When Killing Monsters, 2 Heads Are More Fun Than 1

The idea of cooperative play has been around for some time in "massively multi-player" games such as World of Warcraft. But this approach among games for the popular consoles could help the industry broaden its audience even more. That play style fits better with how women, for example, prefer to learn and interact, said Sheri Graner Ray, a freelance game designer and author of "Gender Inclusive Game Design."

"Everyone seems to think that to get girls interested in gaming, you have to put out a game about fluffy pink kitties that go shopping, but that's not the case," she said.

Alain Tascan, head of Electronic Arts' Montreal studio, which is developing a cooperative-play game called Army of Two, says co-op titles represent a maturation of the feelings that come from playing video games.

"If we are not able to bring more emotions, we won't be able to make the medium evolve as much as we want. Cooperative game play is the path to achieve that," he said. "It's so much more interesting than 'Kill, kill, kill!' or 'I'm going to beat you!' "

Gears of War's Sensitive Side

Speaking of Gears of War, there's a commercial that features the game's main character running through the streets of a desolated town as a quiet piano song plays.

Most game commercials feature booming heavy metal soundtracks, but this one is striking because of its use of a melancholy cover of an already-gloomy 1983 song called "Mad World" from new wave group Tears for Fears.

The cover, performed by Gary Jules, was previously featured in the 2001 cult flick "Donnie Darko" and recently sailed up the charts on iTunes, apparently as a result of the commercial. Both the album and the track were on the top charts this week.

The usual jokers on YouTube have been remixing the commercial by seeing how its visuals play against other '80s-era hits from artists including Phil Collins and Men Without Hats. And another group has started slapping "Mad World" on footage of other games to explore the sensitive sides of titles with names like, um, Killzone 2.

"It fits in really well with this secondary theme of sadness that's in the game," said game designer CliffyB. "About 80 percent of the gamers love it; 20 percent of the gamers hate it and are busy remixing it on YouTube. And that's great. It only helps sell more games."