Valve

Valve Teases the Spitter in Left 4 Dead 1

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

A while ago, Valve were (more or less) gently accused of nicking the Left 4 Dead 2 “Spitter” infected directly from their own forums. Various affiliations, for and against, were causing people to shoot straight from the hip, emotions ran high and great drama was stirring in the air.

But could it be that this concept had already made the records before the aforementioned PR debacle, and better still, is visibly foreshadowed in Left 4 Dead 1?

We all saw this during our various No Mercy playthroughs, either in survival mode or during campaigns, not paying much attention to an x-ray image of a gross, hyperextended neck on a Mercy Hospital corridor wall… wait, what, a hyperextended neck?

What do you think?

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LucasArts Classic Adventure Games on Steam

Nabeel Burney Leave a comment

LucasArts and Valve announced today a new initiative to bring classic adventure games in the LucasArts catalog to Steam. Much loved titles such as Loom, The Dig and Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis will be available tomorrow on Steam.

the_dig_cover LOOM_Cover_Art

The announcement was being teased throughout the day yesterday on LucasArts’ twitter, and now there are a few extra facts being shared there as well. Firstly, this first batch of 10 games is “just a start”, and there will be more to come. Apparently each title has been reworked to run in Windows XP and Vista, and those that previously required SCUMMVM or DosBox to work, now won’t. They are now self-running executables that will work in modern-day video resolutions with switchable full-screen and windowed modes. The physical DRM that came with the games back in the day in the form of cardboard inserts, like the Grail Diary, will now come digitally in the package.

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In related news, the first episode of Telltale’s new five-part Tales of Monkey Island series is about to drop, with the website taking last-minute pre-orders. Later this month the special edition of Secret of Monkey Island will launch, a re-imagined makeover of the original game with high-resolution graphics and a remastered score.

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Puffs of Steam

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

Stuff’s up in the Steam-hood:

Killing Floor, the newest zombie game on the block, is now priced at 17,99€, and is currently selling at a pre-purchase discount of 25%. The UT2k4 version of the ex-modification is still available.

Valve’s Robin Walker admits to Shacknews that the company is “exploring … RPG-style mechanics” with Team Fortress 2.

Left 4 Dead statistics are now available on your Steam community page.

…Valve sues Sierra On-Line in 2002 for unauthorized distribution, goes to US District court with Sierra/Vivendi, and finally battling the merged Activision Blizzard/Vivendi in 2009. Sins of the Fathers, huh?

These bullet-point lists probably won’t become a habit of ours (à la GamesRadar), but it’s worth a shot, eh!

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