Microsoft Europe today announced a new program that will allow select members of the Xbox Live community to see upcoming films before their theatrical debut.

Known as the "Xbox Live Film Club," the initiative steams from a recent partnership with Paramount and will launch with a special sneak preview of Tropic Thunder, which hits the United Kingdom on September 19.

By following the entry guidelines on the official site, UK Xbox Live members can win the chance to see the film early. While Microsoft allows Xbox Live members to stream movies from the online Xbox Live Video Marketplace, winners will need to attend a real-life event instead of enjoying the unreleased flick from their living room.

Presently, the Film Club program is not available for Xbox Live members in North America, though Shacknews has contacted Microsoft for more details.

The veil of shadow has finally come off the long-rumored Ninja Blade, revealing the title to be a ninja-themed hack-and-slash action game from Otogi and Metal Wolf Chaos veterans From Software. Due out next year as a Microsoft-published Xbox 360 exclusive, the game will pack fast-paced cutscenes and high-tension action set in a faithful rendering of famous parts of Tokyo, going by an IGN interview.

The first details were accompanied by the above screenshots, with more information expected to arrive as the game's vague 2009 release draws closer.

A Gearbox representative has confirmed with Shacknews that staff member Corrinne Yu has indeed taken a position at Microsoft, and clarified that has she served as Gearbox's director of platform technology, not technology director, for the past six months.

Word of Yu's impending departure from Brothers in Arms creator Gearbox recently emerged in unconfirmed reports, with the programmer said to have taken the role of principle engine architect on Microsoft's Halo franchise team.

"I accepted the offer to lead the team to build the engines and games for future Halo's on Xbox'es and PC's at Microsoft," read an e-mail purportedly sent by Yu that was later acquired by the press. "I assure you I will continue to help Gearbox."

Her husband, id art director Kenneth Scott, appears to have accepted a position at Microsoft at well, though his exact role is unknown.

In its communication with Shacknews, Gearbox stressed that Sean Reardon has served as its technology director for many years and oversaw Yu's platform technology work. The confusion between the two titles in recent media reports is said to have created challenges for both Yu and Reardon.

The Gearbox representative added that Yu is "an intelligent, passionate and inventive programmer" and that they are "excited about her new role at Microsoft," but did not address recent rumors that Gearbox is developing Halo 4.

Despite Microsoft's past efforts to prevent Xbox Live account hijacking, the theft of Halo 3 multiplayer producer Joe Tung's account has pulled the issue back to the forefront.

The hijacking was not the result of sophisticated computer wizardry, but rather "social engineering," the act of creatively lying to customer service representatives to gain unauthorized access to sensitive information. Xbox Live stores credit card information, and while hackers are unable to steal that information for their own use, they can make unauthorized purchases from a stolen account

Tung is far from alone, as account hijackings are not uncommon among players of Bungie's online behemoth Halo 3. He is not even the only Bungie employee to be a victim of such thieves. But his position makes his case the highest profile to date.

Microsoft claims it previously retrained customer service employees ... Read more

Update: Gearbox has confirmed Yu's departure with Shacknews, adding that she served as director of platform technology, not technology director.

To clarify, Gearbox stressed that Sean Reardon has served as its technology director for many years, and that the confusion between the two's titles in recent media reports is said to have created challenges for them both.

Original Story: Amidst rumors and speculation that Brothers in Arms creator Gearbox has been tasked with developing Halo 4 for the Xbox 720, Kotaku reports that Gearbox technology director Corrinne Yu will soon depart to lead Halo technology development at Microsoft.

"I accepted the offer to lead the team to build the engines and games for future Halo's on Xbox'es and PC's at Microsoft," reads a message supposedly penned by Yu. "I assure you I will continue to help Gearbox."

The message further stated that Yu, pictured above, will begin her new role as "Principle (Lead) Engine Architect of Halo Franchise Team" beginning September 15, 2008.

id art director Kenneth Scott, Yu's husband, appears to have joined his wife in her move to Microsoft's Washington headquarters, as he is no longer listed among id Software's staff and is now a member of the Microsoft Facebook group.

Microsoft has been beefing up its internal Halo team in recent months, with former Bungie content designer Frank O'Connor leaving the studio to work more closely Microsoft on Halo projects.

Rumors that Gearbox was handling Halo 4 emerged earlier this week... Read more

Immersion, the force-feedback company with a rather litigious history, today announced a settlement in its latest legal drama, this time with Microsoft.

Immersion had drawn Microsoft's ire by violating a 2003 settlement, when Immersion simultaneously sued Microsoft and Sony for their use of Immersion's patented force-feedback technology in the Xbox and PlayStation 2, respectively. According to the terms of that settlement, Microsoft was promised $15 million in the event that Immersion settled with Sony as well.

Much later, in 2007, Sony and Immersion did settle, prompting Microsoft to ask for its $15 million. Immersion refused to pay, and a lawsuit ensued.

It appears that Immersion has now elected to pay up, but at a price: today's settlement resulted in Immersion making a one-time payment of $20.75 million to Microsoft and enrolling in Microsoft's Certified Partner Program, effectively making Immersion a customer of Microsoft. Other terms to the settlement are confidential.

An Immersion spokesman said of the settlement: "Immersion is pleased to resolve the litigation and can fully focus on working with companies, including Microsoft, on adoption of its haptic technologies."

While discussing its record-breaking quarter, retailer GameStop revealed that it expects both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 to undergo $50 price cuts by the end of 2008.

A $50 price cut for the Xbox 360 Pro and Elite models has been practically confirmed, with the drop expected to take effect on or around September 7. Whereas the two higher-end Xbox 360 models will drop by $50, the hard drive-less Arcade unit is said to see a reduction of $70, making it $199.

Sony previously stated that it would not drop the price of its various PlayStation 3 units this year. However, the company is introducing higher-capacity PS3 models--the $399 80GB and the $499 160GB bundle--that maintain the existing prices of PS3 hardware.

A partnership with Rock the Vote will allow Xbox Live users to register to vote through their Xbox 360s, Microsoft announced today.

Voter registration will be available via Xbox Live beginning Monday, August 25, with Microsoft also set to provide polls and a forum for discussing presidential candidates. No details were provided as to how the process will operate.

"If Xbox Live were a state, it would rank as the country's seventh largest, giving it approximately 20 electoral votes," Microsoft said of its 12 million Xbox Live users.

"Xbox is a natural partner to help us reach out to youth voters," explained Rock the Vote director Heather Smith. "To realize our goal of registering 2 million young Americans by this fall, we need to go where young Americans are, and there's no doubt in our minds that many are on Xbox 360 and Xbox Live."

In addition to voter registration, Microsoft will also have a "presence" at the Democratic and Republican conventions, which respectively begin on August 25 and September 1.

Update: Microsoft has confirmed to Shacknews that there are indeed no plans to bring the "optimized" D-Pad to North America in any form.

"Basically, the controller will only be available for a limited time in Europe, Asia and Latin America, and has been optimized for certain games that are D-pad intensive," explained a Microsoft representative.

"There are no plans to make those changes to the existing wireless controllers at this time. However, the Xbox 360 wireless controller is one of the most popular controllers of all time and we're confident that it will continue to provide the complete gaming experience."

Original Story: A revised Xbox 360 controller with a more precise directional pad will hit Europe on October 24, Microsoft has revealed.

Said to be "optimized" for Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer series, the green controller is billed as a "a limited edition promotional item that is only available in Europe, Asia and Latin America while supplies last," the company told Eurogamer.

Many gamers have complained that the Xbox 360's directional... Read more

In a surprising turn of events, Japan is completely sold out of Xbox 360 hardware. Microsoft's Japanese branch revealed the news today, issuing an apology to customers and promising that the next hardware shipment would arrive in September.

The Xbox hardware has traditionally experienced low sales in Japan, but sales were apparently sparked by the recent Japanese debut of Namco Bandai's Xbox 360 exclusive Tales of Vesperia. The action-RPG is due out in North America next week.

"Currently, the Xbox 360 is sold out, and retailers are unable to restock their supply," reads the official Microsoft statement, as translated by Kotaku.

"This is a result of our own sales targets being exceeded by the actual customer sales," the company continued. "We deeply apologize for this inconvenience to our customers, retailers and business partners...We truly thank you for your patronage hereafter."

A similar sales boost accompanied the Xbox 360-exclusive release of Namco Bandai's Ace Combat 6 last year, though that spike did not lead to hardware shortages.

Microsoft has announced that the Xbox 360 editions of Harmonix's Rock Band 2, Neversoft's Guitar Hero World Tour and Zoe Mode's Rock Revolution will feature instrument interoperability, as revealed on Microsoft's Gamerscore Blog.

Citing a similar announcement made yesterday in which Sony revealed that the PS3 editions of the upcoming rhythm titles would see instrument cross-compatibility, Microsoft representative Chris Paladino stated, "For the record, we also do that."

"Consider this an official announcement," Paladino added. "All the instruments from Rock Band 2, Guitar Hero: World Tour, and Rock Revolution will be cross-compatible. In other words, welcome to the party."

While neither Microsoft nor Sony specified whether the three titles' guitars, microphones and drums would also see cross-platform compatibility between the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the announcements bring the long struggle between rhythm game developers over peripheral compatibility to an end.

Xbox 360 maker Microsoft has denied that third party games--titles not produced by the console manufacturer--on the Nintendo Wii sell better than those on the Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3, contradicting a Nintendo statement from last week.

Citing data from sales tracking firm the NPD Group, Microsoft said that the Xbox 360's lifetime third party sales amounted to roughly 68M units, followed by the Wii at about 33.4M, and the PlayStation 3 at just under 20M. Third party titles appearing on the Xbox 360 sold 217,252 units on average, compared to an average of 132,517 on the Wii.

"No matter how you slice it, the Wii third party game story is not a pretty one," Microsoft interactive entertainment PR manager David Dennis told GamesIndustry.

In a GameDaily report last week, Nintendo said the Wii's third party titles were selling "better than our competitors," and provided a chart highlighting the Wii's software performance. Compiled with data from sales-tracking firm NPD, the... Read more

Continuing the recent trend of leaks, a new video showcasing the revised Xbox 360 dashboard and its game installation functionality has appeared on the internet.

In addition to game installs and Netflix streaming support, the new dashboard--dubbed the New Xbox Experience--will pack customizable Avatars and the original blade interface when it arrives this fall.

As previously reported, and demonstrated in the footage below, installed games will still require the disc to run as a result of piracy concerns.

Please install Flash to view this Shackvideo

Following the release of Jonathan Blow's independently developed, time-warping puzzle platformer Braid, the developer has revealed that the Xbox Live Arcade certification requirements may have encumbered the title in its crucial polish phases.

"They removed some of the requirements for XBLA games, but there are still a lot of requirements," Blow told Gamasutra. "And I believe that, at least for a single-player game like my game, the vast majority of these requirements are unnecessary."

Blow continued, "I put in a tremendous amount of work meeting all these requirements, when I could have put that work into the actual game, and made it even a little more polished, little bit better."

The developer further noted that while the Xbox Live Arcade certification process is meant to ensure a standard of quality for games appearing on the platform, he believes that the amount of time and energy spent on passing certification has... Read more

Speaking at Microsoft's GameFest UK keynote, Xbox Europe VP David Gosen claimed that some 60% of Wii Fit owners played Nintendo's fitness-oriented, balance board-equipped title once and shelved it soon thereafter, noting that developers should be wary of pushing gimmicks in the place of solid gameplay.

"We've seen some research that says 60 percent of people who bought a Wii Fit play it once and don't play it again. So we have to get the balance right, because what we are doing is bringing new consumers into the market for the first time in their lives sometimes—and we have to treat them with respect," Gosen told attendees.

The executive later expanded on his comments, telling Develop that "what Nintendo have done with the Wii is truly fantastic—there is no question about it. But I think sometimes there is a thin line between gimmick and great gameplay."

The runaway success of Nintendo's motion-centric Wii console has prompted many software and hardware developers to look into motion-sensing control... Read more

Amid increasing revenues for digitally distributed games and downloadable content, a Microsoft executive affirmed his belief that digital sales will eventually overtake those of games sold in traditional retail channels in the near future.

"There's no question digital will overtake physical," said Xbox Europe marketing vice president David Gosen, as reported by MCV. "It happened in music and will happen to our industry."

Speaking at Microsoft's UK Gamefest development event, Gosen added that the success of Xbox Live Arcade and downloadable content for games such as Harmonix's Rock Band and Neversoft's Guitar Hero III illustrate a "convergence" in... Read more

Despite widespread interest in a downloadable Xbox 360 or Wii version of Rare's Nintendo 64 shooter GoldenEye 007, licensing issues and other concerns have the project "locked in a no-man's land," Rare senior engineer Nick Burton stated.

"The ball's not in anybody at Rare's court really," Burton informed Videogamer. "It's squarely in the license holders' courts. It's a shame. It's kind of locked in this no man's land. There's nothing on [Xbox] Live Arcade, there's nothing on Wii."

The Microsoft-owned studio had developed an Xbox Live Arcade port of the game but was unable to successfully acquire the rights from Nintendo, which originally published GoldenEye 007. Video game rights for the James Bond franchise, meanwhile, are owned by publisher Activision Blizzard.

"You've got the guys that own the license to the gaming rights now, the guys that have the licence to Bond as an IP, and there are umpteen licensees," Burton... Read more

Xbox 360 titles supplemented by paid downloadable content on the Xbox Live Marketplace sell an average of $21M more at retail, Microsoft interactive entertainment business manager Kevin Salcedo revealed at the company's recent GameFest event.

According to Gamasutra, the manager stipulated that the boost in sales typically required the content to be launched within a 30-day "sweet spot." The data reflects growing industry trends in which more and more games are arriving to retailers with DLC already available, or with content planned well in advance of release.

"Right now we have over 12 million users in over 26 countries, with $240 million in [Xbox Live Marketplace] transactions revenue so far, with $180 million... Read more

Microsoft today released a new system update for the Xbox 360, which users will be prompted to download when they attempt to connect to Xbox Live.

This update packs no new features, but is said to contain code to "prepare for the future growth of the service." A major system update, dubbed the New Xbox Experience, is planned for this fall, sporting a new 3D dashboard and the ability to install games.

"There are no other changes or enhancements in this update...in other words no new features," Xbox Live director Larry 'Major Nelson' Hyrb explained on his official blog.

The Xbox 360 avatars aimed to debut in the upcoming fall dashboard update will be restricted for use only in titles rated E10+ and lower by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, Microsoft has revealed.

Speaking at Microsoft's GameFest event in Seattle, Xbox Live general manager Eric Kilgore explained that while the Avatars—Microsoft's answer to Nintendo's Miis—are currently planned only to be allowed for use in titles rated E10+ and lower, that restriction may change in the future.

"We are still developing the final policies," Kilgore stated, as reported by Develop. "The final guide we have this year is to think of them in an 'E10' context. That doesn't mean it won't change—but this Fall they won't be able to blow each other's heads off."

Kilgore further noted that the company is currently exploring various implementations of the avatar data, and noted that the avatars can be incorporated as full... Read more