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Thursday, March 10, 2011
Trenched is a third-person tower-defense game
7:13 PM
The Game Peddler
by Ben Gilbert (5 hours ago)14When Trenched was revealed by Tim Schafer at the end of this year's Game Developer's Choice Awards ceremony, we knew next to nothing about it. Though we can't tell you how we feel about it ourselves, previews are showing up all over the web that describe the game as a third-person tower-defense title set in an alternate history post-WWI world.
G4 explains that the tower-defense-style battles of Trenched take place atop walking, upgradeable trenches. As it turns out, television monsters (referred to as "tubes") are attacking the world's mobile trenches and handicapped hero Frank Woodrof is bent on defending them. You'll employ Woodrof's ultra-manliness to defeat said "tubes" and restore alternate reality's normalcy....
Free Comic Book Day brings free The Darkness 2 prequel comic
7:09 PM
The Game Peddler
by JC Fletcher (4 hours ago)6May 7 is this year's Free Comic Book Day, the annual event when fans all around the country crowd into comic book stores for free promotional minicomics (and agoraphobic readers put off picking up their subscriptions).
In observance of this ritual, Top Cow Productions is releasing a free The Darkness comic book that is intended to act as a prequel to the upcoming The Darkness 2 game in the works at Digital Extremes. Although we'd argue that if you really want a prequel to The Darkness 2, you could check out The Darkness -- or the comic book series that ran from 1996 to 2005. But those wouldn't be free!...
Nintendo 3DS review: Depth, charge
7:03 PM
The Game Peddler
by JC Fletcher on Mar 10th 2011 6:00PM31Nintendo released its next-generation handheld console, the 3DS, in Japan last month. North American and European releases are scheduled for late March, but we went ahead and imported a unit so we could inspect all the new features -- and, of course, that screen.
After the break, find out all about the 3DS hardware and its built-in software, along with our impressions of each component. We might not be able to present the review in 3D, but that hasn't stopped us from going in-depth.
The hardware design
The 3DS is very shiny. Very shiny. This has the effect of making it sort of a fingerprint magnet, sure, but it also makes it seem more futuristic. It also feels heavy for its size, compared to a DS...
Monday, March 7, 2011
GDC: The Future of Graphics and Unreal Engine 3
8:57 AM
The Game Peddler
by Arthur Gies
Epic announced a host of new features in their Unreal Engine 3 development platform today at this year's GDC, the biggest of which is support for DirectX 11 and its assorted tools. The problem is, for most people, these kind of announcements might as well be in Sanskrit -- they're full of tech jargon that goes right by the average gamer.
I've gone through in an attempt to translate what Epic means by Subsurface Scattering and Deferred Rendering. The bolded segments are features of the updated Unreal Engine 3 courtesy of Epic, followed by our explanation of what this means for games. Epic gave us the thumbs up for accuracy. Yay, us.
"Image-based reflections that allow surfaces of any shape to reflect an approximate version...
GDC: Darkness II Off to a Great Start
8:52 AM
The Game Peddler
by Daemon Hatfield
Here at the Game Developers Conference I got my first look at The Darkness II, the sequel to the 2007 comic book game. I wasn't sure what to expect because the sequel has been handed to a different developer, but it ended up being one of the most exciting games I saw at GDC this year.
What's the Same?
The Darkness II is still a first-person shooter starring Mafioso Jackie Estacado, current host of a chaotic force known as the Darkness. When Jackie is in the light, he's your regular Wiseguy. But when he steps into shadow the Darkness emerges and you'll see two serpent heads appear onscreen. This is what makes The Darkness' gameplay unique: you can run around dual-wielding guns while using your dark tentacles to mangle and...
Bleszinski: Marry gamers, don't date them (or: design long-term engagement for fans)
8:42 AM
The Game Peddler
by Ludwig Kietzmann on Mar 6th 2011 3:30PM112In a candid talk during the Game Developers Conference on Thursday, Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinksi advised attendees to "have an educated gut," and to be cognizant of the value of marketing and long-term relationships with customers. He encapsulated his talk in the "power creative," a project member who is unique, valuable and visibly tied to the game's identity. "This could be anyone," Bleszinski said.
With consumers constantly immersed in an information feed -- via social networking platforms like Twitter and Facebook -- it's important for game designers to be "surgical" and "devious" in creating IPs that thrive in an always-on, heavily branded world. According to Bleszinski, the...
Saturday, March 5, 2011
GDC: 72 Percent of Players Finished Heavy Rain
7:44 AM
The Game Peddler
by Kristine Steimer
When you first see a statistic like "72 percent of players who started Heavy Rain finished it", it can be difficult to determine what that means. After all, data needs context. Sure, that number seems high – but in high school that'd be the equivalent of a C, which is average. However, if you compare it to the industry average completion rate, which is 20-25 percent, it's downright astounding.
David Cage, president of Quantic Dream (the company behind the title), revealed this information today at a panel during the Game Developers Conference.
To add in some extra perspective I thought I'd compare Heavy Rain's statistics to another extremely popular title, Mass Effect 2. IGN's overall Game of the Year for 2010, Mass Effect 2 only boasted a 50 percent completion rate...
GDC: Is Dead Island Anything Like Its Debut Trailer?
7:42 AM
The Game Peddler
by Daemon Hatfield
Serious. Somber. Disturbing. These are words I would use to describe Dead Island's amazing debut trailer.
You saw it, right?
Today I got to see about 15 minutes of Dead Island in action. What words would I use to describe the gameplay?
Silly. Wacky. Goofy.
Oh, and fun.
Dead Island is a first-person hack-and-slash game set in the midst of a zombie outbreak in a tropical paradise. It's more Dead Rising than Resident Evil, with a focus on action over suspense. The developers themselves say they're going for "zombie zombie zombie all the time." An abundance of makeshift weapons lying around like paddles, baseball bats, and wrenches – and the fact that these can be combined and upgraded – further reminds me of Dead...
Friday, March 4, 2011
Risen 2:Dark Waters..first look
5:27 AM
The Game Peddler
By Andrew Park, GameSpot
We take our first look at Piranha Bytes' sequel to Risen and the spiritual successor to the Gothic series.If there's a better reason to attend the 2011 Game Developers Conference than the opportunity to take a first look at Gothic developer Piranha Bytes' role-playing sequel Risen 2: Dark Waters, we don't want to hear it. This sequel takes the high-fantasy world of Risen, which took place on a besieged island, and will become a full-on, full-fledged, full-featured, full-monty pirate role-playing game, where you play not only as Piranha Bytes' established "Hero" character, but also as a seafaring adventurer in a fantastic age of sail.
Risen 2 will be a full-on pirate role-playing game.
Risen 2 takes place some in-game...
L.A. Noire hands on preview
5:24 AM
The Game Peddler
By Alex Sassoon Coby, GameSpot UK
We review the evidence in a first play of Rockstar's latest tale of redemption. We have heard rather a lot about L.A. Noire since it emerged from the shadows three months ago. Since then we've been impressed by the technology behind it and intrigued by its detective story premise, but we haven't been able to play this long-in-development game. We finally got to try our hand at a few cases on a recent visit to Rockstar's London offices. But be aware: some of the case notes below could be considered spoilers.
L.A. Noire is, as the title suggests, heavily influenced by the golden age of film noir, seemingly offering as rich and murky a vision of 1950s America as the classics of that genre. It has you step...
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