Assassin's Creed 2 will be next up in the "Games with Gold" promotion, Microsoft has announced. It will be free to access for Gold members starting July 16, and lasts through July 31.

The announcement itself isn't surprising, as Microsoft has talked about AC2 on tap before. But just yesterday, Microsoft announced Defense Grid as the game for the first half of this month, so it's unusual for Microsoft to announce the titles in advance.

Defense Grid raised some disappointment among fans, who cited a previous promise of AC2 and Halo 3. Just yesterday, Larry Hryb (aka Major Nelson) tweeted that he didn't know anything about the upcoming line-up.