Archive for May, 2011

Battlefield 3 art shows Gulf of Oman and Sharqi maps

The Gulf of Oman and Sharqi Peninsula maps get the artistic treatment over on the Battlefield 3 blog. The pictures follow on from previous images of Wake Island and Back to Karkand. All four of these maps make up the Back to Karkand map pack, which is free with Battlefield 3 pre-orders and will be released as paid for DLC when Battlefield 3 comes out.

The Back to Karkand pack also adds a collection of Battlefield 2 weapons, remade to work in the Frostbite 2 engine. The lead designer on Back to Karkand also developed the excellent Vietnam expansion for Battlefield: Bad Company, which is good news for players who loved the original incarnations of Back to Karkand, The Gulf of Oman, Sharqi and Wake Island. You’ll find the new artwork below. Click to see it full-size.

The future of Nadeo: creators of Trackmania, Shootmania and Questmania

Bedroom coders’ lairs aside, Nadeo must be the smallest studio you could ever hope to visit. It’s so small that the guidance on how to get there counts the precise number of steps to descend before you reach the front door (it’s four). You park your coat in the mezzanine, nod to the receptionist on your way into the main office, then realise that the mezzanine is the main office, that the ‘receptionist’ is actually studio founder Florent Castelnérac and that you were dangerously close to walking into a cupboard.

Winners of Guild Wars 2′s video contest revealed

ArenaNet announced their two picks for grand prize winners in their “Become a Guild Wars 2 Ambassador” contest this morning, and they are awesome. The winners will be flown out to ArenaNet’s Seattle-based development studio to meet the dev team and, more importantly, spend the entire day playing Guild Wars 2 with them. Watch both of the winning videos inside [WARNING: ROGUE MUSTACHES] to see why they easily earned their reward.

And in other PC gaming news…

So how was your day? Good! Oh, us? We got a severed doll’s head with someone’s name carved into its neck. We thought for about half a second about calling the police, but decided to blog about it instead. Some are saying it’s a “gift” from Official Xbox Magazine, but it’s not. They got one too.

Today we got to look at some gorgeous gaming art and the first officially released Modern Warfare 3 screens. Minecraft got patched, too! We tested it out, and got lava everywhere.

But enough about our clumsiness with lava. what else has been going on in PC gaming today? Read on for news on Assassin’s Creed Revelations, the Space Marine Collector’s Edition and playing as a vending machine in Half Life.

Syndicate script leaked?

Rumour has it that Starbreeze, the developers behind the excellent Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay, are working on a remake of the 1993 Bullfrog classic, Syndicate. Project Redlime is though to be the codename for the project, which is being developed with EA.

Now Siliconera say they’ve received excerpts from the game’s script. The leaked scenes outline a cyberpunk dystopia ruled by embattled corporations. Chips and implants are an everyday convenience and world powers are at each other’s throats over a Uranium pricing dispute.

PC Gamer receives mutilated doll’s head in post. Investigation begins

Look what we got sent today. It’s not pleasant. We can only assume this slightly melted, singed doll’s head is in-reference to a game. Which game? We just don’t know.

Read on for more shots of the spooky gift. We need help.

Chris Taylor on why PC gaming is bigger than ever

I spoke to Chris Taylor recently, and asked him how he feels about the state of PC gaming. ‘Good’ would be an understatement. Chris designed two of the world’s cleverest strategy games: Total Annihilation and Supreme Commander.

More recently, he and his company Gas Powered Games took over development of Age of Empires Online, a free-to-play version of the old classic. Here are his thoughts on why the platform has never been stronger.

Witcher 2 patch 1.1 delayed

CD Projekt were planning to release the first major patch for the Witcher 2 yesterday, but an unexpected problem has delayed the launch. A message on The Witcher 2 site tells the story. “The good news is that the patch is ready. The bad news is that we have encountered some problems with the server infrastructure, making downloading DLCs impossible.” There’s no revised date for the patch, yet. “We will update you when we know more,” reads the official announcement. The patch notes promise to make significant performance improvements of up to 30% for owners of the retail edition.

Minecraft 1.6 hands on: when hatches go bad

The Minecraft 1.6 patch landed earlier today. We dived right in, eager to start playing with the new hatches and maps added by the patch. Spiders died, cows exploded and lava spills threatened to destroy everything. Read on for an account of our first hour in Minecraft 1.6, and a video showing how you craft the new maps.

Modern Warfare 3 screenshots non-leaked

Entirely on purpose, Activision PR has released a set of three new screens from this year’s inevitable record-shattering-yet-divisive blockbuster military first-person shooter. If yesterday’s trailer and the leak from last week left any doubt in your mind that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 would involve men with guns in a variety of locations, some of them damp, let these shots put your fears to rest.

Into The Pixel 2011 collects incredible works of gaming art

Concept art is often beautiful, but even with a growing number of art books being bundled with collector’s editions, it’s just as often work that will never be seen by anyone outside of a game’s development team. The Into The Pixel collection tries to change that. Organised by the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences and the Entertainment Software Association, each year it selects some of the best pieces of gaming art, whatever the reason for its creation.

The 17 new pieces to be displayed at this year’s E3 have just been released, and I’ve posted the PC-relevant images below, including work from Bioshock Infinite, Mass Effect, Dragon Age 2, Alien Swarm and the unreleased Drawn 3. So pretty.

Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition system requirements and DRM detailed

Capcom have detailed lots of PC-centric Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition info on their official blog.

Aside from the anticipated new content (14 new characters, new stages, replay modes and character rebalancing), PC is getting loads of exclusive features – some of which I could actually do without.

Portal 2 mapping contest kicks off

Community site thinkingwithportals.com have launched a new Portal 2 mapping contest. Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to create the best singe player or co-op test chamber you can think of, and submit it to the Thinking With Portals download database before 11:59pm EDT on June 6. Entries submitted at midnight will be incinerated in the nearest Aperture Cleansing Oven.

The best two mapers will receive an Ultimate Portal 2 Gift Pack signed by the Portal 2 developers and both maps will be featured by Valve on The Portal 2 site. Read on for the rules of entry.

Minecraft patch 1.6 is live!

Patch 1.6 for Minecraft is go! Notch announced the launch on Twitter and updated the patch notes on his blog. As we previously mentioned, the new update is set to add multiplayer support for the netherworld, so you can now drag your friends to hell, for a laugh. There are now working hatches and craftable maps, too. The maps should prove especially useful for those of us used to leaving a trail of lit beacons behind to help navigate back to base. You’ll find the full, updated patch notes below.