience of others. Lots of the young riders use it to gain knowledge of the track. It could make a real difference when you get there." This morning THQ were crowing that this was proof that the realistic circuits included in their Moto GP games help riders to prepare for the championship. Although unfortunately the Moto GP that Chaz is presumably talking about is the PS2 version developed by Namco, that THQ were telling us not to confuse with their own game of the same name just a few months ago. Obviously even THQ's poor PR bods are having difficulty keeping track of all these Moto GP games... THQ are also likely to be blushing this evening as the story they pointed us to has now been updated with news of Chaz's debut in Suzuka, Japan. The poor lad finished almost 40 seconds off the pace after losing control of his 125cc Matteoni motorbike and crashing during the first qualifying session. He does get a second chance to qualify tomorrow, but all that racing around authentic real life circuits on his PlayStation doesn't seem to have done him much good so far. Chaz was reported to be setting his sights somewhat higher before qualifying, telling reporters that "there are more than 30 riders in the championship, and I am hoping for a top 15 place". If he finishes in the top 15 he'll unlock the special glow-in-the-dark helmet. Related Feature - Moto GP balls-up

American sports games have become a regular fixture of the console launch line-up, and often, as is the case with the Xbox, we end up with both serious simulations and arcade blitzes. Midway's NHL Hitz 20-02, not to be confused with EA's NHL 2002, falls into the latter category, streamlining the noble art of slapstick in the interests of gameplay. Hitz is a fairly conventional arcade sports game, bending rules here and physics there. The rink seems to be slightly smaller than your average playing surface and teams are made up of four players rather than five. On the other hand, as the presence of numerous copyright screens aptly demonstrates, the game is still backed by an NHL license, meaning that all the players and teams are based on their real-life counterparts, right down to their individual strengths and weaknesses. The main game modes are Championship and Franchise, the former allowing puck peddlers to pick an NHL team and lock horns all the way to the Stanley Cup. The latter is slightly more involved, and before taking on the Franchise mode, players have to head to the Custom Team page and create their own foursome. With only a handful of different outfits and comedic variables though, and a bunch of meaningless statistics to fiddle with, it makes sense to get some time in on the ice first.

One of the things we were promised when the PSone was launched at ECTS in 2000 was a portable LCD screen. Although third party equivalents have already made their way onto the market (and the idea has been 'borrowed' by another third party for the GameCube), Sony's official LCD screen has been surprisingly elusive. That is, until now. Sony has announced that the five-inch LCD screen will go on sale on the 26th April, and joining it will be the Car Adaptor peripheral. Purchasing both peripherals will, quite obviously, allow players to hook a working PSone and screen up in the confines of a modern automobile. [Insert marketing cliché about traffic jams caused by Tekken and such - Ed] Furthermore, an AV connection cable will also be available, allowing players to hook their new PSone LCD screen up to external sources, such as a Sony camcorder, but presumably not an Xbox. Related Feature - LCD for GameCube

Blood Omen II has only just been released on PC in the UK, but already a patch is available from publisher Eidos. The long list of issues which it apparently fixes includes "various crash bugs" which can cause the game to lock up or dump you to the desktop, "minor graphical problems", malfunctioning volume and refresh rate settings in the options menu, and movie playback issues when playing the game at high resolutions. All of this comes to 2.9Mb - full details can be found here. Another triumph for the PC gaming industry then. Related Feature - Blood Omen II screenshots

Infogrames has announced that its PS2 jet ski spectacular Splashdown is coming to Xbox this summer. The Xbox version of the game will include two new courses set in United States. The PlayStation 2 version of the game, developed by Rainbow Studios and released late last year, met with critical acclaim thanks to its tight control system and impressive visuals. Launching this summer though, the Xbox version will have Nintendo's Wave Race : Blue Storm to contend with. Related Feature - Wave Race : Blue Storm preview

French games company Light & Shadow Production has announced another new GameBoy Advance title, this time a good old fashioned shooter called CT Special Forces. Bringing back fond memories of my BBC Micro days, the game features a mix of side-on run and gun action and top-down helicopter mayhem, as well as including a sniper rifle for you to pick people off with from a safe distance. In all there are twelve stages to complete, spread across the traditional desert, jungle, city and mountain locations, along with end of level bosses (or "heavily equipped warlords" in this case) to take care of, and a range of "ultra-realistic" weaponry such as rocket launchers and flamethrowers to toast them with. CT Special Forces will be infiltrating the UK on June 21st. Related Feature - Special Forces screenshots

It looks like we might have to wait a little longer for the gorgeous looking Outcast sequel The Lost Paradise, as an update on the game's official website reveals that the game has been put on hold. The brief statement says only that "because of new development opportunities, we are sorry to inform you that the development of Outcast 2 has been momentarily suspended". What these new opportunities are or how long the suspension will last for aren't clear at this stage, although we may know more after E3 next month. Either way it's a shame - the original Outcast was one of the best games of 1999, and the early development shots of the PlayStation 2 sequel were as impressive as anything we've seen on Sony's console to date. More news when it's available... Related Feature - Outcast 2 screenshots

As if collapsing sales figures in Japan weren't bad enough, the Xbox this week had to face harsh facts here in Europe as well. At launch the console performed strongest in the UK, selling some 48,000 units in its first weekend. Since then sales have gradually been slipping though, and last week (only its second full week on sale) saw the Xbox virtually vanquished from the UK all formats chart, according to the latest Chart Track figures. Halo dropped from 4th to 13th, Project Gotham fell to 23rd, and somewhat embarrassingly Xbox covergirl Dead Or Alive 3 is currently being outsold by the Platinum re-release of Dead Or Alive 2 : Hardcore on the PS2. No other Xbox exclusive titles are left in the all formats top 40, although if you discount PC games and console budget releases Rallisport Challenge, Jet Set Radio Future, Star Wars : Obi Wan and Munch's Oddysee all squeeze into the lower reaches of the chart. Either way it's not happy reading for Microsoft, and weekly hardware sales are thought to be down to four figure numbers in the UK already. A price cut would be good any time now, Redmond. Related Feature - Xbox is a flop in Japan

Descent 3 developers Outrage Entertainment have been bought by THQ. The company now becomes part of THQ's internal studio group along with Volition, the other half of what used to be Parallax Software. The exact terms of the take-over aren't known, but it seems to have come at the cost of one of the company's projects. An update on Outrage's website yesterday announced that "due to circumstances beyond our control" their bizarre looking PS2 game Rubu Tribe has been cancelled. Rubu was going to be published by Interplay, who are having their own financial problems at the moment, so it's no great surprise that the game has been axed by new owners THQ. Outrage are apparently now working on a new action game for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, which will be revealed at E3 next month. Outrage's general manager Matt Toschlog put a brave face on things for the benefit of the press release, stating that "we're delighted to be a part of [THQ's] growth and we look forward to being able to focus on making great games". Meanwhile THQ have set up another new game development studio of their own, this time in Seattle. Going by the strange name of Cranky Pants Games (don't ask), the team is currently working on a GameCube title due for release some time next year.

Those of you who read our Tale In The Desert interview last week but couldn't make it into the associated beta session can rest easy, as eGenesis will be firing up their kilns again for a few hours from 5pm GMT tomorrow evening (Friday 5th April). If you haven't already downloaded the beta client you can grab it here, and then sign up for the beta to be kept informed of future play sessions. Apparently last week's test went well, with the introduction of some new skills, the construction of Egypt's first courthouse, and the discovery of the printing press. Next thing you know we'll all be chatting on mobile phones and taking trips down the Nile in speedboats... Related Feature - Desert Tale interview

Somewhere in the depths of the Springfield nuclear power plant, Mr Burns has been carrying out hideous genetic experiments, grafting Simpsons DNA into Crazy Taxi. The result is Simpsons Road Rage, an amusing if somewhat shallow driving game. The basic premise is simple enough - ferry your passengers around the mean streets of Springfield at breakneck speed with the aim of earning as much cash as possible. Depending on which difficulty level you choose you may start with anything up to 75 seconds on the clock, but when this runs out your car coasts to a halt and it's game over. Luckily whenever you pick up a passenger you get some extra seconds on the clock, although the further you get into a session the less time you're given for each journey and the more frantic things get. Reaching your destination ahead of schedule earns you a few seconds more as well as a modest cash tip, and sometimes you're also offered the chance to earn Road Rage and Safe Trip bonuses. The former involves causing as much mayhem as possible by knocking over trees, lamp posts, signs and innocent bystanders, while the latter rewards you for avoiding collisions with other vehicles. I'll let you guess which is more fun. You can even eke out an extra couple of seconds by knocking over one of the stops for Mr Burns' evil atomic bus fleet, which you can find scattered around each of the game's six neighbourhoods.

Sega has finally demonstrated a handful of PalmOS videogames, during a keynote address at the PalmSource conference in Japan. Despite announcing its alliance with Palm in January 2001, this is the company's first public demonstration of software on the platform. The games ran on a development board using a Motorola DragonBall MX1 processor, and were made specifically for the presentation using Metrowerk's Codewarrior, so don't get your hopes up. Although the games featured colour animation and 3D texture mapping, they are not intended for commercial release and Sega's Palm strategy still remains somewhat elusive. The lovable company has released two of the three demos for public consumption though, and has even provided a translation for English Palm-owning types. The games require PalmOS 3.5 with 256 colours or more to run. Related Feature - Sega to become platform-neutral, Team up with Palm

Bigben Interactive will handle primary distribution for THQ exclusively, MCV is reporting. The deal effective immediately will see BBI managing the storage and distribution of THQ products in the UK and key export territories, along with consumer product support services. BBI MD Dick Francis commented: "The fact that THQ have signed with us is a significant reflection of the confidence they have in our sophisticated IT systems and first rate logistical service."

According to Bloomberg, Xbox is a flop in Japan, and investors are calling for a price cut. Already the most expensive console in Japan - but decidedly cheaper than its European and American equivalents - the Xbox has sold about 165,000 units, a third short of Microsoft's goal to sell out its 250,000-unit launch allocation. Media Create reports that in the week ended Sunday, 4,300 Xboxen were sold, compared to 100,000 PlayStation 2 consoles and 25,000 GameCubes. Heavyweight investors are already publicly calling for a price cut, with one commenting that "Xbox is irrelevant in the Japanese market." Meanwhile, another confessed to being interested in the effect the console's failure will have on part suppliers. Last week rumours surfaced of a rift between Microsoft support and Japanese developers, and just today Microsoft has announced President and COO Rick Belluzzo's departure this coming September. Belluzzo played a key role in the conception of Xbox. Despite the Xbox's low price in Japan relative to its international counterparts, Sony's 15 percent price cut last December and a lack of exclusive Japanese-developed software titles seems to have scuppered the console's chances. Microsoft has yet to comment on the Bloomberg report this morning. Related Feature - Twelfth Night

The Sci Fi Channel has revealed that a four hour mini-series based on the multi-million selling adventure game Myst is in the works. Produced by Mandalay, whose past work includes great movies like Donnie Brasco, Sleepy Hollow and Seven Years In Tibet, in association with Myst developers Cyan and Columbia Tri Star Domestic Television, the series will "uncover an ancient civilization that existed for thousands of years beneath the surface of the Earth, a civilization that created magical books allowing one to travel to other worlds". It's not yet known who will direct or star in this adaptation, and quite frankly we're more excited at the prospect of Sci Fi's new Battlestar Galactica mini-series. Still, Myst should be hitting the small screen some time in the next year or two, so expect to hear more soon.

GameCube fans will be disappointed to learn that unlike the Japanese version of the game, Resident Evil will not ship with a bundled Memory Card 59 when it launches in the States on 30th April. This more or less guarantees that Europe will not receive the memory card either. Capcom promises that the game is still on schedule, and IGN speculates that cutting the included memory card may be a way of reducing the eventual buy price and improving the game's chances of hitting its projected release date. Resident Evil, a remake of the 32-bit daddy of survival horror, has received mixed reviews since its release in Japan, with some publications marking it very highly and others criticizing the game for the same old Capcomisms. Meanwhile, IGN also reports that Resident Evil 0, the next original instalment in the series, may be playable at this year's E3, in just over a month's time... Related Feature - Resident Evil screenshots

Mindscape has signed the UK publishing rights to Starmageddon : Project Earth, a space strategy game from Poland's Lemon Interactive. Starmageddon looks like anything but a lemon though, with eye-catching 3D graphics, semi-realistic physics and an intriguing plot. You take on the role of a "Sundiver", a human plugged into the systems of a space ship, whose fleet is on its way to colonise a new planet when it discovers a coment headed for Earth. And as if that's not bad enough, there's a swarm of hostile aliens lurking in the comet's tail. "Starmageddon: Project Earth is a truly spectacular title that will redefine the RTS genre", according to Mindscape's Simon Orams. "The game takes the best and proven elements of the genre and combines them with some sparkling innovations, making it a universally playable game." With a summer release on the cards, we should know soon whether the game can live up to its promise. Related Feature - Starmageddon screenshots