Train2Game News: Modding software on Kickstarter

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

A new Kickstarter campaign has launched which will help the average PC gamer to use Game Mods easier. This is good news for Train2Game students who like to create mods for games.

Olympus Games announced the launch of a new Kickstarter campaign to help fund the development of its upcoming mod management platform, GMOD. Built on powerful new technology, GMOD streamlines the modding experience for hardcore and casual PC gamers, delivering an intuitive platform where mods “just work”. Leveraging this simple and flexible interface, the GMOD team aims to open up the world of modding to mainstream gamers everywhere.

Supporters can learn more about GMOD or help fund the project at the official Kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gmod/gmod-0

“Modding has always been a very important part of PC gaming, but there’s a reason why it has failed to reach mainstream gamers – it’s rarely a simple process,” said Skylar Kreisher, CEO of Olympus Games. “Our goal is to make mods so easy to find, play and share, that anyone can become part of the modding community. It’s time for a new generation to re-discover their favorite games with innovative modded content.”

The GMOD client is a mod management platform that’s designed to enable gamers to use mods faster, safer and easier than ever before. Users can quickly install new mods with its drag-and-drop interface, enable and disable mods with just one click, and most importantly, never deal with unzipping, directory-diving, copy-paste-overwrite or mod-based re-installs ever again.

GMOD is pushing the modding scene forward by building a holistic solution where players can use mods from any source or community, discover and share new mods with friends and promote the hard working mod developers that make it all possible. It’s a robust platform that, with fan support, will continue to thrive and improve, eventually incorporate everyone’s favorite games and mods.

For more information about GMOD and Olympic Games:

Visit Kickstarter: http://kck.st/Y0oLhC

Join the Facebook Community: https://www.facebook.com/gmodsocial

Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GMod

Subscribe on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/gmod

Train2Game News: UK Top 20 Games – 07.05.13

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

This week, with the bank holiday weekend, was a very quiet week for new games. There isn’t much change in the top 20 and no new games. Dead Island Riptide has kept its number one position as well.

All formats

Week ending 4 May 2013

POS.		TITLE	PUBLISHER	LAST WEEK
1	–	DEAD ISLAND: RIPTIDE	DEEP SILVER	1
2	–	INJUSTICE: GODS AMONG US	WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE	2
3		TOMB RAIDER	SQUARE ENIX	5
4		FIFA 13	EA SPORTS	7
5		DRAGON’S DOGMA: DARK ARISEN	CAPCOM	3
6		CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS II	ACTIVISION	11
7		BIOSHOCK INFINITE	2K GAMES	6
8	–	LEGO CITY UNDERCOVER: THE CHASE BEGINS	NINTENDO	8
9		LUIGI’S MANSION 2	NINTENDO	10
10		STAR TREK	PARAMOUNT	4
11		ASSASSIN’S CREED III	UBISOFT	20
12	–	FAR CRY 3	UBISOFT	12
13		DEFIANCE	TRION WORLDS	9
14	–	THE ELDER SCROLLS V: SKYRIM	XBOX 360 CLASSICS	14
15		LEGO BATMAN 2: DC SUPER HEROES	WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE	16
16		GOD OF WAR: ASCENSION	SONY COMPUTER ENT.	–
17		NEED FOR SPEED MOST WANTED	EA GAMES	–
18		SONIC & ALL STARS RACING TRANSFORMED	SEGA	15
19		GRAND THEFT AUTO EPISODES – LIBERTY CITY	ROCKSTAR	–
20		GRAND THEFT AUTO IV	XBOX 360 CLASSICS	–

< previous week

These charts cannot be reproduced either in print or online without obtaining permission from Ukie. If you wish to reproduce the charts in print or online, please contact david.smith@ukie.org.uk for the appropriate license.

Train2Game News: Games Industry News – 03.05.13

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

It’s the end of the week and it is time for the Train2Game news round up!

Playjam, the team behind the much anticipated GameStick have released a new product ´explainer´ video. The product came under attack when people felt it didn’t live up to expectations. The console is not yet released however and only developers have had hands on. You can see their explainer video here: http://youtu.be/QlNjIzNZh4o

Gazillion Entertainment will be kicking off a Marvel Heroes “Iron Man 3” Open Beta Weekend beginning on Saturday, May 4 through to Monday May 6. This is to coincide with the release of the film. As part of the “Iron Man 3” Open Beta Weekend, new players who participate will be able to select an Avenger as their starting hero – including Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Captain America and Black Widow. In order access the Marvel Heroes “Iron Man 3” Open Beta Weekend, players should register now at www.MarvelHeroes.com. As the weekend approaches, an email will be sent with download instructions.

In further Marvel news prepare to Hero Up this autumn, when LEGO Marvel Super Heroes puts players in control of their favourite Super Heroes from the Marvel Universe. With more than one hundred memorable characters to choose from, each with their own unique powers and abilities, players are in for a brick-smashing adventure. In a new video released today, you’ll get a sneak peek at a few members of the Amazing, Mighty and Uncanny (hint) team who join forces to stop an array of Marvel villains. You can enjoy the trailer, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYAXHqCM-b4

Now for further LEGO news, The LEGO Group proudly announce that their latest, action-packed free mobile game LEGO Star Wars The Yoda Chronicles will be available to play on iOS devices as well as on the official LEGO website from May the Fourth 2013. This is of course, unofficially, Star Wars Day. Questing with Yoda or Count Dooku, players can choose to join the Light Side or the Dark Side in this new game. The LEGO Star Wars The Yoda Chronicles story and game intertwines with the 2013 LEGO Star Wars novelty products in a mix of real time laser battles, intricate dungeon crawling, lightsaber duels and tense space combat high above Coruscant.

Finally, Perfect World Entertainment Inc. and Cryptic Studios are proud to announce that one of the most anticipated free MMORPG’s of 2013, Dungeons & Dragons Neverwinter, is officially in Open Beta. Free to download and play, Neverwinter is built for gamers who crave more action combat, adventure and glory out of MMOs. The major milestone of Open Beta marks the beginning of unrestricted access to Neverwinter and its content creation system, the Foundry, along with no further character wipes. For more information about Neverwinter and to begin playing the Open Beta now, please visit the official website: www.playneverwinter.com/

Train2Game News: International studios game on Kickstarter

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

Stillalive studios is a young independent game development studio who have members all over the world.

They first got together in early 2010 in Innsbruck, Austria as a team of 3. Over time, the team grew due to the ambitious nature of the Son Of Nor project and new members from Switzerland, Germany, Finland, Italy, US, and Ecuador joined the international distributed team of game developers. The core focus of stillalive studios team is to make innovative indie core-games for PC, Mac and Linux with special and unique game mechanics.

Since their small beginnings they have moved on and now have a game on Kickstarter.

The Son of Nor Kickstarter campaign started on 30th April and will run for 30 days and hopes to pique the interest and backing of gamers everywhere to raise the $150k needed to launch this game into the market.

Son of Nor is a 3rd person action adventure game set in a desert world where human kind is on the brink of extinction at the hands of the Sarahul; an evil race of reptilian creatures bent on the destruction of human civilization. Players become humanity’s last hope for survival in an epic struggle to hold back the Sarahul hordes and change the destiny of the entire planet.

In Son of Nor, players command unique force abilities with which they must fight, solve puzzles and ultimately stay alive. These abilities include telekinesis, powerful magic spells and terraforming; manipulation of the game world itself.

Julian Mautner, founder of stillalive studios, said “If you have a specific goal, it will be the player’s choice of how to achieve it. Players can also choose to play in single player mode or enlist their friends to help them. As gamers ourselves we know the co-op in a game is so important and we have had the most amount of fun developing these elements and know, from feedback so far, our backers and gamers alike will find this very appealing.”

The studio released a new video today detailing multiplayer and co-op game elements for their debut title

Co-op is a key motivating factor in the game. Special level sections, in-game rewards and some puzzles will only be achievable and solvable with the help of companions, when playing through the campaign in multiplayer mode.

You can view the trailer for the multiplayer mode below:

A story like this one shows that no matter where you are or what your situation you can make games and get to a successful level. There is nothing stopping you achieving your dream.

To pledge support please visit the Kickstarter page at: http://bit.ly/SonOfNor

Train2Game News: Train2Game Radio – Sam Henderson

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

Last week I got to interview Sam Henderson who was the runner up in the Rapid2D competition. Sam told me about how he came to Train2Game and how he found working with the engine and Windows 8.

You can listen to the interview here: http://audioboo.fm/boos/1366288-train2game-student-sam-henderson-shares-his-prize-from-rapid2d

Or read the following transcript:

My name’s Sam Henderson, doing the Train2Game developer course and I live in Darlington.

Hi Sam, how you doing mate?

I’m good thanks

Excellent, so tell me who you are and what have you done lately?

Well at the moment just trying to be a games developer, went to university for 2 years, didn’t like it, went on Train2Game, learnt loads from that.

I understand you worked with the Rapid2D engine recently, you were part of the competition weren’t you?

Yeah

How did that go?

I came second, I was runner up.

Yeah and what did you have to do for the competition?

Just design games for Windows 8.

How did you find working with Rapid2D and Windows 8 and all of that?

A lot easier than I thought! It was difficult to get used to it but when I did get used to it, it was perfect to use. A lot easier than I thought it was going to be.

Excellent, so what sort of games did you make?

I made a Space Game, I used templates that they provided to us and just tried to edit them. I used a couple of quiz games based on the template they provided us with and I just went from there really.

You had to make a certain amount of games to enter didn’t you? How many?

Yeah it was 5 to enter then for every one you get an extra entry. I made I think it was twenty three in total.

That must have been quite some work!

Yeah, day and night!.

Yeah, who needs sleep!? So was that on your own you did that?

Yeah I was on my own.

You said you were at University and didn’t enjoy it that much. What was it about University that you weren’t into so much?

Um, because we were quite a big class, because games programming is quite popular, I didn’t get the support, the one to one support, I wanted and needed. So the lecturers came in, dealt with the people they liked and who stood out more to them but for people like me who stay back, stay quiet, through certain things, it was a bit harder for me to grasp everything but then I found Train2Game and I found everything a lot, lot easier, a lot more support, got the forum and got the Tutors. It was so much easier to use. In my own time as well.

How did you find out about Train2Game?

I think it was an ad through Facebook!

So how did you initially get into games development? What sparked off your interest for it?

Well my initial games interest was from when I was a kid, I had a lot of free time because I was in hospital quite a bit because I fell in a river and got an ear infection and lost hearing in my ear. So I was in and out of hospital every now and again and I had a games console to play while recovering. That sparked my interest in games and as I progressed through life I just wanted to do more with games and try and produce them myself and get more involved in development for them.

Excellent. So where would you like to end up working in the games industry?

Not sure! Anywhere that’s willing to take me really.

You haven’t got any ambitions to work at any of the big companies or anything like that?

Well I suppose probably my favourite one to work for would probably be Bethesda, working on the Fallout or The Elder Scroll games.

Yeah? They seem to be popular with the programmers because of just the amount of work that goes in to them must be quite appealing!

Yeah.

Alright, well thank you very much then Sam!

Thank you.

Train2Game News: BioShock Infinite DLC leak

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

Reports have emerged of a leak on Linkedin revealing a new companion for the next BioShock Infinite DLC.

The Linkedin profile of 2k’s animator Michael Shanan let the information slip but it has since been edited. The DLC has already been announced so that isn’t a suprise but the news of a new companion is new information.

The DLC will apparently contain “hours of additional gameplay and continue the player’s journey in the sky-city of Columbia with new stories, characters, abilities and weapons”.

Given that, it’s possible that this ‘new’ AI companion will be a replacement for Elizabeth. Her travelling through the game was such a key mechanic that it’s hard to see how they could ask us to play through Columbia’s skyways without someone to toss over health and ammo at key moments. It’s all speculation of course, since this hint was clearly not meant to reach the ears of the gaming press, and information has not yet been released.

My theory is that the DLC will follow the story of one of the other characters in the game, just as the Dishonored DLC followed the story of the assassin Daud. There are several other characters the DLC could follow including the leader of the Vox Populi – Daisy Fitzroy, the old solider – Cornelius Slate or possibly even Lord Comstock himself.

I look forward to seeing what they do with the DLC and will most certainly be purchasing it. You can pick up a 3-for-2 price offer and get the season pass in order to pick up all three pieces of future DLC.

Train2Game News: Pirates taste their own medicine

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

Yesterday saw the release of Game Dev Tycoon, the debut title from developers Greenheart Games. The game in it’s self sounds interesting but the way it has fought piracy is amazing.

Studio founder Patrick Klug decided to pre-empt pirates and he put out a cracked copy of the game himself. He used it to teach pirates a lesson by “holding a mirror in front of them and showing them what piracy can do to game developers.”

The idea of the game, as the name suggests, is to run your own games development studio. Creating games, researching hardware and moving from generation to generation. Those who downloaded the cracked version however will run in to difficulty in about the PS2 generation, where their games will start to be pirated. They’ll see their studio finances dwindle as piracy bleeds out their balance until the point of bankruptcy.

The reactions Mr Klug has found from people pirating his game range from the amusing: “Is there some way to avoid that? I mean can I research DRM or something …” to the depressingly unaware: “Why are there so many people that pirate? It ruins me!”

The sad part of this story comes when you know of the people playing the newly released game, around 93% are using the cracked version, with just under 7% having to chosen to pay the fee of $7.99. Mr Klug also details the various ways he’s tried to reach out and speak with pirates about the harm they’re causing his studio, yet it seems the stronger message will be the one coded into the game.

Klug leaves you with this final thought “If years down the track you wonder why there are no games like these anymore and all you get to play is pay-to-play and social games designed to suck money out of your pockets then the reason will stare back at you in the mirror.”

Train2Game News: Batman: Arkham Origins details and screenshots

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

In the new issue of Games Master magazine speak to WB Montreal, the studio behind the Arkham prequel. They discuss the approach to crafting a different Dark Knight and offers some insight into features that didn’t make the cut.

Warner has confirmed the Batman: Arkham Origins release date as October 25 for consoles and PC. There is also a few new screens from the game which can be seen in the gallery at the bottom of this article.

According to a recent report, Arkham Origins will have a multiplayer mode, making it the first in the series to include it.

Here are the new details as reported in Games Master:

Batman: Arkham Origins is the story behind “how the unrefined, rough-around-the-edges, early career Batman” becomes Dark Knight
Batman and Captain Gordon meet for the first time during the events of Arkham Origins
Senior producer Ben Mattes says there are elements to the story that they will never discuss before the game has shipped
Batman in Arkham Origins has the moves and the abilities, but hasn’t faced the challenges that shape him into the Batman we know. Arkham City Batman is described as Batman 5.0, while Arkham Origins Batman is 0.9.
It’s “year two” of Batman’s career, roughly speaking
WB Montreal has been given everything Rocksteady had, from engine tweaks to concept art.
It plays exactly like Arkham City
At one point the HUD included a storm indicator. Since Origins takes place during a snowstorm, it provided warning of incoming wind blasts. However, it negatively impacted the freeflow combat as “enemies stand around waiting for you to punch them” and “you’re swinging wildly because you don’t know where they are.” The feature was cut.
Another cut feature is the enemy quad-rotor drone which would patrol rooms in search of Bats. The drone “broke the richness of the predator room, which is in giving the player the power to play the way they want.”
Detective mode has been overhauled, as has the gadget upgrade progression tree.
Goons will be able to “take advantage of the verticality” of New Gotham
Legends of the Dark Knight was the “single most inspirational piece of media”
“Making Batman scary again is important”
WB Montreal believes it has made “the coolest version of Deathstroke. He’s a wonderful counterpart to Batman”
Northern Gotham is the area that became Arkham City, it is a mix of low-rent residential and industrial buildings. Referred to as the Brooklyn of Gotham.
New Gotham is described as the ‘Soho’ or ‘East Village’ of the city. It is a brand new, upmarket area, borderline financial zone of the city. Focus is tall buildings, catwalks and walkways here.
The GCPD is corrupt, so Gotham’s swat teams are out to get Batman too
No mention of Joker yet.
A ‘Most Wanted’ mechanic offers a selection of mini-campaign side-stories centered around other major villains.

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Train2Game News: Word slinging game Spellirium

Posted on April 23, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

Untold Entertainment introduces Spellirium, a trashpunk comedy adventure with monsters, mystics, and linguistic spellslingers.

In a future when reading and writing have been outlawed, Brother Todd of the Runekeepers and a motley crew of characters must journey across the devastated landscape, bringing peace and order to a ruined civilization. But outlandish legends thrive on oral tradition, and Todd uncovers a painful truth written in the margins of his life’s story.

Untold is setting its sights on older players with Spellirium’s darkly comic approach to themes of betrayal, individualism, and privilege. The company hopes Spellirium will please venerable adventure fans who remember a time before pointing and clicking, when entire worlds were explored through text parser commands. Puzzlers who delight in crosswords, Scrabble, Boggle, and logic challenges will find something to love in Spellirium.

Using word-based spellcasting to battle monsters and shadowy overlords, Spellirium is an adventure for clever players. More than just manipulating letters to form words, players must utilize palindromes, synonyms, color combos, rhymes, and more. One monster, for example, can only be defeated through onomatopoeia (CRASH, BANG, BOOM). A certain achievement sees players building semordnilaps – words that spell valid, entirely different words when read backwards (ROOM <-> MOOR). A mindless word-search this most definitely is not.

Pre-order customers immediately receive an alpha download of the game, which includes the prologue and two of three acts. The “kickENDER campaign,” as called by Untold Entertainment founder, Ryan Henson Crieghton, will be used to fund further development, including the implementation of the final act, voice-overs, and sound effects.

Rewards for financial backers at various tiers include voicing a character in the game, designing a creature, and branding a word in the Spellirium Dictionary; a collectible list of 50,000 words that can be used to buy items and craft power-ups. The Reserve-A-Word tier is already proving popular with players, who have reserved a bizarre list of words including SLUG, LIZARD, MOIST, BARF, MOMMY, SAMURAI and SAUSAGE.

In one of the support tiers you also get access to the UGAGS game logic and a “God Panel” so you can tweak and play around with the game as much as you want or just see the coding that went in to how the game works. This should be very helpful to any Train2Game developers.

This sounds like an interesting new take on an old system that was used in the likes of the text based adventure, ZORK.

You can watch the trailer below

You can pre-order Spellirium, support them and find out more at www.spellirium.com

Train2Game News: UK Top 20 Games – 22.04.13

Posted on April 22, 2013 by Train2Game Blogger Team

This week in the games charts BioShock has been knocked off of the number one spot! The game that punched it down to second place is the DC Comics fighter, Injustice: Gods Among Us. The new Fire Emblem game on Nintendo 3DS is the other new entry this week coming in at number three.