Xbox 2 to come late this year

A LEAKED press release from industry Dahlings and would-be world-dominators Electronic Arts has let slip that Xbox 2 will be hitting late this year, just in time for the next versions of Burnout and Need For Speed.

According to a filing at SPOnG, the next version of Need For Speed - subtitled Most Wanted - will be making its way onto Xbox, PS2, GameCube, PC, PSP, Nintendo DS and willl have a "...simultaneous ship with the Xbox2 platform."

The time frame certainly makes sense - we're all expecting Gates' next wonderbox before the end of this year, and the massive Q4 success of Burnout 3 would put it on track for a sequel same time, same place.

We called EA for a comment, but every single one of their myriad of press officers was out of the office or away from their desk. Crisis management?

In other Xbox news, Xbit has an interview with Nvidia, in which the green machine gives away some of the details of its deal with Sony for the PS3. While Nvidia told us a while back that making the Xbox 2 chip was a mugs game, since Microsoft wanted to license the chip technology and there was no money in licensing, it turns out that Sony are licensing the PS3 chip from Nvidia. Mugs? µ