Microsoft has an Xbox Live Arcade update for us today, for 400 points ($5) you can get the classic game with these additional features: Two player co-op multiplayer locally or over Xbox LIVE, choice between the original graphics or new high-definition graphics, all new music, hints and tips, three leaderboards, customizable button configurations, and the ability to earn up to 12 Achievements and 200 Gamerscore points.

That should keep you busy for a while, but they've also announced six new games that will be coming soon to their Xbox Live Arcade selection library:

Mad Tracks: This 3-D racing party game from Load Inc. and D3Publisher recalls all the fun of playing with toy cars from childhood. Up to four players can race micro cars in a variety of gameplay modes in familiar settings such as a living room, a restaurant and a toy store.

Rush 'n Attack: Also known as "Green Beret," from Konami Digital Entertainment Inc., this is a faithful next-generation update of this classic coin-op arcade title where the player assumes the role of a special forces agent sent behind enemy lines to infiltrate an enemy military complex and free captured prisoners of war.

Soltrio Solitaire: From Silver Creek Entertainment, this is a collection of 18 different solitaire games, offering co-op and competitive two-player solitaire game modes.

Spyglass Board Games: From Strange Flavour Ltd. and Freeverse, this offers classic versions of the world's most beloved board games, including chess, checkers, mancala and reversi, as well as the ability to enjoy video chat with friends via the Xbox LIVE Vision camera.

Street Trace:NYC: This is a hover board racing and arena battle game from Gaia Industries Inc. set against the urban wasteland of future New York City. Make your mark on the leaderboards in intense eight-player action over Xbox LIVE, or battle at home through split-screen or single-player tournaments.

Undertow: This is a fast-paced action shooter from Chair Entertainment Group that thrusts players underwater as they battle for control of the oceans, and features a robust single player/co-op campaign and up to 16-player multiplayer action over Xbox LIVE.

I'm going to be all over online chess like AIDS on Uno.

By Second Life law, whenever there's any good news to report from the online community of creepy players, there's far more disturbing news to focus on. Second Life is the only game in which there are more actual cats than kitty porn sex offenders. It's also the only game where the sky isn't the limit, yet both clouds and Cloud look like shit.

The good news:  Back in February Final Fantasy VII fans joined together in the Second Life world to recreate Midgar on an island within the game. It's a nice tribute to show their appreciation, but the shrine doesn't end in its appearance, you can even play through the area as a mini FFVII sim game. When you first arrive you choose between the sides Shin-Ra SOLDIER or AVALANCHE rebel, then choose between Fighter, Gunner, and Caster class. A few more clicks and you're buying materia and shopping for weapons.

The people running the level take on the job of Dungeon Master as they act as NPCs, and help pull plot twists at the right time to help the role playing progress from one area and event to the next, like some freaky carnival. I'd rather just play the game again, although I have to admit, this shows more dedicated role playing than any game I've ever seen. Ironically, they have asked Square Enix for permission to run this Midgar Sim, and are assuming their lack of response so far is an undeclared ok. So, with a littler luck, in a few weeks I'll get to bring you headlines such as "Square Enix summons Shiva on Second Lifers" or "Midgar murdered by materia."

Oh, and the bad news? Real life laws may need to be re-written to include the possibility that under-the-age gamers can now "rape" adults online. So, if it's a dude dressed as a dog and a chick dressed as a cat, does that still count? Or have we discovered a loophole in the Constitution, in which human-on-human-on-online bestiality is included as rape? Welcome to 2007. Again.

In the BBC article "beating Warcraft at its own game" they covered three different games they think will give World Of Warcraft competition in the coming years.

Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) had one million players sign up for its beta, creating quite the quick jump towards W.O.W.'s eight million player population. With a whole series of existing books and powerful films to instill the story in our heads, it cuts the first few minutes from ever needing an opening cinema to lay out all the rules, and instead just catches the players up to date in its current setting they already know so well. With a 50 million square meter playing map, and creative approaches to preventing the middle level "grinds" in repetitive gameplay, they've got a good chance at one day catching up to W.O.W.

They also outline the possibility of Star Wars Galaxies ever catching up to the top they arguable once controlled. Star Wars rivals Lord of the Rings as one of the most epic storylines of all time, and years ago their MMO game was running strong with plenty of pleased players.

Jake Neri, producer of Star Wars Galaxies, speaks a lot of truth when he says "Galaxies was one of the first MMOs, there was no handbook on how to do these things." By paving the path to the new genre it enabled Blizzard to storm past them in the fast lane, but Galaxies' launch in 2003 wasn't too long ago, and many believe they're making a come back after a few rest stops along the way.

Then, there's the new blood in the arena - Funcom's Age of Conan, which has yet to come out. Gaute Godoger, the game director at Funcom, said that "The industry so needs competition to World of Warcraft. We need other strong games that can make people understand that there's more to it than WoW." Instead of just approaching the middle level grinds in creative ways, Age of Conan instead is attempting to rewrite all the rules. From combat to exploration, they're re-laying out the keyboard command styles and story progression possibilities.

"It's for adults, we did not want to be a teen-rated game, we wanted to have the possibility of making a game that takes the licence seriously. Players want to be more active in combat and know that their skill as a player matters. There's no auto combat, you have to do all the running and attacking as you sit there." Funcom hopes to be able to pull in-game cities that the players police and run through their own politics. Instead of throwing us into Alliance or Horde, they're trying to break down both walls and let players do the hard work.

Will more work for more rewards be the best answer? Or is lazy running and clicking truly the "WOW" factor of MMORPG success. Either way, I completely agree with Gaute Godoger, the choices should at least be there for us to choose to explore. It's good to see other companies daring to take on projects with the odds being 8 million to one that they'll ever succeed. The next few years should be more fun for online PC gaming than ever before.

Give Second Life an online inch, and they'll take a whole Linden mile. It seems to have finally hit its sexual and violent limits, with a large number of veteran players demanding answers, and rabble-rabble-rabble-ing until they're heard. Linden Labs remained silent until yesterday, where they quickly spoke their mind and kept their cryptic plans for the future vague, and then disappeared leaving the rabbling to continue. This may have not meant much to the pissed off people who like playing in Second Life, but it means a whole lot of possible bad news for people who don't like the game or the types of crowds it attracts:

"We are working to fix bugs and enable incremental improvement. At the same time, we are building the foundations for the next-gen architecture that will radically improve our ability to scale."

To scale . . . where? Bigger populations on PC? Better graphics on PC? Or better graphics somewhere else . . ? Maybe if we pretend nobody has a Wii, Xbox 360, or PS3 yet, they'll lose interest in our markets. Now that going online is the future for all three consoles, it's opened up a terrible hole I don't think we'll be able to close. One dimension's hole is another dimension's infinity, and if we let Second Life in we'll never see them end of the scary future that awaits. Perhaps Sony truly are the smart ones, and are playing weak because they think it'll draw the market to the 360 instead. PS3 Home might just be the cure it takes to protect your 1080p gameplay from furries. Or chicken soup and 7-Up. All I know for sure is that Second Life brings hobo threats, and the best way to deal with that problem is to guide it elsewhere.

The online comic XKCD has had a few good gamer comics in the past, and this is another clever work of art. This is their map of the Internet if you could actually divide it up into landmasses where the most people hang out online. It even organizes it all in four different directions of logic, as opposed to just north, south, east and west. Somewhere in the Not far from Wikipedia in the south is The Last Boss inside the Blogipeligo, spreading information, and up top are the mindless Mysapces. Travel further east and you find the online gaming communities, although I think it's time for World of Warcraft to invade some of Second Life, they don't deserve to own that much land based on the size of their community. Check out the full map image below.

I'm still not excited about the first one, yet Blue Dragon creator Hironobu Sakaguchi has made it pretty clear that there will be a sequel. When asked what we should expect from the next one he said:

"Blue Dragon sold through more than 200,000 units in Japan and again it will continue to build momentum as we get into things like BD2 and BD3. And that's what we're hoping; to really build on the franchise. Maybe it'll take ten years (laughs) . . . We're in talks with Microsoft about development of a sequel. Specifics aren't finalized, but there's a possibility that it will be produced as an online title."

Two hundred thousand isn't that much though, considering the new Pokemon games have already sold over one million copies in America, with another five million sales over in Japan. Hironobu, you should have released Blue Dragon simultaneously with Red Dragon, you fail.

Finally, online gameplay on the Wii is in sight. Nope, not Pokémon Battle Revolution in June, there's a new game doing it first in Europe: Mario Strikers: Charged Football.  Don't forget, football means soccer and death counts overseas, it's the perfect setting for Mario. Thanks to the Wi-Fi multiplayer mode a Wii World Cup is actually something that's possible after its release in Europe on May 25th, Nintendo better not screw this one up.

Gameplay consists of five player teams (up to two real players and three computer players per side), with one playing the team leader with extra "super abilities" available to them. Mario gets steroids and grows to huge proportions, and Peach takes a friggin photo on the game field and freezes the entire opposing team (now we know why she got denied from the Mario Olympics game, what a bitch). On top of this, you also get to choose three side kick CPU players to help out your team tactics, so expect Nintendo to bring back all its ugliest characters to make enough slot choices.  So how will it be played with the new Wiimotes? Straight from the Nintendo press release:

"Basic movement and strikes are executed using the analogue stick and buttons on the Wii Remote and nunchuk, but when the pressure is on, players can use their instinctive movements to affect the gameplay. Flicking the Wii remote will cause the character to check their opponent, hopefully stealing the ball in the process. Players can also use the Wii remote to perform cat-like saves, defending their goal from Megastrikes by grabbing the balls out of the air."

Sounds like a formula for pain and pissed off parents, Nintendo has even erased the rulebook and encouraged foul play, not bad Nintendo, I can see this getting a ton of attention, just like Wii Sports should have if it launched with online leagues. When you fall victim to another player's foul, you instead get an item to help you get revenge, with red shells and chain chomps already mentioned.

The game's multiplayer mode is split into an unranked mode for quick and easy game setups, and a ranked mode where players can compete to climb up leaderboards. The main mode is "Road to Striker Cup" which takes you through seventeen stadiums and three cups to the top of single player exhibition mode, and there's also a Domination mode for quick matches between friends. The estimated retail price for now is 50 Euros (£35), this definitely sounds like a must have Wii title, but Nintendo needs to start moving faster with games supporting leagues and leaderboards. They should hold Mario Golf tournaments that give away online Virtual Console dollar credits to the globe's best gamers. Microsoft pushed Halo and now they're all over the Major League Gaming events, if Nintendo blows this opportunity to get family members of all ages online and having fun, then they've sealed their fate. Even with the bullshit of the Wii friend code system, this is still something exciting to look forward to.

The Lord of the Rings Online MMO game comes out on April 6th, and is already getting much praise.  Instead of following the typical beta testing protocols, they're giving pre-order customers a free chance to play in the open beta before the game's actually out in stores. Doing this shows that Turbine cares enough about players, and their game, to give it dedicated help and player support from before the game's even officially complete. That way when and if the complications and server crashes come, it all hopefully happens during the beta period where players are gaming for free so far, and not during the first month of their new game's lifespan. Furthermore, to encourage players to get involved before the release and help out during beta, Turbine isn't running a character reset swipe once the beta period ends - everyone will keep their game progress.

Jonathan Hanna, Turbine's Director of Community Relations, sums it up with "My mantra is 'beta is live.' This beta-is-live mentality makes the LOTRO launch a kind of midnight opening. But  . . . there's no camping out involved, and you don't even have to pay full retail. Instead, pre-order customers have an opportunity to get a discount for the rest of their lives." They hope making gameplay meaningful from day one will invite real griefers and expose all the flaws as early as possible to benefit the in-game economy by April 6th.

"Load issues and asshats" are expected well after the game goes live, but there's a few more incentives for joining the open beta. Jumping in early gives you the opportunity to play for a locked in price of $10 a month forever and ever. Or, there's also the option of paying a one time price of $200, and then being guaranteed an open account forever without further payments - just so long as the game doesn't fall apart and Turbine pulls a Sauron by successfully closing up shop for good.

Fucking finally. HERE is the news that we've been waiting for - not the official PlayStation Home announcement, I'm talking about some genuinely good Sony PS3 news. And don't say that you've known it all along, no one had a friggin clue this was coming until last week. That being said, Sony has managed to come through and deliver an enormous PS3 feature that is both a service and a free game all in one. It's an outright clone of what Nintendo and Microsoft has done with their consoles, but that still doesn't reduce the PlayStation Home from its revolutionary status. Sony has managed to combine the Wii's Mii avatar system with Xbox 360's achievements system in one large virtual world. The video above touches on the features that you can see below in the picture gallery, and it all looks as good as I had hoped. PS3 has officially stolen he sow at GDC. No bullshit or banter, here's how it works. 

Many PS3 owners will sum it all up as gay for how closely it resembles Second Life, but the benefits far outweigh its downfalls. You get to create a detailed 3D avatar character and explore the virtual Sony world with other PS3 users. The possibilities might be endless, but Sony's already achieved most of them. You can talk with others with a USB keyboard or even in voice chat. You can buy, watch, and even play video games through PlayStation Home (PSH), and Sony isn't limiting it to just video games thankfully. There's simple stuff like bowling and pool tables, and even bold inclusions like entire movie theaters. Instead of downloading movies, will we actually be able to watch movies that are out in theaters from the comfort of our own homes via the PSH? If this doesn't get you excited then you're the biggest Nintendo fanboy in the world, because I doubt this will be topped as the biggest news of the year.

There's a lot of intricacies involved too. Each player will supposedly get their own apartment room space, and get to shop for furniture to customize their homes. Animal Crossing and Sims fans will go nuts. Sony has a lot more planned for your rooms too, instead of just playing PS3 games with others, you can invite your friends over to your PSH home, access your virtual PS3, and start up a game with them from the beginning - not need to have them connect to the game once you've set it all up.

The achievements system might even work out better than the 360 setup. PS3's calling their achievements "trophies" and Sony is even being more generous than Microsoft to score some bonus fans with gamers. Many games will give you trophies just for buying the game. It'll probably be as simple as a virtual poster for your room, but that's still a nice incentive to make us forget how expensive games are these days. There's also a Hall of Fame section for the elite gamers and their trophies, but not many details on that have been announced yet - Sony revealed enough to keep us wanting more for months.

This might be the virtual world I've been waiting to see for years - the graphics look good, the online population will be large and varied, and there's entertainment everywhere. You can see countless big screens placed on every corner to show off new movie and game trailers, and you know Sony won't hesitate to whore out advertising to Coca Cola with their current financial situation. We're in for an online user utopia like never before, and I can't wait to see more. The only bad news I can report out of all of this is that we're going to have to wait until the Fall of 2007 before we get to take advantage of these features. I'm sure Microsoft and Nintendo will do some scrambling in that amount of time, but it doesn't matter. Sony has finally hit a home run and it's not with some shitty Mii character, I'm impressed. Thank you Sony. And thank you to 1UP for the pictures and 1P Start for the video.

First of all, what the fuck is PlayStation Home? If the rumor is true, then it's the Xbox 360's achievements system combined with the Wii's Mii avatar system. Here's what the anonymous Kotaku source had to say:

"Basically, you get to make an avatar for your console (like a Mii) and this avatar has a room. As you play games and accomplish certain tasks, you will receive items with which to adorn the room that are specific to the game (achievements). The kicker is that this is going to be a new requirement for every PS3 game..."

If this is true then I'd be thrilled - Sony has been copying their competitors left and right lately with everything from controller designs to online setups, but at least this dickish doppleganger cloning has a spark of originality to it. Miis are cool and all, but we shouldn't have to wait for Wii Sims or Wii Animal Crossing or Wii This is Starting to Getting Old to use our Miis in fun multiplayer games online - I was expecting a Habbo Hotel styled online world from day one. If Sony could pull an online PS3 user game out of its ass at GDC 07 for all of its registered gamers, I'd give them a lot more credit.

Actually, they are working on a game called Afrika, that's just a simple simulation of the continent's wilderness. If that was only step one of their secret grand plans of mapping out Earth for PS3 users to roam around in, then I'd be the PS3 equivalent of a World of Warcraft addict overnight. The Game Developers Conference is only a few days away (March 5th - 9th), and Sony has promised that they "have something big coming up for the PlayStation Network . . . it has something to do with the Home Button on the SIXAXIS controller, and with the community." Any new news is good news at this point for all three consoles, and even handhelds too, but I have a feeling Sony might steal the show. Nintendo's most likely been sitting on a few secrets of their own, even though Reggie has been denying rumors of more system features coming up, but Microsoft is probably all out of new bragging rights by now. If Sony delivers on an announcement anywhere near as cool as a new online setup, it could shut up 360 gamers for a while. We'll know in a few more days.