One of the more interesting games that's been announced recently is Matchman, which is being released for the DS, the Wii, and (oddly enough) the PS3. The developer for this one is TH-F, who normally develops Chinese games. Thanks to a partnership with Lexicon Entertainment, though, Matchman is slated for a worldwide release.

Blah, blah, and so on -- not that that's out of the way, let's get into the juicy, colorless details. We're not calling the game "colorless" as an insult, mind you; it's just literally in black and white. (Hey, it worked for Echochrome). Aside from that little detail, you may also be interested to know that Matchman is a side scrolling shooter with a storyline that's based on a combination of classic fairytales.

As for the enemies, don't expect to always kill them with a classic "shoot 'em up" mentality. Some bosses you might have to feed until they explode (it's just a wafer-thin mint!), while others you'll have to manipulate (we're not sure how). The game will feature a "Commuter" mode, too, designed for people who take public transportation (so that they can play with one hand and drink a cup of coffee in the other). That sounds like a funny enough idea, we only hope that the rest of the game has the same sense of humor.

Check out the gallery below to see the concept art for Matchman.

From the consistently high Brain Training sales in the UK, we have to assume that at least some of you Brits are nuts for the kind of games that give you a mental workout. Lexicon Entertainment is even banking on that assumption, as the company is releasing five different trivia games under the Super Brain Tease license. Each game will have a different subject, giving you a choice from the following:

• Football (aka soccer, for those of us in the U.S.)
• History
• Geography
• Music
• Movies

We find it amusing that you Brits are so crazy about your soccer, er, football, that Lexicon has ditched a broader "Sports" category in favor of something so specific. All poking fun aside, though, should these titles sell well enough they'll only be the first of many.

The main allure of such games, we're sure, will be their budget price points, as each edition will be offered for £9.99. If the idea of trivia at such a cost interests you, you can expect to see the Super Brain Tease series hit retail in Q4.

[Via press release]

Though we've already spent the afternoon filling your plate with enough puzzle posts to feed you for the next week, we'd be remiss not to mention today's full-version release of WordUp!, one of the finest homebrew games to ever hit the Nintendo DS. WordUp! follows the footsteps of other stylus-driven puzzlers like Tetris and Zookeeper, combining accesibility and portability for an addictive mix.

Linguaphiles will take great pleasure in connecting the game's adjoining letter blocks, spelling out words to clear chunks of the playfield. The top screen serves as a window to your inevitable doom, colorcasting the continuous stream of blocks piling on top of letters you've neglected. The game ends if you go too long without clipping a column, but you're presented with a satisfying record of your longest word, the number of words rubbed out, and which word was repeated most often.

In addition to its solid gameplay, developer Superpanic sweetened WordUp! with an unlockable arcade mode, three difficulty options, and an original and catchy soundtrack. Drop past the post break for more screenshots of this excellent game.

[Via Drunken Coders]

Have you ever idly wanted to be a cat? Well, perhaps the felines dream about being you, as well -- at least, that's the story behind Dream of Neko, a new game headed to the DS. Neko, a kitten (how's that for an original name) who dreams of the freedom of humans, awakens one day to find that he's become one ... but it must not be all it's cracked up to be (we'll vouch for that), because Neko sets off on an epic quest to regain kittenhood. Hey, we're all about the good things in human life, like video games and steak, but sometimes, we'd just like to relax with a ball of string and a pillow as well. We can relate.

Dream of Neko has a tentative third quarter release for Europe so far, and little else is known at this time.