MSNBC has the news that the ever unpopular N-Gage not only isn't going into that good night, but it's going to be receiving a redesign sometime in the future. From the article: "We're looking at new colors, a new look and feel for the QD in the next few months,"

Andrew Burnes writes "A fellow Internet games journalist will shortly plead guilty in a Connecticut court room for being involved in the warez scene, following his apprehension in April as part of Operation Fastlink. Here is a slice of his email to various press and editorial professionals: 'I am very sorry for what I have done, and after I serve my sentence, I hope I will be able to continue my career in the game industry, and move on with my life. This last year has been incredibly hard for me emotionally, facing the consequences of my bad choices, and I am hopeful for your support, but I'll understand if you want nothing to do with me.'

wraggster writes "Natrium 42 has updated his site with many more pictures of his Passthrough Device for the Nintendo DS, called the PassMe. In other DS News, Desktopman has updated His Tetris Game with a 2 player mode on one DS. Also for those interested in DS Hacking you have the DS Homebrew Reference Site and finally Darkfader the original DS Hacker."

RobotWisdom writes "Alice of the Wonderland weblog has managed to transcribe and post the opening keynote address by Raph Koster from the Game Developers' Conference. It was based on his book, 'A Theory of Fun'. My favorite quotes: 'Fun is the feedback the brain gives while successfully absorbing a pattern.' and 'The differences between Cheers, Friends, and a medieval morality play are NOT THAT BIG.' Very upbeat, thought-provoking and inspiring." As an FYI: I'll be leaving for the sunny western coast in less than 8 hours. Expect coverage all week starting as soon as I get over jet lag tomorrow.

GamesIndustry.biz has comments from Mark Rein, VP of Epic Games, stating that he considers the recent talk about sky high game and console prices nothing but scare tactics on the part of large publishers. From the article: "'I guess they just don't have productive tools like we have,' he went on to suggest."

simoniker writes "Microsoft has announced XNA Studio at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Based on Visual Studio 2005 Team System, XNA Studio is an integrated, team-based development environment tailored specifically for video game development, and will likely launch as a PC retail product early in 2006. Gamasutra has an interview with XNA's Chris Satchell with more details on what Microsoft sees as a solution for ever-expanding cost and complexity in game development."

2d is the new 3d writes "PopCap Games has Open Sourced the framework used to make their hit downloadable web games. From the press release: 'The PopCap Games Framework provides developers a quick and easy way to get their projects off the ground, allowing more time to be spent on game design instead of compatibility bugs and multimedia programming issues. For the first time, casual game developers will have access to a refined, reliable framework that has been tested in dozens of games played by millions of customers. ...The PopCap Games Framework is available now at developer.popcap.com. It currently supports Windows 98, ME, 2000, and XP operating systems."

me at werk writes "Following up on Tim Buckley's interview, CBS News' GameCore has posted the interview with Scott Ramsoomair of VG Cats. From the article: "Psychos will always be psychos; they don't need video games to help them. Though this one time my brother punched me in the arm when I beat him in Mario Kart. Does that count?""

flyboy writes "In a similar vein to the remakes of the Origin's Ultima series games reported in 2001 and 2004 a group of Wing Commander fans has remade Wing Commander: Privateer. Unlike the Ultima remakes, the Privateer remake is finished at version 1.0 with 3d graphics and the whole storyline. For the new kids on the block, WC:Privateer was a much loved trading game similar to the more venerable Elite, which appears also to be in the process of a remake. As a linux fan I was most happy with the remake's use of GPL 3d engine software and release of Linux, Macintosh and Windows versions. See Screenshots here."

Bungie will be making a lot of changes at the home office, doubling their staff to ramp up for Halo 3. Changes for fans of the City of Heroes comic are coming as well, as NCSoft announced early this week that they were signing Top Cow publishing to take over the book. There will be plenty of announcements next week at the Game Developer's Conference, where Nintendo will be discussing their plans for Network gaming. MMOGs are, of course, the most networked of games and there is lots of MMO-related news to share this week. Final Fantasy XI players have a new Vana'diel Tribune to peruse, and if you'd like to share some stories the folks over at videogamestudies.com are interested in your characters. Not a new story, but one worth sharing is the republishing of The Big Scam. The Eve Online tale of real-life scammery and backstabbery is well worth a read. Sharing online tales is fun, and 1up.com has excellent journals about their online adventures. Warcraft Stories, My Life in Vana'diel, Memoirs of an Urban Vigilante, and Hooked on Evercrack were all updated this week. Finally, Corpnews has a bright note from the world of Star Wars Galaxies to share as Lord Vader took some time to visit the troops in the field. Update: 03/07 17:18 GMT by Z : As CapeMonkey pointed out, I had the wrong barnyard animal in talking about the CoH Comic.

IGN has word that the next game in the RE series is already under development. There aren't really any details yet on the project, other than the changes made in the interface for RE4 (the over-the-shoulder view, the action orientation) will continue on with the next game. IGN also states that while the fourth game in the series was a GameCube native, the next one is likely to be a PS2 game or a multiple console launch. More details will be available in the next EGM.

GameDailyBiz has a look at the whys and wherefors behind next week's Independent Games Festival. The yearly celebration of independent games is compared by the article to the Sundance Film Festival, and the kind of exposure that gathering has provided to smaller film makers. From the article: "One of the earliest entrants in the IGF, Vicarious Visions, went on to create major games such as Spider-Man 2 for handhelds for Activision. In addition, last year's multi-award winner, online puzzle game Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates, has got almost 10,000 subscribers, each paying $10 a month to keep playing, and is now being published by UbiSoft in a retail version..." The quote is from Simon Carless, co-chair of the IGF and editor of Game Developer Magazine. (As well as the first and fabulous Slashdot Games editor.)

Via Joystiq, the official PSP site has the final specs on the U.S. PSP console and its launch titles. And some nice titles they are, including an Ape Escape game, Metal Gear Acid (the card battle game), and one of most of EA's sports franchises. The system releases here in the states on March 24th.

iethree writes "Natural-Selection version 3.0 final is released today, after several years in beta. NS is the most popular third party mod for Half-Life, it features a combination of RTS and FPS to create one of the most unique games out there. You can view the changelog and read an interview with one of the creators discussing the changes in the final release and the future of Natural-Selection."

Kez writes "HEXUS.net has an article looking at the current state of Linux gaming and the broad number of supported games both natively and through emulation. Included in the article is a chat with the Product Manager of TransGaming - the creators of Cedega (formerly known as WineX.)" From the article: "Well, Linux certainly isn't most peoples' thought for a games-based PC. Especially one being taken to a big tournament LAN party. However, by design or trickery, none of the tournament games at the event were out-of-bounds to my Linux machine, and rousing games of Call of Duty, Quake 2 and Unreal Tournament 2004 were shared by the HEXUS.net collective and any other gamers who felt like joining in." We ran a story about a similar article back in February.

If you have the chance to make it to the Windy City in the near future, the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry is playing host to the exhibit entitled "Game On". The playable gaming extravaganza will run through September of this year, and covers almost the entire history of video games. From the article: "Visitors to Game On will be able to play more than 100 games that illustrate how far games have come both artistically and technically, and see how the video game phenomenon has influenced aspects of popular culture around the world."

Gamespot has a story detailing comments by Square Enix president Youichi Wada. In the article, they touch on the fact that Square is going to be increasingly looking to online play in their future games. From the article: "Wada predicted that online games will be Square Enix's main source of income in the future. 'I think that over half of our income and profit will be based on network content [including games] by 2008 or 2009.'"

Klytus writes "Peter Adkison, former CEO of Wizards of the Coast, Inc., and current president of Gen Con, LLC, recently announced the pending release of a new collectible poker chip game." From the article: "Each chip has 0 to 6 clout points. Players have to make a stack 15 chips while not spending more than a set amount of Clout on the stack. Players take turns throwing the chips into the play area and depending on how they hit the table the individual effects of each chip occur. Chips have stats, abilities and powers that affect game play."

Mr. Ghost asks: "My friends and I have recently been in the market for a good new boardgame or other tabletop game. We have worked through the gamut of games like Axis & Allies, Supremacy, and War! Age of Imperialism. More recently we have been playing tile based games like Carcasonne and Settlers of Catan. I am looking for some suggestions on some new games we could get into."

IGN has an article discussing an interview in which Nintendo President Satoru Iwata talked about the possibility that the Nintendo Revolution's fundamental difference from other offerings may alienate third party developers. From the article: "If the next generation platforms are going to create even more gorgeous looking games using further enhanced functionality, and if that next-gen market can still expand the games industry, then I'm afraid that third-parties may not support Nintendo" Refreshing to hear such an honest assessment from company president.