Monthly Archives: June 2012

Train2Game News: UK Charts Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes flies to No.1

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Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes from Warner Brothers is the new UK No.1, bettering the achievement of its predecessor which debuted at No.2 back in 2008.

The success of Lego Batman 2 sees FIFA 12 drop to second spot, while Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Future Soldier slips one to No.3.

The Train2Game Blog recently spoke to Ghost Recon: Future Soldier Creative Director Jean-Marc Geoffroy and Ubisoft Development Director Adrian Lacey, with the pair offering advice to Train2Game students on getting into the industry.

Max Payne 3 slips one to No.4, Battlefield 3 is a non-mover at No.5, while Lollipop Chainsaw drops two to No.6 after its debut week. As the event gets closer, Mario and Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games moves up two to No.7, while The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim jumps 15 places to re-enter the top ten at No.8.

Sniper Elite V2 from Oxford studi Rebellion slips to No.9, while FIFA Street rises three to re-enter and complete the top ten.

The UKIE Gfk Chart-Track All Formats Top 10 for the week ending 23rd June is therefore as follows:

1. LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes (Warner Bros)
2. FIFA 12 (EA)
3. Ghost Recon: Future Soldier (Ubisoft)
4. Max Payne 3 (Rockstar)
5. Battlefield 3 (EA)
6. Lollipop Chainsaw (Warner Bros)
7. Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games (Sega)
8. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda)
9. Sniper Elite V2 (505 Games)
10. FIFA Street (EA)

Relases for the week ahead include Spec Ops: The Line and The Amazing Spider-Man, while Metal Gear Solild HD Collection arrives for PlayStation Vita.

What are your thoughts on Lego Batman 2 taking top spot? Will it be dislodged by one of the coming week’s new releases?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: Deadlight team talk game design in developer diary

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Get behind the scenes of Deadlight, the upcoming zombie survival puzzler for XBLA in a new developer diary from Spanish studio Tequila Works.

Creative Director Raul Rubio, Narritive Director Antonio Rojano and others discuss creating a story and the game design process for Deadlight while ensuring it wouldn’t be hindered by it as the main character goes through an emotional and physical journey.

Watch ‘The Deadlight Diaries: Creating A Story’ video below, here on The Train2Game Blog.

Deadlight will be released via XBLA during August as part of Xbox Live’s Summer of Arcade at a cost of 1200 Microsoft Points.

There are more developer diaries, giving an insight into the work going into development of a variety of games, here on The Train2Game Blog.

What are your thoughts on the storytelling and game design of Deadlight?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on The Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: How to create and share a weapon for Team Fortress 2

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Ever wanted to create weapons for Team Fortress 2, but you’re unsure how to do it? Well, Valve has posted a piece on the TF2 blog titled ‘How a gun gets made’ and it does exactly what’s said on the tin.

The blog is by Team Fortress 2 workshop contributor Jalcober, who takes us through the development of the Scorch Shot, a weapon for the Pyro. It goes all the way from original concept art, through designing it in 3D to painting, texturing and publishing.  Read the blog here, or watch How a Gun Gets Made in the video below.

Jalcober’s community created weapon is going to feature in a future update for Team Fortress 2. As of August last year, Team Fortress 2 players had earned $2 million through their custom weapons being sold in the game’s virtual store.

Valve’s Steam Workshop now features in a variety of games including The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Portal 2 and DOTA 2, allowing players to create and share their own in-game creations .

There’s more about community created items and modding – both excellent ways for Train2Game students to practice and showcases their skills – here on The Train2Game Blog.

Meanwhile, be sure to keep reading for the latest news from Valve and Team Fortress 2.

Does ‘how a gun gets made’ provide you with useful information? Have you submitted items to the Team Fortress 2 Steam Workshop?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: Guild Wars 2 holding server stress test next week

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ArenaNet are holding a short beta test for Guild Wars 2 next week, as the MMO gears up for launch later this year.

The server stress test will take place on Wednesday 27th June from 6pm through to 10pm and is accessible for anyone who’s previously taken part in a Guild Wars 2 beta test.

Developers ArenaNet recently discussed the importance of testing in determining how fun their MMO sequel is.

There’s more beta testing news, and information on how it’s useful for developers and Train2Game students, here on The Train2Game Blog.  There’s more on Guild Wars 2 from ArenaNet and NCsoft  here

Will you be taking part in the Guild Wars 2 stress test? How important is this process in the development of MMOs?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum,

Train2Game News: My Sea Park, a new mobile game with heavy Train2Game student input released worldwide

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My Sea Park is a brand new mobile game that’s received heavy input from Train2Game students on work placement at DR Studios and its available worldwide for iPhone and Ipad now.

Seven students worked on the iOS game, with Train2Game game designer Craig Moore serving as design lead.

My Sea Park lets players explore their creativity by building the biggest and best marine-themed amusement park in the world. The following Train2Game students also aided in development of My Sea Park, using skills learned on the developer, designer and art and animation courses.

Ben Collings – Art
Ezekiel Morris – Art
Jonny Robinson – Design
Matty Wyett-Simmonds – Art
Rudi Will – Design
Tim Woods – Programming

With more than 50 different attractions available, My Sea Park allows players to maintain and fill their parks with wonderful sea animals, rides, restaurants and other special items to entertain their guests.

In addition, My Sea Park allows players to completely customize their sea attractions with an abundance of decorations, cute animals and shows.

Watch the trailer below, here on The Train2Game Blog.

Like it? Then support fellow Train2Game students by downloading My Sea Park from the App Store now!

There’s more on My Sea Park here on The Train2Game Blog, while keep reading for the latest industry experience diaries from Train2Game students on placement at DR Studios.

As usual, leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: War of the Roses lead programmer talks game mechanics

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Get behind the scenes with development of War of the Roses from Fatshark and Paradox Interactive in a talk by lead programmer Robin Hagblom.

Recorded at DreamHack, the world’s largest computer festival which recently took place in Sweden, the thirteen minute long video sees Hagblom discussing the mechanics of War of the Roses and showcasing some new features. It’s all interspersed with videos of the game in various stages of development.

Watch it below here on The Train2Game Blog.

There’s more about War of the Roses here, while be sure to keep reading for the latest news from Paradox Interactive.

There’s also plenty more behind the scenes insight into game development here on The Train2Game Blog.

What are your thoughts on the mechanics behind War of the Roses?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: Valve teaching with portals in education initiative for schools

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Valve will be giving away Portal 2 for free in its Teach with Portals initiative to help the teaching of physics and critical thinking in schools.

“The buzz surrounding the new role video games are playing in education, we had to throw our hat in the ring. Today, innovative educators are finding ways to incorporate Portal™ and Portal 2 into their classrooms—helping teach physics and critical-thinking skills. It’s eye-opening to see how video games can be used in amazing and unexpected ways to help educate our next generation.” reads a statement from Valve on www.learnwithportals.com/

“Using interactive tools like the Puzzle Maker to draw students in makes physics, math, logic, spatial reasoning, probability, and problem-solving interesting, cool and fun, which gets us one step closer to our goal – engaged, thoughtful kids!” add Valve

Students will also be able to design their own levels using the Portal 2 perpetual testing initiative level creator.

Watch the learn with portals education initiative in action in the video below, with Valve demonstrating Portal 2 to high school students.

There’s more Portal 2 news here on The Train2Game Blog, while you can keep reading for the latest from Valve.

What are your thoughts on the learn with portals iniative? How else can games be an educational tool?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: Project Zomboid team to host “How (Not) To Make A Game” developer session at Rezzed

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Project Zomboid developer The Indie Stone are the latest addition to the developer sessions at PC and indie gaming show Rezzed, and they’re talk is likely to be very interesting for anyone on a Train2Game course.

The session, titled “How (Not) To Make A Game” will see The Indie Stone team discuss the first year of development of their zombie survivalist title, paying attention to what could be seen as common sense.

The team learned valuable lessons about backing up information when the laptops they were using to develop Project Zomboid were stolen.

Chris Simpson, Marina Siu-Chong, Andy Hodgetts and Will Porter will present the developer session on Friday 6th July at the Brighton expo.

“We’re in the final build-up to our 0.2.0 release, so it seemed a perfect opportunity to chart the ridiculous journey we’ve been on for the past year or so,” said Will Porter. “Our public test builds have gone down a storm, so the time seemed right.”

Tickets for Rezzed are available on the official website, and it’s looking to be an interesting event for Train2Game students to attend, with a variety of developer sessions including those from Introversion Software, The Creative Assembly, Splash Damage CEO Paul Wedgwood  and Gearbox Software’s Randy Pitchford.

Not only that, but everyone who buys a ticket for Rezzed gets a free DOTA 2 beta key.

We’ll be sure to keep you up to date with the latest news as the show approaches.

What are your thoughts on the latest addition to Rezzed?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: Games have become easier says Cliff Bleszinski

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Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski believes current generation games have become too easy, with developers more focused on appealing to as many people as possible over a challenge.

“It feels like in this current console generation that we’ve taken a lot of steps to grow the audience and what I think’s happened is that the games have become more linear and easier, so it feels like a lot of quick-time-events,” Bleszinski told X360A.

The Epic Games design director – who helped mentor Train2Game student teams during Train2Game and Epic Games’ Make Something Unreal Live contest at The Gadget Show – pointed to Demon Souls and Dark Souls being what he wants.

“The more I play games like that the more I turned off to them and just want to get back to systems interacting with systems, and get back to a game that, you know, when was the last time a game really challenged you and asked something of you, right? There’s a reason why Demon Souls and Dark Souls have taken off lately. It’s because they really require you actually try.” he said.

Bleszinski says the upcoming Gears of War: Judgement will be challenging and allow freedom.

“Casual mode will still be casual, whatever, if you just want to see graphics and you don’t want to die, but every other mode will be hard in this game and you will die,” he said.

“When I played this in 4-player co-op… I mean, I’ve been playing Gears since the beginning of the course and I really have to hunker down and focus, and if my buddies aren’t reviving me, and we aren’t working as a team, you’re going to die, and it’s okay to die a few times in a game to try some different strategies, the S3 respawn system provides unique challenges.” the Epic Games designer added.

There’s more from Cliff Bleszinski here on The Train2Game Blog, while you can get the latest news from Epic Games here.

What are your thoughts on Bleszinski’s comments? Do you believe game developers have made games easier in order to reach a bigger audience?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game News: The Secret World holding open beta this weekend

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The Secret World, the upcoming MMO based in a modern day setting is holding an open beta this weekend, which means you can get involved!

Funcom’s MMORPG sees players join one of three secret societies – the Illuminati, the Dragon or the Templars – as each faction battles for world domination, and you’ll be able to test it out for yourself from Friday 22nd June through to Monday 25th June.  You can sign up take part in The Secret World open beta here.

“This marks the first public opening of the massive, persistent player vs. player war zone where over two hundred players clash in adrenaline-fuelled battles for power and world domination! Stonehenge and Eldorado are also opening up, allowing smaller groups of players to fight for control over the power held within these legendary locations.” reads the announcement from Funcom.

“This is the final Beta Weekend before launch on July 3rd and we are ending with a bang. Everyone who has ever registered for The Secret World beta will get access to this final Beta Weekend. This is also true for anyone who has not registered yet but still registers by Friday, June 22nd.” they add.

There’s more beta testing news, and information on how it’s useful for developers and Train2Game students, here on The Train2Game Blog. There’s more about The Secret World here.

Will you be taking part in The Secret World open beta? Have you been part of one of the closed tests?

Leave your comments here on The Train2Game Blog, or on the Train2Game forum.