Steven Spielberg Returns To Video Games

 Steven Spielberg is making a return to video games. Newsweek reports that the legendary director has teamed with Mario designer Shigeru Miyamoto to create a new action-puzzle simulator for the Nintendo Wii. Code-named PQRS, the new game "neatly blends the creativity of the building-blocks game Jenga with the charm of a Saturday-morning cartoon. It runs on top of a physics program that lets you manipulate blocks with the Wii remote as if it were an extension of your hand." You had me at "Spielberg" and "Wii".

The second game, code-named LMNO is described as North by Northwest meets E.T. but "if E.T. were female, grown up and, um, hot." In the PS3/X-Box 360 game, you play as an ex-secret agent who forms a bond with the computer-controlled alien woman named Eve. The type of bond you form with her determines the nature of her special abilities and the ways in which she can assist you.

"The challenge is, can the game have an emotional impact on players while they are actively manipulating the world?" says Spielberg.

He's come a long way since the horrible Atari adaptation of E.T. There is also one more game in the director's deal with EA. My guess is that it will be code-named TUVW.