RANDOM VIDEO GAME NEWS THREAD!

[Zoraptor]

  On 4/7/2012 at 12:59 PM, Drowsy Emperor said:

BG3 in some shape or form depends on the success of the enhanced edition and Atari's good will since they currently hold the license. This is straight from the developers mouth.

Really? WOTC itself holds the BG IP, and Atari does not have the D&D licence for new games as of last year, only for old ones.

 

They'd still potentiallt be a sensible choice as a publisher given their experience, but not given their woeful financials.

[mkreku]

  On 4/7/2012 at 9:04 PM, Drowsy Emperor said:

]I can live with hard combat as long as its not a grind fest.

It is.

 

  On 4/7/2012 at 7:35 PM, entrerix said:

also, some people dont like the combat system because its too methodical, but thats a personal taste issue.

Methodical.. Well, if that's what you want to call it. For me it was sluggish. I pressed one button, my character took two slow steps forward and lunged lazily with his little shortsword. There was no way of interrupting the animation once it started, nor was there anything else you could do if the enemies turned out to be twice as fast as you. Methodical..

[Morgoth]

I can only refer to Demon's Souls (Dark is pretty much similar), but it is anything but a grindfest. Grinding is basically tedious and boring, while the Souls games require all your skill and concentration, that's why it is so addicitve.

 

Gonna get Dark Souls day 1 for sure.

[Majek]

It's always grindfest when you want to have multiple maxed out weapons/armor. But that's not the point of the game. To have fun you don't need that. Maybe some farming but nothing tedious.

[Raithe]

Hm, I saw a copy of Fable 3 going for about

[Delfosse]

  On 4/7/2012 at 9:06 PM, pmp10 said:

Epic Games working on a PC-exclusive title.

At this point I can only imagine that it's Unreal Tournament remade into f2p browser game.

And don't forget the zombies and social aspects.

[Morgoth]

  On 4/8/2012 at 12:11 PM, Raithe said:

Hm, I saw a copy of Fable 3 going for about

[Gorgon]

I considered buying it on the cheap, looked at some youtube gameplay and decided against it. Too cartoony.

[greylord]

You never knew that it existed...and now you never will.

 

What's the point of cancelling an unannounced project?

 

Is there some sort of internal struggle going on at the business that this is going to give leverage to one or another party?

 

http://www.gamespot.com/news/gears-of-war-exile-cancelled-6370520

 

  Quote

 

Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski says unannounced franchise entry rumored to be on-rails Kinect game has been canned.

 

 

Gears of War: Exile will never be. Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski told GameSpot today that the rumored Kinect project is no longer in development at the Cary, North Carolina-based studio.

 

"Let's just bury the hatchet now," he said. "Gears of War: Exile was an unannounced game that I can't give any details about that has since been cancelled."

 

[Delfosse]

It was rumored, so it's not like he's canceling something nobody knew about.

 

And the market isn't saturated enough for a tough competition and bribes, they're not gonna cancel games for a kickback from another company.

[Orogun01]

  On 4/8/2012 at 1:01 PM, Morgoth said:

  On 4/8/2012 at 12:11 PM, Raithe said:

Hm, I saw a copy of Fable 3 going for about

[Calax]

  On 4/8/2012 at 4:05 PM, greylord said:

You never knew that it existed...and now you never will.

 

What's the point of cancelling an unannounced project?

 

Is there some sort of internal struggle going on at the business that this is going to give leverage to one or another party?

 

http://www.gamespot....ncelled-6370520

 

  Quote

 

Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski says unannounced franchise entry rumored to be on-rails Kinect game has been canned.

 

 

Gears of War: Exile will never be. Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski told GameSpot today that the rumored Kinect project is no longer in development at the Cary, North Carolina-based studio.

 

"Let's just bury the hatchet now," he said. "Gears of War: Exile was an unannounced game that I can't give any details about that has since been cancelled."

 

This is Cliffy B. He's known for being a bit of an egomaniac. That said, it's obvious that the game was at least a TINY bit known in the industry/gaming circles.

[Morgoth]

Amazon Game Downloads Spring sale

 

Pretty neat. Just bought Darkness 2 for $12,50. You can also use your non-US Amazon account, type in some US adress and ZIP code, and receive the Steam key.

[Calax]

http://kotaku.com/5900341/penny-arcade-pranks-ocean-marketing-nemesis-here-we-go-again

 

http://kotaku.com/cornfield/forum?comment=48722190

 

The second was originally attached to the first. Have fun.

[LadyCrimson]

I'm not asking/advertising for backers, but I discovered this project on Kickstarter called Nekro, by Darkforge, "a group of industry vets hailing from studios such as Blizzard, Sony, Microsoft and more. We have many years of experience creating quality games for both ourselves and large AAA studios."

 

Just sounded interesting to me, perhaps a thematic cross between Dungeon Keeper and....other games. Thoughts?

 

Here's their announcement video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb4KFoizKss

Edited April 10, 2012 by LadyCrimson

[Drowsy Emperor]

It sounds like Overlord for the most part.

[Bos_hybrid]

http://kotaku.com/5900248/david-gaider-ken-levine-and-chris-avellone-discuss-what-matters-most-in-games-the-words-or-the-world

 

Interesting read.

 

Avellone gets it.

[Drowsy Emperor]

They're all correct, except that Gaider and Bioware have let narrative take up too much space in their games at the expense of everything else.

 

If it was really good stuff like PST you could claim its necessary and a part of the experience, but when its 10 minutes of cinematics for every 3 minutes of gameplay in which all the characters spout predictable lines straight out of a Marvel comic, its just a waste of space.

[Nepenthe]

  On 4/10/2012 at 10:58 AM, Drowsy Emperor said:

They're all correct, except that Gaider and Bioware have let narrative take up too much space in their games at the expense of everything else.

I was just thinking about this earlier. It's funny, because it's true for DA2. But it's sad, because it's almost the opposite for ME2. They finally perfected the formula they were toying with from ME1 onwards only to totally **** up on the narrative side of things.

[funcroc]

Spark Unlimited developing Lost Planet 3 for Capcom

[pmp10]

  On 4/10/2012 at 10:44 AM, Bos_hybrid said:

http://kotaku.com/59...ds-or-the-world

 

Interesting read.

 

Avellone gets it.

He just described effect of a random spawn on narrative.

I'd say Levine has a far better point.

Games have become so predictable in their pandering to player egomania that reversing the trend makes for a great shock.

[Tale]

I think Levine's and Avellone's work simply for different things. Levine's idea is very good for replacing exposition. It can convey motivations and characterization. It can convey the history of a location. Avellone's is about the ongoing. And environments aren't typically as responsive in that regard. But I also think Avellone's idea might be too limited and only applicable to open world games. Could Alpha Protocol work on just emergent behavior?

 

It's hard for me to take from what Gaider says. I keep thinking of Dragon Age 2 and specifically Act III. Or Leliana's return even if the player killed her. Was that them just failing to be good liars? Or was that them being too interested in what they're willing to let the player do that they forgot what the player would want, calling out his premise as faulty. Just how well can one lie? I'm inclined to think he does not give his audience enough credit.

[entrerix]

from a design standpoint, i agree the most with levine. level design and world building are absolutely paramount to good game design. vastly more important than writing a neato story to be read aloud to you by voice acted animated cliches.

[Tigranes]

Avellone's basic point is about providing coherent, systemic bases for meaning and narrativisation, which is certainly not limited to just random mob spawns or such. That actually becomes a guiding principle in how you write the 'narrativ-y' bits in the first place, how you write the factions, dialogue.

[Morgoth]

Legend of Grimrock review @Destructoid (score 9.5)

 

Hmmm...