Just in time for Valentine's Day, Amazon is now offering a special buy two, get one free deal on Xbox 360 Platinum Hits titles. The deal is fairly straightforward: just pop three Platinum Hits games into your cart and the cheapest of the three will be knocked down to the wallet-friendly price of zero dollars. It's really the perfect excuse to pick up some great games you might have missed, especially considering many of them have sequels out this year -- notably Fable II, Halo 3, Fallout 3, Mass Effect, BioShock and Dead Rising. You'd better do it quick though, as the offer is only valid through February 13 and only while supplies last.

[Thanks, Goldenchild]

The plasma party may be almost over for those of you still gripping tight to your Xbox 1 and copy of Halo 2, playing game after desperate game before Microsoft shuts the online servers, but Bungie is looking for fans to join staff members in a last hurrah on April 14. Community manager Brian "Sketch" Jarrard proclaims on Bungie.net that, "We're all saddened at the realization that an era is coming to an end," before asking fans to "mark your calendars now - on April 14th let's all rally to go online for one last hoorah." And sure, he might not explicitly mention the emptying of various malt beverages from 40 ounce glass bottles, but that's why we read between the lines. It's right there, people!

It looks like that entire game's worth of removed content might be making it into Final Fantasy XIII after all. GameStop has posted the box art for the Xbox 360 version of the game and, more importantly, it has also posted the art for the back of the box. As you can see above, the box mentions that Final Fantasy XIII will support downloadable content after all, though there is no mention of what the DLC actually is. It's worth noting that the content could be something as simple as Avatar outfits or accessories, though it would certainly make sense for Square Enix to supply its most well-known franchise with post-launch DLC.

The news comes after producer Yoshinori Kitase was rumored to have stated that no DLC had been planned for the game, though he noted it was still "possible." Final Fantasy Union, however, notes that Kitase apparently confirmed DLC during a recent interview with the Dutch Official Playstation Magazine. The box art certainly seems to confirm that, though we've reached out to Square for clarification. As of this writing, GameStop has yet to post the art for the back of the PS3 version, so it's unclear if both platforms will support said content.

[Via Final Fantasy Union]

Speaking to Gamereactor, Lionhead maestro Peter Molyneux revealed that there will be some big Fable 3 news at the X10 event this week. "There's some very, very big things happening in Fable," said Molyneux, "Bigger than you think, and it's going to really upset people." Molyneux added that he is "really scared" about telling people the news, saying, "They're going to get super pissed off, they really are." Still, he concluded that it's "the right thing to do," and confirmed that he will be demonstrating the mystery announcement at X10 in San Francisco. Joystiq's theory: The entire story of Fable 2 was a dream sequence. Whatever it is, we'll be delivering the news directly from X10, so Joystiq's staff and readers can all get pissed off together.

In the meantime, be sure to watch the whole interview, which also contains some really interesting talk about Project Natal.

[Via VG247]

Considering the Xbox 360 received the lion's share of Modern Warfare 2 purchases, it comes as a bit of a shock to us that the already released on PS3 and PC "care package patch" is just now being submitted to Microsoft for certification. That said, developer Infinity Ward's community man Robert Bowling tweeted as much to Game Informer's Andrew Reiner approximately 24 hours ago when Reiner asked about a possible release for the much anticipated fixes.

As Bowling has pointed out before (and details in this forum post on the subject), the patch is set to remedy the following (you might need a pillow for all of this pure, unbridled excitement:

• Care Package, Emergency Airdrop, and Sentry Gun marker grenades sprint speed normalized.
• Fix for "infinite care package" exploit.
• Sentry Guns: Improved placement detection, preventing cases of Sentry Guns inside geometry.
• Model 1887: Bling using Akimbo and FMJ combination now has same range and damage as non-Bling Model 1887s.
• Fixes to prevent various XP hacks.

And no, there's no date given for when it's coming out. So stop asking. (Seriously.)
[Via Game Informer]

The original Bad Company spinoff in the Battlefield series kept the franchise's setting firmly in modern times, but if the Bad Company 2 ESRB description is true, you'll be seeing a return to WWII in the sequel. At the very least, the game's opening will bring players back to the Pacific side of the war, with the ESRB description saying, "In single-player mode, players conduct missions on an unnamed Japanese island during World War II and then move into the modern day through jungles, deserts, and snowy terrain."

Just like we've discovered in our way too many hours with the game's multiplayer demo, the description details the inclusion of "melee attacks with a power drill" (yes, seriously) and the characters use of profanity "during cutscenes and in the heat of battle." And yes, we're just as excited by the former as you might imagine.
[Via BigDownload]

Look, alright, we'll level with you -- we've got a short supply of schweet schwag hanging around Joystiq Prizeland as of late. That should at least partially help to explain last week's absence of a contest. We also kind of felt like you might've been overloaded with games during our holiday giveaways at the end of 2009. What's that? No, you say? Well we suppose that the first few months of 2010 are unusually flush with quality content, so giving away a bit couldn't hurt, right?

We certainly hope a nine foot tall bullet witch will do it for you, because that's what we've got. One lucky winner (chosen at random) takes home Bayonetta on Xbox 360, chosen from the comments below (please leave one and only one) that are left in the next 24 hours. You tell us what you think is the most annoying song you've ever heard used in marketing a game and you may very well win yourself a vidjagame. How about that?!

• Leave a comment telling us what you think is the most annoying song you've ever heard used in marketing a game.
• You must be 18 years or older and a resident of the US or Canada (excluding Quebec, due in part to our aversion to snowy owls).
• Limit 1 entry per person per day.
• This entry period ends at 11:31AM ET on Monday, February 8.
• At that time, we'll randomly select one winner to receive one copy of Bayonetta for Xbox 360 ($59.99 ARV).
• For a list of complete rules, click here.

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What is Joyswag? Since we don't keep the games and merchandise we receive for review or promotional purposes, it becomes "Joyswag," which is passed along to our readers. Please note that Joyswag may be in "used" condition. For more info on our policy, click here.

It would have been nice to hear more of an explanation way back in October when Sega's Alpha Protocol was "officially delayed" to the amorphous "Spring 2010," but, unfortunately, that didn't happen. Speaking with MTV Multiplayer this week, though, assistant producer at Sega Matthew Hickman explicitly detailed the reasons for the delay, saying, "We really wanted to polish the game up, make it everything Obsidian planned it to be, and give the consumer a very polished game."

He added that there's been some "tweaks in lighting here and there," and the inventory screen has been revamped a bit, but in general the team has been focused on "bringing the whole quality level up." The post's author also notes that the game is set for a "Summer 2010" release window now, and we've reached out to him (and Sega) for clarification.

Update: The post's author has responded that, yes, the game's current release window is set for "Summer 2010." Guess that's another delay then, eh? We'll update again if Sega responds.

We knew the Ultimate Fighting Championship was open to all forms of combatants, but we think professional brawler Brock Lesnar's admittance to the league is just a little unfair. Our attention was turned to Lesnar by the recently revealed cover of UFC Undisputed 2010 (the full version of which is posted after the jump), which features his countenance. See, we don't have anything against Lesnar -- we just think it's a little one-sided to pit human fighters up against shaved kodiak bears.

We can't wait to scare the living crap out of all the other game cases on our shelf by placing this one near them when UFC Undisputed 2010 releases May 25.

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We've already seen John Marston get himself into a whole mess of different being a cowboy-related situations before Red Dead Redemption's impending April release date, but today's are (as you might imagine) just a bit different. That's right, folks -- this time he's got a lasso. Rather than employing the ubiquitous Old West tool in cow wrangling, though, Marston drops some rope-based justice on fools and horses alike (okay okay -- we suppose it's possible there are also some fool horses). Peep the five new screens below in our hi-res gallery.

Considering the upcoming digital release of BioShock 2's soundtrack is, well, digital, you could probably just procure the track list from Amazon and grab the individual songs before its announced February 9 release date. Sure, you're not gonna get your ... uhh ... eyes on the fancy digital packaging, but you could snag all those classy tunes a full three days before the other kids on your block. Think about that!

Done thinking? Good, 'cause we've got more BioShock 2 music info for you -- there's also a way to enjoy the soundtrack this very second. How's that, you ask? Well, simple: just grab this iTunes music file or this WIndows music file and enjoy a taste of "Rapture Radio." To be clear, the tracks listed are no bearing on the game's official score which comes with the game's special edition. Head past the break for a breakdown of both the standard and deluxe editions (no prices are available yet).

[Via Destructoid]

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Big-time RTS Supreme Commander 2 is rolling ever closer to release next month, and to whet your appetite for (unit) production, we've got some new screens and descriptions of three of the units you'll be Supreme Commanding around the battlefield. First up is the Bomb Bouncer, a shielded unit that gains power as it's fired upon and can then throw all of that stored-up damage right back in the faces of any units around it. The Pulinsmash is a unit that creates a vortex to "pull and smash" surrounding units into it, damaging and disrupting them like popcorn in a popper.

Finally, the Kraken, as you can see on the right in the picture above, is a sea creature-shaped Cybran experimental submarine that can take down other subs, aircraft and even battlebots on land. Sure, these machines are awesome to go to war with, and we get the whole "commanding the troops" thing, but don't forget that every one of these rank-and-file units has a family. What about the supreme children, Commander?

Valve has followed through with its promise to bring bots to Left 4 Dead 2's Versus mode -- which was frantic enough before all the A.I.-controlled ghouls got added in. A recent patch added the functionality and made a few tweaks to the software development kit, which allows players to make awesome levels based on awesome Nintendo 64 games. Check out the full list of changes after the jump.

The Steam blog post announcing the patch's release promises that the changes will be integrated into the 360 version of the game via an upcoming title update.

Continued →

Eurogamer reports that two new games have been added to the Xbox 360 Classics budget line in EU territories. The two games are Fable II and Halo Wars. If you need a refresher, Fable II is Lionhead's brilliant, charming adventure that we kind of liked back in 2008. Halo Wars on the other hand, serves as both the first Halo RTS spin-off and the swan song of Ensemble Studios. The games can now be had for the tempting price of £19.99 ($31) apiece. Both are worth picking up -- just be sure to watch out for those Warthog rushes.

Alright, alright, calm down -- before you break out the bottle of kerosene for a completely baseless flame war, we're going to point out that the following survey results are from a "comprehensive 55 question survey" of "more than 800 video game professionals from North America and beyond who read Gamasutra, subscribe to Game Developer magazine, or attend Game Developers Conference." We'd also like to note that the not-quite-recovered economy is likely playing a larger role than we can tell at the moment. All that said, the 2009/10 State of Game Development Survey shows that small development houses ("50 employees or fewer") have grown seven percent in the last year -- a statistic pretty much directly tied to the 25 percent of developers now working on "mobile platforms" (nearly 75 percent of which name the iPhone directly).

We're hoping that, by this point in the post, any potential console warriors have moved on and won't notice us pointing out the breakdown of development percentage for each home console. Of the developers working on home consoles, 69 percent said they're developing for Xbox 360, while 61 percent claimed PlayStation 3. Maybe more interestingly, Wii console development dropped from 42 percent of respondents last year to 30 percent this year. Soft sales of third-party Wii titles last year likely didn't help to persuade devs to work with Nintendo. We'll see how that translates to the console's releases in the coming year.