An incredibly cool game I somehow neglected to tell you folks about despite playing it for hours on end, Blueprint 3D is an iPhone game that involves twisting about exploded blueprints until they line up on your screen — or at least it was. With next week's 2.0 update, it's all about transforming your photos into exploded 3D blueprints.

Along with a special Halloween pack and iPhone 5 optimization, Blueprint 3D's free 2.0 update adds an entirely new level of entertainment to the $.99 title. Take a photo or choose one from your iPhone's gallery, process it through the in-game editor and presto, that photo of you and your friend with your faces smushed together is now a 3D puzzle.

Of course you know what the picture should look like. This is about sharing it with your friends, letting them figure out what they are looking at. Try and keep the camera about waist level, okay?

Blueprint 3D [iTunes]

LostWinds isn't a new game. It's been around for years, first on the Wii, then on iOS devices. I'm mentioning it again and now, though, because for a limited time it's suddenly free.

This isn't just one of the best platformers on iOS, it's quietly one of the best platformers this hardware generation, combining a gorgeous art style with some fancy motion controls (now transformed into "swiping and tapping" controls).

The iOS version isn't as precise as the Wii one in terms of character movement, relying on an adventure game-style pointer, but it still works, activating your powers with swipes is super easy and with retina visuals it looks great.

Lostwinds [Apple App Store]

What would a Halo movie look like? For years, that's been a question that Hollywood and Microsoft have been trying to answer to no avail. The long and winding road of making a live-action Master Chief adaption is full of stumbles but, today, Microsoft's 343 Industries begins the rollout of a new webseries set in the Halo universe. But Master Chief's not really in it. Except that he is. Sort of.

Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn focuses on a group of young UNSC cadets, just as humanity begins to wage war against the invading Covenant. The webseries just had its first episode debut on Friday, with only a quick glimpse of a familiar gold visor and green helmet. But director Stewart Hendler says not to expect lots of screen time for Halo's lead hero. Forward Unto Dawn is more of a story about people in the Halo unviverse coming to grips with life during wartime.

I spoke to Hendler on the phone recently and he said that the responsibility of helming the first longform live-action Halo adaptation was "pretty daunting." The live-action commercials and teasers that had come before FUD set a pretty high bar, he continued. "I think why the Halo commercials are so cool, is they never shied away from being dark and bittersweet and telling the honest story of the loss of war. They're not all about reveling in the pyrotechnics and the gunfire. That's there but it comes with a cost." Coming after live-action interpretations that were already striking put Hendler in a certain frame of mind. "There's a huge sense of responsibility for everybody on the team—myself, of course, included—and we want to do it right."

Former Warner Bros. film producer Lydia Antonini was working with Microsoft and brought Hendler in on the project, which he almost walked away from. Antonini e-mailed Hendler with an opportunity to work on "a perfect video game franchise."

I wrote back and I said, 'You know what? Probably not up my alley. Of course, if you were going to say Halo that would be a different story.'" Hendler remembered. "Thirty seconds later, she told me what she was up to. From then on out, it was like I was doing whatever I could to get it." Hendler's desire to work on Forward Unto Dawn comes from a few special reasons.

"I'm not a very talented gamer," Hendler admitted. "Halo was the one game that captivated me more than any of the others. When I was in college, my roommates were the heavy gamers. I was the dude who would wander in and occasionally pick up a controller, miserably fail and walk away. But Halo was the one game that I kept coming back to and that really sucked me in."

What was it about Bungie's sci-fi franchise that hooked Hendler? "I think it was the richness of the story," he said. "That mystery and mythology that came with it. There was a sense in Halo 1 that this story and this world extended way beyond the edges of the TV screen you were playing on."

Talking to the director, I admitted that the blank slate nature of Master Chief as a character generally left me cold, as I said in a recent preview of Halo 4. Essentially, he's kind of like an empty suit for players to step inside of. That's why the other characters get such a prominent focus in the webseries. But Chief's silent heroism does present a unique storytelling challenge.

The pressure might be even more intense when you consider that Hendler and company aren't really able to use Halo's most recognizable persona in the webseries. Master Chief inspires one of the FUD characters who eventually becomes the captain of the Infinity—the giant ship where the multiplayer portion of Halo 4 happens. But Chief only appears in the briefest of cameos in FUD, akin to a force of nature. "We didn't want to tell the definitive one and only Chief story the way that a blockbuster movie might," Hendler explains. "The idea is putting him in as an inspiring character, somebody who comes in, and we can see his effect reflected on the characters around him. We loved that. So, basically, we get to see through their eyes why he's so awesome."

Forward Unto Dawn happens early on in the Halo mythology, Hendler explains, earlier than most of the games deal with. "The idea that these would tell the backstories of characters that were actually in Halo 4 evolved as we put it together," he continued. "The actual original concept was 'How do we use Chief in a way that hasn't been done before?' It sort of tells it an interesting, different slice of the Chief story. So we started looking early on in his career. And that's what led us there." "The Chief's really interesting because he's such a huge part of the univerese, but he's also somebody's whose face is never shown. It's part of the myth and the legend of him that if you show his face, he'll never be as awesome-looking as he is in everyone's head," Hendler told me. "In order to have a central character that you can't see, we were really trying to figure out how to make a movie that incorporated him, but was serviceable from a narrative standpoint and from a visual standpoint, and also it didn't try to bite off more than it could chew."

As for the actual characters viewers will be meeting in FUD, anyone who's watched the teasers for the series knows that it's a very young cast. Part of it is connect with the younger part of the Halo game-playing audience. But Hendler also says that it's because Forward Unto Dawn deals coming-of-age and learning about harsh political realities. "We're definitely looking at this concept of 'induction into the war without much choice in the matter.' There's a notion of innocents being pulled into a war—the virtues of which have been decided long before you ever got involved—and being forced to participate in it whether you like it or not."

Hendler says that one of the best parts of his directing gig was early access to Halo 4. "I'm such a story nerd," he said, "and I love the origins-of-mankind backstory that they are hinting at, with relics that lead you to wonder what mankind's real history is and all that stuff. The fact that we're going back into deep, deep history [in the Halo universe] is exciting to me."

The next episode that continues Telltale's intriguing take on The Walking Dead is releasing tomorrow, the developer/publisher announced today.

Well, sort of. PSN users get first dibs with its release tomorrow. Everyone else in NA will have to wait for Wednesday (shucks). From the official release:

The Walking Dead: Episode Four - Around Every Corner will release Tuesday, October 9th on PlayStation Network in North America for $4.99 or as part of the Season Pass option for $19.99 which includes all five episodes. The episode will also be available on Xbox Live Arcade Wednesday, October 10th for 400 MS Points as DLC within the original The Walking Dead XBLA release, and also on PC/MAC as part of a Season Pass on the Telltale Games Store, as well as through our partners on Steam, Origin, Amazon PC Downloads, GameStop, and GameFly. European and international release dates for PlayStation Network are still to be confirmed. The title is in submission with our international partners at SCEE, and as soon as Telltale Games receives a release confirmation, a date will be announced.

We were also sent two new screenshots and one piece of art (featured above) for you to enjoy. As usual, the group of survivors sees themselves in some tricky situations. But most frigthening is Clementine's look of hope as she leads Lee to what I guess she expects will be a reunion with her parents. Poor Clementine. If only it would be that easy. 'Cause you know it won't be.

Two vastly different, perhaps equally great games hit store shelves tomorrow, October 9th. And we've reviewed both.

Dishonored: The Kotaku Review

I would love to have been a fly on the wall during the pitch meeting for Dishonored. "Well, it's Deus Ex meets BioShock," someone undoubtedly said. "Oh hey, and let's throw in some Half-Life 2 'cause why not?"
It's a bizarre, eclectic blend, the type of combination that might seem too ambitious to... More »

XCOM: Enemy Unknown: The Kotaku Review

XCOM: Enemy Unknown should have been a disaster. It's a turn-based strategy title, a style of game its publisher said only last year was "just not contemporary". More »

The Best Ways I Killed People In Dishonored

Call it morbid, call it gruesome, call it what you will. But murdering corrupt guards in creative ways is one of the most satisfying things you can do in Dishonored, the triumphant stealth-action game that hits store shelves tomorrow.
While playing the game over the past week or so, I killed... More »

Click on the links (or images!) above to read Jason's review of Dishonored—which he calls a masterpiece—and Luke's review of XCOM: Enemy Unknown—which surprises him by remaining true to its predecessors in the best of ways.

When last we left our intrepid gathering of the top ten Facebook games by daily active users, Zynga's FarmVille 2 had made a dramatic leap to the head of the pack. It's still there, bigger than before.

Last week FarmVille 2 inched ahead of Texas Hold 'em Poker, with a mere 200,000 users separating the first and second place spots on the big board of values. This week agriculture has pulled ahead even further, with 7.4 million daily active users beating the card game by a cool 1.1 million.

The rest of the top ten is comprised of the same games from last week, though King.com's Candy Crush Saga (my wife loves the game) has managed to pierce the top five, breaking Zynga's stranglehold on the upper half of the list as people realize ChefVille is pretty horrible and it slips to number six.

On, note the goat that's penned off from the other animals. I hate that goat.

Rank	App	DAU
1.	FarmVille 2 Zynga Inc.	7,400,000
2.	Texas HoldEm Poker Zynga	6,300,000
3.	Words With Friends Zynga With Friends	5,800,000
4.	Bubble Safari Zynga	4,900,000
5.	Candy Crush Saga King.com	4,800,000
6.	ChefVille Zynga	4,300,000
7.	Diamond Dash Wooga	4,000,000
8.	Bubble Witch Saga King.com	3,900,000
9.	SongPop Freshplanet	3,600,000
10.	Dragon City Social Point	3,100,000

See the full list and more at AppStats

When you combine the incendiary oomph of the Mushroom Kingdom's fireflowers and the myriad talents of the various Angry Birds, green pig flesh explodes all over the screen.

The video above—made by amateur filmmakers CC Megaproductions—isn't quite as gory as all that. But it does imagine what might happen if Nintendo's mascot found himself in the middle of the never-ending war between Rovio's avian and porcine species.

As you might think, the Angry Birds' mortal enemies don't really stand a chance against this heroic team-up. But you don't really see the Bad Piggies and Goombas strategizing to making the most out of this impromptu crossover. Either Bowser roasted up the Piggies for a light snack or more action awaits the Mario/Birds team. Let's see the answer in a follow-up, eh?

Yep. Angry Birds + Star Wars. Just announced this morning by the Angry Birds folks at Rovio.

The game will be out for iOS, Android, Amazon Kindle Fire, Mac, PC, Windows Phone and Windows 8.

Peter Vesterbacka, chief marketing man at Angry Birds studio Rovio calls the game "the best Angry Birds game we've ever done. It's the best parts of Angry Birds with all new cutting-edge gameplay set in in a galaxy far, far away." (Then he made a Star Wars joke... you can guess which one.)

The Angry Birds and Star Wars folks will also put out a line of Halloween costumes, plush toys, action figures and other merchandise, beginning on October 28.

Playdek, the folks dedicated to bringing amazing card-based experiences to mobile devices, is bringing the chaotic glory of Fluxx to iOS in time for Christmas, unless the rules drastically change between now and then.

With Fluxx you never really know, now do you? Andrew Looney's twisted creation is a card game in which the rules and ultimate goal are constantly in flux, morphing based on which cards are played.

The latest version of the game is being sold at Target stores in that area next to the registers with all the cards that I never actually see anyone buy, but surely someone does because that's prime retail real estate right there.

"Fluxx is an amazingly accessible and fun game with a light-hearted and ever-changing strategic challenge," said Joel Goodman, CEO, Playdek via officially announcement. "Looney Labs' new version of Fluxx, now available in Target stores, hits it out of the park, and Playdek is happy to be bringing Fluxx to mobile devices."

The mobile version of the game will include pass and play multiplayer, single-player versus AI (I really want to see how they pull that off without creating a sentient AI hell-bent on enslaving humanity) and that modern cousin to play-by-mail, asynchronous online multiplayer.

Playdek makes excellent mobile deck building games. Fluxx is an excellent deck building game. You should probably all be excited now.

When you play Pokémon—no, when you just think about Pokémon—there are two very important things to keep in mind. You could say they are the most important things to keep in mind.

One: "If you make your pets fight in real life, you'll be arrested."
Two: "The police also frown on crushing pets into balls."

Noted and memorized, because these aren't just facts. They're words to live by.

As Kotaku reader KingHippo points out, these facts are apparently from the Official Nintendo Magazine UK.

Thanks Nintendo [Becky's Simblr]