These days, just about every digital software platform under the sun offers giftcards at retail: Xbox Live, Playstation Network, and iTunes, for example. One major content provider has always lacked a retail presence though: Steam. Sure, Steam offers the ability to gift or trade individual games, but that's more of a specific gift rather than a general one. Plus it required the use of a credit card or PayPal account; you can't make cash transactions online, silly head.

There are those that said this day would never come.  But come it has, the day your mouse cries out in terror as you click it thousands of times per minute.  It's been 12 years since Diablo 2 was released, but Diablo 3 is finally here - and he's ready, willing and waiting.  

Talus Studios has begun their funding for a new co-op RTS hybrid game through...you guessed it - Kickstarter. Dark Meridian is a fusion of real time strategy, role playing, and a third person shooter. It allows you to take a persistent character into a battle as both a strategic leader and a frontline fighter. Combining all three genres in one massive war is a daunting task, so if you want it to happen here is the perfect chance to help these guys out. 

4J Studios, co-developer of Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition, has stated what they hope to bring to the game in their next update, giving eager Minecrafters a small look at what they have in store for them in the near future.

Ghost Recon Future Soldier is right around the corner, but you need a Ghost Recon refresher. We're inviting you to a Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 co-op night on to make sure you're ready. The event will take place on Xbox Live, starting at 8 PM CDT on Wednesday, May 16th. Make sure you head on over to the event's thread on the forums for more details. Leave your gamertag in the thread and find other people to meet up with there. Staff members will be sending out invites, so keep an eye out for us.

Watching trailers and gameplay footage are great ways to scope out a game, but wouldn’t you like to test Diablo III out yourself before you invest? Blizzard has you covered. Players are now able to try out the long-awaited game without having to purchase it first.

Happy Monday, people! We have a nice selection of co-op games coming out this week. An iconic PC franchise returns to the spotlight, the XBLA unleashes bullet hell, and the PSN is holding a rave in your living room. Enjoy!

This month's installment of MMOCO is a bit of a philosophical edition. Stuff has certainly gone down within the last month in the MMO department, but it's kind of a steady murmur. And as I sat here, trying to figure out what to focus on for this month's edition, it struck me that we MMO players are in the middle of a pretty great time of innovation and change of the genre.

Welcome to Episode 4 of Good Coop. Bad Coop. - a tale of two three friends who love playing games together. After taking a break from from killing insects in Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon in the last season, our co-op friends are ready to try their hands in another game - Call of Juarez: The Cartel.

Happy Saturday.  Welcome to another new edition of Beyond Co-Op, the weekly column that rounds up some of the interesting industry news that doesn't strictly pertain to co-op. This week we have a selection trailers and release date news.  Here's what we have on tap:

Japanese developer CAVE's latest shoot-em-up Akai Katana hits stores this Tuesday, May 15 courtesy of Rising Star Games' newly-opened US branch. Bullet hell shmups like Akai Katana are notoroiously difficult, filling the screen with hundreds of enemy bullets at once. Rising Star knows this and has considerately created an orientation trailer, explaining just how the gameplay works. It won't make your reflexes any faster, but at least you'll know how to use the ship's various attacks and Phantom mode transformation before you play.

As 1996 drew to a close, a new chapter in videogame history was beginning. On December 31st of that year, Diablo was released. It was a smash hit, and forever altered the gaming landscape. Diablo was a hybrid, blending action and RPG elements together, and it was incredibly fun to play, especially in cooperative mode with a few friends. Today, we’ll take a look at each game and expansion in the series, tracking the evolution of Diablo in anticipation of the launch of Diablo 3 next week.