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Update: Microsoft has issued a correction on this schedule. The Misadventures of P. B. Winterbottom will be priced at 800 ($10), not 1200 ($15).

Major Nelson has a dropped a partial February schedule for Xbox Live Marketplace content, including a particularly nice Deal of the Week. Specifically, next week's deal, beginning February 15, will be Battlefield 1943 for only 800 ($10). If you've yet to pick up the game, $10 is definitely a good price. Also starting next week, both Resident Evil 5 and Beautiful Katamari will hit the Games on Demand service.

The post also notes that this week marks the end of the second season of 1 vs 100. Tonight's episode (9:00pm ET/6:00 pm PT) will feature Magda Apanowicz from SyFy's series Caprica. For the season finale this Friday (10:00pm ET/7:00 pm PT), the game will feature 343 Industries' Frank O'Connor and Bungie's Marty O'Donnell.

See the full XBLM schedule after the break.

We're guessing that the person at Microsoft whose job it is to choose the discounted XBLA games of the week is a huge New Orleans Saints fan. Filled with the overwhelming spirit of victory from last night's engagement, this person couldn't stop him or herself from repeatedly hitting the price reduction button. We're afraid of what might have happened if they were a diehard Colts fan. Can XBLA prices be increased?

Fortunately, things panned out in our favor. During the discounting spree, three titles got their prices reduced: Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is now 800 ($10, down from 1200), TMNT: Turtles in Time Reshelled is 400 ($5, down from 800) and Invincible Tiger: The Legend of Han Tao is available for 800 ($10, down from 1200). Basically, if you've got an itch to watch ninjas or superheroes beat the snot out of things, Xbox Live has you covered for the next seven days.

Well, folks, it's been a long wait but it's finally here. After first being rumored nearly four years ago, Darwinia+ is due to hit Xbox Live Arcade in only two more days. We're sure that the game's fans are pleased to hear the news, as is developer Introversion. After all, the company has a lot riding on Darwinia's XBLA outing.

The game features a single-player campaign, online multiplayer for four players and plenty of sweet, retro stylings. Taking cues from real-time strategy, god games and, oh, let's say Tron, Darwinia has players controlling squads of 2D sprite characters called Darwinians as they battle an evil computer virus. The original PC version of the game took home the grand prize at the 2006 Independent Games Festival.

The price of admission is 1200 ($15).

Rare has announced that its upcoming XBLA remake of Perfect Dark will be playable at the upcoming X10 event next week in San Francisco. In celebration of the announcement, Rare also released a single new screen from the game, featuring one Mr. Daniel Carrington. Click the image above for a nice, high resolution version.

With appearances expected from Fable III, Alan Wake, Halo: Reach, Final Fantasy XII, Splinter Cell Conviction, Crackdown 2 and the Microsoft Game Room, X10 is certainly shaping up to be quite an event. Rest assured, we'll be covering it from the get-go next week.

Atlus has released a new trailer for the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade port of Zeno Clash: Ultimate Edition. Lest you've forgotten it, Zeno Clash is that weird first-person game set in a weird looking universe where you fight even weirder looking people. It's also very creepy, apparently. The trailer itself shows off some of the new moves available in the Ultimate Edition of the game, which hits Xbox Live Arcade this March.

Like we said, it's all a little strange. Honestly though, if you can't get pumped about virtually elbowing weird looking dudes in the face, there's not much we can do for you.

It's long been known that "Project Needlemouse," announced by Sega last September, was the codename for a new 2D, console Sonic the Hedgehog title. It was subsequently revealed (much to our delight) that Sonic would be its only playable character, and we now know that the game will be, in fact, a direct sequel to 1994's Sonic & Knuckles on Sega Genesis. Not only that -- it'll be (wait for it) episodic.

We also know that the officially titled Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 looks like a proper Sonic game -- i.e., there's hope for it yet.

GameSpot, which has a first look at the blue bolt's new downloadable XBLA, PSN and WiiWare adventure, reports that "episode 1" will be available on all three platforms "this summer." Additionally, Sega confirmed to the site that the game will support online leaderboards and motion control on Wii and PS3 (Sixaxis for the latter; sorry, "Arc").

You can watch the first trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 after the break. What do you think?

Yep, it says it all right there in the headline, folks. Gameloft swiftly took $122 million from consumers in 2009, roughly equating to 15 million digital copies of DSiWare Oregon Trail. Alright, alright, the digital distribution-based publishers probably sold some of its other games too, we guess -- mobile games (in general) represented a whopping 94 percent of the company's sales in 2009. And despite our voracious habit for mobile games here at Joystiq, North Americans were second place in terms of worldwide sales at 32 percent, with Europeans leading at 39 percent and the rest of the world trailing at 27 percent. Good luck catching up, rest of the world!

And yes, even amidst the global economic recession, Gameloft predicted "further growth in 2010 in terms of revenue and profitability." The publisher also pointed out its strong position in the long term, saying it will "benefit from the rapid emergence of digitally distributed video games on mobile phones, tablets, consoles, and from major technological innovations." You catch that tablet reference in there? Yeah, we did too. Hey, it's 2010, right? The future. We're in it.

THQ announced a bit of restructuring today, which means, sadly, layoffs. The publisher announced that it's refocusing Juiced developer Juice Games and MX vs. ATV/Deadly Creatures developer Rainbow Studios for content intended for digital distribution. The studios will be renamed THQ Digital Studios Warrington and THQ Digital Studios Phoenix, respectively. About 60 total staff are being laid off as part of this restructuring. Juice Games was already subject to layoffs in late 2008.

The studios will develop games for "all major digital platforms, including Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, iPhone and iPad" -- so much for WiiWare and DSiWare -- and will also work together on a community platform to be used across THQ's lineup of core games.

There's something rather unique on XBLA this week: Coming from non-profit publisher OneBigGame and developer Zoë Mode, Chime is actually a game that benefits children's charities. It's a musical puzzle game reminiscent of Lumines, featuring music from several well-known artists including Moby, Paul Hartnoll of Orbital and Philip Glass. At least 60 percent of the game's 400 ($5) price will go to charity, so you can feel good about picking it up. You can also feel good because Chime is actually a pretty good game. Check it out in the latest XBLA in Brief.

Shortcut: Download the trial version of Chime [via Xbox.com]

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Paramount Digital Entertainment and Piranha Games are bringing Days of Thunder to the Xbox 360 and PS3 this summer and it has a major actor attached. It's not Tom Cruise, Cary Elwes, Robert Duval, Randy Quaid or even John C. Reilly from the film of the same name, though. Nope, it's Michael Rooker? "Who?," you might be asking? Remember the guy who got stinkpalmed in Mallrats? Yes, that's him. Rowdy Burns himself. He'll play your crew chief in this downloadable title, until he gets back in a race car and challenges you on the track.

Days of Thunder plays like an extremely scaled down version of EA's NASCAR series, meaning you hold down the accelerator and rarely use the brake. You can draft other cars to "Drop the Hammer" and slingshot around them and spend points on one of four categories to improve the three different car types.

Update: Paramount has contacted us and asked us to remove the gameplay video, because more impressive material is in the works! Does that sound believable? And will NASCAR throw their weight behind this game? It was announced at an official NASCAR event, and the movie is NASCAR themed to the gills, but who knows. That license isn't EA exclusive anymore.

Check out screenshots and photos from the first-look event below, then read more details after the break.

Last week it was rumored that Microsoft's Xbox 360 and PC Game Room would "never feature" titles with an ESRB rating higher than E10+; today Microsoft confirmed to Joystiq the current plan is to only add titles that correspond to the application's ESRB rating. Rather than submit each individual title for review, Microsoft has opted to submit the Game Room application to the ESRB, netting it an E10+ rating, ensuring higher-rated titles would not see life in the virtual arcade.

In a statement to Joystiq, a Microsoft representative said, "the 30 titles available for download at launch will carry either E or E10+ ratings; beyond launch we have no additional details to share at this time." Based on its statements, Microsoft's Game Room can only include titles that have been submitted to the ESRB in other forms (compilation discs, or through downloadable platforms). While it's possible for Microsoft to submit classic titles that have yet-to-be rated by the ESRB (such as titles released prior to the group's 1994 inception that have yet to receive a rating), the plan appears to focus solely on games already available in some capacity.

Microsoft said that because titles featured in the Game Room are "classic arcade and console titles" the company will be able to add any individual titles to the Game Room without submitting new releases to the ESRB for review -- provided they are currently rated E10+ or lower. While Microsoft says it currently has "no plans" to feature arcade titles rated Teen or Mature, the company confirmed it would be able to resubmit the Game Room application itself to the ESRB for a new rating, if higher-rated titles are considered for future release.

It's hard to say just how good The Behemoth's newly announced BattleBlock Theater will be when it launches (no release date yet!). Even with all the clips and screens we've seen and all the time we've spent with the title (previously codenamed Game 3), we still don't have a deep understanding of what, exactly, is going on. But the team's got a pretty good track record with Castle Crashers and Alien Hominid, so we're willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

None of that matters, however, because what we do know is that what follows after the jump is probably our favorite trailer so far this year. It's actually -- and don't tell any advertisers or con-men this -- a little sad and scary just how easily we can be manipulated.

Matt Hazard: Blood Bath & Beyond was in the unfortunate position of being a not-so-bad follow-up to a pretty darn bad game. As if we needed to feel even worse for it, Gamasutra has released one of its all-too-humanizing postmortems centered on the PSN and XBLA release.

Developer Vicious Cycle's revelations about underestimating the work a downloadable game would take are interesting, but we're kind of disappointed that the "What went wrong" section isn't just "The first Matt Hazard game" in big letters.

We told you last week, but with a certain something likely taking up every ounce of delicious brain juice you've got right now, we felt it prudent to put out a reminder. 'Splosion Man, Twisted Pixel's game of splodey splendor, is 50 percent off this week on Xbox Live, bringing it down to a very reasonable 400 price tag. If you haven't bothered to check it out yet -- it is one of 2009's best games, y'know -- then there's really no excuse now.

Shortcut: Add Splosion Man to your download queue [Xbox.com]