A new beta version 3.0 beta of the
Natural Selection modification for Half-Life is now available. The new
version features
Steam support, 10
new maps, new weapons, and more, along with a new Natural Selection Combat
gameplay mode. In addition to a new client, downloads of the new accompanying
dedicated server are also available.
A post to the
BeyondUnreal Forums (thanks
HomeLAN Fed) has word
from Epic's Tim Sweeney on where they've been focusing their efforts for the
next iteration of their Unreal engine. Here's a bit:
We already have
polygon count where it needs to be. We're going to be focusing on per-pixel
rendering and getting the quality of each pixel on screen as high as possible.
So there's a bunch of different technologies there: dynamic shadowing
technology, stencil buffer and shadow z-buffers. But the whole idea is that
every object in the scene should cast realistic shadows with respect to every
light source in the scene, and every pixel you see should illuminate properly
that way. Of course that's easy to say and there are some solutions for that,
like stencil buffering. But to do that properly you really want fuzzy shadows
everywhere because most light and most environments are quite diffused and if
you look around you very seldom see a really sharp shadow edge somewhere. So a
huge amount of effort and processing power goes into implementing fuzzy shadows
effectively in real-time. That's been a significant part of our R&D right
there.
The Ksoftware Website
now offers downloads of a new version 1.79 build 065 of Kquery alpha 4, the
latest version of this server browsing program. The new version fixes RTCW/ET
colored names, adds RTCW ET team information and Natural Selection 3.0 support,
along with some bug fixes.
BF42 offers downloads of a new trailer showing off the Forgotten Hope
modification for Battlefield 1942 (thanks
Ant).
There's a memorial "conference" today that's being held in memory of my late
mother. Though it's a conference to discuss educational theories and practices
in remembrance of her life's work, it will also have some straightforward
memorial aspects, so MrsBlue, my bro WalterEgo, and myself are going to attend
along with all the teachers and principals and such. It should be an interesting
combination of perspectives, and I guess we'll just try not to be too mystified
about all the educational stuff and then try not to be too misty-eyed when it
comes to all the commemorative stuff.
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