New Halo Reach ViDoc from Convention August 17, 2010

Germany is a long way away from where I am, but that doesn’t mean you’re not getting all the news coming out of it.  Bungie released a new ViDoc from Halo Reach today, called “A Spartan Will Rise” and you can check it out right here.

It’s nice to hear Jen Taylor back in action as Cortana, and we finally get to see the famous Dr. Halsey in a Halo game.  She was an essential character to the Halo fiction presented in the books, and she has been seen in the Halo Legends movie, but this is her first game appearance.

This one reminds me a lot of a similar ViDoc, I believe it was “Desperate Measures”, for Halo 3 ODST where Nathan Fillion introduced all the new members of the ODST squad.

Halo Reach is coming Sepetember 14th, 2010 only for the Xbox 360.

Halo Waypoint Coming to Windows Phone 7 August 17, 2010

I make it no secret my favorite feature of the Xbox 360 is the Halo Waypoint. It’s not even a year old and it’s been giving me a huge incentive to dust off my old Halo games and get achievements I missed out on.

Well the it was announced tonight on Xbox live, the popular software is coming to Windows Phone 7.

You’ll be able to log in to your live account, track your waypoint awards, read the latest news, and stream all the exclusive waypoint videos all from your phone, the same day the phone releases, at no charge.

Unfortunately this is only coming to Windows Phone 7 right now, even though after getting a look at it I’m sure a Droid or iPhone could run it.

Anyone having Live Anywhere flashbacks? There is currently no release date for Windows Phone 7.

Post Quakecon id Software News August 16, 2010

Well Quakecon is pretty much a wrap right now, but there’s still plenty of information coming out of it about id Software’s current projects.

Doom 4, the unfortunate no show of the event, is likely to get a cross platform release, for PC, Xbox 360, and PS3.  Now the last information I heard about Doom 4 indicated that it was going to use Tech 5, the same engine that powers Rage, but whereas Rage is going to be locked at 60FPS (across all platforms), because Doom 4 is going to tax Tech 5 even more than Rage will the game will be a 30FPS game.  Doom 4 still has no release date.

I also read some news about id’s mobile division.  Now I had previously reported that Rage will see an iPhone version, but it’s recently been added that Quake Live (the online browser version of Quake 3 Arena) is being ported to the iPhone as well.  Great news, Quake 3 Arena is a staple of multiplayer deathmatch.  No release dates on those games either, the iPhone is notorious for having a “one second it’s not there, the next it is” reputation.

Latest Alan Wake Musings August 16, 2010

There’s a really good post-release Alan Wake interview here.  Things seem to be going pretty good, but while it wasn’t a no-holds-barred conversation, they did let a lot of information spill out.

• The Second DLC, “The Signal” is coming in the Fall.
• A sequel is defiantly being considered.
• A PC version is not in the cards right now.
• “The Signal” may not be the last DLC, but it will conclude the story started with “The Writer”.

A lot of information to take in.  My conjecture is the team hasn’t yet decided if the continuation of the Alan Wake story will be in DLC or a full sequel yet, but it’s obvious they have plenty of ideas where the story is going to go.  Honestly I’d be happy with them stopping after “The Writer” and then just going into full Alan Wake 2 development.  I like DLC, but there gets to be a point where the amount gets to be overkill and your wallet slowly gets emptied until there’s nothing left.

The talk about PC development was interesting.  The possibility defiantly exists for a PC version of Alan Wake or if there was a sequel, there could very well be a PC version of that.  The thing is that Alan Wake is just so tightly designed for a console right now, developing for a PC version would take an amount of time they just can’t devote right now.  That tells me it’s because they’re busy doing “The Writer” and planning for what’s coming after that.

Rage May Not Lose Dedicated Server Support August 14, 2010

We all know how protective PC gamers are of their dedicated servers.  When it was pulled from one or two games, the internet universally (and in some cases rightfully so) went absolutely apeshit.

Rage never officially lost dedicated server support, but then again they never really had announced dedicated server support in the first place.  There have been musings during Rage E3 showings that made it likely that Rage would also lack a dedicated server option on release for its PC version.  In fact John Carmack mentioned in an interview he was just glad his game was just not the first to announce it if that was what they decided.

However it seemed that the fervor of dedicated server love has made id Software take another look at lacking the dedicated server option, and while they haven’t made a decision yet if Rage will include a dedicated server, the possibility does still exist.

Rage will release October 13th, 2011 for PC, Xbox 360, and PS3.

Crysis 2 Release Date August 14, 2010

The highly anticipated Crysis 2, the first Crysis game to see a console release, finally has a release date.

The first Crysis game was a PC exclusive, which maxed out the systems of everyone who tried to play it, and delivered the highest fidelity graphics at the time.  It was also one of the first games to support DirectX 10.

Crysis 2 will release March 22nd, 2011 for PC, Xbox 360, and PS3.  It will support 3D on all platforms.

Rage Release Date August 14, 2010

Big news from Quakecon today. The release date for id Software’s highly anticipated next game, and new IP, Rage has finally been announced.

This will be the first game released by id in years, the last being Doom 3. Wolfenstein and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars were co-developed with other studios. The reason for the long development was this game was built entirely from scratch with a new revolutionary graphics engine.

Rage is coming September 13, 2011 in the US, September 15, 2011 in the UK. It launches for PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.