Populous reborn: shape the world in From Dust
Remember Ubisoft’s Project Dust? It’s been renamed: From Dust is the new title. It’s no longer being pitched as a “we must save humanity from these natural disasters or surely perish” type of game; it’s shifted into a more comfortable, “humanity are tiny insects and look how pretty this volcano is” space. Here’s a gorgeous tech demo:
Be a squaddie in ArmA 2: British Armed Forces
New ArmA 2 DLC! This time, it centres around a mechanised British troop embarking on a large scale counter-insurgency campaign. It’ll deliver “numerous” singleplayer missions for the new faction, as well as authentic hardware. It’ll be out on the 26th of August for the PC only, and will cost £7.99/$9.99. Trailer and more info below:
APB fights for survival: test new features right now
Following yesterday’s news that Realtime Worlds had entered into administration, we got lots of comments lamenting the death of their urban sandbox MMO. As if in response, they’ve upt up a public test world with a mass of new features. We’ve got the meatiest chunks of the patch notes below. And it seems the developers are listening to customer complaints – improving the well known weaknesses within the game. Radical weapon rebalancing, improved vehicle handling, and new weapon audio are all on the patch notes. Have you played the test version? We’d love to know how the improvements feel in-game.
Interview: Valve on the future of Team Fortress 2
Team Fortress 2 has updated all nine of its classes now, so everyone’s curious about the future of the game. I posted myself to Mann. Co headquarters in the hope of wrestling Saxton Hale for answers, but when I arrived I found only project lead Robin Walker, in his throne room at Valve. Disappointed, I clambered out of my box and interviewed him nevertheless.
He talked about where Team Fortress 2 can go from here, how many people are still working on it, what they plan to include in the next update, why unlocks work the way they do, why they might start a new TF2 beta, and what the point of hats is. Accordingly, the interview is long. This is part one – part two is here.
Team Fortress 2 characters sing Ke$ha and Bieber
I am worried by how good these sound. By good, I of course mean ‘bad’, but in that horrible good version of bad that gets beneath your spine and makes you smilecringe all the way through them. They are recently released pop songs, as sung by clips culled from Team Fortress 2, and they sync up in a thoroughly impressive manner. Listen to two of the best/worst after the jump.
Settlers Online dev: “Monetize all weakness”
Speaking at GDC Europe, Teut Weidemann, design lead on Settlers Online, reckons that to succeed with a Free-To-Play game you need to aggressively target your customers’ weaknesses. “We have to bring them in and keep them addicted and make them keep playing.” I thought this was the sort of thing you worried about journalists overhearing.
Aion 2.0: Elyos Leveling Guide (51-52)
Yesterday we took you on a tour of levels 51-52 in Aion’s upcoming free expansion, Assault on Balaurea, from an Asmodian‘s-eye-view. Today, it’s all about navigating those first treacherous two levels as the Elyos, and of course, we have new usually-friendly guides to lead the way.
Fabulous prize: A complete Logitech gaming set!
Without good peripherals, your brand-new, screaming-fast gaming rig can feel almost as aged and clunky as your old one. But attach a new complete set of a high-end mouse, keyboard and headset, and it completely changes the way you interact with your games.
And today could be your lucky day. Logitech has given PC Gamer two full sets of their freshly updated high-end gaming peripherals to award to our readers. Two winners will each receive:
The G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse
The G930 Wireless Headset
The G510 Gaming Keyboard
Let the contest begin! Click the jump to find out how to win!
Moving pictures prove existence of Torchlight 2 co-op
Runic Games heard fans of Torchlight complaining about lack of multiplayer, and then went and made Torchlight 2. Check out the trailer below for footage of Torchlight 2′s multiplayer in action.
Discover how crafting works in Diablo 3
You don’t craft items in Diablo 3. That would be silly! No, you craft blacksmiths, who craft your items for you. Why didn’t I think of doing that? I could have been rolling in swords by now.
Might & Magic Heroes VI trailer
Might and Magic Heroes VI is a turn based strategy set 400 years before the previous installment. Ubisoft have winged a trailer at us – no word yet on what sort of DRM it’ll have, though. Oh, don’t worry about it. Have some dead kings, violins, and big mad burny-winged women crying golden tears to cheer you up. Screens are below too.
Crysis 2: looks like Crysis, runs on a console
Here’s another video of Crysis 2. This one is a talkthrough with Crytek’s CEO & founder Cevat Yerli and executive producer Nathan Camarillo. The demo shows one of the early pivotal moments in the game’s story. The footage was obviously taken on a dusty old console, and yet it looks easily as good as the first game – a PC exclusive.
Homefront PC port has dedicated servers
Homefront, the oh-god-Korea-invaded-America shooter, has been confirmed for PC. While Kaos studios are hard at work on the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions, THQ have assigned Digital Extremes to the PC version. It’s scheduled for release in “early 2011″.
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm collector’s edition
Blizzard have released details on what you’ll get inside the World of Warcraft: Cataclysm collector’s edition, which’ll be a retail-only exclusive.
Aion 2.0: Asmodian Leveling Guide (51-52)
Assault on Balaurea (“Aion 2.0″), Aion’s massive, free expansion is just around the corner–it’ll be hitting live servers on September 7th. In order to make sure you’re prepared for the coming changes andthe new content, we’ve teamed up with NCsoft to get you all sorts of insider guides and tips for where to go and how to succeed on day one. This is the first post in the series, which will last all week, and it walks you through a recommended strategy step-by-step for leveling through level 51-52 levels as an Asmodian.
