Just a quick heads up since this involves one of the first ladies of gaming, BloodRayn. Sure her games have kind of sucked in the past (pun intended), but she is a kick-ass female character, so we had to give her some news coverage. Of course she’s as sexed up as ever, what with her being “The Sexiest Dhampir Ever” and all. Full press release for your fangtastic selves below.

BloodRayne: Betrayalis Now Available!
Epic 2D hack ‘n slash reboot of legendary franchise hits PlayStation®Network today and Xbox LIVE Arcade tomorrow

Majesco Entertainment Company announced today that its highly anticipated side-scrolling BloodRayne: Betrayal launches today for PlayStation Network followed by a release tomorrow on Xbox LIVE Arcade for the Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft. The PlayStation Network version is included as part of the PlayStation Network PLAY program.

The original video game femme fatale, Rayne, has returned to battle and feed in a brand new hack ‘n slash adventure developed by WayForward, the seasoned team behind some of gaming’s most critically acclaimed brand reinventions. BloodRayne: Betrayal delivers over-the-top stylish action with a healthy dose of bloodshed. You are Rayne, the sexy dhampir with superhuman strength, speed, and agility, recruited by the vampire hunting Brimstone Society for one last mission. The target is a lavish, yet sinister, ball in a secluded castle with plenty of dark surprises. With the help of a mysterious friend, and members of Brimstone, Rayne must infiltrate the manor, take out the fiendish horde, and stop an evil master plot once and for all.

BloodRayne: Betrayal is available now on PlayStation Network for $14.99 and tomorrow on Xbox LIVE Arcade for Xbox 360 for 1,200 Microsoft Points. For more information about BloodRayne: Betrayal, please visit the official game site at www.bloodraynebetrayal.com and be sure to Like us at www.facebook.com/bloodrayne.

If you’re like me and you like to break up some major fragging with some uber-cute gaming, you’re in for a treat. “Bastion” is a new game from Super Giant Games and as you’ll see in the trailer it’s cute and it’s won loads of awards. What’s not to love? “Bastion” sees you take on the role of a kid (male as usual by the looks of things – yawn) “a young survivor who wakes to a world that has crumbled around him, with no one to help him but an old man who believes he holds the key to bringing things back to the way they were.” Full press release below.

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Supergiant Games are pleased to present an all-new trailer for the award-winning Action RPG for Xbox LIVE Arcade, Bastion.

Offering a glimpse into the lush presentation and unique atmosphere that made Bastion one of E3’s top downloadable games, the trailer brings together more of the vibrant hand-painted 2D artwork and hypnotizing narration that left fans buzzing with anticipation. Bastion launches on July 20th as the first game in Microsoft’s exclusive Summer of Arcade line-up, and will be available for 1200 Microsoft Points.

In Bastion, players to take control of the Kid, a young survivor who wakes to a world that has crumbled around him, with no one to help him but an old man who believes he holds the key to bringing things back to the way they were. In addition to pitting players against a host of savage creatures using a variety of unconventional weapons, Bastion features stunning high-resolution artwork, a deep original story, and an innovative reactive narration system that responds to players’ actions throughout the adventure.

Bastion will also be available for PC later this year.

Time for a little tomb raiding, only without the tombs. Gay Girls Who Game take a look at Lara’s new title, the XBLA / PSN / Windows game “Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light”. These two gals are huge fans of the Tomb Raider games, so it’s no surprise they would be expecting this to be good. There’s lesbian connection chat, a Helena Peabody L Word rating and some symphonic Laraaaaa’s thrown in for good measure.

To see the review skip to around 15mins 50secs in.

Two words: “Double Fine”, yippee, yes you know this might be something special with those words attached. Here’s hoping! What we have here is “Costume Quest” a new XBLA title by lead animator of Double Fine Tasha Harris (for THQ). Set at Halloween this is all about trick-or-treating and saving your sibling from a monster. This falls squarely into the action RPG genre and is released on Xbox Live and PSN on October 20, just in time for Halloween. Check out the trailer and see what you think, we think it looks pretty cool.

From the moment one saw the enigmatic bright eyed boy of Limbo, one could not help but be intrigued at what developer Playdead were up to. Screenshots began to appear, all in black, greys and whites and all with some eery captivating notion embedded in every pixel. What was Limbo and who was this little boy.

The answer is a fairly simple one, this little boy is you, a gaming character of no specific name or address, the silhouette of a tiny hero looking for his sister in an eery, disturbing world. That world is, Limbo, the place between heaven and hell and abode of death (theologically speaking). In gaming terms Limbo is a shadowy world of darkness, of nightmarish and devious creatures and even more evil traps.

From the moment you begin, Playdead Studios Limbo the game lures you in, as you wonder just what on earth this is. Is it a game, it doesn’t feel like a game in its most generic sense, it feels like an interaction, an immersive story in which there is little sound, no orchestration, just you, searching in the dark, your tiny feet crunching on damp grass as strange insects chirp in the distance.

Graphically speaking Limbo is a true dichotomy, for it is bland with its lack of color, whilst at the same time, managing to be one of the most wondrous gaming worlds seen for some time. The misty blacks and greys add to the overall mind-fuck that is this world of Limbo. Playdead Studios have managed a triumph of subtle horror, of simplistic yet intricate world design. Just wonderful.

Sound in Limbo is barely present. There is no overpowering orchestration, no booming explosions, screams, no blood curdling or maniacal sound bites one would usually associate with this sort of genre. There is an aural mood of peace and subtle terror. It is here again where Playdead have excelled themselves as masters of deception, for this mix of a peaceful soundtrack with the abject horror of those moments where a trap snaps shut, or there is a zap of deadly electricity only heightens the mood and atmosphere.

At its heart Limbo is a puzzle title, where one must traverse the eery backdrop for a lever to pull, a boulder to avoid, a jump to make, a switch to throw. Despite this however, Playdead Studios somehow manage to inject newness into the genre, at least for the first half of the game. Herein lay traps so devious Grimtooth himself would smile agog at the thoughtful design and mechanisms herein.

Sadly there is a downside as was just previously touched upon, the game seems an opus of two very distinct parts. For the first 10 or 12 chapters everything is new, it defies the very nature of the puzzle genre. Yes there are traps to avoid and switches to pull, but this is almost done in a magical manner. Then there is a tipping point, where Limbo makes a move away from this wonderful newness and steps back into old genre shoes. An eventuating shame, but not one that ruins the game overall, for those earlier levels will no doubt stay with one for a very long time.

Control in Limbo is as gentle as the masterful art style and subtle soundtrack, everything is simple, there are no insane complicated combination’s. The only complaint regarding control would be that sometimes the “leap of faith” mentality of darkened levels leaves the player feeling duped, as though luck plays a larger part than skill or logical thought. This though is a minor flaw and does nothing to ruin what is a superlative title.

Should you purchase Limbo, despite it only lasting a few hours and costing a rather steep 1200 Microsoft Points? Yes. Support Playdead in there efforts to burst the stagnated bubble of “same old same old” video game titles we are forced to endure month after month. Hopefully if they make another Limbo styled title they won’t change up the overall feel of the game half way through, which is this reviewers only true complaint, well, that and the lack of true ending. Limbo left one with something akin to the feeling felt when one finished Another World as the credits rolled by.. what.. that’s it?! What about those creepy little Lord of the Fly Boys? I want to know more Dammit!

Limbo by Playdead Studios is a wonderful title featuring a fresh approach to how sometimes less is more. There is no dramatic soundtrack, no masses of textures and color to make the eye pop, there is just style, meets craft, meets art. Limbo is a wonderful title that only stumbles ever so slightly by changing the overall feel halfway through and forcing us to endure a few “leap of faith” gameplay moments. If you love gaming, at the very least download the demo, then prepare to purchase Limbo.

U-Haul Rating
Limbo by Playdead is the cute / quiet babydyke you crushed on at school. Complicated, beautiful and subtle. You will definitely want to hire that U-Haul and move Limbo on in. The first half of your time with Limbo though will be the best, fresh, new and exciting.

Limbo gets the “Stendhal Syndrome” L Word Rating here at Lesbian Gamers. Remember when Bette Porter starts crying at the beauty of the art before her, left agog at its ethereal wonder? Well that’s pretty much how the first hour or so of Limbo might make the more tender-hearted gamer feel. It is beautiful yet terrifying and it is definitely art meets game design. Now go wipe your tiny white blinking eyes.

According to Dark Energy Digital’s Pete Jones Hydrophobia isn’t as exclusive to the Xbox as we’d all been led to believe. Speaking to Joystiq, Jones stated: “We’re launching exclusively on 360, just to get that one out of the way — but there will be a PS3 and a PC version in the fullness of time”. We’ve covered Hydrophobia a fair bit here at the LG because it features lead playable character Kate Wilson and we like that about this game, along with what look to be some great water physics. There’s sadly no solid release date for the title yet.

We’re back! Yes after cruising the South Pacific for over a week, we’re back to gaming and geek news. Whilst on the cruise we didn’t get to play many video games because such things were allocated to the “teen lounge” and well, we’re a little past that. We did however partake in the game of Bingo, which had a more diverse audience than expected and was a lot more fun than we’d anticipated. This got us thinking about video game Bingo titles on consoles. We looked into it and there’s not much it seems, other than Pouncing Kitten Games indie title Bingo Party, which was slated for an XBLA release in March. We took a peek to see if it had appeared, but it hasn’t. We actually think a bingo game on XBL or PSN would be really cool and a bit of a hit if done right. What do you guys think?

Time for some “Mmm Brains” as Gay Girls Who Game review / chat about Zombie Apocalypse on XBLA. The multidirectional zombie shoot ‘em up by Nihilistic Software sees players controlling one of four zombie outbreak survivors… hmm this sounds familiar… You can check out Gay Girls Who Game take on the Zombie Apocalypse in episode 3.16 – that’s season 3 episode 16, or if you like nice round numbers, that’s episode 60 all up at AfterEllen or below.

We’ve had a spot of cognitive dissonance this past week at LG HQ, all because of XBLA title Shadow Complex. What do you do when the game you’re enjoying and have paid for is based on the work of someone who comes across as a huge homophobe? That’s the dilemma facing gay / lesbian gamers when it comes to Shadow Complex, a game based on the workings of one Orson Scott Card. There’s an uncomfortable feeling knowing you’ve lined the pockets of someone who thinks there should be laws against you for being gay, but should the developers pay the price by people boycotting the game purely because it’s based on Card’s works? We’ll have a full review of Shadow Complex up tomorrow, but for now, what are your thoughts on this murky little subject?

We’ve been messing about on the upcoming Xbox Live dashboard update and it’s looking pretty cool. Not much has changed, it’s much more of a streamlining exercise it seems, so you won’t get lost or need much time to get to grips with it. There’s new areas and sections and the menu systems now have some sweet additions. We’ll list out those changes right now!

Avatars!! Yes we all love our adorable avatars and now you can show them more love, but Microsoft is smart, they’re going to milk us of even more money if we want cool gear for our little virtual selves.

Avatar Marketplace

You can now purchase some premium content for your virtual self and it’s not all cheap. There are new clothing options, including some game tie-ins (Fable, Halo, Monkey Island at present) as well as ‘props’, yes your avatar can now hold things or generally interact with them. We purchased a remote control Halo Warthog (a whopping 400 MS Points!), it’s useless, but was so cute we couldn’t help it, like we said MS is smart, evil, but smart.

As well as the new clothing and prop options is the section marked “Awardables” where you’ll apparently be able to earn new avatar guff simply by playing games. This section was empty however we assume it will be tied into the games themselves in similar fashion to the achievements.

Gold Membership bar
Your info will now be topped with a gold bar (for gold members) and a button in the corner showing how many years you’ve been with the service. This doesn’t serve any purpose other than to show your friends how long you’ve been on the service.

Games Ratings System
This is an odd one, since it looks like you can rate games you haven’t even played, which leaves the door open for a bit of abuse. Still it’s handy to peruse games via the highest rated if you like things with star ratings after them. Rating a title is as easy as filling in how many stars you want to give it – out of 5 – and pressing the B button.

Netflix Updates
We don’t have the Netflix service here in Australia, if U.S. users saw the pathetic amount of movies we get to choose from they’d laugh a hearty pity filled laugh (around 270 or so I believe). U.S. users however can now peruse the Netflix library easier, watch movies with friends in Movie Parties. You can also manage your Netflix queue, browse and sort all from the Xbox (no PC required). There’s also better playback for crappy connections.

Xbox LIVE Party Time!
Xbox LIVE Party also gets a few new features including automatic reconnection to parties if you get disconnected. You can also invite friends with one simple click… sweet!

Games on Demand

This is the digital distribution service Microsoft mentioned at E3 and in short it means you can purchase games direct to your HD meaning no trip to your game store needed even for fairly new releases. This looked pretty cool, but there’s not loads in there as yet. You can even check out the game manuals and anything you buy is linked to your account so you can re-download should something go horribly wrong.

Indie Games

What was essentially once Xbox LIVE Community Games has now become Xbox LIVE Indie Games and there’s plenty there.. and remember you can view them via ratings popularity.

Other Changes….

Some of the other changes include the option to faff with the video display settings and various other settings. You’ll also be able to do account management on the Xbox including being notified when your Live subscription is due for renewal and account recovery.

Achievements have been revamped to make them easier to navigate and include a summary of all achievements earned and possible.

Final Thoughts…..

The overall feel remains the same, but the streamlining that’s taken place is really cool. All the new additions will indeed add to your experience of the Xbox Live service. Even silly things like a warning if you’ve accidentally recorded a blank voice message are handy (and let’s face it, who hasn’t done that!).

Disappointments with the new Xbox Dash
Still not all the clothing options for avatars are non gender specific. It may not seem like a big deal to the guys and that’s probably because THEY GET ALL THE COOL CLOTHES!!! It’s not ONLY lesbians that might like to wear jeans over the thought of wearing skirts you know!!! Anyway my disappointment could be heard in Nigeria when I excitedly told my girlfriend I was going to purchase Guybrush Threepwoods outfit for my avatar, only to see it NOT THERE!

Come on Microsoft, sort it out, make male and female versions of ALL clothes… how hard can it be for cripes sake!

The Xbox Update hits the service worldwide August 11, be there or be square!