NFS: Shift developers making new racing game, this time using crowd-sourced funding
Slightly Mad Studios, the developer behind the Need for Speed: Shift series, is now working on a game of its own called C.A.R.S. (Community Assisted Racing Sim). Eurogamer reports that C.A.R.S. will be a free-to-play, career-focused racing sim that lets players rise through the ranks of motorsport, from karting to elite championships. That’s an ambitious goal in the first place, but the reason it is “Community Assisted” is because SMS is also relying on a crowd-sourced funding system.
SMS calls its funding program World Mass Development, and it will act like a cross between Kickstarter and the stock market, one that offers a variety of ways for fans and investors to support the project. GamesIndustry.biz reports, “Slightly Mad is targeting individuals and fans with shares in the games priced at $5 and $10, $250 options for groups, $1000 for small businesses, and large companies and investors can get involved with contributions of $100,000.”
If the game performs as well as SMS hopes, investors will be paid back with a share of the profits. But for fans who contribute to CARS, the real payoff might be a racing game that finally offers a true career mode, something that few have explored in any detail. Codemasters’ games have always had a veneer of career development, but none of them have really delved into lower-tier racing, despite the huge role that karting championships and spec series like GP2 play in a driver’s career. C.A.R.S. sounds like it will offer something like the “Be a Pro” mode that has been so popular with EA Sports titles.
Of course, the highest forms of motorsport tend to be licensed, and it’s not clear whether SMS will really be able to include series like Formula 1. It also promises to be a huge challenge to model the variety of courses and vehicles that a multi-class racing sim would require. However, that same ambition is also what will make the project so appealing to the racing fans who will ultimately fund C.A.R.S.
And in other PC gaming news…
A Jawa with a rocket launcher? The Old Republic Companion trailer has one of best ideas for an NPC I’ve ever heard. I can’t wait to see what other bizarre race/class combinations Bioware has to offer. Wookie scientists? Ewok Bounty hunters? Hutt erotic dancers? The list is endless.
Check inside for a selection of heavily armed yet adorable PC Gaming news.
Company of Heroes 80% off on Steam this weekend
One of the best real time strategy games ever made is ridiculously cheap on Steam this weekend. Company of Heroes and both expansions are available individually or as part of the complete pack at 80% off. The original game is just £1.39 / $1.99. The complete pack, which includes Opposing Fronts and Tales of Valour, costs just £5.39 / $9.99.
Company of Heroes has a superb single player campaign that features some of the best RTS missions in PC gaming. You start out with a single squad of men, fighting through enemy territory to secure reinforcements, and end up as a well drilled force builds bases, constructs tanks and takes entire towns. The asymmetrical Allied and Axis forces are almost perfectly balanced for competitive mutiplayer, and it’s especially good in co-op against a force of hard AI.
International giveaway: Win Wing Commander and Privateer!
Venerable space shooter Wing Commander was recently added to Good Old Games and, to celebrate their ever expanding catalogue, the nice chaps at GOG have given us some copies to give away.
We’ve got five bundles up for grabs, each one contains Wing Commander 1, 2 and 3 plus Privateer. “But who can enter?” I hear you ask. Anyone! Since these copies are digital, this competition is open to the peoples of all nations. We’re very cosmopolitan like that.
Find out how to enter inside.
Star Wars: The Old Republic trailer talks companions. One is a Jawa with a rocket launcher
Trying to tell a sweeping story in an MMO where every hero is following a similar plot arc is going to lead to some jarring contrivances. In Star Wars: The Old Republic, the most striking of these is likely to be the companion system. Companions will act much like team mates in other Bioware games. By selecting the correct responses and giving them gifts, your relationship with them will change, and they’ll open up more about their past, kicking off new quests.
But imagine attacking an imperial base with your very own equivalent of Chewbacca, and then suddenly running into another hero with their own version of your companion. It’ll be odd, as though you’ve both managed to catch the same giant hairy Pokemon. Bioware are hoping to avoid this awkwardness with the addition of 40 possible companions. Each of them can be given different appearances, and can be levelled up to your own specifications. Find out more in the developer diary above, spotted on Gamespot.
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive beta coming early October
Pro gamers and invited guests will make it onto the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive closed beta early in October. Valve’s Chet Faliszeck told The Reticule that they’re planning to grow the beta in the coming months, and he hopes everyone will have a chance to play by the end of the year.
Counter-Strike pros have already had a chance to go hands on with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive when they were invited to Valve HQ for testing earlier this year. A Counter-Strike: Global Offensive hands-on account from one of those testers uncovered new weapons like the molotov cocktail, and a tweaked and updated version of the Counter-Strike classic, de_dust.
Diablo 3 release date set for early 2012
The release window for Diablo 3 has shifted from sometime this year to early next year. Blizzard have decided to use the time to extend the current beta. “We didn’t put so many years of work into Diablo III to release a game that was almost ready,” says co-founder and CEO of Blizzard, Mike Morhaime. “The beta test is going very well, and we look forward to making the most of the extra time we’re taking to deliver an experience that lives up to our vision for the game and the expectations of our players.”
The announcement also says that Blizzard will be “potentially adding more testers than initially projected,” so if you’re eager to get an early look at one of the most anticipated PC games in development at the moment, make sure you’ve opted in on your accounts page on Battle.net.
We’re on the beta, and we’ve been playing it to death. Read our Diablo 3 first impressions for our first thoughts.
Battlefield 3 will need monster rig to run on ultra settings
DICE community manager Daniel Matros has been answering questions about Battlefield 3 on Twitter. Battlefield fan @bkohn1 asked him whether a rig matching the Battlefield 3 recommended system requirements would run the game on ultra settings. Matros replied to say that “recommended is usually medium.”
So will a top of the range Nvidia GTX580 do the trick? Apparently not. Matros revealed that we’ll need two 580s in SLI to make the most of the Frostbite 2 engine. The minimum system specifications may not be too punishing, but for those who want to see Battlefield 3 at its very best, a hefty upgrade may needed. Battlefield 3 may well be worth the expense. Would you be tempted to upgrade?
Anno 2070 trailer shows Eco and Tycoon factions
The latest Anno trailer highlights the difference between the city-building sim’s two factions. There’s the Ecos, who use sustainable energy sources, floating blimps that clean the air and a smug sense of satisfaction to power their economy. The Tycoons plough through Anno’s luscious terrain with complete disregard for the eco-balance. Their cities are sprawling masses of rust and fumes. They can store the negative products from their enormous factories inside mountains, which is the equivalent of sweeping all your rubbish under a sofa in the vain hope it will one day turn into gold. This never works.
Golden Joysticks: Guess the game
We’ve heard from Tim, we’ve heard from Graham, now it’s the turn of Tom S to tease his favourite for this year’s Golden Joysticks. You’ll probably get this instantly. After all, how many games can claim to let you nuke Ghandi? Not enough, that’s for sure.
The answer will be revealed later on the Golden Joysticks Facebook page, and you can cast your own vote on the Golden Joysticks 2011 site. If you vote in every category, you’ll be entered into a prize draw to win all of the Golden Josticks nominees, and a lovely Alienware laptop.
XCOM trailer shows mission map, customisable squad mates and mad science
There were rumblings of discontent when 2K revealed their FPS reboot of X-Com. Questions were asked. Where are the turns? Where’s the world map? Where’s the ability to customise your squad and research new weaponry? “Right here!” says the latest trailer, detailing the map of the US where you can select your next mission, the RPG system that lets you customise your team mates and the research facility where mad-haired scientists are hard at work electrocuting themselves in the name of science, devising new human/alien hybrid technology for your squad. That’s all very nice, but WHERE ARE THE TURNS?
The hub bits back at base where you can shoot the breeze with team mates look like a nice change of pace from the slightly stiff cover-to-cover shooty sections. This is probably the most encouraging bit of footage we’ve seen of XCOM yet. Check out the full E3 XCOM video walkthrough for 22 more minutes of XCOM in action.
Minecraft hardcore mode teased. When you die, the world dies with you
Notch has tweeted a small but significant screenshot from his build of Minecraft, indicating simply Hardcore more is ON. It adds one simple rule. “World is deleted on death.”
This rule was the driving force behind Tom’s Minecraft Experiment. With every death, he deleted that randomly generated world and got Minecraft to build a new one. Numerous updates have been made since the diary was written. Varied biomes, major geographical features like rivers and ravines and NPC villages will make it more painful to destroy Minecraft’s increasingly distinct worlds. Hardcore mode won’t let your petty human emotions get in the way. When you die, the world dies with you.
NVIDIA says PC games revenue to overtake consoles by 2014
Graphics vendor NVIDIA reckons that the total amount of money spent on PC games will be greater than that splashed out on console titles within the next three years.
That’s according to a report over at Techgage, which says that the claims were made during a conference call with analysts yesterday.
Dota 2 beta originally planned to last for a year. “Our original plan was dumb,” say Valve
In a new entry on the Dota 2 blog, IceFrog reveals that Valve were planning on keeping Dota 2 in beta for “a year or so” so they could bring the number of heroes up to Dota 1 levels. After seeing the reaction to the Dota 2 International tournament at Gamescom, they have decided that “our original plan was dumb.”
“Welcome to the new plan,” writes IceFrog. “We’re going to take the current version of Dota 2, which has The International set of heroes, and get it out there as fast as we can.”
Rockstar talks about Max Payne’s evolution
Max Payne 3 is fully in keeping with its predecessors’ noir sensibilities, promises Rockstar’s VP of product development, Jeronimo Barrera, in an interview with GameSpot.
“For us, noir is not about a place (and if it were, that place would surely be Los Angeles, not New York) but about a particular visual style and a kind of story and characterization telling that has a certain hard-boiled cynicism, plenty of twists, and a sense of decay and depravity.”
Fans of the series have been wary about the new Max Payne game ever learning that much of the game occurs in sunny, verdant South America rather than than the dark, nightmarish New York that defined Remedy’s vision. Barrera, however, argues that it is the other iconic elements of the Max Payne series that made the first two games classics.
