PC Guy Gets Revenge on Mac Guy 11:53 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Vaporware
(40 comments)
You know those really annoying Apple ads on TV with the dude from Dodgeball? Laugh it up:
Exploit code for the Mac is easy to find on the internet, the security vendor claims, which makes it likely that Mac OS X will soon be faced with the same plagues as Windows: botnets, spyware, spam and DDoS attacks. For their part, Mac partisans note that they are still waiting for the first hard proof.
WoW: Burning Crusade Beta Key Give-Away 07:08 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: MMOG
(4 comments)
The World of WarCraft Vault is giving away a cubic-assload of beta keys to play The Burning Crusade. It's all random, so just click on the thingie, fill it out, and cross your fingers.
Ninja Dark Messiah Steam Patch 06:36 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Action
(17 comments)
An undocumented patch for Dark Messiah hit Steam late last night which fixes most, if not all of the stability and skipping problems the game was suffering from. I just played four levels with the details cranked up to high (I had to go medium/low before the update) and it ran just fine. Not a single lock-up either, even in what used to be the crashiest parts. The level loads are still a little long (about the same as Company of Heroes), but other than that, it was golden.
Here are the notes for the retail version which should be out next week.
Ten Hours into Twilight Princess 02:22 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Consoles: Nintendo Wii
(33 comments)
Wii.IGN has a fantastic preview of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess after playing some ten-hours of the game (which turns out just to be the tip of the iceberg in terms of overall length). Keep in mind, it does have some spoilers, but just from the first parts of the game. Here's a taste: If Wii Sports is for the non-gamers, Twilight Princess is for the hardcore. After I spent 10 hours with the game, I barely managed to squeak by two temples, with the third so far off that I could scarcely imagine getting there, let alone approach the objective. (For the record, out of 30 or so journalists, nobody came close to the third temple.) I asked how long it took Nintendo's testers to complete the entire game the first time through. The answer is a whopping 70-plus hours. Adding insult to injury, diabolical Nintendo translator and localization manager Bill Trinen told me that he was working on his second play-through of the game. Knowing what to do and where to go, and skipping cut-scenes, Trinen said that he had logged about 27 hours to make it about two thirds of the way through the temples themselves - and that doesn't account for any of the side quests or time sucks like fishing, a single operation that could easily add hours upon hours to Zelda's depth. You can catch another preview at GameSpy.
Oblivion: Knights of the Nine Priced 01:56 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Action / Roleplaying
(6 comments)
Attention K-Mart shoppers: Bethesda has revealed the price of Knights of the Nine, which includes all of the previously released TES4: Oblivion plugins, plus the new KotN adventure. The price? A cool $9.95. The download comes in at 155 megs and is available on November 21st.
Battlefield 2142 1.05 News 01:52 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Action
(6 comments)
EA posted a brief note reaffirming its commitment to support Battlefield 2142. The v1.05 patch should be out sometime next month:
We would like to explain here how committed we are to increasing everyone's experience with Battlefield, especially regarding the updates for Battlefield 2142. We acknowledge that the patching process could have been smoother for Battlefield 2; we have listened to the feedback and learned from it.
To accomplish this goal Dice has recently formed a Live Team with the purpose of making sure your playing experience on the Battlefield is as solid as possible after the game is launched. Among other things, the team works closely with the community and handles the patching process, together with the Ranked Server Providers.
Your Dice Live Team is located at the Dice Studio in Stockholm and is made up of key people from the game project teams. This means that the same people who actually built Battlefield 2142 will be responsible for updating it. It has the clear advantage of involving people who are fully knowledgeable about the code and design of the game. The patches will also be thoroughly tested in closed beta tests before being released.
The patches will also be entirely dedicated to correcting bugs and making fixes instead of introducing new gameplay mechanics, thus significantly reducing the risk of introducing new bugs with the patches.
With all this said, we would like to announce patch 1.05 for Battlefield 2142. The patch includes more than 25 fixes which will improve every player's experience on the Battlefield.
Halo 3 Weekly Update 01:45 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Consoles: Xbox 360
(5 comments)
Believe it or not, Bungie actually wrote about Halo 3 this week instead of that stupid movie crap. Shocking, isn't it? I know, I still can't believe it myself. Here's a whiff of the single player portion of the game: The Campaign game continues its inexorable progress towards completion. The most obvious changes from build to build are certainly graphical. One level had an entire mountainside removed to reveal a large body of water beyond it. The effect is mostly atmospheric - that particular area suddenly bursts from oppressive gloom to an epic and illuminating vista, yet still forces you into complex battle situations, since you can't very well plunge into the murky deep, so you're hemmed in on two sides regardless. In that particular area, the only way forward, is through a very large crowd of angry Brutes and for the moment, brave Grunts.
Multicore Support for Source Engine 01:39 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Action
(0 comments)
The Valve weekly update chats a little bit about upcoming multicore support for Source engined games. Both Bit-Tech and Extreme Tech have previews. Here's a slice from the Bit-Tech article: Why go multi-threaded / multi-core?
Having gotten some ideas of the mechanics behind the Source engine's transition to multi-core, we were keen to find out what had really motivated this move. Yes, there's new hardware arriving in the form of Kentsfield, but other development houses are not moving as quickly as Valve is when it comes to embracing the technology.
Gabe Newell has a fairly easy answer. "If we're right, other people are going to take a long time to get the multi-threaded versions of their engines out. If we're right with the approach we've taken - which is to iterate and build on top of Source - we can get there a couple of years ahead of where they could be." In other words, Source can be at the cutting edge of engine technology, which makes it very attractive both to consumers and licensees.
"It makes performance more of a software problem in this generation of gaming than a hardware problem. That's not really where we'd like it to be, but that's the reality. But with this investment we're making into the Source engine, we really think that there are games that we can build that other companies that don't make this investment won't be able to build."
Dark Messiah SP and MP Patch Notes 01:31 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- Games: Action / Roleplaying
(8 comments)
The front page of the official Might & Magic website is sporting the changelogs for both the upcoming single and multiplayer patch for Dark Messiah. Both of those are expected to go live early next week.
Update: There's a 6 meg ninja patch on Steam for Dark Messiah which fixes some of the stability/loading time problems. Thanks Slax. Give it a spin and see if it works for you.
In Other News... 01:21 pm
- Robert 'Apache' Howarth
- In-House: In Other News...
(13 comments)
I hope you guys are having a nice weekend. The weather (yes, the most boring topic ever created) is friggin awesome here, and will be perfect the next six months. Gotta love bein' able to wear shorts all year round. It's 81 today with 17% humidity. Not bad for November!
It's almost that time of the year for the "Game of the Year" polls, so get ready to get that starting next week. I'll try to start out with stuff that doesn't have any GoTY quality releases still coming out.
Today's question:
Nominate some crap and suggest some Game of the Year related polls!
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