SQUEEEEeeeeeaaalll! KErrrrrr—UNCH! That is the sound of Vigilante 8 metaphorically skidding off the road from Isopod Labs to the Microsoft XBLA testing facility. It is now being towed back home by a metaphorical recovery vehicle.

Last month Isopod were all smiles when they sent their game off to XBLA, but sadly the game has run into some problems. Microsoft found a couple of bugs in one of it's own code libraries and the game has had to be changed and then resubmitted for more tests.

As Isopod say on the game's dev blog - "We certainly wish it was a quicker process, but this is how the cookie crumbles -- not much else to do".

In the meantime, they recommend you check out Castle Crashers - good advice in any event.

Dev Update #5 [V8Arcade.com]

Hot from the Not News Department of the Kotaku press room comes word that Castle Crashers is going mainstream. That is, if you consider being prominently displayed in endcap ads at crunchy grocery chain Trader Joe's mainstream. Reader Jose wrote in to say he spotted the stars of The Behemoth's XBLA hack and slasher shilling ridge-cut potato chips and Virgil's root beer. Clearly, this kind of endorsement speaks to the gaming/snacking crowd that shuns high fructose corn syrup.

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The XBLA incarnation of cult Ninja platformer N+ is due to receive another healthy dollop of DLC.

For a measly 200 MS Points, players can guide their agile stick figure avatars around 150 single player levels, 50 multiplayer 'race' levels and 25 'survival' multiplayer maps. Add to this the July DLC update (150 single player, 50 multiplayer) then throw in the built in level editor and N+ probably has enough levels.

Also out this week are 200 points worth of new boards for Buku Sudoku at something like one sixth of a point per puzzle - that's pretty much a metric plethora.

N+ and Buku Sudoku DLC release this Wed [Xbox 360 Fanboy]

This week sees another triple shot of new game content coming to Xbox Live Arcade, one that is sho' to satisfy fans of classic gaming. First up is, Rocketbowl. As you might expect, Rocketbowl is a bowling game with a twist, as the balls are rocket powered. It's like bowling, but appropriately extreme, and will set you back 800 Microsoft Points.

SNK's classic 2D arcade fighter Samurai Shodown 2 also makes an appearance this Wednesday. If you want to take a look at Samurai Shodown 2's loading screen, Microsoft has been kind enough to upload that to Flickr. The official release prices it at 400 MSP, but the official game page reads 800 MSP.

Samurai Shodown 2 is not listed as having online multiplayer, but we're checking in to see if that's accurate.

Finally, Shotest Shogi will also hit XBLA this Wednesday. Microsoft describes it as "chess inspired" and has priced it at 800 Microsoft Points. Who's gettin' what?

Right now, The Behemoth are busy fixing the online problems plaguing the fantastic Castle Crashers. Once they're done with that, they'll move on. Move on to giving us all new stuff to play with! Writing on their company blog, they've revealed that at least two new playable characters - the King and the Necromancer - will be made available as DLC, as will at least one new weapon, the chainsaw.

Chainsaw massacre !!! [The Behemoth]

Sometimes the harshest critics of a game are the creators themselves. Just ask Jame's Silva, following Peter Molyneux's lead and reviewing his own creation. While McWhertor called the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade title The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai "Sexy, Stylish 2D Action", Silva's own opinion of his creation differs slightly.

The graphics in The Dishwasher are 2D. In this day and age, this is completely inexcusable: not only are 2D graphics completely inadequate at capturing our imaginations, but 2D-by definition-is not HD. Playing a standard definition game on next-gen hardware hooked up to a monstrous plasma display just seems wasteful-much like that game's treatment of environmentally-friendly messages.

Silva's biggest disappointment is the same as my own - this is not a dating sim. What the hell was he thinking? Whatever it was, he earned every point of the final 1 out of 10 score.

We Get To Review Our Own Games! [James Silva Devblog via Xbox 360 Fanboy]

Sometimes Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, Orkut and OpenSocial just aren't enough. Too much real world stuff, not enough gamerscore bragging.

Enter Raptr - a new social network for gamers founded by Dennis 'Thresh' Fong (he had to do something with all that prize money) that offers a way of tracking your friends and sharing what you are in to on several popular games networks.

Once you have signed in and chosen a nick, you can enter your IDs on Xbox Live, PSN, World of Warcraft, Steam and others, then start entering the games in your collection.

Where it can, Raptr will pull data from your various networks and update your profile with a list of your current games, achievements and the like. There are plugins for displaying your data on Facebook et al too, of course.

A free client for PC or Mac will display and update data from you and your friends in real time as well as suck data from any games you play on your box — less of an issue for most Mac geeks, presumably.

Raptr [via 1UP]

Castle Crashers is great. So much fun. Sadly that fun is often tempered by serious technical glitches in the game, from wonky online connectivity to stuff like erasing your entire game progress. It's annoying, yes, but The Behemoth promise (cross their hearts!) that a fix is on its way.

We just got off the phone with Microsoft and we had a great talk about updating Castle Crashers, YES!! Looks like we're on our way to getting this title update out and the bigger issues like saving and online connectivity resolved, in addition to other bugs that have been reported.

Unfortunately that's as precise as they get, saying they "don't have a specific time frame yet" for when we can expect the release, but it can't be too far off. Can it?

Title Update is Coming! [The Behemoth]

Go, Death Tank, go! The Xbox Live Arcade release of the Saturn multiplayer classic may not have much in the dazzle department, but it's clean and has explosions and looks like a good way to spend some Microsoft Points. It also has an amazing title screen. We can be very meat and potatoes sometimes.

Death Tank Silent Spring Gameplay HD [GameTrailers]

Now that the Summer of Live Arcade is over, Xbox Live Arcade is back to business as usual in a rather unusual fashion, releasing not one, not two, but three new games. Tomorrow sees the release of the ultimate battle between good and stupid as Blazing Lizard's Pirates Vs. Ninjas Dodgeball hits the XBLA, along with CrunchTime Games' space-shooter Shred Nebula, both at 800 Microsoft points. Joining the two bigger titles is Gin Rummy (400 Microsoft points), a card game I am pretty sure my grandmother used to play, though I might be mixing that up with Cribbage.

So, you guys planning on picking up any of these? Which ones? If your answer is Gin Rummy, congratulations on figuring out how to use a computer to surf the web. Tell your helpful grandson I said hi!

This week on Arcade: Shred Nebula, Pirates vs Ninjas Dodgeball and Gin Rummy [Xbox Live's Major Nelson]