There are PlanetSide Core Combat Details on GameSpot filling in some of the blanks on the newly announced Core Combat expansion for PlanetSide. The update says the add-on is due in October, and provides some details about what will be included, as in this excerpt: "Core Combat will add six new caverns to the game, each with its own look and feel. The caverns will be accessible via new warpgates, and these gates will live on Amerish, Hossin, Ceryshen, Oshur, Forseral, and Solsar. The Amerish cavern will feature a river, Hossin will have a somewhat swampish look, Ceryshen will feature slippery and frozen lakes, Oshur will be a maze of canyons, Forseral will have a crystalline area with a large energy beam in the middle, and Solsar's cavern will feature lava and other volcanic features. New alien technology will be introduced, including a new hover buggy called the switchblade, a new support vehicle that creates neutral teleporters known as the router, and a mobile artillery unit called the flail." Likewise, the PlanetSide: Core Combat Website is online with preliminary information and the promise of more to come (including a schedule of when to expect it).

Atari Brings Heroism, Sorcery and...Cows to the PC is the announcement of Once Upon a Knight, the U.S. version of KnightShift, Reality Pump's medieval RTS/RPG hybrid (thanks HomeLAN Fed). The U.S. release date for the game is September. In other previously announced announcement news, Atari Announces "Neverwinter Nights Hordes of the Underdark" (thanks Frans) restates plans for the second NWN expansion, due this November.

There's an Exclusive Call of Duty Gameplay Video on FilePlanet (registration required) from QuakeCon 2003 showing off gameplay in Call of Duty, Infinity Ward's upcoming World War II shooter (thanks Frans). Also, This Sierra FTP Directory (thanks Frans) now offers a bunch of new gameplay movies from The Hobbit in a variety of resolutions and formats. Normally they eventually also link such clips on this downloads page, but I guess they've decided not to make a hobbit of it. Also, a Middle Earth Online trailer is now available from IGN.

Loadedinc's Command & Conquer Generals: Zero Hour Q&A talks with EA producer Harvard Bonin about plans for the upcoming C&C Generals expansion. Also, the NVIDIA Drivers Page now offers a tease that their site will be hosting exclusive downloads of the C&C Generals demo on August 20 (this Wednesday) at Noon PST (which is incorrect, it's actually PDT, or 3:00 p.m. EDT). Thanks Ant and Frans.

Elixir Studios sends along updated Republic: the Revolution release dates, including a U.S. date of August 29, which turns out to be the date for all listed territories except Germany and Spain, which carry a release date of September 5. This means the original U.K. release date of September 5 (story) has been moved up about a week.

3DO games finding new homes on GameSpot describes the outcome of the sale of some of 3DO's assets, reporting: "Street Racing Syndicate was bought by Namco for a little over $1.5 million, the rights to the High Heat baseball series went to Microsoft for an undisclosed sum, and the assets of Might and Magic and Heroes of Might and Magic were sold to Ubi Soft for $1.3 million."

There's a Medal of Honor for Linux beta on icculus.org with a self-described "not-ready-for-primetime" version of the Linux edition of the World War II shooter. The update is being made available in spite of wonky sound and other problems due to the demands (and threats) from the community. Thanks Linuxgaming.

• Half-Life 2
  The Half-Life 2 Q&A on City 17 (thanks Maximus) is a conversation with Valve's Gabe Newell about their upcoming shooter sequel.
• DOOM 3
  Face to face with "Doom" on CNN Money features an article format Q&A with Todd Hollenshead and Tim Willits as well as impressions of the DOOM 3 showing at QuakeCon.
• Vietcong: Fist Alpha
  The Vietcong: Fist Alpha Q&A on the Czech Fansite (thanks Tiscali Games) talks with Michal Janacek and Jarek Kolar of Pterodon about the upcoming Vietcong expansion. The Q&A is accompanied by a couple of screenshots.
• Terminator 3: War Of The Machines
  HomeLAN Fed's Terminator 3: War Of The Machines Q&A chats with Atari producer Aron Drayer about the upcoming multiplayer Terminator 3 game for the PC.
• MoH: Pacific Assault
  The Medal of Honor Pacific Assault Q&A on IGN chats with EA's Brady Bell about the upcoming Pacific Assault add-on for Medal of Honor: Allied Assault.
• Freedom Fighters
  The Freedom Fighters Q&A on Jolt.co.uk talking with IO Interactive's Jeremy Petreman about their upcoming alternate-history third-person shooter. The Q&A is accompanied by some new Xbox screenshots.
• Etherlords II
  The Etherlords II Q&A on Gamer's Hell talks with Nival Interactive's Andrey Yemelyanenko about their upcoming turn-based strategy sequel.
• Horizons
  Horizons Vault's August 2003 Ask Artifact Entertainment is online, with another batch of answers from David Bowman to reader-submitted questions about their upcoming MMORPG.
• Star Net Frontier
  HomeLAN Fed's Star Net Frontier Q&A is a conversation with Vladimir Tarasov of Dart Studio about their upcoming sci-fi themed MMORPG.
• Call to Power
  Apolyton Civilization Site's Call to Power Coverage has a couple of Q&As about the confusing history of the Call to Power project, in preparation for apparent plans to release the source code to the game.
• Primeval: Wrath of Entropy
  There's a Primeval: Wrath of Entropy Q&A on Stratics Central chats with Jerry Van Cleve of Inner Fire Studios to learn about their upcoming MMORPG.
• Sound & Music
  The America's Army Q&A on Music 4 Games talks sound with the audio engineer and sound composer on the America's Army shooter. Also, HomeLAN Fed's Game Music Concert Interview talks with Andy Brick about his participation in the upcoming concert during Germany's Games Convention.
• Misc.
  Gamer's Hell has posted a Singles Q&A and an Arrangement Q&A catching up with development of each of these upcoming projects as well as a Macrospace Company Q&A talking with the "leading provider of wireless gaming solutions to network operators, service providers, portals, handset manufacturers and brand owners." Loadedinc's NadBeetle.Com Q&A discusses development for Microsoft's Smartphone.

Aspyr Media Inc. Ships Activision's Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 For The PC and Macintosh. Here's the thumbnail: "Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 lets players take on the role of legendary skateboarder Tony Hawk and 13 other professional skateboarders as they skate through enormous free roaming levels, choose from 190 progressively harder goals and build their skills to perform 14 of the greatest skateboarding stunts of all time."

• Call of Duty on Gaming Horizon, HomeLAN Fed, and TeleFragged.
• Doom 3 on Gaming Horizon and PlanetQuake3.net.
• Fair Strike on Gamer's Hell.
• Kreed on GameStar.
• Lords of EverQuest on GameSpot.
• Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne on ActionTrip.

In addition to game-specific previews, some more generalized content is springing forth from the gaming fest: There are more Keynote impressions on PlanetQuake3 (along with a video) and in GameSpy's QuakeCon Coverage, where there's also a Tim Willits/Todd Hollenshead Interview and a Rick Johnson Quake IV Interview. Also, Sphinx's Sanitarium (thanks JLF) has general impressions and HomeLAN Fed's QuakeCon 2003 Booth Babe Pics and Case Mod Photos are online.

• Gothic 2: The Night of the Raven on GenGamers.
• Mall Tycoon 2 on Gaming Chart.
• Temple of Elemental Evil on GameBanshee.
• World of Warcraft on the Official Website.

The Big Huge Games Website has info on how to sign up for beta testing of the next patch for Rise of Nations. Here's the full list of planned changes for patch 3.

Infinium Labs Selects Gigex as Exclusive Distribution Partner for Unveiling of the Phantom Game Console. You have been warned. Also, VU Games sends along the following: "To help voice its upcoming space shooter, Battlestar Galactica, Vivendi Universal Games (VU Games) announced today an all-star cast of actor [sic]. The talent signed to lend voices to the highly-anticipated game includes Dirk Benedict and Richard Hatch, who starred as hotshot Viper pilots Starbuck and Apollo in the original television series, as well as Dwight Schultz, known for his roles as 'Howling Mad' Murdock on the A-Team and Lieutenant Barclay on Star Trek: The Next Generation®, and Kristanna Loken, who plays the T-X in the theatrical release, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. The actors will have multiple rolls in the anticipated action title which allows the players to take control of the hottest fighters in the galaxy, and tangle with dozens of swarming Cylon fighters in massive space battles. The game will be available this winter for the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system from Sony Computer Entertainment America and the Xbox™ video game system from Microsoft."

Thanks Mike Martinez.

• Microsoft expects to fend off worm and Microsoft kills Net address to foil worm.
• FBI Looks For Source Of Internet Infection.
• Internet Survives Power Failure (registration required).
• To Each, His Own Sharing a Family PC (registration required).
• Gillette shrugs off RFID-tracking fears.
• Personal beacons take the search out of search and rescue.
• Dan's Data letters #59.

The Chaotic Dreams Website now offers a new version 1.02 patch for the Chaotic Dreams modification for Unreal Tournament 2003.

Battlefield Central now offers downloads of a new map called Eclipse for the Eve of Destruction mod for Battlefield 1942. Thanks Ant.

James Monroe's .plan file has word from the Raven programmer to expect a disruption in Jedi Knight 2 multiplayer play as a DNS switch they've made to the game's master server propagates. The switch may take as little as 24 hours for some, but may take as long as a week in some cases. Either way servers saved to a favorites list should still be accessible throughout the transition.

Official SÖLDNER - Secret Wars FAQ (thanks Frans) has a bunch of new entries.

HomeLAN Fed's Galactic Conquest Q&A talks with PwR about the impressive Galactic conquest modification that brings Star Wars to Battlefield 1942.

• Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic on Game Revolution.
• Disciples II: Servants of the Dark on GameSpy.
• Europa Universalis: Crown of the North on Gamezilla and GameSpy.
• Fire Department on GameGossip.
• Medieval: Total War - Viking Invasion on The Laser.
• RollerCoaster Tycoon 2: Wacky Worlds on Computer and Video Games.
• State of Emergency on GameSpot.

• AspireUSA X-Super Alien Windowed Case on Overclocker Cafe.
• Cooltek 380 Watt PSU (in German) on TecCentral.de.
• Enermax CS-5107 Tower Case on Viper's Lair.
• HeadRoom Home Headphone Amplifier on EXHardware.
• Hercules 3D Prophet 9600 Pro Video Card on OcPrices.
• Kingston HyperX PC4000 512MB Dual-Channel RAM on Intelforums.net on Speedy 3D.
• Leadtek WinFast A350 TDH MyVIVO Video Card on Bjorn3D.com.
• Logitech Cordless Comfort Duo on Guru 3D and MODSYNERGY.
• Palit GeForce FX 5200 Ultra Video Card on SubZeroTech.
• Quiet PC Acousticase on RipNet-UK.
• Samsung 213T 21" LCD Display on GamePC.
• Thermal Paste Comparison on Techware Labs.

• The first Middle Earth Online Newsletter has been posted. Thanks Frans...
• Iraq war game comes under fire. On Kuma: War (story). Thanks Mike Martinez...
• The 21-6 Productions Website now offers downloads of a new version 2.1 demo for Orbz for Windows, Mac, and Linux...

The power returned here late yesterday, followed a few hours later by the resumption of my e-mail. It looks like everything's pretty much back to what passes for normal around here. I think I'm pretty well caught up on the backlog, thanks for any patience you've been able to muster during the blackout.

Play Time:	City Creator. Name That Gunk. Thanks Trey Murff.
Stories of the Day:	Flashlights, pay phones rule in unplugged NYC. One day short of canned food and shotguns. Catch Me If You Can. Calif. Eyes Strong Privacy Policy.
Wild Science:	Nanomaterials Developed For Industry Triple Or Quadruple Life Of Brain Cells. Thanks Jim Chaney. Blame it on the supernova. After Combustion Detonation!
Weird Science:	Redwoods now part of wireless network. Toilet Sensor Aims High (and Dry).
Image of the Day:	Whale flatulence stuns scientists. Thanks Jennerstein.
	Thanks Mike Martinez.