Microsoft has released their partial game schedule for the upcoming Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, and it's chock full of Gears of War 2, Halo Wars, and the New Xbox Experience ... experience. Sure there's plenty of other stuff happening at their booth as well, but we're drooling over these three right now, fetch the bibs. Hopefully those "TBA" slots mean there's going to be some surprises from Bungie someone, which will really kick our saliva glands into high gear.

If you're going to be at PAX, be sure and stop by for some hands-on time with these titles, and then search out one of your favorite Joystiq bloggers to pal around with. We'll be the ones with the plastic spit-shields on to keep the precious electronics dry.

Pictured: our inner child at the Microsoft PAX booth, via Gamerscoreblog's Flickr feed.

In an interview with Gears of War 2 lead designer Cliff Bleszinski at X08 in Toronto, Canada, we learned of an upgraded version of the original "Seriously" achievement, first seen in the popular franchise's previous installment. The achievement, "Seriously 2.0," requires 100,000 kills across the single and multiplayer campaign of the anticipated title. Yikes!

Stay tuned for the entire interview where Cliff reveals his thoughts on the single-player experience, Gears of War 2's Horde mode (first revealed at E3 2008), Too Human and, err, his desire to pee. Yeah, he went there.

Despite (or perhaps because of) the similarities to an episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force from 2004, Penny Arcade's Gears of Conflict Resolution took top honors in this week's webcomic wrapup. We'd also like to take a moment to remind everyone of the 300 "PG" parody, since we still can't stop ourselves from shouting "This is Cake Town" at least once a day at random strangers.

Second and third place go to Ctrl+Alt+Del's Moar Co-Op and Monday Night Crew's Street Dated. A special nod goes to mudron's debut in the wrapup.Thanks to everyone who voted; be sure to let us know of any game-related webcomics you stumble upon this week!

A dynamic duo of details dropped yesterday at the Gears of War 2 panel at the San Diego Comic Con 08 regarding Epic's epic new installment in their well-received locust-splitting franchise. The first of these announcements, revealed by Cliff Bleszinski, was that the title will utilize "linked achievements" to unlock in-game content -- basically, if you have certain achievements from the original Gears of War on your profile, it will unlock certain bonuses (like extra playable characters in the online mode) in the sequel.

The second, and arguably less thrilling announcement, came shortly thereafter -- the obligatory "collector's edition" of Gears of War 2 was unofficially announced at the panel. It will supposedly include a "miniature replica model" of a Lancer, the iconic chainsaw-infused gun from the series. Sure, the special edition's legendary price of $130 may seem a tad unreasonable, but who said that transforming your cat into a futuristic super soldier was going to be cheap?

Joystiq has obtained a video that's set to air at the start of Gamestop's Gears of War midnight tournaments tomorrow. The video contains an introduction by Cliff Bleszinski as well as "never-before-seen footage" from Gears of War 2. Is your interest piqued? Video embedded after the break.

We hope you used pencil when you marked up the August 26 quadrant of your Burly Men of Sera calendar with the following info: "Gears of War: The Pendulum Wars by Steven L. Kent today!" Turns out the preorder info on Amazon.ca – even the cover image! – was a tad premature; Epic and Del Ray Books announced that the Gears of War prequel trilogy of books will be written by sci-fi veteran Karen Traviss, and the first installment will be called Gears of War: The Battle of Aspho Fields (there's a joke here ... what's an Aspho?). No word on why Kent's out – an Epic representative tols us, "While we think very highly of Steven L. Kent's work, we are not working with him at this time."

Here's a snippet from the presser: "Marcus and Dom can take anything the Locust Horde throws at them – but will their friendship survive the truth about Dom's brother Carlos?" Well, will it? We just don't know, but you can find out when it roadie runs into your neighborhood bookstore on October 28, just in time for the sequel's November 7 Re-mergence Day.

In the latest episode of GameTrailers TV, baby-faced Geoff Keighley got a chance to have a pow-wow with Gears of War 2's designer and poster boy, Cliff Bleszinski, who revealed some of the game's heretofore unannounced additions. Chief among said additions are a new multiplayer map titled "Day-One", which features a sizable emergence hole and its massive, treacherous occupant, and the inclusion of AI bots in the game's multiplayer modes, as featured in another of Epic's staple franchises, Unreal Tournament.

Other big reveals during the episode include the revivification of a map from the original Gears' "Hidden Fronts" DLC pack titled "Subway", the addition of player-controlled tanks, and a limited edition red, Gears of War 2-themed Xbox 360 to be released around the title's launch. With the veritable cornucopia of information already unleashed about Microsoft's holiday blockbuster, we're beginning to wonder if they've got any frags up their sleeves for next week's showcase.

Visiting the official Gears of War 2 page right now sends you to a splash page with the above image. The dog tags and the image name have the same numerical combination: 033-116-117-126-071. When converted from Octal to ASCII you get "ESC Nov 9" (ESC as in the control character). Microsoft hasn't issued a press release, but it's hard to argue against November 9 being the official release date for Gears of War 2. We expect a confirmation by next week, if not before.

[Via Epic Forums]

While most of the "new" gameplay elements and maps discussed in the above preview for Gears of War 2 aren't really "new" to the video game news consuming populous, it's still nice to see some of the game's fresh features in action. The preview is fairly comprehensive -- there's looks at some of the soon-to-be-covered-in-gore locales, the new gametypes (we absolutely cannot wait for meatflag), chainsaw duels, new weapons and executions, and brand new, colorful ways of describing acts of grisly violence from the game's all-growed-up iconic lead designer, Cliff Bleszinski. We can't think of a better way to spend eight and a half minutes of a Sunday afternoon than to watch beefy combatants get halved.

By the time you read this, there's a good chance the above video has already been pulled. However, if you're lucky enough to be reading Joystiq religiously (as you should), enjoy some leaked Gears of War 2 beta footage, care of Analog Hype.

Update: Now with more footage, including executions and "death crawls," after the break.

[Via X3F]

To accent the release of 1Up's Gears of War 2 multiplayer video, Microsoft has released a bundle of new screens and images of concept art from the game. Peruse the GoW 2 galleries below at your leisure, but fanboys, please try not to spill any Emulsion on the keyboard.

In an "epic"-ally long video with a lot of talking and not enough gameplay footage, 1Up's Dan Hsu interviews Epic's Cliff Bleszinski (no more CliffyB, remember?) about Gears of War 2's multiplayer. Bleszinski discusses various aspects of GoW 2's online chainsodomy, from god-mode animations, to hostage taking, to the new version of the Gridlock map. Although not confirming the final count, he also says about 10 multiplayer maps will ship with the game. Check it all out in the video after the break.

[Via X3F]

Update: Just to clarify, this video was shot in April before Hsu announced his resignation from Ziff.

In the immortal words of Matthew Wilder, it looks like EA isn't letting some early bad press for Battlefield: Bad Company break-a their stride. We've seen a veritable gaggle of promotional material for the controversial title as of late, including two recent trailers which clown on some other popular shooters. The first of which, seen above, parodies the unforgettable Gears of War trailer, and features an unnamed infantryman butchering Gary Jules' cover of the Tears for Fears classic downer "Mad World". The other (available after the break) somewhat mocks Rainbow Six's stealth tactics. It's not exactly uncharted territory, but we can always appreciate such Yankovician displays of friendly competition between developers.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

This morning, we've received more proof that given enough time, Joystiq is always right (except when we're wrong). You may remember back in August of 2007 when we told you that Len Wiseman, director of Underworld and Live Free or Die Hard, was in talks to direct a film flick based on Epic's Gears of War. Now, The Hollywood Reporter says New Line has signed Wiseman for the gig.

We're guessing that original writer Stuart Beattie is out, as THR says the picture will be written by Chris Morgan, who has previously worked on the screenplays for Wanted (encouraging!) and The Fast and the Furious 4: The Furiousening (troubling!). So there's your crew, what kind of Gears movie are you expecting?

[Via Cinematical]