Before River City Girls became a smash hit, Shantae was WayForward's most popular game series. These games star Shantae, a half-genie hero who can cast spells and transform into animals as she battles pirates and monsters. The most recent game, Shantae and the Seven Sirens, was quite good. There is a Shantae that players have never gotten to try before: Shantae Advance:  Risky Revolution, a game that was canceled in 2004. 21 years later, WayForward is finally releasing Risky Revolution and on consoles and Steam this summer.

Co-op fighting games (not beat 'em ups) are a rare and wonderful thing. There have been a few like Street Smart, Diesel Legacy, and the original Fatal Fury for Neo Geo (not the console ports). Well, the Fatal Fury series sadly dropped co-op support after the first game, but the franchise lives on. In fact, FATAL FURY: City of the Wolves is due out on April 24, and it looks impressive.

It has been a while since we named our Co-op Games of the Year, but it’s time to bring it back, baby. This year, your fearless Surviving Editor (I’m not quite dead yet!) and other members of the Co-op Crew each selected a personal co-op game of the year. On top of that, we all picked a "Beyond Co-op" game of the year as well. ...

National Cat Day is one of the finest and furriest holidays of the year. You can celebrate it by playing co-op kitty titles like Cat Quest III and Cats on Duty, or you can celebrate with the fresh single-player demo for Gori: Cuddly Carnage from Wired Productions. Gori is a surprisingly stylish 3D action game starring a cat on a hoverboard who has to grind rails and slice up lots of cutesy zombies.

While we do our best around here to play nothing but cooperative games, from time to time, a non-co-op title slips in. Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes from developer Rabbit & Bear Studios and publisher 505 Games is a JRPG that's too exciting to overlook. It was directed and produced by Yoshitaka Murayama, the creator of Suikoden series, who sadly died in February. The game promises to be a spiritual successor to Murayama's beloved series.

Welcome back to Beyond Co-Op Reviews, our critical look at games that don't feature co-op modes....

Welcome back to Beyond Co-Op Reviews, our critical look at games that don't feature co-op modes....

Welcome back to Beyond Co-Op Reviews, our critical look at games that don't feature co-op modes....

Welcome back to Beyond Co-Op Reviews, our critical look at games that don't feature co-op modes....

Welcome back to Beyond Co-Op Reviews, our critical look at games that don't feature co-op modes....

Welcome to another edition of Beyond Co-Op, the weekly news pieces that takes a look at interesting happenings around the video game industry that may or may not pertain to cooperative gaming. It was a surprisingly quiet week, most likely due to PAX East happening right now in Boston. While a few announcements have come out of the show, Borderlands being the biggest, there are some others that flew under the radar for us.

While the internet continues to patch up its wounded ego over the whole Facebook/Oculus fiasco, we've been playing our co-op games with big grins on our faces. But since not all games have co-op play (gasp), Beyond Co-Op is here to tease you with some of the more noteworthy news bits from the previous week. Sit back and see how the other side lives.