Monthly Archives: February 2009

DICE has released a list of the big names now convened in Las Vegas for DICE, and it’d be fair to say that anyone with half a brain and a dictaphone could do some serious damage. Maybe we’ll go next year.

Here’s who’s there:

• Gabe Newell – Valve, Founder
• John Riccitiello – Electronic Arts, CEO
• Jun Takeuchi – Capcom, Producer
• Randy Jackson – The Planning Center, President
• Chris Cao – SOE Austin, Creative Director
• David Perry – Acclaim Entertainment, Creative Officer
• Lars Gustavsson – D.I.C.E. Studios/EA, Creative Director
• Bruce Shelley – Ensemble Studio
• Rich Hilleman – Electronic Arts, Chief Creative Director
• Chris Taylor – Gas Powered Games, Creative Director
• Mona Hamilton – Capcom, VP Marketing
• Dan Bilson – THQ, SVP Creative Director
• Ted Price – Insomniac Games
• J. Paul Raines – GameStop, COO
• Anita Frazier – NPD, Senior Analyst
• Brian Raffel – Raven Software, Co-Founder & Studio Head
• Alex Laurant – Lucas Arts & ILM, Art Director
• Todd Howard – Bethesda Studios, Game Director
• Alex Evans – Media Molecule, Co-Founder
• Tom Prata – Nintendo
• Ben Bell – Maxis/EA, Producer
• Ralph Osterhout – Serial Inventor
• Michael Denny & Mike Haigh

Gabe Newell gave his keynote last night, focussing on entertainment as service.

The event ends tomorrow. The Interactive Achievement Awards are being broadcast live tonight.

Valve boss Gabe Newell stuck to familiar ground in his DICE keynote last night, saying the best way to reach new customers is through the word of mouth of your existing clients.

“The old way was using intermediaries,” Newell said. “The product would be sold through retailers or other intermediaries.

“You were really focused on spending three years to build value for your customers to get through the friction of the retail experience.”

When you focus on entertainment as a service, on the other hand, “you will use your customer base to reach new customers, and your focus is much more about providing ongoing value to your customers – maybe every three weeks, or even more often than that.”

To illustrate the point, Newell rolled out some frankly disturbing Steam stats.

• 20 million people connected
• All major PC publishers on board
• 350+ of the best PC games
• Worldwide in 21 languages
• 100% Year-over-year growth since 2004

Get a fuller reports on Gamasutra and G4. From the look of it, the only announcement as such was that Valve’s making a Team Fortress 2 comic.

Epic’s confirmed a major new pack for Unreal Tournament 3.

The Titan Pack will release on March 5, and will contain the following, according to BeyondUnreal:

• Two new gametypes: Greed and Betrayal
• One new mutator: Titans
• 16 new maps: 6 Deathmatch, 4 Warfare, 3 CTF, 3 VCTF
• Two new weapons: Stinger Turret and The Eradicator Cannon
• Two new deployables: The X-Ray Field and the Link Station
• One new powerup: The Portable Slow Field
• Two new characters: Kana of the Ronin and Nova of Liandri
• One new vehicle: The Axon Stealthbender
• All due on: March 5, 2009.

Get playtests on IGN and Eurogamer.

Nintendo’s confirmed an April 3 release date for DSi in Europe, two days before the machine’s release in the US.

Australians get it a day earlier, on April 2.

The upgraded handheld will retail for £150. It’s going to cost $170 in America.

You’re going to be able to buy black and white versions in Europe.

Terminal Reality announced licensing details for its Infernal Engine today.

The tech powering the upcoming Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Infernal is being shown at DICE as we speak (using The Stranger from Nocturne).

Press release after the break.

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SouthPeak has reported a 76 percent increase in revenue for the three month ending December 2008.

The period brought in $17.3 million compared to the same quarter in 2007, in which the company reported revenue of $4.2 million.

“We are very pleased with our solid financial results for the quarter,” said SouthPeak chairman Terry Phillips.

“We attribute the strong financial results to our diversified portfolio, tightly managed costs, and strict supervision of the retail channel and field inventory levels.”

SouthPeak said demand for DS’s My Baby contributed to the strong quarter.

MadWorld isn’t even out yet and there’s already talk of a possible sequel.

Platinum’s Atsushi Inaba has said that, “Platinum Games has several rights so we’ll be developing something new after this, but if there is a lot of interest in MadWorld then maybe we will make another one.”

Sounds solid. Mad, even. The first game’s out for Wii next month.

D3 is to bring a “classic” Matt Hazard title to PSN and XBLA this summer.

Just what it’s about is not known at this time, but the company did release some interesting-looking concept art for it today.

Also, as a friendly reminder, Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard will be released on March 3.

More on Shacknews.

Cryptic’s put out 47 screens of Champions Online, mostly new with a smattering of old. The new stuff looks fantastic. They’re on CVG.

It’s been a big day for the MMO, what with a June release date now confirmed and rumour of a PS3 version popping up this afternoon.

Looks good, innit?

You have to love it when the ESRB provides information on games before publishers do: today it did just that with Punch Out!! for Wii.

The listing describes it thus:

This is a boxing game in which players compete in boxing matches against a cast of colorful, fictional characters. While players can use standard boxing moves (jabs, hooks, uppercuts), most fights are performed in a comical fashion with an assortment of “dizzy stars,” “cartoony” sound effects, and slapstick signature moves (e.g., growling, dropping shorts, conking oneself on the head, twirling, etc.). Boxers’ faces show lumps and bruises after taking damage, and some knockouts are depicted in slow motion as players are sent flying across the canvass. One character flexes his pectoral and glute muscles prior to a fight, while another boxer belches during a cutscene.

We’ve put a call into Nintendo for release date information, so hopefully soon we’ll have more details.

The game was revealed during Nintendo’s press conference last October. Next Level’s the developer.

Thanks, GoNintendo.

Folks who play the Orange Box via Steam will get an engine update next time they log in.

The specific changes include:

• Updated the engine to report SteamIDs using the Steam_0 format instead of Steam_1
• Fixed problems in Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Portal, and Source mods running the current Orange Box engine
• Reverted the change that capped rate at 30,000

For more information hit the link.

Crytek now owns all of the rights to Free Radical projects including TimeSplitters, says 1UP.

Free Radical was at work on the shooter franchise when they were bought out, but this doesn’t mean another TimeSplitters game is a given, says managing director Anvi Yerli.

“At this early stage we’re looking into all possibilities, but it’s just too early to say,” he said.

Nor is the company’s internal focus “linked to bringing Crysis to consoles”.

With the merge, the firm has been renamed Crytek UK and plans to rehire some of the 185 staff laid off in December.

Nicely done there.

Epic’s given out $70,000 in prizes to the best Unreal Tournament modders on the intertubes, the second phase of the Make Something Unreal Tournament.

The winners will be showcased at GDC next month.

Phase 3 of the contest begins in April, and has an entry deadline of May 15. Participation in previous phases is not necessary.

You can download all the winners now. Eurogamer‘s linked to every single one, in a piece that was probably a scream to write.

Blizzard has posted some information regarding new dungeon Ulduar, to be included in the next World of Warcraft patch.

The dungeon encompasses two separate raiding areas and you’ll need the help of siege vehicles to help you assault the denizens guarding the entrance.

Once inside, you can expect a face-to-face encounter with an enormous tank called The Flame Leviathan. Normal spells and abilities won’t work against it, so those new siege machines should come in handy.

Sounds harrowing.

More goodies are on the official site.

SCEE’s taking Killzone 2 on tour in Britain, allowing gamers in Brighton, Birmingham and Manchester to get their hands on the game and experience “briefings, training – and ultimately battle.”

Sounds rough, and probably tumble. Brighton’s just down the road from us, so we’ll pop along, take some pictures and whatnot.

Timings to be announced next week.

The game’s out on February 27.

Puzzle Quest: Galactrix still does not have a solid release date for XBLA.

Speaking with VG247, a D3 rep told us that while the game is scheduled for release on DS and PC February 24, a date still has not been set for the XBL version.

“Puzzle Quest: Galactrix for DS and PC are confirmed to ship to retail on February 24. We’ll also offer several digital download options for PC starting that day. We have not confirmed a live date for the XBLA version of Puzzle Quest: Galactrix at this time,” said the spokesperson.

Developer Infinite Interactive was also unsure when their puzzler would be made available due to the fact that, “XBLA dates often move around at the whims of Microsoft”.

Couldn’t have said it better ourselves. We’ll let you know when we do.

Developer Jonathan Blow’s announced a drop of $5 to the PC version of Braid, as seen on his blog.

“Yesterday, Stardock announced that they would be selling Braid at the end of March for $19.95,” he said. “This price has proven to be unpopular in certain areas of the Internets, so I’ve reduced it to $14.95.

“Pre-orders from Stardock have not been charged yet, so if you pre-ordered at $20 you will still get the game for $15.”

Go Blow. The PC version of his time-warping puzzler’s out on March 31.

Oh dear. GI’s reporting that some Xbox Live users who let their Microsoft Passport Hotmail accounts expire are at risk of getting their Gamer Scores wiped. For good.

“The only alternative is to set up a new Gamertag with your preferred email address,” said a rep today.

Yep, that’s right. Anyone hit by the fault will lose all Achievements and score completely, even if they’ve been working at it for the past four years.

Microsoft’s investigating the problem, apparently. You’d bloody hope so.

Yep, that’s right. Pre-orders for Nintendo’s DSi will start tomorrow, and you can reserve one after you drop $25 on the counter.

A call put in to the local GameStop confirmed that the number of DSi units per store would match the number of units reserved. At best, they may have two or three extra, so if you want one day one — best reserve it.

Also, just a quick note to all customers who get those nifty little discount coupons in the mail: The 30 percent bonus on all games traded towards the purchase of a new DS system doesn’t apply to the DSi.

Bummer.

Criterion just put out some videos of its Legendary Pack cars in action, and very swish they look too. See the hover car hover. See the others drive quickly down roads. It’s all happening.

After the break. You’ll be able to buy all these tomorrow.

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