Rock, Paper, Shotgun

This morning RPS awoke to inboxes bursting with emails telling us off for Battlefield 3′s DLC announcement. This was confusing, as we are not EA. You can tell by the lack of Will Wright posters on our walls. It seems a Reddit campaign has been organised in reaction to news that BF3 pre-orders will come with DLC that others won’t be able to get. The Back To Karkand expansion pack is (somewhat mistakenly) the focus of this ire, not only because it will mean those who buy the game on release will need to spend extra to have the same content as other players, but because they apparently won’t be able to get at all of it. The extra weapons and ammo that come in the Physical Warfare Pack are not to be included in the post-release version.

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Here we go. In an E3 roundup on his blog, Notch has announced that the upcoming 1.7 patch for Minecraft will be the ‘Adventure Update’, and will be the first step along the road of turning Minecraft into… well, an actual game.

Lest we forget, the Minecraft that we all know and love is still in beta, and is really only a test bed for everything that Notch has planned for it. More details after the jump.
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Hack hack hack. The crackers of the world are going after the gaming internet like an axe murderer at a Spring Break bikini party. The most recent victims, after Codemasters last week, are Nintendo, and more pertinently for our crowd, Epic.

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Rock of Ages is a game RPS has been terribly excited about for quite some time. Why? Well, because it’s about rolling a giant, apparently sentient and sadistic boulder through art, history and the history of art, with graphics by someone doing a very convincing Terry Gilliam impression. VIDEOGAMES!

Our desperate anticipation for this next game from the Zeno Clash madmen should soon be over – Rock of Ages lands in August. Well, August 31, which is basically September, but the important thing is it’s only ten weeks until I can fire a massive rock out of a cannon at the groin of Michelangelo’s David. Joystiq reckons it should cost between $10 and $15.

I’ve just been transcribing an interview with Marek Spanel, the boss of Bohemia Interactive and one of the most PC-focused developers in Europe, and this came up: “If it were not for digital distribution we would no longer be doing PC games. It’s as simple as this.”

Obvious to us, perhaps, but it’s an interesting measure of where we are now with PC gaming. You might still be able to get a cheap boxed copy from a mail-order outlet, but the chances are you won’t find PC games at all in the shops at all. And as far as PC developers are concerned, digital is all. Retail is over. Which reminds me, I really must write that thing about Steam’s hegemony…

The Spanel interview – containing details about Carrier Command, Arma III, and Take On Helicopters – will appear tomorrow.

Proteus EP is a musical exploration game from Twisted Tree Games. It’s an EP as opposed to an LP – there are plans for a larger experience to follow – and as an EP will be a brief exploration experience that blends a pastoral 3D pixel-art world with “reactively mixed” music. Ed Key from Twisted Tree explained: “It’s more of an ambient piece than a game, although there is some challenge in finding the location that allows you to progress, and in finding the other couple of locations on the island that have interesting effects.”

I’ve been wandering around a preview version of it for the last twenty minutes, and I can report that it’s charming, and mildly mesmerising – an experience not unlike that bit in a movie where a child wanders into some weird wonderland and ends up gazing about in slack-jawed delight. (That was me.) No release date yet, but the team are planning to release for around $5, and there’s some footage below.
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There is more to Frozen Synapse than beating fellow games-journalist Mike Gapper, but I figure that’s as good an entrance point as any into its work of turn-based-tactical-manoeuvring. In lieu of a Verdict or a WIT or something, I figured I could try and explain some of the details of the game which make it so appealing to me, by yabbering over some video footage. Without a script. Or a plan. So, I set my newly-registered copy of FRAPS rolling and talked about the game. Go yabber! Go yabber beneath the cut!
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Sundays are for waking up and wondering what is going on. What is going on? Well, it seems that a large number of people are cooking bacon. Others, meanwhile are drinking their morning hot drinks and wonder what was said about videogames in the past week. We can help them with that last part. Let’s do that.

• Eurogamer chat with Randy Pitchford about finishing Duke Nukem Forever: “All of the intellectual analysis of the reality of the situation – the situation in the market, the state of the software and the nature of entertainment that existed and entertainment that it should be – all of that led to the sound decision of, yes, this needs to happen.” Or did it? Hmm!

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JESUS CHRIST! What are you doing? You’ll kill us all! STOP!

Where did you learn to pilot a spacecraft? Asshole College? My God, the cadets they’re sending me these days. Alright, listen up. If you sit right there, don’t touch anything and do precisely what I say then we might just get through this alive.

The board game I want to tell you about today is called Space Alert. It’s designed by Vlaada Chvátil, published Czech Games and it’s both a phenomenal bit of game design and like nothing you’ve ever played. Some of you may have read this article before on my blog. You guys can consider this re-publishing a sort of Director’s Cut.
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Happy weekend! Hope you’re all looking forward to enjoying a nice relaxing day playing digital games on your information workstations. If you want to buy some new games, then here’s a selection of some that cost a bit less than what they usually cost, and you can download them right away. To keep your finger on the pulse of discount gaming throughout the week, head over to SavyGamer.co.uk. Here’s this week’s deals: Read the rest of this entry »

Don’t look directly at it! Just a glance, that’s all you can take. Eugh.

• John looks at Skyrim / Skyrim footage of many minutes.
• Battlefield Hands-On / That Awesome Tank Battle.
• Bioshock Infinite unfurls its footage for us. Pretty!
• Batman’s open world looks seriously impressive.
• Brothers In Arms Goes Beserk with Furious 4 / Screenshots of said madness.
• Carrier Command is being remade by Bohemia.
• Magicka’s fine Skyrim mockery.
• We play Saint’s Row 3. John says it looks strong.
• The first look at Hitman Absolution. Gives us pause for thought.
• The awesomeness of Trackmania 2′s canyon trailer. Shootmania now please.
• CCP try to explain their DUST 514 cross-platform with PS3.
• Arma 2 is free to play from later this month! / Arma 3 Trailer.
• Weird and winderful From Dust trailer. Watch this one!
• Star Trek gets a co-op action shooter trailered here.
• First there was World Of Tanks, Now There Is World Of Warplanes
• Prey 2, open world alien-hunting gets footage.
• Tomb Raider footage. People are calling this game of the show?
• Far Cry 3 is revealed and you can see first footage.
• Assassin’s Creed: Revelations trailer is one of the finest.
• Space Marine introduces the Chaos factions in this trailer.
• Amy.
• Need For Speed: The Run mixes scripted stuff with classic chase races.
• Take On Helicopters! Do it now!
• All manner of SWTOR Trailers.
• The Mass Effect 3 trailer.
• Dead Island footage makes the game a little clearer to our tasty brains.
• Baffling madness of the Postal III Grindhouse trailer.
• XCOM trailer emerges, has cuboid alien things, makes Alec ruminate.
• The Heist surprised a few people. In a good way.
• Rock Of Ages is the greatest.
• Paradox bring the strategy sequels with Crusader Kings 2, Sword Of The Stars II and King Arthur II.
• Carmack speaks.