How to find a StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm launch event near you

Much as we’ve all had a love-hate relationship with brick and mortar game stores, some of my fondest memories as a PC gamer have been lining up in the freezing cold with dozens of other gamers to grab the next big collector’s edition at midnight on launch day. If you’re hoping to have that experience with Heart of the Swarm, Blizzard has created a dedicated page to find launch events in your area.
So far, there is only one event listed for each region. There will be some Blizzard presence in Mexico City, Brazil, the US, Russia, France, Taiwan, Singapore, Australia, and, of course, South Korea. Many of these events will also feature prominent eSports pros. The event in our neck of the woods, in Irvine, California (near Blizzard HQ), will feature MC, Polt, Suppy, and ViBE, with emceeing by Day[9] and Husky.
If you don’t live near one of the officially-sanctioned events, I’d recomment the r/barcraft subreddit, which is a hub for organizing (mostly StarCraft-centric) eSports viewing events at local venues. Depending on your area, it’s not always 100% dependable, and tends to be US-centric, but most major metro areas have at least one or two. There’s also a running list on TeamLiquid with a few more locations, including the Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, Croatia, Sweden, and Israel.

Respawn Entertainment will be at E3 with “no intention of showing up empty handed”

On March 1st, 2010, Activision fired Infinity Ward heads Vince Zampella and Jason West. Things were said, lawsuits were filed, Zampella and West formed Respawn Entertainment, half of the Call of Duty studio’s staff walked out, EA jumped in and got sued too, then Yakety Sax played until everyone got tuckered out. Amid all that, Respawn seems to have developed a very blurry game, which may come into focus at E3 according to a pair of tweets from Zampella.
The news is notable because Zampella and West are notable, and not just for their role in creating Call of Duty. Before forming Infinity Ward, they were at 2015, Inc., where they designed one of my favorite shooters ever: Medal of Honor: Allied Assault. The duo is partially responsible for two of the best-known FPS franchises ever, making Respawn’s next game potentially a major competitor.
But if they do announce a game at E3, just how will they announce it? At EA’s press conference? Maybe, but I think it’s also likely Microsoft or Sony has snagged the announcement as a card to play in the battle between the PlayStation 4 and Xbox DifferentNumber. Even so, that won’t necessarily make it a console exclusive, whatever it is. And by “whatever,” I of course mean, “probably a shooter.”

Valve don’t even fire people like a normal company – Varoufakis on hiring and firing

The vision of Valve as a utopian game developer’s retreat was dented the other week, when details of internal lay-offs and firings were made public. In an interview with the EconTalk podcast, transcribed by Gamasutra, Valve’s in-house economist Yanis Varoufakis spoke about the company’s hiring and firing process. It is, as you might expect, all a bit weird.
“It does happen,” Varoufakis said about staff firing. “I’ve seen it happen. And it’s never pretty. It involves various communications at first when somebody’s underperforming, or somebody doesn’t seem to fit in with the rest of the company.
“In many occasions people simply don’t fit in not because they’re not productive or good people, but because they just can’t function very well in a boss-less environment. And then there are series of discussions between co-workers and the person whose firing is being canvased or discussed, and at some point if it seems there is no way that a consensus can emerge that this person can stay, some attractive offer is made to the particular person, and usually there’s an amicable parting of ways.”
The hiring process is similarly crowdsourced. “Let’s say you and I have a chat in the corridor, or in some conference room, or wherever. The result of this chat is that we converge to the view that we need an additional software engineer, or animator, or artist, or hardware person. Or several of them. What we can do is, we can send an email to the rest of our colleagues at Valve and invite them to join us in forming a search committee that actually looks for these people without seeking anyone’s permission in the hierarchy, simply because there is no hierarchy.” Anyone within the company is then invited to take part in the interview process, and consensus is sought before a hire is made.
Varoufakis also details the pay-review process, which he says is largely bonus based. He notes that there’s no upper limit to bonuses, so thanks to the nature of mutual review, “bonuses can end up being 5, 6, 10 times the level of the basic wage.”
“I wasn’t with the company long enough to notice, but there must have been situations where somebody didn’t fit in and eventually was edged out of the company,” Varoufakis admits. “But the vast majority of such moves simply contribute to the overall efficiency, and to the private joy of working there.”

Death Inc gets co-op multiplayer, Molyneux’s fervent support

Plucky Kickstarter project Death Inc. is still fighting towards its £300,000 target with a little over a week to spare. Yesterday, mighty man of games Peter Molyneux joined with other industry chums to pledge his support to the promising plague-bearing RTS, and today the devs have added another two major bullet-points to the game’s list of features: co-op multiplayer and iPad support. You can see both the multiplayer and Molyneux in action after the jump.
The game is sort of Pikmin by way of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, in which your horde of sweating, puking plague victims sweeps through Merry Old England, claiming the souls of its citizens for the Grim Reaper. It’s funny, gorgeous to look at and snappy to control – a fact which you can confirm yourself if you download the demo.

QuakeCon 2013 announced for August

Things guaranteed to happen each year: incrementally improved new versions of popular products, at least one earnestly predicted end of the world scenario, and QuakeCon, id Software’s mega-LAN party/PC gaming celebration. This year the BYOC event will be held August 1st – 4th at its regular stomping ground, the Hilton Anatole Hotel in Dallas, Texas.
Don’t fancy lugging your rig across the country/world? Not to worry, Bethesda will also be showing off some of their upcoming titles for the first time in public. Chances are that means Elder Scrolls Online, but I’ve also got my fingers crossed for a possible Prey 2 revival.
As with previous years, attendance is free. The hotel is also offering a deal on rooms, details of which are available at the QuakeCon site.

Arma 3 alpha goes live next week; get instant access through Steam pre-order

Attention, soldiers! After a uniquely challenging development period, Arma 3 is set to begin public alpha manoeuvres next week. From the 5th March, pre-orders for the military sim will go live on Steam, offering instant access to anyone who purchases either the Alpha or Digital Deluxe editions of the game.
The alpha trial will include four missions (“Infantry, Vehicles, SCUBA and Helicopter”), a limited selection of weapons and vehicles, two multiplayer scenarios, the scenario editor and modding support. All this will take place on the 20 km² island of Stratis, the smaller brother of the full game’s 270 km² Atlis.
“The Arma 3 Alpha is a big milestone in the project’s development,” writes co-creative director Jay Crowe. “Testing early and often puts us on the right track towards improving performance, stability and delivering on our goal of creating a robust final release. It’s also a big opportunity to get the game in the hands of our passionate community, which enables them to start work on their own creations, tailored to the fourth generation of the Real Virtuality engine.”
A free, limited version of the alpha, titled Arma 3 Alpha Lite, will also be available a week after the purchase edition, from March 14th. The lite version lacks both multiplayer and modding support. A full list of purchasing options and their benefits is available from this handy comparison chart.
Arma 3 Alpha edition will cost €24.99/£19.99/$32.99.

Red Orchestra 2 mapping contest rewards the community’s best battlefields

Tripwire have announced the winners of their community mapping contest. Over $35,000 worth of prize money was handed out in recognition of the expertly crafted World War 2 battlefields that mapmakers have created, fuelling fans of the military shooter for months and years to come. The grand prize went to Danh Truong for his Winterwald map, a harrowing icy assault on/defence of Soviet anti-air.
The winners for “Best Original Level”, including Truong’s Grand Prize map, are:
1. Winterwald by Danh Truong, winning $10,000 and RO2 laptop
2. Bridges of Druzhina by Kieran Tobin, winning $2,500
3. Coldsteel by Johan van Pelt – wins $1,000
The contest also looked at “Best Remakes”, awarding quality re-imaginings of classic maps:
1. Gumrak Station by Maik Doktor, winning $5,000
2. Stalingrad Kessel by Florian Montaut, winning $2,500
3 (Tied). Arad 2 by John Cree, winning $1,000
3 (Tied). Rakowice by Johan van Pelt, winning $1,000
All the maps, along with runners up, are now playable from the Steam Workshop.

AMD’s TressFX hair rendering magic revealed, makes Lara’s locks look loveliest on PC

After teasing us all with its TressFX tagline – Render. Rinse. Repeat – AMD have today revealed their (apparently painstaking) collaboration with Crystal Dynamics: the world’s first real-time hair rendering technology in a playable game. Tomb Raider is the first title to get the treatment, with its bedraggled heroine’s bonce featuring the most advanced follicle tech ever.
Realistic hair is, according to AMD, one of the most complex and challenging materials to accurately produce in real-time. With so many different strands and physics computations needed to model their interaction with each other, it’s no wonder that we’ve been stuck with chunky polygon make-weight barnets in gaming. But no longer.

Cheer up, Lara, at least your hair looks nice.

TressFX uses the existing DirectCompute language to use the massively parallel capabilities of modern graphics cards, and AMD is citing the Graphics Core Next architecture as key to the ability to accurately render the hair in real-time. It’s not clear yet whether the TressFX tech is going to be proprietary to AMD’s Graphics Core Next architecture, or whether it’s going to run on any GPU with the compute capabilities necessary to handle such a large number of objects. However, there are strong suggestions it’ll be an open technology: AMD have talked a lot about using the open DirectCompute language, and though their GCN architecture is particularly well-equipped to handle this stuff, they’ve never stated it’s the only architecture capable.
That could be very important for the widespread use of the tech by different developers, and considering Nvidia’s Tessellation/compute-based hair tech hasn’t been really picked up since its launch alongside Fermi in 2010, you’d hope AMD would see the opportunities inherent in making their tech open for all. Plus, AMD has past form in championing non-proprietary tech, like the HD3D tech and the Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) it is soon introducing to its APUs – possibly in the PlayStation 4 and NextBox – so we’ve got high hopes.

Nvidia showed off this demo of tessellated hair back in 2010

The possibilities for this technology are thrilling: more realistic yetis, real-time beard physics, Hair Salon Simulator 2014…
Just imagine!

So, Lara, where you off to on your holidays this year? Rampaged on any endangered species lately?

Resident Evil 6 benchmarking tool prepares your PC for the coming horror

Whether you want to play Resident Evil 6 is a matter best left to reviews. Whether you can play it is something we can answer right now. Nvidia and Capcom have teamed up to create a benchmark app for the upcoming action horror sequel. Think of it as a separate game for you PC, in which it’s forced to battle with extreme hordes of polygons and lighting. It’s even given a score and end-of-level Resi-rank.
The app also comes bundled with some extra promotional gumpf, should a few additional trailers be of interest. Honestly, I don’t think anyone was expecting Resi 6 to be a graphical juggernaut, making this a curious thing to release. Still, for those who are planning an outing with the zombie-laden co-op shooter, I’m sure the extra reassurance won’t go amiss. Alternatively, you can just bask in the smug glow of an S-rank, provided your PC’s up to it.
Resident Evil 6 releases on March 22nd.
Thanks, Joystiq.

PlanetSide 2′s boss on bans – says team are “busting our asses” to get cheaters out

In an address to Reddit, SOE’s John Smedley explained some of the methods and miscommunications behind their continued efforts to ban cheaters from PlanetSide 2. It’s clearly an issue that Smedley feels strongly about, and he doesn’t pull punches when describing the team’s attempts to track them down. “It’s a constant effort,” he writes. “We just want you to know we hate them just as much as you do and we’re busting our asses to get them out of the game. Do we do it as fast as you might like? Not all the time no. But we also don’t want to falsely accuse people without solid proof.”
“If we have clear evidence of a person cheating we ban them. We search for any other accounts they have and we ban those too. We have very good hacking detection algorithms. They aren’t perfect though. There are some things that are very hard to detect.” Smedley confirms that there is no seven-day ban, but that temporary suspensions can be placed on accounts – either for actions that don’t warrant a full ban, or as a measure while the team investigates suspected cheating.
“Sometimes people say ‘But this guy is an obvious aimbotter’. That may be true. It may not be,” Smedley continues. “There are a lot of really good people in this game. There are also aimbotting scumbags. Telling the difference can be tough for our players sometimes but it’s not for us. However we are careful about who we ban. We don’t just ban because some player reports and says person X is an aimbotter. We actually put in the time to confirm this.”
Smedley finishes by reassuring players that bans aren’t the only tool in SOE’s anti-cheat arsenal. “After having personally viewed some of the major cheat sites I can tell you I’m blown away by how sophisticated some of these operations are. They are making money on this. We’re working on that from another angle too that I’m not going to go into just yet (hint. it involves lawyers). But we have the resources to fight this fight and we will keep doing it.”
Thanks, Polygon.

Guild Wars 2 cuts the price of combat – ArenaNet remove paid PvP

Today marks the release of Guild Wars 2′s much-teased second Flame & Frost update, The Gathering Storm. The patch not only adds guild missions, a new PvP map and a continuation of the game’s Living Story, but also brings a change to paid PvP tournaments. Specifically, it removes them, instead relying on a more robust matchmaking system that will govern the remaining free tournaments.
“One of the reasons we initially introduced Paid Tournaments was to create a place for hyper-competitive, highly skilled players to find matches with other players of comparable skill, leaving the Free Tournament system available for more casual competitive play,” explains ArenaNet’s Tyler Bearce. Now that the matchmaking system can accurately place players of a similar skill level, that paid tier is no longer necessary.
After the update, 1-round and 3-round free tournaments will be available, each with a separate matchmaking rank.
Bearce notes that any remaining Tournament Tickets can now be exchanged for Gold, Silver or Copper reward chests at the Ticket Merchant NPC, next to the Tournament Master in Heart of the Mists.

Crysis gets VR mod – beam maximum graphics directly into your face

Listen, developers: if you’re planning to add Oculus Rift support into your games, you’d better do it quick. Wait too long and modding powerhouse Nathan Andrews will beat you to it. He’s unstoppable. Fresh from taming the Source engine to add head and gun tracking to Half-Life 2 and Black Mesa, he’s now turned his attentions to the CryEngine, and has a video of Crytek’s first nanosuited outing running with the tech.
“I ported the Half-Life 2 VR mod that I’ve been working on over to Crysis and Crysis Wars (and also Cryengine 3 if anyone is interested in building a game from the ground up with VR support),” writes Andrews, as if it ain’t no thing. The mod’s not yet complete – as you’ll see in the video, it’s lacking crosshair tracking and iron-sights, making aiming a bit difficult. Still, as proof of concepts go, it’s undeniably impressive.
This may be the thing that pushes me over into actively wanting an Oculus Rift. The device has always seemed interesting in an academic way, but the chance to go Predator through Crysis’ jungle island sounds simply irresistible.
Given that modders are geniuses who can do anything (probably?), which games would you love to see running in VR?

Watch Dogs will use new engine, not old Assassin’s Creed tech

Ubisoft’s much-anticipated hack-’em-up Watch Dogs will not be powered by the same engine behind Assassin’s Creed, which in the name of progress, is good news. The confirmation comes via Ubisoft’s Sebastien Viard, who is the technical director on Watch Dogs and has contributed to Far Cry 2 and 3. He Tweeted earlier today that Watch Dogs uses a “brand new engine” called Disrupt, which was created by Ubisoft Montreal and has been created for the express purpose of powering the new game.
The new info comes after reports yesterday that Watch Dogs will push what creative director Jonathan Morin is calling “hyperconnectivity.” Morin explained it as online “all the time and anywhere.”
Watch Dogs will release towards the end of the year – probably November

After Reset is a post-apocalyptic RPG with classic tastes

There’s something attractive about eking an existence from the charred ruins of civilization. Perhaps it’s because of the various ways to share a story within such a backdrop. Or maybe it’s the carte blanche moments of acting like a complete butthead without consequence. Whatever the magic truly involves, it’ll hopefully work its way in during the development of After Reset, a (deep breath) Unity-powered, multiplayer, isometric, post-apocalyptic sci-fi RPG.
As the nameless development team describes it, After Reset “takes place in the future on Earth dying slowly after nuclear cataclysm that buried nearly all life on the planet.” They say we’ll get a “deep and emotional story” fashioned after genre greats such as Fallout and Stalker, as well as a custom adventure toolkit for modders and persistent multiplayer support.
Further pokings around the game’s website suggest After Reset is still in its very early concept phases. The Contacts section shows an “In Progress” for the 3D modelers and programmers section, a responsibility kind of required if any gamesmithing is to occur. That makes the peculiar presence of a pre-order button a little questionable.
Still, a few proto-screenshots and a fair amount of concept art are available for viewing, so it seems like the team is set on getting this project done. Have a look below. More can be found at After Reset’s website.

The PS4 version of Diablo 3 may have offline co-op, no word on PC equivalent

In a video which has now been removed from YouTube (via the RPS forums), a Blizzard rep announced the addition of offline, shared-screen co-op to the PlayStation 4 port of Diablo 3. Whether this is strictly co-op, or will allow single-player offline as well, wasn’t specified, but it seems odd that offline play would be present and restricted to co-op. There’s no word on whether the feature will make it to PC, and Blizzard tells PC Gamer that it is not yet ready to share anything on the subject.
Offline play has been a highly-requested feature among Diablo 3 players since before release, with its always online model presenting one of the largest controversies in a story that has had more than its share—the infamous “Error 37″ connection failure that plagued launch is up there among the most recognizable memes in PC gaming.
Early interviews with Blizzard seemed to suggest that always online was a decision made in order to give us the best version of the game possible. If the PS4 version really has offline co-op, we have to wonder why they’re allowed to have “not the best version” and we aren’t. The most obvious assumption is piracy concerns.
We’ll update you as soon as we know more.

Black Snow co-op mod: because it’s better to flee the darkness with a friend

Forget for a moment about debating what happens to horror’s impact whenever another player enters the scene. When you open a murkily lit doorway framing a pitch-black hallway seething with malevolent abominations of shadow, you’ll want someone close by to cling to…or a giant, stuffed teddy bear. The Black Snow mod for Half-Life 2 is sadly bear-less, but its new co-op mod-in-a-mod revisits the atmospheric creepiness with up to four players and up to four pairs of pants ready for wetting.
Piggybacking (with permission) on the original single-player Black Snow, the co-op mod adds a few necessary communication binds such as a character, radio, and inventory key. You’re also equipped with a flashlight, since foraging for items in the dark sort of gets easier when you have a bit more light. That’s just me, though.
The objective in Black Snow’s co-op stays the same: gather items, solve puzzles, and fight bravely run away from Very Scary Things. As part of a response team sent into the eerily silent Amaluuk Research Station housed within the icy grip of Greenland, you need to figure out what happened, where everyone went, and oh my God what is that thing runrunRUN.
If you’re ready, head over to Black Snow co-op’s website and give it a download. Be sure to grab your nearest teddy-friend for support.

BioWare: next-gen graphics are “a big leap,” but the difference “won’t be as obvious”

We’ve heard from Crytek on the stacked odds next-gen consoles face against PCs in the ongoing struggle for graphics glory, but BioWare has some thoughts on how money factors into whatever dances across your screen. In an interview with OXM, Art Director Neil Thompson believes the next graphics tier will represent “a big leap” for studios, but any such progression “won’t be as obvious” due to already ballooned budgets.
“People will do things in a cleverer fashion—and I have to be careful here as there are non-disclosure agreements involved; I think they’ll be better prepared, shall we say—but we can’t see a ten-fold team increase again as the budgets would just be ridiculous. You’d have to sell 20-30 million copies before you broke even,” Thompson explains.
Though Thompson’s comments deal more with the generational differences between consoles instead of PCs, his stance on developers staying economically aware as they push their games’ visuals further seems pretty universal. It’s a far cry from the consumer side of the issue, as gamers can achieve comparable visual quality with a setup costing as little as $600.
“I think the main thing is that the industry doesn’t get itself into a corner where it becomes economically nonviable to make a game,” Thompson continues. “The last technology iteration caught folks by surprise, especially with the number of people you needed and the skillset jump that was required to do the work that people expected. In the last generation, the perception was that it was going to be a ten times improvement over the previous generation.”
Check out the rest of OXM’s interview for more of Thompson’s words on BioWare’s art direction and life at the studio.

Red Alert and Tiberium universes planned for new Command & Conquer

The upcoming, free-to-play Command & Conquer is based on C&C: Generals—it was originally being developed as a sequel—but Victory Games says it plans to add the Red Alert and Tiberium universes sometime after launch. Speaking at a preview event last month (read our hands-on impressions), Victory Games GM Jon Van Caneghem laid out those plans and more as he looked ahead to the next 10 years.
“So, we like to say that 2013 is…the beginning of the next 10 years of Command & Conquer games, and we’ve been building this platform and this first game to start that process,” said Caneghem. “As we mentioned, our first outing is going to be in the Generals universe…but over time, we want to add the Tiberium universe and the Red Alert universe, even a new fiction we’ve been working on.”
I was also happy to hear Caneghem mention plans for single-player campaigns. “This really becomes a service that just goes, and goes, and goes,” he said. “We’ll be adding content weekly, monthly, constantly going forward: new universes, campaigns, single-player, more game modes.”
When asked, Caneghem wouldn’t elaborate on how single-player content will be monetized or if we can expect the series’ trademark FMVs. Victory also isn’t saying exactly when Command & Conquer will enter open beta, other than “sometime this year,” or when we can expect the Red Alert and Tiberium universes to show up. We reached out to Kane for comment, but he just did this.

More Walking Dead possibly releasing before second season

Telltale previously said the upcoming second season of The Walking Dead’s continued tale can go in any direction, but eager fans might not have to wait until then for more of that sweet zombie-laden drama. Speaking to IGN, writer and former PC Gamer Editor-in-Chief Gary Whitta reveals the studio is considering working on some interstitial content between seasons to shorten the wait.
“I can tell you what you already know, which is season two is coming,” Whitta says. “There’s not much to say because it really is very early, and it’s a way off. But, knowing that it’s a way off, and knowing that people are hungry for more Walking Dead, there may very well be more Walking Dead from Telltale before season two. We may have a little something extra for you between season one and two.”
Whitta didn’t elaborate on the scope of the possible pre-season content, though Telltale’s primary challenge probably lies with incorporating what players enjoyed best from the initial five episodes as a potential prologue for season two. Earlier this month, Telltale CEO Dan Connor didn’t rule out crossover appearances of characters from the AMC TV show in future episodes.

Dishonored story DLC hinted at by PS3 Trophies

Dishonored’s roof-flitting ride to revenge already landed our Singleplayer Shooter of 2012 award, but there may be more to the saga in an upcoming DLC pack hinted at by a new batch of PS3 Trophies.
The Trophies list accomplishments for a new mission entitled “The Other Side of the Coin,” including High and Low Chaos completions suggesting a story-oriented add-on. A few new locations also appear, sticking with Dunwall’s theme of industrialized aristocracy with mention of a Rothwild Slaughterhouse and the estate of Thalia Timish.
Here’s the full Trophy list:

• Just Business – You got the information needed from the Rothwild Slaughterhouse
• Missing Pieces – You obtained Delilah Copperspoon’s identity from Thalia Timish
• Well Connected – You purchased all of the Favors in The Other Side of the Coin
• No Regrets – You completed The Other Side of the Coin in High Chaos
• Redemptive Path – You completed The Other Side of the Coin in Low Chaos
• Whisper Ways – You completed The Other Side of the Coin without alerting anyone
• Cleaner Hands – You completed The Other Side of the Coin without killing anyone
• Rats and Ashes – You caused a death using an arc mine and a rat
• Message from the Empress – You performed a drop assassination from atop the Empress statue
• Stone Cold Heart – You spoke with the statue of Delilah in Timsh’s estate

If the Trophies suggest what we think they do, I’d like to see a deeper exploration of some of Corvo’s more dramatic encounters within Dunwall, such as with the stone-faced assassin leader Daud, who received the same blessing of shadowy powers from the mysterious Outsider. The Outsider himself is perhaps Dishonored’s greatest enigma to mold future stories around, but they don’t have to involve Dunwall—I’d kill (not really, I’m a Low Chaos kind of guy) for a visit to other locations in the Empire of Isles beyond Gristol, particularly Corvo’s home-island of Serkonos.

Command & Conquer: hands-on with EA’s rebuilt RTS

Command & Conquer might just be the free-to-play game that humanises EA. The venerable strategy series is currently being rebuilt from the old pieces of a previously announced sequel to Command & Conquer: Generals. Its former life as a normal, boxed game has given developers Victory Games a platform to produce an unconventional F2P game. For EA at least.
Tim Morten, senior development director told me: “We have been really fortunate to be able to just start with the game. We spent the first years of development not thinking about business model or monetisation, literally just focussed on the core mechanics of the game, and we got those to the point where we felt it was fun.”

“You’ll be given a certain number of Generals for free, but the others won’t necessarily need to be bought.”

Right now it’s in pre-alpha, but still feels like classic C&C. It’s a resource gathering, force-building strategy game of the type you’d expect from the series. It’s wobbly, and so my hands-on at a recent EA event was punctuated with crashes and log-outs, but it did show me a glimpse of Victory Games’ care and attention. The current build has three generals, all from the Generals era (EA hope to add more themes from the entire C&C lore). The tech-focussed EU faction, the guerrilla warfare inspired Global Liberation Army, and the large scale Asian Pacific Alliance are in there right now, but it plans to launch with a dozen. You’ll be given a certain number of Generals for free, but the others won’t necessarily need to be bought.

“We’re trying to enable players to both grind or buy,” Tim explains. “The first big example would be Generals. Then there’s customisation, so vanity items. Then there’s convenience, things like XP boosts that last a certain amount of time.”

“Free players will get access to all the maps. As Morten points out, splitting the community isn’t the way forward.”

So there will be routes to acquiring things that won’t involve your wallet creaking. And what was that about XP? It’s needed for the persistent profile. It’s the biggest, necessary addition to keeping the game competitive. The Generals themselves level, so as you play the General’s level will increase. But you as a meta-player will have your own level. As Morten explains, that meta-level is needed for the fiddly matchmaking: “As a player who hasn’t paid a dime but maybe has played a hundred matches, you may have some very capable Generals with player powers that have been fully levelled. It wouldn’t be fair to be matched against someone who’s very new to the game, whether they’re a paying player or a free player.”
Which seems to be right way to go. Free players will also get access to all the maps. As Morten points out, when you’re trying to build a community, splitting it isn’t the way forward: “Our current thinking is that we want players to have the ability to play with anybody else, and as soon as you start segmenting ‘Oh I’ve got this map, but you don’t’ it makes it very difficult to play with friends. We feel like maps are something that should be available without price, essentially.”

With that in mind, I mention the possibility of user-created content. If maps are free, then is there a chance for the game to come with a map editor. Surprisingly it’s something Victory games are considering. Morten says they’ll do it if they can make it work: “It’s not as much about free-to-play as it is about the engine. I’m really excited about the possibility of potentially providing the ability for players to trade maps, and to have an interface for that instead of it just being ad-hoc through sites.”

“Our server back-end is run entirely in the cloud, so users having their own box – that’s not possible.”

The good will eventually runs out at server-hosting. I didn’t expect it to be any other way, but Morten confirms that there will be only EA hosted servers that users can customise: “Our server back-end is run entirely in the cloud, so in terms of being able to set-up tournaments using our servers, absolutely, but users having their own box – that’s not possible, because it’s got to be part of our cloud cluster. We’re still going to provide player the hooks to provide their own tournaments, so hopefully they’ll still get the features they want, but with a good quality of experience.”
Which is a lovely reason at least. As for the game, well it’s C&C but with a destructible engine and currently shoddy pathfinding. It’s the very definition of alpha, but in that currently clumsy skin it still has captured the C&C feeling. After wrangling resources and sorting out a build order, I then sent some tanks off to meet the encroaching AI. The tanks that I spent all my time building ran right through some walls and buildings, which was at least a decent demonstration of the engine’s destructible aspects, and then the game crashed. And yet I’m excited. They’re on the right track.

Runner 2 trailer sprints to the finish ahead of tomorrow’s launch

I had a complicated relationship with the original Bit.Trip Runner, both really enjoying it and being hopelessly frustrated by it at the same time. The last few levels caused more vitriolic cursing than any other game I can recall. The sequel, BIT.TRIP Presents… Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien, is released tomorrow. Yay?
Just imagine that trailer with a continuous stream of expletives and you’ll have a fairly good idea of what to expect.
Runner 2 features five new worlds, offering 120 levels of increasingly difficult rhythm platforming. Pre-orderers can expect a free copy of the first game, as well as some sporty new trainers for TF2′s Scout. Alternatively, the Game Music Bundle is currently running a deal offering Runner 2′s soundtrack, the six previous Bit.Trip soundtracks and the game for $20.