I hope everyone enjoyed their Friday the 13th and didn’t run into any hockey mask-wearing psychopaths over the course of your day. After all, I would dearly miss all of your thoughtful comments and encouraging thumbs up that I graciously receive every week! However, if you did happen to run into a pissed off Jason and lived to read this week’s column, then a special shout out to you for your dedication! Bad jokes aside, we have a pretty exciting batch of rumors to cleave through this week.
Whether you’re into the legendary Warcraft III mod DotA, the PlayStation phone becoming reality, trilogy packs for Splinter Cell and Prince of Persia and/or hearing about the dead game that just won’t die Duke Nukem Forever for the billionth time – this week HAS IT ALL! Now that the stage has been set I’m sure all of you Axeheads are ready for blood, so let’s dive through another week with EpicBattleAxe.com’s The Rumor KILL!
THE RUMOR: Valve is making a DotA game
THE SOURCE: Destructoid
MY TAKE: To me mods have always represented the pinnacle of the gaming community. Sure, we at The Axe and other gaming communities use intellectual discussion and analysis to try and build a better gamer but you can’t just shrug at these guys. When a regular Joe Gamer like you and I feels so passionate about a game that they look to create new items, weapons, characters, enemies or even entire new GAMES that sometimes are even more popular than the original source material, it’s certainly worth everyone’s attention. Classics like Counter-Strike and Team Fortress were actually mods of Half-Life and Quake respectfully. Now, according to a tweet by voice actor Jon St. John (yes that’s his real name) the granddaddy of mods Defense of the Ancients is going to become the basis of a new Valve game. For those who need a quick history lesson, Defense of the Ancients (DotA) is a mod of Warcraft III made by alias Eul and created using the game’s World Editor. Based on the Starcraft mission scenario “Aeon of Strife” the game has players control hero characters and destroy the heavily guarded structures known as Ancients with the help of lesser units known as “creeps”. It’s a mod that is not only used as a tournament situation to this day but also is one of the only mods to create a sub-genre of the RTS genre. Mainstream releases like Demigod actually based their gameplay on DotA and it looks like Valve is going to follow suit. The problem is Demigod was a financial flop so will Valve be scared off by that? That’s a question I will answer below.
THE VERDICT: BELIEVE IT!!!
This looks like this is happening. On top of St. John tweeting that he was “in Seattle last week recording for DotA”, Valve has already hired the developer Icefrog who coincidentally is the current developer of the DotA scenario and have been since 2005. That is one too many coincidences for me to ignore. Also, financial risk shouldn’t really be a big problem for a few reasons. For one, Demigod didn’t fail because it was a bad game, the problem was it came out way too early in development so between all the bugs and server crashes it felt more like a $60 beta then a full retail game. Also, Gas Powered Games and Stardock (the developer and publisher respectfully) don’t have the same pedigree as Valve does. In other words, some people buy Valve games because they are made by Valve. Therefore, I think that Valve is smartly tapping into a new genre that they haven’t had the chance to dive into yet and are even going farther by having their game fall into a sub-genre that hasn’t really proven itself outside of the original DotA. If anyone can do this though…it’s definitely Gabe Newell and the crew.
THE RUMOR: A PlayStation-branded phone is coming soon
THE SOURCE: Giantbomb
MY TAKE: Okay, so this one has been around pretty much since the day the PSP was announced way back in 2003. Now it has been over 7 years and we haven’t seen a single sign that this was going to happen, though rumblings of this mystical PSPhone have come up almost every time a new Ericsson is expected to be launched. Now, PSPhone rumor #3469 has emerged and this time a “reliable source” has reported that an Android 3.0-based PlayStation-branded phone from Sony will be available as early as October. That’s really soon, only a couple months for a phone to be announced, marketed and released. Anyway, I’ll dive into the details later but as far as what this phone will feature this source claims that a slide out screen between 3.7-4.1 inches for gaming and a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU to play PSP and PSOne graphically equivalent games. Interested? I am too, just comes down to whether this is actually true or not.
THE VERDICT: SPARE IT!!!
Normally I would kill any PSPhone rumors in a heartbeat, especially ones with a “reliable source” who is reliable enough to see the rumored phone in action but not reliable enough to keep his or her trap shut (though the leak could be on purpose to create hype). What makes me have a change of heart and spare it is this apparent alliance between Sony and Google. It actually fits if you think about it. Google has long been rumored to be getting into the gaming business with their recent partnership with Zynga and acquisition of Jambool, a virtual currency platform developer. This is obviously an offensive push into Apple’s Apps territory and with these acquisitions paired with the supposed power from the rumored phone could be what these companies need to play in Steve Job’s sandbox. So for now this one goes on the back-burner till we learn a little more. It would be nice to have a PSPhone finally come out so we can stop talking about it and instead just pray for Sony’s sake that it doesn’t go the root of N-Gage and fall with as little grace as humanly possible.
THE RUMOR: Ubisoft is releasing Spinter Cell and Prince of Persia trilogies for the PS3
THE SOURCE: Joystiq
MY TAKE: I think this is the point in the console where Microsoft is going to start kicking themselves for not getting on the Blu-ray train. Right now the PS3 is the only console that can put 2 (or even 3) games from the last generation on one disk. This is really going to start to hurt when games like Rage have to come on two or three Xbox 360 disks but only need one Blu-ray disk on the PS3. That’s kind of off topic but it does dive into why we’re seeing this “Collection” fad creep in and why it only seems to be on the PS3. So with the God of War Collection pretty much deemed a success and the Sly Cooper Collection on its way the rumors of more Collections are flooding in faster than we can write about. The latest one is actually not the typical Collection format of two PlayStation-exclusive games and putting them on one Blu-Ray disk. These two packages are actually the Prince of Persia trilogy and the Splinter Cell Trilogy…even though Splinter Cell isn’t a trilogy. Anyway, according to Amazon France both of these sets will be available for 39.95 Euro ($54) and will both be out on November 2nd. Possible? Sure anything is. Happening? That’s a different story.
THE VERDICT: KILL IT!!!
I really think this is a mistake. For one thing we have no information about these trilogy sets and, just like the PSPhone, it seems a bit weird to potentially see these sets in November while not hearing a single word about them yet. There’s also the fact that if the article is to be believed, these sets are going to be PS3-exclusive which is odd considering both of these franchises are third party and support other consoles. In fact, the latest Splinter Cell was an Xbox 360-exclusive which makes a PS3-exclusive trilogy of the series make less sense. I think these Collections or whatever you want to call them are going to stay with first party Sony games and the third parties will either release these trilogies in a multiplatform manner or not at all. Therefore, I feel like we are more likely to see a Team Ico Collection then a Prince of Persia, trilogy which is good news or bad news depending on what side of the fence you’re on.
THE RUMOR: Duke Nukem Forever is being developed by Gearbox
THE SOURCE: 1UP
MY TAKE: Another Duke Nukem Forever rumor?? ANOTHER ONE!! You want to talk about rumors that just won’t die! This game has gone through multiple delays, the development team went bankrupt and then were sued and still…still we think there is this glimmer of hope that the timeless wonder Duke Nukem Forever will grace the presence of a store shelves in our lifetime. So through various sources it appears that Gearbox, the minds behind the cel-shaded Mad Max wet dream Borderlands are going to finally finish development on Duke’s long-awaited sequel and could even have a demo out by the end of the year. Yep you read that right, a demo by year’s end. Could this be it? Could this be the year that we finally see Duke Nukem Forever at a damn retailer so that poor bastard who pre-ordered it all those years ago can cash in? Although… now that I think about it he probably died of hold age with the receipt clenched in his bony, decomposing hand.
THE VERDICT: BELIEVE IT!!!
If only for the sake of never having to talk about this damn game again this better be true (and yes, I do have reasons for believing other than pure frustration). Duke is the type of character that needs Gearbox’s off beat creative minds in order to d-…wait, wait, wait…do you honestly care? I mean seriously, do you actually really want to play Duke Nukem Forever? You know after going through three engine changes, three different publishers and two development teams the game is going to be god damn mess. How could there be a well strung together narrative, focused gameplay and unique atmosphere when it’s taken 13 years to get to the point that there MAY be a demo at the end of the year. I almost want to boycott it out of spite for this joke of a development. Sadly though, I will have to play it…only because I believe you only get a once in a lifetime chance to play a game that’s been in development for over a decade and folks, this it probably it.
THE FINAL SAY
This week my final say is about some potentially awesome news. According to reports zombies will indeed be included in Call of Duty: Black Ops as a multiplayer mode. That’s awesome news if I ever heard it. Yes I know that Activision and Call of Duty are kind of a sour topic on this site but those who played Call of Duty: World at War know that this is THE mode in COD. Forget Spec Ops guys, IMO, this is the mode you want to play. So props to Treyarch for keeping the one game mode that will take you out of Modern Warfare’s grossly overweight shadow.
So that will do it for me and the slaughtering of rumors this week. I now give you the floor to do what you want with these rumors, whether you BELIEVE and let them blossom into truth, SPARE and move them to the back of the execution line or KILL and send them right to the butcher shop…the rumors are now in your hands. This has been another edition of EpicBattleAxe.com’s The Rumor KILL. Have a good week everyone!
Honestly, I am sick to death of Duke Nukem. I really don’t believe it’s ever going to get finished, and if it is, I don’t think it’ll be good. I think people need to just let it go and move on. Claims of Duke Nukem release dates are becoming about as frequent(and believable) as Elvis sightings.
Duke Nukem for Gearbox. Good match. I think that something new should be in Black Ops instead of Zombies. I don’t pay attention to Valve any more until the nest Half Life comes. Ubisoft should bring both collections to Xbox and PS3, which I think they should do(come on Who would not buy them?). An Sony needs something to compete with the 3DS in the next coming year. So a PS phone is a great idea.
On the DOTA note, I just wanna point out that League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth and both very successful DOTA-like games (HoN is basically a clone). HoN’s a full game now at 40 bucks or so and LoL is completely free (but you can use real money to buy in-game skins, characters, runes, etc. that you’d normally unlock by playing a lot and raising game money)
Valve will have some tough competition since people who play LOL and HON play hundreds of games, not just 1-2 weeks. I have over 1000 games of LOL already and they last 25 min to 1 hour each.
Just release Duke Nukem as open source and let the community create something out of it.
I can see the advertisment for Duke Nukem “The most anticipated game of the decade!!!”
Duke Nukem? As if anyone really cares anymore. I was never a fan to begin with and after buying DN3D for the 360, I’m even less impressed.
And the Playstation phone is possible since Sony and Ericson are in cahoots. As for what it does uniquely, we’ll have to find out.
Valve working on a strategy game is good news, I had a feeling the genre was slowly dying off, so a little Valve-injection couldn’t hurt.
PSPhone… I’m just about as excited about that as I am about the iPhone. Not at all, that is. I primarily use my phone to make calls, and I never travel where I have time to game (at my work I have to work, when I am with friends I am with friends, etc.) and besides, it will probably just be frustrating to realise I’m not at home playing ‘real’ games.
Another Trilogy rumor; Splinter Cell is extremely unlikely, especially from Sony I’d expect some MGS pack before that. I don’t think PoP is coming now either… If it was brought up a little before the movie-release I might have fallen for it… now it’d just be a case of bad timing.
DNF stands for Demo Next Fall? I predict a delay.
Warning: The following is a response to this week’s final say and contains a strong negative opinion based on personal preference. If you don’t like reading that, skip it. You’ve been warned.
Okay, here it comes: I passionately dislike zombies. And not the ‘I want to shoot them’ kind of dislike. Just a couple of years ago, the industry was flooded by WW2 themed games which had you shooting Nazi’s. It took some time for that tradition to be broken, but now Zombies are the new Nazi’s for some reason (there are some remains, like Zombiefied Nazi’s or Nazistic Zombies, but you get the idea). They seem to infect everything, are nothing but a generic piece of flesh and are systematically mindless and their only purpose is to be targeted by our various arsenals. Now I get that that’s kinda the idea of a zombie, but I’d like my games to be a little more of a creative product. It feels cheap to me, and here’s why:
I understand realistic AI isn’t possible yet, which results in the AI not matching the inteligence-level of a real opponent. That’s fine and we don’t expect miracles from developers (Actually, strike that, it’s NOT fine and we DO expect miracles.), but to even out the unbalance, there are two possible solutions:
1. Improve the AI.
2. Make it somehow more acceptable that your characters are acting like they don’t have a brain.
Solution #1 is what I’d like to see happening, the only way we’re ever going to get that AI to be as good as real people is by taking small steps in that direction. It calls for creativity.
Solution #2 is the easy way out. An enemy soldier running around without noticing the clearly visible player is a bug. Just call ‘m zombies and it becomes a feature. Look at how good we managed to create a zombie, he’s so stupid he doesn’t even see you. It was very creative of the person who first thought of this brilliant solution, but the originality is a bit gone by now. It is very rare (if ever) that we see a truly original implementation of the fleshy freaks. Mostly it’s just the same thing over and over again.
I never expected to say this and don’t take it out of context but… even the ‘nazi’ solution looks good compared to that.
Valve.. the DOTA market is pretty saturated right now. You got one that is free (LoL), one is $40 (HoN), one that is anicent (Dota), and one that is upcoming and got like 2-3 million users already(from SC2 mod)
but I am still interested in what you got up your sleeve, and good luck taking on a new genre!
If only the Playstation phone rumor was real. I’m sure they would sell a fuck ton of PSPs if they added a phone, a camera, and 30-60 gigs of internal memory..