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New screens of Lumines II, which will feature full music videos

Alas, Black Eyed Peas make the cut

New screens of Lumines II, which will feature full music videos
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PSP
| Lumines II

We love Lumines. We love its legendary designer Tetsuya Mizuguchi (indeed, in another life, I invited him to speak at last week's Develop games conference). So we'll just have to trust him when he puts the Black Eyed Peas' Pump It into his much-anticipated Lumines II.

The sequel will be the first handheld title to include streaming music videos (in much the same way Sony's SingStar does on PlayStation 2). Artists we approve of getting the Lumines II treatment include The Go! Team, Junior Senior and Beck.

"We needed to find music and videos with just the right tone, mix and energy to incorporate into the game," said Mr Mizuguchi, without explicitly justifying the Peas. "I couldn't be happier with the result and am excited to get the game into players' hands."

The complete video listing looks like this:

Beck – Black Tambourine Black Eyed Peas – Pump It Chemical Brothers – Star Guitar Fatboy Slim – Gangster Trippin' The Go! Team – Bottle Rocket Gwen Stefani – Hollaback Girl Hoobastank – Born to Lead Junior Senior – Take My Time Missy Elliott – Lose Control New Order – (TBC)

Two additional songs will also appear on the game's soundtrack –Junkie XL's Breezer and Stigmato Inc's Reality Check – and the game also features music from Japanese artist Shinichi Osawa (known as MONDO GROSSO), who provided the blissful opening track, Shining, for the original Lumines, as well as fellow Japanese performers Ken Ishii and TECHRIDERS.

Some 60 skins, wireless two-player ad hoc gameplay, all new battle modes, and new 3D backgrounds and graphics complete the picture.

We're just hoping the music videos don't undo the classic Lumines experience – and we should find out by the end of the year. Click 'Track It!' to be alerted when we review Lumines II (assuming we can tear ourselves away from it, or swallow back our tears…)