During a live demo of the PS3 and Xbox 360 title Silent Hill: Homecoming (the fifth game in the Silent Hill series), the game's developers revealed that a PC port is planned, although no time frame was specified. We doubt it will be day and date, but this is still good news. Lots of PC gamers have enjoyed the past three games in the series, although the original PlayStation title never saw a Windows release.

Just in case you're not familiar with Silent Hill: it's a Japanese-developed survival horror game. It's not much like the Resident Evil games, though; the characters you play in Silent Hill are not trained professionals. They're regular Joes or Janes who are faced with vastly superior and horrific monsters, as well as psychological trauma. The series is known for its deep storyline, multiple endings, and apallingly disturbing monster design.

With E3 going on, it's possible that the Big Download staff has spent more time watching videos of upcoming games than playing current ones. But the weekend is finally here, and we're looking forward to getting some time that's hands-on instead of just eyes-on with our favorite hobby.

Lead blogger David Craddock will be taking a break from almost single-handedly holding the site together while John Callaham has been at E3 to play Final DOOM (a classic!) on his PC and Civilization Revolution on his Xbox 360. James Murff will be taking a break from his usual indie fare to play Team Fortress 2 and Company of Heroes with his buddies. When they're not around, he'll be laying the SMACdown with Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. Eli Shayotovich is going to be lopping off limbs in Age of Conan.

Lastly, I'm in the middle of moving halfway across the continent, and I had to ship my desktop via UPS ground, so only my notebook is gonna be accessible over the next few days. Therefore low spec games are the flavor of the weekend -- Sam & Max Episode 4 and Fallout. I'm also going to be playing a bit of Rule of Rose on the PS2 (well, technically PS3). But that's us. How about you? What aRe yoU Playing?

2K Games and Gearbox Software's Borderlands (trailer embedded above) aims to be a marriage of S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl and Diablo -- a Mad Max-inspired open world shooter with RPG elements such as character classes, level progression, and system-generated loot.

Those features were put on display during a live gameplay demonstration at E3 this week, the video of which we've embedded on the other side of the jump. It's tough to see what's going on in too much detail because of the quality of the video, so the developer commentary is the real meat. The commentator spends rather a lot of time bragging about the random weapon generation, but there's some good stuff in there about the setting and character advancement. And hey; it's first-time live gameplay footage. That's something, at least.

During an interview at E3, Valve's Doug Lombardi revealed that the company hopes to add a movie making function to Left 4 Dead at some point after the launch of the core game. He loosely described features that would allow players to record, edit, play back, and possibly share their virtual near-death experiences. Sadly, that functionality probably will not be available for a while; we didn't see it in our own hands-on experience with the game.

Lombardi also mentioned that Valve went to Microsoft, Yahoo!, and RealNetworks when it was first conceptualizing Steam, but was told by all that such a service would only exist "10, 15 years in the future." Of course, now Microsoft operates the separate and struggling Games for Windows Live service, which shares some features with Steam.

And yes, we know the above screenshot features the old, now-replaced Left 4 Dead characters. But how about a little nostalgia?

Fallout 3, Far Cry 2, Crysis Warhead, Red Alert 3, Diablo 3, StarCraft 2 -- oh my! Folks declaring the death of PC gaming are clearly smoking something, as all those games and more have been making waves at E3 this week. You're going to need a computer to run those, right? Thing is, these days notebooks are outselling desktops by quite a large margin. And for good reason -- who wants a giant, bulky brick uglying up their space?

Hence the rise of gaming laptops. To help you make the call on which one to get and how to configure it, GameDaily has a guide to buying a gaming notebook. It's mostly beginner stuff -- and some of it we kinda wonder about; it asserts that a 1280x800 screen resolution is too low for serious gaming, for example, which we're not sure everyone cares about quite so much. In fact, wouldn't you want a lower screen resolution to ensure that your notebook will be able to handle newer games at the native resolution for a longer time? But all around it's a good intro to what you need to look out for. Give it a read if you're in the market.

In an interview with business site Portfolio.com, Electronic Arts executive John Riccitello confirmed that an MMO based on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is in development.

Talking about EA's portfolio of upcoming titles, Riccitello said: "We've got two of the most compelling MMOs in the industry in development, [Warhammer Online and] the one that people are dying for us to talk to them about -- in partnership with Lucas, coming out of BioWare, which is, I think, quite possibly the most anticipated game, full stop, for the industry at the point when we get closer to telling you about it." When Portfolio asked for clarification that he's talking about the KotOR IP, he said "yes."

At this point it's hardly a surprise, as the trademark has already been registered and hints have been dropped, but a confirmation is a welcome thing. Essentially, the industry's worst-kept and most popular secret is a secret no longer!

[Via Massively]

Valve Software's Gabe Newell took the stage at EA's E3 press conference to present the cooperative horror game Left 4 Dead. We have the video of that presentation on the other side of the jump, but here are the Cliff's Notes.

All four current player character models will be replaced with the above-pictured folks. This was probably a good change; the old ones weren't very likable or varied. In addition to that bit of info, Newell talked about the game's AI director, which will adjust the gameplay to match players' playstyles, positions, and status.

He also said the game is coming out on November 4th, but that news ain't new. Anyway, the game seems to be coming along swimmingly. Be sure and check out the video after the break!

Give 1-888-4-VAULT-TEC a call. Just do it. Or if you don't have a phone, check out the above-embedded video. After you've done that, come back.

Done? Okay, so you just heard a voice explain that you've reached a nuclear holocaust survival hotline, right? And that you have over 100,000,000 callers in front of you, and you have to wait 78,643 hours, yes? Yes, that's rather odd. Here's the explanation.

This is viral marketing for Bethesda Softworks' upcoming post-apocalyptic RPG Fallout 3, the latest title in what is arguably one of the greatest PC RPG franchises of all time. It has already announced that it's hosting a post-apocalyptic film festival in California. We also just found out hat Fallout 3 will get downloadable content on the PC. The point: things are looking promising on the ironic post-apocalyptic RPG front.

DICE's first-person action-adventure game Mirror's Edge is one of the wild cards of the 2008 lineup for all platforms (assuming it actually does come out in 2008). So far, we've had to rely on clues from a lone gameplay video and a recent story trailer. Now we have a bit more to work with; an interview and a few new screenshots. It's not much, but it's something, right?

In an interview at the EA3 (no, not E3!) press event, Mirror's Edge Senior Producer Owen O'Brien described the game design philosophy behind DICE's new game. The idea is that everything -- including combat -- is grounded in a free movement mechanic that is easy to learn but difficult to master. In fact, the combat controls consist of two buttons -- attack, and disarm. Exactly how those work depends on how you set up the action with movement beforehand.

Watch the interview for more, and be sure to check out the screenshots as well.

Download the Mirror's Edge Gameplay Video from Big Download!
Download the Mirror's Edge Story Trailer from Big Download!

Gamespot is exclusively (for now) hosting the latest Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 trailer. The trailer introduces the new third faction -- the Empire of the Rising Sun, aka Japan. It features C&C's staple bad voice acting, lots of units, general mayhem, and the classic Hell March song that fans of the series will recognize.

It looks like the Empire of the Rising Sun mostly uses Anime-esque Mecha units -- Transformers-like battle robots. Also featured are airplanes that can dive underwater and attack naval vessels from below. We knew Red Alert 3 would have a lot of amphibious units, but it didn't occur to us that it might also feature air/water units. Makes sense, we suppose!

Anyway, check it out if you're a fan. And we figure you are, if you're reading this. C&C is not a franchise that gets pitched to a lot of new recruits. It's mostly about the oldschool, yo.

[Via Joystiq]

Whether you like military shooters, innovative first-person platforming, or racing, Big Download had something for this past week. In fact, we had surprisingly a lot, considering that most game publishers are holding their cards until next week's huge E3 conference.

Next week is sure to be a big week (and rest assured we'll be on top of every new file that pops up amidst the frenzy), but hopefully this will be enough to tide everyone over until then! Here are just a few highlights from the latest new downloads

	HAWX Developer's Diary #1 HAWX is an air combat game in the same near-future world as Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. In this video, a developer talks about the game, and of course there's footage as well.
	Frontlines: Fuel of War Beta Demo Try out this shooter that tries something a little bit different with territory control.
	LEGO Batman Bruce Wayne & Poison Ivy Trailer A humorous sneak peak at a couple of the characters from the fourth entry into the LEGO pop culture franchise series.
	GRID 1.2 Patch The acclaimed racing game gets some important bug fixes.
	Mirror's Edge Story Trailer A beautifully animated sneak peak at the storyline and setting behind Mirror's Edge, an innovative first person parkour game.