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Archived News:
Kalypso Media announces plans for Galactic Civilizations II: Endless Universe,
a standalone third expansion for the strategy sequel due this August that will
include the previous two expansions. So just how endless is the universe? "Space
is big - really big - you just won't believe how vastly, hugely mind-bogglingly
big it is. You may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but
that's just peanuts to space." Here's the announcement: The battle for
galactic supremacy continues in Endless Universe; the new stand-alone add-on for
the acclaimed strategy game Galactic Civilizations II, to be published by
Kalypso Media at the end of August 2008. A stand-alone version, it requires no
additional purchase and also includes the two previously released add-ons: Dark
Avatar and Twilight Of the Arnor.
Galactic Civilizations II is the best selling strategy game in the United
States, has received several awards, and spent a number of weeks in the U.S. Top
Ten Game Charts. Endless Universe builds on the epic story, following on from
Dark Avatar and Twilight of Arnor.
Thanks to Dark Avatar the different races now have multiple characteristics
which adds variety and fun during the game. Now, the races range from
“super-diplomatist” to “super-destroyer”. Also, Dark Avatar provides the planets
with environmental conditions. Thus, the player needs to decide whether he wants
to invest into research and development or leave the planet to a hostile player.
Furthermore, Dark Avatar presents new scenes, new challenges, asteroids which
can be used as mines, new races, and a new version of the spy system.
Further differences in characteristics between the races are provided by
Twilight of the Arnor. Here, the player can experience new features, starting
with individual developments to race-specific weapons, skills and buildings. In
addition, there are sensational improvements to the planets, many new star
ships, a much bigger galaxy, and a new soundtrack! On top of that, “Twilight of
the Arnor” includes editors for the planets, scenario, and technological
development.
The Savage 2: A Tortured Soul
Website has brief word announcing an update will occur over the next couple
of weeks with engine enhancements for the action/strategy sequel: "We're going
to be implementing a bunch of already written engine features and optimizations
in the next couple weeks that should improve your Savage 2 experience."
The introductory movie from Neverwinter Nights 2: Mysteries of Westgate
is now available, offering the opening scenes from Ossian Studios' upcoming
mysterious adventure pack for the D&D RPG sequel. The clip is about half still
shots before segueing to motion pictures (talkies, no less). The clip is posted
on AtomicGamer,
FileFront, and Gamer's
Hell.
Ignition Entertainment announces they
are the latest licensee of Epic's Unreal engine, and while this technology
powers countless current and future games, Ignition (led by Jeremy Stieglitz,
formerly of Artificial Studios) is claiming their Unreal-powered shooter, due
late next year, will be "groundbreaking." Here's word: Gainesville, FL,
July 7, 2008 – Ignition Entertainment, Ltd. (www.ignitionent.com),
a UTV enterprise, today announced that the company entered into an agreement
with Epic Games to license Unreal Engine 3 for its upcoming, groundbreaking FPS,
currently under development at its Florida studio.
“Epic’s Unreal Engine 3 is an extremely versatile engine,” said Jeremy
Stieglitz, Game Director and Lead Designer, Ignition Florida. “So when deciding
on technology for Ignition Florida's first next-generation video game, there was
no questioning that Unreal Engine 3 is the way to go.”
“Ignition Florida is pushing Unreal Engine 3 in a very exciting direction,
especially in terms of environmental capabilities,” said Mark Rein, Vice
President, Epic Games. “These guys have the chops to create some remarkable
games, and we have complete faith in their technical and creative abilities.”
Ignition Florida is developing an original IP for release in late 2009 and is
confident of bringing something fresh and exciting to one of the industry’s core
genres.
The
Future of Infinity Ward on IAMfourzerotwo is a blog entry from a few days
back penned by Robert Bowling, Director of Communications and Community Manager
at Infinity Ward (thanks Ant and
Kotaku).
The post mentions Infinity Ward's ambitions to create a new intellectual
property in the future besides Call of Duty, one which they would
control: We’re excited to announce that in the recent months we have
decided to reup on our contract with Activision publishing. The recently
renegotiated deal may not seem like much of an impact from the outside
perspective, but it has laid the ground work and kick started our future
project, as well as the possibility of a unique new IP by Infinity Ward, that
we’ll have complete control over. We’re excited to be working on our next
project, but it’s going to be quite a while before I can share any details on
exactly what that project is.
The XFX Challenge Website has
the first installment in a series of XFX sponsored webisodes chronicling the
efforts a group of game players as they pursue their goal of breaking into the
world of pro gaming. Hosted by Allgames/Pseudo/G4 vet Scott Rubin, the series
hopes to combine the most interesting elements of reality television, watching
other people play games, and *really* long bus trips (or something to that
effect).
The Max
Schaefer Interview on Eurogamer talks with the Flagship cofounder in a
conversation that mostly centers around Mythos, their upcoming MMORPG. Towards
the end of the article a question about lessons learned from Hellgate: London
prompts a confession that they bit off more than they could chew with the
action/RPG: Oh yeah! [laughs]. If we made a mistake with Hellgate, it was
trying to do too many things for too many people. We wanted a cutting edge
graphics engine, we wanted multiple business models with subscriptions and free
play, and single-player, we wanted to combine third-person play with
first-person play, we wanted to do random 3D levels, and when you're starting
with a brand new game studio with very limited budget and no existing
technologies, that was probably biting off too much. We ended up rushing it to
market and not keeping it in the oven long enough, just out of necessity.
We learned from that, and going forward as a studio, it's a new emphasis of ours
to do things that are more efficient and better-planned, and smaller teams on
smaller projects so we can get more ideas out there. With Mythos we're
definitely taking our time, we're well within our budget and our means to make
it. It's a little bit of a turning point for us - don't try to do everything for
everybody. Just be more realistic about your design goals. Bring it back to nine
tenths instead of ten tenths and things will go much sooner.
Shock and
Awe Tactics on GamesIndustry.biz is an interview with 2K's Christopher Kline
conducted at the Paris GDC. A portion highlighted
in this story reflects Kline's commenting he does not feel the current
game market can support the middle-ground between high-budget games and
lower-cost budget titles that is often the purview of independent
developers: "I think what we realised, which really started that
transition back at Irrational, we were doing games that I'd say were mid-budget
- maybe USD 3-4 million - that there was no real market left.
"You'd have to do something like what EA is doing and go into the casual market,
or you've got to go for a really big blockbuster - just because of the
economics, especially for the small independent developers, you're really
squeezed out of the middle.
I think you can probably still get contracts for that kind of work, but there's
not a lot of hope there for developers being able to survive - just not enough
money to develop new IP and keep staff going.
The
Eschalon: Book II Q&A on RPGWatch
chats with Thomas Riegsecker about the continuation of the old-school RPG
gameplay of Eschalon. Topics include new features, where the story picks
up, cause-and-effect, changes to the skill system, and more.
This press release announces that MySims is making the casual
transition from the Nintendo Wii and DS to the PC in October: The
Sims(TM), an Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) Label, today announced the first
details for MySims(TM), made for the PC, coming to stores in October, 2008.
MySims first launched on the Wii(TM) and Nintendo DS(TM) in Fall, 2007 and has
been a worldwide hit embraced by players everywhere. Now the game makes its way
to the PC with new online features and new characters.
In MySims you can create original characters, build a town, grow a community and
discover a world of your own. Start by personalizing the appearance of your
MySims from head to toe and go on to unlock cool new items as you befriend and
build relationships with your neighbors. Make your creations unique when you
design your own homes, shops, restaurants and more in this fun, open-ended game.
All that you need is a little creativity and some help from the locals!
Now on the PC with new online features and characters! Have fun with friends
safely in a shared online game space and discover surprises and wonders in your
newly created town with the MySims you love and a new cast of characters! Now in
MySims, made for the PC, you can find all the fun of the first game plus new
online features and all-new characters to spark your creativity. Safely chat,
interact and play games like Tag and Hide-and-Seek with your online buddies.
Construct buildings and create objects to use cooperatively with up to seven
friends that are online with you. Like trading cards, share your creations with
your friends in-game, as well as outside the game via email or instant message
so that others can enjoy them in their own MySims town. The choice to play
online is yours, so you can decide to play as a single-player or expand your
experience by playing with friends in an online neighborhood.
"MySims, made for the PC, opens up the world of MySims for you to explore, play
and share with up to seven other friends that are online with you," said Rod
Humble, Head of Studio for The Sims Label. "For the first time, you can express
the creativity of MySims with others in a collaborative way, as you create and
live in a shared town with your friends online. With MySims, made for the PC,
it's a whole new world of interaction with personalized creations, buildings and
towns to share, along with furniture and other tailored creations that you and
your friends can trade. Players who enjoyed MySims on the Wii and Nintendo DS
will view this as a great way to connect with friends in an online PC game and
those new to MySims will find this a fresh and exciting game."
A new Dragon Age Teaser Website is
online, though there's not much to see at the moment (thanks Gamer's Hell). Currently
the site offers a link to the
Dragon Age General
Discussion Forums to foster conversation about BioWare's upcoming RPG, and
an intriguing graphic that says simply, "More July 9, 2008," so mark your
calendar for Wednesday, and prepare yourself for "more."
The X-Plane Website now offers a
new version 9.20 beta 3 of X-Plane, the PC, Linux, and Macintosh flights
simulator. This should appeal to those interest in authenticity, as word is
"X-Plane 9.20 is one of the more FAA-Certified-feature-packed releases we have
ever done."
A new version 1.1.5 of the Snowreal
modification for the PC and PS3 editions of Unreal Tournament III is now
available (thanks Gamer's Hell). Word on the new version is "comes with one new map and
a little fix for the server browser. The new map, SR-EasyRide, is mainly for
Snowreal beginners who want to get a little more used to the controls before
breaking their neck on one of the other maps."
Ah, poo, I read the calendar wrong, and thought I had a consecutive integer posting dealie going here. Guess I should have started with something simple like the ABCs...
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