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'Surgeon Simulator' arrives on Nintendo Switch this fall
Surgeon Simulator. It's got a serious name but it's a pretty silly game, and now it's coming to a new platform designed to maximise the gory, comic fun. According to Boss Studios, it'll arrive on Nintendo Switch this fall. Redubbed as Surgeon Simulator CPR (the "CPR" stands for co-op play ready), the version comes with co-op play and Joy-Con motion controls, and was hinted at earlier this month when the company posted a teaser trailer of the game's famously clumsy hand mashing at a light control.
The tech that makes MMO development easy for indies
SpatialOS is the technical foundation that makes massive, persistent, online world-building possible, even for small video game studios. Think of large, mainstream games like Destiny or Elder Scrolls Online: These are huge universes that support thousands of players at a single time. It typically takes millions of dollars and hundreds of people multiple years to make one of these games -- let alone support it post-launch -- which is one reason it's notoriously difficult to secure funding for the development of massively multiplayer online games. However, SpatialOS puts a spin on this standard. Improbable's computational platform offers cloud-based server and engine support for MMO games, allowing developers to easily create and host online, multiplayer experiences with persistent features. SpatialOS first made a splash at GDC 2015, when it promised to power MMO games with a swarm-like system of servers that switch on as they're needed in locations around the world.
Look for Donald Trump's heart in 'Surgeon Simulator'
Surgeon Simulator is putting the life of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee in your (shaky) hands. With the Inside Donald Trump expansion, you're tasked with performing a heart transplant on the priapic real-estate mogul turned politician. Players can choose from swapping in a heart of stone or one made of gold, and should your procedure be successful, which heart you chose will show up on a tracker site along with the choices of every other would-be doctor. What's more, a running total of the cost of the procedures will populate the tracker as well.
Better than 'Destiny': Studios now make massive games in just months
It usually takes millions of dollars, a decade and hundreds of developers to create a single massively multiplayer online (MMO) game. This is the standard in the gaming industry. Smaller studios generally don't have the resources to create huge, persistent games, and larger ones have shut down and bankrupted entire states while trying to craft MMO worlds. A lot of the hurdles in building MMOs lie within the supporting tech -- running servers that handle complex mechanics 24/7/365, maxing those out and buying more, all while solving problems of latency and persistence. Making the worlds feel real for all players, at all times.
Surgeon Simulator may hack away on iPad in 2014
Developers of the surprise hit Surgeon Simulator 2013 are currently working on a tablet version that could see release in 2014, Joystiq reports. The game -- which gives players the chance to operate on patients using intentionally sketchy controls -- became an overnight hit in 2013 and eventually found its way to Steam via the Greenlight program. It's unclear at this time whether a tablet iteration would simply attempt to replicate the existing procedures offered by the Steam version, or if new surgeries would be included -- tooth pulling, for example. Joystiq's Sinan Kubba saw a version of the game running on an iPad firsthand, but it's still a toss-up whether tablet gamers will actually get a chance to play it. If developer Bossa Studios decides to move forward, the game will likely see release sometime in 2014.
