CryEngine 3 SDK/Editor is coming! 0

by Michael Clark • Editorial

The president and CEO of Crytek had some great news to share this morning..

Our next release will be the Crysis 2 Editor, this is for those of you who want to create content for Crysis 2. In August 2011, we will launch our Free CryENGINE SDK for all of you who want to create totally new content on CryENGINE 3.

Modders and Indie developers rejoice. CryEngine 3 is coming to you and for… FREE. Crytek has decided to release its tools just like Epic has with it’s UDK and uses a similar model if you decide to commercialize your game.

This will not be a trimmed down version devoid of that great features people with true licenses enjoy this is the real deal. Also it will include loads of documentation from the developers themselves giving a vast array of tips and tricks to get started.

This will be a complete version of our engine, including C++ code access, our content exporters (including our LiveCreate real-time pipeline), shader code, game sample code from Crysis 2, script samples, new improved Flowgraph and a whole host of great asset examples, which will allow teams to build complete games from scratch for PC.

http://www.crymod.com/

I really am anticipating this release. I just wish I had the time to devote to making something great and learning the intricacies of the engine. Perhaps I will make some time to do just that…

Here is a early look at some work with the engine. This mod is clearly pretty early in development, but it is looking quite decent. -

Link to the mod’s page

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The Here And Now And The Great Things To Come 3

by Michael Clark • Editorial

Things have been a bit slow this month in terms of new releases recently aside from a couple of notable titles. Namely, Portal 2 and Mortal Kombat.  Both of these were released towards the end of the month so I had to bide my time awaiting these games by going back to play a few classics and trying to get my backlog of games completed.

Most of my time here recently has been spent playing Portal 2 and I really have been enjoying myself so far. There are a few minor complaints though. The constant loading and lack of difficulty of most of the puzzles so far really bugs me. Valve has done a great job with Source, it looks better with every new title they create. Though I believe that constant loading is a sign that this engine is showing its age or perhaps they just need to tweak things some more, but it looks great so that’s a plus. Co-op is pretty exciting and unlike single player some of the puzzles can be pretty tough and require you to think about things a bit differently, ah the things you can achieve with 4 portals!… Adam and I did pretty well for the short time we played. It was good times.. at least it was after sorting out our technical difficulties. The highlight of the game for me so far would have to be the dialog. Steven Merchant(Extras,The Office, Ricky Gervais Show) does a great job as Wheatley and GLaDOS consistently cracks me up. Though I am getting a bit tired of getting picked on in co-op by her. She really has it out for Atlas…

One game I am having a great time with this month is Gears of War. Yes, the original. I did not get into beta for GoW3 and really have no interest in paying for XBL just to try it out. So in light of that we have ditched the Xbox and are playing on PC. While the official servers are pretty dead some decent competition can be found on  Tunngle.  I have been able to get many of my friends back playing as well, a majority of the old crew that played on 360 back in the day.  It has been a real fun experience getting the gang back together to bust some heads.

Next month is going to be great for games. There are some big titles on the horizon.

First and foremost there is Brink. I checked this out during the last Quakecon and I must say I was impressed, I have only gained interest since then. Splash Damage really knows what they are doing as well they should. They have been making class based MP shooters for years now. Unfortunately it seems most people done even know about this game.  That is a damn shame.  Brink takes the class system of games like TF2 and adds a lot more customization/tactical options, objective based game play much like Unreal Tournament’s Assault mode, an amazing movement system that is akin to Mirrors Edge, and combines them to create something new… and dare I say epic.

The strongest selling point for me would have to be the technology behind the movement system. Too long have FPS games been plauged with nonsensical movement. I was tired of seeing areas that I should be able to get to, but was met with failure and more than likely an invisible wall. Brink sets out to change all that. No longer will you forced down narrow corridors, funneling you along the map. You will be able to jump up walls, slide under obstacles, leap over objects, and carve your own path through the maps. It allows you to get creative and more than likely provide ample opportunity to surprise your opponents. Splash Damage seems to have got things wrapped up as the game is due to release a bit early. The new date is 5/10/2011 and I for one cannot wait.

The other big title next month is The Witcher 2, I am literally counting down for this one. CD Project Red consistently amazes me with the work they have done with this game. The first game had its lulls and performance issues, but all of these qualms seem to have been ironed out in the sequel. The new engine the game is running on is simply beautiful and the revamped combat system is getting no complaints from me.  In this game the choices you make and how you play the game actually have a substantial effect on the path you take and the conclusion unlike most rpg’s today *cough* Dragon Age 2 *cough*. A diverging quest system and objectives that can be accomplished in many different ways serves to encourage repeat play throughs and makes you contemplate every decision you make. According to the Dev’s The Witcher 2 comes packed with 16 different endings! I can already tell that this title will be taking up much of my time in the near future. Expect a lengthy review once I get my hands on this.

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So, That Mortal Kombat Webisode Thing… 1

by Adam Blue • Editorial

No one seems to care. I pretty much called it. The original concept trailer was neat, but not Mortal Kombat. Everyone was so excited, but I kept having to ask ‘why?’. You try to make that into a lengthier series, and the original source is lost, making it pointless. Since it’s not trying to be Mortal Komabt, it’s trying to be something else. All that is else is just some gritty, unoriginal filmed-stuffs. There’s no point to it. I want Mortal Kombat with its fantasy elements and Outworld dimensions and demons and shit.

And PSN being down? Lame. I wanted to try some Killzone MP. Down. Then I figure I’d try Netflix on my PS3 instead of the 360 for once. Down. I wouldn’t pay to be a subscriber to that. Yeah, Live! has gone down, but it hasn’t been a nuisance like this.

I just don’t like that there are some games tied into your online account. So, if you’re offline, you can’t play. But, could this have been by Anonymous? Remember Ubi’s DRM that gamers were mad about? Then some hackers crashed the servers…it was to prove a point, but then no one could play. Anonymous is doing the same thing here (if it’s still them). I blame the online gaming community, who supported these hackers for doing this destruction. 50% (being generous) of the hardcore/internet/gaming nerds are pretty stupid anyway. But I guess that’s about the same if you were to compare that stat to the entire human race.

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Game Talk – 4/19/2011 0

by Adam Blue • Game Talk

Kaz: So how are you enjoying the game?

Adam Blue: eh

Kaz: well that says it all lol..

Adam Blue: ha. one handed at the moment

Adam Blue: …

Adam Blue: daughter wants to be held

Adam Blue: sleeping soon

Kaz: ah ok didnt quite know what to think when you said that but that paints a clearer picture

Kaz: lol

Adam Blue: lol

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Game Industry Future Uncertain? Please… 0

by Adam Blue • Editorial

I just read this bit: bit

Developers uncertain of the future of the video game industry. As my native Spanish speaking counterpart would say, ‘El-Oh-El’. I’ve explained my feelings on this issue before, but the below quote gives me an even better reason to do so again:

If there’s anything that’s killing us, it’s dollar apps. How do you sell someone a $60 game that’s really worth it … They’re used to 99 cents.

Why the fuck would you think you’re targeting your game to the same people? I’m sure there’s some cross-market going on, but still…it’s a different market. Totally different. Just like the Wii was essentially a different market. Don’t think it’s the same. LOWER GAMING BUDGETS. That last three-word sentence pretty much spells it out.

Again, don’t think of the 99c games as competition. Look at the style of downlodable (XBLA, PSN, Steam) games being released. They don’t have the greatest, snazzy graphics. And they sell.

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Portal 2 So Far…and FME 0

by Adam Blue • Editorial, Impressions

Portal 2. I really got it for the hype (I admittedly bought into it), but really should have bought the PS3 version to get myself a free PC version. And I should have done it at Toy’s R Us while buying Mortal Kombat (PS3 version for Kratos!) to get a $50 gift card. I failed there. But that’s not the point. The point is, I really didn’t care for the first Portal. It got dull fast. And so far…it’s the same with this.

First of all, the ARG was full of fail. Early release? No. And then 30 minutes for it to ‘unlock’? I thought I downloaded it? Then I go to play, but my character wants to constantly turn right. I finally figured it out by unplugging the mouse after launching the game, using the keyboard to load my save, then plugging in the mouse. It’s a Razer Naga if that means anything.

Playing the campaign…it’s a bit lame. The dialog is cool, but the puzzle rooms are lame, as is the loading between each one. Co-op however, is pretty fun. Mike and I did a bit last night and I find it to be much more enjoyable than the single-player. The co-op includes automatic voice chat…which made the sound of a shrieking, dying, monkey/dolphin hybrid that had found a warm spot in the guts of my monitor. We then tried different things, enabling/disabling this and that…it was a pain. So, we just used vent. But, whenever I would get in-game, the vent volume would drop to near zero. Such a pain.

Anyway, I’ll play through the game and beat it, but it won’t impact me in anyway.

As for FME, that’s Front Mission Evolved. It’s the opposite of Portal. People hate it, I love it. I’ve played through it and beat it, but I found it on sale for the 360 and made the order quick. That’s a game that I will want to go back and get achievements for. Just piloting the mechs and checking out all the customizations – it’s fun. There’s also some DLC I’d like to pick up, one including a survival co-op mode. Sadly, I don’t know anyone else who’d want to join. It’s also on PC, and as soon as there’s a Steam sale, I’ll be on it.

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This Weekend in Gaming – 4/15 0

by Adam Blue • Editorial, Impressions

Sean got me a Gears3 beta key. I originally didn’t care. As you can see from my Killzone 3 post, I’m partial to good single-player campaigns. Gears was a bore, Gears2…I didn’t even start really, as I’m trying to stay awake through Gears. But the Gears3 multiplayer was a lot of fun. Not long-lasting fun though – I’m sure I’ll get tired of it quickly, but it’s worth the time.

While on my Xbox I decided to download the demo for Battle: LA. As you can suspect…I was sold. Ha. Seriously, for $10 that is a lot of fun. Just to-the-point alien shooting with fun physics and tight controls. I like that it’s a slower-paced CoD-style game, and really enjoyed using the right-stick to crouch. The game is about taking cover and popping out to shoot, so having an easily accessible crouch button was more than helpful – it’s what I prefer. I think FPSs need to get back to that control scheme.

I played some games from the Frozenbyte bundle…and not much else I guess.

This post is brought to you by hyphens.

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What is Killzone 3? 2

by Adam Blue • Editorial, Impressions

It’s a marketing game. It’s a game created to…create buzz and make sales. It was the same with Killzone 2 and Killzone before that. I only say this because it is a Sony product, which like Drake and Twisted Metal, has tons of money poured into it to be good. But Killzone 3 isn’t. It reminds me of Resistance. Another mediocre FPS. How can Sony fund this products yet not establish a foot hold like the 360 does in the same market?

It’s easy for Sony. Sony fans will latch onto anything that could potentially be a Halo killer and run with it. It’s like being at the club, looking for girls. There may not be any hot ones out one night, but I’m sure one will make do. If you don’t have anything else to play…just play it? I was certainly multi-platform when I got the PS3. There was no reason for me to spend time on Resistance. Killzone, slightly better, suffers the same fate.

Though, in a way, Killzone is fucking awesome. Amazing graphics, great lore, awesome design (I love the ship and character designs) great set pieces, but all within mediocre game-play. It’s just boring. I’d compare it to Metallica (or, insert love/hate band here) – Metallica are great musicians and make tight, well produced sounds. That doesn’t mean the songs themselves are going to be good even though they seem so on the surface (and after the first album the suck started).

I could only play Killzone 3 in morsels. I’d get bored. I’d see some cover ahead and know exactly what was going to happen. I guess that’s common in games, but Killzone’s mechanics make it lame. It takes a clip to take down an enemy, so there’s a quick way to extend the length of the campaign. It’s fake, unfortunately. And even if you’re shooting, there’s these invisible margins around objects. You can never make tight, precise shots from cover. You’ll see the bullet hits and sparks appear in midair…where the enemies face would be no more. This gives the game an even more linear feel than it had to start with. And you know, it was designed with Move support in-mind. It’s noticeable.

Not only is the killing aspect a mess, but so is the dying. I’ll reload a checkpoint, battle some, and die. Going back, I may randomly die again with no indicators. You never really know how to die. It’s random. I’ve even had one of the assassins approach me, which I successfully locked into the killing animation of, only to be greeted by a viewer – another assassin is behind his dying buddy, watching. As the animation is playing out, I’m thinking, “back up, and get L1 ready”. But there’s no time. The assassin’s death animation lead right into my death animation. And I get to sometimes lie there, waiting for my buddy to make a decision to heal me. Waste of time – I just want to get back into the game.

While I like the lore, it was the game’s story that made the game-play seem pointless. You want to go save the world. Captain says no. But you do it anyway. Captain says good job. Then, another thing happens and you want to go save the world. Captain says no. But you do it anyway. Rinse/repeat. The 10th time this reoccurring theme appeared I wanted to slap these characters and hoped the writers felt it.

I wish Sony can spend as much time in marketing and development as they can on making a game good. They’re spending so much money that they have to make it up by enabling pro mode in Socom 4′s used purchases. And even that game isn’t doing too hot. Won’t be renting that from GameFly…

Though, to be fair, I haven’t even touched multi-player.

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Franchises Finding a Way Back Into Your Heart – Socom 1

by Anthony Delprete • Editorial, Impressions

Socom was total Boss when the PS2 ruled the world. Being one of the most authentic war/tactical games at the time, Socom gave gamers an online experience that still has not been replicated on game consoles. Eleven rounds and no respawns allows players to really get to know their enemy. This slow paced style of gameplay forced players to adjust to their enemies habits that they’ve learned from previous rounds, making strategy an intuitive feature of the series. Future leaders were born thanks to a game like Socom, but the game has not seen the light this generation as it did in its golden era.

So, how did the franchise become almost irrelevant? Well, Socom was originally made by Zipper Interactive. They were the devolopers for the games on the PS2 along with a couple of PSP games. These games under Zipper’s wing have all been given B+’s to A’s by the gaming media. Zipper decided to take a little break from the Socom franchise as the new consoles began rolling out and went to work on a different project, MAG. They then handed the Socom license to Slant Six, who has experience with the franchise for the PSP, to release the game Socom: Confrontation, a multiplayer-only Socom game, Slant Six’s first socom game on a console. Thus the worst Socom game of the series had been created. Socom: Confrontation was plagued with technical issues, that included screen tearing, glitches, and game crashes and introduced terrible control to their characters.

While the new controls in Confrontation had good intentions, it was a one step forward, two steps back kind of deal. They introduced leaning which would allow players to peek around corners but the advantages of this were zero to none. To lean you had to do it with the SIXAXIS controls, so you already knew it wasn’t going to work so well. The aiming was horrid. If an enemy surprised you, your reticule would fly all over the place. Not only that but if you did do a successful lean your view point did not receive any kind of upper hand on your opponents. The aiming just had terrible movement speed that was almost impossible to adjust too. Quite possibly the worst 3rd person controls I have played. On top of all this the game wasn’t pretty in the slightest bit. Character models and bland level detail made it hard to really get immersed. With all of these issues, it seems like this series has alot of work to do to become that AAA title once again.

Enter Socom 4. Its Zipper’s way of saying “We’re back bitches!”. It can also be thought of as if Halo began to take a turn for the worse and Bungie swooped in to save the day. That’s whats going on here folks. Zipper has learned alot from their experience with MAG and hope to incorporate their new found knowledge into Socom.

While I have only played the Beta and there are only two maps and game mode availability is changing constantly, it is still obvious that this is the true Next gen Socom game fans have been waiting five years for. Zipper brings refined control and subtle new features to the series. Socom players are notorious for standing behind a wall and looking around with the 3rd person camera and becoming the best campers they can be. But with the new cover system it gives you a much broader view of the battlefield before you, while still giving the enemy some sort of chance at knowing your behind that wall. So they threw out that leaning gimmick with a proper cover system that works as it should. The aiming has been improved too. If your gun has a iron sight or a scope you will actually look down it as you would in a FPS. The level design is superb this time around. The forests are lush, the lighting is crisp, and the levels are large and multi-layered offering almost limitless firefight situations. Its these little tweaks and polish that go a long way.

My only worries are if the PS3 community will actually pick up their headsets and talk. Talking is HUGE in a Socom game. And it still kind of amazes me that everyone on the primitive PS2 online that played, had headsets, while everyone on the PS3 are a bunch of mutes. If people would plug in their headsets and communicate Socom has the opportunity to claim that most strategic game reward for home consoles once again.

I don’t mean to jump the gun but I do think Socom is back. The Beta is performing admirably well for its status, and the additions are sure to introduce many to this fine series. I do worry about the hardcore fanbase, cause they are extremely finicky about every little detail, so I’m sure no matter what they will find something to complain about. But we’ll see how the final release performs when it drops in less then two weeks, and if people are actually going to buy it cause the franchise name now ‘n days is almost non-existent.

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Bizarre’s Closing, Pitchford’s Thoughts 0

by Adam Blue • Editorial, News

After being devoured by Activision, Bizarre Creation’s closed. You know, the guys that did PGR and Geometry Wars. I guess they thought it was a good idea. With Activision, they developed Blur, which was alright, and 007: Blood Stone which is unfortunately shit king of shit mountain (I’m sure if Brosnan was the lead…the game would be magically better). They had this to say:

“We were always proudly independent. However, when Activision took over, we really felt that they would leave our culture alone, and for a while it was fine, but slowly the feeling did start to change,” says former creative director Martyn Chudley. “We weren’t an independent studio making ‘our’ games anymore – we were making games to fill slots. Although we did all believe in them, they were more the products of committees and analysts. The culture we’d worked on for so long gradually eroded just enough so that it wasn’t ‘ours’ anymore.”

No shit. I’m pretty sure we, gamers, sat around at our computers reading the original news thinking that Bizarre Creations is making a bad move. Someone had to tell them. Was it a known risk? What they said back in 2007:

“Our goal at Bizarre Creations has always been to do all we can to nurture our creative and passionate teams, who excel at and enjoy what they do. Activision’s independent studio model will continue giving us creative freedom to build exciting new brands. Their financial support and marketing prowess will also enable us to build upon the commercial success that we currently enjoy, and take the company – and our games – to an even higher level.”

I told you so. But again, maybe they took the risk willingly? Did they really think this was going to turn out well? Whatever the case, it’s too bad this talent has been scattered.

The whole gaming industry has been changing like crazy with no telling what will work. Multiplayer seems to do the trick, though Randy Pitchford isn’t too keen on the tactic:

“publishers are forcing multiplayer modes onto games they do not suit because of an obsessive desire to keep pace with blockbusters like Call Of Duty.” Also that: “decisions are often motivated by the desire to tick boxes on a feature list, rather than for the good of the game itself.”

I completely understand what he’s saying, but…NO SHIT. This is old news, and something that has long been passed over. Dead Space 2, from EA, is an example of a game that didn’t need multiplayer. And Bioshock 2? Let’s go back to EA. For a while, EA was shit. Around 2007 (most development started before though), they got their act together and started doing some cool, riskier stuff. But from that point on, their numbers were low. They were making games for gamers and not catering to the mass market. So, they had to change. How would they change?

Anytime a new FPS is talked about. People. Ask. About. Multiplayer. It doesn’t matter if it’s Bioshock or fucking Metroid. People want it. No multiplayer? It doesn’t sell. So, developers had to carefully implement MP while still giving the player a unique SP experience.

Randy Pitchford can get away with complaining about it because they make multi-player-centric games. Gearbox has nothing to worry about. Duke Nukem will sell on its legendary hype alone. But, I challenge Gearbox to create a new IP that is single-player only. Even a deep experience like Brothers in Arms didn’t sell too good during its last iteration. Luckily, their other products make up for that (looking forward to the new BiA). What Gearbox hasn’t been doing that publishers have been now, is investing in and creating budget downloadable games. With Gearbox’s talent, I’d like to see what they could put out there.

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