Starting tomorrow, head into the PlayStation Store to cast your vote for your favorite games in nine of the 10 categories and receive a free Gamers’ Choice Awards XMB theme for each vote cast. New this year, you can also cast your vote online in one special community category, Best PSN Indie, and you’ll receive a voucher code to be redeemed in the PlayStation Store for a free exclusive XMB theme. Your votes exclusively pick the winners in every category, and your award winners go on sale.

Don’t go too far because the winning games in each category will be announced right here on the PlayStation Blog in just one week–on March 6, 2012–and that same day, the winning game in each category will be discounted 30% in the PlayStation Store for one week, with a special 50% discount for PlayStation Plus subscribers.

Drum roll, please! The 2012 nominees for PSN Gamers’ Choice Awards are:

Best PSN Exclusive:

• inFAMOUS Festival of Blood (PS3)
• PixelJunk Shooter 2 (PS3)
• TETRIS (PS3)

Best PSN Game:

• inFAMOUS Festival of Blood (PS3)
• Plants vs. Zombies (PS3)
• Resident Evil 4 (PS3)

Best PSN Game Playable Online:

• Hard Corps: Uprising (PS3)
• Street Fighter III: Third Strike Online Edition (PS3)
• TETRIS (PS3)

Best PS3 Full Game:

• Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood (PS3)
• Assassin’s Creed II: Deluxe Edition (PS3)
• Midnight Club LA Complete Edition (PS3)

Best PlayStation Move Game:

• 4Elements HD (PS3)
• Dungeon Defenders (PS3)
• Dungeon Hunter: Alliance (PS3)

Best 3D Game:

• Dungeon Defenders (PS3)
• God of War: Origins Collection (PS3)
• The Sly Collection (PS3)

Best PSone Classic:

• Chrono Trigger (PS3/PSP)
• Parasite Eve (PS3/PSP)
• Xenogears (PS3/PSP)

Best Mini Game:

• Angry Birds (PS3/PSP)
• The Impossible Game (PS3/PSP)
• PAC-MAN Championship Edition (PS3/PSP)

Best PSP Game:

• DISSIDIA 012 [duodecim] FINAL FANTASY (PSP)
• DISSIDIA 012 Prologus FINAL FANTASY (PSP)
• TACTICS OGRE: Let Us Cling Together (PSP)

PlayStation Community Award – Best Indie:

• Dungeon Defenders (PS3)
• LIMBO (PS3)
• PixelJunk Shooter 2 (PS3)

Don’t forget to head into PlayStation Store tomorrow to cast your vote. You decide the best of PSN, so make your voice heard!

We briefly mentioned the “12 for ‘12” sale in our last PlayStation Plus update, but now we’re bringing you the full list of games and discounts. We’re offering a dozen incredibly varied games for this year’s sale: from Q-Games’ frenetic shooter PixelJunk SideScroller to Trendy Entertainment’s slick “tower defense” hybrid Dungeon Defenders, there’s something for every type of gamer out there. Without further ado, here are the 12 for ‘12!

• PixelJunk SideScroller – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, PS Plus $4.89
• PAYDAY: The Heist – Regular $19.99, Sale $13.99, PS Plus $9.79
• Dungeon Defenders – Regular $14.99, Sale $10.49, PS Plus $7.34
• Mortal Kombat Arcade Kollection – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, PS Plus $4.89
• Street Fighter III: Third Strike Online Edition – Regular $14.99, Sale $10.49, PS Plus $7.34
• Eufloria – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, Plus $4.89
• BloodRayne: Betrayal – Regular $14.99, Sale $10.49, PS Plus $7.34
• Rocketbirds: Hardboiled Chicken – Regular $11.99, Sale $8.39, PS Plus $5.87
• Cubixx HD – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, PS Plus $4.89
• Sideway New York – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, PS Plus $4.89
• Rochard – Regular $9.99, Sale $6.99, PS Plus $4.89
• Okabu – Regular $14.99, Sale $10.49, PS Plus $7.34

Not only are all of these titles some of the highest-rated PlayStation games of 2011, they’re also some of the newest titles to hit PSN! You may have seen some of these games featured in PSN PLAY and Only On PSN, and now you’re able to pick up these coveted games at their deepest discount yet.

Starting tomorrow, each game will be available at 30% off through January 23, and PlayStation Plus subscribers can purchase each game at 50% off.

We hope you enjoy this great line-up of discounted titles. Here’s to a great 2012!

SCEA seeks out the best development talent from colleges and universities through our academic program as well as at industry shows like IndieCade (where our PlayStation Home partnership with Codename was born), the IGF pavilion at GDC and E3. We also host developer mixers, where we’ve discovered some of the most talented developers on PSN. Once developers are discovered, we can determine which development model will give them the best support to help them thrive. PSN has been the only platform to fully embrace indie developers, and in 2012, more indie-developed PSN exclusives are on the way, including Papo & Yo, Retrograde, Closure, Dyad, and many more.

With the 2011 coming to a close, we also wanted to highlight some of the most successful indie game development efforts on the year. If you haven’t already, give these games a shot during your holiday vacation.

SCEA empowers some indie developers to self-publish on PSN, and the results are often very successful. Here are 2011′s top-selling PSN self-published indie games:

Top 10 Best-Selling Indie PSN Games of 2011 – Third-Party Self-Published

1. Limbo (Playdead)
2. Castle Crashers (The Behemoth)
3. TestYourself Psychology (Creat Studios)
4. Marvel Pinball (Zen Studios)
5. Worms 2 Armageddon (Team 17)
6. Dungeon Defenders (Trendy Entertainment)
7. Armageddon Riders (Targem Games)
8. Braid (Number None Inc.)
9. UnderSiege (Seed Studios)
10. Hamsterball (TikGames)

To help keep the indie spirit vibrant, we also incubate some indie developers to give them access to our resources, enabling them to realize their full artistic vision while being able to tap into the expertise and experience of SCEA’s World Wide Studios development ecosystem. Here are 2011′s top-selling PSN indie titles published by SCEA:

Top 10 Best-Selling PSN Games of 2011- SCEA-Published Indies

1. PixelJunk Shooter 2 (Q-Games)
2. Fat Princess (Titan Studios)
3. Flower (thatgamecompany)
4. Aquatopia (Playlogic Entertainment)
5. Hustle Kings (VooFoo Sudios)
6. Eat Them! (FluffyLogic)
7. Top Darts (Devil’s Details)
8. Super Stardust HD (Housemarque)
9. Linger in Shadows (Plastic)
10. Rag Doll Kung Fu (Qi Studios)

For some newer, smaller teams who have creative and innovative ideas, SCEA also has the Pub Fund, which provides additional development budget for those teams that might not otherwise have the footing to make their game a reality. We’ve committed $20 million over the next three years to the Pub Fund because we believe this visionary and unique development mindset will ultimately advance and evolve PSN games as an art form.

Top 5 Best-Selling Pub Fund Titles of 2011

1. Hoard (Big Sandwich Games)
2. Tales From Space: About a Blob (DrinkBox)
3. Joe Danger (Hello Games)
4. Eufloria (Omni Systems Limited)
5. Explodemon! (Curve Studios)

In the coming weeks, we’ll be providing a forum for PSN developers to share their stories in indie game development and why they chose PSN as their lead development platform. Stay tuned!

The response so far to inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood has been amazing, and we’re thrilled people are enjoying Cole’s new horror-themed adventure. Just to add some digital chocolate to your Halloween haul we’re putting up an insider movie to show off the coolest powers and enemies you’ll go up against in inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood.

On top of that PlayStation Move is now part of the inFAMOUS world. You can play inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood with PS Move…and coming soon you will be able to play inFAMOUS 2 with Move as well via a free update. So check out the video and have a freaktastic Happy Halloween.

Stay tuned to infamousthegame.com and join our forums on SuckerPunch.com for future updates on inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood. Also follow us on Twitter, @SuckerPunchProd, and check out our Facebook Page.

It’s been a long time since my last PlayStation.Blog post, and today’s entry is a little….different. I’ll start with the marketing facts (inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood available now!!!! $9.99!! Only $7.99 if you are a PlayStation Plus member!!!) but really, I thought I’d give you a little insight into why and how we ended up making a vampire based spin-off of inFAMOUS.

For us, we’d been working for two projects and five-plus years on the main storyline of inFAMOUS. We wanted the DLC to be a chance to take all that art and technology and do something fun and different for players. We knew we couldn’t just release some more missions or a skin pack, so we took a bunch of pitches from all the departments here at the studio for what we might do. We wanted something that fit the world of inFAMOUS, would be fun to work on, and ideally would be unexpected, too.

One of the strong pitches we got was originally called “Vampire City” (a play on “Empire City” from inFAMOUS). The pitch was that Zeke was trying to impress a girl with a tall tale about Cole, Vampires, and the origins of Pyre Night. There was a lot to like about this pitch, some important ones were: finally getting to add flying to inFAMOUS, the strong “Pyre Night” set dressing we could add to New Marais, a solid supernatural basis for new powers, and of course having a launch date in the days before Halloween didn’t hurt, either. So it was decided, and work began!

About the same time, we had some promising PlayStation Move prototypes running. We’d initially thought we would use Move to support UGC authors–but as we progressed, we became convinced we could make the game fully playable with Move. So Move shifted to become a core gameplay feature, and our UGC team decided to tackle our next big wishlist item – “speech bubble” cutscenes. Like making narrative missions? Now you get set-up camera shots and add speech bubbles to characters!

So that’s the story behind “Festival of Blood”… We all hope you enjoy this little “what if” detour in the inFAMOUS universe… From all of us at Sucker Punch, Happy Halloween!!

P.S. I can also confirm the new cutscene tool and PlayStation Move support will appear in the main inFAMOUS 2 game any day now!

We used the same engine as for the two Shooter titles, but the game itself is entirely different. To begin with this is a single-stick controlled game rather than the dual-stick control we had in Shooter, which makes it even more addictive and easy to control. And of course, you can only face to the right as you fly your craft! The only similarity really is that a handful of enemies from Shooter have been “re-imagined” for SideScroller, but to add to them we created a whole slew of new enemies and bosses for you to try to destroy also.

The back-story of the game is that SideScroller is the game the pilot of PixelJunk Shooter is playing on his old computer console in his ship on the way home to Earth after the ending of Shooter 2. This explains the cool “retro” look we have designed with the curved CRT (cathode ray tube) screen and the monochrome look of the interface. However, during its orbit of Apoxus Prime perhaps the computer has been infected… a little?

Some people reckon PixelJunk games are a little tough, and well… yes, they are a little because I think games should be a challenge. However, what we’ve done this time is scattered loads of checkpoints so even if you do die, you’ll restart really close, and we also give you the option to downgrade your difficulty setting if you get a Game Over too. We’ve created 4 difficulty levels so everyone is catered for (I hope!).

Oh and did I mention, the bosses are AWESOME! Maybe I should mention that again…

I’ve got to head off and start finishing off PixelJunk 4am, so I’m going to leave you with the really cool trailer for SideScroller we created (see above). Definitely check it out, because you might be able to spot one of the AWESOME bosses in there!

Remember everyone – October 25th!

In case this is the first time that you’ve seen the game, it’s time for a bit of background. Okabu is a co-op action-adventure following the adventures of two cloud-whale brothers, Kumulo and Nimbe. They’ve been dispatched from their aerial homelands to investigate the source of a toxic pollution that’s been poisoning their people.

As they reach the surface, they encounter four cloud-flying heroes, each with their own unique powers: from the Harpoon-wielding Captain Monkfish to the animal-charming powers of Picolo. Teaming up, they embark on an epic adventure to free their people and put a stop to the onward march of the industrialized Doza tribe.

Featuring a Platinum trophy, two player couch co-op, four expansive worlds, online leaderboards and four unique minigames, we hope Okabu is going to keep you busy for a LONG time!

If you’d like to find out a little more about the game, you can check out our previous posts on the PlayStation blog to meet the heroes, and find out about the gameplay and four worlds that make up the adventure. This game is also part of October’s Only on PSN program.

PULSE also previews the arcade shooting mayhem of PixelJunk: Sidescroller (which definitely brings back memories of arcades) and, in time for Halloween, the new inFAMOUS: Festival of Blood where Cole MacGrath puts a stake into the vampire craze.

The Top Ten features the most popular games so far this year. On the video side of things, check out the new Video Unlimited preview app where you’ll find the animated Batman: Year One and Green Lantern starring Ryan Reynolds.

Watch the full episode of PULSE right here, and in PlayStation Home, or download in HD to your PS3 (SD to your PSP) when the PlayStation Store updates later today.

Since we started development, a lot of people have commented on how much they love the music of Okabu, created by our very talented partners at Resonate. Liam and the Resonate team have blown us away with what they’ve managed to create, and they’ve made a behind-the-scenes video to give you a bit of background. I’ll let Music Director Liam Paton explain in his own words!

With the release of Okabu almost upon us, we wanted to share a short film that documents our last 12 months working on the soundtrack to the game. It has been such a great project to work on and hopefully the footage captures the fun that we had along the way.

Meeting and working with an amazingly talented group of musicians, learning to play the Kalimba properly and working out how to record six-feet wide Marimbas have been just some of the highlights of the year. It feels like a long time ago since Simon first showed us that early build of Okabu last October and it’s really exciting to know that people will soon be playing the results of everyone’s hard work.

So check out Okabu in the PlayStation Store tomorrow and also part of this month’s “Only on PSN” program – we really hope you enjoy it! We’d love to hear what you think of the game, so come say hello on Twitter and Facebook.

We got a slightly carried away during development, and the game ended up quite a bit bigger than we’d originally imagined. Personally I blame Shane (OKABU’s level designer), who kept on suggesting awesome new ideas that we felt we really couldn’t cut. As a result the four worlds are pretty huge, so big that OKABU features a Platinum Trophy, earned through tracking down all the medals throughout the story campaign, finding the numerous secrets tucked away throughout the world, as well as besting the four minigames.

Following on from last week’s post about the Heroes of OKABU, we really wanted to demonstrate how their different skills fit together, so we’ve got a fresh video below that shows longer sections of gameplay. It also shows how two players can work together when playing in Co-op mode.

In the video above, you can see clips from three of the four different worlds from the game. Each of the environments is totally unique, featuring a whole new set of elements to interact with, from giant magnifying glasses and railways, to charging goats and drivable bulldozers.

Lake Waka
The homeworld of the peaceful Yorubo tribe, bursting with exotic vegetation, inquisitive creatures and tropical shores. Its here that the adventure begins, as the Doza’s destructive march finally reaches the borders of the peaceful Yorubo.

Karibu Valley
Karibu Valley used to be a lush river delta, filled with a huge amount of marine life and surrounded by fertile fields. As the Doza stormed through the valley, they constructed an enormous dam, which stopped the flow of the Karibu river. As a result, the lands in the valley have almost dried up completely.

Noko Woods
Noko woods has been visited very little by the Yorubo since a party of adventurers disappeared there many generations ago. There have been rumours of Doza activity deep in the woods, and some strange creatures have been spotted nearby.

Doza Fortress
The homeworld of the Doza, the Fortress was constructed on a huge island. Filled with giant machinery, smog-belching factories, and a near-bottomless quarry, its here that the enslaved Yorubo are rumoured to have been transported.

There’s only a few more days until release, so not long to wait now! Don’t forget to check out the PlayStation Store on 18th October and try out the free demo on launch day. If you’d like to find out more about Okabu, you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook.