When I say there are slim pickings this week, I mean it. The home consoles only get two releases, and there are no new games at all for the Wii and PSP. There's also only one release on PC, but since it's The Sims 3, it's sure to sell a bucketload by its lonesome. The only console not experiencing a game drought this week in the Nintendo DS. There really are no slow release weeks for the DS in terms of quantity, really. Read on for a list of this week's game releases.

Christian Allen, an ex-developer for Bungie, remarks in an interview that Killzone 2 - the flagship shooter of the PlayStation 3 - could "totally be done on 360 if Guerrilla wanted to."

Details after the link.

THQ and Volition have followed up their announcement of the Saints Row 2 (PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PC) DLC with a firm and solid release date for the upcoming third-person action game, Red Faction: Guerrilla (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC).

PlayStation 3 faithfuls look to Killzone 2 as the Xbox killer. And the game is indeed, truly awesome. Even Microsoft officially congratulated Sony and Guerrilla Games for their work. But, surprise, surprise, Microsoft says they have something up their sleeve, something even better than Killzone 2.

Did you hear that? It sounded like a resounding b*tchslap.

Thanks to ackeejag for the tip!

Volition has released a new trailer for Red Faction: Guerrilla (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC) to celebrate the conclusion of the game's beta phase. The video's waiting at the full article.

EGM's resident rumor specialist Quartermann has set his eyes on Capcom, who has recently enjoyed success via its massive catalog of classic games. According to Quartermann in the latest issue of EGM, Capcom may be reaching into that classic gaming bag again.

You may love 'em or hate 'em but let's face it, the contributions of bosses to gaming are almost as important as those of the good guys themselves. In this edition of the QuickList, we're honoring the cream of the crop among the bad guys. The criteria? We scrutinized each based on what he had to offer and what he does best. Whether it's style, toughness or infamy, we took them by what they had to offer and we found 10 left standing. Again, this is all subjective and your opinions are as good as ours. Here they are:

10. The Polar Bear (Ice Climber)- After hours of grueling debates on the subject of whether he's even a boss or not, the Ice Climber Polar Bear has eked his way to a cliff-hanging tenth spot on this list. There's not a lot to say about him in terms of difficulty, but gamers from the past know what time it is when they see the hot, red briefs over the off-white fur. It means you're taking too long to climb and he'll force-advance the level with a jumping fart.

Usually, there's no problem getting to his face and pounding his toes with a mallet, but when playing with a friend or sibling, it sparks an unfriendly war of who gets to nail him. The only way to make sure that you do the honors is to sabotage your partner with guerrilla tactics like unorthodox body checks and busting the floors where they stand. We won't be surprised to hear about domestic violence resulting from this scenario.

The rest of the bad-ass bosses await after the jump!

Here's an idea to end all publisher base ideas - a non-profit game publishing company which will devote its revenues for charities and causes that it advocates.

Rookie game publishing company OneBigGame intends to do just that by embarking on a mission never before attempted by any developer- existing or otherwise.

The game company stated through a press release that the video game industry is among the largest entertainment markets in the world and has a great resource of creative material. It also exercises great influence over popular culture and that's where the company comes in.

By capitalizing on the market opportunity, the game can advocate the causes that it believes in and at the same time, generate revenues to aid charities in line with its vision.

"Over the past months, we have been conducting informal talks with a wide variety of games industry people, and we are confident the development community is ready for a large scale industry wide charity initiative," says Martin de Ronde, founder of the OneBigGame initiative.

Mr. de Ronde is recognized for his role in co-founding game outfit Guerrilla games which released titles Killzone for the PS2 and Shellshock for the Xbox. It is still unclear how details will work out regarding finances and charity, but expect more light to be shed when the company officially goes public in Game Developer's Conference 2007 in San Francisco.

It has been a month since Phantasy Star Universe was released for the Xbox 360, the PC, and not to mention current-gen PS2. Regardless of your chosen platform, we suggest to stop the banters now, be them friendly or otherwise, as we all just want to have a good time.

Anyway as we have said, the game was just released the past month and today, we got word that a number of downloadable contents are already up for fans to enjoy (dozens more are soon to follow). Most of the additions were done to areas and missions. Needless to say though, the two automatically entail new drops, items and materials which then can be used to make new weapons.

First of all, System Defense is a new mission to be carried near the confinement system in West Kugu Desert. Apparently, there's been an outbreak of vicious creatures and the Alliance Military needs reinforcements. Likewise, the mission Mine Defense involves an outbreak of creatures and players' objective are to defend the mine.

• Moatoob: Access Granted! - Due to increased guerrilla fighting between rogue groups on Moatoob, GUARDIAN forces have had limited access to the planet. With the escalating SEED crisis currently affecting more and more of the Moatoob wildlife, rogue groups have reached a cease fire and are now requesting aid. Flyer routes to Moatoob have been re-secured for GUARDIAN missions and will be available on November 17.
• New Guardian Missions - Since the SEED attacks, the native life of all three planets has grown increasingly aggressive and Moatoob is not the only planet in need of GUARDIAN assistance. Parum and Neudaiz are also requesting additional support in a variety of new missions. All GUARDIANS are expected to launch an offensive on the incoming enemy hordes as soon as possible.
• Valley of Carnage - Recently, the vicious Vanda have been forming packs and causing great damage around the Galenigare Canyon. Defeat the Vanda leader!
• Desert Terror - In the West Kugu Desert, the vicious Dimmagolus has become even more ferocious due to the SEED and is terrorizing a nearby energy plant.
• Parum and Neudaiz - Not to be left out with the addition of Moatoob, both Parum and Neudaiz have new missions for GUARDIANS. On Parum, new reports have come in of a very large Koltova spotted beyond the Lakeshore area. All GUARDIAN parties should exercise extreme caution if this beast is encountered.
• On Neudaiz, an area of Sacred Ground is in jeopardy! All GUARDIANS are requested to assist in clearing a dangerous RELIC site. This dangerous mission will take a strong party with excellent teamwork. We advise that only the strongest of GUARDIANS attempt this challenge.

For some people, gaming isn't an escape. It's infiltration and warfare. In a recent article from the Escapist, we find out that this is the life of online guerrilla marketers, and you can bet that you've probably already met some of them online.

"Jack" is an expert in a unique kind of online fraud. Jack spends weeks trying to infiltrate online communities and gaining the trust of others. Maybe he's spent weeks giving fair, unbiased advice. Then he inserts a recommendation: buy this game. And everybody believes good old unbiased Jack. And nobody suspects that Jack has been hired by the game's publisher or developer to pimp the game. Nobody suspects that they are being controlled.

And "Jack" is good at what he does. If the community is mostly young 15-year olds, he blends in. He says that his personalities range from a 10-year-old girl to a 78-year-old man across different ethnicities, stereotypes, and ages. "It's evil," he says. "I'm evil."

"I will make you buy this commercial item or visit some site using any means necessary."

According to our official QJ Dictionary of Mental Health, escapism is avoiding reality by indulging in an entertaining or imaginative activities. So, whenever you don't do your errands because you are busy playing video games, Dr. Phil and Oprah would call that escapism.

So there's a very sick betrayal there: we enjoy video games because they let us escape reality; we become somebody else in another world where we have big guns or swords or muscles and it's perfectly healthy to blow up your enemies and it's easy to tell who the "good guys" and "bad guys" are (yes, we sometimes bring in reality and have huge arguments about consoles or whatever, but for the most part, we just live to play).

We are escapists. And in the end, we fall prey to the advice of people who are only pretending to be escapists like us; people who have studied us, pretended to be our friends, know too much about us, and know very well which products are paying them for real.