Iced tea & assorted refreshments, check; a replacement controller for the one he got a little ahead of himself and smashed through the coffee table last weekend, check — another quick shot of Adam Ferrando, who’s ready for the Nintendo 64 sleepover and promises he’ll keep it together this time. [via Pencil Mode]

Concept artist Adam ‘editmo.de‘ Ferrando turns the tables and lets the final bosses have their day in this faux Famicom cover art created for this year’s Famicase exhibit, an oft-covered perennial favorite.

See more of Ferrando’s concept work (including an alt-take on a Mega Drive Gauntlet cover) via his official portfolio site.

Though footage of its portable counterpart has made many appearances over past several months, above is the first glimpse of the Wii U version of Capcom’s Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, a revamped version of the Wii’s Monster Hunter Tri expected for both systems in March of next year.

Somewhat upstaging its previously featured & cartoonier breakdown of the game’s cross-play compatibility, the new video comes as the game makes its stateside debut at this weekend’s Comic Con, and is part of an apparently revamped push to make this entry in the franchise the one that might finally “stick” in the West, previous attempts never having received even a fraction of the traction they’ve managed in Japan.

Visit the newly rejuvenated official Twitter & Facebook pages to keep abreast of developments over the next several months.

Or, how to convince me that WayForward’s upcoming Nintendo 3DS game Adventure Time: Hey Ice King! Why’d you steal our garbage?! — pre-orderable in deluxe collector’s form and due for release in just over a month — might be as subversively funny as the show itself in a single screenshot.

New footage of the game is being shown off by the team in advance of its public appearance at this weekend’s New York Comic Con, including the trailer above, which shows off more gameplay throughout its heavily Zelda II-inspired world, and a handful of additional screenshots included below the fold.

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Looking every bit like an even further abstracted & awesomely organic take on Nintendo’s bit Generations cult-classic dotstream (the younger sibling of WiiWare’s light trax), Chalo Chalo is a new game from Sparpweed, the Dutch indies behind the recently featured co-op platformer ibb and obb.

Coming just as highly recommended by Vlambeer’s JW Nijman for local-multiplayer play as was the incredible Samurai Gunn, Chalo strips its courses to a single screen and replaces the slip-stream effect from dotstream with minimalist and vaguely Constructivist terrain that can either slow or speed your racer.

The game will also include additional items and powerups, which, as proved in the video above, can turn what initially seems like wild veering into instant reversals of fortune — an exploit that will likely get balanced out of the finished product.

Still heavily in development and having primarily been showcased as part of Dutch Game Garden’s Indigo exhibitions, you can follow Chalo‘s progress via Sparpweed’s blog here.

Seeing as how my previous post on low-poly masters Geo A Day seemed to go great guns in propelling their art into the wider sphere, let’s see if we can’t do the same with this gorgeous nightscape from Voyager3, a work-in-progress by Australia’s Brendan ‘bjzaba_‘ Zabarauskas, that’s eschewing G-A-D’s filtered luminosity for razor-sharp vectors, to just as beautiful results (zoom in here for full-crispness).

See more of Zabarauskas & co.’s ongoing sketches & experiments at the Voyager3 blog or via his flickr, all of which is hugely inspiring world building.

Because it’s always a great day when new Superbrothers art comes your way, presented here is Vending Machine, a new illustration for a Washington Post article profiling Eyjólfur Guðmundsson, in-game economist for Eve Online, and newly hired Valve economist Yanis Varoufakis.

Freshly updated, and thus providing me the perfect opportunity to give it my highest recommendation, is Etienne Perin’s Gauge, a game hasn’t seemed to receive the attention it richly deserves, even after some six months on the market.

Like Terry Cavanagh’s Super Hexagon, it’s a game that knows exactly what it is and does that one thing with fantastic style. In this case, that thing is a single-input interaction that asks players to press the screen to widen a loading-bar style ‘gauge’, coming as close to the outer edge without touching it as possible for the highest score, and never allowing it to fully drop back to its center walls.

Touching either edge will cause you to lose a life, an obstacle that would seem to be easily avoided, were it not for the fact that, over time, the game taunts you with bonus point lines that emerge from the center, tempting you to drop back just pixels away from death, before going on to distract your laser focus with epileptic and ‘psychédélic’ effects.

Though its new update has refreshed its difficulty curve, as well as added “new jokes”, a new ending for players that reach 35 billion points, and a “newborn baby mode” (“for the babiiiiiizzzz!!! LOL”), what’s good about Gauge now is the same thing that was always good about Gauge: it’s risk and reward stripped bare and self-aware, as compulsive and (through Game Center leaderboards) fiercely competitive as all the iPhone’s finest.

Better still, the bulk of Gauge is available as a free download, with an in-game upgrade to unlock all the extra modes that play off the basic formula with limited tap and limited time runs, making it a true iOS essential. [Gauge, App Store; Etienne Perin’s homepage]

As much ink has been spilled on the seemingly senseless slaughter in Dennaton’s Hotline Miami as has blood in the game itself, but not nearly enough attention has been given to its sounds. Early demo versions of the game included a playlist of music both officially licensed and not — some having been placed in-game to set the mood as development progressed.

What has been announced is that the entirety of 2011’s MOON EP, from Boston musician Stephen Gilarde, aka |M|O|O|N|, will be providing the backdrop for much of its action.

Mastered in part at LCD Soundsystem front man James Murphy’s DFA Studio (and sounding every bit the part), the EP is streamable below via Gilarde’s bandcamp, where you can name your price for a download of the album in anticipation of the game’s October 23rd release.

As previously mentioned, also making an appearance on the score is artist & musician Niklas Åkerblad, whose Do Not Lay Waste To Homes… EP is also already up for sale on bandcamp, and is most noteworthy for Daisuke, the laid back beats of which have already made it into the game’s trailer.

And finally, placed here for good measure: Sun Araw‘s Horse Steppin, which hasn’t been confirmed for inclusion, but which made a perfect wind-down counterpoint to the early demo’s disco-death — a song which seems to drip and melt through the cracks between the game’s neon-lit nightscape pixels.

Unexpectedly probably the news I’ve found myself most excited for today, Sega’s just officially announced that ToeJam & Earl — the 1990s roguelike relic that’s honestly not lost a lick of its appeal some 21 (!) years later — will be repackaged for download this November for XBLA and PSN, most importantly bringing online co-op to the game for the first time ever.

The XBLA release will also package in side-scrolling sequel Panic In Funkotron, purchased separately on PSN. Interested parties can take a time-trip back another 10 years and revisit TJ&E Productions’ similarly sort-of antiquated tribute site to all games in the series, released alongside the Xbox exclusive ToeJam & Earl III, which was much more inventive & approachable than most gave it credit for at the time, and wouldn’t at all be another good candidate for re-release.