Falling Leaf Systems offers preorders of Halo 2 and Shadowrun for Windows XP (thanks Xbox 360 Fanboy by way of Joystiq) announces a merger between the VAIO and Alky software projects, which they say will result in a software package to allow Windows XP owners to play Halo 2 and Shadowrun, both released as DirectX 10/Windows Vista exclusives. They offer preorders of both games to be fulfilled through Amazon, promising a free copy of the compatibility software "within a few months." There is no word on what will happen should this interoperability software fail to materialize, nor is it clear whether this is something Microsoft might take issue with, but there is the following statement from Falling Leaf Systems CEO Brian Thomason:

“Microsoft has, in typical Microsoft fashion, decided to launch their forced migration onslaught in full force with the release of two games that will only run on Windows Vista,” stated Thomason. “First they claim that it was impossible to implement DirectX 10 compatibility atop Windows XP, and now they also want us to believe that they couldn’t successfully launch two DirectX 9 based titles on XP either. We plan to expose both theories as patently false.”