Xbox 360 Previews

The Baja 1000 hosts some of the most hardcore off-road racing imaginable. In the marquee race, million-dollar cars battle for over 1000 miles, and each year there are reports of booby traps and spectator-created jumps and obstacles - built for their amusement. There are no closed streets - no, these madmen race through civilian traffic.

Just as Baja racing is the ultimate in off-road racing, the MX vs. ATV team is building what they'd

If you’ve no idea what Baja is, our first preview covers the basics: it’s deserty, it’s off-roady, and it involves racing. It’s brown, with cacti, and mesas, and cloudy skies. It looks a bit like Pure, MotorStorm, Colin McRae Dirt, MX vs. ATV, and the others.

But having been done before isn’t a reason to avoid a genre – at no point in the near future do we expect Epic and Bungie to call it quits on

We’re hoping that even if the words Bangai-O are unfamiliar, the other words in the title, Missile Fury, spark interest in the reptilian part of the brain. It’s an apt, concise description of what Bangai-O specializes in – lots and lots of missiles, all aiming for you. The Bangai-O series has been around since the Dreamcast days, but it served up some missile lovin’ most recently on the Nintendo DS with Bangai-O Spirits. It has never had a proper HD version, so we’re happy to see this latest installment coming along, although we also wish it was on PSN as well, and not XBLA exclusive...

The new Banjo-Kazooie is not a racing game. It is, despite appearances, very much a platformer. Even for a Rare title, the blend of concept and gameplay is a bizarre one, and, we’re not going to lie to you, it doesn’t feel much like the comparatively simple Banjo games of the N64 era. Nuts & Bolts is a brand new start for the franchise, and based on what we’ve seen, we reckon its quirky approach might just work...

Back in April Microsoft invited a handful of press to spend a day inside the barns of Rare's HQ for the world's first look and play of Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. They made us sit through Viva Pinata 2 first, but it was still worth it. Because when Willy Wonka opens the doors to his factory, you drop everything and make travel arrangements. This was the moment we'd been waiting for since the game was announced in September

A would-be hero sleeps peacefully. Suddenly, he springs awake, saunters out of his home and gets swept away on an engaging quest, ultimately saving his world from destruction and a greater evil. This plot descriptor may sound like your typical action RPG setup – Link to the Past anyone? But with gorgeous artwork, levels that build themselves as you go, an exotic world and a grizzled narrator who somehow adds immensely to the experience, developer Supergiant Games is making sure Bastion sets itself apart from the vast horde of typically mediocre action RPGs out there...

The world has fallen apart and The Kid doesn't even know it. He wakes up in his bed and the floor has literally fallen out from under him. The Calamity has occurred. The only thing separating him from the abyss is the ground that mysteriously appears in front of him as he moves. Where is everyone? Why is the world coming back together in front of him? He's got no idea. He's only really sure of one thing: he needs to get to the Bastion so he can meet his family and figure out why the world is completely demolished. Of course, we know just about as much as The Kid does about what's happening. The story picks up right after the end of the world, and it's all about figuring what happened..

Paul Crocker, Lead Narrative Designer at Rocksteady Studios, donned one of our magical interview headsets at E3 last week to give us his thoughts on Batman: Arkham Asylum, which may turn out to be the best Batman game we've ever played. Crocker discusses the reason for the game's short delay, its inspiration, story, gameplay, and more. Have a listen below!

Think of a great superhero game. No, not a good one — there are plenty of those around — but one as essential as, say, Grand Theft Auto IV or BioShock. You’re struggling, right? That’s because there aren’t any. Or rather there weren’t any until Batman: Arkham Asylum came along.