Just yesterday, we posted a head to head between Gears of War 2 and Halo 3 from IGN that asked the question of which one of the two huge Xbox 360 exclusives was the absolute must-have for the system. For anyone who missed it and doesn't feel like going back to watch the video, Halo 3 won. Many will argue that Gears of War 2 is the better game but the latest statistics from Xbox Live are saying quite the opposite. While the full list is posted after the jump, let me lay things out for you. Firstly, this list shows what people have been playing while connected to Live, not how many people were playing the games multiplayer modes on Xbox Live so make a note of that. The results, especially after this recent gaming season, are astounding. Ok , so here is the list: Halo 3 Gear of War 2 CoD: World at War GTA IV Fable II Left 4 Dead Madden NFL 09 Fallout 3 FIFA 09 Now here is the amazing thing, even though we have just been through arguably the best gaming release season of all time, the hugely popular multiplayer modes found in both Gears of War 2 and even Call of Duty: World at War could not take the number 1 spot from the (already over a year old) phenomenon that is Halo 3. That means that even though there was a large number of people playing Call of Duty and Gears of War's single player campaign as well as multiplayer modes (including the incredibly addictive Gears of War 2 semi co-op experience, Horde), Halo 3 still took the top spot with what can now only be people who are still playing the multiplayer. While South Africans never really caught on to Halo 3 like the Americans did, we have to appreciate that Bungie must have done something very right to still have the top spot over all this time. Call of Duty 4 is sitting just below Call of Duty: World at War, meaning that while there are still a lot of players who prefer last years offering, World at War is still making quite an impact on the world, regardless of the fact that Treyarch were at the helm. Just seeing this is almost making me want to go back and play some more Halo 3 multiplayer just to try and see if I can see what all the fuss is about. Honorable mentions come in with Left 4 Dead which is proving to be a massively fun multiplayer experience as well as GTA IV considering it's age and even Fallout 3 considering that it doesn't have any multiplayer. I want to make a mention of Fable II as well although I think that if it's co-op multiplayer had been better, it might have made more of an impact.

Another Prince of Persia video has been released, this time showing a montage of the gameplay elements that we can all expect from the new refreshed title. I think that the game is looking really fun and to be honest, it really needs to be because a lot of gamers have already exhausted a lot of their resources on buying the plethora of games that were released in the recent weeks. I think that Prince of Persia will have a lot of appeal with regards to new and casual gamers and from the looks of things, is set to be quite an enjoyable experience. Prince of Persia hits local shelves this Friday.

When you think about the Xbox 360, two major exclusive titles always spring to mind, Gears of War and Halo 3. So what if you have just bought a console or have a friend who has just bought a console and you just cannot decided which one of the two is the must-have game that should grace the system. IGN have put together a great head to head video, pitting Gears of War 2 against Halo 3 in duel to the death. Which one is the definitive Xbox 360 title and the one that shouldn't be missed. With regards to multiplayer, from a local perspective I will say one thing. It is that here in South Africa, we need to stick together to play lag-free games. So out here it really is all about finding out what all your friends are playing and then getting that. It doesn't help if Gears is better or Halo is better because if you have no one to play with then it is no fun at all. You won't believe who won this comparison and by how much. Check it out.

If you, like me were one of the people that forked out a bunch of Microsoft Points to get your hands on the beat-em-up title Castle Crashers on Xbox Live, only to find out that the best part (online co-op) was plagued with connectivity and lag issues, then this is a bit of good news. There was no doubt that the biggest reason for anyone connected to Xbox Live to get the game was to experience the great arcade action that the game had to offer together with some friends. We all downloaded the game, started playing and were then hit with a ton of issues. This lead me to the decision to pretty much leave the game alone until a patch came out to fix it so that I could properly enjoy the experience that I had been looking forward to for so long. Problem is, that the patch has now taken over 3 months to arrive, so where is it and why are we all waiting so long? The guys at Xbox360Fanboy seem to feel the same way and so they got ahold of Behemoth to try and get some sort of answer with regards to the progress of the patch. Behemoth were happy to respond and have said the following: "We're working with Microsoft to get the title update out as quickly as we can. Sadly, we can't get into details about the certification process, but we've resolved the game's issues with data loss and networking in addition to other bugs. We can't really comment on the release yet as we're not allowed to talk about it because of Microsoft, but the update's release is definitely reaching the end of the process. We've received great support from our fans on our forums in identifying issues. That feedback has helped out a lot and we're really honored to have such an awesome group of fans in the community." Hopefully this means that the patch will be available in not too long (If we are lucky it will be before everyone goes on holiday) and we can all finally kick some ass online with our buddies.

The latest sales charts in from the UK have some interesting stories to tell. Call of Duty 5 is proving that the public doesn't really care who is developing the game and whether or not it is based in World War 2 again. The game appeals to many people and is accessible enough that a lot of consumers are all too happy to pick it up and give it a go. In the same vein, I am not too happy about the fact the Need for Speed: Undercover is sitting in second place. The fact that the game is still getting good sales is only going to let EA know more than ever that they can take huge shortcuts and make a really low quality game and still get away with massive sales due to a recognisable brand. What is really interesting is that Resistance 2, the supposedly almighty PS3 exclusive is only sitting at number 10. Why is that? Well, I was actually very interested to find out that Resistance 2 had only been on sale for a day when the chart was released, which means that the day one sales were probably looking pretty strong. It seems that the UK is also experiencing distribution issues so that may factor into the charts as well. It is interesting to see that so many other recent popular titles are not in the top 10 although it was interesting to see that even though it is so far down the line, Mario Kart Wii is sitting at a very respectable 4th place.

An un-named colleague (Nick) sent a tip over this morning about how Call of Duty 5 on the 360 is outselling the PS3 version by nearly 3:1. Apparently he is not impressed that I kept on sending him the flamebait tips and wanted to get some revenge. However I have been burnt enough recently so I am not going to …

Black Friday, if you didn’t know, is the biggest shopping day of the year over in the States. It’s they day that people leave their brains at the door and run riot through the shops trying to get the best bargains for Christmas. It is also a very nice indicator on how the silly season will progress and this year …

So when I was given the opportunity to review MK vs DC I was a little hesitant at first but decided to give it a go, after all, I did enjoy Dragonball Z. Has the Mortal Kombat franchise finally hit an all-time low or is this new offering a statement that says that the fun has only just begun?... You pick a fighter and then start battling it out against a ladder of opponents and finally, if you make it, you will face some type of boss.... After you have chosen your side your are thrown into the story mode which is basically the same as the Arcade mode but with cut scenes in between fights and without the ability to select your own character, thus forcing you to try out different characters.... The fighting system works well with only a few hiccups, like the blocking not being as responsive as I would like but it doesn’t take away from the overall experience.... While progressing through the story mode I noticed a trend where I would win the first match and then lose the second match 99% of the time because in the second round the AI seemed to take revenge on my first round victory by assaulting me with super move after super move.... The first of these are Freefall Kombat where you hit your opponent off the level and then continue attacking them all the way down.... The Second event is Test Your Might and happens when you shove your opponent into a wall after which you just keep on running through wall after wall.... Even with the super AI I really enjoyed the story mode, it’s a nice change of pace from the normal fight, die, fight, die, fight, die, fight win! The game is simple enough to allow me to pull of cool moves while trying to win and I didn’t even have to resort to cheap tactics to beat anyone, including the bosses.... And this is where the combo challenge comes in. The Kombo Challenge pits you against an AI opponent which never moves or attacks so that you have time to pull off the required combos.... It is sort of an advanced sparring mode, but after trying and failing Superman’s first Kombo Challenge, I couldn’t be bothered.... Nothing beats electrocuting your opponent and mocking him for being a little girl and knowing that any minute he could hit you because he is sitting right next to you.... I think that with this title being aimed at a younger audience, the casual gamer might enjoy this more, but this is not to say that the hardcore gamers out there won’t find anything to enjoy here either.... Scoring Gameplay : 7/10 (Solid gameplay with a few issues, nothing gamebreaking) Presentation : 7/10 ( Nice character models, average backgrounds, a little bland) Sound : 7/10 ( Good voice acting, Standard but cool MK voice “ Finish Him”) Value : 6/10 ( Might not be enough to warrant a R700 purchase, but fans should get it) Overall : 7/10 ( Solid gameplay, looks good and is lots of fun.