Staff of 3D role-playing chat simulation game FeralHeart (successor to Impressive Title) have taken it offline for a week, from 24 January 00:00 UTC until 31 January 00:00 UTC.

Owner and founder Razmirz posted a thread on their forums explaining the suspension:

The reason for this is the increasing number of complaints regarding the game/forum. I don't refer to the ones about the game not working. I'm referring to complaints from users parents.

If you’re not busy flinging feathered folk at pig castles, you might check out these new Angry Birds tie-in books (from rovio.com, of course). How best to describe Angry Birds: Bad Piggies’ Egg Recipes? Here, we’ll let them do it: “Be a pig for a day, no worries in the world, no Angry Birds trying to knock you down. The kitchen is your pigpen and life’s good! So go ‘head, crack an egg or two and fling your awesome self to new levels of egg-cellence with these easy and fuss-free (for the most part) recipes, addictively fun activities and impressive party moves. From the classics to off the wall, these top-secret egg recipes will fill your tummy and tickle your brain!” You heard ‘em. Also available are the Angry Birds Big Red Doodle Book and Angry Birds Big Green Doodle Book, filled with fun drawing activities for Angry Birds fans of all ages.

image c. 2012 Rovio Entertainment

A piece of Skyrim fan-art by Blotch sold for $5500 at Further Confusion 2012's art show last weekend. [sibe/reddit]

The mixed-media work depicts a battle between a leopard-like Khajiit and a non-morphic dragon. [dA, FA]

Videl, the winning bidder, was enthusiastic about his purchase:

It was totally worth it! Love the work of Blotch and love Skyrim!!

The most expensive furry art show piece sold to date is Goldenwolf's "Eyes of the Night", which was auctioned for $10,000 at Further Confusion 2004.

Update (29 Jan): Videl says he was bidding on behalf of his roommates as well as himself.

Dean Dodrill (Noogy) has announced on NeoGAF that his anticipated action-RPG Dust, which won Microsoft's Dream.Build.Play competition in 2009, is coming in 2012.

When a user said they were looking forward to the game's release, Dodrill replied:

Man, I have to play that every day.. Oh, wait, I mean it's great :) It's coming out in 2012, promise.

It appears Earth Eternal is not so, as it was shut down for the second time on November 21^st, 2011 at 9:00PM EST. No reason was cited, but the game's website (and that of its Japanese version, Ikimonogatari), were withdrawn, with an announcement on the project's Facebook page the sole notice — much to the outrage of fans in the comments.

Pokémon meet feudal Japan in this crossover with a popular turn-based strategy RPG. [relee]

The game is set in an alternate version of the Sengoku period. Players must conquer 17 castles in the fictional Ranse¹ region of Japan, with assistance from their fuzzy partners.

It's early days yet, but fans are already arguing about the inclusion of lab-born Mewtwo.

¹ A play on Ransei, meaning "turbulent times"

Solatorobo: Red the Hunter is a story-based role-playing game for the Nintendo DS, featuring character design that should more than appeal to furries. If anything, it's as furry as any Star Fox game, and the characters’ animal nature has more effect on the story than just punny names.

The game is some sort of prequel/sequel/something to a game called Tail Concerto. I missed that one, so this was my first introduction to the setting.

Xseed, September 2011 - $34.99 on Amazon

It's been a long time since Sonic has had a console game that wasn't bogged down by experiments gone awry, usually withholding polish on what should have been core gameplay.

The Sonic fan-base has debated the exact point at which this downhill spiral began – whether it’s the over-fifteen years since Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles, or the ten since Sonic Adventure 2. However, both classic and modern Sonic fans tended to agree that the games were not improving.

Sonic Colors could be seen as the comeback for those who played it, but I was not one who did. A Sonic fan in my youth, after Unleashed I was done. After playing the last werehog level just to get to the next Sonic one and spending fifteen minutes on clunky platforming – the longest level I ever played in the franchise – I’d had enough. I don’t get paid to put myself through such torture; I certainly shouldn’t have to pay for it with time or money.

So why did I play Generations? Valve offered me a free copy of Sonic 3 and Knuckles (and Sonic 3D Blast, lest we think the ’90s had no bad console games) if I pre-ordered it for $30.

Replaying the levels of the "free" old games, I wondered pessimistically whether these gifts would symbolize the game itself: a solid, flowing platformer (Sonic 3 and Knuckles) with injections of clunky, awkward and nearly game-killing 3D elements (Sonic 3D Blast).

Thankfully, this was not the case.

As foretold by ancient lore, a race of anthropomorphic pandas – and their homeland – are to feature in World of Warcraft's new expansion, Mists of Pandaria.

The game also raises the level cap and adds a monk class, combat methods, and pet battles.

I wasn’t as proactive as I thought I would be, and I’m pretty sure I missed a couple posted during the first of September, so apologies there. Otherwise, here was last month’s Newsbytes.

One thing I’ve noticed about Nintendo products is that they last a long time. I’m not talking about the timeless aspect of the games, though there is that, too. I’m talking about the products. My old Nintendo 64 still works. So does my copy of Star Fox 64.

Star Fox 64 3D for the Nintendo 3DS is therefore one of the most redundant video game purchases I could possibly make, but is it a worthwhile purchase?

In a nutshell, if you have a working Nintendo 64 with a working Star Fox 64 cartridge, no, actually. If you don’t, though, it might be worth it.

This fall appears to be setting itself up for a string of new blockbuster video game titles, ranging from Star Fox 64: 3D, to Sly Cooper [4]: Thieves in Time, Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One, a pair of Tekken games, and even the little-heard-of 3DS title, The Rolling Western.

Do you enjoy Homestuck, but find one therianthropic feline troll and a fan of anthropomorphic fauna insufficient to sate your furry desires? Consider Prequel, an interactive comic using characters, species and settings from the Elder Scrolls video games Morrowind and Oblivion.

Although the popularity of the comic caused it to be moved to its own site after two threads, suggested actions and fan-art for the comic's protagonist are still taken on the MSPA forums (which also feature the topic 'shit. let's be furries', now on its second thread).

This week a user on gamer website MMO-Champion noticed that Blizzard Entertainment (creator of popular MMORPG World of Warcraft) had, on July 28, applied to register the phrase "Mists of Pandaria" as a trademark.

This lead to speculation that the next WoW expansion will centre around Pandaria, the home of the Pandaren, a race of anthropomorphic beer-loving pandas who first appeared as an April Fool's joke in the leadup to Warcraft 3.

At this point it is not clear if the application is a genuine clue to Blizzard's future plans, or a piece of misdirection. Nor can anyone, at this point, say if WoW players might get "a chance to play furry alcoholic martial arts masters".

Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter recently published a commentary (translated by Ora) of Alfred Holmgren's interview of a literally diehard Sonic fan in gaming magazine Fienden.

At the center of the debate is French woman Alix Henriol, obsessed with Sonic since 2000:

I could have given anything to have become a robot or a character in a game.

The piece, posted on the newspaper's website, described Alix's desire to become cryogenically frozen until scientists can transfer her consciousness to a console, while referencing cosplay, erotic fan fiction and fantasy sex toy manufacturer Bad Dragon.