I need a new prescription. These glasses are useless!

More details have emerged regarding Vanquish, the forthcoming shooter from SEGA and Platinum Games.

It seems the game will take an old-school approach to world politics, pitting Russia against the US in a struggle to dominate the world’s few remaining energy sources. Though the world isn’t post apocalyptic, it certainly looks to heading in that direction, with San Francisco already reduced to rubble.

In an attempt to distinguish his game from every other shooter before it, director Shinji Mikami relies heavily on the concept of ‘intensity’. As the heroically named Sam, you’ll be donning futuristic armour and battling to liberate a space station. Vanquish certainly looks and sounds like Halo intense.

Knowing the sophistication, and dare I say it, intensity, of shooters like BioShock 2 and Modern Warfare 2, Platinum Games may have a hard time convincing us that Vanquish is the next big thing.

SEGA has now revealed that Vanquish will be released on 360 and PS3 in summer 2010.

It took me all summer to build that treehouse…

Codemasters have announced Bodycount, a new action game featuring Ice-T and the hardcore metal posse he formed in the early 90s. Actually, that’s not the case at all, but someone needs to make that game immediately. In its place, we have the latest first person shooter from Stuart Black, who you may know as the co-creator of Black, the eponymous 2006 shooter from EA and Criterion Games.

Bodycount is set to deliver what the publisher describes as “an orgy of bullets and destruction”, which actually sounds a little unpleasant, doesn’t it? Details of the story remain scarce, but we do know that you’ll be assassinating targets on behalf of a secret organisation. In addition to the single player campaign, Bodycount will also feature cooperative and adversarial multiplayer modes. There will be significant emphasis on destructible cover.

It’s certainly one to watch, but if Black was truly dedicated to the project, he’d change his name to Stuart Bodycount.

The game is due for release on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in early 2011.

True fans insist that Portal was already a co-op game.

Valve has announced that it will issue a sequel to Portal, its innovative and satirical puzzle platformer, before the end of 2010. Portal 2 will be a stand alone product, unlike the original, which was one of five games included with Valve’s 2007 anthology The Orange Box.

Details on the game are currently scarce, but Game Informer has revealed that it will feature a dedicated cooperative campaign in addition to the single player storyline. Arch villainess GLaDOS is set to return in some capacity and at least some of the action will take place in previously unseen areas of the now infamous Aperture Science facility.

The promise of co-op centric puzzles should be particularly well received by those wary of a retread.

Valve informed Eurogamer that Portal 2 will be released on PC and Xbox 360 during the 2010 holiday season. There has been no word as yet on the potential for a PlayStation 3 version of the game. Valve’s Chet Faliszek recently told CVG that the company was dissatisfied with the quality of its PS3 output.

In this episode: Alpha Protocol, The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom, Infinity Ward turmoil, PS3 hiccups, BioShock 2, the hunt for a new Nintendo IP and much more!

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The Panellists: Erin Marcon, Karen Jacobson, David Walden and Peter Nickless

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Related links: You could be next; How did it come to this?; Alpha Protocol is coming