Coming soon "according to Reuters": a video game based on the botched 1993 raid in Somalia now known as "Black Hawk Down" and etched in American memory after two dead U.S. soldiers were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. The company producing the game, Calabasas, California-based NovaLogic, said the game was patriotic, intended in part to educate the public about the U.S. mission in Somalia. But some critics question that aim and whether the game risks blurring the line between history and entertainment and altering perceptions about the bloodiest firefight in U.S. military history since Vietnam.

Planet Unreal today tossed up a new "15MB" medium-sized patch for Operation Na Pali. It fixes bugs throughout various maps and during Co-Op play. Find out more and download here!

The Hottest Ticket for Gamers Everywhere Gets Even Hotter with ATI's $60,000 Return to Castle Wolfenstein Team Tournament and $40,000 QUAKE III Arena Championships at QuakeCon.. QuakeCon 2002, the definitive fan-based gaming convention, will play host to more than just the ultimate LAN-fest and party this year as the Blitzkrieg hits the Mesquite Convention Center on Aug. 15-18, Mesquite, Texas. For the first time, QuakeCon 2002 will be home to both one-on-one and team-based tournaments boasting a combined $100,000 in cash, provided by ATI, QuakeCon 2002's title sponsor.

Defender brings an all-new 3-D remake of the original arcade classic to next-generation consoles, offering the only space-combat game that lets players rescue and defend humans from an alien onslaught with a combination of high-octane, space-combat action and strategic command.

Following a well established tradition, once again everybody (or almost everybody) from the games business met at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E³) in Los Angeles, to check the newest trends and present their forthcoming hot and innovative titles. And, of course to also take a glimpse at the booth babes… In Kentia Hall, CDV presented its biggest line-up of titles so far and impressed visitors and editors with its exciting array of games spanning over genres such as RTS, action shooter and role playing. Take me there!

One more highlight to impress visitors at CDV’s booth at E³ 2002 was the MMPORG Neocron by German developers Reakktor. Now’s your chance to prove that you have style and taste: get the sci-fi cyberpunk Screensaver of Neocron! Grab this 2.7MB screensaver here!

Today xaos.ru offer seven new screenshots from MADia's futuristic flight combat Echelon: Wind Warriors. Check out the screens right here.

The Darkfall Dev Team will be featuring in a Stratics sponsored House of Commons developer chat on June 13th at 6pm PST. Here is a cut and paste from the Darkfall site:

"Join us June 13th at 6pm PST (9pm EST) on Stratics IRC in #DarkfallHoC to ask the Darkfall developers all those questions you've just been dying to ask! The servers are: stratics.frws.com irc.stratics.dhp.com irc.truefear.net and coldfront.gamers-irc.org. Once again the channel will be #DarkfallHoC - Until then join us in #Darkfall for chat about the game and anything else!" (thanks Razorwax)

Mark Rein from Infogrames has updated their forum with following news:

We understand you are anxious for the demo but posting "where is the demo" threads here won't make it appear any sooner. When we think we're close to the demo (i.e. within 5-7 days) we'll let everyone know officially through this forum. We're not there yet, we're still more than a week away. We could be more than two weeks or even more than three weeks away. We're not holding out on people, we're just not done with the game yet and although a lot of the game is coming together very quickly we still have no 100% (or even 80%) accurate way to predict exactly when that will be. I promise the development team is working very, very hard to get an awesome, polished UT2003 in your hands. The demo will be released when we think we've got all the major functionality of the game complete so that the feedback from the demo can be focused 100% on things we weren't already aware needed to be addressed.

Bluesnews today tossed up 11 new O.R.B. screenshots from Strategy First and their upcoming space-based real-time strategy game. Check them out!

Alienware Corporation announced that their flagship system, the Area-51, is now available with Rambus 1066MHz RDRAM memory. Alienware's impressive lists of award-winning systems are aimed at providing gaming enthusiasts with the ultimate gaming experience. The Area-51 is the first system with 1066MHz RDRAM memory to hit the consumer desktop market. By pairing the newly released Pentium 4 Processor with 533MHz front side bus and 1066MHz RDRAM memory, the Area-51 delivers a seamless 4.2GB/s of memory bandwidth for optimal gaming performance.

Irrational Games announces the release of two new characters for the critically acclaimed tactical comic hero role-playing game Freedom Force. In a unique cross-over bonus, the mesh and skin for two supporting cast members of the horror adventure game The Lost are now available for play in Freedom Force.

Got Game Entertainment today announced that The Watchmaker, an adventure game for the PC featuring gorgeous graphics and intriguing puzzles, began shipping this week.

Expanding on the success of Operation Blockade, Infogrames, Inc. announced the summer and fall releases of three additional "operation" titles: Operation Tiger Hunt, Operation Steel Tide and Operation War in the Pacific. The impressive lineup of battle titles brings classic arcade-style fun to a new level. Compelling action and strategic game play elements combine to entice war enthusiasts and non-enthusiasts alike.

Divine times are to begin and for starters immerse in the fantastic world of role-playing uniqueness by taking a look at the trailer of Divine Divinity, straight from E³! It will give you a taste of what it means to fight evil and try to save the world of Rivellon! Get the trailer here!

Welcome to a extraordinary and airy world of Project Nomads in its alpha stage: Visitors at CDV’s E³ booth were surprised by the unbelievably detailed surroundings, the way you can see the grass on the ground sway in the breeze and see the birds fly around. They claimed to almost have been able to inhale the nature and feel the total freedom. Today we serve up the first alpha screenshots of "Project Nomads" by developers "Radon Labs". Njoy!

AMD will introduce its newest desktop PC processor, the 1.8GHz Athlon XP 2200+, next Monday, sources say. The new chip, AMD's highest-performance desktop chip to date, gains nearly 70MHz over its predecessor, the Athlon XP 2100+.

Today we serve up a bunch of nifty screens from Flying Lab Software's LithTech Jupiter-powered action strategy PC game Delta Green. Inside the federal government, a grim conspiracy steals satellite access, spies on the FBI, and siphons funds from the IRS to conduct outlaw operations of assassination, blackmail, and counter-insurgency -- all to keep us safe from a secret world of ancient, supernatural horror that threatens us from the shadows. This conspiracy is Delta Green™. And you're in charge. Njoy the screens!

Nintendo today announces the launch of its biggest internet experience ever - the new official Nintendo website for the UK.

On the day Codemasters launch "Mike Tyson Heavyweight Boxing" for PlayStation 2 and the eve before the Tyson v Lewis fight, Codemasters has revealed its Hard as Nails survey. [and other amusing findings as Codemasters launch "Mike Tyson Heavyweight Boxing" for PS2]