Q&A with Geoff Keene from The Dead Linger

If you've read my earlier article on the dead linger here or have been www.thedeadlinger.com, you know I'm very excited about their imminent alpha release. Just picture a world wide true zombie apocalypse & with The Dead Linger I'm a 100% sure it has potential to be the ultimate zombie survival game. We got planet sized maps, evil zombies everywhere and countless ways to survive or die trying.

Geoff Keen the CEO & design director has been kind enough to do what I call a Q&A10, 10 questions straight to the point so we get to know where the ideas behind the project & what are their plans for it.



Atlas: When did Sandswept have the idea to create TDL & how did it come to mind?

GK: I had the idea to create The Dead Linger way back when I was about 15 years old. I was inspired after reading Max Brooks' The Zombie Survival guide, and I've been designing The Dead Linger ever since. I looked around at all the awful zombie games, and over the past 6 years, the trend has not improved. Only up until about a year ago we finally found the right timing and the right team to really start creating the game.

Atlas: How big is the TDL team, & who is the mastermind behind the it?

GK: The TDL team - Sandswept Studios -- is comprised of 16 extremely talented individuals. I'm the co-founder of Sandswept Studios and I lead the design direction, so I guess you could say I'm the grand mastermind behind The Dead Linger, but with less underwater lairs and maniacal laughing than the usual mastermind demographic.

Atlas: What will TDL do to differentiate itself from the rest of the games in the undead genre,like you say zombie games have died how will you bring them back from the dead ?

GK: The Dead Linger is absolutely going to blow them out of the water. Current zombie games are focused on killing zombies, extreme gore, run and game gameplay, and wacky weapons. Zombies aren't supposed to be silly. They are supposed to be scary. They will be scary once again. We are giving players an open world, full of the undead, and full of possibilities. You can survive and thrive however you choose in this dangerous, undead, and planet-sized world. We are bringing classic, head-shot only zombies back to what should have always been a pure horror survival genre, and has since lots its roots. We are bringing the zombie game everyone dreams about, and we are doing it right.

Atlas: What kind of map mechanics are we talking about, sandbox, endless world or sectioned maps & how big will they be?

GK: The world size is planet-sized. We're planning to lock it to somewhere around 63,000 km squared, with wrapping once you reach the edge (so you can return to your original location by moving in a straight line for a VERY long time.) Most people won't use a world this large, and that's fine. The point is that the option to explore is ALWAYS open. You will have never 'explored everything'.

Atlas: When you say true multiplayer, what do you mean is it more like an mmo with hundred's of people or client hosted where we keep the players to a minimum?

GK: Game servers will be hosted by the community. Player limits will be fairly high (64 to 256 right now is our goal), but our recommended for Alpha is 16 players max in a given world. We will allow servers to set however many players they want in their game, though, as long as their server can handle it. To be clear, The Dead Linger is not an MMO, and it is not subscription based or anything like that, nor does it require internet connectivity to play.

Atlas: What enemies will you feature & what kind. If were talking only zombies then which ones, the 28 days later marathon running z's or the more common Romero zombies that will be slow but come in numbers?

GK: We have three main zombies planned - slow, medium, and fast. The fast zombies are still slower than the player's sprinting speed, and they are fewer and far between. There will be a few other hostile enemies, such as hostile NPC survivors, and the occasional zombie animal. We have a few fun zombie animals in mind.

Atlas: Will you feature pvp in the game and how will you prevent it from becoming a free for all shoot out.

GK: There will certainly be PvP modes in the game, but a lot of players will want to play coop, or more organized team-based PvP. We will provide options for the more anarchistic "free for all PvP", a more organized "Team PvP" (i.e. red team vs. blue team) as well as the more cooperative "Survival" mode, which is the way the game was intended to be played. We expect a lot of emergent behavior in TDL as well. After all; it's a sandbox! Players will certainly come up with their own sub-games within the game. We may add the more popular emergent gametypes over time as official gametypes.

Atlas: When can we look forward to an alpha release date & do we get anything for pre-ordering?

GK: Alpha release is around October, probably later than sooner. If you pre-order, you will receive a DOVRAC gas mask. This is an exclusive gas mask that looks unique to any other mask you will find in the game. We are being very careful that premium items will never create an unfair advantage over other players. TDL is not and never will be Pay-To-Win.

Atlas: What games would you say inspired you the most to create TDL?

GK: I personally can't name a single zombie game that has pushed me to create The Dead Linger, unless you count "This game is so bad, I really need to make that zombie game I want to make." They're all completely wrong when it comes to the kind of sandbox survival zombie game that I want to see, and any of the current zombie games in development were not in development or announced when I began crafting The Dead Linger, so they've had little to no bearing on our development.

Atlas: What is your plan for the zombie apocalypse when it really comes/do you have one?

GK: My zombie apocalypse plan is far too complex to illustrate here. Let's just say it involves many bags of ramen noodles and a slinky.

Thank you Geoff for taking the time to answer our questions.



-Atlas

Silent Hill Book of Memories Release date + trailer

Silent hill book of memories has just been announced for a October 16 release date, enjoy the trailer.

-Atlas

Awesome Cinematic DayZ fan made movie

THIS IS DAYZ THERE IS NO FUTURE THE FUTURE IS NOW.

-Atlas

DayZ standalone to be released by the year's end

Dean ''Rocket'' Hall talks standalone release and comments on DayZ look alikes.


The alpha build of DayZ standalone will be released before the end of the year, probably in December.
"And it's going to be cheap," creator Dean Hall said at the Eurogamer Expo today.
"It has to be out before the end of the year," he stressed. "Not just because we've committed to it but in order to achieve what we have to do. It has to be. There's no 'we hope it is'; it has to be. And it's going to be cheap. We've decided that we don't need to sell a heap of units in order for us to be OK with where it's going. The more units we sell of it the more ambitious we get, because the project has the better resources.
"I like to think we're taking cautious and sensible steps at the moment. I don't really like cautious and sensible. DayZ as a mod wasn't cautious and sensible. But our first few steps have to be that. And if we can achieve that in December, then in January and February we can start to do all the cool stuff, move to more ambitious features."

 

Dean Hall wants disease to spread through faeces in DayZ standalone.

Why the rush? Copycats. Dean Hall made a point of being "suitably vague to stop clones". That was a bullet point on one of his presentation slides. The most notable of these 'clones' has been War Z. An audience member asked what he thought about it.
"Obviously you feel lots of things," Hall answered, "and a lot of your feelings aren't legitimate. I feel like eating ice-cream all the time; it doesn't mean that I'm going to eat ice-cream all the time. So maybe it's natural to get upset, jealous, scared - those kind of things. I definitely think all of those things.

"Maybe they will make a better game - I don't know. Maybe what they're doing is not cool to me, but the way I look at it is what are my options? What could I do? I could stand up here and be very critical of anyone who does a clone copy of the game. What would that actually achieve other than making me look like a dick? It's not going to result in a better game.

"Should I sue anyone who ever mentions something to do with zombie horror - will that make a better game? And the whole premise of of DayZ, and the whole premise of our development is we're going to make an awesome game. That's what we're selling. We're going to price it low and lots of people are going to play it. If we compromise on that, we're screwed.
"I guess what I'm saying is what I feel isn't important," he added. "Maybe that's what leadership is: saying my feelings aren't important here - my feelings are often selfish. There are a lot of other really interesting, cool projects out there like The Dead Linger. How do you think they feel? They probably feel a bit s****y too. I have to be realistic about it and say the responsibility is on me to make a good game. And that's just life."
Dean Hall may have been "vague" by his standards, but by my standards he revealed a tonne of new information about (standalone) DayZ. The top priority is tackling hackers. That's "the" issue, he stressed.
Performance optimisation and bugs are other top priorities. Hall's even made friends with Valve and Notch and Eve Online maker CCP, who all want to see and help with early code of standalone DayZ before it goes live.
One setback is the imprisoned ArmA 3 developers in Greece. They were the two people making ChernarusPlus for standalone DayZ. And they're friends of Hall's. "I just want to see them home," was his coy (and he apologised for being coy) answer. "Whatever I do to see them back is important."
Hall's plans for standalone DayZ were vast. He mentioned diseases spreading through faeces and vomit; removing the user interface; using household weapons; allowing people to craft splints to help mend broken bones. Vehicles he said were a longer-term, "end-game" feature to implement.
But to try and summarise all Hall said would be to do him a disservice. He's a fast and charismatic speaker - a natural, in other words. Luckily his presentation was videoed, and will be watchable, once it has been "processed", below.



source: www.eurogamer.net

-Atlas

Silent Hill Book of Memories ROH impressions

Since i couldnt get around the region lock for my ps vita here is Cj`s from ROH account of the Book of Memories demo.

Silent Hill Book of Memories is a game that has been hated by many since its announcement. Not because of the game’s quality–which couldn’t properly be judged at the time–but because of what its existence meant to uptight purists of the series. Book of Memories somehow tarnishes the series in a way that only those who are still hung up on the departure of Team Silent can see. BoM is blasphemy in their eyes; it shouldn’t exist. This kind of asinine complaint is unfortunately the most prevalent opinion of the game—pre-release mind you.
Book of Memories is a spinoff. That’s it. It does not deserve to be condemned as if it has somehow lessened the value, emotional impact, and depth that Silent Hill 1-4 offered. It’s just a game meant to entertain people. If it offers more than that in terms of its canon story, then great. Let’s just give it a chance, shall we? With the release of a demo we now have a chance to play it for ourselves and judge it properly.
When I had learned that Silent Hill Book of Memories was getting a demo, I was pretty surprised–the Silent Hill series isn’t granted much promotion by parent company Konami. Despite having to jump through some hoops to play the demo (account locks on the Playstation Vita) I was able to play the demo for myself. Here’s hoping it officially releases in North America so that I can continue to play it and find all of its secrets. 

The demo starts off in the bedroom of the protagonist. Upon starting the demo, you first choose an item that starts your character off with a permanent boost to an attribute, and then to the character creator. The two character classes available in the demo are Preppy and Goth. I played as the Goth class because they have more interesting shirts. Sue me.

Each character class has their own unique voice actor. As the Goth character, I was greeted to a dramatic, angst-filled young adult voiced by Troy Baker. Each character class has unique dialogue for in-game communication with other players. These lines are tied to commands like: “Follow Me”, “Health”, “Help”, etc. As a nod to fans, one of the unique Goth lines is “For me it’s always like this.” In my playthrough I noticed several nods to the series’ past.

The story begins by a familiar face knocking on the protagonist’s door. Howard Blackwood, introduced in Silent Hill Downpour, has brought a package from Silent Hill, addressed to the protagonist. Inside the package is the Book of Memories. No explanation from Howard, just more elusiveness.

Soon after Howard leaves the protagonist notices that the book contains all of his or her memories. Curiosity strikes and the protagonist decides to re-write aspects of the book for personal gain. This act leads to the start of the first level.

The demo contains two levels (or dungeons) within the Fire World. Upon entering the first area, Valtiel greets the player with a mission for that particular dungeon. Completing these missions means a reward for your character. The second mission that he gave was to defeat The Butcher from Silent Hill Origins.

Book of Memories is lacking a bit in the graphic department. Textures could be better and character models do not look too good when there is a cutscene or when the camera comes in close. The intro cinematic especially looked strange due to the characters stiff animations and visible neck seams. I’m not sure how often we’ll see our character up close in a cutscene, so I can’t be sure how much of an annoyance this will be. Regardless, the gameplay animations run smooth and that’s the most important thing.

While the textures could and should be a bit better, BoM is stylized and very vibrant, which is to be expected from developer Wayforward. Vibrancy and the Vita go hand in hand. The game isn’t ugly by any stretch, but I do feel that it could benefit from better textures.

Now let’s get to the RPG elements of BoM. Well, it’s an RPG. Such an odd thing to think of with a Silent Hill game. The game has all the basics: leveling up, currency called Memory Residue, stat bonuses tied to artifacts, multipliers, and enemy class types. Combat is done in real time, with the ability to dual wield one handed weapons—two handed weapons being slower but stronger. BoM will contain guns but I already feel that the game will focus more so on melee weapons.

A Karma system also measures your character’s alignment to either evil, neutral, or good. The Karma meter on the top right of the screen shows where your character’s alignment stands. The far left is Blood, the right being Light. Enemies drop Blood or Light essence so that you can refuel your magic. I didn’t unlock any spells in my playthrough; I’m not sure if spells are included in the demo.

Dungeons are made up of several room types: standard, challenges, a library to save, Howard’s shop, Forsaken Rooms which will contain a puzzle that will affect your Karma—these are especially cool, because the camera angle changes within them, and treasure rooms. Upon completing room challenges the player will gain a puzzle piece. Once all of the puzzle pieces are acquired, an actual puzzle leading to the next level can be completed. A hint that will help solve the puzzle must be found in one of the dungeon’s many rooms.

Along with puzzle pieces, health packs, ammo, and wrenches to repair your melee weapon, dungeons also contain notes. These notes either give you a piece of the story or some lore. There are also televisions that will turn on and progress the plot with dialogue. These televisions give the player insight on the repercussions of their actions. I felt pretty bad about what my character had done to poor Derek.

Despite being a dungeon crawler, Book of Memories does have a few elements in common with past Silent Hill games: illusive puzzles, key searching, creepy music, vague and sometimes poetic notes, and weapon/ammo conservation. It may be a few small things, but a little goes a long way to preserving some of that Silent Hill vibe for fans willing to take the plunge. If you’re expecting a traditional Silent Hill game, then you might be disappointed, but that doesn’t mean Book of Memories is not a fun game. It certainly seems like it will be if the dungeon crawling genre interests you.

Silent Hill Book of Memories should be a fun game if this demo is enough to go by. Judging an RPG by playing a small segment is not that easy, but the gameplay and story has me interested. If the full game can provide lots of level, weapon, and enemy variety, I’m sold. I’m still not too sure about the story, but the demo did get me to feel bad about a selfish action that my character committed. Here’s hoping that the final product delivers more of what I’d expect from an RPG and a Silent Hill title.

Source : www.relyonhorror.com

-Atlas

Lucius RPS preview

Here is a preview for Lucius the upcoming stealth/horror game that puts you in the body of the spawn of Satan. For once the tables are reversed & we're the one doing the evil deeds.


Lucius arrives on the 26th of October, just in time to be played as you close the curtains and ignore trick or treaters on Halloween. It’s a 3D adventure inspired by horror classic The Omen, and it’s been developed by three-man Helsinki-based, Shiver Games. But are spines chilled? Are hairs raised? Most importantly: are brains teased? Having played an early copy of the game I feel obliged to tell you Wot I Think.
The scene is set on a stormy night, with a chap lighting a lot of candles, while wearing a red cowl, in a dark room, with ominous chanting music playing. At the same time, a child is being born. Discerning gamers will, at this point, realise that SOMETHING IS AFOOT. And that something is nothing less than some no-holds-barred Satanism. It should be pretty clear from this point onward that bad things are going to happen. And so they do.
Jump forward to the fourth birthday of the child, and it’s time for birthday boy to meet Lucifer in his bedroom. Old horn-scalp has a gift of his own for Lucius, and it’s the power of telekinesis. If you’re wondering why Dad never got you anything great for your birthday, then you’ll be looking at Lucius and thinking “lucky bastard!” Sadly, though, he doesn’t get to grow up to be a Jedi. The telekinesis – and a cheap flashlight for some reason – are Lucifer’s way of telling little Lucius that it’s time to start the killing. Other gifts come later: limited mind control, and the power to wipe peoples’ memories. And yes, it’s a game about murdering a well-to-do family and their servants, but thankfully no pets, since they don’t have any. Nevertheless, it’s sinister by way of eww.
It’s at this point, where you’re finally released into the house, that the nature of the game becomes clear. This is a game that is deeply entrenched in the heritage of the point and click adventure. While Lucius does take advantage of some aspects of its 3D engine – providing you with a lavish, spooky house, full of things that can be picked up and then dropped again – the heart of the challenge is a process that will be familiar to adventure gamers for time immemorial (albeit with a theme of familial murder): finding out what needs to be done to kill your mark, searching the house for items that might be useful, combining them in the inventory if necessary, and then working out how to apply them in the sequence that will result in horrible – sometimes comically horrible – death for the people of Dante Manor. The puzzles are never too tricky, although they can be obscure. Nor do they generally give much intellectual payoff: the victory is in the gory demise, with Lucius watching, unmoved.
After a couple of murders you have the run of the house, and the challenges begin to open up a little. Grisly death follows comedy death-rattle. It’s not supposed to be funny, I should stress, it’s just one of those games which straddles the humour equivalent of the uncanny valley, where sometimes the death of the game’s computer people is very dark, and where sometimes their blank-faced unnaturalness (the characters are pretty crude, by contemporary standards) just makes it seem bizarre, and therefore amusing.
Perhaps that’s just me.
Anyway, I have two observations about how Lucius works as a game. The first is that in tantalises you with some things – being able to pick up items around the house for example – but doesn’t do much with them. There’s a bit where you have to avoid being seen, but no actual stealth. As satan-child, I wanted to sneak. There are some side-missions you can do, fetching and carrying things for people, which allow you to unlock some additional toys, including a trike (which can, nightmarishly, ride right up a staircase), but these are never part of the core challenge. It’s draping the flesh of a 3D game over the skeleton of an adventure game, and the resulting beast sometimes moves a little peculiarly.
The second observation I have is that the details seal the deal with this particular devil. The threatening pulse you get from crucifixes around the house – turning them upside down, Satan-style, removes it – the shadow cast by Lucifer’s head, the weird things that grandpa says as the plot unfolds… it’s all just so.
Shiver are a small team, and they’ve obviously hit limits in what they’ve been able to achieve in terms of technology and content, but they have hit their mark with the 1970s horror movie tone throughout. The music, the characters, and the house itself, are all pitch-perfect. That alone makes this a promising first outing for this studio.
There are also a few small technical quibbles – like some of the scenery popping into existence as you navigate the huge house – there’s really no excuse for that – and the other is that there are points in the game where the characters are just repeating the same line of dialogue over and over as you pass them back and forth in the house. It’s an age old quibble, but recording just a few more lines of chatter usually fixes it.
My conclusion, such as it is, is one that might read a little unfairly, because it’s judging the game, to some extent, on what it does not do. What it doesn’t do is ever really open up to allow you to be a bit more inventive than the conditions-for-murder require. When I first saw this game unveiled I’d sort of hoped for a Hitman-with-Satan’s-kid, but actually it’s just an adventure game that gives you the third-person run of the house.
That’s fine – because it works under that remit – but it nevertheless ended up feeling restricted, like a tutorial segment of a game feels restricted, all the way through. Perhaps that’s down to the lack of complexity in the puzzles… but if they were more complex, would the game be impossible? I’d better stop speculating. What I am trying to say is that I expected it to become more than it was, but it never did. Hopefully, of course, the game will do well enough for Shiver to expand on the theme and actually make this a first step in a wider project of supernatural murder ‘em ups. Perhaps they’ll also take a step beyond the rigid adventure game template, too. But perhaps not.
I like Lucius, and I found it compelling. I wanted to see what happened, even as I found myself occasionally annoyed by obtuse answers to the death-puzzlers. It does not, however, ever quite hit the inventive highs of the great adventure games that it takes inspiration from, and nor does it really make the most of the setting – a child with the run of a huge, spooky mansion – that it has created for itself. Lucius is interesting, atmospheric, but is unlikely to leave its mark on history. And that’s a shame.
Lucius is born on 26th of October 2012.

Source: www.rockpapershotgun.com


-Atlas

New 17 mins of Dead Space 3 Eudora gameplay

Today we get one treat earlier than halloween, we get to see the first few minutes of gameplay and Isaac`s first crack at Eudora.

-Atlas

Silent Hill Book of Memories demo hits psn tommorow

Now we get to try out the horror brawler tomorrow, I promise I will reserve my judgement until I have went  trough it a few times. I still think its a horrible call for Konami to be putting this out and showing no love at all for the number series and the HD re-releases that they still wont fix.

Here's a few screens to hold out till tommorow.

-Atlas

New Atlas the survivor twitter yay!

https://twitter.com/lonesurvivorHQ

Had to get on before the fall so people can retweet me in 3030.

-Atlas

Anna now on steam

Anna the puzzle/psychological/adventure horror game from dreampainters is now available on steam for 9.99. Anna is a game that reads you ... your movements, the things you look at so after a while it starts to get to know your habits. Already if a computer program can read what i do that freaks me out now a horror puzzler that does the same , your in for some awesome scares and exploration.

-Atlas

New Keiji inafune game Yaiba

New game coming from Keiji Inafune , Yaiba is ninja gaiden z. From what i hear it will contain ninjas, mechs & zombies , thats an awesome trifecta of goodness.

-Atlas

Dayz Cosplay (thaasian) deviantart

I found this page today browsing deviantart, if there's two thing i like its dayz and hot chicks so combine the two and voila a awesome photo set.

Source: http://thaasian.deviantart.com/

-Atlas

the War Z preview

Here's a great article i found previewing the war z.


Sitting down to play The War Z for the first time feels like kicking the tires of an untrustworthy car. I feel the need to rattle the chassis, to jiggle handles, check for gum under the seat, listen for groans in the engine—to apply percussion with the expectation that some zombie muffler will fall loose.
Approaching a hands-on opportunity with this sort of diagnostic mindset is unusual. But The War Z is unusual; when the online survival game was suddenly announced in July, we reacted with mild hope and major skepticism. Makers Hammerpoint Interactive were promising a fuller-featured PvP/PvZ world than DayZ while cribbing concepts and mechanics from it, and it was promising you’d be able to play it this autumn—before the final version of DayZ is ready.
Half an hour with The War Z isn’t long enough to suss every concern I have with the game, but my initial test drive of an alpha version was more encouraging than I thought it’d be.
I begin in a parking lot, one that looks like a welcome center for a national park. Conifers, oak, and birch shade knee-high grass. This is The War Z’s “Colorado” map, the first of The War Z’s settings. It’s about 160km² (DayZ’s Chernarus is 225km², or about 40 percent larger).
I start gunless, with this stuff in my inventory:

• Bandages
• A full, 375ml water bottle
• Antibiotics
• Instant oatmeal
• Flare
• Flashlight

And a map, though it’s an always-owned item that lives on the M key. Executive Producer Sergey Titov, playing on another PC beside me, warps to my position. Titov throws a few gifts onto the pavement: a better backpack and a scoped rifle. He stipulates that guns, ammo, and (especially) attachments will be extremely rare in the final version of the game, making it sound like what I’m about to pick up off the ground is an apocalypse-king’s bounty.
Grabbing the loot is an absolute cinch: I look at it, hold E, and a line crawls clockwise around a circle to indicate that I’m picking it up. Feedback! Wait. Why am I happy about this? Right: because grabbing items in DayZ can feel like picking up sleeping cats with tweezers.
Once the gear is in my inventory, I can drag it around freely. Consumables like water and food can be right-clicked within my inventory to be spent. A row of the inventory is reserved for five or six active, “in-hand” items. Scrolling the mouse wheel fast-swaps between these from a set of Doom-style numbered inventory slots. Nothing nests in the backpack itself—all items I’m carrying share in the same visual space.
It’s a modern, functional system, in other words. I’m impressed with this gear setup, and that feeling echos my other small moments of appreciation that emerge during my hands-on: The War Z simply benefits from being designed from the ground up to be the type of game it is. Adore DayZ as much as I do, The War Z lacks a few of the annoyances that arise naturally from the process of stuffing a PvE/PvP, persistent survival game into an intricate military sim.
Titov leads me down a hill to a small town clinging to a two-lane road that curves around a lake. We glass zombies through binoculars at a safe distance. Some are still, some shamble, some stand on roofs. Titov right-clicks, centering his M4’s red dot optics, and plugs away at a few closer undead. His gun fires with the recoil and responsiveness you’d expect in Battlefield 3: bullet drop is modeled, but not all of Newton’s laws are along for the ride. There’s a weird, circular tracer that zips through the air with every shot we fire—an effect I hope is only in place for debugging purposes.
Zeds start to creep in from our back and side (partly because zombie vocalizations and footstep effects haven’t been baked into the build yet), and we flee through an alley formed by a wooden fence and a church. I mash a zed with my flashlight four or five times until it falls over. At this alpha stage, the zombies’ animations and movement balancing is incomplete. Undead streamed in at a consistent pace—about 80 percent of our sprinting speed—that made them easy to dispatch. Right now, they lack the erratic, bobbing gait and head movement that makes kill shots in DayZ so satisfyingly difficult. Titov says faster zombies will be added later on.
We cross open pavement, and trip a few “sleeper” zombies. These undead lie dormant on the ground, but rise when they notice you nearby. We make it across the parking lot okay, then hop the counter of a post office building to check for more gear. I loot painkillers, a military helmet, bandages, and a Mossberg shotgun. The gear is actually resting on shelves. This isn’t some mindblowing innovation, but it’s a tiny detail that, again, reinforces that The War Z will at least benefit from being designed from scratch to be a survival game.

Going downtown

Titov teleports us to another area of the Colorado map. We’re on a highway raised on concrete stilts, overlooking a relatively dense downtown made up of office and residential buildings. I point at the tallest one and ask if we can go in. Titov obliges. We drop down a broken segment of the freeway, taking fall damage as we do, and hop a waist-high wall of sandbags outside the door.
We head up to the fourth floor; the roof of the building is closed off, but Titov says the door blocking us from entering is only in the alpha build temporarily. I start trying to poke holes in what I’m seeing. Is occupying a structure for a longer period of time something that’s supported by the game? Titov says yes: item storage is persistent, so if clanmates want to hunker up in a multi-story office building like this one, they can barricade it, use it as a giant stash, and try to guard it from other players.
How is The War Z addressing death-escaping loopholes like slamming Alt + F4 at the first sign of danger? Titov demonstrates: when you exit the game, you have to wait for a 10-second timer to expire. This is a really simple solution; I’d prefer a system that’s able to gauge if you’re engaged in combat, and prevents logging out when that’s the case. But it’s better than nothing.
What measures will be in place to prevent item duplication and hacking? Titov mentions his experience dealing with cheaters in his other project, War Inc. “For War Z, since it’s a much slower-paced game, we’ve been able to do lots of the logic server-side. On War Inc., we have to do lots of things on the client, just to keep up the fast-paced nature of the game, to keep the lag as low as possible and things like that. For War Z, that’s not a requirement. We’ll see. Obviously once the game is released, we’ll probably see new cheats pop up. Hopefully it won’t be as bad as it was when we launched War Inc. on Steam. The first week was okay, but the second week we had cheating popping up. We spent a month of like, fierce fighting, basically changing stuff on a daily basis. After a month we killed probably 90 percent of the cheaters.”
From my first brush with it, The War Z feels like familiar ingredients mixed by a different chef. My impression that it’d be a more accessible take on DayZ was affirmed by the weapon handling, Battlefield-like movement speed, and seemingly streamlined detection mechanics. The act of shooting isn’t as arcadey as, say, Borderlands 2—the ironsights on an M4 I picked up, for example, had parallax between the front of the barrel and where my eye meets the gun. But The War Z doesn’t seem to have DayZ’s spirit as a simulation—it’s not driven by fidelity, real-world ballistics, or a feeling that you’re in a space modeled after reality. Details like freelook are absent. When you’re about to deploy a barricade item (like a set of wooden planks), the ghost-outline of it floats in front of you weightlessly—a single click deploys it instantly into the world.
And yet, it’s possible that The War Z could still support the kinds of strange and serendipitous player interactions DayZ has become known for. For one, it lacks some of the jankiness inherent to Arma’s engine tech. Corpses ragdoll. Buildings have more than two floors. Swapping weapon attachments—a system straight out of Crysis 2—is effortless. I’m also interested in some of its systems: player authored questing, especially. I’m looking forward to seeing how formalizing bounty-setting and other such systems impacts emergence and the feeling of player-owned stories.
I’m intrigued that The War Z’s offering private, rentable instances too. In addition to larger, full-map servers that The War Z will make available for rent, the game will make smaller instances available, that individual players can purchase for a few dollars a month. These “Strongholds” almost function as player or clan housing: templated settings like a cabin in the woods, a farm, a small town on a cliffside, or a trainyard that you can invite other players to. Titov also mentions to me that “you’ll have the option to “lock” certain locations with keypad lock, so only people who know the code can get inside, thus dividing map space into ‘public’ and ‘private’ portions.” I love the idea of learning someone’s secret code to infiltrate these areas.
So, my skepticism about The War Z is swinging a bit more towards curiosity, I guess. I need to spend much more time with it (and on a populated server) before I can make a better-supported conclusion about what it’s going to feel like to play at launch. Right now, it presents a handful of good antidotes to some of DayZ’s simple issues. But it’s also rough around the edges: the zombies are unfinished and not very intimidating, VOIP isn’t in yet, and presentation elements like animations related to the use of medical and food items are missing. I can’t judge still-unintegrated systems like bounty-setting and Strongholds until I see them. The alpha build didn’t reassure me about how dangerous The War Z will be, either—I never felt the need to be careful, but then again, as a closed alpha, it’s understandably vacant. Expect a more thorough evaluation of The War Z once we’re able to spend more than half an hour in it.

source: www.pcgamer.com

-Atlas

New Silent Hill book of memories release date leaked

I don't know whats happening with Konami anymore but our friends over at ROH  got wind of a October 16th date for the SH BOM release. They picked up the latest game informer and saw the date placed there. If it is it might be the last nail in the coffin for Konami, no press release, no announcements ... i hope this is a mistake from the magazine and not Konami. Ive been an avid silent hill player, having played countless times through the first 3 games & having played all the other ones ... including that horrible escape game and a translated version of the play novel­. Hopefully Konami can rise up like a Phoenix from the ashes of their former selves. I mean come on ... have you tried playing the SH 2&3 re-releases in HD, its a joke the game is barely playable and they wont even spend the time to make a patch to fix it. I think Konami has seriously fallen of the boat on this one, my idea of survival horror is not a brawler with co-op features but who knows the game might be killer fun, i wont judge it till its out.


-Atlas

The legend SOH interview

Valve’s Greenlight program has been running for a few weeks now. The idea behind the Greenlight program is to give Indie developers a chance to get their games released in the Steam Store. A lot of games have been submitted to the program and many of them are horror games. Survival Horror Online wants to give the indie horror game developers a chance to present their games to our readers. The third game we’re putting in a (not yet green) spotlight is The Legend. Again a game that has it’s own take on the Slenderman Mythos. We have a word with Austin Handle and Adam Sklar from Elder Productions.

Austin Handle’s from the United States. Away from his career life, he’s the Lead of Elder Productions and the founder of the Slenderman Mythos Coalition. A coalition of the leading Slenderman Mythology games, specifically Slender by Parsec Productions, Slender: Source by Ethereal Entertainment and “The Legend” by Elder Productions.
Adam, the lead 2D artist of The Legend, is from the UK and he’s currently studying Film and Television at Southampton Solent. He’s always had an interest for films, visual effects and making videos in general.
He’s currently working on Faceless (Previously known as Slender: Source) and The Legend. The Legend is not the first Crysis mod Adam has worked on, he also worked on Red Mesa, which is a mod inspired by Half Life. He’s also helping out other mods such as Alyx, Raccoon Police Department (NMRiH Map Pack), and he will soon be helping out Guard Duty and/or Operation Black Mesa when he’s needed. Adam also worked on Opposing Force 2 for their trailers.
What is The Legend?

Austin “The Legend is an upcoming horror-survival independent game. The story-line is based around the Slenderman Mythology, but, not in a way that most people would expect it. The history, the story, the equipment, the style, within the game is a brand-new experience to this mythology.”

In what way is The Legend different from Slender?

Austin “In The Legend, you will NOT be frantically searching a forest for notes that may and/or may not aid you in prolonging your life. Though, notes will offer a fantastic back-story and may give some useful tips. We pride ourselves on being able to deliver a NextGen Graphics experience instead of the lacking, retro graphics experienced in Slender by Parsec Productions. You will be hiding, running, and even fighting for your survival. The game-play will be based around related characters, and their ties together. The characters, customized by age, play a lead factor in this. For example, when you’re a child, you receive a mystery item to illuminate your paths. As a teenager, you receive a cellphone to contact your teammates (AI or Co-Op Partners) and to light your way. As an adult, you receive a flashlight. As an… wait, that one’s still a secret…”

What are the inspirations for The Legend?

Austin “Our lead inspiration behind The Legend was the stories of Der Großmann and the drive to deliver a new, satisfying horror experience to the community.”

Adam I’m inspired by a lot of things, when it comes to horror it can generally be hard to excite the audience when it comes to films, but in a game the player has immersed themselves in the environment around them, including the element of horror provided by Slendy, so Slender itself really is a critical inspiration, for my videos however, inspirations come from the maps, concepts and soundtrack of the mod, and possibly a few films in my head.

What do you hope Elder Productions will achieve with The Legend?

Adam I’m hoping that Elder Productions can expand on the currently hyped Slenderman Mythos, to enable new and exciting ways to attempt to avoid the Slenderman, to make the player be so scared that they want to avoid him at all costs. The thing that does make Slender scary is the style of graphics, older horror games tend to be scarier, and the graphics are actually one of the prime reasons why, for some people, better graphics equal better horror, but for others, less graphics equal more horror. I agree with the latter. However the Slenderman can be equally scary in both ways, and I don’t doubt that Elder Productions will do their best to make full usage of the CryEngine to make Slenderman even more horrifying and I will do my best to portray that through promotional images and trailers.

Why should we give The Legend a Green Light?

Austin “The best reason? It will be Free-To-Play! Along with Cooperative-Play! We may release DLC later on, depending on licensing options, that will be affordable to all gamers. However, the overall game will be free. Who’s not up for a free thriller experience in the comfort of the unforgiving darkness?”

Who’s not up for that indeed…
Exclusively for Survival Horror Online Austin provided us the second track of the amazing dark soundtrack by Lead Composer: David K.
Austin gave us a tip to be looking out for the next News update on Elders Productions ModDB page. “It will definitely be something you don’t want to miss!”
We want to thank Austin and Adam for this interview and wish them good luck in getting their Greenlight on Steam.

Source : Haiko K. www.survivalhorroronline.com

-Atlas

Dean "Rocket" Hall wants you to help his friends get out of jail

If you haven't heard , two of developers for arma 3 recently got arrested for spy by the military while on vacation in Greece. Dean posted on how you can help get them out of jail, help give back to the man who gave us dayz.

Sep 17 2012 
3:55 pm

My friends are in prison

I really wish my first personal tumblr post wasn’t something like this, but this is an urgent appeal for help.

Two of my close friends and work colleagues, Ivan Buchta and Martin Pezlar, are currently detained in a prison in Greece, charged with allegations of spying.

Just even writing that down is so absolutely ridiculous to me, I can barely stand seeing those words on paper. I know a bit about military intelligence, I spent five years in the Air Force as an Officer, and re-enlisted in the New Zealand Army as an Officer a few years ago, in the Signals regiment. So I know what information might be valuable. The charges are nothing short of absurd. This is a disgrace to the video gaming industry, and both of them should be freed immediately.

They are Game Developers

Me (left) and Ivan (right) sharing a moment at E3 this year

My two friends are game developers. I came all the way to the Czech Republic from New Zealand just to make games with them. Indeed, Ivan was the first person I ever spoke to in the company, both of us sharing a passion for the mountains. After more than two years of passionate work on Limnos, the fictional counterpart and also a game tribute the to the real place, they were really interested to see the real island of Lemnos. They were there as tourists, and are being charged simply because they were working on a video game. A game that portrays Greece as a battlefield for a fictional futuristic conflict. There is no risk in this game, there is no evidence here that any espionage has been conducted or even that anyone’s safety is compromised. This is at best, ignorance about video games, at worst is is an abuse of power.

They helped me make DayZ

Both guys worked together for me over the past month to help make ChernarusPlus, a new map for the DayZ game I am working on. They put in many hours of work with this, a great deal of which was in their own time. When I arrived in the Czech Republic, I knew nobody. Ivan was there at their airport with a big smile and a warm handshake, driving me to the studio in Brno to begin my adventure with the studio. Martin was always on hand to help me out, translating when I needed a Pizza order late at night working on DayZ. When I went to E3, after the pressure and difficulties of my success, one of my bags stolen and the other lost, I arrived in Prague something of a beaten man sitting at a bus stop feeling sorry for myself, very alone a long way from home. Ivan’s flight arrived later, but he called me, picked up, cheered me up, and drove me home. That’s the kind of guy Ivan is.

We need to get them home

There is much more I would love to say about the situation and the various government agencies involved. It’s up to the Greek Government now to get involved and end this immediately.

How you can help them

You have the power to help me free my friends. I need you to do four things, and if enough people get behind this. The world has their eye on Greece because of their economic troubles, let them know the world has two of their friends held hostage. These things are very important. Petitions and such are great but not as powerful as personal contact, these steps will get my friends freed:

1. Send a twitter message to the Prime Minister of Greece (@primeministergr) letting him know we want Ivan and Maxel returned to their families immediately. This is probably one of the most public and obvious things you can do to help. Social Media works.

2. Call, write, or visit your nearest Greek Embassy (click the link for a list). Let them know what they have done is wrong, and that you want them released. Be civil, but be honest. We don’t stand for this in the part of the world I come from.

3. Spread the word, let everyone know. Please forward my post on, and these links, to anyone who might be able to help. For more information you can visit my friends website at http://www.helpivanmartin.org/

4. Let the local press on the island know what you think on their facebook page, and their twitter @LesvosNet. Read some of the comments on this articlefor an idea of what is going on. Let’s end it exactly where it all started in the first place!

—-

Please note: my views here are my own, and not representative of any organization, company, or project that I have or now work for.

Source: Dean Hall tumblr http://rocketkiwi.tumblr.com/




-Atlas

Dead Island riptide gets its first trailer

Good but definitely not as  breathtaking as the first trailer for the original Dead Island game.

-Atlas

Resident Evil 6 Demo now available on xbla & psn

The demo just came out today I'm downloading it right now i will give you my impressions tonight.

-Atlas

3 new WarZ gameplay videos

Good afternoon y'all just some new warz vids, finally we get to see so more gameplay. In the footage we get to see the sniper rifle & ak get down and dirty they also bring up the mod menu for the guns pretty interesting.

-Atlas