The winners of the most prestigious awards in the European interactive entertainment industry were announced in London today at ECTS, Europe's premier trade show for the interactive entertainment industry. The ECTS 2003 Awards, hosted by Kate Russell, are the ninth in a long line of successful ceremonies and were attended by over 1000 leading industry figures in the trade hall of ECTS itself. Kate is a journalist, presenter and self-confessed technophile and has appeared on Gamer.tv, Sky TV, LWT and the BBC as a technology reporter, as well as having contributed to a number of leading computing and technology magazines. The ECTS 2003 Awards categories are divided between 'Best of Year' and 'Best of Show'.. Read more for the awards!

QuakeNet, tonight consolidated it's position as the world's largest chat network, with more than 200,000 people connected concurrently. The actual user peak eventually reached 201,401 users, 1401 users more than the 200,000 user mark.

Team 17 recently updated their Worms 3D site with the words.. "The work on the gameplay continues, due to requests to get the demo size down, the frontend has gone and so has the tutorial. So now it's a 2 player deathmatch with a limited weapons set. But it's just a demo, right?".. Read more below for all details!

Worms 3 will utilise the full power afforded by next-generation platforms, featuring ground-breaking fully deformable landscape technology, and will continue the wild humor and intensive, addictive fun that gamers expect from the Worms franchise. Worms 3 will showcase a raft of new gameplay features, while retaining all the familiar chaos of the original titles, complete with bizarre power-ups, loopy weaponry, and crazy cartoon graphics -- in both single and multi-player modes.

This year you have the chance to create and build the ultimate golfer to take on the TOUR and dominate the world. Whether you play the prestigious PGA TOUR courses or the original design characters, there is something for every golf fan in this game. EA SPORTS, continuing its exclusive partnership with the PGA TOUR and the world's best and most famous golfer, Tiger Woods, delivers the most realistic golf simulation for fans of console golf. Check the new batch of Gamecube and GBA screens...

Empire Interactive on Friday announced that Ghost Master is now available on retail shelves for a fright fest gamers will enjoy. Developed by Sick Puppies and distributed by Vivendi Universal Games, Ghost Master is retailed at the suggested price of $39.99 for the PC. Ghost Master has an ESRB rating of "T" (Teen).

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time takes place within an exotic, mysterious world representing Persian architecture, animals and attire. After his father invades the palace of the Maharajah, the Prince, tricked by a treacherous vizier, uses a magic dagger to release the dangerous Sands of Time from an ornate hourglass. With the aid of a beautiful, mysterious, and potentially untrustworthy ally, players embody the Prince to recapture the Sands of Time and restore peace to the land. Check out the new screens ...

Painkiller is a nickname of a pretty unusual mercenary, who is dealing with supernatural. There are places on Earth where demons and other evil creatures have their nests: abandoned prisons, private castles, deep caves in the mountains. "Cleaning" those places is good money, and our hero needs a lot of it, since he loves living the life to its fullest. One day he gets what seems to be a pretty simple job: to retrieve a religious artifact from one of the nests. When after a furious battle he realizes he might have been tricked into the war between two competing clans of the undead, he tries to play his own cards. If you haven't yet, check our Painkiller preview or read more to check out the new screens ...

The Nokia N-Gage game deck is an innovative mobile device that is creating an entirely new market for the games industry. Built for active and hardcore gamers, the Nokia N-Gage is the first mobile and connected game deck to feature online high-quality 3D multiplayer gameplay over Bluetooth and GPRS... Today we have some new screens from following titles:

• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater
• Red Faction
• MotoGP
• Marcel Desailly ProSoccer
• Rayman 3
• Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell
• Virtua Tennis
• MLB Slam!

Ubisoft has now released a US demo for their upcoming strategy game Warlords IV: Heroes of Etheria. As in the European version this demo contains a single map for solo or multiplayer, and adresses some minor issues that were present in the European version. Read more for download links ...

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 :

• Lethal Skies II - Secret Planes Trailer
• Driver 3 - ECTS Trailer
• UFO: Aftermath - ECTS Trailer
• Shade: Wrath of Angels - ECTS Trailer
• Beyond Good & Evil - ECTS Trailer
• Need For Speed: UnderGround - ECTS Trailer
• 
  
  We will update this throughout the day when new trailers become available. Read more for download links ...

The world has seen all kinds of weapons of mass destruction: nuclear, chemical and biological. Now the threat is digital. A virus, simple in concept yet catastrophic in effect, has been developed. Its target is the communication systems of the world. It will shut down all digital entertainment, economic trade and cripple the military, causing breaches in all security systems and global mass chaos. There is only enough time to send one operative. His codename: Raven. His mission: to find the virus, copy it and then destroy the research lab where it is located. A new batch of screens just arrived ...

Complete with a whole new look and even more player stats, LMA Manager 2004 will also deliver more flexible and detailed management options. Management strategy is more varied and rewarding throughout the main game and setting player tactics is a key new element to the series. LMA Manager 2004 introduces the ability for managers to assign specific focus and position tactics to individual players, as well as an entire team. Read more for some new screens ...

Play as yourself, not a pro skater, and make your way through a plot-twisting, true-to-life story that takes you from unknown local skate punk to fame and fortune as Skater of the Year. Read more for some PS2 & Xbox screens, as well as a trailer showing off some in game footage.

In SÖLDNER - Secret Wars the player takes command of one of these special teams. As Commander he leads the small high tech army consisting of soldiers, light armoured vehicles, helicopters and VTOLs to fulfill a wide variety of mission. The Simulation of a highly complex political system creates a dynamic campaign: each decision has direct impact on the flow of the game. Read more to check out in game as well as vehicle screens, no less than 80 in total...

3Map Games studio and Russobit-M Company are glad to tell you that the spacesimulator Homeplanet will have a multiplayer finally. Developer have started to work on the multiplayer addon a few months ago (expected to be released after Christmas). The upcoming addon will include:

• Cooperative playing the single mode
• up 16 player in Internet and LAN
• Chat
• The statistics of players on our server
• internet-site for statistics

Take on the world's best players as you participate in the ATP's most prestigious tournaments: the Tennis Masters Series. Tour the globe and play on the 9 faithfully reproduced Masters Series tournaments. Travel to the hard courts of Indian Wells, Miami, Toronto and Cincinnati. Visit the luxurious clay courts of Monte Carlo, Rome and Hamburg. Compete on the indoor courts of Madrid and Paris. Try to qualify for the Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai and become the world's best player!

Konami of Europe has announced that Pro Evolution Soccer 3, the latest in its incredibly successful football series, is to be released for PC in November 2003. With the Pro Evolution Soccer series rightly regarded as the pinnacle of console football titles, Konami's is bringing its skills to PC, to ensure that Pro Evolution Soccer 3 becomes the definitive football experience for the format. The PC game will boast all the gameplay advances seen in the accompanying PlayStation 2 release, but will enjoy a greater level of aesthetic detail.

After failed discussions with Activision, the following websites will not be carrying the Call of Duty playable demo, even after its exclusivity is over. This is due to Activision's decision to not accede to the reasonable request of making demo freely available to all game enthusiasts at the same time. Read more for details and head on over to the forum, or post in the comments section, if you wish to express your opinion ...

Logitech today announced that Xbox gamers can now step up the action with two new quality controllers. Announced earlier this year at the E3 trade show in Los Angeles, the Logitech Precision Controller and Logitech Thunderpad are now available online at www.logitech.com and retail outlets in the U.S. for U.S. $24.99 and U.S. $19.99, respectively. European prices and availability will be announced separately.

Strategy First and Nival Interactive are pleased to announce that their highly anticipated game, Etherlords II has Gone Gold! Etherlords II is an exciting mix of role-playing elements and tactical turn-based combat in the best traditions of fantasy trading card games. You can also download the just released single player demo, or check our Etherlords preview from a while back.

Perimeter is a real-time strategy game built on the concept of territory seizure using detailed terraforming and on the subsequent encircling of these zones with a special protective perimeter. The game combines proven principles of controlling resources and unit groups with titles featuring a clear-cut seizure of living space. The gamer has three powers at his or her disposal: The first is terraforming. The second is being able to surround areas of land with an impenetrable force barrier generated by special perimeter units. The third power is being able to carry out military operations with the help of ground and air forces.

With the creation of the transatlantic railway, built with blood, sweat and tears into the murderous wilderness in 1869, the American dream of freedom and prosperity was finally to be fulfilled. With "Railroad Pioneer" you'll be able to experience all this at close quarters and, at the end of a dramatic journey, leave your mark as a railway magnate in the eventful history of steamers and pioneers. Read more to check out some new screens ...

Strategy First and Nival Interactive are pleased to announce the release of the single-player demo for their highly anticipated title Etherlords II, coming out this September. The demo sports a tutorial and 2 missions from the full game. Read more for details and download links ...

In their immeasurable greed and constant thirst for power, the thirteen most powerful Mages of all time doomed the land, hurling it into an endless spiral of chaos and despair. Entire countries were wiped out in the blink of an eye when the devastating power of the Elements was unleashed – Elements summoned by dark rituals. Continents shattered like glass, the pieces strewn about like leaves in the wind. Huge armies, bound by the the power of ancient runes, brought war and destruction to the lands that survived the initial onslaught. All that was left were a few islands, connected by magic portals. Read more for 6 tasty new screens ...

On the heels of the most successful introduction of a massively multiplayer online (MMO) game to date, LucasArts announced today that Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided has surpassed 275,000 registered users. Releasing on June 26th 2003, An Empire Divided has quickly become the second largest MMO in the U.S, in terms of registered users, and is the fastest growing MMO role-playing game (RPG) to date.