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Archived News:
Mojang
announces that beginning on February 4th, Minecraft players will be
able to change their game names from in the game. They explain this will not
cost any money, that usernames still must be unique, but that they will also be
using the occasion to free up unpaid user names, linking to
this article on how to buy an old name. Users will be able to change their
game names every 30 days if they so choose.
The
Writers Guild of America East website has the nominees for the WGA's eighth
annual award for Outstanding Achievement in Videogame Writing (thanks
GamePolitics). The four games in the running are Alien: Isolation,
Assassin’s Creed: Freedom Cry, Assassin’s Creed: Unity, and The
Last of Us: Left Behind. Here's word: The Writers Guild of America,
West (WGAW) and the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) have announced
nominations for outstanding achievement in writing for videogames during 2014.
Winners will be honored at the 2015 Writers Guild Awards on Saturday, February
14, at simultaneous ceremonies in Los Angeles and New York City.
OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN VIDEOGAME WRITING
Alien: Isolation, Writers Dan Abnett, Dion Lay, Will
Porter; SEGA
Assassin’s Creed: Freedom Cry, Lead Scriptwriter Jill Murray;
Scriptwriter Melissa MacCoubrey; Story by Jill Murray, Hugo
Giard, Wesley Pincombe; Ubisoft
Assassin’s Creed: Unity, Story by Alexandre Amancio, Sylvain
Bernard, Travis Stout; Scriptwriting Alexandre Amancio,
Travis Stout, Russell Lees, Darby McDevitt, Ceri Young;
Additional Scriptwriting Jeffrey Yohalem; Ubisoft
The Last of Us: Left Behind, Written by Neil Druckmann; Sony
Computer Entertainment
Now in its eighth year, the WGA’s Videogame Writing Award honors the best
qualifying script from a videogame published in the previous year. To be
eligible for WGA consideration, games must have been released between December
1, 2013 and November 30, 2014, and feature on-screen writing credit(s). Credited
videogame writers must have been or must have applied to become members of the
WGA Videogame Writers Caucus at the time scripts were submitted. Work that was
not produced under WGA jurisdiction was also eligible for submission. Judging
for the WGA Videogame Writing Award is conducted by panels comprised of
Videogame Writers Caucus members and/or Writers Guild members active in
videogame writing.
GabberGames announces the release of War, the Game
on Steam, calling this
"PC strategy gaming for the masses." That said, they also call this one of those
games that's difficult to master in spite of its simplicity, though one element
that sets it apart from a typical RTS game is a spherical map, making for a more
global version of a global conflict. This carries a 10% launch discount, and
here's word on gameplay: 'War, the Game' is a global Real Time
Strategy game.
Take the role of a supreme commander directing your armies across the globe. Use
your strategic wit to battle AI and other players in realistic scenarios.
Conquer the world, city by city.
Easy to learn, difficult to master.
'War, the Game' only has 7 army types. The game rules are simple and
transparent. The first few scenarios teach you all you need to know. After that
it is down to your braininess.
Variety is the spice of life.
Take command of the armed forced of a large variety of nations. Scenarios
require wildly different strategies to win that are not obvious as you start
out. The AI is expanding so there is little time to decide.
The network scenarios are also varied. 25 players in a big scrum or 1 on 1. With
or without alliances.
Slitherine Group has begun closed beta testing of Vietnam '65 for those
interested in checking out this Vietnam War-based strategy game for Windows and
iPad, saying those selected "will be able experience Vietnam ’65 before release
and help us with the final touches, ensuring a smooth release later this year."
If you want to register, you can do so though
this page where they have signups
for each platform. Word is this game attempts to capture the propaganda war as
well as the military conflict this entailed: Early 1965 – Regular US
military units are deployed on Vietnamese soil. The American government sends
massive support to South Vietnam to prevent the Viet Cong forces from the North
unifying the entire country under the Communist banner. This Cold War conflict
was not only fought with classic weapons, but also with unconventional tactics
in order to gain support from civilians.
Vietnam ’65, the new game developed by Every Single Soldier, aims to capture
this unique warfare duality. This is why the players’ main task is not to crush
their opponent as they usually do in other strategy games, but to win the hearts
and minds of the local population! Their main focus will be to plan and execute
counter-insurgency operations so that they will prevent villages falling under
Viet Cong influence. Thanks to a refined AI and a randomly generated campaign
map, players should be ready to face tough and surprising challenges!
Aeria Games announces the launch of
Chaos Heroes Online
on Steam,
offering another way to get your MOBA on. The free-to-play multiplayer game went
live a few days ago, and a
post from that time discusses problems logging in, suggesting the game was
suffering a DDoS attack, but a
quick follow-up announces everything is fine now. Here's word on the
game: Hailing from South Korea, Chaos Heroes Online is a fast-paced and
highly competitive MOBA. It is the successor of the popular Korean Warcraft 3
custom map DotA:Chaos, birthplace of many Korean Pro Players such as SKT T1
Faker. Heroes battle on the fields of glory to achieve victory through careful
planning, cunning strategies and dazzling displays of skill.
As with any successful Korean game, fast reaction time and good decision making
will be necessary to achieve victory, but that is not all.
Alphadia Genesis is now available
on Steam, with this jRPG
carrying a 20% discount in its first week of release, and noting this features
fully redesigned controls for PC gamers as well as Steamworks features including
trading cards, badges, and backgrounds. Here's word: Alphadia Genesis
chronicles an epic adventure with Fray and his investigative team from the
Archleign Kingdom as they set out to solve a mysterious murder case in a nearby
city. After some initial investigations, Fray and his companions are joined by
delegates from the Ghalzabine Kingdom.
This causes tensions to run high, as the Archleign and Ghalzabine Kingdoms have
shared an uneasy relationship since the clone-centric ‘Energi War’ 15 years
prior to the joint investigation.
Twists and turns lie await as Fray and his fellow investigators soon discover
that there may be more than meets the eye with this particular case...
- Alien: Isolation Safe Haven on
GameSpot.
There's now an early access
listing on Steam for H1Z1, saying SOE's free-to-play, DayZ-style
zombie game will begin allowing entrance to players on Thursday (thanks
Blend Games). Here's word on the early access version: NOTE ON
EARLY ACCESS ALPHA:
H1Z1 is currently in Early Access on Steam. With a fully transparent approach to
game design and development here at SOE, we want to transform the way our
players interact and participate with our games. H1Z1 Early Access is your
chance to experience and make a difference in H1Z1 as it evolves throughout the
development process.
The H1Z1 development team will continue to create new features and may make
significant changes based on the needs of the game. Those who choose to purchase
Early Access should anticipate an evolving feature set, bugs, incomplete
content, missing features, and potentially game breaking issues. Early Access is
designed for those wishing to support the ongoing development of H1Z1 and be a
part of shaping its future.
GAMEPLAY
Enter a world that has been overrun by zombies and fellow survivors since the
H1Z1 virus outbreak. Fight for your life against the infected and against the
brutality of others as you attempt to live and see another day. Every moment is
borrowed time with one question to answer… Will You Survive?
Visit the H1Z1
website
for more info!
A
Microsoft Careers job posting seeks a Senior Software Engineer for Decisive
Games, a division of Microsoft Game Studios, as they say they are "building a
studio that will bring the next installment in a beloved strategy game franchise
to the next generation of gamers around the world." (thanks
IGN via
GameSpot). While "next generation" is a console buzzword, the listing leads
off by saying: "help us create the next-generation of awesome games for Windows
and Xbox!" Sadly, Microsoft owns more than one "beloved strategy game franchise"
that needs reviving, so for now we don't know if this relates to Age of
Empires, Rise of Nations, or perhaps something else entirely.
Spiderweb Software announces Avernum 2: Crystal Souls will be released on
January 14th, which is this Wednesday, saying the throwback RPG remake is
coming to Windows and OS X through various digital distributors. There are more
details along with screenshots and
a trailer on the
Avernum 2: Crystal Souls product page,
and here's word: Avernum 2: Crystal Souls is an epic fantasy role-playing
adventure in a unique, massive world, full of strange caves, cunning dungeons,
and the alien inhabitants of the underworld. Fight to complete up to three
game-winning quests. Explore a massive nation of tunnels and caverns, seeking
over 100 towns and dungeons. Master over 60 spells and battle disciplines and
hunt for hundreds of magical artifacts. Avernum 2: Crystal Souls is a total,
ground-up rewrite of the award-winning indie hit Avernum 2.
Continue here to read the full story.
A tweet from the
Hitman account has word from IO Interactive to expect more information
on the Hitman series this year, waiting to share it, in spite of
declaring that they cannot: "There's more info coming this year and we can't
wait to share it!" The last desktop installment in this series of assassination
games was 2012's Hitman: Absolution, and last year saw the release of
Hitman Go for mobile devices. Almost exactly
one year ago IO Interactive offered
details on plans for a sixth installment in the PC series, but this is the first
we've heard about it since then. Thanks
GameWatcher.
Blizzard may be forced to rename Overwatch, the team-based shooter they
announced last year a while after
applying to trademark the title. It turns
out that trademark now carries a
suspension letter from the USPTO apologetically saying that this application
should have been suspended from the start, since a conflicting trademark was
discovered. The site still confusingly lists live TMs for Blizzard's Overwatch,
but the conflicting listing appears to be
this one. Thanks
games.on.net.
The Evolve website
now offers minimum and recommended system requirements for Evolve, Turtle
Rock's upcoming asymmetric shooter. They also outline a bunch of settings that
can be tweaked, and offer the following note saying 4K support is in, but SLI is
still being worked on: "The game supports 4k resolutions right now. HOWEVER,
there is no support for SLI out of the box. Our teams are working on that and
hope to get SLI support into Evolve as soon as possible. As soon as we have more
info to share here, we will!" Here are the specs: You’ve been asking us
what kind of PC you’ll need to play Evolve. Now, we’re telling you.
Here’s the high-level skinny, ripped straight from the side of the box:
OS: Windows 7 64-bit
MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS:
INTEL CPU: Core 2 Duo E6600
AMD CPU: Athlon 64 X2 6400
SYSTEM RAM: 4GB
NVIDIA VIDEO CARD: GeForce GTX 560
ATI VIDEO CARD: Radeon HD 5770
VIDEO MEMORY: 1GB
HARD DRIVE: 50GB
OS: Windows 7 64-bit
RECOMMENDED REQUIREMENTS:
INTEL CPU: Core i7-920
AMD CPU: A8-3870K
SYSTEM RAM: 6GB
NVIDIA VIDEO CARD: GeForce GTX 670 or GTX 760
ATI VIDEO CARD: Radeon R9 280
VIDEO MEMORY: 2GB
HARD DRIVE: 50GB
Not sure if you have the right hardware for the job? You should check out
NVIDIA’S GPU Analyzer
here to see if your PC is ready for Evolve.
Activision announces Call of Duty Online is now live in China, the
only market currently planned for this MMOFPS based on the military shooter
sequel. There are no announced plans to launch this in other territories at this
time, and they say it is created specifically for this market: "Over the last
few years, we've worked closely with Tencent to tailor Call of Duty Online
specifically for the Chinese audience, while maintaining an authentic Call of
Duty experience," said Brian Raffel, Studio Head at Raven Software. "We've had a
unique opportunity to take the best moments from the entire Call of Duty
franchise - along with all-new unique experiences - and deliver the ultimate
entertainment package for a whole new audience." Here's word on how this
operates: The new free-to-play experience for Call of Duty - in which
gamers are able to purchase or rent in-game items - delivers an unprecedented,
unique offering for Chinese players, including Hero Ops single-player campaign
missions, Survival Mode cooperative experiences, best-in-class Call of Duty
multiplayer and the newly created Cyborgs (PVE modes exclusive to the Chinese
market in Call of Duty Online) - all delivered with the trademark Call of Duty
cinematic intensity and fast-paced action, for which the franchise is known the
world over.
This chart lists the 30 bestselling games in the U.K. for the week ending
January 10th, not showing much movement with the first title not on last week's
list FIFA 15 at #20, while Football Manager 2015 remains number
one. On the
all platforms top 40 things are also pretty stable, though Grand Theft
Auto V steals back the number one spot. Here's the
write-up: Week 2
of 2015 sees a return to No1 for Rockstar/Take 2 and ‘Grand Theft Auto V’
(-51%).
This is actually only the fifth No1 for ‘GTA V’, which some people may find
surprising given its status as fastest-selling game within a 7 day period
(launch week 38/2014) and also the fact that this game has sold more units than
any other in the UK (achieved in week 47/2014 after the launch of the Gen 8
versions).
Activision’s ‘Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’ drops to No2 (-61%) having held on
to No1 for a total of 6 weeks since launch. EA’s ‘FIFA 15’ remains No3 (-51%)
with an 8 week run at No1 since launch. There are no new releases and the only
other notable change is the rise of Ubisoft’s ‘Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag’
from No27 to No11 (-3%) thanks to a spike in sales of the official Assassin’s
Creed Kinect Unity/Black Flag Xbox One hardware bundle.
The NFL games were great over the weekend, and for fans of college football,
there's a championship game for dessert tonight. That's not my thing, so I'll
just be gaming with the mutants as usual. Sorry to see Peyton struggle like that
in what may be his swan song, especially since I picked the Broncos to win. That
ruined my chances at running the table in our
playoff pool, though my analysis of the
picks matrix already showed even then I'd have finished in second place.
LastPlace confirms this with a
Google spreadsheet laying out the various scenarios, and it looks like there
are three different ways I can still end up in second place, but also a couple
of ways I can end up next to last. But it seems like seven players are still in
contention to win, which is very cool.
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