Brazil's Mother Gaia Studios is the winner of Microsoft's Imagine Cup, a competition that challenged students from around the world to use XNA community tools to build games around the theme of environmental sustainability.

Microsoft recently showcased the finalists at the 2008 Games For Change event in New York, and Mother Gaia took home the Game Development prize with City Rain, the company announced today. Australia's Team SOAK won the Worldwide Software Design invitational, and Singapore's Team Trail Blazers won the Embedded Development invitational.

Said Microsoft:

A total of 370 students from 124 teams representing 61 countries and regions competed in the worldwide Imagine Cup finals in nine categories: Software Design, Embedded Development, Game Development, "Project Hoshimi" (Programming Battle), IT Challenge, Algorithm, Photography, Short Film and Interface Design. The student teams were asked to undertake a series of challenges relating to digital media or technology depending on the invitational.

Full announcement and details on the winners after the jump!

E3 2008 is less than a week away, and come Monday morning the internets will be buzzing with the latest news from Xbox 360 producer Microsoft. While we know they'll be plugging their biggest titles - Gears of War 2, Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, Fable II, and Viva Pinata - what big announcements could we see from the latest of the big 3?

Rumours have been stirring since December about a potential motion control apparatus for the Xbox 360, and instead of fading away like bad rumours generally do, more and more fuel has been added to the possibility as time went on. With the latest speculation indicating a new motion-controlled friendly redesign of the Xbox Dashboard, E3 could very well be the time for the big reveal.

Xbox Live's Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb has set up an E3-devoted hub with an ongoing blog and video already available to track the adventures of the Xbox 360 at the event. So if you like your E3 coverage with a decidedly Microsoft slant, you can check it out.

Says Major Nelson:

Major Nelson is already lining up exclusive interviews with bigwig industry insiders and TriXie will undoubtedly try to crash a few VIP parties. Video Monkey is ready to bring you the sights and sounds of the show, and our intrepid Inside Xbox game gurus (Ryan and Denny of This Week in Xbox) will be grabbing as many controllers as they can for hands-on impressions of all the hot games. On top of that, look for detailed coverage of the press briefings, exciting new game trailers, and sweeping panoramas from the show floor.

There're plenty of pre-hype vids available already.

[Xbox.com E3 2008]

Being a high-profile, first-party Microsoft title, you already knew this was coming. Gotsta make the most of that cashed-up, loyal fanbase! But you didn't know what, specifically, was in the Fable 2 collector's edition. Now you do! For $US 80, you'll get a Hobbe figure, making-of documentary, "additional in-game content" and a trial Live account. As with the standard edition, it'll also ship with the bonus XBLA "pub games" on the disc as well.

Speaking with Marvel writer and universe architect Brian Bendis, ComicMix got a little insight into the sudden death of the Microsoft-backed Marvel MMO.

Bendis, who was one of the executive producers of the game, said that it was "gorgeous and fantastic" but ultimately killed by a faceless Microsoft exec.

It's hard to believe by this year's E3 is one week away. The show unofficial kicks off at 10:30 a.m. Pacific on Monday when Microsoft starts their press conference. While the show floor, or what there is of a show floor, won't open until Tuesday, there will be plenty of events to look forward on Monday alone. Here's a run down of some of the highlights for the week:

Sunday
8 p.m. Kotaku Party: Open to everyone (21 and over)

Monday
10:30 a.m. Microsoft Presser
1 p.m. Shane Kim Roundtable
3 p.m. EA Presser
8:30 p.m. Gears of War 2 Reception

Tuesday
9 a.m. Show Floor Opens
9 a.m. Nintendo Presser
11:30 a.m. Sony Presser
2: 30 p.m. Ubisoft Presser
4:30 p.m. Capcom Presser
7 p.m. Activision Presser (Not technically a part of E3)

Wednesday
9:15 a.m. E3 Keynote by Gov. Perry
10 a.m. Sony Roundtable
10:45 a.m. Take Two Presser
1 p.m. State of the Industry Keynote
2:30 p.m. Konami Presser

There are, of course, plenty of booth tours, one-on-one interviews, meetings and parties that I didn't include in this concise snapshot. What are you most eager to check out? Me? I'm psyched for the big three's keynote's because those are almost always chockful of news. I'm also interested to see what both Take-Two and EA have to say at their pressers, I expect some news from both, maybe even related, though I sort doubt it. More than any year before, though, I think this E3 will be the year of the third-parties. Lots of big games being shown off.

Hit the jump to vote on what you most want to hear about and see next week.

It's coming from the Daily Mail, so make what you will of that, but the British tabloid is claiming that Microsoft is setting aside £500 million - which is just shy of $US 1 billion - to help cover the costs of an increasing number of faulty Xbox 360 Elite units. They'll also apparently be offering a three-year extended warranty for Elite owners. Both the value and warranty are the same as those offered last year, when Microsoft was forced to pay up and extend the warranties for owners of original 360s. The Elites, however, were meant to be improved consoles, nowhere near as susceptible to the red rings of death as their off-white cousins. We'll update when we hear something a little more...official, because really, we find it hard to believe they've sold that many Elites.

£500m bill for Xbox red ring of death [Daily Mail]

Been a lot of talk about the 360's user interface of late, whether in ways it's showing its shortcomings or in ways it might be going all science-fiction. Today, let's take another tack, somewhere between the two. Let's look at how it might be improved upon, without the need to go all Minority Report. Mik at Platform Nation has assessed the current "blades" system, thinks (rightly) that there's too much wasted space, and has redesigned how the 360's menu system would look were he the one designing it. I must say, it's a definite improvement.

Ah, it just wouldn't be an Aaron Greenberg interview without a little juice to it, would it? Xbox's director of product management has, while speaking with Gamasutra, re-iterated a common and well-worn theme amongst Microsoft (and Sony) executives that, after new gamers buy themselves a Wii, they'll eventually "graduate" to a 360 or PS3. And why will they graduate? Well, because of another well-worn argument: that the Wii is a fad:

Ah, and finally, the pre-E3 hype train picks up a little steam. Citing both Sarcastic Gamer and their own "sources", CVG are claiming that a new Halo game will be unveiled at E3. This Halo game might be Peter Jackson's game, it might not be, but either way, they say it won't feature the Master Chief. Chew on that for a possibility while we dream of a point-and-click "Where In The World Is Master Chief?"

New Halo game for E3 [CVG]