Monday, June 25, 2001

Serious Sam Demo -- 7:08 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Croteam has finally released an official demo of their hit shooter Serious Sam. The demo weighs in at 78.7M and is available from Games Domain. Thanks Blue.

Anachronox Update -- 9:57 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Voodoo Extreme contacted ION Storm's Tom Hall on the current situation with the recently-gold Anachronox. Here's what he had to say:

We just finished all the stuff for the "lil' improvements" 1.1 patch.

We're working on the demo. It's kinda two little snippets of neat gameplay...

The game ships on the 26th and is on the shelf the 27th.

After a little vacation time, we'll be working on the 1.2 patch, containing all the little finesse stuff we wanted to get in. La!

OK, why did the game go gold if a 1.1 patch is done and a 1.2 patch is in the works before the game even hits the shelves, before the inevitable bug reports come flying in? It makes no sense.

The Master comments: Of course it makes sense: if you're Eidos, and having a bad second year in a row, and have a deadwood game company with one game left in the kitty . . .

A.T. Hun comments: I can understand why they'd want to get the game out and be done with it, but it seems like they are guaranteeing that their throats will be slit. A game from a company with a bad reputation that needs to be patched right out of the box? Seems like a recipe for disaster.

The Master comments: Yup, unless it's actually playable out of the box, which I understand Anox is. However, if it ISN'T, this thing is gonna go down like Sin did.

Intel Wins -- 9:07 am CST, Update by The Master

Was doing a quick news check this morning, and spotted this on Yahoo! News: Compaq to Phase Out Computer Lines Not Using Intel.

Now, I know Microsoft is a monopoly, and so does everyone else except the appeals court reviewing the case, but Intel is getting into a nice place as well. 3 years ago, DEC's Alpha chip was pretty much the only top-tier competition to Intel's server processors. Now, Intel just gathered up the tech behind Alpha and gets to laugh in the remnants of DEC's face. Nice.

A.T. Hun comments: This Intel press release has more of the details. Kinda hard to keep the Alpha going when the bleeding high end is not where the money is. As Intel planned (was forced?) to move to a more RISC architecture, the reason to go Alpha becomes less and less. At least AMD seems to be doing well . . . for the time being.

Sunday, June 24, 2001

Unreal 2 Interview -- 3:46 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Gameplex interviewed Legend's Mike Verdu about Unreal 2. Here's a snip for your reading pleasure:

What are the enemies the player encounters and what tactics do they use?

There are 24 different enemies in the game. Some are human - like Military soldiers and mercenaries - and some are totally alien, like the bio-mechanical Striders. The Skaarj from the original Unreal make an appearance in Unreal II, but they are the only race to return from the first game. Some examples of enemies - both in-game images and concept sketches - can be found on the Unreal2.com web site.

Thanks Blue, et al.

Jailbreak: Prisoners of War Released -- 10:47 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Team Reaction and Black Knight Productions have released the first version of their joint mod for Quake III Arena Jailbreak: Prisoners of War. If you are familiar with Jailbreak or Prisoners of War, you should know what this mod is all about. Basically there are two teams. When you are fragged you go to jail. If you're entire team is jailed, you are "executed," and the game starts over. Teammates can free their jailed comrades. Very simple, but very cool. Thanks Blue's News.

Past Two Days' News

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