No matter how big a game may be, nowadays it can always expand outward. Broadband-connected consoles have made it as easy a PC to download expansion packs that keep single-player game code relevant between full-blown sequels.

Oblivion was one of the first to offer full-blown World of Warcraft-style expansion (i.e. more than just multiplayer maps, weapons or “horse armour”) with Shivering Isles, which gave gamers a wonderfully surreal new society to explore and about an extra 25 hours of gameplay.

While none seem as ambitious as Shivering, a bunch of last year’s biggest games are embiggening themselves in 2009. Later this month comes Grand Theft Auto IV’s  "The Lost and Damned" (Xbox-only), which follows biker gangmember Johnny Klebitz and Prince of Persia’s "Epilogue," a three-hour adventure (with a new region, powers and attacks) which adds an entirely new ending to the original.

Two have just come out...

Fable II: Knothole Island Xbox 360, PC

Albion’s a great place to while away the hours and it’s hard to complain about more Fable II content but compared to the awesome-ness of the main game, this expansion is relatively uninspired. Instead of telling a cool self-contained little story set in the Fable universe, it’s really just a two-to-three hour trip to the titular snow-covered island where you’ll do a trio of quests to fix the village’s magic-induced weather problems.

Fallout 3: "Operation Anchorage"; "The Pit" (March); "Broken Steel" (April?) Xbox360, PC

The Fallout universe is filled with backstory for the expansions to explore. The first out the gate is "Operation Anchorage," set in Alaska during the franchise's famous historic battle against the invading Red Chinese. ("The Pitt" takes place in raider-ravaged post-apocalyptic Pittsburg while "Broken Steel" will allow players to join the Brotherhood of Steel and take down the fascist Enclave).

Though it's a flashback to the pre-apocalyptic year 2076, there’s no time-travel involved. Rather, you have to hoof it across the wastelands to a virtual reality simulator (a la Assassin's Creed).  That actually changes the gameplay considerably, as the digi-dead disappear so there’s no corpse looting. As well, there’s not much role-playing—basically it turns the urban RPG into a rural first-person shooter (which is not the game's strongest suit).  

It’s an interesting enough diversion, though if I’m going back in time I’d much rather see what this retro-futuristic society was like before the bombs fell—and you just can’t get that in Palin Country.