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Archived News:
A
post on reddit opens up the thread to those looking for technical support
with Pillars of Eternity in addition to what's offered on their
Obsidian's Technical Support forum for the just-released role-playing game
(thanks nin). That said, he indicates the official forums are probably a better
place to start if you need help. He also points the way to a thread with
workarounds for several known issues. There is also a
Pillars of Eternity Support FAQ with word on patch plans, saying: "Yes,
we're currently working on patch 1.03, which we hope to release during the week
of March 30. We are actively monitoring the Technical Support forum and pulling
issues out into our internal bug database."
Valve announces the first round of tickets for the next edition of The
International Dota 2 Championships which went on sale this morning sold
out in six minutes. Those interested in attending still have one more chance to
get in, as an equal number of tickets will go on sale in the wee hours of
tomorrow at 1:00 am EDT through
Ticketmaster.
Word is: "Marking the fifth year of the tournament, The International returns to
KeyArena in Seattle, WA from August 3 through August 8. Last year's tournament
sold out in less than one hour, and was viewed online by over 20 million unique
viewers as teams battled for over $10 mil in prizes." There are further details
in this FAQ.
Half-Life 2: Update is now available
on Steam as a free
modification for Half-Life 2, fixing a bunch of lingering bugs, adding a
number of visual improvements, and a new optional commentary track to the
first-person shooter. Here's word: "2004's Half-Life 2 was a landmark for PC
gaming and the First Person Shooter, setting the standard for immersion,
animation, and physics-based play for years. Meticulously developed by Half-Life
community member Filip Victor, Half-Life 2: Update offers both long-time fans
and first time players the most visually advanced, stable, and fully-featured
version of Half-Life 2 to date in one free mod download."
The Guild Wars
2 website has details on the new crafting mastery coming to Guild Wars 2
in the upcoming Heart of Thorns expansion for ArenaNet's MMORPG sequel.
In addition, they outline plans for new map bonuses that will play into this by
providing crafting materials. Here's a summary: Previously, highly
sought-after weapons were available through the Mystic Forge, purchased on the
trading post, or through drops from enemies or chests in-game. In Heart of
Thorns, players can elect to invest Mastery points in the legendary crafting
track, setting them on the journey to acquire their legendary weapon.
A related new addition arriving with the expansion is the Map Bonuses System.
This new mechanic adds regularly rotated bonuses to explorable maps offering
players crafting materials as a reward for completing events. With this system,
searching out crafting materials will be a more streamlined experience. It also
offers players incentives to return to areas to earn the materials they
need.
Valve has plans to offer "qualified" developers the HTC Vive Developer Edition
for free ("at least initially") to help jumpstart the fledgling VR game market,
reports
Ars Technica. They say some Vive Developer Editions have already gone out,
and Valve's Doug Lombardi tells them they will provide an online application for
"all interested developers, big or small," which they hope to have online by
next week. This is a stark contrast to how Oculus Rift is charging around
$350.00 for Rift development kits, which may be more than the price of the
eventual consumer units.
Valve's SteamVR page has a description of the developer edition: Built
to deliver high-end VR, the HTC Vive Developer Edition is the first look at
SteamVR. The dev kit comes with a headset, two controllers and two base
stations—everything you need to dive in and start creating new interactive VR
experiences. It will be available this spring, followed by consumer edition
hardware later in 2015.
Steam now offers Early
Access to Asteroids: Outpost, offering first crack at this survival
shooter that shares a name, if not gameplay, with the arcade classic. As noted
on
Videogamer, this is the first of several sort-of remakes they are
contemplating. "Asteroids is the first of a long series of re-births," says
Atari COO Todd Shallbetter. "And we are considering doing the same for our other
iconic games such as Warlords, Adventure, Tempest, Missile Command and many
more." Here's word on Asteroids: Outpost: Asteroids: Outpost is an open
world, sandbox survival game COMING SOON to Steam. Asteroids: Outpost puts you
in the role of a deep space prospector, harvesting your fortune and fighting off
claim jumpers in the latest exploration of the Asteroids Universe.
We are very excited to officially announce the title to the world. The
development teams at Salty Games have been hard at work creating a rich,
immersive and challenging universe to explore. We are happy to invite you to
join us on our journey to launch. We look forward to sharing more details on
game play, in-game assets, videos and beta invites over the next few weeks, so
stay tuned.
Milestone announces
MotoGP15, a new installment in their motorcycle racing series coming this
spring to Windows, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 (thanks
CarGamingBlog). The
detail how this will improve upon prior MotoGP games, summarizing thusly: "Bike,
rider, and team customisation. Enhanced career mode. New game mode. Legendary
two-stroke bikes. The 2015 MotoGP™ Season. These are the ingredients that
promise to revolutionise the game experience for all competitive motorcycling
enthusiasts and MotoGP™ championship fans." Here's
the official
announcement trailer, and here's more: One of the standout features
of this new chapter dedicated to the motorcycle world championship season – a
defining characteristic of the 2015 edition of the official videogame of the
MotoGP™ – is bike, rider, and team customisation, with more than 100 accessories
available for purchase*. Bike: choose from more than 20 bike models across 3
classes, MotoGP™, Moto2™ and Moto3™, choose from 40 different liveries with
official colour schemes, and consider offers from the main sponsors to accept
their sponsorship during races. Rider: change the colour scheme of your leathers
to match your bike, buy boots and gloves and choose your rider’s face. Motorhome:
transform your game experience with 3 different motorhomes (Basic, Mid-Range and
Top-Range), so your avatar can live in a manner befitting to their level of
stardom.
*The 3 motorhomes are available right away, and all of the 100+ accessories can
be purchased with GP Credits, a virtual currency that can be earned in any race
mode, online and offline.
The second highlight of the new title is the enhanced career mode, now fully
integrated with the customisation features. Once you have created your rider
(name, face and principal physical characteristics) you start out on the road to
becoming world champion. You’ll start racing as a Wild Card and subsequently
you’ll be able to negotiate your future career by choosing one of the official
teams participating in the 2015 championship, or choosing sponsors to race with
your own Private Team, taking to the track alongside the existing teams.
Negotiations hinge on your performance during races, meaning your customisation
options and resulting appearance are directly linked to your in-game objectives.
The third new component is the introduction of a new game-mode: Beat the Time.
In this compelling new race players are assigned a specific bike on a specific
circuit. Riders from the different classes featured in the game have set records
on that circuit and on that bike. Your aim is to beat that record.
Continue here to read the full story.
The Dirty Bomb website has word that
the multiplayer shooter is
back in
beta, saying: "Dirty Bomb is back online. For Good. No more data wipes, no
more major downtime," with
this
post offering more on how the game is "back for good."
This post has details on how you can buy the unfinished game to get closed
beta access. On a related note, part of a
Dirty Bomb interview on GameWatcher is highlighted in
a separate article focusing on one aspect of the upcoming multiplayer
shooter. In this, Splash Damage's Paul Wedgewood discusses how they are dealing
with some splash damage their reputation suffered from the bomb that was
Brink. Paul explains that customer dissatisfaction with their previous game
is one of the reasons they are taking such time to develop their next one,
saying that waiting for a game to be ready is a lesson they learned (before
temporarily forgetting it) from their collaborations with id Software. Here are
his thoughts on the situation: Talking of Brink, once we’d patched it up
people gave it really great reviews," he explained. "So think about what might
have been if I hadn’t got that launch wrong. Having lag, which is embarrassing,
shameful for a multiplayer game. The fact I didn’t catch it just drives me
potty, because as soon as we fixed that we got a great response for the game.
We’ve got such a great Metacritic score as a studio, seven consecutive hits and
then ping… Brink is yellow. And it’s our fault because we really screwed up with
the patching. So yes, absolutely, you can’t test long enough. Even after two
years we’re still picking up issues.
Crayon Chronicles is now available
on Steam, offering a
Roguelike RPG with papercraft-style graphics. A look at the game is provided by
this trailer and there
are more details on the Outer Grid
Games website, where they also offer a free playable demo. Word is: "Crayon
Chronicles offers a relatively short (2-4 hours per play-through) but
action-packed RPG experience that randomly generates the level layouts each time
you play." Continue here to read the full story.
A horrible noise started up in the basement yesterday that turned out to be the
death cries one of the circulators that pushes hot water through our radiators,
which are sadly still constantly cranking here in late March. This circulator
governed the heat in my attic office, which had been working up to that point,
but the first heating guy who looked at it seemed convinced this was related to
a problem we have getting heat to the second floor, and started discussing the
imprecision of trying to track down the clogged pipes he thought were causing
both issues. Thankfully, since we were clearly a bit in the weeds at this point,
he called in the big gun from his company, who came in like Winston Wolfe from
Pulp Fiction to set things right. He corrected the misconception the two
problems were related, earmarked the broken circulator for replacement, and
identified two valves and the likely culprits for the issue on the second floor.
The attic is warm again and the first guy is coming back today with replacement
valves, and this will likely finish the job with minimal time and expense, not
18 hours after the discussion suggested we might need to replace all our pipes.
Ah the joys of home ownership.
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