Monthly Archives: June 2009

Gather ’round, kids. It’s story time. Shacknews recently couldn’t avoid stumbling over new documents pertaining to the Take-Two and 3D Realms’ Duke Nukem Forever feud because — hoo boy — within those documents lies one tall tale.

In essence, Take-Two claims that 3D Realms/Apogee wouldn’t agree to develop an Xbox 360 version of the now debatably deceased game, so Take-Two began searching for another developer to get Duke ready for his Xbox 360 close-up. This, of course, meant that 3D Realms would have to provide source code for the outsourced port.

However, that assured screaming match between Take-Two and 3D Realms never even had a chance to occur, because 3D Realms then imploded, taking DNF’s source code with it. Thus, Take-Two sued 3D Realms, since — according to the “agreement” Take-Two hasn’t been seen without since this whole thing began — 3D Realms was obligated to provide source code for the project.

Here’s where things take a turn for the outlandish, though. Take-Two believes 3D Realms has more money than it’s been letting on, claiming said secret mattress stuffed with cash is hidden in an “off-shore account.”

“Upon information and belief, Apogee has title to a substantial amount of funds deposited in an off-shore account, which Take-Two believes Apogee can use to fund its outstanding obligations,” reads the suit.

The Duke developer, of course, says the allegation is rubbish.

“3DR has been in nearly a dozen lawsuits (including against Warner and Fox). We’re always innocent, and we always win. This one is no exception. Give it a year, then the truth will come out,” said 3D Realms/Apogee founder Scott Miller.

More through the link, if you can believe it.

Sam Fisher may be hard as nails, but it sounds as though Splinter Cell: Conviction may be his last foray into the world of espionage. One more game and he’ll be in a wheelchair.

“He’s pretty old, actually,” one of the game’s developers told us, talking at E3, adding that Fisher is in his “50s” in Conviction.

Sam apparently doesn’t mind facing the rigours of middle-age, however, and was seen in fine form in LA earlier this month, torturing and killing with gay abandon.

Conviction’s out for PC and 360 towards the end of the year.

Visceral Games head Glen Schofield has told VG247 that EA is “not ready” to show any of the studio’s titles past Dante’s Inferno and Dead Space: Extraction, and has refused to be drawn on timing for a Dead Space 2 reveal.

“Our two big games are Extraction and Dante’s Inferno: we’re not ready to announce anything [else] yet, no,” Schofield said, talking in a phone interview.

“These two games are the games we’re really focussing on. One of the reasons we changed the [studio's] name [to Visceral] is to go, ‘We’re focussing on quality.’ So right now the focus is on getting these two games to the highest quality. The studio is really working on that.

“I think talking about anything other than that just takes the focus away from the games we’re working on.”

When asked specifically when we can expect to see Dead Space 2 announced, EA PR jumped in with a “no comment”.

Visceral said it was working on two unannounced games in May when it rebranded away from EA Redwood Shores.

Just after the rebranding announcement, Dead Space 2 was inadvertently announced via a developer LinkedIn profile, although the title has now been edited out of the CV.

Valve’s released source files for some of the official Team Fortress 2 maps, as detailed in this blog post.

Maps included are Lumberyard, Ravine, Badlands, Dustbowl, Granary, Gravelpit, 2Fort, Badwater, Goldrush, and Hydro.

For aspiring map-makers, this essentially allows you to edit existing levels instead of having to start from scratch.

Full thing through there.

The Sims 3 tops the US PC charts for the week ending June 6, with Sims products taking all three top slots.

Top ten below. Get all the Steam and Direct2Drive stuff from Kotaku.

1. The Sims 3
2. The Sims 3 Collector’s Edition
3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe
4. WoW: Wrath of the Lich King
5. WoW Battle Chest
6. Spore
7. Real Deal Slots Adventure
8. World Of Warcraft
9. Empire: Total War
10. Fallout 3 Operation Anchorage & The Pitt Expansion Pack

SouthPeak is offering an in-game goody in the form of Captain’s Armor to those that pre-order Section 8 through GameStop.

No word on whether or not pre-order bonuses are going to make it to Europe when the PC and 360 shooter ships this autumn.

More on Joystiq.

Rockstar VP of development Jeronimo Barrera has told Game Informer that Max Payne will be voiced by a new actor in his third game.

James McCaffrey added the vocals for the first two titles.

An older actor is to be used, apparently. The company isn’t using an established star for the role.

The game’s out this winter. Thanks, Eurogamer.

Sega of America president Simon Jeffery has left to take on a role as chief publishing officer at ngmoco.

The iPhone developer and publisher was formed by EA’s Neil Young last year.

Jeffery has been with Sega since 2003.

DJ Hero’s soundtrack will be completely exclusive, developer Freestyle’s told Kotaku.

The game will ship with over 80 mixes later this year.

Gorillaz, David Bowie, Nirvana and Rick James are all includes in the title’s track-list.

There’s more through there.

Realtime Worlds’ Dave Jones has called on the UK government to invest more heavily in the games industry in an effort to help it maintain its position in the global trade.

“Let’s make sure we invest in careers to” keep Britain at the “cutting edge” of the global industry, he told BBC News today.

The interview took place at Realtime’s Scottish offices. And yep, APB was on the screens.

Jones, the original creator of Grand Theft Auto, noted that “some of the biggest ever games in the world have come out of the UK.”

The BBC’s TV report described games as a “huge growth area”.

Britain’s creative industry’s in general will contribute £85 billion to the economy by 2013, said the piece, and employ some 1.3 million people.

Call of Duty: World at War has now sold more than 11 million units, Activision’s confirmed.

The game launched in November 2008.

“These outstanding feats would have never been possible without the continued dedication and support from all of the loyal Call of Duty fans. For that, we at Treyarch and Activision would like to extend our sincerest thank you,” said the two firms in a blog post.

An In-Stat report has claimed that US revenues from watching TV content on games consoles will reach $2.9 billion by 2013.

Apparently, 29 percent of American 29-35 year-olds that own a games machine use it to watch downloaded or streaming video.

Game consoles as in-home content delivery networks are quickly gaining on the more traditional cable outlets, with a forecast of 10.7 million consoles making up a portion of the 24 million homes viewing web-to-TV content come 2013.

More on Kotaku.

If you were undecided on whether or not to shell out for Burnout Paradise’s Legendary car DLC a way back, you’ll be pleased to know you can unlock Toy versions from Big Surf Island.

You just have to do stuff. Like hit all 45 island billboards. Stuff like that. Full details on Joystiq.

As games become services, EA COO John Pleasants has told Venturebeat, the standard model of how the general development industry operated will be thrown out the window. Probably into a “dumpster”.

“If you believe all games will eventually be services — as I do — then the idea of game teams that make a game, ship it, and then do something else goes away,” he said.

“They will now ship and day one begins when the customer gives feedback to the live service. The way you distribute will be different. The way you charge will be different. There will be more permutations in pricing. Merchandising will be much more important. Co-marketing will be much more important.

“You have to have persistent identification and entitlements for a user, no matter where they are or in what game they’re playing.”

EA is currently in the process of onlinifying Tiger Woods, the thin end of what will obviously be a rather large wedge.

There’s a good interview through there.

You know the drill. Music. For Rock Band. Genre: country. Costs $29.99. Out July 21. Tracks:

1. Alan Jackson Good Time
2. Brad Paisley Mud on the Tires
3. Brooks & Dunn Hillbilly Deluxe
4. Cross Canadian Ragweed Cry Lonely
5. Dierks Bentley Free and Easy (Down the Road I Go)
6. Dixie Chicks Sin Wagon
7. Drive-By Truckers 3 Dimes Down
8. Jason Aldean She’s Country
9. Keith Urban I Told You So
10. Kenny Chesney She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy
11. Kenny Rogers The Gambler
12. Lucinda Williams Can’t Let Go
13. Martina McBride This One’s For The Girls
14. Miranda Lambert Gunpowder & Lead
15. Montgomery Gentry Gone
16. Rascal Flatts Me and My Gang
17. Sara Evans Suds In The Bucket
18. Shania Twain Any Man of Mine
19. Steve Earle Satellite Radio
20. Trace Adkins Swing
21. Willie Nelson On the Road Again

All details after the break.

More »

Acti’s put out the latest Wolfenstein trailer, this time focusing on the Assassin. After the break.

He’s great, and all, but surely if you’re an assassin you might want to not glow?

This is supposed to be out this month, but there’s no fixed date. Still “summer”.

More »

Gearbox boss Randy Pitchford’s told Kotaku that Aliens: Colonial Marines is still in the works, but won’t happen this year.

It was supposed to hit 2009.

Everything went a little awry in the world of Aliens when Sega decided to can the RPG Obsidian was basing on the franchise in February.

But still. All’s well that ends well. Ish.

Kotaku and CNET have had emails from Blizzard telling them to get their BattleNet accounts in order and submit info by June 19. That’s this Friday.

As IncGamers points out, this doesn’t mean the StarCraft II beta’s starting this weekend.

But it probably does mean it’s extremely close. You’ll find out very, very soon. There’s that hunch again.

Ubi UK’s just put a September 25 release on TMNT Smash Up. This’ll presumably mean that’s the Euro date as well, but hang fire on that.

The game’s a Wii-exclusive fighting thing, looking not amazingly dissimilar to Smash Bros.: Game Arts is doing it, so that’s no major shock.

Ubi’s releasing a Classics and Platinum edition of Far Cry 2 on June 26, the company said today.

Play’s listing the new version at £15 for both 360 and PS3.

Do yourself a favour. Silly not to at that price.