Not only have we recently evolved from riding horses everywhere to driving cars, we actually have a good number of videogame developers in the area, such as id Software, 3D Realms, and Gearbox Software. So when Editor-in-Chief Nick Chester asked me to represent Destructoid at Gearbox Software's "Victory Party" Friday night, I felt it was my duty to represent the southern population of the industry.

The "Victory Party" was held in Dallas, Texas to celebrate the release of Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC) and Samba de Amigo (Wii), both of which come out on September 23. I was told I could bring one guest along, so before the party I picked up fellow Dallas community member Blehman, and we headed over to the Palladium Ballroom where the event was taking place.

The Sunday Papers: A Sunday List compiled from Monday to Saturday by RPS of the finest Monday to Saturday game-related commentary we’ve seen and then published on a Sunday - in a list - of said articles (except the Monday to Saturday articles we’ve had second thoughts about) and trying to avoid linking to some Sunday lo-fi pop-punk thing an Monday to Saturday artist mate of mine linked to on Monday to Saturday.

• Gamasutra publish the Bioshock Postmortem. I was considering spinning this off into a full post, but haven’t got time to go through it and pull out the interesting bits and comment, but time presses. Let’s just get people chatting with one of the concluding remarks: “Our goal when we set out to make BioShock was very clear. We wanted to get to the next level, moving beyond our suite of critically acclaimed games to make a blockbuster.”
• We’ve never linked to Tim Rogers before, I believe. Not sure why - I suspect it tends to be inflammatory. But he’s reviewing a PC-indie touchstone Cave Story here, and is in a relatively accessible form, so let’s give it a shot. “Relatively accessible” doesn’t mean “not really like how anyone else does it”, however. The contextualisation for once here is some fun and worthwhile meditations of games auterism. Yay!
• I wasn’t at PAX but friend of RPS Andrew Mayer was, who did a presentation about When Player Feedback Backfires which Gamespot have written up. It’s essentially about knowing when to tell your audience to fuck right off.
• We’ve linked to the Silent Amateur before. It’s a gentleman who’s playing through the series-best Hitman: Blood Money missions in the stupidest way possible. Screenshots make it, but the text shimmers too. Anyway - it’s all done now.
• Leigh takes a break from staring longingly at the shelves of Hentai titles to take on the classic What Do Women Want In Games? title. I link because it’s fun and that - as described in the article - Leigh and I seem to be the only people in the reviewing community who genuinely love Mercenaries 2. And this needs to be said. Worth stressing I haven’t played the PC version yet, which sounds even twitchier than the pretty-fuckin’-twitchy 360 one.
• PC advocacy malarkies! Lorne Lanning of Oddworld fame thinks that consoles are the problem for lots of really quite sensible reasons. Meanwhile PCG:US’ Editor in Chief Kristen Salvatore writes a little manifesto about how you can save the PC. Manifesto, eh? Tricky blighters.
• Blizzard interview watch! Frank Pearce describes Blizzard’s success as “exhausting”. Which kind of got an aww! diddums! response from the assembled RPSites. Meanwhile, Jay Wilson talks Diablo III with special reference to the accusations of homosexual preference - akin to World of Warcraft’s - in the colour scheme. And, just for the record, the OMFG! Diablo3ghey!!!! debate is the most ludicrous talking point in PC gaming this year.
• Almost not linked to for the casual use of “raping”, but Games Radar’s David Houghton explains why you’re playing the bad guys in Gears of War.
• Simon Parkin having a big ol’ think about why, after the internet response to Guitar Praise (since we haven’t covered it: Basically, Guitar hero but with Christian Rock) Christian gaming is so Maligned. Agreeably Even-handed.
• The Okmoniks: Scuzzy tweekfuzz fanzine punk stuff.

Failed.

• Spore: It ships to stores today in the US so make sure you check out our coverage of Will Wright's magnum opus, including our five reasons we thing we will love this game, our first out of the box experience and some interesting Spore related advertisements.
• Champions Online: We get a hands-on look at the Snake Gulch zone for Cryptic Studios's upcoming super hero MMO title.
• Reviews: Our latest review takes a look at the next chapter for American McGee's Grimm, Godfather Death.
• Team Fortress 2 Comprehensive Achievement Guide: If you want to see detailed descriptions of every achievement in Valve's multiplayer shooter there's no better place to look.
• Big Ideas: Our latest column on game themes takes a look at being a hero in an MMO title.
• MacMonday: Our latest column on Mac gaming takes a look at the action horror game Larva Mortus.
• Alt-Tab: Our latest feature gallery column takes a hands-on look at Gas Powered's upcoming title Demigod.
• Freeware Friday: Our latest look at free games checks out the recent adventure game remake Quest for Glory 2.

Continue reading The Best of Big Download: September 1-7

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In terms of distilling the core Civilization experience from PC to handheld, this is almost as victorious as the PC-to-console iterations.

We have a very exciting new program to announce - NY Games Conference, an executive media conference focused on the future of gaming. The event will be held at DigitalLife, Ziff Davis Media’s renowned lifestyle technology event at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City, September 25-26, 2008.

NY Games Conference is the dedicated insider forum for media and tech executives to network, do deals, and share ideas about the future of console, PC, online and mobile games at DigitalLife, which now enjoys a unique position on the East Coast as a key industry venue for launching new products and attracting key press coverage heading into the holidays. Topics include: - MMOGs, virtual worlds, social networks, casual games and iPhone games. The conference also features elements from DMW’s cutting edge series of Millennials conferences focused on digital entertainment trends and strategies and consumer marketing for the youth market.

(more…)

via: VGBlogger

Most open source game lovers would agree that it is a tad too annoying when a cool game turns out to be not free. This also limits the gamer’s freedom to download freely, distribute and modify the game without breaking the law. Though the copyrights laws are really strict, many people have been taking freedom to break the annoying law and do what they please to. However, there seems to be some good news at least, for classic PC games Heretic and Hexen have been given new freedom on the net with the next release under the GNU Public License. This allows the gamers to do what they what they want with the game. The source code of the game is available on SourceForge. This might just be a tiny step towards a more vibrant open source community.

Via: Ripten

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