For all those who choose to look at video games like their the devil incarnate, they really are missing out on what might be more most powerful tool for reaching the youngsters of this generation. Not everyone is missing the boat mind you, as this great ad from TobaccoFreeFlorida.com demonstrates. They’ve taken a very typical FPS environment and an uber-skilled protagonist and played out an action sequence where the hero blows away every challenge thrown his way with confidence and little effort. Following his impressive victory, he lights up a self-congratulatory cigarette, coughs, and then promptly falls over dead while enemy robots resume patrols.
With a new Castlevania game in development for the Wii, I had this vague expectation that it was going to be just another Castlevania, full of bats, platforming action Not that that’s bad necessarily, it’s just after having played so many the feel of the series isn’t exactly new and invigorating (ie. I’ve kind of been ignoring progress on this game). Surprise then, when Nintendo Power shook things up with its announcement that the game wasn’t going to be a platformer at all, it was going to be a 3D button-mashing fighter featuring all your favourite Castlevania characters.
I’m not so sure about this. Genre-crossing games can be such huge flops…I hope Konami knows what they’re doing! The platform recipe is the hallmark of the series, but perhaps they’ve found it to be getting a little stale, with interest (like mine) difficult to generate and sales not quite where they wanted them. I’ve got my fingers crossed that it will come out okay, but these things are usually so cheesy and off-putting to both hardcore cannon monkeys and non-franchise invested gamers that they’re a bit of a tough sell. We shall see.
Everything from characters to weapons to the previous games’ musical scores will be worked into the upcoming Wii title. Players will get to flail around to their hearts content, with the nunchuck responsible for player motion and the Wiimote used for hack and slashing your way through opponents.
Continuing our coverage of the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, here’s some information about another dungeon (the first was The Occulus) coming up on the Wrath of the Lich King expansion for World of Warcraft: The Halls of Stone.
The Halls of Stone will be located in the Storm Peaks and will be a level 77-79 dungeon. Blizzard mentioned that they like to keep the level gap small so that they can fine tune the dungeons with better ease and make sure that the loot is fitting to the players entering the instance.
In order to acess the Halls of Stone all players will need a flying mount (as I mentioned yesterday, flying mounts become accessible at level 77). This instance borrows heavily from Titan Lore and will be a dungeon of epic scale.
The Blizzard team shed a bit of light on the role the Death Knight is meant to play in a dungeon or raid setting come Wrath of the Lich King. Essentially, Blizzard told us that the Death Knight hero class is meant to be a viable tank at both the dungeon and raid level and also viable dps if a tank is already available.
However, they assured the audience that the Death Knight is not intended to replace any particular class. They simply want to encourage more players to play tanks, as more tanks lead to more dungeon runs.
At the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, the Blizzard development team discussed the ways in which faction reputation will work in the upcoming World of Warcraft expansion.
The Blizzard team introduced the concept of “Championing” which allows players to sport a specific faction’s tabard during a heroic dungeon run and gain reputation for that particular faction regardless of the dungeon they’re in. In addition, they will also gain reputation for the dungeon they’re running. And if that wasn’t good enough, wearing the tabard of the faction from the dungeon the player is running allows them to accumulate a small percentage of bonus reputation for that faction.
The idea behind the Championing concept is to help players gain reputation in a way that doesn’t feel like a grind as it has in the past. Championing is certain to go over well with a lot of players. Already there was much cheering from the audience.
The Blizzard team also revealed that reputation requirements will be removed as a barrier to entry into Heroic dungeons.
PvP rewards will be accessible through reputation gain, as they currently are in The Burning Crusade, and overall there will be a greater variety of rewards.
Blizzard also recognizes that not all trade skills were equally represented through faction rewards in TBC and aim to fix that oversight.
During today’s Dungeons and Raids Panel at the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, the Blizzard team revealed some facts about itemization in the upcoming expansion.
Here’s a few things we can expect:
PvP gear will be available through PvE in addition to PvP
More items per boss kill in 25-player raids
More items that work for more classes so that loot has a chance to be useful to at least one person in a group
Tighter integration of recipe drops - they want to make trade skill recipes more accessible to a wider number of players, though high end recipes will still drop from high end bosses in raids, the number of these will be smaller than in the past.
Today during the second and last day of the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, Blizzard revealed several tidbits about what can be expected from the WotLK dungeons and raids.
For the Wrath of the Lich King expansion we can expect:
All raids to be available at both the 10-player and 25-player level, with 25-player loot being one tier higher than that of the 10-player raids.
Heroics - all dungeons will be available on a heroic setting
More nonlinear content - Blizzard revealed that they’ve been trying to move away from the linear content currently available in WoW dungeons and instead give players a variety of choices when entering an instance.
New gameplay scenarios such as gauntlets and timed events
Spirit Shard reward system for all raids and dungeons based on Wintergrasp PvP
8 level-up dungeons
4 max level (80) dungeons
3 first tier raid instances ready to go at the launch of the expansion with more on the way
Oh please don’t let this be a cruel rumour…please, please, please!
Word on the street is that Oregon Trail might be making a comeback, and a fancy one at that. Publisher Barometer Games has apparently been talking to Infinity Ward to ink a deal for the development of a new Oregon Trail, using the Call of Duty 4 engine. Said the Infinity Ward receptionist when badgered by the Sarcastic Gamer:
“Infnity Ward will be using the Call of Duty 4 Engine to take gamers back to the age of covered wagons and hostile natives. Rather than limit the experience to an educational foundation, Oregon Trail: Fight to Survive will challenge players to cross a 1:1 scale replica of the United States, while combating hostile indians who will absorb realistic damage, extreme conditions, and realistic diarrhea. While no release date for this game has been projected, we anticipate completion of this title by Q2 2009.”
Realistic diarrhea eh? Sign me up! I’m excited to see what the good old O.T. will look like on the COD4 engine, and it will be surreal to see a much-loved educational game from our childhood updated from a pixellated mass of barely recognizable shapes to a (hopefully) stunning set of realistic imagery.
Nassau County police had a busy night on Tuesday reigning in what are being described as “video game inspired crimes”. Six youths went on a bit of a spree, allegedly mugging a man outside of a super market, attempting a car-jacking, and damaging vehicles with a variety of weapons, including a crowbar, a bat, and a broomstick. The mugging began the string of violent behaviour, as a man waiting for the bus at the end of his night shift was kicked, punched, and beaten severely before the gang made off with a small amount of cash and a cell phone. They then blocked a road, menacing a BMW driver with their makeshift weapons and made for a car-jacking…they got some cigarettes and that was about it, before the woman drove off and called police. The driver of a van was also victim to the pointless rampage, having his van bashed with a bat. Police suspect there might be other, unreported incidents. All were rounded up and charged as adults (the majority with first degree robbery) on Thursday. Two of the teens also have prior records, suggesting that this isn’t necessarily a case of the pure and innocent suddenly becoming corrupted by GTA.
I have never, despite growing up through decades of blood and gore, thought to emulate what I saw on screen. My grasp of right/wrong and reality made even the thought sound incredibly stupid. I hardly think that I was so special and mature to be alone in that thinking. So what about these kids in particular makes them unable to separate the two? I know this latest crime spree is going to ignite another round of anti-video game sentiment, but I’d like to look at it from another perspective…rather than actually thinking that these kids are copying Niko’s antics in the game, do these people ever think that they’ve given naughty kids a very, very convenient path to explain, rationalize, and excuse their behaviour? With all the media fervour, there ain’t a gamer out there that isn’t aware of the controversy, and kids are a heckuva lot smarter than a lot of adults give them credit for. Do something illegal and get caught? Or want to rebel and do something illegal. Blame it on a video game in order to generate some righteous indignation, through attention off of you and what you’ve done, and sit back to watch the circus spin. It’s a very easy out, and though you’re still legally responsible for your actions, you’ve just created a defense and a whole new lawsuit of your own to start. Awesome.
The only thing that they don’t really take into account is the damage they’re doing to the reputation of the gaming industry, and the hard-working people that create this entertainment for us.
As an aside, I think the whole think is actually the Red Hot Chilli Peppers fault..clearly. Check out the Newsday link below to see what I mean.
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Continuing our coverage of the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, here’s some information about another dungeon (the first was 
Today during the second and last day of the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, Blizzard revealed several tidbits about what can be expected from the WotLK dungeons and raids.
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