Neowin.net / Gamers

The Elder Scrolls: Arena and Daggerfall - Free Download

Doug Bemis — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:32:41 +0000

In 1994, Bethesda released a game to begin their series of The Elder Scrolls. Beginning with Arena, Elder Scrolls brought the player into a first person RPG with an open environment to explore. Building on that platform, The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall was published in 1996, giving the player a larger world to explore, skill system, and a 3D world. More recent titles include The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind in 2002 and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion in 2006. For the 15th anniversary, Bethesda has released Arena and Daggerfall as free downloads, both of which require an emulator such as DOSBox to run on newer systems.

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EA officially announces Command & Conquer 4

David Corris — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:16:03 +0000

Today Electronic Arts (EA) has officially announced the development of Command & Conquer 4 for the PC platform with a shipping release date sometime in 2010. The Command & Conquer (C&C) franchise started back in 1995 designed for the PC which was then ported to numerous platforms including the Sega Saturn, Playstation, Nintendo 64 and multiple other systems. The franchise as a whole is made up of multiple story lines across the different Command & Conquer games, the original started the Tiberium arc which has been continued across 3 games so far, and has been announced to be concluded in C&C4 next year.

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TweetCraft: Twitter meets the World of Warcraft

Mitchell LeBlanc — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:34:24 +0000

Twitter serves as a communication platform in our day to day lives, but with a new addon for the World of Warcraft called TweetCraft, it does the same for your character. TweetCraft can: Send and recieve Tweets in-game Upload in-game screenshots AutoTweet when you log on, or reach important goals The messages are handled via an in-game window: Twitter, since launch, has permeated several different areas of our lives and emerged as a social networking giant. This functionality now extends to a virtual world of over 11 million players. To many, such an extension will seem laughable as Twitter has not been met without harsh criticisms.

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PSP Rumour: Sony Ericsson to challenge Apple's iPhone

Fred Derf — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 13:54:06 +0000

Sony Corp. of Japan and Sweden's Ericsson have a long established joint venture in the Sony Ericsson line of cell phones. According to Reuters, it was reported in Saturday's Nikkei business daily that Sony would like to bring enhanced portable gaming features to the Sony Ericsson label to compete directly with Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch product lines. More and more game developers, like Capcom, are designing games for Apple's popular iPhone device and this is seen as a direct threat to some of Sony's portable gaming products. Sony is not commenting on the story but others have speculated that we may see a PlayStation Portable-like device that can make and receive cellphone calls.

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id Software aquired by Bethesda parent company, ZeniMax

David Corris — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:51:47 +0000

In an unexpected turn of events, one that is common in the gaming industry, it was released that id Software has been bought up by ZeniMax, parent company to the popular developer Bethesda. It has been stated that ZeniMax will be keeping id Software as a separate entity along size Bethesda. John Carmack, lead programmer and last founder still working at id Software who will now be leading the company, has confirmed that they wont be going anywhere, "No changes will be made in the operations of id Software in the development of its games," He adds, "This puts id Software in a wonderful position going forward.

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Activision threatens to stop supporting Sony with software

Joshua Seed — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 16:07:56 +0000

Bobby Kotick, CEO and President of Activision Blizzard has issued a statement threatening to drop Sony formats unless the manufacturer reduces the price for the PlayStation 3. "They have to cut the price, because if they don't, the attach rates [the number of games each console owner buys] are likely to slow. If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony," he said. Asked when Sony titles may be pulled, Kotick said: "When we look at 2010 and 2011, we might want to consider if we support the console — and the PSP [portable] too.

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Gran Turismo 5 gets a possible release date, new features

rajputwarrior — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 06:26:14 +0000

Looks like an apparent release date has shown up for Gran Turismo 5 for the Playstation 3 console. The popular online British entertainment retailer, Play.com, has penciled in a release date of November 27th, 2009. When asked to comment about the date, Play.com responded with "Please be advised that the release date currently listed on the website, the 27th November 2009, is as given to us by the publisher / manufacturer or The Game. Should this release date change we will update the website accordingly, so it is worth checking periodically Play.com. This date is given by Sony Computer Entertainment or by Polyphony Digital. This means that Gran Turismo 5 is finally able to play this year!

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GDR: Top 50 Developers of 2009

Joshua Seed — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:13:56 +0000

Game Developer Researched has released its annual list of the Top 50 Developers according to the number of studios, sales from 2008 as well as SKU (Stock-Keeping Unit) numbers and metacritic ratings for each. A survey in Game Developer magazine asked 600 industry professionals from the magazine and Gamasutra to express their opinions on more than 150 game developers. For the second year in a row Nintendo claimed first place, with Blizzard Entertainment taking second. Ubisoft Montreal skyrocketed from 12th place in 2008 to third place in this year's list. The full list of the Top 50 Developers is posted below. 1. Nintendo 2. Blizzard Entertainment 3. Ubisoft Montreal 4. Rockstar North 5. EA Canada 6. Konami 7.

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Pandemic: The Saboteur is not just another WWII game

Joshua Seed — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:07:00 +0000

The Saboteur may be set during World War II but the game's developer Pandemic Studios does not want you to think of it as another World War II game. It's merely the setting, more or less. "We don't even really think of our game as a WWII game, it's the backdrop to our game which gives us arguably the best real world bad guys of all time," lead designer Thomas French told Destructoid. "Our game is big, over the top, and filled with lots of high action. "Mechanically we're so different from those games too and the ‘kitchen sink' of tools we have for the player make for something that's even different in just the sandbox genre as well.

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Update: New Xbox coming sooner then expected?

rajputwarrior — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:29:32 +0000

The intertubes are buzzing once again with rumours that a new Xbox may be on it's way next year (as in the year 2010). According to 1UP, not only will Natal be as big as a new console launch, it will be the next console from Microsoft. Yup, a new Xbox console is coming soon, and not just the same thing with a fancy camera. While developers seem to be complaining that the Xbox is current tapped, this new Xbox is said to have some new muscle under the hood. The specs will include: A new GPU that will be based on Shade Model 5 and will output in 1080p with 32mb of eDRAM.

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