At E3, Phil Harrison announced that more than 80 PlayStation Network Titles are in development and will be released between now and March 2008. Three of the PSN titles will be unveiled at Games Convention 2007 (GC) in Leipzig, Germany (see below). The games will most likely be arcade style games and will be available exclusively from the PlayStation Network Store. More information on the three titles should be available next month.

The three titles to be unveiled are:

• Aqua Vita
• Operation Creature Feature
• Trials of Topoq

Games Convention takes place between 23rd – 26th August 2007, in Leipzig, Germany. Day Tickets are available from EUR 8.50. The Developers Conference will take place between 20th – 22nd August 2007.

A new post over at the PlayStation Blog has confirmed that Rockstar’s next franchise will be exclusive to the PlayStation 3. The post from Michael Shorrock, Director of 3rd Party Relations at SCEA. Although exact about the title were not disclosed because of an arrangement between SCEA and Rockstar, they did promise more information soon. “We agreed with Rockstar and Take-Two Interactive Software that we wouldn’t disclose anything more about the deal or title at this time, so stay tuned, we’ll share more info as soon as we can.”

“we are announcing that a new franchise from Rockstar Games will be exclusive to PS3. As part of our long standing relationship with Rockstar, and the incredible success for both companies with the cultural icon that is Grand Theft Auto, we’ve agreed to the PlayStation exclusive rights of the next great franchise from the Rockstar studios.”

Tekken 5:Dark Resurrection Online will be available to download next week from the PlayStation Network Store, however, it will only be available in Japan. The game goes on sale on August 1st for JPY 2,800 (approx USD 23.59, GBP 11.64) for the full version, or JPY 1,000 (approx USD 8.42, GBP 4.15) for the expansion pack. The full game will weight in at around 550MB, while the expansion pack will be about 220MB.

The game will allow up to 8 players in a room, however, only two players will be able to play. Voice chat in enabled in the rooms so players can socialize while waiting to play. Several new modes have been included in addition to online play, including Survival mode and Practice mode. Look out for more details on the Japanese version as well as details on European and US release dates.

In a recent interview with Ryan Schneider, Marketing Director for Insomniac, Shack News learnt that the the Ratchet and Clank Future demo is complete and should be hitting the PlayStation Store soon. Ryan also revealed that new content for Resistance is in the making and should roll out in the next few months, however, he didn’t give any specific details on the new content.

“I can confirm that the demo [of Ratchet and Clank Future] will be downloadable via the PlayStation Store. Only Sony can tell you exactly when that will be though.”

“We’re always working on enhanced functionality and new content. We actually have some content that hasn’t been shared yet, so I think our fans will be happy in the coming months in terms of ongoing support for Resistance. I don’t want to go into specifics, but we’re not done.”

[Via: ShackNews]

The US PlayStation Network Store has also been updated with new content, however, the US store didn’t get all the same content as the UK/European one. One significant addition to the US store is a gameplay demo of Metal Gear Solid 4, which many gamers are eager to see. A full list of new content can be found below.

• Playable Demos
  • Heavenly Sword
• Game Trailers
  • Metal Gear Solid 4 Gameplay Demo
  • Resident Evil 4 Trailer
  • Haze ‘Origins’ Trailer
• Wallpaper
  • Heavelny Sword Wallpaper 1 and 2
• Movie Trailers
  • 30 Days of Night
  • Across the Universe
  • August Rush
• Blu-Ray Movie Trailers
• Vacancy

Woolworths, a UK retail chain, has been trialling both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD product ranges. They found that sales for both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray had been virtually non-existent, however since the PlayStation 3 release, Blu-Ray movie sales have seen a steady increase in saled. As a result, they are now rolling out Blu-Ray movies across all their medium to large stores, but will be dropping all HD-DVD lines.

Last month, Blockbusters announced that it would stock only Blu-Ray titles in 1,450 of their 1,700 stores in North America. This is bad news for the HD-DVD format and could mean the end of the high definition DVD war if other retailers follow suit.

The UK PlayStation Network Store has been updated with new content including a new playable demo, game trailers and Blu-Ray movie trailers. In addition, three new PlayStation (PSOne) titles are available to download including Spyro 2 and Crash Bandicoot 2. Check out the complete list below.

• Playable Demos:
  • Heavenly Sword
• Game Trailers
  • Haze Trailer
  • Assassin’s Creed
  • Resident Evil 5
• Blu-Ray Trailers
  • Open Season
  • Talladega
• PlayStation (PSOne) Titles
  • MediEvil
  • Crash Bandicoot 2
  • Spyro 2

The PlayStation store is still heavy on trailers, but hopefully we will start to see more game demos appearing soon. Sony is working on a number of downloadable titles for the PlayStation 3 and should appear on the PSN soon.

Sony is indeed listening to the views of consumers on what to include in their firmware updates. In an update to a blog posted earlier, Eric Lempel, Director of PlayStation Network Operations, said that Sony is working on incorporating in-game XMB access and more information on the feature should be available soon. Most of you will probably know that in-game XMB access is one of the most popular features consumers would like to see.

The update reads:
“Also, I noticed a lot of your comments were directly related to accessing XMB features in-game. We understand this is something you want and we are working on it. For the sake of keeping all the comments below on topic, please understand that we hear this request and are working toward a solution. When I have some more info to share on this, know that I will do so here on this blog.”

Now lets see of Sony listens to all the other requests like better video format support and in-game music playback. Whether in-game access makes it in the next firmware update remains to be seen, but so far it’s looking good. Look out for more information soon.

[Via: PlayStation.Blog]

Registration for the closed beta of Metal Gear Online has begun in Japan, unfortunately, you need to be able to read Japanese if you want to register. The beta will be limited to 3000 users, who will be chosen at random from the list of registered users, and will commence from August 20th to 3rd September. If you would like to register for the beta, you must do so before August 6th. Screenshots of Metal Gear Online can be found below.

Hi-Res Screen Shots:

The beta period seems really short, especially since the release date of the game has not been announced yet. A closed beta for North America or Europe has not been announced either, but hopefully more news will be available soon.

[Register for the Closed Beta]