Since Iron Man returns to theaters this week, this week’s $20 GOTW will take a look back at one of old shellhead’s finest moments. A mysterious orb threatens all life on both the Marvel and Capcom universes, so Ruby Heart unites heroes from the two universes in order to help save it. However, fights keep breaking out, and now that teams are made up of three, things are more chaotic than ever. Marvel Vs Capcom 2 would be the last game Capcom did utilizing the Marvel license, and they decided to go out with a bang. MVC 2 features Iron Man, his buddy War Machine, and several of his fellow Avengers as part of the 50+ fighters on hand.
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Still looking for something to do until Diablo III hits, and you’re done with Torchlight? Iron Lore Entertainment’s Titan Quest is here to bring you some mythological era looting and level grinding. After deciding the name and gender of your character, you arrive on the shores of the village of Helios, you find that the city is besieged by monsters. You are then recruited by the order of Prometheus to help bring order back to the world. Your quest takes you from Greece to Egypt and the Orient. The base game contains three acts, and the Immortal Throne expansion, which is included on this edition, contains an additional act, so the game takes around 40 hours to complete. You’ll encounter several types of mythological monsters, and you’ll even face bosses. Unlike Diablo, the environments aren’t randomly generated, but the custom crafted backdrops are visually pleasing. You can customize your character’s class and abilities, and you can join up to 5 other player on either local area network or online multiplayer. You can even create custom quests with the game’s editing tools. Like Age of Mythology and God of War, Titan Quest shows players shows how cool Greek mythology can be and how well it translates into video games. Not only that, it’s another fun way to get your dungeon-crawling fix until Diablo III hits.

Forget about Twilight and all these other vampire films that make the creatures of the night look like goth-emo jerks. White-Wolf pen-and-paper role playing game, Vampire: The Masquerade has been doing the modern-day vampire bit for years, better than anyone else. Bloodlines is the second PC game based on the series (the first was Redemption, although Bloodlines isn’t a direct sequel). Despite the bugs and glitches that were present when the game was first released, the pen-and-paper RPG mechanics translate well to PC, and the game offers a number of options to play through it. Besides Half Life 2, this was the one of the first games to make use of Valve’s Source Engine, so the graphics were pretty good for their time.
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Looking for something to do until Diablo III comes out? Torchlight does a good job of taking care of your dungeon crawling fix until Blizzard gets done. Developed by Runic software, a team which includes people who have worked on Fate and Diablo I and II, Torchlight is a simple-to-play yet complex dungeon crawler. Just like Diablo, players take control of one of three character classes, each with upgradable abilities, and explore the mines below the town of Torchlight, battling monsters, gathering items, and completing quests. The town of Torchlight serves as a hub world where players can purchase and sell items along with other stuff. The player also travels with a companion animal whose form can change. The game isn’t graphically intensive, and there is even a graphics setting for netbooks. Players can create their own adventures using Torchlight’s easy-to-use modding tools. Unfortunately there is no multiplayer, but the developer is working on a free-to-play MMORPG set withing Torchlight’s universe. If you’re looking for some good dungeon crawling to take your mind off the fact that Diablo III is a while away, you’d do well to give Torchlight a visit.

Hope you guys had a good laugh for April Fools day. As you guessed by now, those aren’t this week’s real $20 GOTW and Lost Classics. So, for being a good sport, here you go. To make sure there is no hard feelings, I threw in an extra $20GOTW. All three of this week’s features allow players to flex their creative muscles, so click below and read the rest.
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Developer EV Interactive (whose staff is made up of people who worked on JetFighter and Decent no less) and publisher Vivendi Universal are no less than genius. Few videogame developers have attempted to tap into the non-wrestling and non-NASCAR demographic as flawlessly as EV has done here. The companies have banded together to give us the first videogame based on professional Lawnmower Racing! And you thought those things were just for yard work! Licensed by the United States Lawnmower Racing Association, players can customize their racer and go mower to mower against legends such as Bobby Cleveland, George Herrin, and Chris “Mr. Mowjangles” Powell in the Sta-Bil circuit, Free mowing, and multiplayer racing modes! The soundtrack features the music of bluegrass legends, The Outlaw Family Band! Forget about Burnout, Midnight Club, Forza, Gran Turismo, Mario Kart, and every other racing game! It’s all about LMRM2k7! This game should be on the Xbox Originals, but shockingly, it isn’t! Click after the jump for hints and tips as well as our exclusive powet interview with Mr. Mojangles himself!
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Little known fact for all you World of Warcraft players: before it was the massively multiplayer online hit that it is now, Warcraft was a real time strategy series that, while it may not have been the cultural icon that its online cousin is, it was just as critically acclaimed. In fact, Warcraft 2 (along with Command and Conquer) are credited for establishing many of the 4X (eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate) concepts prevalent in most RTS games, and many of the events in WOW are based on Warcraft 3, which is collected in this box. Like the Starcraft Battle Chest, the Warcraft Battle Chest contains Warcraft 3, its expansion, strategy guides and manuals for both games, and a 2 week trial for WOW. If you played Starcraft, then you should feel right at home, as many game mechanics here are similar.
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Every once in a while, a game comes along that challenges gamers to think. Not just in a problem solving way, but a way to really think about the message that the game is trying to convey. Braid is one of those games. On the surface, the game resembles other platformers, specifically Super Mario Brothers. Even the plot seems like something you’ve seen before: the princess has been kidnapped by a monster, and you make your way through different worlds, only to be told again and again that the princess is in another castle. However, the game’s method of story telling, art style, and mechanics turn the whole thing over on its head.
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