Rock, Paper, Shotgun

This is an outrage! Mice – who scientists believe don’t care about games at all – now have access to a first-person shooter style virtual reality system. Where is our all-encompassing virtual reality kit? We were promised them back in the Nineties and we’re still having to make do with screens, desks and chairs… and sometimes funny goggles. It’s not good enough. You can check out the blatant favouritism towards mice in the video below.
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Crytek last night announced the latest incarnation of their engine, CryENGINE 3 is now available to be licensed. Now that may not affect you or me (unless you’re a games developer of course), but there’s some interesting implications of this latest tech. Of course, it first of all means games are going to be prettier – these are the people who keep bowling us over with each new engine as it creates vivid beaches and jungles. But it’s also looking to streamline development across multiple platforms – letting programmers see how the game will appear in PC, 360 and PS3 on the fly. And rumours abound that it may be the engine of choice for STALKER 2.

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Agreeable mentalist Jason Nelson has a new game. Following on from the previously covered game, game, game and again game and the previously uncovered I made this. You play this. We are enemies. we have Evidence Of Everything Exploding. Like his previous games it marries simple, surreal gameplay with an overwhelming array of random Dada-simulation. This time, uses “documents, both historical and little-known from NASA, James Joyce, Dadaism, Neil Gaiman, Fidel Castro, the Pizza Box Patent” and so on. Also, videos when you die on each level and… oh, I don’t know art, but I know what I like. And I like giving my frontal lobes a good pummeling.

I dislike a title being so long I can’t fit in any of the Dada’s Gone, Come To Dada or Dada, Dada, You Bastard, I’m Through. Admittedly, I’d have never been able to fit the last one in anyway.

“OH YEH!” to quote Gareth Los Campesinos. The Football Manager 2010 demo is out, featuring Foot-to-ball boss-man antics in the English And Scottish league. The biggest changes since last year include a new match tactics system, a match analysis tool and MULTI-BALL ACTION! Well, probably. Anyway, you can get it from here. And find the footage-free but melodrama-high trailer below…
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Alternative title: “Demo-nic Possession”. Cos, you know, occult and stuff. Oh, nevermind. Wolfenstein, the recent manshoot from Raven, has a demo. I know, how about that! We certainly have had a bumper crop of game demonstrations of late. This particular demo is apparently a mere 685mb big, which seems quite economical in these engorged times. It also means that the game is no good, because small = bad, as we all know. Should you choose to install it, you’ll find yourself in a strange alternate world where the Nazis didn’t win the war, because someone shot at them, to death. Get it here, and I am sure there will be more mirrors along soon. Like this one.

The content of Lego Indiana Jones 2 is somewhat odd. Not only does it feature Traveller’s Tales‘ interpretation of the recent abomination of a film, but also apparently the first three films again, but with no repeated content. But most interesting at this point is the level creator that’s coming with it, detailed in the developer walkthrough posted below.

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Do you remember the recent past? Well done. Memory is functional. Anyway, in that recent past you may remember, you may remember us running a compo to tie in with the recent 5th year anniversary of Direct2Drive. And if you don’t – well, click the link and you’ll soon catch up. We’ve picked the winner who recieves many-o-games, and you’ll find him below, along with some of the other answers to our simple question: What’s the most RPSiest game of all time… and why. It was a total set up for sycophancy, and we’re pleased you did not fail us. Well, at least, not mostly…
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Walking_Target and Agent Of Chaos, architects of the much discussed Left 4 Dead 2 Boycott have decided to close the group, considering their mission was basically complete. Both make personal statements. Their opening statements sum up the situation as they see it…

Agent of Chaos: We have accomplished everything we can on our manifesto. Read the rest of this entry »

No, you don’t get to get away from the zombie culture-plague by playing a sci-fi game, because it only pops up there too. A Halloween zombie event for Star Wars Galaxies, inspired by the recent Star Wars zombie novel Death Troopers, is now live (undead?). Assuming anyone is still playing the over-hauled Star Wars game, it seems they’ll be able to get involved in a quest arc to fight zombie wookiees (probably, I mean they’re in the artwork), among other craziness.

The exploding MMO market in China is being cut off from Western economic influence as Chinese regulators ban foreign investment in virtual worlds. This Reuters report states that: “The new directive also disallows foreign firms from indirectly influencing Chinese gaming firms through agreements or technology support.” This is a move which presumably has something do with predictions that the Chinese MMO market will be worth $3.5-4 billion this year. I wonder what the ramifications of this will be for China’s game culture, and whether we’ll see them having a rather isolated and unusual MMO focus like South Korea has done in the past.

Spotted over on VG247.

There’s been a lot of people asking questions about Borderland’s intricacies over in the Co-op impressions thread yesterday. Specifically, how much of an RPG it actually is. Well, the what-is-an-RPG always opens a particular can of debate, but in terms of character development, that they’ve lobbed the character skill tress online can give you a handle of the whole action/RPG mix. Here’s sneaky-lady Lilith , heavy-frenzied mouthbreather Brick, camping-bastard Mordecai and the hilariously inappropriately named Roland. And some further explanation follows…
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