Submissions for the 2013 Independent Games Festival are open as of this morning, with deadlines for both the Main and Student Showcase categories looming in the near future of October 7 and the 31, respectively. Finalists will be announced sometime in January 2013.

This year each category will birth six finalists, each of which will then be playable in the IGF Pavilion on the GDC show floor. These finalists will be competing for nearly $60,000 in prizes (in the form of various awards), the most notable of which being the coveted $30,000 Seumus McNally Grand Prize. The considerably smaller but equally prestigious $5,000 Nuovo Award honors "abstract, short form, and unconventional" games. Last year the Seamus McNally Grand Prize was taken by Phil Phish with his innovative cubist puzzle-platformer FEZ, while the Nuovo Award was given to Daniel Benmergui for his 8-bit comic strip styled IOS puzzler Storyteller.

IGF winners will be announced in grand style on stage come March 27, 2013 at San Fran's Moscone Center, with the IGF Pavilion opening that same day and continuing until March 29, giving all attendees ample time to experience each finalist entry in playable form.

The Independent Games Festival is an important staple in the indie games community and one used to showcase the most brilliant and expressive up-and-coming titles from some of the most creative minds in the field. Previous IGF alum would include titles like Castle Crashers, Braid, Gish, World of Goo, and the now ultra popular Minecraft. Winners of the Grand Prize often go on to see both critical and commercial success as well as widespread respect among peer developers, so its a pretty big deal for any budding indie dev looking to make a splash.

If you're interested in submitting your own creation, you can do so by hopping over to the IGF's official site. But hurry, as you've only got a couple of months left before the impending deadline hits.

Happy Friday and surprise, Neoseeker has adopted a new look for the not-so-new year. If you've visited the site any time before last night, then you'll definitely be able to notice the change.

A newly designed header and footer with mega-menu dropdowns are some of the highlights of Neoseeker 2K12. Clicking around, you'll find that product profiles have also undergone an overhaul, now emphasizing user contributions, NeoWiki editing, and a "wall" that displays updates and happenings around the site related to the game. Overall, just about ever page has undergone a massive visual change with greater functionality in mind.

Videos are also much more prominent now on the front page, and you can browse news without having to scroll through the "all news" page we had before -- scroll down on the main page to check that out.

When designing the new look, our primary goal was the end user experience:

1. Create a more unified, uniform, and consistent user experience throughout the majority of the site.
2. Bring in a more modern and open look, using current and future best practices and concepts.
3. Build on a more cleaner, less cluttered layout with more open space
4. Re-organise the product profile pages so they are more appealing
5. Bring new emphasis to the contribution aspect of profiles, with larger contribution buttons and more obvious edit buttons for Wiki editable areas.
6. Merging status updates with "myfeeds" and create a "wall" for each game.
7. Gentle introduction of #hashtags

Contrary to what the cleaner appearance may suggest, the design was not made with tablet and mobile users in mind. In fact, Neoseeker Mobile hasn't changed except for a few cosmetic alterations. User profiles and forums have also been left mostly untouched, though some of that might change later this year.

You can read all about Neoseeker 2K12 in last night's announcement made by Neo founder Howard Ha. Oh, and notice how easy it is to "Like" us on Facebook or become a Follower on Twitter? Very easy.

Atlus has announced that their handheld strategy RPG Devil Survivor will be making another return with Devil Survivor 2.  Although the first Devil Survivor received a 3DS makeover, its sequel is sticking to the DS.

Devil Survivor 2 will be a strategy RPG like its predecessor, and the story follows 13 devil messengers in Japan, who have just seven days to save the world from mysterious invaders known as Septentrion.  Also coming back is the Demon Auction system, where players bid to obtain new demons.

You can see the new protagonist in the image (center), flanked by Io, his brilliant classmate (left), and Daichi, a childhood buddy (right) to our new buddy.  As always, they're all high school kids making excellent use of their time.

Devil Survivor 2 is set to release this summer in Japan.  No word yet on a European or North American release date.

Sony Online Entertainment has announced today that DC Universe Online is available for digital download off PSN, through the PlayStation Sore.  Since its launch in January, the aptly named MMO based in the DC Comics universe has become SOE's fastest selling game.  Now that's impressive, and you can get in on the action without leaving your couch.

Players are able to create their own hero (or villain) and align themselves with iconic characters from DC such as Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, The Joker, and Lex Luthor as they fight it out over the fate of the universe.  No, you won't actually get to play as those guys in the campaign, but you can unlock their "skins" and corresponding abilities for PVP use.

This downloadable version is selling for the full price of $59.99 USD plus a $14.99 per month subscription. The initial purchase includes a 30-day subscription, and there are optional six-month ($77.99) and 12-month ($134.99) subscription packages.

Developer and publisher THQ unveiled a new corporate logo today, with a ceremony in New York and everything.  And you know what, it looks really nice -- definitely an improvement over the old one.  But why the change?  To better reflect the company's dedication to the changing market, says THQ President and CEO Brian Farrell.

"Our new logo epitomizes the change, innovation and creative growth that are the cornerstones of the new THQ," Farrell declared proudly.  "By developing triple-A, innovative, original intellectual properties, attracting the top talent in the industry, and placing that talent first, THQ continues to redefine itself. This new logo seeks to capture that change and make it tangible."

The logo will be cycled in over the next few months.  Expect to see it plastered on your games starting in February.

Copyright infringement is a huge concern in this digital day and age, as it is excessively easy to copy another's work and claim it as your own. This happens every day, but when the culprit is an accredited review and news website, one must take notice.

This is exactly what has happened and news is circulating that Guru3d.coms owner Hilbert Hagehoorn has taken copyrighted images of the ProlimaTech Super-Mega CPU heatsink and claimed them as his own. The images were taken from BenchmarkReviews.com and altered to remove the watermark logo. However, not all of the logo had been removed and the parts remaining left clear evidence of the original source of the image.

As of now the article has not been taken down, but BenchmarkReviews.com has taken action to resolve the issue by sending a letter asking for the immediate removal of the infringed work. See it below.

This message is to inform you that the website http://www.guru3d.com has infringed upon the copyright of Performance Computers, Inc, a registered corporation located in Nevada, USA.

 At 11:45AM on 08 July 2010 the work entitled ProlimaTech Super-Mega Heatsink CPU Cooler Debuts was published at http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=10896&Itemid=22.

This article contains images property of Performance Computers, Inc. Two particular images have been used without permission:

· http://benchmarkreviews.com/images/reviews/cooling/Super-Mega/ProlimaTech-Super-Mega-Heatsink-Corner-BenchmarkReviews.jpg  
· http://benchmarkreviews.com/images/reviews/cooling/Super-Mega/ProlimaTech-Super-Mega-Heatsink-Bottom-BenchmarkReviews.jpg

All details of this article, text, and images were created by Olin Coles for Performance Computers, Inc., owner of Benchmark Reviews. Hilbert Hagedoorn and Guru3d.com do not have permission to use this or any other material generated by our company.

 Hilbert Hagedoorn for the website guru3d.com has willfully and intentionally violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act by taking images and material from my company and using it to produce income without permission. They have altered the original copyrighted images and manually removed our watermark (although some portion is still intact). Guru3d.com has published their own story without credit given or sources listed. The infringing work is located here: http://www.guru3d.com/news/prolimatech-to-launch-super-mega-cpu-cooler/, with specific regard to this image: http://www.guru3d.com/imageview.php?image=24961.

Please find a PDF attached to this message to serve as proof of violation.

We respectfully request that you take immediate action to remove all copyrighted material from the website guru3d.com. Your prompt response will mitigate potential legal costs and prosecution under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1996.

Thank you for your cooperation.

The Behemoth, creators of Alien Hominid and Castle Crashers, have announced that from Wednesday January 20th to Sunday, January 24th, 100% of all money made from either Castle Crashers or Alien Hominid HD DLC on Xbox Live Arcade will be donated to the disaster relief fund in Haiti. On top of that, The Behemoth team has decided that they'll personally match all money generated.

In short, buy their downloadable content, and they'll donate the money x2 to the American Red Cross Haiti Relief and Development.

Both games are excellent so if you don't already have them, pick them up right now. Then grab the DLC before Sunday, and you'll be helping out a great cause.

Back in April, Activision was sued by Genius, publisher for the lesser-known Scratch: The Ultimate DJ.  Apparently Activision had done a lot of corporate bullying that failed to discourage Genius, so in order to eliminate the competition for DJ Hero, they simply bought the developer, 7 Studios.  Then there was the nasty lawsuit because Activision began hindering development and witheld Scratch DJ assets from Genius.

Activision denies all this, of course, but their new relaitonship with 7 Studios is not exactly off to a great start.  Months after the Scratch incident, the DJ Hero publisher is cutting staffers from the budding development company.  30 employees have been dropped from 7 Studios as Activision moves for a greater focus on music-gaming.

"Since the completion of its acquisition by Activision, 7 Studios has realigned its business to focus its development resources on the music genre," a rep explained.  "As a part of this realignment, the studio is reducing its workforce to better reflect Activision's upcoming slate of music-based games."

Perhaps 7 Studios will soon be tasked with developing future Hero titles?  I'm thinking Band Hero III World Tour Van Halen, or something.

ZEN Studios is keeping gamers guessing lately.  In August, they released an image of Street Fighter's Ryu with a pinball in the background -- wee, Street Fighter pinball.  Now they're adding some Ninja Gaiden to the mix.

The latest teaser image features Ryu and Ayane standing back to back, and ZEN notes they're working on an official announcement, while Sony will be posting some hints on the official PlayStation blog.

Speculation leans heavily toward a new Ninja Gaiden pinball game.  For now, we just have a very tiny picture.

If you're into buying pre-owned games, you may be interested in hearing about another alternative place to bargain hunt.  Walmart, electronic goods retailer, will officially begin selling "gently" used video games.  The store guarantees all pre-owned products will be cleaned and tested before they're stocked, and the games will work like new.

We've known for a while Walmart was planning to hop the used games bandwagon, especially when they started the whole buyback thing.  Now that they're finally selling the used items as well, GameStop and Toys 'R' Us might have more to worry about.

Walmart says that they won't be accepting any trade-ins on used titles, but the used games they sell are guaranteed to play properly.  Any pre-owned games purchased will fall under the same return policy of new products.