Whether it's an ugly tie, a set of discount golf balls or yet another inspirational desk set, dads always seem to end up with the lousiest gifts. Nintendo's working to change all that this year, with a number of fun ways to keep dad happy for Father's Day.

On Thursday, 14th June, the stakes get even higher as Microsoft announced it will releases eight new Gears of War Achievements for the “Annex” gametype and the “Hidden Fronts” Multiplayer Map Pack on Xbox LIVE.

SKATE delivers the feel of skating through innovative controls, authentic cameras, a fully reactive skateboarding city, as well as a reactive city and relevant in-game cameras. SKATE boasts 45 songs from artists including David Bowie, Nirvana, N.W.A. and The Ramones, as well as 18 exclusive tracks from world renowned DJs.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare delivers amazing special effects, including use of depth of field, rim-lighting, character self-shadowing, real time post-processing, texture streaming as well as physics-enabled effects to enlist players into the most photo-realistic gaming experience yet.

Aeria Games & Entertainment Inc. announced their next free-to-play title Project Torque, the first Free-to-Play Competitive Online Arcade Racer or COAR.

As society succumbs to a worldwide energy crisis, a new global depression takes hold. Amidst this desperate backdrop, two superpower alliances emerge. Join the battle on the frontlines of tomorrow as the Western Coalition or the Red Star Alliance.

Scratches is an atmospheric mystery adventure game, and this Director’s Cut features an exciting new chapter, alternate ending, over two additional hours of gameplay, new clues, higher supported resolutions, enhanced graphics, plus much more. This update completely remakes the game's graphics, up until the smallest texture.

Dark Sector is a new and original next-gen action-thriller, developed by Digital Extreme. A dark, gritty experience packed with fast action, incredible superpowers and an engaging story. D3Publisher has "decided to pull Dark Sector out of a very crowded holiday season and it is now slated for release in Q1 2008."

Wildlife Park 2: Crazy Zoo is an expansion pack for Deep Silver's zoo tycoon game, adding 30 new species of animal and plants, new stunt, new attractions, and numerous new features.

Deep Silver has released a new patch for B-Alive's zoo management game Wildlife Park2. This v1.23 patch works for the original and its Crazy Zoo addon, improves performance, fixes gfx bugs and adds balance tweaks.

Pirates of the Burning Sea is a massively multiplayer online roleplaying game set in the Caribbean islands of the 18th Century. You play a bold sea captain, master of your own ship and crew, as you seek glory and adventure across the trackless deep.

Another day, another batch of game trailers was released. Instead of giving them all their own posts, we grouped them, and so far there are trailers for:

• Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning - Quests Trailer
• Chocobo's Dungeon [Wii] - JAP Trailer
• Legend: Hand of God - Trailer #2
• 
  
  We will update this throughout the day when new trailers become available. Read more for download links ...

Comic book artist Todd McFarlane, known for Spawn and various others, is not an stranger in the gaming industry and has collaborated with Bungie and Microsoft to decorate Halo 3 themed Xbox 360 controllers (one Spartan, one Covenant) for $59.99, which also includes a McFarlane Toys Halo 3 action figure. For that same price you can also get a camo green Halo 3 wireless headset, both items are over at GameStop, but won't be available until early September.

Medieval II: Total War Kingdoms offers an unprecedented amount of new content that gives gamers over 75 hours of epic new gameplay, including 4 new campaigns, 13 new factions with no less than 150 new units. Creative Assembly's Brendan Rogers tells us more about the Teutonic Wars Campaign.

In an announcement about complex event processing, a new technology where a software system watches events streaming through the enterprise's software infrastructure, Bioware revealed its yet unannounced MMO is scheduled for 2009.

Ship Simulator 2008, previously announced as Ship Simulator 2007, is a simulation game that puts players at the helm of some of the most varied and detailed ships to be found at sea.

Mad Tracks is an action-packed toy-car racing game, with toy cars powered by spring engines. Races are set in everyday places, like toy stores, mini-golf parks, and restaurants.

Capcom secured the PlayStation format rights to publish official videogames based on the adrenaline fuelled motor sport, MotoGP. Developed by Milestone, MotoGP '07 will feature all the riders, bikes, teams and tracks from the 2007 season.

Ubisoft and the U.S. Army announced that Red Storm Entertainment, in collaboration with the Army, will launch America's Army: True Soldiers, exclusively for the Xbox 360.

Since Troika is no longer amongst the living this patch is not official, so use at your own discretion. This update brings Activision's Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines retail game to v3.7 (requires v1.2 patch installed) and addresses a number of known issues, gameplay tweaks, bug fixes and so forth.