Monthly Archives: March 2009

On IGN. The Phenomic-developed, card-based RTS is in open beta at the moment, and will release at the end of March.

Looks swish. We saw this at EA’s UK event last summer and there was plenty of promise.

On IGN. This latest batch appears to have been given out with the first round of impressions, but at least they’re in one place here.

Take a look.

OnLive boss Steve Pearlman’s told MTV that making his cloud gaming service work isn’t just hard. It’s “psychophysical”.

“No one has pulled it off because it’s an immensely difficult technical and practical execution challenge, involving deep knowledge and experience across many fields,” said the company’s co-founder.

“To make OnLive work involved fundamental work in psychophysical science; custom chip, hardware and wireless engineering; complex real-time software — from the lowest- to highest-level, and real-time network engineering down to the sub-packet level.

“And, it required a deep understanding of business structure in the video game, Internet, hosting, server and consumer electronic industries. Then, finally, it required an enormous amount of just practical execution: testing the system in hundreds of homes and ironing out every wrinkle to make it operate seamlessly.”

Pow. OnLive, in theory, will let subscribers play high-end games, on demand, on pretty much any screen without the need for expensive hardware.

Hit this for more info, and do read the rest of that interview. OnLive was announced at GDC today and is expected to launch this year.

Just got this from a prominent PS3 developer at GDC: “PS3 Firmware 2.70 definitely this week. Developers got it yesterday.”

The update was rumoured to have gone live this afternoon, but was apparently withdrawn.

This source is concrete, kids. Watch for an announcement in the next few days.

Speaking in the second part of a five-part PS Blog interview series with the God of War III developer team, art director Ken Feldman has said it would have taken two PS2′s to create Kratos’s “memory footprint” in the game.

The video’s after the break. The two PS2s bit comes as part of a “things we can do now we have a PS3″ list.

What’s a memory footprint? The game’s out this year, next year, sometime, never.

More »

Joystiq’s posted up first details of Star Trek DAC, the mysterious Star Trek tie-in to be released alongside the upcoming May film.

It all comes from GDC. There’s a ton of stuff through there, including confirmation of multiplayer, the fact it’s a “top-down 3D space shooter,” and that it’ll be “available ‘near’ the launch of the movie on May 8 for XBLA, and the PSN version will follow soon after.”

There’s nothing on what DAC actually stands for, so assume it has something to do with the film’s plot.

Have a read.

Resident Evil 5’s producer Masachika Kawata has told The Gadget Show that anyone holding out for a sixth game in the horror series had better have some serious patience.

“We haven’t decided whether we’re going to make Resident Evil 6 yet,” he said.

“But if we do, it could take anywhere up to eight years, but hopefully only four.”

Um. Right. Considering eight years is a significant percentage of most people’s lifetime, we can do nothing but salute you, Capcom.

Thanks, D-Pad.

Empire: Total War’s managed yet another week on top of the American PC charts, fending off WoW, the Sims and Dawn of War II with apparent ease.

Good for you, Creative Assembly. Data for the week ending March 14. Last week’s chart here. Thanks, Shack.

1. Empire: Total War / Creative Assembly / $49
2. World Of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King / Blizzard / $39
3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe / EA Maxis / $20
4. Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II / Relic / $49
5. World Of Warcraft Battle Chest / Blizzard / $40
6. World Of Warcraft / Blizzard / $20
7. The Sims 2 Apartment Life Exp. Pack / EA Maxis / $20
8. Spore / EA Maxis / $50
9. Mystery Case Files: Return to Ravenhearst / Big Fish Games / $20
10. Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 / EA LA / $25

There’s a new Persona PSP trailer after the break, showing gameplay and cutscenes.

Chances are you already know if you’re going to be getting this, but it doesn’t hurt to look.

So do. Thanks, Destructoid. It’s out in the US this year.

More »

Oh dear. SOE’s John Smedley’s told a GDC lecture this morning that DC Universe Online will now release in 2010.

The PS3 and PC MMO was originally intended to hit this year.

Worse, SOE’s other big-name MMO, The Agency, has also been pushed back into next year.

Not so great. Thanks, Joystiq.

Jamie Durrant, a former Lionhead employee, is suing Microsoft for “hurt feelings” and lost pay to the tune of £45,000 after he claims he was abused for being openly gay.

Durrant claims that the atmosphere at work – where he’d been employed for 11 years – turned nasty after Microsoft bought the developer.

Around January of last year, Jamie says he began receiving abusive emails with subjects such as, “I’m Jim and I’m Gay,” and, “Me and my Favourite Men”.

Durrant says he was given the nickname “Fag Boy Jim”.

How pleasant.

More on the Daily Mail. Thanks, Kotaku.

Hot dog. 1UP’s Sam Kennedy reckons Satoru Iwata’s going to announce “quite a few” new games in his GDC keynote tomorrow.

From his blog:

In terms of highlights coming out of this show, I’d say Nintendo’s Iwata keynote is the one that you’ll really want to watch (Jeremy will be live blogging it tomorrow morning). I thought he was just going to be talking about Motion Plus and DSi, but it turns out he’s going to be announcing quite a few new games — for Wii, Wiiware, and Virtual Console (and this won’t just be Nintendo titles, but also third party stuff). I’ve already heard about a few of them (including one that makes me all giddy… I can’t wait for tomorrow now).

IGN said today that press are being restricted from filming after the first five minutes of the speech, which certainly indicates we’re about to see far more than a MotionPlus display.

Remember: we’ll be liveblogging it. It starts at 9.00am PST, or 4.00pm GMT if you’re on the other side of the Atlantic.

Someone over at the Epic forum‘s dig up a Chinese product page that appears to suggest a piece of Gears of War 2 DLC named Dark Corners will release in April.

Watch for a reveal tomorrow.

The game’s next major chunk of content, Snowblind, will launch at the end of this month.

Thanks, Joystiq.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that iPhone was the only way to make any money in game after the first few days of GDC. Not so.

“PixelJunk Eden made its return on investment within 24 hours,” Sony’s Susan Panico told the GamesBeat crowd today as an illustration of what can go very right about PSN releases.

Of course, Eden was a bit of an easy sell considering the franchise, but still.

Eden Encore releases in April. Thanks, Joystiq.

Microsoft just lifted the lid on a range of new 360 dev initiatives at GDC, as well as showing a blue, XNA-branded 360 dev machine. Do want.

A third Dream-Build-Play design competition has been announced. beginning April 6. The last two produced games like CarneyVale: Showtime, Weapon of Choice, and The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai.

For the 2009 competition, Microsoft is offering a cash prize and the opportunity to win an Xbox Live Arcade publishing contract.

In addition, XNA Game Studio 3.1 is being readied. New features include Avatar support, video playback, and support for Xbox Live parties.

Professional developers (as in, not those making Community games) will also find new tools for downloadable content support.

Loads more on IGN.

The blue dev kit’s shown off in shots on MTV. It’s lovely. The machine will be available to developers this summer.

Kotaku and EG have both gone live with GDC-timed play impressions of Black Rock’s Split/Second.

EG snip:

The game already makes a lot of sense in snapshot form. The controls are simple (triggers to stop and go, analogue to steer), and the selection process for explosions is automatic. Whenever you can set something off, it’s highlighted for you, and the only overlap should be the two different types of powerplay, each of which has its own button. There are also plenty of nice touches, like the HUD, where your power-bar, lap counter and race position are all stamped to your back bumper rather than spread around the screen.

That said, there’s a long way to go – all the way to early 2010 – so things like multiplayer are still question marks, although online and local options are very likely. I suggest that one person could set off explosions while others try to avoid them, and get a deadpanned “yes, I suppose you could do that”, too, with a smile. It sounds like it might be fun; interesting, but uncomplicated, and that seems to be Split/Second all over, except, as with Pure, it’s a deliberate simplicity that hides depth and consideration. In the same way that Pure was considerably more than an ATV game with trick jumps, Split/Second looks to be more than an arcade racing game with explosions.

GDC!

GTTV’s Geoff Keighley’s claimed there are going to be megaton game announcements at this year’s GDC, which is kicking off as we type.

“Interesting to see Variety expecting no Gears of War 2-level announcements at GDC,” said the journo on his Twitter.

“They are wrong. Stay tuned.”

Gears of War 2 was announced in the Microsoft keynote at last year’s GDC.

We are now officially at “shit-pant” level. Nintendo boss Iwata’s keynoting the show tomorrow morning, and Sony has a heavy presence at the San Franciscan event.

Don’t forget Kojima on Thursday.

Get all keynote and liveblog timings here.

Seriously. We’re almost vomiting with excitement. Give us the goods. Right now. Or tomorrow. Whatever.

Update: RPS has a ton of stuff on this.

Update 2: Movie after the break.

Ubisoft just announced RUSE, a cross-platform RTS for release before the end of the publisher’s current financial year in March 2010.

It’s being put together by Act of War: Direct Action developer Eugen.

“Ubisoft is known for innovation and R.U.S.E. continues that tradition, offering the most immense and detailed maps ever seen in an RTS,” said Ubisoft senior marketing VP Tony Key.

“Players can explore the maps using IRISZOOM Engine, which provides an aerial, smooth interaction unlike anything ever seen before.”

The game allows a satellite view scaling from high in the sky to right down in the action.

More on this soon. It’s coming for PC, PS3 and 360.

More »

Prince of Persia’s been halved in price on Steam today, down to £15 or $25, depending on where your cookie crumbles.

The game will be discounted until midnight tonight.

A Ubi game is to be cheapened every day this week on Steam.

Valve claimed that its Steamworks toolset “makes DRM obsolete” in a press release today, one which celebrated the addition of “Custom Executable Generation (CEG) technology” to the system.

“[CEG] compliments the already existing anti-piracy solution offered in Steamworks,” said the firm.

“A customer friendly approach to anti-piracy, CEG makes unique copies of games for each user allowing them to access the application on multiple machines without install limits and without having to install root kits.”

“As we roll out these features, we continue to look for new ways make PC games easier to create and better for customers to experiences,” said Valve co-founder Gabe Newell.

More on Shack.