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SEGA extends Monkey Ball franchise to Revolution

SEGA's enormously popular Super Monkey Ball series will appear on Revolution at E3, the publisher announced this morning - joining Virtua Tennis 3 on a growing line-up of next-gen updates to critically acclaimed titles.

SEGA has announced the development of Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz for Revolution - due to go on display at E3 next month.

Banana Blitz is in development at SEGA Studios and takes advantage of the Revolution's unique freestyle controller; players will be able to jump by flicking the tip of the controller upward, and use it more directly in Whack-A-Mole and ring-toss inspired Party Games.

SEGA didn't specify when Banana Blitz is likely to be released, but they may simply be because Nintendo has asked publishers not to do so until it's had a chance to deliver its pre-E3 address.

SEGA creative director Matt Woodley said the Nintendo Revolution allowed developers to "explore the art of game design" in a unique way. "The new controller, in particular, gives the gamer unique control over their monkey's balls as well as over the mind boggling array of new gameplay styles that are in the game."

The Super Monkey Ball series began life on GameCube, subsequently branched out onto Game Boy Advance, PS2, Xbox and latterly Nintendo DS with varying degrees of success, but always drew a cult following for its acclaimed mixture of challenging mazes - which players had to navigate in a ball without falling into an abyss - and varied party activities, including boxing, billiards, hang-gliding and bowling. The series' solid reputation and the Revolution's promising credentials are likely to create a lot of buzz for Banana Blitz.

Banana Blitz joins Virtua Tennis 3 (PS3, Xbox 360) on SEGA's line-up of next-gen games at E3 - with more announcements to follow in the run-up to the show.

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Tom Bramwell

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Tom worked at Eurogamer from early 2000 to late 2014, including seven years as Editor-in-Chief.