Archive for September, 2010

Explore your Dwarf Fortress dungeon in Minecraft

People are often torn when it comes to the ridiculously deep life-and-death simulation that is Dwarf Fortress. Some say that Dwarf Fortresses near impenetrable blaze of ASCII characters forces players to use the infinite power of their own imagination, to create a fortress in their mind more glorious than anything a graphics card can produce. Other people say “balderdash, give me polygons,” and for these people we present the DF to Minecraft Utility, a program that can read your Dwarf Fortress maps and convert them into a Minecraft dungeon, so you can get a Dwarf-eye view of your creations.

Bulletstorm TGS trailer shows cannonball gun

Bulletstorm is a game about killing people in ridiculous ways for points. The tools and abilites Epic have shown so far have included a glowing leash with which to throw enemies around, and the ability to kick leashed enemies in the head as they sail through the air in slow motion.  There aren’t many developers who would look at early demo and say ”there’s not enough cannonballs. What this game really needs is a gun that fires cannonballs,” but that’s exactly what Epic have done. Read on for more information, and footage of a gun that fires cannonballs.

Arcania: Gothic 4 demo is out

The fantasy RPG series is back for its fourth outing, the first under new developer, Spellbound. It’s got Orcs and Goblins, and dungeons full of giant spidery things to kill. It’s also got a demo, so you can frolic in its idyllic fields, slaughtering weird bug creatures to your heart’s content.

Freeze time and ride bullets in TimeStill 2

TimeStill 2 is a grainy, atmospheric little platformer from Zack Banack. All you have to do to do is collect the stars within each arena to progress to the next, but it’s never simple when time manipulation’s involved. Add swinging blades, lasers and pools of acid and you have yourself a real humdinger of a platformer, and all for the price of an 8MB download.

GOG.com relaunches, is swamped by demand

So it turns out that GoG.com wasn’t dead, it was just sleeping. The new version of the site launched earlier today. As ill advised as their PR stunt seemed, it looks as though playing possum has paid off, as demand has been so high that they’re having to set up new servers to cope with the influx of new customers.

How to become a master miner in Minecraft

Among the stories of people building amazing water slides and accidentally burning their houses down, it’s easy to forget that Minecraft is, at its heart, a game about mining. Minecraft community member, Featherblade, with some help from friends and fellow forumites, has put together an extensive and incredibly well researched guide on how to become the most efficient miner possible.

Supreme Commander 2 AI updated, new DLC units revealed

Gas Powered Games have released a video to brag about their excellent redesign of the AI for Supreme Commander 2 in its recent patches, and they’ve snuck in tantalising clips of some of the new super-units that will be included as part of the upcoming Infinite War Battle Pack DLC. Video and info below.

GOG hoax: “we could not miss a chance to generate some buzz”

This Sunday, GOG.com disappeared, replaced with a vague message from its creators about the website’s closure. It read, in part, that “GOG.com simply cannot remain in its current form.” People were understandably upset. Good Old Games are a digital distributor of old, DRM-free games, and a well-respected company. People were sad to see them close down.

But it turned out they weren’t closing. Tomorrow, the site will re-launch, out of beta with some new features and some new games, but fundamentally unchanged. The closure was a hoax. After days of growing backlash as rumours spread and gamers were understandably unhappy at being fooled, we asked Good Old Games why they decided to re-launch the site in this way. Their statement is included in full below.

Hyper-violent Dead Rising 2 trailer attacks!

For those of us who are used to Left 4 Dead’s breed of super-fast zombies, the old, stumbling George A. Romero style shufflers seem like a bit of a joke. If you can outrun the oncoming apocalypse on a Segway then it’s probably an apocalypse not worth worrying about. Dead Rising 2 agrees, and thinks that the best way to deal with the doddering undead is to humiliate them, preferably using some sort of horrendous weapon constructed from an oar and two chainsaws, held together by gaffa tape. Check out the trailer below for an example of one in action.

Eve Incursion is coming

The latest free update for Eve Online, Incursion, is scheduled to arrive in November, bringing graphical updates and a huge co-operative space war to Eve’s already war-torn server.

Part 2 of the Left 4 Dead comic is out

Part 2 of Valve’s new Left 4 Dead comic, The Sacrifice, is out. In this instalment we get a peak at Zoe’s traumatic backstory as the survivors settle in to life at the military base. Valve have revealed that they’re planning to release the raw art from the comic without speech bubbles or sound effects so that Left 4 Dead fans can construct their own stories. The best ones will be featured on the Left 4 Dead blog.