wargames
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Shall we play a game?
When you think of a rapidly developing Asian nation, fast becoming a global superpower and now harnessing the potential of supercomputing, what's the first purpose for this supercomputer that comes to mind? Hint: think video games, not war games. Regardless of your first thought, we're betting you wouldn't have guessed "World of Warcraft"... but it's true. China's World of Warcraft servers are run by The9, who own Blizzard's distribution rights in the country. "Earlier this year, The9 boasted of hosting more than one million World of Warcraft players online at the same time.To support the complex calculations required to create the game's graphics, The9 owns more than 10 supercomputer systems," Ashlee Vance reports for The New York Times.
WarGames returns to theaters via digital distribution & projection network
The Metropolitan Opera has enjoyed success through digital distribution in HD to move theaters, so of course our next pick for the Digital Broadcast Network is...Wargames? Thanks to the reduced cost of beaming the movie via satellite, National Cinemedia is giving the 1983 flick a one night only return in 300-plus theaters ahead of the 25 anniversary DVD release. This isn't the only movie enjoying the benefits of the technology, and seeing old movies on the big screen is a fine job for HD. However with great power comes great responsibility and we ask that it should be reserved for true classics of American cinema, like Top Gun, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Goonies, Labyrinth. We're not sure WarGames makes the cut.[Via Pop Machine]
Tabula Rasa's new PvP Control Point Wargame
We've been hearing word of more exciting variations on PvP coming to Tabula Rasa soon, and in this week's Feedback Friday, we get some more details and screenshots for the new Control Point Wargame. Apparently, in this PvP zone, each team will own a fortress containing a control point. If one team conquers the other's control point, the losing team is imprisoned and subject to humiliation and ridicule, courtesy of the winning team. This battleground will be introduced to the Public Test Server with Deployment 9 and probably stay to iron out bugs at least until Deployment 10.Also in this report, we get word of Clan Lockboxes which will be introduced as part of the Clan-Owned Control Points feature. At first impression, they seem to operate almost identically to the WoW guild banks, complete with restricted access and clan log tabs. These will be in Deployment 9 on PTS only, but will most-likely be introduced to the live servers with Deployment 10.
Giant Bomb to watch, evaluate every game-based movie
It's common knowledge that movies based on games are generally awful (much like games based on movies). But for all the internet griping about everything from Dead or Alive to Hitman to anything by Uwe Boll, how many of us are insane enough to want an encyclopedic knowledge of every awful game-based movie ever made?The answer to that question is "at least one" and that one is former Gamespotter Ryan Davis, who has publicly set out to watch every game-based flick as part of "The Giant Bomb Video-Game Movie Experiment." While the project sadly leaves out game-inspired movies like Tron and WarGames and animated classics like Pokemon: Yet Another Insipid Movie, we still have to admire the moxie required to even attempt such a project. Will Davis' determination be enough to see him through? Will his sanity hold out? Find out this summer, only in theaters on the web.
Major changes to TR PvP in the works
It's a PvPers delight today, as Tabula Rasa's Feedback Friday features a cameo from designer Chris Strasz. He's stepped in this week to reassure players that the design team is paying attention to the complaints about TR's fragmented PvP system, and there are fixes on the way that he hopes will improve the experience considerably. A big portion of the fixes he talks about have to do with the way that clans function. They're looking to fix many of the smaller problems that have plagued clan participation in the past, such as fixing the problem of leaderless clans and improving the clan roster window to allow players to see when clanmates were last active, as well as providing new incentives to participate like passive buffs.They're also looking to overhaul the nature of PvP itself. They're hoping to roll out a new system of "PvP contracts" where players, squads, and clans can map out a set number of rules before engaging in Wargames. As the system exists now, squads had to sort of amiably agree to rules before fighting, and with this new system, hopefully they'll be able to write the rules in stone instead of relying on voluntary cooperation. And of course, they're looking to more ably integrate PvP into the main part of the game with clan-captured CPs and the like. While I welcome these sorts of changes, the PvP crowd is notoriously hard to please, and one wonders whether their efforts might not be better directed somewhere where they're more likely to be appreciated... like, I don't know, PvE?
Pentagon's "Cyber Storm" war game simulates blogger leaks, train disorder -- wait, blogger leaks?
You've got to give the Pentagon credit for imagining every possible threat scenario in its latest wargame, dubbed "Cyber Storm," but the plotline this time around is pretty wild. Starting with an electronic attack on the Port Authority of New Jersey, major new networks and bloggers spread "believable but misleading" information without revealing their sources -- all while hundreds of people on the "no-fly" list stream into airports, DC's Metro trains shut down, air traffic control towers in Philly and Chicago are disrupted, and mysterious liquids are found on the tube in London. That's quite an afternoon, but we're taking offense to the Pentagon's classification of the press and bloggers as "threats" -- come on guys, we're here to help. We wouldn't spread rumors -- there's nothing at all in the hollowed-out left leg of the front pew at St. Micheal's Church in Fort Walton, Kansas.
Boeing looks to combat sim for war games
Air Assault Task Force, ever heard of it? Neither have we, but apparently the little known combat sim has not escaped the attention of Boeing, which has enlisted developer ProSIM to create a custom version of the title to be used as a "hyper-realistic ground combat simulator" for use in war games. With the ability to obliterate countless virtual lives, Air Assault Task Force puts the notion of games as killing simulators into perspective, but since the game is played from the cold comfort of an overhead tactical display, it makes everything a-okay.According to Boeing, the title will be used in conjunction with tutoring software that the firm is currently developing, adding that the final product will "watch" a player as he plays, making suggestions along the way and after the fact, most likely on how to be a more efficient killing machine. That is until Matthew Broderick hacks the network and sends us all to the brink of global thermonuclear war. If you need us, we'll be in the Joystiq bunker. We have a bunker, right?
Would you like to play a game?
Who among us hasn't seen the geeky "Wargames" from 1983? More to the point, who didn't want to play Global Thermonuclear War with Joshua, the lovable hunk of circuitry that teaches us that, "The only winning move is not to play." So true, Joshua. So true.To learn the lesson for yourself, check out Defcon. It's an online, multiplayer game (you can play solo if you wish as well) that challenges you to outwit your opponents and blow them all to smithereens. After all, what's a little mutually assured destruction among friends?Defon costs $25US and is available from Ambrosia's website.
Avoiding the high-def movie format war
While Microsoft and Sony are obviously hoping their respective high-definition movie support will give them an edge in the console wars, other companies are busy trying to find a way around the format war brewing between HD-DVD and Blu-ray. First, Warner Bros. announced a new layered disc format that would allow all three DVD standards to reside on one disc. Now NEC has announced " two new low cost chips" that will allow standalone players to more easily support all formats starting in April '07.These efforts could cast the proprietary format support of the console manufacturers into a new light. On the one hand, gamers might use their game system of choice as a low-cost entry into the high-def movie market, supporting one format over the other by default. On the other hand, wary movie fans might hold off on locking in to any standard (through a game system or a standalone player) if they know the option for easily supporting both is just around the corner. With all the confusion, it's hard to blame the movie studios for mostly "sitting on the fence and hedging their bets until the technology waters become clearer," as iTWire puts it.Perhaps those considering which side of the format war to support should take their advice from the 1983 movie WarGames: "The only winning move is not to play."(Thanks Prof-KOS)
Play the news: kill Al Qaeda's al-Zarqawi
If you've recently witnessed the news on TV or your disagreeable neighbor's house getting blown to smithereens, you'd likely be aware that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, was killed in a decisive US air strike earlier this month. If this is the first time you're learning of it, the news is reaching you in a way quite dissimilar to the way in which the people behind Kuma Reality Games want it to. Reaching you is just the beginning for them -- they want it to grab you by the arm and yank you into a Source-powered, 3D recreation.The goal of Kuma\War is elaborate and intriguing, though much like a minefield, it's also laced with topical traps that require careful movements to navigate successfully. For every major battle or newsworthy event that takes place in the ongoing war on terror, Kuma\War offers a free, downloadable counterpart, plunging you right into the war-torn boots of an American soldier and tasking you with carrying out the very same mission. Just a scant few weeks after al-Zarqawi's death, Kuma\War will be offering "players" the opportunity to call in the airstrike that killed him or, alternatively, rush his house with a group of comrades in tow.
