The Best of Big Download: May 25-31

Yep, we are just hours away from E3 2009 madness. But we had a lot of pre-E3 activity to talk about last week. Before we head to the LA Convention Center let's look back at the last seven days:
Exclusive Features

• Countdown to E3 2009: We conclude our features on the games we want to see at the show this coming week with our picks in the RPG-MMO categories and for the rest of the games. Plus play along in Big Download's E3 2009 bingo prediction game. Finally check out our interview with the ESA on E3 2009.
• Guide to Team Fortress 2 Spy and Sniper Achievements: It's our latest guide to the newly established achievements for two of TF2's character classes. Check out The Spy guide (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5) and the Sniper Guide (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5)
• The Top 10 PC Game News Stories of May 2009: We pick the big news items for the past 31 days.
• Mac Monday: Our weekly look at Mac games takes a look at the adventure title Cleopatra.
• Boot Disk: Our retro game feature this week offers a look at the classic strategy game Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri.
• Big Ideas: Our weekly examination on game themes takes a look at artificial intelligence and their evolution in games.
• Freeware Friday: Our weekly look at free PC games takes a look at the very distrubing horror game All Of Our Friends Are Dead.

Downloads

• Modern Warfare 2 gameplay trailer: It's the first gameplay footage from Infinity Ward's FPS sequel
• Battleforge Full Game client: Download the new free-to-play full version of EA's recent RTS game
• Warrior Epic client: Download the client for the new fantasy free to play MMO from True Games
• Natural Selection 2 teaser trailer: It's the first footage from the long awaited FPS-RTS game
• Tropico 3 teaser trailer: Check out this teaser for the upcoming island dictator game sequel
• Brink teaser trailer: It's the first glimpse of the Splash Damage FPS.

News

• Battleforge turns into free-to-play game . . . kind of
• Proposed Guantanamo game to get input from real prisoner
• BioShock 2 gets release date of November 3 in US; October 30 in Europe
• Big Huge Games saved by 38 Studios acquisition
• THQ and Kaos Studios announce Homefront
• Stronghold Kingdoms announced
• Report: BioShock novel coming this fall
• Brink revealed
• Dragon Age: Origins gets October 20 release date
• EA Sports to launch PGA golf game for web browsers this fall
• The Matrix Online to shut down July 31
• First Supreme Commander 2 screenshot released
• Achievement unlocks come back in latest Team Fortress 2 update
• Square Enix announces Front Mission Evolved for the PC