Daily News Spin — July 19, 2001 (Thursday)

New Kohan patch

One of our favorite games this year has been patched. Here's a list of the changes:

- adds GameSpy Chat to the connection interface
- adds the ability to ban players
- adds several climate options to the random map generator
- adds Retreat/Rout buttons to the regiment interface
- adds new art for the Dreadlord and Paladin
- adds automatic detection of new versions, and automatic downloading of patches
- adds support for official expansions and mods
- changes pressed move so that the company reverts to column move instead of stopping
- improves the SAI player
- fixes some exploits

Sounds good. You can get the patch details here.

Which console is the most righteously powerful?

MSNBC tries to answer that question.

Bit-for-bit comparisons fall apart when you consider display technologies that use the term �bits� to refer to an entirely different unit than the bits used in processors. Here you can see the concrete ceiling that makes bit comparisons entirely illogical: televisions and monitors only display 24 �bits� of actual color per pixel, and any additional bits are for so called �alpha channel� transparencies and other special effects.

In other words, they don't really know. The article's stuffed full of information, or jargon, depending on your viewpoint. Thanks Jason!

Columbine lawsuit asked to be dismissed

The defendants in a civil suit brought by relatives of the victims of the Columbine shootings have asked the court to dismiss the case, according to this AP story.

Eight manufacturers of violent video games asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit brought against them by relatives of several victims in the Columbine massacre.

In a motion filed Monday, lawyers for the companies said the lawsuit should be dropped because it doesn't allege that any particular game led Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold to go on the rampage.

The companies also argue that video games are protected as free speech and that they cannot be held liable for someone's reaction to the games.

Win a LAN tourney, get an AK-47

The bobbies in the UK are concerned over a LAN party's proposed prize of a real, albeit "deactived" AK-47 as a prize, according to this BBC story.

A spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers told BBC News Online that although they were worried that such a prize was being given, it was not illegal.

However they are currently in discussion with the Home Office following worries about replica guns, which can be mistaken for real firearms.

The UK and Ireland National Local Area Network (LAN) Tour 2001 is giving away the gun as one of four prizes, including a PC from Virgin Interactive and �5,000.

The organizers are just asking for trouble with a prize like this. Use your noodles, lads!

Neckphone launched

No, it's not a device to facilitate phone sex. It's headphones for gamers. Annanova has the story.

The U-shaped Neckphone has been designed with computer games in mind. It has tiny speakers which sit on the neck and not the ears.

The gadget also includes a small vibration generator that sends special effects shudders through the body.

The makers, also called Neckphone, say the device will allow PC users to get a surround-sound experience without the need to string wires and extra speakers all around the room. It involves the Neckphone and two speakers positioned in front of the user.

Crimson Skies files to Silver Screen

Looks like Microsoft's computer game (based on the FASA tabletop game) about an alternative universe with madcap sky pirates will be made into a film, according to Cinescape.

DreamWorks Pictures has picked up the rights to Microsoft's PC game CRIMSON SKIES. The studio is looking to develop the property into a live-action feature film.

They're still looking for a writer to adapt the game, so it may be some time before we see it, if ever. Thanks Andrew and Rob!

Video games as art?

Wired News has an article about a planned discussion of games as art at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Some heavy hitters will be on the panel.

Nolan Bushnell, inventor of Pong and founder of Atari; Will Wright, designer of SimCity and the Sims; Lev Manovich, media artist, theorist and author of The Language of New Media; and Margaret Crane, media artist and former artist in residence at Xerox PARC, are among the panelists.

ArtCade will also showcase a cross section of video games from the '70s to the present, demos of yet-to-be-released games, as well as CD-ROM and online work by artists using video games as a departure point in their work.

Pong...minimalism. The Sims...surrealism. Diablo II...funism.

Final Fantasy X on sale in Japan, FFXI trailer news

Console releases don't get much bigger than this. The New York Times has the story.

While analysts say they expect the game to sell well and lift Square's earnings this year, they are wary of the company's venture into the movie-making business and note it would take a while to earn back the initial costs of about $35 million for developing the game.

$35 million? Whew, that's a lot. That's almost as much as we spent to develop this website! There's also some more news about the release. A bonus disk contains a trailer for Final Fantasy XI, an online-only game aimed at consoles and PCs. Computer and Video Game News has the story.

The trailer, though early, shows a graphical style considerably different from Final Fantasy X. Gone are some of the more fantastical, cartoony elements and in their place is a lush, vivid world that has a much more grown-up feel to it. The environments are already stunningly detailed � check out the forest for starters � and the characters possess a greater sense of realism than ever before. That�s not to say that Square has reigned in its incredible imagination, and one look at the Pikmin-esque organic creature devouring tiny beasts settles any doubts in this department.

Here's a link where you can download the trailer.

3am

Speedball II: Brutal Deluxe, the Bitmap Brothers classic console game, is coming to the Game Boy Advance.

Want to make your own games? Check out DarkBASIC, a 3D game making tool. We tried out a demo of a tank game and the graphics were impressive. The tanks modeled recoil too. It's designed for both programmers and non-programmers.

Fitting right in with making your own games, Gamasutra has a guide to level design.

Wolfpack Studios has announced player housing for Shadowbane.

GameSpy has some info and screens about Thief 3. The screens are the ones that appear in a recent PC Gamer.

Zorro has been announced. Here are some screenshots at PC Pointer. The site's in some foreign language, Martian or German or something.

Interested in beta testing Art of Magic, the sequel to Magic and Mayhem? Click here.

Random Games (Chaos Gate, Soldiers at War, lots of mainstream stuff) laid off about 20 people, according to Avault.

Click here to read yesterday's news