Uncharted director Amy Hennig joins Visceral to make a Star Wars game
When Drake-wrangler Amy Hennig left Naughty Dog in early March, her destination was undecided. It seems reasonable to assume that countless top developers courted her in the following weeks, but something drew her to Dead Space types Visceral - and not just her former working relationship with VP Steve Papoutsis. Can you guess what it was?
“We happen to be making a Star Wars game,” said Papoutsis.
Meet the Aimpad: the prototype peripheral bringing analog control to WASD
You are a PC gamer. When the subject comes up, you’ll argue mouse and keyboard over analog controller to the death, and mean it.
But then there’s that thing you do in Project Cars when the 360 pad’s plugged in, squeezing the right trigger just so to come to a perfect, unscreeching halt. And during Assassin’s Creed loading screens, you’ll try your utmost to cycle through Kenway’s run animations as smoothly as possible.
It’s okay to say it: analog control is nice. Aimpad’s promise is that you won’t have to leave behind the keyboard to enjoy it.
Slower healing and "squished" character stats: WoW is changing for Warlords of Draenor
Where Mists of Pandaria was a step forward into a previously uncharted territory inhabited by furry priests, Warlords of Draenor is a step back in time. Not just in its plotting, which involves a dose of interstellar time travel, but in its RTS-style garrisons that recalls ‘90s Blizzard.
If these preliminary patch notes are anything to go by, the change has meant a pruning of some decade-old systems, and a simplication of some of those big numbers. Here's what we've gleaned so far.
The Elder Scrolls Online is out today. Guess how many mudcrabs you'll need to shoot to top level 50?
Remember when every so often, somebody would ask Todd Howard if Bethesda would ever do an MMO? And he’d say, ‘Meh, probably not. Who owns Fallout these days?’.
Well: there’s a game named The Elder Scrolls Online out on PC today. It’s not made by Howard and co, and maybe looks a little more like WoW than the interconnected Oblivion we’d anticipated all those years ago. But our Nick’s enjoying it, and you might too.
World of Tanks now has 80 million accounts - and its eSports scene is real
Tracked vehicles have rarely entered into eSports since Counter-Strike practically invented the idea in the late ‘90s. That’s possibly because nothing about mile-long lines of stationary armour says ‘fast-paced teamwork’.
World of Tanks might be changing that. Less a historical sim than an approachable competitive shooter, the game has merited a $10m investment in eSports from its creators, Wargaming. And their community have answered.
Frictional Games’ SOMA Gets A New In-Engine Trailer
Frictional Games has released a new trailer for its upcoming explorative horror title, SOMA. This trailer features new in-engine footage from the game, so make sure to give it a go. SOMA seems to be powered by a modified version of Amnesia’s engine and is planned for a 2015 release on PC and PS4. Enjoy! Continue reading
The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing II Slightly Delayed, Will Hit Steam On May 22nd
Neocore Games announced today that The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing II will be slightly delayed in order to get further polished. The game was planned for an April release but according to its development team, it will now hit Steam on May 22nd. Continue reading
New Nvidia Flameworks Tech Demo Shows The Most Realistic Fire & Smoke Effects
During GTC 2014, Nvidia has showcased tha latest version of Flameworks; a system for generating fire, smoke and explosion effects for games. Flameworks combines a state-of-the-art grid-based fluid simulator with an efficient volume rendering engine, and this latest tech demo is impressive (to say the least). This is by far the best ‘fire and smoke’ tech demo, surpassing even the one for Deep Down that Capcom introduced a while back. According to Nvidia, this is real-time volumetric fire simulation running on GeForce Titan Z and packs 32 million voxels. Enjoy! Continue reading
Dragon Age: Inquisition – New In-Engine Screenshot Unveiled
Electronic Arts and Bioware have released a new screenshot for Dragon Age: Inquisition, showing off Dales: Exalted Plains. In addition, the companies revealed that more news regarding this third part of the Dragon Age series will be unveiled next week. Enjoy the screenshot and stay tuned for more! Continue reading
Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure – Launch Trailer
Big Finish Games has released the launch trailer for Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure (also known as Tex Murphy: Tesla Effect). This new Tex Murphy title is currently available on Steam and GOG for pre-ordering, and will be available on April 22nd. Continue reading
Deep Silver Partners With GOG.com, Will Be Releasing DRM-Free Titles, First Is Risen
GOG.com announced today a partnership with Deep Silver thanks to which the big publisher will be releasing DRM-Free games via this digital distributor. The first title will be “Risen” – the first installment of the renowned RPG franchise – that comes with 60% off for the first 48 hours. Continue reading
Get Even Will Support VR Devices, Gets A New “Behind The Scenes” Trailer
The Farm 51 has released a new ‘behind the scenes’ trailer for Get Even that features some gameplay scenes from the actual game. Get Even will support 3D scanning tech, and promises to blend SP and MP together. When players embark on a single-player mission, others on the network can join the quest as enemies, so players never know whether their opponents are human or CPU-based. The game looks promising, and will support VR devices (such as the Oculus Rift). Enjoy! Continue reading
Divinity: Original Sin Enters Beta Phase
Larian Studios has unleashed a massive update for Divinity: Original Sin on Steam Early Access, taking the game into beta while adding loads of new talents and skills; brand new areas to explore and a whole load of other improvements. Continue reading
"Desura's talented team, thriving business and impressive technology are a great fit for Linden Lab," CEO Rod Humble said in a statement announcing the acquisition, the second that the company has made this year. It previously acquired Blocksworld, an iPad brick-building game.
"Our aim is to invest and support the Desura team in making it the most open and developer-friendly platform in the world," Humble continued.
Linden Lab's flagship title Second Life has reportedly been performing much better than is widely believed. With the Desura acquisition, Linden Lab appears to be gearing itself toward bigger things in the future.
@TheVoxelman on twitter
Essay Pro