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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 Danny Internets | April 16th, 2009 - 3:17 pm
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As an avid PC gamer, I am frequently dismayed at the departure of polish and quality control from the industry, a change which has become increasingly evident in recent years. Unlike many of my peers, I refuse to grow numb to what many consider “teething” periods for new games shortly after their release, periods in which we pay retail prices for beta software. It’s a matter of principle that often casts me in the role of the hyper-critical curmudgeon battling off the mindless hordes of raving fanboys while reminding everyone that there was once a time before patches could be used to fix broken software after reaching the hands of the consumer.
While Stardock may have rightfully earned a large stock of credibility with PC gamers for its public stance on piracy and DRM, pushing Gas Powered Games’ Demigod out the door before it was ready on April 14th cannot and should not be excused. For those of you who haven’t picked up the game yet (or don’t plan to), an extremely large number of users are experiencing difficulty with the game’s networking which is unable to negotiate connections between different users’ routers properly, resulting in the inability to connect to games for which Stardock is squarely to blame (Stardock wrote the netcode for Demigod rather than Gas Powered Games).
Obviously the variety of networking configurations used by players is vast, however most other companies using similar lobby formats and Games for Windows Live have developed successful solutions (Relic’s Dawn of War 2, for example). Considering that Demigod effectively has no single player component, the fact that they didn’t perform adequate testing of the game’s multiplayer connectivity is an oversight of staggering proportions. Furthermore, there is a software bug in which players who actually can connect to their opponents still aren’t able to join the game, so either way players are beset with technical issues beyond their control.
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| by Danny Internets | April 14th, 2009 - 9:27 am
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Today marks a rare occurrence in the history of World of Warcraft: the release of a content patch.
In keeping with their ridiculously slow update schedule, Blizzard’s patch 3.1: Secrets of Ulduar introduces new “free” content for the first time since the release of the Wrath of the Lich King patch (3.0) on 10/14/08, exactly 6 months ago. Is that new dungeon really worth $90 in subscription fees? Not to me. But, hey now, we can’t all come to our senses.
See below for a comprehensive listing of the 3.1.0 patch notes.
World of Warcraft Client Patch 3.1.0
The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html
The latest patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/
Secrets of Ulduar
Since discovering Ulduar in the Storm Peaks, adventurers have journeyed to the titan city to learn more about its mysterious past. Further exploration has revealed that the magnificent complex is above all a prison, intended to permanently confine the Old God of death, Yogg-Saron. This ancient horror has corrupted its guards, and now it is breaking through the last of its restraints. Faced with the peril of Yogg-Saron’s imminent freedom, a band of mortals has made preparations for a sweeping assault on the city. Overcoming the legions of iron minions and towering defenses at the city’s entrance will take tremendous strength, but even that great victory may not be enough to overcome the madness that dwells below.
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| by Danny Internets | March 26th, 2009 - 12:57 pm
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According to Jager, Relic Developer and forum liason, not just one but TWO new Dawn of War 2 patches are on the way:
Re: ETA on next big patch?
We have one patch that has already been finalized and is in cert, and then another bigger patch which will be finalized in a few weeks.
Source
The first patch will presumably offer a formal fix to the population cap bug, for which a workaround was provided by Relic on March 10th with patch 1.1.3. Based on community opinion, possible balance changes will likely focus on toning down the Tyranids (particularly the Ravener hero) and increasing the competitiveness of the Eldar, who were severely nerfed during beta testing and in the zero-day patch.
Since the patch is already undergoing the certification process required by Games for Windows Live, it should only be 7-14 days before the update is ready to go live (assuming it meets MS standards).
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| by Danny Internets | March 26th, 2009 - 9:20 am
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While this footage is already featured at virtually every gaming website this side of China, I would be remiss in not posting it here in case some folks haven’t stumbled upon it yet.
A teaser trailer to the sequel to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, one of the greatest first-person shooters ever made (both online and offline), was debuted yesterday at the 2009 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. The phrase “teaser” certainly holds true here; no actual in-game footage is shown, however intense loyalty and respect for the franchise gives it license to be perhaps a bit more coy than usual.
Worth noting is that the Call of Duty prefix seems to have been omitted from the game’s title. No word yet whether or not this is an official change, or just a short-hand way of referring to the game in the trailer.
Release date: 11/10/09.
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| by Danny Internets | March 25th, 2009 - 9:57 am
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At the risk of further hyping what is already just pure hype, a Blizzard Community Representative recently commented on the Diablo 3 forums that next BlizzCast, a series of infrequent (but informative) podcasts produced by Blizzard, will likely be released within the next week and will focus primarily on disseminating new Diablo 3 information:
I’m probably not supposed to say that BlizzCast 8 is almost entirely Diablo III related and should be out before the end of the month. It’s going to be a good one and… oh no!
Source
The remark comes in response to a forum poster’s request for more information on the game, the last substantive piece of which was released back in October 2008. The last episode of BlizzCast was released on 2/3/09 and consisted solely of inside commentary about Wrath of the Lich King, the most recent World of Warcraft expansion. Past BlizzCasts have highlighted news and previews for Blizzard’s other upcoming titles, including Starcraft II and Diablo III.
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| by Danny Internets | March 23rd, 2009 - 11:47 am
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In a press release issued this morning, Microsoft has confirmed that Valve’s upcoming DLC for Left 4 Dead, the Left 4 Dead Survival Pack, will be released on April 21. The developer has previously announced that the release will be simultaneous across platforms, so this is equally good news for PC gamers.
This will also coincide with the release of the Critic’s Choice collectors edition of the game.
Best news of all? It’s free.
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| by Danny Internets | March 20th, 2009 - 2:03 pm
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Bioware announced yesterday that they are now ready to receive applications for those eager to participate in the beta testing of the game’s toolset, which will be included with the PC release of Dragon Age: Origins later this year (Q3 2009):
We are taking applications now from Community members who want to participate in this closed-beta test of the Dragon Age: Origins Toolset, an opportunity to help temper the Dragon Age Toolset into something that may be used for years to come by a vast and thriving community.
We are looking for a wide range of computer systems, testing experience and a variety of technical areas of expertise. No experience with toolsets? No problem. We are looking for all types of users.
To Apply for the Dragon Age Toolset Beta test, please click here: Dragon Age Toolset Beta
- Evil Chris Priestly, Community Coordinator
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| by Danny Internets | March 18th, 2009 - 10:20 pm
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On Wednesday, March 18, Valve released the following update for Team Fortress 2, testing the waters with multicore rendering support:
Updates to Team Fortress 2 have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The specific changes include:
Added Multicore Rendering
* This initial release is aimed at testing compatibility, so the option is OFF by default
* To turn it on, go to the Options->Video->Advanced dialog, and check the “Multicore Rendering” option
Other Changes
* Several performance improvements to decals and client bone/flex setup
* A variety of alt-tab and mode switch fixes
* Improvements to the way the engine initializes surround sound, fixing some specific hardware cases
* Fixed a crash on exit in Vista 64
Source
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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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