Believe it or not, the Nintendo DS has been out for five years now.  But the DSi?  Barely even 6 months.  But that didn't stop Nintendo from announcing a brand new DS system called the DSi LL.  This extra large version of the DSi features dual four inch screens, a bigger stylus, and a longer battery life.

The screens themselves are the same resolution as the smaller screens of the DSi, so expect some truly pixelated looking displays.  All other specs of the system are identical to the DSi - dual cameras, SD card slot, and clamshell design.  The total weight of the system is 314g or about 11oz.  The DSi weighs 7.5oz.

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We've got our first big co-op release of the fall season today with Activision's Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.  The four player co-op brawler/RPG has players choosing from over 25 characters and teaming up to combine powers in a story set in the Civil War story arc.

The game has online and offline co-op for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and local co-op for the rest of the platforms including the Wii, PS2, PSP and DS.  There are certain characters that are exclusive to certain versions of the game, and we have the full list laid out for you.

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We talked a bit about Scribblenauts a few months back, a unique Nintendo DS title from developer 5th Cell.  Check out our original post in regards to the concepts of the game.  The game will be on store shelves tomorrow, September 15th, and by all accounts looks like it should be a solid seller (#5 at the time of this writing).  

While the game doesn't have any co-op to speak of, we do think the game offers a form of social co-op play that will be incredibly interesting to watch.  We've gone ahead and started an official thread to share all of your solutions with each other.  It'll be really interesting to see just how many different ways people solve the puzzles at hand.  

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We wish it looked like this, but it doesn't.

 Activision has announced that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will be coming to the Nintendo DS this fall.  The game is called Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2: Mobilised and the game is so big it has two colon's in the title.

The game is set to feature building to building combat, UAV control, tank control and the ability to man the AC-130 gunship.  It's unclear if the game has co-op play, but apparently the six player multiplayer mode was so awesome they named it twice in the press release.  

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We just snuck this in before end of the month, but we have a fresh batch of Beyond Co-Op reviews for you. Battlefield 1943, Monkey island, and Red Faction: Guerrilla highlight a total of six reviews of gaming goodness.

Electronic Arts has announced a brand new Nintendo DS title today named SimAnimals Africa.  Now you can live out your dream of raising a heard of laughing hyenas while riding the train to work everyday.  The DS version also features exclusive animals over the Wii version (which doesn't feature co-op), there's parrots, cheetahs, meerkats, aardvarks as well as surprise secret animal as a reward for finishing the game.

My bet is on penguin.  Yes there are penguins in Africa...look it up.

The game has players using the stylus and microphone to interact with the animals, and players can team up in the co-op mode for even more fun.  Co-Op allows friends to trade plants and animals and play together to achieve goals faster.  In the animal kingdom...faster is always better.

Sometimes a game comes along that's premise is so awesome, so original, we simply can't ignore it - regardless of whether or not that game has cooperative gameplay.  Scribblenauts for the Nintendo DS is that game.  

The idea behind it is fairly simple, collect a star - win the level.  The trick behind the 200 plus levels in the game is how to obtain the star.  The game is completely open in the puzzle solving, all that is required is for the player to write the word of an object to help obtain the star.

For instance, if the star is stuck in a tree; you could write Ladder.  The game would spawn a ladder, you'd climb it, and collect the star.  Or you could write chainsaw, and cut the tree down and collect the star.  Perhaps you would write lasso, and pull it down.  The game is powered by the Objectnaut database of over 10,000 words that you can write to spawn objects that you can fully interact with.

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In Japan, the Dragon Quest series is as big - if not bigger - than the Halo series is here in the United States.  The next game in the series is coming from famed developer Level 5 and is set to be released in Japan on July 11th on the Nintendo DS.  One of the most touted features of the game is a new cooperative mode.  

But there's been some confusion over this mode, as to whether or not you could play via the internet or only local wi-fi play.
 

Square Enix PR clears up the issue with this: "From the beginning of development, co-op play hasn't been via WiFi, but rather DS wireless play."

And now there's no more confusion. No internet play, only local wireless.  Which apparently is different than Wi-Fi.    Silly Nintendo and their silly names.

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Right now we all should have been knee deep in xenomorph carcasses.  Aliens Colonial Marines was originally planned for an early June release, but has since all but disappeared from release schedules.  Instead we saw publisher Sega choosing to hype up a brand new, and non co-op, Alien vs. Predator title.  We feared the worst, thinking the four player co-op shooter from Gearbox was canceled.  Thankfully that's not the case.

Gearbox president Randy Pitchford has told Kotaku the game is now a 2010 release, and then when the game does release we'll also see a Nintendo DS version.  No word on if that version will have co-op or not.

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Sometime ago we told you that Gauntlet DS appeared to have been cancelled.  Retail listings were pulled, and there was no longer any publisher information.  There appears to be some good news though, as an astute Joystiq reader noticed the game appeared back on the ESRB website under a new publisher.

The original title was set to be published by Eidos, which has since been bought by Square-Enix.  Now the ESRB site lists the game's publisher as Majesco.  We also noticed the game has reappeared on Amazon.com with updated publisher information.  No release date was given, but it's definitely a good sign the game has life. 

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