Along with Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil, Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath is one of the best XBox games you've never played - maybe even never heard of.

This great title was critically acclaimed but failed commercially and it's really a shame. All the Oddworld games were well written and designed and had a sense of humor that really is lacking in a lot of today's titles.

Stranger's Wrath is an FPS with a twist. Jumping back and forth from FPS to third person platformer you're constantly on your toes. Mix in an eccentric ammo system where you have to hunt live critters for use in your firearm and you've got a game that really needs to be experienced to be believed.

Oh - and did I mention that it's currently for sale on Amazon for only $5.99?

Even at it's regular price of $10 it's worth the investment.

1. The How-To-Geek offers up a great tip for getting Windows Vista to automatically disable Aero before starting application. It also automagically turns it back on when you close the app. This is absolutely great for anyone looking to squeeze a little more performance out of their system during games like Crysis or (the PC game I'm currently working on) Hellgate London.
2. The folks at 1Up have compiled a list of the top 101 free games of 2008. There are tons of familiar titles and tons of new ones so be sure to check it out.
3. Could Kid Icarus be making his triumphant return at the hands of Factor 5? It's been a long time since i played th original Kid Icarus - I can't remember most of the game to be honest. The thing about Nintend, though, is that they love using nostalgia to sell games. After all the hype that floated around a potential Kid Icarus game during the launch of the Wii it only makes sense they'd give it a try. But Factor 5? After Lair I'm not quite sure what to expect. For more on this rumor check out the post over at Joystiq.
4. Ever seen an M16 Light Gun for the original NES? Neither had we until GoNintendo found one on eBay. Check out their post about it.
5. Lastly we have a list of the top 12 covers of the Still Alive. My personal favorite is below - if you've bought The Orange Box Soundtrack then you've got a copy of Jonathan Coulton singing the song but this other won is a pretty solid one too.

As 2007 came to an end there were tons of "Game of the Year" posts all over the place - now we have a list that's a bit more prestigious.

The Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences is basically the gaming equivalent to the big Award Shows that aren't happening this year.  With a Board of Directors composed of people from all over the gaming industry (the ESRB, Ubisoft, Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo and more are represented) the AIAS is truly a diverse group.

And they've just released their nominees for the 11th annual Interactive Achievement Awards.

If your looking for some games from 2007 that you might have missed their nominees are truly the cream of the crop with plenty of variety.  Check out a short list of their nominees and click the PDF at the bottom of the page for a full list of categories.

I spotted these T-Shirts over on Rock, Paper, Shotgun and was totally impressed! Valve, continuing to cash in on Portal and it's growing almost cult-like following, has released a series of new Portal T-Shirts featuring the game's Antagonist, the Cake and even the Companion Cube.

With the exception of the Head Crab plushie and The Orange Box Soundtrack these are some of the few things I would buy on the Valve Site.

Speaking of The Orange Box Soundtrack, I highly recommend picking it up if you haven't already. I wasn't sure I'd like it but after downloading earlier this week I've put it into heavy rotation on both my Computer and my Shuffle. I recommend heading over to Amazon to get the DRM free version - you'll also be able to grab it for only $7.99 which is a pretty good deal.

Songs from Amazon can play on iTunes, Windows Media Player and anything else that plays MP3s. You can also download the tracks to your phone, iPod or other MP3 player which I think is just great!

Anyway, check out the t-shirts and the soundtrack.

Downloadable Content is one of those gaming innovations that teeters on the verge of extremely cool and extremely dangerous. Over the last several months we've seen a variety of different types of content hitting the XBox Live Marketplace. While there have been some great offerings for Downloadable Content (most notably the additions to both Crackdown and The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion) there have been some equally questionable ones (like $6 for Guitar Hero II tracks that are part of the original game.)

Up until now, at least that we know of, all downloadable content has been ... downloadable. 2k games has started changing the playing field in a much less than exciting way. As part of a new add-on to NHL 2K8 which opens up the 2K Reelmaker. The XBLM purchase will cost you $5 but doesn't really push downloadable content instead it allows you to download a key that unlocks something that's already on the game CD.

That's right - you're not buying something, you're paying to unlock something you've already bought. It just doesn't seem right does it?

Anyway - 2K Games is also part of the team behind BioShock. You may remember that a few weeks back some code was discovered that pointed to more plasmids being in the game. Is it possible that some of these may end up being "unlocked" thanks to purchases on XBLM?