By Rick Marshall

FROM SPLASH PAGE: Okay, let’s face it — I have an unhealthy obsession with the upcoming “Batman: Arkham Asylum” video game. Every new glimpse of the game has impressed the heck out of me and made me more eager for its release date to arrive… but I know I’m not the only one around here feeling that way.

While I’m worried that no game could ever live up to my grand expectations for “Arkham Asylum” at this point, the project’s latest promotional video does little to bring my hopes back down to Earth — in fact, it only seems to inflate them even more. The video features a bunch of new gameplay footage and interviews with the game’s developers, includes some commentary from head writer Paul Dini, who’s made a long career out of scripting Batman’s adventures in both comics and various animated television series (not to mention his role on the creative team for “Lost”).

Check out the video from “Batman: Arkham Asylum” at SplashPage.MTV.com!

Looks like it’s about the size of a Game Gear and sucks down batteries even faster (6 AAs in about 2 hours), but that’s the price you pay for having “Super Metroid” in your pock..um…napsack.

Check out this site for a full, step-by-step guide on how he pulled it off.

The death knight quickly became one of the most popular classes in “World of WarCraft” at the launch of the latest expansion pack, “Wrath of the Lich King.” Not really a shock, since they were the first character class to be added since the launch of “WoW,” but now it seems their popularity has gotten the better of them. The next patch (currently on test servers) will give death knights a bit of a kick in the pants, balancing them to be a bit more on the level with the other classes.

The issue, it seems, is that death knight tanks are way more effective than they should be, making them a must-have in raids, and making them more durable than classes designed specifically to tank, like warriors. And, when that happens, changes are usually on the horizon.

In this case death knight tanks are gonna be looking at longer cooldown times, according to a recent Blizzard Q&A:

“We wanted to make the cooldowns the unique part of death knight tanking, and we haven’t given up on that design, but it has also turned out that having lots of powerful cooldowns is just an extremely potent way to tank. Many of the Naxx and Ulduar bosses were dangerous from predictable blasts of damage on cooldowns longer than the death knight ones. Plus the cooldowns could be used to survive just a bit longer. When the other tanks could survive two hits, the death knight could survive three. It’s entirely possible you’ll see Icebound Fortitude on a two-minute timer in the 3.2 patch.”

You can read the rest of the Q&A here. Having played “WoW” for about a year (this was way back in like 2005, when the level cap was still a patry 60), I know that these patches can sting. Just keep reminding yourself that it’s for the good of the world. Of WarCraft.

A lot of fuss has been made this week about a quote from Shigeru Miyamoto. Speaking with Nintendo Power about the next “Zelda” game for the Wii, Miyamoto said, “I don’t think it’s going to be that radically different.” Considering one of the major qualms people had about “Twilight Princess” was that it was too derivative of previous “Zelda” titles, it’s a bit of a surprising statement.

But is it a bad thing? Will the next “Zelda” be a bad game? It’s pretty unlikely, given Nintendo’s the track record with the franchise. It does fly in the face of Nintendo’s recent trends, though, making games more accessible to everyone. “Twilight Princess” was the antithesis of an approachable experience for non-gamers, and if you start throwing in Wii MotionPlus swordplay in the sequel, it could get even harder. If things don’t change all that much, won’t it be the same inaccessible experience?

The next “Zelda” on the Wii is still a long ways out, likely to release in the holidays of 2010, but it’s just something to ponder…

“Worms 2: Armageddon” follows in the long tradition of “Worms” games that have been coming out for nearly 15 years now. It’s a 2D, turn-based strategy game where you control a team of cartoon worms armed to the teeth with grenades, rocket launchers and exploding sheep. The simple, almost-cute graphics hide a devious interior, though, as “Worms 2″ is incredibly deep and sophisticated from a strategy standpoint.

The Highs

Team Customization
Apart from naming your team of four worms, “Worms 2: Armageddon” adds many additional layers of customization. You can pick from sound banks to change your worms’ voices, hats/colors to change their looks and graves to change their final resting places. The number of options means you can make a team based just about any pop culture reference you can think of. An “Ender’s Game” themed squadron with space helmets? Yes please!

Online Play
“Worms” has always been a multiplayer-centric franchise, and “Worms 2″ is no different. The number of options and modes that the devs poured on here is admirable, and touches like avatar support (they cry when you’re losing, for example) give your opponent a bit more personality. I never had any problems connecting to games, and thanks to the rabid fanbase you’ll never want for a challenger.

The Arsenal
The number of weapons and items they’ve tossed into this game is large enough that you really have to be a snob to come away disappointed. Every favorite, from the Holy Hand Grenade to the Super Sheep to the Concrete Donkey, is represented with vigor. And relatively new additions (like the lightning bolt to revive dead worms and the sentry gun to limit movements) add interesting tactics to the game.

The Lows

The Learning Curve
While the game offers a semi-lengthy solo campaign to ease you into the intricacies of “Worms,” if you’re new to the franchise and you hop right online, you’ll probably be decimated. “Worms 2″ is a game of precision and planning, and if you have neither, you’re going to be boned.

Final Word
Team 17 could’ve very easily sold “Worms 2: Armageddon” for 15 or even 20 bucks. At 10 it’s an absolute steal and will please strategy fans the world over.

I finished “Fallout 3″ last night. Well, I got all the achievements, at least. Yep, all 1450 points, which includes the main game’s achievements and the add-on packs. It was sort of a proud, if ridiculous moment, considering achievements are meaningless, but you all probably know the feeling I’m talking about. So I posed the question to the followers of the MTV Multiplayer Twitter feed, what is your proudest achievement (or trophy)? Thanks to everyone who responded, here are some selections!

@dave_haas - Getting to level 50 in Puzzle Quest. I think I threw my fist into the air even though I was by myself.

@zackjewell - clearing the epilogue of CoD4 in under a minute. 3 broken controllers and a hole in the wall.

@feitclub - must it be 360? My proudest one (2 actually): opening all seeds on Garden 10 in PJ Eden & finding all Spectra. Exhaustive.

@GameCouch - Endless Setlist! [Ed note: 84 songs, in "Rock Band 2" with no stopping. Insane.]

Once again, thanks to everyone that participated. Lunchtime Twitter Poll will be suspended tomorrow for the US holiday, but participate on Monday and be a Twitter celebrity for a day! Woo!

I’ve already extensively played “Battlefield 1943″ on test servers, but I’m still pretty pumped about it’s release to the world next week. The game’s dropping on XBLA on July 8th, and PSN on July 9th. Whether it’s the “extraordinary value” that the press release claims is a little up in the air (just 3 maps at launch, simplified feature-set compared to recent “Battlefield” releases), it’s still a lot of fun and for 15 bucks a dedicated player could very easily get a few weeks of very late nights.

It’s kinda cool that the downloadable game release schedule picks up in the normally-slow summer months. Xbox still has its “Summer of Games” event planned, where they’ll release a handful of anticipated XBLA games in July and August, and PSN has some gems coming out, as well. And with DLC like “Point Lookout,” the lack of solid in-store games doesn’t hurt quite as much as it used to.

Apple’s resistance to supporting Flash on the iPhone and iPod Touch is a bummer to many, but Addicting Games, one of the most trafficked Flash games sites, has apparently found a work-around. In the coming weeks, they’re going to be porting some of their more successful games to be playable on the iPhone.

Kate Connally, Vice President of Addicting Games, spoke to me over the phone today to talk about the initiative. “We don’t really have a secret sauce for moving Flash games into Objective-C [the iPhone's programming language.] Our approach has been to pick development teams and give them clear direction on the game.”

But they’re not planning on just providing straight ports of the games. Said Connally, “We want to make sure the versions of these games that we create for the iPhone are taking advantage of the unique features that the iPhone offers for gameplay. How can this game take advantage of the accelerometer? How can it take advantage of Bluetooth features?”

When it comes down to picking which games will get an iPhone treatment, decisions are made in-house. At that point, Addicting Games will reach out to the original developer to give them the opportunity to handle the port over to the iPhone. If they’re not tooled up for iPhone development, an external developer will be tapped.

Games will be sold separately over the AppStore. Connally wouldn’t commit to prices, but was partial to the lower-priced games. “We know the .99 cent price point works really well for the short types of games that Addicting Games is built on.”

The first titles getting the iPhone treatment will be “Park It,” “50 States,” and “World War,” and should launch in the coming weeks. While it’s not quite the same as having a library of Flash games on the go, it’s certainly a start.

Grandmaster Flash is a hip-hop legend and was one of the major forces behind the popularity of DJing, cutting and mixing. His inclusion in Activision’s upcoming DJ rhythm game, “DJ Hero,” is unsurprising but that doesn’t make it any less awesome. Flash provides some of the tracks in the game, and will appear as an in-game character. He’s even the voice that will walk players through the initial tutorial.

Activision showed off “DJ Hero” in New York last week and brought Flash around to speak to MTV about his work in the game. A full interview is forthcoming, but we thought you guys might get a kick out of some of the footage we grabbed. Yes, it’s Grandmaster Flash playing “DJ Hero” for the very first time. Things go…erm…well.

In case you live in one of the above regions things don’t actually go well. GMF mentioned that he’s not really a gamer, but he’s definitely going to put in some time to “master” (ha!) “DJ Hero.” He’s sure his son will make short work of it, though.

Ubisoft is working on a title which is near and dear to the hearts of video game journalists the world over, as it brings together two of the things we love best: Video games and churros. Oh, and probably journalism.

“Imagine Reporter” places you in the role of a female (whaaaa???) reporter as she works her way up the chain. Presumably you’ll start by covering county pie-eating contests and how the world’s smallest person fell in love with the world’s tallest giraffe, but over time you’ll advance to anchor.

According to the ratings summary on the ESRB website, the game will feature “mini-games such as taking notes, filming news segments, investigating photos, and interviewing people.” Woo, par-tay! I hope you know how to write short-hand!

(via GoNintendo)