Fantasy author R.A. Salvatore took the stage at GDC 2010 today and, while he made it clear that his talk about how to create believable fantasy worlds wasn’t specifically about his work with 38 Studios’ Copernicus project, he did talk a little bit about what he wants from an MMO game and gave the first mention of what the world of Curt Schiller’s game is like. Salvatore talked for quite a while in his thick Massachusetts accent about his time in Everquest, which he said was “the best world in a game I’ve ever seen.” He also lauded the idea of a death penalty in an MMO, and said that during his formative MMO experiences the threat of death (he once lost a hard-earned level when he was killed by an NPC that he accidentally clicked to attack) made living that much better. “If you take the pain out of the world,” he said, “you lose the accomplishment of winning.”

And while he admitted that the Copernicus designers were fighting with him on whether or not to include a death penalty in the game, the company would at least make sure that a return from death was explained. His team has written over 10,000 years of history for the game’s world (all compiled on “a wiki with over hundreds of pages in it”), and one of the major features of the setting’s lore is a “device that’s perfected” called the “Well of Souls.” The Well, “when you die, will bring you back — if you meet the conditions.” He didn’t elaborate about what those conditions were, but he asked the audience what a worldwide death-prevention device would do to institutions like kings and religions. “What happens when you take power away from powerful people?” he asked rhetorically. “How would it play out?” And, he suggested, if there were people who “turned the Well on,” what if they threatened the rest of the world with turning it off?

Vague, but intriguing. Copernicus still seems like it has a long way to go (Salvatore didn’t show any slides or screenshots during his talk), but fans of the old EQ might find the game a return to the old ways if R.A. has his say.

GDC: R.A. Salvatore wants you to die originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you are interested in playing Heavy Rain but don’t have a PS3 with which to access David Cage’s masturbation session masterpiece, then allow me to introduce you to Press X To Jason, a brand new game by K. Thor Jensen. It takes the Heavy Rain experience and boils it down to its essential elements, giving everything that Quantic Dream’s game has to say without you ever leaving the PC. 

Check it out right here. It’s free, it’s fun, and it even has Achievements that are well worth checking out. Now you can save your $60 for a game with a decent plot, like Final Fantasy Thir … uh … oh. Oh. Never mind. Just go play the damn game. 

Press X To Jason [Heavy.com]

Fans are railing against 2K Games after it was suspected that the newly released BioShock 2 DLC, the Sinclair Solutions Test Pack, wasn’t really downloadable content, but a mere key to unlock stuff already hidden on the disc. Like Namco Bandai does all the time. 

Suspicions were aroused thanks to the small file size of the alleged download. The file is 108kb on Xbox 360, and 24kb on PC, which is pretty damn tiny. Naturally, people are upset to think that 2K is taking the piss out of them, and one poster on the official forums believes that it should be labeled “unlockable content” rather than downloadable content to reflect its true nature. 

Honestly, publishers  should be held to some advertising standards when it claims that unlockable extras are DLC. If you’re merely purchasing a key to activate something on the disc, that’s not downloadable content, and it’s wrong for companies to advertise it as such. Whether 2K has gone this controversial route or not remains to be seen, but it does throw this issue back to the fore, and it’s something that I believe should be examined. 

What about you? Do you believe that unlockable content should not be called DLC, or do you think that it’s fine to have such content masquerade as a download?

BioShock 2 DLC already on disc? [CVG]

And just like that, hours after its debut at the Game Developers Choice Awards, we’ve got the Deus Ex: Human Revolution trailer for you to enjoy after the break. There’s not a lot to see so, instead, let’s talk about what we hear. Is that Christian Bale or just a Batman soundalike?

Continue reading Deus Ex: Human Revolution trailer makes the rounds

Deus Ex: Human Revolution trailer makes the rounds originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 12 Mar 2010 02:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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What other headline could we use? It is what it is. Developer Warren Spector has officially unveiled the latest in the Deus Ex series with a new trailer for what has become Deus Ex 3: Human Revolution. You can see it in all its CG glory right above. Neat, eh?

Human Revolution is due out for PS3, PC and Xbox 360. We don’t know too much more beside that, but Eidos Montreal will be showing off much more at E3. While you wait for that, sit back and enjoy the first teaser trailer. It’s astonishingly pretty and if the game itself looks half that good, we’re in for a real visual treat.

What other headline could we use? It is what it is. Developer Warren Spector has officially unveiled the latest in the Deus Ex series with a new trailer for what has become Deus Ex 3: Human Revolution. You can see it in all its CG glory right above. Neat, eh?

Human Revolution is due out for PS3, PC and Xbox 360. We don’t know too much more beside that, but Eidos Montreal will be showing off much more at E3. While you wait for that, sit back and enjoy the first teaser trailer. It’s astonishingly pretty and if the game itself looks half that good, we’re in for a real visual treat.

During the Game Developers Conference, Eidos Montreal Art director Jonathan Jacques-Belletete revealed that Deus Ex 3 has been officially renamed Deus Ex: Human Revolution. If the name sounds familiar, it’s because Square-Enix actually trademarked it last month. The title accurately reflects the game’s story, which takes place before the events of the original Deus Ex. According to Jacques-Belletete, the world in Human Revolution is on the cusp of a “transhuman revolution,” the beginning on mankind’s first real foray into cybernetics. As such, the Eidos Montreal team came up with a very unique visual style for the game, taking the common aesthetics of cyberpunk and blending them with those of the European Renaissance — think Shakespeare meets Blade Runner.

If it sounds like a weird mix, it is. It was no easy task for the development team either, with Jacques-Belletete noting that it took well over a year to finally strike the right balance. But employing the talents of well-known artists Jim Murray and Thierry “Barontieri” Doizon, they managed to come up with an aesthetic that really works. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take pictures of the concept art and pre-rendered characters we saw, so you’ll have to take our word for it.

As for the game itself, there aren’t many new details. The development team, which started as only a handful of people in 2007, has ballooned to over 130. Human Revolution runs on a proprietary engine and is played from a first-person perspective, though it pops into third-person for certain attacks and taking cover. Only a tiny sliver of actual gameplay was shown during the panel, including a few environments and a conversation between two characters. The environments in particular were impressive, especially the apartment of the main character, Adam Jensen.

Further details, like the release date and planned platforms, remain under wraps for the time being. One thing, however, is certain: We’re definitely ready to see more.

Impressions: Deus Ex: Human Revolution originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’re seated at the annual Independent Games Festival / Game Developers Choice event in San Francisco, absorbing the din of dedicated developers celebrating their craft. It’s about to begin!

Continue reading Joystiq live at the IGF/GDC Awards 2010

Joystiq live at the IGF/GDC Awards 2010 originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In short: this looks purty.

Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes trailer offers taste of high-def wizardry originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Last year’s shockingly awesome superhero title inFamous boasted a massive sandbox world known as Empire City — a playground full of climbable, grindable, shootable objects. It was an impressive environment, made all the more impressive by a startling piece of information revealed by Sucker Punch’s Nate Fox during a recent GDC panel: The whole city was created by a team of just 12 artists.

Fox explained that this feat was accomplished with the liberal reusing of the game’s catalog of environmental assets. For example, there were only two types of cars in the game, differentiated by hue shifts and decals. The map was partitioned into a hexagonal grid — the inspiration for which came from the popular board game Carcassonne, Fox explained. Edges of each hex were designed to effortlessly fit together, allowing designers to make minor changes to each compartment, and paste the location into another chunk of the city.

This might sound like a cheap tactic for a developer to employ, but Fox explained that a developer’s time and resources are limited. By swiftly executing the creation of a game’s setting, the developers are given more of an opportunity to focus on designing “evil lairs” and other memorable landmarks. Oh, and according to Fox, the industry term for these outstanding structures is “Weenies.” Yes, for that reason. Yes, that is wonderful.

GDC 2010: How Sucker Punch built inFamous’ big city with a small team originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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