Monday - February 18, 2002
According to a newsbit on gaminggroove, Valhalla Chronicles, an isometric RPG has gone gold. Here's a short info on the game:
The roleplaying game Valhalla Chronicles is set in an undefined mythological/historical version of the Viking world somewhere around the years 800-1000. The game will unravel an epic story of a time of Vikings, discovery, adventures, raging wars and mythology. Valhalla Chronicles will not only take you to Miklagård (Constantinople) and Vinland (North America) but also to Valhalla, Svartalfheim, Hel and Muspelheim. As one of four heroes you must interact with humans and gods and choose your allies with caution in order to complete your mission. You will meet the powerful and short fused Thor; god of thunder, the wise Odin; god of magic and wisdom and the vile and deceitful Loke, half god and half-giant. |
 Mail problems
Posted by Rendelius @ 15:43 - Top 
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| At the moment, we are experiencing mail problems. We hope we can resolve this issue shortly... |
blahblahblahblah Dungeon Siege Preview blahblah Gamesdomain. blahblahblah snippet:
The mechanics are actually more in line with Westwood's undersold action-RPG, Nox. Your party linearly advances through the Kingdom of Ehb, happening upon non-combat zones on occasion (ie. towns) and talks with any non-player characters it can find for quests. There are no easy portal spells to get you back to safety and supplies whenever you feel like it. Your immediate reaction may be: "That's obscene! But what will I do with all the unused equipment I scavenge? And won't I run out of health and mana pots pretty quickly?"
Some games would leave these questions woefully unanswered, but lead designer Chris Taylor's meticulous and logistically minded approach to developing the game gives you practically everything you need. This would come as no surprise to gamers who remember Taylor as the mastermind behind the real-time strategy, Total Annihilation, which was heavily acclaimed for its innovations concerning interface and micromanagement handling. |
| Swiss site Gamesweb has previewed GamesArts'/UbiSoft's Grandia 2. The game was first released on Sega's Dreamcast a few months ago and is now being ported to PC. According to Gamesweb, Grandia 2 managed to score high when it was reviewed by Sega console mags. Furthermore, the previewer even sees the potential of Grandia 2 dethroning its genre brother Final Fantasy. We'll see about that on or around March, 28 when the game is supposed to be released. |
Due to "an extremely rare bug", the folks from Mythic Entertainment have decided to resolve a relic issue by interfering manually. They have taken a captured strength relic back to Albion after a careful review of the recorded log files.
For more on the issue there's two posts at The Camelot Herald (No. 1 here and No. 2 here). |
If there's one thing that's really cool about upcoming RPG's like Neverwinter Nights, Morrowind, Dungeon Siege (<- definitely), and Divine Divinity (<- hopefully :)) it's got to be that the game isn't over when it's over.
Advanced but nonetheless supposedly rather easy-to-use game editors in the hands of the right people at the right time should guarantee for many more hours of pure fun. You guessed it. We're talking about game mods here, and there is a mod team which will be utilizing the highly sophisticated Neverwinter Nights engine to build an unofficial Pool of Radiance 3.
The goal of the team: to deliver the Pool of Radiance 2 that many expected but never got as for many RPG'ers Pool of Radiance 2 was nothing but disappointment.
If you want to learn more about this highly promising venture visit the mod team's website.
Here's a snip from their main page:
Welcome adventurers to the next installment of the Pool of Radiance series. Please note that this is the unofficial PoR3 game as it will be created using the new Neverwinter Nights game and the story will be written by me. For some of you my goal will be to give you the game you expected PoR2 to be and for many I hope to just bring you one kick ass game.
How it all began:
Not to long after I knew most of the story for PoR2 I realized that the story had many holes that needed to be filled. The biggest hole being: What the hell was happening in New Phlan while these bands of heroes are off trying to find the root of the problem. With NWN seemingly (read: about a year ago) around the corner I decided to begin work on making a module based in New Phlan that told the other side of the PoR2 story...
| | Source: Neverwinter Vault |
| Neocron Central has posted some new screenshots from the current Beta 3 of Neocron, Reakktor.com's upcoming first person MMORPG. The first one is from the tutorial, the next in Pepper Park at a NEOFRAG sign with a CopBot and bum, and lastly Pepper Park in all its neon glory New Screenshots. You can find them here. |
If the game sells as many copies as it gets previews, it will be a bestseller *g*. Here's the next preview of Dungeon Siege, this time at ActiveWin. We serve you the usual snippet here:
The main part of Dungeon Siege is the combat side, the first great and well put together part of the game is that you can assemble a group of up to eight heroes to fight your battles for you through the Kingdom of Ehb. Along your journey you will meet up with various characters who you can speak, in turn some will offer you their help for free, while others will ask for a reasonable fee to join you (the ones who ask for a fee usually have better attributes). The game works very well with the group side of things as you can build up a set of characters who are powerful in all different kinds of combat such as Melee, spells etc.
So how good are the spells, well they work very well again. The first spells you get early on in the game are quite basic such as Fire (a combat spell) and lightening (a nature spell) later in the game as your spell casting attributes start to increase (combat and nature spells have separate attributes) you will get the chance to play with the more powerful spells such as Iron Fist. Unlike some games, different spells work well on different creatures and switching between spells is very easy to do via the menu system that has been implemented in the game. You begin with one spell book, this spell book allows you to play two spells inside it, once you have done this you can move to the top left of the screen while in battle and pick which spells/weapons you want to use while playing.
The next one is at HomeLan Fed, and it serves you some screenshots as well (like the one at ActiveWin)... | | Source: RPGVault |
Whither Interplay?
Posted by Garrett @ 12:17 - Top
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As reported over at Yahoo Finance Wire, Interplay has received a "deficiency notice" from Nasdaq Staff dated February 14, 2002, stating that for the last 30 consecutive trading days, Interplay's common stock has not maintained a minimum market value of publicly held shares of $15,000,000 and a minimum bid price per share of $3.00 as required for continued listing under Nasdaq Marketplace Rules 4450(b)(3) and 4450(b)(4), respectively. Additionally, Interplay does not meet Nasdaq's alternative listing requirements, which require, among other things, that Interplay have a stockholders' equity of $10 million, a minimum market value of publicly held shares of $5,000,000 and a minimum bid price per share of $1.00. Interplay has been provided 90 calendar days, or until May 15, 2002, to regain compliance. Interplay intends to make every effort to regain compliance prior to the May 15, 2002, deadline. If Interplay fails to regain compliance, the company expects to be notified by Nasdaq that its securities will be delisted. |
Gamers Pulse has posted a review of Disciples 2 - Dark Prophecy. Their summary is a very positive one:
Technically, the game had very few flaws. Although the turn based genre is not for everyone, and can take some getting used to, once you get the hang of it, the game is a blast. I never had problems alt-tabbing out and getting back in. I never had any serious lockups within the game. The graphics look great and the game is very well built.
Disciples II takes strategy to a new level where you get an easy to play but increasingly complex game. If you are a strategy fan or enjoy the turn based genre you will enjoy Disciples II.
The final rating is 82/100... |
Tournament of Honor has posted a complete infocard on creatures in Heroes of Might & Magic 4. Some interesting facts they found:
The strongest creature is the Black Dragon of the Asylum, and the most expensive as well.
The fastest creatures are found in the Preserve town, but quite expensive.
The Stronghold may not have magic, but it makes up with hordes of tough creatures, especially very strong level 1 and 2 units, with the lowest in costs.
The Necropolis has some weak units initially but they all have special resistances, and cheap, with the toughest level 3 units.
The Sea Monster, a powerful neutral and unusable creature bests most top monsters of the towns.
Shooters have varying number of shots, and some deliver more damage at long range than others
Spellcasting creatures have a certain amount of spell points, and come with an arsenal of spells.
The Haven town, once the Castle town of Heroes3 (considered strongest) is now the weakest of the towns? |
Acc to this thread over at our freinds from World of Gothic, German Print Mag PC Action has a 2 page preview of Gothic - I'll translate for you:In PC Action 03/2002, there is a 2 page Preview. There is a new Screenshot of the seaport, furthermore it says, that Gothic II is finished by 80% already. PB/Phenomedia is heading for a May release, but JoWood [the publisher] wants in-depth beta testing, so a release later in 2002 is more likely. |
RPGDot Face Lift
Posted by Rendelius @ 09:59 - Top
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As you can see, we are doing some cosmetical changes to our site, and since we are exhibitionists, we do them in public :-). Apart from changing the news display a little, we will bring up some new sections as well, and apply finetuning to this and that. We have, for example standardized the game icons with our newsbits, reopened (and redisigned the release list (although not complete yet). Newsbits now contain links to the comment page, general game info (formerly known as "at a glance"), the game homepage, a link to our screenshots and one to the software store where you can buy it.
All in all, we try to add some polish to the site, but no big changes ahead in the near future (but planned). |
Here are some topics from the official Icewind Dale II forum.About the subraces levels
It will make exactly one level of difference, actually. A moon elf fighter with 250,000 XP can be 9th level with his or her standard bonuses. A dark elf fighter with 125,000 XP is 8th level and gets an additional +2 to intelligence, faerie fire 3/day, magic resistance, day blindness, and vulnerability to fire spells.
BTW, the reason the penalty ends at 10th level is to keep dark elves and other races one level behind everyone else, instead of many levels behind everyone else. If they kept their penalties, the moon elf fighter above would be 20th level with 3,000,000 XP and the dark elf would be 14th level with 1,500,000 XP. That's a little severe.
The reason why the stas of sub-races are different from the manual
We're not bowing at an altar, here. Not all racial bonuses and penalties can be implemented according to the FRCS totem pole. In fact, the deep gnome's Non-Detection power (and Non-Detection in general) downright screws up the whole game when combined with Invisibility. Drow cannot levitate or cause globes of darkness to appear. Ghostwise halflings cannot telepathically communicate with other halflings (and even if they could, how often would that come into play?). In the course of adding and subtracting the various powers that sub-races can and cannot have, we find ourselves balancing according to what is left of their abilities.
A reply on some comments on rushing out games and not listening to board members
Let me take a few moments to explain some things, from my perspective.
This project started development in the summer of 2001. At that time, we were looking at a 4-6 month dev cycle, which is completely and totally insane. Steve Bokkes and I wrote the original story and area documents. These areas were split up between the designers, with me getting only two.
I focused the majority of my attention towards helping the designers have a collective understanding of the story, characters, and general design goals in the game. Once that had been established, I focused on what I arguably am best at: rules design and implementation. Given the original length of our dev cycle, I compiled a three phase list of rules changes that I believe could be implemented. The first phase included the implementation of kits (a given), the implementation of sub-races (based off of the same general idea of kits) and the implementation of 3E ability scores, saves, and attack bonuses. The second phase included the implementation of true 3E feats and skills. The third phase included the dissolution and restructuring of the creature file format, interface, and general engine code to accommodate true 3E multiclassing. The phases were based off of what the dev cycle might actually become (in case someone thought, "A game in 4-6 months?! WHAT?!").
A number of other tidbits were included on those lists: spell disruption checks, the addition of the use magic device skill, bonus spells for all casters based off of high ability scores, ability score stacking rules, armor subtypes, the player scripts that never made it into HoW, and a bunch of other little junk. We attempted to discuss most of these ideas with fans given the obvious obstacle that our game could not legally be announced. While we do listen to our fans, we do not listen for volume. We attempt to listen to arguments. If we are persuaded by arguments, we attempt to implement sensible changes. Sometimes, unfortunately, those changes just can't be made in the time available for us. I designed an entire list of feats and the methods by which they could be used, given our interface. Unfortunately, my design doesn't magically implement itself. It requires the efforts of many attentive programmers -- who are busy making the game as bug free as they can. Implementing new features or making large changes to old features is time NOT spent fixing bugs. In fact, it ALWAYS creates new bugs.
To give an example of what a new feature requires, I'll use base attack bonus. BAB is the replacement for 2nd Ed.'s class/level-derived THAC0 system. It's seemingly a simple change.
* Step 1: Give the producer and programmers a BAB system design that will work in your engine that closely, if not exactly, imitates 3E's BAB system.
* Step 2: Convert all 2DA files that list THAC0 bonuses to 3E BAB bonuses.
* Step 3: Programmer makes sure that BAB is derived from 2DAs in the same manner as THAC0 was derived from 2DAs.
* Step 4: Programmer removes 2nd Ed. attack progressions for warriors based on class, level, and specialization.
* Step 5: Programmer implements a system in which all classes gain additional secondary, tertiary, etc. attacks from an increased BAB that ignores secondary bonuses from weapons, spells, etc.
* Step 6: Programmer implements a special system in which monks gain additional hand-to-hand attacks at an advanced rate, despite a slower BAB progression.
* Step 7: Programmer implements a system for handling off-hand attacks and base multiple attacks from creatures with claw/claw/bite or similar attack actions.
* Step 8: Programmer makes a batch conversion files that derives new BAB values for creatures to replace their THAC0.
* Step 9: Programmer modifies the creature editor so that THAC0 reads "Base Attack Bonus"
* Step 10: Programmer makes a batch conversion of creature files to remove half attacks, which do not exist in 3E.
* Step 11: All functions in the game that grant THAC0/attack bonuses are converted into BAB bonuses.
* Step 12: A designer goes through every item in the game that grants a bonus to hit, removes the word "THAC0:" and replaces it with "Attack Bonus".
* Step 13: Spells and effects that double a character's number of attacks are converted to granting +1 attack at the character's highest BAB. Programmer insures that extra attack does not drop the AB for the "real" primary attack, secondary attack, etc.
* Step 14: All code is implemented and all data files are updated. QA is informed of the changes.
* Step 15: Bugfixing.
BAB was one of the more difficult changes we made for IWD2. We're not trying to exaggerate when we say that some things are easy to do and others are not. We do listen to you, we really do. Often, unfortunately, we can't do what you're asking us to do. Sometimes, we have to listen over the din of many conflicting opinions and simply make a decision that seems sound to us from our perspective.
I spent a lot of time on the message boards prior to the announcement of the title. I spent even more time on the boards after that. Unfortunately, that means I'm not getting work done. I'm not answering Dave's questions, I'm not helping Darren, and I'm making absolutely no progress whatsoever on my new project. I believe it is essential for us to answer as many questions as we reasonably can. I try to be thorough with my reasons for design decisions, and I try to argue a point as long as I believe parties are gaining something from the exchange. However, even I get burned out. I picked a point at which I believed I had answered the vast majority of questions thrown my way and I started focusing my attention on work. I hope that searches through the archives and the presence of other BIS employees on the board can answer the majority of your questions. |
| In our latest Arx Fatalis Element of the Week (number 23), we present you three undead creatures: mummies, liches and "regular undeads". Arx Fatalis will be released by Fishtank in this quarter, and it is a dungeon crawl in the tradition of Ultima Underworld. Have a look and enjoy. |
Yes, this is Dungeon, not Dungeon Siege or Dungeon somethingelse - just Dungeon. This new RPG has been presented in an Interview at Voodooextreme on January 16th (story), and now VE reports that there are new screenshots at the game's site. Here's what they posted there with the screenshots:
Well, as Webguy mentioned again, we have our newest series of screenshots up! Lots of new game content and visual appeal over the originals. Once again we've hit a major milestone, although unlike it is implied below, we're not quite in beta stages yet. Think of these shots sort of representing a proto-pre-alpha-alpha stage:) Thanks to everyone on the team who has contributed to getting us this far! |
The next Warcraft 3 preview is up now at GameSpy. They have special praise for the graphics:
All of the units look terrific, and the sheer graphic detail and life-like animation ensure that these little warriors take on a vivid, virtual existence right from the start. The landscapes are contoured and varied, allowing for differing elevations and tactics. Spell effects and other elements look beautifull, and the passage of time between night and day further innovates the game design. With four races this time around, the sheer diversity of units is astounding as well. |
| Pol.com has a streaming video from the Final Fantasy XI beta for you to look at. Can't tell you what is in there, since my Apple here doesn't like the format of the stream... | | Source: Voodooextreme |
| Voodooextreme posted 5 new screenshots from Dungeon Siege, Gas Powered Games' upcoming dungeon crawl. |
Hope you had a nice weekend :-). Hardcoreware Games did a review of Wizardry 8, and with a rating of 84/100, it is a very positive one. Here's their conclusion:
Wizardry 8 is an epic story and a great game, all in one box. The interface is flexible, and will adjust to your needs. The graphics are richly detailed, and a pleasure to look at, without dragging your attention away from the story itself. Now I understand why SirTech felt the absolute need to complete this game, no matter what, because it's simply fantastic. After playing this, I hope that one day someone releases a Wizardry Collection, containing games 1 through 7, since I haven't played most of them, and my curiosity has been sparked by number 8. Anyone who enjoys RPGs or a good sci-fi/fantasy story shouldn't hesitate to spend the money on Wizardry 8, because it's well worth it. I truly hope SirTech finds a way to continue making games. |
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