GuildWars.com outlines events planned to celebrate the
4 Year Anniversary of ArenaNet's online RPG. The festivities kick off on
April 23 and will run through April 29. The celebration will include special
events, festival rewards, and birthday gifts.
Red Faction Underground
has an update on changes Volition has made to their upcoming third-person
shooter since the launch of its first beta. The listed changes fall into two
similar categories: Community requested changes, and "Community requested
changes which were already planned for the final game." These include changes to
the Stress System, the Veto System, the Concussion Backpack, and more.
A new version 1.2 of the modification SDK for
Call of Duty: World at War
is now available. The new version fixes a problem with the lighting process when
compiling a map that contains a custom model, fixes the "dll version number does
not match converter version" error, and more. The download is available on
FileFront and
Gamer's
Hell.
LotRO Executive Producer Jeffrey Steefel Talks Moria, Monster Play, and Boar
Quests on The MMO Gamer is a conversation about
The Lord of the Rings
Online, and the aftermath of the launch of the Mines of Moria expansion for
the MMORPG: "Moria has been awesome, everybody loves it. All of our players have
gotten into it, we had a huge adoption of existing players. It’s also brought in
a whole bunch of new players, which is what we wanted to have happen. It’s won
awards, all that kind of stuff, but bottom line is that we accomplished what we
wanted to do. We set out to make it a place that feels unlike any other place
anyone’s ever been in an MMO, just in terms of size and scale. I feel like we
really did that, and kind of getting that coming back from players, so that’s
cool."
A new
Bionic Commando "arm lab report" movie shows off the return of the
grappling hook in GRIN's upcoming return of the platformer series. The clip is
available on
AtomicGamer
and
Gamer's Hell.
The Dragon Age: Origins
Website now offers some new Mage screenshots and a new gameplay video
showing off the Mage character from BioWare's upcoming RPG in action. The movie
is mirrored on
ActionTrip,
AtomicGamer, and
Gamer's
Hell.
CNET -
Nudity can't make a bad game good.
"But maybe EA got what it wanted out of this game: controversy. If there
wasn't nudity in this title, I would have never used this space to discuss
it. Without nudity, The Godfather II would be remembered as a joke, instead
of joke that shows topless women."
Joystiq - Is game censorship the new trade barrier?
"Thinking about the recent rash of international game censorship issues,
I noticed a pattern: Games banned abroad are almost exclusively American
(having, at least, significant ties to US companies). Games don't tend to be
banned in the countries where their respective developers and publishers are
located. So, does this speak to the attitudes of the country and free
speech? Or, is it a ruse for creating a trade barrier? More importantly,
could an entire trade war arise from video game content restrictions?"
bit-tech.net - Does Professional Gaming Have a Future?
"Still, at least eSports holds a sufficient number of competitions to
satisfy gamers. But is there enough money? Some of the evidence would
suggest that there isn’t. Between 2000 and 2002, the likes of Fatal1ty might
have scooped $65,000 or more in winnings. In 2005, he won $150,000 for the
CPL World Tour Championship. By contrast, last year’s most successful
player, Alexey ‘Cyph3r’ Yushanevsky, is estimated to have won between
$20,000 and $30,000."
Variety.com - Who cares whether DLC is on the disc or technically all
downloaded.
"If customers don't like the practice, they can and should complain about
overall game costs. Or, better yet, just don't buy the DLC. But nitpicking
about whether DLC is truly all downloaded avoids the real issue and displays
a rather ridiculous attitude of entitlement that gamers need to lose."
Today is the 11th anniversary of the release of the shareware version of Jazz
Jackrabbit 2, Epic's platformer. This can be celebrated through
Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online, where
they are still so into this game that their
JJ2+ program
received its most recent update yesterday.