Along with the classic gameplay fans know and love, the downloadable Ratchet & Clank: Full Frontal Assault is going to mix things up with an integrated tower defense game and the ability for our furry friend to fight side-by-side with the legendary Captain Qwark.

Ratchet & Clank: Full Frontal Assault pits Ratchet and Qwark against a new alien threat that has vile plans for the good Captain. The team will battle aliens through five levels spread across three planets in an attempt to stop whatever evil is brewing from achieving its ultimate goal of something really bad.

Friends will be able to take on the game together in either local split screen or online multiplayer, no doubt causing violent fights over who gets to wear the Lombax pants.

And yes, there's a tower defense element as well. Ratchet will build fortifications that bring his entire arsenal to bear on hordes of invasive aliens. I'm sure that'll be lovely.

We'll know for certain later today — we've got people playing with the game as we speak. In the meantime, check out the PlayStation Blog for more debut screens of the next big furry and robot adventure.

UPDATE: Sorry! We didn't get to this again today. We'll have more on the game tomorrow.

What do you remember most about the original Tony Hawk skateboarding games? The rush of putting together an epic thread of tricks? The exhilaration of notching ever-higher scores? Yeah, those were all great. You'll get those in the Tony Hawk HD remake that hits Xbox Live today. But the pain… the pain was always the best part.

It's up for debate, but in my opinion, the best thing about Hawk's groundbreaking extreme sports titles was the way their virtual skaters painfully crashed out of failed stunts. Everyone who played Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1 & 2 remembers characters leaving their boards in horrifically tangled contortion of limbs and in Tony Hawk HD, the bails look fiercer than ever. The footage above comes from my first few runs with THHD. In it, you can see the game's titular athlete and my own Xbox 360 avatar spraying blood all over the Warehouse level. Things get better, I promise. A review of Tony Hawk HD will be on Kotaku tomorrow.

Reddit user nathanbatson made this image to represent the utter damage done to his wallet after the start of the Steam summer sale. We had our own suggestions for you, but there are plenty of games people are gobbling up at heftily discounted prices for you to also melt your wallet with.

My Wallet Right Now [Reddit]

Life. The universe. Everything. All of the above come from nothingness. You can add the shadowy, shape-changing hero of iOS adventure Nihilumbra to that list. He may come from the void, but the character that starts off a little glob stars in a very special mobile gaming experience.

That aforementioned void isn't just conceptual, either. Nihilumbra starts off as a tiny piece of inky blackness sprouts off from a larger monolithic mass and begins exploring a world much like our own. As it assumes humanoid form and moves from environment to environment, text will pop up on the screen that ties the jumping and movement to a larger struggle of the character's quest for independence and self-awareness. The writing is these passages strikes a ponderous and sometimes bleak chords but does an excellent job of motivating you to surpass the traps and enemies lurking on each screen.

Created by indie dev studio Beautifun Games, Nihilumbra shares the stark minimalism that made Limbo so hypnotic but it also offers colors for the player to paint over parts of the gameworld. Swiping a swath of green on the ground makes it bouncy, for example, and blue reduces friction allowing for a slippery speed boost, much like the gels in Portal 2. The puzzles that you'll need to solve to progress make clever use of the physics manipulation mechanics. You'll need both logic and reflexes to keep your shadow hero alive.

Moreover, the haunting mood of the game seems to dare you to press forward, almost mocking you for wanting to achieve something on your own. Part platformer video game, part storybook fairy tale, Nihilumbra does more than just offer a fun, darkly charming game experience. It also makes you think about identity and evolution. Not bad for a first effort.

Nihilumbra [$2.99, iTunes]

Harmonix's downloadable Frequency-izing of all the Rock Band music begins on August 28 and 29, when Rock Band Blitz comes to the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade for $15. You have no idea how hard I crave it.

The following story originally ran in March of 2011, but since the excellent game it's partially about just came out this week, we're showing it to you again. And, before you ask, the last time I asked Dyad's creator about this special gaming chair, he didn't make it sound like it would be going into mass-production. Bummer.

People at the PAX East gaming convention kept telling me I had to play "the game that's in the machine." It took me three days to find it, hidden back in Indie Alley.

Dyad's lead designer Shawn McGrath must have known indies get hidden in the margins, so he'd make sure that, once you were his near his game, you'd see it. And one you saw it, you wouldn't forget it. His hook wasn't simply Dyad, a summer-scheduled racing game that has you racing and color-matching down a rail of light faster and faster (you want to ensnare like-colored enemies, but not run into them.)

His hook was his homemade arcade racing chair that was cooler than all the fancy professionally-made racing chairs elsewhere at PAX East. McGrath spent about $1900 making the thing and is going to truck it to every gaming convention he can get it to.

Dyad comes out this summer on the PlayStation 3's PlayStation Network chair. The chair you'll have to make yourself. The Dyad site has some how-to's, with McGrath promising to add some chair programming code in the near future..

Original headline: This DIY Gaming Chair Is Cooler Than All Those Professionally-Made Ones

It's hot out. Stay inside. Drink lots of water. And, then, go on and talk about the games you're playing, loving and hating. Head over to Talk Amongst Yourselves, the place where we gather on a daily basis to discuss all things video game and existential. Go to the TAY forum at this link and do what you've always done: share your thoughts and opinions on the things you're passionate about.

Roster editing is done in every simulation sports community but nowhere is it more important than in NCAA Football 13, which has to skirt amateurism requirements (and legal action) by auto-generating random names for its players.

This requires a nonstop effort by fans to accurately name the rosters of more than 120 teams featured in the game. While doing that, they often take the time to adjust the depth charts and make other corrections. Probably the most reputable and accurate set of rosters you could get now is available from the Operation Sports community, for both consoles.

Version one of the PlayStation 3 rosters released Monday. Its editors promise correct player names, numbers, heights, weights, skin tone, year in school, and redshirt status. Transfers into the program have been added; players kicked off the teams have been removed. Correct coach names and other information also are included.

Get the PlayStation 3 rosters through the game's roster share. Go to the Team Management menu, select Roster Share, select Download Roster, and then enter one of these two PSN IDs. KW1KC, or volstopfan14. There is no need to send a friend request to either.

The Xbox 360 rosters arrived last night. They also promise the same accuracy as the PS3 rosters for players and coaches, plus jersey numeral fixes and aesthetic tuning like quarterbacks with the proper facemasks and, this is very important, "all players with dreads have been given dreads."

Get the Xbox 360 rosters through the game's roster share. Go to the Team Management menu, select Roster Share, select Download Roster, and then enter one of these Gamertags. CcAaRrSsOoNn3, CK11, Nsuplaya84, Raven 304, Geauxlden. There is no need to send a friend request to any of them

See the links below for more information and discussion of these rosters.

NCAA Football 13 OS Community Rosters Available Now, Details Included (360) [Operation Sports]

NCAA Football 13 OS Community Rosters Available Now, Details Included (PS3) [Operation Sports]

With games like Infinity Blade and Dark Meadow, developers have proven that Unreal Engine 3 can do dark and gothic. The colorful adventure role-playing game Lili, crafted by the former Epic developers at BitMonster Games, utilizes the engine's power to create something much more fanciful.

If you screw up your eyes just right you could almost mistake Lili for a CGI animated feature. It's certainly on par with some of the colorful platform games we've seen from the current generation of consoles.

Lili follows the adventures of the titular heroine as she explores the mysterious island of Geos, meeting odd characters, exploring scenic terrain, and toppling oppressive regimes using "an amusing 'non-combat'" combat system. You know, the usual.

It's colorful. It's quirky. Like Epic's upcoming PC game Fortnite, it demonstrates the ravenous passion for whimsy that comes from spending years working on a dark and gritty series like Gears of War, which makes complete sense considering the president of BitMonster is none other than former Epic lead designer Lee Perry.

"Epic has been extremely supportive of our new studio and in helping us build the game of our dreams," said Perry via official announcement today. "We set out to create an adventure that is appropriate for nearly anyone. As a designer, it's exciting to see that the Unreal Engine 3 tools are better than ever, and they provide everything we need to achieve a gratifying and imaginative experience."

So far it looks like they're on the right track.

I'm not sure how Lili plays. I'm not quite sure what a 'non-combat' system is. I'm not even sure when it's coming out — the game is in the final stages of development, whatever that means.

What I am sure of is that this is a game I suddenly have an aching desire to play. Prepare for a sound hounding, BitMonster.

The best music collection to come out all year may just be upcoming PS Vita game Sound Shapes. It's already got tunes from Jim Guthrie and Deadmau5 and now adds new music from still-skinny-after-all-these-years superstar Beck.

According to Pitchfork Media, the singer/songwriter best known "Loser" will be contributing new works "Touch the People", and "Spiral Staircase". Just like the other songs in Sound Shapes, each track will be a playable level. Sound Shapes comes out on August 7th.

Beck Contributes Three New Songs to Video Game [Pitchfork Media]