AU Shippin' Out May 10-14: Skate 3

Avoiding the peripheral route that Activision took with the Tony Hawk franchise earlier this year, this week's Skate 3 will be sticking to the traditional controller when it comes out on Thursday. The biggest new feature that developer EA Black Box is pushing this time around is co-op play throughout the campaign, both online with a partner, or offline with an AI-controlled bot. Skate 3 also sees the series ditch San Vanelona for a new skater-friendly town called Port Carverton, which is divided up into three distinct areas: downtown, university, and industrial.

Another game that's sticking to the roots of its genre is 3D Dot Game Heroes, which pays homage to the old-school Zelda games. In sticking to this formula, the artistic design is such that everything in the game is built out of giant 3D squares, bringing the graphics into the HD era while maintaining the classic blocky appearance of the time. Expect to see 3D Dot Game Heroes on store shelves on Friday.

On the hardware front, Microsoft has announced that the 250GB Xbox 360 hard drive will be available in Australia as of today. Like other 360 HDDs, the 250GB sells significantly higher than normal hard drives, with the RRP sitting at A$199.99 ($179.52). Along with the HDD, the box also contains a memory-transfer kit allowing owners to transfer the data off their old drives onto the new one.

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Skate 3 Video Preview