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BioWare’s epic fantasy RPG Dragon Age: Origins has been out for almost a week now, and just in case the game wasn’t occupying 100 percent of your time, BioWare has gone ahead and released the PC toolset to give all you skilled community members the chance to tell your very own mythical tales.

Thanks to camera, voice and lip-synch controls, the combat and creature AI tools, and a full character creator, you can create your very own cut-scenes, quests and campaigns. Once you're ready to share your epic fantasy stories with other players, you can upload them via BioWare’s Social Network. The toolset is only available for the PC, and it will remain so for the foreseeable future.

Have you tried out the toolset yet? How are you finding it?

Infinity Ward has made only 3 games in their 7-year history, but you can't deny the impact that those games have made -- not just from a financial perspective, but also on the first-person shooter genre. The battle scenes in Call of Duty, Call of Duty 2, and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare played with our expectations, put interesting twists on conventional shooter design, and ratcheted up the intensity level. As evidence, we submit to you our Five Favorite Call of Duty Moments (as developed by Infinity Ward). By clicking on this story, we're going to assume that you're not averse to Call of Duty spoilers, so no complaining!

COD Videos   |   COD2 Videos   |   COD4 Videos

Number Five:  "Car Ride" -- Call of Duty

The opening of Call of Duty has you go through the requisite movement and weapons training, and then drops you right into the fray of France. The first few mission objectives, while intense, are standard enough…that is until you hop into the car with Pvt. Moody. This is our first glimpse at IW's ability to design those rollercoaster moments, with the car careening through the countryside, weaving through German defenses and narrowly avoiding the business end of a Panzer tank. The opening statement was clear: "This is what we're doing with Call of Duty. Enjoy."

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If you want to take a crack at Zipper Interactive’s massively multiplayer first-person shooter, MAG, before the current fourth beta phase ends on Nov. 20, then Zipper’s senior community manager Jeremy Dunham wants you to know it’s not too late. You just need to preorder the game at GameStop (or EB Games in Canada), and you’ll receive access.

Over at the Official PlayStation Blog, Dunham highlights a few of the more than 6,000 changes that have been incorporated into the newest beta phase. Some of the improvements include:

• Increased level cap from 40 to 60
• Retooled skill tree and experience curve
• Improved ranking system
• Improvements to character hit detection and reactions
• Skill tuning that sees many of the existing skills amped up
• Refined Leadership abilities and experience points
• Proximity chat feature “that allows you to hear enemies communicating as you get closer, or trash talk them yourself as you punch ‘em full of lead.”
• Shadow War bonuses – “Depending on which PMCs are leading in the number of contracts owned, the entire PMC will earn different bonuses based on gametype. Leading in Sabotage adds experience points, leading in Acquisition increases leadership aura distance, and leading in Domination decreases tactical strike cooldown time.”
• Beta now playable 24/7

Anyone participated in the MAG betas? What are your impressions at this point?

Source: PlayStation Blog

Even though Electronic Arts says they're happy with their most recent financial performance, EA CEO John Riccitiello blamed struggles to succeed on the Wii as a continuing issue for the company. Riccitiello pointed to the disappointing sales of Madden NFL 2010, a game he called "very, very strong," as something EA needed to work on solving hand-in-hand with Nintendo themselves.

"To be honest," he said, "the Wii platform has a been a little weaker than we had certainly anticipated and there's no lack of frustration to be doing that at precisely the time where we have the strongest third party share. We're reaching out to Nintendo to find ways to partner to push third-party software harder. I frankly think they [Nintendo] need more beats in the year than what they get out of a first party slate to be able to have the Wii software platform perform as well as they would like."

Such criticism comes not long after Nintendo president Satoru Iwata admitted Wii sales are "not healthy," especially in Japan, and much of the blame falls on software failing to excite users.

This wasn't a complaint EA had earlier this year, after seeing initial blockbuster sales for EA Sports Active, seen as a complement to Nintendo's own Wii Fit. EA Sports Active did well enough that EA actually moved development staff off Grand Slam Tennis on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 to beef up the team working on the recently released expansion pack for EA Sports Active.

"Wii is where we're missing it," said Riccitiello, echoing previous statements. "I really do think that the opportunity exists to find different ways to partner with the first party [Nintendo] in this case to help establish in the minds of the consumer legitimacy of some of these other brands when they're going out multi-platform because very, very few multi-platform titles are succeeding on the Wii so far."

Riccitiello argued that Nintendo needs to take the lead on making consumers more aware of great games on their platform, games that aren't necessarily made by Nintendo. EA has remained one of the most bullish third-parties on Wii, but in addition to lower-than-expected sales for Madden NFL 2010, Dead Space: Extraction underperformed in its first month, too, selling just 9,000 copies.

"Collectively," he continued, "Electronic Arts and Nintendo need to tackle that."

Have something to share? Have a news tip? E-mail me. You can also follow me on Twitter.

Electronic Arts has been quiet about the Medal of Honor franchise for a while, allowing Call of Duty to remain the leader in that genre of the shooter. That's going to change soon, however. On an investor call today, EA Games label head Frank Gibeau teased a "revitalization" of Medal of Honor to be revealed soon. No other details were revealed about this new take on Medal of Honor.

Gibeau said the company's approach to Need For Speed kicks off a new initiative to "revitalize blockbusters" experiencing creative stagnation. EA considers the Need For Speed experiment a success and will extend the concept not only to Medal of Honor, but other "core IPs" from EA.

Gibeau made it sound like we would hear about these in 2010.

It was originally believed the economic recession wouldn't affect video games much. That prediction proved to be very, very wrong. Electronic Arts is one of the companies that's been deeply affected, prompting the company to announce plans to layoff 1,500 employees. Discussing these issues and how EA will react to them going forward, EA CEO John Riccitiello outlined several areas the company sees as advantages in 2010 and beyond: price cuts, digital sales and motion controls.

Riccitiello brought up digital sales a number of times, declaring EA a company that needs to move beyond just delivering packaged goods at retail and achieving a balance between these traditional sales and digital sales. The executive believes gains in the digital side in 2010 will actually offset dips in the retail sector, encouraged by EA being a "leading layer on the digital direct side of the industry."

Most digital sales come from the PC side right now, sans some experiments by both Microsoft and Sony on their respective services. But EA sees opportunities there with further iterations on the price cuts introduced by Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo in the past few months.

"[There is] room on the console price points," said Riccitiello, pointing out that most hardware sales take place once consoles have moved to the $199 and below price point.

Additionally, Riccitiello believes both Project Natal and Sony's motion controller will extend outreach.

"[These add-ons will] bring new consumers to the market ... and extend the cycle."

It's Monday, and that means it's time once again for us to take a look at some of the new releases hitting store shelves this week.

Well, the wait is finally over, and what could end up being the biggest game release ever is just a few hours away. Infinity Ward's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 arrives tonight at midnight, marking the potential end of jobs, relationships, and pretty much all other forms of responsibility that devoted gamers might have. For Wii and Nintendo DS owners, you’ll be feeling the Modern Warfare love as well in the form of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Reflex and CoD: MW Mobilized.

If the whole military combat thing isn’t your style, then there are a few other titles coming out this week that you might want to check out. Chaotic: Shadow Warriors could be worth a look, just because it's one of Activision's other games being released this week. If you're looking for a little nostalgic gaming with modern console upgrades, then you'll be pleased to know that the classic Nintendo racer Excitebike hits WiiWare in the form of Excitebike: World Rally.

PlayStation 3

• Buzz! Quiz World
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
• Chaotic: Shadow Warriors
• Dragon Ball: Raging Blast

Click through to see new releases for Wii, Xbox 360, DS, PSP and PC.

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Attention all Vulcans, Wookiees and Midi-chlorians: The launch date for Star Trek Online is officially February 2, 2010 in North America, and February 5, 2010 in Europe, according to developer Cryptic's website.

More than any other sci-fi property I can think of, Star Trek is perfect for an MMO. The shows' main themes of exploration and inquiry fit in perfectly with a no-real-plot MMO, and the interchangeable nature of the crews of the different ships on the Star Trek TV programs means it makes sense for different personalities to live in the Star Trek Online universe.

That show has always been about a collective (The Federation) as opposed to being about individuals like, say, Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings. The game allows players to be members of alien races, as well as human, so Klingons are in luck!

Anyway, I'll be there at launch, pretending my desk chair is the captain's throne and yelling "Engage!" at my cat. What about you? Are you tired enough of World of Warcraft to give Star Trek Online a go?

With the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 tomorrow, the good people at X-Play have decided that one very lucky person out there in Internets-land requires a Limited Edition Xbox 360 Modern Warfare 2 console of their very own, along with a 250GB hard drive to store all of your bloody missions, two new controllers, and a copy of the game.

Entries will be accepted until Thursday, November 12th, at 11:59PM Pacific Time, so make sure you enter X-Play's Modern Warfare 2 Xbox 360 Limited Edition Console Sweepstakes now! 

There's only one prize, and the total value of the prize package is $399. Good luck!

It's bad news for 1,500 employees at Electronic Arts.

The company announced plans today for a "headcount reduction" (read: layoffs) of roughly 1,500 employees by March 2010. It will also result in the closing of several facilities. It's unclear what facilities are affected. EA claims the restructuring will provide about $100 million in cost savings.

The news comes on the heels of EA's acquisition of PlayFish.

“EA is performing well, with quality, sales and segment share up so far this year,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello in the company's quarertly financial release. “We are making tough calls to cut cost in targeted areas and investing more in our biggest games and digital businesses.”

More details about the cuts should be made available during EA's financial call this afternoon.

If you're an employee affected by these changes, feel free to get in touch with me.

Have something to share? Have a news tip? E-mail me. You can also follow me on Twitter.

As an international multi-media superstar, I live a life of unimaginable excess. My car is made of solid plutonium. I listen to golden oldies, eat 100 Grand bars and order anything on the menu at the Olive Garden... including the extra bread sticks. Finally, the internet has an auction site for me: You plebes can have your eBays and your auction.com; my monied brethren and I prefer the genteel company at Billionaireexchange.com, a recently launched website that provides auctions for the super-rich looking to unload their yachts, Lamborghini's and death-rays.

I registered an account, and was about to take out an ad offering a human being available for hunting purposes (Jake Gaskill), but, apparently, it violates the company's terms-of-service to buy and sell other human beings in order to provide the discriminating sportsman with a worthy challenge. What a rip-off! The ability to hunt "The Most Dangerous Game" (Jake Gaskill) is the primary reason people become billionaires, and this site that supposedly caters to the wealthy should understand that. I mean, what good is another Gulfstream Jet if I can't affix rocket launchers to it and use it to torment and destroy my enemies (Jake Gaskill)?

Although the site won't let you traffic in humans, you can buy exotic cars, gem-encrusted cell phones and art. Check out the above "Diamond Photograph" by artist Vik Muniz. It's a steal at $62,000.00. I'm no art critic, but even an idiot like me can tell that if this was done with a Bedazzler, you'd call it trash, and it would cost about 6 bucks at your local Salvation Army. But it's made with diamonds, and that makes it Art! Amazing!

On a more serious note: You'd think the super-rich would have a website that doesn't look like a geocities page and throw out SQL errors every five minutes.

Source: Reuters

Threadless, you slay me. And by slay me, I mean constantly wonder if I can justify forking over almost $20 for a clever t-shirt. It happens on a daily basis. I should probably unsubscribe from their newsletter, especially when they highlight amazing creations such as this, the "Alien Autopsy."

This is not your typical close encounter. This...this is much more terrifying.

Source: Threadless

It's World Cup time, and everyone's thinking about soccer! Well, ok, maybe not everyone, but a bunch of you are and there's no better way to celebrate than by playing a soccer videogame. Our very own Sterling McGarvey has a review for the new game Pro Evolution Soccer 2010:

Pro Evolution Soccer 2010 is the Konami soccer game that should have launched with the PlayStation 3 (and the one-year anniversary of the Xbox 360). But since you can’t lament lost time, you must celebrate what you have. In this celebration-worthy case, a revamped engine evokes the simulation focus that defined the series during the PlayStation 2 era. Overall, silly functions like the dive mechanic take a backseat to mechanically sound elements like jostles. It took me at least an hour to get used to PES 2010’s more realistic approach to jockeying for an aerial ball, but after several hours of play, I can say that it’s one subtle thing that FIFA could stand to take a page from.

Click here to read the rest of the written review and see the game's score!

We know when Final Fantasy XIII is arriving in Japan (December 17). Outside of a vague "2010," however, Square Enix hasn't told the rest of the world (specifically me) when Final Fantasy XIII is coming. Square Enix teased an anagram on their website over the weekend, though, which Final Fantasy XIII.net hacked away at before coming up with something mighty interesting.

"A Henchmen Inventor Tent Unto" suddenly made sense as "Announcement Nov Thirteenth."

It's speculation on my part, but there's very little Square Enix could surprise us with at this point about Final Fantasy XIII that would warrant a tease -- in English, no less -- other than a solid release date for the game. The only question is... will they make us wait till next fall? Oh, the river of tears.

Source: Final Fantasy XIII.net

Electronic Arts has added another cog to its already impressive wheel of mobile/casual gaming domination, as the publisher announced today that it has acquired social gaming creator Playfish for $275 million. If Playfish hits certain “performance milestones” over the next two years, the deal could end up closer to $400 million.

Senior vice president and general manager of EA Interactive, Barry Cottle, said in a statement, “EAi has been successfully leading the charge for EA, and with the addition of proven expertise from Playfish, their broad consumer base and strong game brands, we're moving ahead aggressively in our plans to lead in the category of cross-platform social entertainment.”

Playfish has seen over 150 game installs and boasts over 60 million active players per month across a number of platforms including Facebook, MySpace, Google, Bebo, iPhone and Android. Some of the Playfish’s most popular titles include the Facebook games Pet Society, Restaurant City and Country Story.

As a result of the acquisition, the company will now operate alongside EA Mobile and Pogo beneath the EA Interactive umbrella. Considering Pogo’s dominance of the casual online gaming market and EA Mobile’s control over the mobile gaming space (a 34 percent market share according to EA), Playfish is in mighty good company, and the move will only help EA more firmly shore up its mobile/casual/social gaming presence for a while to come.

Any Playfish game fans out there? What are some of your favorite games, and why?