Archived News:
id Software's Robert Duffy updated his .plan with more details on the just released Point Release beta 2 patch. The update also mentions that the source for this version should be available soon. Here's the scoop:
The 2nd Point Release Beta (version 1.15b) for Quake III Arena is out. It should start appearing on mirrors soon. This
version contains several bug fixes and should go final within a day or so. The source should be available shortly after
that ( within a few days ). Per usual, all dates and time frames are subject to change.
Changes:
-Control menu works properly
-Pure server connection notification
-2D Armor icon appears properly
-.arena files are accumulated properly across pk3 files
-A few other smallish fixes
GameFan has posted an MPEG
movie of BioWare's MDK 2, with 43 seconds of gameplay footage. The movie
is available as a low resolution (for the bandwidth impaired) version, or as
a slightly beefier version for the broadband crowd. MDK, as everyone knows,
stands for Mahogany Door Knobs.
id Software has released a new beta 2 version of the Point Release patch for Quake III Arena on their ftp server (1.1 MB). Here is a local copy of the patch along with a list of mirrors. The Quake III Arena FAQ included with the patch has not changed, so presumably the changes in this version entail only bug fixes to the first beta.
Another quadruple of screenshots is being served at incitegames.com, showing off several scenes from Star Trek: New Worlds, the upcoming 3D real-time strategy title from 14 Degrees East and Interplay.
Telefragged has posted four new screenshots of Picassio, depicting some scenes from Promethean Designs's upcoming stealthy action game, where the object is to steal art without getting violent.
There's a new preview of Metal Fatigue up on GameSpot, looking at this upcoming 3D giant-robot RTS by Zono and Psygnosis. The article is based on an initial alpha build, and includes not only the mandatory set of new screenshots, but also some fairly detailed descriptions of the gameplay and other features in the game.
Gamecenter has posted some information on Red Storm's Rainbow Six franchise which, besides the number crunching, includes the first pair of screenshots of Rogue Spear: Urban Operations, the upcoming expansion pack.
Epic programmer Brandon 'GreenMarine' Reinhart has updated the Unreal Technology page with a rundown of several new features that were added with this morning's version 405B patch. They include a Render Control Interface and an Enhanced Actor Rendering Interface, both created by The Wheel of Time developers Legend Entertainment. The new features will only become available with the next public source release, "which will come in the week or so."
The QStat Downloads page has a new version 2.3f beta release of QStat for both Windows and Linux, fixing support for Unreal Tournament servers that are running the new version 405B which was released this morning ( story).
Artifact Entertainment has announced that their 3D role-playing game Demise: Rise of the Ku'Tan! has gone gold, and more information on its availability should be released shortly (thanks VoodooExtreme). This comes a month after the first release candidate ( story), and word is that the "1.00r2 public version will be coming out any day as well."
According to this
post on GASource, Headfirst's first person RPG Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners
of the Earth, will be based on the NDI Netimmerse
engine. If that doesn't ring any bells, it's the same engine used to power
such games as Prince of Persia 3D, Panzer General 3D Assault, Simon the Sorcerer
3D (also by Headfirst) and um...FLW Tournament Bass Fishing. They've also posted
a quote from the developer with more on the game's physics system.
Version 2.19 of GameSpy has been released
exclusively to registered users. This new version adds full support for Quake
III Arena (including a player profile to select skins and models), as well as
improved support for Unreal Tournament and Battlezone II. If you're a registered
user, you can download it at FilePlanet
(we're told that they are having server difficulties, so the download may be
a little slow).
DeadAlfs 2000 has posted an
interview with Simon Woodroffe & Andrew Brazier from Headfirst, the
developers of the first person RPG Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth.
Amongst the topics discussed are the game's weapons, which apparently are quite diverse, as they explained,
"the game contains a complete realtime physics system that will allow the
player to hit monsters or anything else with ANYTHING. Limbs, heads, bottles,
books, chairs... Anything you can pick up you will be able to use, throw and
manipulate."
According to a
news item on Slashdot (which comes by way of a
Linux reseller), Loki Software has
announced that they are working on Linux ports of Alpha Centauri, SimCity 3000,
Soldier of Fortune, Interstate '82, and Heavy Gear II. Loki, you may recall,
recently published the Linux version of Quake III Arena.
Nocturne fan-site The Spookhouse has posted an
interview with Mike Porter, one of the artists at Terminal Reality. Mike
talks about his background, the research involved in creating the various locales
for the game, as well as some hints about their upcoming Blair Witch Project
title. They've also posted a new version of the game's editor on
this FTP site (while FilePlanet is undergoing server upgrades) which makes
it easier to create POD files to distribute to other Nocturne users in addition
to other changes. Lastly, they've also posted a
humorous "alternate ending" to the game (which presumably contains
spoilers).
The Quake Engine Resources page
has the release of a new QER QuakeWorld beta, now offering TeamFortress support
that they say makes the original TeamFortress look a lot sexier. Separate
downloads of the server, client, and client source code are available, and this
version is incompatible with other QuakeWorld servers, which they say
will (temporarily) help stop cheating. Included with this release is qer_2fort5,
they say thanks to John Cook and Valve Software. Next in the works for this
project is enhanced CTF support.
Games Weekly Magazine has posted an
interview with Dynamix' Nels Bruckner, talking to the programmer about his
work on TRIBES 2, including the differences between the sequel and the original,
and some other gameplay issues.
This The Adrenaline Vault
news story describes plans to split the upcoming tactical shooter Private
Wars into two independent products, the original Private Wars (which
according to the AVault's June 1998 Private Wars
preview was expected December 1998), and one called Private Wars: Countdown,
which will come much sooner, cheaper, and should offer more mass-appeal: Countdown
is being described as a slimmed down version of the full Private Wars concept
that will attract more casual--i.e. non-hardcore tactical simulation--users and
highlight the Private War brand with a twisting plot full of intricate human
drama. The game will contain between 8 and ten missions, lots of cut scenes and
be priced to move. Closed beta of the product begins Jan. 20.
The whole
story also discusses the addition of new features to Private Wars including
a radiosity solution to the indoor renderer, and says to expect screenshots
soon.
Bungie's bTV archives page
has been updated and now features the download links for their day three coverage
from the San Francisco MacWorld Expo. Day three featured the first of their
two-part Halo preview, as well as "Bungie Culture 101," an ATI interview,
and lots more. The download is available as both small (32 MB) and large (211
MB) Quicktime movies.
The Matrox Graphics Latest Drivers
page has a new beta version 5.50.005 Matrox Driver for Windows 95/98 for
Millennium G400-series cards. Figures that just when a couple of driver releases
are combined in a nice efficient post, that a straggler would pop up ![=]](/miscimages/smiley4.gif) . This
driver requires DX7 and it fixes the corruption issue some users were
experiencing with 3DWinbench 2000 and 3DMark 2000.
Anatomy of a Video Game
on loonygames is a new article over in loony's nest by Raven's Jake Simpson,
that starts out stating it is "NOT about games design, neither is it a
forum to discuss what's good and what's not in video game design," but
rather is about how a video game is implemented that draws mostly on Jake's
PC experience, specifically with the Quake engines. Also now available on
loonygames for your perusal is Pixel Obscura's
look at the Quake III Arena cinematics, Birth of a Gamer
has a newbie's impressions of Unreal Tournament, and an
article by the loonster himself questioning the viability of using DTS in games.
There is an interview on Die Hard Trilogy 2 up on GA-Source, which has developers n-Space talking about their upcoming hybrid third-person action adventure. The game has you playing as John "yippie-ki-yay!" McClane in third-person action, driving and shooting modes, and the article has a lot more info on how the various aspects of the game work out, including the new story mode that provides adventure elements. Both the game and a demo are nearly finished.
GameSpot has posted four short movies of Picassio, the sneaky action game in development by Promethean Designs that puts you into the shoes of an art thief. The movie clips, ranging from 25 to 45 seconds in length, appear to be from the Dreamcast version, but naturally the gameplay depicted there won't differ all that much from the PC version.
Computer Games Online has posted a brief preview of Hitman: Codename 47, the third-person action game of contracts and assassinations, in development by Danish company IO Interactive. The article comes with two new screenshots and looks at the gameplay in this "thinker-shooter," which will also include a first-person sniping mode.
A new version 405B patch for Unreal Tournament has been released by Epic. The Unreal Technology
page has a complete list of what's new, as does our
local copy of the patch (4.5 MB), which, of course, includes a list of
mirrors. In addition to bug fixes and new features, the patch also provides what
are described as performance improvements, including: "Improved bit packing
for network packets (server performance improvement)." Here's the word on compatibility
from Alan Willard's
.plan: The new UT patch (405b) was released today,
pick it up at your favorite UT website. It is COMPLETELY network compatible with
previous versions of UT, so never fear, if you don't download it and your
favorite server does (or vice versa) you will still be able to connect and play!
This S3 drivers page has
posted a supplemental Diamond Viper II driver for use with Unreal Tournament only.
This is a MeTaL driver and allows for the use of S3TC texture compression in
Unreal Tournament. According to their press release, "this custom software
performs at over 60 frames-per-second with remarkable photo-realistic
imagery."
There are three new
Daikatana screenshots on GameFan showing off the N64 version of ION Storm's
upcoming era-spanning Quake II engine shooter. Also, there are photos of the
recent Daikatana Deathmatch dealie up at ION's office on DaikatanaNews.com.
A little feedback from the messageboards made me decide to try and be less
tedious about server status reports in this space... see the little blurb below
for what's up... I'll start hitting the crack pipe to inspire something
completely unrelated to server woes for Out of the Blue tomorrow, but in the
meanwhile, I'm running a little late, so best to get on with the show. Oh,
yeah... happy birthday Ant, the human
Link of the Day machine.
Link of the Day: Hotel California - The Show
"Watch in Horror and Amazement as a man sings Hotel California with a
French accent, accompanied by a Mime!" Thanks Andy Harrelson.
Story of the Day: PC World News Have You Surfed a Ford Lately
reporting "Voice-activated Internet access will arrive in some 2001
Lincolns." Thanks WarPig[doh].
Server Status: Some tweaks seemed to make things better, another tweak
should be in by tomorrow, and I'm hopeful things are performing better for most
users (they certainly are for me). Feel free to offer feedback is you feel this
is not the case for you.
The unofficial Quake III Arena FAQ by SilverStream has been updated, sporting yet more information and help on id's game of deathmatch extravaganza. And on a related note, Activision has opened their technical support page for Quake III Arena for Macintosh, addressing various problems one might experience with this recently released version of the game (hit the Go button for the initial list of solutions).
Game-Forge has posted an
interview with Headfirst Productions designer Andrew Brazier, talking to
him about their upcoming game Call of Cthulhu - Dark Corners of the Earth, which
Andrew says they're striving to make, "the scariest game ever." He
also says that the game will be played from a first person perspective with
a full co-op mode available, and they may opt to release the level editor along
with the game.
Bungie.org has posted an interview with Matt Soell, "Hot Air Artist" for Bungie Software, conducted during last week's MacWorld event. The talk addresses a couple of Oni and Halo questions, including the state of network support in those games, as well as an assortment of other topics.
Online commerce site CheckOut.com (funny, didn't think they'd have time to
do anything but make ads) has posted a
brief Q&A with Brandon Smith, Cavedog's communication manager regarding
their recent cancellation of Amen: The Awakening. Brandon says the game was
"50 to 60 percent complete" when they stopped development on it.
A new version of Quake 3 Control is now available on its relocated site. Quake 3 Control is a remote admin tool for Quake-series servers, and the new 1.0.31 beta release includes the first implementation of QuakeWorld support (carrying the "still experimental!" warning), as well as ban list support and a couple of other options.
AVault has posted a
news update with word that contrary to reports floating around late last
week, ASC Games has not closed their doors. They are, however, restructuring,
and have "downsized several departments" according to CEO Steve Grossman,
but they plan to continue development of their Unreal-engine title Werewolf:
The Apocalypse with the same producers.
Machinima.com has posted an interview with Jeff Mills, production lead on Nocturne, the spooky adventure game by Terminal Reality. Done by the cinematic buffs at Machinima, the interview concentrates on the filmic feel of that game, discussing cut-scenes, set design, and the possibilities of creating movies using the game engine. It also includes this bit on the Blair Witch Project game currently in development at Terminal Reality:
Machinima.com: It has been mentioned that
Terminal Reality will be producing a Blair Witch
game. The cinematic technique and style was very
important to the success of the Blair Witch Project-
in what ways will the style of the film translate
over to the computer game?
Jeff: The Nocturne engine is a fixed-camera
engine. Unlike the shoulder-mounted cameras of
BWP, our game will have the same look and
cinematic feel of Nocturne while telling another
story from within the Blair Witch mythology. Our
game is not based on the missing filmmakers.
Four new screenshots from Tread Marks have been posted at its
official site. These new shots show off the combat racing mode, as well
as some of the starting post sculptures.
Raven's Brian Raffel updated his
.plan with word that the Soldier of Fortune demo is currently in QA testing
and should be available soon, as well as the news that they are going to begin
working on a Playstation 2 title in the near future. Here's the scoop: Well,
The SOF Demo is looking VERY good and should pass through QA by the end of this
week. We will keep you posted as to when you will be able to down load the demo
and from what site. The Demo will include one single player level and two multiplayer
levels.
I am also proud to announce that Raven Software will be doing a Playstation
2 title, which will be announce in the near future. We are very excited about
venturing into the console market, particularly on the PX2. We finally got all
of our development systems and they are awesome.
Human Head Studios' Chris Rhinehart sent along an email to follow-up on the bit
posted earlier ( story)
referring to puzzles in RUNE, their upcoming Unreal-engine Viking game. In spite
of my having fun with the puzzle concept in calling it "Slash, Slash, Find a Key, Slash,"
Chris points out that there will actually be no keys at all in RUNE: Just
wanted to e-mail to mention that we have no puzzles in RUNE that I consider
lame. That's one of the big philosophies behind Human Head... everything about
the game should be geared towards the gamer. Meaning, any puzzles that are
"lame" or frustrating or just plain stupid shouldn't make it into the
game. Making game isn't about how devious the level designer can be (and how
many different ways that the designer can instantly smash, pulverize or totally
confuse the player)... it's about making a challenging and rewarding experience
that's fun as hell.
And, there are NO KEYS in RUNE. In fact, we have one scenario where Ragnar finds
a locked door and says to himself "Hmmm, I must have to find a key..."
Then says "Awww...forget it" and kicks the door off of its hinges. :)
There is, however, plenty of that slash slash slashin'...
t-break has posted details
on how to enable true 3D environmental audio in Quake III Arena on SBLive!
based cards. Q3A uses A3D 2.0, but by downloading the A2D files from Aureal
(which were created to allow A3D audio to play via DirectSound 3D on non-A3D
cards) you can get full EAX output. Directions as well as a direct download
link can be found on t-break.
In the largest such pairing of an Internet company with a media giant, AOL,
the world's largest ISP (with over 20 million subscribers) has merged with Time
Warner ( here's
the story on ZDNet). The deal seems to be motivated by Time Warner's extensive
broadband system (and AOL's recently announced WebTV style AOL TV service) but
remember that Time Warner also owns some of the most famous media names in the
world, including CNN, Time Magazine, DC Comics, and the entire Loony Toons library,
and that they recently canned their failed Internet portal Pathfinder. The new
company will be named AOL Time Warner, which is certainly the silliest renaming
since Excite@Home.
The official Messiah site has a new screenshot of Shiny's third-person action game, which is currently receiving its final shine and polish for a release (hopefully) in the near future.
DoomWorld has word of a new launcher for ZDoom and ZDoomGL, called BloodSplash. This graphical launcher allows you to "start single- and multiplayer games, load WADs, DEH/BEX files, set skill, level, game and EXE (zdoom.exe, zdoomgl.exe)", and even edit bot settings and multiplayer DMFLags.
Don't talk back! You've got questions? They've got answers in the form of new or
updated FAQs, guides, and walkthroughs (and lots of 'em):
The StarLancer Weekly Screenshots
page on GameRush has been updated, but instead of the usual single shot, the
new posts include a pair of in-game screenshots, two pieces of concept art, and
four shots taken from the cinematic sequences in this upcoming space sim from
Microsoft, Digital Anvil, Warthog, and Jerry Mathers as the Beaver.
Phoebus sends word of a pair of posts by Human Head's Mike Werckle on the RuneNews Forums
that emphasize that while RUNE, their upcoming third-person Viking game is primarily very
action-oriented, the game will still contain what are referred to by one poster
as "lame puzzles," though Mike prefers to characterize them as
challenges, saying they "will be very straightforward, part of the
progression of the story, and hopefully add to the experience."
Computer Games Online's
Command and Conquer: Firestorm preview is online with some of their
face-to-face impressions from checking out this upcoming official expansion to
Tiberian Sun that will offer new single player missions and multiplayer options.
- This Daily
Telegraph article describes a four-year Australian government-sponsored
report on the effects of computer games that found "There is little
reason to believe that the activity itself should be a cause for concern and
little evidence that it is a major source of anxiety within the
community." Thanks jackel...
- The new online issue of GA-RPG's RPG Mythology with BioWare Corp.
is by Designer David Gaider who talks about creating personalities for
characters in RPGs when he writes their dialogue...
- X-Maps 2.0 for LMCTF is a new
21 map pack for this still-popular Quake II CTF variant...
- There's an Amen
petition looking to prompt a release of the portions of Amen: The
Awakening that are done so that someone can finish this now-cancelled
shooter...
- Graphtallica Free Textures for Game Designers and Artists
has a new texture pack with 25 textures used in Freeform projects such as
FvF:Redemption and G-Sector that may be freely used with your project...
Ugh, the server is all boxed up again, it looks like the messageboards might be
the culprit--It really looked like we were getting things shaped up, but this
weekend was a nightmare trying to get any scripts to run, and I can only imagine
it will be worse when full-blown weekday traffic shows up. furn just tried
something he hopes will help, but if it doesn't (it's kind of hard to tell in
the wee hours of Sunday night/Monday morning) I will be working on
this until it's solved, and I promise
to work something out ASAP if humanly possible, even if it's some sort of short-term emergency
measure--certainly disabling the messageboards is a logical option at this point
since the bogged down scripts often make posting to them impossible anyway. I am at the end of my
rope with all this, and I can only hope that none of you
are as frustrated as I am at this point, but I completely understand if you are.
Link of the Day: The Archive of Misheard Lyrics.
Thanks MrsBlue.
Story of the Day: Oh Barney! Nude image in sing-along book prompts publisher apology.
"I love you. You love me. And I love pornography..." Thanks nevermelt.
Bonus Story: UK Police floored by wrestling 999.
Thanks Jon "Pilgrim" Taylor.
|
Twitter 
