Game Informer has revealed its March cover, and it looks like L.A. Noire is finally being shown off in a 10-page feature article. Maybe this means the game's development isn't as troubled as previously reported.

[via Game Informer]

According to a report from analyst group FADE, Xbox Live Arcade is estimated to have made $103.4 million in 2009. This seems to only prove that digital downloads are catching on big time now and will only continue to grow. The top ten games of 2009 were as follows:

1. Battlefield 1943 - $12.5 million
2. Castle Crashers - $7.3 million
3. Trials HD - $7.1 million
4. Shadow Complex - $6.1 million
5. Family Game Night - $4.2 million
6. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 - $4.2 million
7. Magic: The Gathering - $2.8 million
8. Worms 2 - $1.8 million
9. Peggle - $1.8 million
10. Turtles in Time: Reshelled - $1.7 million

Kind of surprising to see that Family Game Night mad it onto that list. It can be downloaded for free as a frontend for the various games, but I guess I didn't think many people would pay $10 a pop for those board games.

[via Destructoid]

Apparently, a team of PC modders have been working on this remake of the N64 classic Goldeneye since 2006, using Valve's Source engine. It's about to move into its fourth beta stage, and they released a new trailer to show it off.

My only two questions: how the hell did I not know about this before, and when can I pay them extravagant amounts of money for it?

It has been revealed that Green Day: Rock Band is not being developed in-house at Harmonix. Instead, the developer of the various Rock Band Track Packs, Demiurge, will be working on the game. Adam Rosenfield, an employee at Demiurge, said in a post on his blog, "Not included in the announcement was the fact that Demiurge Studios was working on Green Day: Rock Band. And I gotta say, it's pretty freakin' awesome working on it. I'd love to tell you more, but NDAs, yada yada yada, so I can't say much else."

This pleases me to no end. I can definitely do without a Green Day-centric RB game, and maybe this means Harmonix is actually working on Rock Band 3.

Horror movie site Bloody-Disgusting.com is reporting today that Warner Bros. is planning to remake the 1995 Mortal Kombat movie, widely regarded as one of the few good video game movies ever made. Screenwriter Oren Uziel is reportedly set to write the screenplay.

As of now, this is all rumors, but I couldn't be more psyched. I adore the original movie, despite all of its cornball special effects and acting. My only demand: Jean-Claude Van Damme as Johnny Cage. Make it so, Warner.

Casual games developer PopCap, maker of such titles as Peggle and Zuma, has lost in a lawsuit filed against them by fellow developer MumboJumbo. PopCap has been ordered to pay $4.6 million in damages to the company, who state that they entered a contract with Popcap in 2006 to distribute all of PopCap's games in North America. MumboJumbo presented internal e-mails from PopCap showing that the company purposefully misled the company into believing they would distribute the games, despite the intent to publish and distribute them internally.

A representative from PopCap said, "PopCap continues to believe that it did nothing wrong in this case, and will vigorously pursue its claims and defend itself through the appeals process."

[via Joystiq]

Cryptic Studios announced today that they will be extending the open beta for Star Trek Online until 9PM Eastern Time tomorrow. The beta was scheduled to end at 9PM tonight, but was extended due to "an incredible response to our Open Beta Test." We reported last week that Cryptic had been taken by surprise by the number of people playing the game, and it looks like that hasn't changed since then. The team also stated that this extension will not affect the pre-order head-start period before the game's release on February 2nd.

While speaking at a music industry conference in Cannes this morning, Senior VP of MTV Games Paul DeGooyer mentioned the idea of bundling Rock Band versions of albums with physical copies at retail. "We would love to see a world where in your premium bundle for the next Muse album, you’re able to also receive that album on your console of choice, and be able to play it.", said DeGooyer.

Mr. DeGooyer did admit this may be a difficult sell to many music labels, considering many labels have come out saying that game developers are paying too little for music rights in games. Personally, this sounds great to me, as a big fan of digital copies of movies bundled with DVDs. Seems like a great way to get people back to buying physical music.

[via PlasticAxe]