So the long overdue Games for Windows Live standalone client is now available for download. It has an amazing array of hot features no one can pass up! Allow me to list them for you in the utmost and greatest detail. Feature number 1: the ability to purchase, download and manage games from the Games for Windows Live Marketplace. Feature number 2: oh wait, hold on I must have misplaced the rest of this list. Oh, hmm. Yea that’s it, nothing to see here, it’s over folks. No friends list, no message center and no achievement browsing? Huh?

It’s really unfortunate how hard Microsoft fails when it comes to the borderline vaporware that Games for Windows Live has become. We were wooed with promises of a bright future with the Games for Windows Live initiative, PC’s very own version of the amazing Xbox Live system. But so far those promises have been empty. While the initiative does enforce some nice standards on developers, like requiring widescreen formats, it falls short of the already established competitor in this market, Steam. Valve has beaten Microsoft at its own game, with far less resources. It’s a shame really, considering how good Xbox Live is. Why can’t Games for Windows Live be that good? For now it seems Steam shall remain champion on the PC as the premiere platform, with its fantastic marketplace, achievement and community features. GFWL has some major catching up to do, get cracking Microsoft, we know you can do it.

•  Change SPU to run two spus in parallel. SPU_core is the official one. SPU_user produces output.
• This lets us do inaccurate things with SPU_user which might sound better while being more accurate with SPU_core. [zeromus]
• Add RTC implementations (not fully) [CrazyMax]
• Rewrite VRAM mapping control and render [CrazyMax]

• Add AVI output [zeromus]
• Remove multithreading from user interface after finding several synchronization issues [zeromus]
• Rewrite input core & replace config input dialog [CrazyMax]

It's pretty simple, just register your gamertag here, then log in and connect to Games for Windows - Live titles for your entry.  You get one entry per day you log on, so there's no need to log on to all your games every day.  But hey, don't let me stop you!

No Way Studios have released the latest video from their forthcoming debut game entitled C.O.R.E. focusing on the unique features that are contained within game and the engine.

C.O.R.E. is an action/first-person shooter for the Nintendo DS and the plot-line revolves around a meteor crash and its consequences. The footage is a mixture of the game intro movie and in-game footage.

As a marine, you are sent in with a secret mission into the lab complex built on the meteor crash site. You will travel through different locations – first on the ground, then deeper underground (security rooms, living sectors, offices, labs, stock rooms, headquarters), then even deeper into the meteor rock. Your aim: to discover mysteries about the meteor by solving quests. The final quest comes deep down underneath the earth, where the biggest secret is hidden. Only you can survive this task and protect mankind.

For the last 11 months, the team have been striving to push the limits of the Nintendo DS with full 3D visuals and they have created levels which are not linear, resulting in several possible scenarios to complete the quests (introduced by in-game movies, some of which will be presented in 3d).

Features:

• Mysterious atmosphere intensified by heavy music and advanced graphic solutions
• Complete 14 huge, shocking levels
• 20 different enemies ranging from insane marines and mad scientist to big deadly mutants and discover secret rooms and special quests
• Choose among 8 types of guns, such as: blaster, shotgun, plasma gun or rocket launcher. Some of them will have alternative shooting options or optical zoom
• Enjoy an interactive world of our design: climb ladders, use vehicles and operate interactive tools like switches, controllers, access cards, open boxes and barrels, break windows, benches, barrels

A release date for C.O.R.E. has yet to be announced, but as soon as we hears something we will let you know.

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• Iwata Says Nintendo Isn't Ignoring the Core Gamers…Again
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• Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII - Seven New Trailers

World of Warcraft Molten Core raid for ATARI becomes reality originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 02 Dec 2008 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Luckily, there's some other stuff in here to make your brains explode less, including the latest instalment of the adorably quiffed Kenka Banchou series, classic Chris Crawford game box scans, the case against art games (rise up, artisans!), and quite a few others besides.

Man of mystery:

NCSX Import Video Games & Toys: Kenka Banchou 3: Zenkoku Seiha - New Import, In Stock
An interesting cult schoolyard brawler series that's Japan-only gets a third instalment: 'The new protagonist in Kenka Bancho is a fresh-faced youth named Takashi Sakamoto who's living on the wrong side of the school yard. He's tough, fast, and has got a serious problem with authority figures. To that end, he gets into fights with other toughs and bristles in the presence of teachers.'

Old Paradigms and a Podcast | How They Got Game
The Stanford Cabrinety Collection has some really interesting scans of early Chris Crawford simulation games for Atari - not just Scram, which was the nuclear-related one I knew about.

Feature: 15 Indie Games for the Holidays - Big Download Blog
Great selection, and another example of people caring about the indie scene, hurray.

One more past blast: Enigma - The Gameshelf
Andrew Plotkin knows good puzzles when he sees them - so I direct you to Enigma, an update of Atari ST puzzle classic Oxyd.

gamebunny » Blog Archive » Otherland: What In The World?
The PC Gamer screenshots/info made it look MMO-bubble cuckoo in the best cyberpunk ways: 'Singapore-based developer, Real U is bringing author, Tad Williams' sci fi novels to life, where varied virtual worlds are lorded over by the super rich. One moment you are traipsing across a “steampunk Mars world”, the next, a “Through the LookingGlass” environment where Oz is “over-industrialized” and out of control.' [UPDATE: Wait, GamesRadar has the preview up, with suitably Bladerunnerneon screenshots.]

Game Design Advance » The Case Against ‘Art-Games’
It's sorta fun we're having this discussion, even if it all seems a little definitionally random: 'The prevailing wisdom may be that games have not achieved the vaunted status of ‘art’, but perhaps the problem isn’t with games. Perhaps the problem is with our own ability to recognize their artistic merits.'

GAMBIT: Updates: Introducing Ochos Locos and the Locos Engine!
'Ochos Locos is a tiny game with a tremendous goal: get players of all ages and nationalities playing and, eventually, creating together. Developed in Python, Ochos Locos was originally created for the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) XO laptop and is also now available for Windows and Linux environments.'

Free Pixel » Looking into Shadows - should Machinima be interactive?
Excellent piece on the PS3 demo: 'Linger in Shadows tries to make exactly this activity, the play with the material of the projected image, accessible to the player. When I shake the PS3 controller, I shake the image, break the sound and continuity of the “film” clip, and find the space in-between. Like the momentary blackness between two projected film images we explore the space between individual visual
moments.'

1. Return To Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is a pretty realistic shooter that allows you to fight other people online and team work is the key to success. Based on the single player game Return to Castle Wolfenstein, released back in 2001, this game is still far from its final hour.

2. True Combat: Elite is a modification for the Enemy Territory game that turns it into a modern day shooter from the rusty WW2 maps and weapons used by the original, but beware - starting off could be extremely tricky online, since you can’t simply walk in the open and shoot around, because one bullet can kill!

3. Since I mentioned Nexuiz earlier, here you have it - a really fast-paced shooter reminding me of Quake 3 - after all, it uses its graphics engine, but heavily modified, so it’s even better than Quake 3 - just give it a try, it’s free, and it doesn’t bite!

4. Tremulous is another excellent shooter based on the id Tech 3 graphics engine from Quake 3, offering Aliens vs Humans multiplayer team combat with some RTS elements.

5. Leaving shooters behind, we have The Battle For Wesnoth, a great online multiplayer TBS game with RPG elements with development going on at full speed since 2003. Best part of it - it’s corss-platform, so if you can’t reach a Windows PC, don’t worry - it also runs on Macs and most Linux-based PCs!

6. Getting back to the shooters realm, I only have one more to tell you about - Alien Arena, a game that takes the old id Tech 2 engine where it has never gone before, making all those who see it go “WOW!” when looking back at Quake 2, the game that used it for the first time.

7. No, this is not a game, but simply a useful advice - if you want more, just be sure to use Google to find the best free downloadable games to suit your gaming needs, but since it is my duty and pleasure helping you, here’s a page worth its value in gold - the Wikipedia freeware games page. It may not be the ultimate resource, since I don’t think such a resource exists, but it’s a great place to start.

Just one more thing - as usual, if you have something useful to add, don’t be shy and drop your valuable hints below. After all, there’s always one more free downloadable game to discover hiding somewhere…