Send News. Want a reply? Read this. More in the FAQ.   News Forum - All Forums - Mobile - PDA - RSS Headlines  RSS Headlines   Twitter  Twitter
Customize
User Settings
Styles:
LAN Parties
Upcoming one-time events:
San Diego, CA 08/21

Regularly scheduled events

Archived News:

Friday, Apr 16, 1999

  

Deus Ex Intentor

The latest update over on ION's Daily Informant page has a big ol' update on the status of Deus Ex, Warren Spector's first person RPG (thanks Billy "latin-boy" Wilson). There are a bunch of really interesting quotes from various members of the team...here's a sample:

The design, code, and art are, at last, coming together, giving the team their first real taste of gameplay. As programmer Scott Martin remarked in a recent .plan update: "Deus Ex is no longer a glorified technology demo; now it's beginning to look like a game..."

Designer Steve Powers agrees. "After spending a couple of days playing missions one and two (over and over), I am very pleased to see how our game is shaping up," he said. "I mean, here we are in April and I am already playing Deus Ex!"

Quake 2 Late Nite

After several months of waiting, Quake 2 Late Nite episode two has been released. If you missed the first one (still available from the Late Nite page) the whole idea is that Late Nite is a talk show, complete with zany hosts, and special guest. In this episode, David "crt" Wright of KeyGrip, Rocket Arena 2, and more recently, MP3Spy fame sits in the virtual couch. This episode was actually edited by StarFury, of the well known Clan Phantasm (those guys behind such Quake 1 classics as "The Artifact" and "Devil's Covenant") and is, as to be expected, well worth the 8 MB download.

Lilith, Eve, Meet Robin & Gabe

Tonight on Lilith & Eve, "the world's only weekly show covering the gaming industry from a uniquely female attitude and perspective," the ladies are joined by Gabe Newell and Robin Walker (neither of which are women, you'll note) from Valve Software. The kids will be talking about Team Fortress Classic, and other girly things. Like giant rocket launchers and beer. Listen in at 7:00pm EST (Real or compatible player required) and go to effnet channel #allgames.com to suggest questions.

LAN Party Signups

Two signups to watch out for...tonight's the rescheduled sign up for QuakeCon at 9:00 PM EST...that'll be over at the QuakeCon site...also, show up tonight at 5:00 pacific time in mp3spy, channel bastard's beatdown for their "Phat Online Party" followed by registration at 6:00 on their site. While i'm on the subject of Bastard's Beatdown, I just have to point out the hilarious intro to their web page...if you've got Shockwave and a decent connection, be sure to check it out. It's a scream. Of course, for all your LAN party needs, point your browser to our LAN parties page, which has tons of these from all reaches of the globe.

New UT Weapon Shots

UnrealTournament.Net has been updated with this week's new weapons, the Pulse Gun and the Flak Cannon. In addition to the normal shots, there are now zips of the original, hi-res screens from each weapon on display ("Just what you see, pal") for wallpaper, etc.

Kingpin Preview

PC Zone's Kingpin Life of Crime preview is up, offering a look ahead at Xatrix' upcoming Quake II-engine game that puts you in the role of a hood trying to claw your way over a bunch of icehole gangsters ("now I'm really angry.... this is fargin' war!") to become the crime boss. The piece offers interviews with the team, and a bunch of exclusive screenshots. To prevent registration problems that popped up on their Q3A preview, that URL has a generic login built in to assure access.

Giants Interview

GA-Source interviews Tim Williams talking to the Creative Director of Giants about Planet Moon Studios' upcoming action/adventure game.

Hidden & Dangerous Preview

Hidden and Dangerous preview on CombatSim.com offering a look ahead at this realism-oriented World War II shooter in the works from the Czech-based Illusion Softworks, offering new screenshots, as well as exclusive Q&A with Petr Vochozka, the game's producer.

More Mortyr Marketing

The Adrenaline Vault News has a follow up on reports yesterday that some stores (Best Buy is offered as an example) will not be carrying Interactive Magic's upcoming back-to-the-future WWII shooter, Mortyr (story). The story confirms the report, but says the decision was based on the game, rather than the content:

However, according to Best Buy’s corporate public relations representative Joy Harris, the retailer, which carries several games containing equally visceral content, this is not the case. Harris said the company, which does not offer a comprehensive selection of titles, has decided not to sell it because they feel the game falls into an overcrowded genre and is not representative of the best selections.

No More Pay to Wireplay

The UK multiplayer online service Wireplay has announced that they are going the route of some other such services before them by dispensing with connection or subscription fees, other than local phone charges.

PM Hardware Bits

Official AvP Page Opens

Tactic sends along word that the official Aliens vs. Predator page has gone live (Shockwave Flash required). Kicking it off, is an interview with David Stalker, Fox Interactive's AvP Project Manager, although half the interview seems to be David interviewing LoPin, his interviewer about the new site.

Next Generation Console Updates

Here's a bunch of news for you on those uber-powerful consoles coming your way...FGN is reporting that the Dreamcast will hit European shores on September 23rd, going for the slightly more expensive price of £199 (US$320)...Dreamfiles.com, possibly the first of many such sites, has opened its doors, allowing you to download saves, and even entire games onto your VMS device...Ken Kutaragi, the new CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment has given an interesting interview where he talks about their plans for the PSX2...here's what he had to say regarding the frightening power of their new system:

The next PlayStation's power to depict images will take it out of the realm of simple gaming machines. Current gaming machines can only show prepared things which, to the user, only seem to be created when he or she is playing. It's a distorted world -- not real at all. With the next-generation machine that "world" will be created there and then, as the user plays. People will look like real people, cats will look like real cats, and smoke will look like real smoke.

Jurassic Doom?

Okay, so maybe not that...I think I'd settle for Andromeda Quake. Jurassic Park Author to Create Video Games is a PR Newswire piece that reveals that Michael Crichton will be making "next generation computer games" via his new company Timeline Studios (thanks Lorne Beaton for the tip-off). Long time Crichton fans will note that his 1969 novel, The Andromeda Strain featured a strangely named program called "deathmatch" which searched a global database of well...corpses. Funny how things work out, isn't it?

Un-Real CTF

Version 1.0 of Real CTF, the cleverly named Unreal CTF mod, has been released. In order to play, you'll need to download both the map pack and the client, making this a big ol' 23 meg. Also available on the page is a GameSpy custom tab, and links to two 24/7 dedicated servers.

Slave Zero Preview

There's a new Slave Zero preview on Computer Games Online with an extensive look at this upcoming third-person game where you can live large as a giant cyborg. Thanks Apache at Computer Gaming Review. Here is a bit from the piece about the game, and its Ecstasy engine:

To match its dark, foreboding story, the environments of the Megacity are vast, dark, highly populated and incredibly violent. As Slave Zero, you'll be put through firefight after firefight and if the action shown off in the pre-alpha is any indication, then saying this game will have wall-to-wall action is something of an understatement. The power behind all this mass carnage is the game's 3D engine, dubbed the Ecstasy Engine, which does a lot more then just make pretty lighting.

The Ecstasy Engine was made specifically for Slave Zero, but one of Accolade's big goals for the engine was to create a technology that could be used for future products. "The main features of the engine are its ability to animate many objects in the world, provide a lot of interactivity in the world, no restriction (from a technical sense) on size of the world or world layout, and a tools chain that allows designers and artists to create and modify the game easily," Matt Powers, Slave Zero's Producer, explains. "The goal of Slave Zero and the Ecstasy Engine was to create a large, populated and animated interactive environment, and to have a lot of action on screen at the same time."

Updated Bleem Demo

The bleem! page has a new version of the demo of this PlayStation emulator that is due for a full release soon, now that they have staved off an attempt by Sony to get a temporary restraining order preventing the program's distribution (story). Thanks Billy at Voodoo Extreme. The updated demo fixes a couple of things, and "by popular demand," fixes support for Castlevania, Tomb Raider II, and the Street Fighter Collection.

N64 Rainbow Six

N64.IGN.COM has posted some info on Redstorm Studios' upcoming Nintendo 64 version of their tactical combat shooter, Rainbow Six. According to the article, rather than a straight port, the N64 release will contain "levels from the original version of Rainbow Six with a mission or two from the recently released add-on pack Eagle Watch for a 'best of' compilation of sorts." Thanks The Rainbow Six Retreat.

AM Hardware Bits

I was asked why the Hardware Bits weren't bulleted. Truth is, it's because I'm not crazy about the bulleted lists, and was hesitant to add another, but I guess fighting what's been proven a practical approach to group postings is counterproductive, so as of this morning, I'll bite the bullet:

New Lithium II

The Lithium II Mod for Quake II page has the new version 1.24 of this Quake II mod. The new release is "finally" based on the Quake II 3.20 game source, and fixes some bugs, including one that caused version 1.23 server to crash. Lithium is one of my favorite Quake II mods, offering a bunch of features that can be toggled on or off, including: strength, resist, regen, haste, and vampire Runes, and an improved HUD offering info like your frags/hr.

Quake 2 2 Player

The Blackmoon development page has word of an unusual Quake II modification called Quake 2 2, which allows you to play a two player Quake II deathmatch on one computer using a windowed mode for each player, somewhat like the split screen deathmatch offered by some console shooters. The newly-released version 1.1 offers support for Catch the Chicken and Quake 2 Basketball, and other mod authors that want the mod to support their work should email kingblake@x-stream.co.uk.

Follow-up

Just a final clarification about the Mortyr movie and preview from yesterday (story, and original follow-up): Neither the preview, nor the movies were new, the confusion was on our end. Sorry about that.

Competitions

Reviews

etc.

  • The recently announced lawsuit against several game and media companies was a subject discussed on Politically Incorrect. Here's a URL to the transcript of that show...
  • Black&White Wire has posted some new info about the engine from Black & White, talking with Lionhead Programmer Scawen Roberts about KNI support and more...
  • The redesigned Shotgun Messiah's Homepage has a re-worked version of their extensive skin tutorial...
  • .txtGen is a site for level designers that automates the process of creating a readme.txt to include with their levels...

Out of the Blue

Most folks with mailing lists seem to have caught up with the change, but I wanted to post one more reminder that news items submitted here would be better addressed to news@bluesnews.com, rather than blue@..., which of course, still works, but loony won't see it (useful for talking behind his back).

Image of the Day: This swanky Quake III Arena desktop wallpaper sent along by Chris "DaFragsta" Sparks.

Thursday, Apr 15, 1999

New Screenshots

The Parsec Homepage has posted a new screenshot from this upcoming "Fast-paced multiplayer cross-platform 3D Internet space combat" game. Thanks BarrysWorld. According to the page, a self-running demo will be released "in the next few months." Also, Man at game Gallery shows off Iron_Strategy, an upcoming game of giant robot combat that melds the action and RTS genres. And the BattleCruiser site has some new screenshots from BC 3020AD.

Starsiege Guide

Starsiege Ride Your Herc to Victory is a CNET Gamecenter Game Guide presenting strategies for Dynamix' game of giant HERC combat. Thanks Billy at Voodoo Extreme.

TFC and Unreal Editing

There are a bunch of TFC prefabs on the Half-Life Editing Resource Center to ease the way for mod authors into the world of editing TeamFortress Classic. Also, Billy at VE sends word of another Unreal Technology page update, this one for mod authors, talking of changes in the upcoming version 224 that will prevent backward compatibility with older versions.

Mortyr Backlash

Mortyr.Net, who probably would have a tough time being carried in mainstream department stores themselves with a swastika in their masthead, have posted a story saying that Mortyr, Interactive Magic's upcoming World War II game, is not going to be carried by certain stores because of some of the game's content.

Hidden and Dangerous Shots

Gamers Central's Hidden and Dangerous preview is online, offering a look ahead at this upcoming World War II shooter from Illusion Softworks illustrated with a bunch of new screenshots.

Return of the Q3A Video

GameSpot TV's Quake III Preview offers the Quake III Arena video shown at the MacWorld Expo in RealPlayer format, with different versions available for different connection speeds.

3dfx Voodoo3 Utility

Earlier today 3dfx sent along a utility to fix a problem with the shipping drivers with their Voodoo3 accelerators that prevented the "Use higher quality but lower performance video" button in the 3dfx Tools utilities from working properly. The utility was for reviewers only because it hadn't passed QA, but now they send word that it has, and may be distributed for Voodoo3 owners until new drivers are made available. Here's a local copy & mirrors of the 3dfx V3 config utility (16 KB).

Half-Life Expansion Announcement

Sierra sent along the announcement of the first official add-on announced for Valve's award-winning shooter Half-Life. Here's the poop on Half-Life: Opposing Force ("Op For"), being developed by Gearbox, made up of members of the now-defunct Rebel Boat Rocker:

Sierra Studios Announces Official Half-Life Game Expansion Half-Life: Opposing Force Due Fall 1999

BELLEVUE, WA (April 15, 1999) - Sierra Studios proudly announces that it will release an official game expansion for the highly celebrated 3D action thriller, Half-Life, this fall. Half-Life: Opposing Force (a.k.a. "Op For") is the official game expansion for Half-Life, the game named the 1998 "Game of the Year" by over 40 publications worldwide. Half-Life: Opposing Force is being developed by Gearbox Software for Sierra Studios.

In Half-Life: Opposing Force, players return to the Black Mesa Research Facility to engage in an entirely new episode of single player action and will be offered an enormous variety of new multiplayer content. Gamers play a soldier this time around, instead of Gordon Freeman. Having the option of playing on the opposing force, the player will experiment with a host of new military, experimental and alien weapons. Also a key feature will be to battle a fierce new alien race as well as interaction with more human characters. Finally, in addition to the extensive new single player experience, gamers will compete in new multiplayer maps designed by industry all-stars.

"Gearbox is extremely psyched to be working with the superior Half-Life game system and universe," said Randy Pitchford, lead designer of Half-Life: Opposing Force at Gearbox. "Our number one goal is to preserve the integrity of Half-Life and provide new experiences that expand upon the sensation of the original-we intend to make Half-Life fans very happy."

"Sierra Studios is excited to formally announce this expansion and to be the first to work with Gearbox Software," said Doug Lombardi, product manager for the Half-Life franchise. "Op For will take full advantage of the remarkable technology that Half-Life produced; including: enemy AI, rendering technologies, skeletal animation system and the extraordinary multiplayer technology that helped Half-Life become the quintessential benchmark action game."

On Heretic II EP Fixes

Raven Programmer Jake "the Gent" Simpson updated his .plan with a bunch of stuff on his GDC experiences, and his update includes this bit on the recently released Heretic II Enhancement Pack:

So the EP is out there. And it has a couple of bugs in it. This highlights our blind spot of real Internet testing. QA at activision didn't catch a couple of bugs, but then we are lucky we got any QA time at all, since they had their hands full of Civ 2 and a golf game. I just want to say thank you to them for putting in the time they did. Anyway, we ARE going to fix the bugs that cropped up. Infact, they are fixed, and QA is once again doing their thing on the code. Its just a question of time before we release this fix. When its released, I'll do a .plan update listing what we fixed and why.

Mortyr Movie Follow-up

Frans at 3D Gamers sends word that while the Mortyr preview referred to earlier (story) is new, the accompanying movies have actually been available on the Interactive Magic FTP site for a while now, and are not actually new themselves.

Interviews

GA-Source interviews Mike Maza, talking to the producer of Maximum Overkill about this upcoming first-person action title from NovaLogic. Also, Voodoo Extreme interviews Seamus McNally, lead programmer of the upcoming tank racing game, Tread Marks, being developed by Longbow Digital Arts.

TNT on the Motherboard

NVIDIA has announced that a new line of Medion desktop PCs will have an NVIDIA RIVA TNT graphic accelerator embedded on the motherboard. Here's the word:

SANTA CLARA, CA -- APRIL 15, 1999 -- NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) today announced that the award-winning RIVA TNT 3D graphics processor will be featured in Medion's new desktop PCs. Directly integrated on Intel's newest 440BX motherboard, NVIDIA's RIVA TNT delivers state-of-the-art 3D performance, in addition to 2D and video acceleration to the mainstream PC market. The RIVA TNT is the first high-performance TwiN Texel 128-bit 3D processor to be integrated into a mainstream motherboard offering. "Incorporating the TNT-based BX Motherboard in their new desktop PCs allows Medion to deliver a high-end visual experience to a broad range of users," said Jeff Fisher, vice president of worldwide sales at NVIDIA. "NVIDIA's award winning RIVA TNT 3D processor is not only the perfect choice for the end-user who wants the ultimate visual experience in 2D and 3D, but it also gives Medion a winning edge in a highly-competitive market."

The Medion line of personal computers is sold directly from Medion, and is designed to meet user demands for the most advanced package of new technologies and features without the premium price. Each Medion PC is built to order and comes with a number of advanced features, including the integrated RIVA TNT graphics processor.

etc., etc.

I figure if the idea of the bulleted collection of miscellany was fair game for adoption by others, that I'd exact payment by borrowing the idea in return of posting a second such collection in a day:
  • The Doom LEGACY Home Site has version 1.28 of Doom LEGACY in two versions, a DOS and a WIN32 variety. Word is a new Linux version will follow soon.
  • Volunteer rebels rock Web community is a ZDNN article describing a U.S. Department of Labor investigation into complaints by former AOL volunteers who claim AOL treated them like employees, but didn't pay them or give them benefits. It's possible fallout from something like this trickle down, as the article quotes an expert saying "If the Department of Labor pulls the plug on this you're definitely going to see some domino effect with online companies [using] volunteers..." As you are probably aware, several community gaming websites make use of volunteer labor...
  • Be afraid: The Virtual Hunt Gets Bigger and Better With WizardWorks' `Deer Hunter II Extended Season' for the PC. Thanks Sharky...
  • A monster Truck Madness competition on the MSN Gaming Zone offers the chance to win a loaded Toyota Tundra...
  • Joe Siegler points out that the Apogee/3D Realms Site has a version 1.2 patch for their Balls of Steel pinball game. Yeah ,pinball is pretty off-topic here, but this is etc., etc., and besides, how often do you get to type "Balls of Steel"...

Spec Ops II Engine Announcement

Zombie and RTIME Announce Spec Ops II and Agreement to Co-Market Integrated Viper 3D Game Engine With RTIME Networking Engine is the announcement of a new integrated Viper 3D (Spec Ops) engine with RTIME's networking engine that will be marketed to developers. Thanks Sharky. Here's some of the release:

SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 15, 1999-- Zombie Virtual Reality Studios and RTIME, Inc. today announced an agreement to integrate the RTIME Interactive Networking Engine(TM) into "SpecOps II: Green Berets", slated for release in July, 1999.

SpecOps II, which is being co-published by Take-Two Interactive (Nasdaq:TTWO - news) and Ripcord Games, is the latest in the SpecOps franchise that has sold over 250,000 SKUs worldwide. Zombie and RTIME also announced a co-development and co-marketing agreement to sublicense the combined Viper 3D Game Engine and RTIME Interactive Networking Engine(TM) to game developers and publishers, allowing them to bring new, high quality titles to market in a fraction of the time and cost.

Unreal 224 Follow-up

I goofed earlier when I said The AVault News story on Unreal 224 didn't contain new info (story), as my recollection of a previous announcement of LOD (Level of Detail) modeling in the upcoming Unreal-engine Duke Nukem Forever (story) led me to think this had already been announced for Unreal, when it had been not (sorry about that). Here's the part on LOD that's new:

Another major enhancement to be included in 224 is continuous level of detail, which varies polygon counts on objects such as player characters and power-ups relative to their distance from the camera, or player's perspective. In Unreal Tournament, this will enable the engine to place more characters and objects on the screen and still maintain a consistent and fluid framerate. Rein said this is an important feature not just for Unreal and Unreal Tournament but also for engine licensees since it also opens the engine to new game types, such as real-time strategy titles, that were not previously obvious choices for the engine.

Looking Glass Stuff

Through the Looking Glass has some information obtained from Looking Glass' Tim Stellmach about the possibility (or lack thereof) of Ultima Underworld 3 ever getting made...here's a quick quote:

Obviously we can't do Underworld 3 unless EA contracts with us to do it: it's their property. Just as obviously we could do a fantasy role-playing game without the Underworld brand. What we're actually planning I am, as usual, not at liberty to say, but we're keeping plenty busy.

Ultima Underworld 1 and 2, you may recall, were Warren Spector's projects while at Looking Glass (he now resides at ION Storm, where he's working on Deus Ex) and amongst the first first person games ever. In other LGlass news, Billy "shock the monkey" Wilson has posted two new screenshots from an alpha version of System Shock II over on that page of his that show off a bit of the standard HUD.

Mortyr Movies

There are a bunch (six, to be precise) of in-game movies from iMagic's upcoming Nazi-killing FPS Mortyr, over at pc.ign.com, showing off a great deal of their architechture, as well as their various weapons and character animations. If you haven't been able to get a feel for the game from the screenshots (see story), I recommend checking out these movies as they are relatively small downloads.

Dreamcast Launch Details

In a press conference this morning, Sega's Bernie Stolar made an announcement about the launch of their new system, the Dreamcast. With its Microsoft OS, modem, PowerVR graphics chip and Internet access, it resembles a mini-PC more than any console to date. According to Stolar, the system will retail for $199, and will launch with ten to twelve titles at launch (including the impressive Sonic Adventure, Sega Rally 2, and Virtua Fighter TB). No specifics were given about their Internet strategy, although he did say that details will be given at E3. The Dreamcast is set to launch stateside on September 9th (yes, that's 9/9/99). Games of note in development include MDK2, and a Dreamcast version of Unreal.

AM Hardware Bits

Creative Shines a Light on that Mud is a Sharky Extreme article following up on their recent discussion of how clockspeeds have still not been revealed for upcoming TNT2 releases, discussing the matter with Steve Mosher Vice President of Graphics Business at Creative Labs. The result is some interesting stuff on clock speeds and Creative's TNT2 and "Ultra-TNT2" plans (as well as a few shots at 3dfx, he keeps calling the Voodoo3 the Banshee2, for instance), though the light he shines is limited, as he doesn't make any concrete statements about planned clockspeeds either. Also, Planet Hardware has been redesigned, and to celebrate they have posted a few new pieces, including reviews of the 3dfx Voodoo3 2000, the Elitegroup P6BXT-A+ Slot-1-S70 Motherboard, and the Matrox Marvel G200-TV.

Mortyr Screenshots

Responding to my comment of not recalling seeing shots from the 2093 portion of Interactive Magic's upcoming shooter Mortyr, Mortyr.Net sends along word of this page and this page with a whole load of such future shots compiled into one place.

Amen Editor Shot

Afflicted.Net has posted a new screenshot from CaveDog showing off the editor being used to create their upcoming shooter, Amen: The Awakening.

Descent 3 Preview

GameSpot's Preview of Descent 3 is up offering a look ahead at this upcoming action space flying shooter from Outrage. DFWM, who sent this along points out that, like X-Wing Alliance (see the Image of the Day from April 6 this year), this game contains its own Quake reference, as evidenced by this screenshot.

More on Unreal 224

The Adrenaline Vault News has posted an article about the version 224 of Unreal being planned for release soon by Epic. The lengthy update doesn't offer any new info, but does summarize all the features currently planned for the patch, as well as an outline for Epic's plans for the release of an Unreal Tournament at some unspecified date prior to the release of the full game (though it doesn't mention if it will be out before the Unreal shareware).

More on Daikatana Sound

ION Storm's Mike "Tarix" Montague updated his .plan with a follow up on his recent interview on PlanetDaikatana (story), filling in some info he failed to provide about A3D sound support. Thanks Daikatana HeadQuarters. Here's most of the update:

In this article I failed to mention anything about A3D which caused a flood of email. We currently do support A3D 1.0. Soon we will have support for A3D 2.0 as well. Anyone with a card that supports A3D, D3D, or EAX and has a set of 4.1 or 5.1 speakers will have an awesome sound experience! At the time of the interview I was working strickly with the EAX features of the SoundBlaster Live! I now have a test computer with a Live! and one with an MX-300 so I can test equally and they both sound great!

My tasks lately have been: Fixing sound problems in the engine, working on the save and load routines, and tweaking monster behaviors and weapons.

We are showing single player stuff at E3. Stay tuned.

Witchboy on Bad Guys

Designing Enemies with Distinct Functions is a Gamasutra feature by ION Storm's Harvey "Witchboy" Smith discussing what goes into making good bad guys (posted a few days back).

New TOW Arena

A new version 2.0 of TOW Arena, the mod that brings the competition of Rocket Arena to Shogo: Mobile Armor Division, is now available. The new release includes a dedicated server, and offers improved stability, many new features, and bug fixes. TOW Arena 2.0 now also prevents people from connecting to the server if they don't load the TowArena.rez file.

New Terror Quake2

An update for Beta 5 of Terror Quake2 is now available, offering a couple of small new features, as well as several bug fixes.

Team Fortress Classic Guide

The Boomstick Joint has posted what they modestly call one damn good guide to Team Fortress Classic, which includes descriptions of all the classes and tips with strategies for different maps.

Competitions

  • Just two more days in the fabulous Blue's News name the two guys in this picture contest.
  • Uberfest 99 has been announced, a follow-up to last year's event which was held concurrently with E3. This time around the event will be June 25-27, again in Atlanta GA, sponsored by the very cool PyroPimps Show. Info on this, and other upcoming LAN events are on our LAN Parties page. Also, LAN Arena.com has word of a large event in Paris on May 8-9.
  • The Dark Army 3 Half-Life Clan Page is hosting a 16 clan, 4-on-4, double elimination Half-Life deathmatch tourney. Head over and enter (if you can stand the Another One Rides the Bus midi on the page).
  • Doomed's Armor Contest looks for the best original Starsiege TRIBES light armor design, with a copy of TRIBES autographed by the development team as the first prize.
  • If you've got a clan or a league, you can add them to the database at LeaguePlay.net, "a meeting place for many online, and offline, multiplaying gamers."

Reviews

etc.

  • The Line Up offers a site devoted to beer, games, and cigars. I don't know if they chose that path to get a link from me, but it sure worked...
  • Birdman's Lair has a couple more new files up to help with Space Orb support, one for the MechWarrior 3 Demo, and another for the updated version 1.1.1 Descent 3 demo...
  • GameCenter has got a Release Dates dealie up that I think is new (thanks Matthew Rorie). These things are tough to pin down, but it's something...
  • One for the anti-bargain bin: Monster 3D II 8 MB. Thanks Easterbunny. Sure, it's $5,192,508.02, but shipping is free...

Out of the Blue

Today is the day U.S. citizens are required to file their income tax returns, as well as the 87th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. I'll let you draw your own connections between the two. There's something going on for some readers that's causing the site to refresh, sometimes multiple times, I'm looking into it, but so far it has me stumped. Also, as I mentioned earlier, we had a problem with a full hard drive for a short time yesterday, it turns out that in addition to resetting a couple of .plans in the BlueTracker, this resulted in a bad upload of the Diablo II movie, my apologies to anyone who had a problem with the truncated file. Once we're sure the storage issue is under control, we'll get back on the stick with the local copies of files. Thanks esses for today's Link of the Day, which follows the full disk theme:

Link of the Day: Microsoft's tips for Windows 3.1 to increase disk space.



Blue's News logo