The Penny-Arcade Expo 2009 panel schedule has been released, and buried amid the myriad of interesting topics and discussions appears to be a hidden gem for Dawn of War 2 fans.

As readers of the site know, I am somewhat of a music game addict.  This means we have several fake plastic instruments lying around our house.  After buying many, selling them off to finance upgrades, etc., we are now "down" to all Guitar Hero instruments.  We have a Les Paul from GH3, a trusty ol' X-Plorer from GH2, and the latest and greatest (for another few weeks anyway) the GH World Tour axe.  For the most part, we've been quite pleased with all these guitars, save a really sensitive tilt sensor on the Les Paul.  Our drum set is from World Tour, and, unfortunately, a few weeks back, the red drum pad stopped working. This wasn't a big deal at the time.  My oldest son was away visiting family, and wouldn't be back for almost a month.  So, the youngest boy and I played guitar together.  The kid can play almost anything on easy, so it worked out great.  However, a week ago, big brother returned.  This left us with a dilemma of global proportions: who had to play the broken drums? Now, you may be wondering, why not just fix the drums?  Can't you go online and order one of those tuner kits from RedOctane for free?  While this may have been the case late last year, apparently there is no way to do so now.  Or, at the very least, I was unable to get one, after jumping through all the appropriate hoops I knew of.  Opening up the drum set was not an option for me, as I am paranoid about breaking, shorting out, or otherwise destroying a rather expensive piece of gaming hardware.  Paralyzed by fear, I left the drum pad in a state of disrepair.  

The Miner Wars team has just released a brand new video and batch of screenshots for their upcoming space-action-simulation-miner game.  I really don't know how to classify it other than it's a six degrees of freedom game that plans to integrate single player and co-op play into one experience.  I get a distinct Descent vibe from it.

I'm torn about Guitar Hero Van Halen.  I love me some Van Halen, as a child of the 80s.  They are one of the most popular bands of all time, after all.  But considering this will be the fourth Guitar Hero title released in 2009, my interest was waning.  (Which is saying a lot, as I am totaaly addicted to music games.)  The news that Sammy Hagar would be absent, as would all of the songs from the era in which he was the lead singer, had me fuming.  I feel some of the band's best music came with Sammy.  Still, there's plenty of good stuff in the game, which of necessity includes pretty much every song you'd expect from the Diamond Dave days.  And the reveal trailer did indeed get me excited, once again.  Considering you can pick up GH Van Halen for free, I'm sure plastic guitar fans will be hoping for this game, spandex pants, and cans of hairspray under the tree this year.

EA has released a set of brand new screenshots for their upcoming co-op RTS, Command and Conquer 4.  The game is set for an early 2010 release exclusively on the PC, and it features some new additions to the franchise.

Borderlands's new graphical style has leaked over onto its box art in to what can only be described as a very comic-book inspired look.  It's not often a developer makes a big deal about the cover of their game, but I must have saw a half dozen tweets from various Gearbox folks regarding the cover.  Gearbox is proud of their baby.

Sad news hobbits.  Those of you hoping to waggle with Aragorn, Frodo, Gimli and the crew in Lord of the Rings: Aragorn's Quest for the Wii are going to have to wait until the spring of next year.   The game joins a growing group of video games that have been delayed from a Fall 2009 release to a Spring 2010 release.

If you're looking to kill some zombies, or perhaps even trounce through the second World War - and you've got a few extra nickels in your drawer - here's a Steam deal for you. 

If there's one thing that can be said about Halo 3's online mode is that it's full of...uh, an unsophisticated style of behavior.  This won't be a problem for Halo 3: ODST's co-op modes, including Firefight, because unless you are friends with some dimwits - you won't be using matchmaking to fill a co-op game.

Activision has just announced a shocker of a deal for Guitar Hero fans.  If you preorder Guitar Hero 5 or you purchase the game in specially marked boxes in September - you'll get yourself a free copy of Guitar Hero Van Halen for free!

We really enjoyed Sacred 2: Fallen Angel last year on the PC and earlier this year on the consoles.  Despite the fact the game's developer, Ascaron, has gone belly up - sales were solid enough to warrant an expansion pack called Ice and Blood.

When Nick invited me to play the newest Call of Duty: World at War Nazi Zombie map Der Riese, I was all too happy to oblige. The trouble with two-player survival games, however, is that if you're both in the same boat -- namely, the S.S. I Have No Clue -- you're not going to get very far. After several attempts to ward off the undead, we finally gave in and went in search of two more comrades in the spirit of 4-player co-op survival.