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Wait, Namco Bandai wasn't done announcing PSP games. Just an hour after their Tekken 6 announcement, the company also revealed a brand new Soulcalibur game for the handheld. Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny is a PSP-exclusive version of Soulcalibur IV. Gone are the Star Wars bonus characters, but in their stead will be at least one new character: Dampiere.

Broken Destiny will feature all the dressings of a console fighter, with arcade, versus and survival modes. New to the PSP version will be a new single-player mode meant for beginners struggling to learn the intricacies of the battle system. It will function, essentially, as an enhanced tutorial mode.

The PSP version will also feature new lighting effects that allow players to fight in stages at different times of day. Other gameplay components, such as the critical finish and armor destruction are also supposedly improved. Finally, Broken Destiny will offer Ad-Hoc wireless play, although according to Gamespot, Infrastructure might be a possibility. Expect Soulcalibur to hit your no-longer-defunct PSP this summer.

Swords and boobs helped propel Namco Bandai to $99.7 million in profit during the third quarter of its financial year. GameDaily reports that Soul Calibur IV has been the publisher's most successful title, selling 2.2m units this fiscal year, followed by Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit's 730k. Overall, the PS2 is the publisher's most successful platform for its software, followed by the Wii. Also, the PSP has been slightly kinder to the publisher than the DS.

Namco Bandai's finances combine the company's video games, arcade machines and toy businesses. Despite a significant drop in revenue, it still plans to walk away with $143m in profit, when it closes the books for the year on March 31.

This week, Best Buy is giving away a free drum shade with purchase of Rock Band 2 bundle and Target is selling NBA Live 09 and SoulCalibur IV for $55. Over at Circuit City, they're giving out free $15 iTunes gift cards with purchase of Fable 2 (LE), a free strategy guide with Far Cry 2, a free t-shirt with the Rock Band 2 bundle and a $10 gift card with Midnight Club: LA. Circuit City is also selling GTAIV, Mercenaries 2, The Force Unleashed and Madden 09 for $45. Have fun shopping.

On Thursday, October 23rd, the once Playstation 3 exclusive SoulCalibur IV Vader character will be available for purchase off the Xbox Live Marketplace. Purchasable for 400 Microsoft points. Yes, we'll admit, $5 for Vader is a bit expensive, but when you look at what you're getting in terms of getting the chance to pit Yoda against Vader in an epic SoulCalibur IV battle of awesomeness. Well, then it doesn't seem too bad. But we must ask, where's our unlockable Jar Jar Binks?

It seems when Namco Bandai told us Darth Vader and Yoda would remain trapped in their respective console domains, it was only true ... from a certain point of view. The company has shockingly confirmed that, due to "overwhelming fan response," those suspiciously blank character portraits in the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of Soulcalibur IV will soon be filled in by a downloadable Darth Vader or Yoda. Good job, fans, we're sure Namco would never have figured out how to make money like this on its own.

The proper Star Wars showdown will begin on October 23rd, provided you're willing to pay 400 and $5 for a hyperventilating throat crusher and his little green friend, respectively. And just so we can work in another tedious reference, we'll add: We pray Namco doesn't alter the deal any further. Good one, us!

[Via press release]

SHOCK! Namco Bandai has just announced that Xbox 360's exclusive Soulcalibur IV character, Yoda, will be available as DLC on the PS3. We totally didn't see this coming.

The DLC pack will be available next Thursday, October 23rd, and will cost $4.99. Xbox 360 owners will be able to access the PS3-exclusive character, Darth Vader, for 400 Microsoft Points.

That's more like it. Have you noticed that we haven't been moaning about European PSN releases for a little while? That's because SCEE has clearly stepped up their game. Big releases are nigh-on simultaneous and demos and add-ons are rarely late, either. Being a European is pretty good this week, with three demos, two song packs for Rock Band and some decent videos and themes. Here's the full release list:

Playable content

• Fracture demo
  
• SoulCalibur IV demo
• NBA Live 09 demo

Add-on content

• Rock Band DLC (listed after the break)
• Rock Band Song Export Key (£2.49/€3.49)

Having said that, the Rock Band DLC is lagging slightly, but we're going to give them the benefit of the doubt for a few weeks, until they get everything synced up properly. The most confusing thing about this update is the Rock Band Son Export Key. Why would Europe need that now, if Rock Band 2 is nowhere in sight? Unless EA is going to surprise the region with a sooner-than-expected (ie, within the next 6 months) release? Who knows. What it does mean is that the song export patch (which includes GHIII controller compatability) should be available soon. Right?

If you've been meaning to pick up Soulcalibur IV -- which was released about a month ago -- but have yet to, then perhaps you've been waiting for that demo that was promised. If you find yourself in with that crowd, perhaps getting some playtime with the newly released demo off the Japanese PS Store will tickle your fancy.

The demo, which is completely in English, weighs-in at about 879MB. It'll allow players to fight a few rounds as either Cassandra (pictured getting whacked in the head) or Nightmare (not pictured). For those of you who want to check out the weapon-clashing blades of SC IV, log into your Japanese accounts and download it. For those of you who don't have a Japanese account and are not in a rush, there's a pretty big chance of seeing the demo on your local PS Store update tomorrow.

Street Fighter IV is unlikely to have exclusive console-specific characters (like Soul Calibur IV) when it releases next year, the game's producer tells Videogamer. Yoshinori Ono believes the idea of exclusive characters is unfair -- and that extends to "downloadable characters" as well.

Yoshinori expresses that this is only his "policy," however, so we won't rule out the influence of the Capcom overlords. SF IV is expected on consoles around the time the Street Fighter movie releases in early 2009.

Weighing in at a reasonable 695MB and available for download off the Xbox Live Marketplace is a brand new SoulCalibur IV demo that has been specifically crafted for your SoulCalibur fighting enjoyment. And before you ask, we'll admit that we don't know all that much about the demo, what's included or which characters are featured in it (fingers crossed for Yoda), so don't ask us. Just download it and quit being so darn lazy. But, we do know what our favorite thing about the SoulCalibur IV demo is, and it's the NAMCO-BANDAI supplied demo description which reads: "Especially suitable for the players out there who are still undecided in purchasing the final product!" Now that's called being honest.

It looks like Yoda and Darth Vader are finally working together. You see, the two Jedi masters have managed to help push 2 million copies of Soul Calibur IV onto the gaming populace. The number accounts for both the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 version of the game. We're curious to see which version sold more copies. No, not because we want the Xbox 360 version to succeed, but because we want some new nerd ammunition for the next time we get into the Darth Vader vs Yoda conversation.

[Via Joystiq]

Namco Bandai's ridiculously cross-branded Soul Calibur IV has cut a deep swath into retail shelves worldwide, shipping not one million units but two since its July 29 debut.

Still, and not to make an example out of you, Namco, but really all of this chest puffery over units shipped is a bit overblown. It's like bragging about how many pencils you threw at the ceiling, rather than what's really important, namely how many stuck. Then again, we imagine it's difficult to look up and count while you're ducking under the desk from falling profits.

[Via PS3 Fanboy]

After seeing Snake, Raiden and Kratos in Soul Calibur IV's Character Creation mode, we knew it was inevitable other fan favorites would soon arrive as well. As you can see above, two very famous plumbers were painstakingly recreated for your viewing pleasure. This site managed to collect even more craziness, with everyone ranging from Dante of Devil May Cry, The Bride of Kill Bill, Nappa & General Tao of Dragon Ball, Golbez of Final Fantasy IV, Cammy of Street Fighter and last but certainly not least, Gundam. Admittedly, we are a little scared by that last one. See who else you can recognize here.

[Via Kotaku]

What's wrong with this picture? It directly contradicts what Soul Calibur IV director Katsutoshi Sasaki said in a recent interview, that's what. Specifically, Sasaki responded "we don't have any plans for that" when asked by XCN if we'd ever see both characters from a galaxy far, far away battling each other on the same console.

You can't get much more official than the game's director, but his comments don't explain screenshots (such as the one above) and video that have appeared on the net clearly (and seemingly authentically) showing both Yoda and Vader in the same version of SCIV. We can't help but think Sasaki is practicing his Jedi mind tricks on us with this one.

[Via PS3 Fanboy]