Apocalypso's Atomic Arcade: 11/15/09

2009/11/21

Chaos Computers Technology Expo Running Until mid December

In local news, in the Tygerburger this week, I saw ad two adverts as well as the usual insert for Chaos Computers, advertising their currently happening "Expo Sure" that takes place from 19 November until 13 December.

"Chaos would like to introduce you to the latest in computer hardware, software, and accessories. We think beyond the hardware, plug-ins, and styrofoam packaging- constantly on the look-out for creative, game-changing solutions to meet your needs. Come test, experience and compare all the new computer gadgets a gizmos at the Centre Court of CapeGate Shopping Centre from 19 November to13 December 2009. It's our chance to turn the computer fuss into computer fun with an expo arena fully loaded for action."

This is the first time I've seen something like this run for nearly a whole month- usually it's a couple of days or so. You can also visit the main website for the expanding retail chain and check it out.

Don't you think that little girl in the advert is just pathetic? Not her, but the look on her face. As if she cares about all this stuff. This stuff is for the boys and men!

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http://www.chaosnet.co.za/

Bioshock 2 Box Art Revealed

I'm a big fan of video game box art, and recently I took a look at Mass Effect 2's latest effort. Despite the box art being kind of "ho-hum", I wouldn't be discouraged, and decided to take a look at Bioshock 2's new box art.

It's not bad, and features the prototype Big Daddy, different from the usual big daddies, which you'll play as in Bioshock 2, as well as one of the creepy Little Sisters on the thing's back.

From the art and such I've seen of the game, it looks as though there will be different variations of Big Daddies, and even a Big Sister too.

It also looks as though they'll be sticking with Bioshock 2, and not "Sea of Dreams" as a subtitle, which I think might have actually been better.

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Big Download

Rumblings: F.E.A.R. 3 Coming Next Year, Scribblenauts 2 too

There was rumours earlier on in the year of a new title coming from Monolith, and those rumours have been brought up again, as some French site is talking about receiving an Excel file with some sensitive information about Monolith's titles possibly coming next year, and among them was apparently F.E.A.R. 3, as well as a sequel to some game called Scribblenauts.

Other than that there are titles like Batman: The Brave and The Bold, The Lord of the Rings RPG, Game Party 4, and Touchmaster 4. Note that these titles may or may not be correct due to Google translate.

The site says that at the request of Warner Bros. they took down the table, and the company denied any and all information, and that the file sent to them was either a mistake or false information (Google translate).

Anyway, the one I care about is F.E.A.R. 3, seeing as I've posted about this on the blog a couple of times. It does seem a little early for another title considering that F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin was only released in February this year, but not impossible. The thing is that people are begging for Monolith to please switch to another engine before getting to heavily into development. And if it is indeed going to be released in October 2010, then one wonders whether they're still sticking with Jupiter EX, or if they've gone with Unreal Engine 3 or id Tech 4, two common choices nowadays.

F.E.A.R. 2, despite being disappointing to some, and average compared to the first game, did have a few good levels, like the one in the school, which was very Condemned: Criminal Origins, but just as cool if not more so.

F.E.A.R. 3 needs to be scarier and more mysterious, like the first game, and give you some stuff to figure out on your own. That's what works in crime thrillers, anyway.

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jeuxactu.com
jeuxactu.com (translated)
Rumor: Scribblenauts 2 and F.E.A.R 3 coming next year

2009/11/20

New Box Art for Mass Effect 2 Released

So, BioWare has released a couple of shots of the new cover art for Mass Effect 2.

New Box Art

This art will replace the old art that was shown earlier on in the year.

Old Box Art

And what does everyone think? Well, nobody seemed to like the old one, and nobody likes the new one either. Surprise, Surprise.

The game itself is still due for release next year in January, simultaneously launched on PC and Xbox 360 (no PS3 for now), so we'll see whether it changes again by then.

This here is the Collector's Edition box, which I think is pretty cool:

2009/11/19

Borderlands Soundtrack Coming Out in December

Didn't think there was a sound track in Borderlands? Well, yes there is, and it will be out this December in time for Christmas.

It features the talents of Sascha Dikiciyan, Cris Velasco, Raison Varner, Tim Larkin, and Jesper Kyd. Jesper Kyd is especially well-known in the industry, and is probably recognized as the artist responsible for the Hitman series and Assassin's Creed.

Hitman Blood Money contains one of favourite game OSTs ever, and it was composed by that man.

Well anyway, here's the track list. Note that it doesn't contain “Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked” by Cage the Elephant. There are some bonus tracks added though.

1. Prelude (Jesper Kyd)
2. Welcome To Fyrestone (Jesper Kyd)
3. Enter Skag Gully (Raison Varner)
4. Fighting Off The Skags (Raison Varner)
5. Removing The Bandit Threat (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
6. Traversing The Deep (Raison Varner)
7. Fighting Sledge's Minions (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
8. Welcome to The Bunker (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
9. Smoking Out The Bunker (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
10. Burning Rubber and Shooting Bullets (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
11. The Junkyard Vista (Jesper Kyd)
12. Welcome to The Trash Coast (Raison Varner)
13. The Rakkhive Emerges (Raison Varner)
14. Assaulting Krom's Canyon (Raison Varner)
15. Battling Krom's Minions (Raison Varner)
16. Fighting Krom and His Gun (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
17. Trash The Bandits (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
18. Trash The Bandits Some More (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
19. Welcome To The Wastelands (Jesper Kyd)
20. Traveling To The Vault (Raison Varner)
21. Destroying the Destroyer (Raison Varner)
22. Bonus - Bring Your Guns (Jesper Kyd)
23. Bonus - Borderlands (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
24. Bonus - The Old New Haven (Tim Larkin)
25. Bonus - Exploring the Mine (Tim Larkin)
26. Bonus - Exploring Overlook (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)
27. Bonus - The Threat At Overlook (Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco)

You can pick up the Borderlands OST from Amazon.

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http://twitter.com/GearboxSoftware/statuses/5805128094
Destructoid

Apocalypse Then: Half-Life

11 Years of Half-Life

Well, recently I covered Half-Life 2’s five year anniversary. Today is its older prequel’s 11th anniversary. I would have covered it last year, but I only started the blog this year.

Half-Life, a sci-fi FPS title, was developed by Valve Corporation, published by Sierra, and distributed by Electronic Arts for retail and Steam online. The game initially had trouble finding a publisher seeing as people claimed it was too ambitious. Originally for PC, it was later released on PS2 along with Half-Life: Decay, a PS2 exclusive addon, until recently when a team ported the addon to the PC. An unofficial Dreamcast port was leaked onto the internet, and there was also a Macintosh port too.

Released on the 19th of November 1998, it was Valve’s first game, in development since 1996 when Valve was founded by Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington. The game has since been praised several million times as revolutionizing the FPS genre in areas such as AI, gameplay involving puzzles, and story, written by Marc Laidlaw. The game was hugely influenced by Doom in story and otherwise. It’s naturally won many “Game of the Year” awards, and scored high in reviews, to say the least.

It involved the player taking the role of Gordon Freeman, a man in his late twenties, graduate from University of Innsbruck and MIT, and scientist involved in Theoretical Physics at the Black Mesa laboratory, an abandoned missile base out in the desert, in New Mexico, USA. Gordon gets involved in a teleportation experiment in the anomalous materials department, and “things go awry”, and creatures from another dimension start pouring out in to the base. Gordon’s main aim initially is to fight his way to the surface, and after that make his way to the Lambda Complex whilst fighting the aliens and zombies all the way, as well as marines and black-ops assassins whose main goal is to kill everyone, even the marines. You get to team up with security guards and other scientists who will help you along the way, and not to mention you are aided by your HEV suit which provides protection as well as access to your HUD, and a boost while jumping.

Many people think that the game used the Quake II engine, when in actual fact it was mainly a heavily modified Quake engine, with some elements from Quake II, called GoldSrc. The game also had no cutscenes and employed scripted sequences, unlike most FPSs of that time. It came with a level editor, WorldCraft, which was notoriously hard to use. Unlike most games, especially of the build era of the mid-late nineties, Gordon didn’t speak at all.

The game received two expansion packs for the PC and one for the PS2, namely Opposing Force, Blue Shift (originally meant o be packaged with the Dreamcast port), and Decay for the PS2. And the sequel, Half-Life 2, which I covered the other day, came along a few years later, taking about double the amount of time to develop, and has been followed by the episodes which chronicle what happens after the fall of City 17.

Half-Life has also spawned many mods over the years, some of which have since been ported to or recreated in HL2's Source Engine. Valve is also very pro-modding, and Gabe Newell claims that half of Valve is made up of former modders.

Interesting things and my experiences with the game:

• Memorable moments while playing the game many times over the years include the tram ride at the beginning through sections of the base, the Surface Tension level with the marines, and the ending with the G-man in the tram. A few of the earlier levels weren't really to my liking, and neither were some of the later levels either. Some of the best parts were in-between.

• Best weapon in the game, besides the crowbar- probably the MP5 (later M4A1 with the HDP), which could shoot grenades from the attached launcher, and probably the crossbow as well, which could kill most of the low to mid enemies with one shot.

• Favourite enemies were the marines, in all their different forms.

• The entire series contains double meanings when it comes to titles, such as Half-Life, Decay, Opposing Force, and Blue Shift.

• The lambda symbol almost looks like a crude drawing of an arm holding a crowbar. This I never really knew or thought about before.

• The scientist models that were pretty common (only about 4 all in all), came back in Half-Life 2 as Isaac Kleiner and Eli Vance. The other 2 still need to be made into characters in HL2 as far as I know.

• The one variation of the security guard came back as Barney Calhoun in HL2.

GameStop Breaks the Rules…Again, Releases Games Early

GameStop broke the street release date for Modern Warfare 2 last week, without permission from evil publisher Activision. In defence of their actions, it was said that the top brass of GameStop gave the go-ahead and it was released early.

Now it seems they’ve done the same thing with Assassin’s Creed II and Left 4 Dead 2 this week. The release dates for these two games were broken too. So, gamers probably aren’t complaining. They can get the game early. But publishers, developers, and other retailers are likely less than impressed, or pleased.

Then again, people hate Activision and Bobby Kotick as of late anyway, and the company made loads off of Modern Warfare 2, and not to mention a big fat truckload of pocket money for “Psykotick”.

GameStop always seeks to get the competitive edge over other retailers, at perhaps at any cost. Whether it’s releasing games earlier than the set release date, or letting GameStop employees play new games before selling them, so they’re classed as second hand; stuff that’s frowned upon by others. And second hand goods are what keep the retail chain going, according to reports.

To their credit, GameStop has come around to the fact that digital distribution is the way of the future, after analysts said that the company was doomed to shut down if it didn’t adapt. It’s now broadening its online capabilities as of this year.

Now people are talking about what devs can do to stop GameStop from ruining their plans as far as
release dates are concerned. It seems as though lately, even if a game is sold by a retailer earlier than planned, games like Left 4 Dead 2 are locked, so they can’t be played before that date. But can this actually stop GameStop and other retailers from doing this? Maybe the issue will be taken to court, and perhaps there will be some sort of penalty for committing the act, or even made illegal.

Oh, by the way, payback is a b1tch: a GameStop was robbed the other day, and 100 copies of Modern Warfare 2 were nabbed.

It seems there is justice in this world after all.

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New Jersey breaks street date for AC II and L4D2
MW2 was released early without permission from Activsion
Heist Nets 100 Copies of Modern Warfare 2 [Robbery]

2009/11/18

I got Borderlands Today, Fastest Selling IP of 2009

Disappointed with Modern Warfare 2's short campaign, I went out and got Borderlands today. From what I've seen in trailers and on The Verge, the game does look good, even if it has that annoying little robot, Claptrap, in it.

On The Verge recently, the headline of one of the news pieces covered claimed that Borderlands is the fastest selling game of this year. A bit of an omission there, as Gearbox has declared Borderlands the fastest selling original IP of 2009. The fastest selling game overall this year would be Modern Warfare 2, thank you.

Russia Offended by Modern Warfare 2, Game Offended Many Others too

In one of Modern Warfare 2’s earlier missions, the player was recruited by the CIA and along with the ultra nationalists, walked into an airport, undercover, and helped gun down innocent civilians. The mission was called “No Russian”.

It was so nice, I played it twice!

Well, Russia didn’t like it so much, and reports claim that at least the console versions of the game have been pulled from store shelves until this level is removed in a patch for the Russian version of the game, for the PC retail and Steam versions. I guess it’s not enough that you are actually given the option of skipping the level when you first start the game, which most people probably didn’t.

Not sure what they'll do with the console versions.

Of course, it doesn’t help that the singleplayer campaign seems to involve a lot of killing of Russians anyway, so some are saying the whole game might have to be rewritten and censored especially for them.

Remember that a similar thing happened in Germany over a single swastika symbol located in Wolfenstein? Compared to that, this is pretty big.

So, what could be done to appease the Russians? Besides taking out the offensive level in question, perhaps all the enemies in the game should be replaced with bears or something?

Modern Warfare 2 has caused a fuss on the other side as well, as Americans, especially Religious leaders and such have slammed the game, probably in no small part due to the missions in the American campaign which detail Washington DC being invaded and reduced to rubble by the Russians in retaliation for the events of the airport mission after it was discovered that an American was involved.

I guess it’s still too soon after 9/11.

Well, you never know, it could happen. Perhaps this little game will spark a resurgence of the Cold War. I doubt it though.

Update: Well, it turns out that the whole story was bull$h1t, but that's not my fault. Activision has set the record straight and disclosed to Eurogamer that they voluntarily removed the "No Russian" mission from Modern Warfare 2 before sending it over there. And only the PC version was ever retailed in Russia, not the console versions as was previously said.

"Other countries have formal ratings boards that we regularly work with. However, Russia does not have a formal ratings entity. As a result, we chose to block the scene after seeking the advice of local counsel,"

"Reports that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 has been banned in Russia are erroneous. Activision only released a PC version of the game in Russia which went on sale on Tuesday, 10th November,"

So the game isn't banned there.

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http://www.gotps3.ru/article/vsjo_pravda_call_of_duty_modern_warfare_2_podvergnuta_tsenzure/
http://hellforge.gameriot.com/blogs/Hellforge/Console-Versions-of-Modern-Warfare-2-Banned-in-Russia
Religious leaders slam Modern Warfare
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/activision-chose-to-censor-russian-mw2

What the Hell is That Green Thing in The Sims?

It’s been there since The Sims 1, and has been there through every expansion and addon. Then there was the sequel, The Sims 2, and every expansion for that one too. Then this year saw The Sims 3 and the brand new The Sims 3: World Adventures.

All the while, I’ve never really known what the hell that green thing is hanging over a sim’s head. I read on the official Sims 3 Twitter account that it’s called a “plumb bob”.

In The Sims 2, it even changed colour from red, orange, yellow, right through to white. So what the hell is a plumb bob?

I was talking to my brother, and all the while I was playing with this thing, a led item hanging on a thread, which almost looked like a spinning top. It turns out that is a plumb bob.

Also spelled as plumb-bob, or as The Sims 3 wiki spells it: PlumbBob. Some even call it a "plummet".

Mystery solved.

2009/11/17

Wikipedia Needs You(r Money)

I was doing my occasional check up on Wikipedia, and saw this message in large letters above the article:

Wikipedia Forever

Whether it didn’t get the message across, I came back one or two days later to discover that once again in large letters, there was a new message:

Knowledge Forever
Ad-Free Forever
Wikipedia Forever

I came back to an article today, and there's this:

The guys in charge of Wikipedia have been talking about how they are going to keep the online encyclopedia running. They don’t want to resort to ad supported articles, like some gaming wikis I’ve come across do. So they came up with this donation option. It’s not the first time, seeing as I know it’s been done before in the past.

Modern Warfare 2 is (not) Surprisingly Short, Like Most FPSs Nowadays

I’ve read it online and I’ve heard it from other people: Modern Warfare 2 was too short.

My brother and I were talking lately and he happened to be pissed off. He said he finished Modern Warfare 2 in only several hours of playing and it was a total rip-off.

I started playing the game in the early hours of Saturday morning, and played a few sessions throughout that day and Sunday, and in the early hours of Monday morning, it was over.
I was really getting in to the game, and all of a sudden it stopped. I should have known that the ending with MacTavish lying on the floor with a knife sticking out of his chest and Shepard kicking the cr@p out of Price was the ending, but I was just so taken in to the game that I didn’t realize that soon the experience would end. I was kind of disappointed.

The thing is no Call of Duty game in history has ever been a long game. With practically every CoD game I’ve ever played, it only took me a few sessions over a period of 2 to 4 days (with breaks) to finish.

And to come across any game nowadays which takes more than several hours to finish is a rarity, besides Fallout 3 or something, which is an RPG. I’m talking about FPSs; shooters.

I mean, Wolfenstein was primarily an FPS with a few extra elements added in to the mix, and even though some claim it was boring, it still took me longer to finish than Modern Warfare 2.

Ever since the nineties, FPS games have evolved tremendously in several areas, but they have been getting shorter in lifespan for the most part. How many times have I played Duke Nukem 3D over the years, and how long did it take me to play through all four episodes of the Atomic Edition? More often, and much longer, to answer both questions.

Yes, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 does have the added bonus of Special Ops missions, some of which are more challenging than what was offered in the actual singleplayer, but once again, the main campaign is pretty short. If only the effort that went into these Special Ops missions was used to extend the singleplayer missions. Most of them were just outtakes from the campaign, but the suspension bridge one was fun.

Well, there is that DLC or expansion which revolves around Ghost that everyone is talking about now, so maybe there will be an extra few missions.

2009/11/16

Video Game Deals: Guitar Hero World Tour and On Tour

I've been looking at the best deals lately, and I've picked up on a Guitar Hero theme over at Amazon:

Guitar Hero World Tour - Guitar Kit (PS3) - $39.49 - Save $20.50
Guitar Hero World Tour (Xbox 360) - $28.49 - Save $13.50
Guitar Hero on Tour Decades - Software Only (DS) - $17.49 - Save $12.00
Guitar Hero: On Tour - Software Only (DS)- $17.49 - Save $10.50

Guitar Hero on Amazon

Modern Warfare 2's Ghost Character to get his own game

Some people think that "Soap" MacTavish is the best character in the Modern Warfare series. Others say its Captain Price, because he's featured in nearly every single main Call of Duty title. I was in the later group, until I saw Ghost.

Ghost is the guy in Modern Warfare 2 with the skull patterned balaclava and the sunglasses, whose real name is Simon Riley, a Sergeant in the SAS and member of Task Force 141, and he just looks and acts so cool.

Too bad he gets killed in the game. Shot and burned alive. Oh dear.

Oops. Sorry if you haven't played it yet.

Craig Fairbrass, the actor who voiced Gaz in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, also voiced Ghost in Modern Warfare 2, and he claims that Infinity Ward is planning a spin-off title for the character, possibly a DLC pack. He's all ready got a comic book series named after him, Modern Warfare 2: Ghost, the first issue out now.

"I'm now voicing a guy called Ghost, who now just got a spin-off comic of his own and they're talking about another little game to go with it. So, I’m quite excited about it. It’s grown and grown and grown.”

“I don’t know. It’s the whole thing I suppose of not knowing who he is. He’s like the head of the SAS and… I’m just so thrilled to be a part of it, I mean it just gets bigger and bigger each year.”

If it does turn out to be a DLC pack or expansion, it will likely be the first kind of addon since United Offensive for the first CoD game. What do the fans say? More or less along the lines of, "I hate you Infinity Ward", "Modern Warfare 2 sucks", and "They're milking the game for more money". Surprise, surprise.

Personally I think that Ghost might be a rip-off of another character of the same name from Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl. He was one of Strelok's buddies and also obscured his features, albeit with a hood and a gas mask. When you think that Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare also featured a Pripyat level like Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl, in "All Ghillied Up", I start to wonder.

Whatever the case, he is not the "head of the SAS".

Some say that Ghost is basically an inside joke at IW, basically like the Kenny McCormick of the developing Modern Warfare series, as he replaced Gaz who was killed in Modern Warfare.

Some say he might be Gaz and that he wears the mask to cover up the injuries he sustained in Modern Warfare. If you look at how the Price character kept reappearing in the series even after he was supposedly killed in Call of Duty, and crossed over into Modern Warfare, it's not impossible I guess.

All we know is he's called the Stig.

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thatvideogameblog.com

Apocalypse Then: Half-Life 2

5 Years of Half-Life 2

Well, it’s hard to believe, but it has indeed been five years since the release of one of the most critically acclaimed FPS titles ever, Half-Life 2. It’s the sequel to yet another well-known and loved game, Half-Life.

Half-Life 2 was developed by the renowned and lately somewhat controversial Valve Corporation, and was released on November 16, 2004 for the PC, after being in development nearly since the original game came out over five years before it, with console versions of the game following lin years later. It was the first in a line of controversial Steamworks games; titles which involve Steam, Valve’s online digital distribution service, and require online product activation. This caused a lot of public outcry, especially for players without a broadband connection. The game was later included in The Orange Box compilation pack along with Team Fortress 2, Portal, and the Half-Life 2 Episodes. Half-Life 2 continued the science fiction story of the mute scientist known as Gordon Freeman, as awakens from approximately twenty year of stasis and he finds himself in City 17, a strange Eastern European-looking place in the future under alien control; the Combine having assembled forces consisting of transhumans, as well as other methods of maintaining compliance, like using headcrabs as part of their biological warfare arsenal. You remember those from Half-Life, right? Gordon found himself yet again being manipulated by the mysterious G-man, and fighting alongside resistance members as well as some old friends from Black Mesa to take on the powers that controlled the City, as well as possibly many other cities of its kind across the world. Dr. Wallace Breen was one of the chief enemies in the game.

Half-Life 2, although arguably not the most graphically advanced game in the world at the time years ago, was still beautiful, and a marvelous game, with great AI and revolutionary physics, animation, gameplay, and story, and was applauded for its immense use of technology, unlike one of its main competitors of that year, Doom 3. It won numerous Game of the Year awards. If people thought that Half-Life was great, then Half-Life 2 was excellent, and is on many lists of greatest FPSs of all time, and its protagonist, Gordon, has been voted as one of the best heroes of any game, despite being a man of very few words, if any at all.

I have played this game at least a few times over the years, as well as the Episodes. When I originally got it, I couldn't wait until Christmas- I had to play it then and there. I remember for a whole few days during the summer holidays of 2004 I was stuck there playing it, just glued to the screen.

There was an expansion pack rumoured in 2005, called Half-Life: Aftermath, but this turned out to be a series of addons called the Episodes, which so far consists of Half-Life 2: Episode 1, Episode 2, and the yet to be released Episode 3, which is still in development. These episodes were part of a supposed revolutionary concept called "episodic content", which means that the masses don’t have to wait for the next game in the series, which in this case would be Half-Life 3. In a sense, the episodes are Half-Life 3, although some argue that Valve would have been able to develop and release a proper sequel in the last five years, and that the episodic content idea, although promising, hasn’t worked too well. In addition to the episodes, another addon called Lost Coast was also released for the game.

Besides this, Half-Life 2, using the Source engine has inspired many games which use the same technology, a lot of which Valve or teams hired by them, has made, as well as fan-made mods, including a remake of both Half-Life (Black Mesa Source), and the expansion, Opposing Force (Operation Black Mesa).

Games that used the Source engine include Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, SiN Episode 1: Emergence, and Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, as well as a Source engine version of They Hunger, called They Hunger: Lost Souls, which is yet to be released. They Hunger was an excellent three part mod for Half-Life.

So Valve, come on and hurry up with Half-Life 2: Episode 3 all ready!