Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Eurogamer editor Tom “Tom Bramwell” Bramwell has been delving into Bioshock 2, and – following a trip to 2K Marin – he’s been kind enough to unload some of his head-meat into our blog. Read on for hot diggity.

Hello, Role-Playing Shooters! Remember BioShock? They’re making another one. Seeing as I’m a bit of a regular in Rapture, Jim asked me if I’d be willing to write something about it on my next trip to the surface, and I said I’d be delighted. Either that or I got drunk and offered. I can’t remember, and it doesn’t matter.
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IndieGames have a really interesting story about Symantec’s response to Zach Gage’s indie game, Lose/Lose, that Kieron wrote about here. The impish game’s a shmup that deletes files from your computer every time you shoot an enemy ship. Which is something anti-virus computer-protecting Symantec have now identified as a threat, and labelled it a trojan.

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“WoW Microtransactions Begin”, says the headline on Bluesnews. I gasp and imagine what the RPS community will make of the idea of selling a mini-lich and a panda with a hat – two in-game pets – for $10 a pop. Buying the panda one actually gives money to charity, too. He’s not evil, you see. My journalistic analysis of this occurrence amounts to me inviting you to imagine Scrooge McDuck’s diving-into-gold sequence, only with squealing Blizzard executives instead of an anthropomorphised fowl.

There scarcely seems like a more logical target for online worlding than Star Trek, so hopefully Cryptic will get it right with Star Trek Online. They seem to be bang on with the sub-par special effects, at least judging by the exploding ships in this trailer. I’ve made more cataclysmic explosions with a balloon than the ones we see here. Nevertheless it’s good to see the game in motion – the third-person away team stuff seems a lot more developed, but perhaps that’s only to be expected, given the Cryptic back-catalog. Anyway, enough with my space-cynicism, I am like a Cardassian who hasn’t had his dinner – go watch!
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In case you hadn’t spotted, the Left 4 Dead 2 demo is now open to all, whether you’ve pre-ordered the game or not. Which you could well argue is the point of a demo. It’s the first two levels of one campaign, so while not offering a big finish, will give you a taste for the new special infected, the melee weapons, and of course what it’s like to play L4D in the sunshine. They say to go to the official site for more details, but I can’t find any there. So instead open Steam. (Oh, and in exceedingly stupid news, if you pre-ordered L4D2 you will now also have a new hat in TF2. I feel like I’m writing news about a Barbie game.)

The promised Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising downloadable content, which is free for PC users, will be available tomorrow along with the new patch. Codies info and trailer below.
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File under What Could Have Been. Robert Olson was Art Director at FASA, and after Crimson Skies started work on… well, Shadowrun. As fond as I am (i.e. Slightly) of the eventual Shadowrun multiplayer FPS, the game which was cancelled before it. The original plan? “They wanted a new Shadowrun, one that was real in the way Peter Jackson made the “Lord of the Rings” universe real. They wanted an IP that would satisfy the hard core Shadowrun fans but appeal to a new and younger audience,” explains Olson. There’s a few more thoughts on what was presumably called Shadowrun: Awakening – because that’s what the URL says – over at the page, plus shots from an early demo. No ‘elf packs are visible.

Move over Beatles Rock Band. Just announced – though sadly as yet unavailable – is that Curious Sense showing their own curious sense by developing a casual game featuring and inspired by the music of REO Speedwagon. Crikey. The full press release below.
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Via the Eurogamer Expo, we got some time with Global Agenda. Here’s the hands-on experience, complete with some input from the developers themselves.

Global Agenda is a game straddling two worlds. It has two different payment schemes, and two different games within itself, almost. It’s a multiplayer third person shooter, with a class based system and jetpacks. But it’s also a huge sprawling PvE/PvP MMO, with the PvP driven by player Agencies that can form and break alliances on the fly in a bitter battle for territorial zones that grant bonuses and benefits. It’s also got some instanced dungeons thrown in there, for the uncompetitive among us.
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This is both cute and scary. Cute, because for the 20th anniversary of Wallace and Gromit, telltale are giving people free access to the Muzzled Episode of their Grand Adventures. You can also order the full package for twenty dollars instead of the usual thirty-five, which include a charitable donation. The offer runs until 12pm on Monday the 9th. If you’re interested, go gets. Conversely, it’s scary because I remember the very first Wallace and Gromit and I don’t need a reminder of my own mortality when I’m still in my dressing gown. Muzzled’s trailer follows…
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Positech’s battlefleet manager game, Gratuitous Space Battles, is now available to purchase. To celebrate this space-fact the demo for the game has been posted, which means you can all have a play of the game without having to pay a penny. Get it here. Cliffski says to expect more development, as well as mods, in the coming months.