Sony Online Entertainment Inc. today announced that its next-generation Real-Time Strategy (RTS) game Lords of EverQuest has entered the exclusive closed beta stage of development with 500 fortunate testers getting the first hands-on time with the game. Over the course of beta, up to 15,000 testers will be allowed into the beta program to test and help with balancing the online multiplayer gameplay. Lords of EverQuest is expected to ship to U.S. and Canadian retail stores this fall and carries a suggested retail price of $49.99.

The first Donkey Kong game on the Game Boy Advance is one of the best side-scrolling games of all time, updated from the original Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), with all-new features! King K. Rool and his Kremlings have stolen Donkey Kong's banana hoard, and now it's up to Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong to get it back. With help from Cranky Kong, Candy Kong and Funky Kong (not to mention a bunch of animal friends), the two simian heroes will have to explore every inch of the island, from the treetops of the Kongo Jungle to the icy cliffs of Gorilla Glacier.

Bigben Interactive is please to announce it is to publish JoWooD Productions' comedy gameshow title, Neighbours From Hell 2 on the PC. Following the phenomenal success of "Neighbours from Hell", the reality TV show videogame. Bigben Interactive is proud to announce the second series! The show's star, Woody, drove his mean-spirited neighbour to distraction during the first series. To escape the mischievous Woody the long-suffering neighbour has decided to take his family away for a well earned break. Little does he know that Woody's antics are about to follow him on his vacation.

Strategy First and Techland are please to announce that their tactical FPS title, CHROME has gone gold…ready for its North American release later this month! “This game has been described as a cross between Rogue Spear and Deus Ex, so you can imagine why gamers are so excited about it!” says Steve Milburn, Director of Marketing for Strategy First. “Jumping in one of the mechs in multiplay and racing across a huge, open map dodging bullets…there’s nothing like it!” Read more for details and some new screens ...

CDV Software Entertainment has announced that "No Man's Land" for the PC is now available in retail stores. Set in the rugged, unclaimed expanse of North America from 1600 to 1900, "No Man's Land" is a historical real-time strategy game that is sure to engender a revolutionary spirit among all who play it.

OK, this weekend sucked plain and simple... After we had successfully upgraded the hardware and started a little tweaking, the server locked up and our remote reboot switch shut down the machine, but did not bring it back online due to a rookie mistake! Either way, we apologize for the downtime. All is tested and working properly now so we will be on our way shortly to update & play catch up! The site should be faster & better so stay tuned for the goodies (as soon as I return home).

Our friends over at Homelan dug up some info from the newest print issue of Game Informer magazine which reveals and gives the first details for Dead To Rights II. While the PC version of Dead To Rights is expected later this year, this new article already sports a number of screenshots from the sequel, details about the new graphics engine, gameplay improvements (including better gunplay, melee combat with swords and improved hand-to-hand combat). Dead To Rights II will feature new gameplay modes like Arcade mode (run through the game and collect points for special moves) and Challenge mode (play special levels to accomplish a specific goal or achievement). The game will be released for the PS2/Xbox in fall 2004, no GameCube or PC version has been announced yet.

As you may have noticed ( judging from the many emails! :) the site was down for part of the day. This was due to performing maintenance on the Worthplaying web box as well as one of the fileservers. Weekend is usually slower in news & updates so we took the time to install some new (and much faster) hardware as well as adding more hd space to one of the file servers. Upgrades never go as smooth as one would like so it all took a bit longer than we had hoped for. Either way, things should run a lot faster so it was worth the sweat. Njoy!

Namco's new R: Racing Evolution is being created by the same team that developed the critically-acclaimed Ridge Racer and MotoGP franchises. The game will be available on all three console platforms and will ship in Q4 2003. Featuring licensed cars, 11 real-world and fantasy tracks, and eight different race types. Some new screens raced in so read more to check them out!

GODZ Team has released the 'Gold' version of their Unreal Tournament 2003 modification. GODZ for UT2k3 features incredible battles amongst genetically engineered, supernatural warriors built by rival planets to compete in a Universal-Wide Tournament. This v1.4 gold version features 2 new maps, enhanced Bot AI and a tons of bug fixes & new features (thanks Vajuras). Read more for details and download links ...