Bulletstorm

G2A, Gearbox, and the Problem of Good and Evil

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

The recent Gearbox-G2A-TotalBiscuit debacle (reported on excellently at Vice’s Waypoint by Patrick Klepek over a series of news articles here, here and here) that was the result of a deal struck to officially distribute Bulletstorm via G2A, was in the offing for the longest time.

It had to happen, because the legitimate online price-race (one that has now cooled, to be frank, after several online retailers have been, or are in the process of, shutting down shop) drives a portion of consumers to find the best available price every time, and every time they are caught unawares by the illegitimate practices of various services such as Cdkeys, Kinguin and the titular G2A, it is principally because of the way we are being sold games, and because of a lack of consumer education.

Therefore, such a burst of activity around this topic has been a good refresher and reminder to gamers that not all is above the board with these cd-key shops. Of course, by now it should be so very clear to all of us that anything that has the word “keys” plastered to it is morally bankrupt in the general view of the retail establishment. But it isn’t, and won’t be, not until the system changes – and that change will probably be to the worse.

The thing is, the framing of Gearbox’s brush with the Bad Guys was largely from the point of view of the scorned developer, as with the help of TotalBiscuit, Gearbox navigated the situation deftly and swiftly, which had the unfortunate side effect of distorting the crux of the issue, and perhaps side-stepping other relevant questions of digital distribution that absolutely led into the intended (or unintended) result of blending questions of legitimacy with illegitimacy, and proper practice with improper practice.

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Interview with Epic Games’ Jay Wilbur

Nabeel Burney 161 Comments

Since its inception in 2008, the Dubai World Game Expo has been the annual showcase for game developers in the Middle East. In the last few years many western studios have taken an interest and have come to sponsor or give panels, including CryTech, Blizzard Entertainment, Electronic Arts, and Epic Games.

Epic had a large presence at DWGE 2010, showcasing their latest development tool, the Unreal Development Kit. Their booth featured a workshop with tutorials on the basics of the UDK, and representing Epic at DWGE were Jay Wilbur, Vice President, as well as Markus Arvidsson and James Tan – two of the independent developers behind UDK-based game The Ball. I sat down with these fine gentlemen to discuss a variety of topics including Unreal Engine 3, the UDK, and games development in general. What follows is my conversation with Jay.

The Slowdown: The Unreal Engine has a long history of licensing and modding; how did the decision to launch the Unreal Development Kit only come about now after all these years?

Jay Wilbur: So, all the while, we’ve always made our games open and available for people to mod – Unreal Tournament 3, going back to the original Unreal. People would be able to use the tools to make their own mod. But that locks those creative endeavours to the game, so somebody else would need to own that particular game in order to play the mod. With the UDK, we’ve freed developers to create standalone applications, turn it into a standalone playable entity – asset, I should say, and then deliver it to anybody who wanted to play it. They wouldn’t necessarily need to own that game in order to play it. So the goal was basically to have more people use Unreal Engine 3 in the development and also have more people be able to play the end result.

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Bulletspeak

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

Together with EA and Epic Games, the Polish Painkiller developers People Can Fly are certainly doing their darndest to specifically target us connoisseurs with their latest Unreal Engine 3 game, Bulletstorm.

How, exactly, you may ask? Glancing over older press releases (frantic, adrenaline fueled, immersive) for Painkiller, the lingo has been amped up several notches: Symphony, carnage, blockbuster, unadulterated, entertainment, arsenal, outrageously, unprecedented, frantic, yell-inducing, inciting, mayhem, insane, execute, exaggerated, excited, onslaught, cutting-edge. 1)http://news.ea.com/portal/site/ea/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100412006088&newsLang=en

(Only missing the good ol’ slobberknocker and barnburner, in other words.)

Good thing, then, that the just-released debut trailer below should back up some of that smack, too:

Below, a list of excerpts and examples of the aforementioned jargon in action:

  1. The developers are slated to deliver a “Blood Symphony of Gunplay and Carnage” packed with “blockbuster moments” 2)http://news.ea.com/portal/site/ea/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100412006088&newsLang=en
  2. The developers “believe” in “making killing ridiculous enemies as awesome as possible” 3)http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/04/16/before-bulletstorm-there-was-painkiller.aspx
  3. Inspired by pulp and Heavy Metal, the company is collaborating with comic book author Rick Remender, “best known for his original pulp sci-fi series Fear Agent and his work on Dead Space” 4)http://gameinformer.com/games/bulletstorm/b/xbox360/archive/2010/04/19/inside-bulletstorm-writer-rick-remender-s-head.aspx
  4. The game places specific emphasis on the methodology of the kill: “special kills that reward players with increased upgrade points” 5)http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/04/26/killing-with-style-an-illustration-of-bulletstorm-s-skillshots.aspx
  5. The team “dubs the close combat in Bulletstorm ‘creative mayhem'” 6)Gameinformer May 2010, p48
  6. The company has also done away with the cover systems of today: “Bulletstorm … has no cover mechanism, and we’re turbo sliding 20 or so metres further than science’s popular ‘momentum’ would realistically take us.” 7)http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=245721

While Wolfire & co. have been shoving it to the mainstream in a slightly different manner, People Can Fly seem to be aiming to counter the current established shooter paradigm in ways that are reminiscent of the Death of Glam Metal!

The question remains, then – which side of the fence is glam metal on, exactly, and what about the Death of Grunge? According to Joystiq, EA have slated Bulletstorm for Q1 2011.

P.S.
Ulysses?

The question remains, then – which side of the fence is glam metal on, exactly? And what about the Death of Grunge?

References   [ + ]

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