The game places the player in the leading role of an over-the-top, John Woo inspired, Hollywood action movie, playing an undercover DEA agent infiltrating the Mexican drug cartels. The leading character has all the characteristics of a modern action film hero like Nicholas Cage or John Travolta, with a popular, vividly colourful and varied backdrop provided by the Mexican setting. Overdose is scheduled to be released on PS2/Xbox and PC in Q2 2005, at which point development for a sequel will be started (thanks HomeLAN).

Shocking and evil, Mortal Kombat: Deception pushes martial arts-style fighting and the Mortal Kombat franchise to new heights with an innovative fighting system, unparalleled depth and brutally intense action, lightning-fast hand-to-hand and special weapons combat, secret and returning characters, moves and combinations with new death-dealing battles and fatalities.

Enlight announced today their latest real-time strategy game Seven Kingdoms: Conquest, the third installment of the highly acclaimed Seven Kingdoms series. Co-developed for the PC by Enlight and Infinite Interactive, Seven Kingdoms: Conquest will be available in North America this September 2005. Read more for details ...

Making good money apparently isn't enough for EA as various online outlets have started reporting that former Maxis manager Neil Young, now spearheading the EALA campus, handed out roughly 60-70 pink slips, sending people home unemployed. While said firings were across the board, the Goldeneye: Rogue Agent and MoH: Dogs of War developers were amongst the biggest casualties. According to Young the layoffs, reducing the head count to 320, were neccesary as part of a restructuring and streamlining of EALA for the future. Read more about on GameSpot.

Computer and video game software sales set a new record in 2004, reaching $7.3 billion, according to final data compiled by the NPD Group. Halo 2, one of the best-selling titles of 2004, took in more revenue in its first day of sales than any movie has ever taken in its opening day. In addition, Nintendo sold over 1 million units of its new handheld game system, Nintendo DS, in North America by the end of 2004, a mark that took Apple's iPod 19 months to achieve.

CDV has launched a new Cossacks II: Napoleonic Wars contest giving fans and gamers a chance to show off their artistic sides by putting together the best Cossacks II wallpaper they can and maybe win a prize for it. The contest runs for the next four weeks, with Cossacks II community forum members choosing the winners. Check the rules for the contest, prizes include copies of Cossacks II: Napoleonic Wars when it ships, and very cool "Napoleon hats." Also, the top three wallpapers will be posted to the official Cossacks II site for download.

Another day, another batch of game trailers were released. Instead of giving them all their own posts, we grouped them, and so far there are trailers for :

• Legend of Kay - Final Trailer
• Red Ninja: End of Honor - Trailer #6
• Fight Night Round 2 - Trailer #4

DRIV3R is an action-packed driving adventure game that stays true to its roots, incorporating the cinematic gameplay and gritty street crime of its predecessors with ground-breaking graphics and three mammoth, wide-open city environments: Miami, Florida; Nice, France; and Istanbul, Turkey.

Project: Snowblind is a the first-person action shooter putting you in the role of an elite super soldier, fighting on the front lines of a near-future war using unique weapons, abilities and high-tech gadgetry that inject depth and variety to gameplay. Read more for new screens ...

JoWooD is apparently not doing too well financially, as today it was revealed to us that the Austrian publisher is closing down two of its development studios. One of our Jowood sources confirmed that earlier this week, it was decided that Transport Giant house Studio Ebensee and Söldner's Wings Simulations will be shutting down in the next few months. Both studios will finish up current projects and then will have a small core team still in place for future patch releases and customer support. Wing Simulations will finish its current Soldner: Marine Corps addon, which is still scheduled for March, but the previously announced Söldner 2 project has been cancelled.