Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Minecraft 1.8 aka “The Adventure Update”, aka “When Jim Plays Minecraft Again”, has been shown on the show floor at PAX, and you can see a bit of that in action below, along with graphical tweaks, dungeons, Endermen, and so forth. You get to see the new inventory and some other stuff such as “creator mode”, but the really interesting thing about 1.8 is the existence of “NPC villages”, where groups of baddies will spawn and live. Check out Notch narrating a video of the update below, via IGN.

Also check out this 20-minute documentary, Minecraft: The Story of Mojang, on Penny Arcade TV.
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According to the official twitter account for Counter Strike: Global Offensive, they’re going to be demoing their new game at PAX next week, and at Eurogamer Expo next month. Not only that, but if you turn up to give it a try, you’ll get given a key for the beta. Sounds like a good chance for us to have an RPS vs Readers showdown to me, although if/when I get killed, I’m going to blame it on lag.

Any of you lot going to PAX and/or Eurogamer Expo?

Last night at PAX, Valve released a new collection of co-op screenshots from Portal 2. I got to thinking that you might like to look at them. In response to this thought, I’ve put them up on popular PC gaming website Rock, Paper, Shotgun. They’re below. As usual, click on them for largess. And largeness.

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Bioshock’s big daddy, Ken Levine, took some time to talk to the masses about his life at the recent PAX. He tells a familiar tale of growing up with geek-tendencies, and then finding games as his place in life. It’s a story that wouldn’t have been out of place in this year’s most exciting book about videogames.

Anyway! PAX keynote beyond the jump.

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The Penny Arcade Expo is, of course, a silly little fan-festival attended only by four people who like reading internet cartoon strips about swearing. It’s definitely not a major gaming event at which a ton of important games are on show, and potentially a serious rival to the likes of E3 and Leipzig. There’s no way stuff like Fallout 3 will reveal exciting new footage there. That would be ridiculous.

So, five lengthy videos straight outta PAX beneath the cut, showing Fallout being RPGy, and not simply FPSy, as was the case with the underwhelming E3 footage. I’ve posted my as-I-watched notes below each. Apologies for their brevity and wobbly grammar, but I figured my off-the-cuff reactions could work as well as ponderous analysis. We’ll have plenty of ponderous analysis once the game’s out, I don’t doubt.

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