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Turbine lifts LotRO's Rohan NDA, unveils Mac client
On the flip side of the news earlier that Turbine is delaying Riders of Rohan until October 15th is the word that the studio has dropped the NDA for LotRO's fourth expansion. Community Manager Rick Heaton announced the lift on the forums: "Today we have officially released Riders of Rohan beta testers from their NDA. Beta testing will continue as we move towards our new release date of October 15th. In the meantime, those beta testers who wish to share their thoughts and experiences thus far with the general community are encouraged to do so here." With the NDA lift comes news that Turbine has been secretly working on a native OSX client for Mac players. It remains to be seen whether or not this client will be available with Riders of Rohan's launch.
Google plans unified gaming hub for Play, cross-platform titles a possibility
In other non-spotlight stealing tech news, Google's set to chop off some of its gaming arms in favor of a sole download hub as early as next year. Plans for this streamlined service were announced by Punit Soni, group product manager for Google+, at this year's Game Developer's Conference. According to VentureBeat, the company's virtual storefronts, which encompass the likes of Chrome, Android and Google+, will all be tied into a single Google Play-hosted destination that should ease game development, potentially making titles accessible cross-platform. In addition to the creation of this one-stop shop, features such as Native Client, Hangouts and a simplified payment system will also reportedly be integrated into the unnamed site. No immediate changes are on deck for this service overhaul, so it'll be a bit before we can see how this "One Google" vision pans out.
MAME gets Chrome Native Client port, is awesome case study
We've already seen MAME burn brightly (and briefly) on iPads across the world and now it's been delicately ported across to Chrome's Native Client. Admittedly, the graphics may not stand up against recent gaming wares seen on Google's new platform, but it's still able to cope with the likes of Pac-Man. Managing to turnaround the whole project in a mere four days, Google engineer Robert Muth branded the brief exercise as "relatively challenging" and has noted down all the deep and meaningfuls in a full case study, available at the source below. For anyone unwilling to dip their toes into Native Client waters, however, there's still plenty of power pellets to be downed online.
Google's Native Client focuses on apps and games, brings Bastion to the browser (video)
In case you missed it, Google's Native Client launched at the end of the summer, promising to ease cross-OS deployment by letting developers run x86 code natively in Chrome. Early adopters have had a few months to tinker with Google's new trick, and now the outfit is eager to show off their best work. Supergiant Games, for instance, has ported Bastion to the Native Client, opening up the Xbox Live hit to Mac, Linux and Chrome OS users. Google's Christian Stefansen says Native Client makes porting existing code bases written C, C++ or C# easy, citing Spacetime Studio's Star Legends -- an MMO with over half a million lines of code -- as an example of a large project that was ported in as little as two weeks. Google touts application middleware ports (such as Unity, Moai, Mono, fmod and more) and easy distribution to the Chrome Web Store as a major boon to developers, and encourages interested studios to check out its new Native Client site to help them get started. Interested? Hit up the links below, or simply skip past the break to hear Mr. Stefansen's spiel for yourself.
Mini Ninjas playable in Chrome soon
Google's "Native Client" isn't merely a technology used to play Bastion in a browser window. It will also allow you to try ... Square Enix and IO Interactive's 2009 game, Mini Ninjas. The publisher announced that Mini Ninjas for Chrome is going into open beta sometime this month. It's designed to run in the upcoming version 17 of the browser. Square Enix plans to make more games from its "group-wide lineup" playable in Chrome in 2012. Perhaps those will include some more memorable fare.
Play Bastion in your Chrome browser right now
Google's new "Native Client" tech lets developers compile high-end programs to run directly in a Chrome browser window. One of the first companies to take advantage of this is Supergiant Games, who has released its PC/XBLA hit Bastion to the Chrome Web Store. If you're running Chrome, and you meet the system requirements, trying out the new version is as simple as opening that link and hitting "Launch App." If it works well for you, you can purchase it for $14.99 and take your saved progress to any Chrome browser on any computer you happen to use. It worked pretty well for us -- on a Mac!
Google's Native Client almost 'ready for takeoff,' ready to make ActiveX look visionary
We're almost there, almost to the release of the Native Client we first got wind of last May. It is, basically, a way to run native code within a browser -- low-end stuff capable of delivering performance good enough for 3D games and the like. Christian Stefansen, a Google Product Manager, said that the stuff is getting closer to delivery, that the team behind it has reached an "important milestone," that code will be "as portable and secure as JavaScript." It was of course security, or the lack thereof, that derailed Microsoft's plans for this sort of functionality in Internet Explorer via ActiveX, a stigma that technology has still yet to escape from. Will Native Client do better? Will Crysis ever be available in the Chrome Web Store? Could a Cr-48 run it anyway? Questions questions...
Google's Native Client SDK developer preview provides helpful reminder of plans for world domination
It's easy to forget some of Google's "we will own you and your children" initiatives: there are simply so many of them. One particular gambit that has been flying under the radar is Google's Native Client, which allows the Chrome browser to execute x86 code natively. This has big implications for moving those beefy, number crunching desktop app holdouts to the browser, which would not only be a boon for Google's ability to make Microsoft and Apple-beating web apps, but a big win for Chrome OS as well. Right now the Native Client is only working with the developer-oriented Chromium browser, with ubiquitous support a distant dream, but Google has already worked out ARM processor code portability, has plans to be completely processor agnostic in the future, and will be updating the SDK "rapidly" in the coming months. Basically, it's on. Check out a video demonstration of some "hello world" code after the break, along with a brief demo of a 3D shooter.
