As the weekend comes to a close, wanted to share a few cool links from around the web. At Gamespot, watch a David Attenborough-inspired video above — courtesy of Gamespot.
And if you’re looking for something completely different (but just as fun), be sure to check out this metal mix of Skyrim’s main theme.
Last but not least, check out new sneak previews for Skyrim at Game Informer and CVG.
Last night’s broadcast of GameTrailers TV is now online – watch above to learn more about Fallout: New Vegas from the game’s Project Director, Josh Sawyer. Use the slider above to search for the segment (it follows info on the latest God of War game), or watch it in HD at GameTrailers.com (just skip ahead to Chapter 3).
For a different take on New Vegas, watch last night’s story from Channel 8 News NOW (KLAS). The piece discusses the game in broad strokes (and features Josh Sawyer), while also asking if the real Las Vegas is prepared for similar circumstances.
Finally, at Comic-Con yesterday, Obsidian’s Chris Avellone, John Gonzalez, and George Ziets participated in the panel,”Fallout: Writing for Evolving Game Franchises.” Read a panel recaps at Gamespot, G4TV, and Kotaku.
Bust out the sleds and snow tires! The Capital Wasteland is under a snow advisory, so I thought I’d warm up and share some of the latest news around the web (and in print).
In addition to handing out awards, the end of the year is always a good time to look ahead. Kotaku has a photo tour of 40 titles they’re looking forward to on Xbox 360 next year — a list that includes both Brink and Fallout: New Vegas. As we have more details on both games, we’ll let you know.
Finally in print, the January 2010 issue of OXM has a feature titled “How The World Ends.” The article is a bit an “apocalypse how?” — discussing games that tackle possible ways Earth could reach its demise (and the possibility of that actually happening). Among the grim futures they discuss are atomic warfare (Fallout 3), Meteor Impact (RAGE), and the inconvenient possibility of global warming (Brink). Look for the issue on newsstands to find out more.
I hope everyone’s having a glourious weekend. Here’s some news and info I thought I’d share.
G4TV caught up with Todd Howard at QuakeCon last weekend. Above you can watch the interview, as Todd touches on the future of The Elder Scrolls, Fallout 3 content on PS3, and Zenimax’s recent acquisition of id Software.
A couple of interesting blog posts at Destructoid. They caught up with Emil Pagliarulo (briefly) for a feature they did on “What the armor says.” Meanwhile, Ben PerLee had a chance to play WET this past week. Here’s an excerpt in which he discusses the game’s soundtrack…
“I’ll say it plainly: this soundtrack is really good, and my favorite part of my hands-on with the game. It’sfilthy hot.”
“As always with the DLC developed for Fallout 3 by Bethesda, the depth and attention to detail is fantastic. There is a wealth of enjoyment to be had and Bethesda has truly shown the world how DLC should be designed, developed and distributed.”
That’s all for now…now get back to enjoying your weekend.
Quick Update: There’s a new preview up for WET at Games Are Evil.
Here’s some of the latest online coverage — in case you’re having a slow Saturday like me.
If you haven’t checked out Drakortha’s Fallout 3 fan videos, definitely give his channel a look. His latest video, The DC Chronicles Ep 3 – Tunnels (above), is quite entertaining.
Gamasutra has a new interview with Ed Stern — Senior Game Designer at Splash Damage for Brink. Here’s an excerpt from the interview:
Kris Graft: What about accessibility? You guys have a background in hardcore shooters, but I’ve always thought that something like Valve’s Team Fortress 2, for example, is a shooter that somebody who’s not good at shooters can still play.
ES: Well, that’s why we hired Richard Ham. He was one of the co-creators of Syphon Filter. He put The Sims on the consoles, which as far as I’m concerned is a superpower. That is a certifiable achievement. And he just finished Fable 2. He is brilliant at taking a system and making it easy to get into.
In WET news, Play Magazine has a new feature on Gaming’s New Girls — featuring the game’s lead character, Rubi Malone. WET also gets a mention (as does Rogue Warrior) in a new BBC article discussing Hollywood stars becoming involved in gaming.
In id Software news, in preparation for QuakeCon 2009, there’s a new YouTube video with CEO Todd Hollenshead making wagers with the QuakeCon Girls. If you’re attending the show, you’ll be able to find out who wins the best. Elsewhere, WebDesignDev has a list of the 30 Most Influential People in Programming that includes John Carmack on the list.
And due to the nature of the world, there are times when you can inadvertently run into a clue or mission that most people probably won’t find until later in a quest line.
Emil: Oh god, yes. That was a decision we made. If the player wants to explore, you can actually cut out probably 10 to 15 percent of the main quest by finding stuff early, like the dad character. The first quest is geared toward finding him, but if you go off and explore, you can still run into him.
In case you missed these, here’s plenty of stories you can read up on…
At last week’s GDC, Emil participated in two events. On Wednesday, he joined Shadow of the Colossus/Ico creator Fumito Ueda (Team Ico) and No More Heroes creator Goichi Suda (Grasshopper Manufacture) for the developer panel “Evolving Game Design: Today and Tomorrow, East and West Game Design.” You can check out some of their discussion at Shacknews. Additionally, on Friday, Emil had the keynote for GDC’s Game Career Seminar. There’s a pretty good recap of the address here at Gamespot.
In case you didn’t already know it, The Pitt takes place in a post-apocalyptic version of the Steel City. With the news of a game taking place in their town, Pittsburgh Station KDKA talked with Jeff Gardiner about the game’s take on the city.
Last week IGN Australia held their awards for the best games of 2008 — where Fallout 3 captured the IGN Select Award for Game of the Year, as well as Best PC Game. The game also received Runner Up honors in several categories — including the all-important Best Widow Maker category.
In our final update on the March Mayhem Developers Showdown, we bowed out of the competition after losing a very close matchup (51% to 49% ) to Turbine. You may recall that Turbine ousted us in the Final Four of last year’s showdown.
As previously mentioned, the trailer for The Pitt debuted on Gametrailers TV late on Friday night. If you haven’t checked it out, it’s now up on their site.
Moving on to other news, nominees for the ELAN Awards have been announced with Fallout 3 receiving nods in the following categories: Videogame of the Year, Best Console Game, Best PC Game, Best Sound in a Videogame Production, Best Art Direction, Best Game Design, and Outstanding Technical Direction.
Finally, Canadian site Game Focus has a new interview with Pete that went up today. Here’s a snippet:
What mistakes and triumphs did Bethesda learned from Oblivion that helped you with Fallout 3?
A lot of it was learning about the big, open-ended experience. What kinds of things did people like or not like? How do we do that better, and different, in the Fallout universe. Technically we learned a lot about how to make the game run better on all these platforms, but much of it comes from the player experience and what they can do, and see, from moment to moment. I’m sure we’ll learn a lot from Fallout 3 we can put into our next project.
That’s all for now. Enjoy what’s left of your weekend.
Looking for something to listen to? Last night the latest AVault podcast (#22) went live — featuring an interview with Pete and Emil. Additonally, they’ve got a written interview with Pete here.
Curious about the image at the top of this blog post? You’ll get it if you check out Todd’s presentation from this year’s D.I.C.E. Summit. You can watch it over at IGN.
Wrapping things up, Castle Karstaag from Morrowind has been named one of the most expensive videogame castles over at College OTR. Champagne wishes and caviar dreams!
