Gears Of War 3, Xbox
Human colony planet Sera has rich deposits of imulsion, a bio-fuel that also attracts the attention of aggressive alien species, the Locusts.
Unfortunately imulsion's side effect is violent mutation of living things, with your job to shoot everything until it stops moving. Gears Of War 3 is a third-person shooter, which is to say you can see your grotesquely beefy protagonists as they lay waste to the Locust horde with chainsaw-bayonetted machine guns. Lengthy (for the genre) plot sequences are designed to demonstrate that its over-muscled troglodyte heroes are essentially decent blokes underneath the ludicrous body armour and lethal armaments. Most important, though, is that despite having nothing new to say, its frequent, noisy gunfights will plaster a big goofy grin on to your face. Gears' overabundance of firepower and supportive teammates will also provide a useful antidote for those who've spent the last few weeks in Dead Island fending off legions of zombies alone, using a kitchen knife.
Microsoft, £49.99
OnLive Launch
The promise of OnLive is intoxicating: play games without having to invest in a console or pimped-out gaming PC. You either download a free client for your PC or Mac or get a micro-console (available free at this weekend's Eurogamer Expo at Earls Court, SW5) and you're ready to play any of the system's 125 games. Because all the processing grunt work is done elsewhere with only pictures and sound sent over the internet, there's no download to wait for and you can log in and play your games from any net-connected computer. Astonishingly it works, providing an experience free from latency (so no perceptible lag between pressing a button and seeing the resulting action onscreen) in very respectable 720p with surround sound. Games already available include Deus Ex: Human Revolution, DiRT 3, Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, LEGO Pirates Of The Caribbean and FEAR 3. OnLive itself is free, with games starting at £1.99. Look out for the PlayPack bundle: £6.99 a month, with access to 100+ games.
Visit onlive.co.uk
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