We're fast approaching the final week of Sony's PS Vita sale on the PlayStation Store. A large number of games have been discounted over the last fortnight, and since all the deals will be valid until July 4th, we've rounded up the whole shebang below!

Highlights of the last few weeks include Motorstorm RC for £3.99, Rayman Origins for £19.99, Touch My Katamari for £11.99 and many others. This week's selection mainly focuses on minis and PSP titles, but there are still a few decent promotions such as Persona 3 Portable for £13.99.

Click here for the full list of promotions >>

After an uncomfortable week of rumours, Sony has officially announced that first-party studio Zipper Interactive has been shut down. The developers behind the SOCOM series, MAG and Unit 13 fell victim to a "normal cycle of resource re-alignment," which presumably means that many of the 80 employees may be found new positions within Sony Computer Entertainment.

It's PWNCAST day, folks! This week we gush about Journey, rip Syndicate a new one, discuss the big GDC debate surrounding modern Japanese games, take a look at the Kara traiiler, and ask if Peter Molyneux is better off without Microsoft breathing down his neck. It's the usual mish-mash of industry insight, witty (and not-so-witty) banter, sexy fun times, and we have another competition in store for you.

Yes, that's right, we found an extra Xbox 360 copy of Mass Effect 3 floating around after our Tiwtter party earlier this week. So listen in to the podcast to find out how you could be in with a chance of winning.

NB. The competition will close at noon on Thursday 15th March.

PWNCAST | Season 1: Episode 5 - Recorded: March 9th, 2012

Topics include:

• Unit 13
• Journey
• Mass Effect 3
• Syndicate
• Inafune vs. Modern Japanese development
• That Kara trailer
• Molyneux's departure

...and much more!

Parental Advisory: We've tried to keep it as conversational and informal as possible and you should be warned that there may be some few instances of strong language.

Click below to play the file, or right click on the banner and select 'Save Link As' to download the file onto your hard drive.

Want more? Check out the rest of our PWNCAST posts onsite, hit us up on iTunes, or subscribe to the PWNCAST Feed here.

Trine 2 will finally be hitting the PSN Store this week after months of certification delays, and to celebrate, Sony has announced a temporary sale for the sensational puzzler. We awarded a 9/10 score to Frozenbyte's puzzly platformer in our Trine 2 review, and you should jump at the chance to nab it for £6.49. The deal gets even sweeter if you happen to be a Plus subscriber, since you'll be able to download it for absolutely nothing.

Plus members will also be able to snag themselves Sly Raccoon HD, Jet Rider, Farm Frenzy 2 and The Impossible Game for free over the next seven days.

In other news, Mass Effect 3 will be releasing digitally on Friday at the laughable price of £49.99, along with PS Vita shooter Unit 13. Brendan recently gave it 7/10, suggesting that a few flaws hold back an otherwise accomplished downloadable title from Zipper Interactive.

As always, we have the full roundup after the break - but I won't hold it against you if you decide to head over to the EU PlayStation Blog instead. It's cool. I'd understand.

Platform: PS Vita

Developer: Zipper Interactive

Publisher: Sony

Third-person shooters were something to be avoided on the PSP, but thanks to the Vita’s second analogue stick we can now safely embrace the genre on a handheld device. Unit 13 comes from Zipper Interactive, the team behind the Socom games, most recently the impressive Socom: Special Forces, so there’s potential here.

Despite Zipper’s last game having a decent plot, this game is very much business only and broken up into individual missions with no story at all. Essentially, you pick one specialist from the unit and get dropped into a level to kill terrorists, kill leaders, kill intel, I mean pick up intel and diffuse bombs. Standard 9-5 counter-terrorism.

Stages vary in length and will often have different parameters affecting difficulty. Some won’t have checkpoints (will cause rage) and no regenerating health and others will have a time limit. Thankfully there are more relaxed ones with checkpoints and regenerating health.

Sony have unveiled their European launch lineup for the Playstation Vita, and it looks pretty damn strong. Four killer app names are in there - Uncharted, WipEout, ModNation Racers and MotorStorm - and there are a couple of other titles that should whet the appetite.

Zipper Interactive has announced a new third person shooter entitled Unit 13, which will hit somewhere "around" the PS Vita's European launch date on February 22nd.

Expect loads of unlockable guns, crunchy rock music, slick graphics and people saying "stay sharp" every ten seconds. We've got the launch trailer after the break.