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

They say each snowflake is unique, and so, too, are each staff member's gaming experiences of choice this weekend.  How appropriate, given the wintry nature of the weather over much of the United States.  Everyone is off doing something different, from old standbys, past classics, and backlog beauties to a game that isn't even on shelves yet!

Remember books?  Sure you do!  Author Jane McGonigal has provided gamers with a new weapon for fighting the good fight.  "What's the good fight?" you ask.  Why, proving to our significant others, bosses, parents, children, or pets, that what we do in front of the flashing screen is important...not just for us, but for the whole world!  In her book "Reality is Broken," McGonigal explores how games help gamers develop problem solving techniques that can be applied to real world problems.  She recently sat down with Kai Ryssdal for a radio interview, and had this to say about gaming and reality:

Two Worlds 2 is out next week in North America and with it comes an 8 player online co-op campaign for you and your magic casting friends to enjoy.  We've been following the game for quite some time and it's gone through an epic journey, almost as great as the one Sordahon has gone through.   We had thought that journey came to an epic, 80's inspired ballad, conclusion - but we were wrong.  Oh so very wrong.  Today we have the latest episode for your viewing pleasure - as Sordahon journeys to the depth of hell, otherwise known as - Southpeak Games Customer Support.

There are those that have said this day would never come... and to those I say - me too.  But its happening; Duke Nukem Forever has gotten an official release date and its probably sooner than you would have thought.  That date is May 3rd, 2011 in North America and May 6th everywhere else.  The game is slated to be released on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC.  

Are you excited about Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon?  Why not?  You must have not played EDF 2017.  It was crammed full of giant insects, giant robots, and buildings that collapsed if you so much as looked at them cross-eyed.  You could play the whole game with a partner in local co-op via split screen.  The last game had 50 levels and five difficulty settings. The only guaranteed way to unlock all 150 guns was to beat every level on every difficulty.  True, not all the guns were that great, but they can't all be Genocide Guns.

Here's a little bad news for those of you who enjoy Rock Band 3 on the Nintendo Wii.  It was recently announced that this past Tuesday's installment of Rock Band Network releases would be the last batch for the Wii.   DLC packages will still be available, but the network has effectively been mothballed.  Is this another sign of the waning popularity of the music game genre?  Why yes, yes it is.  This statement comes from the Rock Band site:

On Tuesday, January 18th, we brought you video of a Starcraft 2 mod called "World of Starcraft".  The mod was created using the tools packaged with Starcraft  2, you know, those crazy mod tools provided by the developers and publishers themselves.  Apparently, this video was a little too awesome for Activision Blizzard Inc. to handle, so they killed it.  It's dead now.  It has ceased to be.  You can't find it, anywhere.  The video has been pulled from YouTube with the old "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Activision Games Inc."  So use the mod tools, just don't make anything Blizzard would want to make money off of.

Previously a Nintendo Wii exclusive, Dead Space: Extraction is headed to your PlayStation 3 with Move support. Now you can sever limbs and extremities in upscaled high definition, and you can still do so with a partner. All signs point to this being an exact transfer from the original retail release, but the best part is how you can get your space-gloved hands on it - Dead Space: Extraction will be included on the Dead Space 2 Limited Edition Blu-Ray.

Vitamin G Studios' unique puzzler, the UnderGarden, is scheduled to be released this winter on PSN. In our review, we felt the game had real potential but fell a little short in the co-op department (in co-op mode, the game focuses on Player 1 with Player 2 mostly being along for the ride). Despite some shortcomings, however, the game still has a great art style and relaxing feel which can appeal to all different sorts of gamers. No word yet on a specific date of release for the PSN version, but it sounds like it may be sometime in February.

It's been a while since we heard anything new about Brink, the 8 player co-op title from developer Splash Damage.  But if you watched our Co-Op Games of 2011 Preview, you know it's still planned for this year.  The game's publisher, Bethesda, is kicking off the new year with a new developer diary and video.  The focus?  In game audio, specifically, the sound of the guns in the game.

This is a patch that's a long time coming, as it applies to the original Left 4 Dead on the Xbox 360.  For those that purchased the Sacrifice DLC for the game, they may have found that it not only erased the progress of some other achievements - namely the Zombie Genocidist - but that certain achievements were unobtainable like one called Sacrifizzle.  Thankfully, Valve have stood by their product and released a patch that fixes these glitches, restores the achievement progress for most people, and introduces a host of other tweaks and fixes.