theodp writes "What Matty and Moises Alou are to Major League Baseball, Poison and his 7-year-old nephew Lil' Poison are to Major League Gaming. Recently, the pair bested 550 Midway Mayhem contestants to take home 1st and 2nd place honors at the largest Halo tournament of all-time. The Chicago Journal reports that gaming prodigy Lil' Poison, who picked up a controller at age 2 and whupped his game-playing Dad into retirement, will be featured on 60 Minutes in January."

Gamasutra reports that a bug that Xbox Live developed over the Holiday weekend has been worked out. From the article: "A short time after this, the vast majority of the missing scores, which were most obvious on Xbox Live Arcade titles such as Hexic and Mutant Storm Reloaded, were restored. [Major Nelson] also noted on his weblog, following reports that the outage might have been related to some kind of user hack: 'What happened was not a result of a hack (or hacks) or anything else security related. This is a bug, plain and simple.'"

1up.com has an in-depth preview of the much anticipated Kingdom Hearts II RPG. The second mashup between SquareEnix and Disney is expected in the states sometime in late Spring or early Summer. From the article: "If the first Kingdom Hearts was a crazy experiment, then the sequel is the final product, refined and polished in dozens of small-but-important ways. One of the most obvious improvements is the game's massively higher budget; though the first looked nice, Kingdom Hearts II is one of the best looking games the PS2 has ever -- or will ever -- see. From photorealistic models to 'I can't believe it's not PS3' massive battles, the game convinces the aging PS2 hardware to do things that seem nearly impossible."

garylian writes "Some of the folks here might remember a Massive game called 'Mourning' that went into development and never really went anywhere. Apparently, it went Gold, but it wasn't even close to complete. Some former fans have a riviting Q/A with one of the former programmers. Highlights from the article include the fact that one of the game backers was a internet porn-lord!" From the article:"The game was going nowhere, no one really believed in its success. We all knew it was going to fail, but we were kind of reluctant in admiting it. Those who realized this and had better opportunities, left. Those who were blinded by different reasons or had no other choices, remained till the end (or maybe had different reasons.) It's not that we didn't try to change this direction the game was heading to... We did, but no one was listening to us. " The interview is well conducted, but you should obviously take this with a grain of salt.

GamerGod is running an article taking a look at the role of the Rogue in Dungeons and Dragons Online. In their estimation, the Rogue class finally gets to do its thing in an online game. From the article: "What rogue would be worth his salt if he didn't have any traps to disarm or locks to open? What truly sets D&DO apart from the competition is the need to find and disarm various traps, snares, and pitfalls. Again, the game's set-up and design makes this an invaluable part of game play. No regeneration of spell points results in limited heals, and no regeneration of hit points makes getting blasted with a trap actually MEAN something." Been playing the preorder Beta this weekend, and it does a surprisingly good job of recreating the PnP experience. Review upon release.

Press the Buttons has an interesting and plausible sounding set of theories for the year ahead. From the article: "Sega will finally create an exceptional 3D Sonic the Hedgehog title when Sonic Team puts the entire extended cast (Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Cream, Blaze, Shadow, and the rest) back in the toy box for a while and focuses on what made the original Sonic games so much fun: blue skies and plenty of speed." Some of them may just be wishful thinking, though.

Though Microsoft has previously stated that a reported problem where Xbox 360s may be scratching game discs was relatively rare, it's apparently common enough that rental agency GameFly has an official policy on the problem. From Gamasutra: "We have received reports that certain XBOX 360 consoles have caused damage to GameFly videogames. Unfortunately, we have been notified that you recently returned a damaged XBOX 360 game. As a precaution, we have removed all XBOX 360 games from your GameQ. Please contact Microsoft at 1-800-4MY-XBOX. Please do not rent XBOX 360 games until you have resolved this issue. In the future, should GameFly receive XBOX 360 games from you that have been damaged, you will be charged a replacement fee."

CivilianHero writes "The New York Post is reporting that a carry-on case, with an Xbox 360 inside, sparked a terror alert to go off at MacArthur Airport after several x-ray screenings revealed the case to be containing suspicious wires. That section of the airport was cleared and the bomb squad was deployed to investigate. That's one more reason why Xbox 360 is the bomb for Games.net and Joystiq."

cyrus_zuo writes "For anyone looking for something different Game Tunnel presents the 2005 Independent Game of the Year awards. Game Tunnel's list of the Top 10 Independent Games of the Year covers gaming from a different angle, looking at the Independent and the Innovative. The awards also include the best of each genre as well as technical categories. Last year's results are still available."

A Reader writes "Since its inception, the PSP Homebrew Community has been hacking away at their little jem of a portable console. Its valiant efforts in the fight for open hardware have not been well received by Sony. Regardless, Yeldarb, a homebrew programmer, has released a PSP Programming Tutorial Series. It covers everything from setting up the development environment to writing your first program to sprucing up your programs with a little graphics programming. The tutorial series is a must read for anyone interested in joining the PSP hacking community."

Steve from Hexus writes "Steering clear of jokes about overheating power supplies, one company is claiming to have constructed a watercooling kit for the XBox 360. HEXUS.gaming has obtained pictures of the product, seemingly attached to an XBox 360, though how it works and how it is installed remains something of a mystery."

phaedo00 writes "Ars Technica has posted their take on Indiana's newest attempt at passing a game law that seeks to restrict the sale of violent video games. This, despite that fact that similar legislation has a track record of failing in every state it has been proposed in. From the article: 'The state capitol, Indianapolis, was one of the first cities in the nation to try and strike out at violent video games, first going after arcades and other entertainment vendors back in 2000. The quest ended up where they all do: in front of a judge, and left for dead. Now that California, Illinois, and Michigan have all suffered astounding defeats in their attempts to address PC and console game sales, Indiana wants to join the ranks of the failures.'"

Carl Bialik from the WSJ writes "The Wall Street Journal Online analyzes the prospects of the Xbox's online-gaming component. Analysts say Microsoft has spent hundreds of millions on Xbox Live, with little guarantees of returns. 'It is not clear that companies like Microsoft and Sony will be able to lure large numbers of players -- each has attracted a small fraction of users to online play with their previous consoles,' WSJ Online writes. 'The companies also must be careful about new business models for distributing games -- such as games-on-demand -- so as not to alienate game publishers, who still rely heavily on in-store sales. And games designed for multiple players have a mixed record of attracting customers.' Says analyst Michael Pachter, 'At the end of the day, we don't play games for social interaction ... We play games to escape.' Microsoft's strategy is 'absolutely flawed,' he added.""

GameSetWatch has a humorous look at a recent press package they received from PopCap Games. From the article: "'Earlier this summer I had a terrifying situation where an unexpected interaction of two new prescription medicines sent me into a panic attack so severe it made me attempt suicide. When I got home from the hospital that night, I sat there playing the endless version of Bejeweled 2 for most of the night, while the last of the overdose I had taken worked its way out of my system.' This, kind readers, is why casual games are actually pretty hardcore."

Joshuah Bearman's, over at the LA Weekly, continues to impress with his 'Pass the Paddles' column. This week he offers up an analysis of why 'Hulk Smash' needs a little more thought put into it. From the article: "If superhero games are so often terrible, it's because they're saddled with the flattening reductionism of superhero film adaptations. But superheroes aren't so simple. The principal disappointment with the film version of The Hulk was that it lacked the mythical gravitas, graceful action and ultimate spiritual reward of Ang Lee's previous masterpiece, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. The film Hulk's oedipal and rage complexes were ham-fisted, and the action boringly brutish. In other words: Crouching Tiger was a better superhero story. (And should have made a better video game; sadly, that title was a disaster.)"

GameSetWatch looks back on the year in Second Life. The freedom-loving virtual world has had a lot of major milestones this year, and it looks like they have a lot to look forward to in 2006. From the post: "Firstly, according to the Second Life Future Salon, a recent virtual appearance by O'Reilly's Phillip Torrone confirmed the existence of a forthcoming 'Second Life Hacks' book. The exuberantly named Hank Hoodoo comments of the attached cover mock-up: 'I really hope O'Reilly actually uses that spork on the cover of the real book.'"

Gamespot reports that the much-anticipated Dead or Alive 4 ships today, after a series of delays and confusion. From the article: "During the past month or so, the game's presumptive release date kept getting pushed back by about a week at a time by online retailers, causing many to wonder whether the game would indeed ship in 2005, especially since Tecmo remained mum about a specific release date all the while. But now fighting fans can look forward to an action-packed weekend courtesy of the latest game from Ninja Gaiden developer Team Ninja."

Kotaku is reporting that, according to some early scans, the new World of Warcraft Alliance race will be the Draenei. From the Wikipedia entry: "The Draenei are one of the three primary races native to Draenor (the others being the Orcs and the Ogres). They once populated the planet heavily, but were slaughtered by the Orcs shortly after their corruption by the Warlock Gul'dan. A small number of Draenei survived, using a recessive cloaking ability. Severely mutated in the destruction of Draenor, they were thought to be extinct, but Illidan and his forces discovered and liberated one of the last surviving Draenei villages among the wastes of what is now known as Outland." Still not confirmed, take with a grain of salt.

pnewhook writes "The Register reports that Microsoft and Nissan have created the first integrated gaming system within a vehicle. Not just in the vehicle, but the vehicle becomes part of the gaming system. From the article: "Conceived by Nissan Design America Inc. (NDA) and equipped with the Xbox 360 next-generation video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, the Nissan URGE concept car allows drivers (while parked) to play 'Project Gotham Racing 3' using the car's own steering wheel, gas pedal and brake pedal while viewing the game on a flip-down seven-inch LCD screen," Nissan and Microsoft said in a statement."

Philly.com is running the confirmation that Sony paid a vendor to lease wallspace for their PSP graffiti ads. Philadelphia groups are slamming the ads as affronts to clean urban spaces, and the Licenses and Inspections Department in the city is planning to cite the business owner. From the article: "Jake Dobkin, copublisher of the Gothamist Web site, considers himself a street-art aficionado. He said the Sony campaign hit his SoHo neighborhood in Manhattan a few weeks ago with not only 'dozens' of spray-painted murals but 'hundreds' of posters of the same cutesy youths. He took aim at Sony for trying to dupe people like him. 'It's clearly a large campaign, and deserves a thoughtful, measured response,' he wrote on his blog. 'Here's mine: corporate graffiti sucks.'"