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Microsoft hasn’t been shying away from the competition lately. Last week they finally hit a home run with an ad for Windows Phone. So here’s one highlighting the strengths of Bing over Google. It also happens to showcase a killer, but underused feature of Windows Phone. Videos below.

The following videos aren’t HD. Sorry, we got them from a reader before they were hidden from the Bing YouTube account. They were prematurely posted there, but not before our man grabbed them for us. Check them out.

A common complaint among most of you is that Microsoft sometimes appears to be lacking dedication to its own platform. When a Microsoft owned property, like Skype, gets a feature on iOS before Windows Phone it’s hard to argue. Apps like Photosynth took months after Windows Phone 8 launched to come to the Store. So when Microsoft launches a new game Halo game you’d expect something to happen with the Halo Waypoint app right? That didn’t exactly happen last year, but the app was updated updated this week. Let’s see what’s new.

So Microsoft Studios updates the Halo Waypoint app. An app that hasn’t seen any love or attention since Halo 4 launched. The latest update (version 1.7) finally includes “stats” for Halo 4.

Nokia unveiled DaVinci Pinball on April 23rd for Nokia Windows Phones and now the game is on sale for consumers. The game is themed around Leonardo DaVinci’s inventions and sketches. The wooden table is chock full of levers, pulleys, and other era-appropriate gadgets. The inventor himself also provides vocal narration, but it's essentially a pinball game.

We’ve had a few tips over the last few days about a new Xbox Avatar prop featuring a bold Yellow Lumia 920 showing up on people’s Xbox 360s. Evidently, the mysterious offering appears in the “Advertisement” section on your Xbox Home page, allowing folks to add it to their collection and showing off some Windows Phone pride.

Alas, none of us have seen here at Windows Phone Central on our consoles, despite the occasional “refresh” of our Xbox Home (Menu Guide > Y button). That makes this addition quite the rare one to actually find, and despite our attempts to get a Store URL to manually add it, we have come up with nothing.

One day after Windows Phone 8 users received the new Hulu Plus app, they’re being treated again to another major app: Foursquare. While Windows Phone has had an official Foursquare app for some time on the platform, the new version is a complete overhaul.

Co-developed with Microsoft and Nokia, the new app is a completely new UI, is much faster to use and is simply gorgeous.

Many of our readers have noticed that Chronos Calendar is no longer available on the Windows Phone Store. The app received a major upgrade only yesterday, but the developer has found a bug within the app and has pulled Chronos Calendar until an update is published. If you've already updated or downloaded the latest version, the developer has offered a quick solution to avoid issues.

Today brings yet another glimpse of the Nokia Lumia 928. Whether Nokia's deliberately putting up billboards and magazine ads or they've lost control of their ad agency isn't clear (we'd bet on the former), they've successfully managed to build up some buzz without saying anything official. Just today an ad for the Lumia 928 popped up in Vanity Fair, with a link to Nokia's website for the image above.

"Capture the highlights" the ad implores, and though the Nokia page doesn't say anything about the phone's name, the image's file name certainly includes the phrase "Lumia-928". While the Nokia page doesn't spill any deets, the fine folks over at Engadget got a look at the ad in Vanity Fair (not really our rag; we're more GQ and Vogue folks) and like the billboard from this weekend, it touts the Lumia 928's low-light prowess.

It’s been a little over six month since Windows 8 launched for consumers. How’s it doing right now? If you listened to the critics and pundits you’d be under the impression that Windows 8 was a flop – another Vista most of them joke. Because we all know Microsoft can’t make two good operating systems in a row, right? I disagree! Today we learn that Windows 8 is on pace to catch up with Windows 7 sales-wise, plus more interesting facts and figures.

We guess Nokia is enjoying creating these new filters for their #2InstaWithLove app, as they keep pushing out new ones each and every week.

And although this morning we saw an actual app update, you won’t need to download a new version tonight. So long as you have version 2.3 you can  now open the app on your phone and you’ll get the new filter live on your phone. Kind of cool how they do that, no?

So what’s the new filter called? Smartshot. And it looks to add a light, reddish hue to your photos, should you choose to use it. Overall, it’s a fun little app and you can’t beat the price. Thanks, Kloyd A., for the heads up!

Update: Gameloft could not confirm the May 8th release date and the game hasn't shown up, so our source looks to have been incorrect. Sorry for getting everybody's hopes up. Ubisoft's Monster Burner is this week's actual Xbox release.

Gameloft announced 12 killer Xbox games for Windows Phone 8 back in October of last year (and later amended the list). Those titles starting rolling out with Asphalt 7 in February. With Ice Age Village appearing at the end of April, we’re up to seven out of 12 games so far. Not a bad two months of releases, but the most anticipated game (among our readers, anyway), N.O.V.A. 3 had yet to appear.

That changes this Wednesday when Gameloft’s N.O.V.A. 3 finally debuts. A first-person shooter based on the Halo series. N.O.V.A. 3 is the closest thing Windows Phone will have to a proper Halo title unless Microsoft ever has a change of heart. Like Modern Combat 4, this one will require 1 GB of RAM and lots of storage space, so some devices like the Lumia 520 and 620 won’t be able to run it.

A handful of weeks ago Hidden Pineapple teased about an upcoming update for Rowi. This morning the update is slowly propagated through the Windows Phone Store and should be available for everyone. Let’s check out what we get with the latest and greatest edition of Rowi.