Kotaku has new Fallout 3 screenshots. Only three, but well chosen, as we get a look at the status screen (complete with indicators showing a crippled head), as well as... this. Even if you had no prior interest in the game, it'd be worth buying it just to learn what set of circumstances can bring about flipping a mutant upside down and then shooting his leg off.

Industry and multi-console news

New media: Resident Evil 5 trailer, first Street Fighter IV commercial along with two hefty screenshot galleries, Fracture trailer, Golden Axe: Beast Rider trailer, Spore screenshots showing the tribal phase

• Ubisoft president Yves Guillemot says they have $1.2 billion to spend on growing the company through acquisitions.
• Rez and Lumines developer Q Entertainment will be localizing Rock Band for Japan, which means revising the soundtrack with Japanese bands and using other "localized assets."
• Age of Conan has taken the top spot from GTA4 in the European sales charts.
• According to SEC filings, Activision plans to release Guitar hero: Metallica sometime between now and March 31, 2009.
• LucasArts intends to offer a Fracture demo sometime in August or September.
• Image Metrics' Nick Perrett argues that eye animation is crucial in game characters, but is usually ignored because it's too costly and difficult to implement well.
• A partial setlist has been revealed for Guitar Hero Aerosmith.
• The Screen Actors Guild has put out an ad in the Daily Variety and Hollywood Reporter thanking the makers of games that use SAG talent (and SAG contracts).
• Ubisoft says Splinter Cell Conviction's gameplay has "evolved." Whatever that means.
• We've certainly achieved.. something here: GTA4 has even gotten namedropped in a New Yorker cartoon.
• Far Cry 2's easy mode is going to be so easy you can play it with one hand.
• Music4Games has an interview with Yoko Shimomura, composer for the Kingdom Hearts series (along with some other titles like Parasite Eve and Legend of Mana).
• Did you notice the destructable clothes in the latest Soul Calibur IV trailer? Of course you did. You freak.
• Kinetic Communications shows you how to mod Rock Band drums for use by the wheelchair-bound.
• I guess the Lost finale referenced Via Domus? I dunno, I don't watch that show.
• During a recent inspection, an airman at a North Dakota Air Force base was caught playing video games on his cell phone when he was supposed to be guarding a restricted area. Although the base seems to have larger problems on its hands: "Last year, an aging B-52 bomber leaving from Minot was mistakenly armed with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles for a routine flight to Louisiana."
• Destructoid makes an interesting comparison between Mass Effect and GTA4 endings and how they handled the matters of choice and theme. Although I don't agree with the writer's assumptions about which path is better and what it says about the "intelligence level" of the person who chose it.
• Moe Moe Niji Taisen Deluxe is a tactical RPG with WWII tanks and planes replaced with anime girls dressed like WWII tanks and planes with turrets and propellers on their arms and when they fight their clothes come off and sometimes they rub suntan lotion on each other and some of them are catgirls and somdfaafklj320fasapt

PC and mobile news

New content: Total Extreme Wrestling 2008 demo, Sword of the Stars: Born of Blood 1.5.2 patch

• The Sci-Fi Channel has announced an intertwined MMO and TV project in which things happening in the game affect the TV show, and vice versa.
• Dreamfall Chapters hasn't been abandoned but is "on the back burner" for now, given that Funcom is kind of busy with things like Age of Conan.
• NHN will be publishing MMO FPS Huxley in the US and Europe.
• The Call of Duty 4 variety map pack is coming to the PC June 5 for free.
• Sony is inviting lapsed Everquest and Everquest II players to come back and play for free until the end of July.
• Some of the female models in Age of Conan recently got an unexpected breast reduction, but Funcom says it was an accident. "This is due to an unintended change in data that was introduced in an earlier patch, data which controls the so-called morph values associated with character models and the size of their respective body parts."
• Saints Row 2 is coming to the PC.
• Crytek says there "almost certainly will not be a patch 1.3 delivered for Crysis."
• Robbie Bach admits he repeatedly considered killing Surface, Microsoft's multi-touch-operated table computer.
• As promised earlier in the year, Havok is now available for free for non-commercial projects.
• There's a look at the evolution of character concept art for Aquaria at the Bit Blot forums.
• Apparently Second Life has a "Child Avatar community." They're upset that they're being excluded from the Second Life 5th Birthday celebration due to pressure from politicians about Second Life not protecting children. Mind you, these people aren't kids -- they are adults who pretend to be kids, which I guess isn't any weirder than pretending to be a wolf or giraffe or something.
• Amazon's deal of the day is Rail Simulator for $7.99.

Nintendo news

New Virtual Console title: Ninja Combat
New WiiWare titles: Protothea, Toki Tori

• Michael Pachter claims that Nintendo is deliberately shorting America on copies of Wii Fit, with 500,000 coming to the US but 2 million going to Europe, to take advantage of the strong Euro.
• The Korean launch of the Wii wasn't a completely rousing success. Some lay the blame on the region coding system that forces consumers to only play Korean localized games (of which there aren't many).
• Nintendo has released a new battle arena for Mario Kart Wii as part of an online tournament, becoming one of the first ever pieces of downloadable content for a Nintendo console.
• Capcom has announced Mega Man Star Force 3.
• StillAliveDS is a homebrew 2D remake of Portal for the DS.
• LucasArts PR manager Chris Norris, when asked about the company's old adventure titles being ported to new systems, claimed that the cart size of the DS made it "impossible." This is really doubtful, given that most of their older adventure games didn't fill up the CD to begin with, and one can accomplish a lot with compression.
• Atlus explains the process behind localizing names during the translation of Etrian Odyssey II. How would you reduce "Owner of the Malicious Glare" to a name of 8 characters or less?
• Mental Floss presents a quiz: Mario villain or obscure dinosaur?
• FireNES is a Firefox extension that allows play of 2500 NES games without an emulator or ROMs. Seems a little unnecessary to me.

Sony news

• EGM has decided not to score MGS4, in response to the number of limitations Konami wanted to put on reviews (apparently there was a pretty long list). Instead, the newest issue features a roundtable discussion of the game.
• Sony is phasing out the Motorstorm bundle.
• While still a rumor, evidence is pointing towards trophies and the in-game XMB coming in the 2.4 firmware update, which could be mere weeks away.
• The official Playstation blog offers the top 12 tips for MGS4.
• A gardening game called Shikitei is coming to the PSN in Japan.
• Wal-Mart is offering a $100 gift card with the purchase of a PS3. That includes the MGS4 bundle.
• There's a rumor that Eternal Sonata's PS3 version could remain Japan only.
• Alone in the Dark is being delayed on the PS3 due to performance issues.
• Amazon has Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops Plus for $9.99.

Microsoft news

• This week's Live Arcade titles are Aces of the Galaxy and Roogoo.
• Microsoft continues to try to make delisting not sound so harsh, saying that you can not only redownload purchased games but you can also buy games if a friend recommends them to you. “The reality is we’re not removing any games from the service, if you will. They’ll always be there for purchase. Think about a book on Amazon. It’s not always going to be featured on the front page of the store.”
• Codemasters is working on a fix for freezing issues in the 360 version of GRID.
• Gamasutra has a series of interviews with Bungie staff, reflecting on Halo 3 and discussing what lies beyond.
• When Microsoft released a demo of Overlord in Japan, they didn't bother to translate it. Instead, they put a text translation on their website you could follow along with.
• The voice of Cole Train was asked about the release date for Gears of War 2, to which he responded that they should ask again on November 16.
• A Ninja Gaiden II demo should be available outside of Japan by the end of this week.