General gaming

General gaming

Lara Croft and the Reinvention of Game Heroes

Posted: 22 Oct 2011 07:49 PM PDT

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Lara Croft and the Reinvention of Game Heroes

How Tomb Raider changed games, and why its leading lady still matters 15 years later.

By: Jeremy Parish October 22, 2011

A woman sits on a boxy sofa in a hotel. It's meant to be a classy Calcutta hotel from colonial days, but the decor is very Silicon Valley circa the mid-'90s: Simple polygonal shapes make up the columns and furniture, and harsh lighting breaks the room into clearly demarcated spaces of shadow and light. The camera rotates around the the center of the room as it zooms in and descends, bringing the checkered floor -- the hallmark cliché of early 3D modeling -- into clearer view.

A robotic man glides toward the divan and its occupant as the point of view comes around. He lobs something onto the coffee table before her: A magazine, which glides to its resting point with no sense of inertia. On the cover is a photo of the woman to whom the magazine has been presented, captured in the act of riddling a massive yeti with bullets.

I Played Blizzard DOTA and Died, and That's OK

Posted: 22 Oct 2011 03:42 PM PDT

I've always been very, very intimidated by Defense of the Ancients. I never really caught wind of it until a few years ago, and by then if you were not in on it, you could never hope to catch up. Stories are legendary of the game's community and, and... I'm afraid to play it, OK? So with some mild trepidation I went to play Blizzard DOTA today at Blizzcon, and really liked it. In fact as soon as I turn in this preview I'm going to go back to get in a few more matches.

Blizzard DOTA takes the same formula of picking a Tank, DPS, Support, or Siege unit type and face off in a 5 v 5 match across a single map that has a variety of routes to the enemy base. The goal is for your team to knock out the enemy towers (that fire on you) while defending your towers, all the while making your way to the enemy base to destroy it. You'll have mercenaries you can rally to your cause as long as you capture their camps located on the map. Sounds simple in theory but is incredibly complex in execution, especially if your teammates don't work together.

"Part of this is to make the game faster, more accessible," explains Kaeo Milker, senior game producer on StarCraft 2. "We don't want you to get in there for 60 to 90 minutes. That's because in the traditional sense of the Dota-style games, they're really tense, and there's a lot of bickering. Even on your own team they're yelling at you and it's not a very pleasant experience."

"What's a Pandaren?" A Preview of WoW: Mists of Pandaria

Posted: 22 Oct 2011 03:35 PM PDT

After so many years of war, conflict, and the numerous Horde vs Alliance taunts, it appears both races will be allowed to take in some spiritual enlightenment with Mists of Pandaria, the fourth major expansion for World of Warcraft. Well, for a little while before they both bring their war to this majestic Pandaren-filled world anyway. A ton of information came out today about the latest expansion, the Pandarens, and the new Monk class so I'm going to get right into it.

What's a Pandaren?

The Pandaren have been roaming around the Warcraft universe since Warcraft III so don't think this is some sort of cash-in on Kung Fu Panda or anything of the like. It's just their universe has never been fully flushed out and they've never been a playable race in WoW before. Interestingly, like the history of Gouken from Street Fighter, the Pandaren's appearance in World of WarCraft derived from a April Fools joke a couple of years ago and fans have been wanting this addition ever since.

StarCraft 2: HotS Multiplayer Makes Sweeping Changes

Posted: 22 Oct 2011 03:29 PM PDT

I really didn't think they were going to change this much for StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm's multiplayer. We were all expecting some news in regards to new unit additions (which we got), but I didn't think stuff was actually going to get cut -- especially the controversial decision to cut the Protoss Carrier. The official word on this is "to avoid redundancy and maintain a tight and manageable number of multiplayer units." So let's take a look at all of the additions, cuts, and changes that are taking place.

Protoss

Units Cut - Carrier & Mothership: It's hard to imagine that the next expansion of StarCraft 2 will negate the ability to "carrier rush" -- I still can't believe it. The reasoning is that the Protoss currently suffer from a lack of a decent AOE anti-air unit late in the game. So instead of adding units that will make the late-game management that much more confusing, these units have been cut to eliminate redundancy and allows the introduction of units that can better serve this purpose for the Protoss.

Posted by Shri Krishna

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