Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics is currently working on a brand new IP alongside its impending Lara Croft reboot.
A blog post from Square Enix community manager Meagan Marie mentioned that the studio is getting ready to reveal "exciting new intellectual property".
"2012 is going to be the biggest year in Crystal's history," added studio boss Darrell Gallagher.
The developer behind planned Firefly and Buffy The Vampire Slayer MMOs has gone to the wall before either game ever saw the light of day.
As reported by Massively, California-based Multiverse ceased operations last month.
Founded back in 2004, the company never actually released a commercial title, with its only tangible video game output being two Flash-based promotional titles for McDonalds and Coca Cola.
A handful of retailer-exclusive Mass Effect 3 items have been announced.
According to GameInformer, purchase the PC version through EA's own Origin store and you'll snag the AT-12 Raider Shotgun.
"The AT-12 Raider Shotgun fires a large pellet spread, ensuring maximum coverage for close-range targets. Designed for superior rapid fire, the AT-12 allows for optimal recovery time between shot," states the announcement.
Racing studios are, sadly, a diminishing breed, and those that still stand are having to adapt to survive. Following the closure of Bizarre and Black Rock last year, existing developers are finding new paths to explore, Codemasters taking its Dirt brand down the downloadable route, while Slightly Mad turn to the strange new world of user-generated content for its ambitious and intriguing Project Cars.
There's one studio that's weathered the storm well enough, and that, despite the struggles elsewhere in the market, still manages to produce up to three boxed racing games per year. And it does that with a thinly stretched team of 90, spread over three floors of a slightly scruffy studio near the centre of Milan.
It's this team that put out the functional yet entertaining WRC game and its somewhat underwhelming sequel, and that in the SBK series has produced arguably the best bike game on the market; not a particularly impressive feat when its sole competitor, Capcom's MotoGP games, has seemingly slipped into obscurity, but a noble one nevertheless.
Hardware specialist Razer has announced Project Fiona - a mysterious new product that promises "PC gaming on an all-new form factor".
A brief teaser trailer, which you can see below, shows clips of Assassin's Creed: Revelations and HAWX 2 but doesn't divulge any further details as to exactly what the system is.
The Verge speculates that Razer could be resurrecting its super-portable Switchblade gaming netbook first mooted at CES last year.
Play with each other.
Microsoft Flight, the new face of Microsoft Flight Simulator, will be free to download on PC sometime this spring.
Microsoft Flight Simulator X, released 2006, was the last full game produced. The benchmark series started way back in 1982, before aeroplanes were even invented.
In Microsoft Flight it's the Big Island of Hawaii you'll be realistically flying around. Everything should look and feel as if it were real life, although taken with a pinch of graphical salt.
There's a moment in 2002's Jackass: The Movie which has become something of a perennial favourite among fans of Johnny Knoxville and co. Hiding in the bushes on a golf course, the pranksters proceed to blast a deafening airhorn whenever the hapless golfers attempt to line up a shot, sending their perfectly-honed swing way off shot. It's childish, irresponsible, anti-social, silly, ultimately pointless and pretty much devoid of any artistic or cultural worth whatsoever.
It is also bust-your-gut, wet-your-pants, double-you-over-in-stitches hilarious.
Jackass was, of course, the most famous millennial extension of the prank show format. Tricking members of the public for fun and profit has been a TV mainstay for years: Allen Funt and his Candid Camera, the fake-beard antics of Beadle's About, Dom Joly's meddling about in Trigger Happy TV. Of those examples, perhaps the last show contains the most interesting aspect: the famous prank in which Joly yells into a massively oversized mobile phone, disturbing the peace in various social situations.
