Archived News:
PC.IGN has posted a second installment
of their ongoing Allegiance designer diary (thanks AllegianceVault).
This week's installment has Lead Designer Rob Girling talking about the gameplay
of their space sim, which is currently in beta testing.
A new preview
of Imperium Galactica II, the sci-fi strategy game, is up at GameSpot. The
preview is fairly detailed, and well illustrated with new screenshots from various
different parts of the game.
New screenshots
from Soldier of Fortune have been posted over at GameSpot news. The seven
new shots focus on the later levels of the game, so they depict a completely
different locale from the demo.
Two Icewind Dale interviews have popped up this evening. First up, is an
interview with Feargus Urquhart on incitegames, complete with two new screenshots
from the game (one of which shows a previously unseen part of the game). Another
Icewind Dale interview
is up on GameFan, where they've interviewed Interplay's producer on the title,
Chris Parker.
Westwood has announced that Command
& Conquer: Firestorm has gone gold, and will hit store shelves on March
9th. Firestorm is an expansion pack for Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun,
that adds 18 new single player missions and 15 new multiplayer maps.
id's John Carmack updated his
.plan in response to the author of the QuakeLives
Quake 1 project's decision not to release his source code (a direct violation
of the GPL license under which the Q1 source was released). Here's what Carmack had to say: This
is a public statement that is also being sent directly to Slade at QuakeLives
regarding http://www.quakelives.com/main/ql.cgi?section=dlagreement&file=qwcl-win32/
I see both sides of this. Your goals are positive, and I understand the issues
and the difficulties that your project has to work under because of the GPL.
I have also seen some GPL zealots acting petty and immature towards you very
early on (while it is within everyone's rights to DEMAND code under the GPL,
it isn't necessarily the best attitude to take), which probably colors some
of your views on the subject.
We discussed several possible legal solutions to the issues.
This isn't one of them.
While I doubt your "give up your rights" click through would hold
up in court, I am positive that you are required to give the source to anyone
that asks for it that got a binary from someone else. This doesn't provide the
obscurity needed for a gaming level of security.
I cut you a lot of slack because I honestly thought you intended to properly
follow through with the requirements of the GPL, and you were just trying to
get something fun out ASAP. It looks like I was wrong.
If you can't stand to work under the GPL, you should release the code to your
last binary and give up your project. I would prefer that you continue your
work, but abide by the GPL. If necessary, I will pay whatever lawyer the Free
Software Foundation reccomends to pursue this.
Microsoft sent word that their Crimson Skies site has officially opened for business. Crimson Skies is a fantasy action flight-sim in development by Zipper Interactive, and the site offers information on the game's story and features, as well as some new screenshots and an already familiar movie trailer.
StrategyPlanet has posted three
new action-packed screenshots from The Rift, a 3D space-themed strategy game
from ThrushWave Technology.
Gamerush has posted a brief preview of Flying Heroes, the upcoming action flyer by Illusion Softworks and Pterodon. Although brief and illustrated with familiar screenshots, the article also includes the intro movie trailer of the game, showing over two minutes of footage in Cinemascope 440x200 format.
The official MDK2 site has been updated with seven new screenshots, again all showing off the doggie character Max in BioWare's third-person action sequel. MDK, as everyone knows, stands for My Deadly Knee-caps.
- A new patch for Need for Speed: High Stakes is out, and available
at 3DFiles, although nobody seems to know what it does (thanks Magnus
"Psycho" Jonasson).
- Version 1.0 of K-Stats,
a LAN party/tournament managing program has been released, complete with full
documentation.
- Q3Comp
Beta 2 is out, adding customizable command listings amongst other changes
to this competition mod for Quake III Arena.
- 3DDownloads has posted a
Quake III Arena remake of the Stomping Grounds map from the Quake II mission
pack The Reckoning. The map was made by Alex Mayberry, the lead level designer
on the Q3A engine game The World is Not Enough.
- The first version of the Q3A deathmatch ranking mod Kings
& A--holes (and they say all the good names are taken) is out there,
with a server set up running it at 208.236.41.194.
Eurogamer.net has posted a
hands-on preview of Evolva, Computer Artworks' hybrid first/third person
action game, complete with gameplay details galore, and 12 new screenshots.
It's a Wednesday, which means it's time for a
new edition of the Blue's News Mail Bag! In this week's edition: bizarre
disclaimers, carpal tunnel advice, some letters on Windows 2000, a driver plea,
Outlaws, and lots more. Head
over and check it out.
German games site nonstuff.de has posted two additional screenshots to their
Sacrifice image gallery.
The shots, like the original ones, are quite impressive looking. Sacrifice is Shiny's
upcoming 3D strategy title, which uses some (but not all) of the Messiah technology.
Gearbox Software's Patrick Dupree updated his
.plan with a clarification regarding yesterday's announcement that the Linux
dedicated server port of Half-Life: Opposing Force was held up while they add
WON.net support. Here's the scoop: One clarification on the WON verification
in the dedicated server. Our game will work the same way that Half-Life works.
A dedicated server doesn't require a WON ID. The support I have to add for WON
is checking to ensure that the people connecting to the dedicated server have
been verified through the WON service. So never fear, you can still play and
run dedicated server at the same time.
GA-Source has posted six
new screenshots from Hired Guns, VR-1's teamplay-based shooter, that's powered
by the Unreal engine.The game uses a multiple viewpoint system, which is well-illustrated
by the screenshots.
A new interview
with Derek Smart, the outspoken Battlecruiser 3000 AD creator is up in The
Mushroom's "legit section" dealing with a wide range of topics, including
his current feelings about Take Two Interactive (the original BC3K publisher),
and the upcoming Battlecruiser Millennium.
Today's Daikatana shot of the day has been posted over at PlanetDaikatana.
Today's image shows the Daikatana sword in its "powered up state"
from episode 1.
GASource has posted six
screenshots and ten character renders from Devil Inside, the upcoming spooky
action/adventure game from the creator of Alone in the Dark (one of the first
such spooky action/adventure games).
Daily Radar continues their Deus Ex week with a preview of ION Storm's upcoming 3D action RPG, covering the story, gameplay and features into some depth. About two dozen screenshots (some of them familiar) show off more of the game's futuristic world, as designed by Warren Spector.
Part 1 of a preview on Terminus is up at Computer Games Online, subtitled Thinking outside the box (didn't Paul Steed copyright that phrase?). Terminus is a role-playing space-combat title in development at Vicarious Visions, and the article has info on the story and gameplay, as well as some new screenshots.
PC.IGN.com has posted a preview of Kingdom Under Fire, a recently surfaced RTS by Korean developers Phantagram that aims to throw a bit of role-playing in with the strategic fray. A slew of screenshots illustrate the 2D looks they chose for the game.
Doing It For The Money With Rick Johnson
is an interview with Raven Programmer Rick "You can call me Ray"
Johnson. The conversation starts with Rick's gaming roots on the C64 and Amiga,
covers his post-college work career (entirely at Raven), and talks about
progress on his current project, Soldier of Fortune.
There's a
Randy Pitchford interview on GameLinks.Net talking with the Gearbox software
director/designer about the success of Half-Life: Opposing Force and discussing
a bit of the future, including plans for their Dreamcast Half-Life game,
Barney's Adventures in Securityland.
This Evolva Preview by 3D Rage
has a bunch of screenshots taken from a beta build of this upcoming shooter from
Computer Artworks. GA-RPG Exclusive Anarchy Online Screenshots
give a pair of looks at Anarchy
Online, an upcoming science-fiction MMORPG "set nearly 30,000 years
into the future." A new Screen Shot of the Week
is up on the official Star Trek Armada
website. This Stars!
Supernova preview on SpieleCity is in German, but there are also a bunch of shots of
this upcoming space turn-based strategy game. New Beasts Details and Screenshots
on GA-Source give looks at this upcoming bigfoot based game (you know what
they say, big feet... big shoes). Finally, even though you can do your own free
preview with the open beta, here's a
GameSpot UK Allegiance Preview with a
four shot screenshot gallery. There's also an Allegiance wallpaper on the Allegiance Vault.
Thresh's FiringSquad's
Shogun: Total War preview offers a set of interview questions with Creative
Assembly on Shogun: Total War. There's a Dark Age of Camelot Interview
on the newly opened Camelot Vault
discussing Dark Age of Camelot,
an upcoming massive online multiplayer dealie where chivalry is encouraged, and
hygiene is not.
Outside
The Garage - 3D Games World, on Machinima.com is the first in a regular
series to find out what the "outside world" thinks of Machinima (game
cinema), talking with Andrew Brazier of Headfirst Productions, Tom Hall and Jake
Hughes of ION Storm, Paul Steed of id Software, and Joshua Vasquez of loonygames.
Also, in Engine
Coding for Machinima - Part 1 Anthony Bailey of the Quake done Quick team
gets under the hood of the Quake source code with some sound tutorials.
A post on GA-Strategy quotes Al
Rivera, producer on 10Six, saying "SegaSoft's million player strategy title
will be released next week, Feb. 28, 2000." 10Six is the strategy game that
will theoretically support up to 1,000,000 players online, breaking the current
online game record by 990-something thousand.
Version 0.9 of Slave Master is now available, the first beta release of this
mutator for Unreal Tournament. In Slave Master fragged players respawn as slaves
to the player that fragged them, and can regain their freedom by collecting
weapons and power-ups for their master (or they can laze around and wait for the
slave-driving old bastard to croak).
The first release of the Quake III Arena Bloodwolf Matchmod is available on the Team Bloodwolf
site. This is described as mainly a mod to setup matches, though it also
offers some client-side enhancements including a new scoreboard and HUD, extra
info from the id function, and a time remaining display. Server-side features
include match setup, countdown, linger state at the end of a match (to allow
time to note scores, etc.), lock and unlock teams, force a player to a team,
make everyone a spectator, a kick command that supports partial names, control
of timelimit, fraglimit, capturelimit, dmflags, gametype, map, etc., deferred
spawning, and more. The manual
has a complete list of features.
ShellShock's Crater has a
new version 00.02.22.00 of the Q3Offline front-end specifically designed for
setting up offline games against bots in Quake III Arena. The new version fixes
problems with the Play & Exit button and with maps/bots not randomizing.
Version 0.09 of the FrikBot for Quake
is now available offering a "client simulator" for classic Quake, a
bot that can play on almost any level or modification with no adjustments
whatsoever.
A new version 1.3 of MapViewerPro
is now available. As its name implies, this is a tool for checking out maps in
Quake, Quake III Arena, or Unreal Tournament (with support for more games to
come). "Simply enter the name of the map like E3M5 or other information and
you get small pictures in the program of the level as well as the name of the
level."
Paul Steed's Thinking Outside the Box
on loonygames offers 3DS Tutorial #1: CyberGuy, demonstrating how to create
a Quake III Arena character model in 3DStudio Max, as well as some reflections
on the consequences of expressing the type of strong opinions he did in his
column last week.
The Crystal Space page has the
second 0.15 beta release of the Crystal Space free 3D engine. Here is the note
on the release: "A LOT has changed compared to 0.14 and also to 0.15r001.
Note that 0.15 is only a beta release. There are no guarantees of anything. It
may not even compile. But I'm confident that it should work on most platforms.
This beta (0.15r002) corresponds to a CVS snapshot of 23 February 2000."
The HEATCIGL, HEAT's Collegiate Internet
Gaming League, has announced a $5,000 all-star tournament in April playing Quake
II, Quake III Arena, and Unreal Tournament. Also, there are interviews with the
participants in the
Razer-CPL Qualifier on Eurogamer.net.
- Word from the Game Developers Conference
is that Bill Gates will be giving the keynote address. In what is not a
coincidence, Gates may take wraps off X-box plans soon
is a Cnet story (thanks Jeff Magill) speculating "Microsoft chairman
Bill Gates may unveil a video-game console system to compete with Sony in
opening remarks at the annual Game Developers Conference in March."...
- Gender Bending
in Games on WomenGamers.Com. "Consulting psychologist Doctor
Kathryn Wright investigates the phenomenon of males who play as female
characters (or who use female models, skins, or avatars) in games."
- There's a
Tower of the Ancient Demo on DemoNews.com offering "a
fast-paced puzzle game, featuring spectacular graphics and sound as you
attempt to avoid the wrath of God." Also, a beta version of a strategy
game called Malos that supports
both Glide and OpenGL is now available...
- This Netscape
FTP directory has Netscape version 4.72 for Windows, Mac, and Unix.
Thanks Ant...
I have been trying to resist the temptation to be an early adopter of Win2K,
because my new work machine has a fresh install of Win98 that is running
like clockwork, as is basically the whole network here at the Blue Tower, a rare
enough situation that I'm hesitant to mess with it. However, since loonyboi is raving about
how well his Win2K experience has worked out, in particular the elimination of the dreaded system resource limitations that Windows users have
been battling since the year 1 A.D. (After DOS), I think I will cobble up a non-mission
critical machine and check it out. It's been long enough since my episode trying
to install NT that resulted in at least 1000 BSODs that I believe most of the
lumps have gone away from banging my head against the wall (and if the wall can
take some more, I don't see why I can't).
Link of the Day: SMOW. Thanks
Phane. "The gift for someone who has (almost) everything."
Story of the Day: IRCer Gets
Laid on IRCNews.com. Thanks Fabien Delpierre. Another milestone after mIRC's
10th registration. I think the illustration in this one has to be the Image of
the Day as well.
.plan of the Day: Brandon
"GreenMarine" Reinhart. Re: "New office rule."
As reflected in Rick
Johnson's .plan update, Raven Software has released the version 0.57 patch
for the Soldier of Fortune demo. Here's a
local copy (with mirrors), and here are the details on the patch from Rick
himself (the full list of changes is so long, I'll spare you all from pasting it here): We've released the patch for the SoF Demo. This patch mainly
represents things we felt were important to fix or adjust in the demo, but only
if we could easily merge it back into the demo codebase (as the main game has
changed considerably). Below represents my crude notes of items we addressed.
Most of these items were QA'd through the low-violence demo release (for the
UK), but as a whole, this has not been QA'd. You can still connect to servers
running the original version, but you may notice view height discrepencies (such
as when you crouch, you're practically eating dirt). This is only a problem
if the server has not been patched.
Epic's Tim Sweeney updated the Unreal
Technology Page with a Q&A of sorts, covering three questions that he's
frequently asked. The questions are all about mod authoring in one way or another,
dealing with ways to get hired in the industry and other related topics, and
there are even some links to Unreal editing resources.
A new interview
with Steve Elwell, Activision's producer on Star Trek: Voyager - Elite Force,
the Raven-developed, Quake III Arena engine game, is up at GameFan, covering
general info about the game and the Star Trek license.
Game-Interviews.com has posted a
Q&A with Ross Ritchie, John Ellerby, and Harvey Randhawa, the marketing
manager, project manager, and lead artist at Promethean Designs on Picassio,
the Playstation 2, Dreamcast and PC first person game of fine art thievery.
Dynamix programmer Nels Bruckner updated his .plan to confirm a rumor that's been floating around lately, in that he'll soon be leaving Dynamix and move on to work for a small local startup. Here's the scoop:
Some of you may have noticed that I've been a
little harder to get in touch with lately and have
been a little less responsive to emails and the like.
That's because I've been trying very hard to wrap up
all the loose ends around here before I move on.
Yep, that's right -- after almost 12 years here at
Dynamix it is (past) time for me to look for a new
set of challenges and see what life is really like
out there. :) I'll be joining a small local
startup... kinda like I did 11 1/2 years ago.
I think Dynamix has some extremely bright and
talented people working for them and a whole slough
of exciting projects (both in progress and soon to be
started). It's hard to leave. In particular, it's
gonna be really weird seeing Tribes 2 for the first
time on the shelves! But, given my personal
situation and my current opportunities, I feel this
is the right move for me now.
Now, how am I going to fit all the "stuff" from my
office into my car? ;)
GameSpot has posted a detailed preview of Might and Magic VIII, looking at the latest 3D installment in the long running role-playing series. While the game will be using the same engine as Might and Magic VII, the article outlines the new story and features, and comes with a bunch of new screenshots.
PC Gameworld has posted six screenshots of The Rift, most of them showing off new scenes from ThrushWave's upcoming space-based real-time strategy game.
There is a new Thief II: the Metal Age preview online at Gamecenter, examining the new features and improvements in this upcoming sequel to Looking Glass' stealthy action game. Most of the screenshots are familiar though.
Redstorm has posted the first U.F.S. Vanguard Sneak Peek page, offering an image and information on the Gladiator class Frigate in their recently announced tactical space combat game ( story). Thanks GA-Source.
The Daikatana screenshot of the day is online at PlanetDaikatana, showing off an episode 2 level by designer Stevie 'Killcreek' Case from ION Storm's hopefully imminent first-person shooter.
A recent story on
Daily Radar quoted an unnamed source at Sega who when asked if the Dreamcast
port of Half-Life would include multiplayer said, "I believe it won't."
After reading this, we got in touch with Gearbox
Software's Randy Pitchford, who made the following statement, which says
that they intend to attempt to include a multiplayer mode: Our goal is to take advantage
of every unique Dreamcast feature - from the advanced graphics capabilities
to the on-board modem - in an effort to make this title amazing. As far as I
know, a first person shooter has never had a robust online multiplayer component
on a console, and we'd obviously like to be the first to pull that off.
It's a Tuesday, so this must be, uhm, an update on the official Summoner site. Of course there is a new screenshot of the week, featuring the High Temple of Urath, and a new entry in the character gallery shows off the Bone Knight in plain 2D or interactive 3D. There is also mention of a couple of developer profiles.
Even more Black & White screenshots can now be viewed at Lionhead's official site. While the rotating images in the center are already familiar ( story), the square of screenshots around them now offer new glimpses of this upcoming strategy/god game.
A new version 1.29 pre-release 3 of DooM Legacy is now available for download. This release will be the last public one before the final 1.29 version, and adds dedicate server support as well as fixing various bugs. Additionally, the source code of DooM Legacy has been made publicly available by way of a CVS repository on the Source Forge.
French developer Gamesquad has opened an official Devil Inside site for their upcoming third-person horror action game. While part of the site is still under construction, there is some information on the game (in French only, so try AltaVista Translations if that's not your "tasse de thé"), and also three screenshot galleries that speak lots of words in any language.
The official Hired Team: Trial site has been updated with a pair of new screenshots, showing off more Environment-Mapped Bump Mapping (EMBM) supported scenes from New Media Generation's upcoming first-person shooter.
The Mac port of Roger Wilco,
the popular real-time voice communication software for multiplayer games has
been released, and is available for download at its
official site (thanks MacGamer's
Ledge). This version is an Alpha build and requires a PowerMac running System
7.1 or higher.
incitegames, has posted five
more screenshots from Black & White, Peter Molyneux' oddball strategy
game that lets you play as god and recruit worshippers.
Gearbox Software's Patrick Dupree updated his
.plan with a status update on the Linux dedicated server version of Half-Life:
Opposing Force (as well as the news that OpFor is currently on sale at several
retailers for less than $30). Here are the details: A while back we talked
about releasing a Linux dedicated server version of Half Life: Opposing Force.
I wanted to post an update on how that's going. We've had the "port"
done for quite a while now and it's been tested and works just great. The only
problem is that, since we're a commercial add-on, we need to put WON net support
into the Linux dedicated server. This is turning out to be a harder to deal
with issue than I originally anticipated. Some changes to the WON libraries
since we released Opposing Force, plus the basic differences between the Windows
and Linux versions have been delaying the Linux dedicated server.
I'm still working on the Linux version when I can and I would like to get it
released ASAP, but unfortunately I have to resolve these WON issues before I
can get any farther.
On the brighter side of things, it looks like Sierra has dropped the price
of Opposing Force. The product description on their web page store has it listed
at $29.95, and the current weekend ad flyer for Best Buy has it listed for $24.99.
AVault
is reporting (by way of Interplay's Philip Holt) that a new version of Freespace
2, titled "Sim of the Year Edition" (no doubt a response to the success
of last year's Half-Life "Game of the Year Edition") will be released
in the near future. This new retail version of the game will include 10 new
user-made missions, some levels from the first Freespace that have been converted
to use the new ships, a new multiplayer mission, user-created campaigns, and
lots more.
ActionTrip.com has posted a
Q&A session with Toby Gard and Paul Douglas, two of the original Tomb
Raider designers, who are now working on Galleon, a swashbuckling third person
action game. There are also two new, high-resolution screenshots up, as well
as a collection of previously released images.
A new interview with
James Thrush, one of the designers at ThrushWave on The Rift, is up at 3dfxGamers. The
Rift is a space-based RTS title like Homeworld, although James describes the
pace of the gameplay as being "much faster" than its competition.
Monolith's Jason Hall updated his
.plan with a clarification regarding his earlier statements about the feud
(or lack thereof) between his company and Epic over their respective
game engines ( story). Here's the scoop: Quick update for clarification -
Some people have read my last .plan and understood that I was trying to say
that I realized that things had gotten out of hand, and that I was apologetic
for my participation in the events, and that going forward I will be more attentive
to matters like this.
Others have read my .plan and feel that I'm trying to be "innocent"
and that I'm acting like I'm "unjustly attacked." This is not so.
To me, the coloring of my character may have been a bit much, but I certainly
see justification for the healthy competition I've received back! All I am saying
that I'm done participating, that there really is nothing left to say, and that
this whole thing has run its course.
That's it!
This week's feature on loonygames is an interview with Terminal Reality, talking to Jeff Smith and Jeff Mills about all things Nocturne and Blair Witch Project (well, at least the things they're currently willing to divulge). Included with the article is a ton of concept art, most of which hasn't appeared online before, and there is a lot of info on their upcoming BWP game, so here is a quote to get you going:
Can you tell me about some of the enhancements you're making to the Nocturne Engine for the Blair Witch?
Mills: Yeah we've taken all the feedback we've gotten from the hundreds of
people, a lot of Nocturne fans on the fan sites have given us good feedback
about what they liked and didn't like about the game. Controls are going to be
a lot friendlier than they were, you'll have those 180-degree turns so you can spin around real
quick and easily. Opening doors, picking up items, climbing ladders, all the action things that
we had a problem with before, are being fixed now, so that in addition to them working better,
just by default we'll also highlight the item to show you what you're targeting. So if you walk up
to a door and there's a light switch beside it, if you turn a little bit to the right, the light switch
will light up. If you turn to the left, the door will light up. So there's never a question as to what's
going to happen when you complete the action. There are no jumping puzzles at all. We left
the ability to jump in even though you're not required to jump at all. I hate jumping puzzles.
JackChaos.com ("The Freak of Geeks") has updated every one of their 45 guides
to Ultima IX: Ascension. The guides cover everything from specific dungeon
walkthroughs to spell locations and all the dirt on different people and towns.
French games site GameData has posted a
massive preview of BioWare's MDK 2. The text is entirely in French (so be
sure to jam a BabelFish in your ear
if you're planning on reading it) but the preview features a huge number of
impressive new screenshots and concept art (including some storyboards from
the game). MDK, as everyone knows, stands for "kibble magnifiques de chien."
ChessMess.com has posted an
UnrealScript Q&A, that features over 30 questions about UnrealScript,
the Unreal engine programming language, compiled from the
UnrealScript mailing list.
GA-RPG has posted a Q&A
with Logic Factory's Todd Templeman, talking about the current status of
Seeker, their first person action title. According to Todd, the game is still set for a Fall release, and they
are testing their "Alpha Arena" version (a multiplayer demo), and that they
expect to do a public beta test of the full game as they near completion.
Computer Games Online has posted a preview of Dogs of War, a 3D real-time strategy game by Silicon Dreams and TalonSoft that is also known as Warmonkeys. A handful of new screenshots illustrate the 3D landscape, the graphical extravanganza, and multitude of units this game aims to provide.
The official Messiah site has been updated with 14 new screenshots of Shiny's imminent third-person action game. Also, an update by David Perry provides insight into just how imminent a release is ("So basically the team can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel..."), as they are stamping out bugs by the dozen.
There is a preview of Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord on Games Domain, examining a recent beta of this upcoming 3D wargame. Set in World War II, this strategy game takes a "simultaneous turn-based" approach, rather than today's more prevalent real-time systems, with the 3D view handled by "camera positions ranging from ground level (zoom 1) to eye in the sky (zoom 7 or 8)." The article also features quotes from Steve Grammont, assisant designer at Big Time Software which is developing the title.
GA-RPG has conducted an interview on Anarchy Online, talking to Funcom's support manager Tor Andre Wigmostad about their upcoming massively multiplayer role-playing game, or MMORPG for short. There are more details about various gameplay aspects, such as the clan system and character interaction, and a full beta of the game is expected to commence later this Spring.
Daily Radar's
Deus Ex Week offers a preview and new screenshots of Deus Ex, ION Storm's
upcoming science fiction RPG. The exclusive screenshots kick off their Deus Ex
Week, which will continue with original character art, development details, and
an interview with Warren Spector and the Deus Ex design team. Thanks Shugashack.
id Software's Robert Duffy updated
his .plan with word of a new version 1.16j Quake III Arena beta release on id's
FTP site. Here are local copies of the
Win32 version (402 KB), the
Linux version (625 KB), and the
Mac version (387 KB), each with a list of mirrors. Here's the
.plan update with the skinny on what's new: New executables for the
point release beta are on the FTP.
-Zombie/Ghost unpure clients no longer remain connected.
-Recursive File System error corrected when running mods with logfile set to 1
-The Auto-download rate is controlled by 'sv_maxRate', specify this value in
bytes per second. The maximum band rate caps out around 25K per second.
There are three
new Devil Inside screenshots 3D-Unlimited showing off action from Devil
Inside, Cyro-Interactive GameSquad's
upcoming horror game that plot-wise sounds a bit like The Blair Witch Project
meets Night Stalker (doesn't someone need to do a Night Stalker movie?),
though visually, the shots (the first one in this group in particular) look very
Matrix.
There's a
Picassio FAQ on Game-Interviews.com discussing Promethean Designs' upcoming
game of art thievery. While it does discuss many aspects of gameplay, the FAQ
reads as much like an interview as a list of frequently asked questions, but is
called the official FAQ for the game, and an actual interview about the game is
promised as a follow-up.
Monolith CEO Jason Hall updated
his .plan with a reluctant response to the most recent reply ( story)
to his most recent interview ( story)
stating that "there is no 'engine war,'" and that he is "just
trying to answer interview questions as best as possible and as a separate task
I'm trying to communicate information on LithTech and what we are doing with
it." The update goes on to discuss how he will attempt to remove "potentially
inflammatory comments" from future updates. Here's a bit: Anyhow,
the conclusion that I draw from this turn of events is that the aggressive
nature of my approach has some people feeling "backed in" to a corner
where their conversation has digressed into a mild character assassination of
me, and I feel that now would be a good time to just step out of this whole
debacle, as I don't have the time or will to defend against this stuff.
So, I apologize to this company for whatever it is/was that I have done to make
them feel the need to proceed in this manner. I certainly did not intend to
create such hostility. I feel that I have always kept the discussion to the
relevant topics, and I feel that I've made valid and provable arguments that
potential licensees can be the judge and jury on.
Everyone can rest assured that I will be spending EXTRA time tying to make sure
that whatever further information we release is carefully screened for any
potentially inflammatory comments. I thought we were already doing this, but
some companies feel that I am specifically focused on them. I'm not.
I will do better in the future to remove any potentially perceived
"slams" from my comments, but some companies have got to understand
that everything that comes out of my mouth is not about them. If they can get
past that, then there should just be smooth sailing from here.
Human Head Studios' Tim Gerritsen updated
his .plan with a lengthy piece that eventually mentions plans to show off
RUNE at this year's E3, as well as plans to offer the Rune technology
enhancements to the Unreal/Unreal Tournament engine "for a fairly
reasonable rate" (the next best thing to a reasonable rate). These
enhancements are detailed on this
webpage, for a price quote, e-mail Tim
or www@humanhead.com.
Electronic
Arts Drops Splinter reports The Adrenaline Vault News, saying
"Electronic Arts has dropped the 3D shooter, Splinter, from its product
slate. Caz Derby, associate producer at Australian-based Stromlo Entertainment
on the project, said the title is still in full development and 'so close to
beta, [they] can smell it.' However, Stromlo is in the process of shopping the
project around for a new publisher." GA-Source's
What Happened with Splinter and EA is a brief Q&A with Stromlo that
discusses this, saying this was the result of "The low sales of the latest Descent episode" and EA having "lowered their priority on all PC products - in particular the
3D flying shooter genre. Unfortunately, that meant Splinter had to go."
The Assimilation 2 website has
the preview edition of Assimilation 2, a teamplay mod for Quake III Arena that
supports up to seven(!) teams, where fragged players are assimilated to the team
that frags them until one team remains. The mod also offers a couple of last man
standing type modes.
The Scissors Quake3Arena site has
the debut release of Push Button Arena, a simple Quake III Arena mod that offers
a button on the roof of a structure in the map that awards 30 frags when pressed
(the button resets once per minute). The mod is actually just a map, there is no
code used beyond what id includes in the original game.
A new version 0.96a of the Q3Log log
parser is now available on the site's newly relocated homepage. There's nothing
new in the update, which is described as bug fixes.
As an aid to skin artists, Painful Detail
has posted the complete set of Grid maps for the male and female Unreal
Tournament Commando models, showing the skins with no textures, just every
polygon mapped in a 2d image. Also, Graphtallica
has released their eighth texture pack, free for use in any project, commercial,
or not.
A story posted for a while yesterday titled Could Microsoft open source code to settle
was old news, already refuted by a report later that day: Microsoft denies Gates made key concession in antitrust case.
Thanks Brendan Reville. Sorry for the confusion.
The Auran BIG Weekend
on aussiegamer.com is a write-up of The Auran Big Weekend
gaming event in Australia from April 29 to May 1. The Razer-CPL
Qualifier Coverage Eurogamer.net is now complete, all 39 pages worth.
The audience here is quite international, so I take pleasure in offering the
occasional irreverent (and sometimes even informative) reference to goings on
here in the US, so I was a bit surprised when it was a couple of
"local" readers who mistakenly tried to correct my reference to Andrew
Johnson yesterday, thinking I meant Andrew Jackson. Here's Yahoo's
Andrew Johnson directory in case there are others unclear on this (President
Johnson's impeachment was quite a fascinating episode in American politics). My favorite
of the corrections came from a student who complained that his college (which
will go unnamed) did not give the holiday off... hopefully there was a mandatory
US History class ![=]](/miscimages/smiley4.gif) .
Link of the Day: Shields UP!
Thanks Hal. This is Steve Gibson's
(the original SpinRite guy, not sCary) Internet Connection Security Analysis
site. I've actually been sent this before, but being paranoid about Internet
security, feared clicking a URL with a .dll in it. But rather than fear it, I recommend
everyone visit this site and see how secure their home machine or network really
is.
Bonus Link: CIA Homepage for Kids.
Thanks North*Pole. Continuing the security theme...this one is apparently for real!
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