While the Universal Media Disc, Sony’s format of choice for the Playstation Portable may not have taken off as a DVD competitor, in an article with Home Media Magazine , Sony’s Senior Vice President of marketing, Peter Dille speculates that with the recent price drop of the PSP that there may yet be hope for the failed movie format.

“The story on UMD is that we didn’t do a very good job at launch with articulating what consumer we were going after,” Dille said. “The studio said ‘here’s a new format.’ And that triggers a bunch of things in the Hollywood pipeline that really didn’t make sense for PSP. Shame on us, because we didn’t explain we were aiming at 18- to 34-year-old males. We’re looking more for Jackass-type movie content. There was a proliferation of UMD movies that didn’t make much sense, and they backed up at retail.”

After losing support of major retailers and witnessing fire sales of the discs at places like Wal Mart and Target, Dille says that Hollywood and retailers may jump back onto the UMD bandwagon. Dille promised announcements in the near future regarding UMD’s rebirth.

These Ubidays are yours and mine, these Ubidays are yours and mine U-BI-DAYS! Ok, sorry, I am just so excited over all of these new gaming trailers and screens that I can barely contain myself!

Surf’s Up is an arcade-style surfing game, where you complete with other surfers from around the world. Play as one of 10 characters from the movie, where if you win you become the new champion and a legend. Read the full article »

Namco Bandai will be releasing Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology for the PSP this July. In the game, players create a fully customizable character that sets out on a quest to crush the malevolent forces intent on eradicating the land of Terresia. Featuring a cast of intriguing NPCs new and familiar to the series, Radiant Mythology offers a singular battle system that promises to “set a new RPG standard”. Complete with new storylines, free-roaming battles, and exceptional graphics, Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology sets out to bring players a quality RPG that can journey with you anytime. Read the full article »

According to GamesIndustry.biz Sony corporation’s hand-held is about to get an upgrade. Sony has signed a four year contract with BT to bring VoIP technology to the PSP. Services will include video calls, voice calls and messaging.

“The PSP is an excellent device for both gaming and communications because of its high quality screen and audio capabilities,” offered Steve Andrews, chief of mobility and convergence for BT.

The UK will be the first to utilize the new services with European regions added later. There is no mention as to when services will hit North America.

Reuters has the scoop on the new “Jackass” video game. The popular MTV series that has spawned two movies is now moving into new territory with their first video game. Johnny Knoxville, Bam Margera, Steve-O and the crew have all signed on to lend their likeness and voices to the project.

“We’re excited as all hell about it,” Knoxville said. “It is kind of odd that people will take on our personas and depressing that they’re going to have to do that. We’ve never really worked on anything like this before. This is our first video game. We just hope that our video game is as crappy as our movies.”

Players will create their own “Jackass”episodes by combining stunts. Most of these aren’t from the tv show and are extreme.

Henry Price, senior director sales and marketing at Red Mile says, “We have the luxury of throwing characters off a 50-story building into a pile of elephant dung without worrying about our insurance rates.”

The game is scheduled to hit the shelves September 24 for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable and Nintendo DS platforms.

Slated to hit shelves in North America on June 1st, Puzzle Scape for the PSP has gone gold. With an original soundtrack containing trance and techno style music, this block-busting puzzle game has players arranging colored blocks to form chains that explode to create vivid backgrounds themes. Each theme has ten different scenes with 40 different levels, power-ups and “additional spice to the game”. Play in artist, architect, and co-op modes with up to eight players on ‘bomb’ mode.

Got Game Entertainment will debut the game with a nicely priced MSRP of 19.99. Visit their official website for more details.

Pro-G provides the top 20 selling games in the UK for the week 20, 2007. Spiderman 3 for the PS3 dominates the UK top games for a third week.

Leisure software charts compiled by Chart Track, (C)2001 ELSPA Ltd
Entertainment Software (All Prices) Week 20, 20071: SPIDER-MAN 3
2: COMMAND & CONQUER 3: TIBERIUM WARS
3: PRO EVOLUTION SOCCER 6
4: WII PLAY
5: COOKING MAMA
6: TIGER WOODS PGA TOUR 07
7: FIFA 07
8: CRACKDOWN
9: DR KAWASHIMA’S BRAIN TRAINING
10: FINAL FANTASY III
11: THE ELDER SCROLLS IV: OBLIVION
12: SINGSTAR POP HITS
13: GRAND THEFT AUTO: VICE CITY STORIES
14: THE SIMS 2
15: GOD OF WAR II
16: BUZZ! THE MEGA QUIZ
17: NEED FOR SPEED: CARBON
18: LEGO STAR WARS II: THE ORIGINAL TRILOGY
19: NEW SUPER MARIO BROS.
20: VIRTUA TENNIS 3

Spiderman 3 has to stay on top two more weeks to match it’s predecessor which maintained the lead for five weeks on it’s release three years ago. It will have some stiff competition next week with several new releases hitting the shelves. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, driven by movies sales, will be a stiff competitor. Mario Strikers Charged for Wii, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales for DS and Crash for PSP will also be released this Friday.

Sony’s got the big guns out now, unveiling over 30 titles across the PlayStation Family. On top of the list are new first-party titles, including Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, SOCOM: Confrontation, Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, The Eye of Judgement and Folklore.

Sony CEO Jack Tretton said, “As you would expect from the market leader, we are seeing a huge influx of games coming to all our PlayStation platforms in the remainder of our fiscal year. Users can expect more than 15 exclusive games and services for PS3, and another nine for PSP.”

Besides PlayStation 3 titles, Sony has a raft of new PSP titles as well, including Syphon Filter: Logan’s Shadow and God of War: Chains of Olympus. On top of that, Tretton promises there is more to come. “We still have a few surprises up our sleeves for this fiscal. The games and services demonstrate the gameplay, community and entertainment possibilities you can have on PlayStation products,” he said.

With all the negative Sony news floating around the last week or two, it’s good to see that their management isn’t buying into it. Sounds like they have a pile of stuff on the way worth checking out.

Celebrating the ‘heroes’ of baseball,
The Bigs is the newest baseball release title from 2K Sports. It will be available for all next-gen consoles, PS2 and PSP. 2K presents The Bigs with a much larger rock-and-roll / arcade feel than you will find in the ultra-simulation titles from other publishers. Looks like a welcome change to me. Check it out.

Some upcoming release dates for you, all in one place! The biggest question is, where are all the Wii titles?