Adam has been talking to the chaps behind MMORTS End Of Nations and ask all the important questions. Read on for enlightenment. Read →
Space is over. Shepard is hanging up is war-trousers. But what does he do before all that happens? Jim reports. Read →
CCP tell all in this wide-ranging interview covering Eve, World of Darkness and that PS3 shooter thing. Read →
ALSO: Arrr! Jim plays with Risen 2's splendid pirates, Goal: Ian Football's reign of terror continues
By John Walker on March 7th, 2012 at 2:40 am.
So while we all already knew, SimCity is back, and it’s being spelt like that. No number, no space. It’s going to be in 3D, resources are going to be finite, and technology pays a significant part. And it’s being made by Maxis, and it’s only on PC. More details, and a trailer below.
By Alec Meer on March 6th, 2012 at 9:12 pm.
Jim’s already judged Bioware’s new guns’n'conversation epic, while I am a mere 10 hours into Mass Effect 3. What I have done that he hasn’t is pick up the contentious From Ashes DLC, allegedly developed after work on the main game was completed and included in the £55 Collector’s Edition, or as a £6/$10 addon to the standard edition. I forked out for the latter, and thus have an extra dude in my crew. We’ve already pondered about whether it should have been part of the core game in concept, but now it’s time to look at it what it actually includes.
I’ve avoided all ME3 storyline spoilers outside of the core concept of From Ashes – if you already own it and want to go in totally blind, I would strongly advise against reading the below. And if you are 100% spoiler-averse about ME3 in general, I would also avoid reading the below. I’ve steered clear of any discussion of plot outcomes, but I do talk about the nature of the new character – stuff you’d find out for yourself not long after meeting him, but I do understand that might be too spoilersome for some. If that’s you, you can find a very quick summation of whether I think the DLC is worth acquiring at the very bottom of the post, underneath the (perfectly safe) YouTube video.
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By Craig Pearson on March 6th, 2012 at 6:21 pm.
Yup, that Massive: the Ground Control and World in Conflict devs have been disarmingly silent of late. But according to reports from the Ubisoft GDC event, they’re helping to create the Far Cry 3 multiplayer. “Huh?”, you might think, but hold that back for a moment – I have more. According to Vox Game’s Brian Crecente
In working on Far Cry 3′s “online universe” Ubisoft Massive is adding elements from the indie scene and social games, they say
Go on let it out now. I’ll join you.
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By Craig Pearson on March 6th, 2012 at 4:50 pm.
Taking the free-to-play dogfight to the air is WoW, known globally as World of Warplanes. The skyborne sister to World of Tanks has finally decided to stop being shy and graced us with some in-game footage. I’m particularly taken with the mix of old and new flight beasts, and the notion of flying in formation with friends under bridges. I’m not one to ignore a massive, immobile, heavy structure when I’m falling through the sky in an unstable tube of thin metal.
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By Alec Meer on March 6th, 2012 at 4:18 pm.
Yesterday’s Assassin’s Creed III firsto-revealo-CGIo-trailero created a spot of inadvertent drama by leaving out a single word in a sentence of text at the end. That word was ‘date’. And the sentence it should have been in was ‘PC format release to be confirmed.’
Cue screaming. Not by me, as I did think it was clear, but some people got the wrong end of the stick because of the peculiar wording.
To them I say, it’s okay! It’s okay! It doesn’t mean that they’ve got cold feet about making a PC version. It’s meant to say ‘PC format release date to be confirmed.’ We have double-checked this with Ubisoft, and while we still don’t know quite when the PC version is due, we can reassure you that it is indeed due. Hugs!
Water beauty
By Adam Smith on March 6th, 2012 at 3:46 pm.
I’ve been charmed by physics puzzler Vessel ever since I first saw its liquids in action, sloshing, spilling and trickling around as gravity intends. I wanted to be set loose in its steampunk world, to jump in puddles and catch raindrops in a bucket. Vessel had different ideas. It would let me play, but it also wanted me to think and it wanted me to think hard. Here’s wot I think about that.
By Craig Pearson on March 6th, 2012 at 3:13 pm.
A lot of the Mass Effect 3 reviews are focusing on the bleakness of Bioware’s story, and quite a few are shocked at the game’s darkness in regard to the choices they made. Some guy called Tom Francis over at whatever the heck PC Gamer is, has figured out exactly why it’s even darker than expected, and it’s a bit of a dodgy trick that BioWare have pulled if true. No, it’s not new-news as such, but it is worth reiterating strongly now the game’s out in some territories. I’ll go into details after the jump, as I’m aware some people view even the words Mass Effect 3 as some sort of spoiler. As long as no-one spoils the ending of Se7en in the comments: I’ve had it on pause for on my VHS for about 16 years. I keep intending to return, but it’s just so tense!
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Brainteaser
By John Walker on March 6th, 2012 at 2:11 pm.
In the always imaginative word of indie gaming, it’s ever-increasingly the case that finding out anything about a game before you play is to take away from the experience. But then you could argue the same is true of most things in life. Which is why I like to break into maternity wards and start telling babies all the spoilers I can think of. “Puberty sucks!” I will shout, as the angry midwives drag me backward from the room. “They lie to you about cell structure in GCSE biology!” I cry as I’m thrown through the doors. But here’s the fascinating thing about Antichamber: even as the developer told me what the game was doing to mess with my brain while I was playing it, it still succeeded in messing with my brain.
By Alec Meer on March 6th, 2012 at 1:01 pm.
Here are my words on Firaxis’ X-COM remake, here are the lead developer’s words, and below, for the first time, is your own chance to eyeball it in glorious technicolour and living motion.
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Cydonia or Sigh-donia?
By Alec Meer on March 6th, 2012 at 1:01 pm.
Last week, I finally got to see XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Firaxis’ X-COM remake, with my own failing eyes. I have various things to post about it over the coming days, but let’s start with a break down of what made my little belly flutter with excitement and what made my weak jaw clench with anxiety. It’s X-COM, but… not. Here’s why.
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By Craig Pearson on March 6th, 2012 at 12:35 pm.
The initial announcement of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive gave us the hope that we could all get along; that you there with your hand-build Intel i7 rig could be playing with a friend who might be sat on his sofa, starting at his giant television, holding a joypad. I wanted that, you (maybe?) wanted that, Valve initially wanted that. Now Valve do not want that. Speaking to Joystiq, Chet Faliszek told them it was because they need to frequently update the PC and Mac versions more frequently.
The beta has proved we want to update not just the beta, but the game itself post-launch frequently on the PC. To do that we need to separate the platforms so one doesn’t hamstring the other. So for that, we have removed the idea of cross-platform play — essentially make all platforms stronger by not mixing them.
