Gears of War 2

It's been a while since I finished Gears of War 3. I liked it and everything but I was majorly bummed that it never revealed why the Locust Queen looks like a human. It was one thing that I really wanted to know. Needed to know. How could developer Epic leave a loose end hanging like that? It's a question that still burns me like a urinary infection.

So in the absence of official canon clarification (or anything better to do), I thought I would knock together a few possible but not all entirely probable explanations as to why Gears of War's Locust Queen looks human.

Welcome to the third part of our weeklong video reimaginings of modern games as retro classics. So far, we've seen God of War as a Commodore 64 game and Uncharted as a Game Boy title screen. Today, it's the turn of Marcus Fenix. We've been travelling forward through the timeline of classic consoles which brings us to Sega's 16-bit baby. Yes, this is Gears of War as a Mega Drive game (that's a Genesis if you're from the US of A). Roll tape...

Welcome to ClassicRadar, a weekly series of GamesRadar’s greatest hits. Today we take a look back at 'Bikes in Gears of War 2?' - the result of a crazy couple of months in 2008 when everyone seemed to be announcing motorbikes as add-ons or additions to their games. PGR4 (sniff) had bikes, Burnout Paradise too... even Mario Kart Wii had two-wheeled vehicles in it. So we photoshopped together some more games with bikes in, and hilarity ensued.

Before Mario became the most iconic character in videogame history – not to mention the most famous plumber in, well, plumbing history – he was just a carpenter named Jumpman, starring in a game named Donkey Kong. Our point? Even the best need a little time to blossom.

Such is the case with these 8 characters. Like Mario, they weren’t necessarily bad or below average in their debuts, but they were truly spectacular in their sequels, to the point that we almost forget our first impressions of them. How much they changed, and how much they improved. Here, then, is a reminder…

One of the challenges of an action game is creating a villain that you, the player, will want to destroy. Some games, like Killzone 3, end up crafting bad guys so cool and awesome, you're rooting for them instead of the so-called heroes. Then there are games that just get it right, making an entire army of bastards you just want to punch in the face.

Thanks to a mixture of visual design, atmosphere and writing, some games go beyond even that, and are able to craft an entire race of enemies that are simply despicable to behold. They're ugly, they're disgusting, and they garner absolutely zero sympathy. Those are the truly successful baddies in videogames, and now we rightly pay tribute...

Love’s a funny old thing, ain’t it? It inspires great works of art. It knows no boundaries, conquering race, creed and geography. And it totally forces you to fork out for cheap-ass chocolates on anniversaries. While love affairs can end a bit messily in real life, we’ve yet to see a couple with romantic woes commit international espionage or murderise a series of skyscraper-sized monsters for each other. But in video games? Hell, its normal practice for digital Cupid’s arrows. So, in the spirit of being a week late for Valentine’s Day, we thought it was high time to celebrate some of gaming’s most ruinous romances.

Mario and Luigi. Abbott and Costello. Sunny and Cher. All fine double acts, no doubt. But you know the thing each of them were missing? Good old fashioned slaughter to really solidify their partnerships. That’s where the grizzly duos inside come into play. Inspired by our recent playthrough of Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days, we’ve decide to document some of gaming’s recent, really homicidal pairings. Two murderers are better than one, after all.

Every character in the history of games is a simpering moron. That's the only explanation we can think of that solves the mystery of how the virtual stars inside managed to fool everyone with the most half-assed, obvious costumes since Zorro chose the smallest Spanish mask in existence and thought: "F*ck it, who'll know." And whether dressing up as the enemy, the opposite sex or a homicidal clown, these characters rubbish disguises rarely got rumbled.

You devious son of a bitch, box. You promised me woman, explosions, grizzly bears! And now I’m tediously flicking through menus in a glorified micro management sim. That’s right, some covers like to oversell the experience of their actual game. Screw giving potential players an accurate depiction of what the title’s about, there’s bi-quarterly sales figures to hit.

We all love videogames. We all love porn. What better example of synergy could there be than a fusion of the two? Videogames and porn, together at last! Nobody could ever find a way to mess that up, could they?

Oh right... we live in the same world as the Internet...