Welcome to Beyond Co-Op, a weekly piece that talks about industry stories that may or may not be related to co-op gaming.

In a recent interview with Edge Magazine, Bungie employee Marcus Lehto said that Halo Reach is a bit like Titanic.  It's going to sink to the bottom of the ocean and fail miserably? Not quite. It's going to go on and make billions of dollars and be the biggest selling game of all time? Perhaps, but not likely.  Reach is like Titanic because we know how the story will end already, we know that "Reach is going to fall and 700 million people are going to perish."

Indie developer James Silva has captured our co-op hearts in a most gory and interesting way. Previously recognized for the dark 2 player co-op Dishwasher: Dead Samurai XBLA title and the quirky local co-op I MAED A GAME W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N 1T!!!1 indie title, James seems to be taking his previous ideas and blending them for a new co-op indie game called Charlie Murder. Charlie Murder will be showing its game face in March, originally believed to be a sequel to Dishwasher. We don't have a price point just yet, but when we do you'll be the first to know.  

Today, we'll look at a great new board game that is simple enough to be accessible for non-gamers, yet deep enough to satisfy a diehard gamer's strategic brain: Pandemic. The best part about Pandemic? It's cooperative! Plus, we've got a guest report from Co-Optimus legend "justabaldguy"!

Some of us hope to get some gaming in this weekend, why others probably don't have a shot.  If there's one thing in common it's a sudden renewed interest in Madballs in...Babo Invasion for the PC.  Funny how that happens.

Ever since last November when "The Island of Dr. Ned" was given a release date, it seems that Gearbox Software has been committed to providing all the gamers out there with as many opportunities as possible to explore and enjoy the world of Borderlands.  This commitment even extends to being mindful of what their community wants to see in their DLC - like an increase in level caps.  Yesterday, designer Jason "haTts" Reiss announced on the Gearbox forums that the next DLC will increase the level cap and, that like so much of their DLC to date, "it's awesome."

Square-Enix is out and about promoting their upcoming sequel to Kane and Lynch, and there's plenty of coverage all over the net. 

For the past few weeks we've been touting Death by Cube as an 8 player co-op title.  Released this past Wednesday I was eager to check it out and see what cooperative offerings it had.  Sadly it looks like we were mistaken and Death by Cube features no cooperative play.  All online modes are either deathmatch or team based versus.

This past week has been a very busy one for my family, but over the weekend we managed to squeeze in some Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.  For our first play through, we played as Iron Man's side.  For the achievement's sake, and to experience the other side of the war, we decided to continue the game on a tougher difficulty, rather than loading our pre-choice save game. 

After a surprising call by a gaming analyst promising the end of Borderlands before it had a chance, the game blew expectations out of the water. How does it happen that a game with such a grim prediction tops over 1 million copies sold? IGN has a theory, and we can't help but agree with it. Borderlands is a game made for gamers, not made to draw in new gamers.

Thankfully there is no buttock showing over the web cam, but the recent ESRB rating of Lost Planet 2 suggests that perhaps this 4 player co-op game available later this year will have more than you bargained for! As well as hinting at some of the environments and weapons available it also suggests that some of the character models are less clad than others. Whilst male heroes will be dressed in the latest trends in armour, the female population may not be so fortunate having to go on a bug hunt wearing only “a piece of cloth hanging down the front and back portions of her body; this outfit tends to reveal her buttocks.”

This month the Battlefield Report takes a look at a myriad of games that have one thing in common: you have to shoot something. Unfortunately, it's not always that easy. We list the most common game functions that help you adjust your aim.