The boys over at Joystiq have some new footage of the upcoming God of War PSP title Ghost of Sparta. Check out the video to see Kratos have a run-in with Midas as they solve an environmental puzzle together…sort of. It’s teamwork the only way Kratos knows how.

Now my friends, that is one sexy PSP-3000. How would you obtain such a hot piece of hardware? In a bundle with God of War: Ghost of Sparta of course. The bundle will include the game, a memory stick, and a TBA movie. Now, I could be lying, because I don’t actually have any firm details. Just the pictures, but don’t you worry I’ve asked Sony for some details. Hopefully I’ll find out more, but I mean, come on, have these things ever included anything else? More pics in the gallery.

Japanese RPG Valkyria Chronicles II will come to North American PSP’s on August 31st. The game will for sure be released on UMD no word on a digital launch for the title. I know a lot of people who really liked the first game, so hopefully Sega can continue that momentum for the sequel.

Nintendo

What I Want to See
Nintendo needs to show us that they still care about gamers. Over the past few years, it’s become abundantly clear that they care about your mom, your grandparents, your little sibling and all the other people in your life that hadn’t played video games before, and that’s all fine and good. But guess what, Nintendo? You’ve got all those people playing already. The people you don’t have playing are the ones who have stuck by you through the ups and downs of your legacy, the actual gamers. Show us the new Zelda, of course, but don’t rest on your laurels thinking that’s enough. Show us a new IP to be excited about that isn’t secretly just an exercise plan. Show us that you still love us by implementing your waggle-wand in an intuitive way into some games we can sink our teeth into. And after you’ve left us breathless with all the kick-ass games you have planned, unleash the monster that is the 3DS, and proceed to steal the entire show with that awesome-sounding device in hand.

What I Don’t Want to See
Exercise games and sports games. Seriously, go ahead and leave those back at the office. We get it. The Wii can deliver active and healthy play experiences. We all know this because about three-fourths of the Wii section at Best Buy is covered in this crap. There are plenty of them; I really don’t need to see Wii90X. Actually, you know what, I’m totally going trademark that. I also don’t want Wii Sports 3. Let’s face it, bowling has already pretty much been perfected, Tiger Woods is killing it with a great golf game and honestly, some of the stuff on Wii Sports Resort was a bit of a stretch. So, job well done on sports games, and now never make another one again. I also don’t want to hear any stupid rhetoric about HD not being important or that the online experience is super great as it is because that’s all bullshit, and everyone knows it.

What We’ll Probably See
I actually have some faith that Nintendo has been listening to the fans for the past year. For some crazy reason, I think they come through for us this year. Unfortunately, I do think we’ll still see Cammy Dunaway fumble her way through a painfully awkward presentation of whatever the next big casual gaming craze is going to be, but I think it won’t be as bad as last year. They will hopefully show us more than one or two games to be excited about, and then, as long as it isn’t Virtual Boy 2, I think they drop bombs with the 3DS.

Sony

What I Want to See
I’m not going to sound very original here, but Kevin freaking Butler. As the central figure of one of their best ad campaigns ever, Kevin Butler has quickly become just as iconic as many of the fictional figureheads that star in many of Sony’s games. People love this guy. He’s clearly got the comedic timing and presence to deliver an engaging presentation. As far as games go, bring on the new stuff! The Last Guardian has the potential to take my GOTY spot with just a trailer, so they better show me more of that. I also want to see some of the PS2 properties that have yet to make the next-gen leap make an appearance…ahem…Sly Cooper. Also, as much as I’m fairly indifferent to the Move, I would be interested if they showed a game for it that actually looked…you know…good. And one more thing: Shadow of the Colossus HD.

What I Don’t Want to See
Just like Nintendo, I really don’t want to see Jack Tretton, or any other spokesperson for that matter, get on stage and lie straight to my face. I don’t want to hear that PSN is just as good as XBL. I don’t want to hear that Blu-ray will overtake DVD in the next two years. And, Sony, I really don’t want to hear that PS3 sales are performing exactly how you want them to because until they are beating the Wii and 360, we both know that’s not true. I also don’t want to see the Move demonstrated for more than a few minutes if it’s not going to be anything more than the WiiHD. We all get how motion control works for archery and fighting games; we’ve watched Nintendo do it for a few years now.

What We’ll Probably See
I think we are going to see a lot of games. With Microsoft being a fairly big mystery this year in terms of software and having to devote a lot of time to Natal, Sony can come right out and dazzle us with a killer game line-up for the rest of the year. We’ll probably see the Team Ico HD remix pack, which will definitely get me excited, and we’ll hopefully see some of the new God of War PSP game. I do think we’ll see Kevin Butler in some capacity. While I won’t hold my breath for him to host the whole show, he will be there. It’s just too bad that we’re also probably going to have to listen to Sony blather on about 3D being the next big thing. Puke.

Microsoft

What I Want to See
As much as I give Natal crap, I am very curious about it. It seems to have the potential for some really great applications, and I want Microsoft to show them to me. I want to see Natal controlled dashboards and games with intriguing uses for the device, and I want to see it all happening live. Oh, and I want the details on price, release date and all that other fun stuff. Other than that, I’d simply love to know what the hell they are going to have me playing for the rest of the year. We know about Halo: Reach of course, but what else is there? They can also have Cliffy B come out and show me a little Gears of War 3 gameplay as long I don’t have to sit through another boring explanation of their even newer meat physics. And if they are going to have any special guests, it certainly wouldn’t hurt my feelings to get Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill up there to present Arkham Asylum 2.

What I Don’t Want to See
I don’t want to see Natal tech demos and flail-ware. If I have to watch some poor intern stand in front of a room full of people and have an upright seizure, I’ll turn off the conference right then. I also don’t want to see a bunch of Natal videos telling me what the thing is going to do. The only “amazing” gameplay and interaction features that I believe are going to happen with Natal in the near future are the ones that I actually see a live person do on stage. No videos of Milo, no girls picking out outfits for the night and no couples pointing at a movie they are watching and ordering pizza on the fly. I’ll believe all that when I see it.

What We’ll Probably See
This is a tough call. I have two trains of thought here. One is that Natal could be awesome, and we will actually witness it do some of the crazy things it’s supposed to. The other scenario is that Microsoft had an E3 prep meeting that went something like, “Holy crap-sauce, Natal doesn’t do anything we said it would do! Quick, let’s get Cirque du Soleil to put on a huge show to distract everyone, and maybe they won’t notice!” Sadly, I’m not really sure which one we’re going to see.

First thing you need to know is that the PSP exclusive Kingdom Hearts prequel Birth by Sleep is due in stores September 7th. The next thing you need to know is that Gamestop will be selling an exclusive entertainment pack. It includes a “Mystic Silver” PSP-3000(yeah, I know)a copy of the game on UMD, a voucher to download a movie, and a 4GB Memory Stick Pro Duo. Sony hasn’t officially named a price, but they’ve all been $199 so far. Why stop now? For more details check out the PS Blog. Also, we embedded a trailer for the game, so you should watch that.

I guess I should say, stories I missed roundup. Anyways, you probably already know all this, but if 4PC happens to be the only place you go for your video game news, here’s some stuff you missed.

StarCraft II is out on July 27th, which really isn’t that far away.

160 Microsoft Points gets you the Mass Effect 2 “Equalizer Pack” DLC. This includes the Inferno Armor, Archon Visor, and Capacitor Helmet. So if you’re on your 5th run through of the game 2 bucks gets you some helpful new duds. Also in BioWare DLC news, Dragon Age: Origins gets the “Darkspawn Chronicles” DLC on May 18th for 400 Microsoft or BioWare points depending on how you roll. I would tell you all about the Darkspawn Chronicles DLC, but this is the first anyone is hearing of it. Oops.

Finally, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II will hit stores on October 26th. The first one was alright, let’s hope the second one is better. I wanted to love it, so, so much. The game will be available for Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, DS and PSP.

After about a months worth of teases Sony has finally pulled the wraps off of God of War: Ghost of Sparta the follow up to the excellent Chains of Olympus. Just like the previous PSP title this one will also be developed by Ready at Dawn. Spoilers: that’s good news. While Chains was a prequel to God of War, Ghost of Sparta will be a sequel to the original God of War. The game will chronicle Kratos’ rise to power. The game is due out “later this year” so expect to see more at this year’s E3.

Via Joystiq

Have you bought a PS3 or PSP in the last year? Kind of wish you could have longer than a one year warranty? Well you are in luck! Sony is offering affordable extended warranty coverage! They are even offering accidental breakage coverage on PSPs. How much does an extended warranty run? I’m glad you asked.

• PS3 – 1-year extension ($44.99) or 2-year extension ($59.99)
• PSP – 1-year extension ($29.99) or 2-year extension ($39.99)
• PSP Accidental Damage – 1-year ($39.99) or 2-year ($49.99)

Not a bad deal, but what if you have an older PSP or PS3? Well then you are shit out of luck. Seriously. To be eligible for the extended warranty you have to still be in the 1 year manufacturers warranty. So, I guess you will have to go buy a PS3 slim if you are so scared about your precious PS3 breaking.

Iron Man 2, easily one of the biggest movies coming out this Summer, is right around the corner, which can mean only one thing. The tie-in game is also right around the corner. It’s due in stores on May 4th, three days before the movie opens. We got the chance to participate in a Q&A with Development Director Mike McHale and Dean Martinetti, the game’s producer.

The first thing you need to know about the game is that it doesn’t follow the plot of the movie. It’s set in the movie’s universe, but is not a scene-by-scene recreation. The team didn’t want to try to shoehorn gameplay into the movie’s story, which is a shortcoming of many movie games. The game does things that would have been too expensive for the movie, such as giant boss fights and missions that take place on a SHIELD helicarrier high above the ground.

An area where movie tie-ins fall short is in the lack of modes, and Iron Man 2 might disappoint those who were looking for co-op and multiplayer modes as Iron Man 2 is only a single player campaign. To make up for that, both Iron Man and War Machine are playable characters. You can select which of the two superheroes you want to play as at the start of each mission. There are two missions, however, that require you to be a predetermined hero, one for Iron Man and one for War Machine.

With the game taking place in the film’s universe but not following the plot of the film, the developers were able to take some liberties with the characters that appear in the game. Several of the heroes from the movie appear in the game, but with only one or two villains in the movie, those voids had to be filled with other characters from the Iron Man comics. To help make this process easier and to make it feel more like the comics, Sega enlisted Invincible Iron Man writer Matt Fraction to write the dialogue and cut-scenes for the game. The devs remained tight lipped about whom we might see but promised that in the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game, the final boss battle will be awesome. They also said that the bosses in the game might be some of the biggest bosses ever made for a video game.

When asked about the length of the game, Marinetti said you could run and gun the game in seven hours, but if you take the time to discover things, it can take about 11 hours. In fact, he hinted that many of the game’s achievements and trophies were tied to discovering things.

One aspect of the game that McHale and Martinetti were very excited about was the lab. Everything in the game is customizable, not just the armor, but even the melee attacks can be changed. There are multiple slots on the armor for weapons, and the weapons can be altered with different ammo types. You can even mix energy and projectile weapons. Some of the weapon customization can get pretty complex. You can upgrade a rocket launcher to fire six rockets at once, but then you can also customize the rockets to do different kinds of damage. Normally, the rockets would behave like any other rockets in a video game and explode on impact, but with the right customization, you can have them explode and do damage over a wider radius, hurting all enemies in an area. Melee combat is definitely a focus in Iron Man 2, when upgrading your character, don’t neglect it, as it seems to be a crucial component when fighting bosses who will not go down easily from long range.

A major complaint about the first game was the controls, especially when switching from hover to flight. Well luckily, it was one of the first issues the team addressed in the new game. Flight controls have been moved to the right stick and changing from hover and flight modes are now button presses. You never have to hold down any buttons to accomplish anything in Iron Man 2.

The game isn’t open world, but it isn’t completely linear either. The outdoor environments are large enough to explore and fly around in while the indoor environments are suited for large in your face battles.

If you think that the Wii, DS, and PSP versions were going to differ from the current generation models, you would be right. While not getting into too many details, the Wii and PSP versions are essentially the same while the DS version plays differently from those. All versions of the game follow the same plot; they just get through it in different ways. The developers also hinted at each game having completely different features from each other but couldn’t elaborate, only saying that we will know more soon.

Iron Man 2 sounds like a great attempt at capturing the intensity of the Marvel Universe in the same vein as last year’s Wolverine game. While I don’t think it will be THAT intense, the game sounds very promising. Straying from the plot of the movie is probably a very smart idea, and as a comic book fan, I can tell you that having Matt Fraction write the dialogue was also a very good idea. We should have a full review of the Xbox 360/PS3 version of the game in early May.