Round-Up: Halo 2 Box Dispute, Game Art Book, MG Ac!d 2 Scope

Today's distinctly Friday-themed round-up features a packaging firm suing Microsoft over Halo 2, a new game art book, and perhaps the oddest peripheral at the Tokyo Game Show, as well as today's product news and Gamasutra job postings. - Microsoft has come under fire from Scandanavian firm Glud and Marstrand, which alleges that Microsoft broke NDAs and revealed trade secrets in the creation of the packaging for its Halo 2 limited edition. G&M apparently met with Microsoft at the game publisher's request to discuss a possible metal casing for the game, only to go with another firm instead. G&M claims that the other firm used information supplied to it by Microsoft that broke the company's NDA over the process for the metal packaging. G&M has filed suit against Microsoft in Washington court over the allegations. - Assouline Publishing has announced the upcoming release of Video Game Art, an examination of the history and influences of video game art. Written and curated by Nic Kelman, the project takes a cultural and artistic rather than technical approach to its discussion of video game art. The book will include commentary from industry artists as well as examples of their work, including some rare and unpublished pieces. Video Game Art will retail for $29.95 when it's released this October. - Konami will be packaging a unique peripheral with each copy of Metal Gear Ac!d 2 when it's released this December in Japan: a scope enabling players to see certain scenes in 3D. The scope device, which resembles an opthamology test, clips to the PSP for users to bring it up directly to their faces. The scope seems somewhat unwieldy, but Konami has said that the version on display at this week's Tokyo Game Show is only a prototype, and they hope to make the final retail version less bulky. No word has yet come out of a possibility for a U.S. release of the scope. - Also updated today: product news including Graphic Remedy's release of gDEBugger 2.0, and today's Gamasutra job postings, including new positions from Blue Fang Games, Eidos, Electronic Arts, EA Canada, Gameloft, Heavy Iron Studios, LucasArts, Nvidia, Pandemic Studios, Point Of View, Pseudo Interactive, Spark Unlimited, and Waterford Research Institute.