Over at Cheap Ass Gamer there is a forum regular by the name of Speedy1961 who regularly posts early pre-release leaks of ads from Circuity City, Target and Best Buy. He's been doing it a long time and appears to be extremely reliable. And he just released the information on the Circuit City ad for the week following E3 and guess what appears? The oft rumored 100 dollar price cut on the PS3.

People have been calling for a price cut since immediately after last year's E3 and their voices have reached a deafening crescendo recently, so it is by no means a big surprise that Sony would drop the price. Unfortunately, this is still going to be filed under the 'Rumor' category because of the lack of hard evidence. Some supposed scans have shown up on the net, but they're a bit dubious. Also there is confusion over whether or not this is a permanent price cut. It seems absolutely insane that it wouldn't be; a temporary price cut (one week) would just aggravate things. We'll find out next week for sure though!

Showing on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, the latest episode of Gamer TV will be a Heavenly Sword special. The show will feature developer interviews as well as new footage from the game. There will also be an interview with Andy Serkis and some critical discussion of how the game is looking.

This is a great opportunity to get an in depth look at the game before E3 hits next week. Gamer TV will be showing on Bravo at different times throughout the weekend. Look below for details and when and where it will be airing.

• Saturday: Bravo 2 @ 10am
• Sunday: Bravo @ 11:30am
• Monday: Bravo @ 5:30pm

The PlayStation.Blog's "Inside the Developer's Studio" feature continues in its run up to E3. On July 2nd Brian Allgeier was interviewed about Ratchet and Clank. On the 3rd, Seth Luisi spoke about SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation.

Seth is very much enjoying the PS3's polygon pushing power, claiming that they are working on producing "intricate and highly detailed urban environments." Characters are also going to be visually impressive, with "skin shaders, cloth shaders, normal maps, and highly detailed textures" making them look scarily realistic. Seth also sings the praises of the PS3's native HDD, reiterating the argument that knowing that all consumers will have a hard drive allows them to utilise it in ways which improve the overall game experience.

Read the full interview over at PlayStation.Blog for more pre-E3 hype. Also, don't forget about the PlayStation Flickr account, which is being continuously updated.

The UK high street store GAME has today said that the PS3 is responsible for over half of its like-for-like sales boosts since the beginning of the year. GAME have seen a 74.1% increase in total group sales for the first 22 weeks of the year, with a 46.6% like-for-like sales boost in the same period. Of this 46.6%, 22.5% is attributed to PlayStation 3 hardware, software and peripherals.

This is great news and shows that the PS3 is still going strong here in Europe. When the really huge games start getting released, no doubt we'll be seeing an even larger increases in sales, particularly hardware. Peter Lewis comments on this, saying that "higher volumes of new generation platforms will increase hardware participation in the sales mix for the year to January 2008." Which is flowery-speak for "hardware will make up a larger part of overall sales in the next six months," which makes sense. As the end-of-year games splurge occurs, more people will be persuaded into buying consoles.

This post serves as a sort of double-whammy. A really cool new trailer of Metal Gear Solid 4, rumored to be voiced in English, will appear at E3. This trailer will appear at the "Sony and Konami Conference" portion of the Electronic Entertainment Expo. This will probably be the only place MGS4 will pop up, so, sorry 360 owners, but we don't think you'll get that MGS4 on 360 announcement just yet.

The trailer is, as we've said, supposedly voiced in English, but also will detail an entirely new environment. We'd been wondering when Snake and the gang would get out of the dismal, cow-robot overrun city. Chances are, though, it won't be horribly different from what we've already seen. It's rare that Kojima and crew show off later parts of a game before the release, but we might get a glimpse of what to expect. Perhaps something a little more futuristic than a middle-eastern city? Like ... a space station! That'd be a change.

[Thanks, TheGuy!]
[via NeoGAF]

It's a pretty glorious thing to see Trauma Center: Under the Knife and any other FPS combine into what can be described as a horrifying mess. We mean that in the best possible way -- it's a terrifying experience to sit down in the middle of a hectic battlefield so you can operate on your buddy who has a bullet lodged in his stomach, heart, leg, etc. Of course, to get to this juicy footage, you'll have to suffer through 1UP's narrative and discussion with some folk at EA. But even so, it's worth a watch. The footage of the game looks amazing. Army of Two looks to be interesting stuff and we're going to keep an eye on it.

[Update: removed WWII from the FPS analogy -- Army of Two is not set during WWII, but when we think FPS, that automatically springs to mind. Especially under the watchful gaze of EA.]

You can't really see it, but the subject line is supposed to come off in a snide way. First off, if you're planning to be the end-all to FPS titles, selecting World War I probably isn't the best choice to make. Can you say "yawn"? Sure, it's not WWII, but seriously, dig into a trench and sit there blindly firing for a few hours? We're not being facetious. Developers Kuju want to create the most accurate representation of the conflicts in Europe ever made.

Publisher Ghostlight explains further: "Period locations will be recreated in lavish detail, only weaponry of the time will be available and character design will reflect the uniforms and style of the era ... we believe that To End All Wars will be an exceptional title that will form the basis of a new gaming franchise." Who knows, maybe it will. Perhaps a realistic recreation of a dirty, violent struggle is just what FPS titles need. We still think WWI isn't the best choice for recreation. Trenches are scary, but perhaps that's the draw. What do you guys think?

In addition to the nifty trailer we've embedded for you, we've got some more information regarding the Square Enix title Romancing SaGa Tactics The Last Remnant. No, we're not going to blab about the characters or basic plot (other than the kidnapping of your younger sister Irena). What we've learned is that there is only one main playable character, Rush Sykes, not two as previously rumored.

Even so, expect large-scale battles with numerous personalities instead of faceless infantry. If you played any of the old Ogre Battle games (which had subtitles named after many Queen songs -- March of the Black Queen, for example), imagine that. What we mean is a "main" character surrounded by some faceless infantry. With that, you'll imagine a fairly turn-based battle system with some more cinematic "realistic" experiences, such as the morale bar and some actions to take in the middle of something else (during a fight sequence, you may get some button cues to unleash a flurry of extra moves, increasing said morale bar). That's all we're going to say for now. Enjoy the trailer and we'll keep you up to date!

Here's a news piece that will be a joy for your hands. You may use them to clap softly to yourself if you'd like, but we prefer shaking them violently as if they were holding a rumble controller with Sixaxis capabilities plus touch sensitivity. At the same price as current Sixaxis controllers. PSM France report that this so-called "Touchsense" ability gives a new sensation to the last-gen rumble we're used to. Random shaking caused by two twirling hammers or whatever. So lame! This new rumble allows your hands to grab a sensation from not only the handles, but through the "levers" as well. We're fairly sure that means the analog sticks. They're kind of levers.

The rumor spawning this information states that the cost to manufacture all this new technology is actually cheaper than previous rumble mechanisms, thus adding very little cost to the Sixaxis, if any at all. Along with this little tip, it seems PSM France found it prudent to claim an upcoming firmware update will enable rumble for backwards compatible titles. We'll see if these rumors are true at E3 next week!

[via Joystiq]

LucasArts is making a game called Fracture. We've covered it once or twice before. We're really excited about it. Taking that into consideration, when we read a new preview of the title, our excitement grew even more because the terrain deformation mechanic is starting to make more sense to us. We'll explain how it works without going into all the back story -- read that if you want. What we will tell you is the visuals look sharper and resolutions higher than 720p are being considered.

You can carry two weapons at a time, along with four types of grenades. Each weapon has a primary (shooting) feature and a secondary. The secondary features primarily (get it?) deal with terrain deformation -- the machine gun will chip away at the ground, making a staircase on a steep cliff. The shotgun bullets bounce off walls and the rocket launcher creates a subterranean torpedo. Another weapon serves as a type of vacuum, sucking up dirt and debris into a gigantic ball, then rolling it into enemies for an eventual explosion. The grenades serve different purposes as well, mostly for terrain deformation. They're really cool sounding, but that's for you to read up on. Look for the game in early 2008 as well as more coverage over E3!

Behold. The first gameplay footage from Rock Band. The great thing about this video is that it shows what's going on off-screen as well as on-screen. Though the people playing are a little over the top, they're also very good. That song looks incredibly hard, for all involved.

The drumset pleases us. Especially after the worries we had when we head it described as a "dinner tray stand". It's also great to see that you can use wooden drumsticks, which means that the hardware will have to be fairly well built. This game presses all of our buttons and we can't wait to see more. Here's hoping some song titles are released during E3.

It's nice to see Turok come back from the horrible spiral it started to take after the first games. IGN got to test ride the dino-hunter title recently and their verdict is what we wanted to hear: "beyond sweet." Let's explain. The jungle you're stuck in on some foreign world is alive with options. Two soldiers approach your hiding place. Shoot them? They'll sound the alarm and waves of enemies will come, not to mention dinosaurs who grow hungry and like loud noises. Bow and arrow them? Yeah, but that's boring. Sneak around and knife 'em? Nah! How about you stick a silencer on your gun, aim carefully and shoot the nearby dinosaur egg nest, and watch the mother run out and feast on the intruders walking by? Now that sounds fun!

Much like plenty of other FPS titles out there, every weapon comes with a secondary fire option and each of these can be used appropriately in a multitude of situations. We hope Tek Arrows come back. Those were nifty. In addition to secondary fire on your weaponry, you'll have context-sensitive commands if you want to, er, "stealth kill" a dino, or if a dino is trying to eat your face. Sounds good, but might be a bit time consuming in those 16-player online matches complete with dinosaurs to kill everyone.

We're cautiously optimistic. The game sounds glorious, looks fantastic and from the hands-on, we get the idea the game has a lot going for it. What could ruin it? Not poor A.I., as it's being touted as something to be reckoned with. Length of the game? Nope, the online mode sounds unique and fun, too. We're not sure, but we think that this new Turok game will indeed bring the series to a new beginning and it will rock.

An interview in this month's PlayStation Magazine held a couple revelations. First, Sony doesn't shell out money to keep a game exclusive, or buy exclusive content to make a game seem better on their console. Second, Jack Tretton feels Sony is the "middle ground" for gaming -- we'll explain in a bit. We're not sparking this flame -- this is Tretton himself and we honestly couldn't agree more with him.

In the interview, Tretton said "We have a very different approach to exclusives than some of our competitors. We don't buy exclusivity. We don't fund development. We don't, for the lack of a better term, bribe somebody to only do a game on our platform. We earn it by saying "you can build a better game on our platform. If you focus your development on our platform, you will ultimately be more successful." We believe him. Even if, over the next few years, only half of the PS2 owners of the world adopt a PS3, it will be the most successful machine this generation and spending, say, $50 million dollars to some company for exclusive downloadable content would be completely meaningless.

Tretton also touched upon what exclusive games meant to Sony. "You know, if we were working on three games, it doesn't make for a very big exclusive list, but if we got 15, we've got a larger exclusive list before the third party comes to you with an exclusive. You almost get to the point where Nintendo's at, where they can do it without the third parties, but I don't know if that makes for a healthy environment. I think we sit perfectly in the middle. Microsoft is too dependent on the third-party community, and Nintendo is too dependent on first-party. We like to feel that we got a pretty good mix." Nobody can deny this. Tretton hit the nail on the head. Even though the price is high, even though the big library of games is still a month or two away, that is the reason Sony will continue to pull through. They don't, as the old saying goes, put all their eggs in one basket.

[via Joystiq]

The HD war over real estate in your living room just hit a new milestone with Sony Pictures Home Entertainment's recent claim of just how successful the European launch of the PS3 was. Citing a 1000% increase in Blu-ray movie sales since the European launch of the PS3 in March, the boys (and girls) in the Sony camp are certainly smiling. Sony Pictures also mentioned sales of their movies account for 50% of all Blu-ray movies sold in Europe, thanks in large part to the permeation of their strongest release to date, Casino Royale.

Other top-selling HD discs include The Departed, which previously enjoyed the top-selling Blu-ray movie slot prior to Casino Royale's runaway truck-like sales growth, and the fantastic BBC documentary Planet Earth. Both highly recommended, no matter what side of the HD fence you happen to fall on.

Ryan Hamlyn, associate producer on Lair, has written a post on the PlayStation.Blog explaining that the game is nearing completion and on track for its August 14th release date. Hamlyn has been playing the game for a while now and claims that the more he plays this game, the more fun he's having.

The post also includes a short explanation on how they developed some of the larger creatures for the game, including the "Spiderwasp" shown above. It may be hard to see clearly at such a low resolution, so check out the official PlayStation.Blog Flickr account (just goes to show that Sony truly appreciate Web 2.0) , where all the screenshots from the "Inside the Developer's Studio" feature have been put up at full resolution. Simply click "all sizes" above the picture to view it in different sizes, including 1920x1080.

Finally, the official Lair website is up, with exclusive new videos and "other cool content". It's pretty exciting to see the first non-launch AAA exclusive for the PS3 nearing completion. We just can't wait to finally play it.