Here's an update on the current DICE Summit 08: Roger Hector, Vice President of Development at Namco Bandai, gave a short talk on how video games have made fictional characters into living icons. He even mentioned one of the greatest icons living until now. Details in the full article.

Our intrepid hero from the 8-bit makes an appearance in another PlayStation Portable homebrew game by developer lukespalding, called Christmas Pac Man. Check out the full article for more info about the game.






Download: Christmas Pac Man

Moral Kombat has finally been screened, and straight after was the panel discussion between Jack Thompson and Lorne Lanning, co-founder of Oddworld Inhabitants. The debate was heated and filled with solid (and not-so-solid) arguments (complete with friendly jests and banter) from both sides.

No hair pulling, no punches thrown (except verbal ones, maybe). Read the full article for more details on the debate.

Another new homebrew game has been released on our PSP Development forums. This time, it's Pac-Man Pizza, a Lua-coded project from jfig111.

Pac-Man Pizza's gameplay is similar to that of Sonic Catch Those Rings. The objective in this game is to eat as many pizzas as you can. Each pizza is worth 10 pizza points, with the total points capping at 1000. The controls are as follows:

• Select = Quit
• Start = Pause Menu
• Circle = Only used to resume gameplay in menu
• Cross = Super Jump
• Directional Pad = Move around

To install the game, just extract the contents of the archive to your GAME folder. Download and enjoy.

Download: Pac-Man Pizza v1.1
Visit: QJ.NET PSP Development Forums thread

Ever wondered what playing tennis in space would feel like? More so, ever wondered what playing tennis in a quasi 8-bit Zero-G court would feel like? Namco Bandai's cooking something for you, and it goes by the name of Smash Court Tennis 3. Now, in light of the previous Pac-Man course we've shown the other day, we've got something from GameTrailers that features yet another mode in Namco Bandai's tennis title: Galaga Tennis Gameplay.

As the name of the video implies, that's just what this mode is all about - getting to play tennis in a Galaga-themed court. The interesting catch in this mode is that you have to "catch" you opponent: win against them to make the alien invaders take him/her away. The background is a mix of 8-bit and 3D object, and can get trippy at times, but hey!, that's the fun of it, of course!

Here's another sneak peek at Namco Bandai's tennis videogame for the PlayStation Portable. We've seen the customization videos and some gameplay - here's to three more videos of Smash Court Tennis 3 to show us what's coming on Q3 of this year.

We see the various tennis courts of Smash Court Tennis 3 on the first video. The second one is more interesting as it has the Pac-Man tennis gameplay. No, it's not Pac-Man holding the racket - he's the ball. The court is overlaid with the typical Pac-Man set and players accumulate points according to how much Pac-Man eats. The points are awarded to the player who gets the normal tennis point. The last one features more courts and some pro play.

Anyway, we'll get you more goodies on Smash Court Tennis 3. In the meantime, check out the videos. Enjoy!

More videos after the jump!

Thanks to German gaming site GameFront, we got a European release schedule for Electronic Arts titles today. Notable releases for this month are Burnout Dominator, Untold Legends, and Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars. Anyway, check out the full release list below.

May 3

• Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom (PS3)

May 10

• Burnout Dominator (PSP)
• Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars (Xbox 360)

June 21

• Sim City (DS)
• The Sims 2: Pets (Wii)
• Pac-Man Rally (PSP)

June 28

• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (DS, Wii, PSP, PS3, Xbox 360)

Homebrew developer shadow77340 (who is just a 14-year old French boy mind you), just updated Pspsokoban to v0.5 over at the QJ.Net Forums. This is a game that is pretty much straightforward - a mariosokoban port that remains faithful to the rules of the traditional Japanese transport puzzle game Sokoban. Having said that, don't get the impression that PSPsokoban won't be able to deliver a few surprises. According to shadow77340, there are 10 popular video game characters that appear in this homebrew including Link, Mario, Sonic, Pac-Man, Goku and others.

The official changelog for PSPsokoban v0.5 is as follows:

• A map edit
• A mode simulation to test your map
• Add 9 more level
• There is Donkey Kong Now
• The best score is now correctly saved ( thx to Zx-81 who help me for the functions atoi ... XD)
• We can displayed the best score in options
• There is more informations in the stats
• Savedata system when you press Start inside the game , and you can continue in the options

Lastly, the coder has a little request for those who are interested to give PSPsokoban a try. According to shadow77340, he accidentally deleted the game's source while in development so there's a possibility that you will encounter some bugs in this version. He would gladly appreciate it if you tell him so whenever you find one.

Download: PSPsokoban v0.5
View: QJ PSP Development Forum

TwitchGuru's got an interesting list up, chronicling fifty women in the gaming industry who've done something great in their time. Of course, all of them aren't real women, but they're still pretty cool.

The list includes all the favorites from games old and new, including Alyx Vance from Half-Life 2, Zelda, from her legendary namesake series, Aeris from FFVII, and even good old Kasumi, whose fame landed her a role as a bikini-clad volleyball player in DOAX 2.

Of course, these are mostly stacked towards some of the more recent games (No Ms. Pac-Man) and the prettier specimens of the female persuasion (No zombies), but it's still a good pick. Just be careful of that Alice girl... she's a whole load of scary in a little package.

Yashamaru just made a Lua version of the hit classic, Pac-Man. You see, Yashamaru over at our forums was working on "some old code" for a certain game. But then the game couldn't use that particular code, so he transcribed it to a Pac-Man ghost instead. One thing lead to another, and now, you have a beta version of Lua Pac Man up for grabs.

What can you expect from this version? Check out the list of features:

• Add Ghosts / (ghosts) AI
• Add maze / controls
• Add Power Pellets / Pellets
• Add Pac-Man
• Add function - eatable pellets / eatable power pellets
• Add function - eatable ghost
• Add function - kill Pac-Man / Pac-Man death
• Add Score / level / lives
• Add Sounds (most added)
• Add Free Life Bonus
• Add start intro / Game over screen
• Add level intermission A
• Add Fruit / Function - eatable Fruit

Features that we can look forward to in future updates:

• Add Vertical (Turn PSP) [Requested by: modcase]
• Add Music
• Add high score system
• Add level intermission B / level intermission C

Download: [Lua Pac Man v0.0 (Beta Version)]
Discuss: [Forum Release Thread]