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iPhone only: As its name suggests, free iPhone application Voice Dialer adds voice dialing to your iPhone. More accurately, though, Voice Dialer is a contact search-by-voice app that also does...

Last month Adam Barenblat started uploading our videos and podcasts over to iTunes for the iPhone, Touch, and iPod owners out there. Of course it wasn't long before we heard from Zune owners,...

Square Enix confirmed today that its oddly titled DS fantasy adventure Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days will be coming to the U.S. The DS title dives into the story of Roxas during the time that Sora was outgrowing his clothes between the first and second Kingdom Hearts games. Though we don't have a release date, the game is set to hit in Japan around February, so the North American version is bound to hit sometime in 2009, possibly during the holiday season. 358/2 Days features the various jaunts to Disney worlds the series has been known for, along with a multiplayer mode that allows players to take up the mantle of Organization XIII members.

What started as a cute crossover has developed into a pretty complex JRPG storyline, and the DS title promises to explain some of the connections between Roxas, Sora, and Organization XIII. If you've missed the boat on the more expansive Kingdom Hearts plot, the recent Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories remake might help catch you up to speed, and it received a positive score from our own Michael Donahoe. Also be sure to check out our report from Famitsu on why you should care about 358/2 Days for more details on where this game is taking the series. We'll let you know as soon as we have a solid release date.

In what might be the least necessary confirmation in recent gaming history, Koei president Kenji Matsubara told Famitsu (via IncGamers.com) that there would be no seat at the table for former Team Ninja boss, Tomonobu Itagaki. This suggests Itagaki would have wanted to go work for the company that cranks out countless sequels every year in the first place, which is plausible only if he's dying to make Gundam Gaiden Orochi Musou 5 XL Empires.

Itagaki, you may recall, left Tecmo and filed a lawsuit against his former employer back in June, alleging that Tecmo refused to pay him a bonus he was owed upon completion of Dead or Alive 4. Even after leaving and suing the company, though, rumors still sprang up that he might want to rejoin after the merger between Tecmo and Koei went through, prompting Matsubara's statement.

As for the merger itself, we've heard word on the inside that many internal executives at Tecmo have quietly rebelled at the idea of the Koei/Tecmo merger -- which is in an advanced state of negotiation -- going so far as to discuss merging with other companies (but not Square Enix, which was involved in the merger talks before Tecmo refused their offer and chose to merge with Koei instead). Despite the internal turmoil, though, the family that controls the majority stake in Tecmo Ltd. seems determined to go through with the proposed merger, as evidenced by the announcement in November (via Reuters) that they would establish the Tecmo Koei Holdings company on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Market in April.

We're going to get double the Diesel in 2009, with Vin's face gracing both Midway's Wheelman and Atari's The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena. Atari released new screens of the latter...

While some of us invest points into intelligence to become doctors, others of us pour those stats into perception and agility to take a different route... Keyhole Surgery is Operation reinvented for...

Sarah the walrus plays a mean air saxophone, and isn't above shaking her wal-tush for attention.

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Mario takes his first roller coaster ride. This reminds me of my first (and only) time on the Cyclone at Coney Island, except I was 23.

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New web service Nombray is out to help folks establish their online identity by registering their name-based domain. Enter your name into the Nombray search engine and register the various available...

Neither the down economic climate nor pressure from online retailers seem to be having much impact on GameStop's plans for global domination of brick-and-mortar videogame stores. Vice President and Managing Director Europe James Kirk says, "Our plan for 2009 is to open 200-300 stores worldwide" in an online excerpt from an article in the December issue of RLI. As ambitious as that sounds, the company opened over 550 locations during 2008. At their current pace they open a whopping 20 to 30 stores weekly.

"We are a rapid growth company and grow where we have the opportunity; outside the US, we are hugely successful in Australia," says Kirk. That's just the tip of the iceberg too. Gamestop became Europe's largest videogame retailer with its recent purchase of the French chain MicroMania and its 300 plus stores. But don't think that they intend to rest on that status. Kirk said that they specifically want to target the UK since it's the largest computer games market in Europe. In the next six months they aim to open in around 10-15 malls there.

The expansion plans are truly global as well with Kirk mentioning potential points ranging everywhere from the Middle East to China and the Far East. Given the continuing gloomy economic outlook around the world it will be interesting to see how GameStop's plans evolve over the coming year. Kirk did say, "Every real estate deal has to stand on its own and be profitable." Whether they can pull that off depends on a number of factors that even selling millions of copies of World of Warcraft expansions may not be able to overcome.

Free CD and DVD burner ImgBurn emerged victorious in this weekend's Hive Five Best CD and DVD Burning Tools, followed closely in tow by commercial burner Nero 9. Freeware app CDBurnerXP rounded came...

Gameloft have released Brothers In Arms: Hour Of Heroes for the iPhone, bringing 14 missions over 3 theater campaigns to your pocket. Control is via a 'fire' icon and a touchable movement circle,...

The Yogen Max is a foot pedal laptop charger prototype that will fold up for easy travel, allowing you to run your laptop like an antique sewing machine. Of course, we all know that the human body...

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