Ever imagine your Xbox 360 and DS joining forces to bring you hours of gaming fun? Well, Rare, the company behind Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise, managed to pull it off: interaction between the Xbox 360 and DS is actually possible. The problem is this feature won't go public. Learn more about it after the jump!

The much-awaited Nintendo DS incarnation of Viva Piñata, Viva Pinata: Pocket Paradise, is finally given a release window, targeted sometime within Fall. And it's a paradise intended for the pocket indeed, since the game enables garden builders to build their own patch of heaven in a matter of minutes. More details in the full article!

Surfer Girl just released a batch of juicy rumors that should have something to raise your eyebrows. According to what's supposed to be "insider info," it might not take forever before a Duke Nukem game gets released, Square Enix is looking at the Nintendo Wii for Kingdom Hearts 3, Twisted Metal is racing its way to the Sony PlayStation 3, and Ryo Hazuki from Shenmue will never get revenge for his father in a full-blown game.

For more rumors, check out the full article!

 

The handheld gaming scene was shaken to its core when Microsoft suddenly announced an upcoming iteration of Viva Pinata for the Nintendo DS - and here to shake you up more are two new screenshots of the game in action. With a quirky garden-creation mechanic involving cute, colorful creatures called Pinatas, Viva Pinata for the Nintendo DS definitely looks like a must-buy, and we see just how the developers are handling its portable version in the images above this article.

Looking at the screenshots, it seems Rare Ltd. is doing a pretty good job of delivering the Viva Pinata joy over to the Nintendo DS, with the graphics looking reassuringly bright and chunky. The creature models also look very solid, although not quite as colorful as their console companions. Still, this could just be the fact that Viva Pinata for the Nintendo DS is still under development, and we'll be seeing a more spruced-up version in the future.

Enjoy these two screenshots that we have here for you.

In a recent post answering fan questions on the Rare Ltd. site, the development team dropped some hints as to what may be in store for the Nintendo Wii Virtual Console as far as games and development are concerned.

Teases on a possible release of the Nintendo 64 hit Banjo Kazooie and quite possibly Viva Pinata were made, with rare saying that at this point "there's always a chance."

The developers, however, made it clear that Nintendo will always have the last say on what gets released in Virtual Console and said that, "beyond the Donkey Kong Country games we don't have anything in the pipeline at the moment, but that doesn't mean it won't happen in future."

Banjo Kazooie for the Nintendo DS was revealed to have been worked on but was dropped in favor of the Xbox 360 version. Rare devs said that they favored the new approach but did not waive the possibility of the project coming to life in the future.

Rare also said that the Viva Pinata project for the Nintendo DS is coming along fairly well. The devs commented that "we can bring across properties other than those owned by Nintendo, so we'll leave you to wonder what's coming after Viva Pinata DS."

For those people who wanted Viva Pinata so badly but don't have Microsoft's Xbox 360, there's good news for you: Viva Pinata for the DS has been announced at Comic-Con 07, which pretty much confirms the rumor dating a few months ago about Rare Ltd.'s colorful candy-filled animals migrating to the Nintendo DS.

It is indeed good news for those who want Viva Pinata on the go, and it will be a blast trading pinatas with friends, and in the youngsters' case, classmates. There are some people, who see Viva Pinata differently, though, and may think that it's actually bad for kids in the long run. But that's a different thing altogether.

Thanks to Kotaku for the pic!

Inter-piñata breeding is apparently loved and approved of by our mommies and daddies. That's right kiddies. Viva Piñata just won this year's top Parents' Choice Award. We've also heard Bill Gates approve of Rare Ltd.'s piñata gardenry game as well, so maybe some other parents follow suit.

If you're curious, other titles which also won the hearts of parents were Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam (Wii and DS), Backyard Basketball 2007, and Animal Genius. From the looks of things though, Parents' Choice Awards are given to those games that feature... animals ("animals" here, would be ana-morphically defined loosely though). Remember last year's award-winner? Animal Crossing: Wild World bagged the top award, and now we have Piñata.

Anyone want to guess next year's winner?

There's more interesting news about the Game Developers Conference 2007 (GDC): this March's conference will include lectures from Ubisoft producer Jade Raymond about Assassin's Creed (slated for PS3, Xbox 360, and PC), from Rare Ltd. about Viva Pinata (focusing on the graphics engine), and from Keiichi Yano about making the cult hit Elite Beat Agents for the DS. This is according to the GDC News blog (via Gamasutra).

Checking the GDC's blog shows a lot interesting sessions. We're curious about the Final Fantasy XII postmortem (it'd be nice to know more about how they handled the technical issues of transitioning between the quest screen and the battle screen in that gorgeous PS2 game).

There's also a tutorial on law, because you have to cover your assets when you're making development deals. Just look at our recent article on the courtroom drama between Spark Unlimited and Activision.

There will probably be lots more of these announcements from the GDC in the next days. The GDC will be on March 5 to 9 in San Francisco. We can't wait for another conference full of quotable quotes, flame bait, big news, jaw-dropping revelations, and gaming love!

It's been quite a while since we last had an update on what to expect in the DS version of the N64 classic Diddy Kong Racing. Today we finally found out a few more details, thanks to the latest issue of Nintendo Power.

Diddy Kong Racing DS will have all of the courses found in the Rare original. The game will also have three multiplayer modes - single card download play, wireless play, and WiFi play - for more mad monkey racing with your friends.

Still no word on whether there will be some changes in the character lineup, but we'll be sure to bring you the updates as soon as we find out.

North Americans will be seeing Diddy Kong Racing DS on store shelves on February 7. For a peek at the gameplay, check out the clip in this previous QJ article.

Those who have been wanting to grab a copy of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney but haven't had a chance should be paying close attention. The long awaited third shipment will be arriving on June 12th, 2006. That is the day after the DS Lite hits stores.

Phoenix Wright is an awesome adventure game that follows the story of an up-and-coming defense attorney by the name of, well, Phoenix Wright. It's one of those games you just can't put down. Order it now because it's sure to sell out just as quickly as before. You'll want to catch up on the riveting story before the sequel, Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Justice for All hits stores in early 2007.