In February 2008 a new game publishing company announced its presence at GDC. Thriller Publishing, co-founded by MicroProse co-creator J.W. "Bill" Stealey along with other former MicroProse members, set itself up as a game publisher devoted to creating military and espionage games with the creative input of (still unnamed) New York Times best selling authors. Since then there's been little info on what the company has been doing but that changed today with the announcement that Thriller Publishing was launching a new subsidiary, Thriller New Media. The new division is aiming to launch online military themed first person shooter games akin to similar titles like Combat Arms. The company will also be putting in a social networking site that will work alongside their games. Big Download spoke on the phone with Thriller Publishing's PR head David Swofford (formerly the PR head at NCsoft) who told us that while the plan is to continue to develop their previously announced games with the unnamed big name prose authors. However, they have decided with this new division to launch online FPS action games in a shorter period of time. Swofford told us that a number of these types of games are already in development at Thriller New Media and that actual game announcements could be made around the time E3 begins in June.

THQ's recent announcement that they were laying off more of their workers to cut costs has lead to some big cuts at one of their high-profile internal developers. Volition, the studio behind the Saints Row and Red Faction franchises will be losing 86 of its 102 members of its quality assurance team, according to what a THQ spokesperson told Kotaku.

Jordan Mechner is well known to the game industry as the creator of the Prince of Persia game franchise but Mechner is apparently branching out and doing more outside movie scripting work. Variety reports that Mechner has been signed to write a movie adaptation of Fathom, the Aspen comic book created and drawn by the late Michael Turner. Fox Atomic is the studio behind the adaptation which will start current hottie-of-the-moment Megan Fox as the title character. Mechner also co-wrote the screenplay to the forthcoming Prince of Persia movie adaptation for Disney. That film is now slated for a Memorial Day 2010 release.

Just a couple of weeks after Nvidia released some new GeForce graphics drivers for its various graphics cards, the company has gone ahead and done it again. The new 182.08 version of the drivers were released to time them with the launch of Nvidia's new mainstream-themed GeForce GTS 250 graphics card. Drivers are available for both Windows XP and Vista in their 32-bit and 64-bit flavors.

As we have talked about on this site many times before, digital distribution of PC games is gaining more of a foothold with consumers than buying them from brick-and-mortar stores in a box and DVD disk. Two new chats on separate web sites emphasize that point. Gamesindustry.biz chats with GamersGate CEO Theodore Bergquist, who states that their PC game digital download business "grew more than 100 percent last year, both in terms of revenue and in the amount of new customers and titles on the site." Even with the current economic crisis he is predicting that 2009 will see "at least 100-200 percent growth." Asked about if he thought brick-and-mortar game stores will still stick around he said, 'If you ask me, I think not. I think they'll get better on the hardware side, selling hardware together with games. But if it's games only, then no way - I can't see it."

Experience the largest paratrooper operation in World War II

Get orders from HQ, go on patrol, spot the enemy, and set up a devastating ambush

Each character designed with individual personality, unique story and background

Incredibly realistic, from trading ammunition to helping wounded allies

Fight major multiplayer battles with dozens of players on each side

Revamped single-player experience includes smarter AI enemies and allies, plus a greater emphasis on story told through open-ended mission-based objectives.

New space battles allow you to dogfight in X-wings, TIE fighters, Jedi starfighters and several other starcraft, or fight it out on foot aboard an enemy capital ship.

Special opportunities throughout the game for players to earn the ability to wield a lightsaber and use their favorite Force powers as a Jedi.

More than 16 new battlefronts on land and in space, including many from Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith such as Utapau, Mustafar and the space battle above Coruscant

All-new classic trilogy locations including the Death Star interior, classic space battles and the fight aboard the Tantive IV, Princess Leia’s blockade runner seen at the beginning of Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope

Criterion Games has officially announced the price for the upcoming Legendary Cars DLC for Burnout Paradise. Gamers who hunger for choice can download each vehicle separately or together in a discounted package when they release on February 19. The Jansen 88 Special (you know, the not-so-subtle nod to the DeLorean) is priced at $3.99 / 320 , while each of the other three vehicles clock in at $1.99 / 160 a piece. The Legendary bundle will also be available for a discounted price of $7.99 / 600 .

While last year was marked with a strong Japanese delegation, this year's coterie of speakers at the Nordic Game Conference is more of the Western variety. Media Molecule (LittleBigPlanet), Insomniac Games (Resistance series), Tigon Studios (anything that has Vin Diesel in it) and consultancy agency Englobe have all signed up to hold sessions at the conference in Malmö, Sweden on May 19 and 20.

Lara Croft may be a treasure hunter, but she came up empty handed in her quest for Trophies in the PS3 version of Tomb Raider: Underworld. This is to be remedied by way of an upcoming patch, says an Eidos community manager. According to a post on the game's official forums, Crystal Dynamics originally desired to have Trophy support included in the shipped game. "The guys at Crystal have been looking into this for a long time because they really wanted to include it," a community rep wrote. "The good news is that I can confirm that a patch for the PS3 version of Tomb Raider: Underworld is being worked on that will enable Trophy Support."