European News Wrap, July 29 - What happened today

And that is the day, the week and indeed the European news month finished. Hope you enjoyed Stace's company while I was off being a lazy s**t. Sweet kid, that wee thing. Anyways, hello: I'm back.

Some decent gamescom news out of NCSoft, Namco and Nintendo. We've got some great stuff planned for the show that I can't get into now, but we're planning our best yet in terms of content, going by our crazy, schedule-clashing timetable anyway.

And this is BEFORE our first ever Tokyo Game Show with Brenna! How exciting! But that's for August, we're still in July yet. Here is the news that landed on my proverbial table.

• NCSoft, Carbine Studios tease gamescom announce
  Carbine teased it overnight, but NCSoft confirmed it this morning: it'll publish the new MMO and it will be the big announcement it has planned for Cologne.
• Namco Bandai confirms gamescom line-up – Dark Souls, Ace Combat, Ridge Racer
  Title says it all. We've got a little cool thing lined up for Cologne with Namco that I can't talk about too much yet, but you're going to like it. A lot.
• SSX shots go nuts on Moby
  MOBY JONES! SUPERSTAR! GOT GOLD MEDALS! BOOYAKA! At least that's what he says in the making of profile in SSX Tricky anyways.
• Fighting genre saturated? “I don’t think it will ever get quite that far,” says Ono
  Don't expect the fighting genre to blow up like the FPS lot did, according to Yoshi Ono.
• Rovio partners with Madhouse to bring Angry Birds to China
  Angry Birds are flying to the Far East.
• GameStop launches eStore-only presence in mainland UK
  The retailer's going online-only in the UK, but this won't have a bearing on the stores in Northern Ireland, due to them being under GameStop Ireland. At least I hope so: GameStop I have are a good bunch.
• EA seeing “very poor returns” for 3D gaming, says Riccitiello
  But John Ricci Tick Tick insists that there's interest for social.
• Kojima hints at 60FPS for Peace Walker HD
  Smooth.
• Friday shorts II: Groove Coaster, Trenched, DCUO
  Go nuts for shorts!
• Koch Media to distribute Guild Wars 2 in UK
  Koch is to distribute Guild Wars 2 in the UK.
• Deus Ex gets high score from PC Gamer in first review
  This looks set to be nothing short of amazing. Watch for this.
• Report – RAM for PlayStation Vita not reduced
  Still unknown the actual memory count is, though
• London-based Call of Duty XP tournament announced
  Are you hard enough to try and beat 31 other clans on Black Ops to head to LA?
• Nintendo to bring Zelda: Skyward Sword to gamescom
  There's going to some other stuff there, but Skyward is the headliner. Wii U isn't mentioned, but truth be told, don't hold your breath on that.
• Heroes of Newerth goes F2P

And that's it. I'm off for another couple of days - albeit it's the weekend - where I'm going to be spending a portion of it prepping stuff, playing San Andreas and Red Dead Redemption. And more gamescom planning. Excellente. But you, you go have a great weekend. Remember: Quakecon's next week, and Nathan's going to be there for us! Be here for the latest when it begins. Have a good one.