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Archived News:
Blizzard has hit the reset button on their unannounced upcoming MMORPG project,
reports
GamesBeat, citing "a source familiar with the matter," who tells them the
game codenamed "Titan" should not be expected before 2016. They say the team
developing the game has been reduced from 100 to 30, with 70 developers assigned
to other projects while the core team starts over on the game. This is
unconfirmed at this point, as Blizzard has not yet responded to their request
for a comment.
Amplitude Studios announces Disharmony, an expansion pack coming this
summer to Endless Space, their 4X space strategy game. They offer
this teaser trailer
for the project, and this explanation: Disharmony brings a brand new
experience to Endless Space players. A new faction with a unique play style,
“The Harmony”, will make its appearance. Battles will be even more intense with
the addition of fighters and bombers, battle formations, a new targeting system,
a redesigned weapon system and enhanced invasion mechanics. The AI opponents
will be significantly more unpredictable with the implementation of the new
‘Adaptive Multi-Agent Artificial Intelligence System’. Prepare your empire for
epic space battles!
Continue here to read the full story.
Tripwire Interactive announces Rising Storm will be released on
Thursday May 30th, offering the new installment in their Red Orchestra
series of World War II first-person shooters. They
graphically warn that: "The pre-purchase period will end when we release the
game so, if you want to get the current 15% discount, you'd better act fast!"
Origin now offers digital distribution of Amusement Park Set,
offering new content for SimCity, Maxis' new DRM-impeded urban planning
game. Here's word: Create your own customized, fun-filled amusement park!
Build your park around your city's terrain and layout using amusement park
paths. Your amusement park will benefit both locals and tourists alike as they
fill your park, riding all the rides and shopping at the concessions. Take your
pick from three themed entrances to bring Sims into your amusement park. Draw
tons of tourists to your theme park city and watch them stay in your hotels and
spend money in your shops!
This
presentation ( Adobe Acrobat format) offers first quarter 2013 financial results for
Funcom (thanks
Massively). This includes a handy list of highlights:
- Revenues in 1Q13 were 6,338 TUSD compared to 2,293
TUSD for 1Q12
- Earnings before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and
Amortization (EBITDA) for 1Q13 were positive with 1,766 TUSD compared to
-4,512 TUSD for 1Q12
- Earnings before Interest and Tax (EBIT) for 1Q13
were -673 TUSD compared to -5,830 TUSD for 1Q12
- Cash position at end of 1Q13 amounts to 3,693 TUSD
- The restructuring process initiated in early
January 2013 was successfully completed in mid May 2013
- As per the above,, the Company e xpects the
positive ef fect from the restructuring to materiali terialize in full in
the second half ond half of the year. However, significant cost savings were
realized in 1Q13 and the operating costs decreased by 1,197 TUSD compared to
the previous quarter and by 2,232 TUSD compared to 1Q12
- The licensed LEGO® online game developed in Oslo
based on the LEGO® Minifigure line is currently on schedule
- The two work for hire LEGO® games developed in
Montreal have reached all milestones in 1Q13
- The first major content upgrade to use the new
business model in The Secret World, ‘Issue 6 – The Last Train to Cairo’, was
released
in 1Q13 with very good take-up rate amongst players
Startup developer Sunside announces plans for Abducted, an episodic
horror-themed action/adventure game coming to Windows, OS X, and Linux this
August, with plans for an early access beta starting in July for customers who
preorder through the Sunside
website. As our headline implies, this may sound familiar: It was first
announced over 11 years ago by Contraband
Entertainment as a cutting-edge game for PC, Mac, and Xbox (1 not One), but it
dropped off everyone's radar until just over seven
years ago when the project was revived, when we already burned off the
headline "Abducted Lives," before it, well died, along with Contraband. The game's
developers never gave up, however, and the project has finally come to life
after those previous false-starts, though they say it is "a completely new game,
a fresh and different take on the old concept, with all new graphics and a
redesigned modern engine."
This trailer offers a cinematic look at the game, and we're told they will
roll out more media and information in the coming weeks. Here's an outline: In
Abducted you play an ordinary person thrust into extraordinary circumstances.
Abducted by aliens and taken thousands of light years from home, you have one
ultimate goal: Escape. But you have so many unanswered questions... How did you
get here? What is this place? Who took you and why? Abducted draws inspiration
from elements of classic adventure games with a deep narrative, environmental
puzzles, visceral action, horror, and of course aliens.
Continue here to read the full story.
Paradox Interactive announces that Crusader Kings II: The Old Gods is now
available, expanding the strategy/RPG gameplay of Crusader Kings II with
playable pagan hordes and the addition of 200 years to the game's timeline.
Here's word on the add-on and a live stream to show it off: In The Old
Gods, the medieval soap opera now extends the timeline by 200 years, all the way
back to 867 AD, allowing bearded heathens to storm the fine cities of Europe.
Gamers will soon have most of Europe out for their blood after they have stormed
ashore with gigantic axes in their hands.
In a gift so generous that surely a human sacrifice is required in return,
selected digital outlets are offering 75% off the entire Crusader Kings II
franchise until May 30th to celebrate the launch of the expansion. To see a list
of retailers offering this deal please visit:
http://www.crusaderkings.com/buy
To celebrate the launch of Crusader Kings II: The Old Gods, Project Lead Henrik
Fåhraeus will be hosting a Live Stream on Paradox Interactive’s Twitch TV
channel:
http://www.twitch.tv/paradoxinteractive
The stream showcase The Old Gods, highlighting some new featuers, as well as
answering some questions from the forums. The live stream will take place on May
29th beginning at 6 p.m. GMT/ 7 p.m. BST /8 p.m. CEST /11 a.m. PDT.
A new version 3.0 Shady Business update is now available for X3:
Albion Prelude through Steam, though it's not mentioned on
Steam News. This is free for
the Windows edition of EGOSOFT's space simulation, and they say to expect a beta
of the Linux edition later this month and the OS X edition later this year. They
add that X3: Reunion and X3: Terran Conflict are available as of now as a beta
for Linux through Steamplay and will be released later this year for Mac OS X.
Here's a video trailer
and a feature list for Shady Business:
- Controller mode to play the X3 games on a big
screen TV for the first time
- The “Shady Business” plot
- The “Corporation Troubles” plot
- The “Breaking Grounds” plot
- New sectors, new gamestarts and new generic
missions
- Largest X Universe so far
Continue here to read the full story.
The
Legend of Grimrock website has word that the Linux edition of Almost
Human's dungeon crawler has crawled onto Steam: Phew, it took quite a
while but finally it’s here: the Linux version of Legend of Grimrock is on
Steam! This means that Steam now carries all the versions of the game: PC, Mac
and Linux.
The standalone Linux version of the game has also now been updated to version
1.3.7 which eliminates a few annoying bugs. Most importantly text input and
mouse look troubles have been fixed as well as the issue some users have had
where they have been unable to export custom dungeons. You can get the update
for the standalone version by redownloading the game from the link that was
emailed to you when you purchased the game from Humble Bundle or from our store.
If you’ve lost the email with the details, you can
get it resent but you can of course also email us as well if you need any
assistance.
- The Humble Indie Bundle 8.
Hotline Miami, Proteus, Dear Esther, Capsized, Awesomenauts, Thomas Was
Alone, and Little Inferno.
- Adventures of Shuggy on
Steam. Save 75%.
- Angry Birds Space on
Steam. Save 66%.
- Crusader Kings II on
Steam. Save 75%.
- Flatout Complete Pack on
Steam. Save 75%.
- Greed: Black Border on
Steam. Save 75%.
- The Guild II on
Steam. Save 75%.
- Papo & Yo on
Steam. Save 33%.
- Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 on
Steam. Save 50%.
- Super House of Dead Ninjas on
Steam. Save 50%.
- They Bleed Pixels on
Steam. Save 66%.
- Tower Wars on
Steam. Save 40%.
- Waking Mars on
Steam. Save 75%.
- Worms Ultimate Mayhem on
Steam. Save 40%.
Link of the Day: Wait
for it... They were trying to escape. Thanks Ant.
Camel101 announces development of Black Talons, a real time tactics game
"featuring a mercenary commander trying to prevail in a ravaged star system"
they plan to release for Windows, OS X, and Linux, though no release date is
currently set. The game will use the same science fiction setting as Gemini
Wars, their real-time strategy game, and
an official website is online
with more details. This
trailer offers a look at work-in-progress gameplay they say does not reflect
the quality of the finished product, and here's a feature list:
- Persistent and customizable squads.
- Deep campaign mode. The actions of the
player directly affect the balance of power on the system. There is one main
objective to achieve, but there's much more to do.
- Customizable Battlecruiser. The
Battlecruiser serves as the base of operations, and can be customized with
weapons or infrastructures that will boost the squad numbers, teleport
soldiers or even bombard the battlefield.
- Faction relations. There are a number of
neutral minor factions in the game. These factions will have missions
available for contract work. When the player completes missions for a
certain faction, the relations will improve with that faction. On the other
hand, completing missions against a faction will lower the relations with
it. Having good relations allows the player to train or buy units unique to
that faction. Having bad relations will make that faction randomly attack
the player during missions.
- Upgradeable and unique (per class) skill
tree for all units
- 5 worlds with different environments and
weather conditions that directly affect the battle: rain, fog, snow,
ionstorms and more insane stuff.
- Different unit classes with specialized
roles: Recon, Tactical, Assault, Support, Engineer. Each class can carry a
different set of weapons and has its own abilities. Powerful mechs can enter
the battlefield with salvaged or bought equipment and weapons.
PC Gamer has word on
the availability of a demo version of Gunpoint, saying the full edition
of this platformer action/RPG (sorry) will be released on June 3rd. They somehow managed to scoop
these release details about this game being created by one of their editors, Tom
Francis. Word is if you enjoy Francis' writing you should not buy this game:
"“I’ve been working on Gunpoint for three years, and it could be a turning point
in my life," he tells his own site (perhaps he interviewed himself). "If it does
well enough, I will quit my job to become a full time game developer. I could
make more games like this, hopefully better and more quickly. This would be
amazing." The demo is available on the
Gunpoint website and
Steam, and discounted preorders are now being accepted.
GfK Chart-Track's U.K. sales charts are online. The
PC Full-Price Top 20 still has Football Manager 2013 at number one
with the most significant new entry being Resident Evil: Revelations at
number nine. The
PC Budget Price Top 20 is also online, with Farming Simulator 2011
plowing on in the top spot. Resident Evil: Revelations is the new number one on
the
All Platforms Full-Price Chart and the
All Platforms/All Prices Chart. On a related note, UKIE has launched what
they call the "first official digital games chart using actual sales data from
PC downloads" (for some reason adding "and Expansion / DLC titles"). Saying
these charts have been in beta testing for the past year, they break this data
down every way possible, offering five sales charts for the not-quite-complete
month of May, covering boxed and digital sales. Here goes: PC boxed &
digital game sales combined (Units)
- SimCity
- Bioshock Infinite
- The Sims 3: University Life
- Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm
- Tomb Raider
- Football Manager
- Battlefield 3 Electronic Arts
- The Sims 3 Electronic Arts
- Just Cause 2 Square-Enix
- Far Cry 3 Ubisoft
Continue here to read the full story.
Techland sends along
this internal Q&A they conducted with themselves to explain more of their
plans for Hellraid, the first-person co-op slasher they are bringing to
Windows and last-generation consoles later this year. Here are
some new
screenshots and here's an answer explaining the Game Master function derived
from the world of pen-and-paper RPGs: Game Master is a complex system
inspired by pen and paper role-playing games that makes each play through of
Hellraid a different, completely new experience. In co-operation mode, Game
Master carefully selects competitive challenges for players and awards the best
ones at the end of each level. It changes where and how you and your friends
complete quests, placement, numbers and types of enemies you encounter as well
as deploying treasure chests and loot.
MCV has word that Intuitive Games is a new Sydney Australia-based
developer formed by Alex Carlyle and other former members of Team Bondi, the
Australian developer that went under earlier this
year in spite of the success of L.A. Noire, their most recent game release.
"I really do want to stay in Australia and try and overcome the drive which is
leading everyone to Canada or the like," Carlyle told MCV. "I want to stay here
and make games and hopefully be able to sustain a small studio, provide
employment and jobs here." Word is they will be staffing up with contractors as
they get started on their unannounced first project.
Steam Forums have news that a patch is now available for Call of Juarez
Gunslinger to add the
requested FOV
slider among other changes to the western shooter sequel (thanks
IncGamers). The FOV fix is explained below the notes as a tweak. Here's the
change list:
Changes:
- hit indicator is now disabled in True West
difficulty mode
- new option to disable crosshair regardless of the
difficulty mode
- new option to adjust mouse sensitivity on duels
- new settings available in video.scr file
- additional checks before posting scores to the
leaderboards
- additional credits
Continue here to read the full story.
The speaker on MrsBlue's iPhone went tango uniform recently, and we headed off
yesterday to the Apple store to have it looked at. The cool thing is that her
phone ended up being repaired on the spot, we just needed to wait a bit for an
appointment to talk to a tech, and obviously there was a wait while the repair
was performed. This gave me my first chance to really experience the operation
at one of these places, which is simultaneously impressive, and depressing. The
place was extremely crowded, but there still seemed to be more blue-shirted
employees than customers, which indeed made it seem like some of them didn't
have anything to do, which made some of periods of waiting for someone seem odd.
A majority of the employees also seemed to be from the same mold: Short overweight
stoners with beards, a bunch of Apple Boba Fetts I suspect may all be cloned
from Steve Wozniak. In spite of a certain leisurely pace, they all seemed to
know what they were doing, but it still feels like calling the place a "genius
bar" is an invitation for some well-deserved ridicule.
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