Microsoft Game Studios and Tecmo jointly announced today that Ryu Hayabusa’s latest hour, Ninja Gaiden II, has sold over one million copies worldwide in a span of just a little over two months. Certainly, that figure doesn’t quite compare to the sales of bigger titles this year, like Call of Duty 4 or Metal Gear Solid 4, but it is nothing to scoff at either.

Question now is, with Itagaki gone, will Tecmo revisit the Ninja Gaiden franchise in the future? It’s a huge, almost guaranteed money-maker for them, so we’re going to say “probably.” more »

Publisher Gamecock announced today that Blazing Lizard’s Pirates vs. Ninjas Dodgeball, slated for a release on the Xbox Live Arcade next week, will hit Wii as a full-fledged retail title later this Winter.

As you’d expect, the Wii edition will offer “several customized control schemes” designed to utilize the motion-sensing abilities of the Wii Remote, along with an all-new story and expanded selection of challenge modes. Press release after the break. more »

If a rumor stemming from an Australian Gamer piece is to be believed, Pandemic’s Batman game movie tie-in with The Dark Knight has been given the proverbial axe. Apparently, development on the title was lagging behind schedule, leaving “higher-ups” at the studio’s Australia-based Brisbane location no choice but to can it in fear of losses.

If true, this wouldn’t exactly be a surprise. Previous reports, one citing an anonymous EA manager, speculated that the quality of the project was not up to snuff and deadlines were being missed.

Why so serious Pandemic? [Australian Gamer

Homebrew developer Hellcat dropped by our forums today to release an update to his Pandora installer for 3.X/4.X kernel based custom firmware, a handy application that allows users to easily create a base Pandora setup (service mode battery, magic memory stick) on their homebrew-capable PSP.

Expanding upon the robust feature set present in the initial release, revision 4b adds support for installing Despertar del Cementerio v7 in a one-click fashion, along with the ability to install ELF Menu v0.4 on your DC7 stick.

Release Thread

Despite being promised for a “nationwide” rollout last Spring, pre-paid PSN cards are still a scarce commodity. That is, unless you have a Meijer nearby. Truth be told, many of us don’t, so it is reassuring to hear that Sony will be expanding availability of the cards to Blockbuster, 7-Eleven and Riteaid stores across the continental United States later this September.

This is no doubt good news for those without access to a credit card or debit card account. We just can’t fathom why it took them this long though.

PLAYSTATION Network Card [Sony]

According to the latest issue of Weekly Famitsu, an enhanced port of Q Entertainment’s Nintendo DS fast-paced block-busting puzzle title Meteos is scheduled to hit the Xbox Live Arcade service in Japan this October. The XBLA edition will of course include achievements, along with one-on-one multiplayer battles over Live.

No word on a release date for territories other than Japan — yet. Considering the majority of Live Arcade titles are released on a worldwide basis, it would be realistic to expect Meteos Wars to hit North America in October as well.

This week Famitsu-Dengeki combo news (all in 1 edition) [NeoGAF]

Homebrew developer Zx-81 has released a maintenance update to PSPWrite, a simple yet powerful text editor that allows users to edit any ASCII format plain-text file on the PSP. The application supports input through either a wireless IR keyboard or the built-in Danzeff virtual keyboard.

Version 1.1.1 includes additional fonts in varying sizes and resolves a word wrap issue with text from the ISO-8859-1 character set. As usual, the full changelog can be found after the jump.

PSPWrite: A Text Editor for PSP v1.1.1 [Zx-81]

True Games announced today that it has entered into an agreement with European-based publisher GOA. Under the agreement, GOA will publish an upcoming free-to-play micro-transaction based online game for the PC. The title, which has yet to be officially named, is in development at Petroglyph Studios of Star Wars: Empire at War fame.

“When we partnered with Petroglyph our pledge to them was that we would make their game a global sensation and that we would work with only the highest quality partners like GOA to help support it,” said Jeff Lujan, Founder and Chairman of True Games Interactive. “Traditionally worldwide partners license a game after it’s been completed, but we are working across the globe to locate partners who can contribute to design direction and adapt the game for cultural tastes in each territory for a true worldwide launch.”

Although details surrounding the title are virtually nonexistant, both True Games and GOA are promising that a “major announcement” will be made soon.

Official Japanese PSP sales figures from Famitsu parent Enterbrain were released today, pegging the handheld at 10 million units sold since its debut in December 2004. In terms of software sales, Capcom’s Monster Hunter 2nd G - unsurprisingly - took top honors on the five best-selling games chart with 2,396,642 units sold. Previous installments in the series also managed to take second and fourth place on the chart. One thing is for sure… Japan can’t get enough of Monster Hunter.

Full software sales chart after the jump. more »

In addition to re-confirming the long-rumored second Xbox 360 price cut, a Best Buy ad circular for the week beginning September 7 has revealed yet another Nintendo DS Lite color — Metallic Silver.

The new color will carry a standard retail price of $129.99 and palette-wise, looks exactly the same as the DS featured in the previously released Guitar Hero: On Tour hardware bundle. Sans Guitar Hero, of course. Expect an official announcement soon, most likely by next week.