The latest trailer for The Lord of the Rings: War in the North seeks to explain exactly why we should care about these unnamed characters who were not deemed worthy enough to be in the actual Fellowship.  The video has bits of the films spliced with gameplay footage, and the results are actually pretty cool.  The trailer gives some much needed weight to the Northern adventure.  After a lukewarm gameplay experience at E3, the whole thing was starting to feel like an unnecessary spin-off.  The in-game footage is all in slow motion, which is exactly how it felt hands-on.  Here's hoping that the elf I played as had the flu or something.  Snowblind has a great opportunity to build on events merely touched on in the novels.  I'd hope they do the legacy justice.

Call of Juarez: The Cartel, is a departure from the norm for the series.  The two previous games were originally westerns.  Now it's a pseudo-military shooter based in the modern day Mexican drug war.  The one guy has a cowboy hat, so you can see that the game is kind of sticking to its roots, if its roots include Uzi's, AK-47's and a crap ton of F-Bombs.  It the video you can see three characters working together, challenges, a revive mechanic, and a progression system.

Crimson Alliance is coming to the XBLA later this year.  Today we have six new screens showing some of the in-game action.  Grab three friends and put an end to the evil Cult of the Soul Siren.  Four players can team up locally or online.  I got a chance to play Crimson Alliance at E3.  It was a brightly colored, fast paced, arcade-style of dungeon crawler.  The inventories were streamlined and easily managed.  You may remember that this game is being offered as a free bonus to anyone who buys all of the XBLA Summer of Arcade titles.

It seems like every other day we're writing about another premium game going Free to Play or offering a free to play mode.  Today we have the tactical PC war game Arma 2 adding itself to the list.

Mike and Nick brave the 4th of July festivities to bring you the latest and greatest in cooperative gaming news and information. On the table is World of Warcraft going free to play, Catherine co-op reveals, and those pesky Steam sales. Finally things wrap up with a new segment that focuses on user blogs. All the co-op goodness you could hope for in under an hour!

Hit the Podcast Page to Listen or Download

As great as it is to have online co-op in a game, nothing beats good ol fashioned couch co-op.  There's something visceral about the experience, the ability to turn to your buddy and high five them when you beat a boss, it just brings an additional high.  So while online co-op may have ushered in a cooperative revolution, it's local co-op play that drove it there.  

Patches that improve co-op

A few weeks ago we reported that Ms. Splosion Man would be out this July.  We speculated (hoped) that the game would have the same price point of its predecessor, a cool 800 MSP ($10).  We must have some good karma, because that's exactly how much it will cost.  The platformer supports 4 player local and/or online co-op.  If it's anything like the original 'Splosion Man, it should be a real treat.  Ms. Splosion Man will release on the XBLA for 800 Microsoft Points on July 13th.  Holy cow!  That's next week!

Sanctum, the hybrid FPS/Tower Defense indie game we reviewed a few months ago, has had 4-player co-op in the works for some time now at the behest of players. An update for the game just went live which implements it as promised, upping the co-opability from 2 players to 4. Also added were "co-op build and upgrade towers" (no idea what those are, but don't they sound fancy!) as well as some additional modes, settings, achievements, and UI tweaks. For full patch notes, read on.

Today we have a new trailer for Catherine, the sort-of-sexy yet very intriguing puzzle platformer.   The latest trailer has a few snippets of gameplay footage.  Catherine looks stunning graphically, and there seems to be a lot more to it than simply a man, some sheep, and giant boobs. (But do you really need anything else?)  We recently covered the co-op components of the game, and we are curious to see just how the game will play out.  You can expect to see our Co-Op Review in the coming weeks.

The Adventures of Shuggy is a puzzle game that challenges your wits against physical enemies, obstacles, gravity and the Xbox Live Leaderboards. There are loads of puzzle games on the market, but Shuggy looks to make its mark using a bit of strategy, and including co-op.

Recently, Co-Optimus staffers were given an assignment: play online co-op with random strangers.  The idea was that it's good to sometimes get out of our comfort zone.  For me, I am most at home when I am literally at home, playing couch co-op with one of my kids.  I only rarely venture online, and when I do, it is with friends I have met through Co-Optimus, or even folks I know in real life.  Heading into the wilds of Xbox Live was a daunting proposal for me.