Author: narcogen

Soulskill has posted a review of Halo Wars over at Slashdot. Generally his opinion was positive. He sums up the game thusly: Ensemble succeeded quite well at establishing a control system that is powerful yet doesn’t fight for intellectual real estate with the actual playing of the game. It’s not a ground-breaking new entry into…

Bloomberg News is reporting that PalTalk Holdings Inc. of New York has paid about $200K for patents belonging to Mpath, which reportedly had discussions with Microsoft once upon a time about technology for “ways to control interactive applications over multiple computers”. PalTalk is now suing Microsoft for violating those patents; they say MS had discussions…

Slashdot is reporting an “explosion” of emulators running under Yellow Dog Linux on the Sony Playstation 3. What does that have to do with Bungie? Because with Linux running on the PS3, you can install Aleph One on it and play Marathon.

…and what they are not doing is investing in original intellectual properties. Actually I think that entire phrase is a contradiction in terms, at least in terms of how Microsoft can invest in something. Invest, in their case, means buy, and once something has proven itself worth buying it’s no longer original. Take a look…

We have a well defined, carefully orchestrated, properly planned universe to explore not exploit. –Frank O’Connor, July 2008, GameFocus I can tell you that if you could think of a game that would work with a party atmosphere that would not gut the franchise, or milk it, we would think about it, seriously. Jason Pace,…

Reader Cryptic of the Bungie Community Group club writes to let us know of that group’s unofficial Community Forge Contest. The contest is for map variants based on the Mythic Maps due out soon; purchasers of the Limited Edition of Halo Wars will get access to them on that disc. The contest winner will get…

This article boils down to this paraphrase: Everyone agrees sequels are bad. I mean, not all sequels are bad, but sequels in general are bad. And just like every game downloaded by a pirate is a lost sale, every dollar budgeted for a sequel is a dollar less for one of the kind of fun…

Thank goodness Sony is a Japanese company, because they can at least claim that English isn’t their native language when someone points out the nonsense in claims ilke the latest regarding PlayStation 3 sales. Things start out fairly innocuously: “In terms of units, it is true that PS3, as compared to last year, is slightly…

BioWare CEO Ray Muzyka’s advanced the possibility that someday gamers would play games on one ubiquitous console. There are “valid reasons,” he says, why the market would trend that direction, with the exception of “Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo maybe having some issues with that [as] they might want to continue their platforms.” You think? This…

mrsmiley sends word that the Happy Halodays grand winner has been announced.

Jonathan Blow, One man creator of the oh-so-pretty Braid platformer, as amazing for its interesting gameplay as its surreal visuals, says, essentially, that videogame stories are bad and probably wouldn’t get much better with better writers since trying to tell a story in a game is a bad idea. One might wonder whether he’s paraphrasing…

The gaming and tech press are all aflutter with the news that videogames beat DVDs… except they don’t, at least, not in all the areas that matter. The data that lead to the “games beats movies” conclusion, much like the one-day comparisons of game blockbusters like Halo 3 to the one-day takes of top films…

MacWorld has mentioned Marathon as one of the best games on the Mac, as part of their commemoration of the Mac’s 25th anniversary.

Heard about Marathon or Myth, but haven’t played them? Played some solo Marathon or Myth, but haven’t had a chance to check out multiplayer? Then check out For Carnage, Apply Within, a group of fans dedicated to arranging regular multiplayer games of these classic Bungie titles. Thanks for the heads-up to urk on Bungie.net.

Blackstar of Blackstar Productions and Narcogen of Bungie fansite Rampancy.net run through the Halo 3 level “Floodgate”, covering gameplay and story, as well as the usual three elements: something that made us Angry, something that made us Sad, and something from another game that we Envy and wish Halo 3 had that it doesn’t. Show…

In an interview with GamePro, Bungie’s own Joe Staten talks about Halo 3: ODST, due out this fall, clarifying when the game takes place (between the end of Metropolis in Halo 2 and the Arrival scene that begins Halo 3). Of course, he also teases fans about an unknown enemy, but what do you expect?…

Rockslider, who skipped Halo 2 to spend a few more years working over megabattles in Halo 1, has found Halo 3 a little more to his taste. His latest entry is on rocket and sniper action on The Ark. Thanks to Rockslider for the heads-up in the HBO forum.

This remark from Valve’s Jason Holtman is the analysis of game piracy that I’ve been waiting to hear someone utter for years: the idea that copyright infringement needs to be analyzed from economic rather than purely legal or moral standpoints. It is, essentially, the market telling producers that something is wrong, and that smart producers…

Normally I avoid even commenting on the intersections between violent real-world crime and fantasy videogame violence. There’s really little point. There’s not much more than can be said on the matter than what is already out there. However, the remarks of Judge James Burge following his conviction of Daniel Petric are simply so ridiculous that…

Wideload Games, developers of Hail to the Chimp and Stubbs the Zombie, is developing a new game: Texas Cheat’Em for Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Network, due out this spring. Later it will come to PC. No details yet on the Wideload site, or an indication of whether this is either “Hot Sauce” or…