The PlayStation Video Store first came to our attention back at E3 2008, when it was simultaneously announced and launched during the Sony press conference.

It took until November 2009 for the Video Store to hit European shores, so we decided to take it for a little more than the usual test drive and see if we could live on just the Video Store for our movie viewing needs for a month.

Here’s the story of what happened…

Last week, as many of you following the #MAG256 tag on Twitter will know (and if you’re not following @PS3Attitude, now would be a good time to do so), we and 127 other gamers were invited to try out MAG.

A mixture of journalists and community members battled it out through the day, leading up to a 256-player match against Zipper, the developers behind the new FPS on the block.

Whilst we received our review copy of the game the very next day, the servers to allow play weren’t switched on at the time, so we have decided to do something a little different with our MAG review.

We’re an ever-expanding team here at PS3 Attitude, and today we’d like to share the news that four new writers are joining the team.

Volunteering to write in order that we can help generate as much charity money as possible in 2010 (and beyond), these four intrepid souls will be brightening your day with PlayStation news, views, reviews and interviews alongside our existing team of Staff Writers.

Twitter is a wonderful thing.

Within the tweets of our feed you get to read all sorts of ‘behind-the-scenes’ info, enter exclusive competitions and read random goodness. Heck, you can even follow various members of the PS3 Attitude team too, finding out what makes them tick.

Some of us check out each and every one of our followers to find out more about the people that read PS3 Attitude, and it was during a recent ‘catch up’ session that we found the most brilliant sculpture we’ve seen in a long time.

It is that time of year when we ask you for a few moments in your busy lives to vote on those games, developers and DLC content that made you happy through the last year.

2009 was a stellar year for the PlayStation 3 and now is your chance to tell us what you really thought stood out. And this year, every person that votes can win one of a number of cool prizes…

PS3 Attitude will be taking a break from providing you, our dear readers, with the latest PS3 news and articles for the next few days.

Whilst the team will no doubt get bored with their presents and put up a story or two, the official line is that we’ll be away on the 25th through to and including the 28th December, and we’ll fall silent once again on the 1st January (just for a day).

But before we go, we’ve got something to tell you…

Assassin’s Creed was an interesting game for so many reasons.

Whether it was the incessant hype machine that rolled into every town, the column inches gained by the (mostly) bulletproof Jade Raymond, the promise of new and interesting game mechanics or the simple fact that it was the second fastest selling brand-new IP in video game history, everything that surrounded the game was intriguing.

Ultimately, however, the game itself didn’t deliver fully on all these promises and was labelled ‘repetitive and monotonous’ by many. So how has the sequel, backed up by a much lower-key but more focused marketing offensive, measured up?

Welcome to the latest in our exclusive CelebReview series.

Instead of being written by the awesome volunteers that help run PS3 Attitude, these reviews and stories have been created by various well-known public figures, world-renowned gamers and media personalities.

Today, the world’s #1 ranked PS3 CoD4 Pro Gamer, Dennis ‘zDD’ Dozier, gives us a two part review of both Modern Warfare 2 and the new SplitFish FragFX Pro controller.

Over the last two months, a number of people working at the Foster City First Party Quality Assurance have known they are living on borrowed time as SCEA look to consolidate their team.

The news that 30 full time positions were to be axed broke recently as Patrick Seybold confirmed the strategic plans for the region, but the contract position losses were unclear. PS3 Attitude can now reveal, thanks to an inside source, the extent of the cuts.

Dante’s Inferno will be getting the ‘reverse movie tie-in’ treatment in February 2010 with the release of Dante’s Inferno: The Animated Movie.

Following the critical success of Dead Space: Downfall, also released by Film Roman in association with EA, this DVD and Blu-ray movie release already reminds us of another project from back in 2003.

And trust us, that is no bad thing.

Welcome to the first in a new series of articles here at PS3 Attitude.

Instead of being written by the awesome volunteers that help run PS3 Attitude, these reviews and stories have been created by various well-known public figures, world-renowned gamers and media personalities.

First up is a review of SingStar Motown, written by Ortis Deley, all round good egg and presenter on Channel Five’s ‘The Gadget Show’ in the UK.

We recently had the pleasure of being interviewed for the Official PlayStation Magazine (UK) podcast, and we talk about what it takes to run PS3 Attitude and why we took the opportunity to make the venture a 100% charitable affair.

We’ve also discuss with OPM our future plans and how you can get involved in helping us expand and improve.

Dylan Cuthbert first came to this writer’s attention back before the PlayStation 3 was even an electrical impulse in the mind of Ken Katuragi.

Dropping out of school at 16 years of age to join Jez San’s Argonaut Software, he became one of the leading lights behind 3D gaming as we know it today. After spells with Nintendo and Sony, Dylan went on to found his own company – Q-Games – which has had success in 2D gaming, rather than the three dimensions Dylan made his name with.

On Tuesday this week, Dylan will speak to PS3 Attitude in our first ever live Twitter interview…

Please give a warm welcome to our latest Contributor, Cleric20.

You may recognise his moniker, because Cleric20 has written guest articles for PS3 Attitude in the past. Also owner of movie review site, Dark Matters, he has often provided us with great game-based movie reviews, such as the recent Gamer.

We went to the launch party. We drank the free booze. We were impressed with the PS3 and PSP iterations of the new Video Store.

Now, you can do one of those three things, as the PlayStation Video Store has gone live in Europe.

The Sony Ericsson Aino is the first mobile phone to include the PSP’s Remote Play functionality, allowing you access to your PS3 whilst you are away from home.

With an 8.1 megapixel camera and a new (for Sony Ericsson) touch-screen interface, it would seem that this phone is perfect for any PS3 owner. But is that really the case?

Square Enix have announced today, via a special video trailer on the official website, that Final Fantasy XIII will be released in Europe (plus other PAL territories) and North America on 9th March 2010.

In addition to the launch date, the game’s theme song is to be provided by X-Factor winner Leona Lewis.

You know we love competitions here at PS3 Attitude, what with our weekly Twitter-based PSFree Attitude feature, and today we have a storming giveaway for you.

By entering our competition between now and Friday 20th November (17:00 UK time) you can get your hands on one of ten great SEGA prize packs.

So what’s included, and how do you enter?

During Eurogamer Expo in London last week, the wonderful people at Relentless Software allowed us 90 minutes of hands-on time to take their first self-published title, Blue Toad Murder Files, for a full spin.

We managed to get through the entire first episode of the forthcoming whodunnit-em-up. So how does the game stack up? And did we manage to pick the right suspect?