Late Night Consoling

Publisher Acclaim went bankrupt in September 2004, and since then the company's assets, including the rights to many games both released and unreleased, have been slowly making their way to various buyers. The Acclaim name itself is now in use by an Asian MMO import company. Last September, a list of Acclaim games for sale indicated that The Red Star, a comic book licensed shooter, had been sold, but the buyer was not disclosed. Today, XS Games announced that it will be publishing the PlayStation 2 version of The Red Star this August. XS has not yet decided if it will release the Xbox version of the game.

An XS representative also noted that it will be publishing Moss Ltd.'s top-down arcade shooter Raiden III for PlayStation 2, the publishing rights to which were acquired from Taito.

Though Bungie's long running Weekly Updates have continued unabated for years now, they have been less informative recently, simply by virtue of the fact that the studio hasn't been able to talk much about what it's been doing. Now that Halo 3 (X360) has been officially announced via an E3 trailer, Bungie's updates are getting a bit meatier again. In the latest edition, Bungie's Frank O'Connor reveals that there are daily multiplayer testing sessions going on at the Bungie offices, suggesting that the anticipated game is shaping up well. Last December, a weekly update revealed that Bungie's next game, which at the time was technically not yet confirmed to be another Halo sequel, was already in vaguely playable form.

Nintendo has finally announced the European release date and price point of its updated DS Lite, which has already launched in Japan and is planned for launch June 11 in North America. DS Lite will be available on June 23 throughout Europe for GBP 99.99 (inc. VAT) in the UK, and 149.99 Euro in the rest of Europe. This news confirms recent rumors regarding DS Lite's launch information. Two colors will be available on launch day, the Crystal White that will be coming to North America as well as a new glossy black not announced for any other territories.

A new version of Nintendogs was also announced for Europe: Dalmation & Friends, due June 16. The game includes a total of twenty breeds of dog, with six--including the previously difficult to unlock Dalmation--available from the start. Nintendo has not revealed if or when the game will be coming to other territories. Nintendogs has been a success in Europe, where 2.5M of the game's 6M worldwide sales were made, perhaps indicating why it is the first to receive the next version of the game.

Cellien Studios was founded in July 2004 and, in the following year became a subsidiary of Ireland-based Star Cave Studios. Cellien is currently developing an MMO for PC, Terra: Formations, as well as the upcoming freeware shooter Illumina. Last week, the company sent out a press release stating that the comapny is shifting its development focus from PC to Nintendo platforms, including Wii, Nintendo DS, and Game Boy Advance. Currently, Cellien is working on original games for DS, and is also looking to port other publishers' multiplatform titles to Nintendo systems.

Oddly, the announcement refers to Cellien as a "former subsidiary." When contacted by Shacknews regarding the meaning of this phrasing as well as whether current PC projects would be shifted to other platforms. In response a Cellien representative stated, "Both Star Cave & Cellien Studios will issue further press releases this week that will answer some of your questions."

In keeping with its goal of deriving an increasing portion of its revenue from licensed properties, Ubisoft has announced that it will be developing and publishing a game based on the television series "Lost." Ubisoft's well known Montreal studio will handle development of the game, which is expected some time in 2007. No gameplay or plot details were revealed. The game is targeted at unspecified home and portable consoles as well as PC.

Speaking of responses to Sony's E3 showing, Microsoft's Peter Moore commented on the competing machine. He stated that there has been "somewhat of a collective yawn from the gaming community about the motion sensing technology," casting doubt on the decision to replace force feedback with the new tech, and expressing surprise at the reveal of the price.

Joystiq has a chat with Epic's CliffyB, who speaks on a variety of subjects. Surprisingly, given rather strong remarks last year by company VP Mark Rein, Bleszinski noted that the developer is currently speaking with Nintendo. Though Bleszinski is a self-professed lifelong Nintendo fan, the company has not traditionally developed on Nintendo systems.

Each Monday for the next several weeks, Nintendo will be releasing audio or video podcasts relating to New Super Mario Bros. (NDS). Today's video podcast is an interview with designer Shigeru Miyamoto. The Toronto Sun also has a full interview with Miyamoto, in which he comments on Sony's motion sensing controller and various other topics.

IGN has a video interview with developers from Ubisoft Montpellier, on Rayman Raving Rabbids (PS2, Xbox, GCN, PS3, X360, Wii), mainly discussing the Wii version of the game.