So folks, if you were in attendance and have flu like symptoms, you may want to head to your doctor. However, the CDC has said you only need to worry if you’re in a high risk group (sickly, elderly or very young) or if your symptoms get severe.

News comes to us from the official PAX twitter:

It’s official! PAX 2009 is completely sold out!

So there you have it, if you have a ticket to PAX, you’re good to go, if you don’t, you’re screwed. Have a nice day.

The above screen shot was taken at the Games Crazy Con that recently went on in Las Vegas where Infinity Ward’s Robert Bowling took the main stage to give us a live demo of the game. Sure, the screen shot is blurry but you can definitely make out duel wielded Desert Eagles if you look close enough.

Not to mention the below Tweet from Bowling’s Twitter:

Just walked off stage. Crowd was amazing, went insane chanting “pick it up!” when I stumbled over Dual-wield Deagles. lol – Akimbo confirmed

Modern Warfare 2 will hit store shelve for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC on November 10th of this year.

via modernwarfare247

Halo Legends will apparantly make its way onto DVD and digital platforms (Xbox Live?) in early 2010 courtesy of Warner Bros. The show will be produced by 5 Japanese anime studios which include Bones, Casio Entertainment, Studio4 C, Toei Animation and Production I.G.

Frank O’Conner, creative director of 343 Industries, let us know that Halo Legends will exist to give viewers a further insight into the Halo universe and along with giving it a new direction. A new direction? You mean to set us up for the impending release of Halo: Reach.

via Joystiq

Mad Catz Art Director, Roentgen D. Reyes, commented on the hardware’s artwork:

“When we set out creating the Limited Edition artwork we knew that we had to create an impactful design that was radically different from the previous imagery and color schemes. With that in mind we chose not to concentrate on a group of characters but instead produce something targeted to the fan community. After working through a number of designs, we focused on one of the strongest ‘fan-favorite’ characters in the game, Sagat. The character is renowned for his large scar which game legend tells us was caused by archrival Ryu. In my mind, playing Street Fighter® IV evokes the player’s competitive nature, with rivalry a key element of the experience.”

The exclusive Tournament Edition arcade sticks will go on sale for Comic-Con attendees for $179.99 while the exclusive SF4 controller, pictured after the break, will go on sale at the convention along with on the Mad Catz website for $49.99.

via Kotaku

As a special treat, LBP Super Creators gevurah22 (Azure Palace) and Darknessbear (LittleDeadSpace) will be at the PlayStation booth to chat with any aspiring LBP creators to give creator tips or just to walk folks through some of their favorite User Generated Levels.

Along with some fun with these famous creators, prizes will also be offered. The PSP version of LBP will be released this fall and will feature new levels and content. This year’s Comic-Con will be held at the San Diego Convention Center during July 23rd through 26th. But if you’re so fortunate enough to be there, I’m sure you already know that.

Read (PlayStation.Blog)

It’s no surprise that Germany’s recent banning of games such as World of Warcraft and Counterstrike would cause an uproar in the gaming community — It seems that a group of German gamers have banded together to form a formal protest against the government’s recent decision.

Said group formed a march 400 strong who paraded through Karlsurhe to show their hatred towards the government’s “war on videogames”. But that’s not all, Destructoid reports that 3 more protests are planned to happen simultaneously on July 25th.

Furthermore, there is an online petition that has formed that hopes to reach 5,000 signatures because if it does, officials are required by law to rethink their banning of such games. Will this be enough? Let’s hope so because I mean honestly, how can you ban Counterstrike?

Want to help out? The online petition is located here.

Didn’t get a ticket to BlizzCon? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Luckily, Blizzard, RayV and DirecTV are offering over 16 hours of the event live for $39.95.

Below is what will be included during the live stream:

Exclusive interviews and commentary

Main stage presentations including opening ceremony

Tournament coverage and team highlights

Additionally, you will be given the exclusive BlizzCon 2009 WoW in-game pet; Grunty the Murloc Marine.

Read (RayV)

It seems Germany is at it again, this time setting their eyes upon Valve’s extremely popular Counter-Strike series. Legislation was recently passed that now makes it illegal to play Counter-Strike in public.

This has led to the cancelation of Germany’s Convention-X-Treme LAN event which is sure to discourage the mass of German gamers. Furthermore, Destructoid is reporting that World of Warcraft has also been banned from public play.

What’s next, Germany, Halo?

It seems that Bungie has followed Treyarch and Epic’s examples with Double XP weekends for Gears of War 2 and CoD: WaW, respectively, and announced the same for Halo 3.

This event begins today and runs until 2AM Monday and will require the Heroic, Legendary and Mythic map packs to participate.

Common developers, now’s your chance, anymore Double XP weekends we need to hear about?

Read (Bungie)

Just like Epic, Treyarch has decided that they will hold a Double XP weekend for Call of Duty: World at War to celebrate the 4th of July. Just like Gears of War 2, this event will take place on July 3rd and run until July 6th.

Additionally, on July 3rd, Treyarch is gearing to launch a playlist update that will incoporate the recently released Map Pack 2 into the Core and Hardcore playlists.

For those of you who are waiting for a Double XP weekend to go prestige, now’s your chance.

Epic has recently announced that they will be holding a Gears of War 2 Double XP weekend to celebrate July 4th. The actual event will take place on July 3rd and run through July 6th.

Not only will players recieve double XP for any ranked game they play this weekend but the winning team will be giving an extra 500 XP.

This is sure to appeal to some but I’m not too sure if it’s how I would like to spend my July 4th. I mean common, fireworks, beer, barbeque, what more could you ask for?

Now don’t get your hopes up too high because unfortunately we weren’t able to secure any Blizzcon tickets to give away to you guys, the readers. Fortunately, there is a slew of websites that were more fortunate than us and were able to get their hands on some Bilzzcon tickets to give away.

Below is a compiled list of all known fan sites holding Blizzcon ticket giveways, courtesy of Starcraft Wire:

StarcraftWire.net – Giveaway 1 – Giveaway 2

BlizzPlanet

Diii.net – (coming soon)

Diablo-Source

StarCraft-Source

inStarCraft

StarCraft II Australia

StarCraft 2 Source

TankSpot

World of Raids

WoW Interface

So, you won’t be getting a Blizzcon ticket from us but at least you still have the opportunity to get your hands on one while Blizzard prepares to put some more up for sale.

You can read more about Blizzard’s annual convention, Blizzcon, here.

It seems that Steve Wiebe and current Donkey Kong champ, Billy Mitchell, have been duking it out in an ongoing battle to claim the game’s world record.

Wiebe, being the underdog, has gained the support of Stride Gum who even went as far as saying that they will give the man $10,001 dollars in quarters if they beat Mitchell’s high score of 1,049,100. Gary Osifchin, marketing director over at Stride, was quoted to say:

“Steve Wiebe is an inspiration to gamers everywhere, and we believe he truly deserves the title of Donkey Kong world champion. This is exactly the kind of long lasting endeavor that we here at Stride appreciate, and we have full confidence that Wiebe will once again surpass the million points mark and avoid the kill screen for long enough in the process.”

Tune into G4 on June 2nd when Mr. Weibe will go for the gold live at this year’s E3.

Read (UGO)

It’s not a surprise that a publisher should pull out of an expensive show like E3, especially during these tough economic times.

Valve is offering a 24 hour free trial of Left4Dead this weekend, which we heard about yesterday, but it’s only for 24 hours. After those 24 hours, you’re probably going to want to buy the game, right?

To capitalize on this, Valve has announced that they will drop the price of Left4Dead by 40% making for a $23.99 final sale.

This is a great chance to not only try but own an excellent zombie game that was generally well received across the board.

Media Molecule’s imaginative user creation-centric platform game “LittleBigPlanet,” which was first unveiled at GDC 2007, was the recipient of the most awards of the evening, taking four awards for Best Game Design, Best Technology, Best Debut Game and Innovation Award.

Other winners included Ubisoft’s hauntingly beautiful update of the “Prince of Persia” franchise, which won the prize for Best Visual Arts, and Ready at Dawn’s portable action-adventure, “God of War: Chains of Olympus,” winner of the Best Handheld Game award. EA Redwood Shores’ shocking horror title, “Dead Space,” won the prize for Best Audio award.

The Game Developers Choice Awards, which honor the very best games of the year, are voted on by developers and created for developers. They are produced and hosted by the GDC and presented by Gamasutra.com and Game Developer Magazine, with the aid of a distinguished Advisory Committee that includes many of the world’s top game creators, and each award is decided by thousands of votes from game professionals worldwide.

(Source) Press

To qualify for the contest, developers-publishers can use the Zeemote Ready SDK to create a new game or modify an existing game title to feature either full Analogue Joystick Game Control or Simultaneous Multiplayer Gaming, Both are unique features offered by the Zeemote JS1 Controller.

The Zeemote Ready Developers Contest is designed to further support and reward the growing Zeemote developer community, which has been instrumental in helping establish the Zeemote JS1 Controller. The contest is being launched on the heels of a breakout year that saw Zeemote establish partnerships with handset manufacturers Nokia, Sony Ericsson and RIM, game publishers including EA, Gameloft, Glu, and network operators, T-Mobile, Orange, Telcel, Vodafone, and Telefonica Movil. Building on the Zeemote JS1’s availability in Europe and Latin America, Zeemote is continuing its momentum in 2009 with product rollouts globally planned in markets such as the UK, South America, Asia, the United States, Asia and additional geographies in Europe.

(Source) Zeemote

Beginning today through May 14, there are two ways to enter to win the Chinatown boss prize package. Your first chance is by participating in the text-to-win program. When boss wannabes buy the new Grand Theft Auto game from GameStop stores, they will receive a code to text in to be entered in the sweepstakes.

Boss status includes:

• A 3 day/2 night trip to New York City for you and 3 friends
• Private limo
• Deluxe hotel accommodations
• An entourage of models and a bodyguard for a night out
• Nightclub VIP room
• $5,000 cold hard cash

Additional runner-up prizes will be given in the amount of $250 GameStop gift cards.

(Source) Press