A few months back it was revealed Blizzard closed down the Blizzard North office, responsible for the Diablo franchise. While people were given other opportunities inside Blizzard, several decided to venture out. Hyboreal Games is founded by Diablo developers and former Blizzard employees Eric Sexton, Michio Okamura, and Steven Woo, and several others are said to join them shortly. While details are completely non-existent, their current, and first, project is Starfall.

BFME 2 takes part in the North where a battle is raging between Sauron's forces vs. elves and dwarves. It will be possible to create/customize your own hero, apart from known figures such as Arwin, and become more powerful as you progress in the game. While BFME was all land based, the sequel will also take the action on the sea, naval battles included, courtesy of an updated engine.

The last of an extinct race, one with unimaginable powers. Ryu is a dormant dragon, awakened by miners, transformed into an innocent child. Now, as an outcast from society, Ryu must remember his fiery past and regain his powers so he can fulfil his epic destiny...

Blending the best of tactical action games with the best of survival horror titles, Gears of War is the first game developed by Epic Games exclusively for Microsoft Game Studios and Xbox 360. "Gears of War" thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing story of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet.

In an interview with German financial newspaper Euro am Sonntag Microsoft executive Chris Lewis revealed that it will have approximately 300,000 Xbox 360 consoles available throughtout Europe for its launch on December 2. Industry analysts' estimates of 300,000 Xbox 360s available at launch "were not far removed from reality," said Chris Lewis. After selling out merely hours after launch in North America, Microsoft expect the European launch to be equally successfull, and aims to deliver up to 3 million units within three months of launch.

German developer Silver Style, known for The Fall: Last Days of Gaia, revealed that it has signed the rights to develop a fourth installment in the classic Simon the Sorcerer adventure game. The previous title, Simon 3D by Vivendi, was heavily criticized for having outdated graphics, mainly due to the project being shelved for a few years, so Silver Style opted to develop its own state of the art 3D engine. Lead Designer Carsten Strehse said that the new title will mainly focus around logical and challenging puzzles, with barely any action parts, the controls will be similar to other point & click adventures like the more recent The Westerner and Ankh. Simon The Sorcerer 4 is tentatively scheduled for Q4 2006.

Back in September we already revealed that EA was working on a third addon for The Sims 2, and today some more information trickled in. Titled The Sims 2 Open for Business, the new addon will revolve around setting up businesses and making money.

Nuclear Nightmare is a dark post-nuclear single-player horror game with RPG elements independently developed by Element115 Entertainment. The development of Nuclear Nightmare officially started in June of 2005 and it's being developed using the Torque Shader Engine from GarageGames (thanks RPGDot).

Only a few thousand humans managed to escape from Earth before its collapse in 2150 A.D. They spent the next few years on the terra forming of the red planet, developing new technologies and building up new civilizations independently and separately from each other, but in the year 2160, something strange happens in this new world ....

Electronic Arts expects the central European market to continue developing quickly and piracy to fall, EA's head of European sales said in an interview. Jens Uwe Intat told Reuters on Friday that consumers in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland who started playing games on PCs are moving to dedicated games consoles -- a sign of market maturity that also makes illegal copying harder.

French video games maker Ubisoft not only wants to remain independent but is also looking to make several acquisitions in a consolidating sector, its chairman said in a magazine interview.

Magna Carta: Tears of Blood is a fantasy role-playing game, developed by Softmax, set in Efferia, a continent populated with five races. In this world, you can use seven different types of Carta and meet a host of characters.

Square Enix is working on a new expansion pack for its MMORPG Final Fantasy XI which will introduce new maps, monsters as well as several new classes such as the much anticpated Blue Mage. Read more for some new screens ...

Blizzard announced that the WoW v1.9 public test realms are now live, and that players can transfer characters over to the test realms and try out all the changes and additions coming in the next content patch, The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj. The highlights of this patch include new 20- and 40- player raid dungeons, linked Auction Houses in major cities, improved Battleground queues, Paladin class improvements, etc. Read more for a full list of features currently being tested ...

EA revealed that the BFME II closed multiplayer beta test will start early December and people who pre-ordered the game will be able to join mid-December, and will run up until the game’s ship date. Details aren't finalized yet but the multiplayer beta test will include multiple factions and maps. The beta test pre-order program will start tomorrow November 24. A downloadable single-player demo featuring skirmish battles against the computer AI will be released at some point before the game ships.

Galactic Civilizations II takes place in the distant future, when mankind has become a space-faring civilization and must contend with other extraterrestrial powers for domination of the galaxy. The sequel is a true evolution for the series, with rethought fundamentals and exciting new changes.

Dungeons & Dragons Online will provide players with the definitive online "Dungeons & Dragons" experience, complete with dramatic dungeon crawling, terrifying monster combat and challenging puzzles, character advancement and guild-based power struggles.

Namco today announced that Real Time Conflict: Shogun Empires, an original real-time strategy game for the NDS, has shipped to North American retail outlets. Set during the chaos of feudal Japan, the game lets players create their own army of unique units and lead them to battlefield victory using a unique and intuitive touch screen control scheme.

GarageGames announced the release of the new Torque Game Engine (TGE), version 1.4, featuring hundreds of technology enhancements, from improved work flow and tutorials, to localization support and editor updates.

Valve's SteamPowered website has been updated with details regarding the latest update for its online delivery system Steam. This release updates the DoD:Source gameinfo.txt to support the Source SDK, and applies a few fixes to the Half-Life 1 engine, and a few tweaks to the H-L1 dedicated server. Just restart Steam for the effects to take place.

Matrix Games today announced the release of their stand-alone wargame War Plan Orange: Dreadnoughts in the Pacific 1922-1930. The year is 1922, World War I has come to a close but tensions still run high. The United States, fearing the worst, developed a system of plans for a potential war in the Pacific against Japan.

Atari and Marathon Animation today announced that Totally Spies!™ is available in stores nationwide for the GBA. Totally Spies! is the hit animated TV series that stars three teen super-spies from Beverly Hills, who fight international crime.

Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows is the fusion of fantasy fighting action with the strategy of user-friendly RPG elements , providing gamers a deep, engaging gameplay experience complete with solo play, co-op and an online community.

Metalheart: Replicants Rampage provides a strong sci-fi story with intriguing cyberpunk influences, sophisticated turn-based combat, random quest generator with the unbelievable tasks variations, a complex character parameter system, and plenty of other wonders to make hardcore RPG fans amazed. Dreamcatcher has released a new patch bringing any international version of the game to v1.2. Read more for detailed fix list and download links ...

Disgaea 2 is the sequel to Nippon Ichi 2003 RPG hit title Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. While no information about a European or North American released is available, Disgaea 2 is scheduled for release in Japan February 2006. Until we do get more concrete details, these rather small screens & trailer will have to do ...