4Gamer has a nice new batch of HD screenshots for the upcoming Front Mission Evolved. Overall, the game is still looking nice and the September 28th release date seems to be still on track. The update also covers the game system setup a bit as well, though with nothing really new to report since we last talked about it. As the awful acronym for the game’s bullet time (as in “E.D.G.E.” or the more idiotic “Emergency Defense Galvanosynaptic Enhancer”) is still receiving large amounts of PR spooge. Though it seems that Square Enix will be doing something right in terms of releasing toys for the game, for that we happily tip our cyborg top hats in their direction.

As we reported a while back, Bandai’s new flagship Super Robot Chogokin toyline has received its first entry in the form of Mazinger Z (as lovingly photographed over at R-Side). In addition, the Tamashii Festival has been in full swing showing off Bandai’s upcoming toy wares. Amongst them was the rather brutal looking Mazinkaiser SKL, from the upcoming series of the same name (with its latest promo here).

In any case, considering Mazinger’s formative influence on the Super Robot Wars games not to mention the fact that said Original Generation mecha (such as the Alteisen and Cybuster) will also be receiving Super Robot Chogokin renditions in the near future, means that this new Bandai toyline is worth keeping a gaming eye on.

What with the release of the Xbox 360 port for Virtual On Force getting ever closer, it seems that there are concerns that this series of games may not entice newcomers. With this is mind, 4Gamer has covered the announcement of a new EX Option. This effectively allows the player to grade the difficulty of the offline singleplayer campaign as per their burgeoning skill level (such as increased health, as pictured above). To be honest these kind of difficulty nullifying features tend to rub me the wrong way, especially considering the previous 360 release of Oratan 5.66 succeeded off the back of its untainted learning curve. Admittedly, this EX Option is entirely at the player’s discretion but this addition to Force reeks of management not development, as any gamer with half a cognitively active brain wouldn’t bother with this.

4gamer has a selection of HD screenshots for the upcoming BluRay hybrid Macross Frontier movie, including the game portion for Macross Trial Frontier. It’s clear that there’s Artdink functional lineage at work here, especially in the HUD but whether they’re involved in the development of this remains unclear and somewhat unlikely. As they have Carnage Heart EXA to be getting on with, not to mention that porting a PSP game to the PS3 is a pretty big ask on the part of Bandai Namco. In any case the hybrid BluRay disc is out on October 7th for 7,140 yen.

As part of a summer campaign for Senjou no Kizuna, to tie in with the game’s recent Ver 2.17 update, players will be able to win new mobiles suits to play with. The four mobile suits in questions are the RX-78-6 Mudrock Gundam, the MSM-10 Zock, the RGM-79L GM Light Armor and the EMS-10 Zudah. In order to unlock each suit, the player needs to either win a match as either Federation or Zeon, for the Mudrock and Zock respectively, or lose with either side to get the weaker GM Light and Zudah. On a separate note, seeing the Mudrock in action since the excellent Zeonic Front is very welcome indeed. This “summer battle” campaign will only be in arcades for a short while though, starting on August 12th to the 25th. However, the camapign will also be extended in September as well. If you want to see the new suits in action, there are videos on the campaign page at the official Senjou no Kizuna site.

One of the more interesting Robot Damashii toys, that of the Zegapain Altair, has finally been released in Japan. Interesting in the sense that this mecha was the titular protagonist in the similarly titled Zegapain and that the series itself was strongly funded by Microsoft in Japan. The plan was to tie in two exclusive Xbox 360 games, Zegapain XOR and NOT, that were very plain ZOE clones alongside the series. Despite the insane amount of product placement in the anime, the most obvious sign of Microsoft’s handiwork was the revolting colour of green they picked for the mecha itself. Despite being a rather innovative mecha design, penned by Rei Nakahara, the saddest thing about the whole thing was that Microsoft hired Cavia to develop the games and it was patently clear their heart wasn’t in it. Though to be honest, who could really blame them when the host work featured a hideously bright green mecha. This then is the testament to the design itself; as this toy is a palpable reminder of when Western intervention in Japanese anime and gaming pop-culture just doesn’t work.

Along with the normal release of the game on December 22nd, for 6,090 yen, Virtual On Force will also be available in a Memorial Box version for an eye watering 10,290 yen. The bump in price is on account of three factors; a 6 disc set of ALL the music from every Virtual On game as well as an artbook covering the 15 year history of the franchise. The final icing on the cake is that it will have a custom created box-art penned by Hajime Katoki himself. Put simply, we’re getting the Memorial Box. The official site has also undergone a functional makeover, as it now covers the VR line-up in the game as well as the World background.

4gamer has covered some interesting new features that will be present in the upcoming Carnage Heart EXA. Specifically, a new screenshot tool as well as an emblem setup that allows you to edit the image on your PC as a bitmap. Considering that Carnage Heart is very much of a remote versus endeavour, as you share configs to “battle” other players, a screenshot tool will be invaluable in producing proof of victory as well as obviously taking snaps of your extended OKE family. The openness of the emblem editor is somewhat worrying though, as it’s pretty much inevitable that you’ll end up facing the pixel art equivalent of a throbbing man sausage at some point in your OKE battling career. That unfortunate aspect aside, EXA continues to look like a very promising continuation of the Carnage Heart series and seems to be helmed by a team that seem to really understand what its fanbase wants.

Gpara have a nice update on the recently announced OG mecha from Super Robot Wars appearing in Another Century’s Episode R. From the Cybuster, above, to the ART-1 and Alteisen Riese the new OG units look stunning in game and it’s amazing to think it’s taken four games for them to be even featured. In addition to the OG unit update, Gpara also has an interview with Acid Black Cherry about his single Re:Birth that will be used in the game.

Kotobukiya have recently announced another Border Break kit, this is the Cougar S – a souped variant from Ver 1.5 of the original Cougar with new weapons and parts. As with all Border Break designs it looks bloody amazing and just keeps on hammering home the fact that this game is still only playable in Japan. The kit will retail for around 3,990 yen and be released in November.