Here's some good news for all those pirate fans out there! Capcom has announced that it will be releasing Certain Affinity's Plunder for the PlayStation Network, Xbox Live, and PC. Best of all, it's slated for release this summer, so you won't have to wait very long to get it. More on the game after the jump!

Left 4 Dead (Microsoft Xbox 360, PC) takes survival seriously - this is what we learned after seeing another trailer packed with footage from Turtle Rock Studios, Certain Affinity, and Valve's squad-based shooter. You don't want to miss out on the zombie rush, so hit that jump for the video!

Certain Affinity reveals in the latest Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM) magazine that the company is working on a game to be released over Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network. The ex-Bungie developers are making a pirates-themed game with tile-based RTS elements and many influences from a famous 1995 board game. Find out more about the game in the full article.

Bungie's having a field day with H2O, adding whole new water effects for that superb splashy effect you've probably already seen in Baywatch (wait, you do watch it for the water, right?).  In fact, an effects artist has been focused on waterfall effects, with the bubbly foam, misty sprays and all that (wet) jazz. Vehicles and biped characters will all affect the water, from ripples to outright water spewing.

Weapons will sport some really nifty tricks to add that polished finish you've been wanting on your assault rifle for so long. And weapons on the ground now stand out, having some significant size increase as if it were telling you, "You know you want to shoot me...yes you do."

The shine finish comes at a minimal processing overhead cost so there won't be any noticeable frame-per-second drain on your beloved plasma screen. They've also been testing out some old and new maps, from a map codenamed Jub Jub to two new maps from Certain Affinity. But these are for Halo 2, which should be coming out to PC fans soon.

And those with depth-of-field (DOF) gripes with Halo 3's new visual repertoire on the Xbox 360, Bungie makes it clear: "We would never implement something in multiplayer that artificially obscured the player’s ability to decide what he or she was seeing." DOF is that photo-realistic blur effect you'd get when you focus your eyes on one thing and force the other to become some bland blob in the distance.

Bungie will be adding DOF effects to make Halo 3 look oodles better than the Mona Lisa, but it shouldn't deter you from picking off that frustrating sniper three clicks away. Most effects will need you to be stationary for a moment, so your eyes actually spot the effect. So no more complaints about the game blurring objects in-game, okay? And here, use this to wipe that smudge on your screen.

And, no, split-screen is not making a farewell performance in Halo 3. In fact, if you got anything bigger than your daddy's plasma tube, you'd love the new look of HD in split-screen. But there won't be any handicaps for folk who keep looking at the wrong half.

And remember Bungie's note on the mic-hogging, ear-bleed inducing players who shoot off more from their mouths than from their in-game pistol? Well, Frankie demonstrates how he can just plaster on some duct tape over their annoying muzzles, in less than a second:

1. Annoyed by player
2. Press BACK button
3. Right stick to select annoying player
4. X to mute

Voila. Fragging heaven without the ear bleed. Plus you can still hear teammates calling for reinforcements a few feet away.

The man heading the multiplayer team of Halo 2 and Halo 3, Max Hoberman, has sprouted his wings and departed the Bungie nest. He's created his own studio, Certain Affinity. But this bird hasn't flown too far away from home, at least not yet: Next-Gen tells us that Certain Affinity has entered into a strategic partnership with Microsoft and Bungie to develop 360-exclusive Halo 2 multiplayer maps. We can safely guess that it will not end there, and that Certain Affinity will also be working on Halo 3 maps post-release of that game.

For those who don't know, Hoberman was behind the team in charge of Halo 2's matchmaking and party system. He left Bungie after establishing the groundwork for Halo 3's MP system, and ten years working for them, though like we said, he isn't straying far from the nest. But Certain Affinity is also working on an as-of-yet undisclosed 360 game.

If anyone wants to speculate, here are some clues. The Certain Affinity team is composed of employees from companies such as Origin, Digital Anvil, and Bungie itself. Among them, their collective experience includes (according to Next-Gen): Ultima, Wing Commander, Myth, Asheron's Call, Freelancer, and the Ghost Recon and Halo series. Ideas, anyone?