Gaming bonanza

Welcome to another week of Game.Ars. Glad you could make it. This week we’re looking at lawsuits, perusing some previews and talking with Renegade Gods. It was an interesting week of news, chock full of game “first looks,” “previews,” and “hands-on” articles. I rounded up a few for you, so you could start writing out your gift lists for the holidays. We begin this week with a touch of nostalgia and a look back at Fallout, one of my all-time favorites. Enjoy!

World of Warcraft gets release date.?

November 23. Yep, you read it here first, or possibly second (or third). Either way, we had to start off this week’s Game.Ars with what is likely to be one of the top-five releases of the year, along with Halo 2, Half-Life 2, Everquest 2 and actually, any number of other games ending with the number 2. November is turning out to be a regular game-release Bonanza! What’s atop my list for November? Sid Meier’s Pirates! Avast!

A look back at Fallout

Game Banshee has taken a right turn onto Nostalgia Lane with an in-depth look back at the history of Fallout. I mean they go way back, starting with Wasteland (including its little-known sequel Fountain of Dreams), and then follow the Fallout family tree from its roots to the possible future of the franchise. Any fan of the series will want to read this article to recapture the Fallout mystic. If you are unfamiliar with the Fallout games, then this is a great way to become acquainted. There are even screenshots that still refer to GURPS, the role-playing game that Fallout was originally licensing, until Steve Jackson Games pulled out of the deal.

Fans of Wasteland would have to wait another seven years before another computer role playing game would appear that takes place in the post-apocalyptic America that fans of Wasteland had come to know and love. As of this writing, Fallout 3 may be beaten and banged up, but like any good science fiction hero, it?s still kicking. With Bethesda?s announcement, Fallout fans at least have something to look forward to.

The good news is that hope springs eternal, and Fallout may not be the dead horse that many of us thought it was. With hope for its future, and an informative look at its past, this is an article that any game-lover will appreciate. Go and read The History of Fallout at Game Banshee.

Show me the money!

There’s nothing like a good law suit to drive up the already-high price of video games. According to an article at a The Register, a Texas-based firm is taking all the major game publishers to court for patent infringement. cha-ching ? Anyway, the article offers the following details:

The firm behind the suit, Dallas, Texas-based McKool Smith, has named all the big guns in the gaming industry, including Electronic Arts, Activision, Take Two, Ubisoft, Atari, THQ, Vivendi Universal, Sega, Square Enix, Tecmo, LucasArts and Namco. The patent, number 4,734,690 is owned by one-time printing and graphics specialist Tektronix and covers the display in 2D of a 3D image. It was filed in April 1987 and granted almost a year later. The technique described is used by almost every game that uses 3D modeling, from the latest titles right back to the likes of Quake and possibly right back to Doom and even Wolfenstein.

As of this writing, no further details about the financial claims are available. But we will certainly keep our eyes on this story as it develops. You can read the article here.

Chat with Renegade Gods

The guys at A-Vault talked with Renegade Gods, the developers of the UT 2004 mod, Eden Eclipse. The game, a front-runner in the “Make Something Unreal” contest, is the brainchild of people like you and me, who think that we could make a game that’s better, faster, stronger ? although we never strap ourselves in and actually do it. Well, these guys did, and they are trying their hardest to break head first into the world of professional game development. So to give these guys a little Ars-love, I decided to link up the interview. It’s a good one, too, with interesting questions and some intriguing answers.

Eden Eclipse went through many changes before we switched to the Unreal Tournament series for development. Initially, we started out using the open source Genesis 3D engine; however, we quickly outgrew that engine?s capacity for being able to produce the kind of game we were trying to make.

Along with info on the origin, and the future, of Eden Eclipse, the interview offers a look at how difficult it is to complete a project such as this. If you think it’s all sugar and rosewater, think again:

There have been times when all of us, in a moment of frustration, have been tempted to walk away from Eden Eclipse and forget the project ever existed

Check out the full interview here.

Reality TV evolves

The eternal question we all ask when we read the daily news is “what’s next?” Well, in the case of reality TV, the answer is reality gaming.

In what can only be described as an evil experiment, a Dutch family has agreed to live in a trailer and follow the orders of Electronic Arts employees, sent to them straight from their offices on Redwood City. It’s a real-life version of The Sims 2, which is either going to turn out to be amusing or go horribly wrong (which will also be amusing in it’s own way).?

The Sturkenbooms has stuffed itself into a trailer and is prepared for whatever the evil geniuses at EA can come up with. According to this article at GamePro, the family has already had to deliver goldfish all across the Netherlands. Now why would someone agree to participate in such an experiment? Money. Yep, they do this for four days and they get US$4,000 to spend on electronic gear. That’s probably going to be just enough to afford a copy of The Sims 2 and its 436 expansion sets..

Talking with D.W. Bradley, legend

Video gaming is not a very old pastime but there are still a handful of people who could be called legends of the hobby. Among these legends (not an all-inclusive list) are Peter Molyneux, Sid Meier, Richard Garriott, and the man to whom this paragraph pertains: D.W. Bradley. If you don’t recognize the name, you should know him as the genius responsible for the Wizardry series of video games, some of which date back more than 20 years. He is also the driving force behind the upcoming Dungeon Lords.

RPGdot.com recently snagged an interview with the man and here’s some of the exchange:

Dungeon Lords is undoubtedly an action game, with fast-paced combat playing a significant role. Dungeon Lords uses a full action model, with the player in direct control of the character?s combat moves. Players create a character from around eight races (Bradley seems to be keeping the exact details under wraps), with six primary stats and skills in six categories. Characters start out with one class specialization from Fighter, Mage, Adept or Rogue but a second specialization can be acquired early in the game…

When Bradley was asked how Wizardry fans like Dungeon Lords, he replied:

Oh, they?ll love it! …It never feels arcade-y or like you?re hacking through endless dungeons. Every area feels unique and it always feels connected to the story backbone.

The discussion was primarily about Dungeon Lords, but the info was direct from the mouth of Bradley himself. He talks about the game in detail from the magic and combat systems to the reasons behind many of the basic design decisions. Bradley, showing his love for the art of game design, ends on this note: ?This is the RPG I?ve always wanted to make.” You go, D.W.

Read the interview here.

The role of role-playing games

Mathew Tschirgi at Armchair Arcade tossed up an editorial on the evolution of role-playing games on both PCs and consoles. From the ancient times before Stonehenge was erected and Wizardry I was released, all the way through to our modern role-playing days, he examines the creation, graphic progression and theme of the genre. The article includes screens from such classics as the Apple II version of Wizardry I: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord and Rogue on BSD UNIX circa 1986 and the original Zelda on NES.

The dungeons in Wizardry I were massive compared to those in Ultima; to have any chance of beating the game, players had to break out the graph paper and draw out maps of where they were going. While it sacrificed the epic overworld feel of Garriot’s Ultima I, controlling a group of six player characters offered a more primal RPG experience not unlike a late night D&D session.

Sometimes I miss drawing my own maps. I remember when Dungeon Master came out and I played it on my Atari ST. I drew all the maps an graph paper with a special key-code marking all containers, treasure locations, and switches. I got some construction paper and then bound the maps into a little book. I was so proud. Anyway, role-players and game historians, grab some coffee and sit down with a look at RPG history.

Hands-on with some upcoming games

Reviews and previews of games are always a subjective thing. The best reviews I read are the ones where the writer expresses his opinions of the game, describes the gameplay, and talks about the interface in a way I can understand. If the writer manages to do that, it is possible to determine if I might like the game, even if the reviewer didn’t. With the onslaught of new titles that comes with this time of year, sometimes it’s hard to know which ones to tack onto your wish list. And so, I have assembled some “hands-on” looks at big games that are in our near future. Not quite a review, not quite a preview, a hands-on look is an actual peek into how a game will play, feel, look and sound. Check these out if you desire some insight into what, and what not, to buy: