I’ll never cease to be amazed at the passion displayed by some videogame fans. Recently, we tossed up a few select screenshots of EarthBound creatures created in Spore. They were splendidly done and elicited a smile from more than a few us here. Not to be outdone, our very community member free touch has created his own unique EarthBound creation – in the form of an Xbox 360 faceplate.

As you can see above, it’s a delightful rendition of the main characters and logo of the game. In his C-blog, free touch gives a few details as to what went into his creation, including the usage of custom colors and an obviously steady hand.

It’s a sharp creation, and I’m glad he decided to share it with us. I lack the ability to draw and paint, so I typically end up baking my videogame creations. It definitely lacks the style, but it tastes good in the end. Something tells me that plastic and paint lacks sugar and the ability to digest properly.

The sixth book in the Halo series, Halo: The Cole Protocol, will be hitting bookstores November 25th. The book was written by Tobias S. Buckell, who also penned the somewhat critically acclaimed sci-fi novels Crystal Rain and Ragamuffin.

If you're in the dark like I am, check out this synopsis from the press release:

Halo: The Cole Protocol unveils the location of the Spartan Gray Team and takes readers into an unexplored conflict of the Human-Covenant War, where unlikely alliances are formed and shattered, altering the course of the humanity's epic struggle for survival.

One thing is for certain in the videogame industry – everything is secret until otherwise noted. Developers will typically spend years on original IPs before announcing them, and often when they are announced early, the details are scant at best. That’s why when MTV Multiplayer asked a newbie Nintendo employee JC Rodrigo how his first day was, he couldn’t really answer.

From the interview:

Umm, I’ll say it was exciting but I can’t tell you what it was. Because I looked around and basically, I said to my boss, ‘Really? Are you serious?!’ and he said ‘Yeah, I’m not kidding.’ So, I’m like ‘oooookay!’ [laughs] So I started doing…something. Something exciting and something unexpected — something completely unexpected.

The county supervisor election in Maricopa Count, Arizona is finally starting to heat up. Fliers aren’t the only thing Fulton Brock and Ed Hermes are dishing out as their campaigns come to a close. In a campaign mailing, Republican incumbent Fulton is attempting to smear the challenger Hermes by mentioning his record on Halo.

From the mailing:

Skilled player of popular video game Halo. Hermes was quoted in the ASU student newspaper as saying, "I am addicted to Halo and play almost every night."

[via GamePolitics -- Thanks, Brian!]

Yay! Another person that makes me feel inadequate!

I have been fiddling around in the LittleBigPlanet beta for about a week now and have not even come close to creating anything this unbelievably impressive. PSN user Upsilandre has created a level in LittleBigPlanet featuring an actual working calculator.

Now, at first this seems kind of boring and almost shrug-worthy. But before you dismiss it, keep in mind that there is nothing in LittleBigPlanet that allows you to just easily create something that adds and subtracts numbers. Upsilandre constructed this ingenious gizmo using more than 1600 parts, including 610 magnetic switches, 500 wires, and 430 pistons.

Honestly, I can’t even begin to comprehend how he/she even attempted to do this.

What do you think? Are you impressed by the level of skill shown in some of these early LittleBigPlanet levels? Like me, are you embarrassed to even show your creation to the world now? What do you think levels will look like once the game finally hits retail (I may as well start hanging my head in shame now)?

[Via 1UP]

Some new images of Gamecock/Spark Unlimited's Legendary have been thrown our way and once again, they show the game's diverse team of creatures ranging from werewolves to griffins to tentacle monsters that look like extras from a hentai flick.

The achievements for Legendary, which are listed after the jump, are mostly your standard "beat this level, kill that thing"-type challenges, but I have to give credit for the unique titles these achievements sport (heh, "Barf Piñata").

Look out for Legendary on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC on October 21. Seriously guys, could you have picked a more busy time for your game to launch?