Late Night Consoling

It's been a few weeks since I've done a theme for my console games of the evening, so in honor of the Super Bowl (which I couldn't care less about), tonight kicks off Sports Games for the Non-Sports Fan week, spotlighting games that are so good, that even I liked 'em.

• Square has registered trademarks for Chrono Break and Unlimited SaGa. Are these their next two RPGs?
• I reported on this last week, but it's now official: Nintendo will be selling the GameCube in Europe for half the price of the Xbox, and about 50 euros less than the PS2 over there (it's still slightly more expensive than here in the US though). Also, Cube.IGN is reporting that the PAL GameCube will support 60 Hz video and RGB SCART.
• GameSpot and Pocket.IGN have each posted hands-on looks at Shining Soul, Sega's upcoming GBA revival of their Shining series of RPGs.
• Good lord, Nintendo's dropping the price of the Game Boy Advance. Maybe now they can afford to release a more expensive one with a backlight...
• Midway has formally announced Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance for Xbox, GameCube, GBA and "other platforms." This is just an announcement though - no screenshots are available yet.
• More Bomberman games for GBA and GC are on their way to America, courtesy of publisher Majesco.
• The year's just getting underway, but GameSpot has written an article that looks at the big PS2 games coming in 2002.
• Hey look, Japanese gamers have to deal with Xbox bundles too.
• And just in case you'd forgotten what it looks like, here are some more screenshots from Xenosaga.