Mass Effect 2 will launch on PC and Xbox 360 on January 29th, says the game’s developer, BioWare. Diarise the date as necessary, and take a butcher’s at these nifty pre-order incentives designed to give early adopters a truly killer in-game advantage.

The first, Terminus Gear, is a winning combination of special armour and destructive firepower. The former boosts your speed, ammunition storage and resilience to damage while the latter is the ‘M-490 Blackstorm’ gun, which is not only powerful enough to decimate all in its path but can also generate its own gravitational field – with equally devastating results, no doubt.

The second offer is Inferno Armour, which enhances your battlefield awareness, responses times, running speed, damage inflicted and, during the game’s less fraught moments, your skills as a negotiator. Nah, we’ll stick with the Terminus Gear, thanks.

BioWare has yet to announce its retail partners for these tempting bonuses. Likewise they may yet have a collector’s edition or two to unveil – we’ll let you know as soon as we find out more. Meantime Mass Effect 2 is shaping up super-nicely, with improved gameplay mechanics, intriguing multiple-branching storylines, bug-ugly aliens aplenty and more, bigger weapons to make sure they stay dead. Need we say more…?