Archived News:
Zombie Studios has released a new multiplayer demo of their tactical first
person shooter SpecOps 2: Green Berets. This new demo features five different
multiplayer game types: King of the Hill, Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Co-op,
and Combative. You can snag the file at SpecOps2.com.
A demo version of SquareSoft's Final Fantasy VIII has been released, and is
available for download at 3DFiles
(thanks Jedi666). The demo is 67 MB, and if it's half as good as the Playstation
version it's well worth it.
The official Roger Wilco site has posted a
new beta version of this popular real-time voice communication software
package (thanks CiKoTiC). The changes are mostly bug-related, but there's also
new stuff added to allow easier integration with MPlayer (which recently purchased
the company).
NovaLogic has released an updated version of the Delta Force 2 demo, available from their ftp sites here and here (37.3 MB), as well as through the auto-update feature in the demo that was released on November 26. The changes are unknown at this moment, but likely include the NovaWorld improvements mentioned in the latest developer update ( story). Similarly, the latest retail patch is available for direct download and via auto-updating, too.
Both Todd Hollenshead and Paul Steed have made posts to a
thread on Quake3World's message boards regarding the cinematics in Quake
III Arena. Todd's post states that the opening, as well as the final Xaero movies
were made by Digital Anvil (with significant input from Paul Steed). Paul later
made a massive post that's just full of interesting details about the cinematics
- here's a snippit: The second half of the intro was done with the very
efective help of Eric 'Monkey Boy' Webb, our resident intern here at id. Aside
from making a good disembodied head in the game thanks to Kenneth Scott, he
spent hours and hours making demos for me. Based on the images I got from those
demos I edited the final sequence which you see in the game revealed through
the title letters.
As far as the tier door animations go, they were designed as informative fluff.
They just matched a name to the face in a nearly static fashion so you had a
more closeup idea of whom you were facing in the arenas.
The Endgame animation was done using motion capture provided by Locomotion Studios
down in Wimberly, Texas with me as the actor. As in all the animations I applied
Mesh Smooth for Max 2.5 to the in-game models (for more rounded edges primarily)
and used the same 'low rez', in-game texture done by the amazing and prolific
Kenneth Scott. The only texture difference in those rendered characters were
in the form of bump maps (roughness), specular maps (shininess), self-illumination
(selective glows) and additional opacity maps (transparency) applied to take
full advantage of the detail made possible only in a rendered image.
There's a new update to the Unreal Technology
Page announcing that NetGames USA's ngWorldStats system, which shipped with
Unreal Tournament, is now available to Unreal engine licensees. This means the
technology is now applicable to any of the many games currently in production
using the engine. Check out the site
for full details, including contact info for licensees.
GA-RPG has posted two new
shots from Icewind Dale, an upcoming RPG from Black Isle studios, the same
guys behind Baldur's Gate and the just-completed Planescape Torment.
Telefragged has posted two new, high-resolution screenshots from Blade, an
upcoming third person action title from Spanish developers RebelAct. The shots
have been posted on top of their previously available Q&A
with the developers.
id Software's Robert Duffy made his first .plan update with the latest news
on the upcoming release of QERadiant, the official editor for Quake III Arena.
You can read the full .plan at QERadiant.com
(since we haven't added him to the BlueTracker as of yet) which contains a full
list of changes as well as a ToDo List, but here's what he had to say about
the release: The editor and map building tools should be available in
about a week. This will include a prebuilt editor, q3map, and additional support
files to get you going with map design and construction. There will also be
some sample maps and shader examples.
I'm in the process of running the editor against various GL configurations and
making sure it runs well on Win98 machines. I'll post a list of confirmed GL
setups that I found to work, with the release. If it runs on a driver set installed
by GLS tup I'll call it good.
The tool and game source will follow sometime after this release. A few things
still need done in that area but it should follow reasonably soon after the
binaries.
The "about a week" time frame estimate is just that. An estimate.
According to LinuxQuake, Loki
Software's Linux port of Quake III Arena has gone gold and is off to manufacturing.
If you pre-ordered a copy from them, LQ is reporting that you could have it
within a week.
Sierra Studios has released the second Half-Life: Opposing Force level, entitled Frenzy, for direct download (648 KB). As with the first level reported earlier today, this is the same level as the Half-Life map "Frenzy", outfitted with OpFor weapons. For more information, see the official Half-Life: Opposing Force site which now mentions five levels will be released this week.
3D Realms' Scott Miller updated his
.plan with some thoughts on a number of holiday releases, including Ultima
IX, Unreal Tournament, and this bit, where he discusses the copy protection
in Quake III Arena (and reveals that Duke Nukem Forever will likely have a similar
feature): I've been watching the debates regarding QA3's server key validation
because Duke Nukem Forever will likely use some form of copy protection too.
Software theft (mostly casual theft, such a making a copy for a friend, family
member, or co-worker) has become such a huge problem that developers and publishers
can no longer release games without protection of some sort. Hit games used
to sell many more copies than they do nowadays, and a good part of the dramatic
drop must be due to the proliferation of CD-ROM burners.
Acclaim has released a new patch for Re-Volt, which fixes some problems with command line options, and adds 3D sound support and a utility for creating collision files. Elsewhere, this morning Electronic Arts released a version 1.1 patch (4.7 MB) for Theme Park World (Sim Theme Park in the US), but further information on it is not available.
The German Unreal Tournament site UT-Web has posted a
Q&A with Jay Wilbur (Epic's biz guy), discussing the upcoming German
version of UT. Due to anti-violence laws, the game has to be changed significantly...according
to Jay, players can look forward to the following changes: "Humans will
be robots, exploding body parts will be nuts, bolts, spark-plugs, blood will
be oil...that sort of stuff." The Q&A is available in both English
and German on the same page.
Gamasutra has posted a postmortem of System Shock 2, the acclaimed 3D action RPG by Irrational and Looking Glass. The article, written by project manager Jonathan Chey, examines the birth of the project, the companies involved, and what went right and what went wrong in the development of the game. If you're interested in what a developer thinks of their own product, these postmortems are always highly recommended reading.
The Croft Times sends word of an update to their unofficial Tomb Raider: the Last Revelation walkthrough, apparently a work in progress that now provides hints to conquer the first ten levels of the game. The site also has walkthroughs for the demo and the training levels.
GameSpot UK has posted a
preview of Sovereign, a 3D real time empire building strategy game with
as many as 500 people playing simultaneously, currently in production at Verant
Interactive, the developers of EverQuest. There's a few new screenshots and
some vehicle renders posted as well.
Westwood has released a new patch for Command & Conquer: Tiberian
Sun. This new update features mainly multiplayer improvements, including improvements
to the interface and fixes for latency issues in addition to bug fixes and gameplay
tweaks. The patch is automatically downloaded when you log into Westwood Online,
but it will also available for download shortly on
their downloads page (which currently still lists the old version 1.13 patch).
AVault has posted four
new screenshots from Evolva, Computer Artworks' new unique first person
title in development. They also promise a hands-on preview in the near future.
Ok, it's a flight sim, but apparently a lot of folks were waiting for this one: MicroProse has released the version 1.08 US/UK patch for Falcon 4.0, their F-16 combat flight sim. There are a lot of changes in this version, including fixes to graphics, joystick control, AI, multiplayer, and more. Mirrors of the 17.6 MB file are now available at 3D Gamers.
Sierra Studios has released what looks like the first of the promised Half-Life: Opposing Force levels for direct download (1.2 MB), presumably called Crossfire. There are an unusual number of assumptions (for Blue's News) in that sentence, because while the file has been available on their ftp site since last night, the official HL:OpFor site still hasn't been updated with the news or a description. So, try it at your own risk, and hopefully future releases will happen with more information. Update: ZaMoose sends along word that this is Dario Casali's "Crossfire" map from Half-Life, reconditioned with OpFor weapons.
Stomped has posted an
interview with the always controversial Lt. Colonel David Grossman, an outspoken
critic of violent video games, who has maintained since day one (and he reiterates
this throughout the interview) that he believes games like Quake to be "murder
simulators."
It looks like Warren Spector's Deus Ex may be making it to the Dreamcast console
system. According to Dreamcast.IGN,
ION Storm, "may have plans to bring [Deus Ex] over to the Dreamcast next
year." While that's just a rumor, and may in fact be bogus, they also say
this: "a source close to the project indicated that the company has a strong
desire to bring the game over, and the port could possibly be underway even
as we speak."
3dfx Gamers has posted an interview with Wheel of Time lead designer Glen Dahlgren, talking about the game, the books and the fans, now that the game has been out for a while.
GA-RPG has posted a first look at Soulbringer, a 3D role-playing game by Gremlin and Infogrames. Soulbringer has a dark gothic look devoid of your typical RPG dwarves and elves, and sports a 3D engine with a realistic combat system and innovative magic system.
Epic's Brandon "GreenMarine" Reinhart made a pair of posts to the
Unreal Technology page with some
stories of note for would-be Unreal Tournament mod authors. He's posted a
full programming document for UT mod authors, and links to
these tutorials for UnrealED on UnrealED.net.
The Vault Network has posted the first in their weekly series of Baldur's
Gate II designer diaries. This first installment deals with their initial
design phase, specifically all the changes they decided to make from the original
Baldur's Gate (both in terms of the game's engine and design issues).
Rich's Project Warehouse
has the initial release of a new Half-Life mod called Scientist Hunt,
a teamplay-based game that scores your team points for killing scientists,
though killing members of the opposing team is by no means against the rules.
The code makes use of the Half-Life Jumbot,
which is by the same author.
- This press release
announces the winners of the Daikatana Deathmatch challenge will be up at
ION Storm's offices a week from Friday to take on the Romero in
deathmatch...
- AI for Games and Animation
is a new Gamasutra feature offering
"a cognitive modeling approach" to the art...
In case it wasn't painfully obvious, the site has been terribly slow since it
came back online yesterday, apparently Pair has had some difficulties getting
their load-balancing worked out, as detailed on
this page, which says things are all back-to-normal there, but there still
seem to be problems. In the mean time, I have put my mad hax0r skillz to work on
re-forwarding traffic from the old server to the new one, to see if it can hold
up this time around, since the old server seems just about completely inaccessible
(many who have written in about the problems with the site assume it is related
to the oft-discussed move, which had actually not yet occurred). Either way, if
you are reading this, something is likely working again, which would be good
news. Once again, we are terribly sorry for these problems, we are very hopeful
that they will be behind us quickly. In the meantime, you will notice that
recent stories from yesterday and this week are slowly being manually added to
this server (since the databases are out of sync). Oh, yeah, if you're having
trouble hitting loonygames, it is
because it currently shares a server with Blue's News, so sorry about the
problems there, as well (sigh).
Link of the Day: The little rubber ninja homepage.
Thanks Alex Ryko.
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