Retail Radar: Guitar Hero going wireless, Platypus PSP, budget imports

Last month, RedOctane and Activision filed a trademark-infringement suit against The Ant Commandos, maker of an unlicensed line of guitar-shaped controllers for the popular PlayStation 2 game Guitar Hero, one of which is wireless. Some gamers expressed concern that if a judge sided with RedOctane and ordered The Ant Commandos to recall its products, they would not have a wireless option when jamming on the living room stage.

That might not be the case, as GameStop has a product listing up for a wireless Guitar Hero controller, this one manufactured not by The Ant Commandos, but by RedOctane itself. The listing has a $49.99 price tag, and indicates that the guitars should ship out November 7, day-and-date with Guitar Hero II.

Over in the PlayStation Portable section, the retailer has started taking preorders for a game called Platypus from MacPlay. Platypus is a 2D side-scrolling shooter for the Mac and PC made with claylike graphics (PSone platformer fans might find the look reminiscent of Skullmonkeys, only cheerier). MacPlay is also down for a PSP version of Luxor, a PC and Mac puzzle game that plays similar to Zuma or Ballistic.

Finally, even with the hoopla about the PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360, there are still reasons to keep an eye on the current-gen release lists. It seems Vivendi Games is going to start supporting the Xbox and PlayStation 2 with an array of inexpensive offerings going forward. As for what constitutes "inexpensive," how does under $10 sound?

Both the Xbox and PS2 are set to receive $9.99 versions of Drive to Survive on Halloween. Chances are that these games would be imported versions of Mashed: Drive to Survive, a sequel to a top-down European car -ombat game from the developers of Micro Machines 2.

Other $9.99 titles GameStop is expecting from Vivendi on Halloween include Victorious Boxers 2: Fighting Spirit for the PlayStation 2 and Ultimate Pro Pinball for the Xbox. The original Victorious Boxers from 2001 was a localized version of Hajime no Ippo, based on a Japanese manga. So it stands to reason that Victorious Boxers 2 would be a port of the 2004 follow-up, Hajime no Ippo 2: Victorious Road. As for Ultimate Pro Pinball, a PS2 game by the same name was announced in Japan, and that title was a compilation of Empire Interactive's Pro Pinball line of PC titles.

Please note, while retailer listings frequently jump the gun on publishers' product announcements, they should not be taken as final confirmation of a game's existence, nor should the absence of a listing be considered as proof that a game isn't coming to a given platform.