Orange have announced the launch of Cannons Tournament, a mobile multiplayer game that allows up to four people to compete in real time across GPRS or 3G networks.

Cannons Tournament puts gamers in charge of a tank with the object of the game to hit your opponent before he hits you. As well as great gameplay and graphics, Cannons Tournament contains tons of weapon power ups and dynamic weather with gusting wind and even snow. Players can challenge other gamers who are online to play in multiplayer mode, or play against specially created bots on the multiplayer server. Between shots players can send instant chat messages, and can see how they rate against the top tank commanders on the daily, monthly and all-time high score tables.

DreamCatcher Games have announced a new combat RPG for release in the next year or so.

According to the DreamCatcher site, the game will be a new breed of epic Fantasy RPG, a unique combination of RPG and Fighter game action in full 3D, featuring a deep storyline shrouded in mystery, surprise, and betrayal. We shall see! Sounds nice, but I suspect it may prove to be another in the line of action RPGs; fun but just not quite enough for the RPG enthusiast to sink their teeth into.

'Dungeon Lords' blends the depth of an epic Fantasy RPG with the flexibility of an FPS-style control system. Gamers journey through a land of ancient castles and dungeon lairs to engage in real-time tactical combat with a variety of deadly foes. It's not just about the battles though, as magic spells and hundreds of powerful weapons and artifacts play a huge role in the game.

The game features an abundance of personal missions and quests along with numerous characters to interact with. A variety of extensive skills and special abilities are available to customize the hero from a variety of races and multiple class specializations. The simple and intuitive design will suit RPG and action fans alike and supports cooperative multiplayer for up to eight players.

Borrowed shamelessly from Games Press, here is this week's All-Formats Charts.

POS.	TITLE
1	Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow
2	James Bond 007: Everything Or Nothing
3	LMA Manager 2004
4	Far Cry
5	Norton Internet Security 2004
6	Sonic Heroes
7	Metal Gear Solid - The Twin Snakes
8	Battlefield Vietnam
9	Unreal Tournament 2004
10	FIFA 2004
11	SOCOM 2: US Navy SEALs
12	Finding Nemo
13	Need For Speed: Underground
14	This Is Football 2004
15	Cricket 2004
16	The Simpsons: Hit and Run
17	Counter-Strike Condition Zero
18	Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six 3
19	Deus Ex: Invisible War
20	Lord of The Rings: Return of The King

Click on the game name will take you to News0r's Game Page for the game.

Ubisoft has announced Settlers 5 (currently a working title) is in production at it's Blue Byte studios. The new version is due to be released by the end of th eyear - probably just before the christmas shopping rush.

The latest Settlers game takes the franchise and pushes it to the next level. Fans will enjoy fully animated 3D technology and enhanced gameplay features, but still be able to relive the experience that makes the Settlers series such a big hit. The game will take the player to a medieval setting, to re-conquer the kingdom currently under the domination of an evil tyrant.

Unsurprisingly, especially after all the recent coverage, Microsoft have reduced the price of the Xbox in the US to US$149.99, from today. The price changes affect only the US, Canada and Mexico at this stage.

Empire Interactive have unveiled - well almost - a new game called Mashed. A top-down racer, the game pits up to four players against each other in a gladiatorial racing battle extravaganza.

Compete over 13 challenging and diverse environments using whatever means necessary to batter and bruise your opponents into submission, and claim victory for yourself. Using a plethora of weapons or just your driving skills unleash your fury, cause absolute carnage and send your friends to a humiliating defeat!

Larian Studios, in consultation and agreement with publishers Hip Games and Digital Jesters, have delayed the North American and UK release of Beyond Divinty to allow additional time to re-record the voice acting within the game. Driven by concerns voiced by the Beyond Divinity fan base, Larian studios have delayed release until April.

'We are very sensitive about what our community thinks about our games, and when we saw they were all but pleased by the voice recordings, the decision to go back to the recording studio was easily made.' says Swen 'Lar' Vincke, project leader at Larian Studios. 'With the support of Hip Games, whom I really want to thank, and a crew of sound engineers and actors who were willing to burn the midnight oil on this, we'll manage to set straight something that could've gone very wrong. Voice recording all the dialogues in a RPG as extensive as Beyond Divinity was a very ambitious task, and we didn't get it right the first time. I'm happy we've been given the opportunity to rectify that.'

Games Radar are claiming to have PDF files containing leaked script elements from both Metal Gear Solid 3 and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, obtained from a Los Angeles-based casting agency.

Scripts that we've today obtained from a Los Angeles-based casting agency reveal parts of the storylines for two of the biggest PS2 games of 2004 - Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

While the MGS3 script appears to include actual dialogue taken from the game, the GTA scripts - that will be used to audition voice-actors for the game - instead make use of lines from the movies Human Traffic, Menace II Society and Colors.

• MGS 3 transcript


• GTA:SA transcript

Updted every so often...

Screenshots

A bug has been found in the recently released Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow for the Xbox. Selecting the Optimatch button on the Xbox Live screen, and leaving it highlighted for more than 10 seconds will apparently freeze the game solid.

The bug doesn't actually affect online play, nor does it happen anywhere else in the game. Ubisoft have already responded, saying a fix for the problem will be released shortly.

In some rather interesting news Macrovision have annouced they are going to hold an 'Anti-Hacker Uni' at E3. The idea behind this is to demonstrate some of the newest anti hacker technology. The technology, called Macrovision SafeDisc® Security API, is designed to stop people hacking into cd's to create 'free' games.

Albeit a good thing does this mean everyone attending E3 will be able to hack into games not protected by Macrovision?

Macrovision is accepting a limited number of registrations for Hacker University for qualified attendees for the program. Registrations may be made online at the Macrovision Website.

OK, not strictly games news, but this link popped up in discussion, and the originality and just plain cuteness of this case mod means we have to post it:

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