Slitherine Strategies are pleased to announce that Spartan has been nominated as a finalist in the 2003 Game of the Year competition hosted by the Independent Games Festival. The winner will be announced at the show in March 2004. Spartan has just about everything that you would expect from a Grand Campaign TBS strategy game and with the added spice of the interactive battles we're sure it will be a winner with the gamers and the judges alike. Worthplaying.com has described Spartan as: "Civilisation with a 3D battle engine.", and one of our aims as a company is to grow our audience to draw in some of those gamers who can't get enough of Civ, or who are just looking for something a little different.

In India, Emperor Asoka Maurya has embarked on a non-violent campaign to bring prosperity to his people and promote Buddhist philosophy. In China, the king of Qin struggles to unite the seven kingdoms and stave off invasions by Hun tribes. To the west, a fledgling Rome battles with Carthage for Southern Europe and the Mediterranean. Meanwhile, Egypt and Seleucid Persia wrestle to control Syria and the Near East. Choose your side and lead your empire to Strength and Honor! Check out the new batch of screens ...

Enlight announced today it will release Fast Lanes Bowling for the holiday season. Developed by LAB Rats Games, Fast Lanes Bowling allows players to experience the excitement of having an entire bowling alley available on their PC. Read more for details & screens ...

Ubisoft announces the acquisition of the rights to distribute Shadowbane all over Europe. This new plan helps strengthen its position on the massively multi-player online (MMO) gaming market. The highly anticipated Shadowbane Gold edition is expected to launch commercially in Europe on both Mac and PC in January 2004. The Shadowbane Gold edition will include the original Shadowbane game and the new expansion, "The Rise of Chaos".

Electronic Arts today announced that Harry Potter fans will experience the magic and peril of Harry's third year at Hogwarts in the highly anticipated Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban videogame. For the first time gamers will play as friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger as well as Harry Potter, switching between characters and utilizing their key attributes and skills to resolve challenges and overcome enemies. The three friends will need to combine their strengths and master a variety of new spells as they face Harry's most terrifying opponents yet: the escaped convict Sirius Black and the Dementors, the sinister guards of Azkaban prison. Read more for details & screens...

Rockstar Games is pleased to announce Red Dead Revolver for the PlayStation2 and Xbox. Developed by Rockstar San Diego, this stylish, western gun-fighting extravaganza is expected to hit retail shelves in Spring 2004. Read more for details ...

Jaleco has released some new screens from their upcoming PS2/Xbox title 'Micro Mayhem.' The title is expected in stores Q1 2004. Read more to check out the goodies...

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II will feature more monsters, graphically stunning environments and five new and unique customizable player characters to choose from, hidden areas to explore, as well as a new item creation system that will allow players to create their own ultimate magical artifacts. Read more for a slew of new screens...

Zuzzexx has released a new update for their RPG/RTS title KnightShift (known in North America as Atari's Once Upon A Knight). This upgrade brings your retail game to v1.109 and adds several new features to the game, is available for International and German editions of the game and adds 4 new multiplayer maps, RPG rebalancing as well as various bug fixes and game tweaks. Read more for detailed fix list and download links ...

Enlight has sent out notice that there is a new patch for X2: The Threat Update 1.1 is available for download exclusively at Egosoft’s website. Since there are several different versions of the patch out already and many will follow once the European territories have released, Enlight is directing everyone to download the patch from www.egosoft.com. This way, EgoSoft can monitor that customers are receiving the correct version of the patch through their registration key. Read more to check a detailed fix list...