SEGA's E3 striptease has revealed the first interesting news since Monkey Ball 3, namely Virtua Fighter 5, a dazzling PlayStation 3 exclusive. The press release announcing the game is a bit light on information, though it does outline two new characters, "El Blaze and Eileen. El Blaze is a Mexican fighting champion who defeats opponents with his quick Lucha Libre fighting style. Eileen, originally from China, uses a Monkey Kung-Fu fighting style that she learned from her grandfather, a former Kung-Fu master."

SEGA pledges the game will be on show at E3, though not available to play. We will, of course, sniff around for any behind closed doors hands-on, though there is a good chance VF5 - as with so many PlayStation 3 showings - will not be running in playable form.

As you'll see from the screens, AM2's latest fighter - under the guidance of Yu Suzuki - is again aimed at being a graphical milestone, as the screens to the right portray, running at a steady 720P. And before we delve into filler text, we should tell you that Japanese journalists close to SPOnG had been assuring us that Microsoft was courting SEGA for the rights to VF5, meaning that Sony must have dropped a serious cheque to scoop this classic update.

If we manage to get hands-on with VF5 this week, we'll write about it, post it on the Internet, and you can read about it here.

By Erica Pemberton