Late Night Consoling

Following reports earlier this week, Bizarre Creations has confirmed that Kuju Entertainment's Surrey branch is developing Geometry Wars: Galaxies, a Wii and Nintendo DS version of Bizarre's well-loved top-down shooter, previously seen on Xbox and Xbox 360. Vivendi Games will be publishing the title via its Sierra Entertainment label.

Today's announcement revealed new details about the game, first revealed in Nintendo Power. Galaxies contains what is described as "mission-based gameplay," featuring a variety of settings and new types of backdrop grids as well as new weapons and enemies. Specific details about the games' control methods, which are said to involve the special control capabilities of each machine, were not revealed. Geometry Wars creator Stephen Cakebread worked on the prototypes for the Wii control scheme before handing the game's main development over to Kuju. Galaxies will not be Kuju's first effort on the Wii; the dev house is currently working on the Wii sequel to its 2005 Cannon Fodder-esque Battalion Wars (GCN).

Galaxies will also introduce multiplayer to the Geometry Wars series, with cooperative, versus, simultaneous play, and hot seat modes available. The Wii version will also feature online leaderboards. Vivendi announced that the game will include some kind of connectivity feature between Wii and Nintendo DS, but did not elaborate further.

"The game is really a three-way joint venture between ourselves, Sierra, and Kuju, and as a result there have been some really nice features planned," said Bizarre's Ben Ward on the project. Vivendi sent over several screenshots of the Wii version. Geometry Wars: Galaxies is set to ship for Wii and Nintendo DS this fall.

Foundation 9 co-founder Andrew Ayre will be leaving the independent developer conglomerate to head up Other Ocean Interactive, formerly Backbone Charlottetown. Other Ocean Interactive will be fully independent from Foundation 9, and Ayre will serve as its CEO and majority owner.

The Prince Edward Island, Canada-based studio was founded in March 2006 and was responsible for porting Konami's Castlevania: Symphony of the Night to Xbox Live Arcade. Currently, Other Ocean is developing Tron and Discs of Tron, announced earlier this month for Xbox Live Arcade.

Terms of the deal, expected to close early next month, were not disclosed.

Microsoft sent word today that K2's ninja-themed Tenchu Z has gone gold for Xbox 360. The game will be released in North America on June 12.