This Friday from 11:30-1:00pm PST, you’ll have a chance to play Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix on XBOX Live against the glorious “Team Capcom.” Including such luminaries as Frank, Alicia, Sven, Seth, and Brian, there may also be an appearance by Chris T., the self-proclaimed “official Capcom Puzzle Fighter champion.”

Brian has graciously allowed us to rack up the losses on his gamertag, so look for “BadBoodah77” on XBL and try to take it easy on us.

See you Friday!

Think you’ve got the right stuff in Puzzle Fighter? Whether you’re an old-school pro or a novice with a knack for gem-smashing, you can see how your stats stack up against the rest of the best. The leaderboards are currently for the Xbox 360 version only. You can view the top 50 players in both X and X-prime modes, sorted by top players that week, as well as overall. How many other downloadable games have online leaderboards the day after a game launches? It’s because we love you (and we also think we’re pretty good at Puzzle Fighter).

Read more about the Leaderboards on Brian’s Blog

…or just jump straight to the Leaderboards!

With Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix hitting Xbox Live today and PlayStation Network tomorrow, the gem-smashing action is sure to be hot and heavy. Once you’ve had a chance to wet your whistle and build some giant gems, check out this quick primer on how to understand the game at a slightly deeper level. This is truly one of the greatest competitive puzzle titles of all time, so once you’ve got a handle on the basics, you can open your eyes to some of the nitty-gritty that makes this game so much fun for serious players as well as first-timers.

Puzzle Fighter Strategy Guide

I dunno about the rest of you, but personally Ive been waiting on this one for a while! So with no further ado, Capcom is proud to announce Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix for download on XBL and PSN!

Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix downloads Capcoms incredibly popular puzzle game into the new generation. This fall, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo comes to Xbox LIVE Arcade, PLAYSTATION Network and PC in its greatest incarnation to date. The new version of the game features newly created 1080p HD graphics, several new game modes, improved game balance, new stage backgrounds courtesy of Udon Entertainment and online play.

Release Date: August 29, 2007 (Xbox LIVE Arcade), August 30, 2007 (PLAYSTATION Network), TBD (PC)

Genre: Puzzle
Platform: Xbox LIVE Arcade, PLAYSTATIONNetwork, PC Rating: E for Everyone
Developer: Backbone Entertainment-Emeryville
Price: $10.00 or 800 Microsoft Points (Xbox LIVE Arcade)

Game Description:
One of the most addictive games of all time has just gotten better! Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix downloads Capcoms incredibly popular puzzle game into the new generation. Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix comes to Xbox LIVE Arcade, PLAYSTATIONNetwork and PC in its greatest incarnation to date, featuring enhanced 1080p HD graphics, several new game modes, improved game balance, and online play.

In Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix, players compete in intense versus battles of wit and speed. As a linked pair of gems descends from the top of the screen, players move and rotate them to form groups and piles of the same color. By destroying these groups of gems with either a crash or rainbow gem, players can send counter gems to fall onto their hapless rival. When the opponents screen is filled up and no more moves are available, the player wins the game.

Features:

• Three different gameplay options:X-Mode: play in classic Puzzle Fighter style,Y-Mode: gems automatically break when three or more gems of the same color line up in a row vertically, horizontally, or diagonally, Z-Mode: players move a 2×2 cursor around the screen rotating the positions of the highlighted gems; more gems are added from below, moving all the current gems toward the top
• Game balance options for X-Mode: Original X-Mode or a newly rebalanced X mode that makes every character a compelling choice
• Counter Gem Edit allows players to create their own drop pattern
• Multiple online gameplay options:Ranked Match using the TrueSkill system players are matched 1-on-1 based on their ranking points, Player Match non-ranked, casual Quarter Match setup allows players to view ongoing matches and stand by to become the next challenger
• Worldwide rankings and leaderboard

Super Puzzle Fighter HD Remix has been approved by both first parties and as promised we will be doing a near-simultaneous release.

XBLA – August 29th – 800 points
PlayStation Network – August 30th – $10.00

You may commence with the trash talk.

Can’t get enough Puzzle Fighting? Read along as producer David Sirlin takes you on an in-depth tour of the thought processes behind the rebalanced mode in the new Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo: HD Remix edition (and if you don’t like the changes, no worries, the original mode is still there too!)

My high level goal was to change as little as possible because the original game is very well-designed and fun. I would even go as far as saying it’s the single best competitive puzzle game. That said, it does have a problem: only 2 of the 11 characters are playable in a serious match. I did not want to get into any deep changes with the underlying formulas or rules becausecharacter balance asidethe game is very good already. So, I restricted myself to changing only three variables: 1) drop patterns, 2) damage scaling per character, and 3) the “diamond trick.”

You can the read the whole thing on David’s blog.

SPFIITHDR’s release is just around the corner, and if you’re gaming on the 360, you know what that means… 200 more achievement points! In all, there are 12 possible achievements. Here are the first six easier achievements, their descriptions, and how many points you’ll score.

Come back next week as we reveal the other six more difficult achievements.

Brian is running a poll over on the Digital Blog asking for your favorite Puzzle Fighter characters to compile into a Xbox 360 Gamer Picture Pack and for Dashboard themes, in time with the imminent release of Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix.

Hop on over now to the Digital Blog and throw in your vote in the comments.

My vote is on Dan!

Brian’s Capcom Digital Blog now has up a hi-resolution Super Puzzle Fighter II HD Remix wallpaper featuring Ken and Ryu for you to download.

Brian also let’s slip that the release date for SPFIIHDR is sometime next month.

Grab the wallpaper from the Digital Blog.

Our customer service department is alerting us to a potential conflict between the latest PSP firmware, version 3.5, and Capcom Puzzle World (most notably Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo) that may cause the title to crash.

This issue appears to be similar to the same issues that we experienced previously with PSP firmware versions 3.3 and earlier, which was fixed with firmware version 3.4.

We are aware of this issue, and are working with Sony on possible fixes as quickly as we can.