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Archived News:
Grab your jetpack, as the InstantAction
Website is now allowing access to open beta testing of Fallen Empire:
Legions, the online action shooter described as a spiritual successor to
Starsiege TRIBES. Anyone with a free member ship can access the beta (thanks
Voodoo Extreme). Word is: "Legions is bringing speed back to First Person
Shooters. Jet through wide open maps as you battle it out with up to 16 players
- all in your web browser. Weapons like the Chaingun and Laser Rifle help you on
your path of destruction."
Wolverine Studios
announces Music Wars Rebirth, a departure from their chosen field of
sports simulations: Michigan, June 24, 2008. Wolverine Studios, a
developer of simulation games, is proud to announce our first foray outside the
sporting world. Wolverine Studios is excited to announce our newest title: Music
Wars Rebirth.
Music Wars Rebirth is the creation of Antuan Johnson who is happy to be bringing
his music industry simulator to Wolverine Studios. Music Wars Rebirth allows
players to create and manage their own record label by giving them the
opportunity to both manage the financial state of their company as well as
managing aspects of the artists signed to their label. The in-depth game play
allows the user to track all aspects of the career of an artist as they take
them from unknown talent to global superstar while catapulting their label to
the top of the music industry.
Antuan began working on the Music Wars series in 2004 with a series of freeware
releases. His most recent version, Music Wars 3, registered tens of thousands of
downloads among various freeware and shareware sites. Fans of the series have
called the games “addictive” and “brilliant” and Wolverine Studios President
Gary Gorski says “I’m very excited about this new opportunity for both Antuan
and our company. We’ve looked for opportunities to expand outside of our
traditional sports-orientated games and I think this game will be a huge success
for our company.”
More details and discussion about the game will be available from our
web forums
This Frontlines Status Page
offers a roadmap for the PC edition Frontlines: Fuel of War, Kaos
Studios' military shooter. There are tentative details on both a version 1.1.1
patch and a version 1.2.0 patch to follow that, as well as an outline of planned
free downloadable content consisting of several maps, new air vehicles, and a
new anti-aircraft rocket launcher weapon. There is also a corresponding
Xbox 360 Roadmap
detailing plans for the console edition. Thanks The Patches Scrolls.
A
statement from Linux Game Publishing (thanks Ant and
LinuxGames) explains that
"exceptionally high levels of piracy of Linux games" is the reason they are
implementing copy protection going forward. Here's a bit: Over the last 6
years, we have resisted adding any kind of protection system to our games. We
believe that users are happier without them.
Unfortunately, many users have decided to ignore our polite requests to respect
our copyright and have simply placed our games for download. They seem to feel
that they are allowed to do so, or they just don't care. Either way, this kind
of action, and the downloading by many people, lead to a significant loss of
revenue, which in turn directly affects our ability to produce new games (we
arent about growing profits, we are talking about lower revenue directly
affecting which games can be licensed). It is estimated that many more pirated
copies of LGP games exist, than do original copies. We obtained this estimate by
seeding the download sites with a number of broken copies of our games, and
monitored the number of requests for technical support that referenced the known
bug we had inserted.
Adding copy protection will give us benefits as a company. Firstly, it will
allow us to recover some of the lost revenue, by means of additional license
sales, either via online vendors or direct through the copy protection system.
Secondly, it will allow LGP to show a solid revenue protection system that will
increase our credibility as a porting company in the eyes of licensors, allowing
us to attempt to obtain higher profile games.
Atari announces that Alone in the Dark has shipped to stores in North
America for Windows, Xbox 360, Wii, and PlayStation2, and all those
editions of the action/survival game should also now be available in Europe as
well, while the PS3 edition is due in the fall: NEW YORK, June 24, 2008 –
Atari, Inc. (OTC Pink Sheets: ATAR), today announced that the eagerly awaited
action survival game Alone in the Dark for Xbox 360® video game and
entertainment system from Microsoft, Games for Windows®, Wii™ and PlayStation®2
computer entertainment system has launched and is available at retailers across
North America. The PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system version is
currently scheduled for release in autumn 2008.
Developed by Eden Games, Alone in the Dark for Xbox 360 and Games for Windows
marks a blistering return for the legendary franchise with startling innovations
and wide screen cinematic presentation. The game follows paranormal investigator
Edward Carnby over the course of one apocalyptic night in which he must fight to
survive and uncover the earth-shattering secret behind New York’s Central Park.
With an exhilarating mix of challenging gameplay, intense storytelling in the
style of a blockbuster TV series, unprecedented environmental interaction,
realistic fire physics as a core gameplay element, and a DVD chapter select
feature which lets everyone reach the game’s climax, Alone in the Dark is set to
change what players expect from video games.
“We set out to deliver an innovative, high quality game to the hands of players
everywhere,” said David Nadal, Studio Head and Game Director, Eden Games.
“Driven by our studio's passion and the desire to create something genuinely
original, Alone in the Dark is a game that will change how you play, and reward
you with an entertainment experience you won’t forget.”
The Wii and PlayStation 2 system versions of Alone in the Dark were developed by
Hydravision Entertainment in parallel with versions created by Eden Games for
Xbox 360 and Games for Windows. The PlayStation 2 system game pushes the
hardware to maximize the gameplay experience, while the Wii game has been
specially adapted to make use of the unique controllers which perfectly suit the
immersive gameplay that ranges from driving to real-time manipulation of
objects.
Featuring a gripping story, design inspired by contemporary TV action dramas,
and original gameplay based on real world rules physics, the action survival
opus Alone in the Dark is in stores now across North America for Xbox 360, Games
for Windows, Wii and PlayStation 2 system, with the PLAYSTATION 3 system version
following later in 2008. For more information on Alone in the Dark visit
www.CentralDark.com/us.
GameStop has a new listing for a Spore Galactic Edition, a version of
the Spore package designed to appeal to all residents of the Milky Way (thanks
xXBatmanXx). This special edition of the evolution simulation includes a "Making
of" DVD, a National Geographic "'The Human Toolkit" DVD, The Art of Spore (a
hardcover "mini-book") a Spore poster, and a "premium" 100-page Galactic
Handbook. The listing projects a September 7, 2008 release, which coincides with
the latest official Spore release date ( story).
New demos are now available to allow the sampling of Stronghold Crusader
Extreme, the new extreme-ified edition of the medieval strategy game. The
demo comes in several languages, the English edition is found on
AtomicGamer,
ComputerGames.ro,
FileFront, FileShack,
Gamer's Hell,
PixelRage, and
Strategy Informer. There are also German, French, Spanish, and Italian
editions of the demo, these are located on
FileShack and
Gamer's Hell.
The image on the Blizzard
Entertainment Splash Page is updated, continuing to raise expectations that
an announcement is forthcoming from this weekend's Worldwide Invitational event.
The image has been enhanced, revealing another rune, and in-depth speculation
about what this all means can be found on
DiabloII.Net.
There's a Q&A with Matt Hooper on Next Generation (thanks
Computer
and Video Games) talking about Rage, Tech5, and other areas of
interest about id Software. One point seems particularly interesting given one
of the cornerstones of id's past successes has been support of user-generated
content. While acknowledging this has an appeal, Matt indicates that support for
such content is not a high priority for them in Rage: What are your
thoughts on user-created content?
As a game player, I love it. But that doesn’t mean at the same time I can’t love
a BioShock or a Call of Duty 4. You can have a focused game, and do that really
well. I think that’s the important thing – doing something really well. What the
other games mentioned do as far as user created content, and just on that side
of things, it’s like a different focus. I think there can be a separation,
almost like movie genres. It’s okay to make a comedy, or a really hardcore,
serious documentary. I think there are different fits.
For us personally, our biggest goal is – you can see it right now – we’re
pushing on the fidelity, visually. We’re also pushing on the gameplay fidelity.
Those two things are huge. For us, we’re doing things that we’ve never done
before. That’s already a lot of eggs in the basket. As far as user-generated
content, it’s not a huge consideration for us right now.
id games have always had mods, but what Spore and LittleBigPlanet have done
is make it automatic, and networked. You can get other people’s creatures,
without doing anything at all. Have you ever thought about automatically
connected maps and a user ranking system for maps in Rage?
Yeah, we thought about all of that, but I can’t say we’ve specifically
implemented it right now. Again, we’re concentrating more on just making a great
game with this new tech. But those conversations happen all the time.
EA Turns War Into Casual Fun on Next Generation is a Q&A with DICE designer
Ben Cousins, who confirms that there are no fewer than five Battlefield
games in the works: "We've got five [Battlefield] titles in development,
which is more than you'd expect," Cousins revealed, noting that the Battlefield
Heroes project began after DICE visited Seoul, South Korea-based Neowiz in the
summer of 2006, a firm in which EA purchased a 19 percent stake.
"We're actually developing a battlefield game with Neowiz for the Korean market
and separate from Heroes," he said.
The Video Game
Voters Network has info for gamers here in New York on how to attempt to
influence the State Senate away from establishing a state commission to study
the effects of "violent" video games on children and establishing legal
guidelines for rating labels, saying such regulation is "entirely unnecessary
and unconstitutional." Update: Thanks to Will for the warning that you
should not do this if you do not want to be automatically become a VGVN member.
This press release has the startling results of a survey on gaming habits
conducted by market research outfit GameStrata. They surveyed North American
gamers, learning that the average expenditure on games and hardware is $765 per
year, which adds up to whopping $30,500 from ages 18-48, which they describe as
the group's "peak gaming years." They also provide a little analysis of
preferences, saying: A strong correlation between the frequency of
digital purchases and Xbox 360 ownership suggests that the Xbox 360 is the
preferred console for the consumption of digital content. Additionally, online
multiplayer capabilities are more important than ever, with the vast majority of
respondents claiming they prefer to spend most of their time gaming with others
on Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network (PSN).
There's
an Alone in the Dark Q&A on Gaming Nexus where Charles Husemann discusses
the just-released revival of the seminal survival/horror franchise. Whether by
timing or design the article does not address the controversy surrounding early
reviews of the game ( story), the topics they do cover include the
Central Park setting, the confusion over whether this would be an episodic game,
non-linear progression, and more.
The 3D Realms Website has put out the
call for job applicants. They are seeking level designers and also mention they
are looking for a programmer interested in game play programming, or with 360
experience." 3D Realms is located in Garland, TX. Also,
Kylotonn Entertainment has a
help wanted, saying "We are recruiting R&D senior programmers for 'Play All'
Project (Architecture, Engine, 3d, Gameplay...)." Kylotonn's location is the
city of lights, Paris France. Thanks Gamer's Hell.
When we moved here nearly eight years ago, we got on the waiting list for
sidewalk replacement, as our village has a program to pay half the cost of a new
walk, which we require. Long after we thought this was all forgotten we finally
got the notice that they are gearing up to do this, so I'm guessing within
another eight years or so we'll have a new sidewalk.
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