Rockstar has announced that Midnight Club: Los Angeles will be released on September 12th in Europe for Xbox 360 and PS3. A PSP version, Midnight Club: LA Remix, has also been announced for a simultaneous release alongside the home console titles.

Midnight Club: LA was originally scheduled for release in the first half of 2008, although we suspect that GTA IV's delay had the knock-on effect of pushing this fourth iteration of the Midnight Club series into the busy autumn window.

"From the beginning, Midnight Club has been about street racing in a open-world," said Sam Houser, Founder of Rockstar Games. "With our team at Rockstar San Diego we have developed a game that we feel once again pushes the boundaries and expectations of what a racing game can be."

Expect the same 'gearhead' style for Midnight Club: LA that we saw in the previous "DUB Edition" of the third game. That means deep car customisation options, allowing you to modify your ride in ways that Steve-from-up-the-road (with his body kitted and racing striped Honda Civic) can only dream of.

"People are going to be blown away when they see how true-to-life Los Angeles looks in this game," said Jay Panek, Midnight Club Producer Rockstar San Diego. "We've added some great twists and turns that let players experience the authentic vibe and feel of the city at blistering speeds that you simply couldn't get away with in real life."

Last week it became apparent that Midnight Club: LA will be integrated with Rockstar's Social Club community site. The Social Club is currently set to offer all sorts of rankings and leaderboards for GTA IV when it's released on April 29th, as well as some pretty fascinating data analysis (e.g. the LCPD police activity blotter). Let's hope Rockstar have got some tricks up the sleeves of their Social Club dinner jackets for Midnight Club: LA.

While Midnight Club: LA is under development at Rockstar San Diego, development responsibilities for the PSP 'LA Remix' version have been given to Rockstar London.