It's common knowledge that the Christmas holidays are very important for boosting market sales. This also applies to the gaming industry, as Paul Hochman of Today notes. He writes that the big three console makers will be having some problems this holiday season, facing their "biggest shakeup in years," due to some deficiencies on each console maker's part.

For the Xbox 360, Hochman cites its persistent problem of product malfunctions - the now-infamous Red Ring of Death - something that Microsoft is scrambling to fix with an allocated US 1 billion budget and an extended 3-year-warranty. Microsoft also advised customers to wait at least one week while their console is being repaired.

In Nintendo Wii's case, all seems peachy for the console. However, there's one spot that Nintendo hasn't managed to fully fix, and that's undersupply.

With an almost chronic case of undersupply, the quest for a Nintendo Wii usually involves the following inconveniences: queuing...

For those who have been waiting for the release date announcement of BlackSite: Area 51, we have reports of a possible ETA. Our internet hamsters have found three sites with the same placeholder date for the upcoming video game from Midway Studios Austin.

GameStop and EBGames (naturally) agrees on one placeholder date for BlackSite: Area 51 for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC; Wikipedia also shows that same date. They all show a September release, September 3 to be exact. Hmm... We couldn't find an announcement for the original release date, though ThreeSpeech has also taken a swing for the Europe release: September 14.

We'll keep an eye out for that official announcement, until we find one, we'll pigeonhole this article in the Rumor bin. Stay tuned.

Hankering for more of LocoRoco's blobs of happiness, courtesy of Sony Computer Entertainment? We've got some for you! A video of the LocoRoco PS3 sequel, LocoRoco Cocoreccho, was shown in the Develop Conference in Brighton, and here's the video to prove it.

We can see the cute bouncing blobs of happy joy singing their way as they get buffeted to safety, and as always their song is catchy - maybe too catchy that hearing too much of it will cause the gibberish song to get stuck in your head.

As always, we'll keep you posted with the freshest info, so stick with us here at QJ. Meanwhile, sit back and enjoy the video!

 
Midway Games just announced that demos of Stranglehold (PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360) will be coming by August 8 for the Xbox 360 and PC. According to Cinder of the Midway Forums, they expect the demo to be up on Xbox Live by then, with the PC demo made available over the major download veins.

Last week, senior game designer Patrick Curry announced that Midway had completed the Xbox 360 demo version and submitted it to Microsoft for verification. They promised "tons" of gameplay in the demo, and Curry mentioned, "You ll be hard pressed to find a demo with this much gameplay crammed into it."

But still nowhere in sight is the PlayStation 3 version of Stranglehold, although it could be safely assumed that it will be out aroudn the same time (or relatively later) over the PlayStation Network. Curry, in fact, reassured PS3 gamers that it's in good hands, stating,"You PS3 owners don't start fretting, we're working on the PSN demo as I write this, and it s comi...

If you thought the Marvel movie and game craze is over after Spider-Man, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four did their numbers, you ain't seen nothing yet. 2008 will mark the big screen debut of Marvel mainstay Iron Man and like the other Marvel movies, he'll have a video game tied in with the flick. What you'll see below is an early gameplay demo with a walkthrough from the developers. Take a look:


The video features a lot of flying and busting done by industrialist-turned-armored-hero Tony Stark. Using Uni Beams and other weapons, he takes out power generators supplying electricity to a big laser cannon. It looks pretty fun beating on hapless humans in your cybernetic glory and it's building  up some anticipation for more on this title.

Activision used to do most of the development work for Marvel franchises but this time, it's Sega's turn to try its hand with Iron Man. The Japanese firm has purchased the rights to create the official game tie-in and this sho...

Fighting game fans waiting for a brawl game to set a steep bar on the Sony PlayStation 3 will have to wait a bit more for Namco's Tekken 6 to hit stores but Famitsu has something to help us chill out this weekend. Get a load of these Tekken 6 scans!

Details on this PS3 exclusive slugfest have been kept pretty much under wraps except for what seems like the addition of weapons and some new characters. These scans should help Tekken franchise veterans draw some theories on what's set for the new chapter in the series. Much to say, we're given the button sequences to execute each character's moves!

As reported previously, Tekken 6 is set on a war-torn world where Jin Kazama has taken over the Mishima Zaibatsu and declared it an independent nation. He's out to take over the world, and a fighting tournament is all that stands between him and his plans. Brush up those moves because this one's going to be one big fight.

   

Remember when David Jaffe, the developer of God of War and other highly-respected games, said that he has a big announcement to make? Well, he just blogged that he is leaving Sony to start his own company.

It will be known as EAT SLEEP PLAY and Jaffe will be joined by the founder of Incognito Scott Campbell in this endeavor.  So far, the company already has a  total of three game console/handheld exclusive deals with Sony.

David Jaffe mentioned that they are hoping to release their first original title some time in 2008. Waiting for that doesn't mean though that we'll be having some dry spells.

The company already plans on putting out a port of Twisted Metal: Head On to the PlayStation 2 this Christmas season.  Jaffe gave a few points on why this PSP to PS2 port will rock your socks off:
It has the original Head On title but it's now running at 60fps and has resed up textures as well as some gameplay tweaks.It has 5-7 levels from the neve...

N4G.com : Unreal Tournament 3 Shaky-Cam Footage from Comic-Con Tags: Sony, PS3, PlayStation 3

Quite a few analysts have given word that Sony has to drop the price of the PlayStation 3 once again to remain competitive with the Wii. This is despite the fact that the company has already slashed US 100 off the price of the console in the U.S.

Is another price drop from the company in order? Well, it doesn't look like this will be happening anytime soon as Sony President Ryoji Chubachi told Reuters during a gathering of business executives in the Shizuoka Prefecture in central Japan.

He said, "We've announced the price cut in the US and have no additional plans beyond that at this time". Sony recently announced though that the company has already sold 710,000 PS3 consoles during the April-June quarter.

It should be noted though that the Nintendo sold 3.43 million consoles in the same period, which could be attributed to the fact that the PlayStation 3 is still double the price of a Wii even after the price cut. However, a lot of people are expecting a ...

 
Remember the days of the Sega Rally coin-ops? Well, Sega is looking to resurrect the arcade racing video game in next gen. Earlier, the official website was released for Sega Rally Revo and it basically has all you need to know about the upcoming game.

Sega Rally Revo's official site features loads of stuff like game info, videos, screenshots, downloads, history, and blogs. They're all pretty much self-explanatory so we won't go into them all that much. The site is available in five different languages (English, German, Spanish, French, and Italian) so you probably won't have any trouble with the Flash on the site.

Anyway, watch out for more news and info about Sega Rally Revo (PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PlayStation Portable, Mobile and PC). Check out the official site by clicking on the link below.