Two Teens Kill 7 Year Old Girl with Mortal Kombat Moves

Two teenagers have been charged with killing one of the pairs’ own 7-year-old sister using alleged Mortal Combat imitation moves. The 16 and 17 year old teens were baby sitting the child whilst the girl’s mother was at work when the incident happened.

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List of everything that's happened since Duke Nukem Forever

The following things have been accomplished since Duke Nukem Forever was announced on April 25th, 1997...

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Half Life Saga Story Guide Updated!!! Includes Episode 2

The Half Life Saga Story Guide has FINALLY been updated with all of the information we learn in Episode 2 and Portal. "The Half-Life Saga Story Guide was created in order to provide a concise, accurate, user-friendly overview of the events dealing directly with the events of the Half-Life Saga".

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Why Nintendo can't ship enough Wii consoles..

Pic speaks for itself!

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Portal says Happy Holidays!

The www.aperaturescience.com site has released a heartwarming holiday card for everyone!Watch the video... There will be cake!

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Improving PS3 visuals with a simple display setting in XMB?

The general response about 360/PS3 comparisons is that the PS3 versions always seemed washed out. The video claims that setting the RGB settings to "Full" instead of "Limited" fixes this problem. Apparently Super-white setting should be set to "On" as well.I would (Click on the link to read more)!

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Clinton Would Crack Down on Computer-Generated Cartoon Sex

Clinton reveals today that she still sees the affair as a victory for child safety. She describe her introduction of the doomed Family Entertainment Protection Act as a response to the "illicit" sexual content in San Andreas, and says, as president, she'd support regulation of the gaming industry.

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Wii, 'Call of Duty' top U.S. charts in November

Nintendo's Wii held on to its spot as the No. 1 video game console in the United States in November, selling 981,000 units, industry data showed on Thursday. It was the Wii's best showing for the console since its November 2006 launch, topping last December's sales figure by 60 percent, according to market research firm NPD.

Microsoft's Xbox 360 console sold 770,000 units while Sony's PlayStation 3 sold 466,000 units, NPD said. Activision had the top-selling video game, Call of Duty 4, which sold more than 2.01 million copies for the Xbox 360 and PS3, NPD said. Activision's Guitar Hero 3 sold 1.9 million copies for the Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, and Sony's older PlayStation 2.

Story Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

Wii, year later

SAN FRANCISCO--Linda Beattie is trying desperately to pay Nintendo $250, but the company is not cooperating.

Two weeks ago, Beattie went to a video game retailer in the Bay Area in search of a Wii, Nintendo's intensely popular video game machine. She timed her visit to correspond with the arrival of a UPS truck that she had heard would be making its regular stop at the store, hoping it might deliver some consoles. She was out of luck.

So Beattie, 44, a permit expediter and not a stalker by trade, followed the truck to the next store, where it did drop off a handful of Wiis. She bought one, but store policy would not let her buy a second for a friend, so she quickly called him.

"He came from another game store that he was staking out," Beattie said. "He got there two minutes too late to buy the last one."

Shoppers across the country have similar stories. With the Wii, Nintendo has created a phenomenon that recalls crazes of Christmases past: Cabbage Patch dolls, Furby, Tickle Me Elmo. But in this case it is happening for a second consecutive holiday season. Nintendo has been unable to keep up with demand, costing it hundreds of millions of dollars in potential sales.

The Wii, with an unusual remote control that players wave to manipulate action on the screen, has attracted a broad, unconventional following--from young children to mothers and even the elderly. It has put to shame the frenzy over another much-hyped gadget, the iPhone, which prompted long lines at its debut in June but was readily available on store shelves the next day.

The demand for the console has prompted creative buying strategies, early-morning camp outs and recrimination against Nintendo for failing to produce enough machines a full year after the product's release.

Jim Silver, editor in chief of Toy Wishes magazine and an industry analyst for 24 years, said it was unusual for an in-demand product to remain so hard to find for so long. The must-have toys of other holiday seasons, like Furby, stayed popular into a second year but became easily available.

"It's pretty amazing," Silver said. "By a year later with hot items, inventory usually catches up."

The Wii is more expensive than those other toys--$250--and is attracting not just eager-to-please parents but also adults like Beattie who want it just for themselves. "I know 6-year-olds that love it and 50-year-olds that love it," Silver said.

The unsated demand is costing Nintendo more than face. Estimates from industry analysts and retailers indicate that the company, which is based in Kyoto, Japan, is giving up $1 billion or more in sales in the ever-important holiday retail season, not including sales of games for those unbuilt consoles.

"It's staggering," said James Lin, senior analyst at the MDB Capital Group in Santa Monica, Calif., who estimates that Nintendo is leaving $1.3 billion on the table. "They could easily sell double what they're selling."

Between the Wii's debut last November and this September 30, Nintendo sold 13.1 million consoles. It ships 1.8 million a month worldwide--a third of those to North America--up from one million a month earlier this year.

When it comes to its planning, Nintendo says it has not done anything wrong.

"We don't feel like we've made any mistakes," said George Harrison, senior vice president for marketing at Nintendo of America.

He said there was a shortage because the company must plan its production schedule five months ahead, and projecting future demand is difficult. He added that there had been a worldwide shortage of disk drives that had hurt Nintendo as well as makers of many other devices.

"It's a good problem to have," Harrison said of the demand, but he acknowledged that there could be a downside. "We do worry about not satisfying consumers and that they will drift to a competitor's system."

At least one of those competitors is pleased with Nintendo's supply problems.

"I'm happy that the Wii seems to be running out of hardware," Howard Stringer, chief executive of Sony, said at a news conference in Tokyo this week. He noted that in November, the PlayStation 3 from Sony outsold the Wii in Japan for the first time.

Sony and Microsoft, which sells the Xbox 360, have both been caught off guard by the popularity of Nintendo's console, which is less powerful and complex than their machines. The Sony and Microsoft consoles are widely available, while buyers tend to wipe out supplies of the Wii in a hurry.

Nintendo sold 981,000 Wiis in the United States in November, its best month yet, while Microsoft sold 770,000 Xbox 360s, and Sony sold 466,000 PlayStation 3 consoles, the market research firm NPD Group said Thursday.

At the Nintendo World store in Manhattan, which receives daily shipments, shoppers line up on the sidewalk every morning for their shot at buying a Wii. There is a vibrant secondary market, with scalpers reselling consoles in store parking lots and online.

And while some people say they will keep searching for a Wii, others are giving up.

"I'm frustrated and I'm not going to try anymore," said Betty Sapien, a San Francisco homemaker, who recently visited a handful of stores, including Best Buy and GameStop, to buy a system for her 9-year-old daughter. "They should have it well supplied. They know it's going to be a big Christmas present, and it's been a year" since it went on sale, she said.

Another shopper, Yvette Marchand, a Bay Area elementary school teacher, said, "I'm not proud of this, spending two hours running from store to store." She spoke as she was standing last week outside of a GameStop. She said she had been to several stores, like Best Buy, where she arrived at 7 a.m. on a Sunday--too late to get a console, because others had lined up at 5 a.m.

"I've also been to Target," she said, but when she asked for a Wii, she felt like the employees were mocking her. "I've received the smirks and the laughs."

The GameStop chain, which accounts for around 23 percent of video game sales in the United States, said it could double or triple its Wii sales if the shelves in its 3,800 North American stores were fully stocked.

Bob McKenzie, senior vice president for merchandising at GameStop, said the company had stopped telling its stores when to expect their weekly Wii shipments. When word gets out about a delivery date, he said, "then people start doing crazy things, like putting up pup tents."

In front of some retailers like Best Buy, where people have lined up to buy a Wii, the lucky few who manage to get one offer to resell them at a premium to those too far back in the line.

Colin Sebastian, an industry analyst with Lazard Capital Markets, said that on eBay, around 86,000 had been offered for sale since December 4, with the average selling price about $320, 28 percent higher than the retail price.

Industry analysts suspect that Nintendo is intentionally keeping the supply low to maintain a buzz. If so, they say, the company risks permanently losing customers, because gift givers might not buy a machine in the new year.

"Nintendo is afraid that if it makes too many Wii, the boom may crest too quickly," said Masayuki Otani, an analyst at Maruwa Securities in Tokyo. "It doesn't want to satisfy all demand right away."

But working in Nintendo's favor is the fact that it has succeeded in further broadening a video game market that had already begun to expand beyond teenage boys and 20-something men.

Beattie, the truck chaser, said she and her friends, all in or near their 40s, have made the Wii a central part of their social time.

"We used to play poker," she said. "Now we have Wii parties." Because she's self-employed, Beattie has continued to hunt for Wiis for her friends who have less flexibility at work: "They can't leave their job when the UPS truck comes."

Radical Iranian students created a video-game where the player must kill American hostages!

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — An Iranian hard-line student group unveiled a new video game Monday that simulates an attempt to rescue two Iranian nuclear experts kidnapped by the U.S. military and held in Iraq and Israel.

The "Rescue the Nuke Scientist" video game, designed by the Union of Students Islamic Association, was described by its creators as a response to a U.S.-based company's "Assault on Iran" game, which depicts an American attack on an Iranian nuclear facility.

"This is our defense against the enemy's cultural onslaught," Mohammad Taqi Fakhrian, a leader of the student group, told reporters Monday.

RELATED: Iran arrests 20 accused of being spies

Iran and the U.S. have been in a standoff over Iran's nuclear program, which Washington alleges is a cover for developing atomic weapons. Tehran denies the charges and says its nuclear projects have peaceful purposes.

Tensions also have escalated over the detention of five Iranians in Iraq. U.S. authorities have said the five include members of Iran's elite Quds Force, which is accused of arming and training Iraqi militants. Iran has denied the allegations and insists the five are merely diplomats.

In "Rescue the Nuke Scientist," U.S. troops capture a husband-and-wife team of nuclear engineers during a pilgrimage to Karbala, a holy site for Shiite Muslims, in central Iraq. Game players take on the role of Iranian security forces carrying out a mission code-named "The Special Operation," which involves penetrating fortified locations to free the nuclear scientists, who are moved from Iraq to Israel.

To complete the game successfully, players have to enter Israel to rescue the nuclear scientists, kill U.S. and Israeli troops and seize their laptops containing secret information.

If players fail a mission, a message pops up saying: "With resistance, you can battle the enemy." Iran's red, white and green flag flutters in the top right corner throughout the game.

"We tried to promote the idea of defense, sacrifice and martyrdom in this game," Fakhrian said.

Fakhrian said his group was trying to market the video game first in Iran and other Muslim countries. But the group also has plans to bring the game, which comes on a CD for computers, to Western countries, he said.

The game comes from the same student group that was behind the infamous "World Without Zionism" conference in 2005 where President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

Ali Reza Masaeli, leader of the group that designed the new game, said it took three years for his technical team to produce it. The team was based in Isfahan, a city in central Iran that houses a nuclear site.

"It is an entirely Iranian product in response to the U.S. cyber war against Iran," Masaeli said.

This game follows the free "Assault on Iran" online series from New York-based Kuma Reality Games. That game simulates U.S. Special Forces destroying the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran. A message left with Kuma's public relations agency was not immediately returned.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

TimeShift Review

Is a nice example of what developers can do with a game if given the proper amount of time to build on a game and improve its foundation. What a year ago looked to be a budget shooter worth only a passing glance has been reworked into a title that plays well and, at times, can look fantastic. It's a first person shooter that comes out in the midst of one of the busiest release periods of all time for the genre and, when all is said and done, can't quite keep up with the leaders of the pack. What it can do, however, is carve out a nook of its own where those interested will find an enjoyable game that plays well and looks attractive, but suffers from some design issues.

The basic premise of having control over the ebb and flow of time, though touched on lightly by other titles, is one that has yet to be fully explored in videogames. While TimeShift falls short of taking the idea to the next level, it's moving in the right direction as it incorporates time manipulation into both combat and light puzzle work. In the end, the shortcomings it has in this area prevent it from reaching the upper echelon of shooters as there is little else that really stands out in the single player experience.

TimeShift puts you in the role of a mysterious physicist (so mysterious that by the end of the game you know basically nothing about the character you just spent hours guiding through peril) with access to a special suit. This futuristic couture can absorb damage, provides Halo-esque health regeneration, and can even manipulate small chunks of time itself. You've likely played games with the much overused "bullet time." That same slow-motion effect is in TimeShift, but you can also go a step further and pause or reverse time. Recommendations as to which effect you should use are given by S.S.A.M., an AI ally, but you're free to make your own decisions.

In combat, this time mechanic can be quite interesting. When sticky grenades get attached to you, rewinding time will put them back in the air so that you have another chance to dodge. Pausing time as grenades or barrels explode will allow you to step out of the blast radius unharmed. Slowing down the flow of time or stopping it entirely will allow you to get a bead on incoming rockets to pick them out of the sky. You can even grab a weapon out of an enemy's hands after stopping time. In short, you're a superhero and TimeShift does a great job of conveying that sense of power to the player.

By the end of the game, however, it largely breaks down to the same bullet-time style of play we've seen a thousand times over. This is in large part thanks to a few overpowered weapons that have more than ample supplies of ammunition. The prime example is the Thunderbolt, a crossbow not unlike the one found in Gears of War. This weapon fires a bolt (no charging time required) that sticks into enemies and kills them instantly regardless of where it hits. The "balancing" on the weapon is that it is slow moving. However, your projectiles aren't affected by your time manipulation. That means with time slowed the Thunderbolt moves too rapidly for enemies to dodge. With its zoom, you can simply sit back and pick off enemies by slowing down time, firing off a volley or two, waiting for the meter to recharge and then repeating. Even when conscientiously trying to play the game in a way that makes use of all of the tools at hand, it's really tough to avoid falling into routines that are sure to lay waste to entire armies. It doesn't help that the framerate can stutter when time is rewound in the midst of a big fight.

The puzzles, too, start out interesting but then grow to be mundane. There are three basic types that dominate the landscape. The one that you'll see most often involves turning a crank to move a platform or lift and then either pausing or rewinding time to get on said lift. Pausing time to walk across electrified water or through other deadly obstacles is another favorite. The last common puzzle is one where you pause time to walk over ramps that would otherwise tip over like a see-saw.

In reality, these hardly qualify as puzzles, especially since the game will recommend which time power to use as you approach the scenario. With every situation scripted, it's also impossible to solve some puzzles in any other way than the game dictates -- even if it seems sensible and doable. There is a lot more that could have been done here -- especially with the rewinding of time mechanic -- that TimeShift ultimately feels like a series of missed opportunities.

Like the time shifting mechanics, more work could have been put into the sci-fi story. The mildly confusing plot is done a disservice by disjointed cuts to and from action, sometimes with no explanation as to why you've moved from one locale to the next. It actually feels like the story and presentation were scrapped and redone many times over without ever having a cohesive idea.

Beware of derelict structures -- not all walls offer full protection. It all adds up to a situation that we don't often see in the videogame world. Enough work was put into making the game competitive with the biggest franchises that TimeShift almost feels like a letdown in that it didn't hit a home run. In reality, it isn't a letdown at all. It just feels like more could have been done with the game, even if the strides the development team took at the end of the project were great by any measure.

While the big idea of time control could have been fleshed out a bit more, the game has a good flow to it. The gameplay is smooth and fun with only minor clipping issues that even the best titles aren't strangers to. Smaller battles interspersed with light vehicle or turret usage and brief puzzles break up wilder firefights with a pleasing regularity. The level design, while largely linear and straightforward, is easy to follow and builds to specific choke points where combat becomes intense and enjoyable. Best of all, there are very few places (outside of the very end) where the game ever feels frustrating. Rather, when death occurs you're often left with a feeling that you didn't make the best use of your time abilities and that the next time will go more smoothly.

The visuals can be a real treat, especially on the first and last levels that take place in a rainy, dystopian city. Pausing time and then running through the frozen raindrops looks beautiful. Rewinding time and watching them go back up is wonderfully mind bending. Other times, particularly in some of the middle stages, it can be obvious that the game came from more humble beginnings and the wow factor is lost entirely to bland art direction, average character models, and uninspired interior and landscape regions. Like much of the gameplay, the visual fidelity is a rollercoaster of highs and lows. The score and sound effects, however, are stuck at the bottom of a valley without any hopes of seeing the top.

Perhaps the best reason to go pick up TimeShift is for the multiplayer arena combat. The time warping mechanics were smartly brought into the online game through chrono grenades -- explosives that send out a small sphere where time is altered. Anything caught within a slow sphere moves at a fraction of its normal pace including people, bullets, and rockets. It's an adaptation of the single player game that works incredibly well and is incorporated into the myriad preset game types with great success.

The standard deathmatch, team deathmatch, one-on-one, and CTF are all in TimeShift, but they also have variants that take advantage of the time controls. One requires you to trap enemies inside of a time sphere before they can be killed. Another gives one "king" unlimited time powers but makes him the sole target of the other players. There's even an attack and defend game type that requires you to impair the opposing team's machine by throwing chrono grenades at it.

TimeShift multiplayer is old-school arena combat, bringing the good and the not so good back to the forefront. It's fast paced with little to no option for taking advantage of cover where the death totals rack up in short order. It also gives many of the customization options back to the player (including control on the console where stick layout and button configurations have enough options to please anyone, right or left handed), remembering to include the oft-ignored system link options.

From what we've seen, the overpowered weapons in the single player game are all properly balanced for online matches. This adds to the nice sense of fury TimeShift provides as grabbing any weapon allows you to immediately dive headfirst into the midst of the fracas. It's a fast and over the top game that allows you to simply hop on and start blasting, then find some depth when you start to understand how the chrono grenades can turn the tides in your favor.

Closing Comments
A great deal of work was done to bring the look and feel of TimeShift up to date, though an equal amount of time should have been spent on the design and presentation. With games like Halo 3 and The Orange Box out and Call of Duty 4 and Unreal Tournament 3 on the way, those design shortcomings feel ever magnified in the face of such giants. That doesn't mean there isn't any fun to be had here and if you have a spare weekend in the midst of the intense gaming schedule this fall demands of hardcore gamers, then Timeshift wouldn't be a bad way to spend it.

from pc.ign.com

Guitar Hero IV, Call of Duty 5 in the pipe

In a conference call with investors earlier today, Vivendi CEO Jean-Bernard Levy fleshed out more specifics on the $19 billion deal that will join Activision and Blizzard into one of the largest third-party publishers in the world. While analysts reacted favorably to the nitty-gritty financial details, what most gamers are primarily interested in is the future of the two publisher's popular franchises.

For Activision's stable of franchises, at least, the future looks pretty much as expected. In an industry note parsing out the benefits of the merger, Activision Blizzard unsurprisingly revealed the Guitar Hero and Call of Duty franchises would each receive new installments. Aside from being confirmed as Guitar Hero IV and Call of Duty 5, no other details on the games emerged.

The two franchises have been a boon in recent months for Activision. After tallying $115 million in first week sales, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock went on to be the best-selling cross-platform game for the month of October. Likewise, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare has enjoyed both critical and commercial success, contributing to Activision's premerger upward revision of its 2008 fiscal outlook.

Activision Blizzard also reaffirmed that a game featuring the James Bond license was in development, Bizarre Creations was still at work on a racing title, and new Tony Hawk, Marvel, and DreamWorks titles were on the horizon.

from www.gamespot.com

1UP Interview: The Direction of Deus Ex 3

Eidos Montreal general manager Stephane D'Astous proves himself a true Canadian in the first moments of our conversation. Before we can get to the subject at hand -- last week's anticipated announcement of Deus Ex 3 -- he almost laboriously turns the conversation to the weather. "We haven't got so much wind," he says, "but it's pretty damp. It gets through the clothes and to the bone."

Soon cold will be the least of D'Astous's worries; his team at the newly-formed Eidos Montreal studio has been given the opportunity to create the next chapter in a much-loved and very divisive franchise. Naturally, forums exploded to this announcement with a healthy mix of excitement and skepticism. A brand new studio taking on a series that had already been mishandled once before? D'Astous agreed to speak with 1UP about how this happened and Eidos Montreal's plans for Deus Ex 3.

1UP: Let's start with the obvious question. Confirmation of Deus Ex 3 was really big news for a lot of gamers, but the press release didn't mention one fairly important thing: platforms that the game will be appearing on. Are you guys ready to talk about that? Can you at least tell us if the game will appear on consoles or PC or both?

Stephane D'Astous: Well, we did that on purpose, because we wanted to tease. I think we've successfully done that if we look at the forums and all the websites. What I can say is that our business plan here in Montreal, which was announced back in February of this year, basically we said that we are going to work only on triple A major titles and only on next-gen technology and PC. We're also going to have smaller development teams of 80 members at the peak, but by achieving that we need to give the dev teams at least a 24-month period of production. If you read between the lines, I cannot say exactly which are the platforms that we'll be working on specifically. It's going to be announced in maybe early 2008 or maybe summer. But we're not working on current or last gen, it's next-gen and PC.

1UP: Both of the previous Deus Ex games had a sort of public mouthpiece behind the vision that the games had. For the original it was Warren Spector and with Invisible War it was Harvey Smith, both of whom have moved onto new companies now. With Deus Ex 3, would that position be filled by you or someone else at the new Montreal studio? Or is that an approach you guys are moving away from altogether?

D'Astous: It's pretty much your option C. It's going to be a team effort. We must remember that Eidos really owns the IP. Obviously it came from the ideas of Mr. Spector, but I think we have very knowledgeable people in the UK. [Eidos product director] Ian Livingstone knows the whole story behind Deus Ex; he was even a writer if I'm not mistaken. He's been helping us out from a distance. But we've done our homework. We're a studio where big egos are not really welcome. It's really a team effort, and we have a very experienced team.

People that we've hired were truly enthused by the first Deus Ex. They know the game by heart. They know what worked and what didn't work. I think the proof that we've done our homework is that our proof of concept was accepted five or six weeks ago on its first pass even with the expectations from the UK set very high. The guys here really worked very hard, and we passed with flying colors. We're very eager to show all the fans more stuff, but each thing has its timing. We wanted to do the first teaser video, which was done in record time, but we knew we needed to show something. I think it gives a little bit of the look and feel of where we're going. We obviously don't want to show everything in the first teaser, but there's a lot more where that came from.

1UP: Does the Montreal team have any developers who worked on either of the previous games?

D'Astous: From Ion Storm? Nope. Our team here is basically several people who've worked on triple A titles, but no one from Ion Storm.

1UP: Going back to Warren Spector for a minute, then, if you don't mind -- obviously, as you said, Spector was extremely important to the development of the original game and he also oversaw some aspects of Invisible War. As recently as a year ago he was quoted as saying that he'd love to return to the franchise at some point. He's got his own studio now (Junction Point Studios) and is doing his own thing, but have you been in touch with him at all or do you expect to be? Even just as far as going to him for advice?

D'Astous: What I can say is that we spoke to Warren -- several people from Eidos did. Very often in life, it's a question of timing. As you mentioned, he has his own studio now that was pretty much bought up by Disney, and he's also working on personal projects. There was a lot of interest on both sides, but at the end of the day it's a question of timing. That's really all I can say.

1UP: Deus Ex has a sizable fan base, and you pointed to the forum reactions toward this announcement as proof of that. But many critics and gamers were left disappointed with Invisible War. What strengths and weaknesses from the previous games are you trying to emulate or maybe overcome with the new title?

D'Astous: Without going into specifics, what we've done the past several months with both games is read a lot of archives about how it was perceived. There's obvious features that we definitely want to continue. I think the dialogue, choice versus consequences, the depth and richness of the game is something that we will certainly conserve. There are other more specific features that we want to keep.

Everyone knows what worked well on the first one and what the second one tried, but now we're five years later, even seven years later from the first Deus Ex. I think we have the possibility to have a fresh look. I think the franchise is at a turning point in its life where new blood will be good, but also respect for the history of that great franchise. With the new technology available now, we really want to give a second wind to this franchise. Games don't last forever. Deus Ex came out in 2000, seven years ago. If we wait any longer, I don't think that's a good thing, but we don't want to rush production either. That's why we're working on a schedule that we're trying to respect as much as possible, but definitely the game will not be published until it has obtained a certain level of quality according to us.

1UP: A huge part of the appeal of the Deus Ex franchise has always been the story. In his article on Deus Ex 3's announcement, 1UP writer Mark Whiting pointed out that "it's often been said the original Deus Ex could (or would) never have been made in post 9/11 America." Given the controversy of the plot in Deus Ex, can we still expect that level of conspiracy and shadowy government activity to remain a focus of the new game?

D'Astous: Conspiracy is something that's really intriguing when it's well-done. Conspiracy stories don't hold the road when they aren't well-developed. The success of the first game lies in that it was very well-done. The storyline was well-built. We're going to be working hard to have a solid and in-depth storyline that will give players the chance to replay.The replayability is also very important. At Eidos we'd like to think that our games are very character-driven. We need strong characters and strong stories. So one of the factors that's very important to us is the game's stamina, its replayability. This will come naturally if we do our homework, and we're driven and motivated to do that. A conspiracy story is definitely an option for us to do.

1UP: I'm sure you can't get into any story specifics yet, but overall are you looking at Deus Ex 3 to be a continuation of the stories being told in the previous games--

D'Astous: [laughs]

1UP: --or do you want to do a fresh start in the same world?

D'Astous: I'm very sorry, but I cannot answer that. We have something that will please the fans that are loyal to the franchise. We'll do everything to respect their following. We're also going to try to bring in some new blood to keep a well-balanced interest in the game. I cannot say when and where the story actually takes place. That's a little too much information for now. Next year we'll be announcing all of that.

I invite all the fans that are interested to participate on our forums. My producer and I wanted to get the forum activated at the start of pre-production, right now, not at the end of the game. We don't just want to see the reaction once the game's released. We have the forum up for pre-production so that the people that want to have accessibility to the developers have a chance to speak, to exchange with us directly. This forum is read by the whole team. It's not something that's not used. Every day I take at least 15 minutes to go through the discussions to see what's on the minds of the people we're making the game for.

1UP: That seems like something fans would get into.

D'Astous: We're trying to get everything in place to make sure that people -- well, when we speak about Deus Ex, obviously there's some passion. And passionate people sometimes get protective. We understand that the reactions are very strong. We expect all that and anticipate all kinds of reactions. We're very honored to be mandated to do the next Deus Ex. I just want the fans to know we'll be working very hard. We'll listen to them.

1UP: In your list of things that the new Eidos Montreal studio is all about, one of the things you focused on is long production cycles. The press release for Deus Ex 3 also mentioned that you're still planning to hire new people for the team all the way into 2009. Given these statements, we should probably expect a long wait before we see footage or hands-on previews for Deus Ex 3, huh?

D'Astous: We're working with the PR department to make sure that we time releases of trailers and information in coordination with the production cycle. I would like to say that by summer next year we'll have a couple of big things to show. It wouldn't be in our favor to wait until 2009 or whatever to show something. We're confident in what we're doing, so we'll definitely want to release some content eventually. So fans shouldn't despair, I'd expect more information on what we're doing next summer.

1UP: And as far as a release time frame, you're not estimating until at least into 2009?

D'Astous: Again this information will be more precise in the next press release, but if you understand our studio philosophy of having a 24-month production cycle, that gives you an idea of where we want to go. I fought for having a minimum of 24 months for pre-production and production, excluding conception, which can go quite a long time. Since we successfully passed this gate, we want to have a minimum of 24 months to do our job.

1UP: Blacksite: Area 51 is another recent game that was a franchise revival of sorts, although not nearly as anticipated as Deus Ex, but Deus Ex: Invisible War developer Harvey Smith was also a lead designer on Blacksite. That game got some pretty average review scores. A couple of days ago Harvey Smith gave a presentation where he said that the project was "so f***ed up" and discussed a lot of the problems they had with development including a lot of trouble from the publisher. How do you guys plan to avoid these same issues?

D'Astous: It's funny, because Harvey actually gave that speech at the Montreal International Game Summit this week, and some of my staff exchanged a bit with him at the convention center. We're aware of what you've just said. I think the publisher of Blacksite is maybe in a different situation than us. It's a priority for Eidos to give second wind to a couple of IPs that have been on ice for a couple of years. We have a tradition of high-quality games, and the games that we're working on will find merit in having a minimum duration for production. Eidos Montreal is very transparent. We're anti-bulls***.

Our production team right now is 35 or 40 guys, and I said to them, "we're working for this type of date. I won't come back in three months or six months to say I'm taking off three months or giving you three months more. Don't expect more time or less time." We're truly sticking to our guns, and we're comfortable with our business plan for the studio and for Deus Ex 3. My producer and I are product management-driven. We don't like to force bad surprises on our studio. We're very much in touch with people that need to be creative, but we also need a certain frame that people can work within, so we've put everything on the table for our staff. They know they need to come up with a great game by this date. So there's no bulls***.

1UP: That will make a great headline. "Eidos Montreal: No Bulls***."

D'Astous: And just one more example of how we're trying to be transparent: this Saturday in Montreal, we're opening our doors to do an Open House. We're inviting the public, the families of the employees, and even the competition to come walk through our studios and see what we're all about. In the future, if there are some fans that would like to come down to Montreal for whatever reason and go through our studio, it would be our pleasure to organize something. We really want to work closely, not behind closed doors.

from www.gametab.com

Orange Box to PlayStation 3 Next Week

Electronic Arts announced today that The Orange Box, previously released for Xbox 360 and PC in October, will be available on PlayStation 3 in North America and Europe next week, on December 11th. France and Germany can expect to see the PlayStation 3 version early next year.

The Orange Box, originally developed by Valve, combines three new releases -- Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Portal, and Team Fortress 2 -- with Half-Life 2 and Half-Life 2: Episode One for what can only be considered a ridiculously great value. Well, we certainly thought so, at least.

However, our recent hands-on session with the near-final PlayStation 3 build (ported by EA UK) revealed several notable performance issues that may or may not be addressed before release. Proceed with caution, PS3 owners -- and look out for a full review here in the near future.

from www.gametab.com

BioShock 2 in development at 2K Games' newest studio?

Source: Notorious industry-info-leaking blog Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars, following up on a job listing on developer-oriented news site Gamasutra.

What we heard: 2K Boston's BioShock has proved to be both a critical and financial hit for Take-Two. Not a month after the PC and Xbox 360 shooter debuted to glowing reviews, Take-Two Interactive chairman Strauss Zelnick boasted that more than 1.5 million copies of the game had been shipped to retailers and coyly stated that the property was being considered as a potential new franchise.

Although a continuation of the series seems all but assured, it appears that Ken Levine's 2K Boston and 2K Australia crew--nee Irrational Games--won't be on development duties for the game. Pointing to a recent job posting on developer-oriented news site Gamasutra, notorious industry-info leaker Surfer Girl notes that 2K Games is hiring for a lead animator at its newly established studio in the San Francisco area, 2K Marin.

Although the current text seems innocuous enough, the wondrous technology that is Google cache reveals that the studio will be populated by BioShock alums. "Some of the creators of the award-winning BioShock are starting up a new studio in the Bay Area and are looking for a Lead Animator," reads the original job request. Notably, the job listing also sees a "fine art background" as being a plus, reminiscent of the much-lauded art deco style of BioShock's city under the sea, Rapture.

Citing her gossamer sources, Surfer Girl's explanation for the new studio indicates that internal drama was one contributing factor in the formation of 2K Marin. "2K Boston is still recovering--a good chunk of the BioShock team did not want to work with Ken ever again, and 2K definitely understood the sentiment and let them set up a new studio so that they can make Bioshock 2, leaving Ken with Project X," she said. "A good chunk of the other senior 2K Boston people who were sick of Ken but didn't move to San Francisco ended up scattering to other AAA developers instead. [At 2K Australia], they're essentially rebuilding a team from almost scratch again."

As for Levine and co., Surfer Girl states that she has confirmed with one of 2K Marin's new staffers that the mysterious Project X will be set in the X-Com universe. "Project X is a new X-Com title, as previously reported by the Internet, and this post has been confirmed by one who left for San Francisco," she says. Take-Two acquired the rights to Culture Brain's classic real-time strategy franchise from Atari in 2005, after the series lay dormant following the less-than-spectacular X-Com: Enforcer in 2001. X-Com: UFO Defense, the original game in the series released in 1993, is widely heralded as one of the greatest games ever made, and has been inducted into GameSpot's own Greatest Games of All Time.

The original job listing clearly indicated that 2K Marin is being staffed by BioShock alum. It is also worth noting that 2K Australia's Web site clearly indicates the studio has moved on to other projects. "We had an incredible run with BioShock, and we're looking forward to the years ahead when we bring you bigger and even better titles," reads the studio's landing page.

The official story: Take-Two had not returned requests for comment as of press time.

Bogus or not bogus?: Not bogus that 2K Marin is picking up the BioShock franchise. Entirely plausible that 2K Boston is working on an X-Com sequel. No comment on the office drama.

from www.gamespot.com

Konami: MGS4 needs to sell 1M on day one

Though both Konami and Sony have on numerous occasions asserted that Metal Gear Solid 4 will be exclusive to Sony's PlayStation 3, rumors have repeatedly surfaced that the final chapter in the Solid Snake saga will eventually make its way to the Xbox 360. Among other reasons, this belief is maintained by the reasoning that, like other publishers, Konami will need to reach as wide an audience as possible to turn a decent profit in this day and age of high-budget development.

Konami spokesperson and assistant producer Ryan Payton believes MGS4 will need to hit the ground running in sixth gear when it lands for the PS3 in Q2 2008. Speaking to Reuters, Payton said that the game will need to sell 1 million copies on the first day due to high production costs. While the game is one of the most anticipated for many PS3 owners, Payton notes that the figure may be hard to reach due to the PS3's relatively low installed base, which stood at approximately 2 million in the US and 1.3 million in Japan, according to recent estimates by stat-tracking bodies the NPD Group and MediaCreate.

However, Payton also reaffirmed Konami's position on MGS4 as a PS3 exclusive. "We're telling our fans that if you want to play Metal Gear Solid 4, you have to buy a PS3," said Payton. "The PlayStation brand has always been good to us, and we're pretty bullish on the PS3."

For Sony's part, the Japanese giant appears to sympathize with the risk third-party publishers take in releasing a game for a single platform. "We understand publishers are needing to recoup their investment," said Sony senior VP of marketing Peter Dille in the report. "From our perspective, as long as the games aren't going exclusive to other platforms, PS3 gamers are not actually losing anything."

Dille went on to say that Sony is offsetting the dearth of third-party-developed PS3 exclusives by ramping up production at its internal studios. The exec noted that Sony currently has 15 in-house studios, more than Microsoft and Nintendo combined.

from www.gamespot.com

Gears of War Review (PC)

Just a little over a year ago Gears of War, with it's excellent game play and dazzling graphics took the Xbox 360 by storm and left PC gamers green with envy for this shooter. Now that same title has finally found it's way to the PC and surpasses all expectations by offering more of everything. With better graphics, more missions and the same great game play, Gears of War for the PC is on track to captivate another set of gamers this year.

Game Specifics

• Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
• Developer: Epic Games
• ESRB Rating: "M" for Mature
• Genre: Third Person Shooter
• Theme: Science Fiction
• Pros: Excellent game play and combat with non stop action; Gorgeous graphics, very detailed & realistic; Includes game editor
• Cons: Heafty hardware requirements; Some awkward controls using Xbox 360 controller

Storyline & Gameplay

The back story for Gears of War is rather simple and for the most part the overall plot is nothing out of the ordinary for a sci-fi shooter. Humans under siege by a terrorizing alien force and it's up to you to try and save humanity. In Gears, players assume the role of Marcus Fenic, an ex-Delta Squad member serving a 40 year sentence in a maximum security penitentiary for disobeying orders during a time of war.

In times of war however, things change quickly and from the outset of the game you are set free to rejoin Delta Squad to help in the battle against the Locust, an underground race of creatures that have already destroyed nearly every city on the planet. Missions are quite linear in Gears of War and overall the story doesn't go very deep, however, it does just enough to keep you interested and moving along to discover the real gem of this game, the non-stop action.

The track record of console to PC ports has not been very good over the past few years, great console titles such as Resident Evil 4 and the Final Fantasy games are just a few that have faired well on the PC. There were probably a few skeptics out there when it was announced that Epic Games would be porting their third person shooter and Xbox 360 smash hit to the PC. Now with the release Gears of War for the PC, Epic has silenced any possible skepticism by developing a game with flawless gameplay that is an even better action packed thrill ride from start to finish than the original Xbox 360 version.

In Gears of War, players have the option of playing with either a keyboard/mouse configuration or with the Xbox 360 controller. The game controls using the Xbox 360 controller are identical to that of the console version; joysticks to move and trigger buttons to aim and fire. The keyboard and mouse configuration follow the standard WASD for movement and the mouse to look, aim and fire. The edge has to go to the keyboard and mouse, it is more natural and can account for quicker reaction times and more accurate aiming when having to do a multi button tasks. These same tasks may become awkward on the controller by having to learn how to use both thumbs and both index fingers (sometimes in different directions) to successfully move how you want.

Game Mechanics & Combat

The action in Gears of War is engaging and intense from start to finish. There are three difficulty levels to play; causal, hardcore and insanity. Each time you increase the difficulty you really must embrace the game's underlying premise towards combat. It's better to wait for your shot from behind cover than it is to Rambo charge head first into oncoming fire. You can take on damage and be cut down very quickly if you do.

Health in Gears of War is pretty straight forward and simple, you won't see a health bar showing your current state nor will you find any first aid/health packs littered through out the environments. Instead when you start taking damage a red icon or Crimson Omen will appear center screen notifying you that you're hurt, if it becomes completely red your character dies forcing you to restart from the last checkpoint. Health is regained automatically when you're able to avoid taking fire and lay low for a few seconds. Once the Crimson Omen vanishes from view you're back at full strength and ready to press on.

From the very start, players are thrown into the heat of combat armed with pistol and assault rifle. Throughout the game you'll come across an excellent choice of weapons; shotgun, sniper rifle, grenades and the Hammer of Dawn, but you most likely come back to the assault rifle which is also armed with a chainsaw bayonet that dishes out some heavy damage in melee combat. In addition to your weapons, you will also be helped out by fellow Delta Squad members who can help with cover, spotting, and taking down enemies.

As mentioned previously, the most effective way to get through combat is to use the duck and cover approach. While behind cover you can rest to regain health or aim and fire at enemies while just exposing a your head or small portion of your body. This makes it much more difficult for enemies to inflict damage. That's not to say the entire game will be played from behind the safety of a concrete wall. You will have to expose yourself and move through the environments to get from checkpoint to checkpoint. Fortunately there are a number of great moves that are built in that allow you to do so. Using the space bar or A controller button while moving enables these moves which change dynamically based on your location in regards to objects in the environment around you. This includes getting into and out of cover, jumping over low cover, evading and many more.

Missions

The single player campaign in Gears of War has a total of about 30+ chapters/missions spread across five acts which should account for about 15 hours of game play. Exclusive to the PC version of Gears are five addition chapters which do a better job of tying some of the acts together. Overall the new missions are great for extending your Gears experience, with some having a little different style of play to them, possibly a look into game play styles that may be seen in future Gears of War sequels.

Graphics

Built using the Unreal Engine 3.0 Gears of War looks great. Character models are detailed and rendered perfectly, while their animated movements are very realistic. In addition to the character models, the game's environments throughout look fantastic and lighting effects enhance and play a big role in setting the mood.

It's worth noting that in order to get the game to look really fabulous it's going to take some heavy duty hardware. The game's minimum requirements call for 1GB of RAM and a GeForce 6600+ or ATI x700+ Graphics card. To get the really great looking graphics however it may take a dual core processor coupled with a DirectX 10 compatible graphics card and Windows Vista. Meeting the minimum requirements will probably get you graphics looking like the Xbox 360 version, which, don't get me wrong, is good but nothing compared to it's full potential.

Multiplayer

Gears of War has a very extensive set of multiplayer game modes which are hosted over the Games for Windows Live gaming network. There are five multiplayer game types that allow for a maximum of eight players to fight along side or against each other. These game types include Warzone, Execution, and Assassination which are slightly different versions of a head to head match-up between Humans and Locust teams. The Annex and King of the Hill modes are geared towards capturing specific locations and holding them for points.

In addition to these multiplayer modes, Gears includes a Co-op mode that enables two players to play the campaign mode together. Connecting to Co-op mode is still done through the Games for Windows Live community and is enabled for the free Silver level membership. In Co-op mode the second player takes the role of a fellow Delta Squad member named Dominic Santiago. Through the Co-op mode, players will have the same overall objective and checkpoints, fight along side each other simultaneously and have the ability to heal/revive the other if within close proximity.

Bottom Line

There have been some bugs/issues with the retail release that have been reported to the Gears of War Forums, but the great thing about PC games is that bugs/issues with an initial release can always be (and usually are) fixed with an easily installable patch. In spite of these issues, Gears of War for the PC is a solid game from top to bottom. Whether you've played Gears of War or not the new chapters, multiplayer maps and better graphics coupled with the same great game play and combat system should put Gears of War for the PC near the top of every game of the year list.

____

by compactiongames.about.com

The Witcher - Reviews @ GameShark, DLA

Seems everyone is catching up on overdue Witcher reviews. GameShark's review describes it as "the best CRPG to come down the pike since Baldur's Gate II", with a rating of "A-":

This is hardly the first game that asks you to make choices. Bioware and others have been doing that for eons. But even games that did very well at it, most choices you make are obvious in terms of their good or evilness. The Witcher gives you far more to think about when answering most questions. Will you risk condemning an innocent man in a plot against you if you’re not completely positive of his guilt? Will you bargain with a cannibal because he has information that’s of use to you? One quest, early in the game, forces you to decide the fate of a witch. Both choices have consequences and it’s not entirely clear, even after the choice is made, which was about the greater good. One certainly feels like the right thing to do, but the body count that ensues… well, even that choice doesn’t feel good when all the ramifications of it are made clear. Not since Fallout has a game so skillfully made the choices a player makes both vague and important.

You may also recall the Steel_Wind from DLA wrote some glowing first impressions a while back. Skavenhorde writes that those impressions were updated a couple of weeks back with observations after completing the game, effectively making it a full review; score - 4.5/5:

Well I have finished the game now. There are some issues which surface as the game moves on I would like to draw attention to.

#1 - Vista Performance: Okay, we can say this the nice way, or say it the hard way. Vista performance is buggy as all hell in full screen mode. Played in windowed mode, the game is stable. That's the fix right now.

#2 - Crashes: I had some of these as the game progressed. Nothing that cost me a game or more than a minute’s inconvenience - but it did happen.

#3 - Pacing: I think this is the largest problem in the game from a design viewpoint. The game starts on a peak in the Prologue, then comes down to Earth a little too hard in Act 1 and even II to a lesser extent. That does not make these Acts un-enjoyable. They are fun. But after the high that the game starts off on, the plot ebbs away to a very large extent.

This is compounded by a sub quest design in Act II that is so large that the main plotline is lost for a lot of players for a looooong time. Not a big deal - but worth mentioning.

from www.rpgwatch.com

Review - Assassin's Creed

I have to hand it to Ubisoft. The people they've got in their PR department are marketing geniuses. They could sell refrigerators to people living on an iceberg, or a stack of Bibles to a group of atheists. Look at Assassin's Creed. The smooth operators behind the ad campaign have taken what is essentially a tech demo propped up by a rudimentary mission structure and parlayed it into one of the most anticipated titles of the season. My hat is off to them; the work they do is without equal. However, the developers in Ubisoft's Montreal studio who actually created the game still have a way to go.

The epitome of "high concept," Assassin's Creed is split between two worlds. The first closely resembles modern times, just a short hop into the near future. In this setting of minimalist furnishings and sterile surfaces, two scientists use a supercomputing analytical device to extract "genetic memories" from a kidnapped bartender named Desmond. The information the machine mines from his DNA makes up the second world, and is the setting for the action in Assassin's Creed.

When reliving the "memories" conjured from Desmond's biological data, the player assumes the role of Altair, an unorthodox and incredibly acrobatic assassin whose life took place centuries in the past. After being disgraced by his own poor judgment, he's tasked with eliminating nine targets described as slavers, warmongers, and people corrupt with power. By removing those who stand in the way of peace, he hopes to regain his status and place within the assassin order.

Although bits and pieces of this "past/future" twist had leaked long before the game's release to cast doubts about the true storyline, I have to say that the dichotomy works beautifully. (And no, none of this is a spoiler... it's all revealed within the first five minutes.) I occasionally wondered whether or not the "future" portions should have been held back for a dramatic twist once players had gotten further in, but that's not a complaint. The whole thing is handled rather cleverly, actually.

As much as I can appreciate the concept, that's not the same as appreciating the game—which I don't. Although it looks stunning in demos and short clips, I became bored and disinterested with Assassin's Creed long before it was over. I would never have guessed that one of the titles I had been most looking forward to would end up being one of the most tedious slogs I've forced myself to sit through all year.

There are so many areas where the game goes awry that it's hard to know where to begin, but I'll start by saying that for a game about assassins, there's precious little assassination going on. I'm no expert on the subject, but it seems logical to expect subterfuge, hiding in the shadows, and slipping into a villain's lair unseen before silently delivering death's kiss on the deserving ne'er-do-well. Instead, Assassin's Creed completely bungles the concept by taking stealth and cleverness out of the equation, instead relying on cumbersome swordplay and tediously scripted scenes.

For example, at several assassinations I saw my subject in the process of murdering a helpless townsperson or some other similar act. Preparing the hidden blade concealed on Altair's left hand, I constantly tried to make my way through the masses in order to strike. I was always allowed to draw close enough to prevent the townsperson from being cruelly murdered, but consistently prevented from taking action until the scene played out. (In itself, a huge missed opportunity). Immediately following, my target would usually "see" me, my silent assassination becoming a clumsy, artless brawl and the complete opposite of my intentions.

Really, nearly every mission follows much the same pattern; rather than striking unseen from a vantage point earned by stealth or careful observation to escape anonymously, Ubisoft Montreal made the bizarre decision to craft the majority of these situations around chasing someone down busy streets or struggling through tiresome melees after expository cut-scenes. These choices don't make any sense until the "free-running" aspect of Assassin's Creed is taken into account.

Rather than making the player work for pixel-perfect jumps or split-second timing while navigating the rooftops and detailed architecture of the game's three environments, all that's required is to simply press a direction and let Altair find his own way. Although this system was originally seen in Toby Gard's Galleon on Xbox, the way Altair moves and adapts to the environment is a major technological achievement and the developers should be proud. However, just because the system is an impressive success doesn't mean that it's substantial enough to keep players engaged over the course of the game, because it's not.

Within an hour or so of venturing through Creed's Middle Eastern-themed cities, the novelty of Altair's Spider-Man act wore off and I started to wonder where the rest of the game was. This adaptive movement system should only be the means to an end, not the end in itself. Unfortunately, the developers seem to not understand this. Instead, they force the player to travel as much as possible, climb incessantly, and base everything in the game around this function. My guess is that they spent far too much time and energy creating the climbing aspect to the detriment of all else. I can see no other reason behind the nonsensical, so-called "assassinations" and the overuse of an incredibly dull combat system.

Adding insult to injury, the game's story burns as hot as a soggy matchbook, never fulfilling the promise of the ingenious DNA contrivance mentioned at the review's beginning. The too-frequent unskippable cut-scenes are enough to beat anyone into a vegetative state of bored submission, each one saying extremely little and taking an intolerable amount of time to do it. As if those weren't bad enough, every "boss" target drowns Altair with the sort of insipid deathbed filibustering that makes Metal Gear Solid's famed talkiness seem positively tight-lipped. If three quarters of the game is climbing, the last quarter is staring at the screen while characters spew endless amounts of emotionally empty dialogue.

Lapsing into formulaic predictability just moments past the title screen, Ubisoft Montreal makes players repeat the same tasks from start to finish while crisscrossing its beautifully-rendered cities an absurd amount of times, wrongly hoping that the impressive means of navigation would be enough to fool people into believing there's any sort of interesting, engaging gameplay to be found. The sad truth is, Assassin's Creed is a prime example of basing a project on a single mechanic rather than creating the appropriate mechanic to support a project. Everything except Altair's athletics feels underdeveloped and painfully shallow, making the end result an overhyped attempt to recoup the development costs for something that's little more than an extended tech demo. Rating: 5 out of 10

Disclaimer: This review is based on the Xbox 360 version of the game.

article by www.gamecritics.com

Contrasting Crysis and Call of Duty 4: Why emergent gamplay is the future

Without a doubt, 2007 has been a marquee year for first-person shooters. We've gotten Bioshock, Call of Duty 4, STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl, Crysis, Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, Half-Life 2: Episode 2, Team Fortress 2, Clive Barker's Jericho, Unreal Tournament 3, Timeshift, FEAR expansions, and more. Even the lesser games are above-average, and the best are some of the best games we've ever seen in the genre.

Two of the most acclaimed of this whole bunch are Crysis and Call of Duty 4. Both were hotly anticipated and both have been well-received by gamers. But I thought that these two games are an interesting contrast – both are first-person shooters, but represent two sharply contrasting design philosophies. Crysis features large, open environments that are highly interactive and allow players to approach any given situation in a seemingly limitless number of ways – so-called "sandbox" gameplay. Call of Duty 4, on the other hand, is very tightly scripted, utilizing purely linear levels that are designed to emphasize the drama and intensity of the action.

Just listen to the developers. In an interview with IGN, Grant Collier, head of Call of Duty 4 developer Infinity Ward, had this to say about linearity and interactivity:

"[E]veryone right now is demanding sandbox gameplay and total destructibility. We personally don't think that it's that fun, I mean, 'go anywhere! Do anything!' That's just - I think it's a buzzword, it's a badge, it's a bullet-point option, but a lot of games they get in there and they try to do that and then they're like 'okay we have the sandbox, now why don't we try to make the game fun'. And total destructibility, you can really ruin the gameplay. There's so many spectacular moments that you have when you funnel the action into certain corridors.... I think right now it's a fad, and the fad will pass, we're not going to be bite on in it - we want the game to be fun first, and destructibility comes second."

By contrast, here's Crysis lead designer Cevat Yerli on Crysis' open-ended, interactive style of play:

New gameplay emerges out of these systems. I was running with speed power towards an enemy and shooting and another person came across running as well towards me, and he jumped over me, and in the air increased his strength, landed, and punched me to death. I was like, “%*&# you!” (laughs) It was like life straight out of The Matrix.

Another really cool scenario was when I was in the harbor under the water, and under a boat. I had the pistol, and then switched on speed and literally, like a dolphin, jumped in the air, pow pow pow pow – killed him. He was like, “What the #(*%!” He couldn’t see underwater because of the boat, but I could see him as an enemy on the radar.

This is an aspect that I’m proud of because the systems are working everywhere, and it’s not like it’s a scripted moment or event or just me versus a person or enemy. It’s always fresh. That’s the cool part of it and that’s what I mean when I say I want the player to express his intelligence in ideally the most wide range a shooter can offer.

So with these two games, we're presented with two highly contrasting gameplay designs: scripted gameplay versus emergent gameplay. While these designs are by no means mutually exclusive (both games contain elements of both designs), in my view the scripted design of Call of Duty 4 represents an aging and increasingly archaic design; Crysis' emergent gameplay, on the other hand, is the way of the future. Here's why (warning – spoilers ahead):

Call of Duty 4 showcases some of the strengths of scripting. At times, the levels are very dramatic and intense. There is a level of storytelling that indeed can benefit greatly from scripted events. However, the contrivances of scripting often hurt the immersion of the gameplay, and a few examples in particular stuck out like sore thumbs to me as I played the game:

* At one point, I was under attack by a helicopter, and the goal was to make my way to a nearby farmhouse, which is heavily guarded by enemy troops. I tried to make it to the house a few times unsuccessfully, being gunned down by the helicopter gunner nearly every time. So I decided to do the most logical thing: I shot the gunner. He fell out of the chopper in dramatic fashion, and it slowly flew away. Finally I could make my way to the farm house and focus on killing the infantry. But wait! The helicopter re-emerged, with another gunner. I killed him, too. This sequence repeated itself numerous times, until it became obvious that the helicopter had infinite gunners – the designers had already decided how I was going to take out the helicopter. Sure enough, once I made it to the farm house I was greeted with an infinite supply of Stinger missiles, and my squadmates instructed me to shoot down the helicopter.

* In another sequence, I was on a mission to assassinate a key character with a sniper rifle. The game factors wind direction into the shots, which is pretty clever. What's not clever is that shooting this character is a pre-scripted event; he is maimed by the shot, losing his arm, but he survives. No matter how accurate I am – I could shoot him in the head or in the foot – the final sequence plays out the same.

* Later in that same level during a massive enemy assault, it is possible to stand in an enemy spawn point, which prevents them from spawning and renders the whole scene a cake walk.

* Scripting also hurts the replayability of the game. When I'm playing any given sequence, all of the enemies spawn at the same spot every time and follow the same scripted patterns. So if I round a corner and get killed by an enemy I didn't see, I know exactly where to aim my gun the next time through. I always know that the guy with the rockets is going to run over that way, and the two guys with machine guns will run this way.

Crysis, on the other hand, gave me some very memorable moments of emergent gameplay:

* On the first level, I was pinned down behind a rock, under fire from a mounted machine gun. Stray bullets caught a nearby tree, which fell on me and killed me.

* I decided to ambush a small encampment of enemies. I used the nanosuit's super-strength to jump up a steep rocky hill on one side, rather than walking up the road or creeping through the woods. I mistimed a jump though, and launched myself about fifteen feet into the air above the enemies I'd been planning to ambush. In an amusing moment, they all gasped in unison at the sight of my superhuman ability, and scrambled for cover. So much for that ambush!

* On a number of occasions, I found myself under heavy fire from a patrol boat. I did the logical thing and shot the gunner. The driver would speed off, usually docking at a nearby beach or fleeing into the distance.

* I tried to use the cloak to sneak up on a group of lazy enemies sitting around on a beach. I changed weapons as I approached and suddenly, they were alerted to my presence and started attacking me even though I was still cloaked. At first I thought it might be a glitch, then it hit me: they had seen the flashlight on my gun.

I could go on and on; these are just a few small examples. Because the gameplay is emergent rather than scripted, the possibilities seem almost endless. Peruse any Crysis forum and you're bound to hear many entertaining stories about surprising, amazing, and even humorous emergent gameplay.

I played Call of Duty 4 after I had played Crysis, and Crysis had spoiled me quite a bit. I kept wanting to destroy vehicles, shoot down trees and knock down walls, but everything was static; I wanted to find better vantage points to attack, but there were artificial barriers blocking my path – often as contrived as an impassable wooden fence; I wanted to shoot the gunner in the helicopter, but... well, you know how that went. And while scripted gameplay does allow for some dramatic moments (as exemplified by the mostly excellent Pripyat level), I feel emergent gameplay allows players to discover situations that are every bit as dramatic, but more unique and special since the player's choices are the catalysts.

I believe that games that reward players for creativity and intelligence are the real wave of the future. The problem of course is that it's much more difficult to develop a player-centric game. Many functionalities can clash with each other, and a lot more things can go wrong than in a narrow, scripted environment. Given the escalating costs of videogame development, I feel very few developers will take the risks of using emergent gameplay. It's worth noting for example that Far Cry, Crytek's previous game released in 2004 and a very ambitious game in its own right, has yet to be imitated by other developers despite its success. Ambition is the most costly development expense of all. But every now and then, we see developers taking risks, doing something special and gamers embracing it. In time, I think, more developers will embrace this emergent style of gameplay, and gaming will be better for it.

article by www.gamecritics.com