Missed this yesterday... the European patch for Battlefield 1942 has finally surfaced after the US was attended to earlier in the week. Battlefield 1942.co.uk has links to a mirror ...love 'em.

According a post on SimHQ.com Razorworks are preparing the source code from Enemy Engaged: Commanche vs. Hokum for public release.

For the uninitiated EE:CvH is probably one of the best, if not the best, helicopter-battlefield simulations ever made for the PC. The quality visuals and interactive battlefield environment the sim created have yet to be bettered in the genre and it's going to be interesting to see what the still active EE:CvH mod community do with the source once they have it.

I for one would love to see a new patch to sort out the last few little niggles and add a proper dedicated server - a flight sim milestone that the game came close to reaching but fell at the last furlong with usability and remote support (that old chestnut).

Reviews

Those splendid souls at CDV have sent along four new screenshots of the seriously unF'y Breed for you to drool over. This game just looks more and more gorgeous everytime I see it:

Previews

It seems that Rally Fusion: Race of Champions will not see the light of day on the GameCube after Activision, the games publisher, announced the projects cancellation yesterday citing "unforeseen problems in development" as the reason.

GC rally aspirants will now have to wait for Colin McRae Rally 3 to get a decent taste of mud and track based love, at least all the signs currently indicate that the wait will be worth it.

Publishers Xicat Interactive have announced that the previously PS2 only racing title Lotus Challenge is now heading for the Ninty GameCube and should be shelf side in March of next year.

The game will include 15 tracks in different real world locations and feature a story mode comprising stunts and missions as well as a full line-up of Lotus cars.

Checkout the games website here for more information.

The eagerly anticipated Metroid on the GameCube has apparently managed to shift a quarter of a million copies in the U.S. in one week since its launch according to this piece on Allcube.com.

The appeal of Metroid coupled with the appeal of the other big GC exclusive at the moment, Resident Evil Zero, has (according to at least some stores) pushed the GC into second place for system sales behind the all powerful PS2 leaving the Xbox to play catch-up on its home turf.

It remains to be seen if the recent launch of the Xbox Live multiplayer service will affect these figures in the longer term however, the post Christmas analysis is going to be a very interesting time indeed.

Previews

Funcom have announced that the planned launch of Anarchy Online: The Notum Wars has been delayed from Thursday, November 28^th by one whole day to 9am (GMT) Friday, November 29^th. The delay has been put in place to ensure as many people who have preordered the Booster Pack will have it in their hands when the new version launches. A combination of distribution delays and the US Holiday (Thanksgiving) is being named as the cause.

In support of this, all Anarchy Online servers will be taken down for patching for approximately 3 hours on the 28^th, beginning at around 11am GMT. Along with this, all Level 1 characters that have not been logged in during the past three months will be deleted from the database. Players wishing to retain these characters should ensure they log in before tomorrow.

It also appears the Notum Wars beta servers have been shut down.

The NEC in Birmingham has noticed the huge popularity of computer games and has decided to create an "interactive experience for consumers to come and play, and compete on, the latest games", and that "give the industry a big audience of enthusiastic games players and, perhaps more critically, also deliver those youngsters who are entering the market for the first time", which translates roughly as a new Computer Games Show.

To be held between the 25^th and 27^th of June in halls 10,11 and 12 of the NEC, XSGameshow is conveniently placed between E3 in Los Angeles and ECTS in London. A website dedicated to the show has launched at www.xsgameshow.co.uk although all it contains besides the flash front page is a basic "Register for More Information" type page.