Kotaku reports on an article in the April issue of Game Informer which has specs and a picture of a new black XBox 360 model. This new model will feature a 120gb hard drive, an HDMI port and HDMI cable for a retail price of 479$, which is 80$ more than the price of the XBox 360 Premium console.

Game Informer has stated this is not an April Fool’s fake story, however it should be pointed out the image they supplied for the article is merely a black debug Xbox 360, used by developers and the press.

Microsoft has not yet made any official statement about the authenticity of this article.

Thanks to forum member Luchador138 for the heads up.

After The Cape #1
written by Howard Wong, art by Marco Rudy

Hero By Night #1
written and drawn by D.J. Coffman

This week, two books caught my eye, and both of them are new. Just looking at the covers, you can already see that there are some stark contrasts between the two in art style, but if you take a look at the concepts, you can see that both use the ever-awesome superhero genre as a springboard. Keep reading after the jump for why you should buy them, and for preview pages of both to back my story up!
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Orange Lounge Radio is reporting Activision plans to release the next version of Guitar Hero in just a few short months.

Activision has announced another sequel for the award winning music game franchise to distribution and retailers. Guitar Hero 80’s Edition will arrive on the PS2 in June on the 13th and will retail for $39.99. Of course, release dates always like to shift around, but as this is Activision’s initial printing of the date to distributers, hopefully this one will stick.

Guitar Hero 80s Edition was originally mentioned as a forthcoming PS2 release back in the January issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly, but official word has been mum since then.

Oh, and obviously this game will include only music from the 1980s. Because we really need more ZZ Top.

Superman Returns, love it or leave it, did make a pretty big splash and made more than enough money for a sequel. Many were already pencilling in “Man Of Steel” for 2009. Now, Moviehole.net reports now that this movie may be scrapped to put Brandon Routh in the Justice League.

Lending some credence to this rumor is the fact that director Bryan Singer is moving forward with a World War II Era thriller with “Usual Suspects” writing Chris Macquarrie, which will film this fall, pushing any start date for Superman well into 2008.

Variety forced a comment out of Warners today, but it wasn’t much except that Singer is still attached to direct and they’ll do it after his other movie.

I’m of two minds of this. Firstly, I don’t know if its such a good idea to jumpstar the JLA movie by sacrificing a Superman sequel… but on the other hand, Returns didn’t do that good and who’s to say theres even money on the table for another movie? Superman getting the League started could do great, especially if they league consists of heroes that don’t have their own movie deals (I doubt Christopher Nolan’s Batman would work in a JLA movie).

Japanator gives word that a Dragon Ball MMO is on the way for Korea and Japan next year. The game will be set some 200 years after the original manga, so don’t worry about teaming up with Goku or Vegeta as they’re all dead. Akira Toriyama will be contributing to character designs of course, and even play created avatars will retain the Toriyama look. Player classes include humans, Nameks and Saiyans, though you’ll start out as a little kid and have to grow up over the course of the game.

Given how popular MMOs and Dragon Ball are in the US, its a forgone conclusion that they’d make it come here too.

*insert joke about spending hours to charge a single attack*

We’re finally back to where we were 20 years ago when Transformers is turned into all sorts of wacky other stuff. Joe Moore from TFW2005 was just sent an image of Transformers Lite Brite Patterns With 50 Pegs.

The patterns included are of Sideswipe from Generation 1 and the Decepticon logo. There’s probably more in the box, but thats all we can see for now.

Man, if Boston was scared of the Mooninites, imagine they’ll poop their pants when they see Decepticons are coming…
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With little over 2 months until the movie’s release, there was some doubt that the third installment of Disney’s mega-successful Pirates of the Caribbean movies would be released on time because we hadn’t seen a trailer yet.

Well the trailer finally ran this evening during Dancing With The Stars, but since you’re not a mental patient, you probably missed it. Thankfully Yahoo is hosting it along with a short clip from the movie in the usual wide array of video formats for internet consumption. Click here to see all the Pirate action.

I’m anxious to see Chow Yun Fat joining the cast, but I hope this one is a bit better than the second. Of course, the first was such a surprise, I went in to the second with expectations too high. [Read the rest of this entry…]

Activision’s Daniel Suarez has a few words with Superhero Hype about their next game, Transformers: The Game.

The game, which will launch on multiple platforms, is supposed to feature 9 playable Transformers and 7 destructable levels over 2 seperate Autobot and Decepticon campaigns. Of note is this comment:

We’re making a game that is for Transformers fans. Since the very beginning, we’ve been very conscious of the heritage of this brand and have worked hard to integrate characters, locations and even subtle acknowledgements to G1 anywhere we can. There are a lot of special surprises, unique elements and bonus features that fans will enjoy.

Considering the unlockable costumes in all of Activision’s Marvel games and the character variations in Traveler’s Tales’ LEGO Star War series, is there any chance we’ll see some alternate looks for the playable characters? I can’t very well expect full 1984 remakes of the whole cast, but I wouldn’t mind seeing Bumblebee’s goofy face returning.

See also: CVG and GameSpot‘s previews.

Thanks Dru!