Strapping on our ever respawning parachute, we've taken Just Cause 2 through its gameplay paces and explored as much of the island nation of Panau as possible to really see what's up with videogaming's latest sandbox gaming option.

Thankfully what's on offer here is a stunningly rich game with a fully realised, functioning game-world let down slightly by bad writing, disengaging characters, horrible voice-acting and poor mission structuring. Though none of this stops Just Cause 2 from being a game well worth an investment.

Click here for the full AusGamers review.

Following Friday's Steam release for the Just Cause 2 demo, Eidos have now let it loose for general distribution, meaning you can now grab a copy locally from AusGamers files [1.04GB] (Update: The correct file is now available, apologies to anyone that downloaded earlier).

With 35 square miles of adrenaline-fuelled gameplay, the demo is packed with opportunities for chaos. Set in the stunning south-western Panaun desert, the demo area contains a full 16 civilian towns and military bases, one of the 50 government colonels to hunt down and assassinate, air challenges, pickups, numerous military and civilian vehicles and one complete, full-game mission, containing an assault on a mountain-top radar station, ending in one of sandbox gaming’s most memorable car chases! While the demo downloads, make sure to check out the latest trailer for a taste of the chaos to come.

Windows XP owners note before downloading that this game requires either Windows 7 or Vista.

For more information about the game, check out AusGamers' hands-on preview or watch this new trailer featuring gameplay from the demo.

Just Cause 2 is on track for an "April 2010" release on PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Avalanche Studios and Square Enix have released the promised playable demo for Just Cause 2 a month ahead of it's "April 2010" Australian release date.

PC gamers can find this one on Steam; Update: A local download is now available here on AusGamers (542MB) - it's also Windows 7/Vista only (sorry XP users). Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 owners should also be able to locate it on their respective online services.

The Just Cause 2 demo features a massive 35 square miles of the Lautan Lama Desert, a vast expanse of stunning, sun-scorched scenery taking up just one of the many islands in the 400 square miles of the Panau archipelago. Packed with towns, villages, military installations, mountain ranges, missions and more, the demo will feature an astonishing amount of activities for the player... and opportunities for adrenaline-fuelled chaos are limitless.

The demo will cost you about 1.2GB of download quota and disk space.

If that's not enough, check out this developer diary video explaining some of the PC exclusive features including 3D-vision support.

Update: A local download is now available here on AusGamers.

Yesterday we had a brief run through Avalanche Studios' Just Cause 2; checking out all the opportunities, and its much touted freedom of devastation creative angle.

The game itself is stunning to look at, easy to pick-up-and-play, and offers a tantalising world of options before you, while the sum of its varying gameplay parts clearly push it ahead of the sandbox pack through player empowerment. Still, it's a hard slog relaying this to the average gaming punter, but so far, so good.

Click here for our full thoughts.

GamingBolt have discovered the system requirements for Just Cause 2, highlighting one particular key issue: it will not work on Windows XP. You'll need Windows Vista or Windows 7 and the included fancypants DirectX 10.

While XP support going the way of the dodo was probably inevitable, it's still quite a common operating system for gamers to have installed. No doubt we'll see more and more games follow this path, and even if Just Cause 2 isn't your cup of tea, it's pretty likely that eventually there'll be some game that you want to play that you need to upgrade for. For those - like me - that haven't found any compelling reason to upgrade yet, might be time to start budgeting for an operating system upgrade!

By now we've all seen much of the in-game craziness possible with the combination of Just Cause 2's open-world environment and the grappling hook and parachute accessories, but Eidos still have more for us.

Today's "Gravity" trailer demonstrates a whole bunch of entertaining ways you can taunt the hostile militia of Panau - all in the name of science of course. Check it out right here on AusGamers.

Just Cause 2 falls out of the sky and grapples onto Australian shelves for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on April 1st 2010

We've seen countless developer diaries for Avalanche Studios forthcoming sandbox actioner, Just Cause 2, but today we have an actual trailer showcasing some of the game's characters, a small amount of its narrative foundation and, as you would expect, plenty of action.

This is fast becoming a the sandbox game to look out for in 2010 with its myriad toolset, allowing for all kinds of destructive emergent gameplay. If you haven't been following it, we highly suggest you go through our video library and have a look.

Click here for today's trailer.