Boiling Point: Road to Hell, previously known as Xenus, will combine intense armed combat with exploration and interaction with a vast and seamless open-ended gaming world. Boiling Point: Road to Hell is in development by Ukrainian developer Deep Shadows and is scheduled for release in Spring 2005.

Sony Online has put up a note in the official EQ2 forums about a total blackout of the EQ2 servers. "All US servers and Innovation are currently down for an upate. We do not have a solid ETA available at this time, but will be updating you with progress hourly and will deliver a more firm ETA when we can. Worlds will be brought back online as they are ready. We apologize for any inconvenience this causes you and thank you for your patience while our folks here work to correct this issue." SOE is posting an hourly progress report, as they gradually are bringing servers back up after 24hours downtome

Law & Order: Justice is Served immerses players in a murder mystery involving a young female tennis star. Featuring two phases of exciting & challenging gameplay, players join their favorite stars from the TV show to first solve the crime and then try the case.

Massive Entertainment has released a new multiplayer map or its sci-fi RTS Ground Control II: Operation Exodus. This Nashorn bonus map needs to be installed in the standalone copy in the game's Custom_Maps folder. Massive Entertainment will be releasing new maps every Friday for the next few months. Read more for download links ...

THQ has released a patch for the recent The Punisher singleplayer demo. This update adds a mouse sensitivity slider, adresses a framerate issue as well as a few other graphical problems in Volition's action game based on the Marvel comic book. Read more for download links ...

The strategy role-playing game from Japan, Stella Deus: The Gate of Eternity, is coming to North America for the PlayStation 2, courtesy of Atlus U.S.A. Read more for details, screens and trailer ...

UFO: Aftershock follows directly from one of the endings of UFO: Aftermath, where the player agrees to hand over the Earth to the Alien scientists, who are trying to change the planet into a giant living organism. The Council of Earth and their followers take refuge on an orbiting satellite prepared for them by the aliens, but not all the survivors of the original invasion where re-located.

Another day, another batch of game trailers were released. Instead of giving them all their own posts, we grouped them, and so far there are trailers for :

• The Unseelie - Trailer
• 25 to Life - Trailer

Today, Paramount announced that it has acquired the film rights to Tom Clancy's video game Splinter Cell and hired Peter Berg (Friday Night Lights) to direct. Variety says Berg is writing the script along with Splinter Cell game writer J.T. Petty and John J. McLaughlin (Man of the House). Paramount said the movie is aimed at combining the game's blend of stealth action with a "dynamic, original" character. Whether Michael Ironside will be playing Sam Fisher (he does the voice in all the games) has not yet been announced ...

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Chaos Theory will offer a high adrenaline experience thanks to never seen before close range attacks, a totally open level design, a completely immersive and interactive environment, and challenging advanced AI. Check these new screens...

Offering over 40 fully-licensed and faithfully replicated club and national teams, players can tinker with tactics, formation, line-up and training before each match. During the game, Pro Rugby Manager 2 displays each bone-crunching tackle, each heart-in-mouth drop kick and every maddening pass and dash to the try-line in such glorious, motion-captured detail, it rivals anything TV coverage can offer.

Area 51 is set in the U.S. government's most top-secret and secure facility located in the Nevada desert. Players take on the role of Lt. Nick Cross, a hazardous biological waste specialist sent to investigate. Read more for details, screens and trailers...

Big Mutha Truckers 2 begins with Ma Jackson being taken into police custody for tax evasion. The only way she can win her case is by hiring Cousin Jacob, the most "fancy-talkin' legal fella" this side of Booger's Canyon. Players will be challenged to raise the cash needed to bribe jurors to let Ma off by trucking, trading, wheeling and dealing.

RollerCoaster Tycoon features all-new 3-D graphics and the ability to virtually "ride the rides", but will also allow players to design amazing fireworks displays that can be choreographed to the music of their choice. In addition, RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 also includes the ability to assign music to rides in the park, new realistic day and night cycles, a park lighting system and various weather effects.

Another day, another batch of game trailers were released. Instead of giving them all their own posts, we grouped them, and so far there are trailers for :

• Jade Empire - Trailer
• Tenchu: Fatal Shadows - Trailer
• MetalWolf Chaos - Trailer

Valve's SteamPowered website has been updated with details regarding yet another update, this time not for HL2 but its multiplayer component, Counterstrike Source, and the Source Engine itself. Most notable is the addition of a new map for CSS, de_prodigy. Read more for details ...

JoWooD's Stargate SG-1: The Alliance is the spectacular interactive game expereince that puts players in the action packed universe of the Stargate SG-1 TV series. Jowood sent us a pre-canned Q&A, but nontheless a very interesting read with plenty of new info.

Wing Simulations has released a Building SDK for its military multiplayer shooter Soldner: Secret Wars, allowing you to create your own buildings for Soldner: Secret War’s. This package includes a detailed Tutorial, 3d Studio Max Plugins, some example files, one Testmap and the documentation. Read more for download links ...

Ubisoft has released the English demo for Blue Byte 3D RTS game 'Settlers: Heritage Of Kings.' featuring a tutorial and one single player mission. Fans will enjoy fully animated 3D technology and enhanced gameplay features, but still be able to relive the experience that makes the Settlers series such a big hit. Read more for download links ...

Midway announced today the development of Blitz: Playmakers, a new, unlicensed videogame exposing the harsh realism and troubling, behind-the-scenes stories of a fictional professional football league. Blitz: Playmakers has been in development at Midway's Chicago studio for the past year in collaboration with a writer from ESPN's controversial "Playmakers" TV series.

Put yourself in a spin with Codemasters' Christmas gift – an egg-shell-hen-t bit of retro fun: the complete Commodore 64 edition of Treasure Island Dizzy from way back in 1988!

Nevrax announced the release of the next chapter in the ever-evolving massively multiplayer online role-playing game The Saga of Ryzom.

Matrix Games and Destroyer Studios have released a new demo for its space sim Starshatter, which includes the training campaign, Operation Live Fire, and the first five days of the first dynamic campaign, Operation Highland, along with a few single missions and a few multiplayer missions that can be enjoyed entirely for free.

Due to continued demand, BattleGoat Studios is pleased to announce the re-opening of the Supreme Ruler 2010 Beta to new applicants. Supreme Ruler 2010 is a groundbreaking Economic, Political, and Military Strategy game for Windows PC's. It supports Single and Multi-Player (up to 16 players) in either “Real Time” or “Turn Based” modes. Supreme Ruler 2010 is scheduled to be released by Strategy First late Q1, 2005.

Fight and evade the powerful military force of the Conquistadors, as they seek to vanquish the seas of the pirate insurgence. Only a pirate captain who masters the power of the voodoo spells, who can outwit their foes and seize the treasure, will truly be ruler over the “Voodoo Islands”. Although Koch Media announced that their game went out of beta testing several months ago, no release date is given yet.