Mass Effect 2: January 26

OK, this is waaaay sooner than I was expecting it, but that's by no means a bad thing. It just means that we'll be playing Mass Effect 2 relatively soonish, because BioWare and EA have announced a January 26 release date for the game on Xbox 360 and PC. That's for North America. Europe will see the game on shelves a few days later, on January 29.

I guess that's it, so... oh hey, they also mention a couple of pre-order incentives. What, you thought 2010 was going to be different? If you slap down your money at GameStop, you'll get download codes for the "Terminus Gear," which includes a weapon and some armor. Here's the company line on those:

• The Terminus Armor is designed for use in extreme planetary conditions, increasing run speed and personal shields, and augmenting weapons with an additional magazine of reserve ammo.
• The M-90 Blackstorm Heavy Weapon generates a high-powered localized gravity well, accelerating particles to near-infinite mass,  and ultimately expanding the selection of heavy weapons available to players when they gear up for combat missions in Mass Effect 2.

If you pre-order from some other participating North American retailer, you'll end up with "Inferno Armor," which offers a negotiation bonus, increased run speed, and a damage bonus for your combat powers.

If you don't pre-order, you'll get some kind of plastic "box" that has a disc or disc-like device inside that says "Mass Effect 2" on it. If this Mass Effect 2 thing is as cool as the last one, that'll probably still be a pretty good deal.