The event was a lot of fun, and you can pretend you were able to be there by browsing through the gallery below. iam8bit always does a great job with these events, and co-founder Jon Gibson promised us there's lots more on the way: He's currently working hard on the leetUP event that iam8bit is co-hosting at the beginning of next month, and says VIP tickets for that one have sold out already. We'll be in attendance, so stay tuned for more.

Tuesday is Valentine's Day, and in addition to being a day full of expectations and guilt, it's now a day where you can be rick-rolled by a damn video game in the sanctity of your own home. The "Gold Star My Heart" Pack drops Tuesday in North America and Wednesday for European PS3 users, and includes four love-centric tracks to get you into (or very quickly out of) the mood.

Peep the full track list after the break, and see if you're the kind of person who'd rather be playing Rock Band 3 on Valentine's Day. (Please invite us.)

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The XBLA/PSN reimagining of BurgerTime needed a little more time on the grill before hitting WiiWare, but now MonkeyPaw Games is ready to serve BurgerTime World Tour to a hungry audience on a plastic tray all right these food metaphors are falling apart.

We'll have to warn you about this week's 3DS eShop game, lest you get unreasonably excited. Maru's Mission is not about Maru the cat. It is a cute-looking ninja action game, though. But not about Maru. Sorry!

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I hold Rhythm Heaven games to a high standard. The DS game became such a fixture in my life that it permanently wired rhythms into my brain. Months after the last time I picked it up, I'll still randomly "scratch-o, hey" or hit imaginary taiko drums in my head. I'm predisposed to seek music games with original music anyway (Parappa, Gitaroo-Man) as it is, and Rhythm Heaven is among the most replayable and content-rich of the genre.

So when I say Rhythm Heaven Fever doesn't quite measure up to its predecessor, please understand that's not a condemnation. I just mean it's merely wonderful instead of the most wonderful.

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The European Union provides us a small-scale glimpse into the potential functions of a truly global society -- and more recently, a global society in crisis. The unified currency of the EU, the Euro, was on the brink of collapse recently and all of its member countries are still running damage control.

Now, France in particular is facing another monetary hurdle, as its tax incentive for game development has expired and casued "genuine concern" the EU may not renew the exception that would reinstate it. State aid is normally forbidden under EU law, but in some cases it is allowed -- without an exception, game-development tax incentives would be banned in all EU countries, including France and the UK, Develop reports.

French developer Quantic Dream (Heavy Rain) said that if the tax break is not reinstated it would relocate its operations to Canada, which does offer incentives for development companies, Develop adds. And according to TIGA, The UK's game-development workforce -- which sees no tax breaks -- fell 10 percent between 2008 and 2011, with 41 percent of its workers relocating overseas to countries such as Canada.

Enjoy a sample of tiny mayhem in the latest trailer for Retro City Rampage, a game we hope developer Vblank is going to stop working on soon (for the sake of his own sanity). Then at the end, note that the developer teases some "BIG NEWS" to be announced February 20. Please, please let it be a release date.

Activision and Double Helix have announced a video game adaptation of Battleship, the Hasbro Studios/Universal Films adaptation of Milton Bradley's Battleship. Set for an April European release and a May North American release, Battleship will combine aspects of the classic board game with FPS gameplay. It will be available on PS3 and 360, with "uniquely designed versions" released for the Wii, DS and 3DS.

The player takes on the role of demolitions expert Cole Mathis, who somehow finds himself in charge of an entire naval fleet and must use said fleet to defend the Hawaiian archipelago from underwater space aliens. This is a separate storyline from the film -- however, given the abundance of extraterrestrials and a severe lack of white and red pegs, we figure it's still set in the movie's universe. Gameplay is split between FPS sections and a "Battle Command" map, which is somewhat akin to the classic Battleship grid we're all familiar with. Here's hoping for Electronic Talking DLC on day one.

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Alex Seropian -- who helped found developer Bungie in the 1990s -- has left Disney Interactive, where he was head of game development. After helping create the Halo franchise at Bungie, Seropian started his own studio, Wideload Games, which was then acquired by Disney when it hired Seropian in 2009 as a creative-development lead.

Disney has confirmed Seropian's departure and said he will be replaced by former Blizzard vice president Bill Roper, Game Informer reports. In 2003 Roper left Blizzard and founded Flagship Studios, which busted in 2008, and he was picked up by Cryptic Studios. In 2011, Roper left Cryptic to join Disney Interactive as vice president of the Marvel Franchise, which recently announced Marvel: Avengers Alliance coming to Facebook in Q1 this year.

More details about Skylanders Giants are coming in from the event currently taking place in New York. First and foremost, the new game will require a new Portal (i.e. "the thing you put Skylanders toys on") in order to recognize the new giant characters. Said Portal will accommodate up to two giant figures at a time. In addition to the giant figures, 12 more normal Skylanders figures are in the works, though it's unclear if they will work exclusively with Giants or if they will be compatible with Spyro's Adventure.

Furthermore, dedicated Skylanders mobile apps are planned for the future, though no further details have were given. The press release announcing the title did, however, promise "advanced integration across console, handheld, mobile and online."

Finally, Toys R Us CEO Jerry Storch revealed an exclusive partnership with Activision going forward. The retailer will sell exclusive figures this year, including "Legendary Trigger Happy" and "Iridescent Blue Bash," both of which are stronger than their normal versions and feature new abilities. In March, Toys R Us will also have a 30-day exclusive on the "Dragon's Peak" adventure pack. See pictures of the new figures in the gallery below.

More details as we get them.

Update: Skylanders Giants will not require a new portal, as it turns out. The new technology referred to at the event will be contained in the figures themselves. Specifically, new figures will light up when placed on the portal, as mentioned in our previous post. We apologize for the confusion.

Last month, domains for "Skylanders Giants" appeared, followed by a lot of cryptic teases from a "SkylandersGiant" Twitter account. Today, Activision and developer Toys for Bob have revealed that Skylanders: Giants is actually a full sequel to the game released last year. Alongside the new game come brand new figures to collect and, as the name implies, they are much larger than the toys released so far.

Specifically, eight new characters will be released, all of them "more than twice the size" of normal Skylanders both out of the box and inside the game world itself. New figures will also feature integrated lights that illuminate when a character is placed on or near the Portal of Power. Finally, Skylanders Giants will be compatible with previous Skylanders figures and, what's more, figures will retain all the stats earned in Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure.

Skylanders Giants will officially debut at the American International Toy Fair later this month. Presumably, we'll have more details, including a price and release date, by then. A Skylanders event is about to take place in New York, we should have more details and media shortly.

Update: We've added a new trailer and galleries of screenshots and the new figures. Also, according to the trailer, Skylanders Giants is coming this fall.

Gallery: Skylanders: Giants

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Gallery: Skylanders: Giants (Toys)

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