Archived News:
An interview with Relic's Alex
Garden is up at PC.IGN this evening, talking with him about their rather
unique strategy game Sigma. Alex talks about how they are trying to make the
game accessible for mass audiences (while still appealing to hardcore fans),
the challenges involved in creating an open-ended game, the different structures
players will be able to create, Sigma's resource management system and more.
Also new on PC.IGN tonight is a
preview of Shadowbane, the upcoming massively multiplayer RPG from Wolfpack
Studios. The preview appears to be hands-off and doesn't feature any new screenshots,
but it does provide a general look at the overall gameplay and major selling
points of the game.
- PlanetSide
The official PlanetSide site has been updated with the first of a series E3 screenshots on the occasion of this week's trade show, today's shot offering another indoor scene in Verant's massively multiplayer FPS (thanks PlanetSide Networks).
- Republic
eUniverseGames has posted a new Republic: the Revolution screenshot, showing off the 3D strategy game under construction at Elixir Studios.
- Sierra's Triple Dose
Like every Monday, today brings new screenshots of the week for Sierra's upcoming games Arcanum, Empire Earth, and Throne of Darkness.
- Operation Flashpoint
Some three dozen new Operation Flashpoint screenshots captured from a press demo of Bohemia's upcoming 3D tactical action game are online at French site Simactu.
- Mafia
At the Gathering of Developers E3 site a new Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven page is online for Illusion Softworks' upcoming third-person action game, although as usual devoid of any new screenshots.
Fan page Havocide.com has conducted an
interview with Dan Cermak, the executive producer at Westwood on their upcoming
FPS Command & Conquer Renegade. Dan talks about what will separate Renegade
from the other FPS titles coming out this year, its ideal hardware configuration,
the different hit zones enemies can be shot in and more, and he also says that
the game is currently in alpha testing, and he expects it to move to beta in
June.
After a false start yesterday, there is now a new BioWare feature on GameSpot Live offering their video coverage of a visit to the BioWare offices, with interviews, an office tour, a look at past games, upcoming games, and more, all available for your choice of Windows Media Player or RealPlayer, or via their preferred web interface, should you meet its particular system requirements. Included are interviews on Neverwinter Nights and BioWare's Star Wars RPG, as well as some new footage from Neverwinter Nights.
GameSpot has updated this evening with a
preview of Age of Mythology, Ensemble Studios' follow-up to the Age of Empires
titles. The author was able to see the game in motion at Ensemble Studios, and
the preview contains a detailed look at the game's 3D engine, the powerful spells
you can summon (yes, spells), how it differs from the Age of Empires games and
lots more. Illustrating the preview are six new in-game screenshots and three
concept art images. Here's an excerpt that describes how the 3D engine is used for subtle effects: Because of the 3D graphics, the gameworld is incredibly detailed. When standing in the snow, units expel frosty breath. When standing idle, they rub their arms and shiver in the cold. Units in the hot desert wipe their brows. As farmers walk through cornfields, they push past the corn stalks, which wave back and forth as they walk through. When buildings are destroyed, their columns topple inward, and roofs collapse. When storms cause lightning to hit buildings or land, fires will spring up exactly where the lightning bolt hit. The detail even extends to representing each unit's upgrades onscreen. When you research upgraded iron shields, your units actually sport shining iron shields. When they get better swords, you see them wielding the same swords you just researched. Because the programmers can attach objects in real time to units, you'll see each upgrade appear on the units. Visually, you'll always be able to tell just how advanced your opponent's troops are--and vice versa.
Apparently the canceled Counter-Strike product Rogue Software was working on
( story) hasn't been canceled, but rather taken on internally
at Valve Software, because next month's issue of Computer Gaming World features
a look at Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, a standalone follow-up to Half-Life:
Counter-Strike. Here's the description we were sent along with
the cover image: July issue of Computer Gaming World to feature exclusive
first look at Counter-Strike: Condition Zero -- a full, stand-alone Counter-Strike
game from the creators of Half-Life. Counter-Strike, the tactical-sim lite that's
popped a cap in the gaming world's ass, is getting ready for its next big stand-alone
update. We're talking new weapons, a new player class, new skins and sixteen
new maps for you and your terrorist (or counter-terrorist) pals to enjoy round
after round of fast-paced run-and-gun action. Formerly in development by Rogue
Entertainment, development has been taken in house (not, we repeat, NOT canceled)
by the masters themselves, Valve Software. All we have to say is: go, go, go!
PopTop and TalonSoft have released a new patch for Tropico, bringing their dictatorial management strategy game to version 1.02. According to the included changes history, this 729 KB patch adds programmable hot keys, fixes some crash bugs, and applies a few gameplay changes, as well as adding support for the map editor, which is available as a small separate download.
GameSpot follows up on today's news that Conquest: Frontier Wars will be published by Ubi Soft ( story) with a quick Q&A with Eric Peterson, CEO at Fever Pitch Studios where this space-based RTS, originally created at Digital Anvil, will be completed. Eric provides an overview of recent changes and improvements to the game, and reiterates their plans for the future, which include a playable demo and the Vyrium expansion pack.
An update on the official Star Wars Galaxies site brings a new Team Comments entry by lead systems designer Anthony Castoro. Lengthier than most of these updates, Anthony talks about his work on Verant's upcoming massively multiplayer role-playing game, the challenges in giving it a Star Wars feel, the design input from LucasArts, and their interaction with the fan community.
It was believed that Rogue Software had rebounded from their recent troubles
when they began work on an unannounced project ( story), but Voodoo
Extreme is reporting that they are in trouble again, this time because a
single player Counter-Strike product they were working on has been canceled.
According to their news update, the game was canceled by Valve Software when
Rogue cofounder Jim Molinets left to take a position at Sony. Valve has yet
to comment officially on any of this.
ActionTrip has a
new preview of Shogun: Total War - Warlord Edition online, looking at the
Mongol Invasion add-on it comes with (and will be available separately overseas
and online via EA.com). The preview contains details on what's new in this expansion
as well as a dozen new screenshots.
Although it's not online via the BlueTracker yet, Paul Jaquays updated his
.plan announcing that id Software has released the second map pack for Quake
III: Team Arena. Here's a
local copy (with mirrors), and here's the info on the pack straight from
Paul's .plan: Three months to the day after releasing Team Arena Map Pack
1, we're proud to announce the release of a second map pack for the Quake III
Arena game expansion, Quake III: Team Arena. As before, this id-approved map
pack contains the work of four mappers from the on-line gaming community. This
time, three are conversions of previously released Quake III Arena Capture the
Flag maps (Dynatron by Ned Man, Courtyard Conundrum by Casey of Threewave, and
Smear Campaign by riscchip). The fourth map (PYRmageddon by Yuri Davidoff )is
an original map, created specifically for Quake III: Team Arena. These maps
have been updated to work with the four Team Arena game types: Capture the Flag,
One Flag CTF, Overload, and Harvester.
These maps are an exciting addition to the growing number of maps available
for Quake III: Team Arena and will make a great addition to the map rotation
on any server.
There is a brief Red Faction interview at Computer and Video Games, talking to Volition programmer Jeff Farris about their Geo-Mod powered first-person shooter that is headed to PC and Playstation 2. This latter version has been completed and will be released on May 22, and Jeff talks about the game's features and technology, the multiplayer options, and a few other topics.
Although no concrete details are available, Take
Two has announced today that they are developing Duke Nukem games for Nintendo's
GameBoy Advance and Gamecube systems (thanks Shacknews).
Duke Nukem has been a console mainstay for some time now, with multiple titles
appearing on Playstation and Nintendo 64, although recently these games have
all been third person. The new titles will be published through Take Two's Rockstar
Games label.
AVault has posted the first
details and screenshots from Good Cop Bad Cop, an upcoming 3D action game
from Revolution Software. As its name would suggest, the game gives you the
choice of being either a good or bad cop, and there are five screenshots here
showing off Revolution's internally-developed 3D engine.
A new preview
of Civilization III is up at GameSpot UK today. The preview contains a pretty
detailed look at the game, with quotes provided by Firaxis president Jeff Briggs,
and there is also a new wireframe image of one of the game's 3D models. In addition
to the preview, GameSpot UK has also posted a
brief interview with Jeff Briggs.
The Junkyard has conducted a
Q&A with Jeff Tunnell, the president of GarageGames. Jeff talks about
how the company was founded and their plans for the future, and he says that
they are currently working on releasing the V12 engine (once they have removed
certain TRIBES 2 features) after which they will focus on their e-commerce system
and their internally developed game. Thanks Voodoo
Extreme (by way of Shacknews) for
the tip.
Real.com has launched their new RealArcade service today, and among the available games is Tex Atomic Big Bot Battles, the robotic arena shooter by Monolith. There is a playable demo that takes only 15.7 MB to download (and includes the RealArcade software) that gives you a taste of the full game. Demos of Primal Prey, a dinosaur hunting game, and several others are also available, while the full games can be downloaded at a price.
Fragland.net has posted a
press release from Ubi Soft that contains the news that they have acquired
the rights to Conquest: Frontier Wars and Loose Cannon, two games from Digital
Anvil that were left in limbo when Microsoft acquired the developer. Conquest:
Frontier Wars has been complete for some time, and the PR says that it will
be released in the third quarter of this year, and it also says that Sinister Games (whose near-finished title Soldier has not been published as yet) will be completing Loose Cannon, which will
be pushed back until 2002, and also developed for next-generation
console systems. Also on the same page is a press release from Ubi Soft announcing
an add-on for The Settlers IV.
Subtitled "Game development is an exercise in adaptation and change," PlanetXboxSpy's
Halo Developer Diary is online, written by Bungie level designer Jaime
Griesemer and promised as the first installment in a series of such articles.
The debut diary discusses the changes in game plan for constructing this
upcoming shooter spurred by Bungie's acquisition by Microsoft, and the
interrelated decision to make Halo an Xbox title, which, as the following quote
illustrates, caused a refocus on the Halo single-player experience: The
decision to move to Microsoft and work on the Xbox lead to one more decision, to
focus more on the solo-player campaign than we had previously planned. This
change, however, is simply a pragmatic one. As much as we want to help shape the
newly forming Xbox community, we have to recognize that it is a console
community. Online multi-player may be the future of console gaming, but it is
not the present, so we knew we would have to have an incredible solo-player
campaign to reach the audience on the same level that Marathon did. We're
not abandoning multi-player by any means, we are pushing it farther than anyone
expects us to, but Halo lends itself to epic and dramatic storytelling,
so that is what we intend to provide.
The Freeze Tag page is offering
the release of the source code for the Quake III Arena (and Team Arena) version
of this teamplay modification where you hit your opponents with the big chill
(though it probably won't inspire them to sing Motown tunes).
There's a tutorial on the use of Hint
Brushes on F.P.S. showing how to make use of this aspect of creating and
editing levels for Quake III Arena.
Internet Gaming League beta 1 is
underway, offering clan rankings, though for the beta only one game
(Counter-Strike) is supported, as is only one league, which is based on the US
west coast.
- Don't Bet Your Cybersavings on Video-Game Spinoffs
(New York Times-free subscription required) looks at the prospects for
success for the upcoming Tomb Raider movie and other game spin-offs, pointing
out that only one game-related movie in history (Mortal Kombat) has made a
profit. Thanks Jonathan C. Forster...
Wow, I kind of forgot to note it was Mother's Day yesterday until pretty late in
the day (hopefully you weren't counting on a reminder from me to call mom). In
case you are thinking this is a bad indicator of what kind of son I am, I was
actually in sort of a time warp myself, since my mom was planning on being out
of town yesterday, we went to GrandmaBlue's last Sunday and had a big old
celebration.
Link of the Day: Pixxxel Chix.
Winner of some under 5K website award, offering pixilated pr0n. Thanks jfp51.
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