While Microsoft Australia's PR Agency have sent us a Press Release suggesting the New Xbox Experience is already here, we're waiting for the download option to kick off when it turns November 19 Northern Hemisphere side, which is still really only hours away.

The free update will apparently start automatically, transforming some "25 million Xbox 360 consoles sold worldwide" (by the end of November, that is) into fully updated new machines.

"Xbox 360 is getting a whole new look," said Andrew Jenkins, Xbox 360 Product Marketing Manager for games and LIVE. "From today Xbox owners are able to download a new user interface for their consoles, effectively updating their Xbox through Xbox LIVE. Xbox 360 now boasts a more user-friendly look and allows users to create online parties, chat with friends, share pictures, create avatars of themselves and much more," added Jenkins.

I have my machine on right now, so as soon as the update is available, we'll let you know.

We've just been notified by a user about a potential problem with Yahoo email accounts - if you're trying to sign up with a Yahoo account or wondering why you're not getting any other email notifications, it appears emails sent to that provider are mysteriously vanishing after reaching the Yahoo mail servers.

We've hit their contact page to try and chase this up and will see what happens (past experience trying to contact mega-companies for support has not exactly been positive).

I've always thought National Geographic, Animal Planet or the like should enter the games market. How cool would it be to have a Great White Shark simulator where you rely on the animal's amazing senses and just work to survive. No points or power-ups, just an endless ocean of seals to breach waters for in a fantastic, dizzying display of power and prowess.

Ah well, I guess National Geographic Panda from Namco Bandai will have to do, though (not that Pandas aren't scary in their own right, the title just sounds like it will be a cutesy DS game). According to a statement, there's also National Geographic Africa in the works for Sony's PlayStation 3 platform.

National Geographic Games will be both creating games in-house (the first of which, Herod's Lost Tomb, has already been completed and will be made available as a free download for PC, Mac and the iPhone), as well as through partnerships with the likes of Namco Bandai, Sony and more. More titles are in the works for the PS3, Nintendo Wii and handheld devices such as the DS.

Nintendo of Australia have let us know the new Animal Crossing for Wii will be hitting Aussie store shelves early next month, December 4. Animal Crossing: Let's Go To The City is the first time the series has landed on Nintendo's new console and will also feature interaction with the new Wii Microphone, Wii Speak.

Build relationships with animals in your town as you go fishing, take in a concert, get your hair done at Shampoodle salon and get a Mii makeover. Design your own clothes at the tailor's shop and the animals in your town can even wear them and take them into other towns!

Decorate your house, go on a shopping spree, watch fireworks with friends, ride the bus into the city - the choice is yours and your options are endless in Animal Crossing: Let's Go To The City.

You can have four functioning towns on the one console or invite people online via your Wi-Fi Connection. We have more info on the game in our press release page.

An all-new costume pack for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is available for download from the Xbox Live Marketplace and PlayStation Network. For the hardcore Star Wars fans out there, doing just that will net you the following:

• Hooded Combat Gear
• General Starkiller
• Sith Assassin
• Imperial Commando
• Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker
• Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi
• Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker
• Darth Sion
• Ki-Adi-Mundi
• Kit Fisto

You'll also be able to pick up new themes and gamerpics to deck out your online profile as well.

You can check out our Star Wars: The Force Unleashed game page and full review right here on AusGamers.

Stumped for what games to spend your money on at the moment (because there are so many)? AusGamers has your back. Well, at least we're ploughing through them as best we can as well (we're only a handful of brave men, remember).

At any rate, today we have the impressive and bold Mirror's Edge in review; a game that is big in its ideas, but smaller in its execution of them. That doesn't mean, however, you should overlook it - in fact, far from it. If you're looking for innovative, enjoyable fun with a new edge that isn't overly tied down to traditional gaming concepts this is for you. If you hate being frustrated, then you may want to prepare yourself.

The co-op zombie slaughtering simulator Left 4 Dead is now available to the gaming public via Steam. You'll need Steam installed of course, and you can head over to the Left 4 Dead page on the Steam website to buy it now for US$49.99, which equates to about AU$1,000,000.95 since the crash of our dollar. However, you can buy four copies for the price of three, so get your pals together, pool your shiny coins and get into the co-op action now.

If you've been living in a cave, our Left 4 Dead game page has a bunch of screenshots, information and videos.

Fans of The Killers anxiously awaiting the release of their third album, Day & Age, will also be able to nab a downloadable track pack featuring two singles off the new release, "Human", and "Losing Touch" as well as a third track, "Mr Brightside", a massive song from their debut album, Hot Fuss.

The track pack will also be made available for download day and date of the release of Day & Age. The track pack will be available from the Xbox Live Marketplace for 440 Microsoft Points, from the PlayStation Store for AU$9.95 and as single downloadable tracks for the Wii at 200 Wii Points a piece (you can also grab the songs as singles for the PS3 and Xbox 360 as well).

The first dedicated exhibition celebrating the birth and growth of the videogames industry, Game On, has found its way to Queensland this summer, debuting at the State Library of Queensland in Brisbane.

Game On tracks the development of videogames from the earliest computer games to arcade-era hits and the very latest from today’s billion-dollar industry. With more than 100 playable games, as well as rarely seen consoles, controllers and collectables, this is a showcase of games history like no other.

You'll be able to check out the exhibition from November 17 through till February 15, 2009. More information can be found from the official Game On website.

If you liked playing in the mud growing up, or dream of smashing through precious rainforest in a Monster Truck, MotorStorm: Pacific Rift is probably going to be up your alley.

If you played the first MotorStorm though, don't expect this to be a massive leap in gameplay; it's very much an awesome addition but just not much further ahead than perhaps it should have been.

Still, there's a lot of fun here and with addition of four-player split-screen, you can now yell at your friends as you crush their puny quad bikes in your Monster Truck! Check out our full review for the AusGamers skinny.

Phantagram have released the first trailer for Kingdom Under Fire 2, the forthcoming strategy sequel in the works for PC and Xbox 360.

Details on the game are a little confusing at present, but developer Blueside claims the game will be an action real-time strategy game with Massively Multiplayer Online elements.

Whereas Kingdom Under Fire: Circle of Doom was an Action RPG deviated from the main Action RTS stream of Kingdom Under Fire Series, this sequel version will be a true inheritor of the world acclaimed Kingdom Under Fire: The Crusaders in the truest sense with promises to deliver a unique game play and story line where the plot is filled with drama between game characters, who will all contribute to raise suspense and intensity of combat. Unlike the previous RTS series where the Human Alliance and the Dark Legion faced each other in endless battles, there will be a new third faction vying for control of the world, which will definitely pique the curiosity of fans worldwide.

BLUESIDE's CEO Sejung Kim stated that "We are preparing for an immense game that will feature not only field battles, but also titanic siege engines and thousands of units that will swarm over monstrous fortresses in siege battles of epic proportions." clearly expressing her confidence in the next title.

Check out the trailer right here on AusGamers. More details and screenshots can be found on our Kingdom Under Fire 2 game page.

A new version of Firefox has landed, bringing this uber-browser to version 3.0.4. The change list is as follows:

* Fixed several security issues.
* Fixed several stability issues.
* Official releases for the Icelandic and Thai languages are now available.
* Beta releases for the Bulgarian, Esperanto, Estonian, Latvian, Occitan, and Welsh languages are available for testing.
* Updated the internal Public Suffix list.
* Fixed an issue where the IME input tool used to enter Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Indic characters was covered by the "Add Bookmark" panel. (bug 433340)
* Enabled additional EV root certificates. (bug 451305)
* Fixed an issue where some passwords saved using Firefox 3.0.2 did not work properly. (bug 457358)
* In some cases, Firefox would not properly save proxy settings for protocols other than HTTP. (bug 446536)

If you haven't auto-updated yet you can download the installer manually now locally from AusGamers.

Wired have a brief but cool article looking at the intrusion into Valve Software's network that resulted in the leaking of the Half-Life 2 source code before the game had even hit shelves and Valve's subsequent attempts to trap the German-based hacker by, well, lying and pretending to offer him a job in the US so the FBI could nab him:

Coordinating with the FBI in Seattle, Valve began a correspondence with DaGuy, who expressed interest in getting a job with the company. From clues in the e-mail, the FBI identified the aspiring employee as Axel Gembe, of Schonau, Germany.
...
Perhaps sensing that his relocation expenses would be shouldered by U.S. taxpayers, Gembe didn't take the bait. He was ultimately charged in Germany, where he was sentenced to probation.

Worth a read!

Blizzard have sent through word they've teamed up with EB Games for a midnight launch of World of WarCraft: Wrath of the Lich King at the retail gaming giant's newest Sydney headquarters, located at 340 George Street, Sydney CBD Thursday, November 13.

Festivities kick off around 9.30pm with a bunch of different geektastic events, including:

• World of Warcraft Trivia Competition
• Guitar Hero Contest featuring music by Level 80 Elite Tauren Chieftain
• Wrath of the Lich King Discussion Panel
• Live Performance by Eminence Artists, creators of Echoes of War: The music of Blizzard Entertainment

You'll also be able to win prizes and other crazy WoW related junk for giving up a precious evening, but clearly the big event of the night will be the launch of the game where 100 lucky buyers could also score themselves a very limited (1 of 100) WarCraft figurine, and five other winners will see their purchase upgraded to the Collector's Edition.

If you live interstate, Melbourne's Swanston Street EB and Brisbane's Albert Street stores will be holding similar events, but make sure you get in touch with them for finer details.

In a massive crackdown on breaking one of the Battle.net cardinal rules: "Thall shalt not use third-party hacks", Blizzard has suspended some 350,000 StarCraft and Diablo 2 accounts.

As part of our continued effort to ensure a fair and fun online experience for all Battle.net players, we have expanded our efforts to remove cheaters from StarCraft and Diablo II.

As a reminder, we reserve the right to close the accounts and ban the CD keys of players who are caught cheating on Battle.net. Cheating ruins the game experience for legitimate players, and we will not tolerate it.

Blizzard also recently took a few WoW players behind closed doors to give them an equally stern talking to about cheating. Looks as though anyone not willing to accept that Blizzard arguably create the most balanced gameplay in the gaming universe is definitely going to cop it.

Capcom have given us a PC demo to host locally on AusGamers for their upcoming MotoGP 08. The demo allows you to Quick Race around the Mugello Circuit with either Nicky Hayden from the US or Spain's Dani Pedrosa. You can also choose from three different riding models and adjust AI to suit your abilities.

This is, of course, just a taste of the final game, and we've been told a demo for both the PlayStation Network and Xbox 360 will be made available shortly.

Grab the locally hosted file right now from AusGamers by clicking here and you can peruse screens and other bits of information from our MotoGP 08 game page.

The Left 4 Dead demo is now open to the public, after a brief period of only being available for those that pre-ordered. Fire up Steam and hope you get a decent content server to play it! For those who came in late:

Set in the immediate aftermath of the zombie apocalypse, L4D's survival co-op mode lets you blast a path through the infected in four unique “movies,” guiding your survivors across the rooftops of an abandoned metropolis, through rural ghost towns and pitch-black forests in your quest to escape a devastated Ground Zero crawling with infected enemies. Each "movie" is comprised of five large maps, and can be played by one to four human players, with an emphasis on team-based strategy and objectives.

Our game page has more info, screenshots and video. Thanks rrrocket for the notice.

Midway have sent along another trailer for the upcoming Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe - the far fetched fighting game that sees the MK characters squaring off against the DC Comic crew.

This weeks video features The Joker. The 2 minute clip shows off a mix of the game's hokey cut-scenes and The Joker's gameplay. Check it out right here in the AusGamers video library.

Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe is due on November 22 2008 for Xbox 360 and PC. Stop by the AusGamers game page for all the other trailers released to-date.

Gaming site 1up have an interview with Evolution Studios' lead designer Nigel Kershaw and creative director Paul Hollywood revealing some curious tidbits about of their arcade racer and PlayStation 3 exclusive launch title Motorstorm.

The video is for the recently released Motorstorm Pacific Rift but the most interesting parts are the comments on the early development of the original Motorstorm. As part of the PlayStation 3 unveiling, Sony released a teaser trailer for the game at the 2005 E3 expo that was actually just a concept render created by an external animation studio, leaving the developers with the massive task of bringing it to life in real-time.

"They actually announced the specifications on a slideshow presentation [at E3]. We sat and jotted them down, and then they showed our movie," Hollywood explained. "It was like, 'This is what the PlayStation 3 can do, and this is what you'll get on it.' We're sitting there trying to do the math in our head and asking, 'Can we really do this stuff?"

Although it never claimed to be in-game action, it was also never confirmed otherwise. They did go on to create a very tasty looking game, though not representative of that original footage. Kershaw goes on to say

"it's this thing that haunts you, that you didn't match your target render... Everybody makes such a big fucking deal of it. Who gives a shit? That's how we make games. If people have got a problem with that, tough."

This has obviously been the case with other early reveals, most notably Killzone 2.

What does everybody think? Is it a bad thing to promote games in this manner, creating a potentially unrealistic expectation? Or a valid marketing tactic to drum up early interest in the game.

Activision's Call of Duty: World at War drops tomorrow Australia wide for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 but we've already received the first PC version patch to get you in the mood.

Here's a taste of some of the changes, which will probably only make sense if you were participating in the beta:

- Mods are now enabled in Co-op, Single Player, and Multiplayer.
- Players will now be notified when a new patch is available.
- Improvements for SLI support.
- License key is no longer required to run a Dedicated Server.
- A Dedicated Server can now be started from the Command Line via Remote Desktop Connection.

Download the v1.1 patch right here from the AusGamers files library and stay tuned post-release for a full review of Call of Duty: World at War from AusGamers.