Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli is very opinionated and open about his thoughts. During an interview with Game Informer - where he talked about a number of topics including Far Cry 2 and Crysis DX10 - he states how the Halo series does not appeal and that “console shooters are at the level of PC shooters 5-6 years ago.” Check it out:

GI: So you’re not excited for Halo 3?

Yerli: No. [But] I don’t want to talk badly about it. The trailer looked great. I know there are millions of people who love it. I tried to play Halo 1; I tried to play Halo 2. (laughs) I really didn’t get it & it didn’t get me. [...] It’s not that it isn’t possible [to make a good shooter on a console], but console shooters are at the level of PC shooters 5-6 years ago. The gameplay has to be more sophisticated - more thinking [than] shooting.

This video interview on Gametrailers with Jade Raymond offers word that there will not be an Assassin’s Creed demo. She explains that a sandbox-style game with three “huge” cities will be very difficult to cut down into a sample. Therefore, no demo.

While we’re on the subject, a video development diary was released by the team, showing off the freedom in the coming game. Check it out below:

Want to get a blood-splattered Wii? Enter this Manhunt 2 sweepstakes then. The prize is the aforementioned bloody Wii, a 50″ plasma screen TV and a copy of the upcoming game.

Remember the bald, “totally hardcore” guy called J Allard who spearheaded the Xbox 360 launch? Well, he has been shifted to the Zune business and well, he doesn’t think gaming is coming to Microsoft’s media player “anytime soon.”

“I love games and maybe for someone with a 40-minute commute, it might be an interesting scenario,” he said. “Thus far, the market really hasn’t proven out that it is a great scenario. Customer satisfaction with what has been done isn’t that high.” He also mentions the problem of the “platform”, citing differences between generations of devices that will cause backwards compatibility a major problem.

Check out a brand new Burnout Paradise trailer, showing off some jumping and racing action.

New bloody screenshots from Condemned 2.

The badass-ness of Contra is coming soon to your DS, as Contra 4 is being released on November 13. A dedicated website for the game will launch later this month. The game goes back to the series’ roots and will feature hardcore gameplay with two-player cooperative play.

If you’re into ads, then check out this Orange Box trailer.

Valve’s upcoming Orange Box will feature music from programmer-turned-musician Jonathan Coulton when it’s released later this week. He has composed a single which will be included in the title. He is known for his rendition of Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” as well as many of his original geek-friendly compositions.

“I am delighted the Valve design team selected me to help make the surprise single a success,” he said. “If it’s not every geek’s dream to be immortalized in a video game, it was mine.”

Trippy shooter Gridrunner++ is headed to Xbox Live, as revealed by Jeff Minter, the psychedelic game’s creator, on his Livejournal blog. Already available on PC and Mac, with demos available from the Llamasoft website, the game is a traditional top-down shooter injected with flying sheep and weird stage names, among other things.

“I already have it running modified for the different aspect ratio and working off the x360 pad as opposed to the mouse, and I’m changing and extending the gameplay; it’ll be a much more involved game than the PC-only predecessor,” he wrote on his blog. “I’m getting all the gameplay working first then I’ll overhaul the graphics; we’ll likely go for algorithm generated 3D shapes rather than the hand-drawn sprites of the PC original.”

Many publications are quoting the latest issue of Official PlayStation Magazine UK, who in turn carries a quote from an unnamed Sony executive that Team Ico are working on a sequel, though it is yet unknown which game he was referring to. The famed team, led by designer Fumito Ueda, is behind the legendary Ico - billed as one of the best game on the PS2 - as well as Shadow of the Colossus, which was released in late 2005 to much critical acclaim.

It was previously known that the team is working on at least one unannounced PS3 project.

Nanostray 2 will be heading to retail early next year, courtesy of Majesco. The publisher will release the sequel that adds two-player co-operatie multi-card play, single-card duels and more on the DS.

Some more new high-resolution screenshots from Burnout Paradise.

MMO publisher and developer NCSoft recently opened Carbine Studios, the latest addition to its stable of development teams. Carbine is currently working on an unannounced MMO that promises to “break new ground in massively multiplayer gaming.”

Among the studio’s staff are a number of veterans, including Kevin Beardlsee who was the lead developer of World of Warcraft. Other notables include sixteen other Blizzard employees, Tim Cain (co-founder of Troika Games) and Jeffery Gaffney (Turbine).

Xbox 360-holdouts will want to mark their calendars, because Gears of War will hit stores for the PC on November 6. As detailed before, the game will feature five new single-player chapters, a new “King of the Hill” multiplayer game mode, three new multiplayer maps, game editor and more. It also includes all the DLCs available via Xbox Live.