IGN has laid out a video review of Bioshock 2, which you can view on Voodoo Extreme.

You can also view the activity on Metacritic with Bioshock 2 PC having one review at 90/100 and Bioshock 2 360 having several reviews with an average of 90/100. Common complaints include a less memorable story, and common praise includes classic gameplay.

Two Unreal engine mods have won awards in ModDB's Best of 2009 awards. Here are the winners and links to where you can get them.

• Best Original Art Direction - Out of Hell (UT2004)
• Best Singleplayer Mod - The Nameless Mod (Deus Ex)

Several Unreal engine mods were nominees and honorable mentions, so you should definitely head over to ModDB and check out all of the winners!

That interesting looking Unreal Engine 3 MMO that has been delayed countless times? Well, it is STILL not coming out, but another side project by Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment and published by FireSky powered by Unreal Engine 3 is Stargate: Resistance. A PC only Stargate shooter that will be released only in digital form. Unfortunately, it looks like the only way to get the game will be for $19.95 through IGN's Direct2Drive. Let's hope that Steam gets added to that sometime before the game's February 10th release date (yes, two days from today).

Ubisoft has sent stones around to various news sites much more important than ours to notify them that Splinter Cell: Conviction (you know, that game you've been dying to play ever since you heard about it several years ago) will be released on April 13th, 2010. Unless you live outside of the U.S., which will require you to wait a few extra days.

Want the Mass Effect 2 DLC available from purchasing select Dr. Pepper bottles but don't want to hunt around the continental US looking for them? Then I have got a deal for you!

Apparently, the DLC codes are fully reusable, all you have to do is sign up on the Dr. Pepper site to hook yourself up. Not only that, but the credentials aren't verified, so you can sign up with a fake e-mail address and still get a link to download the DLC. You can find all the details on Destructoid.

2K Games, along with Neca (of course), are releasing a plushie based on the in-game big daddy toys in Bioshock 2. They are roughly 7 inches tall, and will retail for around $25. Doesn't look very comfortable to snuggle with, though...

Microsoft is officially dropping support from Xbox Live for original Xbox games. What does this mean for you? No more Unreal Championship 2! Sad day, indeed.

Not only that, but Microsoft has apparently already shut down the DLC servers for all original Xbox games so community event organizers trying to organize play-ins prior to the April 15th death date are scrambling to try and figure out how they can either get that content back up or remove it from their matchmaking systems. According to one Bungie employee in regards to Halo 2, they have no idea if they will be able to do that at this point.

On a sidenote, this does not effect any generation 1 Games for Windows Live games, such as Halo 2 PC. As we all know, these highly successful PC games work better on a more robust system, and it is clearly impossible to have different features for different generations of games on the Xbox 360.

Those of you playing Mass Effect 2 on the 360 without a super awesome HDTV have probably noticed that the text gets rather small and unreadable. Project Manager Michael Gamble sounds off in the BioWare forums to let you know that your woes are bound to continue and you should just buy a new TV.

We understand that on some (SDTVs) the smallest text in Mass Effect 2 can be difficult to read. While this was not an intentional result, it was a byproduct of the enhancements to the user interface.

After investigating potential solutions, we have determined that while this issue does affect a small portion of SDTV owners, we are unable to resolve it for Mass Effect 2 through a title update.

It's nice to see a company stand up for the people paying for their products in this day and age!

Destructoid got the poop on why Bioshock 2 even has multiplayer, straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak. They asked Jordan Thomas, 2K Marin creative director about that, as well as other questions about the multiplayer experience.

"Well, 2K sought the opinions of players from all walks of life, who game for different reasons. And we found that a lot of people craved an extension of the experience, that to them, multiplayer was a way to keep their favorite games alive," he answers. "And since we knew we’d be focusing on the game’s single player legacy internally, the choice to partner up naturally followed. "I wouldn’t call the decision easy, in the sense that (just like playing a Big Daddy, say) we knew that it’d be turned into a sound bite initially, and critiqued at about that level of surface engagement, with no explanation forthcoming for a while. But we felt that if, again, we took the question seriously -- “what does BioShock mean to people, and how could some of that set of sensations be expanded to involve others?” --then we could win some people over, and make others who were crying out for it very happy."

Destructoid has discovered the soundtrack listing for the standard and deluxe versions of the upcoming Bioshock 2 soundtrack. Not only that, but you can tune into Rapture Radio and hear selections from the soundtrack as well.

STANDARD EDITION:
The Boogie Man - Todd Rollins & his Orchestra
How Much Is That Doggie In The Window? - Patti Page
20th Century Blues - Noel Coward
Nightmare - Artie Shaw & His New Music
Daddy, Won't You Please Come Home? - Annette Hanshaw
Praise The Lord and Pass The Ammunition - Kay Kyser & His Orchestra
Dawn of a New Day - Horace Heidt & His Music Knights
Night and Day - Billie Holiday & Her Orchestra
My Heart Belongs To Daddy - Eddie Duchin & His Orchestra
Chasing Shadows - Quintette of the Hot Club of France
Jitterbug Waltz - Fats Waller & His Rhythm
I Cover The Waterfront - Connie Boswell


DELUXE EDITION:
The Boogie Man - Todd Rollins & his Orchestra
How Much Is That Doggie In The Window? - Patti Page
20th Century Blues - Noel Coward
Nightmare - Artie Shaw & His New Music
Daddy, Won't You Please Come Home? - Annette Hanshaw
Praise The Lord and Pass The Ammunition - Kay Kyser & His Orchestra
Dawn of a New Day - Horace Heidt & His Music Knights
Night and Day - Billie Holiday & Her Orchestra
My Heart Belongs To Daddy - Eddie Duchin & His Orchestra
Chasing Shadows - Quintette of the Hot Club of France
Jitterbug Waltz - Fats Waller & His Rhythm
I Cover The Waterfront - Connie Boswell
Mental Strain At Dawn - Jack Purvis, trumpet solo, with rhythm accompaniment
Bei Mir Bist Du Schon - Benny Goodman & His Orchestra, with vocal by Martha Tilton
The Trouble With Me is You - Red McKenzie
The Skeleton In The Closet - Putney Dandridge
We Saw The Sea - Fred Astaire
La Mer - Django Reinhardt

For those of you who recall the controversy present over the so-called "sex scenes" in Mass Effect 1, you'll be interested to know that the same type of scenes in Mass Effect 2 are greatly simplified. Of course, you can do a quick YouTube search and bring all of them up right away, but BioWare has denied charges from the community that these scenes were made more tame in the sequel to avoid criticism and controversy. BioWare's Stanley Woo responds:

It's kinda funny that this topic keeps coming up over and over again. People who claim to be old enough and mature enough to handle sex and nudity in a game seem to believe that any lack of sex and nudity in the game is a sign of self-censorship. They generally don't believe that a game can be called "mature" without explicit sex and/or nudity.

Let me tell you, folks, that as a developer full of mature individuals, we are also free to not have explicit sex and/or nudity in our games, no matter what you, Fox News, the government, or Bunky the Wonder Clown has to say about it. We have never considered it a "problem," it is simply a choice we have made and we have every right to make that choice.

What do you think? Censored or just simpler?

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge, Kevin Gross, has ruled to toss out legal action by Midway creditors against the former board of the company. The suit alleged that the board had taken on debts they knew they could not repay and had arranged a sale that screwed over their shareholders.

"The decision is not an endorsement of any of the defendants' actions," Gross wrote in his Jan. 29 ruling. "The defendants oversaw the ruin of a once highly successful company, only to hide behind the protective skirt of Delaware law, which the court is bound to apply."

The case sought to nullify the sale of the company to investor Mark Thomas, as well as require a payment of $90 million.

You can read all the legal mumbo-jumbo over on Bloomberg.

File this under better-late-than-never:

Borderlands may be last-year's news, but with new DLC on the way (the biggest yet!) we thought we'd take a stab at reviewing the game that's been sucking up huge chunks of our time around here. And what better way to dissect a co-op game than a co-op review? hal, Sir_Brizz and Dark_Pulse all weigh in with three opinions and three slightly different scores.

Via Android and Me comes this clip in which Epic Games' Tim Sweeney comments on any future UE3 Android projects - basically no-comment. The questions arise amidst a conversation about Unreal Engine 3 running on NVidia's Tegra Processor. The author of the news piece seems convinced that news of UE3-Android is surely imminent.

Dungeon Defense is described as a tower defense/action RPG hybrid. The game asks you to build defenses in your lair against invading armies. More surprisingly, the game supports 4-player co-op (I believe on a single machine, though) and development has been fully documented in developer blogs with the full source code available.

Additionally, Steve Polge and the game's creator, Jeremy Stieglitz, will be on the 1up Oddcast at around 2:00 PM PST.

Links to the developer blog, developer diary videos, source code and plenty more screenshots can be found on the Epic Games forums.

To get more information and download the title, head to the showcase page.

Hey guys, QAPete here. Long time no see! Hope you are all doing well.

I have a favor to ask you. Two of my friend Betsy Ciciliot-Thompson's kids are going to be taking a "polar plunge" in support of Special Olympics Illinois. Betsy happens to have a son, Dylan, who was born with Down Syndrome, so the Special Olympics is very dear to her heart.

I know times are tough, and this economy is the absolute pits for many people, but if you can afford it, please consider joining me in donating whatever you comfortably can. Thanks!

2010 Polar Plunge Fox Lake