ShootMania Trailer Revealed

** Sign up for the beta of ShootMania: Storm! **

Yesterday, Nadeo and Ubisoft unveiled the trailer for the upcoming installment in the ManiaPlanet universe called "ShootMania".

Now, I'm not normally an advocate of First-Person Shooters, but those that know me understand that I'm a HUGE (understatement) fan of TrackMania and everything cool that Nadeo has built into that community-driven racing series.  That is obviously reason #1 that I would look into ShootMania, but there a couple of things I find very exciting about this title:

• Nadeo has taken the exiting ManiaPlanet/TrackMania engine and all content creation tools, etc. and enhanced them to function as an FPS.  The software developer geek side of me loves this, as it is a prime example of good software architecture.  But more importantly, fans of TrackMania will already be familiar with many of the game's look and feel, including the menus and tools.
• Even more importantly (to me) -- Nadeo's big push is to keep ShootMania a family-friendly game, not focused on hard-core gratuitous violence like many I've seen lately.  ShootMania: Storm looks more like a massive game of "Freeze Tag" in a way (watch the trailer and you'll see what I mean.)  The players seem to freeze, then disappear and respawn to get back in the action.

In TrackMania, Nadeo changed the way that we play racing games.  They completely removed the element of player collision and pit you against the tracks.  It is still competitve because players test their skill in completing the tracks against the other players.  ShootMania isn't any different.  Nadeo has pulled it back to the basics.  From the trailer and some other articles I've read, ShootMania: Storm will be released with 2 simple weapons, and they will leave it up to the community to go crazy and create more; and to leave them free to let their imagination run wild in creating elaborate maps to play in.  The simple play will draw both children, casual gamers and hard-core gamers alike.

This doesn't mean Nadeo hasn't thought about others.  In a video interview with Edouard Beauchemin, product manager at Nadeo, he mentions that they came up with several different weapons, but they really want this to be a community-powered content game like TrackMania is... so they're leaving it at the basics for us to make what we will.

I wouldn't be surprised, after what I've seen the community do with TrackMania, if we don't see a new genre of FPS created within ShootMania within 6 months to a year (if not sooner) of the games release this fall.

As I mentioned before, TrackMania fans will pick this game up very easily, especially those that build maps... the map editor is the same as in TrackMania, but with blocks and scripting appropriate to the ShootMania world.

The trailer is pretty exciting, especially the part where the blue team makes their epic jump over the trees to fly into a red capture point. The end is pretty awesome also.

The game is in its "alpha" stage this month, with plans to go "beta" in June.  You can sign-up to be a part of the beta at the official ShootMania website.

So enjoy the trailer, then sign up for the beta, and welcome in another great product from Nadeo!  I hope they'll be making a big reveal at E3 in a couple of weeks!

Good news for Steam lovers and DRM haters

The Big List of 3rd Party DRM on Steam

I found this today while looking up some information about the Steam versions of Thief Gold and Thief II: The Metal Age.  I want to send a shout out and a huge thank you to those that maintain and contribute to this list.  It will greatly assist those of us who despise and oppose DRM in making well-educated purchases (or in many cases, deciding against purchasing.)

For the record, which I expected, there was no DRM for these two games on the Steam version either.  Someone had posted a forum thread requesting Steam remove it, but was corrected by other players.

I hope you find this useful.  I know I will.  Especially in the rare cases when Steam omits the DRM information from the game's page.

And, as always, you can always purchase Thief Gold on GOG.com as well as Thief II on GOG.com and be guaranteed DRM-free.

Prepare for the Portal 2 Content Explosion

Valve announced today on Steam that the "Portal 2 Perpetual Testing Initiative starts now."

This means that players can create custom Portal 2 levels in a simplified editor without leaving the game.  It also allows players to upload them to the Steam Workshop which will allow other players to find/rate/download puzzles to their hearts content.

Mind you, custom content has been around for a long time for both Portal and Portal 2, but you had to know where to get it, and sometimes jump through hoops to get them working in your game.  I still want to send a shout out to sites like thinkingwithportals.com, portal2maps.net and MyApertureLabs for providing custom content until now.  They've all worked hard to make extending our Portal experience awesome; and have done a great job.

This new effort should make it much easier for all to create, find and enjoy new custom Portal 2 content, and I'm really excited to see how it works out.

So go check it out, and remember, the cake is still a lie... and potatoes are good for us all.

Dungeon Defenders: Aquanos Update Not Working (SOLVED)

Many gamers that love Dungeon Defenders were disappointed the other day after Steam downloaded the Aquanos update.  Many would try to launch the Aquanos map from their Tavern, see the game trying to load the map, then get kicked back out to the Multiplayer list screen that would allow them to select a game to join.

I found a fix on Steam's forums that worked for me, and have blogged detailed instructions at That One Tech Support Site.

The fix involves closing Steam, renaming the ClientRegistry.blob file in the Steam installation directory, relaunching Steam (forcing a recreation of the ClientRegistry.blob file and a download of the latest Steam Client Update.  You then verify the integrity of the game's cache files ... close and relaunch Steam again, then test your issue to see if it is fixed.

I hope it works for you like it did me.

This fix may work for other games you have issues with after updates as well.

Fallout - FREE for 48 hours on GOG.COM NOW!

For all Fallout fans!

Get it while it's hot!  (deal ends 07 April 2012 -- probably around 12:00pm Mountain Time)
GOG FTW!  DRM Free goodness.

Not kidding!

Nitronic Rush - Racing Survival Game from DigiPen Students

(borrowed from the Nitronic Rush homepage)

Hey Gamers!

Dragonfly (Duane) told me about this game today called Nitronic Rush.  It is a project developed at DigiPen; a technology/gaming school.

http://nitronic-rush.com/

PC Gamer referred to it as "the lovechild of Tron, TrackMania and Transformers"

Story mode - flight

It's pretty cool looking... Shawn (Ender) and I checked it out for a few minutes with the keyboard.  It's a little hard to control with a KB, but could be really fun with a gamepad.  I don't know that it has multiplayer, but it has leaderboards we could compete with each other on.

It appears to have a story mode and competitive mode.

Give it a test run and see what you think!  Fans of TrackMania will most likely find enjoyment in this title.  Kudos to the developers that created the game!

Takin' some air...

Best of Luck A&G 2012 TM2 Open Finalists!

Wish I could be there tomorrow to witness the awesomeness of the finalists competing in the A&G 2012 TrackMania 2 Canyon tournament.

I wish you all the best of luck... and have fun!
Can't wait to see the results.

GG

TrackMania 2 Canyon: USA Car Skin Unveiled

CORRECTION: I talked with my friend at Ubisoft and was informed that it's the TrackMania facebook page that needs 100k fans... not the photo itself!  And you'll be happy to know that the page itself has 70,000+ "likes" already, so we're almost there!


So click the link above, not the link below...


-------------------------------

Ubisoft today unveiled a new USA car skin that TrackMania creator NADEO created for the game.  They said if 100,000 people "like" the photo by 04 March 2012, they will release the car skin free in the game.

It already has 100 likes from those that keep up with the RSS feed... will it reach 100k in a week-and-a-half?  Time will tell.

If you like what you see... go hit the facebook page and click the Like button!

Dungeon Defenders - $2.99 on Amazon (digital download)

For those of you that experienced the fun of Dungeon Defenders, wait no longer.

The game is only $2.99 right now on Amazon.com; and there is some free-for-a-limited-time Valentines Day DLC released today called "Etherian Festival of Love."

Go forth, adventurer!

A&G '12 TM2 Open Semifinals Results Posted

"SmellOfTires" map: Synchronized Ski-Mode

See the A&G '12 TM2 Open Semifinals Results

"WHIPLASH" map: All Group 1 racers

Well, the semifinals were a blast; and thankfully went off smooth, unlike the prelims.  There was some close racing in both groups.  I wasn't much competition, but was happy taking 5th place, only 2 points between Dr.Rock and Anxiety who were tied for 3rd and 4th.  It was a pleasure and an honor racing alongside these pros and cool guys.

I was the outsider, pitted against six racers from team AMP (Amplified Gaming).  They were all very cool and we had a great time.

My TournaMania app performed well and successfully tracked both groups semifinal rounds.

Group 1 saw Laurens and Anxiety fighting neck-and-neck nearly the entire round, but Laurens clinched each map in the end, sweeping the scoreboard and securing his victory.

Laurens, Anxiety, Demko and Dr Rock from the AMP team are the finalists from Group 1.

Group 2 had equally exciting racing, with Iceman and FrostBeule duking it out for 1st place.  Supra gave some fierce compeition as well.

Iceman, FrostBeule, Supra and Besus are the finalists from Group 2.

See the full results at the link near the top of this article.

I would again like to thank Macduffman and Anxiety for organizing this tournament... the 2nd official TrackMania 2 Canyon tournament in the USA; and would also like to thank Ubisoft and Intel for their support.

I would also like to thank FNG_Thundr for his support spectating me while I played my semifinal round.  He provided the two fun screenshots in this article.  Hopefully Team FNG can run the A&G tracks in our own tournament at our next LAN party or sometime online.

I wish all of the finalists the best of luck.  Many of the finalists hail from other countries, so I also wish them success getting travel arranged to visit Ohio for the finals in March.  It is guaranteed to be an exciting set of races.

Maps are being custom built by top-notch TrackMania track authors from the TM community.  I'm excited to see them.  They will be released closer to finals time (a week or so before the event.)

GG all.  Let's do it again sometime!