With Thanksgiving on Thursday, Sony’s decided to release this week’s PlayStation Store update today — and I don’t think anyone will be complaining. The release of Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix ($15) is the biggest news and anyone who has read 1UP’s review knows that it’s worth both the hype and the wait. Brain Challenge ($10) joins it as the week’s other downloadable game release and features 25 different brain-teasing minigames.

Should neither of those games interest you, a temporary sale on five older PSN games is in effect until December 4. The Last Guy, PixelJunk Eden, Echochrome (PS3), Novastrike, and Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 are all available for just $5 while the sale lasts.

Little Big Planet once again gets new costumes, with the free costume celebrating the holiday — a turkey head costume. For $2 you can also get the Chimera costume for Resistance 2 fans.

Music gamers get another dose of DLC this week. Rock Band adds nine new tracks today — three from The Killers ($2 each or $5.49 as a bundle), three from Yngwie Malmsteen ($2 each of $5.49 as a bundle), two from Soundgarden, and one from Lamb of God ($2 each). Guitar Hero World Tour calls that with three different songs from The Killers at the same price scheme. And Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol Encore 2 adds six new songs to sing along to for $1.49 a piece.

The promised demo of Dead Space rounds out the end of the list of PS3 downloads, although you can of course find new wallpapers, themes, and videos, as well as five free tracks from Street Fighter HD.

PSP owners, who have likely become accustomed to getting zilch after the past month’s worth of lackluster updates, can find two new pieces of content today. A trailer for Everyday Shooter is the less significant of the two, as the other new download is a new downloadable game, PBR: Out of the Chute ($15), which is the first professional bull riding game on PSP I can think of. It might not be what you were hoping for, but it’s better than another empty week on the PSP front.

Back in August when Sony announced the newest iteration of the PlayStation Portable, the PSP 3000, they announced two bundles that it would be available in: the Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters Entertainment Pack and the 4GB Memory Entertainment Pack. The Ratchet bundle, which is already available, includes a silver PSP, a copy of Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters on UMD, a 1GB memory stick, a copy of National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets on UMD, and a voucher to download Echochrome for free from the PlayStation Store. The 4GB bundle was scheduled to release in November and included a black PSP, a 4GB memory stick, and a voucher to download Everyday Shooter from the PlayStation Store. The price on both bundles were set at $200, with a standalone release of the PSP 3000 slated for $170 later this year.

Sony today announced that, after seeing the demand for the Ratchet bundle, they’ve decided to streamline their hardware lineup and kill off the 4GB bundle before it ever sees the light of day. A post on PlayStation.Blog says those interested in a 4GB memory stick can find one this Fall for an MSRP of $45 (or, for industrious folks who want a bargain, much cheaper and available right now). Beginning in December, the Ratchet bundle will begin to be offered with the standard ‘piano black’ PSP inside rather than the current silver system.

While the recent scan line issues have had me a bit nervous about investing in a PSP 3000, I was interested enough in the 4GB bundle that I planned on buying one anyway. After all, I already own Echochrome, I don’t care about movies on UMD, and I want a black PSP. Judging by the comments on the story on PlayStation.Blog, I wasn’t the only one holding out for the 4GB bundle. Looks like I’ll be sticking with my PSP 2000 for a bit longer than I thought I would be.

N+
Developer: Silverbirch Studios
Publisher: Atari
Price: $19.99
Platform: PSP, DS
Category: Puzzle/Platformer
ESRB: “E” for Everyone
Release Date: August 26, 2008

I had never really played N+ before in either its Xbox Live Arcade or PC iterations (it was simply known as N on PCs), save for a very brief session on PC where I had to close my browser almost immediately because I have a very obsessive personality — and this is the type of game that absolutely thrives on that type of person.

The premise is simple enough: get through a stage as quickly as possible using controls that are nothing more than left, right, and jump. There are little gold along the way to collect that add to your score (which is constantly decreasing as time passes), but your only real goal is to get to a certain spot, which usually won’t be open until you hit a switch. While initially it seems simple and fun enough, you get the impression that the ensuing levels (of which there are hundreds) will become nothing more than a cavalcade of mediocrity. With such basic gameplay, it’s not an unreasonable assumption, but play the game for a solid 20 minutes and you’ll begin to see what’s possible by introducing even a single new enemy.

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Thus far, Sony’s has been the best press conference of E3 2008, hands down. Their turkey melts were delicious, as were the mini-quiches and those fruit drinks they were passing out. The wait staff was prompt and efficient, particularly around the open bar. All I had to do was say “beer,” and there’d be one in my hand within seconds. Oh yeah, and they talked about games or something like that, I think… Read the full article

If the levels in echochrome weren’t mind-bending enough, thirty new maps are coming from North American gamers (well, 29 — and one from someone in Malta) to further vex you. These will only be available for a limited time, and only on PS3, so you’ll want to act fast to get in on the action.

[T]hese additional levels will appear at random in freeform mode depending on the difficulty level you’ve chosen. The difficulty level is represented by the bars at the bottom right of the loading screen between freeform levels, and the difficulty for the next level can be set while the next level is loading by pressing left or right on the d-pad. Levels are picked randomly from all levels in your “gallery”, “portfolio”, and user created levels. Remember that in freeform mode, levels that have not been cleared are selected first – so if you’re specifically looking for one of these new levels, you may need to skip forward until you find the one you want.

The first wave of levels will be released tomorrow, June 26, and more will be released next week. If you want to get a look at the levels ahead of time, you can find all of them on PlayStation.Blog’s flickr. Or, if you’re feeling creative, you can check out this post on PlayStation.Blog for a guide to creating your own echochrome levels.

It’s really a shame that the PSP version doesn’t get some downloadable love. Yes, the benefit of being able to take the game with you on the go is great, but it doesn’t make any sense that the game doesn’t get in on the DLC.

There’s only two flavors of new content on the PlayStation Store for PC — an echochrome theme and, even better, a demo of Secret Agent Clank. We got word earlier today that the game has gone gold, so this will give you a sneak peek at what you can expect from Clank’s PSP game. The demo contains the first level from the game, so if you’ve got a problem with repetition, you might want to skip the demo and just pick the game up on June 17.

A title like that doesn’t write itself very often, so I’m happy to take advantage. The new Rocketmen expansion pack, It Came From Uranus, is now available on the PlayStation Store. You’ll also now find two new Hot Shots Golf characters, each of which cost $.99, and are small enough that I reckon they’re already on the Blu-ray disc you hold in your hands.

Rounding out the DLC scene is this week’s installment of Rock Band tracks and 21 new Karaoke Revolution: American Idol tracks.

You’ll also find demos of both Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit and Overlord Raising Hell, new videos, trailers, themes, and wallpapers.

Hit the break to see all of the today’s new content.
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The long awaited MC Escher-inspired puzzle-platformer, echochrome, is set to release tomorrow on the PlayStation Store tomorrow for both PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable. Each version features 56 unique levels and will cost $9.99.

We’ve written our fair share about it, and if you checked out 1UP’s recent preview and import video review (above), you should know that this game is a must-buy for owners of either of Sony’s systems.

I’m glad the game ended up being a downloadable game versus retail, as there’s simply no way that the game could have been priced at $10 in stores. And at this price, it’s not going to be too expensive to pick up both versions of the game.

So who else will be getting the game tomorrow, and for what system(s)?

Think again.

echochrome’s been available for some time now over in Japan, and thanks to the in-game level creator, we’re seeing some of the most mind-twisting-boggling-bending-contorting-whatever levels ever conceived. As if the game wasn’t already packed with enough challenges to leave you nothing short of perplexed, these user created levels are truly taking things to another level.

Even though I know I don’t have any chance of solving any of these levels (more at PS3 Fanboy), they get me that much more excited to get my hands on the final game. If I do somehow manage to make it through one of these monsters, I’ll feel like I’ve truly accomplished something with my life. It might not make for much of an obituary, but I’d still view it as a hell of an accomplishment.

PSP owners are in for a nice update on the PlayStation Store for PC this week, so long as they don’t mind forking over some cash. Two new retail PSP games (one decent, one good) are now available for download — LocoRoco ($22) and Kingdom of Paradise ($11).

Of course, the echochrome demo is now available as promised, as is the PS one Classic R-Types ($6). There’s also new game videos, wallpapers, and a music track for LocoRoco.

It’s so much, in fact, that for once you’ll have to hit the break to view the full list.

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