Rock, Paper, Shotgun

RPS chums Eurogamer have launched their own digital download service, Get Games, with just one game: Serious Sam HD. It also looks like it’s going to be far and away the cheapest place to get Serious Sam HD (which I’ve just downloaded and should get to writing about later in the week), with the game at just £9.99. Go take a look.

Intel have supplied a rather splendid chip for one lucky RPS reader to build their next PC around. And that’s not all. Those splendid fellows at Codemasters are giving away a whole bunch of Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising goodies too. Read on for complete details of what you can win, how to enter, and other relevant details.
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I love a trailer for an indie game that leaves me both completely bewildered, and absolutely intrigued. Those were my primary reactions when watching the preview of TUNING spotted via IndieGames. It’s by the consistently interesting Cactus-Soft (how could a sane person not love games with names like Ted’s Wet Adventure and God Came To The Cave?), and is an entrant to the 2010 IGF awards. TUNING seems to be a diversion from his scratchy hand-drawn style, and looks absolutely fascinating. See below.

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I’ve been craving Solium Infernum all year. It’s almost certainly going to be the last of the 2009 Unknown Pleasures to debut before the year wraps up. For those who weren’t around back then, Solium Infernum is a turn-based wargame that places you as an aspirant to the throne of hell. And frankly, that’s a perfect set-up for a game as I can think of. With late-Beta code, I’ve had a chance to prod around and see what I think.
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So says Blizzard’s official tweeterer, anyway. Sounds as though it’s more about substituting the age-old system with a new one rather than the wholesale removal of it, but a follow-up fan interview (also containing a bunch of questions that very much go into the fine/finer/finest points of the game) with Jay Wilson sheds a little more light. “We’ve decided to remove the tree-type architecture and we are moving into a purely skill-based system. This new system is still in the development stages and if it does not work, we still have plenty of options to fall back on… It differs from the World of Warcraft/Diablo II type hierarchical styles and is more of a skill pool/path than a tree per se.” On top of last month’s reveal that each class would have its own resource rather than all using the rather generic ‘mana’ it’s increasingly clear this isn’t just Diablo II in 3D. It’s Diablo II in 3D with some changes. Yes!
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Oho, we’ve not said too much about the rejiggery of Serious Sam, have we? I fear it got a little lost amidst all the wartorn modernity, ages of dragons, deadly leavings and lands of borders of recent weeks, alas. But it’s here now. As in, right now, as of today. Steam is its only current home, where it’s busy pulling the crab most muscular in the hope of earning $20/£18 (damn you, exchange rate) of your esteemed funds. I’m in two minds about Sam HD. On the one hand – been there, done that. On the other, well, you know. Serious Friggin’ Sam. Don’t make ‘em like that anymore, and all that. Sniff. Below, a glut of agreeably insane promotional videos that we really should have put up earlier. They won’t improve your understanding of the game one bit, but they will brighten/strangen/unsettle your day. Bless you, Crotream, you mad fools.
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You can now tick off the final two boxes in your I Spy Book Of The Old Republic Playable Characters. The seventh and eighth options were revealed by the German press this morning, and swiftly scanned for the rest of the world to enjoy by terrible word-stealing scandemons. I can barely bring myself to link to StarWarsMMO.net who have posted the pages, which are understandably in German. The internet’s best codebreakers were put to work, deciphering this tongue, and revealed that the last two are one more Jedi and one more Sith, a Consular and Inquisitor respectively. (I pretty much got into journalism so I could use the term “respectively”.) As Eurogamer points out, this has been confirmed by BioWare as definite-o-truth, which means there’s now four Force-based options (the Jedi Knight and Sith Warrior previously declared), alongside the baddie Bounty Hunter and Imperial Agent, and the goodie Smuggler and Trooper. Is anyone planning to pick a non-Force character?

Last week you’ll have noticed young Mr Rossignol doffing his hat and offering you some footage of the forthcoming Borderlands DLC, The Zombie Island Of Doctor Ned. Which is a very splendid name, and released this very day. Now you can enjoy the official trailer for the new content should you be so bold as to look below.

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[18:41] bremxjones3: “Square Enix’s Tokyo developers are to work on the cinematics for Eidos Montreal’s upcoming Deus Ex sequel, the studio’s general manager Stephane D’Astous told us.”
[18:41] Ento: aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
[18:41] swiss-: noooOOoo
[18:41] bremxjones3: Also, Thief
[18:42] swiss-: all, is lost

Aion, the MMO about warring celestial warrior races, did rather well for NCSoft. The European and North American launch snagged 970,000 boxed unit sales, and probably a few more on digital download. Now though they’re looking to the future, and they’ve released this new trailer to show off some of what’s planned. There’s a graphical overhaul at the front end and – holy shit look at those giant fish – but more beyond that, including some serious boss monsters, underwater stuff, what I assume is player-owned housing, some dodgy-looking ostriches, a dude riding a horned dinosaur, some fighting-game-style finishing moves, and, damn, giant wandering colossi being attack with cannons…

Okay, yeah, that’s actually pretty spectacular.
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RPS despise Children. Yet – as aficionados of PC games with terrain – we love boredom. So we’re a little conflicted on whether or not to link to the third yearly Desert Bus for Hope, which has been bumping along for over three days now. As with every year, the idea is endurance playing of one of the most famously tedious games of all time. The first year made nearly $23K. The second just over $70K. This year is at $50K already, and lets hope it, because it’s for a good cause. As in, feeding everyone involved’s meth habit. Er… I mean, the splendid Child’s Play charity. Toddle along and show your support, you good people. Lawful Neutral people may wish to do likewise.