Gamespot is reporting the EA has filed for a trademark on the System Shock brand. From the article: "Electronic Arts registered a trademark last month on the title 'System Shock' for use in video games. Interestingly enough, it also made note that the trademark was to apply to 'a computer game that may be accessed network-wide by network users,' or 'an online computer game accessed and played via mobile and cellular phones and other wireless devices.' An EA representative was not immediately available for comment as to whether the trademark was a sign that the dormant franchise would soon be awoken, or if it was just a bit of routine upkeep of the company's intellectual property. " Take-Two is still developing the title thought to be the spiritual successor to the System Shock series, BioShock. Their purchase of Irrational Studios was reported yesterday.

The NDA for the Dungeons and Dragons Online Beta is now a thing of the past. F13's piece prior to the lifting of the NDA is a good place to get started. They also have a lively discussion going, discussing all aspects of the upcoming game, which launches February 28th. From the f13 piece: "The most important thing to understand about DDO is Turbine is trying a different take on the genre. People looking strictly for a WoW clone in a D&D flavored wrapper won't find it. For some that may be a good thing, for others not so much. Oh to be sure, it has a lot of the same trappings as your previous favorite graphical-Diku-mud; after all, most fantasy computer role playing games owe a little or very large portion of their structure to the granddaddy of all pen and paper rpgs, Dungeon & Dragons. So it comes as no surprise to find this game with familiar fantasy races, defined character classes, and easily recognizable fantasy monsters, magic items and spells. But, as I have grown fond of saying these last several years, the devil's in the implementation. To that end, DDO is almost as easily defined by what it is NOT as by what it IS."

Gamespot is reporting that the U.S. Final Fantasy XI Xbox 360 Beta has begun. You're going to have to get ahold of a Beta disc from the Official Xbox magazine's February issue, and then sign up at the PlayOnline site. From the article: "When the game goes live in May, Xbox 360 players will be able to rub elbows and swap healing potions with their PlayStation 2 and PC counterparts. But for the duration of the beta test, Xbox 360 users will be kept on their own servers. They will be able to interact with beta testers from Europe and Japan, however. While Square Enix has issued a list of known issues with the beta game, support for USB keyboards and mice has been included."

Gamespot has the news that independent developer of the MMOG 'Twilight War' Smiling Gator has unfortunately closed up shop. Funding was the primary reason for their closure. From the article: "Twilight War, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game using the Source engine (first featured in Half-Life 2), would have been Smiling Gator's first game. The company had billed Twilight War as 'an MMORPG with an integrated first-person-shooter-style combat system where thousands of online players come together in an expansive and immersive three-dimensional world.'" The Twilight War HQ site has information on the game for those interesting in what might have been.

GinoMGG writes "Talk about a quick release. Hot on the tail of Desert of Flames SOE is acting fast to give those at the 60 cap something to do. WhoDigs has news from Ubisoft Germany on the Everquest 2 expansion, 'Kingdom of Sky'." Gamespot has word on both the EQLive and EQ2 expansions, while Mobhunter has a closer look at Everquest's 11th expansion - The Prophecy of Ro. From the Gamespot article: "The second expansion for EQII, Kingdom of Sky, will add an all-new structured skill and ability achievement system and will raise the level cap for adventurer and artisans to level 70 and guilds to level 50. It will add 10 new zones, 25 new monsters, and 'troves' of new items. Its plot will concern the Overrealm, a new realm of floating islands suspended at high altitudes, as well as a plot by ancient foes of Norrath to wreak havoc."

1up.com has an in-depth preview of the much anticipated Kingdom Hearts II RPG. The second mashup between SquareEnix and Disney is expected in the states sometime in late Spring or early Summer. From the article: "If the first Kingdom Hearts was a crazy experiment, then the sequel is the final product, refined and polished in dozens of small-but-important ways. One of the most obvious improvements is the game's massively higher budget; though the first looked nice, Kingdom Hearts II is one of the best looking games the PS2 has ever -- or will ever -- see. From photorealistic models to 'I can't believe it's not PS3' massive battles, the game convinces the aging PS2 hardware to do things that seem nearly impossible."

The Guardian Gamesblog had the chance to pick John Carmack's brain about mobile gaming's first official doom title: The Doom RPG. From the article: "Q: On your blog you talked about getting into Java programming as a means of resetting some assumptions and habits after working on Quake III. So did Doom RPG help? How? A: It wasn't so much the Java aspects as the mobile platform that is the diversion. It has been worthwhile, but I didn't get to go all that far down the detour before my primary responsibilities asserted themselves. I did three major blocks of coding on the project and regular design review meetings, which was all I could spare the time for. The crew at Fountainhead did a great job of following up on the direction and turning my rough project into a polished product."

Vistaer writes "After over five years in development, Team Lazarus has finally released their full remake of the classic 80's RPG "Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny". This remake is built as a total conversion for Dungeon Siege, and not only does it retain the original story, characters, and setting of Ultima V, but also adds many new systems and improvements to the Dungeon Siege engine including branching dialogues, day/night cycles, portraits for every character in the game and much much more. Weighing in at just over 500MB, this game could prove to be a delight to many CRPG fans."

SquareEnix has announced some of its plans for 2006. Gamasutra reports on an upcoming three year anniversary party for FFXI in March of next year. There will be some major announcements at the event, as well as information on the upcoming MMOG expansion. Gamespot also has information from the Jump Fest 2005 event, where SquareEnix displayed announced plans for a Dragon Quest VIII spinoff starring Yangus. Xbox 360 RPG studio Mistwalker was also there, with details on upcoming titles Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon.

hipernoico writes "Wired has a summary of good portable RPG games for the end of this year. 'What better way to travel than in the company of a dragon-slaying knight? ' " I've travelled thousands of miles playing various Game Boy Pokemon titles. Although lately WarioWare Touched and Meteos have taken the place of my usual RPG travel companions. What games will you be playing while dreading arriving at your parents house?

Most modern single-player RPGs have changed quite a bit since the early days of the NES. Real-time combat and epic story arcs have allowed the traditionally hardcore RPG market to draw in new fans who may not otherwise want to invest 100+ hours on a single title. Square Enix, the company that founded the genre, spits in the eye of progress with Dragon Quest VIII. This traditional dungeon delve has an old-school heart with a beautiful current-generation exterior. Read on for my impressions of the latest chapter in the mind-numbingly popular Dragon Quest series.

We reported previously on an interview with John Smedley being run by Gamespot. They've put up the second part of the interview, and in the closing paragraph John takes the gloves off. From the article: "One thing that I love about our company is that there is no 'quit' in this company. It's about making sure that we have pride in what we do. People within the company feel so much pride in this game that they want it to beat the crap out of World of Warcraft. That's something we feel very passionate about. We know we are capable of making the best stuff out there, and I'm proud to say that with the changes we're making in Galaxies, I think we're headed in the right direction."

GrnArmadillo writes "The official City of Heroes site is reporting that Marvel's lawsuit over the CoH character generator has been settled. It looks like CoH essentially won, though it's unclear what price, if any, they're paying for the victory. The key portion of the brief press release: 'The parties' settlement allows them all to continue to develop and sell exciting and innovative products, but does not reduce the players' ability to express their creativity in making and playing original and exciting characters ... While the terms of the settlement were not disclosed, all parties agree that this case was never about monetary issues and that the fans of their respective products and characters are the winners in this settlement.'" Commentary is available on Gamespot. Glad this is over. This has been pending almost as long as I've worked here.

Illness and Holidays conspire to keep even the best intentioned reviewers from their goals, and so today you're going to get a potpourri of gaming goodness. November was a big month for games, but most of the attention went to Microsoft's new console. Three titles in particular stand out for creativity, for fun, for addictiveness, and for their lack of 360ness. Some of them have been out for a little while now, but if you're looking for recent releases to put under the tree and either can't afford or can't find a 360 to gift, these titles may be just what you're looking for. Read on for my impressions of Soul Calibur III, The Movies, and Civilization IV.

Via GameSetWatch, the announcement of the 2005 finalists for the Independent Games Festival to be held at the 2006 Game Developer's Conference. Gamasutra has a few more details. From that article: "Following a record total of 118 entries, competition was especially fierce, but the forty IGF judges, picked from mainstream and indie game creation and journalism circles, have singled out their pick of the outstanding indie titles. In particular, the finalists for this year's $20,000 Seumas McNally Grand Prize include Introversion's cult action-strategy title Darwinia, Ankama's French strategy-RPG MMO Dofus, Grubby Games' fiendish puzzle platform game Professor Fizzwizzle, Digital Eel's innovative 'short' space exploration title Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space, and Pocketwatch Games' ecosystem-building title Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa."

In yet another completely unexpected move, Sony Online Entertainment is offering players who purchased the Trials of Obi-Wan expansion for SWG before Nov. 3rd a refund. The recently announced massive overhaul has upset a lot of people. From the Gamespot article: "To appease some of those angered by the reworking of Star Wars Galaxies, Sony Online and LucasArts are offering refunds to anyone with a Galaxies account in good standing who purchased the Trials of Obi-Wan before November 3. Players seeking refunds should send their name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, and Station Name to refunds@soe.sony.com ... All requests must be made by December 1, 2005."

Besides the Burning Crusade announcement, there's lots of interesting stuff going on out in California. Gamespot reports from the scene and has a first look at the Blood Elf starting area. Meanwhile, Next Generation has the lay of the land from the first day of Blizzard's games get-together. From the Gamespot article: "As for the scene, Morhaime announced that slightly fewer than 8,000 attendees would be at Blizzcon, and there seemed to be about that many people crowding in Hall A of the Anaheim Convention Center. The line for showgoers to pick up their free goody bags seemed to snake as long as a line for a ride at nearby Disneyland, looking to be easily more than an hour's wait. Though there were dozens of computer stations, lines for Blizzcon attendees looking to play the new expansion pack were also quite long. Two GameSpot editors stood in line for about an hour to get 30 minutes of play time with the content."

Halloween is almost upon us, and today we've got a pair of games unnaturally interested with blood. If that sounds like a feeble attempt at theming this dual review, you'd be right. October has seen an avalanche of game releases, and two titles for the DS seemed somehow appropriate for this weekend. Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow carries the flag of side-scrolling excellence, and despite being on Nintendo's newest handheld brings back fond memories of days gone by. Trauma Center: Under the Knife utilizes the DS's touch screen to provide a wickedly challenging, more modern, and thoroughly different gameplay experience. Both games have their quirks and copious amounts of blood, and you can read on for my reactions to these sanguine titles.

More information continues to become available from the X05 event. Spitfire15 writes "id Software has announced a new Wolfenstein game coming onto the Xbox 360. During Peter Moore's section of X05's keynote speech he introduced id Software's Todd Hollenshead to the stage. As soon as he got on he unexpectedly announced that id Software and Raven Software were already underway with the next installment of the Wolfenstein series." Additionally, Bioware groupie writes "Today Bioware announced a new science fiction action-rpg that is already in development, Mass Effect. It will only be released for the Xbox 360 with no PC port planned and it's promising photo-realistic graphics, squad based gameplay, and continuous character development." Both titles won't make the launch window. The launch titles themselves are still up in the air, a little more than a month before the console launches. Gamespot reports: "In an effort to clear up the confusion, GameSpot asked David Reid, director of platform marketing for the Xbox, what the exact 360 launch lineup is. He said that 'there will be 15 to 20 Xbox 360 titles available on launch day' with around another half-dozen making it to market by the end of the year."

The Dungeons and Dragons license has graced some truly fine videogames. Planescape: Torment and the Baldur's Gate sagas are some of the finest gaming experiences RPG fans can cite. Dragonshard is the first melding of Dungeons and Dragons with the Real-Time Strategy genre, combining traditional RTS action with RPG elements to create a unique whole. While the game doesn't redefine my understanding of the RTS genere, it's very different from your normal title and is well worth checking out. Read on for my impressions of Liquid Entertainment's Dragonshard.