If ‘shiny’ is among your favourite colours, you should know that Vanquish, for all its violence and brutality, has been polished to a brilliant sheen. The game opens with an orbital space station firing its weapons on San Francisco, essentially melting a good portion of the city and its inhabitants. A threat from the station’s Russian captors gives America just 10 hours to surrender before New York suffers the same fate. This sets the scene for a manic assault on the station. Read the rest of this entry »

Presented in glorious alphabetical order, New Media: Retail Roundup is your indispensible checklist of the home console and handheld titles arriving in stores this week. What will you be playing?

MICROSOFT XBOX 360 Fight Night Champion * Gray Matter * Rango

NINTENDO Wii Rango * Wild West Shootout DS Rango

SONY PLAYSTATION 3 Fight Night Champion * Rango PSP Nothing

VARIOUS PC Dreamcast Collection * Dungeons * Gray Matter * Rift * Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II – Retribution

New Media: Downloadable Digest is your handy reminder of the new downloadable titles released during the past week.

MICROSOFT XBLA Bejeweled Blitz Live

NINTENDO WiiWARE Bit.Trip Flux DSiWARE Bejeweled Twist * Panda Craze

SONY PSN Alien Breed: Descent * TNT Racers * The Undergarden PSP MINIS Nothing

VALVE STEAM Bulletstorm * Cities In Motion * CreaVures * Men of War: Assault Squad * Painkiller: Redemption

Recent instalments of New Media: 20.02.11 l 13.02.11 l 06.02.11 l 30.01.11 l 23.01.11

Welcome to The Black List, your one stop shop for all of the stories published on the site this week.

MONDAY l PODCAST l Episode 30 > In this episode of The Black Panel Podcast, we discuss Original IP in 2011, PSP2/NGP, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Hamilton’s Great Adventure, The Outsider, Raskulls and much more! READ MORE

TUESDAY l NEWS l Anarchy Reigns > The multiplayer focused third person brawler we knew ever so briefly as Max Anarchy has been formally announced as Anarchy Reigns. SEGA and Platinum Games have marked the occasion with the release of a teaser highlighting some of the combatants. It appears that you’ll be taking control of a futuristic samurai, a statuesque woman or a mechanical bull (thankfully not of the rodeo variety). The marquee name, however, is chainsaw wielding MadWorld protagonist, Jack. READ MORE

WEDNESDAY l NEWS l The Gunstringer > Twisted Pixel has announced The Gunstringer, a western themed shooter designed exclusively for the Kinect. Games development is a cutthroat business, so it pays to remain one step ahead of the competition. While others attempt to cash in on the faltering zombie phenomenon, the Texan studio has moved on to what is certain to be the next big thing, marionette simulation. READ MORE

THURSDAY l NEWS l nanoBITES 27 > Forthcoming military shooter Homefront will not meet its previously announced release date. Before you storm the offices of THQ, you should probably know that it has only been delayed for a week. Look for it on 360, PS3 and PC on Thursday 17 March. This is just one of the stories in this week’s edition of nanoBITES, our ongoing feature devoted to small but important news items. READ MORE

FRIDAY l NEWS l Dark Souls > Following its announcement at last year’s Tokyo Game Show, we’ve seen precious little of Dark Souls. Namco Bandai and From Software have finally thrown us a bone, however, issuing an atmospheric new trailer for the game formerly known as Project Dark. READ MORE

Recent instalments of The Black List: 29.01.11 l 22.01.11 l 15.01.11 l  08.01.11 l  01.01.11

In this episode: Original IP in 2011, PSP2/NGP, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Hamilton’s Great Adventure, The Outsider, Raskulls and much more!

Subscribe via iTunes l Direct Download l Podcast Specific RSS l Previous Episodes

Drop us a line: feedback@blackpanel.com.au

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Answer: Visit iTunes and rate the show!

The Panellists: Erin Marcon (@ErinMarcon), Karen Jacobson (@KarenMJacobson), Peter Nickless and Joel Guttenberg

Twitter: @BlackPanelDaily l Facebook: Black Panel Readers’ League

Related links: New Horizons; Everything but the kitchen sink; By popular demand?; FatShark’s tilt at greatness; Development on The Outsider stalls; Buzz: The Ultimate Music Quiz Review