Gamer Blogger

Steam sale is here. Repeat: Steam sale is here.

How did it come to this.

How did it come to this. You were so careful. Your small group of survivors planned meticulously, taking every precaution. For years, you had dodged the cultists—their wails and chantingcovering the noise as you slipped past from building to building. And yet, your numbers slowly dwindled. Now it was just you. But you would never be taken.

Browsing the internet was risky these days, but it was late November. A quiet time—a respite—as the masses prepared for their feverish Christmas orgy. It was hideous, and hypnotising—a mass rush of base digital consumerism. Thankfully, it was still weeks away.

Suddenly, a Tweet. Agitated. Unintelligible. A string of capitalised vowels. A link.

You click without thinking; curiosity making you restless. And there it was: the Steam store page. How could you have forgotten? They do an Autumn sale, too.

Steamsale

"No," you mouth, stumbling backwards, eyes still transfixed on the screen. Quickly, you reach for the mouse, noticing how this year, it has an exploration theme—a natural choice given the recent updates to recommendation and curation systems.

It's not too late. You go to close the browser. If you just quit out... but... what's that? The Evil Within? It's 66% off? That's a good price. You'd always wanted to try that, but where was the time? Maybe you could make time. Maybe you could stop running. Maybe you could give in...

Rest...

Buy...

Dead Realm YouTubers' lack of disclosure may violate FTC regulations

The multiplayer horror game Dead Realm is very popular right now, in large part because, as the developers explained on Steam , "we developed this game to not only be fun to play, but also fun to watch." To that end, it was "created in partnership with leading global YouTube influencers Adam Montoya ( SeaNanners ), Tom Cassell ( TheSyndicateProject ) and Evan Fong ( VanossGaming )," according to its Early Access release announcement .

Dead Realm1

. But as Gamasutrapoints out, that partnership opens up some potential problems with how it's being promoted.

All three of the YouTubers in question have posted enthusiastic "Let's Play" style videos promoting Dead Realm, but none of them disclose their financial ties to the game, or the fact that Cassell and Montoya are actually co-founders of publisher 3Blackdot. Fong hints at the connection, thanking supporters in the description of one video and saying in another, "We will be releasing new content such as new ghosts and new maps," but nowhere is it spelled out clearly. That's problematic because, as the FTC's .com Disclosure Guidestates, such disclosures must be made, and they must be "clear and conspicuous."

"To make a disclosure 'clear and conspicuous,' advertisers should use clear and unambiguous language and make the disclosure stand out," an FAQexplains further. "Consumers should be able to notice the disclosure easily. They should not have to look for it." For video ads in particular, that means "on the screen long enough to be noticed, read, and understood." But that's clearly not the case in the Dead Realms videos. Gamasutra also ran across other instances of affiliated videos in which the required disclosures regarding "brand integration" were not made, despite 3Blackdot claiming they were.

The failure to disclose these financial connections is a serious ethical breach that could lead to an FTC investigation and potentially heavy financial penalties. And for good reason: Actively marketing their own game under the guise of a conventional Let's Play not calls into question everything they've done previously, it also damages the credibility of the YouTuber community as a whole by not just blurring the line between advertisement and editorial, but wiping it out completely.

We've emailed the developers of Dead Realm for more information, and will update if and when we receive a reply.

Home is Where One Starts Explores Childhood Memories

Home is Where One Starts is described as “a short, first-person exploration game in the same vein as Dear Esther or Gone Home .” The game is focused on telling a story with objects and vistas the player finds.

“I remember missing the school bus that morning…” says the girl in the game’s trailer. “Little did I know that morning would change my life.” From what is known about the story so far, it appears the little girl lived in a broken home somewhere in the southern region of the United States. Through the story, players explore the protagonist’s memories, hopes, and dreams. She revisits that day and retells what happened on that morning. The countryside and areas around it hold clues that help answer her questions. Finding the better-hidden clues reveals more information, and can additionally unlock secret endings to the game.

An artist who goes by the moniker of The Tumbled Sea, a musician from Boston, USA, provides the soundtrack to Home is Where One Starts . David Wehle is the designer behind the project, along with his wife Elise Wehle, who voice-acts and contributes art to the game. The creators are also working on including Oculus Rift support, and in fact have already noted that the game will be “Oculus ready.”

Home is Where One Starts is campaigning for votes right now on Steam Greenlight, and is aiming to release this Summer. It will be compatible for both PC and Mac (no word on future Linux support) and launch at a price point of $1.99 USD.

Five awesome moments from the 2014 EMS One Katowice CS:GO Championship

Sometimes you have to watch the professionals at work to appreciate how brilliant a game is.

Sometimes you have to watch the professionals at work to appreciate how brilliant a game is. After watching some of the highlights from this weekend's 2014 EMS One Katowice Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Championship, I was reminded how tense and thrilling Counter-Strike can get. Here are some of the best moments from the event in Poland, from some of the best players in the world.

My favorite video by far is of Janusz “sNax” Pogorzleski from Virtus.Pro (the team that also won the championship) silently taking down three NiP members. The restraint he demonstrates here, waiting for the perfect moment, is unbelievable:

From markeloff vs. Titan, a completely different, chaotic moment. Cornered and almost out of ammo, markeloff pulls through:

And finally, here's Virtus.Pro winning the championship. Listen to that crowd!

In addition to a giant trophy, Virtus.Pro also won $100,000 of the $250,000 community-funded prize pool.

YouTube Gaming prepares to take on Twitch

YouTube is launching a new website dedicated to livestreamed and on-demand gaming content called—brace yourselves—YouTube Gaming.

YouTube Gaming

YouTube is launching a new website dedicated to livestreamed and on-demand gaming content called—brace yourselves—YouTube Gaming. The site will have dedicated pages for more than 25,000 games, "from Asteroids to Zelda," as well as channels featuring content created by both game publishers and the YouTube community.

As livestreams will be "front and center" on the new site, YouTube plans to launch "an improved live experience that makes it simpler to broadcast your gameplay to YouTube," Product Manager Alan Joyce wrote in a. "On top of existing features like high frame rate streaming at 60fps, DVR, and automatically converting your stream into a YouTube video, we’re redesigning our system so that you no longer need to schedule a live event ahead of time. We’re also creating [a] single link you can share for all your streams."

YouTube Gaming users will be able to add games on the site to their virtual collection, and channel subscriptions will provide notifications whenever a new livestream begins. "And when you want something specific, you can search with confidence, knowing that typing 'call' will show you 'Call of Duty' and not 'Call Me Maybe'," Joyce added.

YouTube Gaming was initially hinted at back in March, when an anonymous source said the company was preparing to relaunch YouTube Live following its failure to acquireTwitch, which eventually ended up in the hands of Amazon, in 2014. It's expected to go live sometime this summer, and until it does you can sign up to be notified of future happenings at Gaming.YouTube.com. I would also recommend you take a moment to enjoy this tweet from Twitch, welcoming YouTube Gaming to the scene. Burn.

Burn

Zirkel: A Geometric Puzzle About Contemplation

Solo game developer Marc-Andre Weibezahn recently released his unique puzzle game Zirkel for iOS mobile devices.

for iOS mobile devices. The game is described as a geometric puzzle game that uses circles and fiery, revolving elements to create a relaxing experience for puzzle lovers around the world.

Zirkel offers 70 puzzles made up of different assortments of perfect circles, each with a fiery element that initially holds still. These elements can begin to revolve within the circle with a tap on the screen, allowing them to follow the outline of the circle endlessly. The goal of the game is to accurately time when to start the next circle’s element in order to have one active flame intersect with another for a grand explosion that makes the newer flame grow larger. This is repeated until every single flame is moving and activated.

There are a multitude of layouts and some rule changes in certain levels for added variety, including one where players will also need to manually move the circles. The game’s puzzles are calm and intended for contemplative gameplay, which is then assisted by an atmospheric original soundtrack by Leel.

Zirkel is currently available for iOS devices on the App Store, and can be downloaded for $1.99. For more information about this and future games by Webezahn, follow the developer on Twitteror like the game’s Facebookpage.

The biggest stories from CS:GO's DreamHack 2014 tournament

Last weekend's fourth CS:GO major, DreamHack Winter , ended up as one of the most memorable tournaments of the year for a variety of reasons—some good, and some bad.

Csgo Uzi

Article by Tomi "lurppis" Kovanen

, ended up as one of the most memorable tournaments of the year for a variety of reasons—some good, and some bad. Let's examine the biggest storylines that emerged from the event.

The Fnatic controversy

LDLCcame into their quarter-final against Fnaticnot only having never bested the Swedes, but having lost two straight tournament finals against them. They split the first two maps in their series, and then put up a strong 12-3 first half on the deciding map de_overpass.

Though Overpass is very counter-terrorist favored, LDLC managed to win their terrorist pistol round, thus giving them a very good chance of going up 3-0 in the second half—and practically eliminating fnatic. At 3-13, fnatic successfully used a previously unknown boost, which was so overpowered that it basically breaks the entire map, and thus was immediately ruled illegal by many.

After losing the second half 0-13, with olofm boosted on nearly every round, LDLC protested about the boost and DreamHack admins spent the next six hours determining what to do. Upon coming to a conclusion to replay the second half, Fnatic protested and the whole saga continued.

Ultimately DreamHack's rulingwas that both teams replay the entire third map, as they found LDLC using another potentially illegal boost. The community was outraged with the decision, and soon after fnatic wound up forfeitingthe third map and withdrawing from the tournament.

In reality Fnatic probably knew their odds of winning without the boost were non-existent. They took a risk in using it, as there were no clear rules against it—but it obviously breaks the map when you see it in play. It was a gamble, and it didn’t pay off.

It’s only too bad it took DreamHack so long to come to a decision, thus making the entire situation exponentially worse.

LDLC are world champions

The French came into DreamHack Winter as the world’s second-best team, and were seemingly doomed as they drew their kryptonite Fnatic, who were upset by HellRaisers in the group stage, in the quarter-finals.

Once past the Swedes, LDLC took down Natus Vincere 2-0 in the semi-finals. In the grand final the former VeryGames trio of NBK, shox and SmithZz drew their long-time nemesis NiP, but this time they could not be stopped. LDLC split the first two maps, but came back from a 13-15 deficit on the final map (Overpass, appropriately) to win in overtime with in-game leader and HLTV.orgMVP Happy leading the way.

LDLC are now the official CS:GO world champions and arguably also the best team in the world, given the importance of the major, and their long track record of second place finishes.

It’s a shame some will place an asterisk next to their win due to the Fnatic controversy, but LDLC can sleep knowing they had the game in the bag by then, if not for Fnatic’s shenanigans.

Fnatic are no longer invincible

Since their loss at DreamHack Stockholm, Fnatic have been seemingly invincible. In Jönköping last weekend that aura was seemingly gone from the get-go, with HellRaisers coming back from a 4-11 deficit in their match to top group A ahead of them.

Though their 5-8 thplace finish only comes due to withdrawing from the tournament following the previously covered controversy in LDLC decider, it’s hard to make a case for Fnatic standing a chance anymore at the 3-13 deficit they faced on Overpass.

The kings of CS:GO for the past three months have been slain, and with the drama surrounding the team anything but done, it remains to be seen what happens with one of the most dominant teams of all-time.

NiP return to the top

NiPwere the defending champions from the previous major in August, but had not made the top four in any tournament since then, or qualified for any online league’s finals. Following their roster change that in early November saw Fifflaren retire and Maikelele join on a trial basis, it was unclear what shape NiP would show up in.

The best team in CS:GO history delivered once again, making their fourth consecutive major grand final. Along the way they lost to LDLC in the groups, defeated HellRaisers easily in the quarter-finals, and survived a thriller of a series, including a double overtime game on de_nuke, against their long-time rivals Virtus.pro.

Despite falling just short in the grand final, it’s safe to say NiP has returned to the very top of professional Counter-Strike. They have found a way to fit Maikelele in their system—or adjust the system around him—and will only get better as the team has more time to gel.

You can expect an official announcement of Maikelele becoming a permanent fixture in NiP any day now.

What’s next?

Coming up next will be ESEA Invite Season 17 Global Finalsthis coming weekend in Dallas. The event features eight teams in Fnatic, Virtus.pro, Titan, mousesports, Cloud9, iBUYPOWER and two North American underdogs, but three of those six are using a stand-in.

For Titan, their coach ioRekan, ESWC champion from a year ago—is replacing VAC-banned KQLY. mousesports’ star player allu can’t make the trip due to school commitments, and former ALTERNATE member and mouz legend from CS 1.6, gob b, is stepping in. Finally, iBUYPOWER’s new member desi is not allowed to play, and ex-member adreN will take his spot temporarily in Dallas.

Although it pales in comparison to DreamHack Winter, ESEA Finals will provide three days of solid action, including an all-star match on Friday, and should keep fans entertained for a little longer before the holiday season.

In 2015 the first big tournament will be MLG Aspen, scheduled to take place at X Games on January 23-25, with eight of the world’s best teams attending. NiP, Fnatic and Cloud9 have been invited, and online qualifiers for both Europe and North America are set to begin soon.

You can find Tomi on Twitter at @lurppis . For more competitive CS:GO coverage, go to www.HLTV.org.

YouTube confirms monthly subscription service is coming

Word of the new service came to light earlier today, when Bloomberg reported on an email sent to video creators that said, "By creating a new paid offering, we'll generate a new source of revenue that will supplement your fast growing advertising service." Google later confirmed that the report was legitimate, and that revenues would be shared.

YouTubehas confirmed the forthcoming launch of a monthly subscription option that will let users bypass the ads that normally run in front of videos.

"While we can't comment on ongoing discussions, giving fans more choice to enjoy the content they love and creators more opportunity to earn revenue are always amongst our top priorities," it said in a statement.

The subscription fee hasn't been set and there's no word on when the new service option will be rolled out. The notification of the coming change was sent out to content creators in order to give them sufficient time to review and agree to changes in their terms of agreement.

Orbit’s Odyssey Lands on iOS

Paperkyte, a mobile entertainment company based in San Francisco, recently released their game Orbit’s Odyssey on iOS devices.

on iOS devices. A strategy puzzler that places emphasis on graphics and artwork, the game attempts to reimagine puzzlers using “character interplay and space-time oddities,” according to Paperkyte co-founder Prashanth Shantharam.

In Orbit’s Odyssey , the player controls a humanoid cookie as it travels across the galaxy through 90 brain-teasing puzzles to find Orbit, his space boy alter ego. In each level, the player makes use of two primary actions – rolling and teleporting – in order to collect coins and gems, while dodging monsters that give chase around the planet. Players are encouraged to use a bit of trickery in order to avoid the enemies, and still somehow collect all of the extra items in each level. The developers promise the game challenges the cleverness and strategic skills of each player. Simultaneously, players will be able to enjoy views of the cosmos provided by experienced animators, some of whom have contributed to such animated films as Sherman and Peabody and Book of Life .

Orbit’s Odyssey is available now on iOS devices for free. For more information and updates on the game, those interested are encouraged to follow Orbit’s Odyssey on Twitterand like their page on Facebook.

Valve puts $250,000 on the line at Dreamhack 2014 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament

The Dreamhack Winter 2014 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Championship tournament being held in November will be the latest to put a $250,000 prize pool up for grabs.

Counter Strike Global Offensive

Championship tournament being held in November will be the latest to put a $250,000 prize pool up for grabs. And for the first time ever, all the teams taking part are being invited to train at an advance "boot camp" in Stockholm, Sweden, with accommodations provided by Valve and Dreamhack.

Following the 2013 DreamHack SteelSeries Championship, the EMS One Championship at Katowice, Poland, and the ESL One Cologneeven in August, the Dreamhack Winter 2014 tournamentwill be the fourth beneficiary of Valve's community-funded prize pool, with prize money raised through last year's CS: GO Arms Deal update. The tourney will feature the top eight teams from ESL One Cologne—NiP-Gaming, Fnatic, Titan, Team Dignitas, Virtus.Pro, Cloud 9, Epsilon and Na'Vi—and eight others that will earn spots in online qualifiers held through October.

Announced in August 2013, the CS:GOwas intended to help boost the prize purses at CS:GO competitive events, and thus their visibility amongst gamers and the e-sports audience. It appears to have worked: The number of Global Offensive players has grown by more than 250 percent over the past year, while three million unique viewers tuned in to the ESL One Cologne event.

The Dreamhack Winter 2014 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Championship will run from November 27-29 in Jönköping, Sweden. Dates and locations for the Stockholm boot camp have not yet been announced.

YouTube will relaunch its livestreaming service to focus on games, says report

Following its failed attempt to acquire Twitch last year, YouTube is reportedly renewing its efforts in the livestreaming space.

last year, YouTube is reportedly renewing its efforts in the livestreaming space. According to anonymous sources speaking to The Daily Dot, YouTube is in the process of sourcing and acquiring talent in its efforts to relaunch YouTube Live, the company's existing livestreaming service.

Noting that YouTube has already recruited around 50 engineers with experience in the space, one source said Google (which owns YouTube) is doubling down on its livestreaming efforts. "[That] is a pretty big statement of intent," the source reportedly said. "The time is right as well, with Twitch moving into other areas such as music and so on. Google doesn't want to be too far behind in the arms race.”

Meanwhile, The Daily Dot's source says that "gaming and esports" will be the main motivator behind the relaunch of YouTube Live. "There’ll be huge opportunities for established streamers and organizations soon and I would say that the record numbers of esports viewers are only going to grow when Google start promoting and partnering with these events.”

Google backed off from its Twitch acquisition last year amid reported antitrust concerns. Now Amazon owns the streaming behemoth, having spent more than $1 billion on the site. Little wonder then, that Google has advanced plans to strike a counterattack.

IGM Forum Finds – Theatre of Doom: All of Hell is a Stage

Artery Studios is the source of our latest Forum Find , as they’re responsible for the development of Theatre of Doom , a top-down fighting game based on puppet theater.

, a top-down fighting game based on puppet theater. Players must face off either alone or in local co-op against demonic marionettes of all shapes and sizes in a fight for their lives. Any narrative component beyond that has yet to be revealed, but the game promises beat-’em-up fun with a variety of fighting styles, for Windows PC.

There are over 25 levels in Theatre of Doom , complete with more than 12 types of enemies to defeat. Players are tasked with navigating a classic stage setting against bloody beasts, winding around cliffs while fighting spiny caterpillars, and facing off against wizards on remote helipads. Theatre of Doom will offer Steam trading cards and achievements, as well as leaderboards for players to compare scores with their friends. It also offers controller support for couch co-op using the same PC. Rhe developers are working on a demo, which will be released on IndieDB, while the full game will be released in late-2015.

Those interested can vote for Theatre of Doom on Greenlightto make sure it’s available on Steam. Follow Artery Studios on Twitterand Facebookfor additional updates and screenshots. To interact directly with the devs in the IGM Forums, visit their original postto leave comments and questions.

If you’ve got a great idea for an indie game, have screenshots of a new project, or want to gain feedback from fellow devs and indie game fans, sign up for the Indie Game Mag Forums and Tell Us About Your Indie Game! Have your project seen by our community, and get a chance to be featured right here on IGM Forum Finds !

CS:GO competitive scene in hacking scandal, 3 players banned

Admissions of hacking by three professional CS:GO players have cast a shadow of suspicion on the CS:GO competitive scene.

Csgo Muzzle Flash

Admissions of hacking by three professional CS:GO players have cast a shadow of suspicion on the CS:GO competitive scene. The outed players, Hovik "KQLY" Tovmassian, Simon "smn" Beck, and Gordon " Sf" Giry each received in-game bans through VACearlier this week. The revelations call into question the players’ past performances, both during online tournaments and at LAN events, where the cheat, which allegedly connects through a player’s Steam Workshop, could have been used. For some in the scene, the news also presents the uncomfortable possibility that other professional players have used similar, still-undetected cheats in tournament play.

These revelations could not have come at a worse time for CS:GO e-sports—we’re days away from the biggest tournament in the game’s history, DreamHack Winter 2014.

Professional CS:GO players have been VAC banned before, but arguably not such high-profile players. KQLY, the most prominent player of the three, admitted in a statement on Facebook(that I’ve translated from French using Facebook’s integrated tool) that he had used a third-party program “for seven days.” KQLY denied using the program while he was a member of Titan (during the DreamHack Invitational, for example, which Titan won). “As you may have seen yesterday, I was banned by VAC and unfortunately it was justified,” KQLY wrote. “I wanted to say that I am really sorry for all the people who supported me, I am aware that with my bullshit, my career is now over and my team in a very bad position. They did not deserve it.”

When he was offered use of the program, KQLY says, the provider reassured him that “many pro players” were using it.

“This is a cheat that doesn’t have anything visible on the screen. The only way you’d know if someone did it is if you caught them at the point they installed it on that machine and activated it.”

KQLY has been cut by Titan, who along with Epsilon have been disqualified from DreamHack Winter 2014by the tournament’s organizers. Their expulsion is a huge blow to both organizations, who have spent weeks training for a chance to compete for the event’s quarter-million-dollar prize pool. Speaking to Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, DreamHack’s Head of e-sports Tomas Lyckedal expressed surprise. "I don’t think a pro player has been banned like this since 2001. Of course people have been caught cheating but it’s always been semi professionals, never established players. And it’s a shame it has to happen so close before the tournament,” he said. “I really hope that this doesn’t happen to more teams, but this has to be a clean sport so if it happens then so be it.”

Lyckedal also pledged that DreamHack “will take special precautions”at DreamHack Winter 2014. Playing in Titan and Epsilon’s place will be the winners of a “Last Call Qualifier” organized by DreamHack that takes place on Saturday.

On Friday, Titan issued a statementcondemning KQLY’s actions. As it did so, Titan also criticized Valve for not working directly with teams to remedy the situation. After KQLY’s ban was revealed, Titan says it contacted Valve but was eventually “met with dead silence” after their initial email exchange. "Valve opted for a unilateral decision, handing out collective punishment with complete disregard for team involvement in the problem solving process.” I contacted Valve earlier today for comment but have not received a response.

The nature of the hack

KQLY’s ban was preceded by the ban of Simon "smn" Beckon ESEA, a third-party client used by competitive players to find matches and pick-up games. According to ex-pro and HLTV.orgcontributor Tomi “Lurppis” Kovanen, Valve contacted ESEAwhen it learned of the cheat. The bans of KQLY and Sf that followed, it would seem, were a result of Valve updating VAC to detect the cheat that smn used on ESEA.

The cheat in question is allegedly very difficult to detect, so much so it’s not out of the question for it to have been used at live LAN events. E-sports commentator Duncan “ Thooorin” Shields took to YouTube(embedded above) to speak about the scandal—primarily to call for calm and an end to the “witch hunt” for other potential hackers that’s overtaken some fans in the scene in the past few days—but he also gave his own explanation for the type of hack that was allegedly used.

“It’s a cheat that doesn’t even have an extreme effect—unless you really abuse it—it has layers to it where it can just give you a slight advantage in aiming,” says Shields in the video. “So if you’re already one of the best players in the world, it’ll make it so you just look like you’re having your best game. It won’t even seem like you’re hacking and that was an impossible movement.” He continues, “This is a cheat that doesn’t have anything visible on the screen. The only way you’d know if someone did it is if you caught them at the point they installed it on that machine and activated it.”

The impact

Titan and Epsilon’s disqualification from DreamHack Winter sours the excitement around CS:GO’s biggest tournament of the year. For some, the bans have created a cloud of suspicion around other teams and players. Smn, the originally banned player, commented on a livestream on Fridayabout his ban and the incident, allegedly saying that as much as 40% of the pro scene is using hacks.

Of course, that's one person's statement, and it should not be taken as the certain truth. It remains to be seen whether more players will be VAC banned, and whether Valve will take further action, though some members of the community are already anticipating more bad news. I believe it’s important to temper our suspicion and not jump to conclusions that any one team or player is guilty until there’s hard evidence to suggest that they cheated.

It’s been exciting over the past year or so to watchCS:GO blossom into an e-sport that draws hundreds of thousands of spectators at once. And it’s been exciting to see the scene grow to support dozens of players and teams around the world. Fighting the hack-making industry, as we’ve previously investigated, is a constantly evolving struggle for studios like Valve, who can’t be expected to quash every single assistance program—it’s part of the cost of building a popular competitive game. Valve does, however, in cooperation with leagues and teams, have the power to make the punishment for hacking so unpalatable that fewer pros and non-pros would pursue it. Whatever happens next, it’s going to make for a fascinating tournament at DreamHack next week.

YouTube ditches Flash for HTML5 as default player

Four years ago, when YouTube implemented early support for HTML5, it wrote , "There's been a lot of discussion lately about whether or not the HTML5 tag is going to replace Flash Player for video distribution on the web." Now that discussion has seemingly come to an end, as YouTube has announced that it will now default to HTML5 instead of Flash in Chrome, Internet Explorer 11, Safari 8, and beta versions of Firefox.

YouTube said that a number of "key technologies" have enabled the switch to the new default format, including MediaSource Extensionsthat allow Adaptive Bitrate (ABR) streaming, which lets it adjust resolution and bitrate of video streams on the fly "in the face of changing network conditions," the open VP9 codecthat enables higher resolution at lower bandwidths, Encrypted Media Extensions, new fullscreen APIs, and more.

"These advancements have benefited not just YouTube’s community, but the entire industry," YouTube wrote. "Other content providers like Netflix and Vimeo, as well as companies like Microsoft and Apple have embraced HTML5 and been key contributors to its success. By providing an open standard platform, HTML5 has also enabled new classes of devices like Chromebooks and Chromecast."

The sentimental part of me that still thinks of it as Macromedia Flash is a little bit sad to see such a venerable piece of software coming to its inevitable end; but the part of me that flips out every time the Flash plug-in crashes in Firefox will be happy to see it go. And in the end, despite the teething pains that will almost certainly accompany this transition, that's the part I'm going with. Bye-bye, Flash. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Take to The Skies in Flying Tigers: Shadows over China

Flying Tigers: Shadows over China is a new third-person air-combat action game from Swedish indie developer, Ace Maddox.

is a new third-person air-combat action game from Swedish indie developer, Ace Maddox. The game is based on the historical events of the China Burma India Theatre of World War II, and puts gamers into the cockpits of those fighting for their country.

Soar the skies of Southeast Asia in places like Burma, Thailand, the Himalayas, China, and more. Take part in historical battles including the battle of Salween Gorge and the Invasion of Malaya. Flying Tigers offers a mix of arcade style gameplay with photo-realistic visuals. Players can also slow down time to increase their precision with a mechanic called ‘TrazerTime’.

The game offers a full single player campaign where players can take part in reconnaissance, bomber, fighter, gunner, torpedo and night missions. Flying Tigers also offers fully-fledged multiplayer with up to 16 players and several modes like Master of the Skies, Capture the Flag, and Team Dogfight.

Flying Tigers: Shadows over China is set to release on PC this summer via Steam Early Access. There’s no information on a price yet, but the developer has stated that there will be a flat fee. If you’d like to learn more about the game, visit the official website, follow on Twitter, or ‘like’ on Facebook. You can also find out more about Ace Maddox by visiting their website.

Ready Up - Springtime for MarineKing in NYC, winter for PartinG and DRG (4/20/2012)

I hope you like StarCraft II, because it dominates the eSports schedule this weekend.

MKP Winter Champ thumb courtesy MLG

I hope you like StarCraft II, because it dominates the eSports schedule this weekend. There are two concurrent events this weekend: Dreamhack EIZO Open in Stockholm, and the MLG's StarCraft II Spring Arena 1 in New York. Arena kicks off first at 6 p.m. Eastern tonight, with MarineKingPrime (Lee Jung Hoon, Korean Terran) playing against PartinG (Won Lee Sak, Korean Protoss).

That's a highly anticipated match, and possibly a preview of the Spring Arena's Grand Finals. PartinG has been playing incredibly well lately, and is widely believed to have been robbed of a victory over MarineKing in the Global StarCraft Team League Finals at the IGN Pro League tournament in Vegas two weeks ago. PartinG was significantly ahead of MKP and on the cusp of knocking him out of the tournament when the connection dropped. The match could not be resumed, so they had to replay the same map, and this time MKP took the victory. He then went on a tear and wiped out the rest of PartinG's StarTale teammates to give his Prime team the GSTL crown.

All of which probably didn't sit terribly well with PartinG. This recent history will certainly make their first encounter more interesting, even setting aside the fact they are both playing extraordinarily well these days.

Spring Arena 1is a small eight-player tournament, which is a small field, but an elite one. MarineKing, DRG, Heart, HuK, PartinG, Ganzi, Violet, and MC are all competing for a $10,900 prize pool from Friday to Sunday. To cast the matches, the MLG has brought in Tastosis, djWHEAT, JP McDaniel, Rob Simpson, and Grubby. It starts with round robin play today and tomorrow, then on Sunday players are seeded into a single elimination bracket. There will be no extended series.

As was the case with the Winter Arena, Spring Arena I is not available for free. However, you can buy access to the event, with its seven streams, for $10. Alternately, you can pay $30 for access to the entire spring season. The viewing schedule is here.

If you decide to watch the Arena this weekend, Team Liquid has an outstanding write-up of the top storylinesto follow during the tournament.

What's really surprising is how poorly DRG (Park Soo Ho, Korean Zerg) has been doing lately. After winning the GSL championship, DRG decisively lost the MLG's Winter Championship to MarineKing, who had already eked out a win at the Winter Arena. DRG also got knocked out of Code S contention in the GSL in the first round of competition. DRG's difficulties used to be confined to MarineKing, but they've clearly grown since the Winter Championship.

Meanwhile, at Dreamhack, NaNiwa (Johan Lucchesi, Swedish Protoss) has come home to Sweden to compete against players like Polt, SaSe, Socke, PuMa, and Ret, among others. It's not a bad field, although it's not exactly the League of Assassins that you'll find at Spring Arena this weekend. But NaNiwa may have other things on his mind: he's currently making a strong bid for the GSL championship, a return to elite Code S competition that once looked questionable after a series of incidentsthat called NaNiwa's sportsmanship and judgment into question.

Apollo, Wolf, and iNcontrol will be casting the event. Play begins at 5 a.m. Eastern on Saturday. You can see the rest of the schedule hereand stream it here. The winner of this weekend's Dreamhack Open will receive an invitation to take part in the MLG's second Spring Arena, which starts on May 18.

That's what's on deck for StarCraft II this weekend. It looks like a quiet weekend for eSports outside of SC2, but if there are other events you'll be watching this weekend, be sure to shout them out in the comments.

GDC 2013: YouTube announce new live-streaming API for developers

YouTube are planning to make it easier for developers to insert live streaming tools into their games.

YouTube are planning to make it easier for developers to insert live streaming tools into their games. The API, announced at GDC, will give game makers an easy way to provide their community with integrated tools to stream directly to YouTube, as well as insert breaks for ad placement. Thus they set the stage for the Great Blackout, when the internet will buckle under the weight of Farming Simulator 2014 streams.

YouTube have offered similar features in the past - Black Ops 2 currently features direct livestreaming - but a full API would open the service up to more developers, as well as enable streaming through iPhone and Android devices.

It's an interesting move, and one that seems directly targeted at the popularity of Twitch. Whether this API will offer enough flexibility to tempt existing streamers into an integrated platform remains to be seen. But an easy-to-use solution will no doubt prove attractive to developers looking for an easy way get their player-base sharing video content.

Thanks, The Verge.

Video: Platinum's guidelines for great action game design

From Bayonetta to Vanquish to Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance , Japanese studio Platinum Games has demonstrated a penchant for designing critically-acclaimed action games.

However, the studio's representatives rarely speak in depth about their design process. Platinum Games' Atsushi Inaba contravened that trend last month when he stepped up at GDC 2016 to speak frankly about Platinum's philosophy of action game design.

It was a great talk, one that outlined the game development principles that have guided the studio to create successful games using both external licenses and its own internal IP.

A must-watch for action game developers, Inaba's full talk is now available completely free over on the Official GDC YouTube channel.

About the GDC Vault

In addition to this presentation, the GDC Vaultand its new YouTube channeloffers numerous other free videos, audio recordings, and slides from many of the recent Game Developers Conference events, and the service offers even more members-only content for GDC Vault subscribers.

Those who purchased All Access passes to recent events like GDC, GDC Europe, and GDC Next already have full access to GDC Vault, and interested parties can apply for the individual subscription via a GDC Vault subscription page. Group subscriptions are also available: game-related schools and development studios who sign up for GDC Vault Studio Subscriptions can receive access for their entire office or company by contacting staff via the GDC Vault group subscription page. Finally, current subscribers with access issues can contact GDC Vault technical support.

Gamasutra and GDC are sibling organizations under parent UBM Tech

Hearthstone Help: Interview with Dreamhack Bucharest winner

Greetings Hearthstone fanatics and PC Gamer readers.

Vincent Sariushere, PC Gamer's resident Hearthstone decksmith. This week I've got something special for you: an interview with the winner of Dreamhack Bucharest, the largest Hearthstone tournament to date. Dreamhackis a huge PC festival, and well-known for hosting a wide range of LAN tournaments for major e-sports games, including League of Legends, Dota 2, Starcraft 2, and now Hearthstone.

Q: Firstly, congratulations on your victory at Dreamhack Bucharest. What did you make of the tournament overall?

A: Thank you very much! It was overall an unbelievably great experience and I never expected to win!

Q: What advice would you give PC Gamer readers who fancy playing Hearthstone in a tournament?

A: Just go for it and enjoy it! The best example is Geepsy, a player who was completely new to Hearthstone during the event, and now he is a living Hearthstone Legend! [Geepsy was a local Romanian Hearthstone player entirely unknown to the community, yet in his first ever showing managed to get to the Grand Finals of an incredibly talent-packed tournament using some unfashionable cards.]

Q: How nervous were you during the final few matches?

A: I was surprisingly calm during the finals. I was very confident in my skill and my decks.

Q: Did your decks perform as expected?

A: I can't speak for all of my decks, since I mainly used one throughout the tournament. I expected my Druid deckto win most of my first games in the Best-of-Threes, and then to get counter picked in the second match. I never expected to win 2-0 most of my Games!

Q: What lessons have you learned from Dreamhack that you will take into your next tournament?

A: To practise a lot one-two weeks before the tournament, and two days before the event to just relax and not worry too much about the games.

Q: Your Ramp Druid deck has quickly become popular, can you tell us a bit about the creation of that deck?

A: I collected quite some tournament experience with my Druid deck before I entered Dreamhack. For example I won the Zotac Cup with a slightly different Ramp Druid version and outstanding 19-1 stats. I optimized my deck throughout the months. Every single card was carefully chosen–it's no surprise that it became quite popular .

Q: As one of the designers of the very powerful Midrange Hunterdeck which became hugely popular during the latter half of the April season, can you explain what made the deck so much more dominant than previous Hunter decks?

A: It was much more consistent than the previous Hunter versions. We removed the biggest weakness of the existing Hunter decks–the traps. You can easily play around them, or completely ignore them, until you build up your own win condition. Besides that, you didn't rely completely on the Buzzard-Unleash the Hounds combination to win.

You had other "big threats", like Savannah Highmane for example. These forced your opponents, who usually played around the Buzzard/UTH, by simply not overextending the board with too many minions, to play multiple creatures and make themselves vulnerable to the combo.

Q: Relatedly, Blizzard recently increased the cost of Unleash the Hounds to 3 Mana. Did you think that was necessary?

A: I think it was necessary, since Hunter became too dominant on the Ladder. The broken part was the endless amount of card draw the combo enabled without any interaction from the enemy player. The same problem exists in the existing Miracle Rogue decks, and I believe that Blizzard is going to nerf that next .

Q: Do you expect Hunters to keep running the card, or will we now see some experimentation with non-UTH Hunter decks?

A: I believe that Hunter will be rarely played on the ladder. Before the UTH buff from 4 to 2 Mana, Hunter was a rarely picked class. The other existing class-specific Hunter cards are simply not as good as the cards other classes have, since Secrets are unplayable in the current metagame, and without Secrets the Eaglehorn Longbow is a very expensive version of Fiery War Axe.

Q: Speaking of experimentation, I tune into your stream from time to time and you certainly have some interesting decks. Can you tell us a bit about what you're working on currently?

A: Currently I'm working on a competitive Bloodlust-Shaman deck, and I want to make Priests more valuable in tournaments as well.

Q: What is your single favourite card in Hearthstone, and why? (And also which one do you hate having played against you the most?)

A: Elven Archer is my favourite card, because it looks pretty crappy at first sight, but you can also see it as a Mage hero ability and Paladin Hero ability combined for 1 Mana. It's a very versatile card and I use it in many of my decks. The card I hate the most to play against is definitely Gadgetzan Auctioneer, because it is completely out of my reach how useful that card will be to my opponent, it totally depends on his own draw.

Q: Blizzard has also been showcasing some of the cards that they will be releasing with the Curse of Naxxramas expansion. Are there any that you've seen so far which you expect to have a strong impact on the metagame?

A: As many others already mentioned, the Nerubian Egg will be really dominant in the first couple of weeks after the release. It will be mainly played in Zoo Decks.

Q: Hearthstone senior designer Ben Brodesaid during his appearance on ValueTown that, while they're not introducing any new Keywords with Naxxramas, they are introducing new mechanics. What mechanics would you like to see introduced?

A: Instead of a mechanic, I would like to see a weekly tournament for Arena, as an example. They could implement a system that saves the 12 win-streak Arena decks you've had, and allow you to use those Decks in a weekly tournament against other Arena decks. This would bring back the fun and replayability of Arena, even for pro gamers.

Q: What do you think is the single most interesting deck that's been designed so far?

A: Summoning Portal - Alarm-o-bot - Legendary only - Warlock Deck.

Q: Have you got any simple tips you could give readers who are struggling to climb the ladder?

A: Don't blame bad RNG or Blizzard, try focusing on your mistakes and work on avoiding them. You will eventually become a good player and climb the Ladder with ease.

Q: You just won King of the Hill, but what's next? More tournaments?

A: My next big goal is to help Tempo Storm win Dreamhack Summer!

Q: Finally, any shout-outs you'd like to make?

A: Shoutout to Skar, Reynad for helping me so much with everything, and to all my viewers, fans and of course to all PC Gamer readers!

You can watch Gaara over at Twitch, as well as follow him on Twitter. Team Tempo Storm can also be found on Facebookand Twitter.

How net neutrality affects PC gamers

In January, the US Court of Appeals in D.C. waved its gavel at the Federal Communications Commision and handed down a disappointing verdict: the 2010 Open Internet Order is unlawful.

is unlawful. In other words, net neutrality just took a big right hook to the jaw.

Net neutrality taking a beating isn't going to stop you from playing Battlefield, or prompt restrictive bandwidth caps overnight that make it harder to download games from Steam. Tuesday's decision likely won't affect your day-to-day gaming at all.

But net neutrality is still something you should care about. If you've ever streamed a game on Twitch, followed an amazing speedrunning event like Awesome Games Done Quick, or watched a YouTube archive of a world record solo eggplant run in Spelunky, Tuesday's ruling could impact elements of the PC gaming community you care about.

Net neutrality typically serves as an all-encompassing rallying cry for Internet users and civil rights activists afraid that phone and cable companies are going to trample all over them. It's an important cause—we don't want Internet providers controlling where we browse—but because net neutrality can refer to so many issues, it can be hard to know exactly how it affects our day-to-day use of the Internet.

The common carrier rule

"Neutrality" broadly refers to keeping the Internet an even field for everyone. When you sign up for an Internet package, you can visit any website you want. Nothing is blocked or throttled. Perhaps most importantly, net neutrality is meant to prevent companies like Comcast from interfering with the competition (like throttling Netflix's bandwidth while making sure Comcast's XFINITY On Demand comes in crystal clear).

Those protections are now gone. Here's the key quote from the court's judgement on the Open Internet Order, which codified the FCC's neutrality rules in 2010:

"...though the Commission has general authority to regulate in this arena, it may not impose requirements that contravene express statutory mandates. Given that the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers, the Communications Act expressly prohibits the Commission from nonetheless regulating them as such. Because the Commission has failed to establish that the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules do not impose per se common carrier obligations, we vacate those portions of the Open Internet Order."

The FCC has been treating ISPs as common carriers, ruling that they're not allowed to interfere with or prioritize the traffic flowing across their networks. But it didn't actually classify them as common carriers. Ars Technica calls this wishy-washy rulemaking, explaining "The FCC has avoided calling ISPs common carriers for more than a decade, favoring a 'light touch' regulatory approach that could protect consumers while (hopefully) appeasing political foes of net neutrality."

The court decided that the FCC had the "general authority" to regulate Internet networks, but since it didn't classify broadband providers as common carriers, it can't make specific rules preventing traffic discrimination or blocking. With that key piece of the Internet Order tossed out, ISPs are now free to prioritize data as they see fit.

Trouble for streamers

Why does the FCC's common carrier blunder matter for gaming? Realistically, we don't see a grimdark storm of ISP tyranny on the horizon—Comcast would lose tons of customers if it split off a site like Twitch as an HBO-style upgrade. They're more likely to charge data-hungry services like Netflix, YouTube, and Twitch more money to reach us.

Ars Technica writes that Tuesday's ruling "would allow pay-for-prioritization deals that could let Verizon or other ISPs charge companies like Netflix for a faster path to consumers." In other words, Netflix would have to pony up for guaranteed throughput, and if it didn't, its packets may end up in an Internet highway traffic jam. Video streams would pause to buffer more often or struggle to maintain HD quality.

If Netflix has to pay more to transmit its data, that cost will likely be passed on to customers. The same goes for Twitch and YouTube. Even Steam could be affected if it continues to grow. In September, Gabe Newell claimed that updates for popular games like Dota 2 generate 2-3 percent of global Internet traffic.

Maybe all this just means more ads. Maybe it means new subscription fees. Telecoms now have more power, and one way or another, we'll probably end up paying them more money.

The FCC could appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, but there's a real chance it will wait to see how things play out. In December, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler saidthat he was okay with ISPs charging Netflix more for an Internet fastlane. As The Verge points out in a biting editorial, Wheeler could take steps to reclassify ISPs as common carriers, giving the FCC the power to regulate them much more strictly. But doing that would essentially be standing up in front of lobbyists with billions of dollars to spend and taunting "Come at me bro." The FCC isn't about to pick a fight with all 172 membersof the National Cable and Telecommunications Association.

Wheeler said he's confident that the market will take care of itself. And, presumably, he's okay with the average Internet user, the kind that plays games and streams video every week, paying whatever price the market decides on.

Improbable: How a team of 15 builds a physics-based MMO

The British studio is best known for I Am Bread and Surgeon Simulator , though its body of work stretches beyond that and will soon encompass a high-flying massively MMO game: Worlds Adrift .

When you mention Bossa Studios, I think of floppy breadand spy watches. I do not, as a rule, think about massively multiplayer airship games.

The project is chiefly interesting because of its ambition: Bossa has a team of 15 people working in Unity to build a persistent, scalable online world with the sort of physics-based game design the studio is known for.

The team's goal, according to designer Luke Williams, is to replicate the open-ended appeal of early MMORPGs like Ultima Online rather than their more rigid, content-driven modern siblings.

“When you see Blizzard struggling to keep up with demand for -- when all the World of Warcraft players are leaving because the content has dried up -- well, if Blizzard can't handle it, how the hell can a small studio like ours keep up with that?” Williams tells me during a recent phone conversation. “We’re calling back to Ultima , I think, in terms of having a huge open world to just explore.”

But by the same token, how the hell can a team of 15 hope to build a game of that scope in the year between when Bossa began seriously working on Worlds Adrift last November and when it aims to ship it late this year?

The answer, as it turns out, is that they can’t -- they’ve had to work with an external team at Improbable, the London-based tech startup that’s raised millionsin investment to develop what it describes as an operating environment for building virtual worlds.

“You can think of our technology as an operating system; we’re orchestrating all these processes together to create a bigger experience,” Improbable CEO Herman Narula tells me, via phone. “Nobody at Bossa needs to worry about server infrastructure or networking -- all those things are part of the OS-like layer that we provide. The game really just needs the developers to build gameplay using our APIs and an engine, like Unity.“

Though Improbable’s market isn’t limited to game companies, Narula says the firm has been refining its own technology with Bossa’s help as the two work together on Worlds Adrift .

The game will be the first real public test case for Improbable, and Bossa CEO Henrique Oilifers says the game would never have happened if not for a chance meeting with Narula last year; the project was originally conceived (as Traveller ) during one of Bossa’s regular game jams and shelved because it was too challenging to implement.

“This is something we could not do with 15 people in a year if we didn’t have the Improbable platform to work with,” Olifiers tells me during the same (crowded!) phone call. “I couldn’t do the game, as it stands today, with four times the team -- I couldn’t do it with 60 people without this technology.”

Juggling flaming boxes while playing musical chairs

Olifiers has previously worked on more traditional MMO games at Jagex and other game companies, so he tried to elucidate the ways Improbable's tech differs from traditional MMO game architecture using the example of a traditional chess board with 64 squares.

Imagine each of the squares represents a portion of the MMO game world overseen by a single server, and each is capable of handling a certain amount of data. If a developer wants to exceed that limit in a given square, they have to subdivide it and give each smaller square its own server, which in practice means increasing costs (you have to pay for more servers) and increasing server overhead as you now have ten servers exchanging data instead of one.

"Hooking up with Improbable allows us to avoid these completely arbitrary limitations," says Olifiers. "We can design a game that can say 'Oh, there's a lot of physics-intensive stuff going on over here,' and turn a bunch of workers to focus on that location, handle computing those physics and whatever else is going on -- AI, whatever -- and talk to each other while the event is going on. When that event is over, they go do something else."

Narula claims those "workers" are just Improbable's way of referring to instances of the game engine (in this case, Unity) running on a giant virtual server distributed across many machines in an Improbable cluster. Part of Improbable's job is to manage these workers, creating or killing them as demand shifts and migrating them across machines to minimize lag (alongside client-side prediction algorithms) for players.

"Doing this is like playing a gigantic game of musical chairs with lots of flaming boxes," the Improbable chief tells me. "We're constantly bringing up and bringing down game engines and smaller, other kinds of specialist engines. They're no longer like the monolithic gods that run a particular area of the world; now they're just like, specialist services that handle specific stuff like physics or something else."

What this effectively offers, from a game maker's perspective, is the promise of building a massive online world without needing to create your own server-client architecture -- you just have to trust Improbable to handle things, and build your game using its APIs.

It may not be for everyone, but Bossa seems to appreciate having the opportunity to see how the physics-based design philosophy exemplified by games like I Am Bread works on a massive scale.

"I love designing games like this because you can build a core set of mechanics and then just let the world be played with," says Williams. "I think this form of game design sort of taps into this raw desire for players to learn how things work. What we're trying to do in the MMO space is to bring what we've learned from games like Surgeon Simulator and I Am Bread into an online game environment to see if we can make an interesting MMO game, because the genre has felt a bit stagnant recently."

He and his team are designing Worlds Adrift such that if a player cuts down a tree, it will fall, roll down a hill and stay there until someone does something with it or the entire game shuts down. Players start out on islands floating in the air, but they can use the game's suite of crafting systems to construct airships and explore, building things and fight with (or alongside) each other.

More interesting than the game itself is what its development portends for the future of online game design. If Worlds Adrift works out, it will showcase how new tech may open up MMO game development to developers that have neither the resources nor much interest in fielding games cast from the World of Warcraft mold.

"We know our audience," Olifiers tells me. "It's the person who stops and looks at systems in games and says 'What if...?' That person plays regular games, says 'What if?' and nothing happens. Our games aren't like that. If you try something, chances are you will be rewarded. That's a core design goal."