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Archived News:
This Crysis 2 Product Page on EA.com has a link to the game on Origin using a "buy now" button that says "only on Origin." In keeping with that there is a discussion on the Steam Users' Forums about how the first-person shooter sequel is no longer available on Valve's online service. On the other hand, as noted in sflufan's NeoGAF post, as of this writing the game is still for digital distribution on Amazon, Direct2Drive, GamersGate, and Impulse, so we'll have to keep an eye on them. It is also noted that Alice: Madness Returns is likewise not available on Steam, but is on other services, so perhaps there's some sort of Steam/Origins turf war brewing. Thanks nin via Kotaku.
Electronic Arts announces that Alice: Madness Returns is now available in North American stores, offering Spicy Horse's long-awaited sequel to American McGee's Alice. Here's a bit: Heralding the return of American McGee’s interpretation of the classic Alice in Wonderland fiction, Alice: Madness Returns delivers a sinister and beautifully twisted world for gamers to explore on the Xbox 360® videogame and entertainment system, PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system and PC.
“Spicy Horse is proud to bring players back to the beautiful yet dark world we have created for Alice” A sequel to the original PC hit American McGee’s Alice™, the new title finds a grown-up Alice finally free from Rutledge Asylum for the Insane, but still grappling with the horror and survivor's guilt of the tragic fire that killed her family 11 years earlier. Alice returns to Wonderland to uncover the truth about her past. But what was once a place of refuge has now been transformed into a sinister nightmare, and madness threatens to overcome both Alice and Wonderland. Alice: Madness Returns builds upon the distinct art style of the original game, but with new visuals, story and game design.
Ars Technica has a handy one-stop outline of today's game website hacking incidents. Word is the amusement-motivated hacking group Lulz Security hit several targets today, some apparently inadvertently. The EVE Online login servers were knocked offline, as was the EVE Online website, and CCP tweets: "Earlier we became aware of a DDoS and took all services offline. Our Security Team is conducting a thorough investigation." Also knocked out were the Minecraft login servers as well as the Minecraft website, which was apparently collateral damage. Likewise, the group hacked the login server for League of Legends and the League of Legends Website. Also taken offline for periods today were Finfisher and The Escapist. According to CCP, the EVE Online breach did not expose any user data: "Our taskforce concluded at 22:05 that neither the game servers nor the CCP infrastructure had been breached. Further, we can also confirm that no personal details such as users’ credentials or credit card numbers were exposed through this incident."
This interview on Gaming Illustrated was conducted at E3 where BioWare's James Ohlen spoke with them about Star Wars: The Old Republic, the upcoming Force-powered MMORPG. Topics include the reaction to the game's E3 showing, how they are ensuring the game will have enough content upon launch, the story, advanced classes, operations, what he will do once the game is out, what he would say to people waiting for the beta, and more. There's also a video interview on G4tv.com from E3 talking with Blaine Christine. Word is: "He talks to us a little bit about player vehicles and companion characters-- and he also gives us some insight on how Bioware's going to meet everyone's expectations. His thoughts? 'Don't worry; we've got it handled'."
Games
- Alice: Madness Returns on Impulse.
- Cities in Motion: Design Now on Steam.
- Two Worlds II Castle Defense on Steam.
Patches
- Direct Hit: Missile War v1.5 on Impulse.
- Jamestown on Steam.
- Secret of the Magic Crystals on Steam.
- Space Pirates and Zombies Beta v0.9007 on Impulse.
- Team Fortress 2 on Steam.
- Darkspore on Steam. Save 40%.
- Ghostbusters: The Video Game on Direct2Drive. Save 50%.
- Homefront on Direct2Drive. Save 20%.
- Secret of the Magic Crystals on Steam. Save 50%.
- Two Worlds II Castle Defense on Steam. Save 20%.
Still on sale (previously reported). Continue here to read the full story.
Link of the Day: Unprepared for test Drive. Decidedly. I was sure he was going to hurl. Thanks Ant.
Uncle Sam announces the release of an updated version 3.1 of America's Army, the freeware first-person shooter that serves as a recruiting tool. The new version, which can be downloaded via Steam or one of the sites listed on this page, includes new "Every Soldier a Sensor" gameplay as well as a pair of new maps, among other changes.
Steam News announces the arrival of free-to-play games on Steam, as they now offer five such titles, which include support for Steam Wallet micro-transactions. The five titles are Alliance of Valiant Arms, Champions Online: Free for All, Forsaken World, Global Agenda: Free Agent, and Spiral Knights, and Valve has cooked up a promotion to run over the next week as an incentive to not purchase these games from them, as opposed to not purchasing them elsewhere: Beginning tomorrow (Weds) with Spiral Knights and concluding Sunday with AVA, each of the five launch titles will offer exclusive in-game content to those who try the "F2P game of the day" on Steam. In game transactions in all of the titles will be supported by Steam's micro-transaction backend system that is available to Steamworks partners and currently used in Valve's Team Fortress 2.
2K Games announces the North American release of Duke Nukem Forever, the first-person shooter with one of the longest (if not the longest, period) development cycles in videogame history. The game was released in Europe last week, is now on North American store shelves, and can also be had through the magic of digital distribution from Direct2Drive, GamersGate (save 10%), Green Man Gaming (save 27%), and Steam, and is also available for 20% off through Woot with the code "EMCKDJF85" (thanks nin). According to their possibly biased assessment, the saga behind the game's creation is a story of heroes and legends: From the game’s inception, the legendary George Broussard and his team of immensely talented and passionate designers, artists and programmers at 3DRealms devoted themselves to bringing Duke Nukem Forever to market. When all appeared lost, a small team of dedicated developers, known as Triptych Studios, saved Duke Nukem Forever from what seemed like vaporware death and resurrected the King. Their heroic efforts alongside Gearbox Software, Piranha Games and many other contributors finalized the legacy by bringing the full-featured triple-A title to retail.
Apologizing to no one, Duke Nukem Forever is the high-octane video game equivalent of a Hollywood summer blockbuster. Starring the legendary lady killer and alien slayer, Duke Nukem Forever introduces gamers to a blastastic time filled with head-popping, bone-rattling action, brazenly crude humor, impossibly statuesque women dying for affection, and catchy one-liners that will have you laughing out loud.
This video has the showing of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon from the wee hours this morning (should be Early Morning with Jimmy Fallon, shouldn't it?). This starts with the game's E3 presentation before moving on to some Spec Ops multiplayer play between Jimmy and Simon Pegg, featuring much pistol firing and trash talk from the show's game-loving host.
EA tweets that there are only a few more days to preorder the Alice: Madness Returns - The Complete Collection, which includes a free digital copy of American McGee's Alice. They also tweet about a live chat this evening at 7:00 pm EDT where American McGee will discuss the game. They are offering the chance at a free signed poster to those who retweet about that one. On a related note, Eurogamer has a video of the first 15 minutes of gameplay from the game.
GameSpot has the latest financial reporting for Majesco, where sales of Zumba Fitness have helped the publisher nearly triple sales for the second fiscal quarter. Word is: "Majesco posted sales of $32.14 million, up from $10.91 million for the same period the year before. The publisher also posted a net profit of $2.08 million, compared to a $1.61 million loss the prior second quarter."
"If it were not for digital distribution we would no longer be doing PC games. It’s as simple as this." -- Bohemia Interactive boss Marek Spanel. Thanks VG247.
"You're right there's a massive appetite for that sort of thing," says id Software's Tim Willits on why RAGE is eschewing the traditional deathmatch featured in most shooters. "But it's like McDonalds. There's a McDonalds on every street corner, and I love McDonalds, but I don't want to eat McDonalds every day. Sometimes you need to have steak." Thanks Computer and Video Games.
The Tech Report - The 10 commandments of PC games.
Even though the amount of PC users playing the latest Call of Duty undermines this point somewhat, I'll put it plain and simple: we like dedicated servers in multiplayer games (where applicable, of course). We really love them. First, we can actually have people administering them (and dispensing righteous fury on the hecklers). Second, they often have customizations or improvements we've grown to know and love. Third, we get to pick where we play, which both makes it easier to gather friends around and lets us get optimal ping times. This functionality has existed pretty much forever, and stepping away from it is stepping back.
We have a once-beautiful white birch tree in the backyard that seems to have mostly died over the winter, as now it only has leaves on a few branches near the bottom. This is a pretty creepy vista, as dead trees have a sort of horror movie look to start with, all the worse because the white bark of the birch makes it look like a negative image of a tree, and Hollywood long ago taught us that negatives are a harbinger of terror. That's all bad enough to start with, but now that my bird feeder is all the rage with the local avian community, it has become a favorite haunt of a murder of crows, another horror cliché. It can be pretty unsettling to look out there and seeing more than a dozen crows perched on those dead white branches. Watching... waiting.
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