Long before Mass Effect hit the shelves, developers Bioware had announced their intentions of it being the first in a trilogy. Now, with the runaway success that Mass Effect has proved to be, the sequels are pretty much a certainty. Microsoft’s glee at the prospect another franchise to milk is palpable, considering the game is an exclusive for the Xbox 360. Add to that, the fact that the game in itself is one of the best titles out there, what with gamers in their third and fourth playthrough of the game and still enjoying it. It only means that there is more money waiting to be tapped in form of downloadable content (DLC).

As expected, Bioware has announced “Bring Down The Sky”, the first DLC for Mass Effect, scheduled to be released on March 10. The DLC will be available for download at Xbox LIVE Marketplace at 3:30 PM IST (2:00 AM PST) for 400 Microsoft Points. With around 90 minutes of completely new gameplay, fans have much to cheer about. Achievement Whores will also have a reason to smile with new Achievements worth 50 Gamerscore points for them to loose their sleep over.

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After having finished the fight last September, rabid fans of the Halo franchise had to be content with sticking their friends with grenades online and waiting for the next game set in the Haloverse, the first RTS in the series - Halo Wars. Though the continuation of the story (or rather, the prequel) was expected long before Halo 3 wrapped up (or not) the Master Chief saga, few expected it to take the form of a real time strategy game that Bungie, in collaboration with Age of Empires legend Ensemble Studios are expected to spring on us later this year. RTS games on the Xbox 360, like Command & Conquer: Tiberium Wars before it, have always been iffy, what with the level of control and freedom that a conventional keyboard-mouse combination offers, but Ensemble Studios, like every other console RTS dev before them, have claimed to have worked out the nuances of controlling the game using a standard Xbox 360 controller without frustration levels peaking into the red-zone.

While we wait for the official demo of the game to check out the control scheme for ourselves and speculate on the possibility of wreaking havoc with the Covenant war machine, one of our friends over at Microsoft, like many of us from time to time, developed a case of verbal diarrhoea and slipped us some really interesting information. Now, while we are never in the habit of starting rumors, this one comes from someone on the inside who swears on its authenticity on pain of death, and we’ve been sitting on this one for almost a couple of weeks now, trying to verify it before we say anything about it.

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I’ve forgotten how painful Xbox LIVE can be when it completely refuses to behave - a memory that was more than brought to the front again the last couple of weeks, after my Halo 3 experience sank down the drain because LIVE thought it would be really hilarious to drop me from the match when I least expected it. But to make up for all those lost days on LIVE, and to coincide with the first Xbox LIVE Arcade community awards, Microsoft had announced a couple of days back that the award-winning Aquanox-meets-Unreal Tournament Domination underwater shooter Undertow would be made available to all Gold and Silver members from Wednesday through Sunday. As announced, the game, regularly priced at 800 MS Points, is now available for free download to everyone on Xbox LIVE until Monday, 28 January, 2008 1:30 PM IST.

Now, while I appreciate the gesture, I just can’t condone the fact that this game is taking the place of a regular Xbox LIVE Arcade release every Wednesday, not to mention that the LIVE service isn’t working right even now, after a whole damn month of problems. And what’s worse is that the game, apparently an appeasement for a service that wasn’t working the way it was supposed to (10 million new subscribers notwithstanding) has a small download window on it, after which it reverts to selling for its usual 800 points. Why not run the promotion for at least a week? Wouldn’t it have been better to have users register themselves at the Xbox.com page and get 800 Points instead of having a game thrust onto them that they may already have or not really want?

And what about the Indian Xbox LIVE users who might have already bought the game? We called up Xbox Support today morning and when we got through to a rep, we dropped the bomb and asked Microsoft about what happens to people who have already paid for Undertow. After acting completely clueless about the whole thing at first, and after reintroducing us to the annoying hold music for some time, they came back and said that they would indeed credit the 800 points into our account once they verified our Download History to make sure we had bought the game before yesterday. So, if you’ve already bought the arcade game, then all you have to do is call the Xbox support lines listed here, give them your gamertags and get your 800 points to spend as you please. You lucky dogs you!

You gotta admit, the Xbox Originals deal is a really cool idea, especially if you live in a country which never had the Xbox, completely obliterating your chances of getting an original Xbox disc anywhere within a 10,000 mile radius. Never mind the fact that we still don’t have the 120GB HDD here officially and we’d have to juggle our Xbox Original games via our Download History!

But for those that are planning to download them anyway, like us, there’s nothing better than giving us a chance at winning some cool stuff just for doing it. Announcing the new “Play & Win” sweepstakes on the official Xbox website, Microsoft is now giving those that download Xbox Originals a chance at winning great goodies including an Xbox 360 VIP Accessory Kit that includes a wireless controller, two Play & Charge kits, an Xbox LIVE Vision camera, a Quick Charge kit, the Universal Media Remote, a Wireless Network Adapter, a Wireless Headset, a 64 MB Memory Unit - all housed in a neat Limited Edition Xbox 360 Aluminium carrying case. If you’re not among the five lucky winners that’s going to be getting this killer kit, you can hope to be among the other 50 lucky SOBs that can walk away with a 12-month Xbox LIVE Gold subscription or 1600 Microsoft Points gratis.

All you gotta do is register your GamerTag on the official registration form before December 5th, make sure you got an Xbox LIVE Gold membership in good standing and then download an Xbox Original game off Marketplace with the same GamerTag. Then its off to waiting until December 16 to see if you won anything. And oh, you gotta be a US resident to be eligible to enter said sweepstakes. Damn, we knew there was a catch somewhere. Now we’re off to contact Microsoft India and beg them to do something like that here as well, since it’d be even more of an incentive for us to get our Fahrenheit and Psychonauts goodness come December 4th.

There’s nothing more annoying to a PC owner than having to wait for a game that millions of others are already enjoying. Used to waiting ages for games like GTA, Halo and Fable, it came as no surprise to the PC aficionados that they’d have to endure yet another interminable wait for Gears of War, the game that sold the Xbox 360, to get to their beloved platform of choice. And just about a year later, Gears of War finally arrives for the PC, and to make up for all the lost time, brings along enough candy and flowers to make sure you don’t ever remember being stood up on this grimy, bloody date.

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More than 48 hours to go before we can finally get our hands on Mass Effect over here, unlike some lucky dogs elsewhere who’re enjoying it already. For helpless souls like us that just can’t wait for our intergalactic roleplaying fix, Microsoft has been kind enough to launch the Mass Effect Experience, a great Flash site that puts you in the shoes of Cmdr. Shepard on board the SSV Normandy.

No point in me talking about the site, since it’s awesomeness redefined, but one thing that this site has managed to do is to make me try and break into the local distributors’ store to get my copy. I want my character to get some alien lovin’ already! Come on, Microsoft India, have some pity on us. Send us a review copy or something. Help me end my misery!

Reggie and myself just got back a few hours ago from Microsoft’s Gamers Night, which is arguably the biggest gaming-related event ever held in Delhi, and I must say that we’re both poop-zhausted. Between trying to talk with companies, to actually squeezing some game time with big-boys like Mass Effect and Army of Two – having an open bar with infinite Coke refills is a caffeine blessing in disguise. But the sad truth, there’s not much to talk about. At least, not until this coming Monday, when the media embargo is lifted for all of Microsoft’s and EA’s juicy offerings. Until then, you’ll just have to keep pounding on the F5! In other news, I think I may have contracted some skin disease. These PR folks can be quite the wild bunch, you know! Certainly not as terribly inconvenient as getting an error message from Gears of Wa- OOPS, will you look at the time! I can’t ride that pumpkin back home!

Expect more news at the stroke of midnight on Sunday, count on it.