Archived News:
MTV Multiplayer has news from an in-game advertising conference where
several new titles were revealed, including word that the sixth Call of Duty
game will be Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which is said to be due in
Fall 2009, though no other details are revealed. They also learned that
Project Gotham Racing developer Bizarre Creations is at work on a
racing-themed James Bond game, but the only other details they have are that
it's due in September, and is not tied to any specific movie. Other games
unveiled at the event are Guitar Hero 5 and a new Tony Hawk game, and it sounds
like a skateboard controller or something is planned for the latter: "You’re not
going to be playing this game with a controller in your hands."
The Adventure Company announces A Vampyre Story for Windows has shipped
in North America: "This hilarious adventure is the brainchild of adventure
gaming veteran, Bill Tiller, known for the adventure classics The Curse of
Monkey Island, The Dig and Indiana Jones. It’s got a cast of more than 20
characters each with their own entertaining personality and more than 30
hand-drawn locations in a richly-detailed world. “Adventure gamers should agree
that it’s been worth the wait for A Vampyre Story, all the elements are in place
to make it a classic,” said Byron Gaum, Product Manager at The Adventure
Company. 'Gorgeous graphics, vast environments to explore and a hilarious
sidekick will keep you entertained for hours!'"
NCsoft announces that Issue 13, "Power and Responsibility," is live for
City of Heroes, their superhero
MMORPG, and the
Issue 13- Power & Responsibility Release Notes outline all the changes. It
had been announced that the Mac beta test would begin when issue 13
launched, and while this has not yet happened, word is: "Macintosh players
won’t be left out as open beta testing for the new Mac version of City of Heroes
is just around the corner." We've not yet received a response to our question
about whether this means the Mac edition won't be on sale for the holidays as
planned. Meanwhile,
City of
Heroes Issue 13 interview Gaming Nexus is an interview with Matt “Positron”
Miller about the game.
Steam News has word that
the Windows edition of Shaun White Snowboarding is now available via
digital distribution for your downloading and downhill pleasure. Be sure to wear
gloves instead of mittens so you can flip off anyone who calls you Carrot Top.
New patches for Hotel Giant 2 are now available, updating Enlight's
tycoon sequel to version 1.1, which means the game is presumably now available.
An English patch is posted on
AtomicGamer,
FileFront, and Gamer's
Hell, and a German patch is found on
AtomicGamer,
FileFront, and Gamer's
Hell. There is also an English-language UK demo for the game, this is
available from
AtomicGamer and
FileFront.
Inside
Game Piracy, Part 1- Crushing Discs, Pushing Education on Gamasutra talks
with Christian Svensson of the PC Gaming Alliance for an update on how
this trade group plans to tackle one of its missions of curtailing game piracy,
which for now sound like they are planning to convene a subcommittee to discuss
planning this. They also hear from Ric Hirsch of the Entertainment Software
Association, a more action-oriented group who are currently operating in
seven countries to find and destroy counterfeit and pirated games. There is also
a discussion of digital distribution of pirated materials, and the complications
of trying to address this, and this part one concludes discussing the influence
education may have on piracy. Tomorrow's part two will focus on
"counter-measures, copy protection schemes, and new solutions for piracy-related
issues."
Analysis-
Valve's Lifetime Retail Sales For Half-Life, Counter-Strike Franchises on
Gamasutra may come up a little short in analyzing Valve's sales data, in part
because the significant amount of digital distribution they've done is not part
of the data on sales that have been released. It doesn't take much analysis to
say they've sold a lot of copies, though, as word is that they've sold 9.3
million copies of Half-Life, 6.5 million copies of Half-Life 2,
and all told Valve has sold well over 36 million copies of their games at retail
over the last decade.
A new Codename Panzers: Cold War trailer sets the scene for Stormregion's
upcoming armored combat RTS sequel by depicting the dawn of the Cold War in the
aftermath of World War II, offering the tagline: "history creates heroes." The
game was announced with a 2007 release date, but a couple of
delays later, the trailer concludes promising the game in February 2009. The
download is available from
AtomicGamer,
FileFront, Gamer's Hell,
and
MyGameTrailers.
A second Demigod trailer offers a further look at this action/RPG/RTS
hybrid in the works at Gas Powered Games and Stardock. The clip highlighting
many of the game's gargantuan creatures can be found on
AtomicGamer and
MyGameTrailers.
A new gameplay trailer from The Lord of the Rings: Conquest shows off
more than a Tolkien glimpse of the conquest in Pandemic's upcoming LotR-inspired
action game. The clip has music but no voices, but the titles are in French,
concluding with a confirmation of the game's release date, saying
"La bataille commence en Janvier 2009," which you do not have to be Inspector
Clouseau to translate. The clip is posted on
ActionTrip,
Strategy Informer, and
MyGameTrailers.
A new Heroes Over Europe trailer offers a look at the high-flying action
in the upcoming sequel to the World War II aerial combat of Heroes of the
Pacific. The clip is posted on
AtomicGamer,
FileFront, Gamer's Hell,
and
MyGameTrailers. There is also a new Heroes Over Europe
preview on IGN and
another on
GameSpot.
- The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena on
GameSpot.
- Codename: Panzers -- Cold War on
IGN.
- Demigod on
GameSpot.
- Dragon Age: Origins on
GamesRadar.
- Supreme Ruler 2020: Global Crisis on
FileFront.
Thanks Mike Martinez and Ant.
'Games Are The Convergence Of Everything' on Forbes.com is an interview with
Ken Levine of 2K Boston about his chosen career as a video game developer.
Topics include his current focus on cooperative multiplayer,
the influence of casual gamers, next generation consoles (literally, as opposed
to calling the current consoles by that name), digital distribution, and an
interesting outlook on PC gaming in answer to a question about the industry's
biggest mistake: "I'm a real believer in industrial Darwinism. It's hard for an
industry to make a mistake because the market tends to be self-correcting...but
I wish the industry could find a way to make PC gaming more broadly successful.
There are so many challenges for PC gaming--the complications from systems
specifications to the drivers--most people look at PC games and say, 'What are
you talking about?' It's a shame because as a gamer, I am never more comfortable
than I am sitting with a mouse and keyboard two inches away from my monitor."
Microsoft now offers downloads of a standalone client for Games for Windows
LIVE, a next step in the arguably slow progress in creating a more feature-rich
service. What's new in the new version 2.0 of GFWL is the integration of the
Games for Windows - LIVE Marketplace, but there is no progress on the social
features such as instant messaging that dominate competing products. Thanks Mike Martinez
and 1UP.
A perfect pitch
on GamesIndustry.biz tosses a few softballs at hardball pitcher Curt
Schilling and 38 Studios CEO Brett Close, who discusses Copernicus, the
MMORPG in the works at Schilling's 38 Studios. Actually, the softball pun is
misplaced, as they ask a pointed question about the wisdom of entering the
competitive MMOG market (Schilling: "Yeah because I'm stupid"), and also talk
about the talent 38 Studios has assembled, expanding the game's reach beyond the
PC, the reasons for purchasing the Azeroth Advisor, and more.
GamesIndusty.biz quotes David Gardner, CEO of Atari, on the topic of used game sales,
saying: "Obviously, it has economically been extremely painful for the
industry... the publishers don't benefit," though this is preceded by the
acknowledgement that "Second hand game sales represent consumer choice and
desire" (he doesn't mention if sales of other products that don't belong to "the
industry" are painful too). The article focuses on how Atari is looking to take
advantage of a more "network centric" gaming environment to add value going
forward, though for at least the next year they will continue to focus on sales
of boxed product. They also quote Atari president Phil Harrison, who seems blasé, saying, "The games that have the embedded community, the embedded
commerce, the extended, expandable experiences, are the one's that you would
never want to trade, the one's you want to keep hold of. And that's perfectly in
line with our future strategy so we're not that concerned about it."
A post from a few days ago on Garry’s Blog
noticed by
Big Download mentions the second anniversary of Garry's Mod going on
sale via Steam, offering the commercial version of this mod that allows a
great deal of freedom in using Valve's Source engine to create machinima movies
and to play with game assets in a sandbox environment. The post thanks Valve,
the members of Team Garry, and other contributors for helping make this project
so successful, and reveals just how successful it has been, as over 300,000
copies have been purchased over those two years, which the math guys at
Shacknews point out
adds up to more than $3 million in revenue, based on the mod's $9.99 price-tag.
Thanks Mike Martinez.
A new trailer from The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena
shows off action and the creepily accurate digital depiction of Vin Diesel in
the upcoming shooter sequel and remake combo. The clip is available on
ActionTrip,
AtomicGamer,
FileFront, and Gamer's
Hell.
User-friendly retro game vendor
GOG.com announces a sale on their Good Old Games, which is a tough trick for
a marketplace where prices top out at under $10.00. They are now offering a free
$5.99 game with the purchase of any two $9.99 games. This promotion runs through
December 8, and covers every game in their catalog. On that topic, that catalog
has just gotten a little larger, as they announce the addition of
Disciples 2 Gold
and Jagged Alliance 2
to their collection of DRM-free games.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act is the legislation governing Digital Rights
Management (DRM) and copyright issues here in the US, and every three years
proposed exemptions to the law are accepted, with the latest deadline for such
submissions passing yesterday. In the past, exemptions have been granted to
allow the legal unlocking of region-locked cell phones and the circumvention of
malware-infected DRM like Sony's infamous rootkit.
CNET now has an
article about one of this year's most interesting such requests, as well as
another article on all 19 proposed new exemptions. The request singled out
is by a legal team at Harvard University (including the CNET article's author),
as the famed Ivy League institution pitches for the right to research existing
DRM servers to allow continued access to legally obtained content should those
servers break down or be abandoned. At issue is content protected by active DRM,
as some vendors of DRM-protected movies and music have ceased operation over the
years, in some cases leaving their customers without the ability to access or
transfer legitimately purchased content after the DRM servers go offline. The
article also points out that while there are no known instances of games or
software being impacted by the failure or closure of DRM servers, the growing
trend of such active DRM schemes in games makes this a distinct future
possibility, if not inevitability. The proposal, therefore, calls for legitimate
researchers, be they professional or amateur, to be allowed to tinker with
hacking such online DRM systems while the servers are still active
(emphasis ours), so that such software could be unlocked should those DRM
servers ever go away, since waiting until the servers are gone will likely make
such unlocking impossible. The article does stress however, that it should
remain illegal to make use of such information unless the DRM servers in
question failed or were taken offline.
A new trailer from Ghostbusters: The Video Game shows off the upcoming
video game return of the eclectic, existential, ectoplasm eliminators
(alliteration: who ya gonna call?). The movie trailer-style clip features the
stars of the game (and movies), the Ecto-1, the Stay Puft marshmallow man, and
the memorable Ghostbusters theme song. The clip is available on
ActionTrip and
FileFront, and it concludes repeating the recently revealed
June 2009 release date for the project.
GameCyte
has interesting news about Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena,
the game originally planned as a remake of Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from
Butcher Bay, the highly regarded first-person shooter based on the Vin
Diesel movie.
Joystiq reports the game will include a 10-hour bonus campaign, as developer
Starbreeze continued adding content even when the game's release status was up
in the air due to upheaval at previous publisher Vivendi before being
picked up by Atari. Now gaming site GameCyte cites a new fact
sheet that indicates that this campaign is now the game itself, and the good
news for fans of the original Escape from Butcher Bay is that the remake is
still to be included as well, only now it is the game's bonus content, rather
than the other way around.
A post to the Age
of Conan Forums by Funcom US Community Manager Glen 'Famine' Swan outlines
plans for the promised Age of Conan server merges. In the
short term, word is, "The first servers that will be merged are the US servers
‘Bloodspire’ and ‘Hyperborea’. The list of servers for the next merges will be
published shortly." The post goes into further detail about this rather
complicated process, and there is also a
Server Merge FAQ
in case it's still not clear. Thanks
Massively.
This press
release announces that Electronic Arts has acquired J2MSoft, a Korean
developer specializing in subscription-free PC online games like
RayCity Online, which
are monetized through microtransactions and advertising. The announcement seems
to indicate this is to enhance EA's presence in the burgeoning market for online
games in Asia, rather than an effort at translating more Asian online games for
western audiences. Terms are not being announced, but word is, "EA does not
expect the acquisition to have a material impact on its financial results in
fiscal 2009."
Videogaming247 has comments from LucasArts indicating The Old Republic
may inspire LucasFilm to overcome its reluctance in perusing licensing deals,
quoting LucasArts' Tom Nichols indicating tie-ins with the upcoming MMORPG may
be in the offing: "We are looking forward to working with our partners in
LucasFilm, that have worked with us previously on KOTOR in bringing the comic
books to life, and action figures, and all kinds of things. I think the
potential is there for us to have similar types of products and extensions from
our licensing partners as well."
Variety.com reports that Atari has picked up the North American publishing
rights for the PC, PS2, and Wii versions of Tale of Despereaux, the
animated movie tie-in announced in the summer. The game needed a
new publisher thanks to the demise of Brash Entertainment, and
time is of the essence, as the movie is set for release in North America on
December 19. Despereaux times call for Despereaux measures, and this deal is so
rushed that game boxes will still apparently brashly carry the Brash logo. Atari
is also now to distribute the DS edition of the game, but the Xbox 360 edition
is not included in the deal, and it sounds as if that SKU may have been skewered
along the way. According to the report, Universal and Brash are still shopping
for publishers in other territories where the movie will be showing.
GamesIndustry.biz has more from Atari's press event, where former
SingStar developer Paulina Bozek's plans were discussed in general terms.
Bozek will operate out of Atari London, which is expected to have a staff of
approximately 150 within a couple of years, and the focus of her projects will
be "very much in the social, mass-market space." While SingStar is a
PlayStation-exclusive franchise, word is Bozek's projects for Atari will be
more egalitarian, potentially targeting any console as well as PCs.
Edge Online has a status reports on the lawsuits in the works against
Electronic Arts over the DRM in Spore, which are still moving forward. They have
a response from one of the lawyers involved to accusations these suits are
frivolous, as attorney Scott Kamber says: "I appreciate that there's all
different kinds sentiment out there. ... It's very important to us that the
people and clients that come to us to be their lawyers understand that we
support them and their position, that everyone has a right to decide what's
installed on their computers." He also sums up the issue many take with some
forms of DRM: "Ultimately, just because you buy a game doesn't mean that a
company can do whatever it wants to your computer. I find it somewhat ironic
that game companies or any company would seek to protect its own intellectual
property rights by infringing on the intellectual property rights of the
computer owner."
4D Rulers is offering free
advertising within their free shooter Gore Special Edition for vendors
willing to give away some of their products in return. Word is: "The product can
be anything, but preferably it should be of interest to the average gamer who
likes a mature shooter game like Gore. If you are interested in getting free
advertising for your product, email
Joel@4drulers.com"
Just because I haven't regaled you lately about the incredible work Frans
has been doing on Blammo, our proprietary content management system, that
does not mean he has slacked off at all. A few weeks back a forum comment
mentioned that it would be nice to be able to search the message board, and
Frans has cooked up the ability to do just that. In fact, at this point, the
forum search is more feature-rich than the existing search function for news
stories. Barring unforeseen problems, the new forum search should go live today.
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