Update: “Before they would pitch us on someone like Clinton, they may first go ask if he would do something like that. In no way, shape or form, did we say is President Clinton is who we want for this role or [tell Blindlight to] go chase him,” Pete Hines, the vice president of PR and marketing.

Original: Well, if you need someone to voice the president in Fallout 3, who would better to get than the former ex-president of these United States?

“Celebrity acquisition applies not just to celebrity actors but to sports figures, politicians – we’ve made offers to Bill Clinton for video games and gotten great responses with attorneys who have said, ‘The former president will not participate in one of your video game products, thank you very much’,” says Lev Chapelsky, the general manager of Hollywood-based Blindlight.

“We appreciated that frankness and candor – you don’t get that kind of candor from Creative Artists Agency, frankly. If the answers no, they don’t return your call for six months.”

Chapelsky wanted to snag Clinton for the very obvious role of the president in Fallout 3. “Wouldn’t that have been brilliant? You get to that point in game,” he adds, “and you hear that voice in the ether coming from off-camera and you’re like, ‘I know that guy!’”

[Bill Clinton Was Asked To Voice Fallout 3 via Kotaku]

The 360 already had its turn and now it looks like its the PS3s turn. Bethesda announced today that the previously exclusive downloadable content for the Xbox 360 version of Fallout 3 will be coming to the PlayStation 3. Bethesda has been working on implementing it for a while and are looking forward to bringing it to PS3 gamers via the PlayStation Network.

Operation: Anchorage will be released for PS3 in late June, followed by the release of The Pitt and Broken Steel 4-6 weeks apart. Release dates will be forthcoming. In addition, a new update will be released for PS3 that will allow users to download and play the new DLC. The release date for that update will be announced at a later date. There are also two new DLCs planned for all three platforms:

Point Lookout – Explore a massive new swampland area filled with new quests and it will be available in late June for Xbox 360 and PC. Cost will be 800 Microsoft Points. It will be available through Xbox Live and Games for Windows Live. Point Lookout will be available on PS3 after the first three DLCs have been released.

Mothership Zeta – The aliens have returned, and they’re pissed. Experience an alien abduction first hand and find out if you’re tough enough to survive. And is scheduled for release in late July for Xbox 36 and PC. Cost will be 800 Microsoft Points. It will be available through Xbox Live and Games for Windows Live. Mothership Zeta will be available on PS3 after Point Lookout.

Yeah. Wait should I really be yeah-ing about this? The developer behind hit games such as Fallout, Bethesda Softworks has revealed their plans to announce a Wii project later this year.

In an interview with industry site GamesIndustry, Bethesda Europe’s Sean Brennan questioned whether there’s a market for 18-year-old-and-up Wii titles.

“Is there space in the Wii market for that? I think there is, but again, it’ all about finding out how big that is,” said Brennan. “Is it 5 percent? If it’s five per cent of the market and you can own that space it’s worth doing because you can achieve volume.”

With that being said, it was revealed by the developer/publisher that they are planning a really big Wii game to this year. According to Brennan, “We are going to make an announcement on a really big Wii game this year, we’ve got a couple of other things in the pipeline, and it’s a format we’re really looking at with the right approach.”

“We’re not going to establish a new range and call if ‘My Girly Game Range’ or whatever these other companies are doing, it’s so me-too and boring,” Brennan added.

The downloadable content for Fallout 3 recently came to its maximum with the release of Broken Steel, but Bethesda might not be done releasing new content packs for the game and future packs will rely on projected profits.

In an interview with OXM, Bethesda’s Pete Hines hinted at the prospect for more DLC on the way.

“Whether [Broken Steel is] the absolute last one remains to be seen,” he said. “Because it’s been hugely successful. Operation Anchorage vastly exceeded our expectation. It was like ‘holy shit, we did how many?’ and the Pitt was really successful, after a bit of a false start.”

In addition, he goes on to say that Broken Steel is the most anticipated of the packs among fans, and he expects it to be “hugely, hugely popular.”

[Bethesda Says More Fallout 3 DLC Could Come via 1UP]

Talk about a bold statement. Developer Bethesda Games, know for the Fallout titles, are feeling pretty good about their newest project with Splash Damage in Europe, enough to call it a both a “genre-breaker” and a “killer app.”

“We’re not announcing the name yet, but it’s a first-person shooter. That’s a product that we believe is a genre-breaker, it’s a real killer app,” European managing director Sean Brennan told GamesIndustry.biz.

“From a quality perspective we’re pitching that along the same lines as Fallout 3. We’ve kept it under lock and key, there are so many innovative features in there we don’t want to reveal them too soon. We’ve spent significant resources developing the title. And that’s a great example of our European work.”

There’s a god in heaven. Earlier on today during a Bethesda press conference in London, it was revealed that they are currently hard at work on the newest fallout title, Fallout New Vegas.

The new game was revealed by Bethesda’s Pete Hines who said that the publisher is working with Obsidian Entertainment, known from games like Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II, on the title.

“It is not a sequel to Fallout 3,” Hines said. “It’s simply another Fallout game in that universe.” 

It will be the same sort of role-playing game experience seen in Fallout 3, he said. The game’s official reveal, with more details and a look at the game down the line. Hines added that this title will have no impact on what Todd Howard and his team are working on. Fallout New Vagas will release next year for the PC, Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

[New Fallout Announced via Kotaku]

It seems that not everything is fine in the Fallout circle. According to a recent 10-K financial filing, it seems that Interplay, who were supposed to have been developing a Fallout MMO, maybe getting their tales sued off of them by Bethesda.

It’s a looming lawsuit that hasn’t been officially revealed by anyone, yet. But, it’s not about the ‘rights’ to the game, it’s about the games progress. Lack there of.

Anyway, the deal worked like this, Bethesda was supposed to have commenced “full-scale” work on the title by April 4, 2009, which Bethesda says hasn’t happened. Along with that, Interplay were also supposed to have secured funding for the development of the game, which Bethesda also claim has not happened.

If Bethesda were to go running to this lawsuit, and win, Interplay would lose their rights to the MMO – along with their pride.

[Bethesda To Sue Interplay Over Fallout MMO? via Kotaku]

When Australia threatened to ban Fallout 3, because of  drug references in-game, Bethesda Softworks was quick to react and remove them. But, that is not going to be the case with Velvet Assassin.

When viewing the demo version of Velvet Assassin last week, Patrick from MTV’s Multiplayer Blog noticed that the main character uses morphine as an in-game power-up to slow down gameplay and perform deadly attacks.

“It’s a well known fact that morphine was widely used as a pain killer for wounded operatives and soldiers on all sides of the war. Not only does it fit the realism of the game, but it also plays an integral role in the actual gameplay experience. Use of morphine in the game is not meant to condone drug abuse, but to reflect the realistic nature of the game and true to life historical factors,”explained Aubrey Norris, SouthPeak product marketing manager.

“Additionally, the spirit of the game centers on players experiencing the life of a British operative behind enemy lines through Violette’s memories. In order to provide players with the most realistic and visceral experiences, Replay Studios has gone to great lengths to adhere to the facts history has provided. These reasons are why we decided to include and keep morphine in ‘Velvet Assassin.’”

Today, Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States of America, but in the eye of a Fallout 3 player, who didn’t get a chance to visit Washington D.C., it was time for them to take a trip to his Inauguration, the only way a Fallout player could.

Using the influence of the post-apoplectic Washington in Fallout 3, a player was able to visit Barack Obama’s Inauguration site, and lucky, he was nice enough to bring back some pictures of his trip.

In his very short photo tour he starts off his trip to with a glimpse of the National Mall as viewed from the top of the crumbling Washington Monument. And to end his trip he finishes with a short glimpse to ground of the mall looking up at the Washington Monument.

Ending on that note, this is a very interesting look on today’s events because it’s both a very important history and an important part of  gamers around the universe that we call world.

It’s clear now that plenty of gamers still have plenty of time, even with the so many games coming out, to stop an appreciate a good game. The game that many of us are still to beat, Fallout 3, has ships approximately 4.7 million units worldwide, which reflects the games huge consumer demand. The game officially went worldwide last week and according to Bethesda Softworks the game has made $300 million in retail sales.

For example, in the United Kingdom where it was not released until Friday, October 31 the rapid sales of Fallout 3 have led the game to be ranked number one among all video games, as well as being the number one game on each of its three platforms.

The successful launch of Fallout 3 by Bethesda Softworks follows the success of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, which remains one of the highest scoring games ever published and earned “Game of the Year” honors in 2006.

Many of us are still wondering if the news was true that Fallout 3 looks better on the 360 then it does on the PlayStation 3. Since we’re yet to receive video evidence to confirm this we can only think that the news is true. The game was original planned to make its way to India so that all it’s fans in India could try it out for themselves. But, Microsoft India has announced that it has cancelled its plans to release Fallout 3 in India on the 360. A press statement that was issued by Microsoft states that the game included certain content that could potentially hurt Indian sensibilities.

Due to distribution issues in the region, Microsoft had taken up the role of distributor for Fallout 3 in India, while the PlayStation 3 and PC versions of the game were never scheduled for release in the country. The game was originally planned to make it in India on 360 on October 28.

“Microsoft constantly endeavors to bring the best games to Indian consumers in sync with their international release. However, in light of cultural sensitivities in India, we have made the business decision to not bring Fallout 3 into the country.” -Microsoft India

[Fallout 3 controversy: India release cancelled via GamingIndians]

According to Gamer Chip, a modified version of Fallout 3 will be hitting in Australia later this year. This news comes after OFLC refused the classification of the game, which made it seem very doubtable it would ever see the light of in the day down under. There’s still no official word from Bethesda Games, but in the article Gamer Chip did say something about retailers EB Games now accepting pre-orders for the title. They go on to state some more information about the game saying in their article that “EB Games and GAME representatives, Australia will be receiving the game, albeit in a modified format.”

[Thanks 2 PALGN]

Fallout 3 is still yet to hit stores and news is already began circulating that Fallout 4 is already in the minds of the people over at Bethesda. Speaking interview with TotalVideoGames, Bethesda Games, Pete Hines, told them that they have further plans beyond this year’s hugely anticipated title. “The whole reason we went out and acquired the license and that we now own Fallout is that we clearly intended to make more than one,” claimed Hines.

“This is not something we’re going to do once and then go away and never do it again,” said Hines adding, “when that will be or how long that will be god only knows, but we acquired it specifically because we wanted to own it and develop it and work on it like we do with The Elder Scrolls.”

TheANGRYpixel has confirmed with local distributor e-Xpress Interactive a couple of days back that Soulcalibur IV will indeed not make it to Indian shores. Mainly because Ubisoft doesn’t believe in offering any sort of sales concession when it comes to Indian markets. When talking about the situation, e-Xpress has clarified that rather than haggle with Ubi and import the games for “an obscenely high price”, they elected to not import the game.

But, after Bethesda’s Pete Hines clarified that Bethesda / 2K would still continue to be the worldwide publisher for Fallout 3 on all platforms and would be in-charge of marketing and distributing them across North America, Europe and and Asia, many people may have already gotten a sign of of relief. But, there’s yet official word from them about the confirmation of a Indian release.

June 6, 2008 (Rockville, MD) – Bethesda Softworks®, a ZeniMax Media company, and Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) today announced the Fallout® 3 Survival Edition for Xbox 360®video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system and Games for Windows. The limited Survival Edition is now available for pre-order exclusively through www.Amazon.com/fallout3.

This ultimate Fallout 3 package includes a life-size replica of the Pip-Boy 3000, the wrist-mounted device worn by characters in-game. The Pip-Boy 3000 has been painstakingly recreated and modified for real world display as a digital clock. In addition to the Pip-Boy 3000, the Survival Edition will include all of the items included in the Fallout 3 Collector’s Edition:

The Fallout 3 game;

• Customized, metal Vault-Tec lunch box;
• 5” Vault Boy Bobblehead;
• ‘The Art of Fallout 3’ hardcover book; and
• ‘The Making of Fallout 3’ DVD

“We’re thrilled to be working with Amazon.com on this exclusive edition,” said Vlatko Andonov, president of Bethesda Softworks . “The Survival Edition offers gamers the unique opportunity to own a piece of video game history along with a collection of limited edition items – it’s the definitive Fallout 3 package.”

“This is an exciting day for Amazon customers and Fallout fans,” said Greg Hart vice president of video games and software at Amazon. “We’re delighted to be the exclusive destination for Fallout 3 Survival Edition; this is a great example of the continually expanding selection we offer to gamers.”

Fallout 3 features one of the most realized game worlds ever created. Create any kind of character you want and explore the open wastes of post-apocalyptic Washington, D.C. Every minute is a fight for survival as you encounter Super Mutants, Ghouls, Raiders, and other dangers of the Wasteland.

Currently under development at Bethesda Game Studios – creators of award winning The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion®, the 2006 Game of the Year – Fallout 3 is one of the most anticipated games of 2008 and is slated for release this Fall on Xbox 360, PLAYSTATION®3 system and Games for Windows.

Fallout® 3 has not yet been rated by the ESRB. For more information on Fallout 3, visit http://fallout.bethsoft.com.

All information contained in this news post comes directly from a press release sent out by Bethesda and Amazon.