Insomniac's Overstrike team-based shooter has turned into a game called Fuse, due out in the first quarter of next year on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. And the four characters in the game's co-op team are in many ways the same four that we saw in last year's trailer, but they've changed a lot as well. The names might be the same, but the looks (in some cases) are different, and the weapons, now powered by the alien element "fuse," have seen changes.

So here's your guide to the four co-op characters in Fuse, that make up the "Overstrike 9" team, dedicated to fighting the villanious Raven force around the world. Players will be able to play any of these characters in online co-op, and Insomniac has also created a function called "Leap" that will allow any player to jump, at the press of a button, into any character not already being controlled (so a solo player can jump into any character, two players can jump into either free character, and so on). And all of these characters not only earn experience upgrades as they play, but they also build up fuse power into a "fusion mode" (activated by anyone on the team) that then rewards unlimited ammo and extra functionality in their fusion weapons. Finally, in addition to each character-specific fuse weapon, each character also gets two conventional weapons to wield (one heavy and light, per character), and grenades to throw as well.

Read on to hear where these four characters come from, and what you'll find their strengths and weaknesses are as you play through Fuse.