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[May 14, 2004]
Destination: We're going home was posted by wedge55 @ 7:31 PM E3 ended almost four hours ago, leaving us with little to do. We've all had enough TimeSplitters, Double Dash, and homosexual antics (from the makers of heterosexuality) over the last week to last us for the rest of our lives, or at the very least, until the next E3. OR TGS! Or not. Getting back on track: We've pretty much spent the last four hours sitting in our hotel room, watching TV, and packing to go. Vector_black locked himself in the bathroom again because he seems to think we all find it funny. We did not attend the Insert Credit Del Taco party. We'll have to pay for another night's stay if we're not out of here in thirty minutes, and if we leave now, we should get back home by 1:30 tonight, with a stop or two reserved for any McDonalds we see. After all is said and done, we had a great time here at E3. We were verbally assaulted by LadyGuardian, discovered ShootMe is a woman, and spent half an hour in the Penny Arcade line only to find out that Tycho and Gabe's names are not actually Tycho and Gabe. But most of all, we brought the stories, the ones that really mattered, the ones the major news outlets opted to ignore, the ones that bordered somewhere between stupid and dumb, to you, the twelve dorkclub.com readers who visited this feature over the last week. But even mostest of aller, we entertained ourselves. And in the end, that's all that really matters. E3 for everyone: Guild Wars Penny Arcade described Guild Wars as Diablo meets Phantasy Star Online and left it at that, which is exactly what I was planning on doing. I guess this means I'll actually have to talk about the game. At length. This almost makes me want to resurrect the totally lame OMFG PENNY ARCADE IS COPYING DORKCLUB.COM reoccurring joke. Almost. Relatively long sentence which is complete with subject and verb. Sentence fragment. Right. So Guild Wars is basically a fusion between Diablo and Phantasy Star Online. The game's towns act as universal hubs, and are the only MMO part of the MMORPG. Otherwise, the game's areas are split into one of several instanced classes ranging from solo areas to competitive PvP zones. However, the most interesting play areas, and the ones in which player will probably spend the majority of their time, are the coop missions. Players can either travel through the instanced solo areas to MMO meeting zones, or teleport directly to the next mission area via their map. Once there, they can join one of the many groups forming in the central meeting area before entering the instanced mission with their team of two to four players. These coop missions play out exactly as you would expect them to, complete with random loot, unique boss monsters, and plenty of creatures to slay and/or defend. This is both a blessing and a curse. This tried-and-true formula is entertaining to a point, but there's a definite feeling that we've been here before. For fans of the genre, this is certainly welcome, but for those of us suffering from Diablo 2 burnout, and who have already logged 100+ hours into Sega's PSO titles, the game loses its appeal rather quickly. However, given the fact that this is an alpha build, the gameplay is extremely polished, if derivative. Hopefully Arena Games will use the fact that these areas are instanced to their advantage, incorporating more varied scenarios like those seen in World of Warcraft or promised in Tabula Rasa. However, parts of what makes these missions become so boring so quickly is that every characters is stuck at level 15. They're created at 15 and they'll die at 15, and though they gain experience, they will never level up. This makes it extremely difficult to judge a game based largely around character advancement. Still, the E3 build provides a decent enough sense of what the final game should play like. Interestingly, every character is actually a combination of two classes, one primary and one secondary. This allows for some especially interesting character setups, especially given the functionality of the skill system. Because of Guild Wars' heavy PvP focus (which is not yet implemented in the E3 build, other than small scale 4-on-4 skirmishes), none of the skills are really better than any other, they're simply different. Each skill is useful in different situations, and higher level characters simply have more skills than their lower level guildmates. In order to prevent higher level characters from possessing every single skill the game as to offer, and thus possessing a counter to every situation imaginable, characters are instead limited to having eight skills equipped at a time. For example, my necromancer/monk had a series of damage over time and life draining skills nicely complemented by some party healing and resurrecting skills, making for a potent combo. However, nice as the skill system is, the game's true strength lies in its graphics department. The game's environments are breath-takingly huge, and though they don't quite match up to Far Cry in terms of sheer scale, they more than make up for it in art direction, but given the nature of the developer that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Character models boast plenty of polygons, and everything in the game seems not to shine, but to glow, effectively providing amazing lighting effects without resulting to the plastic looks of DOOM 3 or The Chronicles of Riddick. Though there are still plenty of kinks to work out of the system, Guild Wars has an extraordinary amount of potential, especially given that this is an alpha build featuring a single populated area from the final game. Given the pedigree of the team behind it, I have the utmost faith that Guild Wars will turn out to be an MMORPG to rival even the likes of WoW and Everquest 2, if for no other reason than Arena Games has no plans to charge a monthly fee. Exclusive: Brick Game (working title) Perhaps the most impressive aspect of Epic Games' GDC Unreal 3 technology was the hyper-realistic bricks (the video editing software's getting a workout this week). Besides the obvious Unreal 3, Epic also mentioned they had one more unannounced game using the new Unreal 3 technology currently in development. While grilling a random Atari rep over at the Atari booth mere moments ago, we've learned some interesting new details on Epic Games' unannounced project, tentively titled Brick Game. Brick Game will take advantage of the Unreal 3 engine's stunning brick-rendering capabilities, as the entire game – enemies, environments, and weapons – will consist only of bricks. Brick weapons will fire bricks at brick enemies, discharging spent brick casings, which are also bricks. The Atari rep mentioned an interesting, and initially unplanned strategy, as players can use the fact that their weapons are spewing bricks in two directions to their advantage, damaging enemies with primary fire and discharged bricks alike. The rep also hinted that the game would include some vehicular combat, though the details have not yet been finalized. Though the game should include a lengthy single player experience, it will also be heavily multiplayer focused. Standard game modes such as deathmatch and capture the brick will exist side-by-side with modes made famous by Unreal Tournament such as assault and domination. No word yet on when the game will be officially announced or shown to the public. As large fans of the brick from TimeSplitters 2, especially when used to pwn PopcornChicken, we're eagerly awaiting Brick Game with the highest of hopes. Wedge55 is upset: The future is now As undeniably awesome as both the PSP and Nintendo DS (which I'm betting will launch as the Gameboy DS, or something to that effect) are, I can't help feeling a bit skeptical. And utterly devastated. Sure, the PSP is a feature-rich, ultra-slick device which can run what appears to be crazy a Metal Gear card battle game with better graphics than most Dreamcast games, but all the super-crisp gameplay footage isn't actually running on PSP hardware, but rather running off emulation software on high-end computers. Though Sony's removed the GRAPHIX MIGHT NOT ACTUALLY LOOK LIKE THIS disclaimer they used with the Death Jr. video, not seeing these same images produced via an actual PSP doesn't exactly inspire confidence. Besides, we still don't know the price point for these things, and they could end up costing several arms and/or legs. Personally, I'm not too excited about paying for multiple features I'll never use, regardless of how hard Sony tries to cram as many separate devices into a single handheld. And then there's the lovely prospect of paying at least $60 for a decent sized memory stick. Oh, joy of joys. The Nintendo DS, on the other hand, is the handheld equivalent of the second coming of Christ. Or at least, that's what most major video game outlets seem to be declaring. Yes, I haven't had any chance to play the thing. And yes, I'm basing all of this on gameplay movies, screenshots, and impressions from the show floor, but really, would you expect any less? Graphically, the DS is not a powerhouse. Even the best looking game yet announced, Metroid Prime: Hunters, just looks like a really pretty PS1 title, whereas the ugliest PSP title yet announced (I don't know… that basketball one) looks more like an ugly PS2 game. Additionally, none of the games on display seem to take any unique advantage of the two-screen layout. Although, it's nice to know that half the games on the system will allow me to glance at a map without having to access a menu. While the game is still in motion. Finally. Most of the DS' announced games amount to little more than glorified tech demos, and the most interesting one of them, Namco's Pac Pix, which allows you to draw your very own Pac Man as well as walls to steer him from ghost to ghost, isn't even a game. It's just a tech demo. But don't worry, Pac n' Roll, Namco's stylus-controlled answer to Marble Madness will see a full release. What's really been lost in all the excitement of E3 is that these two systems effectively mean the end of 2D gaming. The DS is backwards compatible, so at least publishers will have no reason to pull the plug on any GBA games in development when Nintendo's “Third Tier” hits this fall, but given Sony's stance on 2D (it's illegal), I doubt we'll see many 2D offerings on their handheld system. It's a shame, really. The handheld market has served as the only source of truly fantastic 2D gaming during this generation (with a few notable console exceptions), but now that this next generation can efficiently push polygons, every developer and their mother will find a reason to replace lively, detailed sprites with large, jagged polys. And thus the realistic prospect of seeing another great 2D Metroid, Castlevania, or Mario (a real 2D game with, you know, sprites) dies away. [May 13, 2004] What if I were to tell you that dorkclub.com had secured exclusive video footage of Resident Evil 4? And that you could download it here? Or here? What then? Gamestop: Gamestop I just preordered Mega Man Anniversary Collection, Starcraft: Ghost, and Pikmin 2 from Gamestop. Gamestop is offering free 2-day shipping on all pre-orders from Gamestop, as long as you enter the code 2DE3 at the Gamestop website. I always shop from the Gamestop website. Gamestop. [May 12, 2004] Stuff: Things So today I walked around a bit. Did some stuff. Looked at things. Tried counting the Gamestop employees. On the plus side, I got a DS stylus handed to me -- that was fun. Just for kicks, I locked the bathroom again this morning before the other guys woke up.
Announcement: Halocraft Following yesterday's announcement concerning Microsoft's acquisition of numerous developers whose names start with the letter B, Blizzard Entertainment announced Halocraft this morning, the latest real time strategy game in their heralded craft series, for the PC. The game will not use the Myth II engine. In an innovative and daring twist, four companies under Microsoft's umbrella will be handling development of the game, each focusing on creating one of the game's four unique factions. Blizzard Entertainment, besides handling the core development of the game, from level design to game engine, will also be responsible for incorporating the Zerg-like Flood into the world of Halocraft. Initial screenshots and gameplay movies indicate that the Flood will play nearly identical to the fan-favorite Starcraft race, as the Flood will rely on superior numbers in order to overwhelm their enemies. Bungie will be handling development of the Covenant, who, rather than rely on sheer strength of numbers, will instead consist of small groups of highly powerful soldiers, each with a wide array of special abilities. Said Bungie co-founder Jason Jones, “If we can make playing as the Covenant even half as dull as the Myth series, then we'll consider it a smashing success.” Chris Taylor will be heading up Gas Powered Games' involvement with the title, working on an RTS for the first time since Total Annihilation. Taylor and his team will be responsible for the USEG, the game's human faction. Besides controlling units such as Marines, Warthogs, and Scorpion Tanks, players will also be able to bring their own personal Spartan into combat. The USEG's Spartan will take up the Commander's role from Total Annihilation, working as a mobile army of one. Spartans will be able to build structures, harvest recourses, and take out enemy armies using the entire arsenal available to the Master Chief in Halo. They will also have infinite health. Finally, Microsoft's' own Big Huge Games division will be developing the ancient Forerunner race. Big Huge Games plans to design the race in such a way so that players will only have a dozen units available to them, but each can be upgraded into one of six hundred different forms, each of which makes the previous form completely unusable. “We're shooting for a race that takes eight hours to really get going,” says Doug Kaufman, senior designer at Big Huge Games. “We're toying around with the idea of starting the player with a primordial ooze which eventually evolves through a few trillion species before finally arriving at the technologically imposing creators of the Halo.” When asked whether or not players could construct their own Halos, and what effects they would have against Flood players, Kaufman commented, “The Halo is the final version of the basic worker unit. Once a player controls eight or more, they win the game.” When asked how they intend to balance four distinct races developed by four wildly different developers, the available Microsoft PR Rep told us Microsoft had no plans of even running the game through beta testing, saying, “We balanced Age of Empires 2 and it had thirteen unique factions.” With three B-named companies behind Halocraft, Microsoft has high hopes for their newest real time strategy title. “I'm thinking of retiring,” added Blizzard's Rob Pardo. Hands-off preview: Everquest 2 It sucks. Interview: Denis Dyack DC: We're thrilled to have this opportunity to talk with you today, Denis. Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule for this interview. Could you introduce yourself for our readers unfortunate enough to be unfamiliar with your work? DD: I am Denis Dyack, president of Silicon Knights. We have been making games since 1992, and our library consists of some of the most innovative and important games released over the last decade. Our first game, Cyber Empires, was an epic real time multiplayer strategy game which was named best multiplayer game in 1992 by Computer Game Review. The game was only released in Europe, and is often forgotten here in the U.S. when discussing land-mark strategy titles. DC: And more recently, you've worked on Eternal Darkness and The Twin Snakes, correct? DD: That is true. We released Fantasy Empires, our follow-up to Cyber Empires, a year later. The game was an official TSR-liscensed product, set in the vast Dungeons & Dragons universe and utilized an innovative artificial intelligence engine that incorporated neural networks into its design. The title is considered by many to be the best Dungeons & Dragons video game title yet released. DC: Yes, you've had a long, interesting history in the video games industry. Can you talk about what you're currently working on? Can we expect to see the next Silicon Knights' game in this generation, or are you holding off for the next round of home consoles? DD: One year later, we released Dark Legions, which won the Editor Choice Award from PC Gamer. The game took an interesting turn during its development cycle as – DC: What about Nintendo? You're company recently split from the Japanese publisher, despite what seemed to be an excellent relationship. During the development of The Twin Snakes, you hinted at future Nintendo-Konami-Silicon Knights collaborations – DD: Nintendo is a lot like Nazi Germany, and Miyamoto is Hitler. DC: Wouldn't Iwata be Hitler and Miyamoto be that guy who came up with the “final solution,” whatever his name was? DD: And Kojima is Mussolini. He puts on this face, acts strong, pretends to be a great leader, but he is weak. He is a puppet! ‘Please, Nintendo,' he says, ‘protect us from communism. Teach us your fascist ways.' And in the end, he will hang, strung up by his countrymen, a mindless puppet dangling from a string. DC: So… does that mean Konami is 1940s Italy? DD: No! Silicon Knights is Italy! Tempted to the darkness by Nintendo, lead by a ruler against the peoples' will! DC: Wouldn't that ruler be you? DD: Forced to fight and die, sent to the concentration camps by the millions, Miyamoto watching as they collect our nude bodies and throw them into the furnace. Meanwhile, NOA, stupid, stupid NOA, is Japan. They think they know what is best but they have no idea. They have awoken a sleeping giant! DC: Sony? Microsoft? DD: They think they know where the future of this industry lies, but they know nothing. They focus on gameplay, creating single player experiences while the rest of the industry goes online, connecting people from around the world. We have stories to tell! Better than any novel ever written! But they want their Marios and their Zeldas with their generic save this, save that narratives! Fools! Did you play Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem?! Do you know what a Requiem is?! DC: Um… Yes. But, going back a little here, why is it that Nintendo of Japan isn't Japan? DD: All I can tell you is that Too Human is in development. You will see it, but I cannot tell you what platform it will be on. Not yet. DC: What? Okay. Hasn't Too Human been in development for like, ten years? DD: We have entire novels that exist within the gameworld, entire libraries filled with hundreds of thousands of pages fleshing out the universe. DC: I… Thank you for your time, Mr. Dyack. [May 11, 2004] Hands-On Preview: stupid Today I stood around outside the E3 entrance thingy and stared at folks intently. My nametag sticker said "n00b." I clutched my Game Gear. Real announcement: PS2 "price drop" Back in the day (specifically today), Sony confirmed the Playstation 2's price drop from $199.99 to $149.99. Even though the console's nearly four years old. And costs Sony roughly twenty-five cents per console to produce. But it's totally justified. Totally justified. After all, it comes with the Sony network adapter and ATV Offroad Fury 2. But not a memory card. Or a second controller. In case you wondering, no, Gamestop hasn't been buying used copies of ATV Offroad Fury 2 for months now. Announcement: Microsoft to acquire B-developers Following the success of Halo, still the XBox's only million seller, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, developed by Bungie Studios and BioWare Corporation, respectively, Microsoft announced its plans to acquire every single video game developer with a name starting with the letter B during its pre-show press conference this morning. Aside from taking on BioWare as a first party developer, Microsoft has added the following developers to its ever-growing list of wholly owned production studios: This list represents only those companies which Microsoft had acquired as of this morning, as the company continues its negotiations with numerous more B-developers. “If we have success with the Bs,” said one Microsoft spokesperson, “we will consider moving on to the Cs.” No word on how this will affect games already in production at any of the aforementioned development houses. Announcement: Earthbound Collection While it's easy to get overwhelmed by all the hype surrounding the Nintendo DS and the new GameCube Zelda, Nintendo announced the impending release of Earthbound Collection for the GBA at its pre-show press conference today, right between footage of Metroid Prime Hunters and Mario 64 X 4. Known as Mother 1+2 in Japan, the single GBA cart houses both the original Mother for the NES and the SNES' Mother 2, released as Earthbound here in the states. Both games will take advantage of their original English translations, marking the first time anyone outside of Nintendo will (legally) see the translation of the first game in the series. Earthbound Collection will be released on October 12 of this year, but in an interesting twist, not only will those who signed Starmen.net's infamous Mother 3 petition be the only people allowed to buy the game, they will be forced to purchase it. In related news, 31,337 people recently withdrew their names from the Starment.net Mother 3 petition. The plan: Operation Surma I didn't get much sleep last night, but neither did LeadPipe. Or PopcornChicken. Or vector_black. Being the financially-challenged super team that we are, we've been forced to share a single room during our stay here in L.A. LeadPipe and PopcornChicken, being incest-capable and all, agreed to share a single bed, while I took the other. Vector_black has been forced to sleep on the floor, largely because he deserves it. But, like I said so many sentences ago, nobody got much sleep last night, as every fifteen minutes I would dive into LP/PC's bed and thrust blindly at whatever I landed on. A pillow, a leg, the back of a neck, nothing was safe from my wrath. The staff really earns their pay around here. Right now we're about to head off to the convention center, as we have no idea what time Sony, Nintendo, or Microsoft's pre-show press conferences begin. We figure we'll just camp the entrance until someone lets us in. Assuming the conferences are even held in the same place as the show proper. We'll try to snap some photos of banners and empty displays which feature names of unreleased games, as it's the closest thing to journalism this industry ever sees, and report back here with whatever we discover. [May 10, 2004] Stupid: a musical interlude Being the complete dorks that we are, we secured our tickets to Square-Enix's Dear Friends, their much-hyped (in certain circles) Final Fantasy concert, long ago even though we're not particularly fond of most of the series (I'M SPEAKING FOR EVERYONE HERE!). However, we realize that most members of The People were unable to attend the concert, seeing as how there were, let's say, one billion people here tonight, and like four billion people not here. Knowing this, I snuck in some sort of sound-recording device whose recordings are easily uploadable to that laptop PC we brought with us (let's say it's vector_black's) and recorded the orchestra's stirring rendition of Final Fantasy's timeless battle theme. This link is the music! Click here to hear it! Hear here! Exclusive first look: wedge55 Wedge55 is slapping himself right next to me, and I wish he would stop. Like... right now. Go back to the GameCube, please. The neighbors are going to hear. In other news, we looked at the booths of all the other gaming sites currently being set up. I lied -- we're not cool enough to be let inside yet. But wedge really is slapping. That part's not a lie, unfortunately. Also, watched STARGATE SG-1! Episode involved a girl with a built-in thermonuclear bomb. This just in R One-Oh-Seven > PopcornChicken Up Here: The way to do things Upon reaching the hotel room, my first act as official "vector_black" of this expedition to hell was to set down most of the other guys' luggage in the bathroom, push the lock on the doorknob, and step back out closing the door behind me. There was a brief burst of creative swearing, and some insulting names were exchanged. Luckily I had my Game Gear to help me while away the time as wedge called someone from housekeeping to come up with a key. Desintation: We're already here LeadPipe, PopcornChicken, vector_black, and I are sitting here in room number 127 of the Holiday Inn City Center (HICC) in beautiful downtown Los Angeles. I wanted room 55, but apparently Ye Ol' HICC doesn't number rooms like normal, room numbering folks, and likes to stick a 1 in front of everything. Either way, room 155 was already occupied, probably by a whore and her uh, whorer. Or worse/better, his. Right. We pulled into town a little under thirty minutes ago, even though the real E3, not this masturbatory dance dance motorcycle circus merry-go-round whole earth festival that all the publishers (those who took enough of our money to afford it) put on over the next two days, doesn't start until Wednesday. If anything, these extra 36 hours will just give the four of us some quality together time, spent bonding over Smash Bros., TimeSplitters, and Double Dash. And overpriced, barely edible pizza from the hotel's kitchen. I seem to have already derailed here, a mere two paragraphs into this website's largest (maybe) feature to date. An eight hour drive starting at 4:00 AM with LeadPipe, AKA Communist China, enforcing his iron will and keeping the homosexual antics to a minimum (we'll see how long he can keep it up), can do that to a man. In case you haven't realized, which, given the title of this page and the nature of the link you clicked to arrive at this feature, I don't understand how you could possibly arrive here unawares, the good old boys on The DORK Club staff are getting our E3 on this year and reporting all the report-worthy reports right here for the people. The people of this fine country who might not have the time, money, or energy to haul their 20.9% obese asses down to L.A. to spend three days wandering around nerd-saturated showrooms playing unfinished video games. The people who work two jobs, bringing up three kids by themselves so that they can lead a better life. The people who wake up before the sun and drive two hours to the mill, working long, hard hours at minimum wage with no benefits in order keep this country moving. We're here for you, America, and we've blocked the IP addresses of all those fucking Canadians and Japanese from viewing this page. We'll be meeting up with Piyonugget, Harisn, ShootMe, and Manatee (who is last because he's the worst) sometime before, or after, the show starts on Wednesday. I'd be lying if I told you we had everything planned out, although we have decided that I'll do everything for this feature while the other seven (!) members of this “staff” spend their days refreshing IGN and cutting in line to watch the Half-Life 2 movie. Again. In the meantime, be sure to check back here every five minutes, because you never know when we'll be posting a piece of life-changing information. |
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