If you don’t feel like waiting for Mercenaries 3, there’s something new to tide you over until it comes out. US Presidential candidate Barack Obama and Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin will both be available as downloadable player characters in Mercenaries 2. The two political super-stars have already appeared in other games, but this marks the first time that the two will be released by a game’s actual development team. I guess the Obama campaign will appreciate the free advertising after paying a reported $45,000 for those Burnout Paradise ads.

So when do we get to play with Nintendo’s new little hand-held gizmo? Those lucky Japanese gamers have had the new Nintendo DSi since Friday, with us North Americans being left out in the cold for the time being. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has not named a specific date, but he says the DSi won’t be available here until well into 2009. That seems to suggest that we can expect it in the summer at latest.

We all love free stuff, and now it looks like your sackboy does too. If you’ve been having problems with laggy servers for LittleBigPlanet, Sony wants to make it up to you. Two new costumes for the game will be released on November 6th, free of charge. One is a cute little sackboy-sized space suit, and the second is a Halloween-themed pumpkin head (you’re a little late on that one, guys). In Sony’s official blog, they acknowledge that LittleBigPlanet’s launch got off to a rocky start, and the free outfits are a way of thanking gamers for their patience. Sony also says that more cool looks for Sackboy are coming.

EA is working on a new game that’s supposedly so good, four major film studios already want the rights. With film adaptations of Army Of Two and Mass Effect right around the corner, Universal, Paramount, New Regency and MGM are reportedly bidding on the film rights to a new game from EA. This one is rumoured to be an adaptation of the epic poem Dante’s Inferno, and it hasn’t even been officially announced yet. Nothing else is known about the game, except that it’s supposed to be out late next year.

Looks like love for The Beatles wasn’t all that MTV and Harmonix needed. Sony/ATV Music Publishing CEO Martin Bandier, the man who holds the keys to The Beatles library, says MTV Games had to offer them a deal that was “very rich” to secure the deal. Bandier also says quote “There have been mutterings from artists and songwriters that they are not being offered their fair share in videogames… but when you get into the world of unique artists, that leverage shifts, tremendously.” Sounds like they had to fork over some serious dough to get The Beatles rights.

The world’s second largest game developer is feeling the economic pinch. Electronic Arts recently laid 540 of their employees, which translates into about 6% for their total workforce. This comes on the heels of a $310 million quarterly loss for the company. Let’s hope all those talented laid-off game makers are able to get back to work soon.

One of the makers of Hellgate: London has found himself a new home. Bill Roper, Co-Founder of the now defunct Flagship Studios, has joined the team at Cryptic Studios and is now hard at work on the new MMO’s Champions Online and Star Trek Online. Roper’s own Flagship Studios was forced to close it’s doors after it’s debut project Hellgate: London failed to meet expectations, but given his past success on Blizzard games like Diablo and StarCraft, we can’t wait to see what he comes up with.

We’re one step closer to another epic battle between transforming giant robots. Director Michael Bay says that filming on Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen is now complete. Don’t get too excited though, editing and special effects still need to happen before the film is finished, and we suspect there’ll be a lot of special effects for this one. Expect Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen to transform your local theatre in June 2009.