There are no new demos on the PlayStation Store this week, but there are new games, new special offers and downloadable content by the truck load.

The games to focus on are 8/10 action puzzler Swarm - made by DeathSpank and Penny Arcade Adventures studio Hothead - and The 3rd Birthday. The latter is a showy PSP crime shooter by Square Enix that involves a steamy, "erotic" shower scene.

Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime turned out to be a load of old ectoplasm (4/10 - Eurogamer).

There are new cars for new and good (8/10 - Eurogamer) racing game Shift 2: Unleashed. And DragonForce's wheat/chafe separator "Through The Fire And Flames" arrives for Rock Band 3. This made headlines way back with Guitar Hero III - how times have changed.

Disappointing final Mass Effect 2 DLC, The Arrival (5/10 - Eurogamer), also shows its face.

And would you look at the obscene amount of DLC for Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12: The Masters - are you sure it's not a free-to-play game, EA?

Today's PlayStation Store update courtesy of the European PlayStation blog:

PS3 Games

• Chime Super Deluxe (free trial, unlock key £7.19/€8.99) - size 189MB
• Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime (free trial, unlock key £7.19/€8.99) - size 261MB
• Swarm (free trial, unlock key £9.99/€12.99) - size 457MB
• Moon Diver (£9.99/€12.99) - size 397MB

PS3 Game Content

• Eyepet Lucky Dip Costume Pack Plants (free)
• Fight Night Champion: Alternate Weight Class Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Heavyweight Legends Pack (£7.99/€9.99),
• Hyperdimension Neptunia: Alchemy Helper (free), Dragon With A Blue Shadow (free), Giant Bull Awakens (free), Out-Of-Control Robot (free)
• LBP Fragrances Costume (Re-Release) 1 Week Only (free)
• Marvel vs Capcom 3 Shadow Battle 02 (£0.79/€1.49)
• Mass Effect 2 Arrival (£5.49/€6.99) - size 563MB
• Need For Speed Shift 2: Unlock All Cars (£7.99/€9.99), Fast Five (£5.49/€6.99), Online Pass (£7.99/€9.99)
• Super Stardust Impact Mode (£1.59/€1.99)
• Tiger Woods Pga Tour 12: The Masters: Adidas Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Banff Springs Golf Course (£3.19/€3.99), Birdie Pack (£11.99/€14.99), Bridgestone Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Callaway Proshop Pack (£3.19/€3.99), Callaway Sponsorship (£3.19/€3.99), Cleveland Proshop Pack (£2.39/€2.99), Cleveland Sponsorship (£2.39/€2.99), Cobra Proshop Pack (£1.59/€1.99), EA Online Pass (£6.29/€7.99), EA Sports Proshop Pack 1 (£0.79/€0.99), o EA Sports Proshop Pack 2 (£0.79/€0.99), EA Sports Proshop Pack 3 (£0.79/€0.99), EA Sports Sponsorship (£2.39/€2.99), Eagle Pack (£19.99/€24.99), Emerald Dragon (£3.19/€3.99), Footjoy Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Greek Isles (£5.49/€6.99), Grip Item Pack (£1.59/€1.99), Harbour Town Golf Links (£3.19/€3.99), Hazeltine National Golf Club (£3.19/€3.99), The Highlands (£3.19/€3.99), Loudmouth Golf Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Mizuno Proshop Pack (£1.59/€1.99), Nike Clothing Pack 1 (£0.79/€0.99), Nike Clothing Pack 2 (£0.79/€0.99), Nike Proshop Pack 1 (£2.39/€2.99), Nike Proshop Pack 2 (£2.39/€2.99), Nike Proshop Pack 3 (£2.39/€2.99), Nike Proshop Pack 4 (£2.39/€2.99), Nike Sponsorship (£5.49/€6.99), Oakley Proshop Pack 1 (£0.79/€0.99), Oakley Proshop Pack 2 (£0.79/€0.99), Oakmont Country Club (£3.19/€3.99), Pinehurst (£3.19/€3.99), Ping Proshop Pack (£2.39/€2.99), Ping Sponsorship (£2.39/€2.99), Prototype Starter Suit (£3.99/€4.99), Quagmire Golf Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), River Course At Blackwolf Run (£3.19/€3.99), Riviera Cc Golf Course (£3.19/€3.99), Shaft Item Pack (£1.59/€1.99), Sheshan Golf Club (£3.19/€3.99), Spyglass Hill Golf Course (£3.19/€3.99), Sundog Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Taylormade Proshop Pack (£0.79/€0.99), Taylormade Sponsorship (£2.39/€2.99), The Els Club (£5.49/€6.99), The Predator (£3.19/€3.99), The TPC Blue Monster At Doral (£3.19/€3.99), Torrey Pines Golf Course (£3.19/€3.99), TPC Boston (£3.19/€3.99), Wolf Creek, Nv (£3.19/€3.99)
• Rock Band 3: "Spinning Wheel" Blood, Sweat & Tears (£0.99/€1.49) "Black Magic Woman" Santana (£0.99/€1.49), "Operation Ground And Pound" DragonForce (£0.99/€1.49), "Somebody To Love" Jefferson Airplane (£0.99/€1.49), "Through The Fire And Flames" DragonForce (£0.99/€1.49)
• Def Jam Rapstar: Danja "Stadium Status (Freestyle)" (€1.49), DJ Khalil "The 15Th (Freestyle)" (€1.49), Drake "Over" (€1.49), Geto Boys "Mind Playing Tricks On Me" (£1.19/€1.49), Nitti Beatz "Playmaker (Freestyle)" (£1.19/€1.49), Soulja Boy "Tell 'Em Crank That" (£1.19/€1.49), Danja "Wyld Money (Freestyle)" (£1.19/€1.49)

PSP Games

• Aedis Eclipse: Generation of Chaos (£13.99/€17.99) - size 581MB
• Bi-Pack Pop Rival Swords + Splinter Cell Essentials (£15.99/€19.99) - size 1277MB / 828MB
• The 3rd Birthday (£27.99/€34.99) - 1182MB (releasing 1st April)

PSP Game Contet

• Lord Of Arcana DLC Pack 4 (free)
• Buzz: TUMQ - Celebrity Quiz Pack (£3.19/€3.99)

Minis

• Mr. Hat And The Magic Cube (£2.49/€2.99) - size 55MB
• 3D Twist & Match (£1.74/€1.99) - size 22MB

Special Offers (available until 13th April)

• Faery: Legends of Avalon (was £11.99/€14.99 now £7.19/€8.99)
• Spectral Souls: RotEE (PSP) (was £13.99/€17.99 now £9.99/€12.99)
• WWII: Battle over the Pacific (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £4.79/€5.99)
• StateShift (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £4.79/€5.99)
• International Athletics (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £3.99/€4.99)
• Skate Park City (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £4.79/€5.99)
• World of Pool (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £3.99/€4.99)
• Spinout (PSP) (was £6.99/€7.99 now £3.99/€4.99)
• Sports Superbike 2 (PSone) (was £3.59/€2.99 now £1.99/€2.49)
• All-Star Boxing (PSone) (was £3.99/€4.99 now £2.39/€2.99)
• Ace Armstrong vs. The Alien Scumbags (mini) (was £3.99/€4.99 now £0.99/€1.19)
• Card Shark (mini) (was £2.49/€2.99 now £0.99/€1.19)

Permanent Price Reductions

• Ridge Racer (PSP) now £7.99/€9.99
• Tekken 6 (PSP) now £15.99/€19.99
• Tron: Evolution (PSP) now £19.99/€24.99
• Hannah Montana: Rock out the Show (PSP) now £15.99/€19.99
• Split/Second: Velocity (PSP) now £19.99/€24.99
• Toy Story 3 (PSP) now £23.99/€29.99

Have you noticed an curious resistance to short, sharp, bite-sized videogames from people who were too young to have experienced them the first time around? It's an interesting phenomenon, but it makes sense.

For gamers whose first experiences of videogames started in the PlayStation and Nintendo 64 era, some express bafflement at the the appeal in the kind of highly abstract, instant video games that existed throughout the 70s, 80s and half of the 90s. They often see little interest in games that lack the kind of depth that they're used to.

And yet for those of us, like myself, who were introduced to games in the late 70s and hungrily consumed all that the classic arcade era produced, and the subsequent home computer boom, this rebirth of ultra-accessible games is hugely exciting. Having been denied these kinds of experiences for so long, the thrill of being able to just get straight into a game without prior explanation is one that has been sorely missed.

So to completely contradict all of that, check out Swarm - a game that has absolutely no intention of being instantly accessible, but one that will win you over anyway.

Swarm

• XBLA - 1200 Microsoft Points (£10.20)

Given how many games struggle to give you adequate control over even a single character, imagine the fun involved in trying to steer fifty of the buggers to safety.

The endearingly throwaway plot would have us believe that we're on a mission to collect DNA to ensure the survival of these 'Swarmites', but what appears to matter most is you ability to keep a score multiplier rattling along at rate of knots.

Mastering the movements of these nimble blue blobs with any degree of competence, predictably, takes an enormous amount of patience. On a basic level, you can gather them together with a squeeze of the right trigger or make them disperse with the left, but more sophisticated manoeuvres, such as being able to stack them into a thin column, or pull off a long jump, is a dark art.

And if its inherent fiddliness hasn't blackened the mood enough, just when you're starting to warm to its wanton originality and charming visuals, Hothead decides to deal out the pain and set the fifth level in the dark. And to make matters worse, reaching the score total that unlocks the next stage requires you to take the kinds of risks that are completely at odds with the already-punishing level design.

As soon as you plunge into the abyss, your score multiplier goes with it - but it's such a regular occurrence, you just have to rely on good old fashioned muscle memory, endless replaying and a smidgen of luck to squeak through.

But after bashing your head against a brick wall for hours, the chances are that you will find the breakthrough, and start enjoying Swarm far more than ever seemed possible early on.

After all the cursing over the bloody-minded mechanics and hideously exacting level design, Swarm starts to become hugely satisfying. Suddenly you're replaying the old levels, seeking out the remaining DNA, chasing high scores, and wondering what all the fuss was about.

Sometimes it pays to do things differently, even if you risk driving your audience slightly insane in the process.

8/10

Video: Swarm's first 15 minutes.

Slam Bolt Scrappers

• PSN - £11.99, Free demo available.

Combining Super Smash Brothers with Tetris is either the work of cracked genius, or a slightly ill-advised mashup. Can you guess which?

Firehose Games' PSN exclusive certainly starts off with the best of intentions. Over the first few levels of its campaign mode, it eases you into the chaos and patiently explains how interlocking like-coloured shapes need to be turned into square blocks, which subsequently act as the basis of your defence or attack.

But getting those shapes in the first place essentially involves beating the crap out of any of the enemies loitering around your tower - as well as ensuring that your adjacent opponent is put firmly in their place.

The fighting system is necessarily stripped-down, but serves as enough of a continual distraction to make the business of shape-positioning a trickier prospect than it initially appears. No sooner have you lined-up your shape, ready to drop, a gaggle will invariably descend and start pummelling chunks off your health bar. Take too much damage, and you're forced to sit out for precious seconds.

This somewhat stressful formula only ever seems to get increasingly unrelenting as your chip your way through the game - so you can probably imagine that the multiplayer Battle Mode is concentrated insanity with four of you at it.

Slam Bolt Scrappers certainly merits applause for managing to make the idea work at all. But the constant need to multitask makes it feel like you're being persistently harangued by a hyperactive four-year old. If that sounds like your idea of entertainment, be my guest.

6/10

Arctic Escape

• DSiWare - 500 DSiWare points (£4.50)

With such little regard for their own safety, I'm not surprised these penguins have been captured. You could probably just usher them in the direction of the nearest lava pit and save yourself the bother of painstakingly ushering the flightless little morons to safety. Just saying.

Against your better judgement, though, you'll more likely wind up spending hours of your life painstakingly directing them to the next flight back to Antarctica.

Yes, it's pretty much Lemmings again, but presented in a way that doesn't make it feel like a cheap knock-off. You'll start off each of the 104 levels with a gaggle of Pingus wandering to-and-fro, bumping into things and turning back round again.

But via the magic of arrow placement, these curious creatures can be pointed in the right direction, and once they've all gotten to the chopper, it's off to the next challenge.

Once Teyon's unexpectedly enjoyable offering gets into its stride, you'll end up not merely directing traffic, but have to make sure they flick switches and jump at the right time. Exciting stuff. No, really.

Now and then you'll find yourself having to hastily rearrange your carefully laid plans once bridges start to collapse. But such is the nature of the DSi, you'll have to keep in mind that only the touch screen portion of the screen can be messed around with - a limitation that becomes apparent the tougher the game gets.

With its rather rudimentary style, Arctic Escape will doubtlessly pass most people by, but those of you who take pride in rooting out DSiWare's hidden puzzle gems will be happy they did.

7/10

Battle: Los Angeles

• Xbox Live Arcade - 800 Microsoft Points (£6.80)
• PSN - £7.99
• PC Steam - £7.99

With extra terrestrials this hapless, I'm not sure anyone has to fret too much about an alien invasion just yet. Just call in Team America, fire some hot lead in their general direction and crack open a celebratory Bud in time for dinner.

I realise first person shooters are getting shorter these days, but, come on. Did Saber Interactive really imagine that releasing a movie tie-in that you can sleepwalk through inside an hour was going to be acceptable?

The game starts off as it means to go on - with absolutely zero ambition to differentiate itself from the dozens of other military shooters all hooahing themselves into irrelevance.

If you were to be kind, you'd probably observe that it's built on solid technical foundations, but at this stage, that's a bit like commending a movie for having a good set. In reality, Battle Los Angeles is so content to go through the motions, it may as well be playing itself.

You'll trudge through the rubble of a few tight set-pieces, pull off the head shots where necessary, duck behind cover whenever you're in any danger, and even smash up a few unthreatening alien ships with the handily placed bazookas.

But at no stage does the game deign to get out of second gear, and by the time you've reached the end, there's a sense of relief that only 53 minutes of your life was wasted on this entirely pointless piece of digital merchandising.

4/10

Video: Battle: Los Angeles' first 15 minutes.

Ghostbusters: Sanctum Of Slime

• Xbox Live Arcade - 800 Microsoft Points (£6.80)
• PSN - £7.99
• PC - Steam - £7.99

The number one, unbreakable golden rule of ghostbusting is that you do not, under any circumstances, cross the streams.

And if you can't manage that, at least bloody well try to respect the license. Don't just lovelessly slap the brand top onto any old half-baked twin stick shooter and expect people not to seek retribution for this wanton abuse of IP.

Stripped of all the fan service that made Terminal Reality's flawed gem so enjoyable, all you're left with is essentially a spooky Smash TV. You, and your three ghostbusting chums, wander from room to room, and take out all the restless spirits by zapping them with one of three weapons, colour-coded to match the hue of your enemies.

After ten, 15 minutes of this monotony, you'll eventually meet a boss monster, and studiously chip away his giant health bar until he stops spamming you with cheap attacks. And so it goes on, through 12 levels of progressively trickier encounters.

It might have been mildly engaging if there had been more to do, but the Behaviour Studio's offering swiftly runs out of ideas after about the fourth level. And, to make matters worse, the further you progress, the more likely the game's dreadful health/revive mechanic robs you of any will to continue.

In a game where you become incapacitated after about two hits, a large chunk of the game is spent waiting for your co-op partners to revive you - and if they get caught in the crossfire, the game will quickly snuff you all out and return you to the previous checkpoint.

With the mood alternating between boredom and exasperation, Sanctum Of Slime is a spirit-crushing exercise that only a committed masochist could appreciate.

4/10

Video: The first 15 minutes of Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime.

Update: Hothead co-founder Joel DeYoung has told Eurogamer that the European PSN version of Swarm will be here on Wednesday, 30th March.

The Xbox Live Arcade release will happen a week earlier on Wednesday, 23rd March.

Original story:
Hothead's action puzzle game Swarm will release on 22nd March on the US PlayStation Store.

The date came via the official Swarmites Twitter account.

Swarm involves directing 50 little blue monsters to the end of a level, saving as many as you can. You need to make tactical sacrifices along the way, though, but these are rewarded with score multipliers.

It's a concept Penny Arcade Adventures and DeathSpank developer Hothead has had simmering since 2006, back when the studio was formed. "Swarm pulls you in and begs you to try and master it," teased Hothead co-founder Joel DeYoung, talking to Eurogamer last month.

Video:

UTV Ignition has announced that Hothead's upcoming action puzzle game thing, Swarm, is heading to PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade.

Announced earlier this year, Swarm involves guiding 50 "Swarmites" to the end of a load of levels, dodging through all sorts of "gauntlets of destruction" in an "often suicidal battle for survival", collecting DNA along the way.

We hadn't previously been told which platforms to expect Swarm for, but now we have. Exciting times.

The game's still on for release in "early 2011" and you can get a sense of how it's shaping up in the trailer below.

Video: