By Shane McGlaun

If you have never played Spore on the PC or Wii you are missing one of the coolest video games of all time. The original Spore lets players build their own creature and evolve it by adding new parts from a single cell organism to a creature, then to a space faring race.

EA has announced that two new Spore titles are coming to the Nintendo platforms this fall. The Wii will get Spore Hero and the DS will get Spore Hero Arena. Spore Hero lets players create their own hero with over 250 parts and unique abilities. Players complete puzzles and missions to save their planet as they upgrade their character.

Spore Hero Arena is an arena combat game for the Nintendo DS platform that allows players to create a gladiator hero and take them on a tour of the galaxy fighting other heroes. Special missions and wins will unlock new parts to upgrade the hero. Multiple players gaming over Wi-Fi is also supported.

[ Spore

By Shane McGlaun

I am a big fan of Spore. The game is way cool and very original. I have spent lots of time playing it on the PC and begin able to grow your own creature from a single cell organism into an intergalactic civilization is too cool.

EA has announced that since the Spore Creature Creator launched in June of 2008 players have created and up loaded about 100 million creations. Out of that massive number, EA says that 31,017,761 of them are creatures. That means that the Spore universe has about 19 times as many creatures as the Earth. At least until we find the cave entrance into the dinosaur realm in the center of the Earth, obviously.

EA is also getting ready to launch an official expansion pack to the Spore game for PC and Mac called Spore Galactic Adventures on June 23. New games for the Wii and Nintendo DS will also be released. The Wii game is Spore Hero and the DS game is called Spore Hero Arena. The Wii and DS titles will launch this fall.

[ Spore ]

By Shane McGlaun

One of my favorite Need for Speed games back in the day was Need for Speed Hot Pursuit. I liked being able to play the cop and give people tickets and I liked running from the police as well. I guess EA tried to go all “PC” with Need for Speed ProStreet and took the racing off the streets. The game was cool, but I wanted police chases.

The latest title in the franchise, Need for Speed Undercover, gave me my wish and EA has announced that new DLC for the game is available for the PS3 and coming soon for the PC and Xbox 360. One of the DLC packs is a free offering called the Challenge Series and adds 60 events to the game. Along with new events called Highway Wars and Highway checkpoint races.

Players can also win three new cars in the Challenge Series. A premium content pack is also available for $5 or 400 MS points called the Boss Car Pack. The pack gives all of the cars the level bosses drive in the entire game. I am glad to see EA offering some free DLC for fans of Undercover.

[ Need for Speed ]

By Shane McGlaun

I am a big fan of PC shooters and my favorite all time shooter was Crysis from Crytek. I was almost as giddy as a schoolgirl when I heard they were launching Crysis Warhead. Warhead had great graphics, but the story line wasn’t quite as good as the original.

EA and Crytek announced that they are offering a free trial of the multiplayer shooter Crysis Wars available through Friday April 17. The trial allows players to play all of the games three multiplayer modes and all 23 maps.

The maps each support teams of up to 32 players and have multiple modes of play per map including InstantAction, frantic deathmatch with the nanosuit, PowerStrugle, and two team modes. Crytek also announced that a Crysis Maximum Edition is coming on May 5 for $39.99 that includes Crysis and Crysis Warhead as well as Crysis Wars.

[ MyCrysis ]

This post is syndicated with permission from Gadgetoholic.com

Personally, I’ve never been a big fan of sports games on the PC or consoles. I have always leaned more towards games that had stuff that you can do in real life — like shooting zombies or racing cars at 250 miles an hour downtown with cops chasing you. Despite my gaming preferences EA’s Madden NFL is one of the biggest franchises of any type to ever hit a game console.

Today marks the launch of EA’s Madden NFL 09, and this year’s version marks the 20-year anniversary of the Madden NFL franchise. EA says that the Madden NFL 09 assesses your skills and adjusts the gameplay to keep the experience fun and challenging as you get better. The constantly adjusting difficulty also means that the veteran players can play with the inexperienced without new players getting spanked too badly.

The cover athlete for Madden NFL 09 is Brett Favre before his trade from the Packers to the New York Jets. The trade meant that EA had to go back and print a new package for the game. That fact leaves me wondering if any of the NFL 09 games made it into the wild with Brett Favre still in his Packers uniform. If they did, those copies should be worth money to collectors.

Via [ Gadgetoholic ]