The latest update to Tiny Tower adds costumes, new features, and borrows a few of GamePro’s awesome ideas.

The latest update to Tiny Tower brings some welcome improvements. And a few of those improvements are things we already suggested.

Of course, sitting around complaining about things we want is a lot easier than actually making them happen, so we’re not going to demand a cut of Tiny Towers profits…this time. But here’s a list of what’s been added to the game:

• NEW ELEVATOR!
• New bitizen dressup menu including new costumes!
• Business floors can now be upgraded to hold more stock.
• Real Estate VIPs now fill all empty bedrooms in a floor.
• Added new Residential floor.
• Increased the dream job bonus to 2 bux.
• Fixed bug causing neighbors view to crash when friends had emoji chars in their name.
• Fixed bug causing music to play even when sounds are off.-
• Added demand percentage numbers to stats screen.

And even if you don’t have a smartphone, you can get in on part of the creative fun: NimbleBit has set up an online character creator right here.

As a parody of modern crime shows like CSI and NCIS, the Naked Gun game is set to reimagine the classic franchise for a new audience. But will it be successful?

Surely, you’re joking. The classic Naked Gun comedy series is coming back as a Facebook game?

While it might not be remotely timely, and it looks like they’re going for a lot more gross-out, web humor than the pun-filled exploits of the films, this is a real thing. Set to coincide with the Blu-Ray release of The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad, the game will be an episodic adventure game “across multiple platforms.” While the game’s official site promises that it will mix, “adventure game mechanics with addictive social gaming features,” it’s unclear exactly what type of game The Naked Gun: International Crime Unit Police will be. (Yes, ICUP…we get it.)

And don’t call me Shirley.

I’m willing to try the free-to-play first episode out, but I’m not ready to wholeheartedly support the project. After all, it lacks the likeness of the real Frank Drebin: Leslie Nielsen.

A couple who love their dog and occasionally cosplay made a wise and adorable decision: they brought their dog along to Baltimore’s Otakon 2011 dressed as Okami’s Amaterasu.

Rather than leave their dog Dante in a boarding house for five days, one couple decided to bring their fluffy white canine along on their trip to Otakon 2011, dressing him as Amaterasu from Okami. Keeping both comfort and stability in mind, Dante’s owner crafted a harness, wings, a shield, and flames to resemble Clover Studio’s likeness of the sun goddess, in the form of a white wolf. What’s more, everything about this proves that GamePro needs an office Samoyed.

A detailed description of the process can be found on the “Philosophy, Cosplay, World Domination” blog Practical Evil.

OnLive’s game streaming service is up and running in the UK and Europe, but at this time only free trials are accessible.

Eurogamer recently revealed that game streaming service OnLive was headed to the UK, with the official launch set to coincide with September’s Eurogamer Expo. Attendees to the show would be in with a chance of receiving one of “thousands” of the service’s MicroConsole systems, allowing them access to OnLive through their TV.

Turns out the service has been activated for the UK a little sooner than anticipated. UK players, when attempting to download the OnLive client, used to be confronted with a message saying that the service was unavailable in their region. Now, however, they can download the client for PC or Mac, set up an account and access the service with no problems — the only thing they can’t do at this time is add a credit card to their account, as currently the service only accepts cards with U.S. or Canadian addresses. This doesn’t stop UK players from making use of the service’s community features or taking advantage of the 30-minute free trials available for many available games, however.

If you’re in the UK and you’re interested in using OnLive when it launches on September 22, it might be a good idea to sign up now and reserve your account name.

Thanks to Ross “ThreeSpoons” McNeil for the tip-off.

Trion Worlds’ upcoming massively multiplayer online real time strategy game End of Nations will be released using the increasingly popular free to play business model.

Trion Worlds’ End of Nations, developed by the team behind the original Command & Conquer, is looking like excellent fun — Jason had a blast (literally) with it in our recent preview. Today, Trion Worlds has dropped the bombshell that the game will be free to play, lending further weight to the theory that the business model is maturing nicely — and that “free to play” doesn’t have to mean “substandard in quality.”

“Being able to offer a premium game such as End of Nations for free sets us apart in this industry,” said Dave Luehmann, vice president of third party development at Trion Worlds. “At Trion, we strive to innovate online gaming while emphasizing the delivery of the best core gameplay experience available. Our decision to release End of Nations as a AAA free to play title is guided by these principles.”

All players will have access to the full game, including its single player/co-op campaign, for free. Trion hasn’t yet revealed specific plans for premium items in the game, but there will be retail and digital-only Collector’s Editions available. There will also be a monthly subscription program, apparently offering “extra value and convenience.” Trion notes in its official FAQ that the game will not be “pay to win” — the premium subscription and items are “about value, but not about gameplay advantage,” apparently.

End of Nations doesn’t yet have a specific release date, but you can find out more about it on the official website.

Server activity quadrupled and game revenues doubled during the first month of Age of Conan’s adoption of the free to play business model.

Funcom announced back in May that Age of Conan would be going free to play this summer. That change in business strategy for the game has now been live for a month — and it’s paid off for Funcom bigtime.

“The launch of the hybrid business model has been very successful so far,” said Funcom CEO Trond Arne Aas. “The activity levels on the servers are booming with a fourfold increase in players during July. We more than doubled the revenue generated from the game, and we have experienced a positive development in subscriber numbers. This definitely gives us great hope for the game’s future.”

The new hybrid business model for the game sees it free to play with optional premium content and subscriptions offering additional areas to explore and benefits for paying customers. In celebration of the new-found success of the game as well as the upcoming Conan movie, the team has been hard at work developing a movie tie-in adventure pack named “Savage Coast of Turan.” This will feature new world areas, monsters, characters and equipments from the movie, set to release on August 18.

“We are delighted to see the success of Age of Conan: Unchained,” said executive producer and game director Craig Morrison. “We have been working hard to show that we are one of the best and most unique MMO experiences on the market. Our focus now is to deliver even more content and new experiences to players, starting with the movie tie-in adventure pack that is launching in the near future.”

You can try out Age of Conan: Unchained for free right now.

In an admirable example of literal titling, Larian Studios’ upcoming game Dragon Commander sees you commanding dragons in an attempt to conquer the Divinity universe.

You might not be overly familiar with Larian Studios, but the Belgian developer has been quietly beavering away since 1996. Its best-known titles are the Divinity series, most recently seen on PC and consoles in the form of Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga.

Today, the developer has unveiled its latest project: Dragon Commander, a strategy game set in the Divinity universe.

Casting players in the role of the Dragon Knights, players will command armies in an attempt to conquer the empire. Divinity’s trademark combination of high fantasy with elements of art nouveau and steampunk sees players making use of both magic and technology to advance their own war effort — and also dragons.

“We’ve been dreaming about a project like this for many years, and fresh from the success of our latest game we realized that there is nothing that holds us back any longer,” said Swen Vincke, game director for Dragon Commander. “The new game blends together our favorite genres and themes. [...] We have role-playing, we have strategy and we have exploration… and we have plenty of dragons. We also feel that we have finally discovered how dragon combat can work well in a game. We’re pretty much breaking new ground here, and we’re very much determined to surprise the players with what we’ll offer in this game.”

Further details will be revealed during Gamescom next week.

Disgaea series character designer Takehito Harada and musician Tenpei Satou are reportedly working on a new title for release early next year.

The Disgaea series is known for its quirky sense of humor and memorable character designs. Speaking at the Akihabara Denkigai Festival event in Tokyo, Nippon Ichi CEO Sohei Niikawa announced that two of the most influential figures behind the series’ distinctiveness — character designer Takehito Harada and musician Tenpei Satou — were working on a new project. The new title is an action RPG set to arrive early next year in Japan, and will be formally announced towards the end of September of this year.

No further details on the game were given, though one piece of artwork (shown above, courtesy of Impress Watch) was shown and a brief sample of music was played. The platform on which players could expect the new title was not revealed, though Niikawa reportedly told Japanese publication Dengeki that the game would feature full polygon visuals. That doesn’t really narrow it down these days, though.

During the event, Nippon Ichi also confirmed a remake of Disgaea 3 in time for Vita’s launch, whenever that might be. The new port, dubbed Disgaea 3 Return, will include enhancements such as close-up character portraits as well as all the DLC from the PS3 version.

Thanks, Andriasang.

Gaming on modern smartphones and tablets is awesome, until you come across a title where touchscreen controls won’t cut it. Enter a new solution for Android devices.

PC World reports that thanks to a new $1.65 app, gamers with Android devices can now use PS3 Sixaxis and DualShock 3 controllers with their favorite games.

You’ll need a rooted Android device that is compatible with the Bluetooth protocol used by the PS3 controllers. If you’re not sure you have that, there’s a convenient free app to help you check.

Once you’ve done this, fire up a copy of either SixaxisPairTool or MotionInJoy, plug in your PS3 controller via USB and make a note of the Bluetooth address. Then fire up the Sixaxis app on your Android device, enter the Bluetooth address into the app, unplug your controller from USB and hit the PS button.

Congratulations! If you’re doing this with an Android phone, you now have a controller that’s bigger than the screen you’re playing on — unless, of course, you use an HDMI cable like in the video above. Now you can get to enjoying all those legally-acquired ROMs of retro games without using a control scheme that makes you want to scream.

The Bemani series, widely credited with popularizing the rhythm action genre, is back with a brand new iOS title.

1997′s Beatmania for PlayStation is probably the game you can blame for the plastic instrument craze. Coming packaged with a turntable and keyboard controller, it’s often credited with popularizing the rhythm action genre in Japan, even though PaRappa the Rapper technically got there first in 1996. Since that time, the Bemani series, named for its development team within Konami, has evolved through Dance Dance Revolution, Guitar Freaks and numerous others.

The most recent entry in the series to hit American audiences is Jukebeat, now available for iOS devices.

Based on the rhythmic tapping of squares in a grid, Jukebeat is a port of a Japanese arcade machine known as Jubeat. The iOS version doesn’t feature the licensed music of the arcade original, but it does offer remixes of tracks from Contra, Frogger and Lethal Enforcers for free, with four additional track packs, each containing four songs, currently available for $3.99 each.

It seems the rhythm action genre is making something of a comeback on iOS devices, with recent weeks seeing the release of EBA-inspired Osu!Stream and Groove Coaster, and January of this year seeing the release of WINtA from Parappa the Rapper creator Masaya Matsuura.

Check out Jukebeat for free via the App Store.