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As an apology for the recent hacking and outage of the PlayStation Network, Sony is offering free games to PS3 and PSP owners who lost service during the outage. In addition, users will receive 30 days of free PlayStation Plus service and free rentals from their online video rental service.

To claim your free games, just log onto the PSN Store anytime the first 30 days after it's restored (which it should be soon) and download the games. Two game downloads from the list of available games are allowed for each system - 2 for PS3 and 2 for PSP. Five games are available for each platform, including the critically acclaimed inFamous on PS3 and LittleBigPlanet on both the PSP and PS3. Check the listed source for the full menu of free games and other stipulations of the deal.

This is for the North American PSN Store only; other regions will likely have their own "customer appreciation packages" announced later on. I dunno about you guys, but I'll be getting my Wipeout on at the first opportunity.

Source: North American PlayStation Blog

You might recall laszlow's post from a couple months back, in which we, the gamers, were invited to vote upon which games should be included in their retrospective. Time has flown, and now the results have been made public - well, people who voted got the results an hour ago, but now they're actually public.

So, how did your favorite games do? If you're thinking specifically of Square Enix games, they did pretty okay. For the PlayStation, three of the four games came from the old Squaresoft: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy Tactics, and Einhander. Beyond that, though, not so hot; Final Fantasy lost to Zelda, Chrono Trigger also lost to Zelda, and Actraiser whiffed against the first Sim City on SNES.

I think a fair number of the results were pretty predictable, but that's probably because a lot of the games are either truly impressive, had lax competition in their categories, or both. I happily greeted the news that Bioshock and Portal both got in, personally, and was quite amused to see Minecraft topple the Starcraft II juggernaut. To form your own opinions, just hit the source link below.

Source: Smithsonian Institute

First of all, as I'm sure you've all noticed, the CoN home page got a bit of a tweak; you'll now notice two boxes containing New Stuff and Your Stuff. Most of this information was all available in the previous format, with the exception of the new Quizzes heading. It'll work just like the others: when there are new quizzes available for you to take, you'll get a convenient link straight to the quiz page. And it's much prettier now, isn't it?

To make the new CoNQuiz system even more accessible, updates on Facebook and Twitter will be automatically posted whenever a new set of quizzes is available, just because we care!

Finally, in spirit of making the quiz questions even more exciting, I've come up with a themed set for this month: all the quizzes are composed entirely of "Who Said It" questions. You'll be given a quote and the title of the game from which it was taken and asked to select which character from that game said it. The difficulty ranges from pretty obvious to semi-obscure, so it should be fun for all.

With that said, have at them!

Well, what have we got today. Here's a hint: It's not a new Chrono series game. I misled you for funsies. What we DO have are several versions of Chrono Trigger being released on various platforms almost simultaneously. We've got the Playstation Network Version, which is a port of the Playstation version. This, however, will probably not be seen until next month. There's the WiiWare version, which is a port of the original SNES version. Finally, there's a shiny new version for iMode mobile phones, which is an upgraded version of the DS port. The mobile version will be split into two parts, which must be bought separately in order to get the whole game. It also features (apparently) updated visuals and a more relevant control scheme.

In Final Fantasy news, there's some interesting stuff on the Type-0 front. You know how we've had moogles since Final Fantasy V, and that's their name? Well, in Type 0, it would seem that "Moogle" is actually an acronym for a miltary position. Oh, and they're part of a group called "Cranberry Knights", too. For more details on the upcoming PSP game, check here for a summary of the story, batlle system and characters, and here for details on the missions and summons. Also more character details. Gotta love Famitsu.

And what else have Square-Enix been up to recently? Well, they've just released an app for the iPhone that teahces the English language to the user. Useful! (And sexy!) Add another notch the the iPhone tally, since their next app in production is a comic book/game hybrid, titled "Imaginary Range". This is set to be released on May 5th, for iDevices and Android. I guess the iPhone tally should be modified to include those too, huh. Finally, a little snippet of possible plagiarism. Japanese Wii RPG "Pandora's Tower" was given some box art recently, and one of the characters bears a resemblance to one of the known Final Fantasy Versus XIII characters. Comparison images within, with plenty of red pen pointing out the similarities. They do appear very similar in design, but as of yet, no comment from either developer has been made.

That's all for now, folks. You can return to playing Final Fantasy IV Complete.

Source: Andriasang, Siliconera

Since our last post on the Wii 2, there has been a considerable amount of new information to hit the interwebs. So let's break it down!

First of all, Nintendo pretty quickly confirmed the rumors that were going about: yes, there is in fact a new console well in the works, codenamed "Project Cafe." Because, you know, you gotta have a codename. As initially supposed, the console will receive its first public unveiling at E3 2011.

We also have a few notable details about the system's capabilities. Its processing power will be greater than what is currently boasted by the PS3 and Xbox 360. Apparently, Project Cafe will be able to achieve resolutions of 1080p. I don't really know what that means, but another source says that it will be capable of HD resolutions, so I'll just assume the terms are synonymous. In addition, it has been stated that the new system will be fully backwards compatible with the Wii.

Perhaps the most interesting info currently available concerns the new control. Nintendo appears to be returning to a more classic style with this control, which will feature analog sticks and a pretty standard layout. Oh, plus a 6-inch touch screen right in the middle. Think Dreamcast appearance. This touch screen controller will allow for additional interaction with the game, but it will also be able to stream content from the console to be played on the control exclusively. Sources have said that the touch screen will also be HD resolution, leading to some serious cost speculations. In addition to the already-existing usefulness speculations. (Check the first link below for more information and an image.)

Most recently, information has come out suggesting a system price in the range of $350 to $400. The console will apparently be ready to ship as early as this October, though Nintendo may very well hold off on that date. "Stream" is rumored to be one potential name for the new system; and we'd only just gotten used to Project Cafe.

Nintendo also intends to make a pre-announcement (it's kinda like LeBron, just go with it) in the relatively near future.

Source: IGN, IGN, IGN

Related to laszlow's recent newspost, Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger have been confirmed for released in North America. FFVI will be released both on the Playstation Network and the Wii Virtual Console, whereas CT will be solely on the PSN. This information was leaked by the ESRB recently. No date has been specified for their release, nor any information about European releases.

FFVI and CT? Two of the board at large's favorite games. Squenix knows what they're doing here, and all you old fogeys who remember when these games came out first are gonna get the chance to relive all that without resorting to emulation (or handhelds). I can't wait either!

Source: RPGamer