Saints Row 2 players who have the Xbox 360 version and a Live Gold membership can pick up the first episodic expansion - Ultor Exposed - on the Live Marketplace for 560 MS Points ($7 US) for this week only.

The expansion includes three co-op missions and a co-op metagame. Use our Co-Op Meet-Up forum to find some like-minded gamers to play Ultor Exposed online.

When you're done checking out this 30% discounted expansion, be sure to free up your schedule for our Official Xbox Live Co-Op Night and our Official Halo Waypoint Co-Op Night on Thursday and Friday, respectively!

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A new batch of games has been given "Platinum Hits" status from Microsoft.  "Platinum Hits" are value priced editions of well reviewed, high selling titles.  Out of the five titles selected, three of them feature co-op: Grand Theft Auto IV, Left 4 Dead, and Saint's Row 2!  If you haven't picked up a copy of one of these yet, perhaps now is the time.

Grand Theft Auto IV - Co-Op Score 3.5

Left 4 Dead - Co-Op Score 5

Saint's Row 2 - Co-Op Score 4.5

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Direct2Drive is celebrating their 5th birthday by offering a full month of $5 games.  We're only at week 2, but already we're seeing some great deals on over 25 titles.

What co-op titles can you snag for $5?

• Saint's Row 2
• Serious Sam Gold
• Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2
• Aces of the Galaxy
• Assault Heroes
• Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

That's a total steal right there for any of them.  There's even some solid classic strategy games like Civilization IV, and a $5 deal on Bioshock!

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No sir, no phallic imagery here.

The latest DLC for 2 player co-op title Saint's Row 2 is now available!  "Ultor Exposed", as it is called, looks to be a worthwhile purchase for fans of co-op!

Disgruntled Ultor microbiologist Tera Patrick holds the key to the corporation’s illicit research activities and revenue generating schemes. Help Tera dismantle the Ultor Corporation by exposing the megacorp's seedy operations to the citizens of Stilwater. Battle through three all new co-op enabled missions. Commandeer new air and ground vehicles including attack aircraft and luxury sports cars. Customize your character with new hairstyles, law enforcement uniforms, and all new clothes. Own the streets in new Strong Arm and Gangsta Brawl multiplayer maps. These are your Saints and this is your city like you’ve never seen it before…fully exposed!

You'll recall that Tera Patrick is a porn star.  "Fully exposed", huh?  Hmm.  Whatever you do, don't go looking for images of her to use for a news post while you are at work.  If you do, immediately clear your browser's cookies, history, and cached files, and deny everything. I'm just saying.

You can add the Saint's Row 2 DLC to your Xbox 360 queue at the link below.

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I'm going to begin this news post with one of the most bizarre developer quotes in recent memory.

"Consider this: You've got Tera Patrick on speed dial," Volition's James Torbit described. "She's unloading an assault rifle into a Masako super soldier while you're driving around a truck full of dead bodies. In your garage you've got an armored vehicle that fires heat-seeking missiles as fast as you can pull the trigger... and you're wearing a new alien costume. Honestly, WTF is going on here?"

That seems to be a fair question.  Torbit is describing the upcoming DLC pack for Saint's Row 2.  The pack will be entitled "Ultor Exposed".  Speaking of exposure, the aforementioned Tera Patrick is an "adult film" star.  No word on how much of Ms. Patrick will be exposed in the game, if any, but that's what the internet is for, after all.  As far as co-op goes, Ultor Exposed will feature "a new co-op metagame that tracks your performance during missions in co-op and hands out bonus cash to the player with the better score."  This DLC sounds interesting, on many different levels!

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50 Cent seems to be worth a lot more than his name suggests. After all he's dabbled in everything from rap and Hip-hop music, to books, to movies, and to our pleasant surprise, co-op video games. Now, he's taking on the project of...Video game movies?

You read that correctly, as 50 Cent has discussed with an ensemble of reporters in a conference call, that he hoped to adapt THQ's Saints Row to the big screen. So far, he's only mentioned producing the film, but perhaps his involvement will be much deeper. After impressing us with Blood in the Sand, it'll be interesting to see what happens next!

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Amazon.com is running a 50% off sale on the Saint's Row 2 Collectors edition for both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.  

That means you can get two copies of the game for the price of one - perfect for the 2 player co-op title!  We reviewed this title back in October and it earned quite high marks!  Get it while the getting is good because this deal ends today!

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While Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 gamers had gone back to the row a few months ago, PC owners were left waiting thanks to a few delays.  But the day has finally come where you can don your very own Hot Dog suit...and your buddy can be the Mustard - as you take down evil gangs throughout the city in Saint's Row 2.  

While we can't guarantee the PC version will be identical to the console version, you can get a good idea of what the game is like from our official review.

 It's been a crazy and interesting year.  We launched Co-Optimus.com some 11 months ago with two goals in mind - promote co-op gaming and provide co-op gaming information.  Since that time co-op gaming has gone from a bullet point on the back of a box to the main feature promoted by publishers at press conferences.  In total there were over 100 co-op games released this year,  and that my friends is pretty damn awesome.  As the staff looked back over the list it was pretty clear what the standout titles were, but that didn't make the decision any easier for choosing our Co-Op Game of the Year.   

So now I present to you our first annual Co-Op Game of the Year Awards.  Each staff member has picked their respective GOTY followed by the pick for the site.  

Amazon is currently running their 15 Deals in 15 Days of Video Games deal.  Every day there's some new video game related deal, today's just so happens to feature the very co-op friendly game Saint's Row 2.  In fact, the best deal is the collector's edition, which is available for $49.99 (regularly $79.99).  Also available are the regular editions for cheap, the PlayStation 3 version will set you back $42 while the 360 version will set you back $45.

Use the above links when ordering to support Co-Optimus, and don't forget to  to read our review of the game.

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