Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D is on store shelves, but the two player co-op game hasn't dropped out of the news quite yet. After a story broke earlier this week about the lack of ability to delete a saved game file, controversy has been brewing around the title.  Gamestop actually refused to allow trade-ins of the game earlier this week after learning of the "feature."  Now though, the retailer has reversed its decision in a quote to IGN.  

Bodycount: Winner of most impressive muzzle flair 2011

If you've ever played Demon's Souls, you know a shield is the difference between dying quickly and dying slowly.  (You're going to die no matter what you do).  If you have a good shield at least you get a chance to take a few baddies with you.  You may remember that some of the shields (like the Tower, Brushwood, or Adjudicator's) were quite spiffy, but maybe you have your own personal coat of arms you'd like to see emblazoned across a digital piece of steel.  Namco Bandai has announced a Shield Design Contest for Dark Souls, the 'sorta' sequel to Demon's Souls.  

At Nintendo's E3 conference, a brief little snippet was dropped that was good news for co-op fans.  The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures will be released in the DSiWare store this fall, for free.  Released originally as a bonus with the GBA version of A Link to the Past, the game was remade and released for the Gamecube, using the quirky GBA link cable to great effect.  We covered this version of the game here.  It had long been rumored that a DS remake was in the works, and now it appears the rumor is becoming fact.  Recently, Nintendo confirmed that the DSiWare release will be the GBA version.  This is unfortunate, as the Gamecube remake was a significant upgrade, particularly visually.  Still, free is free, and the core gameplay of four Links running around solving puzzles together is awesome, regardless.  DSi and 3DS owners can look forward to Four Swords this September.

There's a lot of co-op love in XBLA's Deal of the Week sale!  Four out of the five games feature co-op.  Hard Corps: Uprising, X-men Arcade, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time Reshelled are all 50% off.  These four games have an average score of 4 out of 5 in our Co-Op reviews. Comic Jumper, and excellent single player game, is also for sale for half price.

As Digital distribution becomes more popular, sales happen. Whenever a sale appears, many gamers instantly hit that “confirm buy” button. Without a tangible way to document how many games that actually includes, or how many of them we have time to play, we may be victims of digital hoarding.

Up until this point, everything we've seen from Arcen Games' A Valley Without Wind has looked impressive, but something seemed off.  The game was originally an isometric view sort of like that of RPGs of old on the SNES and SEGA Genesis and while it worked for the 8-bit style graphics of those days, the more realistic style in AVWW made things look awkward.  Now after months of deliberation the team has switched the game, instead opting to make it a side scrolling affair in the realms of Super Metroid or the more recent Shadow Complex.  

We've been speculating a long time on what Battlefield 3's co-op campaign will be like. Nick tried to get the scoop at E3 but was denied any telling details. All roads seemingly led to a four-player campaign or series of maps, similar to Battlefield: Bad Company 2's downloadable mode, Onslaught.

The Uncharted 3 Multiplayer Beta kicks off today for PlayStation Plus subscribers and owners of inFamous 2.  The rest of the world gets access on July 4th with the entire beta ending on July 13th.  During the beta period Naughty Dog will be making three maps available to play, with two at any one time in rotation.  They'll also be rotating game modes in and out throughout the weeks.

My advice.  Don't vault.

Call of Duty: Black Ops is getting yet another DLC map pack.  This means more "Zombies."  We got "Ascension" with the First Strike pack, "Call of the Dead" with Escalation, and now we get "Shangri-La" in Annihilation.  CoD: BO's "Zombies" modes have really improved on each other, and the latest one appears to follow suite.  Check out the video below for a glimpse of some of the new toys that will be available (pungi stick claymores!).  Yes, the evil monkey makes an appearance.  We even have a screenshot gallery of some hot zombie action.  

The sequel to the so-bad-it's-good Earth Defense Force 2017 is almost here.  Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon has more guns, better visuals, bigger bugs and (supposedly) functional vehicles.  If you spent any time with 2017, you know that the vehicles were one of the worst features in the game.  Calling them "features" does a disservice to the word.  This latest video introduces the Mech, a bipedal, side-stepping weapons platform.  Here's hoping it controls more like the mechs from Trenched and less like EDF 2017's Vegalta.