demolition-derby
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Bugbear teases destructive 'next car game'
Finnish game studio Bugbear Entertainment, original developers of the FlatOut series and Ridge Racer: Unbounded, began teasing its next racing game today. Under the working title "Next Car Game," the teaser trailer above shows off a chaotic demolition derby using in-game footage.According to the developer's site, it feels "there hasn't been a proper demolition derby game in years." The game is coming to PC and other platforms, though Bugbear didn't specify what ones. Fingers crossed that ColecoVision in on the list.
Game console pioneer Jerry Lawson dies at 70
Gerald A. "Jerry" Lawson is one of the great unknown pioneers of the video game industry. He passed away this past Saturday morning of unspecified causes, according to an announcement on Digital Press. Lawson will be remembered as the engineer of the first cartridge-based game console (with a pause option!), the Fairchild Channel F, which launched in August 1976 as the Video Entertainment System (VES). He was also the only black member of the legendary Homebrew Computer Club, formed in Silicon Valley in the mid-70s. In the early 1980s he founded and ran Videosoft, which developed a handful of games for the Atari 2600. Additionally, Lawson's Demolition Derby was one of the first coin-op arcade machines, produced in his garage in the early '70s and installed in a southern California pizzeria shortly after Pong debuted. One of its key design features prevented players from stealing "free" games by jiggling the coin switch. Just last month, Lawson was honored during the 7th Annual IGDA Minority Special Interest Group Social Gathering at GDC. Shortly before the event, he was profiled by the San Jose Mercury News. More about his life is revealed in a 2009 interview with Vintage Computing and Gaming. [Photo credit: Maria J Avila Lopez/Mercury News]
E3 2009: Racing updates zoom into Free Realms
If you're one of the many people who really enjoy the Racing game or Demolition Derby in Free Realms, then you're in for a treat. We learned in speaking to Andrew Sites, Senior Producer for Free Realms, that the team at SOE are hard at work on a huge content update specifically geared (no pun intended) towards the fans of the racing games. The update, currently scheduled for July, will include progression for racing players allowing them to become better racers over time until they eventually unlock a prestige class mechanic. This prestige racer class is slated to allow players to hit level 20. In addition to the prestige class, we'll also see a new garage being added to the game which will allow players to have a special place to store all their cars. The new garage will also allow players to modify them, including changing speed, braking, handling and all those other spiffy mechanics that racing gamers like to pick from in order to build the car of their dreams. As if this weren't enough, in August, all you Free Realms racing fiends will be treated to a Pro-driver class which will grant new cars and tracks. Should be a turbo-charged series of updates! Massively was on the ground in Los Angeles last week and covering all the latest E3 MMO news coming from the convention. Check out our breaking coverage (or all the Joystiq network E3 reporting) and keep your eye on Massively's front page for the latest developments.
