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Archived News:
Positech Games announces the release of Democracy 3, saying the election
and governance sequel is available for Windows, OS X, and Linux. The game is
available on Steam and
directly from the
Democracy 3 website, with the later providing the DRM-free version of the
game as well as a Steam key. Here's word: Democracy 3 is the third in the
series of complex and deep political strategy games where the player takes on
the role of President or Prime Minister, charged with the task of keeping the
population happy, the economy booming and preventing society collapsing around
them.
Democracy 3 is the only game of it's kind. Not an election-simulation, but a
government-simulation, built around a custom-programmed neural network and
unique iconic user interface that represents the thousands of simulated voters,
pressure groups, policies, laws and statistics that make up a detailed model of
a western democracy.
As president, you decide what laws to set, which taxes to raise (or cut) which
government programs to expand, introduce or cancel, whilst keeping one eye on
the countdown to the next election. All political careers end in failure, and
Democracy 3 is thus a game that cannot truly be won, only eventually lost.
Democracy 3's release comes at a curious time, when the US government is
actually shutdown, the political parties engaged in a stalemate where
passionately held arguments about the right to affordable health care,
state-provision of public services and the need to balance a country's spending
against it's income are in danger of bringing the US economy to the brink of
implosion. There may not be any governing going on in Washington right now, but
all the more reason for gamers to pick up where the politicians have left off.
Can they avoid triggering the games 'debt crisis' situation and do a better job
than the republicans and democrats? Can you?
This
Kickstarter is for Undead Overlord, a real-time strategy game that
will put players in control of a horde of zombies. The campaign has a pretty
modest $60K goal, as the indie developers have already completed much of
development. Word is: "It's worth noting that JumpCore is already incorporated.
Software and hardware are already in place. So all funds raised through
Kickstarter will go directly towards finishing the game and towards sending out
fun backer rewards. In fact, we've already brought Undead Overlord to a playable
state that is just about ready for backer testing. We're not shambling around
mindlessly here, and we want you to know it!"
The website has more on the game.
Here's
a Kickstarter for a new system called castAR described as "bridging the
physical world with the virtual worlds; 3D holographic like projections in AR,
fully immersive environments in VR" (thanks
Eurogamer). Developer Technical Illusions includes Jeri Ellsworth, who
worked on Steam hardware betas before
being let go by Valve earlier this year, and
they are seeking $400K to pursue developing this eyewear: castAR's
projected augmented reality system is comprised of two main components: a pair
of glasses and a surface. The frames of the glasses contain two
micro-projectors—one for each eye. Each projector casts a perspective view of a
stereoscopic 3D image onto the surface. Your eyes focus on this projected image
at a very natural and comfortable viewing distance. A tiny camera in-between the
projectors scans for infrared identification markers placed on the surface. The
camera uses these markers to precisely track your head position and orientation
in the physical world, enabling the software to accurately adjust how the
holographic scene should appear to you. The glasses get their video signal
through an HDMI connection. The camera is connected via a USB port on the PC. We
are still experimenting with communication options on mobile devices.
Link of the Day:
Happy Bartolomé Day. Thanks JDreyer.
LEGO.com now offers a playable demo for LEGO Marvel Superheroes. They
don't say much, here's the entire description: "Here you can download and play a
demo of LEGO® Marvel Super Heroes™. It might be a good idea to get your parents
to help with this. This demo is available for PC and needs to be installed for
you to play this awesome level. The demo works for Windows (8, 7, XP, Vista) but
not for MAC." Thanks Clever Caviar.
The
Roberts Space Industries website reflects the continuing flurry of activity
surrounding Star Citizen, the upcoming space combat game that looks to
return to the glory days of games like Wing Commander and Privateer. The game's
crowdfunding campaign is hurtling along, and has surpassed the $22 million mark,
triggering the new stretch goals of a Facial Capture System and a Public
Transportation System. They add: "In addition to this immersion-enhancing design
upgrade, we’re also going to dedicate some of the additional funding to making
next year’s CitizenCon a bigger event! Thank you for making this all possible.
Keep spreading the word!" Here's the summary of the latest happenings, which
includes the release of a patch for the game's
hangar module and the commercial for the
2944 Aurora: Two pieces of great news: after a long night of hard
work, the promised Hangar patch is available! You can check out the Avenger, the
privateer outfit, the Aurora LN, the fish tank… and a few other surprises. The
second piece of news is that in just four days, we’ve hit $22 million in crowd
funding! Between the hangar patch, the
bomber reveals, the
Aurora LN, CIG Manchester and the start of
The Next Great Starship, this has been a big anniversary week… and the best
is yet to come!
The Ethan - Meteor Hunter website
announces an October 22nd worldwide release date for the Windows edition of this
indie platformer. Seaven Studio celebrates the news by releasing
this debut
trailer showing off the game and its story. Word is: This also mean
that players who have bought 'Early Adopter' and 'Supporter Edition' on
http://www.ethan-game.com will enjoy the
game 5 days before release on Friday 18th October, perfect for the week end : )
Ethan: Meteor Hunter will also be available on GoodOldGames and many other
stores. We're not giving up on Steam so please upvote Ethan Greenlight page
here!
http://www.seaven-studio.com/greenlight
The Aartform Games
website now offers a playable demo for Spice Road to introduce this
trade simulation set in the 18th century. There's also
this trailer to give a
pre-sample. Here's word on the game: ABOUT SPICE ROAD:
Strategy trade empire building on the old Silk Road. Town building, social and
ecomomic simulation game.
Deep in the mountains and deserts of central Asia, where life is hard and death
is sudden, thin trails of gold, silk and spice trace a web between the
industrial forges of the West and the exotic climes of the East.
You are a colonial governor in the 18th Century, building a town on the Spice
Road in a time of war and discovery. More than spice travels your roads – musket
armies, philosophies, and power plays that span the globe are at your control.
From palace to monastry, trade post to smugglers den – your town is worthless
without the nobles, monks, merchants and rogues that chose to live in it – and
keeping them all happy at the same time is never simple.
Continue here to read the full story.
The new
GFK Chart-Track list of the 20 bestselling full-priced PC games in the U.K.
for the week ending October 12th. Total War: ROME II retains the number
one spot amid all the Sims game. On the
all-platforms top 40 Pokemon X & Y join the top five and GTA5
steals back the top spot from FIFA 14. Here's
the overview: Having
debuted 4 weeks ago at No1 as the biggest selling game of all time (week 1
sales), Rockstar/Take 2’s ‘GTA V’ re-takes No1 (-53%).
EA’s ‘FIFA 14’ (-66%) drops to No2 – both titles have now had 2 weeks at No1.
Nintendo’s new fully 3D 6th generation Pokemon titles debut at No’s 3&4, with
‘Pokemon X’ at No3 and ‘Pokemon Y’ at No4. Sales on these 2 products are around
double last year’s Pokemon Black2/White 2 opening week (W41-2012). Pokemon X and
Y are the first major headline Pokemon releases to be coded as 3DS titles (after
‘Super Pokemon Rumble’ and ‘Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Infinity’) and X/Y are the
first major Pokemon releases to launch in the same week as a Nintendo hand-held
console (2DS launched this week) – we’ve come close before with 3DS hardware
(W12-2011) released 3 weeks after Pokemon Black/White and DSI XL (W9-2010)
released 3 weeks before Pokemon HeartGold/Soulsilver.
Debuting at No5 is Sony’s PS3 exclusive ‘Beyond Two Souls’ from Quantic Dream,
last seen 3 and a half years ago with ‘Heavy Rain’ (W8-2010) which debuted at
No1. The final new releases this week are NIS America’s ‘Dragon’s Crown’ at No19
and the third Moshi Monsters title, Mind Candy’s ‘Moshi Monsters: Katsuma
Unleashed’ at No28.
"In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue."
Today is Columbus Day here in the U.S. As usual, I can't say if that will impact
anything, because this holiday seems to generate lots of sales, but not
necessarily a lot of time off, though I think schools may be closed today.
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