Create a quest for STALKER 2
GSC have launched a competition asking entrants to design their own mission for STALKER 2. The best entries will be forwarded to the game’s lead developers, and might even make it into the full game as a playable mission.
Lego Star Wars 3 footage shows epic battles
The Lego Star Wars games have always done a great job of bringing Lego’s blocky brand of slapstick to the Star Wars Universe. With Lego Star Wars 3, they’re adding another element: scale. Huge ground wars will let you lead troops of units, and even bigger space battles will pit you against colossal capital ships. Combine that with a revamped graphics engine and Lego Star Wars 3 is starting to look pretty special. Check out the developer diary, embedded below, for some footage of the huge new battlefields in action.
Commanding your underlings in Star Wars: The Old Republic
The latest video from Bioware sheds some light on the role your crew members will play in Star Wars: The Old Republic. You’ll be able to order your lackeys to scavenge materials, craft items and even act as your own personal ambassador, going out on trade missions to secure valuable goods. The best part is the ability to generally boss your crew around, forcing them to work slavishly while you go out have on more exciting adventures.
New Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood trailer released, Ezio explodes everything
Ubisoft have released the most dramatic and over the top trailer yet for Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood. It’s got exciting music, a sex scene, Ezio blowing up men with a tank, Ezio blowing up galleons at sea with a boat-tank and Ezio launching an ariel bombardment from a Paraglider. It has to be seen to be believed, which is good because the video’s embedded below.
Eve Incursion split into three updates and delayed
Eve’s free Incursion update was supposed to be arriving later this month, but CCP have changed their plans, and are now planning to release the update in three stages, with the biggest update set to arrive early next year.
The £55,000 GSL StarCraft 2 final is about to start, here’s where to watch
The final of GomTV’s second Global StarCraft 2 League is about to kick off – at 10am GMT, 2am Pacific Time. It’s free to watch live, but if you miss it, you need a season ticket to watch it later ($20, likely reduced once the tourney’s over).
Both in terms of prize money and the talent it attracts, the GSL is the biggest StarCraft tournament in the world, and one of the biggest e-sports tournaments ever. The English commentary is done by my personal favourites Tasteless and Artosis, who make high-level play easy to understand even for noobs – season one of this tournament is what turned me around on e-sports. Grab breakfast or a midnight snack, depending on your time zone, and check it out.
Call of Duty: Black Ops patched
Call of Duty: Black Ops has just received a new patch. The update is focused on improving performance, particularly on systems with dual or quad core CPUs. CPU performance is supposed to be the issue behind the stuttering that many players have been experiencing when trying to play online, so if you’ve been experiencing those issues, this update will hopefully solve them. The patch also includes a “Friends fix for join in progress and Friends tab in server browser”. Steam will apply the patch automatically the next time you start up the game.
Civilization Facebook game coming next year
Civilization Network plans to take Civilization to Facebook, letting friends team up and forge new civilizations online. The game was announced way back in October 2009, but Take Two have just confirmed that yes, it’s still alive, and it’s definitely coming next year. Not much is known about the game right now, except that it will be free to play, but more details are set to emerge soon on Civilization Network’s Facebook page, where Take Two have announced that they will be looking for some beta testers in future.
Minecraft updated, “sheep and cows look like sheep and cows now”
For some games, patch notes read more like beat poetry than a list of code tweaks. Minecraft is one of those games. The latest update for Minecraft includes such gems as “zombie pigs eventually forgives” and “lava flows further in the Nether”. Read on for the full list of changes.
Gaming is the best medicine
I’m currently quarantined away from the rest of the PC Gamer crew for fear of spreading what may or may not be the zombie virus around the office. I’m sitting here with a box of Kleenex, hot tea with honey and several gallons of Robitussin within an arm’s reach, but the most effective way to treat my symptoms, far and away, is to play some games. A few minutes into a game is all it takes for me to completely forget about the stuffy nose and throbbing headache, and it’s not until I have to get up for bio-breaks that I remember that I’m actually miserable.
New Civilization V patch in the works
Firaxis have set about outlining the content of the next big patch for Civilization V. The next batch of changes are going to concentrate on improvements to the AI and diplomacy, and contains fixes you’d only ever see in a Civ game, like “adjust Napoleon to make him more likely to go for culture”, and an “update to tactical AI pillaging code”. You’ll find the complete list of changes are below.
Programmer creates Kinect PC drivers
Last week hardware company Adafruit Industries out out a $3000 dollar bounty for the first person who could get Microsoft’s XBox 360 Kinect peripheral working on a PC. That prize has now been claimed, after the winner managed to create some PC drivers for the device just three hours after its European launch. There’s a video of the successful hack in action below.
Doom 3 Hexen mod released
A while back we talked about Hexen: Edge of Chaos, an unofficial sequel to Hexen made in the Doom 3 engine. After more than five years of working on the project, it’s finally out, and all you’ll need to play is a copy of Doom 3. Read on for more details, and the launch trailer.
PC Gamer US Podcast 247 – Soviet Interference
We managed to carve out an hour and seventeen minutes (before succumbing to radio propaganda attacks from the U.S.S.R.) today to address the state of Call of Duty: Black Ops on PC. Logan, Evan, Andy, former intern Erik Belsaas and Stan Press from Astro Gaming convene to share their multiplayer and single-player impressions and thoughts on the patience-hampering stuttering issue many players are still experiencing.
And as we monitor Dan’s conversion to zombiehood while he’s at home in sick-quarantine, he guides us our chat on UK retailers’ claim that Steam is “killing the PC market,” which has sparked a massive comment thread on this-here website.
Tyrannwarsaurus — the Orion: Prelude trailer
Another mod is about to become a man. A dinosaur-fighting man, specifically. Orion: Source, one of the better Source-engine multiplayer mods we originally played in 2009 is transitioning into a full, standalone game sometime next year. Whiz developer David Prassel (who, after eating all his greens, has been making games since age 11–and had formed a development team by age 13), mailed along the latest trailer for Orion: Prelude, which I’m happy to share with you within, but not before I deploy my favorite quote from Jurassic Park: “Hold on to your butts.”
