The mega-delayed portable game is becoming the 'Duke Nukem' of the PSP. It was originally promised in 2005 and now looks like a 2009 release.

Read the sad news here.

When the first trailer hit last year (the one with the amazing roller coaster drive-by scene), I was a little skeptical. I just kept thinking, "there is no way the game is gonna look this good."

As each additional trailer was released, I lost the awe of original clip... right up to the release most recent trailer, which has worried me the most.

Is it just me, or has the game really been scaled-back in the looks department? I just don't think the same level of graphic next-gen-ness, that we saw last year, is in this latest trailer.

It's the TV marketing campaign for 'GTA IV' (and GameStop) that starting to reverse my trepidation. I love the style of ads and the ridiculously varied set pieces that are shown in the 60 second spots.

Here it is:

But something over the weekend pushed me into the same giddiness that I felt last year when I saw the first footage from the game: an interview with someone that's already finished the game on gamesradar.com. This is enough to make me wish April 29th was here now.

I'm easy, huh? But let's see how this goes...

I also explain why I think the latest rumors of a Blu-ray equipped Xbox 360 are hogwash.

If you're at all a fan of roleplaying games and own a PSP, then Crisis Core should be on your short list.

The fact that it's a prequel to FFVII is just icing on the cake.

I do think a full FFVII remake is probably inevitable, and I'd bet the only reason Square Enix hasn't given us one yet is because it wants to milk us for all the prequels, sequels and spin-offs that it can before finally putting FFVII to bed for good.

But Crisis Core really is a great game, shameless franchise whoring or not.

Here's a video from Square Enix that I've posted that shows how the real time combat system works.

It's like it's vibrating at me through the packaging!

You can get yours in a couple days for the outrageous price of $54.99, or buy the the Metal Gear Solid 4 limited edition PS3 console with DS3 controller in June for $499.

Either way, this puppy is gonna cost ya'.

UPDATE: Brian Crecente stole my headline! Just check the time stamp!

Apparently it was "Wii for Women" day at the store. I haven't heard of this concept. I thought Wii was for everyone. But, on March 30th, Wii was for women.

Here's the flyer for the event.

So what was the draw? Besides the event "focusing on women and... Wii," there also seemed to be a few dozen Wii's for sale beginning at 1:00 PM... which explains the large number of men in the "Wii for Women" line outside the store. Oh, and there were also prizes including spa packages and GPS units.

This brings up numerous questions in my mind, such as:

• When the #$%&! will Nintendo make enough Wii's for everyone? C'mon, it has been nearly a year and a half.
• Why do women LOVE Garmin GPS units so much (I know this from personal experience)?
• When is "Wii for Men" day?
• Why were Hawaii and Alaska excluded from this event... would they both not benefit from Wii, women, GPS's and spas?

Just wondering.

DOUG UPDATE: I guess I should have read Victor's article Saturday... that would have given me a clue!

It's a pretty pitiful confession and I have no sympathy for him, other cheaters, pirates or haxors. Especially haxors.

Read the sob story here.

Basically, Nintendo is shipping extra Wiis to Europe, because the strong Euro results in a bigger profit.

So at the bottom of the column, I made a joke about how you can blame the French for the Wii shortage.

Well, I got about half a dozen e-mails about that comment, including two from readers in Holland and one from a guy whose cousin in France sent him a copy of the column, and another from a reader in Canada, whose hackles were all in full OUTRAGE mode about my insult.

Hey, I'm just happy I've got an international fan club (well, a hate club, anyway).

UPDATE: Woot! I earned a Kotaku post! Where's the love for punchbutton, though?

Crave, part of CNET UK, put together a list of the 30 dumbest video game titles ever.

Some had me crying laughing; and I swear I own a few of these.

Check 'em out here.

Being good at 'GH' could become a career for some peeps!!

Here are the dates, times and locations for the (take a breath) Camp Jam and NAMM Present the “Ready-Set-ROCK! Tour,” a Free, Interactive Event Featuring Music Clinic with Rock Legend Jeff Carlisi, NAMM's Wanna Play Guitar? Program Featuring Guitar Hero™ III - Legends of Rock and Rock Solo Contest

Saturday the 29th:
• 3:00 p.m. at Murphy Music located at 940 Airport Fwy Irving

Sunday the 30th:
• 12:00 p.m. at Sky Guitars located at 531 N. Elm St. in Denton
• 3:00 p.m. at Guitar Center located at 2333 North Central Expressway #101 in Plano

I posted the press release with more info after the jump...

If you're in the Dallas area, and you're a 'Guitar Hero' axe-master, you might want to stop by Victory Park, near the American Airlines Center, a couple of hours before the next three Dallas Mavs home games (April 2nd, 8th and 10th).

Each night's top five finalists will win tickets to that night's Mavericks game and an opportunity to play on the main stage!

The overall winners will get a chance to compete for even more prizes on April 16th including a 'Guitar Hero' performance during a quarter break of a First Round Playoff game... GULP!

No pressure there....

Details after the jump.

Gamers that have been tampering with their Gamerscore and Achievement points can expect this:

• Resetting the entire Gamerscore for an account to zero
• The account will be unable to regain all previously obtained achievements and Gamerscore, however, the players will have the ability to gain future Achievements by earning them fairly, like the majority of the Xbox LIVE community does.
• The account will be clearly labeled as a cheater for the community to view on xbox.com. You can see an example here. In dash, the personal view of the gamercard will be labeled as well.

WOW! That's awesome.

PS: I'm not a cheater or a haxor. I just checked, my Achievement points are still there and still low.

I was just discussing with a co-worker that I have never been afraid to use my credit card info on any of my consoles, especially my PS3. So, wouldn't-you-know-it, the rumor that the PSN network might have been hacked pops up on Wired's blog.

I'm running home to change my settings!

I had a chance this weekend to test out a preview of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue for the PS3, which is itself a preview of the full version of Gran Turismo 5 (which will come out eventually, I guess).

Anyway, I enjoyed the preview, but didn't get to test the online features in GT5 Prologue, so fingers crossed that online racing will be seamless and painless.

One note about the preview that I didn't have room to include in my article in the paper: the lighting effects in Prologue are fantastic, especially when you speed out of a dark tunnel and are momentarily blinded by bright sunlight before your driver's eyes adjust. Very impressive.

I do think that Prologue buyers will also want to invest in the upcoming DualShock 3 controller, which contains the vibration technology that Sony foolishly dropped from the SIXAXIS.

While I quite enjoyed the preview version of GT5 Prologue and am looking forward to the full game, a lot of gamers probably have their attention focused on another racing title that also ships in April: Mario Kart for the Wii.

Simulation or arcade: take your pick.

And it's nice to see top-flight games coming out sometime other than the Christmas season so gamers don't have to horde all their cash for the last two months of the year.

Perhaps this essay from GameSetWatch can lend some useful perspective to those angry commenters.

What's interesting is that nobody has said my criticisms of the game are incorrect. Rather, I should love the game because everybody loves this game because it has Mario and everyone loves Mario and I SUCK!!!

Also, I'm a hater.

By the way, here's my column from Saturday about why it's still so hard to find a Wii.

And here's my column from last week, that I forgot to post, about how the PS3 is beginning to outsell the Xbox 360.