Archive for February, 2010

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 really makes the news these days.
Here is a 30sec TV spot for the game promotion:

And here is the first Dlc illustrated on video:

CCP, (Crowd Control Productions), developers of Eve Online and World of Darkness Online announced the opening of a new studio in England, Newcastle. CCP has studios in Reykjavik (Iceland), Atlanta and Shanghai. CCP has been working in China since 3 years on Dust 514, a MMOFPS on console.

This new studio should gather a team of 10 or 20 staff and will be the junction between the Icelandic and Chinese offices.

This news is an occasion to watch a video of Dust 514 again. This game will propose a continuity of Eve Online Universe on the planets. Gamers of Eve Online and Dust 514 will have the possibility to chat via Eden, a CCP’s community portal. The “space marine” we’ll play will influence Eve Online’s world. Action scenes will support about 64 players on the same map.

This video was released during the 2009 European GDC:

For the 14th Anniverseray of Qtest’s (the very first public beta of Quake), we can read John Carmack, Tim Willits and others sharing their souvenirs on the Bethesda’s Blog:

“We were watching a live online chat when the upload went live. When the first person got it, there was a great clamor for reports about what it looked like. Unfortunately, one of the first things reported was “There is a turtle in the corner of the screen.” I had a check in the code to draw that icon as a sign that you were running at 10 frames a second or less, so you should reduce quality settings to get a more playable experience. Quake was one of the first PC apps where floating point performance was a critical factor, which meant that Intel’s Pentium processor had a huge lead over the competing AMD and Cyrix processors of the time, which had FPUs that were more similar to the 486. A lot of systems weren’t really up to it.

We eventually removed the “turtle check” from our games, because some people felt that we were insulting their systems, but there was also an interesting effect that was a product of the times — we found that a lot of people would crank up the resolution until the frame rate dragged down to about 10 fps, regardless of their CPU speed. Competitive gamers may disbelieve this, but for players that were more interested in the then-novel experience of exploring a modeled virtual world, getting the visual fidelity up above 320×200 resolution was important enough to make the game only barely-interactive. Most people had to wait a bit longer for glQuake and the 3DFX Voodoo to start getting the best of both worlds.”

And Quake arrived and revolutioned the FPS genre…

DICE and Electronic Arts announced that two new multiplayer maps for Battlefield: Bad Company 2 will be unlocked on March 2nd. This map pack features the Laguna Alta map playable in Conquest mode and Nelson Bay map playable in Rush mode, bringing the total number of multiplayer maps up to 10. Later in March, DICE will release another map pack, with which the player will play the Arica Harbor map in Conquest mode and Laguna Presa map in Rush mode. Available in the box, the content packs are unlocked by simply inputting a VIP code (included in the shrink-wrapped box).

“Battlefield: Bad Company 2 will redefine online modern warfare on March 2nd. We are deeply committed to the FPS community and Battlefield fans worldwide,” said Patrick Bach, Senior Producer for Battlefield: Bad Company 2. “These first two map packs are just the beginning. We’re planning ongoing support for the community by always keeping the experience fresh and ensuring the best possible gameplay experience.”

The press release announced that the game’s tactical destruction “shakes up the gameplay delivering epic battles never before seen in a modern warfare game.”

Here are some nice words that confirmed I was in the good way when I pre-ordered the game

Quake 3 is ported on Android thanks to the developer named Thunderbird2k. This version’s name is Kwaak 3. It works on the Motorola DROID at a frame-rate of 20-30 frames per second. The game works with touchscreen input with 2 players and on a small map. The frame rate dropped a bit on a larger map with more players.

Get more information about Kwaak3 here: http://code.google.com/p/kwaak3/

Genesis A.D. (Another Day) will be released in 2010 (nothing is confirmed). It’s a KTH’s creation and a sci-fi action FPS, multiplayer oriented: announced as a MMOFPS). The beta is opened since June 25th, 2009 in Korea.

This video shows an important part of the gameplay which seems complicated on screens but poor on that video. Graphic design aren’t really of high quality and the “MMO” part is pretty hard to guess while action seems to be the word. In other words, I have a strange feeling of shit about that game.

Quake Live celebrates its first birthday. The free multiplayer FPS of id Software released a new patch today which provides corrections, a new achievement (available until March 9th) and a new map: Fallout Bunker.

At FPS Time, we are Quake Live addicts. So we recommand you to go on the website: http://www.quakelive.com/, login, download the plugin and fight!

Do you know OnLive? OnLive is the technology which allows you to use the power of a distanced computer connected in streaming with your platform. During the last CES we’ve seen OnLive running on iPhone with Crysis. The game is fluid and the graphics are greats: the iPhone doesn’t support anything. I’ve already mentioned that i can’t understand how you can play a FPS on iPhone. Maybe I have too big fingers.

However, we can imagine playing Crysis on Ipad with a true pad with the Bluetooth or maybe a keyboard and a mouse! Which might enlarge the Ipad possibilities and make accessible and practicable a lot of PC games.

For the moment OnLive is still in beta test and we’ve recently heard about small lag problems which can drive you crazy on FPS games.

I am usually cautious when there are rumors about such big licence. Though, we never really know if these rumors comes from magazines which truelly do their investigation jobs or if it’s coming from the communication team.

It seems there was an announcement concerning a role in motion captures and voices for 4 characters among whom a member of a special unity of the Vietnam war. Frank Barnes, the character, is a member of the Studies and Observations Group (SOG) who achieved secret missions in Vietnam between 1964 and 1972. Activision hasn’t offciaially communicated on the question yet.

Where the hell is Rambo? And, will we be able to shoot Hippies?

Aaah these Hippies…

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 campaign in France is a direct provocation to the French army’s recruitement campaign.

Watch that picture took in Paris subway: the left ad is the French army’s poster which website is “www.devenezvousmeme.com” which can be translated by “BecomeYourself.com”. On the right, Battlefield’s ad and the website indicates: www.devenezplusquevous-meme.com” which means “BecomeMoreThanYourself.com”. This website leads to the official website of the game.

No official response from the French army but i’m sure they don’t really appreciate it.