This relatively straightforward trailer for Star Trek Online includes plenty of in-game footage and ship battles to keep fans in anticipation of the upcoming MMO. To learn more about the game and how it plays, check out our hands-on feature.

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Valve has yet to release the mod tools for Left 4 Dead 2 (we assume they are coming soon-ish) but in the meantime that hasn't stopped some enterprising mod creators from shoehorning the characters, new zombie bosses and items from the just released shooter sequel into the original Left 4 Dead campaigns.

The L4DMods.com site has the full instructions on how to make this happen. The site puts up plenty of warnings that this kind of thing is not for folks who are unfamiliar with opening up and altering a PAK file but as you can see from the above screenshot it is possible to get Coach, Nick, Noelle and Ellis up north to battle the infected.

[Via Kotaku]

This trailer for the Need for Speed SHIFT Team Racing Pack, an upcoming free content expansion, provides fans with a glimpse of some of the big features to expect. As its name indicates, NFS SHIFT players will have to switch their driving styles from individual strategies to more team-oriented ones as they speed down these tacks. Also included are brand new vehicles to muscle against the competition with. Unfortunately, even though the trailer indicates otherwise, the Team Racing Pack isn't available yet. It releases in Europe on December 1st for the PC and Xbox 360 and on December 3rd for the PlayStation 3 console. North American players across all platforms will have to wait until December 10th, but the Need for Speed SHIFT playable demo can be downloaded right now here.

Download HD Need for Speed SHIFT Team Racing Pack Trailer (305 MB)
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If you follow Big Download around (and if you do we will consider putting a restraining order on you) you know that we like to post up the big sales deals that the GoGamer.com brings us during their still misnamed 48 Hours sale. Today is no different as a ton of PC game titles are on the list with sale prices that will last until 3 am Eastern time Tuesday.

This week, the deals include recent PC games like Borderlands for $36.90, The Sims 3 for $32.90 and Tropico 3 for $27.90. Older games are cut to the bone such as Bionic Commando for $17.90 and the first Halo PC port for $12.90.

In Dark Void, players are trapped in an alternate dimension after flying through the Bermuda Triangle. In this place, an alien race with a sinister plan to take over human civilization. As demonstrated by this trailer, the aliens come in many different varieties of looks and battle armor. Dark Void is scheduled to release in North America on January 19, 2010 and across Europe on January 22nd.

"Dark Void is an adrenaline-fueled blend of aerial and ground-pounding combat which centers on Will, a pilot who crash lands in the Bermuda Triangle following a routine mission. Will wakes up to find himself in 'The Void,' an alternate world resembling a primitive earth where aliens with superior technology are planning to take over civilization. Together with a faction of humans who have disappeared into the Void, Will takes on the alien race using their own advanced technology including a high-powered jet pack to defeat them and keep order in the civilized world."

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It's one of the most revered sci-fi movies of all time, and at one point developer Gearbox Software thought hard about making it into a game. The 1982 classic Blade Runner still holds up well and has been the subject of game adaptations before, most notably a 1997 released action-adventure game from the now defunct Westwood Studios.

On the Official Xbox Magazine web site, Gearbox's head man Randy Pitchford states that at one time Gearbox had pursued getting the Blade Runner game license rights, saying, "We chased it down and we could of had it." However, they decided to abandon their plans for the game after looking at the costs. Pitchford states, " . . . the way we wanted to do it, we wanted to spend 25-million dollars. And when you do the math on that, we weren't going to make it back." That's likely true, although we have to wonder what kind of game design would require such a high budget.

If you didn't get enough of kicking names and taking asses when Serious Sam first came out in 2001, then here's your chance to get into the action... this time in blood splattering high-def. The game is available now through various retail outlets.

"The classic arcade FPS Serious Sam: The First Encounter is reborn in glorious high-definition for legions of long-time fans and a whole new generation of gamers around the world. Featuring dazzling visuals and revamped design, gamers take control of the legendary Sam 'Serious' Stone as he is sent back through time to ancient Egypt to battle the overwhelming forces of Notorious Mental and the Sirian army."

Download Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter Launch Trailer (197 MB)
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It's been the talk of the internet ever since its presence was leaked online a few weeks before the game came out. But the now infamous "airport level" in Modern Warfare 2 has certainly generated a lot of debate both among gamers and the mainstream media over whether or not it is appropriate. Now the main scriptwriter for Infinity Ward's first person shooter claims the sequence was something they had to do.

GamePro.com's interview with Jesse Stern (who has a day job as a writer for the NCIS TV series) has him talking extensively about that airport level, where Russian terrorists mow down unarmed civilians. He states, "Every single person in testing opened fire on the crowd, which is human nature." He adds, "I hope that people don't just look at it as being this simplistic and brutal sequence. We've done our best to treat it with care and not to make it gratuitous."

Ultimately Stern feels that the sequence was worth putting into the final product, saying, "This is a triple-A game and the top grosser of all time with this huge budget behind it, yet we're still taking major chances wherever we can and the airport level was a risk we had to take. Sometimes you take huge risks and it really works. Sometimes it doesn't work at all. But if you don't take the chance, you're not going to make something new."

Fans of Need For Speed Shift have likely been wondering if Electronic Arts would be offering any downloadable extras for the racing sim. Today EA sent the word out that the first such free DLC is on its way. Owners of the PC version will be able to download the DLC on December 1.

The free extras will include the addition of four American classic muscle cars and one import sports car to the game (1967 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray 427, 1967 Shelby GT-500, 969 Dodge Charger R/T, 1971 Dodge Challenger R/T, 1998 Toyota Supra Mark). It will also add the Team Racing online gameplay mode where two teams of up to six cars battle it out in stock vehicles.

One of the most critical voices of the game industry, particularly of how games handle violent content, is closing its doors. The non-profit National Institute On Media and The Family has announced that due to lack of funding it will officially shut down by the end of the year.

Formed in the mid-1990s by psychologist Dr. David Walsh, the group was best known for its Video Game Report Card which it issued every year with backing from US lawmakers. The report card always gave failing grades to games which had lots of violent or adult content, even games that had gotten rave reviews from game critics. According to WCOO's web site, Dr Walsh stated that despite his group's shut down he feels that it had a positive effect on keeping certain games away from children. He states, "The fact that the retailers will no longer sell video games, adult video games to little kids, is something we take a great deal of pride in."

This short but sweet gameplay video, captured in a BioShock 2 competitive multiplayer session, reveals many of the weapons and abilities players can look forward to using. Besides the freeze power, there also appears to be the teleportation power that was removed from the first game before it released due to game balance issues. It looks like those issues got worked out in the sequel.

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Usually Mac gamers get the shaft when it comes to getting native ports of previously released PC games. If they are released at all they usually are behind by months or even years after the PC versions are out. In the case of Star Trek D-A-C that's not the case at all as the Mac port of the movie-based game is now scheduled for release this December.

Transgaming is handling the Mac port duties for the game which was originally created by Naked Sky Entertainment. If you have a Macand have a hankering for some movie-based top down space shooting action, you can go ahead and pre-order the downloadable Star Trek D-A-C port for $8.99 at the GameTree online web site.

While technically this isn't official we are going to go ahead and call this puppy anyway. Next week we should see the release via Steam of Serious Sam HD, the graphical remake of Croteam's first game in its first person shooter series. The news comes via a rep from the game's co-publisher Devolver Digital who stated on the Seriously message boards, "If you preordered on Steam I think you will be very happy on the 24th."

We assume he means November 24 and if that's correct then the game should be ready to go on Tuesday. The game was also supposed to be released for Xbox Live Arcade but so far there no word on when that might happen.

Even though the market share for the PC version of Modern Warfare 2 is only a small percentage of the total sales for the first person shooter, the sheer number of units sold for the Infinity Ward-developed game in its first days could still be in the six figure range for the PC port. We've already taken a stab at what those numbers might be like. Now comes word from Infinity Ward itself that the PC version is indeed selling well.

In a post on the company's official message boards, community manager Robert Bowling states that while the PC port does have the smallest market share of all three versions of the game, that doesn't mean the PC version is not a big seller. He writes, "The PC version of Modern Warfare 2 has actually outsold the PC version of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare in its first week. Making it the most successful PC version." Specific sales numbers were not mentioned. One wonders how many more copies would have been sold if Infinity Ward had opted to support dedicated servers.

For a little while it looked like PC multiplayer gamers might not be very happy with the upcoming revival of Aliens Vs Predator. Comments made by a Sega producer for the first person shooter last month cast doubt that the game would have dedicated servers for playing the online aspects of the PC version

Well, multiplayer gamers can breath a little easier now. An email press release sent to Big Download from the game's developer Rebellion quotes the company's CEO Jason Kingsley as saying, "Despite rumours, Rebellion has always been planning to support dedicated servers for AvP PC and we can now officially confirm that this is the case." The game, which will also be one of the first DirectX11-supported PC games, is due out in February 2010.

[Via email press release]