The Crash Bandicoot franchise is rapidly achieving legendary status, especially since it was announced that worldwide sales now exceed 11.5 million units. The third instalment, Crash Bandicoot: WARPED, has certainly been no slouch, selling more than 1.2 million units in North America since its November launch. “We couldn’t be more thrilled with the holiday sales results of Crash Bandicoot: WARPED,” said Mark Cerny, president of Universal Interactive Studios and executive producer of the series. Chances are that we will see a fourth instalment before the end of the year, maybe on PlayStation 2.

Development is due to be resumed on the controversial N64 emulator, UltraHLE, following Nintendo’s decision not to sue the authors. Sites posting the code have also been let off the hook, although anyone distributing ROMs on their site should beware.

Head Games are about to release what must be the first ever rodeo simulator for the PC. Extreme Bull Rider gives you the chance to ‘strap on’ for the ride of your life, or be a rodeo bullfighter. Up to eight players can sign in together, choosing from 20 riders and 10 bulls. “Now gamers can put on their chaps and experience first hand the eye-popping, high-bucking action of bull riding and bullfighting,” stated Dan Hammett, vice president of Head Games Studios. “From the comfort of their own homes, players can find out if they have what it takes to reign in the arena.” Alternatively, you could just dress up like a cowboy and run around singing ‘YMCA’.

Where is Daikatana? It’s certainly not on the MPlayer site as promised a while back. Well, Jon Romero is none too pleased himself and has been explaining the no-show. “We’re finishing off some remaining polish and sending it off to MPlayer for their final testing phase. We will be releasing the demo in the ‘practice’ area of MPlayer first, then into the ‘tournament’ area when ‘practice’ is through with their testing. When it gets into the ‘tournament’ area, everyone can download it and try it out. About a month or so later, we will put up the Internet Deathmatch Demo release so you can play over LAN as well and start up your own servers.” Future Gamer suggests that everyone bookmarks the MPlayer site and checks it out every five seconds. We will.

Blue Byte have announced that a mission CD for The Settlers III will be released on April 1. The add-on will feature three new campaigns, 10 new single-player maps and 10 new multiplayer maps for playing over a LAN or the Internet. There will also be a level editor on the CD, enabling easy creation of your own maps. Let’s just hope that they are not having a seasonal joke at our expense.