Archived News:
RPG Vault has posted the cinematic intro movie of Evil Islands, illustrating the 3D role-playing strategy game by Nival that is already available in Europe but will be available in the US later this Spring. The 48.6 MB trailer runs for nearly a minute and a half in appropriately wide-screen Bink format.
GameSpot has posted a video of Fighting Legends, taped at last weeks Game Developer Conference. The 75 MB movie runs for a bit over eight minutes in MPEG format and has Maximum Charisma's Steve Escalante demonstrating their upcoming massively multiplayer role-playing strategy game in detail, sporting lots of gameplay footage captured from a monitor.
RealGamers UK sends word that a playable demo of Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising is now available from their site, offering you the chance to try out this 3D action/strategy game by Rage Software. The demo clocks in at a hefty 111.3 MB and offers three levels from the full game, including a tutorial. Beware that the download server appears to have limited capacity though. Additionally, Rage itself has posted an updated English patch to bring the retail game to version 1.02. Update: a US-based mirror of the demo is available at 3D Gamers.
As promised, the official Gothic site has now posted the second German demo of this third-person action RPG by Piranha Bytes. This massive 249.3 MB demo is available for download from Gamesmania.de and includes a part of the "Oberwelt" (Upperworld) from the full game. If you prefer the somewhat more reasonably sized (89.5 MB) original demo, that is still available at 4Players.de ( story).
Daily Telefrag has posted an interview on Spells of Gold, an isometric fantasy role-playing game by Russian developers Jonquil Software. Lead designer Vilur Shakirov explains the game's premise, character development, the magic and combat systems, and the proverbial more. The first three screenshots with the article are new as well.
There is a new Tropico diary at Computer Games Online, covering progress on the management strategy game in which you can be a dictator over your own Caribbean island (thanks Stomped). The diary appears to have been penned a few months ago, as PopTop's Phil Steinmeyer describes his experiences with creating alpha demos for their publisher and a journalist.
GameSpot Previews Resurrection: The Return of the Black Dragon looking ahead to this third-person action adventure by Spanish developers Nebula Entertainment. The preview describes the game's premise, the three main characters, and the kind of gameplay you can expect, and is illustrated with a dozen new screenshots.
RPGDot has conducted an in-depth interview on Redmoon, the Korean isometric MMORPG that's coming to the US courtesy of JoyCity Entertainment. Kevin Hannah is at hand to talk about the game's backstory, its popularity in Korea, how they're dealing with player killing, the ongoing beta test, and lots more.
In anticipation of the imminent release of TRIBES 2, Loki Games has released the dedicated Linux server for download from their ftp server (6.4 MB). This dedicated server is only needed for server admins that have not already installed the Linux client (as it's included in the latter), and requires the Windows CD to be present during installation. Further details are available in the README file. And in related news, LinuxTribes reports that voice communication in the Linux client will be added in a future patch.
XGR will be conducting another audio interview tonight, and this time Ed Del Castillo will be in the hotseat talking about the 3D real-time strategy game under construction at Liquid Entertainment. The chat kicks off at 9:00 PM EST and will require WinAmp to tune in to.
- Startopia
GameSpyDaily has posted some twenty new Startopia screenshots captured from a recent build of the 3D space station management game in the works at Mucky Foot.
- Commandos 2
A square nine new Commandos 2 screenshots are online at GA-Source, showing more areas from the squad-based tactical combat game by Pyro Studios.
- Bridge Commander
Fansite The Bridge has posted a new pair of Star Trek: Bridge Commander screenshots illustrating the capitol ship space combat sim currently docking at Totally Games.
- Lord of Destruction
As is their way, Blizzard has released another new screenshot of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, offering a new scene in their upcoming isometric RPG expansion.
Sierra Studios has released a small patch for Half-Life: Opposing Force that updates the version of Opposing Force CTF found on the retail Half-Life: Counter-Strike CD to version 1.1.0.6, bringing it in sync with the other editions of Gearbox' mission pack ( story).
Look out, here come more game releases: Electronic
Arts has announced that Black & White has shipped to retailers, and according
to the local Software Etc. here, stores should be getting it tomorrow or
Thursday. Also, THQ has announced
that they have shipped the PC version of Evil Dead: Hail to the King (which
is a little odd, since they never announced it was gold) and Strategy
First has announced that Waterloo: Napoleon's Last Battle is now available.
No announcement has come down the pipe regarding TRIBES 2, but it is also expected
in stores by Thursday.
Version 2.52 of the venerable server browser GameSpy
3D is now available. This new version adds support for Serious Sam (retail) and restores
support for LAN Master in addition
to other changes. It is available for both shareware and registered users.
Beta builds of Tropico are still making the rounds, as evidenced by this morning's
new preview of the game
over at Mindless Games. Like the others in recent memory, it's hands-on
and features the author's impressions, and although there aren't any new screenshots
here, 13
new shots from the game can be found over at Gamer's Pulse for those that
need a screenshot fix. Finally, a
new Tropico developer's diary is online over at GameSpy.com, which takes
a look at the art creation process.
Interplay has released a patch for Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel, updating the squad-based tactical combat game by Micro Forte. The patch clocks in at a hefty 75.8 MB and "Implements 'spr-sprites_0.bos' file, in cases where certain users have reported missing images in their inventory." The patch is not needed if you successfully installed the full game and do not experience the aforementioned problem.
Stomped's
World War II Online Interview talks with Rodney "Hatch" Hodge of Cornered
Rat Software about their upcoming ambitious massively multiplayer title. Rodney
talks about what vehicles are available ("all of them"), how players
will communicated with each other, how characters advance in rank and more.
As promised, Croteam has released the SDK sources v1.00a for Serious Sam, their just-released fast 'n furious shooter. The 3.7 MB download contains everything mod programmers need to get started: "the header files and libs to link with the engine and game, complete sources of Entities.dll and Game.dll, debug version of game/tools useful for debugging your mods more easier, and autogenerated headers for model files." Update: mirrors are online at 3D Gamers and FilePlanet.
Italian gaming site Nextgame.it has conducted an
interview with Shiny's Dave Perry. The interview doesn't deal with any particular
game, but rather talks about the industry in general, and Dave comments on the
future of gaming on cell phones, how he feels broadband is still several years
off and more. It's available in both English
and the site's native
Italian.
Real.com Games has posted a video preview of Tex Atomic's Big Bot Battles, offering some impressions of what this robotic arena shooter by Monolith is about. The video runs for nearly two minutes in (what else?) RealPlayer format and sports a series of stills with a voice-over by the illustrious Tex Atomic (complete with Texas drawl) explaining the game's premise and features.
An update to the official Earth and Beyond site brings new information on Westwood's upcoming massively multiplayer space epic. There is a new diary by community manager Maria Hamilton, more info on the three races in the game, and the FAQ has also been updated with a few more Q&As.
A new version 2.0 of Heretic II Siege is now available, updating this class-based teamplay mod for Raven's venerable third-person action game. This release offers two new maps, new weapons, spells and class abilities, as well as other improvements and fixes. Thanks HereticII.com.
There is a new gameplay movie of Shadowbane on the official site, showing off the upcoming 3D fantasy MMORPG by Wolfpack Studios. This Lizardman Battle clip runs for 16 seconds in QuickTime format and features a combat sequence in "the Swamps of Irydni."
A new movie showing off Emperor: Battle for Dune is now available at
Westwood's official Emperor site (thanks Dune2k.com).
The movie is in the self-running Bink format, and has Westwood president Louis
Castle introducing the game, its 3D engine and various aspects of the gameplay,
including how they have tried to keep the interface familiar for Command &
Conquer fans. It's all illustrated with lots of in-game and cinematic footage, totalling some seven and a half minutes.
A new preview
of Startopia is online over at Daily Radar today. The preview is brief,
but it contains some gameplay details and new screenshots which were taken from
their playable build of the game.
Also new on Daily Radar this morning is a
preview of Tropico, the upcoming dictator-sim from PopTop Software. Like
the Startopia preview it's based on their impressions of a full build of the
game, and contains gameplay details along with new screenshots.
The game isn't quite out yet (any day now) but that hasn't stopped PC.IGN,
who have posted a tips and tricks
guide for Black & White. This isn't an in-depth guide to the game, but
rather it consists of some general tips for beginners.
GameSpot UK has posted a
Q&A with Anoop Shekar of Volition, talking with him about their upcoming
FPS Red Faction. It's very short, but nonetheless Anoop comments on their internally-developed
engine, the importance of the storyline and their decision to include playable
vehicles.
About.com Interactive Fiction has posted a
new preview of Myst 3: Exile, which chances are you're either looking forward
to or want to destroy completely (there really isn't much middle ground for
this series). The preview consists of an overview of the game, as well as an
interview with Susan Weyer of Presto Studios.
The third article
by composer Andrea G. Pessino on creating music for games is online over
at Sibelious (thanks Warcraft III.net).
Andrea is the author of the score for Blizzard's upcoming Warcraft III, and
he talks about creating this music and even provides three excerpts from the
game's soundtrack in MP3 format. In case you missed them, both Part
1 and Part
2 are also online.
A pair of Project IGI guides are online this morning: GameSpot UK has posted
their full
guide to the game, and the
walkthrough by "Kenny" at GameFAQs has been completed. Also new
at GameFAQs is a
mini-FAQ for Croteam's just-released Serious Sam.
Quake III: Revolution, Bullfrog's port of Quake III Arena to the Playstation
2 has hit the streets, and so the first batch of reviews are popping online.
Daily Radar
has reviewed the game, giving it their "hit" status, although
they criticize it for its lack of mouse and keyboard support, while PS2.IGN
has posted an article that compares
its to the other versions of the game, although they appear to be less than
enthusiastic about it. Iomega, who obviously feel a little slighted as the planned
Dreamcast ZIP drive was never released, have
announced their plans to release one for the Playstation 2...hopefully they'll
have better luck this time. Rumors
surfaced late last week that Microsoft was going to be pushing the Xbox
launch back to early 2002, but at the Game Developers Conference, Xbox
Technology Director Seamus Blackley debunked that and also mentioned that
they plan on having 12 - 20 games at launch this fall. In other Xbox news, Microsoft
has changed the Xbox hardware yet again, this time increasing the size of
the internal hard drive from 8 to 10 GB, and they have also announced that they
will be broadcasting Bill Gates' keynote address from the Tokyo Game Show on
their website this Thursday at 8:00 PM PST.
Stomped continues their series of guides to Quake III Arena levels with their
guide to Q3DM6. Like the previous one it's by Johnathan "fatal1ty" Wendel,
who specifically provides tips for playing the map in the QIL teamplay competition.
Birds Bot Manager,
a bot-building API for Half-Life has been released. It's is still in beta form,
but it allows for the easy management and creation of bots for the game, and
the mod and its complete source code are available for download at
its official site, along with plenty of documentation. Also, the source
code from the Hellfire Arena mod
for Quake III Arena is now available, as are all the files needed to create
levels for the Annihilation
Q3A mod. In upcoming mod news, The
Backburner has posted new shots from the Red Justice, X-Mod, Judgement and
Mutually Assured Destruction mods on their news page, and they have also conducted
a Q&A
with one of the X-Mod developers.
Blue is off with the family, hence this morning's unusual update from yours
truly. Thanks to everyone that e-mailed me regarding my victory over my father
in our annual Oscar bet. I've got a great track record, as I've only lost once,
and last year we tied...besides that, I've won six or seven times. For those
that don't quite understand my obsession with the Academy Awards, think of it
this way: I don't watch football, I watch movies, so the Oscars are my bizarre
version of the Super Bowl. And yes, I've already started eying movies for next
year's awards...it's a shame HBO didn't release Wit theatrically first (even
for just a token screening), as I don't expect to see too many movies
better than that this year. If you get HBO, you owe it to yourself to watch
it.
Story of the Day: Saudi
Arabia Bans Pokemon (CNN.com). Thanks Phane.
Bonus Story: Pranks
Show Lighter Side of Mir (The Moscow Times.com). Thanks John Simms.
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