Left 4 Dead Online Details

Valve just announced that their upcoming zombie survival thriller Left 4 Dead will be on dedicated servers for anyone who plays online no matter the platform. They also announced that the Xbox 360 version would include two person splitscreen mode for online play and the splitscreen can be horizontal or vertical - your choice!

Dedicated servers are always a great idea since it means less lag and no host advantage. All games should implement dedicated servers.

And I am also always a fan of splitscreen co-op. Too many games have moved away from this feature.

Overall, I was already extremely excited for this game, but this makes it look that much better. Keep it up, Valve!

Halo 3 Co-op Update

Lukems has updated the Bungie site with some great news about the Halo 3 co-op mode. The game has been tested and polished and will definitely have co-op mode with up to 4 players. Beware the SPOILERS. Here are some of the details:

* Players Can Not Jump In Mid Game
* Players Can Start on Any Level that Has Been Completed by Host
* Each Player Will Have Their Own Character (see below for characters)
* Each Race Starts with Different Weapons (Humans get Human Weapons, Covie Get Covie Equivalent)
* This Will Definitely Change the Way Halo Campaign is Played
* Max 2 Players on Split Screen Co-Op

To keep with the story line and not break the visual continuity there will not be 2 Master Chiefs. Instead each player will be their own character: The Master Chief, The Arbiter, N’tho ‘Sraom, and Usze ‘Taham. Bungie gives a little summary of the two new characters and more should be revealed during the game play.

Gears of War had great co-op moments, but now with 4 players and the large environments that the Halo games usually have, this game is sure to be epic with lots of epic moments. I will definitely need to get a second harddrive to store all the great moments. Boo yaka

4 Player Co-op in Halo 3 Confirmed

Bungie has announced in Amsterdam today that yes online co-op is in and yes 4 player co-op is in. This comes after leaked information about online co-op was looking rocky. Bungie is going to update their site later today going into more details.

No Online Co-op for Halo 3

In a disappointing announcement, Bungie says that there will not be online co-op for the Halo 3 campaign mode. While the lack of online co-op was the biggest complaint abotu Halo 2, the developers are saying they are having too many problems implementing online co-op and are cutting it(for now) to make their deadline.

Bungie has not ruled out the possibility that they would release a downloadable update which would implement online co-op sometime after the game's release. This announcement also squashes the online four player co-op rumors which have been circulating.

Halo 3 will still have a co-op mode, but it will be like Halo 2 - gamers can choose either split screens or a LAN connection.

There's a small possibility the developers could get the online co-op working before release, but most of them have turned their attentions to polishing up everything else to make the September deadline.

I'm definitely disappointed. I figured with a number of other games including two player online co-op nowadays, it wouldn't be a problem for Bungie. After all, they created one of the best online party systems for Halo 2. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but I'm not holding my breath...

Electronic Gaming Monthly Rumors

In the rumor section of Electronic Gaming Monthly, there were two interesting rumors.

The first one is that Gears of War is trying to change their achievements so they don't require "ranked" games. I don't know if this is possible, but it'd definitely help me out since I play mostly player matches.

The other one is that they want to release a version of Dead Rising that is co-op. The rumor mill also says that there would be a patch which would be downloadable to make current versions co-op as well. That would be awesome. However, I highly doubt it.