Tuesday, August 19, 2008
News
British Sales Charts
11:20PM Luke Plunkett | Britain got Olympic fever. OK, maybe not fever. Maybe just a slight case of the sniffles, because despite Britain’s surprising surge up the medals chart, the official tie-in game could only clamber its way up to eight place. Why am I mentioning the eight-placed game? Because it’s nice to talk about a non-Nintendo game for once. More »
The 5,000 Square-Mile Racing Game
11:00PM Brian Ashcraft | Developer Codemasters is unveiling multi-plat title FUEL at the Leipzig GC. What’s FUEL? It’s a racing game, so big that it deserves ALL CAPS. It’s hailed to have the “largest racing environment to appear in gaming — ever”. The game supposedly has a 5,000 square-mile playing area with “no boundaries”. Up to 16-players race it out in D.I.Y. cars through places like Nevada’s Grand Canyon. The game boasts a full day-and-day cycle and even features a weather system with tornados, thunderstorms, snowstorms and sandstorms. Hope it looks and plays as promising as it sounds. Codemasters unveils FUEL [Eurogamer] More »
Game Sharer Must Pay Over $US 29,000
10:40PM Brian Ashcraft | An unnamed British woman looks set to be out £16,086.56 ($US 29,950) after being ordered by London’s Patents County Court to pay American developer Topware Interactive. Apparently, the woman shared Topware’s Dream Pinball 3D on a person-to-person file-sharing site. Says prosecutor David Gore, a partner at law firm Davenport Lyons: llegal filesharing is a very serious issue resulting in millions of pounds of losses to copyright owners… As downloading speeds and internet penetration increase, this continues to be a worldwide problem across the media industry which increasingly relies on digital revenues…The damages and costs ordered by the court are significant and should act as a deterrent. This shows that taking direct steps against infringers is an important and effective weapon in the battle against online piracy. The woman must pay damages of £6,086.56 and costs and disbursements of £10,000. Davenport Lyons isn’t finished — the law firm is going after 100 people believed to have also illegally uploading Topware’s IP. Dream Pinball 3D? More like Nightmare Pinball 3D. Illegal file-sharers face fines after copyright case [Telegraph via MCVUK] More »
Team Fortress 2 Gets New Game Mode, Maps
10:20PM Luke Plunkett | Sick of Valve’s water-torture Heavy updates? We were. Just a little. Was starting to feel like a dojo, and boy, are we all dojoed out. So it’s great to see the proverbial floodgates open with this latest announcement, because not only are they introducing an all-new gameplay mode into the game – Arena mode – but five new maps to go along with it. Arena’s designed for small, quick, tactical engagements, and will take place on new (well, newish) maps that emphasise this new approach. Three of the maps are existing ones that have been remade to suit Arena (Well, Granary, Badlands), while the other two – Lumberyard and Ravine – are all new (and are pictured below). Arena Mode [Team Fortress 2] More »More New (High Quality) Final Fantasy XIII, Versus XIII Images
10:00PM Brian Ashcraft |
Valkyria Chronicles Toys All Up In Your Capsule
9:30PM Luke Plunkett | Valkyria Chronicles is still a few months off. Pity. Why not pass the time, then, by playing with these capsule toys! Bust them out, put them together, re-enact all the pivotal moments from a game you haven’t even played, all because you like the look of the screenshots and are totally behind the idea that in this version of the Second World War, it’s awesome that there are chicks who drive tanks in short shorts. SR 戦場のヴァルキュリア [Yujin, via Siliconera] More »
News
Here’s What EA Is Bringing to Leipzig
9:00PM Brian Ashcraft | EA has just announced which of its titles will be on display at the Leipzig GC. According to Jens Uwe Intat, Senior Vice President and General Manager of EA European Publishing, “Never before has EA had such a diverse and powerful slate of offerings, and it’s been great to see consumer and critical response to our games. As more and more people come into interactive entertainment, we are ready with the best games in sports, action, casual, horror, simulation, and online. We’ll be bringing more new games to market this year than in our history, and Leipzig is a great European window to showcase those offerings for the broad range of people that love to play them”. Hit the jump for the list of games. More »
News
Music Games Driving The Whole Damn Industry
8:30PM Luke Plunkett | The gaming industry just keeps. On. Growing. And shows no sign of slacking off! And while many pundits will point to the runaway success of the Wii as a key catalyst for this growth, some sales analysis by UBS’ Ben Schachter shows that the driving force behind the industry’s success is in fact music games. Particularly, Guitar Hero & Rock Band. According to Schachter’s research, music games accounted for 19% of all gaming sales last month, and accounted for a crazy 44% of gaming’s dollar growth over July 2007. Yeah, it’s only one month, and yeah, they’ll account for growth because they’re expensive, but still. Don’t rain on their parade! That’s big money whichever way you look at it. Music Video Games Account for 32% of Industry Growth [GameDaily] More »
News
Hellgate Creator On Why Hellgate Sucked
8:00PM Luke Plunkett | Poor Hellgate. It promised so much, and delivered so little. So little, in fact, that it drove developers Flagship Studios out of business. As the mourners file slowly away from the studio’s funeral and make their way towards the free finger food and drinks, it’s time to reflect on just why Hellgate never made it. Creator Bill Roper has a fairly good idea: Some of them were just bad timing in the PC market. The PC market was lousy last year. Some of it was the fact that we were an independent studio. We didn’t have unlimited money, and we had to ship when we had to ship. Part of it was because we overreached, and that was a design problem that was totally our fault. We tried to do too much. We tried to be a standalone game and a free-play game and an MMO and an RPG and a shooter. We were trying to be something for everybody and ended up really not pleasing many people at all…. Sounds about right to us! Bill Roper: ‘Hellgate Wasn’t As Good As It Should Have Been’ [1UP] More »
