* SquareEnix are speculated to soon unveil a new Carmageddon game, after the cancellation of the series in 2005.
* The Witcher 2 will require an NTFS-formatted HDD (with 16 Gb for the game) due to the file size limitations of FAT32 and the large size of some of the game’s files.
* Dragon Age 3, despite the poor reception from gamers of Dragon Age 2, is on the horizon as BioWare starts looking for environmental artists.
* Gameloft’s CFO has argued that incorrect evaluation of market value has inflated the social gaming market and created an unsustainable bubble.
* The eagerly awaited open beta of APB Reloaded, set to start on the 18th May, has been delayed due to an unforeseen bug.
* On the subject of MMO Betas, Guild Wars 2 will have its own coming in the second half of this year.
* Despite the partial reversal of fortune for the beleaguered studio, Champions Online and Star Trek Online developer Cryptic Studios is to be sold by Atari.
* On the subject of decline, NCSoft has attributed limited marketing to its own decreased sales.
* CD Projekt Red have announced that The Witcher 2′s upcoming DLC will be free.
* THQ now argues that it rivals EA and Activision-Blizzard in size following the success of Homefront. Homefront’s mediocrity evidently didn’t damage it’s sales too badly.
* Sony Online Entertainment is offering free identity protection services to European customers who might have been affected by the recent hack.
* Honest Hearts, the first of three recently announced DLC packs for Fallout: New Vegas, has been released.
* Valve Corporation have released beta authoring tools for Portal 2.
* Chris Taylor of Gas Powered Games argues that the free-to-play model is the future of PC gaming.
* Cthulhu Saves the World has been approved for Steam release, the creators are hoping for a May release.
* GoG.com have announced a weekend long sale on Activision-themed RPGs, including the Vampire: the Masquerade games.
* Opponents of piracy are pushing a new US Bill to combat piracy. It won’t work, I’m sure.
* The US Navy have taken the fight against Somali pirates online in an MMO, something it’s been building since 2009.
* Valve announced that it has no plans for a Source Engine 2, preferring incremental changes in patches to massive engine shifts.
* Brink has vanished from the UK Steam storm, but Bethesda have been fairly tight-lipped beyond that they are looking into the issue.
* Ars Technica’s Opposable Thumbs looks at the future of the Halo franchise after the release of the Defiant maps.
* After the devastation of the PSN and SOE, Sony Online’s downtime should be only a few more days.
* Also in MMO news, NCSoft has announced that Lineage’s Western servers will be shut down on the 29th June. No new accounts can be created and remaining time will be refunded.
* Despite the push behind The Old Republic, a Janco Partners analyst has proposed that the Mass Effect would make a more profitable MMO for EA.
* Bethesda have revealed that Brink will contain 102 quadrillion unique characters appearances, as well as over 26,000 lines of dialogue (a refreshing high number for the company behind Oblivion).
* Crytek reported around 50 lay-offs, a large hit for the company behind Crysis.
* Sadly, we’re told not to expect a Super Meat Boy 2. After the trials of making the first, Team Meat wants to wash its hands and move on.
* On the plus side, though, there is finally a level editor for the great indie hit.
* Deep Silver, it has been reported, needed Square-Enix to distribute Dead Island.
* Ubisoft have released details about the new Assassin’s Creed game, Revelations.
* The Ages of Empires Online beta is available for download, but best hurry or you will miss the boat.
* Increased game sales of its video games division have partly offset the decline of media giant, Warner Bros.
* EA have reported stated that it expects Star Wars: The Old Republic to be ready and released before March 2012.
* Mass Effect 3 will expand its target market and increase its commercial appeal to a wider audience.
I’m abandoning main news in order to push for more separate news articles, leaving more room for quick-cap news here.
* Opposable Thumbs talked about the story and aftermath of the controversial Potato Sack promotion for Portal 2.
* One of the iconic Abe games (Oddysee or Exoddus) is getting a new HD remake sometime in the future, it has been confirmed. We can hope this’ll find its way to the PC.
* THQ’s Red Faction: Armageddon has been delayed by a week, no explanation has been given but last minute bug fixing is suspected.
* After disaster after disaster, F.E.A.R. 3 has been pushed back again from its already amended release date to later in June.
* EA’s latest Need for Speed entry, The Run, has been detailed and dated for a November release.
* Players will be able to download the Brink server software via Steam before the game’s release. Bethesda have also offered an FAQ about the configuration of the server.
* With their recent woes, JoWood have received a helping hand from GoG.com who are selling JoWood titles with up to 75% off this weekend. With a little luck, this’ll help keep the wolf from JoWood’s doors.
* John Romero has started work on a new Facebook game. The game, Cloudforest Expedition, will be the second game that Romero makes on Facebook and is expected this Summer.
* Lord of the Rings Online creators Turbine are merging their US and EU LOTRO servers, relieving Codemasters Online of their duties maintaining the EU servers on the 1st June.
* After a bumpy ride with Alpha Protocol, but success with Fallout: New Vegas and preparations to ship the new Dungeon Siege game, Obsidian Entertainment have apparently gone through a round of layoffs.
* Mojang have released details about the modding plans to be implemented in Minecraft Beta 1.6.
* Bethesda have released details of the changes from Oblivion to Skyrim. Looking at some of the changes (especially to attributes), I don’t think this’ll be the breaker in my downward preference for Elder Scrolls games (from Daggerfall onwards, anyway).
That’s all for this week. See you after the weekend.
Sorry it’s a day late. Holidays created the delay.
Quick cap news
* South Korea has enacted a gaming curfew preventing gamers aged 15 or under from playing online games from midnight to 6AM. The curfew was passed unanimously.
* Gearbox has announced that any talk about Borderlands 2 not from them should be dismissed. It has stopped it popping up.
* Telltale has announced a release date for the remake of Hector: Badge of Carnage.
* An “ultra edition” of Super Meat Boy for the PC has been announced for release in the UK between and September.
* With its UK release, Mortal Kombat creator Ed Boon recalls the original game’s controversy nearly 20 years ago.
* THQ reports boosted sales for Dawn of War II Retribution after switching the platform from Games for Window Live to Steam.
* Ubisoft are offering free games with every purchase this weekend. It wouldn’t be too hard to purchase all the Ubisoft games worth having with such an offer.
* Fallout: New Vegas has little in the way of extra DLC so far, but that has not stopped a GOTY edition being prepared, it seems.
* An internal memo from Activision revealed a very strong optimism on the future strength of the Call of Duty series, good news for Call of Duty fans.
* Fans protested against certain aspects of Portal 2 on Metacritic. Personally, I agree that the in-game store is a bit of a low blow from Valve, but finds the criticism beside quite off the mark.
Main news
Lack of time means there’s no main news this week, but the upcoming week promises a full return to schedule and a review of Portal 2.
* Epic Games will host a two day set of tutorials on the Unreal Development Kit at the East Coast Game Conference.
* Dungeon Siege III has been delayed, now releasing in late June.
* Hi-Rez has switched Global Agenda to a F2P model with those of us already having paid getting “elite agent” status.
* Funcom’s Call of Cthulhu-esque MMO The Secret World, announced four years ago, is officially on the back burner.
* Myst Online is now released as open source, fulfilling promises made as far back as 2008.
* The Call of Duty versus Battlefield 3 marketing war is estimated to end up costing US$200m. This truly is the war to end all wars.
* GameStop are opening a Facebook store. The new system allows sales and pre-orders done via the Facebook interface.
* It’s been reported that Apple has rejected PopCap’s experimental label, Unpleasant Horse, from the App Store on grounds of “maturity” issues.
* Multiplayer has, sadly, been ruled out of Mass Effect 3, but the details are looking good.
* Wrestling star The Rock wants to star in a Black Ops film adaptation. Given his last foray into game-based films, I hold little hope for great artistry.
Main news
Minecraft is leaving beta this year, with plans to release the final version on 11th November. This coincides with the release of Skyrim by Bethesda. Many may be disappointed by the fact that the final release won’t look much different from the beta (which itself is not a whole deal different from the alpha), but assurances are that development will continue. Other reports are that beta 1.5 will add weather effects.
* Play.tm falsely reported two new Fallout: NV DLC packs on their way, but the report was denied by Bethesda.
* One more reason to see the PC as the natural home of the indie developer is that Nintendo stated a complete lack of interest in what it calls “garage devs.” Most think it is merely the Nintendo crying at the Apple Store eating so readily into handheld sales.
* NPD have stated that they are slowly adapting to the new era of digital distribution, after criticism that it couldn’t account for what is now 40% of the market and still growing.
* The new Stars Wars MMO from Bioware Austin, the Old Republic, has nearly 1.5 million beta-testers according to EA.
* For those with misgivings about the bugs in Dragon Age II, a patch has been released which most importantly fixes the busted save file problem.
* The final DLC for Mass Effect 2, called Arrival, will see the light of day on 29th March, across all platforms. This last DLC sees Shepherd to the edge of the known galaxy and will lead in to Mass Effect 3.
* Volition are saying the PC is worth investing in, despite the threat of piracy. I suppose that’s very easy to say given that they probably know as well as anyone that piracy dents sales very little.
* On the subject of piracy, Ubisoft showed themselves to be both dumb and hypocritical this week as it was discovered they had effectively “pirated” their own stuff after a Reddit user launched the accusation.
* Jagex, developers of RuneScape, have a deal with Hasbro to make a new Transformers-based MMO expected to be released sometime in 2012.
* Valve announced that they were hiring Doug Church. Church has an impressive 20-year long career that saw him work on projects like Thief: the Dark Project, System Shock and Ultima.
The Main News
The big story today is that the $400m Activision versus EA lawsuit got the go ahead and has been scheduled for May. The saga started after Activision counter-sued ex-Infinity Ward devs who accused Activision of firing them to avoid royalty payments. The suit exploded as 38 others at Infinity Ward then filed lawsuit against Activision. EA were added into this after Activision accused them on using unlawful practices to create this whole situation for Activision in the first place.
It, finally, gives me such great pleasure to announce that a game I loathed since I first heard its stupid, half-baked premise and saw the ridiculous and sometimes tasteless publicity stunts pulled for it has been released to utter disappointment of the part of reviewers. Homefront’s release to poor reviews left publisher THQ with falling stock by more than 20 percent. Reviews concentrated on how brief the single-player campaign was, as well as poor writing and voice acting, while speaking more favourably of the multiplayer aspect. If you’re are looking for a decent multiplayer game, however, you can do a lot better for a lot cheaper without having to go through an utterly implausible story. Even reading the reviews that are 80+ on Metacritic, they often point out the same problems as the lower reviews, but seem arbitrarily to tack on a good score as if to keep THQ happy.
