Key House Democrats plan to insist the Pentagon shut down the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and are contemplating the relocation of many of the 385 or so remaining terrorist suspects to military brigs along the East Coast.
While the front-runners in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race were battling for the lead Wednesday, more than a dozen mushers were getting spoiled at the Takotna checkpoint.
Filed under: PC, Sony PlayStation 3, Microsoft Xbox 360, First Person Shooters, GDC, Business, Galleries
Crytek occupies a medium-sized booth space at this year’s GDC show floor. The company, showing its CryENGINE2 to developers, announced that it found its first customer in Avatar Reality, Inc. Hoping to land more interest, the company is hosting a series of rotating presentations about its level editor, sound system, character animation, engine, and other features.
Harald Seeley, Development Director for Crytek briefly spoke with us about the engine and its outlook, saying that it’s at alpha now for the PC, and they’ll ship the SDK to AVI in four to six weeks. Seeley said that Crytek is working to bring CryENGINE2 to the PS3 and Xbox 360, but those plans don’t mean that Crysis will be released on those platforms.
Modders and indie designers should look for a PC version of the development environment bundled with Crysis. Seeley said that the consumer tools offer nearly all of the features of the fully licensed engine, and that modders may be able to work out terms to release commercial software created with the free editor.
Seeley thinks that the commercial version of CryENGINE2 will lead other middleware engines because it was developed for DirectX 10 instead of being prettied up from an older version of the API. He said, “This will become the standard. … [Gamers] won’t be willing to settle for titanium trees any longer. If it looks breakable, if it looks like you should be able to pick it up, [you will.]”
Gallery: Crytek GDC booth
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Filed under: Microsoft Xbox 360, Action, GDC
Castle Crashers is a chaotic storm of spinning swords, overly aggressive primary colors and the occasional (but never displeasing) decapitation — which is why we like it. Though the GDC demo boasts only a few notable changes from previous iterations, it still warrants a look. A long and loving look accompanied by a forlorn sigh and the formation of a gently sparkling tear.
One of the most interesting things about the game is the manner in which it draws your attention. It’s even a little conflicting, as if two sets of fingers are snapping in your face in an alternating pattern. When you’re not trying to spot your character deep within the colorful anarchy of battle, you’re adopting a wider view of all the over-the-top action. It’s like a tug of war, and one not too dissimilar from the battle between order and chaos that’s at the core of the game.
Continue reading Castle Crashers GDC ‘07 impressions
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Filed under: Culture
“That was the single greatest moment of my life. He stood in front of me, he smiled, he took my game, he signed it, he shook my hand.”
-A passerby, talking on his cell phone about a chance meeting with Shigeru Miyamato, shortly after a presentation by game composer Koji Kondo.
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Filed under: Nintendo Wii, Action, GDC
If you only saw screenshots like the one above, you’d be forgiven for mistaking Super Paper Mario for an All-stars-style update of the original Super Mario Bros. When you see the 95 percent complete build on the GDC show floor, though, it’s easy to see that the game is a true continuation of the Paper Mario series, with a few significant changes thrown in.
Everything you remember from Intelligent Systems’ two Paper Mario games is here — the irreverent writing style, the smoothly animated flat characters set in a detailed polygonal world and the items and leveling structure will all be familiar to Paper Mario fans. The now-familiar Paper Mario sidekicks also return in the form of Pixls — little hovering companions that can perform specialized functions like turning into bombs or grabbing nearby enemies.
What’s changed is how you interact with the enemies — through platform-style jumps instead of turn-based battles. It’s amazing how the lack of jarring, momentum-stealing battles every 30 seconds transforms the game into a more fluid and much more enjoyable experience.
The other major change, as has already been shown in countless online videos, is the ability to switch between a 2D side-view and a 3D over the shoulder view with a tap of the A button. It’s interesting to see the familiar 2D environments converted into sometimes-complex, layered 3D environments, though the puzzles that used this mechanic in the demo seemed pretty facile.
The Wii’s motion-sensitive controls allow for some occasional aerial acrobatics, but for the most part, the game brings back the simple run and jump control scheme of the NES Mario games with little embellishment. Which is just fine by us. Just because the Wii allows for motion-sensitive controls doesn’t mean they should be shoehorned in when other, simpler controls work just as well or better.
Continue reading Super Paper Mario GDC ‘07 impressions
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Filed under: Culture, Features, PC, Sony PlayStation 2, Sony PSP, Microsoft Xbox 360, GDC
6:20 p.m.: The Joystiq crew walks the red carpet, because we’re just that important.
6:33 p.m.: Gnarls Barkley’s cover of the Violent Femmes’ “Gone Daddy Gone” is blasting as we find seats in the press section. Cushy seats with recline-able chairs.
6:42 pm: Sam and Max introduce the start for the independent games festival. The mention of projectile vomiting is disturbing, but welcoming somehow.
6:43 pm: Jamil Moledina and Simon Carless march onto stage, noting that the show is being broadcast to the entire world. We sense somewhat sinister undertones.
Continue reading Joystiq not-so-live coverage of the IGF and GDCA awards
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It’s hard to tell from the picture, but this man was just standing in the middle of GDC’s Moscone West Hall talking on a cell phone in a full motion-capture suit. We’d like to think he was filming an animation sequence for “X-treme Cell Phone Simulator 2: Voice Mail Hell.” In our imaginations, the game is going to be released for PS3 and Xbox 360 but, ironically enough, not for cell phones.
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Filed under: Nintendo DS, Nintendo GameCube, Retro, Nintendo Wii, GDC
The Game Developers Conference has been trying to get Koji Kondo to come speak about game audio for ten years, according to an introduction by Tommy Tallarico. The wait seemed well worth it, as the famed Nintendo composer’s first public appearance in the United States drew a standing ovation from the hundreds-strong assembled crowd today.
Kondo, who has worked on the music for the Mario, Zelda and Star Fox series, among others, stressed three main points in making good game audio:
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