Epic Games’ VP Mark Rein has made a quick post in the official UT forums and let everyone know that the PlayStation 3 version Unreal Tournament III is done, approved by Sony Computer Entertainment America and has been released to North American manufacturing. Rein estimates that the game will hit store shelves mid-December.

Mark Rein: “Midway has started talking to retailers to figure out exact timing and they will have a formal announcement early next week when everyone is back from the Thanksgiving holiday. My guess is that Midway will start shipping the title to North American retailers on Monday December 10th and it could show up in stores as early as December 11th but more likely toward the middle of that week.”

No such luck for UK and Europe though, gamers there will have to wait for ‘08: “..we have a few localization-related tasks to complete and then we should be starting the certification process pretty soon. My best guess is early next year (January or February) for the game to ship over there,” said Rein.

[See also: Unreal Tournament III gallery]