It was no secret that Sony would be bringing along their newest portable console to this year’s E3, and last night we finally got some details on the much-anticipated follow-up to the Playstation Portable. This new device, formerly known as the NGP, was revealed, newly dubbed as the PS Vita.

The PS Vita sports some impressive hardware features, including dual analog sticks and touch screens, one in front and one in the back. It also has an OLED screen, GPS, and six axis motion sensors. The device features the standard d-pad and familiar Playstation four button placement above the analog sticks.

If you’re in the US, the PS Vita will cost you $249 for the Wi-Fi and $299 for the 3G/Wi-Fi model, available on AT&T. These points price the PS Vita right alongside the Nintendo 3DS, and we can expect to see the device released by the end of the year.

While Sony gave audiences a lot of details on the PS Vita itself, not much was said in the way of games we can expect to see on the platform. The fact that the Uncharted franchise was to appear on the Vita was no surprise, but it was still a treat to see the way the game will mix traditional thumbpad gameplay with the PS Vita’s touch features.

Last year, we took a more traditional approach with our Best Video Games of 2009 article with categories such as Best Music Game or Best Action Platformer. This year we are going to depart from the traditional and give what we think are categories that truly deserve to be rewarded their due.

Best Use of Zombies / Best Downloadable Content – Red Dead Redemption “Undead Nightmare”

The ultimate “What If” scenario brought forth to one of the best games of 2010, “What if the undead invaded the old west?” And the answer doesn’t just involve a lot of people dying. There are horses of the apocalypse, big foot, some hard choices to be made and people turning on or abandoning their fellow man left and right.

This awesome story told over the revamped look of Red Dead Redemption using characters players have already grown to know, love or despise makes Undead Nightmare not only the best zombie game of 2010 but also the best exmple of DLC for the entire year as well.

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We’ve seen a lot of mock-up PSPs in the past. Whether they were imitation PSPGos, PSP Phones, or PSP2s, these were either very good, or very bad, models of the gaming system we all know and like.
However, the supposed PSP2 pictures that have recently leaked onto the internet don’t look like mock-ups.

Perhaps that’s due to the crappy image quality, but it’s definite these weren’t thrown together on Photoshop by a fanboy. From what we can see, this PSP slides like the PSPGo, but looks much bigger. It’s also got two analog sticks, a microphone, touchpad, and camera.

We’re unsure whether this model will ever see the light of day, as Sony has stated they’ve designed several different variations of the PSP2, but it’s definitely interesting to see what they’ve been thinking about for the device.

According to Kotaku‘s report, the images have been confirmed by a development source. You can make your own conclusions after the jump.

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At Comic Con, the folks at Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment gave us a walk through of their new family friendly Lord of the Rings title, The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest. Rated E10+, Aragorn’s Quest takes a drastically different tone and gameplay style from the recently revealed The Lord of the Rings: War in the North.

Shown on the Wii, Aragorn’s Quest has players listen to the tales of Samwise Gamgee as he explains to his children the events of The Lord of the Rings, focusing on the tale of the current king Aragorn. Over the course of eight chapters, players are then given the opportunity to take the role of Aragorn on a series of quest that follow the events of the three films. Each quest contains smaller side quests players can embark on.

Having Samwise voiced by Sean Astin and Gimlee voiced by John Rhys-Davies is meant to keep an older audience into the game as they help younger players through it. Unfortunately during our walk through, the noise of the convention prevented us from experiencing the voice acting.

The game has a simple visual style that strays away from the dark overtones of the film and previous game titles. There is no blood or any other effects that would go against the game’s family friendly image. Using the WiiMote, players hack and slash their way through hordes of goblins, orcs, spiders and trolls in an effort to escort Frodo to the peak of Mount Doom to destroy the one ring. Different motions result in different strikes. During combat, directional prompts will appear to perform specific actions and finishing blows. Players will also have a chance to switch between ranged and melee combat as well.

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There’s been a lot of sequels to the Kingdom Hearts franchise ever  since the first game hit the Playstation 2 in 2002, and while Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep won’t be the last, it certainly looks to be the best Kingdom Hearts game we’ve seen in awhile. I fought the crowds and cosplayers at San Diego Comic-Con and made my way to the Square Enix booth, where I was able to play a few short (but very sweet) minutes of Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep.

Firstly, I couldn’t help but notice how vibrant the graphics were in Birth By Sleep. Maybe I’ve been playing too much of Kingdom Hearts: 356/2 Days on my Nintendo DS and I’m just used to lower resolution, but the PSP is definitely one powerful portable and Birth By Sleep looks great. I demoed the Lilo and Stitch level, Deep Space, and the backgrounds and characters were super detailed and vibrant.

In Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, you play through three different scenarios as characters Terra, Aqua, and Ventus. While playing, I found that the standard hack and slash gameplay was pretty standard and I was finding everything unfamiliar. But a huge problem I had with the gameplay was using the analog stick instead of the D-pad.

While this sounds like a simple change, it won’t be easy for someone like me who’s played a ton of similar RPGs like Final Fantasy on the PSP and is used to using the D-pad. I was constantly accidentally using the D-pad to run around and as a result selecting things I didn’t mean to, which was wasting some of the short time I had to play. This isn’t something that is going to deter me from playing the game straight through, it’s just something annoying that needs some getting used to.

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So E3 starts tomorrow officially while today is the Microsoft Press conference. As you have already seen, we have gotten some advanced notice on some of the happenings going on at the event.  A few changes will be happening with our coverage of the event compared to last year.

This year we won’t be giving a fully detailed recap of the BIG 3 Press Conferences from Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo as a formal post. We will, however, be posting our thoughts and coverage on the big announcements and trailers as well as give a full indepth discussion with Matt Raub, Chris Ulrich and myself on this week’s episode of the podcast.

We have also gotten official word from various industry sources on what companies will be showing at the event. These have come from various press releases, other industry insiders and various leaks from the LA Convention Center itself regarding the event.

There has also been tremendous speculation around the event. Some of those rumors will be examined below as well. Finally, some of my own personal E3 2010 theories and predictions will be put out there too.

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While the PSPGo might not be on the top of most gamer’s “must-have” lists, it definitely is about to jump a little higher in the ranks. Sony’s dishing out some great deals to make investing in this portable console even more affordable and appealing.

Starting this month, any PSPGo system purchased will come with a voucher for three downloads for the system absolutely free. This is an $80 value, and includes quality titles such as LittleBigPlanet, Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters and SOCOM: Fireteam Bravo 3.

It seems like Sony is finally figuring out how to deal with people who want to upgrade to the PSPGo, but don’t want to abandon their already assembled UMD collections. This way, gamers can start playing these free games as soon as they get their new PSPGo consoles at no cost to them. This deal will be running until March 31st, 2011.

Additionally,Sony’s permanently dropping the price on Ape Escape: On the Loose, Buzz! Master Quiz, Hot Shots Golf Open Tee, LocoRoco 2, Patapon 2, PixelJunk Monster Deluxe, SOCOM: Fireteam Bravo, Syphon Filter: Logan’s Shadow and Twisted Metal: Head On. These games are all being added to a new “Favorites” software line, and they will all be available for $9.99. Not bad.

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With the Kick-Ass movie about to hit theaters Marvel is doing another cool thing to tie in with the film’s release. Starting today, they are offering the complete Kick-Ass limited comic series in single issue format for iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. The comics can be downloaded via the Comixology or Iverse applications for Apple devices and PSP users can download directly to their device.

“I have an ancient cell phone given to me by a relative that’s so old it can’t take pictures so this tech is so far away from me it might as well be science fiction,” said Kick-Ass writer and co-creator Mark Millar. “But I read about it on Comic Book Resources and Marvel.com– the guys seemed excited so consider me excited by osmosis. More readers and new readers is always a good thing.”

John Romita Jr, artist and co-creator of Kick-Ass, said, “I’m excited about these advances in technology that I have been hearing about for, what seems like ten years. Now it has arrived, and all I can think of is that it advances the state of ‘comic books’ in that it will direct people to the source material. I believe this will cement the tangible material, the comics themselves, into the hands and minds of future ‘young’ generations! It always comes down to the quality of writing and the sequential art. Holding a comic and turning the page for more will forever be a novelty, even with advanced technology as an option.”

So there you have it right from the creators. This is a new way to discover the world of Kick-Ass and hopefully enhance your appreciation for the comic and what the filmmakers were able to accomplish when bringing the comic to the big screen.

Kick-Ass the movie opens everywhere tomorrow.

Who hasn’t walked down the street and seen people with their heads buried in their iPhones? And you know they aren’t all looking up stock quotes or making work calls. Most are playing Paper Toss or checking in with Foursquare. We even see those jealous Verizon customers with their Droids as they secretly wait for their carrier to pick up the iPhone.

Smart phones are the way technology is pointing with their layers of functionality and ever increasing capabilities. That’s why it wasn’t a surprise Thursday morning when the Wall Street Journal reported that Sony would be entering the smart phone arena. Of special interest to this particular item though is that it will be “capable of downloading and playing PlayStation games”, possibly referring to PlayStation One titles specifically.

Reported as a device that “blurs distinctions among a netbook, an e-reader and a PlayStation Portable,” they are already expecting a 2010 launch. It is possible that Sony may make a big announcement regarding this phone next week during the Games Developers Conference.

With ever declining PSP sales and the lackluster response to the PSP Go, one would think the portable device market was in trouble. Nintendo has shown with the DS and the record breaking game sales of Plants vs. Zombies on the iPhone have shown that this isn’t the case however and that Sony is just searching for its niche still.

2010 has already proven itself to be a big year for games and only two months have gone by so far. From the look of things, March doesn’t seem like it is going to slow down either.

Cross platform heavyweights Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Final Fantasy XIII start off the month strong while Mega Man 10 finds itself sprinkled through the month on the various consoles. Closing out the month on the cross platform titles is Just Cause 2.

Likely the biggest individual release will come from the PlayStation 3 with God of War III. After being the inevitable comparison for Dante’s Inferno, Kratos comes out on March 16th ready to take no prisoners. The PlayStation 2′s lifecycle finally looks to be coming to an end as it only has one release this month.

Take a look below at every game coming out for the month of March.

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We were pleased to give everyone a first glance at UFC 2010 earlier this month with the announcement of the game’s cover athlete, Brock Lesnar. Today, a new set of screens for the game was released that look to set the bar even higher than last year’s iteration.

The level of detail in the character models is amazing from the lines of sweat running down their bodies to the hair on their arms. Take a look below at the screens and try to tell us you aren’t excited to see what UFC Undisputed 2010 has to offer.

In somewhat related UFC news, former champion Frank Mir recently came under fire for a statement he made about Lesnar to the media. Mir was quoted as saying to WXDX-FM that he wanted Brock Lesnar, ”

UFC President Dana White said he was terribly disappointed in Mir, stating that, “Frank’s been with the UFC a long time, he’s a two-time heavyweight champion and a commentator for the WEC. I think his emotions are running high right now, he has a big fight coming up next month and he’s still upset about his loss to Lesnar. He’s been talked to, he regrets what he said, and he won’t be saying anything like that again.”

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Numbers of console and games sales were released by the NPD group for the month of January 2010 today with some not so surprising results. The Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS (including the DSi SKU’s) lead the console war as they continue to dominate this generation in terms of sales. Even after their record setting Wii sales in December, the little white box with waggle controls still is flying off shelves. With that comes five of the top games being Wii titles.

The griefer’s paradise New Super Mario Bros Wii tops their charts, follwed by evergreen favorite Wii titles like Wii Fitt Plus, Mario Kart Wii and Wii Sports Resort. The only surprise on the Wii comes from the critically panned Just Dance from Ubisoft (averaging a score of 47 from Metacritic).

XBox 360 surged back in front of the PlayStation 3, no doubt with some help of their over half a million selling release of Mass Effect 2. The XBox 360′s version of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 also outsold the PS3 version by a firm 65,000 units. Co-op shooter Army of Two: The 40th Day debutted on the charts in the number 8 spot, followed by the apocalyptic release of Darksiders, both the games being the XBox 360 versions.

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