Rahul Shirke

Lord of the Rings: Conquest trailer looks tedious

Wow, people still make and play Lord of the Rings games? I mean seriously, it’s been a while since the King returned it’s not like we’re magically going to be seeing prequels of it some 20 years in the future (OK, maybe the Hobbit). But what the hell, when EA has a franchise, they’re gonna make sure it’s milked clean.

Lord of the Rings: Conquest is being developed by Pandemic Studios, the same guys behind Star Wars: Battlefront (they were acquired by EA not very long ago, you will remember). As you can probably guess, Conquest is the Lord of the Rings version of Battlefront (which in turn was a Star Wars version of the Battlefield series). Hmm.

In the epic struggle between good and evil, you get to pick your side. The game will get you up close and personal with Lord of the Rings’ mass scale battles. In the good campaign, you will be able to play as one of the many heroes of Middle-Earth: Gandalf battling Saruman, the battle of Isengard through the eyes of an Ent and such. The dark campaign, however, will take you to an alternate route, where Sauron managed to kill Frodo and secure the One Ring. Now he must battle across Helm’s Deep, the Shire, Weathertop and so on, ultimately in Rivendell.

Personally, the trailer doesn’t look too exciting. It reminds me of the Lord of the Rings: Return of the King game, which I had absolutely no interest in. The graphics don’t seem to be in with the times, and the art style wears me out a but. They remind me of the Age of Conan game that came out recently. Not interested.

But if you are, then this game is coming out later this year for the PC, Xbox 360, PS3 and the Nintendo DS.

First Look at Gerard Butler in Game

Gerard Butler: ever since 300’s first trailer came out, he has been seen on dictionary entries for “awesome”. Butler will be next seen doing awesome shit in Game from Lionsgate studios. As the name suggests, the movie will be about a game, but judging by the first photo released (that you see above), it is going to be a far cry from Game Over and most other abysmal video-game-inspired movies.

In Game, we see a huge uber-violent multiplayer game called Slayers, that involves real death row inmates. Butler plays Kabel, one such inmate who must go through what must be one hell of an adventure of death, fury and destruction. Funny thing is, Kabel will be completely controlled by a nerdy teen, who, going by our experiences with Halo, will be screaming expletives while munching on potato chips and tacos.

No, seriously: Kabel will have to fight the creator of the maniacal game and overthrow the system, while at the same time being entirely controlled as a sim character. This is a very promising concept that should most likely go pretty well. The photo above seems to suggest that a bit of 300 style will be applied here as well, which can only be good. The plot also sounds pretty similar to Death Race, starring Jason Statham. Personally, I’d prefer this to Death Race.

The plot also sounds unusually similar to Unreal Tournament and its sequels. In UT, we see a futuristic gladiatorial tournament where humans, aliens, mutated humans and other such beings fight each other for fame, glory and fortune in a ultra-violent killing frenzy of a tournament relished by seemingly adolescent viewers across the globe. Interestingly, the background on some of the characters in UT2003 says that they were prisoners and were forcibly entered into the tournament.

Whatever the case, this is one movie to watch out for. It is scheduled for release this year, although we have practically no information about it, such as more photos, a trailer or anything like that…

GPG confirms Dungeon Siege III

Dungeon Siege not only represents an idea gone wrong, but also how you can waste about $50 on absolute boredom. While I have yet to play (i.e. never) Dungeon Siege II, I hear that it does not differ much from the point-click-kill-rinse-repeat formula. Seriously, the game had no storyline, no deep gameplay value, no detailed character customization, practically none of the hallmarks of Western role-playing games.

I could go on and on, but I restrain myself now to bring you this. Talking to Eurogamer Germany, Chris Taylor from Gas Powered Games confirmed that Dungeon Siege III will happen. Gas Powered Games is already working on Space Siege, a sci-fi RPG that looks like it will have some depth, but I can foresee that it won’t get nearly as much hype as Mass Effect.

As for details on the game, Taylor confirms that the game will be all about a single hero, unlike multi-character parties from the last game. This will go in tune with Space Siege, which focuses on a single protagonist and the changes he is willing to make on his body to take on alien adversaries. No other details have been announced yet, such as a release date or a platform. GPG’s games have, however, all been PC exclusives, so it’ll be a bit of a surprise if DS3 goes multi-console.

Vader’s apprentice from Force Unleashed now in Soulcalibur 4

In what appears to be a somewhat disturbing trend of cross-overs and cameos, we now have one more outlandish addition to Soulcalibur 4’s roster: Darth Vader’s apprentice. Star Wars nerds will be quick to point that there has been only one apprentice to Lord Vader, and that is the guy from Force Unleashed. So yeah, apparently he’s coming into Soulcalibur 4.

Darth Vader and Yoda have already been included into the roster, and we thought they were pretty much the only ones. For all we can guess now, though – we might have the entire Star Wars cast in a few seconds.

While Vader and Yoda were exclusive to the PS3 and the Xbox 360 respectively, the Force Unleashed apprentice will have no such restrictions and will be available to both consoles, because yeah – the loser apprentice is always nerfed enough to not be exclusive.

Meanwhile, rivalling series Mortal Kombat has got the DC Universe as a crossover. Batman vs. Sub-Zero or Lord Vader vs. Ivy? Must have!

Soulcalibur IV will be releasing on the Xbox 360 and PS3 on July 29. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, for the PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, and Nintendo DS will be arriving on September 16.

Crytek reveals Crysis: Warhead

Faithful readers will remember that we reported when Crytek registered the Crysis Warhead trademark. It looks like the name has been materialized into what appears to be a brand new game: not an expansion or a console port, a full-fledged title!

Warhead puts you in the eyes of one of the most loved characters in the game, Sergeant Sykes (a.k.a. Psycho). The game will take place parallel to the events of the original game, set through Sykes’ view of the other side of the island. Sykes will be armed with a larger arsenal of fully-customizable weapons, all new vehicles and stuff.

Crytek will be focussing on improving their storytelling (which is a noble move, IMO) and game performance. That means that Crytek will most likely not be raising the graphics bar to superhuman levels. But hell, better game performance at least means it will work on normal computers and not alien mainframes. And for once, we’ll have a sensible storyline.

Warhead is a PC exclusive and is being developed with a new and enhanced version of the classic CryENGINE 2, at Crytek’s Budapest Studio. That is where you go to capture the copies and ransom them. Or do something like that. Yeah.

Stay tuned for more info, most likely in the coming summer. Meanwhile, you can ogle over the official press release here.

Valve: PC Gaming is where all the action is

We’ve had all sorts of articles going on lately about how PC gaming is “dying”. Valve doesn’t think so. At a press event in Bellevue, Washington, Valve held steadfastly to their love of the PC and declared it as a robust and relevant gaming system. Gabe Newell went so far as to say that “[the] PC is where all the action is, and there’s a perception problem”.

It seems that Valve is placing emphasis on Steam and other online software distribution methods, and with good reason. Citing figures, Newell said that DFC Intelligence data showing that PC online sales have been on an increase since 2001, while retail sales comparatively flat. Valve also expects online sales to overtake retail very soon.

An interesting statement he makes is,

“We don’t really have a champion of the PC platform. If you write a story about the Xbox 360, there’s just an army of people who are going to descend on you to make that picture look as polished and rosy as possible. Same things for the other consoles – but there’s no equivalent on the PC, and the people who are traditionally driving these messages, like Microsoft or Intel or Apple are, for various reasons, not very effective champions.”

As we say from Valve’s latest announcement of Steam Cloud, Valve has been pretty aggressive on establishing the PC as the best video game platform out there. It’s time they got some support!