THQ stated this morning that players have created over a million characters using the Saints Row Initiation Station. The free download, available on XBLM, PSN and Steam, allows future Saints to create a character for The Third, which launches next week.

The publisher stated that 1.2 million people have used the Initiation Station, with the most popular "nontraditional skin colors" being green, red and silver metallic -- no word yet if the latter group all had surfboards. There have also been 24 characters tagged as "God." Apt, since there is sure to be plenty of smiting.

Ubisoft has posted the financial results (PDF) of the first half of its fiscal 2011 and, though the company still isn't in the black, losses have been significantly reduced. For the first half of the year ended September 30, Ubisoft reported sales of €248.5 million, down from €260.5 million during the same period last year. While sales were down, Ubisoft's six month loss shrank from €89.8 million in the first half of fiscal 2010 to €37.1 million.

The results were higher than expected, with CEO Yves Guillemot citing an 85 percent growth in the company's online business and strong back catalog sales of titles like Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, the Just Dance series and Michael Jackson: The Experience. Guillemot also noted that Driver: San Francisco enjoyed "better-than-expected sales."

In the second quarter alone, the online segment in particular saw sales increase by 132 percent, led by titles including From Dust and ... the Smurfs Facebook game. Frankly, we're starting to worry about a grim future in which all video games are Smurfs social games.

Riot Games has announced that Season Two will bring ranked team play to the online MOBA title League of Legends. Previously, players have had their own individual gameplay rankings, but starting with the game's Season Two update, teams will be able to form up on either the 5v5 or 3v3 maps, and get their own rankings as a group. Teams will need a captain to create and invite or remove members, and will be able to choose a name and tag to go with their rating.

The company is also tweaking the in-game Summoner Spell abilities. The Rally and Fortify spells, which Riot calls "underused," are being removed from play, and in their place will be Surge and Promote. Surge will allow Summoners who chose it to boost themselves up with an aura buff, empowering their champions and anyone around them with extra combat effectiveness. And the Promote spell has made its way over from the Dominion gametype, so players who choose it will be able to beef up a minion in the standard game now.

Season Two doesn't have a release date yet, but it will also bring the long-awaited Spectator Mode to the game, which has already been seen on the servers in preview form. Odds are that we don't have too much longer to wait for the full update.

Speaking to Next-Gen, Epic's Cliff Bleszinski expressed his belief that developers can still sap some untapped potential from Microsoft's Xbox 360. Said Bleszinski, "With creative programming you can squeeze anything out of any given platform," adding that all is needed is "a little code magic."

Bleszinski stated that Epic employed such magic in creating Gears of War 3, noting, "We're now at at the point where it's not learning how to use the hardware, it's learning to trick the hardware into doing what you want it to do." He compared the current state of Xbox 360 to the end of the Super Nintendo era, when programmers "started using Mode 7 in ways you never expected."

Presumably he's not talking about go-karts and turtle shells.

As Max Payne reinvents himself for the modern generation, don't expect him to lean too hard into the brave new world of 3D. Rockstar's Dan Houser told Variety he's still unimpressed with the tech (even if it's possible Max Payne 3 will include it on PC).

"I don't think anyone has solved the riddle of how you make 3D an integral part of the gaming experience," he told the publication.

We'd like to take a moment here to take a firm stance in favor of utterly non-integral gaming innovations. Isn't that the whole point of 3D, sort of a George Mallory on Everest "Because it's there" type thing? We want to say here and now that the moment 3D has a purpose, we're gonna start pushing for 4D, and just wait until you see the glasses you'll need for that.

While an initial Online Pass Code is required to access Mass Effect 3's "Galaxy at War" content, the PC version will require an initial internet-based verification before you can get to Sheperding all across the galaxy, a Bioware interview with producer Jesse Houston reveals. Relax, though -- it's not going to require a continuous internet connection like some of Ubisoft's PC titles. It'll be just a one-time thing, which, now that we think about it, were probably Sovereign's exact words to Saren.

The other big chunk of news to come out of this Q&A is a lack of local co-op support at the game's launch. Houston doesn't rule it out as a future addition to the game and says "it is definitely on the table as something we might add." Finally, Houston explained that the new Kinect functionality demoed at E3 won't be included in the multiplayer, assumedly because it'd be the noisiest thing ever.

If you've just finished Dark Souls and are looking for an entirely new method of torturing yourself through video games, this new project from QWOP developer Bennet Foddy should suit your needs quite well. It's called Poleriders, and it's a competitive, two-player pole vaulting game. Only, instead of trying to use a pole to clear a raised bar, you're trying to either kick a ball through your opponent's goal, or kick your opponent's head, which is also tantalizingly ball-shaped.

Truth be told, we didn't find it nearly as difficult as QWOP -- though, we suppose difficulty will change based on the relative pole vaulting skill of your adversary. Vaulting against your roommate? No problem. Vaulting against four-time US Nation Outdoor Champion vaulter Jeff Hartwig? Well then, buster, you're in for a world of hurt.

No, that last one isn't a question -- it's this week's PlayStation Plus subscriber bonus. Where is my Heart? is a charming little Minis title about a family of monsters searching for a new home. Also, this week sees Square Enix kick off its Winter of RPGs promotion with Chrono Cross.

Oh, and there's this Modern Warfare 3 thing going on today, along with its subsequent Elite service, we guess. If you're into that kind of thing, you can read more at the PlayStation Blog via the source link below.

I hope you like Battlefield 3, because based on my trip to EA's Redwood Shores offices yesterday, you're going to be getting a lot more of it. In a brief presentation prior to some extended time with next month's Back to Karkand DLC, the word "service" was used more than once. EA sees Battlefield 3 as a platform to deliver more content and Back to Karkand is the first salvo in that strategy.

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Microsoft has posted that the Xbox.com website is getting an update "in the coming days" that will remove the "My Xbox" frontpage currently there now, and replace it with a "Social" section to make use of the "Beacons" feature eventually making its way to the console. Beacons are a way to mark which games you're currently playing or want to play, and are supposed to encourage you and your friends to set up times to play together on Xbox Live. Players will be able to set up three Beacons at a time, and add an additional comment as well, like "between 7-9pm PST" or "Horde mode only."

The website update will also make use of the "Metro" setup coming to the console's dashboard, and of course allow for access to the usual Xbox.com actions like redeeming codes, messaging friends and checking out their profiles, or browsing for and purchasing Xbox Live titles.

Officially, the console's Dashboard Update is still scheduled for a "Holiday 2011" release, though previous reports have placed it sometime right around Thanksgiving. With this update coming to the website as soon as next week, however, it's a good bet the console update is also close at hand.

[Thanks, Liam!]

Batman: Arkham City's official November 18 launch date for PC in North America has been slightly shifted to November 22. Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment also stated the PC version will be available November 23 in Australia, November 24 in France and Benelux, and other European territories beginning November 25.

Although WBIE wouldn't confirm, a major South African retailer has stated the game won't launch on PC until December in the region.

The PC launch will occur just as the "Robin Bundle Pack" hits the digital distribution circuit.

On this Call of Duty day, we look back at the success of Black Ops, a game so outrageously popular that its sales figures show up in other companies' earnings reports. Really!

In an investor presentation today, Ubisoft posted the top ten games in the US from January of 2010 through September of 2011, according to NPD data. And that's how we learned that Call of Duty: Black Ops sold 14,983,459 units in the US through September.

Of course, the point Ubisoft was trying to make was that Just Dance 2 was the second-best selling game in the US (at 5,245,480 copies), but we found that the second-most interesting number on the list.

We said that "Modern Warfare 3 is a great Call of Duty game, just as every other entry in the franchise is a great Call of Duty game." It's not perfect, but it's the best at what it does... and what it does best is make a whole ton of money. Here's what others had to say:

• OXM (95/100): "Sure, we can come up with a list of things we'd love to see from the series - whether it's a revamped campaign approach or a revitalized game engine and aesthetic - but when everything here is this well-executed and offers so many enduring thrills, it's hard to knock it too much. MW3 absolutely delivers."
• Game Trailers (93/100): "As attention spans dissipate, games like this strike the sweet spot of time spent versus reward gained. Yet there's also an extremely deep multiplayer experience where the changes seem minimal but pack a big punch. If you're expecting a huge departure from what's come before you'll be disappointed, but fans will get exactly what they're looking for. World War III shouldn't be this fun."
• Gamespot (85/100): "Whatever diversions or innovations may lie in Modern Warfare 3's future, the competitive multiplayer still offers the same sweet satisfaction you've come to expect from the series. This is some of the best online shooter action around, and with the daunting challenges of Spec Ops and the exciting, globe-trotting campaign, Modern Warfare 3 stands tall as another great descendant of the game that changed a generation. "
• Eurogamer (80/100): "Whatever next year's entry brings, some measure of reinvention will be essential. For now, its exuberant blend of testicular bravado and blockbuster gloss ensures that Call of Duty retains its crown as the shooter genre's biggest, boldest rollercoaster ride for at least one more year."

  Gallery: Modern Warfare 3 (11/8/2011)

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Take-Two Interactive recently released its financial figures for the second quarter of the 2012 fiscal year, boasting "better-than-expected" net revenue of $107 million. That figure -- driven largely by L.A. Noire and MLB 2K11 sales -- pales in comparison to the company's $245 million in earnings from the same period last year. Of course, that period last year had Civilization 5, Mafia 2 and Red Dead Redemption on the docket, so there's that.

Despite the surprise upswing, Take-Two didn't revise its expectations for the entire fiscal year, during which it hopes to earn around $1 billion in revenue. Though they didn't explicitly say so, we're assuming they've revised expectations for whichever quarter Grand Theft Auto V will launch in to "three bajillionty dollars."

A tired but resourceful former cop delays an alien invasion. It sounds like the eventual outcome of the never-ending Die Hard franchise, but for now it's the picture of Take-Two's first quarter of 2012. We didn't think there'd be room for Max Payne 3 and 2K Marin's overhauled XCOM in the same month, and now the latter project has been bumped into the publisher's fiscal year 2013.

Originally scheduled to launch on March 6, 2012, the promising tactical shooter is expected sometime between April 1, 2012 and March 31, 2013. XCOM's public invasion has moved ahead in jolts since it was first announced, but has grown quiet in recent months following rumors of layoffs at 2K's Australian studio.

At least it's a chance for humans and aliens to agree on something: these things are never easy to plan.

Activision has reported its financial results for its fiscal third quarter, ended September 30. The company posted revenues of $754 million, up from $745 million during the same period last year and, more importantly, over $100 million more than its original outlook of $650 million. Net income came in at $148 million, a hefty increase over the $51 million brought in during the same period last year.

The company brought in a record $427 million in revenues from digital channels, accounting for 57 percent of total revenue. The results also make note of Call of Duty: Black Ops, which Activision cites as "the #1 best-selling title in dollars in aggregate across all platforms in the U.S. and Europe for each of the first three quarters of 2011."

On the back Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and the "stronger than expected consumer response" to the toy-driven Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure, the company is raising its revenue outlook for the rest of the year from $4.18 billion to $4.33 billion.

When you've got a good idea and no money to back it up, it can be really frustrating trying to get dat paper. Investors often don't see eye-to-eye with creative types like us -- our Cookie Cannon (patent pending) is such a damned good idea and we've yet to find a person with lots of money who agrees. That's why we like crowd-sourcing and, more specifically, Kickstarter.

The latest campaign to catch our eye is for a documentary called Beyond the Game. Ian Santer needs $20,000 so that he can produce this behind-the-scenes look at the culture surrounding the games industry, with an emphasis on "the fighting game community, the advent of the chip tune sound, and the formation of underground art collectives." If you want to help him out, hit up the source link below and plunk down some cash.

We're of the firm opinion that your time is too precious, too valuable to be spent reading a full review for a game that was already reviewed many, many years ago. What's the point of applying a score to a game that's old enough to be enrolled in the sixth grade? That's why we invented Deja Review: A quick look at the new features and relative agelessness of remade, revived and re-released games.

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In the eyes of many, the original GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64 stands out as much more than a mere game. GoldenEye is a legend with a legacy all its own; one that cannot be substituted or replicated. Of course, that didn't stop Activision from making the attempt in 2010 with a brand new game with the familiar moniker of GoldenEye 007 for the Wii.

Mercifully, the publisher made the very wise (and legally mandated) decision to carry the franchise forward in name only. Rather than creating a direct remake of the 1997 classic, they crafted an entirely new experience that was surprisingly original while still feeling classically GoldenEye. The new game featured much of the style of the original while reimagining the story and characters and events in the modern day.

GoldenEye 007: Reloaded is the latest attempt to fill in the N64 classic's sizable tuxedo -- this time in high definition. Unfortunately, while Reloaded fits into the right suit, it seems that it's gotten a bit snug.

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We haven't heard exactly how BioShock Infinite will make use of the Move peripheral, only that it will; however, we now know that you'll have the option to play Infinite with its very own "special" Move device.

Videogamer caught the following note in a Move article on the UK PlayStation site: "A special PS Move peripheral is being produced that will draw you even deeper into this stunning vision of a parallel future." The article no longer makes any mention of a specialized peripheral, suggesting that this news got out a little bit early, and Sony and Irrational are now trying to open a tear in the fabric of reality into a parallel future where we don't know about this.

We're contacting Sony and Irrational now to try to learn more. Until then, let your imagination run wild! Is it a Skyhook? A bottle with a glowing ball on top?

[Update: 2K told CVG the purported device is not real.]