Latest Articles (Page 3506)

Stories have an uneasy role in the game development process, often tacked on at the last minute to satisfy a tick box in the game design document. Graphics - check! Soundtrack - check! Plot - check! It shouldn't be this way...

Shenmue 2 is probably the best swansong the Dreamcast could hope for. The eagerly anticipated second chapter to Yu Suzuki's magnum opus pushes Sega's final console to the very brink of its capabilities. The most endearing thing about the Shenmue story, for me at least, is the fact that you're never completely sure of your position in the big picture. The beautifully rendered intro sequence merely hints at the direction of the story, and the sense of being led towards something bigger than what we're immediately presented with is forever there. Yes, Shenmue 2 is extremely impressive, at least technically, but does it live up to the previous instalments ability to fascinate, intrigue, and make off with our breath? The game proper obviously picks up where the predecessor left off, as Ryo arrives in Hong Kong in pursuit of his father's murderer and the truth behind the events that led to his death. Your starting task is to simply locate an address, and so as you begin to wander about the harbour it becomes your primary objective to interrogate as many locals as possible. So far, so familiar, apart from the fact that the dialogue is in Japenese. Having English subtitles and Japenese speech is far preferable to the mediocre job the Western voice actors did in Shenmue, and it lends a tremendous amount to the atmosphere.

The game is enormous, set over 20 centuries and features a total of thirteen playable characters, each equipped with weapons accurate for the time period, and the ability to target individual body parts and other areas of their enemies. Characters are controlled in the third person with a mix of Tomb Raider and Resident Evil-style camera use, in a 3D engine that takes advantage of every trick the ATI R300 can pull, at a 640x480 resolution and a stunning 60 frames per second. Obviously at this point it's impossible to comment on 50 / 60Hz options in European titles, but the version we have seen is definitely running at 60. The story is told through the player's actions on screen and during in-game cutscenes, where detailed facial animation will play a big part. Full-motion video sequences will also be included. Eternal Darkness may be a fantastical adventure, but Silicon Knights are trying to be as historically accurate in their depiction of the various locations as possible, right down to Latin voiceovers in some sections and enemies with authentic domestic fighting styles. Insane? That's not the half of it. The game's prized feature is the insanity meter. As players face more and more bizarre and unbelievable challenges, they have to question what's going on, and like any human exposed to enormous stress, they start to crack. The player's ability to deal with new challenges and experiences is lessened. This can lead to all sorts of effects, from the subtle; opening your inventory of items to find everything missing, to the downright confusing; walking into a room to witness your own, gruesome death, only to be resurrected by a flash of white light a moment later. Your level of sanity will reflect directly on your environment and abilities.

John Carmack has given gamers an early Christmas present by releasing the full source code for Quake 2. As with the release of the Doom and Quake source code in recent years, amateur developers are now free to tinker with the game engine as long as they stick to the terms of the GPL. The game itself remains under copyright though, so if you want to use textures, models and other artwork from Quake 2 in your mod, demo or game your audience will need to have their own legitimate copies. When id Software released the Doom source code it led to a flurry of activity as a variety of "source ports" were hacked together, adding everything from higher resolutions and OpenGL support to proper online multiplayer and capture the flag. Quake also spawned a host of spin-offs, ranging from a DirectX port to bizarre visual tricks such as adding a psychedelic fish-eye lens effect or making Quake look like it was being hand-drawn on your screen using a smudgy pencil. Whether Quake 2 will result in a similar outpouring of weirdness remains to be seen, but if you want to have a look at Carmack's code, you can grab the full source (just 1.4Mb worth) here. Related Feature - Quake suffers acid flashback

After lengthy delays caused by upgrades to the internet backbone of the Novaworld serivce, multiplayer support for Comanche 4 is finally getting off the helipad today. Novalogic's VP of IT John Butrovich explained that "with demand on NovaWorld currently reaching well over 400,000 game joins per day, upgrades were needed in preparation for the launch of Comanche 4". Unfortunately those upgrades weren't actually completed in time for the game's launch, which has left its online support grounded for the last few weeks. John added that "we are happy to announce that the upgrades to this free service is now complete, and I'd like to thank our customers for their patience during this re-vamp". More improvements to the service are being planned for the future apparently, but hopefully they won't prove quite as disruptive. Related Feature - Comanche 4 review

Bulgarian developers Black Sea Studios have signed an exclusive four year deal with Germany's Sunflowers Entertainment, creators of the popular medieval strategy game Anno 1602. Founded earlier this year by Vesselin Handjiev, the man behind the amusing (for all the wrong reasons) real-time strategy game Tzar : Burden Of The Crown, Black Sea is already the self-described leading game developer in Bulgaria (certainly it's the only one we've ever heard of) and is aiming to become a center of excellence for south-eastern Europe. Amazingly enough their first project with Sunflowers will be another real-time strategy game, and we are already quivering with anticipation. Well, maybe not. In one of the three press releases we've received about the partnership so far, Gerhard Schanz of Schanz Consultants (the company which brokered the deal, in case you were wondering) announced in a wonderful piece of bungled translation that he is "confident that Black Sea Studios will deliver games to the industry that are path-braking blockbusters". We think the words he was looking for were probably "ground breaking". Or maybe "path finding". But certainly not "path braking". Meanwhile Sunflowers boss Jürgen Reusswig decreed that "providing an incredible level of fun and long-term motivation in a both technically and graphically high-quality environment is priority number one for the Bulgarian team". We can only hope that Black Sea will live up to these aspirations and produce something more impressive than their founder's last project... Related Features - Tzar review

CDV and Russian developers Fireglow have announced that they are working on a sequel to their hit real-time strategy game Sudden Strike, imaginatively titled Sudden Strike 2. The follow-up looks suspiciously like the original game, but this time round the British, German, Russian and American armies will have some new neighbours as the Japanese launch a sneak attack on gamers around the world, while the French have apparently surrendered their place in the sequel in the face of this oriental onslaught. Quelle surprise. The sequel's battles and campaigns are expected to have a firmer basis in historical fact, and a more realistic damage model is also being promised, along with a range of other tweaks and tucks to the gameplay. With a spring release on the cards, we should know soon whether this is a true sequel or a mission pack with delusions of grandeur.

The fourth and final upgrade for Operation Flashpoint is now online, offering a new multiplayer paintball map, improved net code and other fixes and optimisations. It's only about 6Mb, and you can download it from the Codemasters website. Meanwhile those of you who haven't already bought the Operation Flashpoint Gold Upgrade add-on can now download it for a mere £4.99. This gives you a massive new twenty mission single player campaign showing the conflict from the Soviet side, along with a 64 page .pdf format Operation Flashpoint strategy guide from Prima. Finally, those of you who have yet to discover the joys of Operation Flashpoint can download a new multiplayer demo. Weighing in at 49Mb, it includes two capture the flag maps for you to play online or over a network, with support for two to eight players. Well worth a look if you missed the game the first time round. Related Feature - Operation Flashpoint review

Techland have announced Pet Racer, the latest attempt to bring the anarchic cartoon racing genre to the PC. Featuring over thirty tracks spread across five settings, including the inevitable forest, desert and arctic environments, the developers are promising "hilarious characters and great playability". The game also comes with a selection of bizarre power-ups, from your standard speed boost to a "tomato launcher" and "wasp hive". The mind boggles. If you live in Techland's native Poland you can bring this boggling to an abrupt end tomorrow morning when the game arrives on store shelves, but the rest of us will have to wait until Techland can find an overseas publisher for the game. In the meantime, you can scour these screenshots for clues... Related Feature - Pet Racer screenshots

In a move which is sure to shock absolutely nobody given Red Storm's habit of milking a franchise 'till it bleeds, a mission pack has been announced for their recently released tactical action game Ghost Recon. Due for release as early as March, the add-on will transplant the action to the deserts of Africa as war breaks out between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Along with the new sun-soaked environments and eight new single player missions, the game will also add a few new weapons, vehicles and enemies into the mix. Interestingly, while the add-on hasn't even been officially named yet, the press release describes it as "the first mission pack" for the game. So no doubt we can expect a string of follow-ups, spin-offs and sequels over the next few years in true Rainbow Six fashion. Related Feature - Ghost Recon review

If Trade Empires is to be believed, the development of civilization is defined not by wars and diplomacy but by trade. Instead of conquering new territory by invading neighbouring countries, you spread your influence by setting up markets and supplying them with the goods they require, hopefully at a hefty mark-up. It might not sound tremendously exciting, but the result is a surprisingly deep and addictive experience. Over the course of sixteen scenarios the game covers four thousand years of history and four continents, taking in the birth of Egypt, Sumeria and China, the rise of Greece, Phoenicia and Rome, the colonisation of America and the industrial revolution in Europe amongst other topics. In each mission you will start out with a small amount of cash and be set a target score to achieve by a certain year. Sometimes winning is simply a case of earning lots of money, while in other scenarios you will get bonus points for building up the population of cities or importing specific goods. At first sight the whole thing can look rather bewildering, and while the interface is neatly laid out and fairly logical, it does require a lot of mouse clicking to actually get anywhere. Luckily then there is a helpful tutorial mission to ease you into the game and introduce you to the basic concepts, from setting up your first markets to trading different goods between them. And this is essentially all that you will be doing for the rest of the game.

Although you may realise that Sony's PlayStation 2 can output glorious Dolby Digital surround sound, you may not be aware that Electronic Arts is now offering DTS compatible videogames, the first of which are NHL 2002 and SSX Tricky. The former features full 5.1 channel DTS surround sound, while Tricky had 4.0 channel DTS. As IGN put it, "With the DTS sound, gamers were given a level of high fidelity sound that isn't common in most videogames and true separation with the surround speakers at a quality that you simply can't get with matrixed surround sound techniques like Dolby Pro Logic." EA has now made the decision to stick with DTS for its forthcoming PS2 releases. It makes it all the more worthwhile if you have a killer hi-fi in your living room.

Sony is making its boldest move yet into broadband content and gaming services. In addition to the company's previously announced alliance with NTT in Japan, reporters have been told today that Sony will also ally with Yahoo Japan and Softbank. Yahoo Japan and Softbank recently launched a cut price ADSL service in Japan, which is presently lashing the broadband market from a new angle in the Far East. Sony hopes that by building a rich network of content and fast access in Japan, it will set another enviable example for players like Microsoft and Nintendo, and attract new customers to its stunningly popular PlayStation 2 platform. Still the market leader the world over in spite of its competition, Sony's console will be the first to provide a range of digital content to the consumers, with music, games and video. The network that Yahoo Japan and Softbank help to create will also include auctions and financial services, according to Sony's announcement. There were about 350,000 ADSL lines in use in Japan at the beginning of September, and by the time Sony launches that number could more than double.

Nomads is one of the most spectacular looking PC games currently in the pipeline, set in a shattered world of precarious rocky islands floating amongst the clouds. Falling somewhere between Jules Verne and Laputa, it's certainly an eye-catching setting. But what about the game behind those gorgeous visuals?

Inspired by the critically acclaimed PlayStation title, EA Sports BIG has confirmed that it is developing Sled Storm 2 for PlayStation 2. BIG promises visually stunning high-impact sled racing with treacherous environments and no rules. The usual collection of shortcuts and big-air jumps will litter the courses. Motored sleds are extremely powerful, yet delicate, and EA Sports BIG hopes to capture the feel of the sport like never before. Their significant experience with extreme sports titles should give Sled Storm 2 an advantage before the snow even comes into it. EA have already published a selection of screenshots and a detailed press release. Along with the previously announced FreekStyle, BIG plan to release the game in March of 2002. Related Feature - Sled Storm 2 screenshots

The CSFB has finally produced independent sales estimates, which give a good picture of the console industry in the United States since the launch of Microsoft's Xbox and Nintendo's GameCube. According to the report, Sony leads console sales by a hair's breadth, having sold 962,000 PlayStation 2 consoles between November 11 and December 8. Meanwhile, Microsoft have sold 934,000 Xbox consoles since November 15th, and GameCube may only have sold 602,000 since its launch date the 18th. In a separate release, Sony claims to have sold a staggering 1.5 million PlayStation 2 units since Thanksgiving week, giving them a total of 6.5 million since the launch of the console in October 2000. Nintendo on the other hand claimed sales of over 800,000 units, and said it would "ship 1.3 million units by Christmas," as it continues to restock retailers at the rate of 100,000 units a week. Microsoft took over where the others left off, with spokesman David Hufford's rather embarrassing "Xbox has caught fire since launch," leading to all sorts of amusing quips about campfires in the new housing extension and covering of ventilation holes. Microsoft has invested $500 million in advertising the Xbox. Presumably they have no money left to vet their press comments for this sort of thing. Related Feature - Everyone's A Winner

IGN is reporting that Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto and Satoru Iwata will speak at the 2002 D.I.C.E. (Design, Innovate, Create and Entertain) Summit, the first of what the organisers hope will become an annual event. Hosted at The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, it will take place at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas on February 28 - March 1 of 2002. Iwata, former president of HAL Laboratory and now Director and General Manager of the Corporate Planning Division at Nintendo, met with a warm reception at the recent Nintendo Show in London's Westminster. Shigeru Miyamoto has not notably spoken on game design since the 1999 Game Developer's Conference, where he received a standing ovation. Now that he is lead director on all Nintendo projects his speech will be even more interesting, and with games like Mario Sunshine and Legend of Zelda quietly evolving under his watchful eye we can expect his address to focus on how to innovate within a franchise amongst other topics. Expect full coverage from virtually every corner of the web come the D.I.C.E. Summit. Related Feature - The Nintendo Show

Nintendo of Japan has plans to use the GameBoy Advance as a 'digital broadcasting remote control', the company revealed yesterday. Collaborating with Nippon Broadcasting Corporation, Nintendo plans to run quiz shows where GBA owners will be able to respond to questions from home and have their answers delivered to the programme's producers over the Internet. A special cartridge with software to drive the client-side interface will be produced. The company declined to comment any further, and it seems unlikely that this idea will get further than Japan unless Chris Tarrant spots it. Whether the GameCube will be used at all is also unknown, although we fear that the GBA <> GameCube cable could become a new linchpin for the likes of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, which Eidos will be looking to reinvent after the second game in the series flopped so dramatically. Related Feature - Nobody wants to be a Millionaire

With Peter Jackson's big budget take on The Fellowship Of The Ring hitting cinemas this week, attention has once again been focused on the inevitable video game tie-ins. Electronic Arts today reiterated the fact that it has "an exclusive deal with New Line Cinema to create games based on the upcoming The Lord Of The Rings movies". Unfortunately this exclusive deal isn't quite as exclusive as EA might have liked, as just last week it was Vivendi Universal reminding us that they had the exclusive rights to publish games based on the Lord Of The Rings. Of course, the truth is that both companies have an exclusive license - Electronic Arts will be developing games based on the sure-fire hit movies, while Vivendi Universal went straight to the Shires and got rights to the original novels from Tokein's estate. Given that relations between the movie makers and Tolkein's heirs have been somewhat strained, this is perhaps not too surprising. As a result both companies are now planning to release Lord of the Rings games for a variety of platforms, although neither of them had a game ready in time for the Fellowship's cinematic release. Instead EA are hoping to cash in next autumn, when the Fellowship will no doubt be released on DVD and interest will be rising again in anticipation of The Two Towers arriving in cinemas, while Vivendi have yet to confirm their release plans. Whichever interpretation of The Ring comes out on top, gamers can at least look forward to an entertaining battle between the two licensees, and hopefully the result of this competition will be better games from both sides.

Codemasters today announced that they have picked up publishing duties for the PlayStation 2 versions of two first person shooters from popular Wisconsin developer Raven. Soldier of Fortune : Gold Edition and Star Trek : Voyager Elite Force were previously due to be released in Europe by EON Digital, but the small UK-based publisher ran into financial difficulties a few months ago and has been selling off its projects ever since. While the original games were published by Activision on PC, the PS2 ports of both titles are distributed in the USA by Majesco, and are now expected to appear in Europe some time in April courtesy of Codemasters. Related Feature - Elite Force PS2 screenshots

Although the public actually really honestly for the love of God doesn't care who is selling the most consoles for the most part, both Nintendo and Microsoft persist in publishing figures and subsequently rubbishing the other's. The latest "facts" from Nintendo's side are, in no particular order... Total North American shipments of Nintendo have now reached 1.1 million, about 800,000 of those sold. Nintendo is shipping 100,000 consoles a week to replenish supplies, and has increased production to meet demand. While on the software front, Super Smash Brothers Melee has sold a quarter of a million copies, making it the fastest selling game for any new console launched this year. Which is only so interesting when you think about it.

Activision has sanctioned the development of the fourth game in the rapidly ageing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 will be developed by Neversoft Entertainment as per the previous three, and will feature even more top-rated skaters, tracks, and intuitive controls, and will probably continue the franchise's unrivalled dominance in the skateboarding race. Very few details have been provided at the time of writing about Tony's fourth outing, but gamers can expect to play it in 2003's fiscal year according to Activision, who are keen to point out that Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 is currently one of the top-selling games across the globe, and that you should think about buying it. Related Feature - Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 review

For once, none of Bond's well-documented adventures on the big screen form the basis of Agent Under Fire. Instead the game has its own storyline which is a montage of Bond stereotypes, and fans of the books and films will find déjà vu on the lips of every new character and in the objectives of every mission. Far from annoying, it's what makes the game such an achievement. EA have finally produced a Bond game worth its salt, after three abortive attempts on the PlayStation. Agent Under Fire's tacky story leaves you with no doubt of its ancestry. With the last few movies, simple motives like love and revenge have driven our hero, and EA, not eager to take any chances with a confusing thinking man's plot, have gone with a standard-issue secret agent story. Bond's job is to undo the work of a nefarious worldwide organisation with key genetic data on world leaders. Their plan is to replace each leader with a cloned sympathiser, with the overall aim of world domination. This will not stand. So Agent Under Fire is a first person shooter first and foremost, and beyond that it features classic Bond sections such as car chases. Boasting a high framerate and a surprising lack of aliasing or flickering, it makes a strong impression in the visuals department within seconds of being fired up. The levels are enormous, often filling the picture with polygons and intricately detailed textures, and Bond's surroundings are also well lit. Explosions are fairly common, and when they happen they flood the screen with colour and have a tendency to startle. Bond himself is The Matrix's residual self-image equivalent of several actors, looking like every stereotypical secret agent in the world. As always, he's sharply dressed thanks to some excellent cloth animation, and along with the key players in the game his shape and profile are in perfect harmony.

With Christmas approaching, those of us who count ourselves amongst the hardcore are forced look to the Far East and States to satisfy our gaming desires. There are many domestic releases for the PlayStation 2 here in Europe, but many of them suffer from borders and other issues. With competing consoles from Nintendo and Microsoft already available in the States and plenty of top quality PS2 titles us Europeons won't be offered until well into next year, this could be our last chance to get hold of something to silence that damned turkey over the festive period.

Q, the Panasonic-manufactured DVD player / console derived from Nintendo's GameCube, is susceptible to the same region cracking Nintendo's native console can be fooled by, although the procedure for 'fixing' it is a lot trickier thanks to the physical layout of the Q's innards.

In the days of the 16-bit console, when Sega's Mega Drive (Genesis) and the Super Nintendo were going head to head, a relatively unknown platformer was vying for attention. James Pond, starring a fishy secret agent on a mission to rid the world of evil, played … some sort of fiddle, but way back at the rear of the room, under a pile of coats belonging to Mario, Sonic and about a hundred other platform heroes.

When SNK slipped quietly away into liquidation last month, nobody was sadder to see them go than me. But with them went a collection of characters and properties so vast and all encompassing that it was inevitable someone would pick them up. That someone is Playmore, a Japanese Pachinko company. Pachinko is a form of gambling native to Japan, but Playmore clearly have bigger things to think about, having gained the rights to all of SNK's intellectual properties, including King of the Fighters, Fatal Fury, Samurai Shodown and Metal Slug. Playmore will soon become SNK Neo Geo in a company relaunch, with a Korean company HQ and a new business plan to be announced in January. Whether Playmore will try and work with these famous hallmarks of gaming by themselves is unknown. Capcom amongst others were collaborating with SNK at the time of their demise, and it would be nice to see that relationship resurrected. Frankly, it's a bit surprising that Capcom didn't buy the whole kit and kaboodle themselves… Related Feature - Rest in peace SNK (ahem)

I'm not sure exactly when it happened, but WWF wrestling games moved from being brutish, uncontrollable sprite-fests to souped up, polygon-powered party games. Acclaim made a handsome buck off the backs of WWF Warzone and WWF Attitude, before THQ crept in to steal their thunder with the Smackdown series. WWF Smackdown was one of the best-looking PSX games at its release, and new gameplay initiatives helped THQ control the massive interest in WWF games quite authoritatively, so that when WWF Smackdown 2!: Know Your Role showed up in November of last year it had no trouble cleaning up. The fact that it was a brilliant game was somewhat irrelevant. Now that it is finally time for the PlayStation 2's first WWF wrestling game - over a year after the console's launch - WWF Smackdown: Just Bring It! can be assured of selling on the strength of its predecessors without much trouble. But does it deserve to do so? Is it as worthy of The Best Wrestling Game accolade as the games from whence it is spawned? Well, yes and no. Visually, Just Bring It is a peculiar blend of utter garbage and exceptional presentation. Developer Yuke seems to have taken the original PSX graphics engine - the game is noticeably similar to its predecessors in look and feel - and incorporated some excellent new animation, with virtually any move you could care to name (and a whole bunch of others) performed realistically and spectacularly, all backed up by some surprisingly good CPU camera manipulation. This is in addition to some intricately modelled and detailed wrestlers (of which there are well over 50 in the game), with each one easily distinguishable and coming complete with the obligatory entrance scenes. Unlike previous wrestling games where weedy models stuttered towards the ring to the accompaniment of canned laughter and a tinny rendition of their theme tune, Smackdown does a good job of building up to the event and getting the adrenaline pumping. Whether you choose to watch it or not, it's actually there this time.

While most flight sims aim for an almost excessive degree of realism, manuals that put War & Peace to shame and controls that require several hours of real life pilot training to master, Comanche 4 is a very different beast. Designed to appeal to the Quake generation, it's all about pick up and play action rather than detailed flight models. A brief tutorial mission should make even the most inexperienced of PC pilots feel at home with the advanced RAH-66 Comanche helicopter, and then it's time to head off to war. Suitably enough this is a new kind of war you are facing, with heavily armed terrorists the target in most missions rather than hostile nations. In all there are six campaigns, which you can play in any order, and should you get stuck on one mission you can simply switch to a different campaign and come back when you're feeling more confident. Settings range from the Balkans and Belarus to the Libyan border and tropical islands, with everything from deserts and jungles to snow-covered forests and debris-strewn city streets to explore. The one thing that these locations have in common is that they all look absolutely stunning. Doing away with the voxels of yore, Novalogic's new polygonal graphics engine still produces extensive and highly detailed terrain while taking full advantage of modern hardware.

Electronic Arts have released a multiplayer demo version of Medal of Honor : Allied Assault, a Quake 3 engined first person shooter set during World War II. Weighing in at over 130Mb, the Allied Assault demo features a single deathmatch map called Stalingrad, along with a selection of player models and weapons from the full game. It's a FilePlanet exclusive, which means that you can download it from any of the following sites -