Archived News:
The possibility that the Generations mod was in jeopardy of being shut down became public
the other day ( story), and now the other shoe has dropped, as the Generations Main News page has word
that this Quake II mod has been "terminated" as a result of correspondence with
id Software about its Trademark violations. Thanks The Last Doomer. Word is that the
reason they continued this long in violation was the result of a "misunderstanding
between [the generations team] and id," but the update also makes it clear that they
have not actually been "foxed," that is, id has not specifically asked them to
shut down, but rather, this is their voluntary solution to the situation. Here's the part
that explains that:
id Software has specifically stated that they are NOT asking us
to shut down Generations. Therefore, we are not technically "foxed," as the term
goes. But id has set guidelines as to what restrictions we are expected to place on
ourselves. Generations, as far as v.98 goes, is in broad, direct, and clear violation of
nearly all of these guidelines, in virtually every aspect. In fact, so is every version of
Generations that has ever been publicly released. In case you haven't guessed, the Files
page is down, and the mirrored downloads will soon be unavailable. In volunteering to
remove the files, we hope to avoid any further legal complications with id
Software.
Sierra Studios sends word that none other than Ritual's Famed Levelord™ has joined an
"all-star" team of level designers contributing maps on a contract basis for
Gearbox Software's upcoming official Half-Life add-on Opposing force. Here is a good chunk
of the press release:
BELLEVUE, WA (June 14, 1999) -- Sierra Studios™ and Gearbox Software
announced today that famed level designer Richard Gray, also known as
"Levelord™", has agreed to create a multiplayer map for Half-Life: Opposing
Force. Half-Life: Opposing Force is the first official game expansion for Half-Life, the
thrilling PC CD-ROM created by Valve Software and named "Game of the Year" by
over 40 publications around the world.
Levelord, best known for his work on Ritual's SiN, 3dRealms' Duke Nukem 3D, and id
Software's Quake: Scourge of Armagon, is the first announced member of an elite group of
"all-star" designers who have joined Gearbox Software on a contract basis to
create new multiplayer content for Half-Life: Opposing Force.
"Gearbox is very excited to have Levelord contributing to this project," noted
Randy Pitchford, co-founder and lead game designer at Gearbox. "His always clever and
unique designs are sure to bring a whole new level to the Half-Life multiplayer experience
with Opposing Force."
"We've been great friends since the days of Duke Nukem," said Levelord, "We
have a mutual respect for each other's work, and I'm very honored to work with Gearbox as
well as with Valve."
In addition to his groundbreaking single player creations for some of the most acclaimed
3d action titles of our time, Levelord has designed many of the most popular and creative
multiplayer maps of the genre. These include Duke3d's Tierdrops (where players exist in
the same space but in different dimensions), Hipdm1 for Quake: Scourge of Armagon (the
level that started a new genre of 'suspended in space' multiplayer platforms) and Spry for
SiN (where players are the size of mice in a huge living room).
Half-Life: Opposing Force (a.k.a. OpFor) will feature a dozen new multiplayer levels
created by 3d action industry All-Stars like Levelord. OpFor also features an expansive
new single player episode were players return to the Black Mesa Research Facility from the
exciting new perspective of a soldier to eliminate a new breed of fierce aliens. The
title, which is being developed by Gearbox Software, is scheduled to be released this
October.
The Blackmoon Development page has version
1.3 of Quake 2 2 player, the mod which allows two players to compete in a Quake II
deathmatch using a single computer (with the appropriate extra hardware), though they are
still looking for programmers who can program support for two mice into the mod.
Kokak's Heretic Page has a new
version 0.5 of Kokak's OpenGL port of the Heretic source code. Thanks Billy "Heretic" Wilson.
The Prax Entertainment page has a new
version 1.0 of Immediate Half-Life 2, their add-on that makes it easy to launch Half-Life
maps with custom settings for each map. The new version offers improved operation, and
compatibility with Half-Life version 1.0.1.0.
FTP.Netscape.com has a
new version 4.61 of Netscape Communicator. As usual with the earliest word on the new
release, currently only the English language version is available. Thanks Mike Rutkas.
Woo! It's time to see the
results of our third contest, kids...swing by and see how badly you did
(or just run over there to laugh at some of those goofy entries). And while
you're at it, don't forget to check
out our next contest. Hmm...maybe I'll start making these questions harder.
Too many people are actually answering all of them (there were a wopping ten
right answers last time).
PC Gamer Online has posted
noted level author Neil Manke's latest work, a level set for Half-Life called USS
Darkstar, along with some rave reviews about the collection, which they call a
"masterpiece," from Quake
Map Hotel, 3D
Map Realm, and 10 Four, along with the 11.4 MB download.
Computer
Games Online previews Quake III Arena starting with the past, detailing the game's
history starting with the project codenamed "Trinity" all the way through the
future, speculating about engine licensing possibilities, saying " Half-Life 2,
anyone?" Also, Benvenuti nel covo dei DSQ announces
the Italian language homepage of the Dark Side Quakers, home to their Italian language Q3A
preview (as well as some mind-numbing midi). Finally, ZDTV's
updated Quake III Preview offers an audio preview of the game in RealPlayer format, offering DM footage and commentary about
the game from Dennis "Thresh" Fong.
Computer
Games Online previews Thief 2: The Metal Age looking at the upcoming sequel to Thief:
The Dark Project, saying "Looking Glass' next first-person looter goes co-op."
GameSpot
UK's Descent 3 Screenshot Gallery has been updated with a dozen new shots of this
imminent game (shots 31 through 43 are the new ones). Thanks Frans from 3D Action Gamers.
There are some new Hired Guns
Screenshots on PC Paradox showing off more action from this upcoming Unreal-engine
first-person shooter that will put players in simultaneous control of four players.
Version 1.0 of AMD Zone's K7 FAQ is
up answering all your FAQing questions about AMD's latest and greatest processors. Also,
the AMD-K6 Technical Documentation page has
been updated with new info on the K6.
The Hive interviews
Outrage's Craig Derrick talking to the producer on Descent 3 about the game, which is
due in stores sometime this week.
Speaking of Interplay (publishers of Descent 3, from the story above), they send along
word that once again they are looking for participants for a focus group about gaming.
Here's the skinny:
Interplay is looking for more playtesters to participate in some upcoming focus
groups. Applicants must live in the LA/Orange County, CA area. If interested, please send
a message to betatest@interplay.com with the
words "focus group" as the message subject. Participants will receive a free
Interplay game of their choice.
Planet Daikatana
has posted a strategy guide for the Daikatana Mplayer deathmatch demo.
There's a Titanium
Angels trailer on GA-Source showing off this upcoming "3D action adventure where
you control Carmen Blake, a tough, futuristic bounty hunter, who rides on the back of
Titan, an intelligent spider-like assault vehicle with a personality." The AVI-format
trailer features the spider-like assault vehicle, Titan. Also, the Chinese Diablo II
Movie on DiabloII.net was apparently received through a Chinese TV station, and shows
off gameplay, as well as cinematics from Blizzard's upcoming sequel to Diablo. There are
also versions of the movie posted there with just the gameplay and just the cinematic
elements separated from the rest of the trailer.
Creative Labs
Products Graphics Voodoo2 page has new beta drivers for Creative's 3D Blaster Banshee
and the 3D Blaster Voodoo2. I've been told these drivers allow support for textures
greater than 256x256 (traditionally a Voodoo limitation) by breaking them up into smaller
textures (see this Maximum
PC article for details on that), and while the site doesn't mention that specifically,
it does discuss texture management improvements as part of the new release. What the page does
say is that the drivers support Quake II, GLQuake and Hexen II, as well as adding support
for Quake III (specifically Quake III Test 1.05) in a single mini-GL file. Thanks Chad Wills.
Preacher sends word that Epic's Mark Rein posted to the Unreality.org
Message Board with some comments on Saturday's Epic-hosted Unreal Tournament
LAN party: Actually what the event was was us showing up to do some testing
on a big LAN with a bunch of people who hadn't played the game before. We're
going to do it again next week. There's no point having 50 people come out if
there are only 14 machines. Next week we are hoping to bring some Savage4, TNT2
and Rage128 video cards to test. The TNT's would have performed considerably better were it not for a bug in
the version we brought that prevented us from using low and medium texture details.
We knew about this bug.
UT performance is roughly the same as Unreal - in some places it's maybe even
a little faster. If you have enough machine to play Unreal then you have enough
machine to play Unreal Tournament. The performance you witnessed on a Celeron
400 would have been roughly the same on anything from a PII 266 and upward.
All the improvements that are in the latest Unreal 225 version are also in Unreal
Tournament. It plays quite well over the internet.
We've improved TNT performance a LOT under D3D in the most recent version of
Unreal (225) and we're continuing to work with Nvidia to get even better performance
out of their cards. We did experience some problems with the TNT cards on Saturday
because a last-minute bug forced to use only the absolute highest setting for
texture detail (higher than the default setting) which isn't suitable for machines
that have less than 128Mb of RAM - these had 64Mb. That ended up causing lots
of disk swapping which gave an inaccurate picture of TNT performance which otherwise
would have been quite acceptable. This will be fixed in time for next week.
In related news, Billy "Screenshots" Wilson has posted two new UT screenshots on that newly redesigned page of his.
SamHell interviews Zoid giving the ten
questions once-over to id Software's contract programmer about his work, the growing
acceptance of Linux by the gaming community, and plans for the Q3A version of Threewave
CTF.
Thresh's FiringSquad previews
Shadowman, offers a hands-on look at this third-person action/adventure title
currently in the works over at Acclaim that takes place in the land of the dead.
Thresh's FiringSquad's Diablo
II preview is also up, offering pictures, descriptions, and accounts of Blizzard's
upcoming sequel to their insanely popular action/.RPG. The preview includes Q&A with
Blizzard's Bill Roper to get the inside scoop.
TrendKill dot Net's Quake3 Arena
Console Command List apparently actually has a few more commands listed than the list
mentioned as the largest yesterday ( story),
though the other list ( Mad Dog's
CFG) seems to have more complete descriptions.
The 3D Body Shop has posted a new VWEP pack to
allow visible weapons in Quake II for a load of user-created models. The pack has visible
weapons for over 25 models, as well as a bunch of new models, skins, and sounds.
AoW TFC League is a five-on-five mixed connection
(each team must have at least two high-ping players) TFC tourney.
- The Rift 3d page has the release of the
materials created for the ill-fated Jurassic TC, a never-completed Quake II mod based on
the big ole Spielberg movie. Other mods can freely adopt what they want from the release,
which includes sounds, models, and animation, but no code...
- Letting
the Chips Fall Where They May is a NY Times Online (free registration required)
article explaining that the PlayStation2 will not be exported to China, since its
(American-made) CPU is designated a super-computer (apparently soon HP calculators will
fall into this category as well). Thanks Kent R. Spillner...
- GX
Message Boards' Unreal Tournament Discussion board is online...
I learned a long time ago that there's a strong Murphy's Law in effect on the Internet,
which has made me superstitious enough about making predictions about things that are
going to happen that I'd be hesitant to write in this space that I plan to continue
breathing for fear of immediately dropping dead on my keyboard. Therefore I can't believe
I managed to make a comment a couple of weeks back about things settling into a
normal schedule around here because loony's DSL line installation was so imminent. Of
course that rat Murphy reared his ugly head, and that has still not come to pass. I won't
comment any further about when I imagine loony will be 100% online for fear talking too
much about it will cause what connectivity he currently does have, a single phone line and
a modem, will go away as well.
I've gotten several responses that suggest the page
reloading glitch I described yesterday is a Netscape problem (specific to one version) with
iFrames, but I haven't confirmed that this is the case (if it is, I'm afraid I'm just going
to ignore it).
Link of the Day: Catholics
want saint of the Net. Thanks TonyT.
Drakan.Net has word that an updated demo for Drakan:
Order of the Flame has been available via the Gigex download dealie since sometime last
week. The newer version of the demo fixes some bugs, and adds refined AI as well as
Arokh's lightning attack. The links provided there are Gigex for modem users
and Gigex for LAN users
behind a firewall, and Frans also sends word that the demo is available as a 60-some
MB download from 3D Action
Gamers' Archive's Drakan Order of the Flame page.
VampireCentral is the name of
a new site devoted exclusively to Nihilistic's Vampire - The Masquerade: Redemption.
To celebrate their grand opening, they've posted their
E3 Preview, complete with new screenshots.
Black & White Wire has posted a new
interview with Scawen Roberts, 3D programmer and animator on the upcoming 3D
"god game," Black & White.
Here are a few more previews for your Sunday afternoon enjoyment:
George Broussard posted to the 3DRealms message board, with a small bit on
Duke Forever (thanks JulianKC). Here's George's response to a complaint about
the lack of interactivity in Unreal, and the question as to how it would be
fixed in DNF: We've done so. DNF is the most interactive FPS game I've
ever seen as it stands right now. Some is done with meshes. Some with world
brushes. But we have god-like control over both and it leads to "emergent"
gameplay the likes of which you've never seen
That's a large part of what we spent our first 6 months doing with Unreal. Making
it more flexible dealing with interaction. The last 6 months have dealt with
character systems and interaction.
SSI Beta Test Central now has Prince
of Persia 3D listed as one of the games that they will be beta testing in the near future,
saying on the site "Beta Test scheduled for June or July." Thanks BetaNews. There's no word on how open the process will
be, or how many testers they plan on accepting, but there is a Beta Test Application if you are
interested in trying to participate.
A bunch of reviews and word on those daughterboards for the Monster Sound MX300:
Tweak3D's Half-Life Tweaks page has been
updated with new intelligence on getting best performance from Half-Life, adding a whole
load of information on running TeamFortress Classic, which was released since the last
version of the guide was published.
A big update to the Q3Test console commands list on Mad Dog CFG has been updated, as
has the Quake3Arena
Visual and Performance Tweak Guide, offering their best effort at providing support to
improve performance and tweak the visuals in Q3Test. They claim their Console doc is
"the most complete and up-to-date on the web."
The Quake 3 Center's Randamu mod is a new
Quake II mod that adds random item placement and a unique scoring method that rewards
"streaks" where a player gets a run of frags without dying. The plan is to
continue to refine the Quake II version of the mod, and when Quake III Arena is released,
to create a full Q3A version.
Kokak's Doom Page has
version 0.5 of Kokak's OpenGL port of the id Doom source code. Thanks Billy "ArchVile" Wilson. According to
the site, "For fast rendering, a 3D accelerated card is needed (OpenGL compatible).
It runs fine on a P200 with a voodoo1 3dfx card."
The Generations page details a
situation emerging that's put the future of this ambitious Quake II modification in doubt,
as id Software is apparently concerned that the mod's use of material from other id games
causes a copyright problem. Thanks iGore. This is all preliminary, but
the update on the page makes it clear they are concerned about their ability to continue
with the project, saying "id has yet to mention anything of foxing the project; it's
only a possibility at this point."
- The 4th Dimension Interactive site
has news that the cool-sounding "Crush Depth" mod for Quake II is nearing
completion, with an update on the site already giving word on plans for Crush Depth 2...
- Birdman's Lair has added SpaceOrb 360
configs for Requiem, Aliens vs. Predator, the Drakan demo, and (oldie but goodie)
Mysteries of the Sith for Jedi Knight. Thanks Frans at 3D Action Gamers...
- Dteam 3d Design Guild has a new utility up
to help create Q3ATest configs that requires Excel...
(Or: What happens when someone says "here, just use this HTML")
I've started getting reports of what seems to be a return of the glitch that causes the
news page to reload for some readers (actually I think the problem never went completely
away for some). I'm fairly positive it has something to do with the ad banner below that
uses an "iframe" to display it (which I'd be lying if I claimed I understood).
I'm going to look into this again, but if I can't figure it out I'm just going to kill the
offending banner, because something is clearly going wrong, and while I've never had the
reload glitch myself (I imagine it's something browser specific), I know I'd have no
patience for it if I did, especially if I was one of the few who are apparently
occasionally redirected to the page in the ad, which is just plain out of control (my
apologies if you are one of the readers so affected).
Link of the Day: The Original Joe Forman Micro-Gerbil
2001, from the same deranged mind that brought us the The Frog Bender 2000. Remember,
these are drawings... no actual animals we harmed in the making of these animations (to my
knowledge). Thanks Brian Thomas.
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