After what seems like forever, quite possibly the multi-format game of the year is here!

The hugely anticipated, new instalment in the ground-breaking Grand Theft Auto series has landed and is going to be the game to tear gamers away from Call of Duty 4.

Focusing on the story of Eastern European immigrant Niko Bellic, GTA IV takes players back to Liberty City and promises a cinematic story told like only Rockstar can, a vast and detailed world to explore, and gameplay like the series has never seen before.

Grand Theft Auto IV is the next chapter of the award-winning Grand Theft Auto franchise from Rockstar Games, and it will be coming to the Xbox 360 and PS3 on day one.  If you’ve not already got yourself a pre-order, what the hell are you waiting for?  PS3 owners go here, buy and enjoy finally having a game to play.

The last few GTA titles have been truly monumental, each based on the same concept but pushing the format a little bit further each time.  For GTA 4, that pushing has given us, for the first time, multiplayer GTA! Gamers will experience hours of additional gameplay with two downloadable episodes exclusively available on Xbox LIVE following the release of the game.

Personally, I can’t bloody wait!

I grew up in a time when if you wanted a car racing or a beat-em up game you’d sit yourself in front of the TV and turn on the Megadrive or Super Nintendo. If flight simulators or first person shooters (FPS) were your thing, then you’d need a PC with the freedom of movement offered by a mouse and the array of buttons you can only get with a keyboard.

I’m from the latter camp that lives and (mostly) dies by the keyboard-mouse (KM) combination and find that movement and aiming with a controller is too slow and cumbersome.

Thankfully, I’m not alone and some clever sods have managed to build a unit that can map all the inputs from a KM and translate it into what the controller would normally send to the console. Many see the adapters as offering an underhand advantage, crying at every opportunity that the offending users should be outlawed. Surely then this highlights the flaws in the original controllers and the need for a better interface?

The first couple of products were the XFPS 360 and the XFPS 360 Pro which both met with mixed reactions amongst the gaming community. Those that tried these early units found slight niggles with the implementation that made it hard to use when playing as sniper types.

This is where the XFPS 3.0 Sniper comes in. With updated sensitivity, the Sniper is currently the ultimate interface for games such as Halo 3, The Orange Box and recently released Call of Duty 4. The bullet is well and truly bitten, the order is placed and my adapter is on it’s way courtesy of Play-Asia.com.

Now it’s just the wait for the Postie!

In a case of ultimate game parodies, “Schadenfreude Interactive” have taken the whole musician-video game concept to another level with their latest title: Accordion Hero.

As far fetched as it sounds, with the current breed of musical games, you can bet that someone out there is considering turning it into a saleable product.

Nestling in amongst other quirky titles such as “Grand Theft Ottoman” and “Hannibal Crossing”, Accordion Hero (and Accordion Hero II) is the complete package for the budding squeeze box artist.

Gadgets blog Gizmodo are equally as impressed and are threatening to join the revolution.  Maybe this could be the start of an Xbox Live Morris Dancing game?

Gamers Lore have reported that a Halo movie may still be on the cards…  I didn’t even realise there was one ever in discussion!

I don’t know why it didn’t cross my mind a long time ago.  Maybe it did but I just blocked it out of my grey matter because I really don’t think a Halo movie would do the franchise justice. This is one of those times when I really should do a bit of digging on the subject to see what else has been said but I’ll ramble on all the same.

Halo works well as a computer / video game.  The artists are shit hot and visuals in Halo 3 are stunning from the sprite models through to the epic backdrops.  A Hollywood live action film would just be embarrassing, conjuring up visions of some kind of Guyver style production.

The Halo world is too big and established for a director to rework into a movie.  Games into films is a stupid business.

Instead (and I want ROYALTIES from this idea) I propose a fully CGI’d Halo experience.  That way the Master Chief and the Covenant can be as unreal as Bungie intended.

Now where’s my cheque Hollywood?

Well it wasn’t all I was hoping for.

There I was frantically battling my way through hordes of gunfire on my single player campaign, racking up Xbox gamerpoints as I went, thinking that it was all going to be worth it when I finished the final level and I’d be rewarded with 3x the points for finishing it on the Legendary setting.

But it only gave me “normal” points.  Bugger.

In case you’ve been living under a rock or the Xbox really isn’t your thing (or maybe you were one of the half a dozen people that bought a PS3) then I’m talking about Halo 3.  I waited years for this bloody thing to be released, putting off my 360 purchase until after launch.

The wait was worth it.  The game is very, very good both in single player (campaign) with a great storyline and online multiplayer where you can listen to idiotic American kids screaming at each other, exchanging torrents of “no YOU’RE gay”.

One good thing has come out of finishing Halo 3 – I get to have an early night!  At least until Call of Duty 4 is out

Rumours are floating around the official Xbox forums that the 65nm chipset for the Xbox (codenamed Falcon) is real and it’s now being installed into the latest Xbox 360 hardware.

Unfortunately the only way to check is to up end the console and shine a torch through the air vent. If you have a copper pipe across the heatsink then it’s unhappy faces all round as you’ve got the old chipset. However, if there’s not a hint of copper in sight, you’re got yourself an Xbox with Falcon-inside (TM).

Currently it’s only the special edition green Halo Xbox systems that are likely to have the smaller chip, whether we will see it filter through to the Elite, Pro and Arcade is anyone’s guess.

All this means is that your 360 should run quieter and cooler as the chipset requires less energy to operate. Non-Falcon systems will still run fine (probably) so there’s no reason to head down to Cash Converters just yet.

I did take the time to check inside my Xbox 360 and I think I can see the Falcon, but I’m not 100% convinced. I’ve highlighted the area in question…

Falcon inside my Xbox 360

Dim-witted sales staff have managed to hand over copies of Halo 3 to eager Xbox 360 customers that had pre-ordered Microsoft’s highly anticipated title.

The eagled-eyed customers have been posting about their triumph over on the Eurogamer.net forums and a user going by the name of “blogsrus” has even posted photo evidence to silence sceptics.

Whether all stores in the UK are now aware of the blunder is uncertain but one thing is for sure, people are going to be willing to pay a premium for this on the Internet’s junk shop!

The game by developers Bungie Studios  isn’t due for release on the Xbox 360 until September 25th (or 26th for Europe) and has broken all pre-order sales records, selling over 1 million in the US.

I suppose it had to happen. After months of waiting in anticipation, the ending of Halo 3 has been leaked 7 days and 13 hours (at the time of writing this) before the game is released.

Bungie are blamed as the source but I’m guessing it was leaked by a rogue cleaner wiping down desks late one Tuesday night.

It doesn’t look like there is going to be a Halo 4 after all if that’s what has become of the Master Chief. All that hype for nothing.

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