Yesterday, the most popular MMORPG in the world, World of Warcraft, opened a virtual pet store on their website. For $10 each you can virtually own a ‘Lil KT or Pandaren Monk. With the purchase of the Panderan Monk 50% of the proceeds go to the Make a Wish foundation until December 31, 2009.

These cute little guys first appeared a few months ago data-mined through MMO-Champion, along with a video of the Panderan Monk idle animation. Since the release of these pets it’s rumored that ‘Lil KT frostbolts cats that it sees! If you play World of Warcraft and have been to the Naxxramas raid, you know the deal with Kel’Thuzad and the cat Mr. Bigglesworth.

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The FPS, Darkest of Days, released in September, has just released updates and a level-editor for the PC version of the game.

The game updates consist of “Instant Action” gameplay that allows players to choose their favorite weapons and travel back to past missions with the weapons of their choice. The update also included support for fourth and fifth mouse buttons, a mouse smoothing option, fixes for hardware specific OpenAL and ATI crashes, and new PhysX system software.

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Recently, Nintendo’s CEO, Satoru Iwata, announced that WiiWare will be offering downloadable demos before the end of this month. This will include the online stores for both the Wii and DSi platforms.

Iwata realizes that the overall sales of the WiiWare games are very low while XBLA and PSN sales are very high. He believes offering demos will increase the WiiWare sales, but it may not be the ultimate solution. For now, only a small number of games will be offering a free demo. Nothing was mentioned as to if Nintendo will increase the amount of demos offered in the future.

This could be the beginning of more powerful marketing for the WiiWare store. Perhaps not enough to compete with XBLA and PSN, but it’s a start for sure.

[Source: Gamasutra]

Recently, Quantic Dream’s David Cage told G4 that they were working on a playable Heavy Rain demo for consumers. With all the anticipation and fan excitement surrounding the game, Quantic Dream is having a tough time choosing the right scene to demo. David had this to say about their decision-making troubles:

“If we show an action scene, some players will think that this is what Heavy Rain is all about, and it is the same thing if we show an exploration scene. The problem is that each scene of the game offers contextual game play, which is something very difficult to explain and convey in a single demo. Demos are often a double-edge thing: if you don’t release one, players may think that you have something to hide.”

Heavy Rain is scheduled for release in early 2010 exclusively for PS3, so here’s hoping the playable demo will be available before the end of the year!

[Source: Game Center Online]

Eufloria, previously known as Dyson, was created by Alex May and Rudolf Kremers. It made its breakout onto the gaming scene at the Independent Games Festival. It was designed as a simple, elegant, single-player RTS to attract both the casual and hardcore gamers alike within its asteroid plant growing theme. It is available for PC right now with plans to support Linux and Mac in the near future. You can download the game on digital download sites for $19.99.

Starting the game I was intrigued and eager to learn about the gameplay. In the background was playing a peaceful tune by Brian Grainger. Brian wrote the soundtrack for Eufloria, and it’s very zen-like. It perfectly encapsulates the ambient game idea that the creators are trying to create.

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Activision has announced a new downloadable pack for Marvel Ultimate Alliance: 2 for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

On Thursday, November 5th, this pack will feature new upgrades, missions, and the characters Psylocke, Carnage, Cable, and Black Panther. There is also one unannounced character that will likely be revealed once the download is available on the online stores. This upgrade to your game will cost 800 Microsoft Points on Xbox 360, and $9.99 on the PlayStation Store. Also, the character, Juggernaut, will be available by himself as a download on November 5th as well for 160 Microsoft Points, and $1.99 on the PlayStation Store.

Preview screenshots under the cut!

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Looks like everyone’s jumping on the overpriced special edition bandwagon these days. With Modern Warfare 2’s Prestige Edition pre-sells doing so well, my guess is Sony thought it would be a great decision to create their own more expensive than the average collector’s edition package for God of War III. To be honest, it seems like a very good decision on their part. There’s so my hype around the God of War series that putting out the Ultimate Edition will surely be a hit.

But are you getting your money’s worth? The Ultimate Edition has a price set at $99.99. It boasts a 8.3″ wide x 10.5″ long x 5.9″ tall “High-End Sculpted Replica of Pandora’s Box.” The rest of the contents are under the cut:

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As the Bethesda versus Interplay legal battle continues, Bethesda seems to have lost the preliminary injunction over rights for the Fallout license, according to No Mutants Allowed. This allows Interplay to continue working on the Fallout MMO, and because of this Interplay has started constructing concept art for the Fallout MMO.

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THQ released its newest installment of Drawn to Life today, Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter. It is available on Nintendo DS, and for the first time for the series, on Nintendo Wii as well. THQ is also introducing the new Action Drawing tool that will allow objects to be drawn directly into the game.

In Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter for Wii, players will be able to control and draw with their Wii remotes. Players can draw over 100 items to use throughout the game. The game will also feature multiplayer gameplay. This will allow players to draw what they need and go against friends in a variety of mini-games.

The DS version of the game is almost the same. The only major difference is that the Action Drawing Tool will assist players in solving puzzles as they progress through the game.

This new edition of Drawn to Life is rated E, and available on Wii for $49.99 and DS for $29.99.

Happy gaming!

Blizzard Poster, Daelo, announced the new set of Icecrown raid testing for this week! Don’t forget to leave your feedback on the official PTR forums if you’re going to be raiding Icecrown this week.

You can read the full post below with all the raid test times!

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Torchlight is a new dungeon crawler, action RPG similar to the Diablo series. It was developed by Runic Games which is comprised of designers that used to be a part of Diablo, Diablo II, Mythos, and Fate.

Basically, it plays very similarly, I’m hearing it plays almost exactly like Diablo as in it’s a classic dungeon crawler where you fight monsters and bosses, and collect loot. Right now it is released as a single player experience only, but there are plans to flesh it out to a full-fledged MMO down the line.

Now, there’s no need to go out and attempt to find a retail copy because you can purchase it via Steam for $17.99. The game releases tomorrow so log into your Steam account to pre-purchase the game and get ready for hours of loot whoring fun!

[Source: Diablo3X]

During a panel at the PLAY Digital Media Conference, Kai Huang, co-founder of Guitar Hero, said he is expecting the sales of DJ Hero to be slow at first. Huang stated, “Activision has its sights set on a long-term sales goal, and not the typical first month results.”

This makes sense when a game like this really relies on people actually trying it out first at a friend’s house or in-store demos. Huang said at the panel that Activision’s “strategy again is to focus on in-store demos” like they did with Guitar Hero.

Activision is hoping the sales pattern of DJ Hero will follow a similar one to Guitar Hero. DJ Hero is being marketed as a fun music game that you’ll love to play with friends so they’re really working hard on getting the demo systems out to stores and into people’s homes so they can ensure their long term goals with the game.

[Source: IGN]

Yesterday, Star Trek Online finally went into closed beta October 22nd after the long wait by fans. If you were lucky enough to be accepted head over to startrekonline.com to download and get started! If you haven’t, but you have signed up, keep checking your email because they will continue sending invites out periodically.

On the STO site there is a post by Rekhan how to tell if you were chosen for the closed beta, as not to get confused with scam emails:

“If you look to the right of the page, the ‘Closed Beta’ application graphic will change to indicate you’ve been accepted, if you’ve in fact been accepted. (It’ll read “ACCEPTED” in big, bold letters.)”

Don’t forget to leave your feedback in the STO forums!

[Source: Star Trek Online Official Site]

Directors, designers, and writers, a.k.a. the top “go-to guys” of Square Enix’s Final Fantasy XIII, Tetsuya Nomura and Motomu Toriyama, recently gave the Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu a few new details on the upcoming game.

A worry of consumers was extensive load time, since that seems to becoming more and more common in large games. Toriyama told the magazine that the game will only have minimal load times. Toriyama said, “the only load times you’ll have to endure is when you transition from town to field (and back again), because once you’re in a specific area, the game is seamless.” He revealed that the loading issues were taken care of early in developments to ensure a great experience for players.

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Today, Blizzard announced the first round of Icecrown raid testing on the Public Test Realm (PTR). For anyone that is living under a rock, Icecrown Citadel is going to be the final raid of the “Wrath of the Lich King” expansion for World of Warcraft, or so Blizzard tells us (I still have my suspicions about that). Daelodev from the US forums said in a post:

We are scheduling raid tests in Icecrown Citadel for October 21-22.

The schedule is as follows:

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