It seems we didn't have to wait long to discover the higher bidders for the other lots in the THQ bankruptcy auction after all, as European publisher Nordic Games has laid claim to that honour, ahead of pending court approval for the sales on May 13.

The Austria-based outfit has recently published Painkiller Hell & Damnation, and SpellForce 2, but is perhaps better known for their 2011 acquisition of fellow Euro publisher JoWood and the rights to the Gothic franchise (from Polygon):

"The Debtors accepted Nordic's offer of $4.9 million for substantially all the IP except two titles, Homeworld and Drawn to Life," a court document reads. "The bids for individual lots for the assets, excluding the Homeworld lot, did not exceed $4.9 million, and Nordic paid a premium over such individual bids to acquire the aggregate lots."

Nordic Games will acquire more than 150 individual titles as part of the accepted bid. The publisher calls the sale the "biggest acquisition deal in the company history."

Lars Wingefors, owner and CEO of Nordic Games Group AB, said in a statement that the acquisition of THQ's property "turns over a new leaf for the entire Nordic Games Group."

"In the long term, we either want to cooperate with the original creators or best possible developers in order to work on sequels or additional content for these titles," Wingefors said. "A very important point for us is not to dash into several self-financed multi-million dollar projects right away, but rather to continue our in-depth analysis of all titles and carefully selecting different financing models for developing new instalments of acquired IPs."

Other noteworthy intellectual property from the sale includes Titan Quest, Supreme Commander, Frontlines, Stuntman, Juiced, Full Spectrum Warrior and Destroy All Humans.

Nordic has opened a new set of discussion forums calling for community input on the direction it should take with the new brands.

According to Polygon's report, the only remaining THQ IPs that did not go to Nordic Games, are Homeworld for Gearbox Software, and Dawn to Life for 505 Games.

THQ and Vigil Games will be bringing the brilliant dungeon-crawler, Darksiders - released early this year on both Xbox 360 and PS3 - to the PC platform, with Vigil handling all porting duties.

They've also suggested the game will be fully optimised for the PC (not just a straight port), with all the customisation you would expect of a PC outing, though there's been no mention of specs, DX11 or the like.

PC owners will be swinging their giant sword this June, and if you want to know exactly what it is you should be looking forward to, check out our review.

THQ and Vigil Games, having had so much critical success early in the year with Darksiders, have decided to open the floodgates for those who haven't picked up the game yet by offering a free 90 minute demo featuring the game's entire first dungeon.

"We are really pumped to be bringing a playable demo for Darksiders to Xbox 360 and PlayStation3," said David Adams, General Manager of Vigil Games by way of Press Release. "We really wanted to give gamers a true idea of the variety of gameplay that the game offers and so rather than just making a standard 20-minute demo version of the first few levels, we decided to give away this massive level and reveal the true essence of the game."

You'll be able to grab the demo from both the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live from February 25. In case you missed it, AusGamers' Darksiders review can be found here.

In case you've missed it, AusGamers has a single Darksiers "Chaos Eater" sword replica to give away, only one of 70! And our competition closes tomorrow, so you have one day left to attempt to win your new piece of furniture.

I've actually played with one of these, and if I didn't work here, I'd be entering this competition with gust, because it's awesome! All you need to do to win is tell is 25 words or less, what chaos you would eat if you had a sword this awesome - the most creative entry will win. It's that simple.

To enter, click here.

The media outlay for Q1 games is starting to ramp up, and with Darksiders pretty much the first 2010 cab off the rank, it looks like we're going to be seeing more and more from Vigil and THQ in the lead up to its release.

Today we have a trailer for "Ruin", War's trusty steed whom he earns a little ways into the game. And, having actually had the privilege of riding around on the mammoth horse, I can tell you he's an important and awesome part of the whole experience.

For the full video, click here, and in case you missed it, AusGamers strung together a list of 10 reasons to keep your eyes peeled on Darksiders.

THQ were nice enough to hook AusGamers up with some extra Darksiders love, and while you already know we're chomping at the bit for the game, we're still willing to share with you deeper reasons why.

So if you missed our hands-on preview (from a much earlier build, mind you), or our interview with creative-director, Joe Madureira, be sure to check our list of 10 reasons why we think this is one of the first things you should buy in the new year (even more than food or drink). We also have a stack of new screens you can check out here.

Click here for our 10 compelling reasons.

Don't let your preconceptions rule you. I did, and then found I was sorely mistaken with what I thought Darksiders was going to be like. What I've learned since having my eyes open is this is one hell of a solid action adventure title that takes more than few cues from some of videogaming's heavy-hitters.

From the mind of comic-book legend, Joe Madureira, Darksiders is the story of War, one of the four horseman of the apocalypse and easily the most feared. For our full thoughts on why your should be getting all excited about the year-end release of Darksiders, check out our in depth preview.