Archived News:
There are some new
Rogue Spear: Urban Operations screenshots on SimHQ.com showing a bunch of
shots they've snapped off upon receiving a build of the follow-up to the
follow-up to Rainbow Six.
Unreal Universe Deus Ex Interview Series
continues with a Q&A with ION Storm's Harvey 'Witchboy' Smith talking about
his work on Deus Ex, ION's upcoming science fiction RPG, discussing various
gameplay elements, the game's AI. location based damage, and more.
An update to the Half-Life FAQ on I.Am-Half-Life
adds 14 new frequently asked questions (and answers) about Valve's shooter,
including troubleshooting tips for all manner of problems it is possible to run
into.
The Starlancer
preview on GameSpot UK follows the pigs in space theme in looking at
Warthog, who are teaming up with Digital Anvil to create Starlancer, the
upcoming space combat game that will serve as a companion to the also upcoming
Freelancer. In addition to the extensive game preview the piece also goes into
considerable detail on the history of the project, and how the folks at Warthog
hooked up with the Roberts brothers at D.A., and a Starlancer on GameSpot UK
Gallery showing various ships of the line that will be at your disposal in
the game.
A new version 0.99.1 of JHexen has been released. There are a lot of changes and fixes in this OpenGL and Direct3D port of Raven's venerable Hexen, most notably new support for 3D sounds through DirectSound3D, A3D 3.0 and EAX 2.0, as well as several rendering and menu improvements.
Interplay has released a playable demo for Invictus: In the Shadow of Olympus, their recently released strategic role-playing game set in a mythological world. The demo weighs in at a massive 103.5 MB, and more details are available at the readme page.
Computer Games Online has posted their GameStock 2000 roundup which, among familiar screenshots from most other titles shown at the event, sports three new images from MechWarrior 4, the giant robot combat game.
French developers GameSquad have updated their Devil Inside screenshots gallery with some fifteen new images from their upcoming third-person horror action game.
Alice@Stomped has posted a new piece
of concept artwork from American McGee's Alice, the hybrid first and third person
Quake III Arena engine title being developed by Rogue and Electronic Arts. This
week's image is of the "Blood Roses," and they hope to post more artwork
each week.
Two previews of the Dreamcast version of BioWare's MDK 2 (which is virtually
identical to its PC counterpart) have popped up: incitegames has another
one of their trademark MPEG movies of in-game footage, and Daily Radar has
posted a
Q&A with BioWare CEO Dr. Gregory Zeschuk talking about the game, including
the inevitable question about the title (which as everyone knows stands for
Millionaire Divorces Knockout).
An alpha version of Assassins,
a mod for Quake III Arena that adds four new player classes, new weapons, and
other items, has been released, and is available for download at
its official site. This is an alpha, so naturally bug reports and feedback
are requested.
Version 0.02 of the server-side Oni
Bot for Quake III Arena has been released. It's still an early release of
the bot, but the author says that the bot can, "find targets in its field
of view and attack the target." But he has high hopes for the project,
as it is part of a larger scientific research project in Artificial Intelligence,
and it utilizes, "the latest techniques in multi-agent systems."
PC.IGN has updated their existing
preview of Ground Control with a whopping 14 screenshots and 12 movies in
Quicktime format, all from a beta build of the game they received. And if you're
looking for still more screenshots, 9
new shots are up at GameSpot News (oddly enough, from a build of the game).
The
Coming of Age of Asheron's Call is the name of an interview with Turbine's
Toby Ragaini and Scott Herrington on ActionZine. They talk to the lead designer
and producer of Asheron's Call about the past, present and future of their massively
multiplayer role-playing game.
At GameStock just the other day, Microsoft announced the first details about
The Conquerors, the upcoming add-on pack for Age of Empires II. There are three
previews up, one
at Gamecenter, and two separate ones at GameSpot News - the
first one featuring the initial announcement, and the
second one containing a look at the logo and additional details.
A new version of Beryllium,
a server-side only mod for Quake III Arena has been released, and is available
for download at its
official site. This new version adds stats regeneration and the ability
to change player speeds in addition to other changes.
Doom, Damnit! has posted what can only be described as a
confrontation with id Software's Christian Antkow, that results in his admitting
to creating some incredibly horrible maps for Doom way back when. Just because
they like torturing him, they've even posted them, so you can see for yourself
just how bad they were (for the record, I think I've made a worse level, but
I never let anyone see it for obvious reasons).
A new preview of Crimson Skies,
based on a demonstration of the game at this week's GameStock show, is up at
PC.IGN. Crimson Skies is a new action/flight-sim from Zipper Interactive, the
company behind Mechwarrior 3.
Q3Map Explorer is the name
of a new front-end for id Software's Q3Map and Bspc tools, allowing you to easily
set compiler switches, and even a complete arena editor for adding bots to .arena
files.
For those of you whose little people just won't
listen to reason anymore, GameSpot's Game Guides has posted their
full strategy guide for The Sims, available in their usual online (free)
and downloadable PDF (pay only) formats. Also, two guides for Allegiance are up at Allegiance Zone,
one
on Turreting Basics and one
dealing with the Scout Supply Squad.
PlanetMoon Central has posted a
new single-panel cartoon by Planet Moon's Shawn Nelson, poking fun at all
the new features the company has just added to their upcoming action/strategy
title Giants.
- St-Armada.com has posted the results
of their beta test contest, so hop over there and see if you won.
- Clan Death DealerZ are giving away
twelve limited-edition Everglide Giganta mouse pads, all you have to do is
answer their baffling question of the week. There will be a new contest every
week for the next seven weeks.
- Fast-MHz is throwing a contest to
win an Asus V6600 (GeForce 256) video card.
- The map depository MapFinger, which
features user-made levels for everything from the Quake games to Warcraft
II, now boasts over 1,000 original maps...
- Hellhound has posted a
brief new strategy guide for Quake III Arena CTF...
- Z-Axis has posted an
interview with the infamous Mynx of PlanetQuake's Dear Mynx column (which
you can blame, or thank our own Blue for)...
- CamelotVault, a recently opened site devoted to covering Camelot, an upcoming online RPG game, features a special Focus
Group Message Board that the developers will be monitoring...
- Esylum.net is a new hosting service
for game sites, offering free hosting and a percentage of ad sales...
- David "crt" Wright, the author of Rocket Arena, has written an
article at GameSpy.com on the future of mods...
- Stomped@E3 has posted an
interview with Doug Lowenstein the head of the IDSA, the organization
that runs E3...
Well, if you live in Japan, then today is officially Playstation 2 day, as
the little console is now on sale, and no doubt available absolutely nowhere.
It'll be interesting to see if Sony delivers on their promise of having over
a million units for sale...that alone should be worth watching. For those of
you considering importing the thing, be warned - for starters, it's quite possibly
illegal ( according
to this story, at least), and then there's the fact that its region encoding
applies to DVDs as well as games. So that means you can't watch US DVD movies
on the machine - just imports. And of course, then there's the price...I've
seen them being advertised at almost $900, with games going for as much as $80
(not counting the ones that come with additional hardware). I think I'll wait
for the US release...and sit here in total envy of anyone who actually has one.
Link of the Day: Phone Bashing
- a bizzare site with clips of guys dressed in giant foam cellphone costumes
literally bashing innocent people's cell phones (although they were all refunded
for the act). Thanks Snap. ( Update: ( by Blue) seems they actually didn't refund these phone owners diddly-squat...pretty bizarre, actually).
Story of the Day: Japan
police step in as PlayStation mania heats up (keeping with the theme here,
of course).
Bonus Story: Student
wins $1,500 from school for losing Pokemon cards (thanks Buclerpp).
.plan of the day: Yesterday's Randy Pitchford .plan update. Just because it means so much to him. ![=]](/miscimages/smiley4.gif)
A new preview
of Digital Anvil's Starlancer has been posted at Gamecenter, featuring quotes from designer Erin Roberts
about the game. There are quite a few interesting details in here, from info
about the storyline (and how it unfolds) to specifics about the gameplay.
incitegames has posted a
new movie featuring footage from Ground Control, an upcoming 3D RTS title
from Massive Entertainment. The film shows how the camera system works, and
unlike most of their movies, this actually features actual in-game sound effects
instead of dubbed techno music.
Also on incitegames is a
new MPEG movie featuring footage from Third Law Interactive's LithTech engine
title, KISS: Psycho Circus - The Nightmare Child. The film is available as either
a large or small download, and clocks in at 45 seconds long.
3dfx has released new Voodoo3 2000/3000 Windows 9x Drivers version 1.04.04 BETA, fixing problems with Glide Unreal as well as Midtown Madness, and boosting the usual all-caps warning that these beta drivers are unsupported, so download at your own risk.
Blizzard Entertainment has announced
the details of the special limited Collector's Edition of Diablo II that will
be available when the game is released (thanks Mach5). This jam-packed box is
loaded with everything from a DVD version of the game's intro movie to the soundtrack
and lots more. Here are the details: Blizzard Entertainment announces
a one-time production run of Diablo II Collector's Edition. Available only during
Diablo II's initial launch, this special edition will be offered in limited
quantities. The Collector's Edition will include Diablo II on four CD-ROMs,
a 24-minute Diablo II cinematic on DVD in wide-screen letter box format, the
Diablo II soundtrack with 70 minutes of music, the Wizards of the Coast pencil-and-paper
role-playing game based on the AD&D rule set and a Diablo II manual signed
by the development team. Diablo II Collector's Edition will be available exclusively
at Babbages, Electronics Boutique and direct from Blizzard. The expected price
for the product will be $60 - $70.
Gamecenter has posted a surprise demo of Half-Life: Opposing Force, the expansion pack by Gearbox to Valve's acclaimed first-person action game. The demo is available as a 30.4 MB download for those who already own Half-Life, or a 71.2 MB version that is playable standalone, and features a "montage of the levels and areas in the expansion pack."
As expected after yesterday's auto-update patch ( story), Novalogic has released a downloadable Delta Force 2 patch version 1.06.14. The 8.2 MB patch fixes weapon emplacements and more, as described in their developer notes.
AVault spoke
with Steve Grossman, the CEO of ASC Games, about the current status of their
Unreal-engine title Werewolf: The Apocalypse - The Heart of Gaia, which has
been in a shaky position ever since the company announced that they were in
"a state of transition." According to Grossman, "“Werewolf is
still in development, and is going strong. The situation at ASC is still in
the process of unfolding, but with promise of clarification in the near future."
Matrox has released new
TurboGL drivers for their Millennium and Marvel G400 cards. This new version
(1.30.002) adds support for Starsiege: TRIBES and Tread Marks in addition to other changes, and will only
work under Windows 98.
According to this
story at ActionAce.com, Shiny, the developers of the upcoming games Messiah
and Sacrifice, have beaten out several contenders (including Bungie Studios)
for the rights to make a game based on The Matrix, last year's ridiculously
successful sci-fi movie. If this is true, then a formal announcement should
be coming soon.
Eurogamer.net has posted an
interview with Jason Kingsley, co-founder of Rebellion, the developers of
Aliens vs. Predator and the upcoming action-RPG Gunlok. Jason talks about the
company's humble beginnings with the Atari Jaguar system, and goes into detail
about the transition from the console AvP to its more recent PC incarnation.
There are also three new images from Gunlok, their current project, as well
as some gameplay details.
AVault has posted an
interview with Tim Train, former designer for Firaxis, and one of the founding
members of Big Huge Games. Tim talks about their new company's plans, which
are still in their infancy.
According to this
story on Daily Variety, the actress who will be portraying Lara Croft in
the upcoming film adaptation of Tomb Raider (directed by Simon "Con Air"
West) is none other than Angelina Jolie, Oscar® nominated actress and daughter of Jon Voight. Thanks Jason Ocampo for the tip.
If you're getting that "insert disk 1" error with the recently released
Metal Fatigue Demo ( story),
Spamkill sends along this tip that should get things working: The demo
does work. If it doesn't self-extract correctly, you neeed to change the .exe
extension to .zip and then extract the contents which will be in a folder called
"disk1". Just run the setup in that folder and start building giant
robots!
Tritin Films, the people behind
the Quad God and Comedy in Armor films, have released a new film titled, "The
Kick." This film is all of 400k, and is notably simpler than their previous
efforts. As their page describes
it, the film "does nothing but show one opponent kick the other opponents
butt." It's available for download in Real Video format at
Machinima.com.
SegaSoft has released a new 10Six client for download on the official site, although it's not clear what this March 2 version changes from previous releases of the massively multiplayer action/strategy game that went into full operation last Monday ( story). Also, there is a new intro movie trailer available in three different sizes.
The official DooM Legacy site has a new version 1.29 pre-release 5 of this OpenGL port of id's classic DOOM. This is proclaimed to be a really stable release, and the last one before the 1.29 final release. The source code has also been released, as required under the GNU GPL. Also, DoomWorld has word of the first beta release of GlBoom, an OpenGL port of TeamTNT's Boom engine. Lastly, DoomWorld also mentioned Doom3D, a new Win32/DirectX port that features Direct3D acceleration, full TCP-IP networking, and more.
GameSpot UK has posted a
massive, 41-image gallery, featuring new screenshots from Project IGI, an
upcoming first person shooter from Norwegian developer Innerloop Studios, that
features a fractal-driven, original engine.
Also new on GameSpot UK today, is a
new preview of LucasArts' 3D strategy game Force Commander, which is based
on a hands-on test of the full game. They've also posted one
of their trademark image galleries, which features 21 new shots from the
game.
Daily Radar has posted an
interview with Rade Stojsavljevic, producer of Firestorm, the just-finished add-on
for Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun. Rade confirms that Firestorm
is the last time they'll be using the current C&C engine, but dodges the
question when asked if this will be the last top-down C&C game.
New screenshots
from Loose Cannon, an upcoming game from Digital Anvil, headed up by Tony Zurovec,
the creator of the classic Origin Crusader series, have been posted at GameSpot
News. In the game, you play a futuristic bounty hunter, and it is played both
on foot and inside a vehicle.
According to PlanetAvP, Aliens vs.
Predator Gold, the new edition of Aliens vs. Predator that features improved
multiplayer code and OpenGL support (not to mention new multiplayer weapons and a strategy guide)
is set for release on April 6th. Also, screenshots from the new multiplayer levels in the pack are available at AvPNews.com's Gold Edition section, which also features a rundown of all the features in the new version.
Another installment of PC.IGN's
Summoner Diary has been posted. This week's installment features Volition's
Tim Borelli talking about the process of animating the game's characters, including
the all important, "watch Kung-Fu movies" step.
There's a Tim Willits
interview on Mean Arena talking with the id Software level designer about
all sorts of stuff like his work, his feelings about Q3A, his start in the
business, id's future plans, some less topical stuff, and still more (if you can
stand it).
Hypothermia
interviews Kenn Hoekstra talking with the project administrator at Raven
Software about life at Raven, life in general, games, his KISS tattoo, and more,
though nothing about bodybuilding.
There's a
Baldur's Gate II chat log on RPGvault.ign.com (in case there's a difference,
there's also BG2
log on BG Chronicles) recounting the chat action in last night's IRC shindig
with the folks at BioWare currently toiling away at this sequel to the hit
AD&D game. The RPGvault also has
highlights of the session on their main page, as well as some more new BG2
details gleaned from an update to the Baldur's Gate II
site as well as messageboard
posts by "Designer Dave Gaider, Lead Programmer Mark Darrah and Paul as
well as Interplay webmaster Slyle."
Unreal Universe has the release of
Skaarj Generator ][, an Unreal Tournament update to a classic Unreal map by Epic designer Innox
that was apparently intended for inclusion in the just-released UT Bonus Pack ( story). While they're at it, they've posted a pair of screenshots from the
upcoming release of Rocket Arena for Unreal Tournament, showing maps also being
created by Innox.
Interview with James Parkman
talking with the Legend Entertainment level designer about his work on Wheel of
Time and the upcoming Unreal II as well as some thoughts on the U2Ed level editor
that is going to be released soon.
There's a new Troika Games
interview on Joystick.fr talking with some of the developers of the upcoming
RPG Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. The interview is French, so
you'll have to try something like AltaVista Translations
to read it, but there is also an audio version in streaming RealPlayer
format that is in English.
A new version UT MouseBall, the
nutty (cheesy?) sport for Unreal Tournament is now available, adding a new map,
as well as a blimp that provides a scoreboard.
Word from counter-strike.de
is that they are attempting to inspire a back to the future weekend where
servers will run the first beta of Counter-Strike for Half-Life. They have the
betas available for server operators and clients to download, along with handy
instructions on how to avoid ruining your current Counter-Strike installation.
How about a B.A. in Quake
on ZDNet News (thanks Ron Johnson and George Cifrancis) offers hope that an
interest in Quake and other games might some day earn one a college degree,
rather than simply putting one on the slippery slope to flunking out. Here's a
bit: The program incorporates courses in a variety of disciplines,
including psychology, sociology, graphic design and human kinetics. The goal is
to create students who are not only able to code and design games but also have
an understanding of the societal impact and significance of this $7 billion
industry.
A
post on the UT bonus pack on Unreal Universe offers strategies for the new
maps, as well as a review of the pack. There's a new Unreal Tournament
deathmatch guide on City Of Games.
Also, there's a new Lonely
Planet-Spog/DMMQ3DM3 strategy guide on Hellhound. Finally, the
Allegiance Vault's Turret Guide
is online.
The Outrage Entertainment site has word of
the release of the source code for D3Edit, the Descent 3 level editor, on The
D3Edit website. Also, the Microsoft Flight Simulator
page has a new version of the MSFS2K SDK.
There's a new version 2.61 of the Winamp
.mp3 player (thanks 3D Spotlight),
including "Massively improved CD Audio support," and "improved
SuperPiMP installation." Coming this fall to theaters near you: Shaft
vs. the SuperPiMPs. The Microsoft Mouse-PC Drivers
page has new version 3.1a IntelliPoint drivers (thanks File Flash).
This webpage (seems you
have no choice but to wait out the "dramatic" intro) has information
on a Quake III Arena tournament that will take place on Monday March 20 at the
University of Texas, with all the proceeds from the event to benefit the
American Diabetes Association.
Well of course it's going to be another messed up demo, following a theme of the
week. While it may not be the case for everyone, Darkhand Brackstone sent along
a warning about the Metal Fatigue demo released yesterday ( story),
saying the demo wouldn't run, complaining it needed "mission disk
#1." Sure enough, upon testing this seems to be the case, so take this into
account before going for the 24 MB download (unless, of course, you have mission
disk #1 laying around).
The "all-you-can-eat" review bar is open, please don't put more on
your plate than you plan on finishing:
The new edition of Dear
Mynx discusses which is bigger, the Blue Tower, or Redwood's tree (thanks
Rick Noble and CrackHeadBob). Lemme
tell you, sometimes being in the public eye, even to this small degree, gets really
weird.
Link of the Day: NoWebPatents.org,
joining what seems to be a growing movement protesting Amazon's one-click
patent.
Story of the Day: CNN.com - FBI smokes out Coolio in computer attacks probe.
Thanks Mark Williams. From the story: "However, there are a number of
"Coolio"s in the Internet world, and the FBI is systematically
investigating each of them." I wonder if they'll get around to nutty old
Coolio from NYC DWANGO?....
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