Page 1 of 2: Page 1 Page 1 Page 2 Capcom knows how to throw a party. At a press event held last night in San Francisco, the publisher presented a veritable circus of spectacular sights. We saw new games or media for franchises Resident Evil , Devil May Cry , Mega Man , Lost Planet and Phoenix Wright . We were introduced to a brand new way to play the Wii with Project Treasure Island Z . Heck, they
Kingdom of Amalur's best quest, House of Ballads
Why I Love
I first realized what the House of Ballads was about–and that it might be something special–when I stumbled across a quest called ‘Reprisal, Reprised’.
In Why I Love, PC Gamer writers pick an aspect of PC gaming that they love and write about why it's brilliant. Today Jody celebrates a great quest in the overlooked RPG, Amalur.
I first realized what the House of Ballads was about–and that it might be something special–when I stumbled across a quest called ‘Reprisal, Reprised’. A young woman in some old ruins explained that the magic blue elf-people called Ballads Fae revere stories so much they re-live their legends in an endless cycle, like actors performing the same plays forever. One of those Ballads told of a troll who lived in these ruins, a beast so greedy he swallowed a ruby ring. If I helped her set the stage for that story the troll would appear, just like in the tale–and that we could kill it, dig the ring out of its stomach lining, and pawn it for cash. She’d figured out how to tap into the myth cycle of an immortal supernatural race, and used that knowledge to farm them for loot. It was both an arch comment on the repeatable quests of MMOs and a clever little story of its own.
Fantasy games love to show off their slightly tweaked versions of the traditional fantasy races. “Our elves are different! They’re super racist!” But in Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning they really were different, which was surprising in a game that in so many other ways played it straight, with its textbook amnesiac chosen one hero trudging through a main questline about saving the world from an ancient evil. Like The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion it was the kind of game where you needed to go off-piste to find the good stuff, deviating from the tale it wanted to tell. You needed to travel to Sidequest Country.
The House of Ballads is a faction tucked away in the north of Amalur’s map, and their job is to guard the legendarium of the Summer Fae, who are the nice-guy elves of the setting. (You can tell because they have terrible Irish accents.) The Fae are sort of immortal, reborn into new bodies shortly after they die, but what makes them unique is the way that’s incorporated into their culture. Their limitless lifespans leave them in no rush to achieve things for posterity and so instead they happily repeat stories from a romantic past when knights and rogues rescued kings and slew trolls.
When you arrive there’s an opening in the role of Sir Sagrell, the hero who slays a fairytale villain called Bloody Bones. While normally everything in the Ballads plays out according to the script this time something’s gone wrong, and Sagrell fell before his time. The Fae are so bewildered by this unexpected twist they’ll even allow a mortal like you to step into the role, so long as you promise to play it by the book. But Bloody Bones isn’t following the Cliffs Notes and refuses to give up and die on the end of your sword (or those Omniblade daggers you unlocked by having Mass Effect 3 registered to the same account). Bloody Bones has become convinced his ending’s not written in stone.
Behind this rewriting is the Maid of Windermere, one of the Winter Fae who plays head villain in a myth arc called The Telling. Where the Summer Fae represent growth, the Winter Fae are all about decay and destruction, and the Maid thinks it’s time the Ballads themselves were destroyed. But winter knows summer will follow it, and the Maid only wants to corrupt The Telling so the Summer Fae can grow a new one rather than being chained to their canon. She wants to be rid of the clichés of questing fantasy heroes, to find new stories to tell.
The Ballads Fae who have been captured by the Maid have been enchanted by her magic, but they talk like they’ve been liberated. Sir Farrara looks with wonder on the chance to be whatever he wants; Queen Belmaid revels in not having to be subservient to a king who is inferior to her just because that’s what the Ballads dictate. Whoever you choose to side with–of course it boils down to a binary moral decision, this is still a fantasy RPG–the Ballads will be permanently altered by your actions.
Our lifespans may not be limitless, but given the number of worlds we can immerse ourselves in via games we can live plenty of lives if we choose. Like the House of Ballads we can find meaning and comfort in re-telling our favorite stories, and there’s value in that, but we can also strive for something different. Even if it is in a sidequest tucked away in the corner of a familiar map.
Ken Levine's fascinating, lengthy BAFTA Q&A is now available to watch online
If you have an hour-and-a-bit of time spare today, you could do a lot worse than to spend it watching this recently uploaded BAFTA Q&A with Irrational Games' Ken Levine, in which he chats about System Shock 2, BioShock and BioShock Infinite - well, the clue was in the name of the presentation: 'From Shodan, to Big Daddy, to Elizabeth: The Evolution of AI Companions'.
with Irrational Games' Ken Levine, in which he chats about System Shock 2, BioShock and BioShock Infinite - well, the clue was in the name of the presentation: 'From Shodan, to Big Daddy, to Elizabeth: The Evolution of AI Companions'. It's a fascinating talk, particularly if you're interested in the history of the series and the company, or game stories in general - and something of a tasty main course after the recent bombardment of BioShock Infinite trailers.
Levine talks us through the history of the series in the first part of the hour-plus video - paying particular attention to his approach to narrative and choice - before chatting to journalist Simon Parkin, and eventually taking questions from the audience. It's totally worth a watch, unless you're (understandably) on a BioShock blackout in anticipation of Infinite's imminent March 26th release.
Use Logic to Complete a Slick 60s Spy Thriller In Agent A
Animated in a stylish, 60s-influenced manner, Agent A sees its titular agent pursue deadly femme fatale Ruby La Rouge to her secret hideaway.
sees its titular agent pursue deadly femme fatale Ruby La Rouge to her secret hideaway. The game is for phones and tablets, and comes from Yak & co. It is the winner of the PAX Aus Indie Showcase 2015.
Agent A is a spy-themed puzzle game, driven by inventory and environment interaction. La Rouge has been dispatching A’s fellow agents, and he must use his logic to infiltrate her hideout and capture her. The puzzles are designed to reward careful observation and thought, and to make sure the player should never have to just test things out until something works: they have to keep track of their surroundings like a talented agent.
The game is comprised of 15 rooms for exploration, 30 inventory-based puzzles, and 20 puzzle screens. The stylized animation combines 2- and 3-dimensional designs, and is created by Mark White, who makes up Yak & co alongside coder Jason Rawlings. Between them the pair have over 25 years of industry experience, and previously spent five years working together at Millipede.
Agent A is available for iOS 7.0 or later on iPhone, iPad, and iTouch. It’s downloadable for $2.99 from the App Store. For more information check out the game’s website, or Yak & co’s website, Facebook, or Twitter.
Mega Man Legends 3 cancelation was your fault
There's also this helpful back and forth. July 21, 2011 Source: 1UP.com , Twitter Topics Action Mega Man Legends We recommend By Zergnet Load Comments
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning developers find a new home courtesy of Epic Games
There's a light at the end of the tunnel for a few of those left jobless by the closure of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning developers Big Huge Games, thanks to Unreal Engine chiefs Epic Games.
Epic President Dr. Mike Capps - who, I now realise, has one of the most dramatic titles in the industry - has revealed in athat the developer will be setting up a new studio in Baltimore to house a number of ex-Big Huge Games staff.
"On Wednesday, the ex-BHG leadership team contacted us." Capps explains. "They wanted to start a new company and keep together some of the key talent displaced by the layoff, and hoped that they could use an Epic IP as a starting point for a new game. We loved that they all wanted to keep working together, but it was pretty clear they'd have trouble building a demo and securing funding before their personal savings ran out."
"In one of life's coincidences, Epic's directors had spent the morning discussing how we'd love to build even more successful projects with our growing team, but that we'd need a dramatic infusion of top talent to do so. Which, we all knew, was impossible."
"So now we're planning to start an impossible studio in Baltimore."
Capps also mentions that some displaced developers are moving on to Zynga East and Zenimax Online, which suggests that a number of ex-Copernicus developers could find their way onto The Elder Scrolls Online. Hopefully that means their MMO ambitions will be realised after all.
The new studio doesn't have a name yet, and there's a lot still to be arranged - but it's good news for those affected by the problems at Big Huge Games and 38 Studios.
The Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning developers hit financial difficulties last month when 38 Studios failed to make a loan repayment to the state of Rhode Island. Making one payment wasn't enough to keep the studio afloat, and company-wide layoffswere announced shortly afterwards.
PC Gamer US Podcast #344 - Galactic Bully
This week we speculate on the nature of the unexpected layoffs at Valve , and also discuss the future of Gas Powered Games , the state of Kickstarter as a financing platform, and celebrate the re-arrival of System Shock 2 .
Listen to PC Gamer Podcast 343: Galactic Bully
Have a question, comment, complaint, or observation? Leave a voicemail: 1-877-404-1337 ext. 724 or email the MP3 to pcgamerpodcast@gmail.com.
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@ELahti(Evan Lahti)
@tyler_wilde(Tyler Wilde)
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Jump to Section: Best Price Comments “I told you what I was and now you see,” says Cassidy to Jesse Custer in the nasty, dim yellow light of the back room in Tulip’s house. He’s just finished drinking the blood of one of Annville’s more hapless idiots. Struggling to recover after setting himself dramatically on fire , Cassidy’s a mess of scars, burned hair and dried blood from the animals Tulip’s been
Mega Man is dead, and why that’s a good thing
The following is a guest editorial from frequent GamesRadar contributor Jim Sterling. For our response, and our thoughts on the fate of Mega Man, listen to TalkRadar podcast episode 168 this Friday. To say that Capcom has found itself on the receiving end of some ill will lately would be an insultingly mild understatement. Since the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3 last week, the publisher has suffered
38 Studios auction finds no buyers for Kingdoms of Amalur rights, "Copernicus" MMO
An auction to sell off the assets of shuttered game developer 38 Studios found no buyers for either its unfinished MMO—known as Project Copernicus—or the rights to RPG Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning , according to a report in the Providence Journal.
in the Providence Journal. The Wednesday auction was part of an ongoing effort to recover funds following the bankruptcy and closureof the Rhode Island developer in 2012.
The auction did find some success by selling off the rights to Rise of Nationsand its spin-off Rise of Legends, in addition to the trademark for Big Huge Games, the subsidiary company that helped develop Reckoning. The entire auction raised $320,000, according to the lawyer managing the sale, Richard J. Land.
“The Receiver did not receive acceptable offers for the remaining lots, including Project Copernicus, 38 Studios' in-development Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, and Helios, 38 Studios' integrated social media platform," said Land in a statement, according to the Providence Journal.
Both the Curt Schilling-founded 38 Studios as well as Big Huge Games saw difficulty soon after the release of Reckoning in early 2012 and subsequently missed paymentson millions of dollars in loans from the government of Rhode Island. The Copernicus MMO had once been projected to be releasedearlier this year, but now looks unlikely to ever see the light of day.
Thanks, Game Industry International.
System Shock 2 arrives on Steam
The infection spreads.
System Shock 2, the atmospheric and genre-defining brainchild of Bioshock:Infinite designer Ken Levine, has been released on Steam. Originally published in 1999, System Shock 2 blended RPG and FPS elements with a cyberpunk flair right out of a William Gibson techno-nightmare.
System Shock 2 was already the most requested game on GOG.comwhen it was released there in February, and will likely see similar interest on Steam due to its nostalgic pull and its competitive price point.
The Steam version lacks achievements at the moment, but handily advertises full German-language audio support, just in case you want to reach a whole new level of alienation. Sometimes I just feel like survival-horror is best experienced in a foreign language.
To prep yourself for the cybernetic terror that awaits you, check out Tom Francis's take on the classic title in his Reinstallrun-down or spend some time with Ken Levineas he talks about the history of the System Shock series during a recent BAFTA Q&A.
For a decidedly less-terrifying but still interesting peak into the background of System Shock 2, Irrational Games has excavated some original concept sketches. They even include the original coffee stains.
Explore Meditation Through Games with SoundSelf
Conceptual games often have loftier goals than simply that of entertainment, and SoundSelf is no exception.
is no exception. A project by Robin Arnott(sound creator for Antichamber , and developer of the isolation terror-fest Deep Sea), SoundSelf is a project geared toward relaxation and exploration of the mind through music and sound.
(As someone who suffers from seizures, I should warn that there are sequences in some of the press videos which may exacerbate migraines or seizure disorders. Please use precaution when previewing this game, whether here or on another site.)
SoundSelf , slated for release this year, is described as an LSD-inspired experience that encompasses Burning Man (the music festival) in a computer simulator. The player (or players – all can use the same microphone) can sing, chant, or do whatever noise-making relaxes them, and SoundSelf will repeat complimentary tones back while creating a visual representation of the sounds on-screen. The result is a feedback loop designed to help the player become refreshed and relaxed.
“Green Eye Large” – one of the patterns that can be created by the player’s voice.
After a very successful Kickstartercampaign in 2013, which included prototype downloads, SoundSelf has been Greenlit on Steam, and is available for pre-order via Humble for $15, and is playable on both PC and Mac. (If you’re excited and would like to try the alpha now, you can do so for $30 at that order link.) SoundSelf is also designed for use with the Oculus Rift, bringing an even more immersive experience to the player.
For more information, please contact the developer on Twitter, follow the game’s progress on Facebook, and keep your eye on IGM for an upcoming interview with Robin Arnott soon!
Mega Man coming to Nintendo 3DS, unsurprisingly, in 3D. Feel free to 'w00t!' to your heart's content
3D Mega Man! In 3D! My apologies for making that opening utterance sound like the bullet-point-flogging raving of a desperate PR, but I promise you that both ‘3D’s were relevant. Because Mega Man Legends, Capcom’s no-fixed-2D-plane, look-he’s-got-polygons-and-everything series from the PS1 days, is getting a sequel on the 3DS. In 3D. Okay, those details I mentioned? Not so many actually. We know that
Kingdoms of Amalur developer makes loan payment, Copernicus MMO due in 2013
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning developers 38 Studios have paid off part of their debt to the state of Rhode Island, governor Lincoln Chafee has announced.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning developers 38 Studios have paid off part of their debt to the state of Rhode Island, governor Lincoln Chafee has announced. Earlier in the month, the studio missed a payment of $1.1m, prompting fears about the future of Copernicus, its long-standing MMO project.
As reported by Joystiq, Chafee went on to announce that Copernicus will be released in June of 2013. At the same time, 38 Studios released a showreel - which you can view above - revealing the game's environments. If nothing else, it all but confirms that Copernicus is set in the same world as Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.
The timing of the video suggests that 38 Studios are looking to drum up confidence in the project following their shakey start to the month. Their financial troubles aren't over, however: they'll owe another $2.6m in November, and a further $12.6m in 2013. Given that this is the first we're seeing of the game, a release date only thirteen months away seems ambitious to say the least. On the other hand, there are some genuinely pretty vistas on display. At this point, the responsibility lies with 38 Studios to prove that there's a game in place to match them.
"I want to make sure we're doing everything possible to make sure 38 doesn't fail" Chafee told the press, but emphasised that there'd be no further state support for the developer. "It's time for them to go out and get private capital funding. That's the deal. It's a generous deal, but stick to it."
System Shock 2 might be getting a re-release on GOG and Steam
It seems classic horror shooter and BioShock precursor System Shock 2 may finally be available for purchase again soon.
It seems classic horror shooter and BioShock precursor System Shock 2 may finally be available for purchase again soon. An article on FleshEatingZipperreveals the news and points to the site for Night Dive Studios. The only problem is that the studio's page conspicuously lacks contact details or a firm announcement, so we can't verify the claim just yet. We certainly hope it's really happening.
FleshEatingZipper reports that unnamed sources told it a "new development/publishing studio will be handling the release," and later updated the article to specify Night Dive as that studio. Night Dive's own site describes it as specializing in "finding classic, abandoned, and forgotten PC games and bringing them back into the hands of gamers," but that's about all the information it offers.
We were able to dig up a Facebook page, as well as the LinkedIn profile of Stephen Kick, a former Sony Online Entertainment character artist who is listed as CEO of the new studio. We've contacted Kick for more details, and will update this article should they be presented.
UFHO2 Invades Desktops and iPads
After a successful Kickstarter campaign back in early 2012, UFHO2 recently launched on Desura , the Humble Store , and the Apple App Store for mobile devices.
for mobile devices. It’s a turn-based, competitive strategy board game with brand new stages, board layouts, characters, and game modes; UFHO2 is a sequel to the 2009 Flash game known as, you guessed it, UFHO . The game features a story mode with ten different planets, which equates to over thirty different matches in total.
UFHO2 has a cross-platform endless online and local multiplayer mode (iOS included). There are ten different alien races to unlock, and each race features its own unique power. Several of these will be recognizable from other indie titles including World of Goo , Gish , Super Crate Box , and Bit.Trip . Using strategy and logic, the player must navigate the maze-like game board and beat opponents by reaching the Gems first. Different alien worlds will contain different level layouts, forcing players to keep up with the constantly changing game style.
In early 2010, Ciro Continisio and Francesco D’Andrea joined together to make Tiny Colossus; their main focus was creating a sequel to UFHO , which Continisio had created in 2009 at a different studio. Game design was forced to a halt after Continisio was offered a better job at a studio. In the end of 2011 into 2012, they returned their focus onto the sequel by launching a Kickstartercampaign. The campaign was a success, but the longer development time for UFHO2 caused the development funds to run out.
In early 2013, game development was brought to a standstill once again. Recently, Continisio found extra funds for development and started to push forth, once again, towards completing the game. Progression was made in January 2014, and now the game is ready for release.
After a difficult road through development, UFHO2 is now available for desktop via the aforementioned markets: Desuraand the Humble Storefor desktops, as well as for the iPad via the Apple App Store. The desktop version is on sale for $8.79 USD on sale until April 15th (full price $10.99 USD), and the iPad version on sale for $3.99 USD (full price $4.99 USD).
New Alice: Madness Returns trailer is gorgeous, horrific
MSNBC has the scoop on the latest Alice: Madness Returns trailer, as well as an interview with creator American McGee, who, despite his other projects, is probably still best known for the original, 11-year-old American McGee's Alice. Madness Returns is a direct sequel to the cult classic, and takes place eleven years (you're a clever one, McGee) after Alice first fell into a morosely corrupted Wonderland
Kingdoms of Amalur devs in difficulty after missing state loan payment
38 Studios appear to be having some problems paying back hefty loans owed to the state of Rhode Island.
Blue's Newshighlight a report from the Boston Heraldsaying that the studio missed a $1.1m payment at the start of the month and are now requesting more money.
Studio founder and former baseball star Curt Schilling held a private meeting with state officials earlier today to discuss the state of the company. Afterwards, officials responded by deciding to not decide anything for a short while. With taxpayer money on the line, the studio could face hard times ahead.
The board are planning to consult industry advisers to get a better picture of 38 Studio's current status and take action later. “We're making a good decision by not making a decision,” said board chairman/governor Lincoln Chafee.
38 Studios released their first game, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning earlier this year. It didn't do badly, but it's taken a long, long time to make. The studio's aspirations to build an MMO could explain the problematic financial situation they seem to find themselves in. They're famously expensive to make and maintain.
38 Studios execs haven't commented on the failed loan payment but a beleaguered Curt Schilling said this to reporters after the hearing. “My priority right now is to get back to my company. My priority right now is to get back to my teammates.” Hopefully it's just a blip and the studio can turn their fortunes around.
System Shock 2 might be getting a re-release on GOG and Steam
It seems classic horror shooter and BioShock precursor System Shock 2 may finally be available for purchase again soon.
It seems classic horror shooter and BioShock precursor System Shock 2 may finally be available for purchase again soon. An article on FleshEatingZipperreveals the news and points to the site for Night Dive Studios. The only problem is that the studio's page conspicuously lacks contact details or a firm announcement, so we can't verify the claim just yet. We certainly hope it's really happening.
FleshEatingZipper reports that unnamed sources told it a "new development/publishing studio will be handling the release," and later updated the article to specify Night Dive as that studio. Night Dive's own site describes it as specializing in "finding classic, abandoned, and forgotten PC games and bringing them back into the hands of gamers," but that's about all the information it offers.
We were able to dig up a Facebook page, as well as the LinkedIn profile of Stephen Kick, a former Sony Online Entertainment character artist who is listed as CEO of the new studio. We've contacted Kick for more details, and will update this article should they be presented.
The Sun At Night Review – Homeward Bound
Crashing landing on Earth, Laika crawls from her ruined pod, unable to remember where she is or how she got there.
Crashing landing on Earth, Laika crawls from her ruined pod, unable to remember where she is or how she got there. She finds her plasma cannon close by among the wreckage, attaching it to its holster above her hind legs before she continues on…
Every so often, a game comes along with just the right amount of narrative, character depth, and combat pacing.latest projecthas nailed all of the above and more.
Prepare to be blown a way by an immersive experience where you take the part of Laika, a canine astronaut sent into space, only to crash land back on earth in the midst of a power struggle in Soviet Russia. Do you think you’ve heard part of this story before? Well in fact you have, Laika was an actual soviet space dog sent up in Sputnik II on November 3, 1957. Unfortunately, the Soviets had no de-orbiting technology at the time, and Laika’s fate was sealed as the first animal to orbit the Earth. While Laika’s real-life story ends there, Minicore Studios has taken this sad event and tried to continue the adventure. “What that kind of said to us, is maybe in fiction, in our game, we can think of some way to make it right,” said Peter Odom, the Creative Director of Minicore Studios .
The Sun at Night is a 2D side scrolling action adventure game with fast paced combat, an impressive amount of character progression, and a solid narrative to stand on as you learn the story of what the world has become after Laika lands back in Russia. From the very start, the game feels reminiscent of Megaman X , as the tutorial introduces game mechanics, setting, and story seamlessly without having to rely on text frames or novelized help screens with an endless amount of reading. It goes so far as to make sure that you as the player lose one of the first fights in the game, nudging you to want to upgrade your weapons, shields, and movement capabilities to be able to come back and handle those tougher fights later on.
There are quite a few weapons to choose from; you start off with a blaster which can be charged to fire off a larger shot (yes there is another Mega Man parallel there), and you’re able to upgrade each weapon individually, or based on their grouping. The upgrade system includes an Offensive, Defensive and Utility tree, each with their own aspects from double jumping and hacking, to an increasing shield regen rate and weapon power. The game really allows you to customize your own gameplay around how you’d like to play it, and then rewards you for choosing a style. At the end of each progression tree is a powerful ability that makes maxing out that skill tree worthwhile.
The combat itself is introduced fairly well; the first weapon you find you can either pop off a few small shots before it overheats and you have to wait for it to cool, or you can charge the weapon and fire a larger, more damaging shot and then wait for the weapon to cool. When being shot at, you don’t have to simply rely on avoiding the ensuing ‘bullet hell’, but are equipped with a sophisticated shield system. Activated by the right mouse button it will absorb a limited number of shots before breaking and having to recharge. This mechanic is also skillfully used throughout the game when encountering different environmental obstacles, such as an electrical beam. In these instances, “better shield through it” is a common and more clever use of such a simple mechanic.
The chiptune soundtrack is perfect at providing the feeling of a futuristic, almost dystopian Soviet Russia as you and fellow freedom fighters battle against the government. It helps to lay down the foundations for an immersive experience, and will stick in your head for hours after you’ve stopped playing the game.
There aren’t many other ways to say this: GET THIS GAME, as it is well worth your time, and more then worth the measly $15 that Minicore Studios is asking for. The game currently has a greenlight campaign on Steamand needs our support to get into the Steam library.
Alice: Madness Returns releasing June 14 - your summer just got stabbier
According to CVG , EA has confirmed that Alice: Madness Returns will release June 14 for PC, 360 and PS3. We had previously expected a later release date, so the news that madness will be returning this summer fills our hearts with a rush of red, viscous joy - the same sort of joy we plan to spill lots of this June. Madness Returns is American McGee's answer to, "Hey man, why don't you make an Alice
First screens of Kingdoms of Amalur's Teeth of Naros DLC released
Last week, 38 Studios, Big Huge Games, and EA announced a second Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning DLC expansion called Teeth of Naros.
a second Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning DLC expansion called Teeth of Naros. This week we've received a big batch of screenshots, and next week, on April 17, the DLC will be released on Origin and Steam. Things move fast these days.
Teeth of Naros will introduce a floating city, new dungeons, new enemies, new armor, new weapons, and other things which are similarly new. Like the last expansion, it'll cost $10 or £7. Check out all of the new screens inside.
Reinstall: System Shock 2
System Shock 2 is a first-person sci-fi survival action RPG, which is just a list of my favourite words.
System Shock 2 is a first-person sci-fi survival action RPG, which is just a list of my favourite words. We can't claim they don't make them like that anymore, because they've made two like that in the last three years and they're working on a third (BioShocks 1, 2 and Infinite). But they don't make them quite like this anymore.
Fire it up, and the first thing you notice is you're tall. First-person games often make your viewpoint lower than it realistically would be, to avoid environments feeling claustrophobic when viewed through the small window of your monitor. Shock 2 has a very different feel, and it comes out in your movement too. You don't burst into a full-blown sprint the moment you touch the forward key, you build up to it smoothly. And you come to a stop smoothly too, which screws you up the first time you try to do some fiddly jumping. You also have no air control: the moment your feet leave the ground, your trajectory to hit it again is completely predetermined.
The result is a game where you feel weighty, real, even a tiny bit cumbersome. But you have a sense of yourself in this place. You're not just a camera zooming around to the next thing to shoot. That's partly why it's frightening: it's hard not to associate yourself with this fragile body lurching around the corridors of the Von Braun, being bludgeoned with lead pipes and frazzled by green laser pips.
Pre-emptive apologies
Yet a lot of the horror wasn't really about your own predicament. The zombies bludgeoning you weren't undead, living dead, or brain dead: they were parasite-infected people who knew full well what they were doing, and didn't want to do it. “Hurry! Run!” is what you expect to hear from an ally, not the deformed wretch you're running from. And when they catch you, there's no ferocious roar; just a tormented “I'm... sorry...” as they bring their blunt implements awkwardly to bear.
It gets worse. The stiff, screeching Cyborg Midwives turn out to have had their machine parts forcibly inserted while they were still alive. Then come the eggs, erupting on contact into slithering worms, infected spores, or swarms of blood-drinking alien insects. But even when the hordes of semi-invisible poisonous spiders show up, nothing SS2 throws at you is ever quite as startling as the screech of its psychic monkeys.
The Von Braun is mankind's first faster-than-light spacecraft: a huge vessel, all five decks fully explorable. The hub structure has been used before and since, but it's never quite as exciting as when it's on a space ship. You pass the central elevator dozens of times on every floor, its satisfyingly chunky yellow button a reminder of all the places you haven't explored yet. Each deck feels different: Engineering the hellish radioactive bowels, Med/Sci the convenient home base, Hydroponics a disgusting jungle, Operations an intimidating nexus of ninja-infested boardrooms, and Recreation at once luxurious and sinister.
Dead quiet
The people who lived there are all dead, infested or fleeing, but their lives were still in evidence through their recorded messages to each other. Audio diaries have become a cliché since, but that's not what these were. Most were messages from one crew member to another, and sometimes you'd find the reply. It might not have had Quark from Deep Space Ninein it, but the non-actors give the kind of naturalistic performances you rarely hear anymore. Most are just people talking, which simply doesn't call for acting with a capital A.
Most articles about System Shock 2 are primarily about SHODAN, but for me she was never the focus. It was these smaller stories I spent my time thinking about: Tommy Suarez and Rebecca Siddons' impossible quest to find each other in the chaos, Delacroix's rising panic long before anyone else saw the problem, Diego's subtle transition from proud UNN officer to servant of the enemy, Bronson's ruthless measures to curb the threat - and her utter defiance to the last breath. Since SHODAN's influence is unknown at first, little of the incidental plot actually relates to her. And it's the incidental stuff that kept me company as I crept through Shock 2's endless corridors.
Survival horror is really just the cooler cousin of resource management, and in a nerdy way I think that's what keeps me coming back to System Shock. The permanent upgrades to your cybernetics are much more meaningful and exciting than Deus Ex's augs, and the frightening ammo drought has you frantically reconfiguring your weapons mid-fight to spend your shots more efficiently.
The firefights themselves aren't much fun, in shooter terms, but the guns feel like guns. Every shot jerks your aim off course with an alarming bang, reinforcing your instinct to make each one count.
Eight years later, BioShock would surpass it as an action game, but BioShock never felt as clean, smooth and crisp. That still makes its predecessor more exciting to explore – even the third and fourth times round.
System Shock 2 has now been re-released on Steamand as a special edition on Good Old Games, for $10.
Reinstall is a monthly regular in the magazine in which we revisit classics that are still worth playing today. This article first appeared in issue 220 of PC Gamer UK.
The Sun At Night Review – Homeward Bound
Crashing landing on Earth, Laika crawls from her ruined pod, unable to remember where she is or how she got there.
Crashing landing on Earth, Laika crawls from her ruined pod, unable to remember where she is or how she got there. She finds her plasma cannon close by among the wreckage, attaching it to its holster above her hind legs before she continues on…
Every so often, a game comes along with just the right amount of narrative, character depth, and combat pacing.latest projecthas nailed all of the above and more.
Prepare to be blown a way by an immersive experience where you take the part of Laika, a canine astronaut sent into space, only to crash land back on earth in the midst of a power struggle in Soviet Russia. Do you think you’ve heard part of this story before? Well in fact you have, Laika was an actual soviet space dog sent up in Sputnik II on November 3, 1957. Unfortunately, the Soviets had no de-orbiting technology at the time, and Laika’s fate was sealed as the first animal to orbit the Earth. While Laika’s real-life story ends there, Minicore Studios has taken this sad event and tried to continue the adventure. “What that kind of said to us, is maybe in fiction, in our game, we can think of some way to make it right,” said Peter Odom, the Creative Director of Minicore Studios .
The Sun at Night is a 2D side scrolling action adventure game with fast paced combat, an impressive amount of character progression, and a solid narrative to stand on as you learn the story of what the world has become after Laika lands back in Russia. From the very start, the game feels reminiscent of Megaman X , as the tutorial introduces game mechanics, setting, and story seamlessly without having to rely on text frames or novelized help screens with an endless amount of reading. It goes so far as to make sure that you as the player lose one of the first fights in the game, nudging you to want to upgrade your weapons, shields, and movement capabilities to be able to come back and handle those tougher fights later on.
There are quite a few weapons to choose from; you start off with a blaster which can be charged to fire off a larger shot (yes there is another Mega Man parallel there), and you’re able to upgrade each weapon individually, or based on their grouping. The upgrade system includes an Offensive, Defensive and Utility tree, each with their own aspects from double jumping and hacking, to an increasing shield regen rate and weapon power. The game really allows you to customize your own gameplay around how you’d like to play it, and then rewards you for choosing a style. At the end of each progression tree is a powerful ability that makes maxing out that skill tree worthwhile.
The combat itself is introduced fairly well; the first weapon you find you can either pop off a few small shots before it overheats and you have to wait for it to cool, or you can charge the weapon and fire a larger, more damaging shot and then wait for the weapon to cool. When being shot at, you don’t have to simply rely on avoiding the ensuing ‘bullet hell’, but are equipped with a sophisticated shield system. Activated by the right mouse button it will absorb a limited number of shots before breaking and having to recharge. This mechanic is also skillfully used throughout the game when encountering different environmental obstacles, such as an electrical beam. In these instances, “better shield through it” is a common and more clever use of such a simple mechanic.
The chiptune soundtrack is perfect at providing the feeling of a futuristic, almost dystopian Soviet Russia as you and fellow freedom fighters battle against the government. It helps to lay down the foundations for an immersive experience, and will stick in your head for hours after you’ve stopped playing the game.
There aren’t many other ways to say this: GET THIS GAME, as it is well worth your time, and more then worth the measly $15 that Minicore Studios is asking for. The game currently has a greenlight campaign on Steamand needs our support to get into the Steam library.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning 'Teeth of Naros' DLC releases April 17 on Steam
38 Studios, Big Huge Games, and EA have announced that a new Kingdoms of Amalur expansion, Teeth of Naros, will be released on Steam on April 17.
38 Studios, Big Huge Games, and EA have announced that a new Kingdoms of Amalur expansion, Teeth of Naros, will be released on Steam on April 17. This is the second DLC expansion for the game, and will include the floating city of Idylla, which contains over 20 side quests and "a mysterious new race," five "enormous new dungeons," three new Twists of Fate, nine new armor sets, six new shields, and 18 new weapons. As with the previous expansion, Legend of Dead Kel, Teeth of Naros will be priced at $10 or £7.
"Players will journey through a forgotten land called the Teeth of Naros, a harsh environment named after an ancient troll god," reads the press release. "In this new journey players will encounter the Kollossae, a devout race of giants, and uncover the mysteries of their faith."
For a preview of the "ancient troll god," read any YouTube comment.
Thief 2 and System Shock 2 unofficial patches fix bugs and add widescreen support
Unofficial patches for System Shock 2 and Thief have appeared on a French forum , offering support for widescreen monitors at high resolutions.
, offering support for widescreen monitors at high resolutions. C'est bien! There are a few mods out there that'll do you a similar service, but these patches are bundled with some bug fixes. Both patches seem to share the same changelist, which will be a relief for all guards on shallow water watch as "AIs now breathe from their head instead of their stomachs. They will no longer drown when up to their waist in water."
Doors can no longer flee the game world either thanks to a fix for a bug that "sometimes caused doors to float away into infinity." 32-bit colour support is also included and "textures can now be automatically promoted to 32-bit, improving quality and effectively eliminating the palette limit."
The patch was spotted by former Irrational chap and co-founder of the awesome Idle Thumbs, Chris Remo, and Kotaku, and arrives alongside news of a new update for the epic Complex mod for Homeworld 2. Modders FTW!
The Most Memorable Indie Games of 2012
This list isn’t about the best indie games of 2012 though there will likely be some overlap.
This list isn’t about the best indie games of 2012 though there will likely be some overlap. This list is a personal reflection on 2012 and covers my personal selection of most memorable indie games. I had a blast playing Hotline Miami, Awesomenauts, Mark of the Ninja and FTL. Those were all great games, but didn’t necessarily leave a lasting impression. This list covers those indie games that are so experimental, artistic, and unique that they are not only memorable this year, but will likely be memorable for years to come. This list covers games like Braid. I still think about Braid to this day. It’s unique time platforming mechanics were great, but it’s dark unfolding story and flowing painted graphics left a much more lasting impression. The list is in no particular order, but hopefully you all have taken the time to experience these memorable independent games:
The Unfinished Swan by Giant Sparrow
WTF is it?
The Unfinished Swan is a game about exploring the unknown. You play as a young orphan boy who just recently lost his mother and wanders into an and unfinished kingdom. The game starts in a completely white space where you must throw black balls of paint to reveal the world around you.
Why it’s Memorable:
The Unfinished Swan works because of it’s brevity and charming storybook plot. The opening chapter where you splatter paint to reveal the world is genius, but the game continues to evolve with each new chapter and has a simplistic beauty. From the graphics to the story, there’s something about this game that reminds me of the book, Le Petit Prince. This isn’t the best game out there. It lacks challenge and is only a few hours, but transcends. The real triumph of the game is the way it plants you in the shoes of Monroe, the game’s protagonist. The game is a coming of age story, a fairy tale, a story about discovering yourself, and a tribute to lost love ones. While the game is only a few short hours, it’s time well spent.
Little Inferno by Tomorrow Corporation
WTF is it?
In Little Inferno, you stare at the same little brick fireplace and order new toys, objects, and more to burn right in front of your eyes. Every object reacts differently to the flames and there are combos to discover that will progress you further in the game and unlock new items to order and burn.
Why it’s Memorable:
One of the most striking things about Little Inferno is that it’s not much of a game. The fact that Tomorrow Corp was able to make burning things over and over again on the same screen fun and interesting is remarkable. What’s even more remarkable is the odd post-modern story laid over top of it. I definitely cannot shed light on what the game is about. I haven’t quite figured that out for myself, but I do know that there’s something about the game and fire that makes Little Inferno strangely hypnotic. I lost half a day of work beating the game in one sitting and every time I hear mention of it, I’m strangely drawn to boot it up and play through it again. Why I’m sure some gamers will find the story too introspective and short, I can’t help but be drawn towards the flames.
FTL by Subset Games
WTF is it?
FTL is basically a digital board game. It’s a real-time spaceship simulator rogue-like where you are constantly fleeing and jumping across the galaxy. Each jump constitutes a new randomized situation. You’ll battle pirate ships, come across stores, get offered missions, hire new crew members, and more. It’s strategic, can be played at any pace, and is incredibly difficult.
Why it’s Memorable:
FTL is so memorable for primarily 2 reasons. First, it is incredibly challenging and strategic. I have still yet to beat it on Normal. The challenge really makes you mull over every decision, but what makes it so great is that your utter failure only leads to you wanting to start over and over again. FTL is insanely addictive and easy to pick-up and play on any machine. It’s also one of the most unique game experiences that I’ve had all year because the pacing and strategy is so very different. There’s no need for dexterous mouse skills or frantic button presses; It’s slow pace made it perfect to play on the go with my laptop and crappy touchpad (how many games can you play with a touchpad really?). I have been on many planes and trains this year, cursing to myself playing FTL. It is an intense single-player board game with a lot of strategy and some luck thrown in for good measure. The challenge is immense, but you’re always unlocking new tools and ships or simply have new ideas that you think will get you one jump farther.
Fez by Polytron Corporation
WTF is it?
Fez is a game about a little fella named Gomez that lives in a 2D world until he acquires a magical Fez that lets him see that his world is truly 3D. It’s an open-ended platforming and exploration game that lets you shift the 2D perspective of the world with your 3D abilities.
Why it’s Memorable:
Fez is memorable as much for it’s gameplay as it is from the controversies surrounding it. Before being released, Fez had been in development for 4 years and as seen in Indie Game: the Movie, there were legal complications and bad blood between some of the original Polytron founders. Fez was also at the center of the IGF controversy this past year having won the 2008 Visual Arts prize and the Grand Prize this past year as well. This controversy ultimately led to Phil Fish leaving twitter, but that’s not it. Polytron also criticized Xbox’s patch policies and refused to pay $10,000 to update and fix their game for their fans. Add to this that the 2-man team split up (Renaud moved to Toronto to work with Capybara) leaving Phil Fish the sole person currently running Polytron. All that publicity alone has made Fez memorable, but I haven’t even touched on the innovative 3D mechanic and the enchanting world to explore in this game. There’s no denying Fez’s infamy.
Journey by thatgamecompany
WTF is it?
Journey is a 3D exploration game where you play as a cloaked figure making their way to the top of a mountain. If you’re playing the game online, other nameless users will accompany you – whose names are only revealed at the end of the the game. There’s no dialog in this game at all, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a story across the game’s 2 hours. It’s all about the visuals and your own interpretation.
Why it’s Memorable:
Only a fraction of Journey’s beauty can be captured in a still image. There is truly no greater showpiece for the argument that game’s can be art then Journey. It’s exceptionally beautiful and a joy to experience. What’s even more memorable though is the cyclical and infinite story. It’s amazing how imagery can convey such a spirtual and emotional story. The mystery of the world, the cloaked figures, and everything that you experience along the way is more memorable than any book or movie that I saw this past year. Journey is the type of game that you want all of your thoughtful friends to play so that you can discuss it with them. It begs to be dissected and interpreted like any poignant piece of artwork.
I’m sure I left out some games that touched you this year. Let me know what games you found memorable in the comments below:
Alice: Madness Returns artbook coming from Dark Horse
There is a certain subset among us that like the more artistic side of gaming good and freaky. Luckily, there are developers that like to make their games along those same lines. If you fall into the first category, the upcoming art book for Alice: Madness Returns will be exactly what you need to spruce up your (probably equally freaky) coffee table. ABOVE: What, your place doesn’t look like this?
Alice: Madness Returns – new trailer and screenshots
New screenshots, concept art, and a teaser for Alice: Madness Returns have just arrived. Look carefully, and you’ll see the White Rabbit and the Queen of Hearts appear in the extra creepy video. We don't want to spoil the trailer for you, so enough talk. Check out the trailer and new images - and let us know what you think about them. Above: Alice with her vorpal blade (aka big ass knife) Above: An
Kingdoms of Amalur MMO due "later in the year" says artist
Comic book artist and Kingdoms of Amalur designer, Todd McFarlane, has been to Start about his work on Amalur.
about his work on Amalur. About halfway through he mentioned that the team is still working on building a full scale Kingdoms of Amalur MMO and says that "it's supposed to come out later in the year."
McFarlane told Start about a conversation he had with Amalur backer and baseball player, Curt Schilling, in which he voiced his concerns about releasing Reckoning before the MMO. "If Reckoning comes out first before your MMO, which we're still working on, it's supposed to come out later in the year, and that comes out and it lays an egg, I don't understand what your marketing campaign is," he said.
"From the mediocre game that nobody bought and doesn't really like that much, comes a big giant version of that game!" he quipped.
A valid concern. If your game is laying eggs, something has gone badly wrong. Here's the full interview with McFarlane.
System Shock 2 concept art uncovered
Every month, Irrational hand us a free news post by putting up some interesting tidbit from the inception of one of their various classic titles.
Every month, Irrational hand us a free news post by putting up some interesting tidbit from the inception of one of their various classic titles. This month, it's System Shock 2's concept art. System Shock 2 was Bioshock's cool uncle who got him into most of the music he likes. Well. Maybe it was a bit more than that. Check it out here.
I remember when I first played it - I'd just got a really nasty throat infection and couldn't speak, and it weakened me so I was stuck in bed. For three weeks. With a laptop and System Shock 2. Best. Illness. Ever. Although more than a little scary. How many of you have played it? How did you think it compared to Bioshock?
Game Giveaway: MegaByte Punch
We have a few free copies of MegaByte Punch from IndieGameStand .
MegaByte Punch by Reptile Gamesis part adventure platformer, part Smash Brothers and part design your own robot. There’s a robust single player mode where you can play through large stages and boss battles and there’s a great 4-player fighting game underneath it all. Enter using the widget below:
Dark Souls 3's graphics options revealed
I've been resisting the urge to watch videos or read previews of Dark Souls 3, as I feel I ruined the previous games slightly by soaking up every bit of pre-release info I possibly could.
I've been resisting the urge to watch videos or read previews of Dark Souls 3, as I feel I ruined the previous games slightly by soaking up every bit of pre-release info I possibly could. YouTube thumbnails/video titles and tweets have made sure I can't remain unspoiled entirely , but thankfully I'm still largely in the dark about this third and apparently final medieval epic.
One thing I don't mind knowing is the range of graphics options available in the PC game (not least because I'll be playing it on PS4). We already know that the game will run at 60 frames per secondon PC, and that your computer will need to be this goodto run it—but what visual settings can we hope to adjust when we're in the game?
It's your standard range of graphics options, to be honest, if a little lacking in the anti-aliasing department. As shown in a recent IGNlivestream, and as screengrabbed by a Redditor, here's what Dark Souls 3's Advanced Settings look like:
It's a much better assortment of options than those available in the original Dark Souls, although it is a bit odd to see anti-aliasing reduced to a binary state. If you're curious about the key bindings, you can see those here too.
Dark Souls 3 is out April 12, and I'm delighted to say that I don't know much about it. Hopefully I won't be too burned out on Souls games, and Soulslikes, when I pick it up. (Ta, PCGamesN.)
Morning Glory: Inside The History Of Ready At Dawn
Founded by top-level talent formerly from Blizzard and Naughty Dog, Ready At Dawn has spent the last decade growing into one of the most talented studios in the industry.
Founded by top-level talent formerly from Blizzard and Naughty Dog, Ready At Dawn has spent the last decade growing into one of the most talented studios in the industry. While visiting the Ready At Dawn for our cover story on its new game The Order: 1886, we sat down with co-founders Ru Weerasuriya and Andrea Pessino to get the full story behind the studio's rise. From the dark days of Daxter's excruciating development to the possibility of a 2D God of War, we hope fans enjoy this glimpse into the challenges of being an independent developer in an increasingly risky industry. Our thanks to Ready At Dawn for opening up their archives and supplying us with rare footage from the studio's history.
Watch the video below to learn how three ambitious developers went through the "terrifying" experience of growing a rogue studio from scratch.
Since this is a longer video, we broke down the chapters below.
0:00 - Leaving behind the world of Starcraft and Warcraft.
3:30 - Founding Ready At Dawn and pitching Daxter
7:06 - The challenges of developing Daxter for the PSP
12:15 - Looking up to and learning from Naughty Dog
13:28 - Developing God of War: Chains of Olympus
15:45 - Porting Clover's Okami to the Nintendo Wii
17:11 - Growing internal talent, developing God of War: Ghost of Sparta, and saying goodbye to old friends
20:21- How The Order: 1886 has changed the studio and the struggle to stay independent
To learn more about the future of Ready At Dawn and their new game The Order: 1886, click on the banner below to enter our hub for exclusive coverage.
Thief: Deadly Shadows mod removes mid-mission loads, redesigns transition zones
Here's a little something to get the taste of the recent Thief reboot out of your mouth.
Here's a little something to get the taste of the recent Thief reboot out of your mouth. Industrious, possibly Hammerite modders have been working on a Gold mod for Deadly Shadows for a while now, which among other things removes the loading transitions that were a bit of an annoyance in the original game. While these haven't been excised from the tutorial or the between-mission city hub—and by 'excised' I mean the constituent map parts have been carefully stitched together—the nine main missions have been lovingly reworked. Thief 3 Gold has just left beta, if you want to try it out.
Thief 3 Gold goes beyond shoving map parts together, however: it also redesigns the bits where loading would have occurred, and makes it so that you don't have to nick the Widow Moira's inheritance on Expert difficulty, among other tweaks. 1.0 won't be the final version of the mod, obviously, but expect it to be integrated into Deadly Shadows' big Sneaky Upgrade modeventually, which fixes a ton of issues with Eidos' hobbled Thief threequel.
Will Thief 4 receive the same care and attention sometime down the line? We can only hope. One quick fix that would make the game roughly 53.86% better would be to remove that abysmal Thief-Taker General character from the game.
Important stealth reminder: the excellent Dark Modis now standalone.
Thanks, RPS!
Douglas Circumstance Brings 8-Bit Extermination to Kickstarter
Developer A Jolly Corpse has moved its upcoming platform shooter, Douglas Circumstance , to Kickstarter with the hopes of raising funds for the game’s remaining development cycle.
Players take control of Douglas, an extreme pest exterminator, and they must fight off hordes of creatures in a world inspired by 8-bit classic titles. According to the developer, “ Douglas Circumstance is a classic PC platform shooter set in a world full of memorable monsters and animated characters. It’s a unique combination of pixel-perfect platforming, twitch shooting, and secret-hunting that’ll remind you of classics like Mega Man , Duck Tales , and Contra .” The game is also said to contain a variety of comedic boss fights, which occur approximately five times in each level.
Douglas Circumstance began its Kickstarter campaignin November with the aim of raising $25,000 USD. The campaign has received approximately 15 percent of its funding and has just over two weeks remaining. Jesse Bull, of A Jolly Corpse, says that due to financial obligations, he can’t devote all his time to the game’s production. The developer goes on to say, “With a backing from all the great people at Kickstarter, however, I could make Douglas my number one priority. I could take a break from freelance work completely, and commit the time and energy to Douglas Circumstance that I think it deserves.”
If the campaign is successful, the game is estimated to release on PC in 2016. For more information, check out A Jolly Corpse on Facebook, Twitter, and the official website.
Tales of Symphonia will hit Steam in February
It's been an exceptional year for JRPGs on PC, and 2016 is also looking positive: come February 2 the previously promised Steam port of Tales of Symphonia will arrive.
will arrive. Those who pre-purchased Tales of Zestiria on Steam earlier this year will have the game automatically added to their library.
Originally released on GameCube in 2003, the game was subsequently ported to PS2 and PS3, the latter in the form of a HD remaster, which will likely form the basis of the PC port. There are tonnes of Tales Of... games, but this is probably the one that made the most impact. The system requirements were released back in July, and you can check them out here.
The Symphonia release date follows news earlier today that the forthcoming Tales of Berseria will release in the west, and it's no surprise: Bandai Namco has clearly received the message that these games have an audience on PC. If you're in the mood for a JRPG, we've compiled a handy listof games available on PC.
Post-Modern: Inside The Development History Of Call Of Duty: Ghosts
With Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 tied up in a relatively neat package , the team at Infinity Ward began the long trek of developing a brand new entry in the series.
, the team at Infinity Ward began the long trek of developing a brand new entry in the series. We visited the studio for this month's cover storyand spoke with executive producer Mark Rubin about the history of the game that eventually became Call of Duty: Ghosts. What started out as a few notecards about dogs and the apocalypse is now months away from a gigantic release and we hope that the video feature will help explain the process. You may have been confused about the recent story trailerthat shows astronauts with guns, so Rubin also adds some more context of the story in Ghosts.
Watch the video below to learn why the team didn't make Modern Warfare 4 and what makes Ghosts feel narratively distinct from previous entries.
To see more exclusive videos for Call of Duty: Ghosts, click on the banner below to enter our month of content.
Thief preview: Garrett returns to a city of voyeurism and detail, power and character
Originally published in PC Gamer UK issue 252.
"I heard it's like stroking a turtle!” There are probably lots of reasons for not listing a crass line of NPC dialogue as your favourite part of any game, let alone the much-anticipated return of a classic. Still, this is my favourite thing about the new Thief. Partly because it sounds rude, which always goes over well, but also because it captures the spirit of the old games in a way that a thousand hissing water arrows never could – a snatch of conversation caught while cosily enveloped in shadow, the sense of a busy, oblivious world playing out in the light. It's about voyeurism and detail, power and character, and it's a big part of why Thief currently looks like an assured reinvention of a fiercely guarded series.
The studio behind this reinvention, Eidos Montreal, have previous experience with this kind of material. They were founded in 2007 for the specific task of bringing back Deus Ex and Thief, two games associated with an influential creative group that moved between the Looking Glass and Ion Storm studios at the turn of the last century, and are spoken about in the kind of hushed tones normally reserved for great artists or really old people. The games were bound by common ideals: first-person perspective, choice, immersion – and the first reinvention, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, succeeded because it made excellent choices about what to keep from the original and what to update and improve. Now the same process is being applied to Thief.
"As far as Eidos Montreal are concerned, this is the same Garrett as before."
When the team talk about this process, a few things happen. As a group they're aware of the pressures of expectation, but still unusually relaxed and funny – producer Stephane Roy, for instance, opens his introduction by saying his job is “to convince you that I really loved Thief, I'm not just saying it”. The other thing that happens is that everyone says “pillars” a lot, referring to core elements of the first two Thief games in particular (the third game is a more distant creative relation). The arrows are a pillar. The shadow-based stealth is a pillar. Freedom in achieving objectives is a pillar, as is the unnamed city. But the strongest pillar, the one expected to bear the most weight, is the thief himself: Garrett.
Garrett announces himself with a line of monologue that is, under the circumstances, perfectly ambiguous and Garrett-like: “I've been away, but I couldn't tell you where.” The main points being that he's back, and he still talks to himself in the style of a cynical noir hero – handy, since he rarely talks to anyone else (he's the kind of guy who “doesn't have a Facebook page”, says one of the team). As far as Eidos Montreal are concerned, this is the same Garrett as before. “We had carte blanche,” says game director Nicolas Cantin. “We were able to do everything we wanted to do, but at some point we wanted to constrain ourselves within the Thief experience. Our goal was to bring back Garrett, the master thief.”
He looks broadly the same as we last saw in Thief: Deadly Shadows, only with nearly a decade's worth of visual embellishments and detailing. He's an odd shape for a hero: wiry, slightly hunched, bound in leather with piercing eyes staring out from a under his hood. There's an irony somewhere in the character who made not mass-murdering every polygon in sight a first-person possibility, also being the one you'd scream and run from on sight. The added visual sophistication heightens the effect – the scar across Garrett's right eye, for instance, the one that suggests a plot continuity with the very first Thief, looks raw and jagged rather than a leading man's cosmetic accessory. It looks like it really hurt.
The new visual fidelity was key in nudging the team towards Garrett's buckled leather. “With the new power of the platform today, we can really go deep with the shaders,” explains Cantin. “We can almost say 'what type of leather do we want?' and it will be exactly that.” If that gives anyone else flashbacks to mixing seven subtle varieties of brown while painting a Warhammer army, Cantin's team took meticulousness even further. “We made real costumes,” he says, “then lit them to see how [the leather] would react to the lighting.”
"Garrett uses the new gear and technology to build his new bow, which is now more powerful."
Similar steps were taken with Garrett's bow – another of the game's perceived pillars, although this time one open to some changes. Describing the original bow as “kind of weak”, Cantin explains how the specifics of the new game's setting have influenced the updated weapon. “We now have a more industrial setting, a clash of medieval and new industrial. Garrett uses the new gear and technology to build his new bow, which is more powerful than before.”
It's also a bit more self-consciously cool: not just a stick with a string on it, but a folding mechanism that snaps out into a deadly metal instrument. Like the leathers, the bow was physically constructed, this time by a traditional blacksmith in Montreal whose functional design work ended up changing the weapon's final in-game form. (I actually visit the workshop where, as the proud Quebecois artisan turns red hot iron with his bare, blackened hands and speaks earnestly about his mission to save the ancient knowledge of smithing, I decide never to introduce him to my wife.)
Changing the bow is inching into more sensitive territory. Not because the bare aesthetic will be missed, but because the arrows it fires have always been Garrett's principal way of interacting with his environment. Part of the original game's non-lethal sidestep was that arrows were in the main not for killing – they were for snuffing out torches with water, covering noisy floors in deadening moss, and making sounds to distract guards. And so it will be again, the only changes to this particular pillar being an idiomatic refresh of the arrow types (it's now dry ice, rather than water, that extinguishes torches) and, servicing one of the development team's wider concerns, stress-testing the ammo types for plausibility. “We worked really hard on the credibility of those things,” says Cantin, “especially that layer of magic and mysticism. We still have some of those [ammo types], like fire for example, but now balanced so we'll believe in it a little more.”
One of the most interesting elements of the new Thief is an expansion of this pronounced sense of the world's physical properties: the soft carpets, clopping flagstones, almost blanketlike darkness. Now on the borders of the first-person screen are Garrett's hands. They rest on surfaces and obstacles, brush against walls – not always visible, but creeping into view when Garrett presses up against objects, giving a sense of the fabric and flavour of what the studio are calling a “tactile world”.
"On the left, a thief protests as he's clapped into the stocks, on the right a noosed prisoner is kicked from a first-floor ledge."
In the demo Eidos Montreal have prepared, this tactile world looks like one you wouldn't necessarily want to touch. The introduction to The City, another core returning element, has a sense of BioShock-like parade. Garrett rides a bumpy wooden cart through a portcullis checkpoint, with piles of plague victims stacked nakedly on the filthy roadside, top hats and iron armour marking the clash of medieval and Victorian, bystanders and guards muttering and arguing as he passes by. There's a sense that The City is happening on cue – on the left, a thief protests as he's clapped into the stocks, on the right a noosed prisoner is kicked from a first-floor ledge and swings lifelessly into place alongside two or three others.
The City is the same place as before, with a different configuration. The Hammerite and Keeper ideologies that dominated the earlier trilogy are all but swept away (at least on the surface – the occasional Hammerite slogan might appear as a brickwork advertisement, and I did glimpse some Keeper glyphs in the demo).
Zems Digital Card Game Draws From Kickstarter
There are a number of card games out there nowadays, so it can be pretty tough to introduce something new and/or interesting.
Zems , from developer Impulse Limited, hopes that its blend of hex-cell strategy gameplay will be enough to draw people in.
Zems allows each player to construct a deck of cards which translate into different effects on the battlefield. The board itself is constructed of hex-shaped cells, onto which the cards are transformed into actual creatures and weather. There appear to be at least three kinds of cards: Followers, Spells, and Constructs. Followers are the actual units that fight on the battlefield, and can be placed in cells adjacent to the player’s hero character. Spells run the gamut from simply drawing cards to changing the weather. Constructs are akin to buildings, with each Construct carrying a special effect to the terrain it occupies.
The goal of the game is to destroy the enemy’s hero, which is both one of the strongest units players have and their only free unit. Hero units – of which the game will start with four – each have their own special ability that can be used at will, provided the player has enough energy to do so; energy units are necessary to complete in-game actions.
The game is fairly complex, so if it sounds interesting at all, it might be a good idea to check out the game’s Kickstarter page. The developer is seeking $40,000 USD over the next month, and on top of very clear goals for both the game and the campaign, the campaign page details exactly how the money will be spent. Zems is also up on Steam Greenlight. The game will launch on Windows (there’s an Alpha demo on the Kickstarter page), and the developer plans to release it for Mac and Linux PCs, as well.
Rise of Incarnates shutting down after just a few months
Bonkers free-to-play fighting game Rise of Incarnates is shutting down, just a few months after its launch on July 1.
Bonkers free-to-play fighting game Rise of Incarnates is shutting down, just a few months after its launch on July 1. There's no reason given by publisher Bandai Namco, but the servers will remain up until December 15, at which point Incarnates will bite the dust.
The announcement was made on Steam here, and notes that, as of today, players can no longer purchase 'IP' (a virtual currency bought with real money). You'll need to use any existing IP before December 15, for obvious reasons.
I'd not heard of Rise of Incarnates before now, but it looks pretty crazy in screenshots and videos: an over-the-top 3D brawler that pits two teams of two against each other. Here's the announcement trailer from the last year.
Ghosts, Dogs, And Fish: The Story Behind The Memes
One of the most unexpected side-effects of Activision and Infinity Ward promoting this year's Call of Duty game is the popularity of an in-game dog named Riley and the importance of fish AI.
One of the most unexpected side-effects of Activision and Infinity Ward promoting this year's Call of Duty game is the popularity of an in-game dog named Riley and the importance of fish AI. Starting with the debut making-of trailer at the Xbox One reveal event, the internet latched on to the absurdity and charm of a dog being a member of your squad in Call of Duty: Ghosts. Bets were soon placed on the odds of that dog surviving throughout a game that aims to create a more "emotional" experience for the player. While visiting the studio, we spoke with Infinity Ward's executive producer Mark Rubin about the story behind the memes from the studio's point of view.
Will Riley live or die? Will the fish get out of the way? Watch the video below to find out.
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Why Water Arrows are a Thief's best tool
[VAMS id="GIucGmk0gnQA6"]
Garrett's back for more masterful pilfering in Eidos' Thief reboot , and the team wants to honor the influence of the series' original trio by including some familiar tools.
, and the team wants to honor the influence of the series' original trio by including some familiar tools. Perhaps the most recognizable of Garrett's arsenal are his Water Arrows, used to douse light sources from afar. I think they're one of the franchise's most recognizable items, and one of the best-known mechanics in stealth gaming. Here's why.
Compete Locally or Intergalactically in SciFi Racer: Turbolink
Turbolink is a futuristic racing game in a top-down style, featuring multiple unlockable vehicles, diverse courses that can be manipulated through hacking, and powerful items to find.
The game’s story mode is set in the distant future. Humans live in large colonies in outer space, the last 400 years of the race’s history filled with secrets and conspiracies. The player controls a pilot selected to compete in the highly competitive and dangerous tournament, Turbolink. With the help of a skilled mechanic, the player builds a super-car to defeat the opposition.
Turbolink can also be played in split screen mode with friends. The studio, Division Five, has taken the game to Kickstarter to fund an online multiplayer mode, and is aiming to raise $20,000 CAD in the next 26 days. Division Five is a small indie studio founded in 2014. For Turbolink, Division Five has teamed up with AudioTech, who is creating an original dubstep soundtrack for the game.
Turbolink is in preparation for release on Steam Early Access for Mac, Windows, and Steam OS, with release on Xbox and PS4 planned for March 2016. The team also offer Xbox Live Arcade Keys on their Kickstarter.
You can back online multiplayer for Turbolink here. For more information, visit the game’s websiteor Facebook, or follow the game on Twitter.
Tales of Zestiria will be locked at 30 fps, says Bandai Namco
Tales of Zestiria is coming to Steam!
is coming to Steam! And if that rings a bell, it's probably because we actually found out about it back in June. But now we know more, thanks to the official Tales Of blog, which also explains that the PC release will run at 1080p, support 4K resolution, and be locked to a framerate of 30 fps.
Wait! Don't go!
Okay, that last point might be a little off-putting, but Bandai Namco explained that there's really no other option. "The 'Tales of' battle system has always been an integral part of the gameplay experience, and changing the framerate proved to have profound consequences on things like: animation, balance, difficulty, and overall fighting mechanics tuning," it wrote. "We do this in the best interest for the players’ experience!"
The draw distance on the PC release will be double that of the PS3 edition, with a "far" option that will extend it even further. Shadows, antialiasing, and textures have all been upgraded, and players will be able to select a low, medium, or high setting for each graphical option.
Meanwhile, over on Steam, we have system requirements:
Minimum:
OS: Windows Vista 32/64-bit
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz or AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+, 2.6Ghz
RAM: 1GB
GPU: Nvidia GeForce 8800GT or ATI Radeon HD 4830
DirectX: Version 9.0c
HDD: 12GB
Recommended:
OS: Windows 7 (x64) or Windows 8 (x64)
CPU: Intel Core i3-530, 2.93 GHz / AMD Phenom II X4 940, 3.0GHz
RAM: 4GB
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti / AMD Radeon HD 7850
DirectX: Version 9.0
HDD: 12GB
Tales of Zestiria lists for $50/£40, and will be out on October 20. Bandai Namco will serve up the first look at the PC version of the game during a livestream on Twitchthat will include giveaways, an appearance by the Tales of Ambassador, and more, set to take place at 10 am PT on September 24.
E3 Booth Tour Round-Up
The spectacle that is E3 needs to be seen to be believed. For those that couldn't experience it first hand, we took a camera through the major booths to bring sights to you.
Check out the videos below to see a quick sample of what Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony had in store for E3 attendees this year.
Battlefield Hardline: Robbery expansion is coming in September
Electronic Arts has announced that the next expansion to Battlefield Hardline will be called Robbery .
. It will include four "expansive" new maps—The Docks, Break Pointe, Museum, and Precinct 7—and a five-on-five mode called Squad Heist, which is being billed as an homage to Battlefield 4's Squad Rush.
Squad Heist will unfold over three distinct stages: Grab a drill, break into a vault, steal the loot, do it again at a second vault, then haul ass to the exit point and fly to freedom on a helicopter. The police, naturally, need to ensure none of that happens.
"Obviously, this will all be themed to the map. You might have to take the Glass Cutter (Drill) and steal the Blue Diamond (Loot) from the Display Case (Vault)—but the basic idea stays the same," EA explained. "At each stage, criminals get 25 deploy tickets. If those tickets are all lost, the cops win the match."
The Robbery expansion will also have four new weapons, two gadgets, two factional vehicles and vehicle upgrades, new camos and vehicle paints, and the "Legendary Super Feature." That last bit sounds potentially very interesting, what with it being legendary and super, but unfortunately I can't tell you what it is because, to be blunt, I have no idea. I've emailed EA for clarification on that point, and we'll let you know if and when I hear anything back.
Thus far EA hasn't put out a Robbery "reveal video," as it did with the Criminal Activity DLCin May, but we do have this image of three ne'er-do-wells about to be arrested by the dinopolice, and that's not nothing. Battlefield Hardline: Robbery will be out in September.
SYSTOLE Teasing a Multi-platform 2.5D Adventure
An intriguing, mysterious adventure is on the horizon for 2015.
An intriguing, mysterious adventure is on the horizon for 2015. Venezuelan studio Guaguan released a teaser that showcases a little robot awakening among gears and contraptions; this is SYSTOLE .
The studio describes SYSTOLE as an adventure game that features environmental challenges and puzzles. The protagonist, a small robot, is born and “left without purpose.” Abandoned, the robot seeks to discover its purpose, events that led to the beginning, and more about the mysterious world.
The robot has magnetic powers that skillfully let it traverse between ledges and platforms. This will also be a way to evade hostilities in the areas. The developers designed the world to be open, so any area can be explored first, and even manipulated to venture further. For instance, a lava zone can be changed with a Cooling System to freeze the hot rivers. Furthermore, the players acquire masks to unlock new abilities to help reach previously unattainable zones for secret goodies or to progress.
SYSTOLE is primarily developed in Unity for PC and Mac. There’s a strong possibility for publishing on consoles as well, and the developers are looking at the PS Vita, PS4, Xbox One, and Wii U. There will be a crowdfunding campaign in February 2015 along with a demo of the game. Check out the their websiteand look to IGM for future updates.
Dark Souls 2: Scholars of the First Sins mods may be causing softbans
A Dark Souls 2 "softban" is essentially an exile into a realm of cheaters: Softbanned players can continue to play, but their online interactions are limited to other softbanned people—a much smaller pool of players than would normally be available.
"softban" is essentially an exile into a realm of cheaters: Softbanned players can continue to play, but their online interactions are limited to other softbanned people—a much smaller pool of players than would normally be available. It's typically a punishment meted out for cheating, but Kotakureports that a growing number of Dark Souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin players are saying they've been softbanned simply for using the DS2fix mod.
DS2Fix, as the title suggests, clears a number of technical issues with Scholars of the First Sin, including a significant weapon durability bug and a couple of big crash bugs. It also, according to its Nexus Mods description, will not trigger softbans. And mod creator Alessanro De Micheli told Kotaku that, unless the game itself has changed, he's confident DS2fix isn't the problem.
"Unless Fromsoft patches the game to recognize DS2Fix64, it cannot be detected (because the game doesn’t know what to look for)," he said. "So, the only logical conclusion here is that the game is actually flagging any hook / injector—that means that even by using x360ce, SweetFX, ReShade, DXTory or the Durazno Dead-zone fix for controllers will put users at risk of getting banned. Being DS2Fix64 the only ‘SotFS-made’ tool available it also is the most exposed one to accusations—players would likely think DS2Fix is at fault, not anything else they’ve been using for years."
A lively argument about whether or not DS2Fix is the culprit is underway in this Reddit thread, among others, which unfortunately just highlights the fact that nobody really knows what's causing the softbans. It's quite possible that DS2Fix is the problem, despite De Micheli's insistence that it's not, and in fact the sheer number of complaints has prompted him to reach out to Bandai Namco for official confirmation, one way or the other.
We've done the same, and will update if and when we receive a response. In the meantime, we strongly recommend avoiding the DS2Fix mod, and other injectors like SweetFX with Dark Souls 2, until the situation is cleared up. Better safe than softbanned, right?
Refining Tactics – The Combat Of Dragon Age: Inquisition
BioWare listens to their fans.
BioWare listens to their fans. When we visited the studio for the latest cover story, the development team made it clear that a lot of their audience enjoyed the more tactical approach to combat from Dragon Age: Origins. While BioWare wouldn't confirm the return of the tactical view from that game, creative director Mike Laidlaw and executive produce Mark Darrah are pushing for more strategic encounters in Inqusition. We spoke with Laidlaw and Darrah about their vision for the next iteration of combat in the series, and senior gameplay designer Josh Stiksma showed off some pre-alpha footage.
Watch the video feature below see combat from Dragon Age: Inquisition in action.
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Battlefield Hardline: Criminal Activity trailer released
Battlefield Hardline's Criminal Activity DLC is set in an alternate reality in which, variously, night clubs, malls, apartment blocks and derelict logging concerns are patrolled by anthropomorphic gun-toting... oh wait, they're just masks.
Battlefield Hardline's Criminal Activity DLC is set in an alternate reality in which, variously, night clubs, malls, apartment blocks and derelict logging concerns are patrolled by anthropomorphic gun-toting... oh wait, they're just masks. That makes more sense.
Oh well, I'm less excited now I've realised this isn't a gritty Sonic reboot. Still, I've started this post, so it's only fair I post the trailer anyway.
EA says the new crop of maps are highly destructible, and "littered with small-time crime jobs". The Criminal Activity pack will be out next month, with Premium subscribers getting a two-week head start over gen pop.
Major Mayhem’ Review – Bigger And Badder Mayhem In Version 2
‘Major Mayhem’ Review – Bigger And Badder Mayhem In Version 2
After I graduated from high school, I became a big fan of Time Crisis 2.
After I graduated from high school, I became a big fan of Time Crisis 2. I mean REALLY big. I’d play it all the time, to the point where I knew exactly when enemies would jump out and attack in order to maximise my score. The memories I had of that experience came flooding back as soon as I picked up Major Mayhem , Adult Swim and Rocket Jumps’ touch based action game that recently got a major (pun intended) upgrade to 2.0 not too long ago, so big in fact that we thought it was worth revisiting the game for another review.
Haven’t played Major Mayhem yet? Well, my links to Time Crisis aren’t far off from what to expect. You’ll play the Major as he runs from left to right, dodging incoming fire from a number of enemies at once. Like TC, you’ll pause along various parts of each level and must eliminate the targets before you can move on.
Shooting them down is as simple as tapping right in top of the target, though as you dig deeper into the game you’ll find other techniques such as throwing grenades with an accurate tap towards the intended target. If you’re quick on the trigger finger, your combo score will go up quick and fast. Too fast, though, and you’ll leave yourself out in the open for too long and be hint by a stray bullet or two. The Major does have three ‘lives’, so to speak, and plenty of armour upgrades and special attacks to unlock to keep the combo meter running.
The more levels you play, the crazier the action will get. Enemies will become smarter, shooting out multiple bullets towards you or using different weapons, but the Major does have a few extra tricks up his sleeve such as dodging Max Payne style. And what shooter would be complete without more weapons to unlock and upgrades to existing items, which Major Mayhem has in spades here.
Though it has to be said, you can complete the game using the stock standard pistol you get at the start if you really wanted to, but only if high scores aren’t your thing. If they are … well, I’ll get to that in a second.
Among the additions to the game since it first made headlines just on a year ago are three new games modes, to go along with the original mode now dubbed ‘classic’. Timebomb gives you a minute to do as much as you can, while Arcade throws out a few random levels at you and Survival is just that, survive as long as you can with the one life afforded to you.
Given that classic mode has so many levels already attached to it, these new modes add even more longevity, though I think Timebomb is the better of the three in terms of offering up a really good challenge. Only a minute you say? Challenge accepted!
The one thing that may hold you back from putting in many hours worth of game play into Major Mayhem is its freemium game design. Yes, it’s free to download and play, but you’ll have to build up your coin collection in order to purchase some of the bigger, stronger weapons in the game which can determine your overall high score.
Like I said before, you can play and beat the game without having to spend a dime of in game currency, but the option is there to build up towards something bigger or just buying it as soon as you’ve unlocked it. I didn’t buy anything myself, personally I don’t with these games, and didn’t have any less a fun time with it.
My only real concern with Major Mayhem’s design is the loading screens. Turn on the app and you’re sitting for a little while before hitting the main menu, and jumping between levels takes a few seconds. It doesn’t sound like much, but considering the abilities of Apple’s products (I reviewed this on an iPhone 4) it would have been nicer not to have so much time wasted behind another load screen.
But it’s hard to fault the quality of Major Mayhem . The content update adds a ton of cool new features and equipment to an already entertaining game, with the action fast paced and the visuals colourful. For someone like me who has a fondness for twitch shooters, it’s the kind of game that’s just hard to put down once you get really into it.
[review pros=”New content is well worth the while, smooth action all the way” cons=”load screens are a pain, ‘freemium’ content won’t be for everyone” score=90]