The time has come as Introversion’s newest title, DEFCON is going live at this very moment. Introversion’s online store has been hammered all day, even Steam is a touch slow at the moment. I predict great things for DEFCON and Introversion, with DEFCON possibly even being more successful than Darwinia, dare I say it. It’s too late now to get the pre-order bonuses, sorry folks, if you had pre-ordered through Introversion, you would have gotten a digital download and a boxed copy mailed to you, if you ordered through Steam, you would have gotten $5 off, making this amazing game only $9.95. On with the desctruction!

Read more: DEFCON

YouTube saves the day, again. Recently, Intel held a huge presentation to showoff their upcoming monster quad core processors, which will hopefully begin appearing at the end of this year (preferably on new iMacs, which I plan on buying). To show off the power of the Quad Procs, Remedy was invited on-stage to demo their new upcoming psychological thriller, Alan Wake (A. Wake), running on a monster Intel Duo Quad Core system, overclocked to 3.73 GHz and an Nvidia graphics card. Though not the highest of quality video, one can see that Remedy has done an amazing job at recreating Twin Peak’s lush and open environment, which I would wager to say was one of their goals. It’s a shame their animation system looks as clunky and ugly as Max Payne’s.

Watch the video presentation after the jump..

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A talented World of Warcraft fan created a very well-made online comic, which covers the lore of World of Craft in comic book style layout. Let’s just hope it stays up long enough for people to enjoy.

Read more: Read the fan made World of Warcraft lore comic

Well, that was shocking. Cryptic, Marvel Entertainment and Microsoft Game Studios today announced that Cryptic has been tapped to develop Marvel’s upcoming MMO, Marvel Universe Online, which will be released for the Xbox 360(!!) and Windows Vista, presumably next year. This is a shock because it was only a short time ago that Marvel Entertainment (and DC Comics) had Cryptic and NCsoft in their sights, accusing both of allowing users to infringe on their respective copyrights, by allowing users of NCsoft MMO City of Heroes to create characters resembling well-known Marvel and DC brands. I’m sure somewhere in South Korea, an NCsoft executive is throwing things at the poor intern who has to break this piece of bad news. How this will affect NCsoft is unknown yet, but, I can only imagine that with the release of Marvel Online Universe, NCsoft had better be planning a way around the potential fallout, as City of Heroes and City of Villains players abandon ship to play as Marvel-created super heroes. Though, whether players will actually get to play as Wolverine or Spider-Man remains to be seen.

Read more: Marvel and Microsoft announce Cryptic as Marvel Universe Online developer | Cryptic’s open letter to their fans

After many rumours, RedOctane finally announced that Guitar Hero II will see a release on the Xbox 360, with the game and the “X-Plorer” controller currently being shown at Microsoft’s X06, currently underway. The controller is designed specifically for the Xbox 360 and players will be able to download new content, such as rock rhythm, lead and bass guitar tracks (awesome). With the Xbox Live Arcade being as great as it is, I imagine the possibilities are endless for downloadable content.

Read more: Red Octane announces Guitar Hero 360

As the new City of Heroes Issue 8 expansion approaches, more information has been released on the City of Heroes rewards program, which NCsoft is using to show their appreciation for their subscribers, a smart move considering the beating the City of Heroes has been taking in the past few months. Players get rewards based on the length of time they’ve been in-game, going in 3 month increments, rewarding players with badges, tokens, costume upgrades and the ultimate, a free respec, always a good thing to have in a MMORPG.

3 months: Trustworthy
- Trustworthy badge
- Costume Piece: Trenchcoats
- Costume Change Token given to all characters on account

6 months: Faithful
- Faithful badge
- Costume Piece: Greek Alphabet Chest Emblems
- Costume Change Token given to all characters on account

9 months: Dependable
- Dependable badge
- Costume Piece: Belly Shirt for Females, Scottish Kilts for Males
- Respec given to all characters on account
- Costume Change Token given to all characters on account

12 months: Loyal
- Loyal badge
- Temporary Power: CHOICE: Permanent Undead Slaying Axe or Permanent Sands of Mu
- Pre-Order Sprints: Rush, Dash, Quick, Surge
- Base Item: Wall Mounted Weapon Displays

Read more: City of Heroes Veteran Rewards program

Jack Thompson once again wastes lots of people’s time and tax money, this time filing a ‘pioneering’ wrongful death suit in New Mexico against Sony, Take-Two and Rockstar Games. The suit is on behalf of the relatives of a family slain on Sam Donaldson’s ranch earlier this year, when a 14 year old boy killed his family after his father hit him for not cleaning horse stalls fast enough. The young boy alleges his father had abused him for years, but that was all forgotten by Jack Thompson, who instead of addressing the fact that an abused child resorted to such desperate lengths to escape further abuse, grandstands and tries to buy himself and his twisted ideals more air time on the evening news.

Read more: Rockstar / Take-Two blamed for all of society’s problems yet again

Though this is just an early teaser trailer to the upcoming Danish platformer, Limbo, it’s already looking brilliant and I’m already thinking of the possibilities. An indie game to the core, Limbo is being produced by 1 extremely talented individual, Arnt Jensen, who is behind the art, concept and design. Limbo has recently received a healthy grant from the Danish government in order to continue the development of the game, more proof of the good that government funded innovation achieves. More information will be coming soon on the availability of the game and I’m holding out hope that the developer will soon have a dev-blog where he can discuss more about his ideas and game design.

Read more: Limbo - The Game

Microsoft’s Major Nelson announced the new content this week for the Xbox Live Arcade, with no major announcements other than the availability of the Lego Star Wars II demo, which is now available for download. The only other items announced are trailers for titles such as Just Cause, The Darkness, Sonic and several others. I’m totally looking forward to the new Lego Star Wars though, not only because Chewy rips off little Lego arms, but also because I think the original was quite a feat for a Lego-inspired game and certainly a fun little extension of the aging Star Wars brand.

Read more: Major Nelson’s XBLA announcement | Lego Star Wars II

A new fitness center opened up in California last week, specifically targeting teens aged 13 through 18. The first of it’s kind fitness center focuses on striking a balance between electronics, fitness equipment and a hangout spot, by featuring exercise machines that have been mashed up with video games, giving the teens a healthy, multiplayer environment, where a bike workout can turn into an impromptu bike race up a virtual mountain. The gym also features Dance Dance Revolution-style machines as well as LAN-connected XBoxes for gamers to get in a quick Halo deathmatch while getting their iron on.

Read more: Fitness center mixing exercise and video games