Namco announced today the hiring of Grantley Day as Director of PC Development, reinforcing the company's commitment to its expansion into the PC games market. Day brings to Namco more than eleven years of experience in developing entertainment software for the PC, including most notably his online game development work for The Sims franchise at Electronic Arts.

Electronic Arts today announced that Boston Red Sox All-Star and 2004 World Series Most Valuable Player Manny Ramirez has been selected as the spokesman and cover athlete for MVP Baseball 2005, scheduled for release next spring under the EA SPORTS brand.

Konami today shipped Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater for the PlayStation 2 to retail stores nationwide. The newest installment in the tactical espionage series that defined the stealth genre takes gamers on an all-new action-packed adventure through the jungles of the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War era.

Spider-Man is swinging into retail stores nationwide in Activision's Spider-Man 2 for the Nintendo DS. The game, which is based on this summer's blockbuster film from Columbia Pictures and Marvel, is among the first titles to hit retail stores alongside the Nintendo DS hardware.

Gamers should arm themselves with wooden stakes and flamethrowers as Activision unleashes the highly anticipated Vampire: The Masquerade -- Bloodlines to retail outlets nationwide.

Microsoft has released a demo for Blue Fang Games' zoo building sim featuring the freeform game mode, four different animals (Bengal tiger, Thomson's gazelle, camel, and peafowl), and a portion of the objects from the full game. Read more for download links ..

Try a commercial combat of extremes! Mad Cars is not a simple race. It’s a way to snatch out a small picture of unpredictable future. How is your car going to look like after WW III? What is going to happen with the famous races? Who is going to set the rules? Earn your wealth on what you can do best, whether it’s insane driving, mad fighting or sneaky protectiveness.

Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) today announced the upcoming release of EyeToy: Kinetic, an innovative new physical exercise title produced in association with Nike Motionworks.

Rockstar Games and Interscope Records, a part of Universal Music Group, proudly announce the details of the 8-CD box set soundtrack to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, the latest installment in the best-selling Grand Theft Auto franchise. The box set is scheduled for release on December 7th, 2004 in North America and December 6th, 2004 throughout Europe.

GMX Media today announcing that they will be publishing the ground breaking military Real Time Strategy game Will of Steel for PC. The game is to be launched across the UK in the Q4 2004. Read more for details, screens ...

Oddworld Stranger's Wrath combines first and third-person gameplay with familiar Oddworld elements and an all-new engine to deliver a unique gameplay experience. Set to award-winning visuals, players will be moved by the complex and inspiring story as the Stranger comes to grips with his true nature in the hunt for the ultimate bounty.

Konami today announced that King Arthur for the PS2, Xbox and GameCube has shipped to retail stores nationwide. Developed by Krome Studios PTY, Ltd., and based on the true story behind the tale of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, players will relive the legendary action as they wield Excalibur and battle on horseback.

Cossacks - Napoleonic Wars returns one of the most successful strategy games of the past years to the real-time battlefield - with reinforcements: Meet Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of France and probably the most ingenious strategist in European history! Enter the battle on the side of one of 10 great European nations and rewrite European history in six exciting campaigns.

Microsoft has issued a new patch for Gearbox/Bungie's first person shooter Halo: Combat Evolved. This upgrade brings your Halo retail to v1.06 and addresses a rare crash bug that could occur if a malicious individual (hacker) purposely imitates a game server and sends invalid data to clients who try to browse the server list (thanks Joe). Read more for details and download links ...

THQ today announced that it has acquired Blue Tongue Entertainment Limited. The Australia-based studio recently developed THQ's Polar Express for the PS2, PC and Gamecube, and is currently developing two cross-platform releases for late 2005.

id Software released an updated version of SDK for their sci-fi FPS DOOM 3, allowing the mod community out there to go to town and bring on the mods. This v1.1 SDK adds the promised vehicle support as well as a few bug fixes over the previous version (thanks 3DGamers). Read more for download links ...

Fire Department 2 (known in the US as Fire Captain: Bay Area Inferno) will feature a lot of improvements and new features such as multiplayer capabilities, better AI, control over a larger amount of units, improved graphics, five campaigns, and, of course, more realism. Pointsoft has released a demo featuring the 'Das Einkaufszentrum' mission from the first campaign (thanks Demonews.de). Read more for download links ...

Parkan II is a 3D space simulator combined with first person action planet side. In the game players will get an opportunity to explore a vast universe, visit different planets, their satellites, huge space stations and immense space destroyers.

Ubisoft has released an update patch for its adventure game Myst IV: Revelation bringing your retail game to v1.02 and addresses no bug fixes, only improvements in performance (thanks 3DGamers). Read more for download links ...

In Half-Life 2, the player again picks up the crowbar of research scientist Gordon Freeman, who finds himself on an alien-infested Earth being picked to the bone, its resources depleted, its populace dwindling. Freeman is thrust into the unenviable role of rescuing the world from the wrong he unleashed back at Black Mesa. And a lot of people people he cares about are counting on him. Beware of the spoilers...