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Archived News:
CDV
Releases Cossacks Free is the press release announcing that this
Cossacks downloads page features the "Cossacks: Enemy of the Crown
Campaign," a free campaign for use with the English version of Cossacks:
The Art of War. Here's the description of the 13 MB download: "The campaign
is different from the Euro/Arabic Campaigns that came with the Cossacks titles -
particularly with a view to graphical scenery, using Winter-snow and Spring-mud
based maps." In a related note, The Wargamer
(thanks AVault)
has word that the North American version of the Back to War Cossacks add-on on
"is delayed until no later than 2003." citing "marketing
reasons."
The G.I. Combat Downloads Page
now offers downloads of the promised demo of G.I. Combat, the World War II RTS
game from Freedom Games that just went gold ( story). There is no
indication of exactly what the 94 MB demo contains.
RPG Vault's City of Heroes Design Journal #9
is online, in which "Lead Designer Rick Dakan discusses the pros and cons of character
classes plus Cryptic's solution." He discusses the roots of how computer
games handle character classes in pen-and-paper RPGs, more flexible methods that
have been pioneered in the table-top realm, flexibility and other benefits for
moving away from strict use of classes, the limitations of classes and level
limitations, good reasons for retaining a class system, why a classless system
is desirable for their upcoming superhero MMORPG, how their emphasis on
super-powers creates "individual character classes," and more.
The Platoon Preview on
PC.IGN.Com offers a look at Digital Reality's upcoming game based on the Vietnam
War movie of the same name. They describe the game's use of the tradition RTS perspective,
the resource-free tactical style of gameplay, the inclusion of characters from
the movie, the 3D environments, the role of foliage for defense, the enemy,
units, and more.
- The Sims Online
HomeLan Fed's The Sims Online
Q&A chats with Maxis' Chris Trottier about the
upcoming MMO installment in the best-selling Sims series. They discuss the idea
behind this project, customizing your character, starting resources,
professions, in-game communication, response to criticisms that this will
not actually constitute a game, how testing is progressing, avoiding launch
difficulties, that they are still on track for a 2002 launch, and more.
- Civilization
III: Play The World
HomeLAN
Fed's Jeff Morris Q&A chats with the Firaxis designer about Play The World, the upcoming Civilization
III multiplayer expansion. Topics include difficulties presented by
implementing multiplayer support in a single-player game, multiplayer modes,
the "turnless" mode, support for the creation of custom MP
scenarios, NGEs, and more.
- Extinction
The Extinction
Q&A on Worthplaying talks with Jim Omer from Rival Interactive about
Extinction, their upcoming "Real Time Strategy Game of Adventure and
Survival" set in prehistoric times. Topics include the game engine, how
far along in development they are, plans for a demo, system requirements,
resources, the story, tribes, units, and more.
JoWood’s Europa 1400 – The Guild Puts Your Life Skills to the Test
is a press release announcing Europa 1400 – The Guild, the
"life-simulation game," is due in North America on October 30. Here's
a bit on the game from the release, which also describes how players can seek
public office, pursue their love life, and more, all set in Europe during the
middle ages: " Europa 1400 – The Guild opens with players deciding
which of the 12 varied careers they wish to pursue. The rate at which their
career develops and the amount of attention they give their career is then
entirely the choice of the player. Some players may look to hire a manager to
handle their business affairs, allowing them to concentrate on other aspects of
their life. Others may want to take greater control and run all aspects of their
business themselves."
A new version of Cube is now available, a "Landscape-style
engine that pretends to be an indoor first person shooter engine. Combines very
high precision dynamic occlusion culling with a form of geometric mipmapping on
the whole world for dynamic LOD for configurable fps & graphic detail on
most machines. Uses OpenGL & SDL."
Some minor follow-ups on yesterday's ramble about roadkill prevention. Several
folks recommend those deer whistle dealies that sit in your grill and apparently
frighten them out of your path. I figure this comes under the heading of
couldn't hurt, but I do wonder if they actually work... is there real science
behind those, or is this just snake oil? Also, just for the record (and to
satisfy theAntiELVIS' question), in none of the incidents I described was I even
remotely speeding. I take the possibility of hitting something very seriously,
and am pretty darn careful where that potential exists. I daresay that if
excessive speed were involved in any of the cases I described, I imagine a
couple of accidents would have ensued... in the case of the driver cutting me
off, it would almost certainly have been a collision, it was way too close as it
was (and no, I never got any indication that the other driver, who was on the
far side of their car from my point of view, was even aware of what almost
happened).
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