Big Download Blog

Download: Gold Slam

Steven Wong — 2008-08-28T10:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Demos, MMO, Multiplayer, Sports

Gold Slam, a free to play online tennis game, just entered open beta and invites players to jump into the action. go to goldslam.aeriagames.com to create an account and start playing.

Download Gold Slam (335 MB)

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New Petroglyph game info coming "soon"

John Callaham — 2008-08-28T10:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Biz, RTS

We've been waiting patiently for info about the new game from Petroglyph, the Las Vegas based developer behind Star Wars: Empire at War and most recently Universe at War: Earth Assault. They recently announced plans to create a free-to-play RTS title with publisher True Games Interactive.

This week we got word via a press release that Petroglyph and True Games Interactive " . . . intend on making a major announcement soon regarding the full features of the highly-anticipated new game." The announcement came with news that GOA will handle the European publishing details of the title. We wonder how the free-to-play model will be handled and how a developer like Petroglyph, which is used to high profile projects from major developers, will change their format for this new situation. Stay tuned.

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Penny Arcade empire continues to grow

John Callaham — 2008-08-28T09:30:00 00:00

Penny Arcade is no longer just a web comic strip about gaming. It has evolved into having those strips collected into books, launching a hugely successful children's hospital charity called Child's Play and the basis for a new episodic series of games called Penny Arcade Adventures. Perhaps the biggest part of their empire is the one that begins in Seattle on Friday; the fifth edition of the Penny Arcade Expo.

The Seattle Times has posted up a new look on Penny Arcade on the eve of PAX 2008, telling the story of how two buddies, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins, created the web strip, survived the first few rough years and then met Robert Khoo, a University of Washington business graduate who took over the money end of Penny Arcade and helped Krahulik and Holkins become the massive success they are today. Penny Arcade Expo first started as a way for fans to meet the two creators; in five short years it has exploded into the single biggest consumer video game event in North America. Yet Krahulik and Holkins still work mostly on the strip while Khoo handles the numbers.Sounds like a good deal to us.

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Spore ads start showing up in odd places

John Callaham — 2008-08-28T09:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Culture, Sandbox, Simulation, Spore

By now we know that Electronic Arts is going to be pushing hard to hype up the release of the long awaited life simulation game Spore but we didn't know exactly how they would do it. CNet's News.com reports that EA has already been putting up large posters for the game on the side of buildings in San Francisco.

EA wants to make this game a huge mainstream success like The Sims but this time they are really making sure people know about this game beforehand. The CNet author speculates about more possible promotions for the game. Will there be TV ads? Yep. Will there be magazine ads? They are already out there. But then he adds speculation about a Spore ARG (alternate reality game) to which we have to say, "Huh?" Isn't Spore a kind of ARG already? That seems kind of pointless.
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New Nvidia GeForce beta drivers released

John Callaham — 2008-08-28T08:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Hardware

If you live on the wild side like we do you likely want to have your hot dogs without mustard, watch football games on TV with the volume really low and download new graphics card beta drivers. So we have a deal for you. Nvidia this week released some new GeForce beta drivers (177.92) for all of their current chips. These include the newly released 9400 GT, 8500 GT, 980 GT and 9800 GTX+ models.

The release notes for the new beta drivers reveal a number of game related issues that have been addressed in this new download including Prey. F.E.A.R and City of Heroes. There's also some performance improvements for games like BioShock, Assassin's Creed and Call of Duty 4. As usual, this is a beta release and thus is not officially supported by Nvidia.

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Steam offers RACE 07/GTR Evolution pre-order package deal

John Callaham — 2008-08-28T08:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Driving

The folks at Valve continue to give Steam customers (at least those in North America) some cool package deals on games on their service. The latest is for the upcoming SimBin developed racing simulation GTR Evolution. This latest game is actually an extension of the previously released RACE 07 and contains nearly 50 cars, 19 different tracks and both a simulation and arcade racing mode.

GTR Evolution actually contains the full RACE 07 game and Steam is offering people who pre-order GTR Evolution 10 percent off its regular $39.99 price before it launches on September 1. If you already own RACE 07 you can download GTR Evolution from Steam; it is also priced at 10 percent off its regular price of $19.99.

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Will Wright not offended by Spore porn

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T20:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Sandbox, Simulation, Spore

One of the biggest attractions of the upcoming game Spore is the ability to design and evolve your own alien creatures. People who have used the already released Spore Creature Creator have gone nuts with their own creative monsters and some have had some . . . interesting appendanges. In a new chat about the game for the Associated Press (and posted on Yahoo) Spore's creator Will Wright says he doesn't mind the more adult creations that have been made for his game.

Wright states, "Some of it's really good for what they were shooting for. It's amazingly explicit, especially when those creations are animated. We just have to make sure those people aren't messing up the experience for others." Spore will indeed have filtering software to keep people who download new user creator content for the game away from such creations if they so wish. Spore itself is still due for release on September 7.
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Nvidia pushing for more 3D PC gaming

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T19:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Hardware

There have been tons of different approaches for making PC games and then projecting them into 3D space. Nvidia believes it has a new solution and showed off their plans at their own Nvision conference this week. Our sister site Game Daily has a report on some of Nvidia's plans for this subject.

Nvidia is partnering up with TV manufacturers like Mitsubishi and PC LCD monitor makers like Viewsonic (like the one pictured above) to support their upcoming GeForce Stereoscopic technology. Nvidia will release an emitter and 3D glasses in the new future that will allow anyone with a PC rig with an Nvidia Geforce 8 graphics card or higher to view over 350 PC games released in the last five years in 3D. Pricing for the GeForce Stereoscopic technology, along with a release date, has yet to be announced. Meanwhile, San Diego based iZ3D already sells a similar technology along with their own $600 22-inch monitor that they claim supports over 400 PC games in 3D.

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Dead Space DVD and Blu-Ray animated prequel details

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T18:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Culture, Survival horror, Dead Space

Electronic Arts is really pushing the marketing of its upcoming survival horror game Dead Space. This week, details were revealed on one of the side projects for the game; the direct-to-DVD animated prequel that's being handled by Film Roman and Starz Media. The DVD will be released on Oct. 28 by Anchor Bay, a week after the game's release.

The film will be released in both DVD and Blu-Ray formats and High-Def Digest reports that both versions will have deleted scenes and trailers, a digital copy version that can be transferred (legally) to your PC or mobile video device and two exclusive cheat codes for the game. The Blu-Ray version will have additional downloadable animatics from the movie and a Blu-Ray first; an isolated music score that you can download in MP3 format.

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Legendary video destroys the world

Steven Wong — 2008-08-27T17:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Action, FPS, Survival horror, Trailers, Video

From New York to London, the end of the world takes on many looks and shapes. In Legendary, major cities get torn apart by mythological creatures released from Pandora's Box. In this latest video, the game's developers go into detail about what it takes to bring about the end of the world and why it makes for great tourist attractions.

Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 4 (510 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 3 (51 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 2 (59 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 1 (141 MB)

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Review: Tank Universal

Steven Wong — 2008-08-27T17:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Features, Action, FPS, Indie, Opinion

Tank Universal captures the nostalgic feel of classic games like Battezone mixed with an art style similar to the movie TRON. Even the plot follows a TRON-like plot line. A person diagnosed with a terminal illness enters into a virtual reality, where he ends up in neon world primarily made up from simple polygons. There, he joins a rebellion group fighting against a murderous and oppressive dictatorship. In order to upset the seat of power, players must jump into a tank and start blasting away the opposition.

This low-cost independent game may be a little thin on plot, but it more than makes up for it through gameplay. Players drive a virtual tank and battle through maze-like zones dotted with deadly enemies and turrets for 30 levels. These levels have great variety to keep players engaged for hours. The game primarily involves capture-the-flag with some take-and-hold elements thrown in, but doesn't always repeat the game types. Sometimes, it's just a matter of getting from point A to B without being destroyed.

Players uses three different resources. Moving near a glyph will convert it to your side, enabling your production facility to produce computer controlled tanks to fight alongside you. The more glyphs you control, the stronger your side will be. Taking down major targets earns upgrade points which can be used to purchase special weapons like missiles and speed boost. These special weapons need shard points to operate, which are dropped by enemies after you blow them up.

Appreciation for the art style will largely depend on how big of a TRON fan you are. Environments are mostly black with glowing red and blue lines, made up of sharp, box-like objects. Many areas are sparsely decorated. The training room, for example, is a huge square with a single box-shaped computer in it. Some areas, like the tram level, look fantastic because of its size and special effects, but the style also has a few drawbacks. The biggest problem is that almost everything uses the same few colors, which makes it very hard to spot enemies at a distance. The game also uses a film grain on top of everything, which makes it even harder to see. It's a little frustrating to run into black walls hidden in darkened shadows while trying to dodge tank fire, but you eventually get used to things and learn to compensate.

For the most part, Tank Universal is a very strong and challenging battle game. The virtual tank is easy to control, and if players hold down the fire button long enough without being hit, they can fire off a charged blast that will destroy most targets with one hit. Enemies react competently to try to stop you. Unfortunately, the same can't quite be said for computerized allies. They do a decent job of slowing down enemies and taking capture points, but there are times when they don't seem to be doing much of anything. There's no way to give them orders, so you can't defend weak positions, call reinforcements or set up a distraction. One example is during the evacuation sequence where you need to need to fend off incoming enemies to help vessels escape. Oftentimes, this requires you to become a one tank army that constantly rushes from one end of the map to the other.

The game has a few minor issues, including collision control between tanks. Sometimes hitting a friend or ally will stop you dead in your tracks, other times you'll pass straight through them. One sequence early on in the game has you running through a tank battle on foot looking for an escape tunnel. However, the mixture of dark graphics, constantly falling down, invisible walls, and a strange inability to jump or climb over small inclines gets in the way. However, it's hard to be too nitpicky about a game that costs about $10 on Steam, especially since the tank fighting and strategic elements work so well.

The real disappointment comes from the lack of multiplayer. Although there's a skirmish mode, Tank Universal doesn't feature a multiplayer system, which is a complete shame because this game practically screams for it. Computer controlled opponents aren't bad, but there's no substitute for the challenge of actual live players. Still, players get their money's worth and then some for their purchase. If you're a fan of the TRON art style, and want a fantastic action strategy game for a budget price, Tank Universal is such a great deal that it's practically a steal.

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New Far Cry game in early development; will stick with Africa setting

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T16:00:00 00:00

Filed under: FPS, Far Cry 2

Ubisoft's upcoming open world shooter Far Cry 2 has a lot of people expecting it will be great. So, apparently, does Ubisoft who are now in early development of the next game in the series at their Montreal studios. Videogaming247 has a quote from team member Patrick Redding who confirmed the plans during last week's Games Convention.

Interestingly, the dev team will apparently keep Far Cry 2's Africa setting for the follow-up game with Redding saying, "There are still things we want to do with the African setting, and I think it's safe to say we'll continue to explore it." While he says other locations might be considered for other titles in the series, he adds, "I think to save time, for us, one of the reasons we chose to use the African setting is because we felt that in order to retain the Far Cry brand value, of an exotic, dangerous environment, a place that maybe people haven't had a chance to see themselves, or have seen extensively in film, television and other games, we wanted to choose Africa."
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Download: Space Siege DVD ROM Recognition Fix

Steven Wong — 2008-08-27T15:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Patches, Action, RPG, Survival horror

This patch fixes Space Siege's problem with recognizing certain DVD drives. Patch must be copied into game directory and run with the disc in drive.

Download the Space Siege DVD Recognition Fix (16 MB)

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Asheron's Call releases 100th content update

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T15:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Expansions, MMO

It's one of the longest running MMOs in history and this week Turbine announced that their first game, the fantasy MMO Asheron's Call, just had its 100th free content update released to its subscribers. For those who need details, this update adds the beginnings of the much requested (by the game's players) an Elder Games system along with two new PvP controllable towns.

Turbine first released Asheron's Call in November 1999 via publisher Microsoft and made a point to have the game feel like a ongoing storyline was taking place with monthly events and content released. Two commerical expansion packs for the game have been released since the launch and the free content updates have also continued. Turbine took over full control of the game from Microsoft in 2003. The game has even outlasted its graphically improved sequel Asheron's Call 2 which launched in 2002 but shut down completely just three years later.

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Impulse Phase 2 launches; adds 2K Games titles

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Biz, Downloads

Stardock has released it's promised next major update for its Impulse digital distribution platform. "Phase 2" of Impulse adds a number of games from publisher 2K Games to its line-up, including Civilizations III, Shattered Union, Sid Meier's Pirates! and Sid Meier's Railroads! The update also adds the new enhanced version of Tilted Mill's Children of the Nile to the game line-up along with a number of other non-game PC software applications for download and purchase.

As we previously reported, Phase 2 of Impulse also adds a number of new features including ImpulseReactor which will allow developers to add things like matchmaking , cloud computing, rankings, achievements, multiplayer, NAT negotiation, and more. The recentStardock strategy game The Political Machine 2008 will be the first game to have the new Impulse Reactor feature. Also a private beta of MyImpulse has begun which will allow any developer to submit a game or other program for sale via Impulse. According to the press release, "A team of Impulse moderators evaluate the submission and (if accepted) could go live within one business day."

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Penumbra: Requiem now available for download

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Expansions, Adventure, Survival horror

The Penumbra first person horror action-adventure game series just got an expansion pack. Penumbra: Requiem is now available for download at Gamersgate and Direct2Drive for just $9.99. The expansion from developer Frictional Games requires the installation of Penumbra: Black Plague.

In a note on the Frictional Games web site site, the developers state that this expansion concentrates on the physics puzzles and gameplay more than previous installments. According to the site, "Requiem does its best to deliver a nightmarish and feverish atmosphere. Penumbra: Requiem is an attempt to deliver a fresh and rewarding experience and not just some rehash of previous material." While the expansion is for the moment for the Windows platform Macintosh and Linux users will get their own versions soon, according to the web site.

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New Europa Universalis: Rome expansion announced

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T13:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Downloads, Expansions, Strategy

The folks at Paradox Interactive continue to stay busy. Last week they announced plans to release Hearts of Iron 3, the latest game in their WWII strategy series. Today the publisher announced plans for yet another downloadable expansion pack to a previous historical strategy game, Europa Universalis: Rome.

The expansion is titled Vae Victis and will be available for download via Gamersgate for $9.99 in late 2008. The expansion concentrates on the Roman Senate where you will have to deal with the many members and parties in order to have your goals as leader of the Roman Empire accomplished. You have to make sure the ruling party votes for issues in your favor and have them pass laws that you want to see past. The expansion will also have things like updated military AI and an overhauled interface.

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Big Iron: Chill out

Rafe Brox — 2008-08-27T13:00:00 00:00

I must not overheat.
Heat is the chip-killer.
Heat is the thermal death that brings total obliteration.
And when it comes, I will turn the fans on to speed its path.
Where the heat has gone, there will be processing.
Only my FPS will remain.

Last week, we talked about the importance of feeding enough watts to your components to allow them to perform their best. The other side of that coin is dealing with the waste heat that is a byproduct of all that high-speed math. Heat's pretty much as far down the entropy scale as you can get -- most of what we do turns organized energy, one way or another, into heat. The problem with this state of affairs, at least for electronics, is that they are happier the colder their environment is.
If you're like us here at BI, you'll want to keep tabs on how good a job your cooling solution is working... before something locks up, melts, or lets the magic smoke out. Fortunately, there are a lot of monitoring tools at our disposal, in addition to self-protection circuitry and sensors in today's CPUs and most current BIOS implementations that will either slow things down, or shut them off completely before a catastrophic heat event takes place.

It is incumbent upon us to make the millions (or billions) of transistors in our small, rectangular minions happy by keeping them at a sane temperature. This means we'll need to be moving heat away from the hottest, most expensive bits, and then getting it the hell out of the box.

The first part is done by the heatsink and fan combo (commonly abbreviated HSF). Affixed directly to the video card, motherboard chipset, or installed on our CPU, this is typically a many-finned feat of engineering wrought in aluminum, copper, and occasionally something more exotic, and sporting a fan or two. The simplified name of the game here is air flow and surface area. The bigger the thermal delta between the cooling surfaces and the transistors supplying the heat, the faster that temperature will try to equalize, wicking heat away from that fragile, temperamental bit of silicon.

"Temperamental"? Anthropomorphize much?

NEXT >>

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Joystiq gets response from E For All organizers

John Callaham — 2008-08-27T12:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Biz, Culture

We are not sure why the IDG World Expo would respond to our sister site Joystiq about a story that we first wrote about the apparent lack of game publisher interest in this year's E For All Expo. In fact we alerted IDG that we were working on such a story and wanted a comment beforehand. But in any case they did indeed send a comment to Joystiq and other media outlets so in the interest of fairness here is that response:

"We're disappointed that you didn't contact us yesterday before putting up your E for All post, and we hope you'll do so in the future. At this point, we'll just say that the show isn't over until Tiger hits his last hole in one, Microsoft has packed up its last Xbox, Target has sold its last Wii Fit, Fatal1ty has blown away his last opponent, and the World Cyber Games National champions are crowned. Further announcements are forthcoming, and we are confident that E for All 2008 will be a great event for everyone in the game community."

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Guide to TF2 Heavy Achievements, Part 3

James Murff — 2008-08-27T12:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Expansions, Features, FPS, Multiplayer, Team Fortress 2

Da, Comrade? Vat can we help you with? Oh, you haf your new orders? Glorious! Praise to Mother Russia in all her visdom! We heard you will be gettink new weapons to assist in your fight for one of the Amerikanski corporations. While we do not applaud you working for capitalist dogs, we do not question to visdom of the Motherland. So, in celebration of your new orders and weapons, we will give you this document. It details how to acquire your new armaments. Do not misuse it or distribute it to the enemies of Mother Russia, or we will be forced to inform the KGB of your treasonous actions! You may view parts one and two of our guide as well.

Icing on the Cake

Get 20 kills on players that you're dominating.

This one is not, as you might be led to believe, getting 20 dominations. This is actually killing 20 people that you are currently dominating again without them killing you (hence removing your nemesis status). Chances are you can get this easily, since players that you are dominating are likely to continue to die by your hand. So to get it normally, find a Medic to pair with and go at it!

To farm, get a friend to be Scout on the opposite team and kill him 23 times. 3 times will give you the domination, and the other 20 will give you the achievement. If a Medic is with you, you can also get Big Pharma and Division of Labor rather painlessly. Easy but takes a long time to farm. Make sure that the Scout is dominated before you kill him more.

Tip: If you are killed by the same person you are dominating after killing them again (such as being killed by a Pyro's flames), it still counts.

Crock Block

Survive a direct hit from a critical rocket.

This one is pretty easy to get. Have a Medic continue to heal you as you fight a Soldier. When the Soldier fires a critical rocket, jump into the path of the rocket and let it explode against you. As long as you are overhealed, you will survive it. To do this normally, just be an offensive oriented Heavy that has a Medic attached who suicidally jumps in front of rockets.

To do it farming-wise, just hold in front of a Soldier until he hits you with a critical rocket, and make sure that you are overhealed or being healed by a Medic. As soon as you get hit by a critical, as long as you didn't die, you will get the achievement.

Tip: As the achievement suggested, splash damage doesn't count. The rocket must hit you directly.

Kollectivization

Get 1000 assists.

This one is the Heavy grind. It is probably the achievement you will get last, mostly out of the fact that it will take forever to get. Doing this normally and doing it farming is pretty much the same process. There isn't anything special to doing this. Start up a Heavy, start killing stuff. The only difference between normal and farming is whether or not the enemies will fight back.

Note: This is getting 1000 assists, not providing 1000 assists. Kills do not count towards this.

Spyalectical Materialism

Kill or assist in killing 10 cloaked spies.

This one is mostly luck to get in normal play. You have to bump into an enemy Spy or see them cloak in order to get a bead on an enemy Spy. However, as it also counts if you get an assist, this is a great achievement to get by working with a Pyro on defense. If you damage the Spy, and the Pyro torches him, you will get progress towards this achievement.

To farm this one, work with an enemy Spy. Have him cloak in front of you, and then unload on him while he is still cloaked. After he dies 10 times, you will snag the achievement. Extremely easy to farm as long as the Spy fights the temptation to backstab you (which is a rather large temptation, we must admit!).

Tip: The spy must be fully cloaked or beginning to de-cloak as he died. If you kill him as he cloaks, before he finished, it doesn't.

Permanent Revolution

Kill 5 enemies without spinning down your gun.

This one is incredibly easy to get, as long as you manage to not die between killing enemies. Make your way to the enemy base and get near a high-traffic area. Start spinning your gun, and just start killing enemies. Make sure you have alt-fire constantly held down to keep the gun spinning after a kill you keep from wasting ammo. After 5 kills, if you didn't wind down, you will get the achievement.

To farm this one, get 5 Scouts to line up. Unload on them, not stopping until the very last one has died. As soon as the 5th Scout falls, you will get the achievement. You don't even have to use the alt-fire to continue the spin like doing it normally.

Tip: If the gun at any point starts to spin down, it counts, even if it never comes to a complete stop.

Communist Mani-Fisto

Kill an enemy with a critical punch.

This one can be easy or hard, depending on what kind of Heavy you are. If you are the kind to get up in the face of your enemy, you should get this easily. If you are the kind that plays mind games and attacks mostly with firearms, you may find it a little hard. Since a critical Heavy punch will kill just about any class in a single hit, it's fairly likely that if you kill an opponent, it was a critical and you'll get the achievement.

To farm this, get a Medic with Kritzkrieg to charge up his ubercharge and then uber you. As you have guaranteed criticals, walk up to any enemy class and punch them. They should die after one to two hits, netting you the achievement with minimal effort.

Tip: This is more of an easter egg, but right-clicking while punching punches with the right hand!

Redistribution of Health

Heal 1000 damage with med-kits in a single life.

This one is rather dangerous for a Heavy to do, as it's very easy to die without a helpful Medic around. However, it's easier for defensive Heavies than offensive Heavies, thanks to the better location of med-packs. Basically, as you get damaged, heal yourself through med-packs instead of Medics, and you'll get the achievement as long as you stay alive to pay the 1000 mark.

To farm this, get near a full med-pack an enemy Demo to plant two bombs under you and blow you into the air. The bomb damage and fall should nearly kill you. Then collect the med-pack to instantly return to full. Repeat until achievement is gotten. Remember that you can fall on med-packs to keep from dying, as the health triggers before fall damage.

Tip: This does not include healing through the cabinet. The achievement will not trigger until you die.

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