With tomorrow’s PlayStation Store Update, you’ll be able to download Vanquish and Mega Man Maverick Hunter X free if you’re a PS Plus member. We’ve got more including special content for Dust 514, and a launch week discount; so without further ado, let’s get to the goods.

Don’t have PlayStation Plus? Go to the PlayStation Store on your PS3 or PS Vita or click here to get access via the Sony Entertainment Network online store.

February 19th PlayStation Plus Update

Vanquish (PS3)

PSN Price: $19.99, Free for PS Plus members

Celebrate the release of Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance by playing one of Platinum’s finest action titles: Vanquish. The same studio that’s bringing you Raiden this week, also delivered one of the finest sci-fi shooters in Vanquish. Check out its fast and fluid combat system, experience the visceral melee combat, and download this PS3 Full Game free as a PS Plus member.

Mega Man Maverick Hunter X (PSP and PS Vita Compatible)

PSN Price: $9.99, Free for PS Plus members

An enhanced remake of the classic Mega Man X, complete with 3D character models, remixed music, and all new unlockable features, this is classic Mega Man turned up to 11. When Sigma leads a group of Reploids in a revolt against mankind, it’s up to X and Zero to protect the world from ruin. You can download this title free as a PS Plus member and play it on your PS Vita, or PSP.

Dust 514 Starter Pack

PSN Price: $9.99, Free for PS Plus members

DUST 514 brings intense infantry combat, large-scale warfare, and deep character advancement to a free-to-play massively multiplayer shooter. Wage war in the next generation of first-person shooters, where a single victory could prove the crushing blow to a galactic empire of thousands of online EVE Online gamers. While the game is still in its beta phase, you can take advantage of this free Starter Pack. Remember, additional content you purchase in Dust 514 while it’s in beta will be carried over to your account when the game sees its full release. You can download Dust 514 now, and it’s free to play.

Urban Trial Freestyle (PS3 and PS Vita – No Cross Buy)

20% off for PS Plus members (PS3 Version: Original price: $14.99; PS Plus Price: $11.99 PS Vita Version: Original price: $9.99; PS Plus Price: $7.99)

Urban Trial Freestyle challenges players to push their risk-taking to the absolute limits and deliver maximum stunt rewards. The game`s nonstop action is complemented by a host of features including multiple game modes, leader boards, rider and bike customization, and much more. With slick urban detailed graphics and an innovative physics engine fine-tuned for fun pick-up and play, the game has been specifically engineered to get the most out of both PS3 and PS Vita versions.Learn more about the game from the PlayStation Blog’s coverage and download it this week!

What’s your favorite content from this week’s PS Plus update?

What was your favorite content from January’s PS Plus offerings?

Don’t forget about the upcoming Dungeon Defenders PS3 Community XP event as well! The game is still free for PS Plus members. Click here to learn more on how to sign up for this event!

Lastly, if you haven’t downloaded Retro City Rampage or PAYDAY: The Heist, today is the last day they will be free in PS Plus; same goes for the Critter Crunch, Derrick the Deathfin and Karateka discounts.

Let us know your feedback on PlayStation Plus in the comments below, and don’t forget to use the poll links to speak your mind about what content you liked the most. If you want to see what the rest of the PlayStation community is talking about, head over to the PlayStation Community Forums in the PS Plus space to continue chatting about PS Plus, or find other topics to contribute your thoughts to, or start one for yourself. See you in the comments!

Here’s what we talked about during the demo, and some extended gameplay video to hammer home the points he makes about the game’s detail and frenetic gameplay.

Jeff Rubenstein, PlayStation.Blog: What are we seeing here?

Julian Mehlfeld, SEGA of America: This section of the game takes place in a forested area. In the last section you’re in a transport escaping from what I will not describe – you can see it from yourself when you get the game when it comes out. You’ve crash landed in a park. A lot of areas of the game are very industrial – if you’ve played through the demo, you’ve got a good sense of that. In this section there’s more trees and grass, and kind of a change of pace both in color and environment.

You’ll have different cover points, different environmental obstacles. So you’re working your way deeper and deeper into a facility, and towards a larger dam area.

PSB: Something that immediately pops out when seeing this game is attention to detail, especially in the character’s armored suit.

SEGA: The detail in the suit is incredible. Whenever I demo this game, I have people take a look at the character, take a look at the suit, and take a look at the weapons. If you’re not familiar with Vanquish, the suit is developed by Darpa, and your character, Sam Gideon, has created it. It has a couple of key features: a dash that gets you around the environment very quickly, and one where you can slow down time using the Augmented Reaction System.

These two abilities open up the suit. The dash in particular, you’ll see a larger jet and vents on the legs too. As you move through the environment the suit opens up, the jet comes out. If you use up your “juice,” the suit opens to let out the exhaust. You’re a bit vulnerable at that point so there’s a nice color change to make you aware of that. You can see an indicator on your back when it’s ready to go again and you’ll see the suit come back together – it’s a very nice, very clean effect. When the action is so intense, it’s a very key point of information for you as well.

Also the weapons, they work off a kind of “keyring” system called the Blade System. Basically, any time a weapon is picked up, you can slot it into your keyring. You can have 3 weapons at any given time. As you switch weapons within the ring, it basically forms from one core, and the weapon builds out to form the weapon you’ll be using – machine gun, heavy machine gun, sniper rifle, shotgun – you can just see bit by bit as it comes together. It’s a quick animation that looks really, really good. [play the video above to see it in action]

PSB: Bayonetta was really over the top, as well as other Platinum Games produced titles. What’s larger than life in Vanquish?

SEGA: What we’re playing through right now, there are two very big baddies who do all kinds of crazy stuff. In Vanquish, in both environment and enemy, you’re going to find yourself in a lot of unique situations different than you’ll find in any other shooter. Basically, it is very fast, very intense, and very action oriented. Even the mid-level guys you’ll come across, they do not stand back, they do not wait for you to come to them – they come to you. So you’ve constantly got to be on your feet, constantly be ready to take on whatever the game is going to throw at you.

PSB: Speaking of Bayonetta – that was a great game, but the PS3 version of the game had some technical issues. Tell me that Vanquish be different.

SEGA: Vanquish was developed on PlayStation 3 first and foremost, and then ported over to other systems. The experience you’ll get on PlayStation is incredible. It runs really clean, it’s very smooth. I know there were concerns after Bayonetta, which is totally understandable. I wrote on the Blog for you guys, and there were a lot of questions about this. My feeling is: play the demo, it runs just as clean as it does in the demo. It’s not like there’s a fakeout.

PSB: Why is there no multiplayer?

SEGA: That comes up a lot for Vanquish, and my feeling is that this is a mikami game with Platinum games. Mikami made Resident Evil and really intense single player games. Platinum Games is known for making really amazing experiences. Merge the two and you get a really good title in Vanquish. If you’ve seen the game, seen the videos or played the demos, you know this. Both the boost mechanic and the way it’s laid out, it’s very fast it’s very intense it’s very action oriented. You take those same mechanics, the Augmented Reaction System, the boost, and tie that into multiplayer, you have a slowdown mechanic and a very fast boost mechanic. It’s hard to put into a multiplayer format, I would say. It’s not impossible, but you’d have to pull back in a lot of ways on how those mechanics work. In the single-player game, those features are integral to the experience, and if you dilute those, you change the game. The single player game as they’ve come up with is amazing.

PSB: We’ve got some questions from our readers via Twitter. @jamaican27 asks: Will vanquish have alternate costumes?

The game doesn’t feature alternate costumes. Sam’s suit is an integral part of the game. There are secrets in the game, little things that you’ll find – I’m not going to spoil it for you, you can experience it for yourself. But there are things that you’re go through and discover along the way.

PSB: @Disturbed932 wants to know: What is Platinum doing for Vanquish that will extend the replay ability? I remember the demo having timed missions.

SEGA: As you go through the game, based on time, based on how many enemies you kill, based on how you kill them, your score is going to go up. We’ve got a leaderboard system, you’re going to want to play through again and again for better scores if that’s what you’re into. If you’re not into leaderboards, you just want a more challenging experience, you can get that out of the campaign; once you beat the game the difficulty will become harder and harder. In addition to that, there’s challenge modes which unlock throughout the story, which are based on time. It’s your raw skill – you have to know that stretch of the environment, know the enemies, know the waves, and it’s based on how well you can do it. They’re fun, they’re intense, there are some that I’m still having trouble getting through. It’s kind of a very fast, strategically how-am-I-going-to-get-through-this mode.

PSB: @r2wadhwani asks: When is Vanquish coming?

Vanquish is launching on October 19th, and post launch we’ll have another demo, which will show that challenge mode. So you can actually get a chance to see how intense things will get and what kinds of things it’ll throw at you. It’s a really good representation of some of the more intense areas of the game.

*****
Any more questions for SEGA about Vanquish? Julian promises me he’ll be around to answer them today.

The Story So Far…
Vanquish is set in a desperate future, one that centers around exponential population growth, a demand for resources, and a political power play from Russia that lands you in the heart of the action aboard an orbiting space station. You play Sam Gideon, DARPA Agent and co-designer of some very advanced technology – the Augmented Reaction Suit (ARS). Your mission is to work with the infiltrating military to restore order, find your fellow agents, and prevent an attack on New York City, among other American targets.

The Secret to Success
Vanquish is the newest game from the mind of Shinji Mikami, creator of such classics as Resident Evil. Known for his epic games, Shinji Mikami has taken on the 3rd person shooter in a way that only he could. Working with PlatinumGames, together they’ve come up with a very fast, very fluid, and very intense cover to cover shooter. How you operate the Augmented Reaction Suit (ARS) system and the key abilities it grants you will be the deciding factor in your success – or failure. The two abilities that I find the most useful are Boost and Augmented Reaction (AR).

The Augmented Reaction Suit, you’ll find, is incredibly fast and agile when you use Boost to navigate around the demo area. Boost allows you to dash over to save wounded marines, evade attacks, or quickly close the distance on any enemy to deliver a punishing melee attack. Boost into cover, boost out of cover – boosting is one of the best tools you have for both defensive and offensive action in Vanquish.

While Boost grants you speed, Augmented Reaction (AR) will grant you time. Time will save you in both a reactive and proactive manner – push forward with your Boost and flip on AR to destroy enemies while you dash past them. Jump out of cover into AR to line up headshots and stop a guarded threat behind cover. Roll into AR, plant your body, and focus fire at heavily guarded targets for maximum efficiency. Defensively – you’ll enter into AR when you take on too much damage, granting you a moment to kill your main threat, or evade into cover to recharge and continue the fight.

I highly recommend checking out the tutorial before jumping into the full game to see how these two abilities play out. You’ll get a chance to mess around in a safe environment and become comfortable with how the game works. Trust me, you can adapt while you play the game and absolutely get through it – but you will benefit from a bit of practice!

The Demo Challenge
So as a spot of fun, I figured I’d leave you with a challenge to see if you can best what I consider to be a very impressive clear-time on the demo. Our own internal producer, Keith, has become quite good at the demo from various trade shows and has a clear time of 6 minutes and 12 seconds. I challenge you to beat this time! Keith is good, but I’m betting the community will be able to best him in a few short days after release – prove me right, post screenshots if you can, and show them what community can do!

The Vanquish Demo releases on Tuesday, August 31 at a time to be specified by PSN – we hope you enjoy the demo and look forward to your impressions!