A bit straightforward - the maker finds a new way to exploit the mechanic then follows it for five levels instead of going for a less rigid and more experimental theory of level design. 

http://www.flipsidegame.com/
Sock will like this. 

Great little game, nice simple concept and pretty well done also. 

Must. Stop. Playing. Fuck. 

http://www.battlefield-heroes.com/dev-blog/battlefield-heroes-trailer-released

Tired of realistic WWII shooters? Well, you'll only be 50% tired of this game then! 

The video is hilarious. Hope it doesn't take until the end of the year for the game to be released. 

loved that video, I'm sold (though I won't have to pay i guess) 

Probably not my cup of tea but the trailer made me laugh, respect to them for the idea and change of WW2 shooter focus. 

http://www.joystiq.com/2008/03/07/return-to-quest-quiz-tim-schafer/ 

http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/post.aspx?postid=303512

Nice article by one of the guys behing Sins of the Solar Empire. 

that's one of the games that I have to keep in mind for later trying...
(I've been playing UFO and Master of Orion lately.)

It's sorta funny to read some gaming magazines again. It's probably more than ten years since I last took a look. Some editorial personalities have diverged a bit from my views, but some have still something interesting to say.
And the old Mikrobitti computer magazine is nowadays for general consumers, there are even music reviews in there.

It's a hard choice. Gamers and computer enthusiasts are no single demographic. Either you can try to gather for all of them (general gadget consumers) or then the largest segment (single slightly adolescent lifestyle men, studying or working in IT).

Awaiting mikrobitti's pizza reviews. 

Just saw this on Blues...

http://www.bluesnews.com/cgi-bin/board.pl?action=viewthread&threadid=85990

"Dark Salvation....a freeware Quake III-engine shooter....The game lets the player take on the role of a young dead woman who has been sucked into the underworld and is now possessed by a deadly object. This game will take you back to the days of old school FPS shooters with it's single player fast action game play set in various surreal underground worlds. There are plenty of levels, secrets, monsters and secret weapons to explore, find and fight and we'll be targeting the game at a budget price this 2008 year."

Hmmmm....possible? 

Sounds Like Shadowman, looks like Painkiller.

Hope the team knows that "oldschool" doesn't mean "shitty level design". 

PK comparison is the obvious expectation. Personally, I'd hope not. PK was a good fun game but the single-minded semi-horde combat got old pretty quickly. A game with proper monsters that actually mean something would be welcome. 

I think it was the level design - the monsters were ok for what they were, the occasional cooperative attack AI was nicely done (eg. skull bikers using the normal bikers as human shields) but the levels were basically a series of box maps, with the expansion following the same theme but making trick jumping a progression prerequisite. 

textures/sounds/themes were done very well, but levels were indeed boring. But what made me stop halfway through were the frustrating "secrets" which were mostly movement tests. The fun just stops for me when I need one hour or more for some of the jumps. Pffft. 

and all the shots are full of clich�s but might still be fun if they keep the gameplay as mindless action DooM style 

With Painkiller's (lack of) level design, the game was basically stillborn. It's a shame, because it could have been a great game. 

as bad as painkiller's gameplay might have been, it had fantastic looking maps. since they're using the q3 engine, i wouldn't expect it to look as good as PK, but i think it's something to be strived for, regardless. 

since they're using the q3 engine, i wouldn't expect it to look as good as PK

"nearly as good" is fair enough for me, atleast one can expect good fps from the well optimized q3 engine; whereas for me PK runs with 250 fps in an empty map, but as soon as monsters appear it goes down into the 30 fps range, no matter the settings. Not acceptable. 

I haven't tried it, but I'd assume that a good artist could throw enough pollies and textures at the Q3 engine and probably make it look just as good as PK, whilst running a lot faster. 

The Q3 engine has always been my choice for 'remake of classic quake' fantasy.

a good artist could throw enough pollies and textures

This for me is the problem. One must do more than throw polys and pixels to be a good artist.

The screenshots on Blue's are less than stellar. They have that all-too-common style of game design that looks like someone burned a new age jewellery shop to the ground, dumped the debris in a skip, then threw me in after it.
Glowing, sparking, purple crystals? Really?

Your shaders have to be really neat to make such gaudy choices work. And here's a tip for aspiring modellers out there: if your skillset doesn't cover human anatomy, don't show hands on the weapon models, especially skeletal hands.

Look, I want a decent Quake-like game too. The FPS industry has been choking on so much concrete for the last several years I think my body has actually developed a chemical tolerance to it.
And these guys are at least putting in the work, slogging away for seven years. I wish them luck.
But even Painkiller, with a decent budget thrust up it's heavy-metal backside like a stake in a bloated corpse, wasn't more than a simplistic shadow of what is truly enjoyable about Doom and Quake.

I'll probably buy it when it arrives, more as an expression of solidarity than a vote of confidence.


- Kell McDonald, still waiting for a proper high-poly shambler :( 

Ask Lunaran. I think he's got a high-poly shambler somewhere. 

Yeah, forgot about that. He surreptitiously linked me it when I was sleeping. The perv.

That's a modification of the Q1 shamb though. Not a remake for a Q3-or-later engine.

A new shambler must have fully modelled jaws bearing vicious thorny growths that serve as teeth for the vile beast. And rugose, mouldy flesh that hangs in scabrous furrows from its hulking semi-simian frame, swaying repulsively as it lumbers towards the luckless victim...terrible, barbed claws...that reach...



Excuse me, I have to lie down. 

Sup Kell :}

This for me is the problem. One must do more than throw polys and pixels to be a good artist.

I wasn't claiming that makes a good artist because it doesn't (obviously it doesn't).

My point is that a typical environment in PK uses a triangle count and an amount of texture data somewhat in excess of that seen in Quake 3. To make a visually comparable scene in the Q3 engine, you are probably going to be adopting triangle and texture budgets similar in magnitude. An experienced environment artist of course will use the usual tricks and optimisations to make the most of what he has at his diposal.