Recently, at the E3, Harmonix’s Rock Band swept the best awards, with both Joystiq and Game Critic Awards gave it the Best in Show Award.  Alex Rigopulos, CEO of Harmonix, stated at E3 that all the major tasks are complete, and that they are just fine-tuning Rock Band at this point.  Rock Band is currently slated for the Holiday Season.  Check out some of the in-game screens:

The graphics look a bit blurry to me!

But hey, big explosions are a plus.

Same old car-riding thuggery.

The real question is if GTA 4 will have another “hot coffee” incident or not!?

Sony has announced that its coveted PSP-2000 will be released in Japan on Sept. 20.  According to Joystiq, “[t]he handheld will release for ¥19,800 ($162) in six colors (black, white, silver and three pastels)”. 

And as for the actual technical specs of the PSP-2000, check out this post, which notes that its RAM has been doubled and that it can be charged over USB, among other things.  In the US, the PSP-2000 will ring up at the tidy sum of $199 for the entertainment pack, and $169 for the stand-alone unit.  Check out this photo of the manual for the PSP-2000:

For those about to rock, we salute the 80’s.  Rather than release a full-blown sequel to the Guitar Hero series, Harmonix developed an expansion that serves as a tribute to the short-lived hair metal era, calling it Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s.  And although this is the last Guitar Hero title that Harmonix is producing, it won’t be the last GH title; Activision’s Neversoft division will be taking over future GH game developing.  Furthermore, GH Encore will be hitting all the next-gen consoles, including the Wii.  Check out the following partial song list!

1. Opening Licks
“I Want Candy” – Bow Wow Wow
“Holy Diver” – Dio
“Metal Health” – Quiet Riot (Encore)

2. Amp Warmers
“Nothin’ But a Good Time” – Poison
“I Wanna Rock” – Twisted Sister

3. String Snappers
“Lonely is the Night” – Billy Squier
“Synchronicity II” – The Police
“Heat of the Moment” – Asia
“Shakin’” – Eddie Money
“Bathroom Wall” – Faster Pussycat (Encore)

4. Return of the Shred
“Round and Round” – Ratt
“I Ran (So Far Away)” – A Flock of Seagulls

5. Relentless Riffs
“Play With Me” – Extreme

6. Furious Fretwork
“18 and Life” – Skid Row

The following songs have yet to be categorized into stages:

“Balls to the Wall” – Accept
“Only a Lad” – Oingo Boingo
“The Warrior” – Scandal
“We Got the Beat” – The Go-Go’s
“Devil’s Night Out” – The Mighty Mighty Bosstones

There are 30 songs total, 11 yet to be announced.  They’ve also licensed the class Gibson Les Paul guitar for the next-gen platforms, which means that the unfortunate PS2 will get stuck with the Gibson Kramer.  Guitar Hero Encore will hit stores this June, and will be followed up in the fall with Guitar Hero III.  Check out the official Rock the 80’s website for more exclusive multimedia.

Joystiq just got their hands on four news screens of Rockstar’s GTA: IV, as well as some very interesting concept art and illustrations.  Check out the breath-taking screenshots first, then the concept art:

Grand Theft Auto IV looks like Gold!  We’ll keep you posted on the latest downloads and multimedia.

The president of Blizzard, Mike Morhaime says, “With StarCraft II, we’ll be able to do everything we wanted to do with the original StarCraft and more [...] We recognize that expectations are high following the long-running popularity of the original game, but we plan to meet those expectations and deliver an engaging, action-packed, competitive experience that StarCraft players and strategy gamers worldwide will enjoy.” And, judging from the in-game screens, it looks like Starcraft 2, if nothing else, will adhere to the sort of visual and gameplay standards that Starcraft established.

Here are some of the official Starcraft II screenshots and concept art. Check out the official website for more Starcraft II multimedia (including official trailers) and downloads.

We can’t wait for this to drop!!!

That’s right.  WoW: Burning Crusade, the official, and long-anticipated, expansion to World of Warcraft, is being released at many GameStop locations at midnight on January 16th, 12:01 AM.  Certain stores are pulling out all the stops for WoW: BC’s launch, with “costume contests, card game tournaments, screen-shot character judging, and more! Events will vary by location, check with your local store for more information.”

DigitalBattle has the word that the fan remake of the legendary N64 classic The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time in 2D has made progress.  The news come from a thread at SomethingAwful forums, which states:

Daniel Barras, an old friend of mine, has announced that Release Candidate 1 of OoT2D will be released soon. He’s waiting on his laptop to be airmailed to him (and he probably needs to put a couple finishing touches on it).

The game is basically the 2D translation of Ocarina of Time for N64. It will include everything from the original game, and i BELEIVE he was intentionally coding in the glitches found in 1.0 gold cart, but i’m unsure if this will still be a feature. It will also include a special dungeon and 3 extra items (i think it’s armor, boots, and another sword. The only thing i can say for sure is the armor).

Regardless of whether this project to remake the classic Zelda game is real or not, the screens still look great.  Check them the screenshots below:

Japanese PS3 owners recently discovered that Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, which was essentially a remade version of Tekken 5 with some new characters and modes, was available for download from the Playstation store at no cost.  The big difference in this version of Tekken 5, of course, is that it is High-Def (HD), running in 1080p.  There are many modes in this game, including arcade battle, ghost battle, versus battle, and a gallery for viewing and downloading images and movies.  At 830 megabytes and about $17 in value, Japanese PS3 owners must feel the Sony love.  Can’t wait for this one to come to the US!