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Archived News:
Reports are coming in from all over the place with news that Doom is repeatedly
being mentioned on MSNBC when talking about
yesterday's Colorado School shooting ( see
our earlier story for the "proof" that the suspected shooters
were Doom players). Mike C wrote in saying that he heard one reporter say that
the kids may have thought they were playing a "real life game of Doom,"
while other reports have pointed out that in game footage was being shown. Also,
it has been brought to light that one of the alleged shooters ran, of all things,
a site on AOL devoted to Doom mods.
pc.ign.com has posted a
brand new demo from Descent 3 for your downloading pleasure. The 36 meg
download does feature multiplayer, for those itchin' to try it out. According
to the developers, "[the] Descent 3 Demo 2 is a one-level demo of Descent
3 that we've created to give everyone a taste of all the great stuff we've done
since we released the original Descent 3 Demo last year." So there you
have it.
Nihilistic's Steve "Gateway" Tietze updated his .plan
with word that he's posted some video footage taken from the recent Game Developer's
Conference in Real media format. The video shows off a number of different games,
a lot of various images from different booths at the show, and even has a glimpse
at a really wacky webmaster. Here's the scoop: Well I put some of my
Game Developer Conf video I took this year of the show online. I encoded it
with Real Player.. you will need the latest version of G2.
Its just some bits and pieces of the expo floor showing
off some games and hw.
I'm looking for mirrors to support the load on the servers I have right now.
I will keep these up for a day
or so so email me if you want to mirror it on your site as well.
I also have a 50 meg mpg of this if like better quality video :)
here are 2 mirrors for it right now..
http://lazy.accessus.net/~gateway/carp.ra
http://www.trebel.org/gateway/testVMHB.ra
Several readers have written in reporting having seen televised news reports showing the Doom logo on something visible through clear bags containing materials said to be related to the suspected shooters in the Colorado School shooting yesterday that left 15 dead. Now
u238|Malleus points out that the second picture under the It looks like a war zone headline on the School
cleared of bombs, investigators enter story on CNN Interactive does indeed show what appear to be a pair of books, each with the Doom logo
on the cover, in bags being removed from the home of Eric Harris, one of the alleged shooters in the tragedy. There is no word yet of what connection anyone is drawing between these materials and this case.
Two bit of editing news: Qoole.gamedesign.net
has posted a new set of entities for TeamFortress Classic editing with Qoole. Also,
Valve's Harry Teasley sends word of an IRC chat about Half-Life mod making tomorrow night
(April 22) at 5:00 PM Pacific Time, in #halflife.org on irc.gamesnet.net. Here's the
skinny:
"Half-Life MOD and Level Development Chat"
Talk to the developers of Half-Life and get answers to your questions on the SDK, and
building MODs. This chat is a great opportunity for serious developers to have all their
questions answered.
The kinds of questions appropriate for this chat:
- How does the MOD browser work?
- What's the difference between the standard and professional SDK?
- How does TFC replace the HUD graphics? - Can I sell my MOD?
- What is in the next update of Worldcraft?
GA-Source
interviews Randy Pitchford of Gearbox software about their upcoming Half-Life: Opposing Force. According to the Q&A, they are about 20% through the project, and they expect
it to be available in October.
QuakeCity Gaming Network interviews
Rob Gee talking to the Raven's Rob Gee about their upcoming Star Trek: Voyager game.
Computer Gaming Review has posted a short
Q&A with Dynamix programmer Rick Overman talking a bit about the new 1.002 patch,
what's down the road, and about progress on the editor.
Valve has created versions of their Teamfortress Classic Guides translated into English,
French, German, Italian, and Spanish. The new files are now available on Planetfortress.
Two bits about Half-Life this afternoon for you...first up is an interview
with Gearbox Software's Randy Pitchford over on AVault about their new Half-Life
mission pack Opposing Force, which he says will be shown at E3. Also, ModCentral
posted this bit from Harry Teasley, regarding Valve's desire to show off HL
mods at E3: Sierra Studios would like to extend the opportunity to all mod teams
to showcase their Half-Life add-on at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, the
gaming industry's largest trade show, this May 12th through 15th in Los Angeles,
CA. Sierra is looking for professional-quality mods of any type, so here's a
rare opportunity to display your skill and creativity before the entire computer
and video game industry.
Add-ons chosen for the show will be shown on the show floor on PCs specifically
designated for these demos and will be included on a special CD distributed
to the gaming press. This is an incredible opportunity for add-on teams to make
themselves known to the industry professionals. If you wish to be considered
for inclusion in the Sierra Studios E3 Half-Life presentation, send your mod
or ftp information to het3@valvesoftware.com no later than May 10, 1999.
Regards,
Harry Teasley
News and Pictures from the Raving Toy Maniac
already has news up about plans for Quake III Arena action figures from ReSaurus, as well as an update on the stat of the
Quake figures (thanks Steve Lawson). Here's the update:
The eternally busy gang at ReSaurus has just announced, via
their new ReSaurus Newsletter, that their next all-new series of Quake
figures will be based on the upcoming id
Software release Quake III: Arena!
There are four figures planned for the new series, including a new Male Marine named Sarge,
Slash, a female cyborg, the alien champion known as Klesk
(pictured, from the game) and Sleeg a heavily armored alien.
Subscribers to the ReSaurus Newsletter were given a special sneak peek at
the control art for the Klesk figure. Want to see it? All you have to do
is sign up for the Newsletter right here!
So, what about the figures based on the original Quake game announced at Toy
Fair? ReSaurus plans to release many of those items, including
the nearly completed Shambler, in the future (possibly as exclusives for
their in-progress Collectors Club). As always stayed tuned to the ReSaurus website, as well as right
here, for the latest news!
It's a Quake world, baby! Are you ready?
BTW, there's a specific request on the Q3A toy concept art described above that it is
not for republication, so you'll have to get the newsletter if you want it. Also, the ReSaurus Newswire has word of an
"upgrade" to their Quake II figures (though as far as I know no patch or point
release will be available for existing users). There will be changes to some existing
figures, adding some new features, and some cultural diversity: "Four brand new
characters will include Marine Viper - a solid African-American fighting machine; Female
Marine Lotus - a seductive, Asian warrior; an imposing Tank Commander; and an even
creepier Iron Maiden. All four figures feature "upgraded" heads, accessories and
paint schemes."
The bleem! site has word that the first CDs of this
PlayStation emulator for the PC have arrived and are ready to ship. Thanks McCheese (who
apparently lost his bid for re-election as Mayor). A comment on the site makes it sound
like there's a chapter in the Bleem (bleem!?) saga that's yet to be revealed: "we
don't have much time to explain the delay right now, but once we get your orders out the
door, we'll tell you the whole story ... and it's an ugly one!"
The Hive interviews
Gabe Newell talking to Valve's Managing Director about Half-Life and its follow-ups.
Here is a quote on the subject of the newly announced official add-on from GearBox:
Newell: We knew the guys at Gearbox. Doug Wood here at Valve
was actually one of the founders of Rebel Boat Rockers. Charlie Brown and Gary McTaggert
had been doing some consulting with RBR on Prax Wars shortly before coming to Valve. So we
had a lot of confidence in their team, and we were excited by the ideas they came up with
for creating a complementary experience for Half-Life.
Put down your crack pipe and hit the Frag Pipe, Nihilistic's Steve "Magicman"
Thoms updated his .plan
Can't wait for Quake3? Tired of midair railing 5 of your friends simultaneously?
Need something fresh and exciting to occupy the time between refreshing your ftp sites
checking for Q3:Arena? Well, I have the answer for ya...a brand spanking new Quake DM
level.
Ok, it's not exactly brand new, but it's new to Quake. My second level converted from
Quake2 to Quake, The Frag Pipe.
Get it here:
ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames2/levels/deathmatch/p-r/q1_q2dm3.zip
And, in case you haven't seen it, my first conversion to Quake, The Edge (released about 4
months ago), can be found in that same directory:
ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames2/levels/deathmatch/p-r/q1_q2dm1.zip
A new beta version 2.3a of QStat
the Quake server status program is now out. This program that can generate a live webpage
for a game server now offers complete Half-Life support (players and server rules),
Half-Life master server, TRIBES servers, TRIBES master servers, Shogo, Hex player colors,
Several new template variables, bug fixes and more.
Sloshy Software Inc. has a new version 2.39
of the QuickStart Eraser Bot wizard that fixes a few bugs in this front-end to this Quake
II bot.
- GameStats's
Spring Cleaning Contest offers you the chance to win a lot of the clutter from
someone's office, which include unclaimed prizes from previous contests.
- Icon Contest Amended: Here are the updated (as of yesterday) rules to
our IE5 Icon Contest: It turns out that the IE5 icon can be 32x32 under some circumstances
(blame loony for making me think my original 32x32 posting was wrong), so it causes a bit
of a change in our Icon contest. We'll award a prize for both the best 16x16 and the best
32x32 Icon. Also, it turns out the better format is .ico format (blame me for that one
-- I'll be sure to run the next contest through more rigorous quality assurance before
posting it). Thanks Red-Death for the clarification about the icons, as well as the
helpful link to WinFiles.com
Windows 95-98 Icon Editing Tools. Sorry about the messiness. I will convert any .bmps
we've already received to .ico files, and of course, anyone who wants to redo their own
and resubmit it is welcome. Entries go to contest@bluesnews.com.
Contradicting my comment yesterday, today was another late start. I had a trip to Dr. Drill yesterday, and, though it turns out I still have a wisdom tooth extraction in the near future, for the most part, this marks an end to the work we had set out to do, ending the over year-long saga of my choppers. While I thought that with loony in place to cover my absence yesterday I could get away with this trip without comment, it turns out the pain-killer thing knocked me out last night, so even this last trip goes on record, but I guess it's
only appropriate to share the news that this is over with those who have been subjected to my tales of dental woe all this time. If I had any idea this morning would have been impacted, I'd have had loony make this the first day he tried his loony hand at the morning update, certainly one of the ideas behind his presence is for just such an eventuality.
Link of the Day: Someone wrote asking why no links to one of
Levelord's favorites, Old Man Murray Game Reviews.
No, they're not very nice to Levelord, they're not very nice to a lot of people (including
me), but it's pretty damn funny stuff.
Here's a local copy (and a list
of mirrors) of the Starsiege 1.002 patch (537 KB) released earlier ( story), along with word from Apache about what's new.
This patch addresses the following:
- The memory manager has been improved, and it no longer allocates 200mb of virtual memory
up front
- Fixes some texture cache problems on Voodoo based cards and increases performance
slightly
- Some improvements in OpenGL performance
- Many more resolutions available in OpenGL
- Support for additional OpenGL cards (i740, Savage3D, TNT2)
- 32bit support in OpenGL on the TNT2 chipset
- Save game name == planet name crash bug
- Rogue pilot server crash bug
- Frozen join screen bug
- Infinite join screen ping bug
- Misc. bugs
There's a post on the Epic
MegaBoard from Mark Rein giving the latest update on why the latest update about the release of the Unreal 224 patch was incorrect. Thanks PlanetUnreal. Here's part of the post. Ignore the
part about slinking away with his tail between his legs and shutting up now, he goes on
with more, if you want to go over and read the whole post:
Jackal--> Actually I did say that the patch would be out "later this week"
referring to the end of last week. When I made that statement it certainly looked like a
slam dunk it would be out around the weekend. The whole team was planning two days off
from Unreal Tournament to work exclusively on testing the patch thoroughly. But as the
weekend rolled around it still had some problems that needed to be resolved and retested.
So, I apologize for that. You'd think I would have learned my lesson by now in terms of
letting people know our expectations. I think I'll just slink back into my cave in shame
with my tail between my legs and shut up now.
Not one, not two, but three posts of addenda to rules of contests (one of them our own!):
- First, the addendum to out Icon Contest. It turns out that the IE5 icon can be 32x32
under circumstances (blame loony for making me think my original 32x32 posting was wrong),
so it causes a bit of a change in our Icon contest. We'll award a prize for both the best
16x16 and the best 32 by 32 Icon. Also, it turns out the better format is Icon format
(blame me for that one -- I'll be sure to run the next contest through more rigorous
quality assurance before posting it). Thanks Red-Death for the clarification about the
icons, as well as the helpful link to WinFiles.com Windows 95-98 Icon
Editing Tools. Sorry about the messiness. I will convert any .bmps we've already received
to .ico files, and of course, anyone who wants to redo their own and resubmit it is
welcome. Entries go to contest@bluesnews.com.
- Second, The Q2PMP has posted a LoveDoll
contest update with word from Paul Steed clarifying the rules about what kind of models
will qualify to win.
- Finally (quite the day for these), Epic's Mark Rein sent along this announcement about changes to
the Unreal Level Design Contest. Here's the conclusion:
It will probably take us a week or two to haggle with the lawyers over the
updated legal language and get the site changed over. This is going to be an AWESOME
contest. It's hard to keep everyone happy but we're trying our best. I'd like to thanks
those individuals whose feedback helped us to make this a better contest - you know who
you are.
A new version 1.002 patch for Starsiege (not Starsiege: TRIBES) is now available. No word
yet on what the patch does (there's no word as of this writing on The Starsiege Universe), but the patch is up
on this page posted by the
fine file-loving folks over at 3DFiles.com.
The Sierra HomeWorld
site has been updated with three new screenshots, as well as a pair of units
for their unit viewer (that are on magazine CDs this month, so you may already
have them). Also, HomeWorld.org is reporting
that the beta should be available today...stay tuned.
The Interplay Descent 3 page
has been updated with their weapons of the week. This week there's two new weapons:
the Plasma Cannon, and the EMD Cannon, and each has a downloadable MPEG movie
showing off their stuff. Also, if you entered Interplay's In
Your Face Contest, be sure to run by there and verify your entry, as there's
only three weeks left (thanks to The
Descent Chronicles for that one).
Couple of ION bits for you today...SS-Messiah is the winner of Week 4 of the Daikatana DM Tournament, and he'll be joining with R-Gauss, SS-Valdez, and Grindage in their trip down to Dallas, TX for the finals, where they'll deathmatch against The Romero. To celebrate his glorious victory, they've posted an interview with Messiah over at ActionXtreme.
Monolith's Mike Dussault updated
his .plan with a massive update on the status of LithTech 2, the next version
of the engine that powered Shogo and Blood 2, and will be behind Third Law Interactive's
KISS: Psycho Circus title. Here are a few memorable quotes: Support for
32-bit textures and screen surfaces has been in for a while. I'm very happy
with the way it's structured.. all the color conversion code was strewn out
before but now it is cenralized, clean, and simple. It's definitely better to
be using 32-bit textures and a 16-bit screen than 16-bit textures and a 32-bit
screen.
We have a SoftImage terrain exporter now. This is a huge leap over the previous
way we made terrains. It's much faster and easier to texture and manipulate the terrains in Soft.
There are some new tricks the preprocessor does to optimize the terrains. It
can sometimes strip out 65% of the polies on the terrain with no noticeable difference.Detail textures really enhance
the look of our terrain. It really makes the texture on the terrain look larger
and more detailed. The goods...
The model lighting is much more accurate now. Models can be lit accurately
from lights placed in the environment, so you can get nice subtle bits of light all over them.We're playing around with
different blending modes that work well for things like the sun and clouds passing
overhead.
Proving that three years without a new PC title doesn't hurt his ability to
score headlines, here's a bunch of Duke Nukem related news for you on this Tuesday
afternoon. IGN64 hasn't posted any new screenshots,
movies, or sound clips from the upcoming N64 Duke game Zero Hour, but they do
have... the box art. Woo! (Actually,
sarcasm aside, it does look pretty nice...it's nice to see another original
Duke painting after all the times they've reused the original Duke 3D cover art.)
Redchurch has posted an
interview with Lee Jackson, talking to the music and sound guy behind Duke
3D...and swing by the recently launched Gamesplayer.com
for an editorial
on why Duke Nukem is the best first person shooter of all time (although take
it with a grain of salt, considering the author is a Mac user, and admits to
never having played Half-Life).
Aztech New Media Restructures is a
press release from a few days ago that describes reorganizations at this software company,
but buried in the bottom of the release is word of a new commercial add-on for the
upcoming sequel to Rainbow Six. Aztec is also working on add-ons for Starcraft, Urban
Assault, and Shogo: Mobile Armor Division. Here's a quote from the announcement:
"Aztech is honoured to be associated with Red Storm and the Tom Clancy
brand," said Christopher Seepe, Aztech CEO and Chairman. "Tom Clancy is a
worldwide recognizable symbol for quality and accurate detail in adventure novels, and the
sequel will be an exciting addition to our expanding line of licensed add-on and
enhancement products for best-selling computer games."
Seepe said Aztech has been granted a worldwide exclusive license. The title of Red Storm's
Rainbow Six sequel game has not yet been finalized. Aztech's Rainbow Six sequel expansion
pack is expected to be released in the early Fourth Quarter of 1999.
Monolith has released the tools and game source for Blood2 to allow mod authors to get
their hands on some of the inner workings of the game. The files can be downloaded at The LithTech Game Modifications page.
Interplay Announces
FreeSpace 2 is the press release announcing the sequel to Descent FreeSpace: the Great
War. If you missed it, we posted a new screenshot from FreeSpace 2 yesterday ( story). Here's some of the lowdown from the press release on the game,
due in Winter 1999:
IRVINE, Calif., April 19 /PRNewswire/ -- Interplay Entertainment Corp. (Nasdaq: IPLY - news) announced today the plan to release
the sequel to the highly acclaimed Descent FreeSpace: The Great War(TM) entitled FreeSpace
2(TM). Developed by Volition, Inc., FreeSpace 2 will offer players significant new
gameplay advances, including the most engaging dogfighting ever seen in a space combat
simulation, all new single and multiplayer missions, and immersive nebula effects that
will add an all new dimension to the space combat genre.
"Our goal for FreeSpace 2 is to set a new standard in both multiplayer and
single-player space combat-sims, encompassing heart-pounding dogfights and spectacular
visual effects," stated Mike Kulas, President of Volition and one of the creators of
the award winning Descent I and II.
Adding to the excitement, FreeSpace 2 will feature a variety of multiplayer options
appealing to both deathmatch and teamplay crowds. Fans of the original will again relish
the real-time, in-game voice messaging that allows players to taunt their opponents or
strategize with their allies via a simple microphone and multi-play connection. FreeSpace
gamers may also design their own custom missions using the FreeSpace Mission Editor 2
(FRED 2) shipped with the full retail version of the game.
Through the Looking Glass has a lengthy discussion of some of the planned features from Looking Glass Studios' upcoming System Shock 2, the sequel to the cult-favorite first-person action/RPG. The article is based on some recent debates on the newsgroups in which the game's developers participated.
Activision Gets Weighty With
Heavy Gear 2 is a Next-Generation Online
piece discussing plans for Activision's sequel to Heavy Gear with the game's director,
Jack Mamais. Thanks Apache. Here's the answer
to one question that defines the distinction between a Gear and a Mech (as in MechWarrior
III), which he feels defines the difference between the two games:
"Personally, I don't consider MechWarrior 3 to be a direct
competitor. They are using mecha that have huge scale. They are capable of
withstanding enormous amounts of damage and still remain walking. Heavy Gear 2, on
the other hand, is much more fast-paced. Your gear is very agile and you'll have to use
those abilities to keep you out of danger. I guess you could say piloting a mech is like
driving a battleship, and a gear is like a PT boat."
GameGirlz interviews Harvey
Smith talking to ION Storm's Witchdoctor about his work on ION's upcoming Deus Ex.
A correction to the warning posted yesterday ( story) about the just-released Expendable demo from Rage ( story), comes from Peter over at Rage, who corrected my interpretation
of the warning:
The problem you report only occurs when using a 3D accelerator card with a 2D
card where the 2D card has no 3D component of its own (such as the S3 trio) this should
only affect older cards.
The demo should be fine when used on a Voodoo 1 or 2 card with most graphics cards, such
as Matrox Mystique etc. which do include some degree of 3D component
As you say, this problem has been fixed on the full version.
QuakeStarter's Official HomePage has a new version 0.69b of the QuakeStarter Quake II front-end. They are poised to quickly put in the features required to support the Q3ATest when released to be the first Q3A front-end.
Eff Pee '99 (Fragapalooza '99) has been
announced, for mid-August in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Details are on their page, and
more LAN events than you can shake an RJ-45 at are listed on our LAN Parties page.
- HardwareCentral's Ultimate
PC Giveaway is giving away a $7,500 PIII system.
- The QuakeCity Network is giving away a pair
of copies of TeamEvolve's Red Odyssey add-on for BattleZone in exchange for filling out
their poll.
- A reminder about our own contest, which is to design a new IE5 favorites icon for Blue's
News. I believe the .bmp format icons are supposed to be 32x32, but the only real
rule will be whatever looks the best when it is installed. Deadline will be Friday April
23, 1999, at 11:59 PM. Send all entries to contest@bluesnews.com.
Good luck to all who enter. (I originally wrote last week as the deadline when I first
posted this yesterday, sorry about that).
- Levelord posted a little explanation in his .plan about our previous
(guess the photo) contest for the many who wanted the real story behind the
shot.
- FPS Spectator's Julios Interview is up, talking to the man they call the Evil Knievel of Quake II...
- Hyperionics has released a new version of the HyperSnap screenshot utility that offers improved visual quality. Thanks DemoNews...
- The Team Fortress Classic Webring is underway...
- 30 new textures have been added to EZStudios' texture collections for level designers...
- GetRight.Com has a new version 3.34 of this utility that takes some of the nightmare out of large downloads by allowing you to resume after problems, even on HTTP downloads. Thanks Von...
- The Dteam 3D Design Guild has posted a new PainKeep (classic Quake 1 mod) map, along with a Reaper bot for PainKeep dealie to play on it. Speaking of mappers, Happy Birthday to Dan "danimal" Proietti, co-author of DaPak (there's a first look at danimal's new Quake II project on Ramshackle)...
No time to ramble (stop cheering!), I got a later than usual start on the news the past
two days as I force my schedule around a bit so that it integrates better with Loony's.
I've gotten a couple of questions about the links page lately, luckily I have good news to
report on that, which is it is in the process of a complete overhaul, to be completed, of
course, when it's done.
Link of the Day: Sandia National
Laboratories. As James, who sent this along, points out, "Two words came
immediately to mind: Black Mesa."
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