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| by Danny Internets | May 20th, 2009 - 1:08 am
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Having been out for two full months already, Left 4 Dead is slowly seeing an influx of third party dedicated servers to compliment those hosted by Valve/Steam. While it’s great to see gamers step up and support the community with both their time and money, one of the more popular complaints amongst regulars is that it’s becoming increasingly difficult to locate un-modded (”pure”) servers. This difficulty is largely due to the lack of a functional server browser built into the game’s interface. PC users of the game can access a bare-bones browser through manual console commands (specifically, “openserverbrowser”), however there are no applicable filters for server-side mods or altered cvars. Note to Valve: the #1 way to piss off PC gamers is to strip useful features from a multi-platform release because they don’t work well on consoles.
Indeed, some mods and settings are useful and even downright necessary when they provide fixes for game-breaking exploits. The AI boss infected bug, in which unscrupulous players could swap between spectator mode and the infected team in order to spawn entire armies of hunters (fixed 1/14/09), was prevented by the modding community weeks before the problem was officially remedied with a game update. Other server mods exist to automatically boot players who grief via friendly fire, or to prevent them from suiciding as a survivor (using the /kill command, thus gimping their entire team) while a votekick is taking place.
Douchebag safeguards. Griefer punishers. Exploit prevention. These are the kinds of mods we need (and for which we are grateful).
What we do not need are profanity filters.
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| by Timmy Walnuts | April 22nd, 2009 - 9:43 am
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You’ve come to a moral crossroad, one leads to the path of virtuous, self-righteous glory, the other, a dismal path of thievery, death and destruction. Only one may be chosen, which do you follow? A superb concept for nearly any genre of video game. A concept, however, that has never truly been accomplished. Morality is not as simple as good or evil, an aspect that seems to have been lost over the past 10 years since the release of BioWare masterpiece, the original Baldur’s Gate (and subsequent sequels). Even though there were more specifics tied to your choices in BG, a true “moral compass” feature has yet to be done correctly.
When I had heard Peter Molyneux flaunt his original visions for Fable, I couldn’t help but get excited. An entire game where the moral decisions you make will completely impact how your journey unfolds? Sign me the **** up! Yet, false promises and hyped game mechanics have slowly been becoming almost somewhat of a norm, whether the game “lacks” certain content and then makes you pay for it (ahem…Resident Evil) or it just simply doesn’t live up to its name. Yet, these heartbreaks are flagrant among games that focus around one’s decisions and moral capacities. And its about damn time we get a game that can keep ALL its promises, not just some (or one).
As cliche as it seems to have become to nitpick Fable’s shortcomings, it still stands as the prime example of both morality driven gaming and failure to meet expectations. As much as I’d like to bash both Molyneux and his company’s inability to follow through with ideas, I’m more concerned with playing a game where my choices aren’t simply seen as good or as evil. In the first Fable, your decisions were very simple, kill the thieves and protect the innocent, you gain points for your “good side.” Murder the helpless and steal from the poor, tally some points on that “evil side.” Furthermore, your appearances affected your moral compass as well, for if you adorn certain clothing you’ll be perceived as noble or scary, keeping that good and evil, black and white comparison continuous. Fable II generally did much of the same, tweaking certain aspects and adding the concepts of Purity and Corruption. Admittedly, Lionhead Studios did make slight progress in veering away from such stark contrasts, as one could be evil yet still be pure, and vice versa.
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| by Timmy Walnuts | March 31st, 2009 - 4:04 pm
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If you’re old enough, you may remember the first truly addictive first person shooter developed and published by then fledgling gaming company id Software. This shooter became a staple for the genre, blazing a trail for other landmark titles. Simply known as Wolfenstein 3D, the game blended graphic violence with fantastical story, pitting the protagonist against an entire castle full of Nazis, with only a knife and pistol at your disposal as you break free of your jail cell. With groundbreaking gameplay and plot, the inevitable controversy came to light very soon after the games release. Not only was it deemed too violent, the use of the Nazis and their symbols garnered a banning from Germany on all versions of the game (besides the SNES version, which took out the Nazis. But who wants Wolfenstein without killing them?). Although Wolfensteing 3D received a lot of negative press, id Software never looked back and continued to churn out genre-molding, legendary games in the likeness of Doom and Quake.
With the superior 3D graphical engine created, many developers utilized it to create notable first person shooters/fantasy. One company, however, housed the technical wherewithal to develop further installments of two very popular id Software series. Beginning their career using the Doom engine, Raven Software developed many games under the Heretic/Hexen game series, all formally published by id. Starting as primarily PC developers, Raven has progressed throughout their twenty year lifespan to working with consoles as well, most recently developing Marvel: Ultimate Alliance to generally positive reviews. With their success and collaboration with id, Raven was granted a shared development over Quake 4, and now were given the spotlight again for the next installment of Nazi slaughtering that will be Wolfenstein.
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| by Danny Internets | March 31st, 2009 - 2:14 pm
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Any fan of Dawn of War, Warhammer 40,000, or just good old-fashioned ass-kicking needs to see this video immediately. Embedded in this article is pre-rendered footage showcasing he developers’ collective vision of what Dawn of War 2 should have been. Had Relic been able to hold on to even a tenth of the awesome contained in this video Dawn of War 2 would easily have been the most visually stunning and downright nastiest RTS games ever published.
The biggest and most notable differences between the video here and actual gameplay are the fluidity of movement and robust physics. With the exception of leaping Tyrannids, most units in Dawn of War 2 tend to chug along very slowly and unit interactions are unnoticeable save for the elaborate (and, unfortunately, easily overlooked) melee “sync” kills. In this video we see the mighty Space Marines bowling over the smaller Eldar Guardians (space elves) and even knocking through environmental fixtures. Reality be damned, that is the breed of awesome that never gets old, no matter how many times you see it.
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| by Danny Internets | March 24th, 2009 - 11:03 am
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Good things come to those who wait. That is, unless you’ve been waiting for Fallout 3’s newest DLC, The Pitt.
After having been delayed until the end of March, The Pitt was finally released today by Bethesda Softworks to Xbox and PC users. To the dismay of its fans, many of whom stayed up past midnight to be the first to experience the DLC hot off the presses, the release is apparently so riddled with bugs that the game is unplayable under most circumstances.
Within minutes of The Pitt’s debut, internet forums buzzed angrily with reports of a myriad of bizarre technical problems ranging from out-of-place smoke stacks to floating objects (trees, barrels, rocks, etc.) to system instability. While not game-breaking, perhaps the most obvious issue with the game is the presence of numerous red exclamation point boxes (pictured above) dotting the landscape, which are used in other Bethesda games (such as Morrowind and Oblivion) to indicate missing texture files.
Apart from its cosmetic problems, a number of serious glitches also plague the expansion. Most notably, users report that the downtown area of the city itself, an activity hub integral to advancing the story among its other uses, causes repeated system crashes at the loading screen upon entry. PC users complain of both constant crashing to the desktop and hard lock-ups requiring a cold reboot. For many, the game is simply unplayable in its current state.
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| by Danny Internets | March 20th, 2009 - 8:48 am
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In line with our continuing coverage of politicians’ desperate attempts to deflect blame from bad parents to the video game industry, Derbyshire.co.uk reports this week that Glenis Wilmott, elected Labour Party leader to the European Parliament, has recently been pushing the legislative body to mandate the installation of a new feature to all video game consoles sold in the region. This new feature would consist of a red button which would allow parents to disable the machines when they display objectionable content that might forever warp their children’s fragile minds, potentially forcing them to engage in antisocial behavior or commit any number of heinous atrocities.
Apparently, Mrs. Wilmott is not aware that virtually all modern electronics already have this feature: the power button.
Wilmott’s cesspool of stupid website further expands on her position:
A red button fitted to consoles, computers and other gaming devices would offer parents the chance to control access or even disable games with inappropriate content.
The recommendations in a report for the European Parliament also says that parental control options on video games should be backed up with more information on game content and an age rating system which is the same across Europe.
Studies show that violence in video games does not automatically lead to violent behaviour. But prolonged exposure to scenes of violence can have an adverse effect on the player and even potentially lead to violent behaviour.
Source
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| by Timmy Walnuts | March 20th, 2009 - 12:36 am
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No. Definitely and emphatically no.
However, Ninja Blade does have some potential. I decided to give it a go last night, curious to how From Software and Microsoft Games Studio’s take on the modern ninja in Tokyo could be any different than Ninja Gaiden. Which, I found pretty quickly, that the protagonist Ken, which seems to be a constructed rival against Ryu Hayabusa, is much different. Not only does he have a token black guy as his helicopter pilot, he has the stereotypical master that is the only one who speaks with a Japanese accent, and a team full of ninjas that sound as if they just got out of the suburbs.
As you literally dive right into the action, scenes occur with button prompts to kill some demons that have overrun Tokyo. These button prompts, although somewhat entertaining and stylish, tell you what action is going to be performed. So if you are to use your grappling wire to latch on to a building, it will tell you to press “X” and right under the button, it will say “WIRE.” Now, I’m not sure what the purpose of added text does. Is there a disease that affects eyesight so only text can be read and no visuals may be seen? I’d rather be somewhat “surprised” how Ken is going to continue to free-fall from 1500m in the sky, rather than knowing he’s going to “JUMP.”
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| by Danny Internets | March 18th, 2009 - 2:04 pm
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| Fan reaction to Diablo III’s new look |
Bill Roper, ex-vice president of Blizzard North, the studio responsible for thefirst two installments of the Diablo franchise, recently sat down with Wesley Yin-Poole of Videogamer.com to share his thoughts on Diablo 3 and its new visual style.
As most people know, the new direction taken by the art team responsible for bringing Diablo III to life has not been well received. The first screenshots were released in June of last year and by listening to fan reactions you’d have thought the apocalypse was under way. People jumped out of windows, heads were exploding left and right, 13% of South Korea’s 18-24 male demographic took their lives in ritualistic suicide–it was the worst international tragedy since Alone in the Dark’s opening weekend.
While maintaining a professional demeanor and non-confrontationally neutral stance, Bill Roper expresses his own displeasure with the look of the game:
One of the things I always enjoyed about that separation between Blizzard and Blizzard North was that the Diablo games had a very distinct art style. They had different art directors, they had different people working on it, they had a different sensibility about them. Diablo was I think grittier and darker and a little more leaning towards the photo realistic. Whereas the Craft games that were being built down in Irvine were bigger and broader in scope, brighter colours, just different pallets and different presentation. Both of those were very strong from that visual standpoint, for example.
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| by Timmy Walnuts | March 13th, 2009 - 3:33 pm
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I was taking a little stroll through the internet today, and when I’m poking around aimlessly, I generally don’t find anything of much interest. But today felt different. First came the most amazingly awesome thing I’ve seen in a long time. This has got to be the best Metroid cosplay ever, if not the best cosplay of all time. Not to mention she’s pretty smokin’. But continuing with this Metroid theme, I became curious to when we could expect another to be released. And wouldn’t you know it? The official Japanese Metroid site has a banner at the bottom of the screen, after the flash intro, that simply states “Another Side Story - Coming Soon” with a picture of a space pirate next to it. Yes, I know this has been posted for about a month now, but I still needs my Metroid.
I just hope that this “side story” doesn’t mean another first person experience (and that its not on the Wii). We need a return to the series roots; a side-scrolling, exploratory adventure to continue where Metroid Fusion left off. I don’t want much. Just a nice, old-school feel with some new features, maybe a new type of beam weapon? Shit, I’ll even take a spin-off that focuses around the space pirates, just give me a classic Metroid game. The Castlevania series continues to garner much success using this formula, one that was created by the original Metroid team.Yet, we haven’t seen a seen a 2D installment for about five years now, and its about damn time for one.
Why not take the graphical success of Street Fighter IV, that 3D look on a 2D plane, and mesh it with the exploratory nature of the Metroid series? The game would look fantastic, and with the right development team, could bring the series back to its Super Metroid glory days. Hopefully some news will surface sooner rather than later; all we have is a dinky little banner that possibly points to the same Metroid Dread that was mentioned in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption.
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| by Danny Internets | March 12th, 2009 - 1:26 pm
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Yesterday in southwest Germany, disturbed 17-year-old named Tim Kretschmer walked into the Albertville secondary school and opened fire on his classmates and teachers, indiscriminately gunning down 16 people in a brutal rampage before being killing himself during a firefight with police.
And as devastated families and a grieving German people come to grips with the reality of this tragedy, activist groups and government lobbyists have seized on this moment barely more than 24 hours after the fact and are already taking turns at the blame game.
After police interviews and local investigative reporting discovered that Kretschmer was a talented table-tennis player who had considered pursuing his interest on a professional level, the nation has renewed its discussion over whether or not stricter regulations are needed for the hobby. Anti-table-tennis lobbyists argue that the correlation between the boy’s obsessive interest in the sport and his abominable actions constitute a definite causal relationship, and that by banning table-tennis or at least making it more difficult for the hobby to be enjoyed by children we will decrease the likelihood of such an event occurring in the future. Furthermore, proponents of stiffer legislation and criminologists cite that the reflexes, strategies, and physical endurance acquired through table-tennis playing enabled Kretschmer him to carry out his plan more effectively.
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