What’s InsIde? Index 01 Colophon 02 Gaming Buzz
Managing Director
Dr Pramath Raj Sinha Printer and Publisher
Kanak Ghosh Publishing Director
04 Open Source Gaming 07 Must Try Browser Flash Games 10 F.E.A.R. 3 12 Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows Part 2
Asheesh Gupta Editorial Staff
Jayesh “Big Daddy” Shinde, Abhinav ‘Tayschrenn’ Lal, Sambhav “echoplxx” Daffu, Kshitij “PVG” Sobti, Raj “ ZeXiX” Saxena Designers Senior Creative Director Jayan Narayanan Art Directors Binesh Sreedharan, Anil VK Associate Art Director PC Anoop Visualizers Prasanth TR, Anil T Senior Designers Joffy Jose, NV Baiju, Chander
Dange, Sristi Maurya, Designers Suneesh K, Shigil N, Charu Dwivedi Chief Photographer Subhojit Paul Senior Photographer Jiten Gandhi
14 Alice: Madness Returns 16 Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition 18 Solar 2 20 Sneak Peek: Alienware M14x 22 Max Payne 3 24 Pro Evolution Soccer 2012
Production Brand Manager Navneet Miglani Sr GM - Operations Shivshankar Hiremath Manager Rakesh Upadhyay Asst Production Manager Vilas Mhatre Asst Manager Vijay Menon Management Trainee Omkar Tarde Executives M P Singh, Mohd. Nadeem Ansari Head Office
Nine Dot Nine Interactive Pvt Ltd Kakson House, 2nd Floor, A & B Wing 80, SionTrombay Road, Opposite R K Studio Chembur, Mumbai 400071, help@skoar.com For any business-related enquiries, contact business@skoar.com Published, Printed and Owned by Nine Dot Nine Interactive Pvt Ltd. Published and printed on their behalf by Kanak Ghosh.
26 The Lord of the Rings: War in the North
Published at Bunglow No. 725, Sector - 1, Shirvane, Nerul, Navi Mumbai - 400076
28 Best Gaming Franchises
Editor
Printed at Print House (India) Pvt. Ltd. R-847, TTC Industrial Area, MIDC, Rable, Navi Mumbai 400701.
Anuradha Das Mathur
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NEWS
GAMING BUZZ What’s happening in the world of gaming? Here we bring you the inside scoop on upcoming games, release schedules, leaked screenshots and buzz on the latest gaming hardware.
faster performance than its nearest competitor. This big daddy sports 2GB of GDDR5 RAM, 1120 stream processors and 1.6 teraFlops of computing. The card also supports AMD’s HD3D technology for 3D gaming on an HDTV.
Batman: Arkham City Collector’s Edition revealed
Limbo available for download on Steam come August 2
arner Bros. has announced the contents of a limited edition collector’s copy of the highly anticipated Batman: Arkham City game. It includes a cool Batman statue, an art book, original animated movie called Batman: Gotham Knight, token to download an Arkham City album full of original songs, privileged access to the Iceberg Lounge Challenge Map and a Batman: The Dark Knight Returns skin. Oh, and the game itself. All for US $99. The game launches this October.
he smash hit Indie title of 2010, Limbo – a puzzle solving game – can soon be enjoyed on your PC. That’s right, the critically acclaimed
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WWE ‘12 wrestlers to get better stage entrances
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he good guys over at THQ have confirmed a feature that promises to make WWE ‘12 more realistic. In a Twitter update, the game’s creative director said the wrestling mania will feature “mini-trons, side-trons, curve-trons, and banner movies” during the entrance sequence for wrestlers. Rest assured when John Cena walks into the arena, the entrance will be as action-packed as the real deal. The game releases in November later this year.
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stock. With this acquisition, EA has added cult casual games like Plants vs. Zombies, Bejeweled and Peggle under their brand, and will no doubt make huge inroads in the mobile and social media gaming sectors.
AMD launches HD 6990M, world’s ‘fastest’ mobile GPU
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esponding to Nvidia’s GTX 580M, the current “fastest notebook GPU”, AMD’s launched the monster Radeon HD 6990M, boasting 25%
Xbox game will hit Steam worldwide on August 2 (no word on pricing yet), while the game’s original haunting soundtrack is already available on iTunes. Don’t know what Limbo is all about? We suggest going to Wikipedia and reading about it – hundred words is too little, it’s an injustice to this minimalist game with universal acclaim. You just have to play this game, if you haven’t already!
The Darkness II delayed till Ferbuary 2012
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ans of the original Darkness, a gruesome nocturnal action game, hoping for a much-awaited sequel will have to despair a bit longer.
EA buys casual gaming king PopCap for $750 million
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opular casual gaming studio PopCap has been bought by EA for a whopping $650 million cash and additional $100 million in
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NEWS
Developed by Digital Extremes, The Darkness II has been pushed to a February 7 release by its publisher 2K Games. However, the game was featured in July’s Comic-Con 2011 festival at San Diego, California.
history. There’s an all-new commentary team comprising of Jim Nantz and David Feherty as well. The PC version comes out by the first week of next month.
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine is coming!
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FIFA 12 includes features based on community feedback
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his year’s FIFA title is poised to get better than ever, with increased focus on integrating features demanded by ardent fans of the franchise. As a result FIFA 12 will not only support new features like precision dribbling, tactical defending, and a new player impact engine, but also put focus on career mode. Tweaks have been made in the quest to make FIFA 12’s career mode as realistic as possible – for example, players are unhappy if they
person action will feature underwater combat with player’s skills increasingly tied to their weapons, and the combat system is much different from the original game – this should help freshen things up a bit. There are tweaks to the game’s subscription fee as well. We still
aren’t paid similar to other superstars in the squad, scouting for younger talent is improved, and media reports in the game’s newspapers will act as additional input during the transfer window to give you more options to track players efficiently. We can’t wait to try all that on September 30, can you?
don’t know when Guild Wars 2 is coming out of the door – couple of our friends can barely wait to get their hands on this game, though.
Guild Wars 2 takes new directions
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12 update for PC
f you’re a fan of Guild Wars, an online fantasy RPG, you’re in for a few surprises in the sequel slated for release some time soon. First off, there’s a dynamic event system in place, replacing the original personalized questing method, thereby allowing users to create unique user experiences in a consistent world. The game’s third-
A is still sticking by Tiger Woods in its annual PGA Tour franchise update expected to arrive in September next month. The multi-platform golf game will for the first feature the hallowed turf of Augusta National, scene of the annual Masters Tournament, where the winner wears the coveted Green Jacket – a tradition steeped in golfing
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hat’s right, the beloved RTS franchise will see its latest addition next month when THQ finally unveils Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine – but it features third-person action style gameplay this time around. You play as Captain Titus who has to meet the advancing Ork horde on the Imperial Forge World to slow them down to launch a massive counterattack. What’s more? The forces of Chaos are also gathering to make your space marine life a living hell. by Jayesh “big DaDDy” shinDe
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Open Source gaming By Kshitij “PVG” soBti kshitij.sobti@thinkdigit.com
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ooking at how closely most major game distributors guard their games, one might get the impression that open source and gaming have very little in common. This could not be further from the truth, and this is evident by the humongous game modding community that flocks game developers that actually embrace modification and extension of their games. You will find hundreds of mods for games like Half-Life, Civilization, The Elder Scrolls etc. Mods many times are an example of open game content for an otherwise proprietary game. They include the mods we mentioned above for Valve’s games. Such mods require that one purchase the original game first. On the other hand, we have companies that open source their game engines while keeping the game content / art under a proprietary license. A notable example is Quake. IDs policy is to open source game engines of older games whenever a game with a newer engine comes out. Soon after the release of id’s next game RAGE using the id Tech 5 engine, the id Tech 4 engine will be open sourced. Remember that id Tech 4 has been used in games as recent as Brink, so it is indeed a big gift to the open source community. Another prominent example is Freespace 2, a brilliant space combat simulation game by Volition. When Volition found itself unable to continue creating expansions or sequels to the Freespace franchise, they decided to open source the game instead. This move has given the game new life, as the open source community has continued development on the game under the FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project and brought the 1999 game to modern standards.
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To play FreeSpace 2, you will need to buy a licensed version, and use its data with the new enhanced builds of the game released by the community. Quake III is no different. Between two different kinds of “open” games that both require purchasing licenses, it is easy to come under the impression that such games don’t exist. There are much fewer games that feature both open content and open engines. Another impression that surrounds open source / free games is that they are bad because of poor graphics. This, dear readers, is the perfect example of major commercial companies “winning”. Gaming has little to do with graphics, but this fact has been beaten out of the heads of gamers by major game distributors constantly distracting them by gloss. Once one separates gaming graphics as just an aspect of the game experience, one can better appreciate the indie, and open source games of today. Graphics are one of the most central and important aspects of the game, but are not a replacement for the rest. A game with brilliant graphics but no other redeeming feature is unlikely to be as enjoyable as a game with poorer graphics but great and innovative gameplay. This of course is neither here, nor there. Just because a game is open source doesn’t mean it is a marvel either. Games are pieces of creativity, and usually need a vision and direction to guide them towards a final result. With something as practical as software, there can be agreement over the basic details; however with something as divergent as the plot of a role playing game, one can expect more forks of the game than in the conversations. Open source games are thus usually of the kind that focus on gameplay itself, and don’t have an overall plot or story. There are exceptions, but usually you will find more FPS, puzzle, platform, strategy
etc. games than RPGs or action-adventure that are driven by plot games. One example of a popular RPG that is open source would be Dink Smallwood, however that too started as a commercial game that went freeware and subsequently went open source. Whatever else one might say; there are some core benefits of open source games. They are usually, but not necessarily cross-platform, and run on Windows, Linux and Mac OSX, with many even available for mobile platforms, and game consoles. And if a game is open source, it’s almost always free. We wanted to highlight some of the best open source games out there, and so we present to you, (what we consider to be) ten great open source games. To stay true to our open source theme we are only considering games that are fully open source, data engine and all.
LinCity-nG LinCity-NG is an improved version of LinCity, a city simulation game. It is similar to commercial city simulation games such as SimCity (in fact its name is a play on Linux and SimCity) in that it puts you in charge of building a city, with the objective of making the city sustainable (or evacuating everyone to another planet). While the old verison of LinCity is no longer in development LinCity-NG goes on, with the latest major release of LinCity-NG 2.0 just in 2009. In LinCity-NG you can start with an empty board, a random village or a predefined scenario. You have to manage resources for your city, such as food, water etc. and develop transportation, power and other infrastructure. You can improve your technology infrastructure by adding schools and universities, further giving you access to newer buildings. The only way to lose is to starve your entire population.
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For those who have played simulation games such as this one before, LinCity will be easy to pick up as it not radically different from the usual city Sim, however for those who are just getting into city simulators, it can have a steep learning curve due to the lack of guides / tutorial levels in the game – such are usually present in commercial games.
against commercial RTS games. Eventually 0 A.D. plans to incorporate some unusual features such as realistic ships and buildings that are modular, and can thus house other units – so your units could battle mid-sea – support for seasons that change over time, rain and snowfall, auto-upgrading units etc. Some of these are already well underway.
FreeCiv Civilization was undoubtedly one of the most influential games of all time, and has led to the development of many clones. At this FreeCiv fares quite well. FreeCiv is more than a clone of Civilization, it was intended to be a Civilizationlike game that could work in multiplayer mode such that the developers could play with their friends. Civilization at that time did not support multiplayer gaming. FreeCiv has come a long way since its early days, and recently has even launched an online version of the game that runs in the browser using the HTML5 and the canvas. The online version is open source, just like the native version, and can be run on one’s own server.
0 A.D. 0 A.D. is a relatively new real-time strategy game similar to Age Of Empires that focuses on history between 500B.C. and 500A.D. but mostly it just intends to be a fun game. The developers want to portray history accurately as far as possible unless it affects the gameplay negatively. While the game is in its early stages currently, work on both the artwork, and the engine is on at full speed. It is a beautiful game with great artwork and animation that can hold its own even
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the BAttLe For Wesnoth Anyone who has used Linux for a while has probably noticed this game in their repositories. The Battle for Wesnoth is another turn-based strategy game, however one that is very different from Civilization. For one, Battle for Wesnoth has a fantasy theme with humans, elves, orcs and the like. The Battle for Wesnoth is a rather old game, having been in development since 2003, although its age only does it a favour. The game is very mature with welldone artwork, soundtrack, and a full set of campaigns (with cutscenes featuring original artwork). Even installing addons for the game is simple. It lists available add-ons in-game and can download, install and load them without complications. For those wanting to create content for the game there exists an Eclipse-based IDE.
GLest / MeGAGLest Glest (MegaGlest is its multiplayerenhanced fork) is a 3D real time strategy game that mixes tech and magic. The game is moddable enough to be made unrecognizable as the original game. Like The Battle for Wesnoth, MegaGlest too can download mods and install them in-game. Glest has two factions, Tech and Magic each with their own unique units,
tech trees and abilities. Magic has more raw power, while Tech is easier to handle making an overall balanced gameplay. The combination of magical units casting spells on technical units fighting back with technology makes for a rather interesting game. The game’s graphics are fully 3D and can be zoomed down up to ground level. Other than these two factions, many other have been created as mods for the game and are now supported. Classic civilizations such as the Greeks, Norse, Persian, Indian etc. are now supported. Using mods one can get new technology trees, new tilesets, maps, factions and other cool stuff. The RTS game includes a number of scenarios of varying difficulties, and custom games, internet gaming, and LAN games as well.
WArMux Ever wanted the Mozilla team to blow up the Pidgin team? If you answered yes, there’s something wrong with you! But that’s exactly what Warmux is all about. Warmux stands for War of Mascots from UniX, and is as worms-like game that will have you blowing up mascots from various open source projects. Heck, what a concept. The cartoon-style characters and effects, its attachment to open source project, and the interesting weapon sets make for a fun game. The game also sup-
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ports multiplayer, both online and on local networks making this a perfect game to play casually with friends on your college LAN the night before a tough exam.
vDriFt Vdrift is a racing simulator that focuses on realism in physics rather than in graphics. The game is still in early stages of develop-
ment, but already it features dozens of tracks and cars – based on real tracks and cars – and of course realistic physics simulation. As the name might suggest, the simulation capabilities of Vdrift have been built with drift racing in mind. This means, that like with any other racing simulation game, this isn’t meant for anyone who prefers non-realistic arcade style racing games such as Need for Speed Hot Pursuit etc. For simulation fans though, it has a lot to offer if not good graphics. Vdrift supports various gaming controllers including joysticks, gamepads, and racing wheels, and force feedback is also being implemented. Vdrift has some advanced features such as replay support, multiple camera modes, and driver aids (for n00bs).
ryzoM Ryzom is an MMORPG that is not only free and open source, but also comes with a free and open source server component!
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It is somewhat unique in that it is not a discontinued / obsolete / abandoned game, but one that is still active while being open sourced. The game is free to play online up to a decent level of 125. There are still paid subscriptions that remove this limit. Since the server is open source as well, you could of course set up your own, and play for free with no limits. You could create your own small online RPG experience for yourself and friends. Of course if you want the community you will probably be better off with a subscription. Ryzom is a science-fantasy game that does away with character classes and instead allows more customized characters. The game features weather changes and seasons and has good mob AI. The game even has a starter area for those starting with the game to learn how it works before joining the larger community.
as you get damaged, and larger as you deal damage! There are a number of other mutators, some being exclusive to certain game modes. Red Eclipse has other idiosyncrasies that make the game feel unique. For example, it removes ammo limits, and makes health regenerative. It also includes parkour-style moves such as wall runs, power slides, etc. The game also lets you modify key variables such as the gravity, damage dealt by different weapons, etc. These
variable configurations can even be saved to be reloaded later. Finally, the level editor of Red Eclipse is also quite brilliant, it allows one to enter the game environment and float around while moving and manipulating objects in space.
Dink sMALLWooD reD eCLipse Red eclipse is the open source answer to Unreal Tournament. This multiplayer FSP features all the usual match types such as capture the flag, defend the flag, deathmatch, campaign, but adds some of its own innovations in the mix. For example, it features a variation of capture the flag called Bomber Ball that has you transporting a bomb (before it explodes) to the enemy base. Hold it too long and it will explode, so you must keep passing it to teammates. To make the game even more fun and variant, it includes “mutators” that can further modify the gameplay style. For example, with a mutator called “Vampire” active, you gain health by damaging enemies, another called “Medieval” restricts the game to just swords, in the “Expert” mutator only headshots can kill, with “Jetpack” you can fly around, and with “Resize” you become smaller
Dink Smallwood is an old, but incredibly fun and funny role playing game that remains popular despite being over a decade old. In fact recently it has been released for mobile devices, with Android and iPhone versions and an updated “HD” version of the game. While these versions are not open source, and the mobile versions are not even free, the older game and assets remain open. In fact a version of Dink Smallwood called FreeDink is in development under the GNU project! Dink Smallwood follows the adventures of a pig farmer as he embarks on a number of satirical heroic quests. The graphics of Dink Smallwood seem a bit dated now, but do not detract from the quality of the game itself. Dink Smallwood has seen great modding interest and today, over a dozen years since its release there are still mods being made!
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Must-try browser based Flash games
By Raj “ZeXiX” SaXena raj.saxena@thinkdigit.com Desktop tower Defense Get out your guns and get ready to kill the creepers! This addictive little game gives you a list of towers with a specific range and capability. The aim is to defend an established path, not allow the creepers to “cross over”. The creepers will find the shortest route from the starting to the ending location. Some creeps have special powers like that of flight or of high speed. You are free to build a maze with your towers in order to prolong their journey. There are ultimately six upgraded varieties of towers to choose from with each offering a unique advantage. The upgrade option renders the tower useless for sometime but fetches more money and has a devastating effect on the creepers. But remember, higher the upgrade higher is the price tag. Cheers to
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Sitting in a boring practical session or behind your office computer? Check out these Flash Games which almost made us miss our deadline. the death of productivity! Link : http://bit.ly/digit_flash01
Angry BirDs Remember your Trajectory lessons? Well this is where they come into play.
The story of the game is that a tribe of green pigs keep stealing the bird’s eggs, and you have to help get them back. There are five kinds of “Angry” birds, each with different capabilities out on a mission, which is to destroy the green pig tribe. The pigs hide behind glass, wooden or stone formations and the flightless birds have to destroy the formation using slingshots. Deploying the right bird at the right time is the key to finish stages with a single fling. The controls of the games are pretty simple, even better when on a touch-sensitive surface. The game is now available as a Google Chrome App so that you can play it offline also. Link : Available Free on Google Chrome Web Store
Light tempLe Angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection, remember this when you start playing this game. The game is a puzzle based game with you having to control both “Fireboy” and “Watergirl” at the same time. Both can touch their surfaces and collect their jewels but not each others. You have to use objects in each level such as mirrors and
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stones, etc., to complete each level. The aim is to finish each level with Rank A i.e. without making any mistakes which can be pretty tough. The game has forty levels, each level having its own balls and boxes to be put in different boxes. And ya Beware of the Black Oil as it kills both of them. Link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash02
DouBLe wire This is one game that always makes you want for just one more turn. It’s a mouse based game with the aim of using the wires to get as far as you can without falling down. Keep moving forward else you will fall down. The only control in the game is your left mouse
tive of the game is to tumble the block through the map into the square hole. The map contains bridge-opening switches, teleporters, and blocksplitting switches to make your travel through the map easy or difficult. You can control the block with the arrow keys, but beware, you tumble outside the map and that’s the end of you. Solve a puzzle and move to the next of the game’s 33 levels. The circular switch gets activated just by rolling the block over them but the cross switches require more pressure -- you will have to place the block carefullt to trip them. The [ ] splits the block into two parts thus bringing a twist in the game making you rethink your strategy in the later stages. Link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash04
Vector runner
button just aim and shoot! But don’t be fooled by the simplicity of the game, it really is a test of your mouse handling skills. The obstacles get repetitive after a while, but it is still fun to play with. Slow and steady is the mantra of this game, avoid taking huge leaps as it will put you into trouble a very large fling outside the screen will also kill you. Link : http://bit.ly/digit_flash03
BLoxorz Get out those thinking hats of yours cause this game requires brain and skill. The game offers brain-bending challenges that will definitely keep you occupied for hours. The objec-
If you are an adrenalin freak then this game is for you, while other racing games put too much up on the screen to distract you, this game is as simple as it gets. With a broad stretch of road to “run” on, the game puts in some red pyramids and other geometric shapes in your way. Although we liked the game but, Vector Runner would not be our list of name choices, I mean there is NO RUNNER, just a blue block to represent it! As the game proceeded, so does your speed and the difficulty level. The drum rolls and other sound effects when you collect the power ups or hit an obstacle increases the immersive feeling of the game. Link :http://bit.ly/digit_flash05
winterBeLLs The jumping bunny and the falling bells. This game is a complete mouse based one with the bunny jumping over the bells to go higher and higher. The first jump is made via a mouse you can jump as far as you can move the mouse, often all the way across the screen. Your first
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bell fetches you 10 points, the next 20 and so on but your entire score doubles every time you bounce off a bird. The game may seem easy but you have only one life and if you miss any landings you’ll usually plummet right back to Earth. The game is a piece of art soothing to both your eyes and ears; nice to enjoy during your coffee breaks. link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash06
Ant trAcks A puzzle sorting game filled with bugs, grubs and leafy plants. An army of ants is under your control and you have to guide them accumulate their food
resources into proper storage units. The storage units are long hollow logs of wood with a picture of what they should be deposited inside. The ant’s movement can be altered by changing the direction of the red arrows. Each level has a predefined goals as to how much of each type of food is to be collected, complete the goal and you’re through. The game has 20 levels with some ant-hungry insects such as spiders, dragonflies and venus flytraps compelling you to figure out a safe
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route if you want to save enough ants to complete the stage. Link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash08
the heLicopter gAme The object of the game is to fly your helicopter as far as you can without hitting the ceiling or floor or the obstacles on the flight course. Sounds easy,
finish, game over. The game is controlled via the arrow keys making it pretty simple to adapt to. You must push objects out of your way while avoiding hitting any snake eggs as they follow you and try to kill you. You can use your power booster to gain speed and charge yourself up when the big green ball arrives. Link : http://bit.ly/digit_flash10
epic wAr 4
right? Well, it ain’t, and we consistently crashed and burned at first. Fortunately, the game restarts quickly, after a brief but determined struggle, we managed to go from a distance of 24 to 246. The game kept track of our best score, at least for a session. The minimized mode lets you play with some stealth. Ever seen people play Solitaire to learn how to mouse? Copter Game does the same for more experienced mousers. For gamers, it’s a workout, like push-ups that also train your hand-eye coordination. Arguably useful, definitely fun, and highly recommended. Link :http://bit.ly/digit_flash09
The game has a prehistoric look, one that transports you to the Stone Age. Build an impenetrable castle and fend off orcs, goblins and dragons. The game features five heroes with unique abilities of their own. There are twelve
even the laziest person on planet earth will be able to enjoy this extremely addictive game. The aim is to follow the track for as long as you can. The game deals with mouse control, the ball is your mouse and you have to prevent it from colliding with the ceiling or the floor. As the game goes on, the speed of the ball, or rather the speed of the track increases and the twists and turns get steeper, testing your mouse handling skills to the limit. The game has a basic look but keeps you mesmerised with the challenge it poses. Link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash12
the impossiBLe Quiz We would like you to play this one and
snAke runwAy We all love playing with snakes, and after many versions of mobile games now we have this snake runner in which the objective is to run as far away as possible while watching for the electric bar that follows your snake. If the deadly electric bar reaches you,
levels with three difficulty modes (normal, hard and epic), as a bonus the game offers four extra stages for additional challenges. The game allows you to experiment with five levels of twenty different units and twelve unique spells, and you have to fight your way through 4 epic bosses and surprising stages for hours in this Epic defense game. Link :http://bit.ly/digit_flash14
BALL A’trAck Gaming doesn’t get simpler than this,
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send us a review . Warning: The quiz can get pretty frustrating or silly at times. As the name suggests, the game is in plain English terms “CRAZY”. This is the ultimate test of your presence of mind and your outside the box thinking. You will have to wrack your nerves to get through this one. No high end technology needed, no gigabytes of RAM and Graphics needed to complete this game, just shear “Brainware” will propel you through the hundred and ten questions that it puts forward. Link: http://bit.ly/digit_flash13
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Enjoyable Nightmare By Abhinav ‘Tayschrenn’ Lal abhinav.lal@thinkdigit.com
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hile 2005’s F.E.A.R or First Encounter Assault Recon is not one of the most recognizable shooters of the last decade, the original, and its subsequent expansion packs (Extraction Point, Perseus Mandate) and sequel (F.E.A.R 2: Project Origin) quickly gained quite a cult following in FPS crowd for their smart AI, solid shooting and melee mechanics, time-dilation, and of course, frightening if at times repetitive supernatural phenomena and atmospherics.
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F.E.A.R 3, or F3AR, is a whole new take on the franchise, which was previously developed by Monolith Productions. With the fifth instalment in the new hands of Day One Studios and consultants like horror masters John Carpenter and Steve Niles (of 30 Days of Night fame), fans were quite sceptical of F.E.A.R 3’s success, and newcomers were wary of the emotionally charged story-driven trailers. The result is a game that manages to satisfy franchise and FPS fans at the same time, by keeping and enhancing old elements like the AI and mechanics, adding new ones like well-thought out multiplayer and cooperative campaigns. The story catches up where F.E.A.R 2 left of, and starts with
the earlier franchises’ protagonist Point Man on his own and his brother Paxton Fettel back from the grave, together off on a quest to find their psychic mother – Alma Wade, before she spawns a monstrosity that might destroy the world. The changes from earlier instalments become quickly apparently in F.E.A.R 3’s gameplay, there isn’t much of a coherent storyline, making the game a point to point shooter with collectibles. There are no more kicks or punches in melee mode, just the knife and a slide. Players have health of the Modern Warfare style, regenerating when not under direct fire. The scary scenes are either jarringly out of place or mundane, neither resulting in any real frights.
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While fans of the franchise might stand up in arms with all these changes, Day One Studios has managed to remove excessive hoarding of the medkits, and the frequent quick saves that plagued previous franchises. Some fans will balk here, this will make or break the game for them. Will they be willing to look at the new instalment as a standalone piece that offers them something different from other FPSes? If so, they might come to enjoy the new cover mechanics, the intelligent and speaking squads of AI with excellent voice-acting betraying their tactics, great music and sounds nuances, as well as the new game modes, while retaining the solid shooting mechanics, time-dilation etc. Players of F.E.A.R. 3 can go through the 7-8 hour single-player campaign as the Point Man, with the ability to replay any Interval as Paxton Fettel, with his telekinetic powers allowing him to possess enemies, explode them, and feed off them. The campaign is divided into eight almost hour-long Intervals or stages, sufficiently lengthy if you count
the playbacks as Paxton Fettel as new playtime. The new co-operative mode allows two players to play the campaign together, locally or online. Co-operative players can frequently explore the campaigns at their own pace, requiring proximity if only one player is down and dying in need of revival. This allows players to finish the campaign in a much shorter time. Developers Day One have added a competitive streak to the co-op mode, by giving the player with the most points at the end of the level the title of Favourite Son. Points in all the modes of the game allow users to level up, with new skills, etc., that they can use in every mode. The four new multiplayer modes of the game are interesting, taking several popular modern multiplayer FPS models, and adding some. All four modes support a maximum of four players at a time, and each mode has its own maps. Soul King, the first of these, allows each of the four players to possess zombies and
soldiers on the battlefield, making them fight each other and go after the other players, and collect souls of dead victims. Contractions, the second mode lets up to four players kill incoming waves of enemies while maintaining their position. The third, F**king Run, is where players have to run away from deadly cloud of gas while killing enemies in their path. Finally, Soul Survivor will randomly make one of the four players a Paxton Fettel, who tries to possess the remaining players in the allotted time. In terms of graphics, the game is surprisingly plain, with none of the cutting edge occlusion and lighting we’ve seen in Crysis 2, or look forward to in Battlefield 3 and MW3. However, even with the lack of super-detailed textures, the game manages to retain a realistic look, with barely a raw pixel standing out of place. The attention to detail is very evident, and every part of a map is envisioned completely. F.E.A.R. 3’s changes might just piss off fans, however, if they play the game as a standalone title, they might just enjoy the new cover mechanics, improved graphics, and the new co-operative and multiplayer modes. These add many hours to the overall playing time, making the game even more value for money after the 8 hour campaign, and, the entire game has a point-based progression system for new skills and perks.
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Genre: First Person Shooter, Horror Studio: Day One Studios Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Price: PC (MS Windows): `999/-
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by Jayesh “big DaDDy” shinDe
jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com
I
t feels just like yesterday since most of us picked up and read through J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, not knowing when and how the series would end. But as all good things should come to their conclusion, so does Harry Potter’s adventures, which have become the part of modern folklore. Let’s step into this mythical, magical world one last time to see how EA’s video game matches up to the climax narrated in the books.
Storyline No surprises here, the final installment of the Harry Potter video game stays true to the narrative in the books – if you haven’t read them, we’re not going to spoil it for you. The storyline is linear, as straight as an arrow, with very little diversion from the the theatrical narrative of the movie with the same name – Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. Harry is out to find and destroy the horcruxes and ultimately defeat Voldemort and the Death Eaters he keeps encountering in his quest – ably supported by his two best chums, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Other playable characters keep moving in and out depending on the track You can play as any of the three characters, but most of the action in the game revolves around Harry. At times, and I’m just nit-picking here, the central story does become a little too predictable – how I’d have loved some branches of creative liberties embedded in the game! But EA has played it safe here, trying to stay loyal to the book and script and try and win over the fans. I guess that’s good, but it could’ve been a whole lot better, spectacular even – but no such joy.
Game modeS The game lets you experience the scripted story mode, and this is mainly the thread you’ll be starting with. There’s an additional
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challenge mode, but since it requires you to play through the story mode to collect rare items and unlock levels, it’s the same thing – you would’ve played most of the challenges by the time you finish with the main storyline. How idiotic!
Gameplay Compared to the previous Harry Potter game – Deathly Hallows Part I – the latest avatar is much-improved. The game’s a lot faster and actionpacked, to say the least. Its third person cover shooting dynamics works well in terms of story-telling and attacking the bad guys. However, the gameplay lacks depth and is boringly repetitive – cut scenes convey your next task, then Harry, Ron and Hermione enter an area with a lot of cover options – it could be bookcases in a library or carts and fences in a deserted street – which is the sign that Death Eaters are on their way. Once the bad guys arrive, all hell breaks loose. The action is frenetic but the enemy rarely poses a compelling challenge, even boss fights are tame (for the most part) and lack some much-needed variety. On the other hand, we liked the various spells and charms you learn as you progress through the game. Where Protego casts a defensive shield and Expelliarmus knocks wizards’ defenses, Stupefy, Petrificus Totalus, Expulso and Confringo are all used to shoot down enemies – and they’re all different visually. Stupefy is for close range attacks, while Petrificus Totalus is akin to sniping; Expulso can be summed up as an assault rifle, while Confringo is an explosive cannon blast.
atmoSphere The overall mood in the game, like the movie it resembles so closely, is overwhelmingly dark and brooding. Although the labyrinthine Gringotts, Chamber of Secrets, Hogsmead village and half-destroyed Hogwarts castle are a visual treat, poor level design fails to exploit their potential – how we would’ve loved a fast-paced shooting level sitting inside one of the train-carts inside Gringotts’ tunnels, for example. But yes, the game has good visual landscapes. The soundtrack is also good and it closely marries with the official movies’ sound bytes, giving you a reference point if you have watched the films. There’s splashes of humour across the game which is good. My favourite two levels from the game are the ones where you blow the Hogwarts bridge and Professor McGonagall’s battle with giants outside the school’s castle – both very intense, very good fight scenes. But too little, too late, as the final chapter in the Harry Potter saga is nothing but a demure end to a ground-breaking fantasy novel series that deserved to go out with a lot of firecrackers and fanfare.
Genre: Third Person Shooter, Action Studio: EA Games Publisher: Electronic Arts Price: PC (MS Windows): `999/-
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By ABhinAv ‘TAyschrenn’ LAL abhinav.lal@thinkdigit.com
A
merican McGee’s Alice was launched to critical acclaim back in late 2000, a startling third person action platformer that was a twisted and macabre take on the classic, deceptively simple children’s tale by Lewis Carroll – Alice in Wonderland. In the game, Alice is summoned to her subconscious, or Wonderland to save it from disease and chaos, confront the Queen of Hearts, with events climaxing with the burning down of Alice’s family home. Releasing more than 10 years later, Alice: Madness Returns is set in a world where ten years have passed since the fire, and a memory-robbed Alice is still recovering from her mental and emotional trauma, and has recently been de-institutionalized from the asylum. Still visiting a psychiatrist, Alice is forced to penetrate the fog of darkness in her mind as therapy, to root out the cause of her hallucinations, and find and confront
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her locked memories. She takes on the quest of finding out the truth of the events 10 years past, and the action starts when she derails from plan, chases a kitten into a dark alley, and falls into Wonderland, a Wonderland gone bloody wrong. Rotted and withering, Wonderland is back in chaos, worse than ever before, and Alice must save it yet again, with the help of friends like the Cheshire Cat, White Rabbit, and the questionably-motivated Dutchess, whilst hunting down her past picking
up memories through Wonderland, and the streets of London. The game is intermingled with brilliant drawn and stunningly creepy 2D cutscenes, apart from small 3D action sets here and there. Even with all its decay however, Wonderland is still a beautiful if madly-lit environment, from the Mushroom Forest to Mad Hatter’s Domain and Cardbridge. Developers Spicy Horse used the Unreal Engine, and has done a truly great job with the environments, levels, character designs, all of which are breathtakingly creative and vast in scope. Unlike Lewis Carroll’s two books based in Wonderland, this game cannot be enjoyed by both the young and old. Alice: Madness Returns is a gory game, with disturbing imagery, bloodsoaked scenes, imagined lobotomies, flying pig-snouts, malignant screeches, and an unsettling score all rounding things off with a strictly For Adults rating. Alice: Madness Returns is a thirdperson action game similar to Darksiders and Devil May Cry, without the combos. Alice has various weapons which can be upgraded through the game, with the Vorpal Blade for close range combat, the Hobby Horse for
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mid-range combat, and the Pepper Grinder for shooting at longrange. Alice: Madness Returns also features platforming like the first game, with Alice navigating moving and/or invisible platforms, mushroom tops, and air vents with her triple jump and float ability. Other moves include shrinking to fit into warrens and keyholes, and dodging/dashing as a cloud of butterflies. The shrinking also gives Alice the Shrink Sense, with which she can see hidden platforms and areas, as well as notation and markings to help with her exploration. The game is centred around the combat, and the PhysX-based graphics are truly beautiful and exceptionally fluid, with blazing weapon and movement trails, and exploding damage. An Nvidia PhysX enabled graphics card is required to truly enjoy the game’s full potential, but a decent ATI one does quite well, with slightly different but rather charming results. The game is not without its flaws however, and after a while, even with the interesting music score, the beautiful environments, you will get bored of the repetitive platforming, lever pulling, and fighting of small groups of characters, with barely any progression in combat skills and weapons (like
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Genre: Third-Person Action, Platformer Studio: Spicy Horse Publisher: Electronic Arts Price: PC (MS Windows): `999/Darksiders or Devil May Cry) with exception of levelling up, which increases the lethality of the weapon. Collecting teeth and roses for points and health will quickly lose its charm as well. In the end, the stunning graphics, and the game’s storyline and cutscenes keep alive the interest, though at times Alice sounds decidedly uninterested in the whole affair, whether it is saving herself or all of Wonderland. While the landscapes are always stunningly vast, there are frequent small and large areas that cannot be traversed, no matter Alice’s size, jump ability or focus. American McGee-helmed Spicy Horse has a done a great job imagining Alice’s latest return to Wonderland, taking players on a graphically intense third-person combat tour through a stunningly detailed world filled with sepia-tinted vistas, putrid decay, and all kinds of bad guys. A lot of repetition and simplistic character and level progression however hold the game back from achieving the cult status it could have held.
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Review
ArcAde edition It’s time to hone your street fighting skills. This is one heck of a game!
By ABhinAv “TAyschrenn” LAL abhinav.lal@thinkdigit.com
F
ighting games hold appeal for a very wide variety of gamers. Even most non-gamers are willing to try fighting games, if nothing else, based on my experience as a host. The PC as a platform unfortunately has seen very few fighting games since the late 90s, with consoles and actual arcade parlours dominating the PvP fighting landscape. Oh, there were a few releases of not so famous titles sprinkled through the last decade, but it wasn’t until Capcom’s Street Fighter IV that they got their fighting fix in 2009. 2008’s Street Fighter IV (SFIV) made its way to the PC in 2009 at roughly
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the same time as the console versions, Capcom had vowed it would not bring 2010’s Super Street Fighter IV (SSIV) to the PC due to the rampant piracy of the first game. Capcom released Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition (SSIV:AE) to arcades in 2010, then to consoles earlier this year, before finally relenting and bringing it to PCs in July 2011, a whole year after the SSFIV release. SSFIV brought 10 new players to SFIV, ten of whom (Adon, Cody, Dee Jay, Dudley, Guy, Ibuki, Makoto and T.Hawk) we’d seen before in previous Street Fighter titles, and two new ones – Juri and Hakkan. SSFIV:AE brings four more characters (Yun and Yang, Oni, and Evil Ryu) to the game, bringing the total up to 39. Since PC gamers never saw the release of non-Arcade Edition
Super Street Fighter IV edition, we will beconcentrate on the differences be tween 2011’s Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition and 2009’s Street Fighter IV. The Super in SSFIV brought not just graphical improvements to the game, it also “balanced out characters” out more “fairly,”
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something quite a few players complained about in SFIV – that some players like Sagat, or Seth, or Gen were more powerful than other players – gamebreakingly so. Capcom therefore humbled those who were too fast, too strong; tweaked their timings; and gave players the option of a second, different type of Ultra move, and additional Super moves. Interestingly, all characters come fully unlocked, with no tedious Arcade trials to go through to add them. The Arcade Edition also brings some more balancing tweaks, and we tried our hands at all the players, enjoying the new stuff since the last edition, and the many new players -- many find the Yang and Yun players to be ridiculously unmatchable, with their strength, speed, and 3x combo potential. Balanced or unbalanced, you would still have to be ridiculously good to play Yun and Yang to their full potential, so, until mastery, this flaw can be ignored. Coming to gameplay, we’d like to emphasize that there is no real single player to Street Fighter IV. Single player Arcade/Challenges/Training modes are deathly boring when compared to multiplayer Versus or Online matches. Single player mode is for honing your skills. Of course, playing on Very Hard or Hardest is sure to test out your skills quite well and even make you break a sweat. Great for showboating to bored guests, and to hone those skills further...The cut-scenes in the Arcade storylines are boring for everyone except the most hardcore Street Fighter fans. There are also bonus stages, a nostalgic throwback to the original Street Fighter and its mini-games. Multiplayer is where the action starts, and on a PC, this is where a battle of another sort erupts. Two keyboards are on the SSFIV:AE are possible to achieve, but a still a little difficult, with a limited number of supported keyboards, and some plugging in issues. It is much simpler to invest in a game controller or fighting stick if you don’t already have one. For online play, Games for Windows Live suite is quite good in this latest game, with a new online ranking system, as well as features like double-blind character selection in online ranked matches, and modes
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like tournaments for four or eight players, team battles, and endless battle mode. Online matches also have a replay channel, where you can save up to 30 of your online and view others. matches, You can allow follow other players, and be notified of their new videos, etc. Graphics of this latest addition are certainly a heart-warming reminder for PC advocates, that their platform is actually the best. Very well optimized and extremely smooth, the game ran at 114 FPS on a modestly endowed machine, with great many tweakable options including motion blur, anti-aliasing, texture filtering, etc. Capcom has also provided options for variable, fixed, and smooth framerate settings, truly useful. On the whole, the game is extremely good looking, and the new stages and characters something players of the last version will gawk at. All the explosions, particles are well-handled,
Genre: Fighting, Arcade Studio: Capcom Publisher: Capcom Price: PC (MS Windows): `999/- (approximately)
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with some impressively designed new Ultras making the game quite a spectacle to watch even for veterans. A must buy for nearly every gamer, Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition is currently the best looking, most complete, and nuanced fighting game in the PC market. SSIV: AE is ready to make your PC the centre of your house again, bringing back the good old days of two-player PC combat without LAN cables or network connections. Buying the game is also essential because of online multiplayer Battle and Tournament modes, giving players the chance to learn new skills and show off on an intensely competitive battlefield.
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Review
By Jayesh “Big DaDDy” shinDe jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com
E
ver so often, when you are almost overwhelmed by the latest and greatest games launching all around, you come across something so harmless that you don’t quite gauge its potential. Indie games have that knack of throwing up surprising little gems and Solar 2 is one such game I had immense fun playing.
Plot In the words of its Australian developer, Jay Watts, “Solar 2 is an open-world, sandbox game set in an infinite abstract universe.” That’s right. Your journey in the game begins as a small piece of celestial rock floating around in space after an immense big bang. At this point, the game’s step-by-step tutorial kicks in – don’t worry, there’s isn’t a whole lot to memorise, mostly it’s
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just shortcut keys and navigating the small heavenly body through the universe on your screen. Before long, you’re gathering speed and bumping into other debris floating in space around you to gain mass and level up into an asteroid. You keep bumping into asteroids to become bigger and eventually level up to a small planet. After you become a planet, the rules of engagement change – you can’t bump into things any more, lest the impact depreciate your mass. Instead you pass next to an asteroid to suck it in your orbit. Attach a few more asteroids revolving around your planet’s girth and then on the press of a button absorb them to gain mass and become a larger planet with the prospect of evolution – yes, intelligent life is now a possibility. Soon enough, you have miniscule spacecrafts of various size and shape ejecting from your planet and patrolling it against an impact from
a fast-moving asteroid or another planet hovering nearby. From here, your planet gains more mass and becomes a small star – stars can have other planets revolving around them and make their very own solar systems. As your star grows in stature, you can attract bigger planets and command complex star systems – often, you will come across similar star systems which you either destroy or run away from. As you assimilate more mass, you ultimately become a black hole and start absorbing everything in your path – unless a bigger black hole comes your way – till you grow so large that you collapse onto yourself and there’s a second big bang and the game starts all over again.
GamePlay Watts, or ‘Murudai’ as he calls himself, has done a superb job of producing an addictive game. The genre can be defined as casual exploration
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adventure, the game’s absorbing as well as soothing. There are no fancy graphics, there are no cut-scenes, there are no photo-realistic effects. Instead what Solar 2 offers is a nice and simple game that’s addictive in nature and focused on gameplay. The game’s controls are simple WASD for up, left, down, and right, respectively – playing it with a gamepad is double the fun and an Xbox 360 controller works just fine. Solar 2 sports simple animation – asteroids, planets, stars slamming into each other, objects revolving, etc. – that are well executed. We would’ve loved to exert finer control on the life planet stage of the game, have more say in what kind of live evolves and so on – it would’ve just given the now-casual game some much needed depth for longevity. Speaking about life, although spaceships sprout and patrol the mother planet against space menaces, you have zero control over them and they more often than not become liabilities to do without. For example, the game has side missions – which I’ll get to in in a
bit – that demands various things from you. In these side missions, if you’re a complex star system with life planets, it becomes near impossible to approach any other heavenly body without your system’s spaceships darting forward and destroying them in earnest – it’s fine if you’re in a side quest which asks you to blow up stuff but otherwise the tiny spaceships can be irritating. Speaking about side missions, yes there are a few in Solar 2, indicated by direction arrows around your object on screen. Follow the arrows to end up in a circular station to trigger the mission – the missions range from taking on a bigger star system to destroy it, running away from a fleet of alien spaceships, protecting a small planet in your system from an asteroid shower, and more. These side missions are a good break from the overall game, which doesn’t really have any objective. Solar 2 has engaging music and a carefully crafted soundtrack that heightens your overall involvement and fun quotient of the
game. Explosions, slams, shooting spacecrafts, and an appropriate space-hopping background score help keep you engaged in Solar 2’s unique experience. The game sports a clean, minimalistic menu and quick to start off the blocks – it has a tiny installer as well. Solar 2 is a fun little game that packs a unique experience in a deceptively small package. There are a few chinks, we won’t deny, but we hope to see them fixed come Solar 3 – and who knows, it might even get more complex. Also this is one game we think has immense potential for porting on a handheld device – iPhone, iPad, Android, and others.
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Genre: Indie, Casual Studio: Murudai Publisher: Murudai Price: PC (MS Windows): `450/- (approx.)
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Preview
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Sneak Peek:
Alienware M14x G Style, Design, & Unmatched Performance
aming laptop enthusiasts, take heed. There’s a new kid on the block and it goes by the name of Alienware M14x. Sitting between the ‘tiny’ Alienware M11x and the uber-powerful Alienware M17x, the M14x blends the best of both machines, providing the optimum middle-ground between portability and performance. Early reviewers of the iPad 2 hailed the tablet as the long-awaited “iPad Killer”. If one may borrow the term and apply it to the Alienware M14x, it may well be dubbed as the “Alienware M15x killer”. That’s right, this new 14-inch highend gaming laptop from Dell Alienware effectively replaces the hugely success-
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ful 15-inch gaming rig, the M15x. And it does so effortlessly, in keeping with the overall Alienware ethos. The M14x is built like a tank, sporting a thick metal exterior with chiseled edges and a solid feel like no other laptop we’ve seen. Even though the gaming laptop is made of metal, the Alienware M14x isn’t without a sense of elegance with a finely polished screen lid and chassis edge. Add programmable glowing LED lights to the mix and we have a potent combination of style, design and toughness that is quite frankly unmatched by any other brand in the laptop segment. Not only is the Alienware M14x all about brutal performance, attacking the
latest 3D DirectX 11 games with relish, bringing them down to their knees, it is also equipped to utilize its battery optimally, ensuring there’s minimal wastage. That’s right, the gaming laptop comes with Nvidia’s Optimus graphics switching technology – depending on the process – to toggle between its dedicated and onboard graphics. The laptop’s actually promising a general usage battery time of over 4 hours, which is very good for a gaming laptop. You don’t have to be tied down to your desk or study table after every couple of hours. Let’s take a closer look at what other notable things the new Alienware M14x laptop sports.
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Noteworthy Features: A 14-inch WLED HD+ (900p) display (1600X900) T Intel® Core™ i7-2820QM processor 2.30 GHz with Turbo Boost 2.0 up to 3.40 GHz C 8GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM (2 x 4GB) J 3.0GB DDR3 NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M with NVIDIA Optimus F Up to 750GB hard drive (7200RPM) N 8x SuperMulti DVD±R/RW Slot load optical drive L High-Definition 5.1 Audio with WavesMAXX Audio Z 2.0 Megapixel HD Video Camera with dual digital microphones I Weight 2.92-kg with 8-cell Lithium Ion battery (63whr)
The new Alienware M14x has a thick, meaty palmrest which doesn’t buckle under pressure and a responsive, textured touchpad. Can you see the glowing LED highlights? Coolness.
Connectivity: A Gigabit Ethernet T SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Ports
Talk of its internal hardware is a non-issue, as the Alienware M14x comes equipped with close-to-the-best hardware configuration available on a highend laptop. Its exterior is strong and well-built and one can never miss the glowing Alien logo on the laptop’s screen lid.
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C Hi-Speed USB 2.0 Port with PowerShare Technology J Mini-Display Port F HDMI 1.4 Audio and Video Output N VGA Port L Intel Wireless-N WiFi Link 1000 a/g/n Z Bluetooth 3.0 I 9-in-1 Media Card Reader
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Preview
By Jayesh “Big Daddy” Shinde jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com
I
t has been closed to eight years since the last Max Payne game. And words can’t describe the agonizing wait of fans looking forward to the next game in Take Two’s adored Max Payne franchise. The game has been delayed twice, it’s release date is yet not confirmed, and naysayers are claiming it’s being delayed again – or worse, it’s shelved. What utter nonsense! All that changed earlier in March when Rockstar dropped two screenshots of the upcoming Max Payne 3 game on its official twitter account, confirming the game’s ongoing development and upcoming release. So what’s in store for Max Payne aficionados in take three of the game?
Further on, the developers are going to start upon a brand new chapter of Max Payne’s life. Reports suggest that Max has aged – even gone completely bald, as some screenshots depict him – “more world-weary and cynical than
ever [before].” In fact, if you look at some of the screenshots included in these pages, Max does look rougher, tougher and more menacing than ever. Now that’s more like it, so far so good. An official press release confirms
What
we know so far According to an account from one Rockstar executive, Max Payne 3 will feature the protagonist as you’ve never seen him before – which is alright, but it doesn’t tell you a whole lot.
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that Max has moved on from New York City, which means the new game’s action is set to take place in a new place altogether. Sao Paulo in Brazil is the city of choice, where Max Payne is now working as a private security agent with a powerful Brazilian family – sounds a little bit like Denzel Washington’s character in the movie Man On Fire. We also know that the game begins immediately after Max has been double-crossed in his new adopted home in Brazil. In terms of timeline, the events depicted in Max Payne 3 are set eight years after the previous game ended – so there’s a huge gap that the studio will most likely have to fill. Great for gamers, in terms of depth in storyline.
More Changes While Rockstar has been tight-lipped over the game’s development, a cover story featured in the May 2011 issue of UK’s Edge magazine shed more light on Max Payne’s new directions in the history of the franchise. For starters, a hugely popular element in the previous game – Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne – is heading out of the door. According to some claims, the comic book panel cut-scenes used for explaining the plot in the previous Max Payne is being shelved – again, this is just an unconfirmed report that Rockstar hasn’t commented on. Some of us here in SKOAR!, including me, feel the comic book panel narratives are indispensable from the Max Payne franchise – they’re brilliant, why change
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something that works? Only to make it even better. That’s right – the static comic book panel narrative will make way for an animated collage of action from the game to move the storyline ahead. We gather that this tweak in narrative style is essential to make better sense of the game’s apparent time-bending plot. Fast cutting and careful editing will be deployed, according to the Edge magazine report.
The
all-new Max Payne The action is going to be fast-paced and brutal. In an exclusive game demo for the Edge story, one mission showed the wife of Max Payne’s employer, Rodrigo Branco, is kidnapped by the local Brazilian street gang. To
deliver the ransom to the kidnappers and fetch Branco’s wife back safely, Max has teamed up with another guy and he no longer appears as the bald macho-man he’s depicted as in most of the teaser images – Max has a full head of hair. We also hear that the controls of the all-new Max Payne 3 gameplay are similar to the ones seen in Grand Theft Auto IV and Read Dead Redemption, with a cover system being deployed as well. In most of the recent screenshots Max is shown wielding dual-handed pistols – one in either hand – while shooting which will be nice to experience. The environments are fully destructible, so look ahead to some serious mayhem! Max Payne 3 will also feature a multiplayer mode for enthusiasts to slug it out over the network. So when is the much-awaited game coming out? No official word on that yet, but we have a few pointers to share. Amazon has listed Max Payne 3’s release date as December 1, 2011 – it even sent out emails to users who pre-ordered the game, claiming the date was changed to Dec 1 based on new release date information from the publisher. Sweet! Duke Nukem Forever didn’t go down well with fans who waited for over a decade for the game. We think Max Payne 3 won’t suffer from a similar fate.
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Pro Evolution SoccEr 2012 By Jayesh “Big DaDDy” shinDe jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com
F
ootball season is just around the corner and weekends are never going to be the same. If that was not enough, one of the best soccer gaming franchises is about to get a whole lot better. Watch out EA, the game wizards at Konami are threatening to reclaim lost ground with Pro Evolution Soccer 2012, scheduled to release later this year. Here’s why Electronic Arts’ FIFA 2012 has some stiff competition later this year... If there’s one thing Konami’s Pro Evolution Soccer (PES) has always
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been renowned for the world over is its believable gameplay. Whenever you played a PES game between two football teams, it was always more realistic – the way the players moved, tackled, attacked and defended – than a competing FIFA game released that year. Obviously, that took a bit of a pummeling in the past couple of seasons when FIFA improved its gameplay physics while Konami chose to rest on its laurels. All that’s expected to change.
Gameplay PES 2012 has something called Active AI – a fancy term that encapsulates all the gameplay tweaks deployed in the game.
This includes a lot of off-the-ball controls and player movement patterns determined dynamically in the background by the game engine before you even kick the ball. Players are more intelligent at reading the game and I’m not talking about the one’s playing the game – when to make an overlapping run or anticipate a diagonal pass, even making dummy runs to pull defenders away and give you extra space. Defensive marking has gone to a whole new level, according to Konami. Often the space between the defensive and midfield lines would swell in past PES games, giving too much space to the attacking side – that’s being rectified. In the 2012 avatar, teams will keep better defensive shape, tightly marking playmakers and making their job of releasing wingers or forwards a lot tougher. Ball physics has also undergone redesign – PES 2012 attempts to treat
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Preview
the soccer ball as its own entity; passes and shots need to be taken more carefully. Referees are more intelligent, too. Basically, PES 2012’s overall AI has just improved, affecting every aspect of the game. This promises to be a treat for fans. In a series of teaser trailers, Konami is trying to focus on Active AI more than any other component of PES 2012. We think the moves the company’s making in terms of team and individual AI in PES 2012 are ground-breaking; the gameplay is definitely going to feel a lot different from PES 2011 and 2010, for sure.
can see the likes of Wesley Sneijder, Jermaine Defoe, and others clearly, with sweat glistening on their face – just adds to the overall realism of the game. Then upon scoring a goal, or after a foul, resulting player animations are fine-tuned to a greater degree to express joy, frustration, anger and other emotions a lot better. This has a direct impact on the player playing the game and their experience. Goal keepers are also relooked in the new game, their animation varied, their anticipation of decisive shots and resulting movement more finetuned. All this means that scoring’s going to be increasingly difficult – and hence the joy of scoring a goal more intense than before.
atmosPhere Konami hasn’t specified about the list of stadiums been added but there are a few other details. For example, factions of the crowd will be arrayed in kits of the playing teams – a long sought-after
feature – so watch out for them celebrating with the players after a goal’s scored. There’s also a brand new camera angle called Pitch Side and it’s at a lower eye-level than the sideline, interesting how that should play out. Of course, non-playing elements like managers shouting in the technical area, groundstaff sitting low near the advertising boards and camera men shooting the action through their lens, all of them are likely to add to the atmosphere. We still think the scripted extravaganza of FIFA will be better but all these additions at least give PES fans something extra to cheer about, so that’s nice. With the upcoming 2012 season, PES is fighting back hard with improved focus on the thing that made it popular among fans in the first place – its realistic gameplay. We can’t wait to have a crack on goal! We know FIFA 12 is coming on September 30, but Konami still hasn’t revealed the launch date of PES 2012.
Players As expected, Konami’s improved player graphics and accompanying animations. Textures and models of player design have improved in 2012, particularly in the facial region. Iconic players are easier to recognize off the bunch. In some of the cut scene images, you
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Preview
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Preview
By Jayesh “Big Daddy” Shinde jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com
O
ne of the most eagerly awaited action RPGs of the year, Tolkien’s epic mythical world is being revisited to tell an untold story of unmatched courage and heroism in The Lord of the Rings: War in the North. Unlike some of the earlier LOTR games like Battle for Middle Earth II and LOTRO (Lord of the Rings Online), the gameplay in the upcoming War in the North is of co-op action style. Make no mistakes, this isn’t an RTS or an RPG, it’s something different. The War in the North isn’t developed by EA Games but by a little-known dede veloper called Snowblind Studios, part of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment – the studio specializes in RPGs. The story’s a branch of the novels that Tolkien hasn’t delved into, mentioning it in a brief appendix but not much detail. The ingredients are there to do something original. But the gameplay itself is some kind of a throwback to the bygone days – the classic hack and slash technique. Oh what fun hack and slash games are! The
August 2011
War in the North is co-op hack and slash RPG, and given that Snowblind Studios has previously worked on Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, we expect it to be pretty darn good. There’s very little you can do wrong with a tried and tested formula and still make it exciting in an altogether different fantasy setting.
Plot In the beginning, when early teasers on War in the North’s website and Facebook page were displayed, it was understood that the game would have three central characters – a Man, Eradin the ranger, an Elf by the name of Andrield, and Farin the Dwarf – none of them characters from Tolkien’s novels or Jackson’s movies, if you notice. But recently at E3 2011, Snowblind Studios revealed a fourth character – Beleram the giant eagle, similar to the ones that lift Frodo and Sam from Mt. Doom. The eagle Beleram isn’t a constant companion, like a hovering assault helicopter over your character’s head, but a fighter jet that needs to be called in – you can only summon Beleram so many times and in open spaces only.
The three main characters are of different races and have different strengths and weaknesses. Andriel is the mage of the pack, performing spells to thwart enemies; Eradin, like any ranger, is good with the bow and has stealth; Farin is the toughest among the group, fighting with his great battle axe. The characters collect items from loot drops and advance their individual experience. During battles, the characters can expect help from their races – the Dunedain, Elves and Dwarves, respectively. And since the war is being fought on multiple frontiers, you will need all the help you can get. Locations in the game include Fornost, Mount Gundabad, Rivendell, Ettenmoors, and Mirkwood. But who are these characters out to defeat? It’s Agandaur, Sauron’s most cruel ally, a Black Numenorean that threatens to lay waste the northern region of Middle-earth. He will command armies that will feature not only scores of Orcs and Goblins but hill Trolls, cruel and cunning. And their forces vastly outnumber the good guys. Very soon it’ll be time to enter Middle-earth again. Until then, Elen sila lumenn’ omentielvo!
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F e at u r e
By SamBhav “echoplxx” Daffu sambhav.daffu@thinkdigit.com
I
f you were asked to name three things that make a great game you would probably fumble a bit considering the ghosts of mars keep a constant watch on you and you wouldn’t want to slip their secrets away. Probably the first three things you spill out would be graphics, its genre or maybe the storyline. There’s more in making a great video game other than these usual suspects. We’ll tell you a secret, it’s the game developers who toil and sweat to develop them in their dark and unkempt basements. This section would focus on industry’s best gaming franchisees and on the people who have made the gaming industry generate more revenue than Hollywood itself.
Best
gaming O franchise Resident Evil & GTA
ne of the most scary and highly successful horror video game titles are undoubtedly from the Resident Evil stable. The series has been widely acclaimed by critics for its scare tactics and involving every trick in the book to create an atmosphere of shock and fear. Umbrella Corp and the city of Racccoon project an image of a dark and an eerie atmosphere. While playing the game you almost get a creepy feeling that some one’s right behind you. The game has inspired several Hollywood movies, novels, collectibles and toys. Resident Evil is the brain child of video game producer Shinji Mikami and is published by Capcom. Mikami has worked on other great titles for the studio as well
There’s a lot that goes into making a great video game. We’ll tell you the secrets behind great game development and the people who toil and sweat to create them in their dark, unkempt basements. This section would focus on industry’s best gaming franchises and on the people who have made the gaming industry generate more revenue than Hollywood itself.
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F e at u r e
such as Devil May Cry, Ace Attorney and so on. Known as Biohazard in Japan, Resident Evil is Capcom’s golden child. We feel that the entire series lacks a continuing story line which engages the player and moves in a linear manner. Resident Evil is also credited with starting a whole new genre in gaming known as survival horror.
History The idea behind the game came from a little known title called Sweet Home which was only released in Japan in 1989. Although the game was marketed as RPG it gained wide popularity as a survival horror. Although sweet home received a mild response Capcom was on it’s way to create the game which would define the rules in the horror genre of video games. Resident Evil 1 was ported to the Playstation and hit the stores in 1996. The game featured members of the Special Tactics And Rescue Service or STARS discovering cannibalism murders in the city of Raccoon. Players had the option of choosing any of the two members of the STARS force. Having a different storyline and mission objectives for each of the in game characters was another area where Mikami and his development team had hit the bulls eye. It was as good as choosing you own adventure and moving within your story. Resident Evil series was amongst the first to offer different story modes to choose from, each character had its own special abilities and separate scenarios. The game’s camera angles were fixed in certain areas and focused on 3D characters put over pre-rendered environments. One eighty degree camera view would come later with the release of the third edition of the game. The secret recipe in making a great survival horror was mastered by the guys at Capcom studios, the idea was simple and innovative: start with limited ammo, allow fewer game saves and place them far away from each other and offer health packs to regain energy when he’s just about to die. By the time Resident Evil 2 came out in 1998, Mikami and his team had spent
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two years developing. The game was received with a mild response, some critics even said that it was a disappoint. The game had better graphics and also introduced a new protagonist Leon S Kennedy. In 1999 the third installment of the game introduced a new enemy - Nemisis. He was a mutated giant, extremely difficult to kill. Players now had to dodge attacks from a rocket launcher as well. Again the critics had the same complain that the game’s engine was outdated and desperately needed a refresh. This part in the series served as a midquel and a sequel to the game’s earlier two versions with events happening both before and after the story. Capcom made several deals along the way with game console manufactures. The first one resulted in Resident Evil code Veronica which was released on Sega Dreamcast. In another agreement a new game and a secret game was promised to buyers of Nintendo Gamecube. Capcom agreed to release all the previous games in the series on Gamecube and the new game which was promised to Gamecube owners turned out to be Resident Evil Zero, this
would tell the events before all hell breaks loose in Raccoon promcity. The secret game prom ised was Devil May Cry. Fans got a first look at the fourth game at Tokyo game show in 2002 and before the fiinal game was released two previous verver sions were showcased as trailers and later scrapped. This happened because Capcom thought that the game wasn’t good enough. However when the game rere leased in 2005 it turned out to be a huge success. Apart from innovative tech, the inventory management system was revamped and better shooting and aiming techniques were incorporated. The game was ported to PS2 leaving Gamecube owners feeling left out. This is our favorite game in the series. Leon makes his return to rescue the American president’s daughter and fights off gigantic mutant monsters and crazy ass villagers. By the time the fifth game was out it was 2009, the game was set in a zombie infested village set in an Africa country this time. The running system in the game again proved to be a let down as shooting while running was still amiss. The game however had an online co-op mode which made up for the weak points in the game.
sHinji MikaMi Shinji Mikami is the driving force behind almost all the Resident Evil titles. He has a career span of more than 20 years in the gaming industry and is one of the most respected per- sonalities in the gaming fraternity. From the early 16 bit Disney titles to the Resident Evil series Mikami has been behind some of the most creative and inspiring games from Capcom. One never knows what to expect next from a Shinji Mikami game, we guess that’s what has made him so successful in the industry.
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F e at u r e
Top 5 villains in the series CriMson Head He pretends to be dead and when you get near him he launches an attack. A zombie turns into a crimson head monster when the T - virus has been lacking in his body for a while. A magnum gun comes in quite handy to kill the bugger.
WilliaM Birkin A gruesome, ferocious rival Birkin goes through several stages of transformation. Eventually he mutates into a blob of flesh and tentacles. Lot of ammo, health is required to kill this mutant.
lisa trevor Used as a lab rat for experiments in the Umbrella corp facilities, Lisa transformed into an abomination due to the virus. There’s a rumour that she became immortal due to the experiments.
neMesis A bio-organic super soldier, Nemisis was designed by Umbrella corp. He carries a rocket launcher as his weapon of destruction and appears as the main villain in the third series of the game.
Wesker One of the most cunning and smart villain in the series Wesker is the driving force behind Umbrella Corp. He wants to rule over humanity and achieved super human powers from an experimental virus.
first week earnings of GTA IV. The level of detailing involved in the games is another feat achieved by Rockstar studios apart from gifting the industry and gamers with the sandbox format. Rockstar pioneered the open world environment where players are free to roam and do whatever the hell they want. The level of wide acclaim received by the game is apparent when any sandbox format game is known as a GTA clone.
History The entire GTA universe has layers and layers of missions, side missions, races, radio stations, in-game activities such as small games and other playable content which lets you unlock hidden missions. The general outline of the game has remained more or less the same. An average Joe rises up through a city’s ranks by committing illicit crimes. The protagonist generally plays for revenge which was the case with the latest installment of the game or just to kick some underworld butt and become a millionaire while at it. GTA games have had their fair of controversies and law suit slapped to it too. With the advent of the first GTA title cities like Liberty, Vice City and San Andreas which were to be the main cities in upcoming editions were already conceived, these would be made into full fledged games later. The first two GTA titles had a top down view, where the player could move and interact with the environment with the camera serving as the eagle’s eye. Designed by DMA design studio the games
were released on multiple formats prevalent at the time. A major breakthrough came in with the game’s third release Liberty City. The city was roughly modelled on the city of New York. This was probably a defining moment in the franchisees life which could make or break the game. The game made way into the hearts and minds of players and game developers. It incorporated a few untouched and path breaking techniques such as cut away scenes, mini-GPS locator or the map legend use of desired vehicles and weapons and so on. The game this time did away with the top down view and featured a 3D third person perspective. The game’s 3D display was made possible by the remodelled new game engine. Liberty City defined and laid the foundation for all future GTA titles giving the series a unique identification like the health and ammo count on the top right side of the screen. In 2002 GTA Vice City came along and burst all charts. The game was set in the year 1986 and was loosely based on the city of Miami. The in-game design, missions, detailing and graphics were all increased by a notch and have been perfected over the years. This was also the first game to feature fully operational aircrafts and planes. Fan expectations and regard were quite high with the release of San Andreas and the guys at Rockstar delivered a city which was four times larger than Vice City and five time larger than GTA III. Emphasis was laid on the complex transportation system which connected the three cities in the game via train, air and highways.
We love Rockstar studios and arguably their best game so far, Grand Theft Auto. Rockstar studios is a pioneer of sandbox environment games in the industry. The effect of the GTA series has been huge both on the industry and video game fans worldwide. The series has been highly successful making guys at Rockstar studios richer by $500 million and this is just the
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Not only did GTA Vice City have a mid-80s setting, it seems to have been heavily influenced by Al Pacino’s Scarface, a cult movie chronicling the life of a goon who rules the underworld
GTA IV is considered as the best in the series, it’s richer in graphics and storytelling. It’s the most expensive game ever made till date with budgets above $100 million. New combat tricks were devised for the game giving Niko a better aim at his enemies. The game’s engine was created by a small team called the RAGE technology group, which is an in house team at Rockstar. What’s interesting to see here is that in each GTA universe time actually moves ahead. If Vice City was set in the 80s, San Andreas was set in the 90s and GTA IV in recent times.
tHe Houser
BrotHers Brothers Sam and Dan are the creators of the series. Apart from producing the GTA they have written and given voice overs for the game. They were featured in TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people list in 2009. Both Sam and Dan wanted to become rockstars when they were kids, perhaps an inspiration behind the studio’s name. Their affection towards music landed them a job at BMG, however they realized that their creative appetite was more than just handling music. They started out with BMG Interactive another division of BMG which was into developing video games. The division wasn’t doing well the time they joined in. Houser brothers involved a little known Scottish studio called DMA design and built on the idea of having an open world game where the main objective was lacking. The result was the first
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two GTA titles. New York based company Take Two interactive caught attention of a little known British studio that came into limelight overnight with it’s title and bought the rights to the game. This is how Rockstar studio came into existence. The Houser brothers moved to the NYC, they were given a budget and the creative freedom to do what they want. The brothers knew that DMA design would be required to deliver the big blow. They teamed up on GTA III and the rest is history.
Money
spent, earned What started as a dream for two young Brit teens turned out to be one of the biggest pop culture icons. Both Sam and Dan are President and VP at Rockstar studio respectively. The entire series has sold more than 28 million copies worldwide and made over $500 million in revenue.
CeleBrity
guest appearanCes With GTA III came the money and Rockstar studios was ruling the charts. Now that they had both money and fame they could afford to have big Hollywood celebrities to give voice overs for the characters in the game. Some of the high profile names include Samuel L Jackson, Ray Liotta and James Woods. However after featuring Ray Liotta as Tommy Vercetti in GTA Vice City producer Sam Houser thought that the actor was over taking the game’s character as he constantly imagined playing as Ray and not Tommy
in the game. It was decided to have small time rap artists for GTA San Andreas rather than celebrities.
protagonists
in tHe gaMe None of the main characters make a return in the game’s subsequent installments because the time is in progression. Till the game’s fourth stage most of the earlier characters are dead. However a few other characters do make their return, particularly the Leone family. As for main characters, there have been four so far. There have been discussions and talks of why haven’t Rockstar featured a female lead protagonist in any of the GTA series. Most likely it’s because of the game’s graphic nature which mainly draws attention of male players.
MusiC
used in gta series The music choice in the GTA series has been phenomenal. It has matched the life and times of the era in which a game is based. Apart from awesome title theme compositions the fictional radio stations play hit songs from that time. Rockstar studio has gone to great lengths in selecting the music across genres. The studio has paid $10,000 in acquiring the rights for each track in GTA IV. They even hired a private investigator to search for the family members of a deceased artist in order to get rights for his song. To ensure the right kind of music gets selected a survey for 2000 people was exercised so as to know what they listen on their MP3 players. Similar songs and artists were then featured on GTA radio stations. Our favorite station is VRock from GTA Vice City. Laslow the channel’s RJ is quite quirky and funny.
tHe Future Fans have been forever in wait for the next GTA title, touted to release in 2012. The next game should be playable in air, land and water. This might add to the real world appeal of the game and imagine the fun one would have playing GTA in space or maybe under water. Fan spoof and art work for GTA 5 is plenty on the internet.
SKOAR! 31
editorial
Evil Never Dies...
W
e’re back with another edition of SKOAR!, India’s only gaming magazine. In this issue, we celebrate two evil incarnates in popular gaming franchises – one has been a recurring villain in a decade-old story inspired by a children’s book, while the other has been haunting the confines of a tale for over half a decade. I’m referring to Voldemort and Alma Wade, of course. Despite knowing so much about Tom Marvolo Riddle’s transformation from a school boy to the bad-ass, devil-personified-wizard he turns into, there’s still a sense of mystery about Voldemort. This spooky, deeprooted, fear of the unknown is amplified even further in the case of Alma Wade – a secretive paranormal entity hauntJayesh Shinde ing the world of Assistant Manager, F.E.A.R., a game Test Center which frankly “Big Daddy”
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doesn’t have a line separating the real from the unreal, sanity from madness, consciousness from hallucination. In the game reviews of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 2 and F.E.A.R. 3, Voldemort and Alma’s respective storylines come to a heady conclusion. However, I’m not completely sold on the idea that their legacy will die. Who’s to say Rowling, or the game studio, won’t resurrect ‘He Who Must Not Be Resurrected’ and Alma’s spawn won’t inherit her curse? In an age where original script ideas are increasingly rare – just look at Hollywood movies from the past couple of years to get the drift – it’s hard to imagine powerful characters such as Voldemort and Alma not having lasting impacts on the future of their respective franchises. They have way too much recall value, something any fan of the series can readily relate to. With entertainment studios making significant inroads into the world of games, it’s in everyone’s interest to fester evil and keep a villain’s legacy alive – if resurrecting him or her isn’t on the cards.
Let me hold that thought and digress from the topic of evil and powerful villains to give you a quick summary on the pages of SKOAR! that follow. We liked Alice: Madness Returns for its scary portrayal of a Wonderland gone horribly wrong, came across a few Open Source and Flash gaming gems, and also feature three more eagerly awaited games: Max Payne 3, Lord of the Rings: War in the North, and Pro Evolution Soccer 2012. I wish we could have covered even more, but alas! combating real-world demons is always more difficult than the ones that inhabit our PC screens, which can be dispatched of with a few deft clicks. What I want to know, however, is what games or villains gave you the chills when you played them in the dead of the night? Write in to tell me at jayesh.shinde@thinkdigit.com, so that we can find out our reader’schoice, scariest games/villains of all time for the next issue. To end, I should add, that although we wanted both Voldermort and Alma on the cover, sorry Voldy, Alma looked a lot spookier.
August 2011